Pecan

Apart from narrow racism is there any point to this 'playing as a country'?

Last night in the pub, when asked what I'd done over the weekend, I pulled out a notepad and wrote: "dV=(IspG)ln(M1/M0). That I learnt this from playing KSP is cool. That I've memorised in from playing KSP is not a good sign. Help, I need beer!" Thankfully, I'm not married any more so I can get away with KSP and beer.

Thank you for commenting. What is it that you don't like about the intake clipping? If it's the "cheating" aspect, then I agree but I thought the technique should be demonstrated for those that wish to use it. Hehe, also remember that right from the start I said I wasn't very good at spaceplane design ^^. Alternative and 'best' designs for these missions are welcome, if anyone wishes to contribute them - especially the (space)planes. As noted the ones I have implemented, especially the early satellite launch vehicles (Chapter 3) are primarily intended to show different design and construction considerations within a logical mission-structure and are not, neccessarily, great designs in themselves.

(May be answering out of turn ^^) The original "Better Stock Craft" challenge was about making better versions of the vehicles supplied with KSP - the ones that are labelled 'Stock' when you click Load in the VAB or SPH. What GregroxMun is saying here is "There should also be these vehicles with stock KSP". In this first week what he's asking for is an example of a space-tug, yes. As you can see from my previous post, I've submitted a minimalist, unmanned, design. You and - if we get enough entries (!) - the voters might prefer a more complex but capable craft. It's a question of what we all think *should* be available to all newbies - which is one reason for including the .craft file as well. Don't throw away what you've done :-) Next week that could be exactly what he's asking for.

Puddin is making some good points that deserve closer reading than I think most people are giving them. Note, specifically, that he is NOT moaning about KSP and clearly says he already thinks he's got value for money. Respect to the OP! (And look at how quickly this thread has filled up ^^). I bought KSP 'as is', in alpha, with the implication that the developers were working to improve it, if they could. A few months later an update was released - had Squad called that 'final' then a) obligations would have been met, my free-update entitlement would end!!!, c) like Puddin, I still would have had value for money. Love to Squad! Now 'alpha', 'beta', etc.: "When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to meanâ€â€neither more nor less." These are not legal terms, they are used by development teams, as they choose, to organise their work. In as much as they mean anything - and admittedly, they ought to when used outside the team (such as to us) - they only mean; a) alpha - we know this isn't finished yet, beta - we think it's finished now, c) release - we're finished even if it isn't. Squad make it pretty clear, I think, that there is more/different functionality planned for KSP before they will consider it "feature complete", therefore it is still unfinished (alpha), however well what we already have works. Once it's complete-but-not-"right" they will presumably call it 'beta' and have a round or two of polishing and bug-fixing (More Love To Squad!) before saying "OK, that's what we wanted to give you" and making it *dramatic chord* Version 1.0 ;-0 None of this is a bad thing, I think. What we have is "under active development" and keeps getting changed. We still keep getting updates for free - contrast that with The Sims, as a legendary example, where it is far buggier than KSP but "expansions" are costly and a "new" version is released every couple of years, requiring a whole new bank-loan ^^. In the end it's semantics and expectation-management. I really do think we can be thankful that Squad so obviously wants to produce a comprehensive, quality-but-fun, game/simulator. I also think Rowsdower and the team do a very good job of keeping us as informed and involved as they do, given that they could probably get a bigger client-base and more cash right now if they just dropped the guilltotine. Face it, KSP already gets great press.

Pleased to see someone else who wants to write a meaningful narrative of their KSP missions. The tutorial in my signature was designed specifically to be a full-length narrative following a logical progression, although it focuses on the vehicle construction and design rather than the flights themselves. (Proof reading STILL required, if you can bring yourself to it). Your core mods look like a good set. You might want to consider Ship Manifest instead of Crew Manifest - it does fuel and other resources as well - or add TAC fuel balancer if you feel the need. Enhanced navball has always seemed a bit underwhelming to me too whereas the NavballDockingAlignmentIndicator (Get An Abbreviation!) is really useful. Or just use Navyfish's original. Kerbquake is another and fairly new visual enhancement mod you might like, with the others you list in mind. Final Frontier I don't know, but isn't there a hint of StarTrek there? On your 'uncertains' I can definitely recommend SCANSat; it adds a lot of purpose for satellites without making anything harder. RT2, on the other hand, is fun "in itself" but can take a lot of work, especially at the start. I suppose it comes down to how awkward you want to make it for yourself - FAR, DRE, Dang It and Construction Time are in the same category; good, but you'll have to change the way you play. The life-support mods may fall into this category as well but there is a bit of variation amongst them as to how onerous the extra considerations will be. With some you can just add a "life support" grab-bag and more or less forget them, others will need constant attention. Kethane, KAS and IR are really up to you. Certainly if you've got Kethane then KAS is a useful addition but while I love the idea of building 'interesting things' with KAS/IR I never actually have wanted to! They give you the option anyway so they're probably, 'probably'. Joint reinforcement I've never needed and Interstallar/colonisation fall into parts-packs as far as I can see. Nice, but there's no easy "reason" that you can get from Kethane. I'd leave out scaled-up mods just as you have RSS. At the other extreme RealChutes and EPL will make things both easier and more interesting. So, finally, tech tree. Why? 0.24 is going to change the whole career mode so it could be interesting but until we see what it offers why confine yourself to a different way of doing things? Career mode as it is just means grind-for-science and all those mods will be pretty pointless. Best to say sandbox and just let the adventure evolve, or commit to 0.24's whatever :-) PS: On MJ and info mods: There's a lot of overlap in the information that MJ, KER and VOID can display. More and more I find that I'm using MJ and not KER (especially since MJ can also show deltaV/TWR for other bodies in the VAB/SPH now) but VOID is a relative newcomer that's getting a lot of positive press. You might like to look at that one.

If it's not at 90 degrees then it's never going to be in a stationary orbit. So much of this seems wrong, but Tortoise is asking about shuttle bays so I'll shut up about RT2. So why a shuttle and why a bay? Is this the bit where you want it just because it looks cool? Lol - no, it's ok, I'm just losing the plot here, ignore me.

"two gravity assists around Eve - one to cancel out my inclination with Eve," No gravity assist will change the inclination around the planet you're flying-by so the inclination after your first Eve fly-by will be exactly the same (2 degrees) as before.

Lol, what is that? Clangers?

Ninja'd by Boomerang. I would add that you can also a) launch straight up to Kerbin-stationary range (takes a lot of fuel) or use KOS. The RT2 thread and associated web sites/pages have a lot of different techniques for getting started with it.

Nah, I think we can scrub this. I've got too many other things going on to dedicate time to it now anyway. Writing a KSP Interactive Fiction (text adventure game) next, although I've been giving myself a bit of a break after finishing my tutorial.

These things do not go together at all. You don't need manned and you don't need a shuttle. 'Fess up - What's the real reason? - we all know, you just want one because it looks cool. That's fine, we've all had that feeling at one time or another. Most people get over it pretty quickly. Yes, I am just messing about. Seriously though - your initial commsats need only be very small. Almost anything should be able to launch them, even unmanned.

That is an artefact of the current career mode. As noted by others, it is soon to be replaced. When it is, and any progress you've made so far is redundant, you'll be glad of all the practice you put in trying the different parts available in sandbox ;-0

We're talking rocket SSTOs ;-)

Yep, but what I don't get is WHY you have to counteract the magnets? ETA: Sorry, what I mean is I don't understand what actual problem they're giving you. Is it because your station is being pulled out of a nicely-tuned orbit/alignment instead of just the other ship being pulled in?

So you're complaining that, while docking is fine, your unrealistically modded spacecraft don't work with it properly? Why is this the fault of the docking system? You might want to add "or could exist in an internally-consistent manner" to your definition of 'simulator' too, otherwise all the planets have to go for a start and only RSS, with already-existing engines, etc. would be possible ^^.

Yep, I use that as my 'Mk1' rocket, without all the pesky ancillaries - but I may add a link to your post so people get the idea ^^.

It's simple, but it does the job with fuel to spare. In the example run cores were first placed into 200km and 75km orbits, so the launch-vehicle/tug had to rendezvous out at 200km then push the first core to 75km to rendezvous and dock with the other. VAB description text: This is a simple space tug designed to dock two stock space station cores or other vehicles. It has a small fuel tank and engine for rendezvous and moving vehicles over larger distances and monopropellant and RCS thrusters for the fine control of docking them. The probe core is required for it to operate without crew, and the docking port allows it to do its job. Two solar panels provide electricity; these are simple fixed panels to minimise the chance of damaging them during docking manouevres. Composite picture: Full pictures, .craft file and VAB description text on dropbox: https://www.dropbox.com/s/sb66tnectdja7xu/Core%20Tug.zip

Congratulations :-) However you want to play it, of course, but that lander and, particularly, the Kerbin return, is huge! ETA: Oh, and I LOL'd at the flag text :-)

Has anyone nudged him, btw? I know he likes to stay stock but 1,200m has to be a lot of temptation :-) It would be nice to see his comment on this if nothing else.

Stealth_Eagle did ^^. Just uploading my .craft and images to dropbox, btw. It's after midnight though so I may post it all here tomorrow.

Which part of this do the landers help with?

The simple way: if you see 'atmospheric effects' during launch - white contrails then red plasma - you're going way too fast.

Oh yeah! Internals for everything. We need that.

At the risk of derailing the thread: You're always orbiting something and so are the planets and moons. In Kerbin-system you, Mun and Minmus are orbiting Kerbin. This is similar to the planets (including Kerbin) orbiting the sun. So going between Mun <-> Minmus is like going from one planet (including Kerbin) to another. When you escape Kerbin's SOI you are still in orbit around the sun. So transfering to a planet is like transfering to Mun/Minmus from Kerbin. alexmoon.github.io/ksp/ will tell you when the planets are aligned so you can make the transfer, just as you need to go at the right time/direction to get to Mun from Kerbin. This is known as the 'transfer window'.