Madrias

Those speeder bikes wouldn't happen to have anti-collision systems needed for a little adventure through the local woods, would they?

So I should tell Jeb that he can't test jet engines in the server room tonight, I guess?

960 parts puts me flickering yellow/red, which bottoms out my playable frame rate (I drop below 20 FPS, specifically) but I can still get it to space. 1000 puts me solid red and barely playable, but I could manage as long as precision isn't needed.

I really need to get back into trying to outright break the repulsors with strange crafts that shouldn't move. Granted, hiding repulsors in the wheel arches of Jeb's truck was amusingly fun. Suddenly taking to the sky in Jeb's mighty monster truck after making a flying leap off of a cliff without fear of the landing is so much fun. Adding Firespitter's floatation module to the monster wheels and giving them propeller modules made for an amusing way to cross water. I'd had some experience pulling that trick with the small tracks, and wanted to just go big. Plus, it's just like Jeb to say, "Walk on water? I can drive on water."

I tore the wheels off of Jeb's monster truck hitting those pipes.

Yeah, as someone who's used a lot of Repulsors as well, I also echo the "use a few launch clamps" strategy. Starting with repulsors off, also a good idea. Death rolls are not fun when they're caused by improper craft settling. Alternately, do as I've done for some of my repulsorcraft, putting wheels under the vehicle, letting it settle on those (works best for light craft, I've found) then firing up your repulsors and taking to the sky.

*cringes at the mention of "maxed out repulsor" despite knowing it's the Alpha repulsors, not the Dev repulsors.* I don't know how much weight a single repulsor can handle. I think the biggest thing I've moved was my mobile base, but even that was only maybe a little over 100 tons, and I fired 24 repulsors to keep it nice and steady. I've moved a 35 ton tank on 8 repulsors, though. As for my cringe... Lo-fi, if you haven't tried it already, try a dev repulsor set to, say, 30 on any vehicle of any weight, then load it in. It's amusingly destructive.

Small wheels are as good as ever, and I'm glad to see an ability to adjust ride height on the fly now. No more bottoming out on hills because I set my suspension too low. No more tipping over because I was set too high. Haven't tried the tiny wheels yet. Was having too much fun breaking the KSC with Jeb's monster truck. As for a reference to the small wheels, as far as the version I was using before... No texture and the curvy springs. Much more impressed with the new design. Though, I must admit, it looks like the textures are moving even when the tire is parked and the brakes are on.

Oh, so just after I praise the heck out of the medium wheel, you decide it needs to be wiped out... I see how it is. (Just so you know, I'm joking. I don't mind. Just had to play along, after all.) Also got around to trying the Large Wheels and had a lot of fun driving around KSC. They make good monster trucks if combined with Lack Luster Labs... The small wheels, I think I need to update my pack because I'm still running an older version, I think. Yes, I'm from the Department of Redundancy Department, deal with it. Still, from what variation I have, they're fun. I'll go grab the latest and greatest Dev Build and see if I can break something.

I have to admit, now that I've had a good long run with the Medium Wheels, I like them. Made it half way to the North Pole with wheels that were comfortable with everything but the occasional terrain seam (which I put the blame squarely on SQUAD's shoulders. Seriously, how am I supposed to drive a rover around a planet if the planet insists on ripping my wheels off with invisible seams). I put 'em through some significant abuse. Hills, jumps, 40+ m/s downhill dashes, zig-zagging up and down hills, not a hint of trouble. Heck, not even the traditional "KSP Suspension jitter" came up. Smooth as silk at 20 m/s, even over some of the roughest terrain I've driven in a while. These wheels are a lot of fun.

Another exciting chapter! I am curious, though, about Lodan's nightmare. Trying to determine if it's subtle foreshadowing or an actual past event, or just Lodan doesn't like flying.

Given the number of intakes, I'm not surprised you made it to orbit. Wing surface to fuselage ratio makes your vehicle a high-lift device, reduces the amount of fuel burn to go upward really fast. RAPIER engines make SSTO easier by automatically switching from High-Efficiency Jet Engine to Medium Efficiency Rocket. All told, it's a solid SSTO design, although useful only for crew transfers in its current form. A cargo bay would make it more useful, although one would have to design smartly to fit a satellite in there. I'm far from an expert, but I've built my share of spaceplanes. What worries me the most is the fact that you're relying entirely on command pod torque and engine vectored thrust to steer your plane. It's always wise to have an alternate method for when you run out of fuel and electric charge.

Ion Powered Rover Drag-Racing, or Infinigliding the Bridges. Both are fun, but often destructive.

Hmm... I've got another idea to throw at you, if you think you can manage it. Similar in function to the Repulsors, though a little 'lower tech' if you will. Possibly fixed height value, but the difference being that they use liquid fuel directly instead of Electric Charge. The proverbial equivalent of gasoline-powered box fans used to hold mid/lightweight craft up. Was something I thought of when zooming around KSC in a VTOL aircraft and hovering mere meters over the ground in a Firespitter propeller vehicle. Obviously one thing that I'd love to see would be some form of built-in steering in something like that. Just different enough from the repulsors to be interesting, and a useful device.

Regarding the pool in .25... I landed a jet in it. VTOL ran out of gas (I'm an idiot and didn't refill my tanks after draining some for a CoM/CoL/CoT check) and I had to glide. Had to make a decision: Spend a ton of Funds to repair my Administration Building, or land my gliding jet in the pond. Splash. On my Sandbox save, I kinda drove a small truck into there. By accident, of course. No, KSC Insurance Inc. isn't investigating the event with a fraud case. Jeb was simply driving "normal" and made a turn that may have been a bit too sharp when trying to make a stop in a parking space so he could eat some snacks.

Jeb! We've got a lot of nuts here, how about a shipment of bolts? Sorry, couldn't resist. Just, um, look out for when those arrive. Jeb likes his boosters. I'm having fun with the small tracks. They make for very useful rovers. I've also had a bit of fun with the repulsors, and I'm just itching to try something later on.

0.17. Spaceplanes were so much fun.

Windows 7 x64 Professional. Only because my desktop wouldn't run with the Home Premium version. Missing features and all that... I also refuse to upgrade to Windows 8/8.1 because I refuse to run a tablet OS on my gaming system. I've tried a few variations of Linux and, well, while I somewhat liked some features, I hated others, and I've been using Windows since Windows 95. And yes, I've even used Windows Millennium, which makes Vista look good.

My strategy to get rid of the original three just involves picking a planet and giving them a nice orbit. In my sandbox save, the three of them are lazily orbiting Jool in the three-kerbal command pod. I figured it was more appropriate to send them away on exile rather than killing them. Sure, stuff is still named after Jeb, but he, and his two best buddies in the orange suits, are enjoying a polar orbit around Jool.

I think that mod still works on the (now renamed) MK1 Inline.

I'm flying strong in KSP .25 x64. So far, I haven't noticed any oddities other than the right-click mishap, but I will wholeheartedly admit my desktop is far from normal. As for the memory-induced crash, yeah, it happens. I'd crash a heck of a lot faster on x86 mode, though. You can't pull 3GB and get away with it. I've had two crashes on .25, but again, I'm willing to accept the crashes, move on, and relaunch the game. I've played far, far buggier games than x64 KSP.

Those little wheels look cool, though, and I hate to be a stickler about it, I'd love to see a split version where the front and rear wheel aren't connected to each other. Makes controlling rovers easier for me, because I can toggle steering on the rear wheels, have selectable multi-wheel-drive, and do odd things with my designs. Though I dare say, those might almost be small enough to make Go-Karts out of and go screaming around the KSC.

As for a further revision on MACE, Manually Actuated Combination Engine. I think best when I've been up for 24 hours or more. I know you're not sold on the name, it's just something that was bugging me, that my previous acronym had been rather clunkily assembled.

I'd like to see some things added to make KSC seem less deserted. Then again, I'd love to see some cities too, but we'll just have to wait on stuff like that, if it happens.

OpenGL seems to have improved things for me (been using that little -force-opengl flag since .23.5) as well as removing the massive "Let's use ALL THE RAM!" strategy KSP likes to pull. x64 mode just eliminates the crashes over sustained playtime (like when I decide to fly airplanes around Kerbin in one fell swoop) at the mild cost of some right-click/left-click goofiness (easily dealt with) and some mods not playing fine with it.