Torquemadus

I didn't use asparagus previously, so the fact that I still don't use it shouldn't come as a news flash. Asparagus is a supposedly "efficient" staging method that saves fuel (which is cheap) by throwing away lots of engines and empty fuel tanks (which are very expensive). My strategy is based on the use of expendable solids and recoverable fly-back stages.

Hi everyone! In this thread, I'm going to demonstrate my Kerbooster fly-back stage. Note that the Kerbooster was designed from the outset to be used on high difficulty settings, so some players may find this approach to be overkill, but it should serve to demonstrate how to fly a low-cost space program to those that are interested. I derived the Kerbooster name from the Starbooster concept featured in Buzz Aldrin's science fiction novel Encounter With Tiber. I currently play career mode on custom difficulty set to 20% resource gains (compared to 60%) for Hard. This still gives me plenty of resources to do missions, but means that I have to be sensible when it comes to costs. Otherwise, I can easily end up spending more on a mission than I get back in contract rewards. If you examine fuel tanks and solid rockets in the VAB, you can use tweakables to look at how much they cost with and without fuel. With liquid fuel, most of the cost pays for the fuel tank, not the fuel it contains. With solid fuel, most of the cost pays for the fuel, the empty solid rocket is worth very little. In fact, the recovery value of empty solids is dwarfed by the values of the parachutes needed to recover them. Solid rockets are cheap and you can afford to throw them away once empty. Liquid fuelled rockets are expensive, but only if you don't recover them. Therefore, I design all of my missions accordingly. I use two-stage-to-orbit launch vehicles that use a cluster of solids as an expendable first stage and a recoverable liquid fuelled rocket as the second stage. In the early game, science progress is slow and part unlock costs are high, therefore I initially get by with simple parachute recovery methods. Once I have enough tech, I switch to winged fly-back stages, which give me 100% recovery value. If applicable, I also make any upper stages recoverable too. This means that the cost of any mission is reduced to the cost of the fuel I expended and the empty "trash bins full of boom" I discarded. In my current save, I used my two-stage-to-orbit Kerbooster to send direct ascent landers to the Mun and Minmus that are also capable of acting as long-distance surface rovers. Each lander is loaded with scientific instruments and is capable of traveling long distances over the surface of either moon. I'm not in a hurry to bring either vehicle back, since I keep getting more and more contracts to plant flags and transmit data. Instead of planting a "flag garden", I can easily travel over the surface and plant flags in each new biome I encounter. Once their missions are complete, the landers are able to return to Kerbin and land on the runway (tested previously). So far, my Kerbooster has been adequate for the launch of missions of any size I need to get the job done. I previously tested heavy and super-heavy variants of the Kerbooster in earlier patches, but I haven't so-far gone any further than test flights with dummy payloads, since I've never needed the extra payload capacity they provide. The term I use to describe the Kerbooster configuration is a "stack shuttle". Instead of the familiar NASA shuttle configuration, I arrange the shuttle as a stack, with the solids as the first stage, the orbiter as the second stage, and the payload mounted on top. This allows the shuttle to operate in the manner of a conventional launch vehicle without the bother of squeezing the payload into a cargo bay. These images show a typical Kerbooster launch. If available, the pilot for the fly-back stage is "rescued" from orbit, which helps to offset the cost of the launch. Recovery of the fly-back stage takes a bit of practice, but is easily achievable once you get the hang of it. No need for mods to calculate it for you. Adding big enough wings for a safe unpowered glide landing also adds enough lift to glide long distances if needed. This makes it easier to make corrections if your re-entry isn't as accurate as you hoped. The direct ascent landers spend a long time on the surface of each moon, each experiencing multiple day/night cycles. Note that on high difficulty settings, the science value of returning the lander to Kerbin is quite low, it makes more sense to remain on the surface and fulfil contracts as they become available and use the Outsourced R&D strategy to earn extra science.

LFB test contracts currently offer an insane amount of money. These pics show me playing on custom difficulty at 30% resource rewards (compared to 60% for Hard difficulty). This flight is essentially a free lunch. I got offered equivalent contracts for the Skipper and Mainsail which weren't worth the cost of the fuel needed to launch the mission.

I'm glad you agree. You can never have enough boosters during a spaceplane launch! Why bother with those silly jet engine things?!

Here are some pics of my Kerbooster fly-back stage coming in to land (stock, no mods). This is a design I've used numerous times in previous patches, but this is the first time I've flown it using the Spaceplane Plus wing parts from 0.25. The approach is fairly typical, I overshoot the KSC, make a sharp turn around and glide back. Just as I flare the nose of the plane for final touchdown, each of the four triangular wing parts explode in quick succession (too fast for me to react to take a pic). The rectangular wing parts have twice as much lift, so the plane still has enough lift to land safely. Although this didn't prevent me from landing, it was still disconcerting to have parts of my plane exploding around me while I was trying to land! Presumably, this has something to do with the aerodynamic loads on those parts during the landing. It seems that they can handle re-entry and some pretty hard banking turns, but fall off when I make an unpowered glide landing. Maybe I should add moar struts or something...

Today I updated my Kerbooster fly-back stage to use the new wing parts.

Everyone knows that the best video game ever was Advanced Lawnmower Simulator! ftp://ftp.worldofspectrum.org/pub/sinclair/magazines/YourSinclair/Issue28/Pages/YourSinclair2800090.jpg http://www.yoursinclair.co.uk/wiki/Main/AdvancedLawnmowerSimulator

Whenever a new patch video drops, I send copies to everyone I know who might possibly care about KSP. I know quite a few dedicated space travel enthusiasts who nonetheless don't play KSP because they think it's a silly cartoony pseudo-simulation starring Sandra Bullock-Kerman featuring satellites that orbit in the wrong direction. I only came to KSP because a friend of mine insisted that I try the game, knowing full well I'd be hooked once I tried it. He was right!

Currently, Sandbox Mode allows us to play the game without constraints. No science. No tech tree. No money. Build anything you want without having to unlock the parts you need or earn the funds needed to pay for them. In Sandbox, I can build an Apollo Saturn 5 replica and fly it to the Mun. I can build a giant space station that dwarfs the ISS. I can send a monster interplanetary spaceship with dozens of crew to establish a base on one of Jool's moons. Why? Because I can. That's why. I can build anything I want, let my imagination run wild and have a lot of fun doing it. Career Mode places obstacles in our way to add challenge and strategy to the game. Each mission I send out is another step along the road towards the ultimate goal of overcoming all the challenges Career Mode has to offer. There are constraints that limit what I can do. At each step, I'm working to push back those limits so that I can do more and progress further. I start out with limited funds and a limited number of parts. As I progress through the game, I unlock more parts and earn more funds. I have to carefully decide which tech tree nodes to spend my precious science points on. Which parts do I pay funds to unlock? How can I get maximum mission return from my spacecraft for minimum cost? Do I really need to unlock that expensive new part, or should I try to complete the mission without it? Note: If you want Career Mode to be challenging and fun to play, you need to increase the difficulty offered far beyond the 60% resource returns offered by "Hard" difficulty. "Hard" mode is a free lunch at current difficulty settings. 0.90 introduces upgradeable buildings and upgradeable kerbals (through experience). We are told that this will improve the performance of parts through better ISP, more thrust, and so on. This has been pointed out as a potential game-breaker. It has therefore been suggested that upgradeable buildings and kerbals will ruin the game and should not be implemented. Let's say that Squad keep the relationship between Sandbox and Career as they are now: Sandbox is KSP without constraints, Career adds constraints to make the game more challenging. How does upgradeable part performance fit in with this? An obvious approach is that Sandbox presents the parts without constraints, while Career imposes constraints on the parts to make the game more challenging. Suddenly, this turns the idea of upgradeable parts upside down and makes this feature a positive change, not a negative one. Let's set this out clearly: I start a career save with limited science, limited funds, and limited engine performance. In this context, upgrades to buildings and kerbals suddenly make a lot more sense. Sandbox gives me each part at full performance without any constraints. Career mode downgrades the performance of each part unless I upgrade my facilities and train my pilots. If parts have less thrust and less ISP unless I expend resources to upgrade them, then part upgrades become a way to make the game harder, more challenging and more fun.

The simple point you need to understand is this: Hard Mode isn't hard enough. Playing on high difficulty is about turning down resource gains until it starts to hurt. Hard Mode isn't hard enough in this respect. My current Career Mode save is set to 30% gains for science, funds and reputation (compared to 60% for Hard) and 0 starting funds. This starts out deliciously difficult, forcing me to design each mission with great care. Unfortunately, this difficulty eases off after the first Mun landing (tough as it was to get that far). I'm therefore looking at starting again at 20% and seeing how well I cope. I view reverts and quick-saves as a safety net that allows me to recover if I encounter game-breaking bugs that would otherwise ruin my game.

The reason I put this one out there is because this is the only way to make engine tests pay on high difficulty settings. If this isn't an exploit then fair play. I wanted to see what the community thought about this, since a lot of players might not think that this kind of flight is possible.

Since version 2.5, my pilot is often ejected violently away from the capsule when he goes EVA. They usually tumble either "up" or "down" at high speed relative to the ladder on the capsule they just exited. This can be a nuisance when gathering EVA reports, since it instantly propels him away from his ship at high speed, requiring significant use of EVA fuel to get him back. The consequences when landed on the Mun or Minmus can be spectacular, as the pilot is often catapulted upwards or into the ground at high speed!

Today, I examined a potential exploit in engine test contracts. I previously noticed that you can modify the staging sequence in flight. This allows me to "activate" an already activated engine to complete engine test contracts. I play on custom difficulty with contract rewards for science, rep and funds set at 30% (compared to 60% for Hard difficulty). At these settings, it can be difficult to earn money from test flights, as the rocket I build to perform the test could easily end up costing more than I get back in rewards. I got a contract to test the LFB in flight above Kerbin. I use the LFB itself to perform the launch. I edit the launch sequence in flight. This allows me to "activate" the LFB, even though I have already used it to get there. I then recover the LFB after splashdown close to the KSC, refunding most of the cost of the LFB. I help myself to a large contract reward for an easy flight. Ten percent of the funds received are spent on the Outsourced R&D strategy. I'm not sure whether "activating" the LFB if flight in this way is an exploit or not. The point I'm trying to make is that this kind of flight is possible. When I first tried out the contracts system, I assumed what most players assume and built an elaborate lifting vehicle to fly the required engine to the required altitude and speed, or orbit, or whatever, and then activated the engine to complete the contract. Now, I can use the engine to get there, and then activate it again under the required conditions. This has a huge impact on the usefulness of engine test contracts on harder difficulties.

Hi everyone! I thought I'd just post a quick demonstration of how to test an LFB in flight. I'm playing on custom difficulty, reducing contract rewards for science, rep and funds to 30% (compared to 60% for Hard difficulty). I've just blown almost all of my cash on a Mun rocket (currently outbound to the Mun), so I'm looking for some easy contracts to replenish my coffers. First of all, I need an inexpensive rocket capable of lifting the LFB to the correct altitude. The most obvious candidate is...the LFB itself! A quick edit to the staging sequence sets the LFB to "activate" the next time I press the staging button. I'm now at the correct altitude and speed, so I can now press the staging button to "activate" the already activated LFB. The LFB is recovered after splashdown close to the KSC. (Waste not want not ). I can now help myself to a hefty wad of cash! Please note that ten percent of all proceeds go to the KSC Science Outsourcing Fund, helping to create a better tomorrow for all Kerbals.

You can "activate" the same engine multiple times by editing your staging sequence mid-flight. Note that this does not turn the engine back on, you have to do that manually. The same goes for parachutes that have been used and re-packed, you can "activate" them through the staging sequence, but they won't deploy, you have to deploy them manually. You can even do this with solid rockets. If you need to test a solid rocket in flight, you can ignite the solid rocket at launch, edit the staging sequence in flight, and then "activate" it again while the rocket is still burning or after burnout.

I'm still not convinced that this thread is actually a flame war against the Kerbal Experience feature. It would seem that this thread is actually a flame war against Career Mode. Therefore, those of us who actually do play Career Mode have to loose an important feature that we want, because players who don't play Career Mode don't want Squad to spend time developing career mode.

Agreed. I'm optimistic that with proper planning and testing, Squad will give us a worthwhile new feature. I don't want to see it scrapped before it even sees the light of day.

That would seem to be an effective summary of this thread so far. Kerbal Experience has the potential to be a significant feature of Career Mode. Yet, many players are calling for it to be scrapped completely before we've even had a chance to see it.

From a strategy perspective, Kerbal experience has the potential to make Career Mode a lot more interesting. It could provide an incentive to bring a larger crew on a mission, so that each can bring their unique set of skills. For example, you might decide to bring Sulu Kerman for his ace piloting skills, Scotty Kerman for his engineering expertise, and Spock Kerman to do science. Or perhaps you might decide to take only one kerbal in a smaller and cheaper ship. If so, which kerbal do you bring? Which skill matters more to the success of the mission? Allowing pilot skill to affect performance factors such as ISP adds interesting strategic dilemmas. Players will have to take pilot skill into account when designing their missions. For example, sending Spock Kerman will get me more science, but sending Sulu Kerman means I'll need less fuel and thus can send a smaller and cheaper ship. This will require some use of abstraction to explain the effects of pilot skills, but could also make Career Mode more challenging and interesting. Conversely, I don't think crew experience should be an active feature in Sandbox, any more than unlocking parts and gathering science is. Sandbox should offer a way to have fun in KSP without the "Space Program Tycoon" features getting in the way.

Indeed it does. I define low difficulty as any setting that doesn't offer any meaningful challenge to the player, so that certainly includes normal and moderate.

There's no point in using the Admin Building on low difficulty, because players are given far more resources than they could possibly need. Players can earn insane amounts of money, science and reputation without ever flying beyond Kerbin's moons. Since resources are already effectively unlimited, using the admin building to get even more resources is meaningless. Playing on low difficulty doesn't just make the Admin Building meaningless. It makes Career Mode meaningless. If players are being given far more resources than they could possibly need, then the resources themselves become meaningless and the game becomes indistinguishable from Sandbox. The question then, is what effect the Admin Building has at higher difficulties where resources actually become meaningful.

Prior to 0.25, we had a tech tree that we could blow wide open in a few launches, without ever needing to fly beyond Kerbin's moons. We had a contracts system that was effectively a license to print money. Now we have the Admin Building, which allows us to take our license to print money...and convert money into science! Using the Admin Building in this way does not remove the challenge from Normal difficulty. You can't remove something that wasn't there in the first place. The Admin Building is intended for use at higher difficulties, where resources are finite and need to be carefully managed.

I built a small jet plane so I could do some "test in flight" contracts. I completed the contracts, but found that it was quite difficult to simultaneously fly high enough and slow enough to meet the required conditions. By the time the tests were complete, I realised I had already flown a quarter of the way around Kerbin and by coincidence had used a quarter of my fuel. For a bit of fun, I decided to keep going and try to fly all the way around Kerbin and try to make it all the way back to the KSC. I fully expected that I would burn through my remaining fuel and have to make a rough landing somewhere. I'll admit, I've read accounts of "Air Hogging", which supposedly is achieved by means of part clipping, intake spamming, and generally building planes in ways that were unintended. I ultimately ended up circumnavigating Kerbin three times, purely because I underestimated how difficult it would be to bring myself back down from sub-orbit with only control surfaces and an air breathing engine to guide my aircraft. Third time around, I managed to bring my craft down close enough to the KSC to make a powered go-around and land on the runway.

I don't get to encounter the Kraken very often, but it graciously put in an appearance for me after first stage separation. Dancing SRBs!

Kerbal Space Program features Kape descendants that are so utterly primitive that they genuinely believe that tablet KCs and smart phones are a really neat idea. They believe that the pursuit of ultimate happiness is ultimately governed by the acquisition of pieces of paper called Kurrency. This approach is ultimately doomed to failure, since it isn't the pieces of paper that were unhappy in the first place. In practice, they no more understand their fate than a tea leaf understands the history of the Kerbal East Kindia Company.