I lose more Kerbals that way...

[keeper]

Any plane landing is just pot luck for us, i have enjoyed and mastered a few airplane game titles, but on this Space kerbal program we a) do not posess the knowledge to build a plane, and lack the experience in every craft ever tested well enough to land successfully.

Finally on the way to Duna for the first time so will no doubt be failing lots of re-entry/landing/maneuvers as well soon!

[cantab]

Probably landings. In quickloads-allowed saves I pulled off Moho and Tylo on the second try, but that was still after crashes first time. In a no-revert save I crashed on Duna twice and still consider that my nemesis. I've even killed a Kerbal crashing into Minmus.

I have my share of launch failures too, but I usually provide some sort of contingency to save the Kerbals.

[TrainEngie]

I just chose other.

Air/Spaceplane landings (Adjustible Landing Gears like to veer my planes to the left. That's why I like KAX gears and the small stock gears, fixed and retracting ones)

Ascent (Too much pitch causes my commsat launchers to split in half and crash my install.)

Once we're in space, everything is much safer... for some reason.

- - - Updated - - -

I just chose other.

Air/Spaceplane landings (Adjustible Landing Gears like to veer my planes to the left. That's why I like KAX gears and the small stock gears, fixed and retracting ones)

Ascent (Too much pitch causes my commsat launchers to split in half and crash my install.)

Once we're in space, everything is much safer... for some reason.

[Hobbes Novakoff]

When I'm actually doing space-program stuff, space plane landings at night. However, overall: Weapons testing.

[Cairol]

I lose most of them during ascent, because of the needed iterations to get that rocket stable all the way through.

And another big one are landings on other bodies. Because I misplanned or misjudged some of the parameters for a safe landing.

If I had TAC Life SUpport installed, the most deadliest one would be to get my beloved brave Kerbals stranded in mid-space, because my fuel calculations were off.

This actually happens alot...

[Renegrade]

Other.

My losses occur from two things:

1. Unfocused ships getting eaten by rogue muns (Ike has a huge SOI, and the Mun has taken Kerbals during interplanetary missions when for whatever reason, the orbit path prediction failed to note a collision with it).

2. Bugs, primarily the cargo bay/fairing heat bug blowing a ship apart on takeoff (I've been lucky and haven't experienced the "collided with VAB" bug, aside from losing a single tailfin).

[Moh1336]

Right now it's other. I've started a highly modded career, so I am still getting used to landing low altitude air craft.

My issue is balancing lift with weight. My current jet requires me to approach at 140m/s to keep enough lift so I don't nose down. The breaks on the first set of wheels are so useless for this I have to approach over the sea and expect to come to a full stop 3,000meters away from KPS. Sure I could use parachutes, but where's the fun in that?

[steve_v]

2. Bugs, primarily the cargo bay/fairing heat bug blowing a ship apart on takeoff (I've been lucky and haven't experienced the "collided with VAB" bug, aside from losing a single tailfin).

Now that you mention it, where's the poll option for "taken by the kraken, in his many forms"?

If it weren't for quickload / revert I'd have lost far more kerbals to bugs than any pilot or design errors on my part.

On the "collided with <something not there>" bug, I certainly have encountered this, repeatedly.

[RogueMason]

Spaceplane landings, but only because of the ridiculous bug that causes your wing parts to randomly collide with space centre buildings when approaching the runway.

I'm amazed that bug hasn't been caught and flamed alive yet. It's the single most annoying one I've ever come across.

[Renegrade]

Now that you mention it, where's the poll option for "taken by the kraken, in his many forms"?

If it weren't for quickload / revert I'd have lost far more kerbals to bugs than any pilot or design errors on my part.

On the "collided with <something not there>" bug, I certainly have encountered this, repeatedly.

Yeah, we do need a kraken option

I've gotten a fair number of the collided with <not there> bug, actually, but not in 1.0 (it's still there though, that one tailfin was nowhere near the VAB). I restricted the scope of my answers to 1.0.x for the purpose of this thread

One funny example of that bug is ShimmyTheJJ crashed into the VAB about halfway to Jool on twitch..heh. Blew up an entire ship, and not a small one at that! D:

[worir4]

I am surprised take off isn't higher. For me at least it is the most dangerous part as if my rocket has not enough struts or wrong staging or other basic errors, it usually blows up during takeoff.

[Mat2ch]

I don't know why, but I'm not killing any Kerbals anymore... I developed a good feeling, what is good, what is bad and it works pretty well. Ok, my last reentry was a bit harsh and blew up a docking port, but I managed to land safely...

The only time I kill Kerbals is, when I'm doing crazy airplane designs and fly around the space center and hit things *coughs*...

[steve_v]

I am surprised take off isn't higher. For me at least it is the most dangerous part...

That's what Launch Escape Systems are for.

[worir4]

That's what Launch Escape Systems are for.

Meh, who uses them any ways?

[steve_v]

Err, me? I don't really like needlessly killing crew on launch.

Anyone else feel that instant revert seconds before exploding is just a wee bit too, ah, forgiving?

[Torquemadus]

Other: The most common cause of death among my Kerbals has been rover related accidents while on the Mun. Most involved a combination of high speeds and hidden cliffs, crater edges, and steep slopes.

My most common cause of non-fatal stranding has been due to landers overturning after landing on a part of the Mun that looked really safe to land on when I was selecting a landing site.

[Deutherius]

I lost only two kerbals since 1.0.x, one lost all parachutes due to reentry heating and the other guy got a parachute malfunction on all chutes (all of them had 0 drag after deploying. I blame FAR, which was installed not long before). All other missions had (so far) better designed vehicles and better luck.

[Coyote27]

To me, trying to land a plane is the single hardest thing in KSP. I'd rather risk a crew trying to touch down on Tylo with unknown dV.

[Bloody_looser]

Other: I tend to run out of return fuel during excessive ground activities. Kebals get stranded and then life support can get them.

[DocMoriarty]

I lost most of my Kerbals in the current 1.0.x career due to reentry in the beginning. A total of 6 died so far in my career. Haven't lost any more lately.

[mythic_fci]

My greatest accident rate is extraterrestrial landings and/or takeoffs. I'm still quite inexperienced in those areas, and the 1.0 aerodynamics is really screwing with my Duna missions. In a close second is landing a spaceplane/experimental plane; sure, it can just barely fly, but can I maneuver its clumsy butt to the runway and not smash it apart? No.

[Guest]

Off-world EVA mishaps have taken more of my Kerbals than anything. Rover crashes, falling off crater rims, that sort of stuff.

[InterCity]

The deadliest part of my space program is reentry, with a total of 2 casualties so far in my career. This number might change though, as i've yet to go to eve.

[Brigadier]

I think I've planned more rescue missions than actual science-gathering missions. Getting stranded because of a lack of fuel/electricity/landing craft stability is only just behind showering pieces around other worlds as I struggle with limited resources at landing.

[Starhawk]

I keep trying to improve my spaceplane efficiency and am using a very aggressive ascent profile where things tend to get really hot. The shock cone intake temp bar gets completely full just around 14 km altitude, then starts to drop off.

Got a Rapier-based spaceplane up to 1700 m/s* in air-breathing mode the other day.

Happy landings!

*edit: Wrong! I must have accidentally clicked the speed indicator into orbital mode rather than surface mode.

Edited September 1, 2015 by Starhawk