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Showing results for tags '*) but eve'.
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Hello, I'd like to pose you the challenge of designing a vessel that can go anywhere*), over and over again. For the sake of argument, let's assume that the payload will be tourists (one or many, I don't care); I want to see your solution for getting them wherever they want*), and return them back to Kerbin. And then to pick up the next tourist(s) on the surface of Kerbin and do it all over again. *) except Eve. Some things are just asking for too much. Requirements: I consider this to be more of an engineering challenge, so I don't expect you to go out and actually land on every friggin body in the system ('cept Eve). I do expect you, however, to convince me that the vessel is up to the task. The vessel should work. It should be capable, not only of landing only Tylo and coming back again, but also of reaching the more far-flung destinations (and be able to come back, of course). You may ISRU as much and as often as you like. Intermediate stops are fine. Refueling at KSC will be alright, but show that it's feasible. Craft should be able to land safely within a few minute's drive from KSC, without much saveloading. Please don't overdo it with the flybys. I'd rather see you take a refueling stop at some intermediate body than snatch a gravity assist from it. From a reviewer's perspective, "Refuel on Mun, refuel on Vall, Refuel on Tylo" is much easier to follow than a gravitational pinball game. Very stocky vessels. Reason is that I want to recognize the parts I see. This pretty much requires you to go all stock with the engines, and remain quite stock-like with the tanks. Your ISRU setup should "just work". By which I mean that one just needs to turn things on and wait in warp. If it requires frequent toggling, you fail the test. I also want to know how you find the ore deposits to land on ("I pre-scanned the system with Scansat" will be a perfectly acceptable answer, or even "I tried till I got lucky" -- really, I just want to know). Submission Guidelines: Show your work. Make sure to have some data displays (at least the resource panel, preferably also a dV readout) open in enough of your pictures for me to ensure that you didn't just use infinite fuel. If you prefer to make a video submission, please be so kind and provide a few stills with readable data to serve that purpose. Also don't always show your vessel from the same side: I want to see your design. Ideally one should be able to reconstruct it from the screen. If some things are not immediately obvious from looking at them, a few explaining words will be appreciated. Please don't spam a forum post with dozens of high-q PNGs. Use an external gallery like Imgur, or at the very least take the time to turn the PNGs into JPEGs. Why? Ever since ISRU is a thing, I tried to come up with such vessels. For some reason or other, I can't find many ways of solving the problem. (I also tried to make true go-anywhere vessels and found the results outright ridiculous -- hence the limitation to anything but Eve). Recently, several so-called SSTAs showed up on reddit which were anything but -- basically spaceplanes with nukes that could, of course, provide a shuttle service to Laythe and most smaller moons, but would struggle with reaching Moho, much less could they land on Tylo. That brought me back to that old idea. But once again, my ships are variations on a single theme. That's where you come in -- I'd like to know if my solutions really are the only ones or if I lack imagination. I hope to attract a few fellow builders who find this interesting enough to come up with and show their designs. Please understand why I don't show my own ships, at least not right away. Likewise, the "rules" are as fuzzy as they are because I don't want to send people down a certain path. I don't have plans for offering a badge. I also won't keep this challenge going forever (don't see why it should, actually I'm afraid that it won't catch on at all). I do, however, promise to pay attention until the end of September and will post short descriptions in the OP, pointing out neat features, great achievements and the likes.