What is your most facepalm-worthy moment regarding KSP?

[severedsolo]

Ironic that this comes up after my little episode yesterday.

I'm circularising in mun orbit after taking off from a landing, daughter comes over to distract me, doing my burn, keeping one eye on the AP readout on KER.

I'm aiming for a 20km orbit, so I see the readout starts with 2, hit x. When I actually look at it properly, that 2 was in fact - 2000km (ie hyperbolic) - worse, I'm escaping on the wrong side, so I'm going to be thrown out of the kerbin system.

quickly turn retrograde, return to my original orbit, and realise I've now used all my return fuel. Been a while since I've had to mount a rescue!

[Brainlord Mesomorph]

Three words:

Ladder upside down.

[MaxwellsDemon]

Mine was landing a second lander on the Mun to rescue the first, and then it needing to be rescued itself...  there was quite the unintentional Mun colony going there for a bit.   

In both cases, it was poor design.  The first lander included fuel tanks that were only LF as well as some LFO tanks, so I was sitting there with fuel left-- but was out of oxidizer.   Blech.   The second lander had the engine sticking out a bit too low relative to the landing legs, and lost its engine upon landing.

Building a lander big enough to rescue the first two was a challenge, but it all worked out in the end.   But still...   ::facepalm::

[Geonovast]

1 minute ago, MaxwellsDemon said:

Mine was landing a second lander on the Mun to rescue the first, and then it needing to be rescued itself...  there was quite the unintentional Mun colony going there for a bit.  

[MaxwellsDemon]

Yup, that was pretty much it.

The biggest pain was that I wasn't very accurate in my landings yet  (still not, but improved) and the closest I landed the third lander was 2 km away... walking six kerbonauts over 2 km one at a time was a loooong process.   (Since that time, EVA Follower has made that sort of thing easier...)

[Antstar]

On 2/12/2018 at 8:20 AM, XrayLima said:

Easy - 5 Kerbal, multi launch, constructed in orbit, beast of a thing trip to Duna. Boring wait for window and multi week transfer. Landed Ascent/Descent vehicle perfectly. Realised I hadn't fitted a ladder. Came straight home, not one of them even EVA'd.

 

Doh.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

No spoiler, just fat fingers on a mobile and you can't delete it!

 

You can (just) eva jet pack your way back up on duna...

[Domax]

Ok,

In carreer I made a full trip around Duna and returned into the atmosphere of Kerbin realising that I didn't put any chutes ...

[Antstar]

Worst ever for me was an interplanetary transfer where I sent the lander and orbital module up as one piece. Got to the planet, undocked, and wouldn't you know it, one craft with 2 docking ports and the other with none. At least the ports were on the lander so a rescue mission was possible. ..

[roboslacker]

When I forgot the parachutes for my interplanetary return capsule

[KSACheese]

I sent a mining rig to the Mun once. 

Problem was that I tipped it over. And broke the solar panels... and the radiators... and I still couldn't get it upright.

 

I've stopped trying to mine at this point.

[DJWyre]

After much badgering from Bob and the invention of a new-fangled 'probe core' thingymajig, the scientist is allowed to make a proper space flight after Jeb OD's on Twiglets at the post-mission office party (again).

Unfortunately, Bill had too much Scrumpy....

 

[GrandProtectorDark]

I like to often remodel entire bases and ship with KIS/KAS, causing a huge mess and often 5+ hours before I'm happy.
I unfortunately have the tendency to not quicksave often enough. Now, reconnection parts with KIS sometimes causes a wierd bug/glitch/anomalie, where the game has no idea to which part the moved part is connected, causing the whole craft to violently combust. 
And in that second of lag where the game is trying to figure out what is happening, I realise how much time/progress I've lost due to having to revert to quicksave, made 10 to 30 (or more) mins ago.
"I've made a huge mistake" 

[Cortwade]

I forgot parachutes on a 23 million fund mission... The crew was not happy to wait 5 hours for a engineer crew to attach a few on the ship...

[StrandedonEarth]

2 hours ago, Antstar said:

Worst ever for me was an interplanetary transfer where I sent the lander and orbital module up as one piece. Got to the planet, undocked, and wouldn't you know it, one craft with 2 docking ports and the other with none. At least the ports were on the lander so a rescue mission was possible. ..

That’s what KAS is good for, if you remember the screwdriver. I once had to edit a screwdriver into Bill’s pocket to move some drills that were mounted too low. 

[Geonovast]

4 minutes ago, StrandedonEarth said:

I once had to edit a screwdriver into Bill’s pocket

I did that once.  It was right after this mission.  I had to edit it in because I neglected to bring a screwdriver on the re-do of that mission.

My reasoning was that even NASA wouldn't forget a screwdriver twice.

[luizopiloto]

I was flying a passenger jet to the island in IVA... The landing should went smoothly but I forgot to lower the gears... surprisingly, all the crewed parts survived the crash...
PS: I play flight simulators since 98... ಠ__ಠ

[the_pazter]

I once was sending a flyby mission to the mun, and accidentally pressed the time accelerate button too many times, i did not get any science, i did not quicksave the game, i did have to start all over again. 

[Tyko]

5 hours ago, Domax said:

Ok,

In carreer I made a full trip around Duna and returned into the atmosphere of Kerbin realising that I didn't put any chutes ...

I've done this...it was awful. Lost 2 crew

[memes in space]

Just a minute ago I screwed up a plane (because all i have are the terrible juno engines right now) and I instinctively hit F9 instead of revert. Now I'm multiple science points behind. Fade me

[MinimalMinmus]

Me: "Let's launch a rover to Eve!"

Everything goes fine, 200 days later I deorbit it over Eve, then switch to it...

"No control"???

Oh, right, I forgot the probe core.

*proceeds to bang his head at the nearest wall*

[InterplanetJanet]

On 2/25/2018 at 6:59 PM, Geonovast said:

Know what happens when you stage fairings early and the pieces get reflected back to you?

You lose your entire solar array and half your thermal control system, that's what.

*shrieks in remembered terror* What do they make those Thermal Control Systems out of anyway, microscope slide cover glass?!?! I had once tuned down a fairing's eject speed to so low it took 30 seconds to clear the rocket's sides, and it stlll shattered a TCS into zillions (well, dozens) of shards.

On 2/26/2018 at 3:42 AM, Brikoleur said:

II have mad respect for the people who play this without revert/quickload

I have a deep and abiding suspicion that they aren't actually human.

But I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who 'plays with face in palm'. =)

Edited March 1, 2018 by InterplanetJanet
I hate typos.

[InterplanetJanet]

8 hours ago, luizopiloto said:

I was flying a passenger jet to the island in IVA... The landing should went smoothly but I forgot to lower the gears... 
PS: I play flight simulators since 98... ಠ__ಠ

RL pilots say there are two divisions: those who have made gear-up landings, and those that are going to....

Edited February 27, 2018 by InterplanetJanet
OriginalTopic: I'm a noob, so I think basically everything I do is facepalm-worthy, because I'm still learning the game!

[Antstar]

13 hours ago, StrandedonEarth said:

That’s what KAS is good for, if you remember the screwdriver. I once had to edit a screwdriver into Bill’s pocket to move some drills that were mounted too low. 

Yup. I now use it as a matter of course, would have saved a lot of time and Xe

[purpleivan]

Sent up a fuelling ship last night (5 orange tanks) to fill up my Laythe colony mining vehicle, ready for its departure. After the transfer the refuller had pretty much only fumes left onboard and I planned to use that to re-enter it and consign it to the great waste bin of the skies.

Unfortunately a few seconds after undocking, instead of hitting T to turn on SAS, I hit Z, slamming the now very light vehicle full tilt into the side of the fully fuelled mining ship.

With the inevitable explosive consequences of course.

Edited February 27, 2018 by purpleivan

[MaxwellsDemon]

I notice that a lot of the facepalmworthy moments are due to deficiencies in design-- at least, mine certainly were.

I'd just like to add that those moments for me have been reduced (but not eliminated-- there's still room for operator error) by the KRASH system by the indefatigable linuxgurugamer.   Not to be confused with the "Kerbal Krash System," KRASH is a simulator that you can run from the VAB to see how your current design will function in different environments.