Alternis Kerbol Travelling Circus -- Episode 34: Over the Hills and Far Away

[KAL 9000]

Not to be outdone by @cratercracker, I'll contribute something to the Circus!

*cue old-timey adventure music*

On a lonely moon slowly spinning its way into damnation 

A race of not-so-intelligent beings evolve and attempt to make their way to the stars

They will suffer many failures...

And endure many hardships...

And although these explosions look cool...

They will eventually make it...

Hopefully.

THIS INFOMERCIAL INSPIRATIONAL MESSAGE HAS BEEN BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE TRAVELING CIRCUS

 

Edited September 12, 2017 by KAL 9000

[Geschosskopf]

  On 9/12/2017 at 4:13 PM, KAL 9000 said:

On a lonely moon slowly spinning its way into damnation 

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LOL!  A very appropriate description.  Thanks for the inspirational message.  It and the mission flag seem to have helped.

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EPISODE 4: You Can't Always Get What You Want

  Reveal hidden contents

 

The ongoing ice cream crisis was still top priority and the Alternis Kerbol Travelling Circus next built a 2-seat rover to go get the required surface samples to complete that research.  2 seats, of course, for redundancy.  Even if pods are no longer supposed to explode, the Circus doesn't trust them yet.  So Bob and Samner went and got them.  As it turned out, both were needed because the newly developed ladders didn't work so Bob couldn't get back into the rover after getting his sample and had to walk home while Samner continued to the 2nd site.

This accomplished, it turned out that botanical research was required, so the Boffins modified the I Scream You Scream by doubling its length and adding a Botany Lab to the back of it, to grow plants needed for the botanical experiment.  Once it was ready to go, Bob and Samner got in and parked it beside the runway for the the 28 days it would take to grow the plants to start with.  The Scientists insisted the plants had to be grown in the lab, not just plucked from the ground where they were readily available.

Unfortunately, as with many MOST other things about the AKTC, technical glitches caused the screenshots propaganda photos of both these awesome rovers to be unavailable.  They were accidentally deleted lost by a careless intern, who was immediately purged.  But Bob and Samner will be gardening for some time to come, so hopefully another photo op will arise.

Shortly after the "Botany Bay" rover drove off, part of the SPH roof collapsed.  However, nothing important was damaged and worker casualties were within acceptable limits, so life went on.  The were no repair costs associated with this accident, thanks to a very effective cover-up by Mission Control.

Then it was time to cram Handin into GoOrbit 4.  By now, the Circus had developed EVA technology and wanted Handin to get out and get a sample of space, in the unlikely event he got there.  Thus, welding the hatch shut was no longer an option.   Luckily, the Scientists has recently developed the Kerbal Tranquilizer Mk 1, a specially modified section of lead pipe carefully calculated to render a Kerbal unconscious for enough time to launch the rocket without him jumping out, and with a better than 50/50 chance of not inflicting permanent injury.  This was tested on Handin with satisfactory results, but the Boffins were convinced they could do better and began experimenting with remote-activated hatch locks.

And so GoOrbit 4 lifted off.  It was immediately obvious that the Circus wasn't going to space today AGAIN because the main lifter engine failed.  But Mission Control decided to see how high they could get it anyway, or perhaps set a new distance record for the rocket.  This did not go well.  After dumping the useless lower lifter stage, the 2nd stage proved uncontrollable.  It lacked tail feathers, begin intended to operate only when the rocket was already high and fast enough not to need fins.  Thus, it immediately began tumbling and slowing down.  As a result, the dead lower lifter stage, still careening upwards with all the momentum of its full tanks and in a perfectly straight line thanks to its collection of fins, caught up with and rammed the upper part of the rocket from behind.  As luck would have it, the upper stages were at that moment pointing more towards space than not, so the massive explosion happened well behind the Mk 1 Capsule OF DEATH.  Utterly alone amongst all sentient beings in the Multiverse in celebrating this outcome, Handin and his Mk 1 Capusle OF DEATH tumbled away unscathed.  If he'd already recovered from his tranquilizer, Handin surely blacked out again from this.  But no matter---all Circus vehicles have autotonomy so the capsule jettisoned what little remained attached behind it, deployed its chutes, and came down safely in Scrap Metal Bay, still within sight of KSC.

10 days later, GoOrbit 5 was ready to go and it was Jack's turn again.  By then, the Boffins had their remote hatch lock ready to test.  This was deemed a very important advance because Handin's debriefing/dissection hadn't yielded any useful information, thanks to him being KO'd the whole time.  Now that shouldn't be a problem.

Anyway, GoOrbit 5 miraculously got off the ground and through SRB separation without anything going wrong except the control system, which caused the rocket to start leveling out too low again.  Mission Control was not taken by surprise this time, however, and although the upper ascent stage still gave some trouble, it managed to get high enough to reach space.  As with the only GoUp probe to reach space, however, it was on a sub-optimal trajectory with its Ap rather higher than desired.  Even worse, shortly before leaving the atmosphere, the OMS engine failed, meaning the only usable fuel was what little remained in the upper ascent stage.

It took the boffins a while to realize this, however, and they almost circularized Jack's orbit at 757km.  This would have left GoOrbit 5 in orbit permanently, which was unacceptable as that would have meant the loss of most of its Science!

While Mission Control wondered what to do about this, at least the remote hatch lock worked fine and Jack was coaxed outside with a few zaps on his shock collar.  He acquired a sample of space in an empty mayonnaise jar.  Various other bits of Science! were obtained automatically.

By now Mission Control had hatched a scam developed an amazing plan to salvage the mission.  Instead of circularizing at Ap, they burned just a small amount of the upper ascent stage fuel to raise the Pe to 75km, just clear of the atmosphere.  EPIKFAIL immediately wired funds to the Circus for achieving an orbital trajectory. 

Waiting only for this check to clear, Mission Control then immediately lowered the Pe back to 35km and jettisoned both the upper ascent stage and the dead OMS stage, to get them off the ship before they potentially blew up accidentally.  Of course, being rigged with TAC Self-Destruct charges to prevent the build-up of space junk, the stages then exploded intentionally    These were the first gratuitous explosions in the AKTC's history.

Then the GoObrit 5 payload re-entered.  Given that GoOrbit 4's heat shield had exploded (so KERBAL!), there was some concern that this would happen again.  Fortunately, however, the heat shield had no malfunctions until after it was no longer needed, and then it was just a slightly crumbling away instead of an explosion.  Also, all the parachutes managed to work right for once,, so that Jack returned to Kerbin safely.  Soon, he was on his way back to KSC for his debriefing/dissection, which provided much useful information as he'd remained conscious the whole trip.

If the general Kerbal population cared about the space program at all, or if the Circus cared anything about its astronauts, then Jack might be remembered as both the 1st Kerbal in space and the 1st Kerbal IN (but not TO) orbit.  But such care is lacking in both cases and Jack himself would rather forget the whole thing, so only the readers of this thread will mark these events .

 

Tune in next time for more of the slow spin into damnation.

Edited September 19, 2017 by Geschosskopf
removed and replaced excessive uses of "thus" to start sentences

[Angelo Kerman]

ROFL! Loving these reports. Leaking heat shields? That's a new one... I think it's the new MM patches for resources that are adding breakable fuel tanks to the heat shields. Fun, but not intended, heh.

[Geschosskopf]

  On 9/13/2017 at 4:47 AM, Angel-125 said:

ROFL! Loving these reports. Leaking heat shields? That's a new one... I think it's the new MM patches for resources that are adding breakable fuel tanks to the heat shields. Fun, but not intended, heh.

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Yeah ablator is a resource so heat shields are being treated as fuel tanks.  But that's fine.  We all remember tiles falling off the shuttle so that's how you rationalize leaks.  And while rhe graphics for catastrophic failure show an explosion, that can be considered a premature jettison.  So I wouldn't change a thing.

Besides, making heat shields out of explosive material is SO Kerbal 

Edited September 13, 2017 by Geschosskopf

[KAL 9000]

  On 9/13/2017 at 11:27 AM, Geschosskopf said:

This would have left GoOrbit 5 in orbit permanently, which was unacceptable as that would have meant the loss of most of its Science!

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Jack's well-being is, of course, of no concern. 

  On 9/13/2017 at 11:27 AM, Geschosskopf said:

Tune in next time for more of the slow spin into damnation.

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YES! My inspirational speech (and explosion GIFs) saved Jack's life the mission! 

And speaking of dead Kerbals... 

"Jebediah Kerman. Kerbonaut. A kerb barely alive. Gentlekerbs, we can rebuild him... Make him better, faster, stronger... the world's first bionic kerb..."

Edited September 13, 2017 by KAL 9000

[Geschosskopf]

  On 9/13/2017 at 2:21 PM, KAL 9000 said:

Jack's well-being is, of course, of no concern. 

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To the Circus, astronaut lives are only of concern as long as they have mission-critical tasks to perform.  Once those tasks are accomplished, they're of no more use than empty boosters.  Thus, the value of Kerbal lives varies with the mission.  If a Kerbal is needed to pump gas once every few centuries on Eeloo for all eternity,, then no effort will be spared to keep that Kerbal alive for all eternity  That's usually cheaper than sending out a new one every few centuries.  Otherwise, returning living Kerbals to Kerbin is only of value in so much as their debriefing/dissections enable the Scientists to increase the accuracy of their forecasts of the bare minimums of life support Kerbals will need to live long enough to do what the mission requires of them.

That said, most Kerbals in the Travelling Circus eventually become institutionalized which is, after all, the desired result of their biochemical indoctrination.  And it's often (but not always) cheaper to capitalize on this investment than to start over with newly press-ganged vagrants.  Thus, mission planning must take this into account as well..  Jack is a noob who is only alive today because 1) his pod has been rendered safe(r) since the early days of the AHTC, and 2) he's been to space so there was valuable info to be gained from a thorough debriefing/dissection.

 

  9 hours ago, KAL 9000 said:

YES! My inspirational speech (and explosion GIFs) saved Jack's life the mission! 

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Well, I wouldn't go THAT far, but Walt thought "slow spin into damnation" was the best marketing slogan ever, so it's now the AKTC's official tagline

[Geschosskopf]

EPISODE 5: Struggle

  Reveal hidden contents

 

The AKTC decided to follow up its success of getting a Kerbal into orbit (but not actually completing an orbit) by launching an orbital science station.  But this was a big, heavy, expensive piece of gear so the rather haphazard methods used by the GoUp and GoOrbit rockets wouldn't do.  No, all the potentially explosive parts would need thorough testing beforehand.  In this testing, explosions were desired, not only because they look cool but because these Kerbals learn a lot from failure.  So the Boffins first designed the ship so they'd know what it needed, then put the more volatile parts on a test stand, and ran this over and over again.  And it exploded many, many times, thus providing much good data.

While this was going on, the Scientists were farming Science! testing various science lab parts on the ground beside the runway.  This necessitated press-ganging a wad of new sciencemate strikers, but much was learned.

Another Scientific project was to finish off the ice cream research with some more surface samples.  The same old rover (only with much-improved ladders that now actually allowed re-entering the vehicle) was deployed for this.  As it happened, this sortie took place during a total eclipse caused by Jool.  For some reason, the sun was still visible through the giant planet.  There was much speculation about Jool's density (or lack thereof) and gravitational lensing.

At last, the test rig quit exploding so much so the Boffins figured they'd ironed out most of the bugs and built the full-scale Kerbin MOLE Mk 1, spent a couple weeks carefully integrating it, and wheeled it out for launch.  Whereupon 3 of its cluster of 4 main engines promptly failed and the great vehicle simply tipped over.  There are no pics of the actual explosion because I was too busy cursing to take them the camera was destroyed by its violence.

Fortunately, the launchpad wasn't too badly damaged and there was plenty of money left to build the Kerbin MOLE Mk 2, which had some improvements learned from the demise of the Mk 1.  2 weeks later, the Mk2 was ready and actually got into the intended 150km orbit without any serious failures.  That made 3 successful launches for the Circus.

By this time, Bob and Samner were finally done growing plants and quickly completed their botanical experiment.  So here's a belated pic of their ride, the Botany Bay.  NOTE:  Inside the botanical lab are 2 post-it notes.  One asks, "Who ate all the snacks?"  The other says, :"It was KKKKKKAAAAAAAAHHHHHNNNNNNN!!!!!"  So the "Botany Bay" name is doubly fitting   That, plus this episode's theme music being sung by the oritnal Captain Kirk.

Samner's long-duration rover ride made her the most experienced of the more expendable sciencemate strikers.  Thus, no sooner had she parked Botany Bay than she was immediately hustled aboard the new LKO Science Runner, along with one of the newer pressees, Dizer.  The LKO Runners are intended to be general resupply vehicles for orbital stations.  They can carry 2 Kerbals and the rear cockpit can be configured to hold a variety of supplies and/or special MOLE experiments.  That's what this one had, which is why it was called the Science Runner.  The Runner can carry 6 MOLE experiments but the MOLE itself can only hold 4.  The MOLE was launched with all 4 and the Runner had 2 more, so hopefully would come down with a full load of 6 eventually, providing nothing went too wrong.

As it happened, the Circus managed to do 2 successful launches in a row (that' now 4 total) , and Samner and Dizer arrived safe and sound at the Kerbin MOLE Mk 2.  The AKTC's first rendezvous and docking happened in the dark, as is only right and proper.

However, all was not well.  The Runner's OMS engine failed during 1st stage separation.  While the upper lifter stage turned out to have enough smash to make rendezvous, it didn't have enough left to deorbit the Runner, so there was no going home without fixing the 909 in the OMS stage.  And that engine was not accessible until the upper lifter stage was out of the way.  So once docked, Dizer EVA'd to get that squared away.

NOTE:  As a long-time HATER of the "new-fangled" Kerbal class system, I had instinctively set up BARIS so that specific skill was not required to fix stuff.  But that's an attitude from back in the day when all engineers could do was change tires, which EVERYBODY should know how to do.  However, with BARIS, engineers now have LOTS to do, and with MOLE, scientists have LOTS to do.  So after having Dizer fix this engine, I thought about it and decided maybe I'd go back and make BARIS engineer-specific.  After all, that would have given me a reason to send an engineer up to the station, with the potential for additional death and destruction.

Meanwhile, back on Kerbin, there were a number of contracts that required an airplane.  These had fallen out of vogue with the whole Turbopusher fiasco but now Mission Control wanted to try again, this time with a jet.  So the Boffins cobbled one together.  It had the newly developed Adjustable Landing Gear, which are now included in Kerbal Foundries.  These wheels have electric motors, allowing the plane to taxi without running the main engine, a potentially useful thing.  To test this out, the prototype plane (with Handin at the controls) was sent on a tour around KSP getting yet more ice cream surface samples.  Things went well until plane came to a hill too steep to climb with the electric motors, so Handin lit the jet engine for extra push.  And it exploded.  However, the blast propelled the plane over the crest and Handin was able to complete the contract.  There being, of course, no chance now of doing the contracts that actually required flying, the Recon Jet was ingloriously recovered.

The Circus, of course, plans to explore more than Kerbin eventually, but that will require setting up a communications network.  The 1st step of this was to attempt to put some relays in highly eccentric polar orbits around Kerbin.  So, the Kerbin Relay Mk 1 was born.  The 1-stage lifter had no trouble getting to a 150km parking orbit but the probe's own stage, which would carry the relay antenna into its high orbit, failed during ascent.  Thus, the mission was a failure right off the bat.  However, having a relay in LKO was still of some benefit so the empty lifter was staged off in a glorious gratuitous explosion.

Unfortunately, the staging caused all sorts of problems in the probe itself.  Not only did the relay antenna itself fail, rendering the whole show pointless, but a short-range antenna between the instrument package and the useless fuel tank exploded, blowing the probe in two.  An utter and complete waste.  And everything had been going so well to start with.  There was much cursing and smashing of monitors at Mission Control.

The only good news was that the Kerbin MOLE Mk 2 hadn't fallen apart yet, and in fact Samner and Dizer were making good progress on their load of experiments.  They had 3 of them complete by now, which were transferred into the Runner for the eventual trip home.

Still, the Boffins and Scientists in Mission Control were in a foul mood.  So, to cheer themselves up, Mission Control ordered MANY tests of the Recon Jet, watching it explode over and over again.  Able spacer Silong, a new pressee, no doubt lost his hearing by the time they were through.

 

 

Tune in next time for more of the slow spiral into damnation.

Edited September 19, 2017 by Geschosskopf
typos

[Angelo Kerman]

Oh my, That's frigging awesome! Love that somebody finally found the post-it notes in the Botany Bay. With all those plants they're growing, I wonder why they keep eating all the snacks...

[KAL 9000]

KNN: Kerbal News Network! News happens... or not!

BREAKING NEWS: Scientists have confirmed that Kerbin's orbit around Jool is decaying. In a hundred years, it will either crash into Jool or be torn apart by tidal forces. 

Intern Linus Kerman, the Circus boffin that this reporter was able to interview, said that the Circus "could care less". The Circus motto of slow spin into damnation seems oddly apt. 

Next Up: KNN's Movie Marathon Night kicks off with Illinois Kerman and the Noun of the Semi-Mystical MacGuffin!

[Cydonian Monk]

  On 9/16/2017 at 10:09 PM, Geschosskopf said:

The AKTC's first rendezvous and docking happened in the dark, as is only right and proper.

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  On 9/16/2017 at 10:09 PM, Geschosskopf said:

And it exploded.

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I'm starting to think the game knows you like your gratuitous explosions and has decided to add in a few extra just to keep you entertained. "I heard you like explosions...."

 

[Just Jim]

  On 9/17/2017 at 12:14 AM, KAL 9000 said:

Illinois Kerman and the Noun of the Semi-Mystical MacGuffin!

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I think I would pay to see this one... lmao.... 

[IncongruousGoat]

  On 9/16/2017 at 10:09 PM, Geschosskopf said:

Still, the Boffins and Scientists in Mission Control were in a foul mood.  So, to cheer themselves up, Mission Control ordered MANY tests of the Recon Jet, watching it explode over and over again.  Able spacer Silong, a new pressee, no doubt lost his hearing by the time they were through.

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Wait a minute... his? Are you sure about that? From the crew portrait it looks like Silong is female.

[Geschosskopf]

  On 9/16/2017 at 11:51 PM, Angel-125 said:

Oh my, That's frigging awesome! Love that somebody finally found the post-it notes in the Botany Bay. With all those plants they're growing, I wonder why they keep eating all the snacks...

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Your IVAs are the best!  Those who don't take the time to examine them are really missing out.  So many hilarious things like this all through your mods.  The Hacienda's claw to grab plush toys is still my favorite, even more than a disk case for Bill Space Program  

That said, I'm becoming highly suspicious of this whole "botanical" thing, which carries multiple meanings, especially because I can't preload tanks with "plants" on the open market.  At least I don't need (yet) to load tanks with butane for more advanced research. I have enough things exploding already, thanks  

 

  On 9/17/2017 at 12:14 AM, KAL 9000 said:

KNN: Kerbal News Network! News happens... or not!

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I'm pretty much speechless at this, and I'm quite drunk so that's saying a lot

 

  On 9/17/2017 at 12:34 AM, Cydonian Monk said:

 

I'm starting to think the game knows you like your gratuitous explosions and has decided to add in a few extra just to keep you entertained. "I heard you like explosions...."

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Glad you caught the shout-out.

There's a BIG difference between planned, gratuitous explosions, desired failures on the test stand, and mission-killing explosions.  But as ye sow, so shall ye reap so I guess Karma is catching up with me.

 

  On 9/17/2017 at 1:04 AM, Just Jim said:

I think I would pay to see this one... lmao.... 

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Me, too.

 

  On 9/17/2017 at 1:12 AM, IncongruousGoat said:

Wait a minute... his? Are you sure about that? From the crew portrait it looks like Silong is female.

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Silong looks like a guy when he's not screaming like a girl.  But in my universe, Kerbals are asexual fungi, just with different worker castes which modern society has made more and more redundant, so they're converging back to a single type.  I suppose Silong is further along this "trans-caste" path than most.

Edited September 17, 2017 by Geschosskopf

[Dman979]

Also quite fitting for a Kerbal who has gotten fed up with being bricked into a science compartment:

Farewell to your bricks and mortar,
Farewell to your dirty lies!
Farewell to your gangways and your gangplanks
And to hell with your overtime....

 

Really enjoying this, and I'm doubly glad that you're back.

[ElJugador]

Oh man, the press-ganging, boffin-purging, flotilla-flying, Pathfinder-using maniac is back! Augh yeah. But just one question: have you increased the part failure rate DRAMATICALLY here to have a more entertaining/realistic explosion frequency or is this BARIS' normal behavior as regards maintenance because if it's the latter, I'll have to reconsider getting it. No offense, Angel.

EDIT: One other thing: is the part of your exploits where you went to Sarnus recorded because I'd love to see what you did.

Edited September 18, 2017 by ElJugador

[Geschosskopf]

  On 9/17/2017 at 5:49 PM, Dman979 said:

Also quite fitting for a Kerbal who has gotten fed up with being bricked into a science compartment:

Farewell to your bricks and mortar,
Farewell to your dirty lies!
Farewell to your gangways and your gangplanks
And to hell with your overtime....

Really enjoying this, and I'm doubly glad that you're back.

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LOL, nice!  Sounds like the lower deck of the Circus has a new shanty    Thanks!  I'm quite flattered.

 

  On 9/17/2017 at 11:35 PM, ElJugador said:

Oh man, the press-ganging, boffin-purging, flotilla-flying, Pathfinder-using maniac is back! Augh yeah. But just one question: have you increased the part failure rate DRAMATICALLY here to have a more entertaining/realistic explosion frequency or is this BARIS' normal behavior as regards maintenance because if it's the latter, I'll have to reconsider getting it. No offense, Angel.

EDIT: One other thing: is the part of your exploits where you went to Sarnus recorded because I'd love to see what you did.

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Thanks!

BARIS settings...........    That's a complicated subject I don't fully understand but in general, it seems to work like this:  BARIS has 2 ways to kill you:  normal wear-and-tear and launch failures.  Normal wear and tear checks parts 1 or more times per day and they pass or fail based on their Mean Time Between Failures and Reliability, both of which increase the more times you fly that part.  I have this set to only 1 time per day and it really hasn't caused me any problems yet because nothing's been in flight long enough to matter.

What's causing my problems is the launch failures.  If this is on, every time you stage, it seems like every VULNERABLE part in the ship gets checked regardless of their MTBF,.  Thus, this is always hanging over your head all through the mission right up to deploying the chutes at the end, assuming you make it that far.

BARIS has a number of ways customize how harsh it is:

• You can turn off either the wear-and-tear or the launch failures completely.  Turning off launch failures will make you able to get to space as routinely as without BARIS and then you just have to worry about things gradually falling apart over time during the mission.
• You can adjust a slider that determines the difficulty of the failure checks.  Right now I've got it at the default "normal" position but it has 3 easier and 3 harder settings.  I'm beginning to think that if you have launch failures enabled, you should turn the difficulty down a bit.  So as I type this, I'm taking it down a notch to "easy" (it also has "very easy" and "super easy", plus "hard", "very hard", and "hard core").
• You can change the frequency of wear-and-tear checks.  I have this at the minimum of once per 6 hours, but you can increase this to hourly if you so desire.  IIRC the default is 2 checks per day (every 3 hours).  If you have nerfed the check difficulty, you might want to increase the check frequency.
• You can shield certain general classes of parts from BARIS:  pods, cores, passenger/hab modules, resource converters, drills, engines (except electric motors which always seem immune), resource containers, SAS, RCS, and transmitters.  Purely structural parts, everything dealing with electricity (solar panels and batteries), and decouplers don't seem to be on BARIS' menu at all.  Maybe heat shields, too.  Used to be, BARIS considered heat shields as "tanks" of ablator but I think that got taken away in the last update.
• You can turn on an option to allow parts to explode on failure (default is off).  If you set this, you can then adjust the severity of the explosion (how much damage it does to the rest of the ship), which you can do separately for launch and wear-and-tear failures.  I have launch explosions at 15% and others at 1%, so they're more cosmetic than really dangerous.  The main problem with exploding parts is that explosions in stacks can bifurcate your ship.
• You can adjust how many flights it takes for a part's MTBF/reliability to increase.  I have this all they way down at 1 flight (I think the default is 5).  Note, however, that this only counts for "launches" where you have to stage the engine to start moving, so rover sorties down't help.  So built test rigs as shown in some of my pics, with fuel tanks nearly empty and thrust limiters way down, then recover the wreckage.
• You can change the "cost" (whatever that means) for a part to gain experience.  I have this at minimum.
• You can change the chance of a part gaining experience from failure.  I have this set at 100% (it defaults much lower).
• Then there's the whole event card system that can be turned on/off, varied in frequency, and adjusted in severity.  I have this all turned on and the default 18-day frequency.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks for your interest in my infamous Sarnus mission.  That's found in The Outer Planets Travelling Circus thread.  This was a career game so there was a lot of build-up to start with, including the 1st Sarnus Expedition (SE-1) of just probes.  The notorious crewed mission was the 2nd Sarnus Expedition, (SE-2) so if you want to skip the boring stuff, read only these episodes:

• 9 and 10:  Ship designs of SE-2
• 11:  Finding the Monolith on Orvok with SE-1 and meeting the crew of SE-2
• 14 (1st part only) for the arrival of the 1st part of SE-2
• 15-28:  The horrible misadventures of the crew of SE-2 in the Sarnus system and the return of the scarred survivors

[Geschosskopf]

EPISODE 6: When the Saints Go Marching In

  Reveal hidden contents

 

(otherwise known as, "Why Kerbals Rarely Pray")

In an effort to drum up at least a trace of enthusiasm for his space program amongst the general public, The Emperor decreed an open house at KSC.  This required a massive advertising campaign because until then only a handful of Kerbals not involved in the space program even knew there was a surface world above their tunnels, let alone that there was space above that, too.  But when the imperially sponsored adverts cut into their reality TV shows, the vast bulk of Kerbalkind simply used that as an opportunity to get another beer.  Thus, when the great day arrived, nobody showed up until some well-connected bourgeoisie, not wanting The Emperor to lose face and thus cause them to lose their positions, closed their sweatshops and mills for the day and lured their workers into the special subway trains with promises of free beer and snacks at the destination.  Unfortunately, it took less time to make such promises than to deliver on them, and soon an angry mob of workers who were losing their wages for the day was rampaging around KSC.  And once the beer finally did arrive, all this accomplished was to change the mob from angry to drunken.  They left much damage in their wake but The Emperor was quite pleased, having now increased the fraction of Kerbals who knew about the surface by many orders of magnitude.  Whether they knew about the space program, however, or remembered anything about their field trip, was an open question.

Once the wreckage and litter were squared away, the Circus got back to work trying to put a pair of relay satellites into eccentric polar orbits.  So up went the Kerbin Relay Mk 1-2.  Somewhat to everybody's surprise, it worked flawlessly.

But then things returned to normal.  The Recon Jet was finally deemed airworthy and Silong, who had somehow survived all the testing, was given the honor of making the 1st flight.  He (or she--nobody was ever sure which) roared down the runway and all was looking fine.  Unfortunately, just as the Recon Jet was reaching flying speed, its nosewheel hit a chuckhole in the runway and snapped off.  Instantly the nose dropped to the pavement and the jet cascaded down the runway in an impressive series of explosions.  Silong became the 1st Kerbal to be killed by something other than BARIS.

Soon, a somber-looking rover made its 3rd trip to the flagpole by the Astronaut Cellblock and another flag was planted.

By now, Samner and Dizer up in Kerbin MOLE 1 had finished their 6th and last experiment.  They had toiled their way through Crystal Growth, Power Tools, and Temperature Study, besides Orbital Construction, Space Adaptation, and Cryogenics.  So while Samner powered down the MOLE and powered up the LKO Science Runner, Dizer lugged all the experiments into the LKO Science Runner and made sure they were all tied down securely.  They were the 1st 2 Kerbals to actually complete orbits of Kerbin, and they'd'done many as they'd been in space 30 days by now.

Unfortunately, the (mostly) good fortune that had accompanied the Kerbin MOLE 1 so far now deserted her.  The LKO Science Runner absolutely refused to undock from the MOLE.  For a brief moment, the UNDOCK button had appeared on the screen and Samner had pushed it.  It disappeared, nothing happened, and it never came back.  The ship and station were still 1 vehicle, all controls affecting both equally, and no combination of controls could pry the Runner loose.

NOTE:  This is none of BARIS's or MOLE's doing but seems to be a 1.3 bug that's cropped up in my absence.  It seems to be common and puts a damper on plans to do more Science! stations.

So Mission Control told Samner and Dizer to sit tight for another couple of weeks, and put another LKO Science Runner into integration as a rescue ship.  But before that could launch, the Kerbin Relay Mk 1-3 completed first so up it went.  This suffered a throttle failure of the lifter engine, resulting in too much Ap.  And the probe engine also failed.  But fortunately, the probe engine still worked, just not very well.  But everything else kept working and this was enough to get the probe up to its intended Ap, although the inclination was rather less than desired.  No doubt the relay will fail eventually and it'll have to be replaced, but for now it's close enough for government work.  Thus, this was scored as the Circus' 6th successful launch.

Shortly thereafter, the LKO Science Runner 2 was ready and renamed Rescue 1.  It was sent up autonomously and flawlessly for successful launch #7, and soon docked with Kerbin MOLE 1

Unfortunately., Rescue 1 had the same inability to undock as the LKO Science Runner.  This caused Dizer to pray to the spirit of dead Jeb, whom she envisioned as a protector of those attempting to return from space and who, being dead, was in position to petition the Uncaring Gods.

Mission Control now referred to the Kerbin MOLE 1 as "Tarbaby" because everything that touched it stuck.  By now the Scientists were getting very twitterpated.  All their Science! was stuck in orbit and could only be pumped between suitable containers, not hand-carried.  Plus, they desperately wanted Samner and Dizer to get home---after 44 days in orbit, their debriefing dissections would be fascinating.  But the docking problem probably doomed the Science!  The best the Boffins could come up with was sending up another ship nearby but not docking, so that Samner and Dizer could EVA to it, then deorbit the whole station and its 2 stuck ships, hoping it would break up in a good way and that they could then take control of the Science!-laden Rescue 1 before it burned up.  Needless to say, a number of middle-management Boffins were now purged.

In any case, there was nothing for it but to send up another ship.  And the Scientists were so frantic by now that they coughed up an extra $47K to rush its integration so it could launch later that very day.  So up went Rescue 2.  Unfortunately, it approached the station at way too high a relative velocity and there was a very non-gratuitous explosion.  All concerned agreed It was as if the spirit of Jeb had possessed Rescue 2.

But miracle of miracles, Dizer's prayer was answered.  The explosion wrenched Rescue 1, its Kerbals, and its precious Science! free and sent it away in a functional state.  Samner wasted no time in creating some space between Rescue 1 and the expanding debris cloud.  However, the 2nd stage engine and tank started acting up so were jettisoned to avoid a potential disaster.  Now all depended on Dizer's field repair of the OMS engine, which she now had no idea how she'd done.  Amazingly, this engine had survived all the trauma it had been through and did the deorbit burn flawlessly. 

But at this point, Dizer remembered she was in Rescue 1, not LKO Science Runner, and that she hadn't ever touched this particular 909.  No wonder it worked so well.  But given the trauma of recent events, plus her sudden religious ecstasy, it's understandable that she was a bit confused.

Regardless, Samner staged the OMS engine away once the deorbit burn was complete.

Apparently something had been hanging by a thread that was snapped by the firing of the explosive bolts.  Nobody will ever know what it was for sure.  But the result was that about 10 seconds after OMS separate and while still well above the atmosphere, every single part of the LKO Science runner exploded simultaneously.  Thus perished Samner and Dizer, and all their Science!  The entire Kerbin MOLE project had ended in nothing but a huge expense with zero return on investment.  Quite a few Scientists of all ranks committed suicide at this disaster and yet more Boffins were purged.

Soon, 2 more memorial flags were planted.

Meanwhile, the surviving Boffins used their new network to take stock of the debris cloud that had once been Kerbin MOLE 1 and Rescue 2.  Only the Hab module had been destroyed, scattering a slew of fragments and detached surface-mounted parts all over.  The aft section with the MOLE itself and a couple of rocket stages was relatively intact and still had functioning solar cells, but no means of controlling it.  Then there was the forward section, consisting of the airlock and the still-stuck LKO Science Runner.  This had a few small solar panels, a field-repaired engine, and control.  But it obviously wouldn't survive landing with the airlock module fouling its chutes, not to mention the extra weight thereof.  Oh well, there were still useful resources in both sections that might be handy later.

Moving on, the Boffins next looked at the wreck of Rescue 2 and couldn't believe their eyes.  It contained all the Science! that had been believed lost with Samner and Dizer.  Several senior Scientists stepped back inside from their window ledges to see for themselves.  How could this happen?  While there were several logical explanations, such as the kinetic transfer of Science! or even the Magic of Wild Blue connectionless resource transer, none of these really made sense.  Kerbals had never seen geological Science! stick to their hammers despite having been digging tunnels for millennia, and the Wild Blue systems hadn't even been powered up.  Eventually, Mission Control had no choice but to proclaim this another miracle.

But the precious Science! wasn't home yet.  Rescue 2's 2nd stage engine was gone and its tank was looking suspiciously explosive, and nobody dared stage it off after what had just happened to Samner and Dizer.  Then some junior Boffin remembered that decouplers could be activated manually, without using the normal staging control system.  And amazingly, this back-up system had survived the impact.  Soon, the dangerous fuel tank was spinning away although, sadly, without its self-destruct charge being triggered.  But the good news was, nothing went wrong with the rest of Rescue 2 when the tank was jettisoned.

And amazingly, the OMS engine still worked and performed the deorbit burn without a hitch.  But again, nobody dared stage it off, or even stage the chutes.  So Rescue 2 rode down with its OMS stage still attached.  Surprisingly, it didn't burn off as expected.  Thus, when the ship had slowed down sufficiently, the Boffins manually triggered the drogue chute in Rescue 2's docking port, then manually separated the OMS stage, and it fell away cleanly.  Working quickly, the Boffins then manually activated the main chutes.  And soon enough, the precious Science! of Kerbin MOLE 1 was safely in the chemical-stained hands of the surviving Scientists.

The miraculous events of this mission were brought to the attention of the Church of Kerbin and the heirophants of the High Synod were soon debating the case of Probationary Saint Jebediah who, after all, had performed the necessary 2 miracles, all recorded on video and audio.  He had freed Samner and Dizer from their prison as requested and he had saved the Science!  Some hardliners refused to believe in the existence of the surface and space, claiming they were contrary to Holy Writ.  Others weren't sure how this new Science! stuff could co-exist with faith.  But the majority reminded the others that they hadn't had a new saint in centuries, and it would be nice to have another feast day on the calendar.  This argument quickly carried the day and Saint Jebediah was officially Kanonized with his feast day set on Day 283, the anniversary of his miracles, because the anniversary of his death, Day 1, was already a holiday.

 

Tune in next time for more of the slow spiral into damnation, but at least we have a saint now

Edited September 24, 2017 by Geschosskopf

[KAL 9000]

Praise Jeb!

Praise Jeb! 

Praise Jeb! 

Meanwhile, in the Afterlife: 

Jeb (with Heavenly SSTO): WOO-HOO!!! 

Orbles: I'M STARTING TO REGRET YOU TALKING ME INTO THIS!!!

 

[Cydonian Monk]

Oh gods, that open house. And I love the picture of the wrecked space center in the event window.... "a few things got damaged...." Is that part of BARIS?

And that docking port bug is exactly why I'm still in 1.2.2(or whatever). I have enough stuck docking ports already at Kelgee Station, no need for more. There were quite a few other annoying 1.3 bugs as I recall, though none as serious as that.

[Geschosskopf]

  On 9/19/2017 at 3:21 PM, KAL 9000 said:

Jeb (with Heavenly SSTO): WOO-HOO!!! 

Orbles: I'M STARTING TO REGRET YOU TALKING ME INTO THIS!!!

Expand  

Slight corrections:  SSTOs are for those condemned to the Underworld, not those raised to the Upperworld.   And Orbles is still very much alive, last seen building a theme park in the Caribbean 

 

  On 9/19/2017 at 4:23 PM, Cydonian Monk said:

Oh gods, that open house. And I love the picture of the wrecked space center in the event window.... "a few things got damaged...." Is that part of BARIS?

And that docking port bug is exactly why I'm still in 1.2.2(or whatever). I have enough stuck docking ports already at Kelgee Station, no need for more. There were quite a few other annoying 1.3 bugs as I recall, though none as serious as that.

Expand  

Yup, BARIS includes random "event cards" such as the open house.

So tell me more about the 1.3 bugs.  For instance, how frequent is the docking port problem?  And what other annoying bugs are there?

Edited September 19, 2017 by Geschosskopf

[Cydonian Monk]

  On 9/19/2017 at 10:31 PM, Geschosskopf said:

So tell me more about the 1.3 bugs.  For instance, how frequent is the docking port problem?  And what other annoying bugs are there?

Expand  

I don't really remember most of them, to be honest, or what ones were specifically caused by the game vs those caused by mods. I do know I ran into the docking port bug when I tried to do something with some older craft. (Such as rendezvous one Sulphur with the other Sulphur and fuel tank that are in Vall orbit and then, well, undock.)

My initial experience with it was generally ok. It was only once I started to do much of anything with 1.3.0 that I started having annoying little problems. And then life got busy, I drove ~8,500 miles around the western US, and a hurricane parked over my home for four days. 

I see nothing about the docking port weirdness in the 1.3.1pre change notes (and there's apparently no longer a public bugtracker?), so it's also possible it was a mod or just my ships that have been dragged across 20-some-odd versions causing it - and a seperate issue from yours. (I'm pretty sure I still have some bugs hiding in my persistence file from 3 years back when a ModuleManager glitch broke the universe; same for the original RemoteTech.)

Edited September 19, 2017 by Cydonian Monk

[Geschosskopf]

  On 9/19/2017 at 11:10 PM, Cydonian Monk said:

I see nothing about the docking port weirdness in the 1.3.1pre change notes (and there's apparently no longer a public bugtracker?), so it's also possible it was a mod or just my ships that have been dragged across 20-some-odd versions causing it - and a seperate issue from yours. (I'm pretty sure I still have some bugs hiding in my persistence file from 3 years back when a ModuleManager glitch broke the universe; same for the original RemoteTech.)

Expand  

There's still a public bugtracker.  It's here:  https://bugs.kerbalspaceprogram.com/projects/ksp/issues

There is no report on docking ports, however.  I asked about how to deal with the problem over on the questions forum and was told by @bewing that there wasn't a bug report because nobody had yet seen the problem in a stock game (as if...).  Fortunately, somebody quickly provided one.  So maybe bewing has run off with it into the beta bug tracker with it, and maybe it will get solved.  I"m almost tempted to test it in stock just to see if I can find it, but I figure I'll leave it to others.  There's a reason I'm no longer a beta guy.

Anyway, there are other options besides docking.  I'll try those in the future.

[bewing]

  On 9/20/2017 at 3:40 AM, Geschosskopf said:

told by @bewing that there wasn't a bug report because nobody had yet seen the problem in a stock game (as if...). 

Expand  

Not quite what I said.  There were never any bug reports from stock that had testable ships and savegames. But there have been a few untestable bug reports over the years. https://bugs.kerbalspaceprogram.com/issues/10083 for example.

But there may be many variants on the bug, and there is certainly a lot of mod interaction -- most of the stuck docking ports ever seen are certainly mod bugs. So yes, I have now entered in the one variant and we will see how widespread the fix is when it comes.

 

Edited September 20, 2017 by bewing

[KAL 9000]

  On 9/19/2017 at 10:31 PM, Geschosskopf said:

Slight corrections:  SSTOs are for those condemned to the Underworld, not those raised to the Upperworld.   And Orbles is still very much alive, last seen building a theme park in the Caribbean 

Expand  

This is JEB we're talking about. 

And Orbles has a ladder with him, right? He can go to the Afterlife at will.

[Geschosskopf]

  On 9/20/2017 at 2:40 PM, KAL 9000 said:

This is JEB we're talking about. 

And Orbles has a ladder with him, right? He can go to the Afterlife at will.

Expand  

Right.  Jeb wants to go to SPACE.  For the most part, SSTOs can barely reach LKO, which doesn't really count as space, and only get even that far after a disproportionately vast expenditure of time, effort, money, and test pilot lives, especially considering their very limited payloads.  SSTOs are thus seen as a form of punishment.