Commander Zoom

I have a game still running .24.2, for the above reason(s). I am also excited to see this series resume, or (if it comes to that) restart.

.8 or so. No Mun, no persistence, no orbital map... Went to Mun and Minmus when they were added, but there I stopped for the longest time - other games wanted my attention, and I was waiting for certain things (like docking) to become stock. Finally ventured beyond Kerbin's SOI and started building space stations, etc, somewhere around .19 or so. Been keeping this save going since then. I'll finally start over with 1.0.

I don't think it counts, by the rules. That lander was just one of three ships (any one of which might have fit within the circle - I much prefer orbital assembly to launching Whackjovian behemoths), and I did use mods - nothing really cheaty, just MechJeb et al and a few custom parts like the old deployable heat-shield from Goblin Industries (technically unnecessary, as we don't have re-entry heat yet, but...). I figure I'll make a thread and let people decide for themselves.

Went to Eve. Came back. (Stable orbit of 100.667 km x 99.291 km. Arch's good mate Alf was there to make the pickup, in another craft.) More pics to follow, in separate thread.

Yes, yes I do.

Nice design. And yeah, rather similar to mine (which was, of course, inspired by ones I'd seen here on the forums), though I don't have the lab in the middle. I'll have to consider that, and the skidplate, for my next game. To add a little more to this post, here's an anecdote from my own roving, illustrating both the perils and the rewards: During a drive on Duna, the rover hits a long down slope. Having taken the autopilot offline to let the rover free-wheel, and now past the speed where passive braking (holding down the reverse key) has any effect, the driver has no choice but to take heading control offline as well (as even touching the steering at this point will surely flip them*) and pray that stability control keeps the rover upright. This it does, and after a wild ride of at least five klicks - with a maximum speed of 40.6 m/s, perilously close to wheel failure - a convenient hill finally slows them down and ends the excitement without having to resort to a quickload. * and may have; memory is fuzzy after all that white-knuckled excitement, but I seem to recall a full barrel-roll that ended up with the rover back on its wheels, early on (at a mere 25 m/s or so). No doubt the guys in back thought that was great fun!

Funny, mysterious, and edge-of-your-seat exciting. I love your designs, your writing, and your presentation.

Thoughts: I am dismayed that so many people are apparently unable to tell lashes from brows. I'm pretty sure the eyes are that wide apart on the current, male kerbals as well. They've always had that wall-eyed stare. I hope that modders will come up with ways to modify or remove the topknot.

It's not just him. I've done a LOT of roving on Duna with a decent-sized rover (cupola + hitchhiker + large SAS and other stuff, eight wheels on side-mounted rails) and while MechJeb is great for holding speed over flat land, it's very touchy when it comes to braking. It'll sometimes let the speed creep up on downslopes and then hit the brakes, just as described, often resulting in an accident and the need to quickload. I run along flats at 15-20 m/s, but have to reduce to 10 or even 5 m/s for rougher ground or steep descents.

Mission Day 845. 590 Kdays on the surface. 28 Kdays since the conclusion of the Duna Odyssey. ~120 hours to return launch window. The sun is at its zenith, and it's time to go. All data and samples have been transferred to the lander, and the hab and lab put in shutdown mode; the antennae and delicate solar panels have been retracted. Tre makes a few remarks, as he, Kenmore, Lanbert, Matsby and Henway line up for one last photo on the surface. "We are leaving now, but we do so knowing that others will follow. They will stand on these sands and look up at these skies; they will climb these mountains and dig into the soil, and discover things we did not. They will walk in our footsteps and blaze new trails, standing on our shoulders to see further and reach higher... just as our journey was made possible by those who came before. We are on a great relay race, stretching out through time and space, and when any one of us falls, others will be there to pick up the torch and carry it onward, toward an ever-receding horizon."

Love those pods.

Mother of God. How did I not see this thread before? These are amazing, especially (now) including the Ponderosa. I was already planning on using some form of MKS/OKS for my next career game, but I think these just won the contract. (one niggle - in your last pic, it looks like the access tubes for the workshop modules are lit (apparently from within) but the rest of the module - and the tubes on the adjacent Ponderosa(s) - is/are not. Could you sort this out? Personally, I'd prefer them dark.)

I encourage you to keep this going, at least to a point where you're happy. Heck, I'm still nursing a save along in .24, having started it back in .19 or .20... Also, awesome post(s)/ship(s).

When you announced you'd be walking around the Mun next, I honestly thought you were joking. I should know better by now.

Back in .8 or so, before persistence or orbital maps or time acceleration (or much of anything), after a few successful orbiters, putting one up and leaving it there while I went to work. Came back 8-ish hours later and it was still up, circling the globe, having done so perhaps 15 or 16 times in my absence with no fuss at all... Everything surrounding Neil Armstrong's passing in 2012 - the forum response, the reveal of the memorial, and my own mission to it. Finally getting "serious" about space - coming back to the game somewhere around .19 or .20, after certain features (like docking) finally became stock rather than mods, and doing many things for the first time that others had long before: space stations, comm sats, probes, missions beyond Kerbin's SOI. (The furthest I'd gone until then was the moons and back.) One of those missions was my personal tribute to a friend; check the link in my sig. I've nursed that save through at least two years and four updates, and it's still going, holding at .24.2 in a directory all to itself. I'll get to 1.0 ... eventually.

The mod is "Kronal Vessel Viewer" (named in the thread title) and it can be downloaded here or here.

Are you referring to the current poll results? People have already given several reasons why you're not going to get good data out of a poll, or an OP, like this one. I'm a bit embarrassed, but not really surprised, that it was made.

Workin' on it! I've been following your thread. And I have a three-ship group en-route at the moment. Just a one-kerb lander, however; no rover.

Bump. While Tre has probably racked up enough kilometers already to qualify for a trip around Duna, today he and the rest of the First Expedition finished making it official. With stops for darkness and charging batteries, it took a total of 101.5 hours, or just under 17 Kdays. Direction of travel was west to east, or left to right (counter-clockwise). (approximate route) One notable stop, and the site of another flag-planting, was the peak of the giant shield volcano which I've named Mt. Paragon. (It's the light spot in the middle of the plains on the western half of the image; to the northeast, at the edge of the polar cap, is another which I call Mt. Titan.) On the way back through the Grand Valley, the rover passed within sight of Mt. Ascendant. /e salute

Completed my circumnavigation of Duna by (pressurized) rover. With stops for darkness and charging, it took 101.5 hours, just under 17 Kdays. Direction of travel was west to east (left to right), or counter-clockwise. (approximate route) (fixed the time - 17 Kdays, not 30 )

Well said, Brotoro.

You heard it here, folks. Fairings wider than the rocket are totally unrealistic.

I've generally been on SQUAD's side, but not this time. I'm sorry. It's too soon.

Other than trying to make a new part from an existing model and config file (which... sort of worked), only once: to make it possible for Kerbals to grab the rack that KAS containers slot into, attach it elsewhere, and/or fold it up and stick it in the container.

As I'm fond of pointing out, I got this game before plotted orbits or a Mun. By now I'm well down into fractional pennies.