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This video will talk about if KSP is worth the buy. I list my biggest problems with the game at this time, and if you are OK with that. Then it could be a buy for you.

Well thank you for the strait answer Troy, I like you PR style. One of my friends is working for an NGO based is Cameroun that works on model forests across Africa. I think there goal would align perfectly with your mission and so I will talk to him about you guys. I am not sure what exactly he is doing, but in my mind it can really profit from good satellites images. I will also think about making a donation, if I do it will be something small has I am just an humble engineer but I approve of your goals and means and I admire your efforts, god speed.

That's not unusual; people will open a thread but not watch the video for many reasons. They might simply wish to see what the thread is about. They might realize they don't have time to watch a video right then, and make a note to come back and do so later (if it seems interesting). There might even be people who clicked the thread by accident. And not everyone coming to a thread is a new reader: they may have already seen the video, and simply be back to read the discussion. Some observations, which I hope will help: - I think your kerbals would look a bit better if they were a paler green, possibly with a more yellow tint. At least, that's how the official kerbals look to me. - I'd agree with the audio balance comments earlier ... the music is too loud relative to the dialogue. - I would speed up their motions a bit (limb movements and such) ... not necessarily make each motion take less time overall, but rather to make each motion start and stop faster. It would tend to inject a bit more life into their movements. - It appears (based on the specular highlight on their eyeballs and on the shadows) that you are using a single light located in front of the scene with some ambient light; this makes everything look flat and the shadows very harsh. You should probably kill any ambient light in the scene and use a three-point (studio) light setup if you aren't using Global Illumination. And since there's a large window and it isn't completely black outside, maybe a faint bluish backlight coming from outside the window. Your lights should also have a falloff (so they aren't the same brightness to infinity). In particular, this would mean that the patio outdoors would have much more of a blue tint due to the sky outside affecting them more than the light on the Kerbals does. - The window itself looks like dull grey plastic at the moment, which is mainly an issue with that large specular highlight on the material. Specular highlights are mostly just "cheats" for the reflections caused by very bright light sources. They are large and dull like this where the surface is rough on a microscopic scale and scatters the rays randomly, but not so rough and so random that a highlight is completely indistinguishable. Glass is not like that; unless it is frosted, dirty, or cloudy, it doesn't scatter reflected light much at all ... window glass in particular tends to reflect a fairly clear mirror image, when it reflects at all, otherwise it is transparent. So the window should either be very obvious (small, bright reflection of the light source, with the rest of the objects in the scene reflected too), or it should not be visible at all (no highlight, no reflections). I'd lean toward making it mostly invisible, but realistically in this scene it would be acting a lot like a mirror given how dark the exterior is. - You shouldn't use camera motion to switch from subject to subject like this, at least not often. It's certainly a valid technique to change focus to a different subject, but this is generally used more sparingly and for one of a few particular reasons: * To establish the overall scene before you begin. Look at the first fifteen seconds of the . The camera starts out focused on the text on the side of one of several crates, then gradually moves to focus on a kerbal rooting through a different crate.* You are introducing something completely new to a scene, often for added drama. Imagine a furious space battle against desperate odds; after the last explosion, you see the hero's ship has (barely) survived, and someone on the radio says "Thank god, all enemies have been destroyed. We are now safe" ... and that's when the music picks up again and the camera turns to show the arrival of the *second* wave. * You are drawing attention to something that has been present in the background all along (or at least for an unknown amount of time), or the effect the scene has had on something in the background. Two Kerbals are sitting at a restaurant table eating lunch, talking about some cute kerbalettes that were flirting with them at the counter. They get up and leave, and instead of the camera following them or immediately changing scenes, you pan over to reveal that one kerbal's girlfriend was sitting at the next table eating her own lunch and now looks very distressed ... uh-oh! If you use camera motion instead as your primary means of changing camera angles, making each scene one long continuous shot with the camera pausing and then moving from angle to angle as new people talk, it will feel very computer animation-y, and sensitive people may even get sick from all of the camera motion. I don't know which software you are using, but most of the packages I'm aware of allow you to add multiple cameras. You add a camera for each (usually static) angle, and render the frames for that segment separately. Then you assemble them in your editor (no fancy transitions, just a cut to the next camera). In the steam announcement video above, for example, there are cuts to new camera angles at 16, 18, 22, 28, 30, 34, 35, 36, 37, and 41 seconds. The camera only moves between those points for two real reasons: dramatic effect, or to track the movement of a kerbal within the scene. Alternately, you can just move a single camera from position to position in the space of one frame.

The Courage of Conviction. Jeb regained his composure with a visible effort, although he was still looking a little wild eyed. “Uh - if you'd care to step over here." He led Thomplin and Halnie over to the nearby control panel. A stubby handgrip protruded from the panel mounted on a complicated looking articulated arm. "This is just for testing now of course," he said, "but eventually, we're hoping to develop this into a control system for the pilots." Jeb cupped his hands round his mouth. "Clear the stand!" he shouted, "RCS test about to start!" He waved towards the handgrip. "Go ahead." Halnie stepped forward eagerly. "OK what do I do." “Just take hold of the handgrip and try moving it around", said Jeb. "You'll soon get the hang of it." Halnie pushed the controller tentatively forward and jumped as a burst of flame shot out of the top of the thruster block. She hurriedly pulled it back, only to trigger a second jet of flame from the nozzle underneath. Frowning slightly she pushed the handgrip slowly forward, until the upper nozzle just fired and then drew it back again, triggering the a brief puff of flame from the lower nozzle. "Forward and back control pitch," said Jeb, waggling his hand to demonstrate. "Side to side will control roll eventually, although you won't see any difference now. Proper pitch and roll control will need a pair of thruster blocks." Halnie pushed the controller to one side experimentally and sure enough the upper thruster fired again. "Twisting the handle gives you yaw control," Jeb continued "but again, proper control needs a pair of blocks". Moving more confidently now, Halnie twisted the handgrip back and forth and grinned with delight as first one and then the other of the side nozzles burst into life. Jeb grinned too. "We're running a calibration test on the controller later today, he said. "You're welcome to help if you like - we need to test it with as many people as possible to get an idea of where best to put the trigger points. You'd be welcome to have a go too, Thomplin!" Thomplin was still mulling over Jeb's first comment. “You mentioned something about pilots, Jeb. What exactly will they be piloting?" “Easier to see than describe, Thomplin. Come and have a look at the Kerbal 2!" Halnie gazed at the squat pod with delight but now it was Thomplin's turn to look a little wild eyed. “You're going to put a kerbal in that?" he asked incredulously. “Kerbal-s actually," Jeb corrected him. “The capsule is a bit cosy but it does seat three." Halnie was walking around, inspecting the Kerbal 2 from all angles. “I don't know much about spaceships," she commented, “but this one looks almost finished. I don't see where your thruster blocks are going to go, let alone our propellant tank." Jeb nodded. “The Kerbal 2 won't really need them," he said. “It's only designed for sub-orbital flight. You get a nice view from 35 kilometres up but you're not high enough to need RCS control. We're thinking that the orbital capsule will be a bit smaller actually and it'll probably only have room for one pilot by the time the other systems are in place." “A nice view," said Halnie lightly, “Sounds like you've already been there, Jeb!" “I have," Jeb said simply. “The Kerbal 1 is inside if you want to take a look at it later but I thought you'd want to see the launch site first. We'll be mating the Kerbal 2 with its launch vehicle too, so you can have a good look at the whole ship." ---------- Ornie's truck bumped over the grass as he drove out to the launch pad. Beside him, Thomplin's head was swivelling back and forth as he took everything in. Plenty of room to put up a Stratus billboard or two, just like Jeb had promised. Lots of people to look at them too, if the number of seats was anything to go by. Halnie's eyes were fixed firmly on the approaching launch tower, although at the moment, it looked like nothing so much as a very large shower booth. She commented on this to Ornie, who chuckled. “It does a bit now that you mention it. We call it The Tent with all those drapes hanging around it. They do a decent enough job of keeping the vweather off during assembly although I'm looking forward to the day that we can put up a proper building for the job!" As the truck came closer, pairs of kerbals emerged from behind the drapes and started rolling them out of the way, exposing the tall central tank and stubby side boosters of the rocket. Both Thomplin and Halnie's eyes widened. Halnie was practically bouncing up and down in her seat in her eagerness to get out and inspect the Kerbal 2 at close quarters. For his part Thomplin wasn't any more convinced by the rocket than he had been by the capsule. The truck rolled to a stop. A shadow fell over the cab as high up on the launch tower, the assembly crane swung around and lowered a cable down towards the waiting spacecraft. Halnie hopped out the cab and watched as the capsule was hoisted into the air and set delicately down on top of the rocket. Two kerbals, both securely tethered to the launch tower, set about attaching a set of what looked like clamps to the capsule, although Halnie couldn't help noticing that they were being handled rather gingerly. Ornie followed her gaze. “Decouplers," he said briefly. “Basically, small explosive bolts that we use to detach the booster once it's out of fuel." Even Halnie looked slightly taken aback at that and beside her, Thomplin just rolled his eyes. “I know," Ornie acknowledged, “they do work though. On a different note, we were wondering - do Stratus make larger versions of those spherical tanks?" “Depends what you mean by larger but yes we do another tank that has about twice the volume of the demo model we showed you."Halnie cocked her head. “Difficult to say how heavy that would be - depends what you put in it and at what pressure." “Hmmm," said Ornie, “I'm not sure what Bob and Wernher had in mind but that sounds like it should work." He pointed at the side boosters. “At the moment, those things are solid fueled but we're really hoping to stop using solids. We were thinking about a pressure fed liquid design but that would need us to store quite a lot of high pressure gas in a small space. Your larger tank sounds worth a try." He looked at Thomplin. “You'd be more than welcome to talk things over with them tonight and come and watch the launch tomorrow." Thomplin didn't need to see Halnie's face. “That would be most generous," he said. ------------ Geneney waited by the capsule, clutching the gantry rail and trying to ignore the beads of sweat running down the back of his neck. Lucan stood beside him, his bright orange pressure suit highlighted against the grey sky, one hand swinging his flight helmet casually back and forth. There was a knock from inside the Kerbal 2 and then Bob clambered carefully back out through the hatch. Geneney steeled himself and climbed inside, squeezing in past the control panel and settling himself into the centre seat. Bob passed his helmet through the hatch and then climbed in himself. He set to work connecting Geneney's suit to the capsule systems whilst Geneneny shuffled around trying to make himself comfortable in the confines of his seat. Finally, Bob placed the helmet over his head and locked it carefully into place on the neck ring of his suit. He rapped on the transparent visor and gave Geneney a cheerful thumbs up before crawling back out of the capsule to let Lucan take his place in the third seat. Geneney stared around the inside of the capsule listening to Lucan chattering away as Bob plugged him in. Then Lucan too got a good luck rap on the visor and a thumbs up. With a final “Good Luck," Bob climbed out onto the gantry, slamming the hatch shut behind him. Lucan reached over his head and twisted the locking wheel closed. A detached part of Geneney's mind nodded in satisfaction as the hatch bolts slid smoothly into place with a reassuring clunk. Geneney flicked a toggle switch on the control panel. “Control, this is Kerbal 2." Ornie's voice came back over his headset. “Reading you loud and clear, Gene. Running final checks on the booster." “Understood Control." Geneney flicked off the external comms link. “You know guys, this capsule looks a lot more sturdy from the outside." Lucan turned his head awkwardly towards him. “Just as long as you remembered to stick the parachute on top. Besides you built this thing." “I know - that's what's worrying me." Wernher cleared his throat. “How do you think I feel then," he said wryly, “given that I built the engines. Better switch the external loop back on Gene - they shouldn't be too much longer with those checks." Bob's voice filled their ears. “All rocket systems check out. Guidance control and launch sequencing transferred to booster. Ready when you are, Ornie." “OK then. We all know what we're doing. LV-15 engine start on my mark, 3 second hold down at full power as a last check, then we release the clamps and light up the Trashcans. That last bit is probably... Geneney smiled and found himself relaxing at last. Going to be a bit bouncy, he murmured to himself. "... so you might want to hold on something. Ignition in five...four...three...two...one.. Mark!" Geneney braced himself, as the Kerbal 2 came to life around him. The capsule shook with the steadily increasing rumble from the LV-15 far below his back. "Holding for three...two...one..." The RT-5s ignited right on schedule with a deafening roar, ramming Geneney back into his seat as the Kerbal 2 hurtled skywards. Halnie and Thomplin held their breath with the rest of the crowd as the Kerbal 2 soared out over the sea trailing a thick plume of roiling grey smoke behind it. Despite his earlier misgivings, the sheer spectacle and controlled fury of a live rocket launch had touched even Thomplin's cautious soul and he had cheered himself hoarse with everyone else as the Kerbal 2 lifted off. Halnie was simply starstruck as she watched the fiery dot disappear into the sky. ---------------------- It was noisy beyond belief, the shaking was terrifying and it was the most exhilarating thing he had ever done in his life! Geneney's face was pulled back into a broad grin as the acceleration built up to painful levels. How long had the Trashcans been burning? Lifting his head was out of the question, so there was no way to check the fuel gauge on the control panel. No way of checking the altimeter either. No matter Geneney, he told himself, just enjoy it while it lasts. Outside, the sky was gradually fading into a deep midnight blue as the capsule rose higher and higher. The RT-5s stuttered briefly, once, twice, before finally falling silent. All three kerbalnauts were flung forward in their straps as the thrust abruptly died away. Four loud bangs announced the departure of the Trashcans as the LV-15 pushed them gently onwards. “Kerbal 2 this is Control. Come in Kerbal 2!" Geneney forced himself to speak. “This is the Kerbal 2," he whispered. “Say again Kerbal 2." Wernher spoke up. “We're all good, Control. Clean separation on RT-5s. Gene got a little squashed but he's OK." Lucan's voice sounded a little strained. “There has got to be a better way of doing this," he said, “I mean - I didn't think Bob was exaggerating when he was talking about getting mashed but sheesh - he really really wasn't joking either!" Ornie laughed. “Bob's just wondering if you're all going to join him in persuading Jeb to fit some extra padding to those seats. Thirty seconds to staging, guys!" After the crushing acceleration of the Trashcans, the last moments of powered flight were almost soothing. Geneney leaned forward and watched the reading on the fuel gauge drop lazily downwards. There was a brief moment of quiet as the engine shut down, followed by a familiar bang as the booster dropped away, leaving the capsule to coast upwards under its own momentum. Geneney was delighted to find himself feeling unexpectedly light, so light in fact that he was floating off his seat and bobbing gently against his harness. “Look guys - I'm floating!" Next to him, Lucan was looking happier than he had all flight. “This is awesome! Hey, Control - how come nobody told us about this?" “No response from here," said Ornie, “I'm guessing they were just wedged a bit more tightly into their seats. Looks like you're all getting a first on your flight too!" “Hey that's a thought," said Geneney, “Move your head, Lucan - I want to see out of the window!" Absolute silence filled the capsule. “Are you guys OK up there?" “Oh yes," said Geneney softly, “Oh we really are. I don't how to describe this, Ornie. I know how Jeb felt now - there just aren't good words for this. Bill did a great job with his photos but... I guess it's like trying to photograph a sunset. Even the best pictures just don't compare." --------------- Shadows slowly drifted over the capsule walls as it coasted onwards, lit from beneath by the bright glow of Kerbin's atmosphere. It rocked slightly as it reached the top of its arc and started the long descent. The kerbalnauts could hear a gradually increasing thrumming noise from outside the capsule as it dropped back into thicker air. Geneney kept one eye on the altimeter as the Kerbal 2 plummeted back towards the ground, acutely aware that his life and Lucan and Wernher's too were entirely dependent on the folded pieces of fabric mounted on the capsule roof. He glanced at the control panel uneasily as the capsule continued to accelerate. CRACK! Geneney jerked against his harness as the drogue chute deployed. The queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach told him that the Kerbal 2 was finally slowing down. Moments later, there was another sharp crack as the drogue departed, followed by a deeply reassuring thump as the main chute shot off its rails. The capsule was slowing down rapidly now as the parachute bit into the surrounding air. Geneneny watched the altimeter unwind. Three thousand metres, two thousand... one thousand. The main parachute unfurled, lines going briefly slack as the Kerbal 2 slowed to a virtual standstill and then floated sedately down towards the waiting sea. ---------- Halnie let out her breath in an explosive gasp as the orange disc unfurled and turned to Thomplin with shining eyes. “We have got to be part of this, Tom! This is the future and Stratus needs to be there with it. You've seen what these people are planning - you know this is just the start!" Thomplin embraced her wordlessly. In his heart of hearts he agreed. Selling the idea to Stratus management wasn't going to be hard either. If that fellow Ornie was correct, each rocket alone would need four of their large tanks each and then goodness knows what else the capsule would need to store. He gently let Halnie go and turned to Jeb with a wry smile. “I think that last test just convinced us, Jeb. I can give you six of each type of tank in exchange for that sponsorship deal you mentioned. After that you'll need to start paying but I have a sneaking feeling that you'll be qualifying for a bulk discount!" Jeb clasped his hand with gratitude. “Thank you," he said softly. Halnie watched the Kerbal 2 as it dropped towards the horizon. “I do have one question," she said. “How do I learn to fly one of those ships?" << Chapter 6 :: Chapter 8>>

All this talk of what a robot can produce scientifically, versus having boots on the ground, it doesn't really matter, the fact we are boldly going forth and experimenting with new things is what truly matters. We as a species must place more money and faith in our science programs. We talk about spending money on renewable resources and replacing our dependence on fossil fuels instead of on Space Exploration, but I propose that truthfully funding man spaced exploration, or robotic for that matter, is an investment in renewable resources and new forms of energy. These are all technologies that would be vital in the future of space exploration. Historically, these industries have grown parallel with our space programs, it's only after we as a people, lost touch with what the space programs do for us, that we cut funding and those industries had to struggle for funding. I say, bolster the Space Program (be it manned or robotic) and you bolster all of mankind!

Wow! I did not think I would get to talk directly to the person in charge. I do greatly advise you to play KSP if you don't its a great game. I am very noob at it in many ways still, and it amazes me to see so many peoples of all ages learn the basics of space flight and navigation with a fun game and get so good at planning mission and trajectories. The essence of it is so complicated and alien, yet it will be required if ever we advance to the stage where you can actually say "I am a space pilot and travel the solar system with my own ship". If it ever gets to this, maybe kids who played a video game will already grasp the fundamentals and excel at them. I guess my question for you would be what are your plans to get us there? Will giving you money really advance this cause?

Why certainly good sir As originally planned, this chapter ended up being rather long, so I decided to break it into two. Second half is a little more fast paced and should be coming up shortly! These New Engines There was a stunned silence and even Jeb seemed a little taken aback. “I admire the ambition, Wernher," he said, “but we havn't even flown a crewed flight to orbit yet. Or flown anything to the Mün for that matter." Wernher looked at him impatiently. “Of course not," he said, “and believe me, I know exactly how much we need to do before we can even think about it. Pressure fed engines are still going to be a major step forward though, especially if we use hypergolic propellants. Just open two valves and whoosh - propellants mix and engine fires. Believe me, I'd much rather be depending on something like that to get me back to Kerbin rather than a collection of igniters and pumps!" Jeb made a placating gesture. "OK, OK. I see what you mean - I just hope the people at Stratus can come up with what we need. In the meantime, we need something a little smaller but something that will still be a useful test of the Stratus tanks." Bob cleared his throat. “We could launch another satellite," he suggested, “Except this time we make it more like a mini capsule. We use the same LV-902 second stage that we used for the Kerbin 1 but we upgrade the LV-15 with the new turbopump. That should boost its performance enough that we can launch a heavier payload than last time." Everyone's attention was fixed on Bob as he continued. “We build a propulsion module with one of those Stratus tanks - assuming they are all that Jeb seems to think they'll be. Then we have the satellite itself but this time it's a little bit more than a radio transmitter in a ball. It has a heat shield at one end, a parachute at the other and a couple of cameras in the middle. We lift both modules to orbit, fly them around a bit, take some pictures and then use the propulsion module to de-orbit. Satellite detaches from the propulsion module, re-enters the atmosphere and lands by parachute." Jeb's jaw dropped. “Good grief, Bob. I'm not sure who's worse, you or Wernher." Wernher spoke up. “Actually that sounds doable, Jeb but I suggest we keep it simple. We use the propulsion module as a very small third stage if we need a bit more speed to get to orbit. Then we use it to put the satellite into a slow spin. We do a couple of orbits, fire the propulsion module again to stop the spin and then one last time to drop out of orbit." Lucan raised a hand. “I presume that we time things so that we do the de-orbit maneuver after an exact number of orbits?" “Exactly," said Wernher. “Fitting any sort of guidance system into something that small is going to be difficult. I'm not saying that we can't do it but I don't think it should be a priority. So we don't bother. It does mean that we'll get a pretty odd collection of pictures though, since the satellite will be pointing in the same direction all the time, rather than tracking the horizon." “Hmm, calculating the re-entry path is going to be fun. Might not be a bad idea to fire a couple of test flights out over the sea first to give us more idea about how much drag we'll get. Not with a full flight article though of course, just something the same size and mass..." “I've got an idea," said Richlin, “Ornie and I have got a couple of friends out by the Eastern Wakira coast. If we did put a radio in this thing, I'm sure Sigbin and Doodlie would let us know as it passes overhead. That should give Lucan time to tweak the re-entry a bit." “Hang on - where are we putting the heat shield and when do we lose the propulsion module?" “Will we have room for a radio and the cameras?" Jeb had to raise his voice as nineteen excited kerbals started discussing Bob's plan and arguing over the technical details. “OK, OK folks! I think that's a big yes for Bob's satellite plan! But at the risk of bringing everyone back down to Kerbal for a moment, we've got another ship to launch first!" ---------- The propulsion team surveyed their work with satisfaction. Four RT-5 boosters, complete with decoupler mounts, rested in the assembly jig, neatly arrayed around a mockup of the Kerbal 2 lower stage. Malmy's back made a popping noise as he stretched. “I think that's got it, lads. We can finish the paintwork this afternoon and then take em out to the Tent tomorrow." Ornie opened his lunch bag. “Sounds good to me, Malmy. The lower stage is about done apart from the arming circuits for the decouplers and Gene's people are out there working on this today. Hey, Wernher - put the radio on would you? It should be about time for the news." Familiar music drifted through the air. “This is KBS News at 1:00pm. In our main story this lunchtime, space fever heats up in Foxham as the Rockomax Corporation announces a successful test of their new BA-A rocket booster. Our space correspondent Leland Kerman was there to watch the launch." Ornie dropped his bag. “Rockomax Corporation?" “Good afternoon. I am Leland Kerman and I'm standing outside the main control room at the Rockomax test site. With me today is Ademone Kerman, owner and company manager of Rockomax, who has kindly agreed to speak to KBS before this important test flight." “Ademone, perhaps you could tell the listeners a little about this flight. Why is this such an important test?" “Good afternoon, Leland and welcome to this test of our new BA-A booster. This is the first in what we hope will be a series of our next generation solid fuel rockets, so it's a pretty big day for us." “I can imagine, Ademone. So what height are you expecting the BA-A to reach? Will you be aiming for orbit?" Ademone laughed. “I'm afraid not. The BA-A is really a test bed for a number of new technologies, which we will be building into our planned orbital launcher in the coming months. It should still be quite a spectacular flight though - the rocket will reach a top speed of just over 1 kilometre per second and a height of just under 17 thousand metres." “That's quite a way up - I hope it's not going to drop back on our heads!" “Oh no - by the time it falls safely into the sea, the BA-A will be over 25 kilometres away." “That's extremely impressive, Ademone. But tell me - why Rockomax? What made you decide to become a rocket builder?" “Well as you know, Leland, Rockomax used to be the Speciality Firework Company, so we've always been a rocket company really - we're just building bigger ones now. But really, it was the Barkton Satellite that made the decision for me. The idea of launching a rocket all the way around Kerbin was just inspired!" “So you're convinced about the Barkton Satellite? Many people have dismissed it as a hoax or a joke." “Oh I thought so too at first, Leland. But it quickly became obvious that it was quite real. I do a little amateur radio myself and let me put it this way - it would have been easier to put a satellite into orbit than it would have been to coordinate a network of fake radio broadcasts so accurately across the whole of Kerbin." “Well that sounds pretty conclusive to me and I hope our listeners will feel the same way. Ademone Kerman - thank you very much." “It's now just under five minutes to launch. In the distance I can just make out the last of the Rockomax engineers making their way back from the booster..." Ornie clicked the radio off. “Sounds like we have a little competition," he said quietly. Wernher was still looking indignant. “A hoax - why would we bother with a hoax?" Malmy was looking a little wide eyed. “One thousand metres a second - I wouldn't fancy sitting on top of that." “Well you need to be going a lot faster than that to get to orbit," said Wernher, “But I don't expect they're putting much on top of their booster if those altitude and range figures are at all accurate. A solid fuel motor with a very light payload will get very fast very quickly but there's no real way of controlling the thrust. I think they're being rather optimistic with their talk of an orbital launcher." “Even so," said Ornie, “they managed to get it off the ground without exploding - and they did it on a live news broadcast too. They might be optimistic but they're not exactly lacking in confidence either. We should tell Jeb about this." --------- Thomplin was feeling somewhat dubious as he pulled up outside the old warehouse. This had to be the right place with a sign like that but it all looked a little bit run down. It was busy enough, although it wasn't really what he'd expected from an organisation that had apparently launched a rocket into outer space. Someone had obviously noticed their arrival and passed a message inside, since a couple of minutes later a cheerful looking kerbal wearing a bright red hat popped his head around the warehouse door and bounded towards them. "You must be Thomplin! Welcome to the Junkyard and Spaceship Parts Company. I'm Jeb by the way". Jeb peered into the cab. "Pleased to meet you um... "Halnie. Is there anywhere we can put the van?" "Absolutely, Halnie", said Jeb enthusiastically, "There's a couple of spaces in the yard, I'll just go and get them to open the gates for you! He rubbed his hands together. "I tell you - you're going to love the test we've got set up for your tanks!" Jeb bounced away and disappeared back inside the warehouse. Moments later the main gates opened with a squeal of rusty hinges. Halnie glanced over at Thomplin, shrugged and started the van. Both kerbals looked around the yard with interest. This looked a bit more promising and if nothing else there certainly seemed to be a lot more going on. One kerbal was crawling out of a strange squat looking pod, which appeared to be surrounded by makeshift scaffolding. Another was perched on top of the scaffolding, carefully attaching what looked like a conical lid to the roof of the pod. In the centre of the yard a group of kerbals were gathered round some kind of metal framework peering intently at something. Jeb ran over to them. "This way!" he called, gesturing towards the framework. Their curiosity piqued, Halnie and Thomplin followed him. The device mounted on the framework was like nothing they'd ever seen before. It appeared to consist of a small cube of metal struts stuffed with a dense tangle of plumbing. Four nozzles were attached to the outside of the cube, each one pointing in a different direction. A tube led out of the back and into a large cylindrical tank standing next to the main frame. Jeb pointed at the tank. “You see the problem?" he said. “We can make the control thrusters pretty small but that's no good if we still need a big heavy tank for the propellant." Halnie and Thomplin stared at him blankly. Jeb looked momentarily puzzled. "You did know that we build spacecraft right? Well this is a steering system for a spacecraft. You can't use wings in space - no air - so we use sets of small rocket thrusters to steer instead." Halnie bent down to inspect the fuel line coupling. “Looks like we'll need a 3c adaptor," she called over her shoulder. “The tank looks standard enough, so the filler pump ought to handle it. Then she noticed the warning signs painted on the side of the cylinder. “Best bring the protective gear too I think - whatever this stuff is it looks pretty nasty." “In that case," Thomplin said dryly, “why don't we just see if we've brought the right sized tanks first." Everyone gathered round eagerly and craned forward trying to see as Halnie opened the equipment cart and with some effort, lifted a white metal object onto the test stand. As promised, it was basically spherical, it's smooth walls broken only by a hose coupling on the top and a set of metal flanges which it was currently resting on. Malmy was skeptical. “Well it's small enough. Doesn't look like it hold 20 kilos of anything though." Thomplin gestured. “I assure you it's heavier than it looks. Go ahead and pick it up if you like. Actually if you could put it on the ground that would be helpful." Malmy slipped his hands casually under the tank and lifted. His eyebrows shot up as he took a rather better grip on it and tlifted it carefully down off the stand. He looked at Thomplin with new respect. Thomplin nodded slightly and rather theatrically, took a heavy looking sledgehammer off the equipment cart. He raised the hammer over his head and before the horrified crowd of kerbals around him could do anything, let it drop squarely onto the tank. Malmy stared in disbelief as the hammer bounced off. “Pressurised," said Halnie casually, "I wouldn't try that with an empty one but they're pretty sturdy once you fill them up. I would stand back for this part though." Everyone moved a respectful distance from the test stand as Halnie donned her protective clothing and lifted a second tank off the cart and hooked it up to the propellant cylinder with practised ease. There was a collective drawing in of breath as the filler pump started up with a loud clatter and monpropellant flooded into the tank. The pump shut off automatically and Halnie carefully closed the cylinder valve and disconnected the tank. Working briskly she lifted it onto the test stand and attached it to the thruster block. “OK, Jeb - what was that test you wanted to show us?" << Chapter 5 :: Chapter 7>>

Nope. We can't be sure of anything. Human beings can't reproduce any task exatcly the same way twice. And when we talk about computer games, that's worse either.

Ah yes, but there's a very good reason for the jarring change in his personality. You may have noticed Bob trying to talk to him about it, but Jeb brushing him off or evading it each time. "Bob recognized a defense mechanism when he saw it." Each of the crew has their own issues to deal with after having experienced such an unbelievable tragedy. They went from having been born on a ship and taught they would one day lead everybody to their salvation on Kerbin, to fleeing in terror from the only home they had ever known, forever losing almost everything precious to them in the process while everybody and every thing they knew and loved was destroyed. Both Bob and Bill have lost somebody close to them in the same individual (Gindal), and are wanting to go back to the Horizon to find whatever resolution they possibly can to patch the hole left in their lives. Nelnie is coping by starting a new family, having been alone for years on the Horizon previously, but is frustrated to realize she wants something more. Mackenzie (Mac) is focusing almost all of her energy and attention on the forge (the garage), finding some solace in playing as big a part as she can in the group's continued survival and growth Jeb, meanwhile, hasn't yet faced the things that are haunting him. He's been through a great deal as well; recall his own loss on the Horizon's bridge. But, he's got an even heavier weight on his shoulders, which is at the core of why he almost seems to have a split personality. To go into any further detail delves into spoiler territory! Thanks very much for your encouragement! This is the kind of writing I really love to do most, so it's good to know I can just let all these ideas flow freely without having to bring down the Edit Hammer so heavily on them. I saw a couple of folks doing similar things with their screenshots, and thought about how cool it would be to bring elements from the game into a realistic environment, and use them to help illustrate a story that's striving to do the same thing. You can count on more of that as the chapters progress.

I use FAR and find the above not only advantageous but essential to getting off the ground at all. But FAR is something of a mixed bag when it comes to realism IMHO. While it does require you to make realistic-looking rockets (at least much closer to real life than the pancake asparagus nonsense you can get away with in vanilla), it goes too far the other way IMHO. Still, all in all I much prefer FAR to vanilla so recommend you try it. Some observations from my experience with FAR and ROCKETS (so don't talk to me about spaceplanes ). Far is beneficial in some ways for rockets although it also imposes numerous penalties. But to get the most out of it, you really need tweak your ascent profile to something more realistic. This is mentioned in the docs. You want make your ascent in a long, gradual curve starting at pretty low altitude. After much testing with MechJeb's ascent profile tweaker, what works best for me is setting the turn to start about 6km, use the 70% curve, and finish the turn at 80km. MechJeb will either fly this itself on autopilot or will project aiming markers on the navball is you want to fly it yourself. The latter is pretty much essential if you really want to get the most out of the whole exercise. Anyway, doing all this means I routinely get to 100-150km LKOs with only about 3200 dV; my record is 2800 dV. Thus, for payloads of up to about 60 tons, my ascent stage is usually nothing but a stack of 2 of the biggest fuel tanks with 1 of the biggest engine underneath, with MAYBE a couple of small-medium SRBs. No asparagus, no crossfeed. HOWEVER, you pay for this in other ways, which I shall now list: First off, a requirement of FAR is that the CoL be as close to the bottom of the rocket as possible. You need rockets that look like arrows, long and skinny with lots of tail feathers. Sticking little winglets on won't cut it. I need 4 stock delta wings with standard control surfaces to do this, and any SRBs need at least winglets, sometimes full delta wings, too, depending on payload shape. A stack of 2 of the biggest fuel tanks leaves little room on top for payload before you hit the VAB ceiling. This significantly limits the size of your payload, as does the need to put it in a fairing if it's lumpy. This all means that you'll have to dock stuff together in orbit to get anything big in space. You'll also need a mod with fairings, or figure out how to get Fairing Factory to work with 0.20 AND the rest of your rocket. While all the tail feathers are usually enough for adequate control in the lower atmosphere, you REQUIRE copious RCS to turn these long rockets above about 40-50km. Like to face prograde to circularize the orbit. A good rule of thumb I've come up with is that for each big fuel tank in the ascent stage stack, the rocket as a whole needs 4 RCS clusters on each end to get facing the right way before it passes apoapsis, and of course the fuel to run them through at least 1/2 the ascent. Unless you're just going to Mun, your payload will probably be docking, so will of course have 8 RCS thrusters of its own and a mono tank. That takes care of the top end so you need 8 more RCS clusters on the bottom (I usually mount them on the tips of the delta wings) and a BIG RCS tank in the ascent stage. On the way up, the payload RCS tank drains first. Thus, it's good practice to build your ascent stages so you can circularize the orbit with a tad of dV to spare. Then you can pump whatever RCS fuel is left out of the ascent stage into the payload before ditching the ascent stage, so the payload will be able to dock. Forgetting to do this is very annoying . Because the ascent is a long, constant curve, you're never holding still. This complicates dropping SRBs. To avoid them smashing into you, you need to use a lot of Seprotrons, all carefully placed to throw the boosters far away without tumbling, which can be tricky if the SRBs have wings on them. You'll probably have to get (I THINK it is) TT's latest Modular Multiwheels mod, the one with the "heavy strut" part. This strut can stretch a VERY long way. You often need this to go from the top of your payload through the bottom cup of the fairing onto the big fuel tank below, to keep the payload from wobbling through the fairing. This is only really a problem if you're launching long, lumpy payloads that have docking ports on both ends. Anyway, I like FAR (at least for rockets--it infuriates me with spaceplanes). Just say good-bye to launching huge rovers and T-shaped station components with pancake rockets.

Sorry didn't notice someone had posted in here. Still not dead, just a little hiatus. I need to dig through my development version to see where I left off, I think I was in the middle of an upscale of the parts. I need to do that and the config updates. But I don't plan on releasing anything before 0.21 because I want to see how the SAS updates affects the vectoring; might not need the compensator plugin so much anymore; we'll see. Haven't talk to Pirate in a while, so the status of the explorer shuttle model is unknown.

I got the softnose airplanes, and for flying instructions, they talk a lot about AOA, and changing it to X if it is above or below Y

One thing that makes the first few missions hard is landing everything. Not only is it difficult to land where there is control, but you lose a valuable asset (a satellite) when doing so. Another thought is some geostationary and/or ground station missions before the space ones (ie. land a vehicle with 3 crew x degrees of longitude away from KSC). An optional side mission could be putting unmanned relays on some of the mountains about the place (maybe a repeatable mission for landing something above 2000m, they won't have much coverage, but every little bit helps). I started writing a mission pack, but the rewards need tweaking (mostly increasing). Note that I haven't required any specific antennae/dishes/etc because I like the variety of being able to choose your own depending on available mods/aesthetic/etc. MissionPackage { name = RemoteTech Starter Missions description = Some of our scientists have noticed that unmanned missions are a bit tricky if you can't control any of the probes. Mission { name = Ground Control description = Controlling probes is a bit tricky with a planet in the way. Get some Kerbals over the horizon so they can take over mission control when KSC loses sight. We suggest eastward and near the equator to make things easy later. reward = 15000 category = LANDING LandingGoal { crewCount = 3 description = Land somewhere away from KSC's longitude. Don't forget a remoteCommand and comms of some kind so the crew can take control. Which ones are up to you. body = Kerbin minLongitude = -60 maxLongitude = 90 } } Mission { name = Baby Steps description = We need to check our models against some measurements from the upper atmosphere. Get a probe out of the atmosphere; you don't need to bring it back once we get what we need. reward = 8000 category = ORBIT requiresMission = Ground Control SubMissionGoal { description = Exit the atmosphere. OrbitGoal { body = Kerbin minAltitude = 70000 minSeconds = TIME(2h) } PartGoal { partName = sensorBarometer partCount = 1 } PartGoal { partName = sensorGravimeter partCount = 1 } PartGoal { partName = sensorThermometer partCount = 1 } } LandingGoal { reward = 4000 optional = true description = Land at Kerbin body = Kerbin } } Mission { name = Beep beep beep description = We're not quite ready to put up a communication network yet. We still need more data. Get a satellite into a decaying orbit. reward = 10000 category = ORBIT requiresMission = Baby Steps SubMissionGoal { description = Orbit OrbitGoal { body = Kerbin minPeA = 40000 maxPeA = 70000 minSeconds = TIME(40m) } PartGoal { partName = sensorBarometer partCount = 1 } PartGoal { partName = sensorGravimeter partCount = 1 } PartGoal { partName = sensorThermometer partCount = 1 } } LandingGoal { reward = 10000 optional = true description = Land at Kerbin body = Kerbin } } Mission { name = Talk the talk description = Get a sattelite up to improve our comms network. You probably won't break even with the funding we've managed to acquire for this, but the improved infrastructure will help. reward = 5000 repeatable = true category = ORBIT requiresMission = Beep beep beep SubMissionGoal { description = Orbit OrbitGoal { body = Kerbin minPeA = 70000 minApA = 200000 } } } Mission { name = Connection troubles description = Low orbit satellites are all very well and good, but let's get something a bit more reliable. Put a satellite in a synchronous orbit over the KSC. reward = 25000 category = ORBIT requiresMission = Talk the talk SubMissionGoal { description = Get into a synchronous orbit over KSC. OrbitGoal { minOrbitalPeriod = 5h 59m 50s maxOrbitalPeriod = 6h 10s body = Kerbin } } } Mission { name = Stepping Stones description = Good coverage of the Kerbin system will help keep your probes in contact. reward = 14000 category = ORBIT requiresMission = Talk the talk SubMissionGoal { description = Get a relay into a high orbit over Kerbin. OrbitGoal { minPeA = 5000000 body = Kerbin } } } Mission { name = Over the Mun description = We're almost ready for some unmanned exploration further afield. Put a relay in a high polar orbit over the mun reward = 25000 category = ORBIT requiresMission = Talk the talk SubMissionGoal { description = Orbit OrbitGoal { minPeA = 50000 minInclination = 70 body = Mun } } } } Feature request: It'd be nice if we could add costs for our own resources. I like using H2/LOX/etc from the modular fuel tanks but at the moment there is no cost (although fuel is rather a drop in the bucket so it's not too bad). Possible balance note: Planes seem to be a tad on the expensive side. I have trouble building a 3 seater under about 20k (it's more like 50k if you want it to look plane-ish)

After 6 months of waiting, I get to again talk about my favourite game of all time. Wrong. Shown here and here is that Wheatley hacked into (what I believe is) the Sputnik which is in Earth orbit. In Portal Chell had leg implants to let her fall long distances without getting hurt (replaced by boots in Portal 2) so why wouldn't she have implants in her arms to make them stronger? I mean, I own an ASHPD replica and it is heavy to lug around, so some arm implants would be needed to hold it for a long time. Also, the "shoot the moon" ending was planned to be an easter egg and not be the true ending, where Chell would be sucked into space and die.

Is there any talk about a mission control??? I have been flying in the cockpit view for a min now and then I was flying an automated rocket/power unit to join the space station when I began to wonder how cool it would be to have the option to remotely control a satellite or a rover i.e. having to install cameras and radios and...and...and you get the idea.

I'm ending this challenge. This game is not mature enough (code and dev wise) for the mods. Basically this one would've required some good amount of mods, and the KSP team didn't set this game up where it's a 100% for all the mods to talk to one another. I'm not blaming the KSP team, but I am just saying the game is too new to do this one. However, you can still try to do this if you want.

Ehh I needed an exuse to talk my parents into getting me a new one, Looks like I'll need to get my own though Or at least a new fan.

http://imgur.com/a/ptKgu This is the command ship and the AarnCo command orbital Station (aka clover station) also proof the torpedo ship can infact make it to jool. Final part count: AarnCo command3c (clover Station) : 300 AarnCo command3 ship armed : 246 AarnCo defence 3 with 12 torpedos and 4 fully armed fighters : 524 AarnCo Resupply3 with full re supply loadout : 325 AarnCo Surveyor3 with 4 torpedoes 2 fighters and 2 probes : 264 AarnCo Tanker3 with ion drive tug/adapter : 127 word of warning always send a tanker first as most of these end up on fumes by the time they arrive, and since barring the command ships most dont have RCS on the main body its a bit of a pain to dock. as always here are the download files http://www./folder/v8gpqdlycu47z/ksp_mk3 I also added the lifter Ive been using to get them in orbit in the VAB as its own thing since there was a lot of talk about people needing one. hopefully it will help. next update will be me trying to wrangle the mess around jool into a nice little exodus to pol and some nice screenshots of docking (my patients willing)

AMD was working on something like this. There was a lot of talk about their K8 chips back around 2006. The buzzword for it was 'Anti-Hyperthreading' where two or more cores would act as a single faster core. As far as I know, nothin much came of it. Not sure if it was scrapped or simply did not provide a significant boost in performance... *edit* Never mind, after doing some research, I now see that it was an unsubstantiated rumour...

Now this isn't some fake survey where you can win a free I-pad, no nothing like that at all. I just need some creative input for upcoming (hopefully) episodes of the kerbal show. So, just submit a reply in the form that answers the following questions (or don't. i live in freedom land so i can't force you) 1: Weekly, or every other week? I've asked this before, but i'm still wondering whether i should follow it or not, simply speaking would you rather have a good video every other week, or some crap video i put together at the last minute every week? (but bi-weekly might not always deliver good content) 2: Use dynamic hair with strands, or textured hair? Pretty straight-forward. no hidden meanings here. 3: What do YOU think i could do to improve the animation? 4: I'm thinking of once a month making a kind of "science talk with Drew" kind of thing where i pick a topic (like "Can still lakes of lava exist on Moho?") 2-4 minutes, may or may not be animated. 5: Are you happy with how much i haven't been delivering lately? I'm serious, if you think i'm doing a crap job with the uploading schedule and not delivering (like most OP's on Imgur with their safes) Please, feel free to speak your mind. 7: What kind of outfits do YOU think civilian kerbal's wear? 8: Are you aware there is no 6?

My math says a single medium detector that's never idle requires 10242 * 0.9s / (1 + ln(1000)) = 19 minutes, 25 seconds to scan every cell. This is a lower bound; you'll basically never get a full scan with one detector in 20 minutes because the only way to avoid enough overlap is to make adjustment burns, and that requires dropping out of warp. The NRE is normal and not a problem. I still don't think this is a Kethane issue; it looks like the overlay object is instantiated just fine, and then KSP runs out of memory trying to load a texture. The map overlay starts right as you're switching scenes, so a LOT of stuff is being loaded at that time and there aren't usually debug messages printed for them. I think you're just running too many mods (particularly part packs) and need to remove some or lower your texture settings. [EDIT] I don't have that power, talk to the forum mods.

This is indeed the way Squad are making Kerbal Management. Basically, [besides their starting stats] you train them in the field you want them to be. Some Kerbals will pick up on things quickly, while others will just not work out. Not 100% that the Kerbals can "control" any crafts you direct them to, but there have been Live Streams where Squad do talk about that aswell. Indeed KSP is definately better to Control for yourself, but there are some people out there who prefer to use Mechjeb's Autopilot, mainly because when you have Space Stations and you are constantly sending ships up to keep your Refueler happy, it can end up being abit tedious. Having Kerbals that could do this for you can help give you more time for enjoyable things to do in the game rather than constant chores over and over.

I have noticed that only very recently people talk about Kerbals loving snacks. Even when the Lander Can IVA and Cupola IVA were released, people payed little attention to the fact that both of the sticky notes have snacks referenced on them.

What the ASAS in 0.21 would talk like: "This is your ASAS captain speaking, please prepare yourselves for takeoff by fasting your seat belts and choosing from a selection of beverages to drink on the way up; there's no need to worry about it spilling, this flight is going to be smooth and stable from here to LKO, at around 50,000 feet we'll be breaking the speed of sound, feel free to watch the trails left behind by this event from your luxurious self righting recliner. Enjoy your flight with ASAS spacelines." *cue liftoff protocols* *3 *2 *1 [.5 of a second later] *Bing* "This is your Captain speaking, we have left the launch pad and are now on our way to orbit, the seat-belt sign has been switched off now, feel free to move about the cabin." (In case you haven't seen, the new ASAS is the polar opposite of the old ASAS)

Unfortunately, using a plugin like that would mean that you'd need a relatively expensive computer to run the mod at a decent framerate. I'd rather not compromise that in any way. I suppose it might be doable if it was used only on the command pod, though. I'll talk to aphazael about it. What concerns me is the fact that it essentially removes the texture to use a reflection cubemap, and that is undesirable on something as complex as the command pod.