MiniMatt

Seeing as you edited in your big orange orders: ... nine minutes after I posted: ... I'm going to guess that's aimed at me. So I'll oblige and clarify that my opinions are largely aligned with those of Doug Ellison His concise and eloquent quote merely saves me from having to say the same thing but with less eloquence.

Going by the OP, it looks like you have till Thursday evening edit: Thursday evening in the lands of tea & crumpets / bratwurst / garlic / paella / insert European national stereotype. In Anzac lands I'm guessing that's Friday morning.

Quoting NASA's Doug Ellison from this piece on Polygon: "I knew KSP was something special when I watched a young kid  probably less than 8 years old  playing KSP and using words like apogee, perigee, prograde, retrograde, delta-v; the lexicon of orbital mechanics. To the layperson orbital mechanics is a counter-intuitive world of energy, thrust, velocity, altitude that this kid  just by playing Kerbal  had managed to get his head around." In other words - 8 year olds are a hell of a lot cleverer than we give them credit for KSP is suitable for all, and dividing players into "junior" and "mature" is probably both unrealistic and a way of protecting the fragile egos of those of us who - by dint of years on the clock - fall into the "mature" camp

Re entrants also being voters I don't have a problem. The value in these threads comes from people's thoughts more than their votes - many people (and I try to include myself in this category) spend an awful lot of time testing all entrants, writing up their thoughts on each entry, and cast their vote only after considered, reasoned thought. The introduction of concordant voting has introduced considerable finesse to finalist selection (and introduced considerable extra work for Xeldrak - work for which he is to be commended). Those who posted their voting thoughts and reasons in the last comp (and quite likely previous ones too, but I missed a couple) were, as memory serves, all very honourable in voting their own entries in last position. That said, more registered voters in this stage would always be a good thing so go ahead and drop Xeldrak a PM with your email address - it adds to his workload but also adds much value to the competition. Re asymmetric flameout v. single central jet I'm quite relaxed. My criteria when voting won't view asymmetric flameout as a negative unless it's introduction brings nothing new to the table. I don't see asymmetric flameout as a positive virtue to teach new players, but neither do I see it as an inherent negative - rather I see it as a means to an end. Asymmetric flameout is the penalty for multiple jets but multiple jets allow you to carry more into space or get there quicker. So, if your design does functionally nothing more than a competing design without asymmetric flameout then yes I'll view your design more negatively than the one without this penalty. But if your asymmetric design allows for bringing more into space in a similar time, or the same load in a much faster time then these are advantages a single jet design won't have. Never. Thinking out loud is something I value highly in these comps. I'm more than a little jaded and pessimistic in life, in leisure (ie KSP) I try to be more optimistic and ... possibly naïve.

On reflection I think this first sentence suggests a greater problem than actually exists. Looking back on the BSC challenges I can only really think of one (diplomacy forbids stating which) where *my* first thought of the winning entry is "doesn't really fit my perception of BSC". Finalists have been packed with genuinely worthy contenders - but that is not to say those that didn't reach the finals or win the competition weren't worthy; the standard in these challenges, across all entrants, is consistently extremely high and often the only thing separating candidates becomes quite personal preferences. I'm of the opinion that anything any of us make will be imperfect simply because everybody's needs, whims, and preferences are different and no craft can fulfil all engineering priorities equally. Rather than engineering in imperfections for the player to fix I prefer the approach of keeping a craft straightforward such that a new player can visually understand how it works and thus how they can improve it themselves to fit their own preferences and needs. I recall being a living breathing example of this whilst deciding how to cast my final vote in the BSC VTOL challenge - I saw flaws (petty flaws admittedly, but I'm a petty man!) in Giggleplex's design but the inherent strength of the design really made me want to play around with it to "improve" those failings and the clarity of the design made it simple to do so:

I find myself unable to come close to the awe inspiring efforts of those above. However, the final chapter in Mir's operation I find myself replicating with perfect accuracy on a near daily basis: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mir#Final_days_and_deorbit)

This is something that has *perhaps* tended to appear in a lot of the BSC challenges although I also get the impression it has lessened a lot lately. I've said this before but it bears repeating, use your vote wisely according to your own criteria, but don't pay too much heed to the result of the votes if you have an entry in the comp - the joy of these challenges is in learning new tricks, discovering/stealing new engineering solutions, being awed by the craftsmanship of making things look good without resorting to (in my mind) un-BSC-like excessive clipping or multi-hundred part monsters. Hitching your motivation for these competitions to the vote result risks frustration and denies you the simple joy of merely participating. Ultimately we all have more important things in our life to worry about than an internet space plane vote so choose what you're going to worry about (eg the mortgage, the kids, your exams) and what you're simply going to enjoy (eg BSC challenges). "Build a better Aeries-4a" is genuinely what I think most if not all entrants have done. Trouble is, we all have different priorities on what we wish to improve. Some people will wish it had more DV, some will wish it had more crew capacity, or carried more science, or was easier to fly, or faster to reach orbit, or easier to dock, or easier to land. Because one design can't address all these without also making the craft heavier, more complex, more part hungry etc, any entrant, and the eventual "winner" will still serve as a springboard, an inspiration for players to adapt and build from. Personally I could live with the Aeries 4-a's single crew capacity, it's lack of science, and it's modest role appropriate DV, but wasn't keen on it's unbalanced docking or it's large physical size (I tend to build my space stations too cramped). I also felt the atmospheric flight handling could be improved a bit, action groups could be simpler, an abort system would be nice, and, crucially, it lacked a really cool little antenna which automatically extends on take-off. So I built the Mallard to address all these issues as best I could (especially the antenna). Others will look to fix other deficiencies, and others will look to fix the same ones I did but make a better job of it (and I'll subsequently steal their tricks!).

Named after it's extensive canard use, the Mallard is designed first and foremost for easy docking. To that end, the docking port is inline with the cockpit, avoiding confusing navball changes and allowing intuitive RCS control. RCS is well balanced and the Mallard's short, stubby, compact design allows for operation at crowded & cramped space stations. Another innovation of the Mallard is it's single button toggle between air breathing and vacuum modes of operation. This setup, achieved by shutting down rocket engines on initial launch stage, allows for a single button (1) to toggle modes, shutting down air intakes (to reduce drag) and the single flameout-friendly jet engine at the same time as igniting rocket engines. A further press of this single button opens up air intakes, spools up the jet engine, and kills the rocket engines. It is hoped this single button toggle design makes the Mallard as intuitive as a Rapier equipped plane. Vote Mallard! Features Single button (1) toggle between atmosphere/vacuum and back to atmosphere operation Take off at sub 90m/s Balanced RCS, docking port inline with cockpit and compact design for easy docking Single jet engine keeps craft stable in the event of flameout Twin RAM intakes feeding the single jet allow for ~35km ceiling and ~2km/s velocity before need for rocket power Abort system uses stabilising landing legs to prevent cockpit rollover upon landing LKO orbit easily achievable with 1/3rd jet fuel and 3/4 rocket fuel remaining Just enough fuel to orbit the Mun and return safely to Kerbin should you wish Front brakes disabled to prevent squirrely landings No clipping (well, no debug menu clipping, dorsal and ventral canards may be a bit clippy for some tastes) 51 parts, 11.5 tons (wet) Action Groups (as noted in in-game description) (1) toggles between air and space modes (toggling jet/rocket engines and air intakes) (2) toggles ladder (3) toggles ventral solar panel (Backspace/Abort) kills all engines, decouples capsule, jettisons forward canards (to prevent odd infiniglide issue under parachute), deploys chute, lowers stabilising legs Craft file Is here. Go on. You know you want it.

Aww shucks, always struggle with spaceplanes and fear my "always a bridesmaid, never the bride" status will continue in these comps Will PM email once I'm sure of my technocratic credentials to vote

xkcd: what if is consistently great. The machine gun jet pack and the mole of moles ones are, I think, my faves.

With a rescue mission! But yeah, as highlighted above by katateochi and others, multiple occupancy command pods can set off with reduced crew compliment, there's also the hitch-hiker utility can part, and there is also FIDO THE RESCUE ROVER: ... a craft file and further description for which can be found at http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/70164-The-incredible-adventures-of-Fido-the-Rescue-Rover

Feel an overwhelming urge to go all Strandbeest

I suppose technically, being in orbit around an atmospheric body does not necessarily imply or require being "in space". Orbit requires covering an arc compatible with the radius of the planet in a time frame compatible with the gravitational constant and mass of said planet. Ie. one can orbit the Earth whilst staying just above the surface by maintaining a velocity of ~8km/s - maintaining that velocity in the face of drag's oppositional force will naturally require the constant application of energy but I think it's still "in orbit".

Built for Xeldrak's Better Stock Craft: Rover + Skycrane challenge a mere two months after the challenge actually ended (ahem) Fido was designed as a hypothetical replacement for the stock Rover + Skycrane craft. Main aim was to make the skycrane useful after deployment rather than just more debris (something I'm all too good at making all on my own). To this end it's equipped with much more fuel allowing for return trips from many bodies, landing lights and legs, much less savage TWR, a high gain antenna such that it can relay scientific readings from the rover and act as a target for bouncing laser beams off (I know - not really relevant in KSP, but, well, imagination). The rover was also improved, maintaining 6-wheel drive & low centre of mass whilst adding RCS powered roll-recovery, RTG power in addition to solar, and a command chair for rescue missions. The Incredible Adventures of Fido the Rescue Rover! Overall mass goes up to a (slightly chubby) 3.4 tons and part count up by 11 to 63. With ~1,500 vacuum delta-v (sans passenger) Fido is capable of landing at and returning to orbit around: Mun, Minmus, Ike, Dres, Bop, Pol and Gilly ... where dozens of stranded crash happy Kerbals litter my save files. Further it's capable of one-way first contact science missions at: Duna, Moho, Eeloo and Val Strap on some parachutes and one way missions to Laythe & Eve should also be possible. It's also capable of making a very pretty crater on Tylo. Thrust to weight ratio tweaked to be just above 1 on Kerbin to allow for testing - this still allows for controllable landings on Mun and Minmus but may want to further tweak down for lighter bodies (and likely descend on RCS alone at Gilly). Afix upside down atop a rocket of your choosing using an appropriate fixing (eg. docking port for rescue missions, stack seperator for one way missions). Initially Fido is configured with front wheel steering and six wheel drive. Remember steering and motor power can be individually toggled for each wheel to suit conditions and battery power. As with all rovers, one may find control is more stable when using the docking mode controls (lower left). Fido is equipped with RCS thrusters to enable self-righting after a roll and to allow for a "hop" up to the base station docking port when parking. Fido makes just one use of part-clipping. Part clipping is something I'm rather down upon in Xeldrak's BSC challenges as I feel it hinders a new player's ability to decipher the inner workings of a stock craft. In this instance however I feel justified in using it - the RTG generator is clipped inside the octagonal scaffold at Fido's hindquarters. Here I feel clipping makes sense from an engineering perspective (that really is just scaffold around an empty space - may as well fill that void with something useful), and from a new player perspective in that the result is clearly visible externally without disassembly; plus the clipping is detailed in the in-game description along with instructions on how to do it (ie. Alt-F12). Craft file is here

Meh Went ahead and made one anyway so no-one will miss out on the Incredible Adventures of..... Fido the Rescue Rover EDIT: Craft file for Fido, and full description at http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/70164-The-incredible-adventures-of-Fido-the-Rescue-Rover

AAAARRGGGGHHH!!!! Curses

Yep, though suspected it might have something to do with high part count resulting in sluggish performance and chutes missing a turn between update cycles as a result. Partial solution for part heavy craft was to stage central chute first to take the bulk of the initial forces and fire side chutes a second or two after once initial forces had settled down. Or design light enough such that one central chute is sufficient.

Many - very well deserved - congratulations to Giggleplex, and commiserations to Tarmenius and in particular Ravenchant as the vote count in no way reflects upon the quality of your craft. Many thanks as always to Xeldrak for organising and running a fine competition which has again taught me new stuff whilst somehow also being supremely good fun. As for the next one - if we knew what that was now we'd all be busy building ahead of the start time Although personally hoping for a certain skycrane

By luck alone! Numerous FAR attempts have been horrendous (although the 116 ton Land Speed 8 also doesn't do too badly under FAR... until one tries to stop it). Anyway, craft file for above entry is here so you're more than welcome to see if there's some magic trick I've accidentally stumbled across. It's got the Real Chute drag chute at the back so I'm not sure how it'll load without that installed. EDIT: Oh, action group 1 deploys the chute, fires the booster and engages front brakes. Back brakes can be safely engaged when it's decelerated down to 200m/s or so.

Okies, either a multiple entries or an illustration as to need for mod categories. FAR + Real Chute = 503m/s Real Chute = 433m/s Completely stock = 425m/s The only change between the stock model and the FAR & Real Chute runs were that the drag chute was replaced with a nose cone and the retro rocket filled with 20% fuel rather 10% to make up for the loss of braking force - this added to mass accounting for the drop from 433 to 425 seen in the chute versus stock run. Will make craft file available in a bit.

Yeah, stock chutes of any variety don't open if you're on the ground making their use impossible in this challenge - arguably this is something of a design oversight on the stock parts. I am really liking the Real Chutes mod as it does add a great deal more to think about, some new solutions and some new challenges.

Ok, very quick test and still not ironed out all the kinks as amply demonstrated below but taking the Land Speed 8, installing FAR and Real Chutes, capping the fuel cans with aerodynamic nose cones, take away two of the four RT-10 solid boosters and add five radial drag chutes: Yes it's a failure but it was surprisingly close to success. Overall braking force seems nearly sufficient, failure came right at the very end of braking as an engine dipped and clipped the runway. The chassis and Bill survived intact at the end of the runway. Fixing those final stability issues will likely dampen the final max speed achieved but this failure achieved 566m/s. With exactly the same chassis, the exact same number of engines, the exact same quantity of fuel - only changes were installing FAR & Real Chutes, swapping two of the four retro boosters for five radial chutes, and capping fuel cans with nose cones - that achieved a raise from 423m/s to (ultimately nevertheless a failure at) 566m/s. I'll again restate: FAR or any other mods do not make the challenge easier. FAR or any other mods certainly don't "cheat" the challenge. They make the challenge different. EDIT: As a suggestion, I'd simply create three tables: Stock, Controlled Mods (allowing eg. only B9, Far, and Real Chutes), and Open (wherein everything else is allowed & competitors are on their honour to list what they use and keep potential OP mods in check). Like I say, no mods really make the challenge easier, they just change the course. A stock craft won't be optimal for a FAR course, and a FAR craft won't be optimal for a stock course - they cease to be comparable but that is not to diminish the design ingenuity required to make either craft work. Giving them their own category makes such designs comparable once again to other craft driving the same course.

If you say so but I fear it begins to make comparisons unviable. As an example I've just downloaded RealChute and had a quick play whilst I should be working Take my 12 mainsailed Land Speed 8 for which the craft file was provided a few pages back - max speed attainable was 423m/s - and that 423 is 100% repeatable as that's the maximum speed it attains before running out of fuel. The only way to reach a higher speed in the acceleration phase would be reduce drag, reduce mass or add thrust. So I removed the four RT-10 solid boosters which were hindering the acceleration phase, adding significant unwanted drag and mass and simply added three radial drag chutes from Real Chutes. That's it, no other redesign other than changing action groups to fire front brakes separately from back brakes and deploying the chutes. Max speed now attainable from the Land Speed 8 has now increased from 423m/s to 441m/s. Neither the chute braked or booster braked variant is better than the other, they're both simply playing by different rules. EDIT: Perhaps worth clarifying that I - and I don't believe anybody - thinks use of FAR makes the challenge easier as such, or indeed that use of any particular mod is cheating. None of these mods detract from the skill of the designer, all they do is change the course. Formula 1 engineers have a different set of parts, rules, and challenges to play with than Rally engineers and their courses are different. The Formula 1 car may be able to accelerate and brake harder than the rally car but nobody is suggesting the F1 engineers have devised a better design, only that their design fits their course.

Yeah I think I might bow out at this stage. The inconsistencies between mods begin to make comparisons unviable. Looking above I can see RealChutes, and without testing I'd very much assume that the braking force afforded by them is far greater than that which can be achieved via a similar mass and drag of retro solid boosters. Re FAR versus stock I'd note only that in the conceptually similar fastest air breathing jet under 1000m altitude challenge the fastest FAR run is currently 1,529m/s, the fastest non-FAR run is 381m/s. Re skids rather than wheels, this one I'm a little more tolerant of. It's rather difficult to retrofit with skids a craft designed for wheels and vice versa, but in the knockups I've got successfully running I've seen a roughly 10% top speed advantage given to wheels and a roughly 250 metre braking advantage given to skids. At current records I'd suggest the overall advantage lies with skids but I note that the friction inherent in skid designs appears to put limits on the total amount of thrust which can be applied before craft disintegration. This limits the logical progression of "MOAR MAINSAILS" which can take place with wheeled designs and I'd assume the theoretical max speed attainable would come from wheels. But while mods are only classified as "controlled versus non-controlled" I'd suspect that simply adding a super strength strut mod would allow skid designs to blitz all competition.

post the album name between imgur tags so in your instance you'd use: *imgur*0gbqB*/imgur* (replacing the asterisk with open/close square brackets Edit: interesting how much of a difference the FAR drag model makes to the runs.