Emotionally invested - most draining happy sad moment?

[Overland]

Im interested to know whats everyones most..emotionally deep and or epic moment in KSP? I know theres threads about worst deaths..best moments,

 

but as a player of KSP that sometimes gets entirely engulfed within its own lore..along with my craft and her crews welfare.. itd be nice to see if others shared a similar thing

 

such as the end of a terribly dangerous landing after a long draining journey that brought a realworld sense of relief once it was over..maybe even shed a tear in pride or sadness for whats transpired

 

that moment where time stands still after a beloved craft is lost despite all your best efforts..knowing full well she was unique and even a rebuild wouldnt feel the same or that moment never relived..

 

one of a kind emotionally invested immersion the likes of very few games ever have..for me its disturbingly common sometimes..

even simple moments

like the unplanned video of 4016s return home that mixed so well with a then recently discovered coldplay tune "gravity" that both fit KSP like a glove and made a simple return home of a locomotive and her crew such a profound moment.. my baby was home safe..not scattered horribly in bits on kerbins green unforgiving landscape.. coming into the yard at near idle.. but most of all.. driving over the very ground that in all reality very few kerbals and thier train ever see again once they depart KSC for the first time..

i admit it grabbed me unexpectedly and the whole thing seemed like a perfect moment..unexpected as it was

 

 

 

so! 

yes ive got the courage to admit such things in the name of science

 

anyone else? 

 

Edit: posted 4016s video..for the song mostly

 

Edited February 4, 2016 by Overland
Added video - as example

[Jhawk1099]

Well, since it has been 7 hours and anyone has yet to respond I will go first. I was trying for Duna. This was my first try at any interplanetary trip. It took a few tries just to get the phase angle right as several times I timewarped past it. Then my next hurdle was the atmosphere and areobraking. I tried 5 times, 4 of them I went to low and burnt up and the 5th I just carried on right past Duna. Then finally I managed to get into an orbit with only minimal retro burns. This was my first bit of joy. I then detached my Ike probe and put it into a parking orbit so I could land my Duna craft with Jeb Bob and Bill inside ready to do some science and take their picture (they probably tasted the surface sample). This also took a couple tries. But finally I managed to land on the orange surface. This moment was one of great joy. Then I thought, "well... I have far less fuel than was I planed to have at this point but I still have 100 more m/s than this app on my phone tells me I need". I was concerned because I had only around 30 hours into the game and honestly had a very vague idea of how to get back. I then proceeded to land my Ike probe which tipped over upon landing but it fulfilled my contract. I went back and did other things in the Kerbin system while I waited for the phase angle and all I could think about was getting my guys back. This made actually getting them back one of the greatest moments that I have experienced with games.

[Scotius]

I've sent an asteroid exploration mission to a rock crossing Kerbin's SoI at its very edge. Everything was fine until i klawed my ship to the asteroid, and sent one of the crew EVA to retrieve sensor readings and restore Goo containers. My game crashed promptly. Reload...ship was where he was supposed to be - still securely anchored. But my poor Scientist was already several hundreds of kilometers away and kept drifting towards interplanetary space. Mission and science was forgotten and abandoned immediately. I detached the ship and started working on retrieving my castaway, while retaining enough fuel to get back to Kerbin. It was very close shave - when i finally got close enough to Bobfrey, he had to cover last couple of kilometers with his jetpack. I was so low on fuel i couldn't waste anything, or i wouldn't be able to close the orbit around Kerbin - my ship and ALL three Kerbals would drift into solar orbit With empty LFO tanks, i had to use RCS to dip the orbit into the atmosphere - then it was just a matter of waiting couple of weeks game time through subsequent aerobrakings until i could bring everybody home. I brought back very little science from that mission, and budget of my space program took a painful hit that day - but i regretted nothing No one gets left behind!

Note to self: Next time wait until NERVAs can be unlocked. It saves fuel and a lot of headache

[FyunchClick]

Returning back to Kerbin from my first Duna mission with this big tug. Seeing that pale blue dot grow bigger and thinking about how I'd park her, have a shuttle rendezvous with her, and how the crew of returning heroes would say goodbye to their home for the last three years through many adventures, before I mothballed her there as a monument to my skill and perseverance, outdated as she was now I had returned with the science to fill out the tech tree but still cherished for her achievements.

Of course this was immediately followed by a d'oh moment as I realized I'd put her in a retrograde orbit around Kerbin, and the shuttle waiting to pick up the crew would have to go back empty and another sent up, which kinda spoiled the moment I had going there but in a very Kerbal way.

Edited February 3, 2016 by FyunchClick
spelling

[Overland]

Thankyou everyone so far,

Some beautiful uniquely kerbal moments  

 

made all the more great by the fact that I and im sure others reading can visualise even feel the very same pride and sence of urgency as experienced first time around.  

 

A wonderful credit to both the author and squad that gave such a game to make such things...actually...a thing

 

The only other game to ever compare with similar aspects would be world of goo

 

although its likely the goo balls having some place in a kerbals evolutionary past.. Makes it not all surprising

[Kerbal101]

Why,... had it right now.

Was searching for Monolith, pinpointed exactly by satelite scan, to no avail - for about 2 hours.

Its plainly simply not there. But I thought, perhaps, its like Stalker - where stuff falls under textures. See for yourself.

 

[Overland]

3 hours ago, Kerbal101 said:

Why,... had it right now.

Was searching for Monolith, pinpointed exactly by satelite scan, to no avail - for about 2 hours.

Its plainly simply not there. But I thought, perhaps, its like Stalker - where stuff falls under textures. See for yourself.

 

My god, its full of mountains!!

Ahh mountains.. Eater of planes..kilometre wide unintended docking ports of landers.. Genset consuming fiends of trains.. Each disturbingly grey as if the dust of a thousand kerbals was scattered here.. A reminder of the  all powerful kraken.. Evil things indeed... And disturbingly capable of reproduction given how ....unfĺat terrain has become in 1.05

 

Terrain detail doesnt fix it? KSC2 has a similar problem

But! Congratulations are in order.. You never gave up..never surrendered.. Even though indirectly it ended up the same as many illfated missions..becoming one with the ground.. Take pride in that

Edited February 4, 2016 by Overland

[Evanitis]

14 minutes ago, Overland said:

Terrain detail doesnt fix it? KSC2 has a similar problem

I'm pretty sure it's intended. Or at least it's this way for a while. I visited the place in 1.0.4 (almost stock, nothing installed that had anything to with terrain), and it was submerged too. KSC2 was totally fine.

EDIT: Ahh, it's -this- thread. Since I posted, I'll be on-topic too for a bit. The kerbals I envision always sacrifice their lives gladly for the betterment of Kerbalkind, so I rarely get emotionally invested. Guess it also matters that I'm not hardcore enough to restrict my quicksave use. But there was a time where I landed a small, low-tech plane on a peak (after many tries) for a contract. It flipped a tiny bit. No damage was done, but Val struggled -really desperately- for like an hour to somehow nudge the plane into a takeoff position - without pushing it off from the cliff.

^no matter how good it looks, that solution didn't work. A less spectacular one much later did.

Edited February 4, 2016 by Evanitis

[Kerbal101]

1 hour ago, Overland said:

My god, its full of mountains!!

Ahh mountains.. Eater of planes..kilometre wide unintended docking ports of landers.. Genset consuming fiends of trains.. Each disturbingly grey as if the dust of a thousand kerbals was scattered here.. A reminder of the  all powerful kraken.. Evil things indeed... And disturbingly capable of reproduction given how ....unfĺat terrain has become in 1.05

 

Terrain detail doesnt fix it? KSC2 has a similar problem

But! Congratulations are in order.. You never gave up..never surrendered.. Even though indirectly it ended up the same as many illfated missions..becoming one with the ground.. Take pride in that

Yes, I did create VTOL's in stock; but with KAX+TweakScale (on primary engine), I have this:

Unfortunately, I never experienced pre-1.0.5 versions and I have no mods influencing surface of planets; so this has to be the lower detail setting.
Another unhappy trait of KSP, using just one core, and I have a 5-year old AMD.
Still, I am very happy it processes a dozen of mods without getting into any issues (x64 linux here).
So long, it does not cause crash, may it float under textures. Perhaps, it has activated itself. None can understand nature of monolith.

 

[Esme]

Unfortunately, I can't provide pictures, as nothing but a video of my desktop (which I still don;t know how to do - must learn, one day) would have done the experience justice. I have posted this elsewhere, incidentally, but can't recall where.

 

It was my first 3-man capsule lander, sent to deliver extra crew to my small but expanding Minmus base, back in an earlier version of KSP.  For some reason, whilst I could get ships buiult from 1.5m parts to perform perfectly on jobs around Kerbin or Minmus, my luck with 3.0m designs had been apalling.  But after testing first by launching one with a single crew member into Kerbin orbit and seeing how much dV I had left, it was time to send the first 3-man crew I'd ever launched, to Minmus.

And amazingly, everything went reasonably well at first, but if I recall correctly, the trajectory was a bit off and needed some correction. Then some more correction. Injection into Minmus orbit was a bit ropey - and so on. Suffice to say that by now, the surface of Minmus  was the only place the capsule could reach (it should've had sufficient dV to be able to return to Kerbin from Minmus orbit, if need be), but that was Ok, because the Minmus base included a fuel refinery (I was using the Kethane mod)

 

So the ship was carefully aimed at a landing close to the base, but the fuel margin was thin. And somehow, the ship seemed to just slowly be leaking dV (almost certainly I was simply just having a bad day and doing things inefficently, but it seemed that the ship was jinxed!).  I was now using manouvering jets to try to help slow the thing down as well, and accidentally nearly set the thing tumbling. More fuel wasted.

 

The design of the ship was a 3m fuel tank of similar height to the capsule directly under the capsule, then a 1.5m drum of monoprop. The main engine was directly under the monoprop, but the tiny auxiliary engines were attached to the sides of the main fuel tank, along with the manouvering thrusters and the landing legs.

 

By now, the ship is coming in too fast at about maybe 30 degrees from vertical, and was durned near out of any kind of fuel or reaction mass. I couldnt bea rteh thought of losing all three of teh crew, so I quickly made one of them EVA, hoping to get at least one of tehm down on their jetpack, but too late! he exited teh capsule only a fraction of a second before the ship hit with a flash and a boom. The Kerbal I;d EVA'd was flung off in a low, fast arc, and my stomach squirmed - I felt sure I was about to see a Kerbal pulped by smashing their space-suited body into the landscape at high  speed. But no! They bounced! Surely the next impact would kill them? I cringed, in anticipation. Astonishingly, the kerbal survived four or five successive impacts before skidding to a halt. I yipped in delight, and got him to stand up when my mouth fell open again; I was dumbfounded.

Entering from the left of the screen was the ship, skidding along on the capsule side, nose-down. The main engine and the monoprop tank were gone, and two of the landing legs had buckled, but the ship was otherwise intact, and the crew had survived!  It was so perfectly timed that it could have been a cartoon, it honestly was. And so unexpected - when I heard that bang on impact, I had thought the entire ship destroyed.

 

The icing on the cake was that, having repaired the landing legs, and finding a couple of spare spherical monoprop tanks, and some spare solar panels to replace some that had been lost during the ships eventful landing,  the ship was refuelled, and, after some careful experimentation, righted. Due to Minmus' low gravity, the remaining miniature engines were sufficient to be able to get the ship into Minmus orbit and return it to Kerbin, so the pilot was able to get the ship home where it could be properly rebuilt! 

 

I've never had a ten-fifteen minutes so full of highs and lows and tension, either before or since,  as that landing on Minmus with a 3-man ship!

[Vermil]

Well, there was the time when Bob went EVA during a ballistic trajectory and failed to board his pod before re-entry. I was sure he was going to die then, but I did my damnest and braked as much as his fuel lasted before impact. Luckily, he landed on his head and bounced like a mile high. When he was done bouncing around there was nothing wrong with him.

There was the time Bill was returning from a Minmus landing and crossed Mun's path and got slingshot into a wild orbit with insufficient fuel to return ( I made my burns blind in those days, I didn't understand the maneuvering node). Luckily, he eventually crossed Mun's path again and was flung straight into Kerbin. I just loved that.

There was the time I got Jeb, Bill and Bob into a bad, low orbit round Jool. I tried and tried. It took me about 140 days (ingame) and uncounted orbits, always on the verge of disaster, fuel steadily depleting (avoiding encounters which flung them into Jool), before I managed to get a positive slingshot lifting them up to Laythe. That was a great triumph, because I was very close to giving up and having lost most hope.

 

 

They then made my first manned landing on Laythe and successfully returned to Kerbin on fumes and a drop.

 

Edited February 4, 2016 by Vermil

[pandaman]

Some great experiences on here.  Here's mine. ..

In an earlier version (pre reentry heat damage) I planned a Duna expedition to plant flags and return home from the three anomalies there (coordinates courtesy of the@MalfunctionM1Ke spoiler thread).

My plan was for a 2 crew team for each anomaly in their own ship with four probes to provide inital reconnaissance and location reference, a lander/rover drive around to find the anomaly if my landings weren't too accurate and a separate lander to collect the crew from the surface and return them to orbit as well as providing a rescue capability.  This would be supported by another 'auxiliary' ship for the return of all crews to Kerbin in one vessel that also carries a spare rescue lander and probes - just in case.

Due to my inexperience and cautious nature I decided to double up - again just in case. This brought my total to 8 ships, 6 Explorers and 2 Auxiliaries for the expedition. 

The launch and initial transfer phase went to plan with encounters with Duna set with a few days variation due to flight trajectory variations.

Sadly 2 Explorers succumbed to a Kraken bug on Duna SOI entry and were lost (lucky I brought extra), I was deeply saddened by the loss, but thankful it wasn't my direct fault. 

The probes deployed effectively enough near their targets, and the crews followed using the probes positions as markers to get closer to the anomalies.  The Curiosity Camera and SSTV crews found their objectives without undue drama, while the Face crew got a little 'over enthusiastic' and wrecked their rover forcing them to take a (frankly deserved) long walk to their destination. 

So, anomalies found and flags planted it's time to head home. Landers were despatched to collect the crews who all had fairly short drives to get to them, apart from the Face crew who had to walk again. 

The SSTV and Curiosity crews got to orbit and rendezvous with the Auxiliary safely, but the Face crew had problems (again) the lander ran out of fuel and couldn't get a stable orbit so one got out to push, which failed, so he tried to get back in, which failed also. This left one Kerbal in an out of fuel lander and another effectively in freefall from orbit.

So, the free fall guy was able to use his jet pack to get a 'safe', but awkward 40 x150 orbit while the other was able to redeploy the lander's chutes to land safely back on the surface. A 'spare' lander was dropped to pick up the guy on the surface while the 'spare' auxiliary managed to pick up the orbiting Kerbal and get him to the return vessel.

Now with all crews safely in the return auxiliary it was time to wait for the transfer window and go home.  The feeling of relief and achievement when the chutes opened safely on Kerbin then the cabin came to rest on flat enough ground and the 'recover vessel' tab opened is one that will live with me forever.

I now plan to do similar expeditions to all bodies in 1.1

[GarrisonChisholm]

I had a somewhat emotional expedition just recently, and it started innocuously.

I generally don't do the orbital rendezvous rescues.  I have retrieved 2 (they both had cool names, and I felt I should at least prove to myself that I could do it), but I find the endeavor a bit tedious and the EVA travel slightly nerve-racking.  So I was trying to get a contract I could do, and bypassing the foolish ones and rescues, when I saw one that stopped me; "Rescue Nina Kerman."  ...Nina is my younger daughter's name.  So, ...Crap.  How can you *not* rescue the Kerbal with your daughter's name??  So, I rescued her, but then had to get her up to speed with the rest of my astronauts, as I now figured she should be my first Kerbal to set foot on Duna.

The Mars II vehicle (my Duna ship) was tested on a Mun landing.  It was a close thing, as the craft was heavy and its "suicide burn" starting altitude was about 14km.  However, as I posted in the "What did you do today" thread, we succeeded, and the pictured Kerbal is Nina.  However, then mission control started to become concerned.

The craft was shut-down and stable on the munar surface, but Jeb noticed that the resources board was showing that there was positive ablator burn.  Mission Control checked the thermostats (one mounted on each 2-engine nuclear pod for just this purpose) and saw the temps were north of 700 K and rising.  We checked everything, there was nothing active, so the only conclusion was that the 8 nuclear engines had generated so much heat that they could not radiate it; the ship was slowly cooking itself to death.

Not wanting to see what would happen to the 110 ton craft if those engines exploded on the surface, the ship launched in emergency to make munar orbit at least, and then once we saw Kerbin rise we just kept burning, as the ship glowed more and more red (pictures available but not present).  Halfway home the ablator finally stopped burning off, having lost 299 of 800 points, and temperatures started to fall.  The whole time, worried more than any person Reasonably should have, because Nina Kerman was on board.

They recovered safely, but that was the most hair raising 45 minutes I'd yet had.

[Rarity]

A long time ago I had this huge trip planned to Laythe with my best crew onboard.  I play with crew respawns disabled so I try all I can to keep them alive but I'm really bad with orbital maneuvers and fuel management, but I thought I had compensated enough.  Anyway, I got to Laythe and detached my lander to take Jeb and Bill down to the surface.  All good so far, I was feeling great about it.  They frolicked about and had their fun, then returned to the lander to rendezvous with the return stage where Bob and I believe another Kerbal, probably Doodhat, were waiting.  But I had forgot the parachutes and had to do a powered landing, which used too much fuel so I couldn't quite make it back into orbit.  The lander was sub orbital and decaying rapidly, over the course of maybe five minutes.  I switched to the transfer and burned down to get close to the lander (it was high enough that I could force a change to a different craft to put it on rails so it didn't decay until I got close) but there was way too much turbulence to dock it.  So I took a risk and EVA'd Bill out and flew to the transfer stage without too much trouble but I was going down fast.  I switched back and got Jeb out.  The wind was getting really strong and I almost lost him but made it back to the transfer stage.  I thought I was clear but the ship had a TWR of like 0.5, even on Laythe.  I burned with all my might but ultimately fell to the planet's surface.  I fought to the bitter end, pointing the crew capsules up to maybe have a nice crumple zone.  There was a 4-crew capsule near the top with Jeb in his own pod as the tip, and upon impact everything was destroyed but Jeb's pod.  He was the only survivor.  He was the one I was most worried about losing, but in the process of saving him I lost three other amazing Kerbals and Jeb was stranded.  It was a very bitter victory.

[SpaceplaneAddict]

Like when BOTH of my Jool-5 ISRU attempts were lost/stranded in space? When I cried then tore out a few keys?

[Brainlord Mesomorph]

When  I gave up on the Joolian Exploratory Fleet  

A massive fleet, every available ship, every last Kerbal. It took MONTHS! I started in version 0.25 and by the time I got to Jool you guys where playing 1.05.  I even had a poll asking if I should continue. The Poll said NO, but I kept going anyway.

I just wanted to know if the designs would work. Until I realized that it just didn't matter anymore. None of it work in the new game. I still have the saved game in a separate folder. I think 10 of the 12 ships are in orbit. And I just gave up and started over in 1.05

 

Edited February 9, 2016 by Brainlord Mesomorph

[Geschosskopf]

On 2/3/2016 at 5:34 AM, Overland said:

anyone else? 

It was way back when the update from 0.20 to 0.21 broke my save, destroying the whole space empire I'd built from scratch.  I took this rather hard.

But once bitten, twice shy.  So now I don't form deep and lasting commitments to stuff in KSP because I know it'll only break my heart again eventually.  This doesn't stop me from becoming quite infatuated with things, but I now view such relationships as wild flings, to be enjoyed for the brief time they last and then no regrets when they're over because then it's time for the next fling.

[Andem]

My first manned Mun landing went horribly wrong. 2 Kerbals on the Mun's surface, having a whale of a time. When they got into the lander, the game bigged out. I use USILS and I use no respawn or quickloads unless the game crashed. Two EVAs later they were stuck on the Mun. I sent a myriad of rescue vessels, but they died on the Mun anyway.

[bncrock]

My .24 save laid dormant in the clutter of folders in my computer. Recently, I pulled it out and ran it in my 1.0.5 game. Aftet almost two years I revisited my biggest save and finally took my interplanetary craft, which had been in orbit for less than 2 real years, to duna. I encountered a few problems (objects inside each other, fuel lines breaking, non retractable solar pannels getting ripped off during my aerobrake) but I put it to use and felt good about myself. Also, I completed a moon base concept that I put togethet long ago and put it on the moon.

[DMSP]

Well, it was in my 0.90 save. As 1.0 came out, I did a final return home call.

5 years after that call, my last 3 Kerbals from my Jool Return ship (4 "Onion" Orion-Style spacecraft docked) entered the atmosphere and landed in the shores off KSC.

I recovered them, all 90 Kerbals home, and shut down the save.

I then deleted it. It was a sad moment but it was only the end of the beginning.

[Mister Dilsby]

On 2/2/2016 at 6:34 AM, Overland said:

such as the end of a terribly dangerous landing after a long draining journey that brought a realworld sense of relief once it was over..maybe even shed a tear in pride or sadness for whats transpired

Yep. I couldn't shed that tear on the forum myself, so Jeb did it for me. This was the end of my first book here. I couldn't believe I was never going to fly that ship again!

...but since this is Kerbfleet, we didn't weep for long  Jeb dried his eyes, we cashed the funds, and moved on.

 

[corvustech]

For me, it was probably my most horrifying KSP experience.  Truly creepy. 
An asteroid of decent size was entering Kerbin's SOI and was traveling at a speed similar to Kerbin's relative to the sun.  This meant it was only entering the SOI, but I would have significant margin for error on the intercept, as it'd be in town for a little while.  Science had just been introduced, and I had a KLAW-equipped tri-engine vessel already at 200/200 around Kerbin.  I couldn't ask for a better opportunity to capture my first asteroid than this. 

The crew in this case were three "hired" Kerbals.  All white spacesuit types.  The pros were on Minmus and couldn't be bothered. With KAS parts in the cans and plenty of fuel I started my approach.  It wasn't long before the Trident vessel had a visual on the asteroid.  I was excited.  Thrilled, even.   Then, there was darkness.  

I sat in darkness for a bit, unable to help the crew of this little ship.  I wondered, as it was silent and all I could see was a navball that wasn't doing anything, what had occurred.   Eventually I had to Alt-F4 to quit.  I reloaded the game, and simply used Resume, but I did not end up where my manual quicksave had left me.  Naturally, I went to mission control and found that the ship was quite close to the asteroid, and so I switched to it. 

Terror.  Three little terrified faces with red lighting because of the suddenly depleted electricity, but rotating in light from the sun through the windows.  Other than that, my view was black and I watched as the altitude descended from 999999999 to -1111111 and lower.  At -7777777 I tried to Alt-F$ and reload the save again.  The wiki said the Hell Kraken only struck EVA'ing Kerbals!  How was this happening?!?!!

When I reloaded, the asteroid was gone.  So was the ship.  And the crew.  That Asteroid....was a Kraken Egg.  Three brave Kerbals died so that the rest of Kerbin, apparently, could live. 

[luizopiloto]

The first time I went to Eve with crew... I wondered, designed and tested everything on Kerbin... no mods... not even KER... and everything went fine... no need to send a rescue mission... and I discovered, Kerbals on command seats weights 94Kg... I had to improve the return vehicle for the other missions to have a better Dv margin...

[purpleivan]

Difficult to pick just one moment, so I've picked two.

The first (which I'm sure a lot of players would pick) was my first manned Mun landing. I'd built up to this Apollo style with a Kerbin orbit test of my command module and lander (with separate descent and ascent stages), a Munar orbital mission and finally a third mission to land on the surface. The experience was sheer terror during the landing as it felt like I was running low on fuel during the descent (I made it down with about 10% left in the descent stage), followed by the excitement of having made it down in one piece.

The Second experience was when exploring the abandoned airfield near the KSC, which I was doing with a little lander/rover that I rocketed then parachuted onto the island. After a couple of minutes driving around the hangars suddenly the view switched to thousands of kilometers from Kerbin with only the Mk2 Lander Can of the rover in view, containing Rolley Kerman who ended up lost in space. No fuel, no engines to burn it with if I'd had any, just the lander can.

Rolley had fallen victim to the "anomaly" on the island. Tragic loss.

Edited March 15, 2016 by purpleivan

[Polar Explorer]

     It was my first Mun mission,let alone first week in KSP.I was in low munar orbit and started my descent,everything was pretty good until the landing.One:I skip the surface horizontally and one landing gear is broken off.Two:I had to fly over to find a new spot because there was nothing flat to land on.Then gravity hit me and RIP Jeb.