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I'm hoping for interstellar to offer some new worlds with new navigational, piloting, and design challenges. Eve used to be the final boss of KSP, with Eve, Tylo, and Moho perfectly representing the design, piloting, and navigation triad, but after enough times going there and back it kinda doesn't feel that challenging any more. I forget what it was called, but I'm looking forwards to that new super Tylo they have teased, and that binary system. I am a little bit worried that all the sci-fi technology they are going to add may remove a lot of what would have been a challenge, but inevitably I'll fall back into going for the low mass records and it won't be mass optimal to use any of the super heavy advanced engines. The grand tour record in KSP 1 is under 8 tons at this point, and there's been talk of pushing it low enough that we might not even need the Rapier any more. Speaking of which, when KSP 2 gets stable and polished enough for the low mass leaderboards to take off, the meta is going to be interesting. The ion engine was nerfed a LOT in KSP 2, you can't really use it to land on most of the small bodies like you could in KSP 1. Without a high tech lightweight replacement, we're going to see a lot of ultralight liquid fuel craft with opportunities for per body customization (although without EVA construction, this is docking port constrained), which should hopefully lead to a more interesting design than "Use the same ion lander for everything except Duna, Laythe, Tylo, and Eve."

Bolded for emphasis. Consider for a moment that the average KSP1 player never leaves Kerbin's SOI. I read somewhere once that a whopping 70%+ of players have never gone any farther than Minmus, and another 10% or so have only ever sent probes into Kerbol orbit. Those numbers could be wrong, and I could be remembering them incorrectly. But that's 80% of the KSP1 player base (assuming the numbers are right) who have never had a probe, lander, rover, etc., land on a celestial body outside of Kerbin's SOI. Also consider for a moment that there are some KSP1 players who have landed on Duna, or Dres, or Moho...but who have never landed a Kerbal on Eve. Or who have sent probes to Jool, but have never landed on any of its moons. Or who have never even been to Jool. Or Eeloo, due to its distance and inclination. Even with being able to spam science points in KSP1, and being able to unlock the entire tech tree without ever leaving Kerbin's SOI, some experienced KSP1 players have never been to the outer planets (or landed on one of the inner ones). I can accurately state this, because I'm one of them. In KSP1, I have never landed a Kerbal on Eve, I've never even attempted to launch a landed probe from Eve, and I had never been to Jool (although I have been to Eeloo). So you want to talk about a challenge to experienced KSP1 players? For starters, you can't just spam science points in Kerbin's SOI any more, so now you have to go farther than Minmus if you want to unlock the entire tech tree (or even just get better parts). Sure, there's some local missions you can get some science points out of. But you are never going to even sniff Tier IV until you've gone interplanetary and back. And for those KSP1 players who never left the local SOI, that's going to be a challenge. Take myself, for instance. I mentioned above how I've never even been to Jool in KSP1. In KSP2, I've not only been to Jool, but I've gotten a probe in orbit AND I've landed on and returned from Pol. Things I've never done in KSP1. And I can tell you that it was certainly a challenge. I guess that an answer to your question lies in what someone really thinks a challenge is. Are experienced players going to have an easier time of things in KSP2 than new players? You bet your booties. And that's because they already understand builds, launch windows, gravity turns, transfers, and all the good things that come from having played the previous game. They already get the physics part of it, which is a pretty decent learning curve. But that doesn't mean that there aren't challenges for experienced players. It just depends on what they did in KSP1, and what they expect out of KSP2.

Operating the flaperons in the hypersonic regime is completely untested. There was some early talk of putting a subscale demonstrator on Falcon 9 just to make sure the flaps operate properly...who knows how that will go. Looks like we have a good SES-2? Wait, no, that was just a cold-gas flip.

T - 4:30 minutes! It's awesome to hear them talk about Starship production lines. It also sounds like they'll make flight 4 prep more quickly after this launch.

The KSP forum moderator's team presents the Threads of the Month March 2024 Edition March is finally here - well, at least we are already in the middle of March! Before I get too far into this TOTM, I want to take a little bit of your time to discuss a growing trend in the United States and Canada - the growing suicide rate. It is not just young people or old people - it is among all age groups. I work at a local community college and am one of the trained mental health first aid caregivers. I am also a combat veteran and am a trained veteran's crisis mental health first aid responder (22 U.S. veterans commit suicide each day). Before our spring break last week (our spring break began on March 4th), I had the opportunity to assist a student in crisis. He is okay, got the professional care needed, and is now in professional outpatient counseling. This is a small victory in the battle for life. I've seen too much death in my life. Yesterday, I lost a thirty-year Army buddy to suicide. I say this to encourage and empower. If you live in the United States or Canada and feel as if life is getting the best of you, call 9-8-8, and you will be connected with local or regional people (free of charge) who can assist you. Reach out; you're not alone. Some people care enough to volunteer their time and efforts to help you through whatever crisis you're in. Find a friend or family member, a teacher, a professor, someone - and talk. Whatever it is, there are people who want to help you. You do matter. And you matter to this forum community. Now, without further blathering by this bald old man, let's get into the threads selected by you, the community members, as noteworthy for March! Instructions on using the TOTM images: If your thread has been selected as a TOTM, you can copy the image's link above, go to the area of the forum where you want to place it, and then paste the link. Press the <CONTROL> button when the image appears and right-click on your mouse. A menu will drop down and allow you to edit the picture. You can resize it - the first number can be changed as large or small as you want. Eventually, I will add these images to the thread I've created as a repository. For those out there who like the nerdy parts of the TOTM: To continue what I started in May 2021, I have kept some forum statistics to respond to those claiming the forum was dying, or interest in the Kerbal Space Program was declining. 326 new forum accounts were created in February (an increase of 47, or up 16.84% from January). Out of the new forum members who joined last month, there were 20 who transitioned from new accounts to being active and participating in the forum. This conversion means 6.13% of the new users who registered their accounts last month are now contributing members of our community! (This is a decrease from January; 12.18% of the new members became active and contributing members). If you're interested in meeting the new members of our forum, click here! Now, without further delay, I present to you the threads of the month for March: Cinematic-based Fan-fiction, Mission Reports, and Kerbal Space Program-inspired Creative Works: This category features a video or other cinematic form of a Kerbal mission report using in-game video-recorded gameplay. Note: This has changed. Instead of awarding this to a thread, this is a *post of the month* since most new cinematic works are posted in a single thread. We have a lot of great content creators, but because they've been posting their mission reports as videos in a single thread, most of their work goes unnoticed by the general forum audience. Hopefully, this change in the category to a Post of the Month (POTM) will highlight the great work done by these deserving content creators. Other threads containing cinematic posts will also be featured in this category. Many great content creators deserve this recognition since we were aware of the thread by @Halban: Post Your Cinematics Here! (Cinematic Enthusiasts) that serves as a repository for cinematic threads. The thread received the TOTM previously, but it was felt that it wasn't enough for those who shared your fabulous creations featuring our favorite Kerbalnauts. Instead of being a TOTM, I've changed it into a CPOTM - a Cinematic Post of the Month. This month, we had a few nominees in this category. It's not often that we have two nominations featuring the work of one content creator, but this month, we do. So, it came down to choosing the most unique concept by @kurgut. And this cinematic is sure to please. In the cinematic "Journey to the center of a black hole | KSP RSS | Interstellar," @kurgut pushes the hardware of their PC and the limits of the game to produce a high-quality work of visual art. You can find the link here: Sometimes, the forum software will get glitchy, and an exact post may be a little hard to find, especially when it is buried in a long thread. In case this happens, here's @kurgut's cinematic presentation, "Journey to the center of a black hole | KSP RSS | Interstellar": If you encounter other cinematics you feel are worthy of being recognized as this category's post of the month; please nominate them! You can use the exact instructions to nominate a post containing a video as you would use to nominate a thread. Fan-fiction, Mission Reports, and Kerbal Space Program-inspired Creative Works: This category features threads (or threads) that, while not directly related to the Kerbal Space Program, may be creative, fan fiction, or other presentations related to the game. One of the fantastic things about the TOTM's history is the threads you think would have been nominated earlier in the forum's history. Surprisingly, this thread is one of the earliest and most popular fan-fics, but as far as I can tell from the history of the TOTM we keep, it has never been nominated before. So, thanks to you, the long-time readers of the thread and forum community, this oversight has been corrected. The thread, "Kerbfleet: A Jook Odyssey" by @Mister Dilsby (formerly known as Kuzzter), has been revived, and new chapters are being added now with their return to the forum! Here's where you'll find this thread: So, if you're interested in seeing a mission report done in the style of a graphic novel, this is the thread for you. Forum Member Created Challenges and Missions: This category contains missions and challenges created by you, the members of our gaming community. Many excellent missions and challenges threads are created that expand our fun with the game and press our skills, creativity, and sometimes, luck beyond what we get accustomed to. Let's face it: we all have our go-to design basics and our go-to vehicles we like to use. Sometimes, a good challenge can cause us to think of another way to achieve our goals. There was no submission for this category this month. Game Support/Game Mod of the Month: This category features either help with the game (stock or modded) or mods that improve the Kerbal Space Program's quality-of-life gameplay. When I first began playing KSP1, one of my favorite mods was Final Frontier. That mod gave me a way to have the brave Kermen who still crew my various crafts have meaning and stories behind them. I am sure many of you were hoping that someone would develop something similar for KSP2 - well, those hopes have become a reality! @leonardfactory has done just that! From the ground up, and with all new artwork, they have created one of the mods many of us have been waiting for. @leonardfactory introduces the mod in the OP: You can find the mod here: As always, we want to thank our family of mod contributors who continue to develop new and exciting mods that support our KSP2 community! General community threads of the month: This category features a thread that adds to the community and doesn't fit the game support/game mod categories. This month, we have a nomination that's neither a mod nor a mission report. It's more of a "show and tell" by @Tony Swallow. In the thread, "Setting wings to a Precise angle by using an Inclinometer," without any mods, the thread is introduced: In this thread, you can see how construction tools can be made using stock parts to aid you in the construction of your craft: General space flight and space science threads of the month: This category features a thread that adds to our forum community's STEM knowledge (science, space flight, and related fields) and doesn't fit the game support/game mod categories. Honorable Mentions: Sometimes, choosing which threads will be selected as the Thread of the Month for our five categories is challenging. We get many good nominations each month but limit it to one for each type. Threads nominated but not selected as a thread of the month become honorable mentions. The honorable mentions for this month are: How Chuck Yeager broke the Sound Barrier - The Complete Mission - KSP RSS/RO by @kurgut Maritime Rescue and Salvage by @Mostly Harmless The honorable mention for this month may not have made the Thread of The Month, but if you think it might be worth another opportunity, please renominate it! Congratulations to all the winners of the Thread of the Month! We want to thank our forum members @AlamoVampire, @Royalswissarmyknife, @woeller, @Zhetaan, the moderation team members, and the staff who nominated this month's contenders. Thank you so much for helping us identify noteworthy threads and bringing their awareness to our forum community. We'd appreciate your continued help in the future. Odds and ends: TO NOMINATE A THREAD FOR CONSIDERATION: If you find a thread you feel should be considered for next month's thread of the month, use the "Report a comment" feature (the three dots on the upper right corner of the comment box) to report the thread. Please put in the text field of the port post "Nomination for the thread of the month," and we will do the rest! You can always nominate more than one thread, too. IF YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT GOES INTO THE DECISION WHEN CONSIDERING THE TOTM: Wonder no more! This helpful guide is to help you understand what we use to help determine what makes a thread a really good thread and one that becomes a thread of the month/cinematic post of the month. It's everything you did or didn't want to know and includes helpful tips. And the last word for this month's post: I'd like to thank a few people who trust me enough to continue supporting and allowing me to contribute to the forum. I want to thank the Lead Moderator, @Vanamonde, for bringing me on as a moderator. It was a decision I'm sure he has had moments where he often wonders why he did it. I'd also like to thank @PD_Dakota, our community manager, and @Nerdy_Mike, the KSP Franchise Community Lead, for tolerating me and allowing me to continue to serve our Kerbal Space Program forum community through the monthly Threads of the Month post. In case you missed last month's threads of the month, you can click here.

This then we talk about reuse who makes sense. Far more for boostback, you want to drop second stage fast so you don't have to spend loads of fuel boosting back to pad. For Saturn 5 it made sense to make the first stage tanks larger even if TWR at launch was low as kerosene and aluminum was cheaper. Later you got cheaper solid fuel engines. In part funded by having to replace the solid fueled nuclear missiles rockets. Now falcon 9 stretches the road transportable rocket to the edge I say.

MISSION_UPDATE - Tour de Minmus - Johndin and Podcal looking on the ancient relic found in the mysterious crater on Minmus. While Poduki relays their findings to KSC FOREWORD: Before we start - I would like to say that this post became a lot longer than I anticipated. I would very much like some honest feedback on weather I should dial it down a notch and be less detailed. Or cut it into more edible pieces. or if its just all good and fun. Before we start - I would like to thank all who indulge in my increasingly longer forum posts. Any way.. Funny story! A mistake was made by my internet provider and I was without internet this weekend! It was an odd experience.. I mean I grew up without internet.. but I realized how much of my home is setup to use internet.. I hear my radio through my Sonos and see TV through my Chromecast. At least when I was a child we had antenna tv and FM radio. It actually made my wife and I talk about getting a low tech FM radio - Just incase the political climate deteriorate even further in Europe.. and we need to be able to get news from the government. But before we go all doom and gloom... let's keep on topic... Without internet, the only game I could play was KSP - the others required internet in varying degree. So I managed to get the rover the last stretch to the mysterious crater in record time. Before being offgrid for an weekend, I was only driving the rover, half attentive, while listening to Audio Books or Podcasts with my wife. This weekend, the journey was done with plenty of whiskey in the glass and vinyls on the record player. You may be thinking, why plenty of whiskey? is Rovers that bad? well no... whiskey is a nice drink of course.. but also yes.. let's talk about Rovers.. and how much I dislike the Rover Game Mechanics. MISSION TASKS: A. Test the Rovers functionality and maneuverability - Success B. Drive an expedition to explore the North of Minmus - Success C. Drive the Rover back to Base Camp One C. Recover Rover via Dropship and return it to base- Success D. Return Dropship to ICV Explorer - Success LESSONS LEARNED; LESSONS IDENTIFIED: Section A: The Rover has left the Sheet Ice of the frozen lake and drive in the Snowdrifts that cover most of the little moon. Let's talk about rovers: I... HATE the way rovers drive in this game. It is not that I expected it to be Snow Runners, with the game simulating every minute physics detail of sand, snow and mud.. But man It would be nice if rovers at least drove like a car... and not a shopping trolley... It would be so nice if the wheels had just an inch of traction.. Speaking of traction.. What does the traction slider even do? It seems very backwards. If I turn traction up, the engines cannot turn the wheels, it feels like the engines are terrible underpowered (are they that weak?). But if you keep the tracktion down, you'll be wheel spinning like mad.. but unlike in our world, were the vehicle would dig it self down.. In the solar system of Kerbol the vehicle will gain momentum... a lot of momentum. I found I could get my rover to ~10 m/s on rough terrain (the only limiting factor being that it's hard to gain speed when the wheels dont have a lot of contact with the ground from all the jumps) and I never reached the limit on the flats of the Sheet Ice lakes.. the rover hit a small bump and tumbled. The science junior on the front broke off. - It was a bloody miracle the antenna didn't break off or the vehicle exploded.. So Johndin had to pick up sample and take readings by hand after that. The rest of the journey was done with the antenna folded down... and then only folded up to send situation reports to Kerbin, or the ICV when it passed by. After realizing this was how it was going to be - the only thing left to do was to strap in hit the speeder and tune the radio in on: And Start drift.. I mean driving. I found that the only reliable way to turn was to create a custom made Action Group for turning the Reaction Wheels ON - do the course correction and then press another custom made Action Group turning OFF all reaction wheels (to avoid the rover doing flips from the torque power when pressing forward). Because of course the "Only online when SAS is on" is bugged. The rest of the lessons learned Lessons identified I've put in spoiler sections for those interested to keep a bloated post more streamlined: 1. Axle configuration and angle of climb: 3. Thrusters: 4. Lights: 5. Power and Recharging: Section B: The rover - stopped in the snowdrifts - to enable Johndin to take samples and readings - While a cresended Kerbin is setting in the horizon. The Expedition to the Northern parts of Minmus was divided into 5 legs: Leg 1: Contained the initial testing of the Rover on the Sheet Ice Flats of (what I have Identified to be?) The Greater Flats that Base Camp One was established on. After that it took a sharp turn North East to get to new terrain that was found to be snowdrifts. This was done in the hopes that the reason the rover drove like a elephant on ice skates was because of the sheet ice - and not game mechanics.. Unfortunately I was to be disappointed. The rest of the leg consisted of the traversal of the Sheet Ice by night - Heading North West. Leg 2 + 3: Would be traversal of the hardest terrain the Rover forced. It was the heavy cratered mountains North of The Greater Flats. Leg 4: Would be the traversal of the less demanding rolling hils on the path North West - Dont let the map fool you - it looks way more smooth than it is. I thought it would be quickly traversed at high speeds. But the low gravity and rolling hills meant that as soon as the rover exceeded 10 m/s - it would spend the same time in the air (between jumps) as it did on ground. Making it impossible to really pick up more momentum. Leg 4 ended shortly before the destination. (My kids wanted to see what was in the crater, and were sleeping at the time) Leg 5: would be the last short stretch to the edge of the crater with the mysterious lightsource. (My daughter was so impressed by the monument that she had to call my wife so she could see it) Bellow a Map showing the approximated route with legs marked: From Right to Left: Leg 1, Leg 2, Leg 3, Leg 4 and Leg 5 Bellow in the spoiler section you can see a detailed walkthrough of the Journey: The Minmus Monument: Here, at the end of the journey I was presented with a choice - Call the mission done and drive home. Or, in the true spirit of the great kerbalnaut Jebidiah, drive down the cliff side and study the monument up close - though with the chance of not being able to get up again... or worse.. crash and burn The Rover had shown itself to be quite tough - It had survived landings with up to 20m/s - And no way in hell I was going to drive the rover all the way back again. No... going down would be a great excuse for a pick up via Dropshop and be flown back to Base Camp One, Johndin argued. So down the slope it was. Geronimo! - the rover going down the slope. While it is true the rover had survived traversing a chasm with the thrusters - and subsequently bounced in the rolling hills for several km going 20 m/s (it's hard to break when your wheels hardly touch the ground). Going down the cliff side quickly accelerated the rover to 40-50 m/s. and worse still, it was aiming directly for the statue. While I was positive that I could survive these speeds on uneven terrain as long as I kept the wheels leveled with the ground.. I was sure the suspension would not "tank" slamming into the statue at the center of the monument. In a last ditch maneuver Johndin, (who had pitched the idea of going down), managed to pull hard on the controls, pitch the rover up and break the rover with the thrusters. - a daring move! Having redeemed himself, he was given the honour of planting the flag.. and take another sample. KSC was still just visible over the ridge.. and the call for a taxi was relayed to ICV Explorer. While waiting for the dropship to arrive. Johndin, Podcal and Poduki had ample time to study the ancient ruin. Who was it depicting? How was it build? By Whom was it build.. answers I will likely only get once I've exhausted the sandbox experience - and try the campaign. Section C: Dropship arriving at The Minmus Monument - ready to pick up the Rover Crew. I had a feeling that by diverting the remaining fuel from the 3 Dropship to 1 - I would be able to complete the taxi mission. I was correct. It was strange to zoom past the terrain I had just spend the better of 4 evening to cross in meer minutes. Playing with audio on for once, I found that the Minmus Orbit Theme is really awesome - it made the tour back to Base Camp One felt like a final victory lap. I was to make one important Lesson Identified though: When correcting inclination - eyeball it - maneuver nodes are unreliable, as seen from the example bellow: The maneuver nodes are weird around extreme inclination burns - If I told the node just to burn Normal it would say that my craft would leave Minmus SOI before reaching the northern hemisphere. I had to adjust by also pulling on the retrograde node for the maneuver to stay in orbit. In the end the maneuver node did not work - and I ended up just burning Normal and eyeballing it. (without leaving the Minmus SOI) The result was this: Notice how much much further apart the two vehicles would be before the burn was complete. As well as the wrong fuel bars from image 1 to 2 (which had a quick load between them) For detailed walkthrough of the pick up - see spoiler section bellow: Plotting the course to Base Camp One: the next leg - getting the rover back to Base Camp One was a simple maneuver that did not require a lot of Δv - since there was no need for a expensive correction inclination burn. And the correct direction could be picked from the start, The maneuver wasn't even required to be orbital and a sub-orbital path was charted: The rest was just a final victory lap, were the achievement could be marveled at. - a few course correction had to be done as I forgot to take the rotation of Minmus into account. The last thing to do was to pluck the rover back into base for a refuel - I was a bit nervous about this since the rover tilted the base when I tested this feature on the runway of KSC - the alignment was slightly off. My fix to this was to give all the base elements landing legs - not only because I anticipated it would be nice on uneven terrain, but also because I thought it would fix the tipping issue spoiler alert - it did: As you can see it worked fine - but for a moment I had real fears that docking the rover to the base would cause it all to do flips in the low gravity. My fears were unjustified - The rover was refueled. Although not to full, as I didn't want to empty the G.P.U - the G.P.U was dropped only half full because of weight synergy between the base modules and the dropships performance window (around ~10t cargo each) - but I expect that I need to either downgrade the rover fuel levels (which is fine) or upgrade the fuel amount for the generator (which is harder to pull off). there are many things to consider for future base missions. In the spoiler section below you will find a detailed walkthrough of the tour. Section D: The dropship tacking off after waiting for ICV - Explorer to get into an optimal position for rendezvous. I thought i was smart and waited for the ICV - Explorer to get around Minmus, so I didn't have to play catch up - I did not wait enough though. After doing the initial sub orbital burn to get the right AP for a intercept orbit set, I realized that I was going to get ahead of the target... New plan had to be made. I had 2 options: A. Make a inclination correction burn and set an orbit 10km higher than target - wait for it to catch up and perform rendezvous maneuver. B. extend the AP and to meet target on the other side of the planet - making use of the approx 30° difference in path and correct inclination and make the path orbital at target. Option A. was the safest - but would use more Δv - something that was a bit on the low side (in hindsight it would not have been an issue) - option B used less fuel - but would need to perform both circulisation and inclination correction at the same time (this would also not be an issue due to the low orbit speeds around Minmus) I decided upon B and in the end the relatively speed to target was only 50 m/s opun arrival- an easy correction. the dropship safely docked back at ICV - Explorer. The Δv between the dropships are all but spend now - which means It will be hard to perform another pick up of the rover in the future. Although that being said - the Crew Shuttles have enough Δv to land and take off on the Mun from a 10km orbit. and the two that landed the crew at Base Camp One only spend 1/3 of their Δv - having 921 left - so Δv could be taken from the Crew Shuttle still docked to the ICV - as it only need enough to perform an emergency landing in case of catastrophic event. Now the only thing left - was to dock the dropship back at the mothership and call it the day.For detailed walkthrough see spoiler section bellow: Moving Forward: Where as I have done the long stretch from a bit south of the Minmus Equator - to the northern hemisphere. I only came across 2 different biomes. And can I truly call the expedition a success when so many more biomes are left to be explored? So much Science can be done? The Δv of the Dropships may be spend - I may have done enough Rover Driving on Minmus for 1 life - But.. there are two perfectly well functioning Crew Shuttles at Base Camp One - with ~920 Δv on them each. Maybe a few further excursions to the other flats - the south pole etc. can be done to gather more science with them? Am I done with Minmus, or should I explore further before closing down the Minmus Base for now and fly the Kerbals home. I need to ponder on this. Stay Tuned for More!

I would love to see a Kerbol Origins or OPM port, or Parallax. I'm not sure how likely or feasible it is, but it would be really nice to see those mods ported over to KSP2. Despite KSP2's bugs, the game has improved a lot and can be seen as a similar title to KSP1. Honestly the amount of creativity generated over the course of KSP1's lifespan is staggering, and it shouldn't just be abandoned. Anyone interested in a OPM/Kerbol Origins/etc. revival? Maybe like a "modloader" that you install into KSP2 with mods that you can enable and disable? I don't know KSP2 modding, so maybe i'm not the right person to talk about this, but it still would be cool.

It's a much better take than the Netflix documentary. I like how they review past aviation incidents when talking about possibilities. Although they do talk about a couple conspiracy theories, it only last for a minute or so, and it isn't presented as a "subtle truth" in the same way the Netflix one did. Compared to this, the Netflix one really looks like it was created to peddle conspiracies.

Well, what the heck... all this talk about the 2017 eclipse made me go and book a trip for my family and I to go see totality again. Fingers crossed that the weather cooperates.

What happen if the anti proton hit an heavier atom, It was some talk of using antimatter to generate fission who generated more energy. Then mostly in charged particles, Storage is solved for tiny amounts, not amounts who take out more than the launchpad. Even at an worst case scenario rockets explodes over many seconds. Antimatter does not it detonates.

Honestly it depends on the Source. I know in every source I have and have written it is nm or nM not nmi But I also know "public friendly" sources that do nMile or N-Mile, IE places where they talk about Statute miles as miles instead of Statute Miles and please never abbreviate Statute miles as smile

I just see general issues over and over They are treating the Beta/Early Access as the real game, so behind the curtain, is for an "element of surprise".. There is simply zero ways for us users to help find bugs in updates that are not out yet. With only two CM's one on leave and the other is poor dakota, there is simply not enough CM's to keep the community satisfied. For example, we hear about the holy grail of the slack channels, and yet dakota cannot show nor talk about anything that is really in there.. I mean is it really hard to do that, give us no information unless it's really needed and show us untextured models, or UI WIP, or something of the sorts? I really don't know who is the big wig on that but it's getting kinda silly hearing about crafts they have built, cool stuff the team has been working on and everything in between that they have had to make multiple Slack(tm) channels just to keep it in check. saying that some of the team even adds music and other things to it and what not and then just not show any of it?? Just to get like a 1st anniversary of the game a single photo/leak of colonies, and to see, read or hear that the team wishes that we could see it spin around or if it was in motion cause it looks so cool, like the first year? What does that mean, the textures only got worked on and its movement is not functional yet? I'm questioning if it is hard to post a photo and then during the same time, create a video of the vehicle in motion in case the parts show physical movement, and if you want to get extra spicy put a kerbal near the part/craft. Example: Teaser 1 Teaser 2 Teaser 3, 4 Also making a funny joke that some of the videos recorded are like 1080p30fps/60fps and like 2500kbps. I just made 3 or 4 leaks out of a single craft and guess what, that will be 4 weeks' worth of leaks instead of a single photo and groaning of "where leak", you know how long it took for even editing placing craft down and video editing well if i wasn't doing other things all this would have taken an 30 minutes at most, and 30% of it was trying to make a poor first leak photo instead of the crisp 4k. but man.

I'd definitely prefer more spread resources also. Actually, one of the things I find most interesting in real life are stellar distributions. I'd love to see heavy metals be the most common in the inner system, slowly replaced by silicates through the middle and then water ice further out. I definitely agree the basic resources will be available everywhere. Based on how they talk about setting up a base, I think every body will have some kind of base building material. Stuff like water, fissiles, carbons, I for sure agree will be available almost everywhere in varying richness. I would like to see some stuff locked behind a large developed colony too. But, I also expect those resources I mentioned weren't brought up in game for nothing. I also think as far as game design, they're trying to encourage visiting every possible place. I still expect some of the advanced materials for building the far future engines to be rare. Maybe available on only one or two planets in the Kerbal system.

I want to stress that this isnt a name and shame thing. This is a cautionary tale about a game company and its less than ethical or consistent behaviors. As some of you know I have been playing a game called Path of Titans, a dinosaur sim/survival game. I was able to log in and play my dinosaurs as recently as 060003042024. I went to log into Path of Titans not 1 hour ago to play and grow my spinosaurus and perhaps finish the growth on my Tyrannosaurus Rex. I want to stress that at this moment as I am about to log in, I have 0 indication of anything wrong. No Email from Alderon Games or anything. I launch my game on my PS5 and hit X. I am suddenly confronted with a log in error: Publisher Ban. It would seem that based on my research (I am not the first this has happened to, where a ban suddenly appears with 0 warning or explanation) I have been banned from Path of Titans. I can however still log into my Alderon account on their website. I have of course submitted a request for an explanation and to formally lodge an appeal should that be needed. I also want to stress that the player base is exceptionally toxic as a whole. They trash talk fellow players calling them garbage, bad and other far far worse things. They abuse players, mock them and do other heinous actions simply because there are 0 rules (I do not mean that as hyperbole either, their official servers have 0 rules, yet when you report players they ((the gms refer to the Terms of Service)) state there are no rules on the official servers) and can essentially get away with murder. I myself have found that there are rules if you know where to look, specifically into their ToS which are a legal contract that is enforceable by law, but, who reads the ToS or EULA? Well, one of their rules specifically bullet point 7 of section 1 subsection b: "attempt to, or harass, abuse, or harm, or advocate or incite harassment, abuse, or harm of another person, group, including Alderon Games’s employees or Alderon Games’s customer service representatives" which is the rule I would cite when reporting players. And thats the thing of it, thats all I have done in that game, aside from be mildly toxic at the start and last night (24 hours ago) supplied a complaint in the global chat about how anemic and weak the TRex is in game compared to its real world counterpart. I myself as far as I am aware have not violated any rules, yet here I stand am banned. All I have done in recent times is report players for harassment (2-3 reports at most on this subject), reported 1 player for a possible actual crime when they potentially violated a real US law, for their privacy I will not cite which law or what was said, but, suffice it to say, i may now that this has happened follow up with actual federal law enforcement, and then my most recent report was against a player who made claims that their actions did real world harm to another player. Again, I have received 0 email as to what I did or why I was seemingly banned. SO, why do I write this? I want to caution any who read this to avoid Alderon Games. They are not ethical or consistent in rules implementation or enforcement. To the mods, I am totally unsure if this violates any rules to make this cautionary tale, if I did/am violating something uh... I guess snip and edit as needed or perhaps replace with a cute picture of a cat? But, I really do not want our community to trip into the trap I fell into as I feel gaming should be fun and reasonably risk free. 010903052024

Hello again Jantee! Apologies, but I am a bit unsure if this post was meant for another topic? It seems a bit off topic in relation to this - note that I am all for small talk.. Just confused me a bit x) Any way I did not know the Spirit of the Eagle ship. It looks quite awesome, reminds me of some of the Ron Cobb's early designs for Nostromo in Aliens. Looks like an cool build and yeah it looks like it will do best as a low gravity no atmosphere ship. Problem with VTOL is the weight of the extra engines imo. But yeah... that vehicle does not look like it would be able to make it off planet earth x) Though getting it to a AP of 136k - you should be able to get to LKO? Where you could refuel it. I wonder if an alien style dropship would have the Δv enough to get to orbit.. in my experience the rapier engines cant carry a lot. But I guess it could be worth exploring. I wish I could answer your question. I am flattered you think I have the answer. As of now I've only had tro probes leave Kerbin SOI - and they were both Duna Missions with the propper antennas to reach Kerbin. One of them was a failed attempt to get a CommNet constellation setup around Duna. I did not have enough Δv to hit my orbit to circularize my smaller satelites.. and crashed the vehicle into Duna insted. I have decided to put my Duna mission on hold until OJT has given me an Okay to do a mission report with my Duna Mastery Challenge progress. So unfortunatly I cannot give you a certain answer.. I can only say that it is my understanding that Bigger antennas relay to smaller antennas. And that planets dont obscure signals. So i would say that a big craft with signal stength to reach Kerbin can send a pro down the Mo-Hole

Came here to say this (linky no worky ) in reference to: Largely I'd agree, but there ARE people entrenched within the bureaucracies who are, maybe even their superiors are, but everyone's had a bit too much "we've-been-here-before" over the decades about what's surely coming just over the next hill that never actually arrives (NASP anyone?). So they're afraid to seriously talk about it, as if even that much attention might make it all vanish like a dim star just in your periphery when you try to really see it, as so many have before. When Starship really and truly is here, the floodgates will open. IIRC an old UA-1205 Titan booster is around 250 tonnes. Expendable Starship can send 300 tonnes to just about anywhere. That's a whole lotta reliable, storable when-I-say-WHOAH-I-MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAN-WHOAH!!! once it gets there. With mass left. Just sayin...

Someone did here's the https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.technologyreview.com/2021/12/07/1041420/spacex-starship-rocket-solar-system-exploration/amp/Article, ( and there was a open letter by some people at NASA talking about using starship and that NASA need to start to dream big). Just to give an example: a deep space fully refueled V3 starship can give a 9KM/s DV to a 150 tons payload. And if that payload is a 15 tons probe, and 135 tons fuel with an engine with storable propellant that has 300 seconds of ISP, this gives the 15 tons probe 7 km/s, enough for a direct transfer and propulsive brake to Neptune. With a probe 20 times heavier than voyager. But transfer time with a Hohmann is 30 years to get there. If we could speed up and down 0.5km/s (1km/s total) the travel time get cut to 12 years, and we would probably still talk about a 10 ton probe. And numbers get even more stupid if we start to refuel starship to a tanker that is fully fueled on a highly hell optical orbit, like getting a 500 ton probe to Jupiter orbit, or 200 tons to orbit one of it's moon, all done with only propulsive method.

I wanted to put this out into the community about the next major roadmap updates to see if anyone agrees. Obviously the team has a plan for what features should come when but they have also said they will be flexible based on what the community wants. Perhaps this can be a thread to show what the community wants first. I am extremely excited for the colonies update and can't wait to see KSP2 finally achieve features that will separate itself from it's predecessor. It is my understanding from interviews and KSP2 development posts that the colonies update really only brings building colonies into the game. The only real purpose they will bring to the game is looking cool and launching vessels from whatever planet/moon you want in the Kerbolar system. That is all fun and good, honestly I would probably have hours of fun with that anyways if development stays on track with the current roadmap; However, this would also mean that the colonies wouldn't get any "True" functionality until after the interstellar update. Once the colonies update comes we will likely see a large gap between that and the interstellar update sense there is such a large amount of new mechanics and development that will need to go into new solar systems and how to get there. There was a 10 month wait for the first big update of KSP2 "For Science!", I understand that was to fix a lot of bugs on launch so I don't expect Colonies to take as long but I wouldn't expect it in the next 3-4 months. If we estimated an average of 6 months between each update that would mean we could get colonies around June or July, then interstellar around December or January of 2025, and then go back to resource gathering by Jun or July of 2025. Having a whole year between being able to build colonies and being able to utilize colonies in the way that I believe the devs want them to be used seems out of place to me. While I and many others are extremely excited for interstellar, I think we would also appreciate the colonies and their functionality being completely fledged out before going into the next "BIG NEW THING" for KSP2. To me it does not make sense to add construction of colonies, have a gap and add interstellar, then go back and add functionality to colonies. Another point to make, sadly, is bug fixes. The colonies update will likely have some things to it that the community will have notes on what could be done better, of course these things can be addressed in smaller updates in between colonies and interstellar, but I think it would also be good to have the next big roadmap goal also be connected to colonies, making the focus of the development team "locked in" on getting these parts of the game perfect before moving on. If resource gathering is next on the list from colonies it would also allow them to add big "second thought"/"lesser priority" things to colonies seamlessly in addition to the exploration roadmap goal (similar to how For Science! added reentry heating). Lastly I would like to talk about integration of the resource gathering and transportation system from interplanetary to interstellar. Resource distribution on this large of a scale seems to me like a hard case to crack, I think there will be some errors in the first version that the becomes publicly available. I would personally rather have those struggles on interplanetary missions rather than interstellar ones in the first implementation of resource gathering. If we switched interstellar and exploration on the roadmap hopefully it would mean that the resource distribution systems can be perfected and easily ported to interstellar. I would rather have headache and be able to look at it as just a problem with the one feature of resource distribution rather than feel like its frustration with interstellar and resource distribution. Overall I love that the development team has been more open with communication and taking advice from their audience (Thank you for fixing wobbly rockets ). I do wonder what the rest of the community thinks about this, and if the developers would consider changing such a big decision. Anyways much love to the devs and the community, I'm sure that we will be happy with whatever way development goes but I think it is something to consider. P.S. this could also mean that you could push the second new star system addition to come in the multiplayer update which could be fun to have the first looks of new territory to be with friends. Just a thought!

I wanted to put this out into the community about the next major roadmap updates to see if anyone agrees. Obviously the team has a plan for what features should come when but they have also said they will be flexible based on what the community wants. Perhaps this can be a thread to show what the community wants first. I am extremely excited for the colonies update and can't wait to see KSP2 finally achieve features that will separate itself from it's predecessor. It is my understanding from interviews and KSP2 development posts that the colonies update really only brings building colonies into the game. The only real purpose they will bring to the game is looking cool and launching vessels from whatever planet/moon you want in the Kerbolar system. That is all fun and good, honestly I would probably have hours of fun with that anyways if development stays on track with the current roadmap; However, this would also mean that the colonies wouldn't get any "True" functionality until after the interstellar update. Once the colonies update comes we will likely see a large gap between that and the interstellar update sense there is such a large amount of new mechanics and development that will need to go into new solar systems and how to get there. There was a 10 month wait for the first big update of KSP2 "For Science!", I understand that was to fix a lot of bugs on launch so I don't expect Colonies to take as long but I wouldn't expect it in the next 3-4 months. If we estimated an average of 6 months between each update that would mean we could get colonies around June or July, then interstellar around December or January of 2025, and then go back to resource gathering by Jun or July of 2025. Having a whole year between being able to build colonies and being able to utilize colonies in the way that I believe the devs want them to be used seems out of place to me. While I and many others are extremely excited for interstellar, I think we would also appreciate the colonies and their functionality being completely fledged out before going into the next "BIG NEW THING" for KSP2. To me it does not make sense to add construction of colonies, have a gap and add interstellar, then go back and add functionality to colonies. Another point to make, sadly, is bug fixes. The colonies update will likely have some things to it that the community will have notes on what could be done better, of course these things can be addressed in smaller updates in between colonies and interstellar, but I think it would also be good to have the next big roadmap goal also be connected to colonies, making the focus of the development team "locked in" on getting these parts of the game perfect before moving on. If resource gathering is next on the list from colonies it would also allow them to add big "second thought"/"lesser priority" things to colonies seamlessly in addition to the exploration roadmap goal (similar to how For Science! added reentry heating). Lastly I would like to talk about integration of the resource gathering and transportation system from interplanetary to interstellar. Resource distribution on this large of a scale seems to me like a hard case to crack, I think there will be some errors in the first version that the becomes publicly available. I would personally rather have those struggles on interplanetary missions rather than interstellar ones in the first implementation of resource gathering. If we switched interstellar and exploration on the roadmap hopefully it would mean that the resource distribution systems can be perfected and easily ported to interstellar. I would rather have headache and be able to look at it as just a problem with the one feature of resource distribution rather than feel like its frustration with interstellar and resource distribution. Overall I love that the development team has been more open with communication and taking advice from their audience (Thank you for fixing wobbly rockets ). I do wonder what the rest of the community thinks about this, and if the developers would consider changing such a big decision. Anyways much love to the devs and the community, I'm sure that we will be happy with whatever way development goes but I think it is something to consider. P.S. this could also mean that you could push the second new star system addition to come in the multiplayer update which could be fun to have the first looks of new territory to be with friends. Just a thought!

1st rule of ban club is you dont talk about ban club. 2nd rule of ban club is you dont talk about ban club. banned. 230703012024 new page!

I think you are missing the biggest complain from so many people.. There is a finite set of mission parameters that have a linear but non logical progression. These yield disproportionately more currency than actually performing science. People want more gameplay and the expectation of gameplay is different. So many of the people talking about how great the current state of game is are clearly more in tune with the sandbox approach. Nothing wrong with that. We are not saying that the current content is not good. It's just a far cry short of what the Career player expected from KSP2. That's fine being EA and all.. but they have repeatedly skirted the topic of how they will make it more like career. The dev talk about adding more static missions so you can have even more of the same old missions to do over and over. There was a dynamic aspect to KSP1 and the vast majority of people saying that mode sucked or was severely lacking... didn't even spend the bulk of their time playing that mode bc they enjoyed sandbox more. That's so awesome. I'm happy KSP2 is currently kn a state that is meeting your expectations. Meanwhile for science has been achieved. They are moving on to colonies. Then the next part of the road map. To sell the game they advertised the part I love the most as the 2nd road map stop... and blew the stop sign all together. I now feel like my concerns aren't even relevant bc. 1. Discord and Forum will ban you for voicing options of this nature more than a handful of times, even if about separate topics. 2. The devs have said the nailed for science and the sandbox community agrees. By by procedurally generated missions and quirky dialogues boxes. 2 of the 4 things that kept me vested in the franchise.

Problem with lots of weird alien communication methods is that most outside of visual one who sign language is the low bandwidth, not an huge issue for animals who just say a few things to say but not something you can build an society out of. Sign language has the downside of being line of sight and you have to watch the speaker not that you are doing. But it would work and work better if better field of view or more eyes. And you would need hands or something similar to make tools so if you can not speak you use some sort of sign language, you probably has loads of sounds too but they would be more like our body language but more to call attention or shout warnings, I want to talk to you / ask a question or watch out. But decoding an alien language without direct interaction would be much much harder than decoding hieroglyphs without the rosetta stone who I assume we done by now but an alien language is an much harder nut to crack. Also decoding signals might be an problem today everything is encrypted often multiple times like an https is probably again is encrypted

Issue with this is that they have to have radio or they could not hear the satellites. Radio is just 125 year old, much less in practice as in able to communicate with an satellite even if pretty powerful. Assuming we do this in 200 years. The alien will be less than 300 year behind us or ahead, so ahead is much much more likely and we are likely to could talk directly to them, but sending an probe with data would make sense. If not they could not get anything from the satellite and you have to land, if they are doing agriculture you should probably be able to spot that from orbit. Send down an lander. If they don't have fields with crops they would be hard to spot. Named this image first contact, an cat like alien trying to eat an small rover. We did not know of them before she spotted the rover and went to investigate.

Y3 D325-Y4 D169 - Jool Explorer So, hot on the heels of the departure of Draco, we have another historical event taking place: The arrival of Jool Explorer at the Jool System! If you recall, Jool Explorer was launched all the way back in the middle of Year 1, almost two and a half years ago! Heck, that was all the way back when Jerry here was an intern! Ha ha! What's that, Jerry? You're still an intern? Oh. Well. Talk to KR about that. In any case, as Jool Explorer is approaching its goal, this is a good time to review its mission objectives: Minimum Objectives (If we don't accomplish at least this much, we'll wind up sitting in front of a Kongressional hearing.) One flyby of Jool One flyby of Laythe Primary Objectives (These are the objectives that the probe has been designed to achieve.) Two flybys of Jool Two flybys of each of Jool's large moons: Laythe, Vall, and Tylo Deploy one atmospheric probe on Jool and one on Laythe Secondary Objectives (Once the Primary Objectives have been completed, if the probe has any capability left, we will attempt to accomplish these additional objectives.) Flybys of Jool's minor moons: Bop and Pol Additional flybys of Jool and its large moons. So, this morning, Jool Explorer crossed over into Jool's SOI. Our first task is to adjust its trajectory coming in to the Jool system. The folks over in Orbital Dynamics have worked up a plan for us that will let us use a gravity assist at Laythe to capture Jool Explorer into the system rather than burning fuel, which will help extend the life of our propellant load. If you're unfamiliar with the concept of gravity assists...well, go ask the guys in Orbital Dynamics. There's a reason I'm in management. This maneuver will also check off our first minimum objective with a flyby of Laythe. So Jool Explorer burns at the very edge of the Jool system to set up its capture maneuver. However, as we all know, the Jool system is huge. It's going to be almost sixty days before the Laythe flyby. So, back to work, everyone. We'll get back to this in a couple months. ---------- Well, here we are back with Jool Explorer on Day 384. The Science team has been hard at work over the last several weeks getting preliminary readings from the experiments on board Jool Explorer, and they've already been releasing some stunning photography. Today is the day we discover if our burn two months ago was good. Jool Explorer is rapidly approaching Laythe. And, so far, it appears that we are right down the middle of the slot. Science has all of their instruments and cameras ready to go for our first flyby. We'll be passing about 140 kilometers away from the surface. And we have our first successful flyby! Flight just got back and let me know that their numbers indicate that Jool Explorer has successfully captured into an elliptical orbit around Jool. Excellent work! So now Orbital Dynamics is getting to work on plotting the next burn, which should be at JEs first apoapsis in a couple of days. ---------- Day 387 now, and Jool Explorer is getting set to burn at its Jool apoapsis. This burn will set us up for releasing our first atmospheric probe into the atmosphere of Jool. The burn was successful, so Jool Explorer is now on a sub-orbital trajectory for Jool. We'll get back to it in a couple of days for the probe separation and burn. ---------- And now we're back on Day 389. Jool Explorer is about an hour away from entry to Jool's atmosphere, which we obviously would like to avoid. So, first up, we trigger the separation of the Jool Atmospheric Probe. Then Jool Explorer immediately turns and burns to increase its periapsis above Jool's atmosphere. This would not be the time for an engine failure. <nervous laugh> But, thank goodness, that burn was successful. Now we can turn our attention back to the atmospheric probe. This is an important milestone of the mission, so obviously we hope that the periapsis was set to the correct height to ensure proper entry. <glances nervously over at the Orbital Dynamics folks sweating in the corner> The probe enters the atmosphere and is almost immediately enveloped in plasma, entering radio blackout. It's a long five minutes. But eventually, radio contact is restored. The probe survived atmospheric entry! It immediately begins radioing back data from its instruments. When it reaches about 200 kilometers below entry, its parachute deploys. It continues to sink deeper into the Joolian atmosphere, sending back pressure, temperature, and spectrographic data as it goes. However, although the probe is tough, it is not indestructible, and the Joolian atmosphere is unforgiving. Finally, after sinking an amazing 500 kilometers into Jool's clouds, the probe stops transmitting. That was an incredible outcome, and I'm sure the Science team will be parsing through that data stream for a long time. Meanwhile, Jool Explorer's instruments have not been idle, and they have recorded their data from their first flyby of Jool, meeting our second minimum mission objective. So, we have met the minimum mission requirements! Now JE is headed back up to its apoapsis above Jool, and OD will be plotting our next move. ---------- Back at periapsis on Day 393, and Jool Explorer is burning prograde this time to set up another flyby of Laythe. This is a pretty major burn, but it will set us up for the release of the Laythe Atmospheric Probe, which is a major milestone of the mission. So the fuel expenditure is justified. See you back in five days for the flyby. ---------- Back now on Day 398. Jool Explorer is approaching Laythe once again, this time on a suborbital trajectory. An hour away from entry, the atmospheric probe is released. Jool Explorer immediately burns to raise its Laythe periapsis...and its Jool periapsis? Or so the OD guys tell me. I don't get it either. I just keep pressing the "I Believe" button. In any case, Jool Explorer is safe now and recording data from its second Laythe flyby. Meanwhile the atmospheric probe is burning its way through Laythe's atmosphere and we're all holding our breath. The probe hurtles tantalizingly over a couple of major land masses... ...deploys its parachute... ...and settles into the ocean. That's fine. The probe floats. We'll probably get better data from Laythe's liquid water than we would from dry land anyway. In any case, another successful probe deployment, and a second Laythe flyby checked off of our primary mission objectives. Jool Explorer passes out of Laythe's SOI and then sweeps down to its Jool periapsis. The probe's orbit is very low now. The good news is that this gets us a very close flyby of Jool, which marks our second flyby of Jool itself and makes the Science team very happy. However, the low orbit will make it very difficult to perform flybys of the other Joolian moons. We could just burn to raise our orbit, but the Orbital Dynamics wiz kids have a better plan. They want to use another Laythe flyby to raise the probe's orbit with a gravity assist. So, here we are now, just a couple of hours out of Laythe's SOI, and we're burning at Jool periapsis to set up another Laythe flyby. I guess we'll see how that turns out in a couple of days. ---------- Well, Day 400 now, and Jool Explorer is swinging by Laythe again. After the flyby, Flight confirms that the gravity assist has raised Jool Explorer's orbit by a considerable amount. And Science has collected their data from Jool Explorer's third Laythe flyby. So now JE is back on its way to Jool apoapsis and we're setting our sights on the rest of the moons. ---------- Four days later now, Day 404, and we're back at Jool apoapsis. Orbital Dynamics has another burn scheduled that should set Jool Explorer up for its first Tylo flyby. Exciting! ---------- In other news: As Jool Explorer is coasting down Jool's gravity well, Draco reaches its mid-course correction burn on Day 406. The crew of Draco have been following the progress of Jool Explorer with great interest. (Because, let's face it, they don't have much else to do.) As they look out their windows and see Jool as a sparkling green gem in the sky, the Kerbol System doesn't seem so large after all.... ---------- Three days later, Jool Explorer is approaching Tylo for the first time. The probe swings by in a close pass and collects its data. It then exits Tylo's SOI and carries on. The next day, 410, Jool Explorer is back at Jool apoapsis. Orbital Dynamics assures me that a small burn here will set it up for another flyby of Tylo in a week or so. ---------- Day 419. We're back for our second Tylo flyby. This, unfortunately, is a more distant flyby. Science is disappointed. But OD assures me that there is a method to their madness. After Jool Explorer has exited Tylo's SOI, the probe burns again. And this burn sets it up for its first flyby of Vall next week. As an aside: Once this burn was completed, Flight sent me a notice letting me know that Jool Explorer has reached 50% of its initial fuel load. Good to know. ---------- It's Day 425 now, and we're excited that we're passing through our first Vall flyby! Science has all of their data, so Jool Explorer is just going to keep coasting for now. ---------- It's Year 4 Day 4 now. Happy New Year, everybody, hope you all had a good holiday. Jool Explorer is approaching Jool periapsis, and OD has a burn planned that will bring it back for its second flyby of Vall. That went well, Flight tells me everything is in order. It's a long haul back to Vall, but we'll see you back in a couple of weeks. ---------- Okay, Day 24, and Jool Explorer is flying by Vall for the second time. So, for everyone who hasn't been keeping score, this means that Jool Explorer has successfully deployed both atmospheric probes, and completed two flybys of Jool and all three of its major moons. This means that Jool Explorer has successfully completed its primary mission objectives! Since we still have almost 50% of our fuel load remaining, we've given the go ahead to start into the secondary mission objectives. Orbital Dynamics should be getting us some flight path options for those any day now. Right? <Orbital Dynamics guys look startled for a second, then run back to their offices.> ---------- Day 27. Jool Explorer is back at Jool apoapsis today. And Orbital Dynamics has given us a flight path that is...ambitious. The plan is this: Jool Explorer is going to make a minor burn at apoapsis today that will put it on a course to flyby Vall. It will get a gravity assist from Vall that will put it on a course to flyby Tylo. It will get yet another gravity assist from Tylo that will put it on a course to flyby Bop. I am pounding that "I Believe" button today. So Jool Explorer makes its burn. ---------- Day 28, we have our third flyby of Vall... ---------- Three days later, we have our third close flyby of Jool... ---------- Four days after that, on Day 35, we fly by Tylo for a third time... And after we exit Tylo SOI...well, I'll be damned. We will need a course correction burn, but not a major one. I guess that worked. Good job, folks. ---------- Now on Day 40 we have our course correction burn for Bop. We're right on target. Things move even slower here in the outer reaches of the Jool system. See you all back in two weeks. ---------- It's Day 54 and... Heerree'ss Bop! Science is very excited, although all it appears to be is a captured asteroid. Jool manages to look small from out here. So our next target in the extended mission is Pol. Unfortunately, there are no large moons out here to provide gravity assists. So we will just have to burn for it. Orbital Dynamics is working on a plan for that. ---------- So, did I mention that things move slowly out here? It is now Day 131, two and a half months since we left Bop, and we have finally reached the burn for Pol. Now we have to wait more than two weeks for the flyby. All for just another captured asteroid. <yawn> And Flight has just informed me that this burn brings Jool Explorer below 25% of its initial fuel load. ---------- So, it's Day 148 and we're getting the first pictures and data back from the Pol flyby... ...aanndd...that is not just another captured asteroid. I will be very curious to see what Science has to say about that one. ---------- So, after the Pol flyby we have some hard decisions to make concerning Jool Explorer. The probe has accomplished all of its primary mission objectives, and all of its secondary objectives. It has roughly 22% of its initial fuel load remaining. It is in the outer limits of the Jool system, with no gravity assist targets available, so any destination we pick for it will require a large expenditure of fuel. And there is a possibility that if the probe is allowed to orbit uncontrolled in the Jool system it may crash into Laythe, possibly contaminating its surface with the radioactive contents of the probe's radiothermal generators. So KSP management have decided that the probe should use its remaining fuel to achieve a controlled disposal in the atmosphere of Jool. Day 155, a week after the Pol flyby, Jool Explorer performs its final burn. ---------- Two weeks later, Day 169. Jool Explorer is a couple of hours out from entry now. Still sending back data. The probe is hurtling towards Jool's atmosphere at over 9,000 meters per second. This is the closest it has ever come to Jool, still getting good data on the planet. And as the probe enters the outer limits of the atmosphere...end of transmission. What a mission! Atmospheric probes deployed on Jool and Laythe! Four flybys of Jool, three flybys of Laythe, Tylo, and Vall, and flybys of Bop and Pol! A staggering amount of data! We'll be turning our attention to Draco and Duna here in just another week, but after this it will be hard not to be imagining what a kerballed Jool mission would look like. Eh?