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Perhaps I\'ll talk with the community manager and work on getting all the KSP LP\'ers together to help push this further. -DR

You sir are a genius when it comes to plugins, and I have noticed more people are starting to talk about, and recommend, your work

So, because this has infected way too many threads, we can have it here. If you can\'t stay civil, then don\'t talk. I\'ll start: Metric is better than imperial because it works in a regular numbers of multiplications (10, 10, 10 etc.) as opposed to an irregular numbers (12, 3, 1760 etc.)

Hey, everyone! Since the RP is officially shut down forever on this forum, I figured I\'d better redirect my creative juices into a new aspect. And, seeing as I love to write and consider myself a decent author, I\'ve decided to type up a KSP-related short story. So, without further ado: Just a Day in the Life Launch commencing in five, four, three, two, one... 'WAHOOOO!' Jebediah Kerman, known more commonly as Jeb, yelled enthusiastically as the shuttle rocketed into the air. All three of the ship\'s crewmembers were glued to their seats due to the high speeds they were travelling. Bill was desperately attempting to keep the rocket steady, while Bob was passed out and snoring in his seat. 'For the record, this was a really bad idea,' Bill muttered, punching flashing buttons with one hand while controlling the rocket with the other. 'I mean seriously, Jeb, what made you think a rocket made entirely out of solid boosters was a good idea?' Bob snored in agreement. 'I still stand by my choice,' Jeb responded, donning the sunglasses he always kept in his spacesuit. 'What could be better than flying through the air at hundreds of meters per second with no control whatsoever over your thrust? Just sounds like a good time to me.' 'Just come help me with this thing,' Bill said, exasperated. 'I need you to steer while I keep it from overheating.' 'Whatever.' Jeb lazily reached over and pressed a random button. Immediately a decoupler activated, pinning the command module to a now un-steerable hunk of randomly placed rocket boosters. 'Wrong button!' Bill screamed. 'That was the emergency ejector! We were only supposed to use it after the boosters ran out! Bob finally woke up. 'Where the heck am I?' he asked, then looked out the window and saw that he was in an uncontrollable rocket hurtling through the air at breakneck speed. 'Oh, right, it\'s Tuesday.' 'Ah, Tuesday,' Jeb reminisced. 'The only day those boring scientists let me make my own shuttles. I love Tuesdays.' 'Hello!' Bill yelled. 'Trying to keep us alive over here! A little help would be appreciated!' 'Yeah, yeah, yeah,' Jeb responded. 'Just relax. Even if we die, they\'ll just clone us and we\'ll be right back where we started.' Just then, the rocket\'s SRBs finally depleted, and the shuttle began to decelerate. Bob looked over to the altitude meter and gasped. 'Hey guys, look, we made it out of the lower atmosphere this time!' 'Woo!' Jeb punched his fists in the air. 'New record!' 'Now, how are we going to get back down?' Bill said. 'I hope you didn\'t \'forget\' the parachute again like last time.' 'No, I didn\'t forget it,' Jeb said, looking annoyed. 'Have a little bit more faith in me, will you? I knew you\'d be worried, so I took the parachute off the top of the pod and set it inside for safekeeping.' 'Jeb?' 'Yeah?' 'THE PARACHUTE NEEDS TO BE ON TOP TO ACTIVATE, YOU IDIOT!' 'Whoa, Bill,' Jeb replied. 'I don\'t know where this new angry side is coming from, but I don\'t like your attitude. We\'ll be fine.' 'It\'s a good thing I installed a backup parachute when Jeb wasn\'t looking!' Bob pulled a remote out of his spacesuit. It only had one button on it, labeled 'open parachute.' There was also a warning label, stating to keep the remote out of reach of toddlers and Jebediah at all times. Bob pushed the button, and just as the shuttle began to fall back to earth the parachute deployed. 'We\'re saved!' Bill rejoiced, smiling. 'We\'ll live after all!' He began to prepare the pod for landing, steadying it and such. 'Fine,' Jeb said, 'But Bob, I\'m going to have a serious talk with you after we land.' He looked thoughtful for a moment, then sprang up. 'I almost forgot!' Jeb told the others. 'I installed an experimental engine on the command module!' He reached for a large red button with the word 'DANGER' above it. Immediately after he pressed it, there was a BOOM and everything went black. ... Two hours later, Jeb, Bill and Bob stepped out of the cloning vats, looking refreshed. 'Yeah, let\'s not do that again,' Bill said, and Bob nodded agreement. 'Maybe leave shuttle design to the professionals, Jeb?' 'Are you kidding?' Jeb replied. 'That was the most awesome time ever! In fact, I have a few more ideas, most of them involving moar boosters. Believe me, next Tuesday is going to be awesome!' With that, he bounded off towards the VAB. Just Another Mundane Mission 'Oh, you\'ve got to be kidding me...' Bill Kerman rubbed his fingers against his temples, fighting off a headache as he viewed the speed gauge. 'Jeb, what the heck did you get us into?' Jeb, Bill and Bob were currently flying at thousands of meters per second, hurtling towards the Mun at extremely dangerous speeds. They were on a Mun landing mission, but at this point it seemed more likely that they\'d become a new crater on the Mun\'s surface. Bob was screaming his head off, Bill was desperately attempting to steer the craft, and Jeb was relaxing in his seat and drinking a milkshake he had snuck onboard. So just an average expedition. 'I don\'t get why you guys don\'t see the genius behind my ideas,' Jeb countered. 'Turning an old fuel tank into a decoupler worked perfectly; the tank exploded, separating us from the other stages, just like it was supposed to.' 'Except for the part where it caught on fire too early,' Bill retorted. 'And then blew up our orbit stage, as well as mangling our landing stage. What are we supposed to do now?!' 'AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!' Bob said. 'Exactly, Bob,' Jeb replied. 'I\'m glad you see it my way. All we have to do is slingshot around the Mun, then around Minmus, launching us into an orbit around Kerbol until we ultimately end up back in an extremely high orbit around Kerbin, at which point we\'ll just deorbit until we end up back in a sub-orbital trajectory towards the Mun.' 'Wouldn\'t that just leave us where we started?' Bill asked. 'We\'re already in - Oh my god, only fifty thousand meters above the Mun and still going nearly five kilometers per second.' Bob passed out from fright, collapsing onto his chair. 'Look, just give me the controls,' Jeb said. 'I hid some miniature rocket boosters in the rocket just in case of this issue.' He reached under the control panel and pressed a small, inconspicuous button. Immediately, windshield wipers began to sweep across the windows. 'Wrong button!' Bill yelled. 'Forty thousand meters, and our speed\'s still increasing!' 'Yeah, yeah,' Jeb muttered. He pressed a huge, extremely conspicuous button, and immediately a few tiny SRBs began to fire. 'How did that solve our problem?' Bill asked, annoyed. 'We\'re just going faster towards our deaths!' Jeb pulled down on the pitch, slowly moving the navball\'s indicator upwards. 'See? No problemo. We\'ll just fly low around the Mun until the SRBs run out, and then hit the ground on the wheels I installed while the engineers were sleeping.' A crackly voice emanated from the communications radio. 'Bzzt... You did what?' 'Erm, nothing,' Jeb said. 'Definitely not wheels to ride around the Mun\'s surface or anything.' 'Mission control!' Bill yelled. 'We could use some help!' 'Bzzt... Oh, relax, Bill. We\'re getting the cloning vats ready as we speak. 'Nice to see you have a lot of faith in us,' Bill muttered, then his eyes widened as he viewed the altitude meter. 'Ten thousand meters! Jeb, how\'s that idea of yours coming?' 'Got it!' The nose suddenly pitched upwards, barely missing a giant arch that the rocket passed. The SRBs finally died down, and the craft began to fall towards the Munar surface. 'Now THIS is what I\'m talking about!' The broken landing engine suddenly broke off the main body of the craft, and wires and pieces of small debris began to make a trail of sparks and metal. It also woke Bob up, who groaned as he looked out the window 'We\'re not going to last much longer in this state,' Bill said. 'Soon this whole thing\'s going to fall apart.' 'Relax, I\'m landing...' The craft had leveled out, but it was still going at an extreme speed. 'You all need to relax. We\'ll be fine.' 'Hey, guys...?' Bob was rummaging at the back of the command module. 'I think I found a remote for a retro rocket back here.' 'Really? Activate it!' Bill said excitedly. 'We might have a chance of living!' He lunged for the button. 'Aw, come on, Bill,' Jeb said. 'Why do you have to be such a killjoy? I can land this thing myself, thank you very much.' And with that, the craft rumbled onto the Mun\'s surface. There was a huge jolt, and Bill and Bob were thrown against the floor of the command module. The craft flipped over multiple times, before finally coming to rest on its side in a crater. 'WAY too close, Jeb,' Bill muttered angrily. 'And how are we supposed to get home?' 'That is a good question,' Jeb said, although he didn\'t look very worried. 'But don\'t worry, I brought plenty of Mountain Dew for everyone!' Atmosfear 'I can\'t believe we got stuck testing a plane while the recruits are in orbit and on the Mun,' Bill grumbled. 'We\'re the most experienced team the space center has!' 'Yeah, most experienced at blowing up,' Bob joked as he climbed into the cockpit of a new spaceplane design. 'Jeb makes sure of that.' 'I, for one, think this flight is going to be awesome,' Jeb said. 'I installed a few, um, special surprises, to make our jobs more interesting.' 'I swear, Jeb, if you mess this up again, I\'m going to kill you,' Bill replied angrily. 'Eight launches in the last two weeks, and only two of them were successful.' 'Loosen up, will you?' Jeb responded, then started the plane\'s engines. It began to move forward down the runway, steadily gaining speed until it lifted off the ground. 'I guess that wasn\'t too bad,' Bob said. 'We haven\'t exploded yet, at least.' 'Oh, you just wait,' Jeb said, grinning. He suddenly pulled the roll to the side, and the plane did several corkscrews through the air as it flew upwards. Bob screamed, and Bill desperately attempted to keep the nose up. 'Stop that, Jeb!' Bill yelled, shoving Jeb\'s hands away from the controls and steadying the plane. Just then, something kicked in and the plane began to shoot straight upwards at an extremely high speed. 'What was that?!' Bob said as they flew up higher and higher. 'Jeb...' 'Well, you know how you said you didn\'t want to fly a plane?' Jeb looked like he was barely holding back laughter. 'I installed rocket engines instead of atmospheric ones, as a joke Who knows, maybe we\'ll get into orbit!' He burst out laughing, then pressed a button on the control panel. Immediately there was a click sound as the wings and outer hull detached from the plane, revealing a small rocket inside. 'Not funny, Jeb!' Bill yelled, trying to level out the rocket and avoid going any higher. 'I dunno, it is kind of funny,' Bob remarked. 'See? Even Bob\'s enjoying it,' Jeb said, donning his sunglasses and taking the controls. 'We\'ll just shoot into orbit for a bit, and then return when our engines run out. No harm done.' 'Except for the fact that the plane\'s body just crashed down to the ground,' Bill retorted. 'And that we\'re almost out of fuel, and that we\'re going nearly a kilometer per second.' 'I don\'t see the problem with any of those things,' Jeb replied. 'Bzzt... Jeb, WHAT THE HECK did you do?' A voice said out of the transmitter. 'Get back down here, now!' 'Fine,' Jeb muttered, and swung the nose of the rocket completely downward. They lost control over it, and the shuttle flew randomly through the air. 'Happy?' 'Give me that!' Bill grabbed the controls, steadying the rocket pointing slightly downward. 'Jeb, did you happen to remember to install a parachute when you made this rocket? 'How was I supposed to put a parachute on the nose of a cone-shaped cockpit?' Jeb replied. Bill had passed out, and was asleep in his chair. 'Ugh, whatever. Did you remember a decoupler, at least?' 'A what?' 'A decoupler, Jeb! Did you remember to put in a decoupler!' 'Nope.' 'Great.' The rocket finally ran out of fuel, and began to sink like a rock towards the ground. Bob snored, Bill screamed, and Jeb smiled as they fell closer and closer to a large mountain range. 'Ooh, I nearly forgot!' Jeb reached out onto the control panel and pressed a small button. An SRB suddenly kicked in, slowing their speed down. Jeb also moved the nose up, leveling the rocket out for landing.The ground grew closer and closer as the rocket slowed down, until... 'We\'re alive?!' Bill had woken up and was looking out the window, Jeb having somehow landed the shuttle. 'Yep,' Jeb remarked, leaning against the control panel. Suddenly he slipped, his elbow hitting the button for an emergency afterburner, and the craft exploded. Orbiting Around 'Well, would you look at that,' Bill said, looking at a panel of various orbital information. 'We actually managed a circular orbit this time!' 'Only because we tied Jeb to his chair the whole time,' Bob remarked. 'Yeah, thanks a ton for that,' Jeb muttered. 'And it\'s only the day before Tuesday, too! Show a bit more respect for your commander.' 'Sorry, Jeb,' Bill replied, 'But we\'ve seen what you\'re like in the days leading up to Tuesday, so we had to take some desperate measures to get a successful trip.' 'Hey guys, come look at this view,' Bob said, pressing his face against one of the command module\'s windows. 'You can see half of Kerbin from up here!' 'I bet if I spit out the window it would go straight through somebody\'s brain,' Jeb joked, looking down at the planet. 'Well, don\'t get any ideas...' Bill responded, checking over the orbital information one last time. 'But really, this turned out pretty well.' 'You mean boring,' Jeb grumbled. 'What\'s the fun in a successful mission? I haven\'t been to the cloning vats in, like, three whole days.' 'And with any luck, we can keep it that way,' Bob replied. 'I hate the cloning vats. You just sit there in a tub of green glob for an hour, and then you step out perfectly fine. It\'s weird.' 'At least it keeps us alive,' Bill said. 'And it\'s necessary, because of Jeb.' 'Hey, it\'s not my fault I\'m more fun than you guys - Oh, hey look, an asteroid.' 'A what?' 'An asteroid. Headed our way.' 'Great...' Bob screamed and passed out. 'By the way, why does he always do that?' Jeb asked. 'Defect at birth,' Bill replied. 'Whenever he screams, his body loses so much oxygen that it temporarily shuts down and he passes out.' 'Ah, I see. Now, what are you going to do about that asteroid?' 'I don\'t know,' Bill said. 'It\'s headed straight for us! We\'ll never be able to steer out of the way in time! Do you have any genius ideas in that head of yours, Jeb?' 'Well, I have a couple,' Jeb replied. 'But I\'m still TIED TO A CHAIR.' 'Oh, right.' Bill untied the ropes around Jeb\'s wrists and ankles that were binding him to the chair. 'Okay, now what?' 'Did the scientists install that experimental new afterburner I told them about?' Jeb asked. 'I\'m not going to answer that question,' Bill replied, looking away. 'You just did.' Jeb pushed a glowing red button; the rocket suddenly shot forward like a dart, gaining speed extremely quickly. Jeb used the momentum to steer the rocket around the edges of the asteroid. 'Well, we did it,' Bill said. 'But now the asteroid is heading straight for the space center!' 'Huh, what are the odds,' Jeb responded. 'It\'s almost like this course of events is being controlled by someone sitting at a desk and typing on a computer in an alternate dimension! Do you know what we have to do?' 'Yeah,' Bill said. 'But Bob isn\'t going to like it.' 'Like what?' At some point Bob had woken up, and now looked quizzically at Jeb and Bill. 'We\'re just going to slam our multi-billion dollar rocket into an asteroid at thousands of meters per second, obliterating it,' Jeb replied. 'And Bill helped me come up with the idea, no less! It\'s amazing!' Bill screamed and passed out again, slumping backwards in his seat. Jeb hit the afterburner one last time, and the rocket slammed head-on into the asteroid. A few hours later, all three Kerbonauts stepped out of the cloning vats and sighed in relief. Apart from a few smaller meteorites scattered around the area of the KSC, there were no damages. 'You know, Bob, I see where you\'re coming from,' Jeb said. 'Those cloning vats are kind of gross.' 'Does that mean you\'re going to try a bit harder not to blow us up?' Bill asked hopefully. 'Are you kidding?' Jeb laughed. 'Tomorrow\'s Tuesday!'

My suggestion for designing the systems is simple: call up or write to some astrophysicists. I\'m sure there\'ll be lots that will happily talk about their field and provide all kinds of interesting and (semi) realistic possibilities or even actual discoveries. Knowing that some facsimile of the in-game thingie is out there would be very cool

Yes, but if you want to get ideas from a public place or a library, you can\'t talk.

This is a joke, right? Are you aware of how toolish you sound? To suggest that the Mun arches are a \'spoiler\'? It\'s bad enough that people talk like the second KSC is the equivalent of Snape kills Dumbledore. Maybe whenever a new part is released we shouldn\'t talk about it because SPOILUZRRZZZZ THERAZ SPAES PLAENUZ IN VERSCHUN 0.15!!!111oneELEVEN1111!! Hey here\'s a thought, if a tiny bit of geometry totally ruins the game for you, stop reading the forums and go do your exploring. I for one don\'t give a shit, it\'s your problem if you consider something a spoiler and nobody else\'s. This is like intentionally going to Hooters specifically to complain about how women in hotpants with cleavage showing offends you.

Turn the picture upside-down, and THEN, we\'ll talk.

Got it. To be fair we need somewhere to keep updated, but maybe small talk should be kept to a minimum.

As soon as I get back to my computer (on the ol\' laptop atm, not a hope in hell that KSP could run on it ;P) I fully intend to give this a go. I\'ve been browsing the required mods and that unmanned comsat plugin looks freaking amazing, can\'t wait to get a good com sat system set up, been interested in the challenge for a while but never had the motivation to make a satellite network, now i will. Which leads me to a question; For later turn missions, mun and minmus landings and all that, how would we replicate comsat networks? Since i\'m assuming that everyones attempts are all on one persistence files and can see that comsats from different \'companies\' will communicate with each other. Is collaboration an aim here? since we don\'t see each other\'s results I foresee an issue either in setting up a join network that is efficiently distrubuted, or preventing \'cross talk\' between different player\'s networks. Erm yeah sorry about the wall of text but i was kind of thinking as i typed. Will post soon! oh and what kind of format do you want Don (for the email, concerning budget & other turn data)? For all of the details n that. - cheers, Bellaby

Indeed it does (and now its here ) That was an awesome video. But I could listen Neil Armstrong talk about stuff for a long time

Talk about how they planned to make a dominoes pizza on the moon. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/space/8734456/Dominos-plans-pizza-on-the-Moon.html

I am American! (Seriously. I am. Many of my peers talk like that for no reason, and then say it is friendly.)

This should be a good challenge for everyone. We\'ve had threads to talk like Orcs, the physically death prone and even British - but none for the hardest of all! Talk like humans! I\'ll start; Hello!

So basically, talk like a stereotypical chav. Right.

For those of you who don\'t know (which I would expect would be the vast majority of you), I do a short Science section on one of the community radio stations in Western Sydney. It\'s called 'Snarky Science'. Well, I know you guys will all be absolutely snowed under with Eurovision and all, but if you can fit a little time slot into your busy schedules, we\'re on air tomorrow night. Time is a little flexible, but it will be some time (shortly) after 10 tomorrow night, Sydney time. That\'s just after UTC 12:00, 27th May 2012! - just over 25 hours from now. The theme for the evening is 'recent developments in Space.' I thought I\'d mainly talk about the entry of private players into space, and what that means. Obviously we\'re starting with SpaceX, it being topical and all, but moving on to Virgin Galactic (which are looking good for a launch in the next couple of years) and a few of the other COTS providers. Okay, so over to you - what else do you think I should include? Station details: People in the Penrith Valley (Sydney, Australia): Listen to 100.7FM. Everyone else: listen online.

Eh, you should start your own thread if you want to talk about the Dictator. I\'m telling you, because you\'re the first person who\'s post has no relavence to the topic of Prometheus whatsoever. It\'s fine to mention other movies because you think they\'ll be better, but please remember what this thread is about.

Home from my surgery...great news, bad news story tho....the surgery as originally scheduled for 2-3 hours but ended up taking 4 1/2 hours. My boyfriend was in the waiting room and starting to panic, and when the surgeon came out to talk to him he called him over to a private room. Immediately he thought something really bad happened to me, and he was in tears, but I was ok....what happened was my one disc (C4-C5) was so badly herniated that my left shoulder nerves were badly damaged and he had to go in and try and repair them. That\'s why the surgery took do long! So, the great news is....all the pain I have been dealing with for 7 years is gone! It is amazing! The bad news is.....because of the nerve damage in my left arm, I have no use of it right now. I may eventually get it back, but I can\'t start therapy for it till my neck bones fuse at that takes 6 to 12 months Overalll, getting rid of the pain is worth any sacrifice I may have to make, so I am very happy! Thank you everyone for your thoughts and support!

If I posted an image, I would have to A. Make sure it was a recent one B. Nobody elseis in it C. I am old enough to. Believe me, I look and act older then I really am. And if you saw my picture, you would talk about the mass of hair on top of my head.

Continued... Bill: What..happened? Once the psychedelic mist cleared, the blue and green world stretching out below them was the single most wondrous sight in the universe. Unfortunately, it was accompanied by a cacophony of alarms and flashing lights: OFF AXIS--BAD TRAJECTORY--REDUCE SPEED. Two tense minutes were spent barking orders and fighting controls. 'Up ten.' 'Bearing 040.' 'Main engines to one third.' 'Oxidizer depleted.' 'Spool up airbreathers.' Despite a long series of creaks, squeals, and groans--several of which came from Bob--the spaceliner held together and was soon on a smooth course sailing high above Kerbin. Bill: Systems check. Bob: The Navigation computer is unresponsive. No communication from satellites. Can\'t test star tracking until nightfall. Radar blank, terrain mapping nonfunctional. Jeb: No response from KSC. There\'s a weak signal, though, and I can make out some local rock and roll channels and somethin\' aboot 'Iteration one-zero-whatever'. Bob: Local radio uses longer wavelengths and the plane has a special antenna for that. Unfortunately the transmitter is short-range only; we won\'t be able to raise KSC until we\'re right on top of them. Everything else--satellite communications, KPS positioning, radar--all use the microwave antennas, which must have been damaged during re-entry. Jeb: Or, ya know, I doubt the warranty covers green space clouds. Bill: Engines and control systems check out OK. Altimeter OK. Gyrocompass OK. We can fly by dead reckoning, but without knowing our position, it doesn\'t do us much good. Jeb, get the charts. Hopefully we\'ll be able to recognize landmarks this time. Jeb: What about secondary airports? Bob: What if we- Bill: Only as a last resort. KSC has the only functioning runway rated for spaceplanes, the rest are under construction. We\'ve already taken damage and navigation is shot; trying to land on a shorter runway would be suicide. Jeb: Maybe they could clear a long stretch of highway? Bob: Or better yet- Bill: Uneven, risky, not something I\'d want to try either. Still, if we happen to fly over a big city, try to reach someone by radio. At least they might point us the right direction. Bob sighed. Jeb: I doubt we\'ll reach anyone anytime soon. Of all the land on Kerbin we could have found, why did it have to be the middle of a featureless plain? We could be almost anywhere. Bob: I think I could, um, work out our coordinates by the clock and Kerbol\'s position in the sky. Assuming the clock is right, of course. Give me a couple- Bill grabbed the mic. Bill: This is your captain speaking. We seem to have suffered some instrument and communication malfunction, but everything is currently under control. He turned off the cabin shade. Bill: As you can see, we have returned to Kerbin and are en route to KSC for landing. We apologize for the inconvenience. He clicked the mic off again. Bill: I need to go talk to the flight attendants and let them know what\'s going on. Hopefully they can help keep the passengers calm. If anyone asks, we\'re on our way to KSC and everything is fine. Bill left the cockpit. Jeb: And while we\'re busy finding our ass from a hole in the ground, let\'s have some rock and roll! He tuned the radio and the cabin was filled with the fuzz guitar of Kerman Greenbaum\'s 'Spirit in the Sky'. Bob: COULD YOU TURN THAT DOWN, PLEASE? Jeb: WHAT? Bob: TURN IT DOWN NOW! Jeb: NO, SORRY, I\'M NOT CLEARED FOR THAT ACTIVITY. YOU\'LL HAVE TO TAKE IT UP WITH COMMAND. Bob cranked the dial down. Jeb: Ya know, I\'m gonna to have to report you for that, eh? Bob: You *bleep*ing bastard, are you *trying* to screw this mission? Jeb: Hey, little guy, I\'m just kidding. And stressed. And frustrated. We\'re *home*, how can we be so lost? Bob: *sigh* ...Sorry. I think the stress is getting to me, too. I tried triangulating our position using the ship\'s clock, but no luck, so I figured it must have been reset when we lost the computer. Then I tried using my own watch, and it still didn\'t add up. I guess the radio was just the last straw. I was out of line. I...want to go home. Jeb: You and me both, kid. But chill and think about somethin\' else for a while, ya know? Like--why does the plane have a FM radio, anyway--I thought they took out everything non-essential to save on weight? Think some engineer just needed his music fix? Bob: Oh, no, FM is only a side effect. The low frequency radio is mainly for old-style air-to-air comms and... Jeb, you\'re a genius. Jeb: I know. How? Bob: The low frequency radio is required safety equipment on all large aircraft, used for VOR and ILS in case of satellite outage. Jeb: Come again? Bob: The old instrument landing systems. No one uses them anymore, but major airports still have to operate it. Why didn\'t I think of it earlier? We may not know where we are, but if we\'re on the same side of the planet as KSC we could ride its beam in like a homing missile! Jeb: Ride in like a homing missile... Mind if I write that down? I\'m going to use that line. Bob: Just try not to go kaboom at the end. Anyway, here in the chart book is KSC\'s frequency and I\'m locking it in now. Yes! It\'s weak, but it\'s there! We\'re going home! The door opened and Bill stepped into the cockpit. Bill: I felt the plane bank. Have we got our position? Jeb: Not exactly. Bob figured out how to lock on to KSC\'s beacon; we\'re riding it in like a homing missile! Bill: Hopefully without the boom at the end. Bob: That\'s what- Bill: Nice work. Bob: Thanks, it- Bill: So, do we have an ETA? I\'d like to have something to tell the passengers. Bob: Well, I didn\'t have much luck getting our location, as our clocks seem to be off and the beacon only gives us direction. I did some calculations on the signal strength, and time of day, terrain features, and the relative strength of stations from known locations- Bill: Jeb, do you know? Jeb: Bob told me it\'d be aboot an hour, give or take. The autopilot\'s locked in and we could sleep through the rest of the flight. Bill: Thanks, Jeb. I\'ll go talk to the passengers. Bob whined. Jeb spent the next half hour thinking about the flight\'s events. How could they have traveled to the Mun? How did they get back? Was it a natural phenomenon, something which defied everything he had been taught, or was it some sort of constructed gateway between worlds? What did it mean? When Bill returned, the plane had begun its long descent. This was, under normal circumstances, the most dangerous part of a flight. The huge plane had to descend nose-up, and the heat shield blocked view of the ground below. It was hard enough to trust the autopilot when they had the benefit of satellites and terrain maps; how much more with only a radio beam and barely functioning communications and radar? Jeb and Bob handled the the stress in their usual manner--Jebediah wore his trademark grin, while Bob was hunched in a fetal position in his chair. Bill: Have we tried raising KSC? Jeb: Ten minutes ago. Some static, not much more. Bill: We should give it another go. Even with a broken antenna we should get some signal at this range. Jeb: Kerbal Space Center, this is Pan Kerbal Flight 33. Do you copy? Through the static, a distorted voice replied 'This is Kerbal Space Center, say again? Message not received.' Bill grabbed the mic. 'Kerbal Space Center, this is Pan Kerbal Flight 33. Our navigation system has been damaged. Please confirm our approach trajectory, over.' 'Negative, Flight 33. Our radar is not yet operational. We have a visual on your plane and you appear to be on a good approach, over.' The tower helped walk them down through the last stages of descent. Finally, the autopilot leveled the craft out, the gear lowered, and they saw the familiar building of Kerbal Space Center. Jeb: Uh, Bill... where\'s the runway? Sure enough, there was only a barely leveled dirt strip where the enormous KSC tarmac should have been. Bill: Oh god...Autopilot off! Abort! Abort! As they stopped their descent, a piercing alarm filled the cockpit. TERRAIN--PULL UP--TERRAIN--PULL UP They were heading straight for a canyon wall a short distance ahead. Whatever normally frequented this airstrip must have been far nimbler than a spaceliner. Jeb: We should probably do somethin\' aboot that, ya know? Punching the throttle and pulling hard on the yoke, they were able to steer up and out of a slightly shallower part of the canyon, though they came far too close to the rim for anyone\'s liking. Bill: What just happened? Jeb: Yeah, so KSC is in the mountains now? I should probably sell my surfboard. Bill: Did you lock on to the wrong beacon, Bob? Jeb grabbed Bob\'s chart book. 'Looks fine to me. There\'s the map, there\'s the frequency, there\'s the radio. It checks out. Besides, they identified themselves as KSC. Bob: Um, I have a theory. The radio crackled to life again. 'What the hell are you kids flying?' Bill: Tower, please identify yourself. Over. 'This is Kerbal Space Center. Who are you people, over?' Bob: Excuse me. Bill: Kerbal Space Center is on the coast. Impersonating a traffic controller and operating a false beacon is a criminal offence. I can have you arrested! Bob: Um, Tower, what year is it? 'Kerbal Space Center is RIGHT HERE, and it\'s September 13, 3439. Now get off this frequency! I\'m reporting this incident to the KAA! Out!' Bill switched off the radio in disgust. Bob: That explains it. Bill: Explains what? Bob: This is where the KSC was originally built; where the first few satellites were launched. The equipment was later moved south, to the equator, when we started launching rockets in earnest. Bill: But I\'ve been with the program for a decade. I\'ve never heard of operations going on at this location. Bob: Because this KSC hasn\'t been here for almost twenty years... our time. Bill: Our time? Wait...are you saying that nut job is right and it IS the year 3439? Bob: It makes more sense than building a fake base where the old KSC used to be just to fool wayward space planes, doesn\'t it? Jeb: Curiouser and curiouser, eh? Bill: So assuming I believe you--which I don\'t--what\'s our next move? Can we reach the green cloud again? Jeb: Nah, rocket fuel\'s gone. Even if we could, who knows where it would send us next? Bob: At least we now know our location--so we can plot a course. The space plane runway at our KSC was already built in 3439, before the rest of the base; they used it for freight carriers. Assuming we can reach it, we can land, refuel, and plan how to get back to *our* Kerbin. And if we end up stuck here, we might even set the space program ahead a couple decades. Jeb: Any port in a storm, then? Bob and Jeb studied the charts, fuel consumption tables, and finally worked out a flight plan that would reach home just as fuel ran out. Bill tried to reassure the crew and passengers, and they set out on the long journey back home. Bob: Huh, there it goes again. Jeb: What? Bob: For just a second, we had what looked like a weak satellite signal. That\'s the third time in the last hour. Jeb: That\'s good, right? Bob: But in 3439, these satellites didn\'t exist yet. Jeb: That\'s still good, right? Bob: I don\'t know. I hope so. After hours of flying, and with the fuel tanks all but empty, they finally spotted the familiar mountains and coast. Home was just ahead! Bob: Still negative response on VOR and IFR. We\'ll have to fly in the hard way. Fuel\'s gone, but it shouldn\'t matter now. Just then, the radio crackled to life. 'Unknown craft on approach vector, this is Kerbal Space Center. Please identify, over.' Bill grabbed the radio. 'Kerbal Space Center, this is Pan Kerbin Flight 33, requesting landing assistance, over!' 'Flight 33? Boy, are we glad to see you. You disappeared from our scopes shortly after launch; is your transponder malfunctioning, over?' Bill: Our microwave antenna is damaged. We need someone to guide us in, over. 'Roger that. Your vector is looking good. We will continue to advise.' Bob: And tower... what year is it? 'It\'s...well, it\'s 3461. I don\'t think you\'ve been gone *that* long, Flight 33.' Jeb: You\'d be surprised... The descent was mostly uneventful. KSC\'s instructions were spot on, and the only exciting moment came during final approach: Bob: Hey...guys? Bill: What is it now? Bob: There\'s--something--on--the--wing! Bill: WHAT? Bob: It was a joke. Bill: Shut up, Bob. Bob sulked. With a squeal and a shudder, the landing gear hit the tarmac. The huge craft stalled and tipped slightly, making contact with all four wheels, before finally coming to a halt near the end of the runway. As they sat, waiting for the emergency crews to escort the passengers and crew off the damaged plane, Kerbol peeked above the horizon. Bill: Home. Isn\'t it the most beautiful thing you\'ve ever seen? Bob nodded his head. Bob: You know, this will give the world a lot to think about. Jeb: Are you silly? After we get debriefed they\'re going to call it all an 'instrument malfunction'. Hey...Bill? What, Jeb? Why do the ground crew all look like ponies, eh?

I guess I\'m a bit late for the party. I\'d have posted this over 24 hours ago but the flight was such an interesting odyssey I decided to make a story to go with the pics. Mind you, I don\'t write. However, I do have to write *something* from time to time just to remind myself again why I should never write. I apologize for the suffering these attempts inflict upon innocent readers. (full discretion: the flight actually occured as depicted. The story did not. A few screenshots were recreated.) Oh, I had to split the story between posts. Yep, it\'s that long. Click the spoiler tags at your own peril. Also, bonus points for catching the less-obvious TV references. Bill: It\'s a beautiful morning here at Kerbal Space Center. Winds are 5 knots from the southeast, the temperature is a balmy 23 degrees Kelsius, and as usual, there\'s not a cloud in the sky. We apologize for the delay; KSC has been experiencing some equipment malfunctions this morning and flights have been delayed as a result. I\'m your Captain, Bill Kerman, and with me are Jebediah-- Jeb: Hey everyone! Bill: -and Bob- Bob squeaked. Bill: -your co-pilot and navigator. Thank you for joining us for the maiden flight of Pan Kerbin\'s first commercial spaceliner. This will be a brief tour of the planet, and we will orbit the equator twice before returning to KSC. Estimated travel time is three hours. Please fasten your seatbelts as we are now cleared for takeoff and will be in the air presently, and be careful to follow the safety procedures demonstrated by your flight attendant. Bill: This is your captain speaking. We have now reached cruising altitude. Please remain seated and do not unfasten your belts; we are now accelerating to our transition velocity and preparing to engage our rocket engines. Make sure all personal items are safely stowed in the compartment directly in front of you: Once we begin orbital insertion, any loose items can endanger everyone in the cabin. Jeb: Ya, we don\'t want anyone getting impaled this time, eh? ... Bill: This is your captain. We have reached maximum velocity and are now ready for orbital insertion. While our rockets are active, you will notice a strong force pushing you against your seat, and if you look out your window you may think the plane is pointed an unusual direction. Please remain calm, as this is perfectly normal for space flight. The clocks on the ceiling and the screens in front of you will indicate how soon the next rocket burn will begin and how long it will last. Also, an audible tone [ding-ding-ding] will sound one minute before each burn. As you heard, we are counting down from sixty seconds... Bill: ...Ignition in five seconds--four--three--two--one-- Bill: You\'ll notice on your screen that we have reached a stable orbit at an altitude of 80km. We will be remaining here for the next two hours before deorbiting and returning to Kerbal Space Center. If you completed your zero-g training class, feel free to explore the cabin. If not, you may prefer to remain in your seat and enjoy the view out your nearest window. We ask that you keep track of any personal belongings in the cabin, as they must be stowed away for safety before we use our rockets. If in doubt, don\'t get it out! Jeb: But if ya do get horribly injured by a flying iPad, try to bleed in front of one of the cameras, eh? I put the clips on YouTube. Bill: And... mic off. Bill: Jeb, I think we need to have a talk about your... professional behavior. Jeb: Oh, it\'s all in good fun. The kids love it! Bill: That\'s not what I meant. You\'re scaring Bob. Bob: I am not-huh? Bill: Don\'t worry, Bob; Jeb\'s just being an idiot. Ignore him. Bob, are you alright? Bob pointed out the window. Jeb: Ya know, you don\'t usually see clouds in space. Especially green ones. Bill: Shit, we can\'t maneuver in time. Brace for impact! Jeb: With a cloud? Bill: With whatever is *venting* it! There\'s probably a loose oxygen tank in there somewhere! Bill shut his eyes. When he opened them again, several seconds later, the mist was gone. Jeb: Well, that was trippy. It reminds me of this guy I know who grows the best...Wow. Bob was making a sound reminiscent of a balloon with a tiny leak. Bill: What...oh. Shit. Bill: Oh god. What happened? Jeb: I can\'t raise KSC, and the computer\'s going right nuts. But you can see the constellations...we must be, well, close to home. Bill: Did something happen to us, or did something happen to Kerbin? Look for landmarks--anything that could give us a clue where in the world we are. Jeb: Looks like they got the extra long tour, eh? Bill: What? Jeb: The passengers. Bill: Oh god, the passengers! Dim the cabin windows! Jeb: Don\'t you think we ought to tell them? Bill: Are you kidding? We need a plan first. If we tell them their home is just...gone, there\'ll be chaos! Do you want that? Jeb: Sure. Bill: ... Jeb: For YouTube, eh? Bill: Just... just look for landmarks. I\'ll try to fix the computer. Oh, and get Bob out from under his seat... For the better part of an hour, Jeb surveyed the barren, primeval world beneath them. Had they been catapulted to some distant place? Or had they traveled through time, and were now witnessing the birth--or the death--of Kerbin, their home world? A curious rock arch caught Jeb\'s eye, sticking up from the rim the large crater they were passing over, but like every other strange sight it only brought questions, not answers. ... Everyone flinched as the Windows startup sound blared through the cockpit speakers. Bill: Okay, I think I\'ve got the computer fixed. Now to start the navigation software and get a fix on our location. Jeb: Hey, Bill. Bill: The nav package is up. Trying to get a lock. Jeb: Uh, Bill... Bill: No response from satellites. Switching to star tracking. Bob: Bill? Bill: Well, that doesn\'t make any sense. The clock must have reset... Jeb: KERBIN TO BILL! Bill: What? Jeb: I think I found a landmark. Bill: Oh god. Jeb: You say that a lot, ya know? Bill: But if Kerbin is there, we must be... Jeb: On the Mun? Bob: Technically, we\'d have to land to be on the Mun. We\'re currently in a low orbit. Jeb: Hey, he speaks! Bill: Shut up, Bob. Bob squeaked. Bill: So... how do we get back? Our flight computer wasn\'t designed for this. Jeb: We could point the plane at that big round thingy and fire the rockets. Bill: Wait--what\'s that, off to the side? Is that the cloud that brought us here? Jeb: Well, I dunno, call me racist but all green space clouds look the same to me. Uh, Bill? Rockets? Big round blue thingy? We going? Bill: Head for the cloud! With any luck, it\'ll take us back home! Jeb: Or we could do that, eh? Bob whined. To be continued...

While trying to re-establish my Munolith bases after .15 Kerbalized my persistence file, I began a new and more efficient program to take Kerbonauts to the Munoliths. A new rocket was born, utilizing the Cuttlefish Delivery Vehicle and Bigtrak 'Puddle-Jumper' rover designs by chickenplucker (by Jeb, I love that design!). After launching Munolith Investigator 1c to Munar orbit (Kerbals don\'t talk about 1a or 1b ... or the Kraken they encountered >), I sent another orbiter to re-establish contact with the Munar Anomaly at Silisko Crater. Once I was able to re-establish its position, I switched over to the Investigator, only to have a catastrophic malfunction destroy most of the delivery vehicle and lander ... ie, I was left with the pod, a mechjeb, and a parachute ... no engines, no fuel, and no RCS, approximately 12km above the Munar surface in a slightly eccentric orbit. Thinking quickly, I decided to embark on my first ever rescue mission. It would require a vehicle capable of going to the Mun, establish a rendez-vous and capture, and then return to Kerbin. So I thought, Hey! Why not try the Cuttlefish for this mission, slightly modified. I hadn\'t seen anyone else use it in such a capacity, so I figured I\'d give it a whirl. After many days of trying to figure out the mechjeb Rendez-Vous module, I decided to pretty much wing it. It took a GREAT MANY quicksaves before I got my orbit perfected to intercept the wayward craft. And after a series of catastrophic disasters practice runs in a simulator, I finally managed to do it! This is the story of Rescue 1, Investigator 1c, and our six brave Kerbonauts: Munolith Investigator 1c Flight Crew: [li]Henrie Kerman[/li] [li]Gusble 'Gussie' Kerman[/li] [li]Dunvin 'Dun-Dun-DUUUUN' Kerman[/li] Rescue 1 Flight Crew: [li]Hensey Kerman[/li] [li]Sidrick 'Spidey-sense' Kerman[/li] [li]Fredrey Kerman[/li] The Cuttlefish Modified Delivery Vehicle: The Cuttlefish Modified Rescue Vehicle: Note: The 'Cuttlefish' legs were removed for this picture And the video of the journey: (Side note 1: I did not realize that my video recorder was picking up audio of a Minecraft Let\'s Play series featuring Two Awesome Gamers, Whitelight and Jaeza. During editing, I heard the commentary, and decided to leave it in pending a couple of modifications to the audio track, as it sort of fit .) (Side note 2: Some of the scenes had to be recreated due to unforeseen glitches, HD space, and corrupted video files. I\'ve tried to make subsequent recreations as faithful to the original mission as possible, but in some instances, this was impossible. Some artistic license was required, due in part to the cinematic-esque quality I wanted to capture. The actual capture was never caught on video ... someone forgot to push the record button :-[.) Part 1/2: This retrieval mission - Well, sort of ... Note: Due to the extra RCS tanks, it was required to fire up RCS thrusters in order to get this beast off the ground. http://youtu.be/XKKwh9lSmig Part 2/2: The return mission - Well, sort ... well, you get the idea ... Note: Most of this was a recreation of the original event. http://youtu.be/1kGm6nNtJOc Soundtrack from KSP sounds folder: editorLoop01.ogg Taps, US Army ) And yes, I managed to land that close to KSP by accident, although in the original mission I was a bit more east of there (about 1-2km IIRC) on both occasions. Rescue 1 splashed down approximately 50m from Investigator 1 in the original ... would have been more Kerbal if I\'d managed to nail them On a completely side-note ... rendez-vous is HARD!

And I was just about to make a well reasoned point. Basically I said; 1. We all know what is an appropriate way to talk to another human being. We should act accordingly. 2. Land claim conflicts can be resolved quickly, quietly and calmly by PM. 3. Radion can just give it up as a joke and drop the whole project. 4. Radions claim is probably at the upper limits of what nation size should be in order to encourage new nations. 5. Retention wasn\'t accounted for. Most likely to encourage new RPers and because not everyone has decided to rejoin. We all have to play nice together, and I really hope that is what we all want.

I like this. So basically you\'re saying we should talk about things we\'re doing in the game?

Well, I managed to get this into a 76.5-79.5km high orbit with half a standard fuel tank left to go higher/ come back down with. It\'s got 6 gimballed engines drawing from 7 fuel tanks to get you up (hit t and it\'s dead steady all the way), then one non gimballed engine from two fuel tanks for getting your orbit and what not. I initially tried it with the little rocket engine on the second stage, but it couldn\'t achieve orbit before you fell back into the atmosphere. The lander is just a glider, no fuel or engine. I was shocked at how stable it was. Let\'s not talk about my initial attempts at a side mounted lander... So many crashes...