BagelRabbit

7/10 I like propaganda. And you will too! Here, help me hang these posters that tell everyone how great propaganda is. It's for the good of our country!

Pshaw, that's nothing. JPL (the Jet Propulsion Laboratory) put its name in Morse code on each of the Curiosity Rover's tires: ...and so every time the wheels turn, the letters "JPL" are stamped in the ruddy Martian dust. JPL... JPL... JPL... Given, this is supposed to give an accurate measurement of how far the rover's driven (simply look back on the tracks and count the number of JPL's to determine distance). But c'mon people! This is akin to red-planet graffiti! We must petition NASA to send up a manned mission to replace the Curiosity Rover's tires before Mars becomes too much more desecrated by the tire tracks. It's the only way to make the madness stop! Perhaps more importantly, it's yet another reason to put boots on Mars. C'mon guys! Let's get some signatures! /joking -Upsilon

What? You're kidding me, sonny! You can't even walk straight. You can barely fly rockets, you piece of Kraken bait! I'm doing my job. Your explosions are pointless. You claim immortality? I couldn't care less. You're trying out missiles? Oh, how cute! How fun! I can move things with my mind. Physics: 0, Me: 1. Yeah, you claim to break physics with clipping and Krakens. Guess who can't change his size? Sir, you're in for a smackin'. Why did you even challenge me, worthless green creature? You don't stack up in the slightest. Get back to the bleachers.

Hello everyone! I just wanted to acknowledge that I have, indeed, relinquished control of the Group. Or as Starwhip said: That being said, I'll still certainly be around the thread, suggesting changes and the like. I'm like that one curmudgeonly house-guest that just won't leave ~~~ As far as I can tell, Duodex copied and pasted the entire thread into a previously nonexistent post by Endersmens that was "made" six or seven months ago. It's cheating the system a bit, but hey, it works! When I started this group back in the Dark Ages, there were thirty-two light-greeners and the only ones to make it to six bars were SQUAD and Cap'n Skunky (both with their Reputation counts artificially inflated). There's now four times that many people, with more being added all the time. To make matters worse, my schedule has become more and more constricting lately, which has resulted in no time to update the Group. (I used to be able to update it once a month or so, but alas, it's no longer possible.) Endersmens has a lot more time to update the Group than I do, and after he asked to take control, I eventually agreed. Now I can use that time for actual work, or even better, actual bona-fide hardcore procrastination! I think that would work quite nicely, Endersmens. Hang on a minute... let me give you some +Rep for your troubles I'd have to agree with Kuzzter here: these people deserve a nod, even if they're not technically light-greeners anymore -Upsilon

The darker side of the Moon, not counting the night side, is actually the near side of the Moon (the one we see when we look up at night). It has a number of dark lava seas called "maria," whereas the far side has very few. Here, look at this albedo image taken from the Clementine orbiter: As you can see, the side visible to us here on Earth is quite a bit darker overall. So whenever someone says "the dark side of the Moon," you can smile to yourself knowing that it's not difficult to see, especially with binoculars or a telescope of any size ...unless you're talking about 'metaphorical darkness,' like the Dark Ages, and saying that we don't know much about the far side of the moon. Even then, that's not really true either anymore. -Upsilon

I've seen you around for a good long while but I don't think we've ever really communicated, gmpd2000. I really love everything about your profile: your location (I'm a big fan of Spaceballs too), your Twitter (I have something sarcastic for that as well), and even your signature! Though I have an absurd load of Reputation and don't give it out nearly as often as I would like, I still agree with the sentiment there. Oh, and I'm glad you're aerodynamically stable. I have one of these t-shirts around somewhere... I need to wear it more often. -Upsilon

Nailed it! After landing this little plane safely, I realized that the craft's SAS torque was great enough to pull it into this position. After a couple of false starts, I got the plane to balance on the nose. The result made it seem like Jeb had just suffered a rather hard landing... making it a perfect screenshot opportunity -Upsilon

Hey, I'm not a tremendous fan of veggies, but eating nothing but mac 'n' cheese paste and freeze-dried steak slabs for months would make me say :hailveggies: upon my triumphant return to Earth. I would only be hailing vegetables for about five seconds though. After that, I would be eating them. And hailing something you're actively grinding to a pulp is a little weird. -Upsilon

I try, Red... Oh my Kod, do I try! I try all the time, in this institution. The user below me understands the reference I just made.

I heard a great story once about a slot machine paying out several times in a row. The casino sent a frantic call to the machine's builders: "We're losing money here!" The builders replied: "It's just a matter of random chance and the machine will still make you money." Sure enough, more people played the machine, for obvious reasons. Because the overall rate of winning was the same, though, the slot machine eventually made the casino some serious cash. The moral of this story is that the house always wins (don't gamble, kids!). But it also shows that random chance will occasionally do weird things. (Indeed, I've seen the KSP sand castle appear three times in a row... but I've also gone on a year-and-a-half streak of not seeing it once.) So I agree wholeheartedly with MailletC here: Don't worry about it, NovaSilisko -Upsilon

9/10 I've definitely seen you a good number of times, Robotengineer

This would be a bit better suited for the Fan Works section. That being said, this is nice! A couple of pointers from a guy who's obsessed with music though: • One of the things that makes the KSP theme so great (and so regal-sounding) is its use of the minor seventh chord made by the triplets and the high note: the "bum bum bum ba-da-da dee bum bum." (I wish I could type musical notes on a staff. It would help so much!) Instead of playing a minor seventh chord, though, you just played an octave. Now, that's not a bad thing necessarily, and I've done it before too. It can detract from the music though, and it's a significant deviation from the original score. There were several other deviations from the main theme as well; I'm not sure how intentional or needed they were. • The scoring seemed a little weird. In the game's theme, the score remained relatively triumphant, with very little dissonance. In your scoring, there were a bunch of instruments playing in the background that clashed a little. The clashing seemed to happen at the end of phrases, which is a real no-no. (You generally want the music to 'resolve' by the end of a phrase.) • C'mon! If you claim to make the KSP theme in Garageband, you'd better finish the thing. Seventeen seconds' worth of music doth not a theme make, to misquote the Bible. Keep at it, my friend! -Upsilon

In my headcanon, Wernher was such a brilliant scientist that he was abducted from Germany at the age of nineteen, so that the Germans wouldn't have the ability to make K-2s in the first place. As such, he had lost his German accent after a few years. Keep in mind, too, that these events are taking place dozens of years after the KSC was shuttered, and that Wernher would have had plenty of time to lose his accent in the interim. When I say 'bum,' I don't mean a person who carries about his or her possessions in a shopping cart and sleeps under overpasses. Rather, I'm using slang for a part of the body that is also known as the posterior or the gluteus maximus. There's a three-letter word that's used to refer to this part of one's body and also to donkeys. Whenever you see the word "bum," you can substitute in the other word in your head. I don't mind, but others probably do. -Upsilon

Hello everybody! I'm reasonably well-known for writing posts. Now, I'll be writing some stupid little KSP-related comedy stories as well! Hooray! So, this may become a series, or it may not. It all depends on how well-received this stuff is. So if you like it, please say so! And if you think that it's possibly the worst thing you've ever seen, say that too! Only say it a little more nicely than that, for pity's sake. Right. Here we go. ~~~ Wernher von Kerman: Build Supervisor! The sun was shining with all of its might into the dusty confines of the VAB. Crates had been piled into an especially cobwebbed corner. Someone had written "Ferfurt is a Bum" with his finger on a grimy window. The dust bunnies were now the size of small oxen, and they were ready to engulf any Kerbal who unwittingly reached for the #21-315 wrenches at the wrong time. It was a normal day at the KSC. And yet, within the dusty and rusty building, a small team of Kerbals strove to make one final rocket. They wanted to recapture a tiny bit of the glory of this place; they wanted to restore its legacy. Or maybe they just wanted to fly Ferfurt into space and leave him there. Ferfurt really was a bum. This team was led by Wernher von Kerman. Greying and constantly wheezing, Wernher was nonetheless the most qualified Kerbal to help the team. His love for building rockets had been partially replaced with his love of waving his cane about, muttering, and using the restroom. But his passion for rocketry was still strong, and all of the Kerbals respected him for it. Or at least, they pretended to. Now, Wernher wanted his team to get up far earlier than would generally be considered sane. He would have used a bugle to awaken the sleeping builders, but he needed to catch his breath after standing up. So instead, he lit a match and threw it, assuming that the floor would have enough pyrotechnic crud on it to get things going. He was right. A suspicious brown stain on the floor disappeared with a loud CRACK, throwing little bits of dust bunny through the air. The builders woke up with a start and yelled some things that are not polite to discuss, so I won't discuss them. Wernher just smiled a gentle, wrinkled smile and said, "Get up, ya lazy bums! When I was your age, we all got up at five thirty sharp. (Wheeze.) We didn't just lollygag about. That's the problem with kids these days. They're just so - mumble mumble mumble The day had begun. It was time to start building. "Alright... um... Mr. Wernher." (The Kerbals had realized quite early on that Wernher was to be called Mr. Wernher, and perhaps Mr. Wernher, sir if you wanted to get along well.) "What will we be doing today?" "Well, um, that's a good question. Say, what was your name again?" "Calrie, sir." "Say again?" "CALRIE, SIR." "Oh, okay. Like the shell." "Not cowrie - you know what? Never mind. What are we doing today?" "Well, let's see. (Wheeze.) We've done the capsule, right?" "Sir, we did that a year and a half ago." "Okay, how about the boosters?" "We're actually done with pretty much everything, sir. All we need to do now is get the thing out on the pad and launch it. The rocket's right there. I think... um... I think you need your glasses." "Okay. Say, have you figured out who's going up yet?" "We... um... we were thinking of sending up Ferfurt. Sir." Wernher wheezed and squinted at Calrie. Then he looked across the room at Ferfurt, who was sitting bolt upright and smiling a chipper smile. "Hello, sir! How are you doing this fine morning?" he said, standing up to reveal his pressed pants and immaculately clean shirt. "It's great to see you." As I said, Ferfurt was a bum. "Are you sure you want to launch him?" Wernher shifted a little. "Back in my day, we only sent up the slovenly and misguided youth. Ferfurt, on the other hand..." "Sir, we thought that - um - sending Ferfurt up would be a good way to show that nowadays, astronauts have sophistication and taste." Calrie had practiced this excuse at least a few dozen times. Apparently, this practicing had paid off. Wernher bobbed his head up and down and growled, "Alright, we can do that." He paused. "I need to use the bathroom. Give me a minute." He wandered to the restroom at about the speed of the average glacier, wheezing as he went. As soon as the door was closed, Calrie yelled to the others, "Guys, guess what? Ferfurt's going up!" The room exploded into cheers. Even Ferfurt murmured a "How nice!" and offered an encouraging smile. The VAB may have been grungy and filled with homicidal dust bunnies, but now it was also filled with a bunch of very happy Kerbals. For once, the old building seemed bright and festive, and the project seemed almost worthwhile. And then Wernher poked his head out of the door and yelled, "Quiet!" (Wheeze.) "Why are you yelling like that?! Back in my day..." ~~~ So this is the first chapter. Once again, let me know what you think about this stupid story! Thanks for reading this... -Upsilon

Okay, first of all, your title is misleading. I hate to be pedantic, but if someone had an idea for a warp drive ("invented" a warp drive) tomorrow, nothing would probably happen for four or five years as tests were done. There would be some initial hype from the press, but that would be quashed as people correctly stated that unless repeated attempts worked, it wouldn't be worth even a tiny bit of attention. [speculation] After a working warp drive was created beyond a shadow of a doubt, the military would probably seize control of all plans and methodology behind the warp drive. They would state that this could be used against the United States, pointing to the law of E=mc2 turning mass into energy and thus releasing an almost unimaginably large explosion if the thing was abused. Debates about using the warp drive for war would become a household subject. North Korea would claim to have created their own warp drive, but nobody would believe them. After years of petitioning, scientists would finally be given permission to attach a small payload to a warp drive and send it out into space. The payload would merely warp a few light-days away from Earth to test the feasibility of such a project. While the warp initially appears to have occurred successfully, no radio contact is established. It turns out that warp drives generate such intense amounts of electromagnetic radiation in all frequencies while passing the light barrier, it cannot realistically be used. Government funding towards warp drives is finally cancelled due to the tensions it causes ("if you can't use warp drives for scientific purposes, why are you still pouring money into the program?") and the exorbitant cost. The warp drive, however, has captured the public's imagination. Forty years later, a man claims to have the original warp drive's blueprints. An amateur team of scientists attempts to follow them and ends up killing six people and wounding another three when they get something just a little wrong. The days of the warp drive are over. [/speculation] Yes, I overthink things. I also think, however, that this thread is more about speculation on humanity's actions than it is on spacecraft. Perhaps this thread would work better in the Space Lounge? -Upsilon

I like to think of the smilies as: - Bill - Jeb - Bob Val's a little difficult, as she's female and all of the Kerbal smilies are male. This actually strikes me as sexist, now that I think about it, but I've always identified her with the "kiss" smiley: On a side note, I've never actually seen the 'kiss' smiley used, as far as I can recall. I actually associate the general smiley ( ) with sal_vager, as he ends many of his posts with it. I can't really 'give the identity' of any of the other smilies, but this could definitely be something to build a story around... -Upsilon

Ah, the famous law of UpsilonAerospace comes into play. It states that whenever there's an exceedingly common but little-commented-upon effect that happens on the Internet, people will somehow think that they were the ones to discover or publicize it, and will thus name it after themselves. (irony fully intended) As for my favorite rocket, I'd have to give that distinction to Orbital Science's Pegasus rocket. These little guys are extremely cheap, they're surprisingly reliable (at least since 1995 or so), they're small and cute, they feature a really neat method of launch, and they're arguably the closest things we have to orbital spaceplanes today. Here's your standard Wikipedia article for more! I would recommend reading through this little guy, especially if you haven't heard much about the Pegasus rocket yet. -Upsilon

"Holey Ship!" When one of my designs doesn't work as intended.

This is a very good point. While all of these schools are very nice, you may not make the cut for some of them due to your SAT scores (or, on the contrary, some of them might not be capable of meeting your needs if you have very good scores. It doesn't seem like this is the case though, as all of the schools I've heard of on your list would do quite nicely). I personally haven't looked at colleges in a good long while, but I do think I have another question or two (or three or four) to ask you. • Are you interested in any minors? I know that I'm a big fan of engineering but I also have my liberal-artsy side. Some of the schools here are almost certainly straight scientific schools with almost no emphasis on anything else; are you willing to make the commitment to go into aerospace engineering at this point in your life, or do you want to explore more options? • What do you want besides a good education at your college? Would you want to live in a college town? Do you enjoy partying? Would you like a college that has a suitable climate for you, politically or meteorologically? You certainly don't need to post all of this on this thread, but please do take it into consideration when you're looking at colleges. There's a lot to consider, but at the end of the day, all of the colleges on your list are probably places where you'll meet friends, have fun, and learn a lot. Try visiting some of the colleges closest to your hometown if you have the time. And don't sweat this process too much. -Upsilon

I'll echo Vanamode and Seshins here. It sounds as if, though you're coming in pretty well for a docking until the last minute, you begin to lose control when you get too close to the docking port. Fine-controlling things is hard, especially with misplaced (or absent) RCS thrusters or not enough/too much SAS. I've played KSP for thousands of hours, and I still don't have it down to a science. That being said, without any images or videos, it's difficult to diagnose your problem. For all we know, you could have installed one of the docking adapters upside-down (which is a very common problem, believe it or not). Can you please give us a little more information to work with? -Upsilon [EDIT: It sounds as if your problem is actually a known bug with the game that causes docking ports to not want to connect. I think Claw has a bugfix for this, but I can't find it ATM... would anyone be willing to help?]

IMHO, regex, it is a terrible thing for you to look at an engine and say that it is boring because it no longer has a tendency to explode. If the only thing that keeps your play sessions interesting is the chance that your rocket engines will go boom, you need to play KSP differently, or take a break, or something. Your sanity very likely depends on it. ~~~ I'm not entirely sure why this thread was created, by the way. What was the purpose of this thread, other than bemoaning the removal of an aspect of the game that most people disliked anyway? Do you want SQUAD to re-institute the old nuclear-engine heating system (amid the protests of many), do you wish to vent anger, or do you just want some sympathy from your fellow Forum-goers? I respect you, but unless you provide a solution to the problem you're complaining about, this thread does absolutely nothing. -Upsilon

If by "Kerbal" you mean slapping things together and expecting them to work? Oh, yeah... I've seen some pretty "Kerbal" stuff. Possibly my favorite example of this sort of thing is the time when one of my friends, Daddyisabar from the Rocketry Forum, did his best to fly a plastic model of a battleship. With rocket engines. Pardon the large images here: (The engines went in the tubes that you see near the front of the rocket. The orca on the bottom was for stability.) Believe it or not, this design might have worked... if it wasn't for the fact that only one motor lit. Sadly, the battleship did a bunch of flips and was destroyed upon its hitting the ground: 'Twas a great loss. To be fair, I've flown some pretty "Kerbal" stuff as well, and some of it has even worked! This "soccer field rocket" went up to nearly a hundred feet (the drag was real) before tumbling back down safely: I think that these two (and especially the space battleship) are some pretty good contenders for the "Most Kerbal Rocket Ever Flown in Real Life." Good stuff. -Upsilon

Wait, let me wrap my head around this for a second. You want to turn our former-ninth-planet into a killer death ship by running it into Kepler 452-B? ...okay, so here's what we would need: • Permission from all governments on Earth to allocate a great deal of their resources (and some of their population) to even attempt a project like this. • Rockets far bigger than the largest ones ever constructed to ferry engines and bits of colony ship to Pluto. • Some fuel source for the engines. While burning the H2O on Pluto would probably cause it to leave the solar system, it would be hundreds of thousands of years before we reached Kepler 452-B. It would probably be better to bring some form of propulsion instead. Ion engines would be nice and efficient, but since you're suggesting a hare-brained scheme already, I'd go with Project Orion-style nuclear bombs pushed out of the back. That way, any unexploded bombs left at the end of the mission would also put a little more kick into the explosion. • A good knowledge of Kepler 452-B's population and climate. Does Kepler 452-B actually have any creatures on the surface: it too hot or cold for anything other than extremophilic bacteria? We'd also need to know that there was a species on Kepler 452-B that really needed to die. • A good knowledge of what happens after large impacts. I understand that Kepler 452-B would lose most of its existing species, whatever they were. But would it ever cool down (or at least, cool down in less than a few million years) from a Charon-sized impact? If we had all of these things (and all of this knowledge), I would say go for it! It would give us a very good sense of Pluto's geology, it would give us humans another world to live on, and best of all, it would mean the end of all of these worthless is-Pluto-a-planet debates. I'd be willing to give you seven Nobel Peace Prizes, a million bajillion dollars, and a pony for this idea. I'm sure I stashed all of that stuff somewhere... -Upsilon

Clearly, the only proper way to pronounce Jool is much like how Here's what it should sound like: *ahem* JOOOOoooOOOOOOOOºººOOOOOL! As option #4 is the only one that vaguely resembles the above, it's probably the best way to say Jool. That's actually a really great way of saying "Jool." I should put it in my signature... -Upsilon

This is somewhat unrelated, but I name all of my craft that are going to that moon "Lay the Orbiter," "Lay the Lander," or the like. It's a terrible pun (if you could even call it a pun), but at the very least, it's vaguely clever. I'm generally am not too good with coming up with clever things, so this represents a big step forward for me On the topic of what I call Laythe, I generally pronounce it like the word "lathe." In my young and inexperienced days, I thought that "lathe" was pronounced like the word "lather" except without the 'r,' so there was a time when I used that pronunciation for Laythe as well. Those days have long since passed though. -Upsilon