Forgotten Space Program

[Cydonian Monk]

Finally finished with what I needed to get done in v1.0.5 and have moved on to KSP v1.1.2. I've managed to get (most) of the mods updated to the point where this save loads. Aside from those parts in abandoned or not-yet-updated mods, there were only two parts missing, both parts that have been deleted by their creator..... So I've copied those two forward on my own, and will keep them much like I have the older Squad parts. 

[Edit: Found one of the parts, just renamed. So I'll mass-replace it in the save.]

Should have a full update ready later tomorrow. 

Edited June 4, 2016 by Cydonian Monk

[Just Jim]

6 hours ago, Cydonian Monk said:

Finally finished with what I needed to get done in v1.0.5 and have moved on to KSP v1.1.2. I've managed to get (most) of the mods updated to the point where this save loads. Aside from those parts in abandoned or not-yet-updated mods, there were only two parts missing, both parts that have been deleted by their creator..... So I've copied those two forward on my own, and will keep them much like I have the older Squad parts. 

[Edit: Found one of the parts, just renamed. So I'll mass-replace it in the save.]

Should have a full update ready later tomorrow. 

Awesome!  Good luck!!!!!

Edited June 4, 2016 by Just Jim

[TheKosanianMethod]

16 hours ago, Cydonian Monk said:

Knock on particle board [closest thing to wood I can see in my office], the only flooding I've had this round was in our parking lot at work, and only ~4 inches at that. Still dealing with a bit longer than normal commute, and seriously considering buying a kayak. Or retractable pontoons to strap on the side of my car. 

Folks seem to forget Houston is a swamp. The frogs certainly haven't. Chirping like mad these days. 

Here in Northern VA, we are preparing for what may be a few inches of rain over the weekend, or a few in an hour. I keep seeing mixed reports. As for the car pontoons, you may need this. Do you happen to own a Ford Bronco?

[Cydonian Monk]

16 hours ago, Geschosskopf said:

And I love to hear frogs.  It means that many fewer skeeters. 

Yep. I've even taking to letting wasps "hatch" before I knock down the nest.... Only because those mean SOBs supposedly eat young mosquitos.

 

9 minutes ago, TheKosanianMethod said:

As for the car pontoons, you may need this. Do you happen to own a Ford Bronco?

Now that's what I'm talking about!

[Cydonian Monk]

Begin Kerbal Space Program Version 1.1.0[*]

--

 

Forgotten Space Program

It's happened again. Those ill-meaning kerbals ran off and completely forgot about their space program. There was a global crisis. The workers were upset. The party elders demanded strawberries. The Great Powers took notice. Nobody remembers because the thought police made sure to erase those that did. Space? Yes, we always have space for more members of the Glorious Kerbal Worker's Party!

And so years pass. Eventually one of The First Citizen's Opinion Reinforcing Units stumble on the ruins of the long forgotten program. Trailers. Sheds. Laboratories stripped of all their worth. The common housing blocks and factories of the great Kerbal Union had encroached on the site, blanketing it in ash and soot. Large barrels of fleas had been stored there, awaiting use by the nearby reeducation centers. A few quick tortures and a property seizure later and The Party Boss became the operator of the most glorious space program on Kerbin. 

And that's when the fun ended.

GLORY TO KERBIN!

--

The Party Boss was surprised to learn they had captured a small band of counter-revolutionaries when they liberated the space center. This group had been working to develop armaments, no doubt with the aim of supporting the villainous Enmore Kerman in his never-ending bid to overthrow The Party and assassinate the First Citizen. Despite their obvious treachery, the small band had continued to deny knowledge of The Party and were refusing to answer any questions. Even interrogation failed to uncover their secrets, so The Party Boss came up with a better idea.

They would become cosmonauts for the glory of all working kerbals. Through their sacrifice they would be cleansed of their transgressions and welcomed back into the ranks of The Party as full peers. 

GLORY TO KERBIN!

It didn't take long for The Party Boss to convince The First Citizen to reassign their weapons expert, Wernher Kerman, to this new space venture. And Wernher had more than a few insightful ideas. Glorious ideas. He had been working on designs for accelerating travel of his fellow kerbals, and now those designs would help spread the glory of The Party to the heavens themselves. 

And these malcontents would be his guinea pigs. [Wherever Guinea is and whatever pigs are....]

Wernher's "Project Unity" would not only cleanse the waters of the Glorious Kerbal Worker's Party, it would also help to bring all kerbals together. To unite them towards one goal. One purpose. One end. This simple project would place a brave and glorious kerbal into orbit, where they would sing the praises of The Party to all who would listen and all who would follow. And all would listen and all would follow.

The first to reach these glorious heights would be their new comrade and former leader of the counter-revolution, Rosuki Kerman. A kerbal who fashioned herself as The Boss of these malcontents, who had thus far refused to disclose the identities her co-conspirators, she would now lead them to greater glory atop a mighty barrel of burning fleas. 

GLORY TO KERBIN!

--

"Look, all I'm saying is we could reach orbit if you make a few small changes... Ow!"

The Party Boss slapped Rosuki's hand with the Truth Strap. She had been cooperating with Wernher and his design team for several days, more out of her desire of self preservation than a willingness to help these... kerbals... advance their goals. Yet every now and then she'd say something that disagreed with the Glorious Kerbal Worker Party's worldview and would get a slap on the hands to "train" her. 

"It isn't supposed to work this way. I know what I'm talking about. The rest of my team knows what they're talking about. If you just change... OW!"

"You will listen to and obey fellow citizen Wernher Kerman. No! More! Questioning!"

Wernher raised his hand to stop The Party Boss from further education of Rosuki. "No, I think ve might be on to somethink here. Please, let her continue."

"Thank you. As I was saying, these flea barrels are useless individually. But if you... Ow!"

"Sentences must not start with but!"

"Fine!" That last one hurt, so much so that she rubbed her hands together to keep the welt from growing larger. "If you change the design and stack the flea barrels on top of each other, and then strap several of them side by side, you can use them to boost this mess high enough that it might reach orbit."

"Und how do ve do this?"

"Struts and decouplers." She made a splitting motion with her hands to mimic the action. "Explosives. Drop the spent stages off as the rest climb."

"... to glory...." said The Party Boss, almost under his breath.

Wernher nodded. "Genius. Und obvious. Yet ve do not have such a tool."

Giving these madkerbs explosive decouplers was not a good idea, but judging by their present design Rosuki was absolutely sure it was her only chance of survival. And she certainly wasn't going to show them how to make liquid-fueled rockets. They had blown up munths worth of research when the space center was captured just to keep that secret safe.

Besides, if she didn't help, and this "cleansing" launch turned out to be as fatal as she expected, then who would look after the rest of her team? What would happen to those still in orbit? Elite was nowhere to be seen, their contacts to the North suspiciously quiet. No, she had to make this work. 

And so she did. It wasn't hard to scrape up [magic science points] engineering know-how from the area surrounding the space center. In a short time Wernher had all the pieces he needed to build what Rosuki hoped would be a working orbiter. It was an insanely complex craft, beyond what this new Wernher should yet have been capable of understanding, but he was proving to be a very fast learner. Rosuki could see why Elite and Jonbald had been so insistent on using Wernhers. No matter the background he always got up to speed quickly.

--

A short time later and Unity was ready for launch. It had proven to be even more insane looking once all of the flea barrels and hammers were stacked and strapped together. They forced her to climb the side of the rocket and enter the capsule on her own after the team of hundreds of kerbals had carried it (by hand) to the launchpad. 

The thick smog of this Kerbin was enough that Rosuki could barely see beyond the VAB, and she wondered if the mist itself wouldn't ignite when the rocket lit. The first stage, a small kick stage intended to just lift the thing above the launchpad, ignited while the craft was falling from its launch clamps. A half second of freefall and then a strong pull backwards. The mist did indeed appear to be burning as Unity climbed into the unseen beyond.

If her design worked as well as she had planned, the falling debris from the first two stages would damage the launchpad, meaning The Party Boss would be unable to send his goons to recover her. At least not before she reached one of the stations she hoped were still in orbit. The stars at night were non-existent, and she had rarely seen a blue sky since... since the event. 

The rocket continued its bumpy ride into space, cutting through the thick soup of Kerbin's polluted lower atmosphere and into the thin, blue band above it. She rolled the ship around to get a view of the ocean, sad to see it too was choked with the thick, yellow haze. At least some part of the sky was still blue.

Such devastation. How had Kerbin come to this? How could kerbals be twisted so? The aggression displayed towards herself and her team was entirely unlike any of the previous Kerbins. This government was, no, best not to even think about it. Every Kerbin from here to eternity would be entirely unlike her Kerbin. 'You can never go home again' could never be more true. All she could do now was survive, or die trying. 

And then she was in orbit. Here she was supposed to recite some speech penned by The First Citizen and then play a recorded message for all who could hear. She knew they knew she was in orbit, they'd stuck enough transponders in the ship and her suit to track them from another galaxy. So if she failed to start the broadcast they would know she hadn't been reformed and "joined" their endless party. (She wondered why anyone would go to a party where the snacks were a swift kick and a strike from a leather belt. What a terrible party.)

No, there would be no propaganda from her, not this day. She pulled the hatch's locking bolts free, kicked open the door and tossed the tape recorder and its vile message into the inky void.

She scanned the sky before climbing back in, hoping to catch a flare or two. If she was lucky she might have just launched into an orbit that was near one of the large stations. If she was really lucky, she would be near Kelgee Station. If she was really, really lucky, they would come out to get her.

Turns out she was only really lucky.

Her suit's radar was limited, and showed only a blip in a 130km orbit, but there was no mistaking the outline of Kelgee. Her ship, if an orbiting piece of propaganda could be called a ship, had four as of yet unused kick motors for deorbiting. Fired in two bursts this would net her somewhere near 175m/s. Not enough to set up a proper rendezvous with Kelgee, but it would get her close enough to close the gap with her EVA pack. 

She had never been the best at orbital mechanics, a behavioral scientist by background, and spending the last several years running a space agency hadn't helped. Thankfully the adjustment needed to set up the Kelgee rendezvous wasn't particularly complex. The amount of ∆v to be spent was known, all of it to be spent in one or two burns, so all she needed to do was find a vector where burning said ∆v would result in a close-approach to the station.

Once she had it set up, she dialed both burns into the primitive flight computer and took a nap. The jolt of the two motors woke her from a nightmare of her imagination into a nightmare turned real. The second burn followed shortly thereafter, bringing her closest approach to half a kilometer. It would have to do.

The intercept was estimated at some two-hundred meters per second, well within the capabilities of her (admittedly overpowered) EVA pack. Rosuki waited until the ship was some five kilometers from the station before she kicked open the hatch, pushed off from the ship, and made her way towards what she hoped would be an island of sanity in this maelstrom of madness. 

She started to panic when Kelgee came into view, its many pieces tumbling end over end, having seemingly come unglued. Unglued. Unglued. Just like her mind. Unglued. Unhinged. Unattached. All she could do was laugh. Ha. Ha ha. She let go of her EVA controls and cackled madly. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. 

And then something pushed her from behind.

The jolt of the two motors woke her from a nightmare of her imagination into a nightmare turned real. Kelgee Station's disintegration had all been a dream. A horrid, horrid dream. She had dozed off after the first of the two course alignment burns, her tortured mind playing terrible tricks on her. No, that couldn't happen to Kelgee. If it was going to fall apart it would've done it years ago, in the decades while it was hidden from the radar.

She waited until the station was some five kilometers away before she left her capsule behind. She had to turn away from the station to complete most of the rendezvous burn, her relative velocity brought down to a more manageable twenty meters per second. A second burn and her intercept was at zero with a relative velocity of almost nothing.

A quick blast from the EVA pack turned her towards the station. She closed her eyes as the edge of the station came into view, not opening them again until she stopped her rotation. Relief. Sanity. All there. Thankfully. Glued. Attached.

All there, plus an extra shuttle that hadn't been when they lost contact. One of the Sulphurs from the Mün, obviously, but which one? Had all five of the crew come back? Why? For food and oxygen, no doubt. Were they still here? The Titanium was still docked, but nothing was ever certain from one cycle to the next. Chaos had reigned supreme until she and Elite had implemented Jonbald's plan. An optimistic plan that clearly didn't account for hostile governments. A plan now in tatters, with even more kerbals scattered across the solar system than had been when they started. Failure.

She made her way to one of the airlocks along the station's spine, checking its small window before cycling the atmosphere just in case someone was inside. Empty at first, and then holding one kerbal: her. The pressure equalized over the course of minutes, slowly. With that done she removed her helmet, pushed open the inner hatch, and hoped to see a friendly face waiting on the other side. 

Instead raised space tools and angry looks greeted her, wrenches held firmly and with intent by Rozor and Tetris. One of them pulled her quickly out of the airlock, the other yanked her helmet away and tossed it across the cabin. Rozor was checking inside the airlock for more invaders while Tetris pushed her against a wall. A look of recognition quickly appeared on both their faces. 

"Boss?" Rosuki tried to nod. "Hey! It's The Boss!"

Others slipped into the cabin from the lower decks, nine in all, each carrying an improvised weapon. Wrenches, hammers, water bottles. Rondous, Edsel, Elkin, Barbara, Verly, Mardi, even the half-awake Steve, all came to greet The Boss. The first contact they'd had from the ground since the radios went silent.

The Boss smiled, happy to see them all still alive. She motioned towards their wrenches and hammers. "Expecting someone?"

Rozor grinned and worked his wrench into a loop of his suit. "Yeah. Queen Sieta has a lapdog, some raider calling himself Captain Hallock. Keeps coming around demanding supplies and parts, threatening to vent the station's atmosphere if we don't play along. Real jerk. Flies around in a tiny lander can but claims to have an entire fleet."

"Sieta? Queen?"

He nodded. "Queen of Space. You didn't know? We thought she was the reason everything went silent. Says she was crowned by the Ghosts of Kerbin under full authority of The Great Powers and all that nonsense. We kind of hoped you were her pirate, Hallock, though sneaking up to the station in an EVA suit isn't really his style." 

Tetris came bounding back into the cabin, having ventured into the upper decks to do something. "What happened?"

"Later. Right now I need a radio. Do any of them work?"

"No, not unless you want to talk to our Queen. The entire network went down at the same time, more than a year ago now. We fixed a few of the stations and satellites here and at the Mün, but Sieta changed something and now they're all scrambled. Same threats of ashyxiation from her dog if we try to bypass it."

"Ok. In that case we need to get a broadcaster into an orbit that can see the North Pole. Any of these shuttles still..." An alarm sounded across the station, loud and shrill. Rozor darted to a control panel while the others scattered back from where they had come. "What's that?"

"Proximity alarm. The radar picked up a blip, small contact approaching from towards the planet. Friends of your's?"

She hoped not, and said as much. Most of her team was still on the surface, and there was always a chance those lunatics had sent another of them up. Unlikely after her defection. She felt ill when she realized none of them were likely to still be alive.

"It's coming in to dock at the port docking arm." Rozor unsnapped his wrench while watching the console, Tetris moved to a position adjacent to the airlock. "Transponder identifies it as the 'Unity 5'."

"Five? What happened to the other three? Wait, wait, wait... dock? How did they develop a docking port so fast?"

Confused looks from Rozor and Tetris. "Huh?"

"I don't have time to explain, but the Kerbin below us isn't the Kerbin you were born on. The kerbals that run it aren't friendly, they aren't nice, and they're not coming to sell us life insurance. They sent me up here to spread their lies, probably hoping I'd die in the process. Whoever climbs out of that ship isn't here to make friends."

They opened the outer door of the same airlock The Boss had entered, hoping to entice their new friend to use it. It worked. Minutes ticked past as the hatch closed and the pressure equalized. Rosuki realized she didn't have anything to fight with, if it came to that, but stayed in the cabin with Rozor and Tetris anyway. And then the hatch opened.

The Party Boss pushed his way into the cabin, still wearing his full EVA suit, a small pistol held firmly in his left hand. His attention was immediately taken by Rosuki, the other two kerbals in the cabin dismissed as non-threats.

"Malcontent! You failed to make your speech and play the message! And the message, oh that message is the most important part. You might say it had a very, explosive, yes, explosive ending. The First Citizen is most disappointed." He shifted around, using short blasts from his EVA pack to stay oriented. The cabin quickly became hazy.

The Boss spit at him. "You don't belong here. Go back to your labor camps and your poisoned world. Your kind has no place here."

The Party Boss wiped his faceplate clean and grinned sharply. "Your reeducation is complete, comrade, and I'm happy to report that you failed." 

He raised the pistol towards Rosuki just as Tetris brought her wrench down hard on his left arm. The scream from inside the suit was barely audible over the sound of the gun, the reflex from his arm breaking having forced him to pull the trigger. A cloud of sparks and smoke were spreading into the cabin as Tetris and Rozor grabbed the invader and pushed him against a bulkhead, the gun knocked free from his grasp. Both looked up to see The Boss staring blankly into the distance.

The round had misfired, its precise chemistry disrupted by the near infinite heat and vast absolute cold of the vacuum during its travel to Kelgee from the Unity 5. (That, and it had been manufactured by malcontents hoping to sabotage the Glorious Kerbal Workers Party in the name of Enmore Kerman.) Or perhaps the ghost of Kelgee had stepped in to save a friend he had never known, none could say. The bullet had separated from its casing, the reaction of its powder delayed enough that it exited the muzzle at a leisurely pace.

Gradually a shot rang out.

Rosuki was mesmerized, this lethal mass spinning rapidly about its axis and perfectly stable in its flight. She tapped it as it approached her chest, the soft contact causing its spin to deteriorate into complete chaos. End over end, now spinning about many axes. Chaos. It settled into a pattern, spinning mostly about one axis as it occasionally flipped to another. She tapped at it again. More chaos, yet it settled once more. A pattern always forming.

Still, its perfect flight was disrupted, never again to return. An accident and an act of malice had sent it flying, but curiosity had been its final undoing. It could never go home again, the round having been spent, the empty shell equally lost. Would the lead rather be back in its casing, potential unspent? Or was it happy here, lost in the chaos, its purpose interrupted? Such questions were meaningless to spent lead. All it could do now was survive, or die trying.

The Boss reached out and grabbed the bullet.

End Kerbal Space Program Version 1.1.0[*]

[*] Some scenes filmed on location at KSP v1.1.2 because coming unglued isn't the path of sanity.
Gradually a shot rang out: All Credit to Charles Schulz

 

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Edited December 4, 2016 by Cydonian Monk

[legoclone09]

Awesome! So what happened to Kerbin? Nuclear war? I saw the terrain was different during the launch.

[Cydonian Monk]

6 minutes ago, legoclone09 said:

Awesome! So what happened to Kerbin? Nuclear war? I saw the terrain was different during the launch.

It collapsed. Was there a war? Perhaps. Answers in time.

[EbonJaguar]

1 minute ago, Cydonian Monk said:

It collapsed. Was there a war? Perhaps. Answers in time.

And time in riddles?

[cubinator]

Woah.

I mean, wow. What the Kraken? That's a huge plot twist. I have to break this down:

-A kommunist party took over the world (probably via global thermonuclear war, hence the absolute devastation)

-This party is essentially the Thought Police, with nearly as much power (There seems to be a revolutionary group that still exists, although it will soon be powerless)

-The Party are also grammar Nazis (Hopefully not regular Nazis too).

-Hallock is hanging out with Sieta, and he is (most likely) the one who disabled the comms. For some reason he really doesn't want them reactivated.

-We now know The Boss' name, and that she is no longer in a position of power.

-Wernher seems to have had his memories erased, so he will inevitably be on the Party's side. At least he doesn't know anything about the Things and Stuff and the Jool mission.

 

Right now the Jool crew are the most blissfully ignorant (although they do know something's up, but they don't know how big it is). Unfortunately, there's probably going to be Kerbals on Laythe from Forgotten Space Program 1 that aren't exactly likely to be friendly, considering Hallock's condition. The Jool crew will need to fend for themselves and potentially face hostile company in the Jool system. And the current political conundrum seems hopeless.

Kraken help them, they're all in one thick pickle...

[legoclone09]

This would make a good book, I'd like to see it as one sometime.

[Geschosskopf]

So, doing some digging, there's this.....

On 4/18/2016 at 8:52 PM, Cydonian Monk said:

< OpenFreq-MLA-12 : And so we name this spot Jonbald's Rim. Today we're honoring the explorer Jonbald Kerman, famous for having conducted an extensive exploration of the Mün, or rather the Island of the Mün, way far back in the early days of sail. >
< EVA-MLA-01 : Go to the suit channel! Now! >
< OpenFreq-MLA-12 : What? As you can see Rosuki is now flailing her arms wildly and pointing towards her helmet radio. We'll be right back folks. >
< EVA-MLA-12 : What? You know we're in the middle of... >
< EVA-MLA-01 : Jonbald's Rim?! Are you out of your mind? You'll blow his cover! >
< EVA-MLA-12 : Relax, Ros. Nobody knows he's the same Jonbald. How could they? >
< EVA-MLA-01 : Oh, you don't think they'll notice we just named some random spot in the middle of nowhere Jonbald's Rim? There isn't even a rim here!

And here's a video of some of what seems to have happened on that mission:  https://youtu.be/pKlBcTTNyFE

 

OK....    I'm beginning to get the idea I think....

In my universe, game updates are supernovae that destroy everything and everybody in space but the same civilization on Kerbin survives and starts over again.,  In this universe, it's pretty much the opposite.  Everything in space survives but the civilization back home gets randomized.  And despite having just sprung into existence, this new civilization has all its own history and institutions going way back, except it hasn't been to space yet.  And apparently it uses different radio frequencies so nothing in space can talk back home, although they can still talk to each other..  It's like the new Kerbin was transported in from a parallel universe or something.

So what I'm thinking is that Kerbals who were in space during an update have been trying to figure out what's causing this, and trying to figure out ways either to roll with such punches better or maybe stop the changes from happening. The Rosuki Boss seems to be one such, along with Elly and several contemporaries, plus apparently really old-timers like the Jonbald mentioned above.  Thomlock just figured the changes were natural after being away 90 years, although I can't figure out why everybody remembers him being famously dead.

Anyway, as part of the effort to do something about the changes, Rosuki et al tried to leave something behind so the Kerbals of the next world wouldn't have to start from scratch.  Kinda like the Moties and their nuke-proof museum bunkers    That's what this seems to be:

On 5/1/2016 at 5:46 PM, Cydonian Monk said:

"So it worked..." The Boss looked at the box and then around the room.

 

But it occurs to me that some of the Kerbals aware of what's going on might take a different approach.  Such as using their superior knowledge and technology to achieve positions of power in the new civilization.  And it would not surprise me if The Party Boss was one such.  For instance....  

1 hour ago, Cydonian Monk said:

How did they develop a docking port so fast?"

Not only a docking port, but an apparent lack of RCS or anything but SRBs, and was still able to dock.  And knew where to go.  And took a docking port instead of a parachute so had every expectation of success.  That's not just Wehrner being quick on the uptake, that's somebody who's done this before.  I suspect that the unmasking / de-helmeting of The Party Boss will reveal a familiar face

I am tickled to see that Sieta and Hallock fulfilled my prophecy, too

Anyway, all very curious.  Great story!

 

 

 

[Cydonian Monk]

13 minutes ago, Geschosskopf said:

Not only a docking port, but an apparent lack of RCS or anything but SRBs, and was still able to dock.

Oh, it had RCS. (And parachutes, too....) Four linear ports on the sides, two pointing backwards on the end of the SRB. Fun docking when you can only go forwards and sideways.

You've mostly got the right idea.  

Edited June 6, 2016 by Cydonian Monk

[Kerbart]

Damn did I open the thread on page 1 again? I thought I had finally kicked that habi... oh wait, I did not. Nice twist!

[monophonic]

Okay, my mind has finally melted. I was already constantly mixing this story up with the Ussari space program, but now I completely cannot tell which one I am reading. Next I bet I'll start hearing the Kraken whisper things in my ear. Well done @CydonianFailure . Or were you @Catastrophic Monk . Oh crap... Where's the Doctor when you need him?

 

[AviosAdku]

This ... just got complicated (and fun), eagerly awaiting the new Kerbin of v1.1.2

I don't know much about your earlier reports but they seem to be in the same universe. I don't know if this happened before but it seems that this time, the Cat/Kittehkat/Gronnek is out of the bag, from now on there are no longer simple relics but a growing number of factions already in space and starting to interact, and not all in a friendly way.
That said, there's a bucket load of mysteries to investigate (the knowledge of previous cycles, the rapid tech advancement of the 1.1.1 Kerbals, what else is lurking out there) along with the developing plotlines. In short: loads to look forward to.
Keep up the good work.

Edited July 5, 2016 by AkuAerospace
Removed "sign off"

[DMSP]

12 hours ago, Geschosskopf said:

So, doing some digging, there's this.....

And here's a video of some of what seems to have happened on that mission:  https://youtu.be/pKlBcTTNyFE

Th... That's it! That's the Station! That's Pequoni 1!

@Cydonian Monk, you have put together such an amazing story. What ever happened to the Argon relays, may I ask?

[Cydonian Monk]

1 minute ago, DMSP said:

What ever happened to the Argon relays, may I ask?

All four of them had their circularization burns entered into the Remote Tech flight computer prior to losing contact (actually dialed in right after they made their escape burns), so they executed those burns and entered their intended orbits. The two inner system ones worked flawlessly, the two outer ones ran out of power and had to enable the backup power supply for the burn. Once the burn was complete and the solar panels were aimed towards the Sun the two outer ones came back to full capacity. 

So they're out there where they belong, just possibly not talking to anything or maybe only talking to themselves. 

[Angelo Kerman]

This is a well woven and written story.

[Andem]

Hmm... Will the First Citizen be revealed as an alternate "Boss"?

[Geschosskopf]

15 hours ago, Cydonian Monk said:

Oh, it had RCS. (And parachutes, too....) Four linear ports on the sides, two pointing backwards on the end of the SRB. Fun docking when you can only go forwards and sideways.

Ah, I was going off the absence of visually obvious mono tanks.  So....  the Party Boss is probably the 1st Kerbal in the history of KSP to make any use whatsoever of the 5 units of mono in the Mk1 pod.  Even more of a sign he's not the average rebooted-to-a-new-configuration kerb-on-the-street, but one of those in on the secret and able to avoid being rebooted.  Like, for instance, The Rosuki Boss and her "counterrevolutionary" co-conspirators were all on Kerbin during the update but carried on as before.

 

15 hours ago, Cydonian Monk said:

You've mostly got the right idea.  

That's actually frightening.  I don't think I've ever had a good idea in my life.  But en vin est vérité, as they say   

So which of the good ol' kerbs has gone rogue Casca opportunistic on us?  Jonbald?  He hasn't turned up yet...

[SpaceplaneAddict]

After reading this, I have come to the conclusion that this is causing me

*Insanity.

Edited June 7, 2016 by SpaceplaneAddict

[cubinator]

@Cydonian Monk do you just come up with these story points on the fly, or did you write it all out beforehand, start to finish? Either way, it's crazy good.

Edited June 7, 2016 by cubinator
A cone is what a flashlight makes, not what I am trying to type.

[Cydonian Monk]

17 minutes ago, cubinator said:

@Cydonian Monk do you just cone up with these story points on the fly, or did you write it all out beforehand, start to finish?

A little of both. The larger pieces I write the framework of weeks (or months) in advance, and I have a general outline of where things should go. Others I just write up on the fly. Typically I don't "flesh" things out until the mission has been run, so most of these reports are written an hour or so before they are posted. They're often only proof-read once, though I do go back and fix errors that jump out at me.

That isn't to say I won't toss out or change an entire plot line if something goes differently or a mission outright fails. Example: Originally Hallock was just going to disappear after he stole the Sulphur lander (to later reemerge as Sieta's Privateer), and the Memory of Tomorrow would still be the ship going to Jool. Then some glitch happened and the other lander at Pioneer Base was duplicated in the save, resulting in both copies of it exploding. I decided then and there that just stealing the Sulphur lander wasn't enough.

 

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6 hours ago, Geschosskopf said:

So which of the good ol' kerbs has gone rogue Casca opportunistic on us?

Wow. Didn't realize that series was still going. 41 books? Amazing.

Edited June 7, 2016 by Cydonian Monk

[cubinator]

2 minutes ago, Cydonian Monk said:

snip

Yeah, that makes sense. I usually write my mission reports in a similar fashion, though with a lot less story-building! I was just wondering how long ago you decided where the story would go when you upgraded to 1.1. It seems like it was a tough transition.

[Cydonian Monk]

1 minute ago, cubinator said:

I was just wondering how long ago you decided where the story would go when you upgraded to 1.1. It seems like it was a tough transition.

2013.  Ok, not that long ago, but lots of where it goes from here was already partly in place when I started this back in December. Some things are different: The upcoming 1.1.1 report will be brief, different than what I had originally intended, and entirely representative of my opinions of 1.1.0 and 1.1.1.