Jool 500 Kolonization Challenge

[septemberWaves]

This is basically exactly the reason I didn't include EPL. The challenge is supposed to be semi-realistic, and although in future we will be building things off-world with ISRU methods, it'll be centuries before we can do that with any reasonable degree of advancement - possibly even millennia. I would add in Civilian Population if it gets updated, because any real colony will need to be self-sustaining in terms of people as well (though adding Civilian Population would mean a reworking of some challenge contracts).

[Maxsimal]

Gonna try this out once mods are updated to 1.1.2

[Jetski]

Didn't get pics this time, but after a hilarious EPL interlude, and a failed attempt to become proficient at UKS, the mission continues with my MKS-Lite/USI-LS/Deepfreeze mods.  First massive colony ship has a Jool intercept, and I launched a re-designed Laythe Supply base that should be able to produce quite a surplus of resources.  Both caught the same window as my experimental floating base and the Skycrane for rescuing defunct craft in-system.  Onwards!

Edited May 7, 2016 by Jetski

[Wardstone111]

I have just been looking at the very small banned list and just thought it may be better that instead of Koperincus being banned, make it so ay mod that changes the posision or orbital bodies of Kerbin, the Jool system and anything in between.

This allows people to use things like the outer planets mod as it does not actually do anything to he challenge.

Edited May 7, 2016 by Wardstone111
Adding a reason

[RA3236]

1 hour ago, Wardstone111 said:

I have just been looking at the very small banned list and just thought it may be better that instead of Koperincus being banned, make it so ay mod that changes the posision or orbital bodies of Kerbin, the Jool system and anything in between.

This allows people to use things like the outer planets mod as it does not actually do anything to he challenge.

And the Sun too  

[Jhawk1099]

Here's a video of testing out SSTOs and their practicality for transporting things around. Not made explicitly for this challenge but testing for this challenge was part of it.

SSTO challenge/testing video

 

[Admac]

Any thoughts on allowing EPL use only in Kerbin orbit?

That would allow some latitude in making non aerodynamic vessels and wouldn't be that unreasonable to expect that at least some parts are assembled on orbit.

[Jetski]

 

Hard to calculate costs for EPL vessels for scoring, though

[Jhawk1099]

@Jetski is it possible to created a closed loop life support system with USI life support? yeah I know there are greenhouses but they require fertilizer+mulch to operate. And yeah you get mulch from Kerbals but I have yet to find a way to create fertilizer perhaps @RoverDude the creator of the mod has an answer. I ask this because I don't want to constantly be shuttling fertilizer to the system.

[RoverDude]

You can convert a number of resources into fertilizer - the 'how' depends on what other mods you are using.

[Chris97b]

23 hours ago, Jetski said:

 

Hard to calculate costs for EPL vessels for scoring, though

It wouldn't be bad at all, just add in the VAB cost of the ship. Obviously this would screw with the scoring, as the cost of the booster required to orbit the ship wouldn't get taken into account, but honestly in looking over my spreadsheet so far with recovering stages I'm actually spending very little in the way of funds to get to Kerbin orbit. (Last example: Cost of payload: 208,216; Cost at launch: 368,434; Recovered from spent stages: 121,111.87; Net cost into low Kerbin orbit: 39,106.13) Less than 40K net funds to orbit almost 150 tons is peanuts compared to the overall cost of the program.

This kinda goes hand-in-hand with my idea of an EPL category too though. As long as you're comparing apples to apples it doesn't really matter how you calculate the scores, as long as everyone is on a level playing field

I still haven't started designing my colony ship yet, but I will almost assuredly be using EPL to assemble it in orbit. Part of the fun for me in this is designing a Jool program that at least seems somewhat realistic, and a massive colony ship in my opinion should look like it was assembled in orbit, with bits and bobs sticking out everywhere. A ship built to operate exclusively in a vacuum should *look* like a ship built to operate in a vacuum

As a sidenote, this has been really fun so far. I've got 10 ships staged for a Jool transfer window coming up in about 30 days, and every ship I launch it seems like I come up with ideas for 2 more

 

 

[YarTheBug]

Hey, eloquentJane!

I believe I'll give this a try. I have a few mods I'd like to request clearance for which mainly have to do with ease of play. The major exception is HooliganLabs Airships . I've included a list of what I'll be using, and a separate one for what else I'd like to use.

I'll start a new save tonight and see if I can figure out RemoteTech and USI Life Support (I've only ever used TAC). I'll wait until I hear back from you about the possible mods to be added to the "approved" list.

Cheers!

Yar

 

Mods I plan to use:

·         Atomic Age

·         B9 Aerospace

·         Community Tech Tree

·         Connected Living Space

·         DarkSideTechnology

·         DeepFreeze Continued

·         Infernal Robotics

·         Karbonite

·         Karbonite Plus

·         Kerbal Alarm Clock

·         Kerbal Attachment System

·         Kerbal Inventory System

·         Kerbal Joint Reinforcement

·         Kerbal Planetary Base Systems

·         Near Future Technologies

o   Construction

o   Electrical

o   Propulsion

o   Solar

·         Science Revisited Revisited

·         Surface Experiment Pack

·         RemoteTech (Starting with Delay…)

·         Tarsier Space Technology

·         USI Kolonization Systems

·         USI Life Support

Others I’d like to use if they can be added to the “approved” list:

·         [X] Science! (Science Checklist)

·         Flight Manager for Reusable Stages (Lets you jump back in time and control dropped vessels)

·         Final Frontier (Track individual kerbal achievements)

·         HooliganLabs Airships (Airships! Imagine a Floating colony on Jool herself)

·         Inline Ballutes (High-altitude balloon/parachutes. Alternative to heat shields.)

·         Precise Node (Maneuver node editor)

·         Routine Mission Manager (Allows repeated missions sans tedium)

·         StageRecovery (Recover stages which have sufficient T/W or Parachutes)

·         TAC Fuel Balancer (Allows fuel to be moved between parts or dumped)

·         TweakScale (Change the size of a part. Modifies capacity or power for new size.)

[captinjoehenry]

A newish mod I would recommend that you add would be the Sea Dragon mod.  It adds the real life proposed and designed super heavy sea launched sea dragon launch vehicle.  It was confirmed to in real life cost between 50 and 600 dollars per pound to orbit which is about 1/4 the cost of the saturn 5 launch vehicle.  It is also 23m in diameter and 150m long and can easily lift over 1000t to kerbin orbit and beyond.

mod: 

 

wiki page:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_Dragon_(rocket)

[Wardstone111]

On 11 May 2016 at 9:44 PM, YarTheBug said:

Hey, eloquentJane!

I believe I'll give this a try. I have a few mods I'd like to request clearance for which mainly have to do with ease of play. The major exception is HooliganLabs Airships . I've included a list of what I'll be using, and a separate one for what else I'd like to use.

I'll start a new save tonight and see if I can figure out RemoteTech and USI Life Support (I've only ever used TAC). I'll wait until I hear back from you about the possible mods to be added to the "approved" list.

TAC life support is now updated. I just thought you should know

[Wardstone111]

Also, I have stared using Kerbal construction time to make it more difficult, changed from USI LS to TAC LS, KRASH which is to do with KCT, Heat control (but not currently for Jool), Cx aerospace (but not currently for Jool) and KW rocketry (but not currently for Jool).

[quarrion]

Hello, little progress so far (finals) :/ I just wanted to make a little mod request. Including Hooligan Airship mod would enable us to build floating airship-colonies on Jool which is ultra-cyberpunk-cool

[Luovahulluus]

Just wanted to chime in and say I'm starting a new career game to attempt this challenge. I already did it once, but managed to corrupt my saves playing around with installing more mods when moving from 1.1 to 1.1.2. I'm trying to keep it quite realistic: I will not bring with me lots of stuff I don't need, like a lifter that has no specific purpose planned. I guess that makes it an easy level entry.

I'm using USI life support and a bunch of other mods.

@eloquentJane, on page 4 you say "As for the career games, I did suggest having maximum returns on funds and science so that it's quicker to unlock everything". The first post doesn't mention maximum funds being allowed. Are they?

 

[septemberWaves]

I'm not going to allow EPL currently. That may change in the future, as I do like the idea of orbital construction around Kerbin for awkwardly-shaped spacecraft, but I will need to come up with some rules regarding it that I don't have time to figure out right now. However, KIS and KAS can often accomplish constructing things that can't be easily put in fairings, as can Infernal Robotics (although I understand not wanting to use IR due to its tendency to have bugs).

I'm not going to add in the Sea Dragon. Whilst it looks to be a very well-made mod, the launcher seems rather overpowered even for purposes of this challenge. If anything can't be launched with SpaceY Extended (and from testing I know that those 7m parts have an enormous capacity) then it's probably more realistic to assemble it in orbit. And in any case, the forum thread for that mod states that it's not stock balanced, so it's not an option to add.

@YarTheBug I have no issue with any of those mods except for Stage Recovery. Many of them are utility mods that have no effect on game physics and don't add parts, and any mod like that is allowed (I need to update the original post to say so, I realize that I overlooked it). I'd be a bit careful with floating Jool colonies though; definitely do some testing first to make sure that they neither get deleted nor explode when you time warp or switch vessels. In the case of Stage Recovery, I'm not going to allow it because I'd prefer that you use Flight Manager for Reusable Stages so that you actually have to control the dropped stage and land it yourself.

@Wardstone111 I have no issue with any of those mods. I'd overlooked Cx Aerospace, I meant to add it in earlier; and the same can be said for several of Nertea's mods including Heat Control.

@Luovahulluus I've been meaning to rework the CHALLENGE involving freighters for specific masses; I haven't had time to find a good alternative that I'm happy with, and probably won't for a couple of weeks as I have exams to focus on. I thought I had mentioned maximum funds in the original post but apparently not. Yes though, maximum funds are allowed because they don't actually affect the price of rockets and this isn't meant to be a challenge in gathering funds.

I'll update the original post with all of these changes later, as I currently don't have much time on my hands.

[Admac]

Communication Sat Scoring Concern;

I do not like the scoring/rules for comsats, and I think they can be made better.

Based on the height of orbits, there are several ways that you can get 100% coverage with as few as 4 sats per body. I think the full coverage challenge should be 4x per body instead of 6, and the challenge I suppose can be w/e but there are lots of inclinations that make 6 almost 100% double coverage. Also the current scoring calls for 6 comsats around each of 5 moons + 4 around Jool, for a fairly skinny 8 points. Launching 34 sats into precise timed orbits seems like it should be worth more. Esp considering they'll have to be individually scripted with massive RT delays.

Also; Orbital transfer stations with 20+ kerbals in them will obviously have antennas, I assume they can be counted as comsats?

Edited May 19, 2016 by Admac

[Jetski]

Chapter 7 is up - the first Kerbals are orbiting Vall, and my first land base (a converted supply ship with habs attached) is camped out in the lowlands of Vall.  10-Kerbal base, and 5 Kerbals in orbit for now.  Just set up my correction burn for the  frozen 100-Kerbal colony ship, I need to get these bases up and running!

 

Just a suggestion for RT commsat networks: If you can conclusively prove you have 100% coverage all the time from fewer sats, that is cool, and maybe @eloquentJane can give you a pass.  If not, just put up 4x4 and call it a day, as sat launches are far from the most difficult part of this challenge.  I'm interested to see some of the cleverer RT designs, but I think people are having trouble getting them working permanently in practice what with timewarp and all.  If you have a better solution maybe show a few screenshots to prove your point?

Edited May 19, 2016 by Jetski

[septemberWaves]

There's a couple of things I need to rework. I'm currently in the middle of some exams so I don't have a huge amount of time on my hands, but as soon as I am able to I'll be making some changes (primarily for challenges involving freighters and communication networks).

[Chris97b]

Just FYI, it looks like there's a fork of Civilian Population that's been ported to 1.1.2 It's still fairly experimental, but it seems to me like this would be a really good addition to the challenge

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/140127-112ckan-civilian-populations-revived/

[macktruck6666]

Seriously, how am I supposed to get 500 kerbals in Career. That's 500 different rescue missions and paying for them costs to much and updates to slowly.

[Admac]

well it only take like 20 minutes to rescue a kerbal from the kerbin system, so just knock that out in the first 10000 or so minutes of your career!

But if you are one of those people that doesn't want spend 17+ hours rescuing dudes, i suppose there are a few mods that can help, astronaut overhaul and deepfreeze come to mind. oh and Civpop.

 

[quarrion]

Any chance of adding KSPRC visual pack? It contains Kopernicus but all planets remain in the same place - it completely revamps terrain and removes many negative height-map bugs