Grumman

I wouldn't want it to be universal, but I would like to see some Tourists get the ability. For example: Level 0 Tourist: Can go on EVA from a craft on Kerbin's surface, and nowhere else. The basic tourist who you trust to get on and off the bus, but not much else. Level 1 Tourist: Can go on EVA from a craft on any celestial body's surface, but can't activate the jetpack. A tourist who you'd trust to bounce around on the Mun. Level 2 Tourist: Can go on EVA anywhere. A tourist with enough training that you'd let him go on a spacewalk. Level 3 Tourist: Still can't control a craft, but counts as a Scientist and Engineer while on EVA. I.e. not actually a tourist, but a specialist you are being paid to ferry up to some satellite that needs fixing or whatever.

It sounds like you'd want to install Kerbal Attachment System (which might need Kerbal Inventory System). Technically it is possible to transfer Kerbals between two craft even if they are only connected by a winch or fuel line, but if you want a more sensible solution that does not involve the Kerbal's doing a tightrope walk between the two craft, USI Kolonisation System has some Kerbal-sized placeable pipes for crew tunnels.

Just an update: The patch notes for .1203 includes the line "Fix physics "jolt" caused by wheels clipping non-wheel parts in all circumstances when vessels unpack." Unfortunately, this does not fix the problem of the Pack Rat exploding on launch.

I'm going to be blunt: I think you're making your mod worse. There's no such thing as a self-sufficient colony unless you can reduce the rate at which homesickness increases to zero. And now you're adding a fourth counter to the mod I started using because it didn't have three counters like TAC-LS. If it was me I'd get rid of Hab time altogether as being solved by pointless busywork, and only implement radiation in the most abstract sense: that Kerbals get homesick faster in deep space than in low orbit around or on the surface of semi-habitable planets and moons.

I don't like those parts either, but they're easy enough to remove - just go to the GameData/KIS/Parts folder and delete the "fun_*" folders.

When reentering Kerbin's atmosphere, you want to spend as much time as possible in the upper atmosphere. Too low, and you gain heat too fast and incinerate yourself, too high and you're not burning off orbital velocity for free. For that reason, I'd generally suggest entering an "orbit" of 55-60km and then pitching your nose up so that you're converting some of your lost velocity into lift and not just drag and thus can stay in that sweet spot for longer. On the other hand, doing it this way will make your eventual landing site less accurate.

When somebody does decide to do this, you should know that the GameData/KIS/Parts/Guide folder has the same content as the PDF as DDS image files.

I agree with Regex: build a probe designed to dive into the sun. Because it would be awesome.

I don't want them as competition, but having a bumbling rival always three or four steps behind you could add some nice flavour to some of the contracts. We already have contracts to rescue Kerbals stuck in orbit, so that could explain where they come from. Maybe you'd get a contract to send an Engineer to the Mun and fix one of their rovers after they broke all the tires doing burnouts. Or they might have a permanent space station in LKO that gives you contracts to bring them shipments of consumables.

Are you confusing the anchor with the claw? The anchor works by producing drag if it's resting on something, points up. The claw works by hitting something and getting stuck to it, points down.

I'll do some proper testing later today, but for now I'll just mention that the KIS compressed folder is misnamed KAS, and that a simple winch test rig (probe core -> inline winch -> port -> weight, all suspended by a launch gantry) is working as expected.

As I suggested last year, adding support for non-zero wind speeds and using that same feature to simulate a ringed planet. You could make a gas giant which effectively has a narrow band of thin atmosphere spinning at orbital velocities around it, encouraging you to either match velocities or use a heat shield to protect the craft as you pass through it. A planet with airless highlands and oxygen-filled valleys would also be cool.

I disagree. The point of having a life support mod is to have a number that follows certain rules that you try to keep above zero. What happens if you fail and it actually hits zero doesn't matter so much, as long as you don't take it for granted.

Cities only take as much memory as you're willing to assign. Skyscrapers are cheap to implement, for example, since they're basically just collections of blocks of different sizes with random window textures tiled on the sides. Shamus Young's website has an example of what procedural generation can do.

Cities and clouds would be the best place to start, as they would have the most effect on the intended play style. Cities would add landmarks visible on the night side of Kerbin, making navigation easier, while clouds would hide landmarks, making navigation harder. I would also like to see a few cities scattered around with civilian airports that are used as optional objectives for tourism contracts. Getting paid extra if you can return the tourists to Kerbin by landing at Kerbopolis Airport (which might not be on the equator, unlike the KSC) would be a nice way for people to challenge themselves.

As far as I'm concerned, the right way to fork a mod for a compatibility update is to release only the files necessary to fix the mod. If the .dlls stop working, release new .dlls, but don't package everything together so they don't need to download the original mod in the first place. I'd place the blame with Squad, not the community. If people seem impatient now, it's because the move to Unity 5 and the changes to probes has been a Sword of Damocles hanging over our heads for the better part of a year. KSP is all about the persistent saves, and knowing it would be lost but not when in a game that is supposed to be out of beta is a killer.

My own plan involves building an orbit-to-orbit mothership to ferry a fleet of spaceplanes from Minmus to Laythe, using a low pass over Kerbin to take advantage of the Oberth effect. Four satellites to put in polar orbits of each moon, 8-12 probes to check out nice resource patches, a couple of Mk 1 sized spaceplanes for exploration, a Mk 4 sized transport to ferry rovers to the surface with an ISRU to refuel everything, a submersible or two...

I agree that these should be looked at. Having four distinct categories of command pod balanced by their strengths and weaknesses, and balanced within those categories would be good. 1. Aeroplane cockpits. The heaviest parts, but with the best impact resistance, good heat resistance and the best aerodynamics (low drag or added lift). 2. Command pods. The jack-of-all-trades. Good impact resistance and heat resistance, reasonable aerodynamics. 3. Lander cans. Best for orbit-to-orbit ferries, rovers and moon landings. Poor impact resistance and heat resistance, poor aerodynamics, but light and cheap. 4. External seats. Even more extreme than the lander can. Even worse impact resistance and heat resistance, even worse aerodynamics, and no reaction wheels or internal stores, but extremely light and the cheapest of the lot. I'd also like to see the Hitchhiker's role split in two, with one designed for moderately cheap transport of Kerbals to and from orbit (i.e. a type 2) and one designed for extremely light and cheap transport of Kerbals exclusively in low gravity, zero atmosphere environments (i.e. a type 3). Perhaps throw in a roller-coaster style row of 2-3 external seats with no command authority as well.

Or just make it a three setting toggle instead of two: opaque, window only, wall&window.

Yeah, if you have KAS installed, you can use a Kerbal on EVA to grab the end of the winch and either use it as a tether for the Kerbal, or plug it into a port on another craft to tether the two craft together.

TextureReplacer hasn't been updated to 1.1 yet, but about a year ago I made a skin pack for that mod that gave tourists an assortment of Hawaiian IVA suits to wear.

Thank you for the replies. That does sound like it would have worked. The problem was caused by the Stayputnik and its unusual roll path. Instead of just rolling down hill, picking up speed until it hit something and broke, it rolled in a wide arc across the slope at about 2-3 m/s, then did a quick spin that burned off all its speed, then did another wide arc at 2-3 m/s, over and over again.

The level 1 runway is a death trap. Planes are already inclined to flip over and kill everyone without getting them up to speed on a bumpy gravel road.

I get a message saying that I cannot go to the KSC without reverting to the last autosave, which was before the launch. Anyway, the question is now academic. I waited 30 minutes and it was still rolling, so I reverted and redid the mission.

I can't go to the Tracking Station, because that requires going to the KSC. I can't go to the KSC without reverting to before the mission was launched.