I'm a new player and I'm looking for tips and tricks

[Interstellar Yeet]

24 minutes ago, The_Cat_In_Space said:

400 Science?! You should get all available things with that science to get better parts! 400 science is really good!

Yeah I just don't know what to invest in. I can upgrade like 2 things or 3 at max. I could get some docking stuff but honestly I don't feel ready for that yet lol. Seems so hard. I could get the space exploration thing for 90 science + that next step. https://imgur.com/a/0chO7M7

7 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Haha, it's alright.  I've done my fair share of facepalm worthy things in this game.

The fins do add stability.  But if you're careful enough, you can get the rocket to orbit without them.  Having them there adds weight and drag, which means you use more fuel to get to orbit. 

I may have been wrong about the rocket not being able to return.  It looks like there's enough left in the rocket after I get to orbit to not only transfer to the Mun, but also get to orbit and start the decent.  That might, might leave enough for the landing and return.

Once I'm done, I'll repeat and get some good screenshots.  I'm sorry, I do not have discord.

Do you understand the concept of dV?

I basically copied this rocket from Scott Manley on youtube so it should have enough fuel. If i can do everything right from launch to re-entry I should have enough fuel. I do not unfornetaly, I've heard delta V mentioned many times, and I do believe it has something to do with launching and fuel efficiency and actually getting into orbit? Anyway, I'm still looking to research something for my 400 science that could possibly help me land on the mun and return, but I still haven't gotten any answers as to what I should upgrade.

Edit: I do know that you can actually orbit the Mun, without decoupling to the landing stage before running out of fuel, I just can't fly well enough for that to happen. 

Edited November 2, 2018 by Interstellar Yeet

[Geonovast]

6 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

I basically copied this rocket from Scott Manley on youtube so it should have enough fuel.

Well, what I built doesn't.  It's roughly 400 m/s dV shy of getting back to munar orbit and then back to Kerbin.

Would you mind uploading your actual rocket's .craft file?

I'll see if I can find a @Snarkian explanation of what dV is as he has a knack for explaining things to beginners.

[Interstellar Yeet]

1 minute ago, Geonovast said:

Well, what I built doesn't.  It's roughly 400 m/s dV shy of getting back to munar orbit and then back to Kerbin.

Would you mind uploading your actual rocket's .craft file?

I'll see if I can find a @Snarkian explanation of what dV is as he has a knack for explaining things to beginners.

I could do that, although I do not know how. If you could tell me how that would be greatly appreciated. is it located in the files of the game or can i somehow find it in-game? 

[qzgy]

2 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

Yeah I just don't know what to invest in. I can upgrade like 2 things or 3 at max. I could get some docking stuff but honestly I don't feel ready for that yet lol. Seems so hard. I could get the space exploration thing for 90 science + that next step. https://imgur.com/a/0chO7M7

If you don't feel ready that's fine - it is definitely one of the more challenging techniques to learn. I'd think about investing in bigger rocket parts (like larger engines and fuel tanks), some of the electrical and science stuff,  and maybe the flight control things.

 

Just now, Interstellar Yeet said:

I could do that, although I do not know how. If you could tell me how that would be greatly appreciated. is it located in the files of the game or can i somehow find it in-game? 

In the game files, go to saves, then the name of the savegame you are in, Ships, thenVAB or SPH depending if you built it in the Vehicle Assembly Building (the tall thing wheremost rockets are made) or the Spaceplane Hangar (The other one). Your craft file should be there, named whatever you made it. Just upload that file to dropbox or some other file hosting site and that should be enough to share it (if that made sense)

[Geonovast]

4 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

I could do that, although I do not know how. If you could tell me how that would be greatly appreciated. is it located in the files of the game or can i somehow find it in-game? 

Inside the folder that you installed KSP to (If you have Steam it's going to depend on what operating system you're using), there is a folder called "game".  Inside "game" is "saves".  Inside "saves" is a folder with the same name as your game save.  Inside there is "Ships", inside "Ships" is "VAB".  Inside "VAB" is a file with your ship's name.  You'll need to upload that to a file sharing site, I use Google Drive.  Make sure any permissions it might have is set to public, and post the link here.

Eck, Ninja'd by @qzgy

Edited November 2, 2018 by Geonovast
Ninja'd

[Snark]

22 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

Yeah I just don't know what to invest in.

There are many different ways to approach it, since KSP is such a flexible game. 

However, one general strategy that I find usually works well:

1. First and foremost:  Unlock new science instruments before just about anything else.  More instruments = more science = more stuff. 
2. After science instruments, the Terrier engine should be your top priority.  A tremendously useful engine that will take you to orbit, to the Mun and Minmus, and to the other planets.
3. The next thing to unlock should be solar panels, because you'll want that for any ship that needs to go beyond short stays in LKO.
4. After the above, pretty much anything else is gravy-- go after them at your whim, based on what you feel like doing next.

If you are into rockets and not airplanes, you can leave alone pretty much the whole tech tree of airplane parts, and spend the points elsewhere.

It can be worthwhile to unlock docking ports, because once you have both solar panels and docking ports unlocked, there's a whole category of fairly lucrative contracts ("land an outpost on X", "put a station in orbit around X") that become available, which is a handy source of cash in a career game.

 

[Interstellar Yeet]

4 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Inside the folder that you installed KSP to (If you have Steam it's going to depend on what operating system you're using), there is a folder called "game".  Inside "game" is "saves".  Inside "saves" is a folder with the same name as your game save.  Inside there is "Ships", inside "Ships" is "VAB".  Inside "VAB" is a file with your ship's name.  You'll need to upload that to a file sharing site, I use Google Drive.  Make sure any permissions it might have is set to public, and post the link here.

Eck, Ninja'd by @qzgy

 

5 minutes ago, qzgy said:

If you don't feel ready that's fine - it is definitely one of the more challenging techniques to learn. I'd think about investing in bigger rocket parts (like larger engines and fuel tanks), some of the electrical and science stuff,  and maybe the flight control things.

 

In the game files, go to saves, then the name of the savegame you are in, Ships, thenVAB or SPH depending if you built it in the Vehicle Assembly Building (the tall thing wheremost rockets are made) or the Spaceplane Hangar (The other one). Your craft file should be there, named whatever you made it. Just upload that file to dropbox or some other file hosting site and that should be enough to share it (if that made sense)

Thank you guys, I just set up a free trial on drop box and I will give you my ships file ASAP. By the way, I can unlock heavy rocketry and get that skipper engine. It has about 3 times more thrust than my current ones if that would help me.

[Snark]

23 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

I basically copied this rocket from Scott Manley on youtube so it should have enough fuel.

Wellllll... not necessarily.  A lot of the really popular Scott Manley videos are old-- specifically, they're old enough that they were made before KSP 1.0.  That's relevant because 1.0 completely rejiggered how aerodynamics work, and also made significant rebalancing of engines.

The practical upshot is that post-1.0 KSP is practically a whole different game from pre-1.0.  A rocket designed well for one may not work well in the other.  So if you're looking at a Scott Manley video from before KSP 1.0, you shouldn't copy the rocket because it won't necessarily work in KSP today.

[Interstellar Yeet]

I can't do this dropbox thing. I uploaded the ships file to dropbox but I can't share it anywhere as far as i can see

16 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Inside the folder that you installed KSP to (If you have Steam it's going to depend on what operating system you're using), there is a folder called "game".  Inside "game" is "saves".  Inside "saves" is a folder with the same name as your game save.  Inside there is "Ships", inside "Ships" is "VAB".  Inside "VAB" is a file with your ship's name.  You'll need to upload that to a file sharing site, I use Google Drive.  Make sure any permissions it might have is set to public, and post the link here.

Eck, Ninja'd by @qzgy

https://www.dropbox.com/s/aifuhuuysg295rh/MunLander.craft?dl=0  

 

This link should work, let me know if it is of any use to you! Never tried dropbox before.

[Geonovast]

Well, I found something that might help with stability.  One, turning the rocket 90 degrees is going to help a lot, especially when you decouple the boosters.  When you're only running two boosters, you want them on the "right" and "left" of the rocket.  So if you're heading East (which you almost always will be), then you'll want the boosters on the north and south sides of the rocket.

Also the boosters weren't centered on the decouplers, which could cause control issues on launch.

I'm flying your rocket with the two issues above fixed, and I can tell you straight out - there is not enough gas to land on the Mun and come back.    There's really only enough to get there and land.

[Interstellar Yeet]

2 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Well, I found something that might help with stability.  One, turning the rocket 90 degrees is going to help a lot, especially when you decouple the boosters.  When you're only running two boosters, you want them on the "right" and "left" of the rocket.  So if you're heading East (which you almost always will be), then you'll want the boosters on the north and south sides of the rocket.

Also the boosters weren't centered on the decouplers, which could cause control issues on launch.

I'm flying your rocket with the two issues above fixed, and I can tell you straight out - there is not enough gas to land on the Mun and come back.    There's really only enough to get there and land.

I unlocked both of the next tiers of rockets so I'm currently trying out the rockomax x200 fuel tanks + the mainsail engine in the middle and also i got 2 of the twin boar rockets on the side. So this thing is going pretty damn fast right now, but it's using alot of fuel tho. Maybe you could help me design a rocket with these engines and fuel tanks I unlocked? Maybe If I keep the original rocket i sent you, and for the launch stage I add the huge rocket and save the middle one for when im in orbit, then fly to the mun and use my remaing last stage and fuel to land and re-entry on kerbin? 

[Interstellar Yeet]

20 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Well, I found something that might help with stability.  One, turning the rocket 90 degrees is going to help a lot, especially when you decouple the boosters.  When you're only running two boosters, you want them on the "right" and "left" of the rocket.  So if you're heading East (which you almost always will be), then you'll want the boosters on the north and south sides of the rocket.

Also the boosters weren't centered on the decouplers, which could cause control issues on launch.

I'm flying your rocket with the two issues above fixed, and I can tell you straight out - there is not enough gas to land on the Mun and come back.    There's really only enough to get there and land.

I unlocked both of the next tiers of rockets so I'm currently trying out the rockomax x200 fuel tanks + the mainsail engine in the middle and also i got 2 of the twin boar rockets on the side. So this thing is going pretty damn fast right now, but it's using alot of fuel tho. Maybe you could help me design a rocket with these engines and fuel tanks I unlocked? Maybe If I keep the original rocket i sent you, and for the launch stage I add the huge rocket and save the middle one for when im in orbit, then fly to the mun and use my remaing last stage and fuel to land and re-entry on kerbin? 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/aifuhuuysg295rh/MunLander.craft?dl=0 here's a link to my newest rocket @Geonovast. Those two twin boar rockets are working so good that my antennas and solar panels actually exploded before I even got into orbit so yeah, this could be the way to go? 

[Geonovast]

Just now, Interstellar Yeet said:

I unlocked both of the next tiers of rockets so I'm currently trying out the rockomax x200 fuel tanks + the mainsail engine in the middle and also i got 2 of the twin boar rockets on the side. So this thing is going pretty damn fast right now, but it's using alot of fuel tho. Maybe you could help me design a rocket with these engines and fuel tanks I unlocked? Maybe If I keep the original rocket i sent you, and for the launch stage I add the huge rocket and save the middle one for when im in orbit, then fly to the mun and use my remaing last stage and fuel to land and re-entry on kerbin? 

Certainly, having the larger diameter tanks will help you.

When you're designing a spacecraft, you need to work backwards.  For something like this, you would design a craft that can, from a Munar orbit, land, take off, get back into orbit, then do the burn to get back to Kerbin.  Needs, say, 1500-1600 m/s of dV.  Then you need to design your transfer stage, essentially just fuel tanks and an engine, that will push you from Kerbin orbit to the Mun, and get your Munar orbit injection.  I'd give it 1200-1300 m/s of dV.

Then you take that, attached to your landing/return craft, and build the booster capable of getting that to orbit.  Usually around 3400 m/s of dV in that.

At the Mun's surface, you'll need about 900 m/s of dV to get back home.  I just landed with 2 m/s to spare.

Not 2,000, Not 200,  2.  Jeb's.... ok with it, somehow. 

*Disclaimer: I am by no means an expert at this game, but I'd like to think I'm pretty good by now.  This is a huge deficit, and I don't think any amount of more efficient flying will get you the extra dV needed for the return.

As far as what dV is, here's a recent discussion.

All the fancy boxes in the following screenshots are from a mod called KER, which tells you every number you could possibly need for your rocket, and more.  I've become quite accustomed to it, it's very nice to have.  Best basic uses I get out of it are per stage dV, TWR (thrust to weight ratio, tells you if your rocket has enough thrust to get off the ground), and ap/pe readouts.... which are really nice to have in flight so you don't have to keep checking map view to know how high you're going to get.

One other thing you may consider is enabling advanced tweakables, and setting fuel flow priority on the tanks.  This can 1) remove the yellow fuel lines, and 2) allow you to drain the tanks bottom to top, which will help with stability and let you trash those giant, draggy fins.

Higher number drains first.

This is another reason why you want the boosters on the N/S sides.  Much less chance of collision:

2 m/s left!  I don't think I've ever had a closer landing... maybe.

6 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/aifuhuuysg295rh/MunLander.craft?dl=0 here's a link to my newest rocket @Geonovast. Those two twin boar rockets are working so good that my antennas and solar panels actually exploded before I even got into orbit so yeah, this could be the way to go? 

Well, I wanted to talk to you about that too.  I think you overdid the panels.  The original 3 panel setup you had before should be just fine.  Your control issues were signal related, I'm sure.  Not power related.

I'll take a look at your new rocket.

[Interstellar Yeet]

7 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Certainly, having the larger diameter tanks will help you.

When you're designing a spacecraft, you need to work backwards.  For something like this, you would design a craft that can, from a Munar orbit, land, take off, get back into orbit, then do the burn to get back to Kerbin.  Needs, say, 1500-1600 m/s of dV.  Then you need to design your transfer stage, essentially just fuel tanks and an engine, that will push you from Kerbin orbit to the Mun, and get your Munar orbit injection.  I'd give it 1200-1300 m/s of dV.

Then you take that, attached to your landing/return craft, and build the booster capable of getting that to orbit.  Usually around 3400 m/s of dV in that.

At the Mun's surface, you'll need about 900 m/s of dV to get back home.  I just landed with 2 m/s to spare.

Not 2,000, Not 200,  2.  Jeb's.... ok with it, somehow. 

*Disclaimer: I am by no means an expert at this game, but I'd like to think I'm pretty good by now.  This is a huge deficit, and I don't think any amount of more efficient flying will get you the extra dV needed for the return.

As far as what dV is, here's a recent discussion.

All the fancy boxes in the following screenshots are from a mod called KER, which tells you every number you could possibly need for your rocket, and more.  I've become quite accustomed to it, it's very nice to have.  Best basic uses I get out of it are per stage dV, TWR (thrust to weight ratio, tells you if your rocket has enough thrust to get off the ground), and ap/pe readouts.... which are really nice to have in flight so you don't have to keep checking map view to know how high you're going to get.

One other thing you may consider is enabling advanced tweakables, and setting fuel flow priority on the tanks.  This can 1) remove the yellow fuel lines, and 2) allow you to drain the tanks bottom to top, which will help with stability and let you trash those giant, draggy fins.

Higher number drains first.

This is another reason why you want the boosters on the N/S sides.  Much less chance of collision:

2 m/s left!  I don't think I've ever had a closer landing... maybe.

Amazing! If you could land the rocket I designed then I'm 100% we can get it to the mun and back to Kerbin with loads of remaining fuel with some of the stuff I just unlocked. 

EDIT: I think I overdid my newest rocket. I had an apoapsis of over 400k meters by the time my twin boar rockets ran out of fuel.

Edited November 2, 2018 by Interstellar Yeet

[StrandedonEarth]

Well, as Snark said, you really want the small Terrier engine since it is intended as an early small lander engine. The big engines you've unlocked are great for lobbing heavier stuff into orbit, but are not intended for landers. As he also said, unlock as many science instruments as you can, because that let's you collect more science on any mission, as long as you put them on your craft! 

But of course it's easy to be seduced by bigger, more powerful engines, MOAR POWAH!

dV (delta V, from the greek letter delta, which means "change") is the measure of much your vessel can (or needs to) change its velocity vector. The same amount of fuel will give more dV to a lighter craft.

This thread is chock full of good tips and tricks, but beware, it started a long time ago before 1.0 was released, so the older posts may no longer be accurate.

It appears you are on PC, which opens up a universe of mods. The easiest way to get them is with CKAN. You really don't need any mods to start, but as time goes on you may find yourself wishing for more info than the stock game provides which is why I started using mods. Kerbal Alarm Clock and Navball Docking Alignment Indicator are the first two mods I ever got.

Eventually, you will want to dock. It is hard at first, but gets easy when you know how to do it., Part of the challenge is how well you balance the RCS on your craft (capslock for fine control is far more forgiving of unbalanced RCS). The other half of the challenge is how you fly it. For that, I made this handy image:

Hope I haven't overwhelmed you! Welcome to this great game, and happy launchings!

[Geonovast]

4 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

EDIT: I think I overdid my newest rocket. I had an apoapsis of over 400k meters by the time my twin boar rockets ran out of fuel.

Well that could just mean you're not turning enough during the launch, not necessarily that it's overpowered. 

A few things before I even launch this guy:

The game hates sudden diameter changes, and it will cause a ton of drag.  So those nosecones on the twinboars are not only silly looking, but they're not doing much.  You have the same problem with the skipper at the bottom.  Imagine the rocket flying through water instead of the air.  Large, flat surfaces perpendicular to the direction of travel resist a lot.  When you're running your hand underwater sideways, so the side of your index finger is in the front, it's pretty easy, right?  What happens when you turn your hand so that your palm is the leading edge?  It becomes a lot harder to push.

You can pretty much consider the lower atmosphere to be water.  So if have the 2.5m nosecone, or the structural 2.5m to 1.25m adapter, you'll want to use it.

15 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Well that could just mean you're not turning enough during the launch, not necessarily that it's overpowered. 

Well... actually, yes.  This is A LOT of engine.  You're looking at a TWR of roughly 4.4.  That means the rocket is producing over 4 times its weight in thrust, which is pretty high.  That's why you get going so fast so quickly.  Your first rocket had a TWR of 1.87, which is a pretty nice place to be.

So I think this is what I'm going to do before launch.  I'm ditching the skipper in favor of getting the swivel back, which had no problem pushing your rocket into orbit.  It's also just as fuel efficient as the skipper in space... which translates to more dV as the swivel half the weight.

I'm turning the thrust limited on the twinboars down to 50%.  This puts the TWR at a little over 2.  This will help you not explode in the atmosphere and they'll run twice as long.

I'm also enabling the crossfeed so the swivel is left with a full tank when the twinboars depart.  I might consider not even lighting the swivel until that happens... as it's not as efficient in atmo as boars.

Honestly it's still not the best way to go, but I don't know what other parts you have available to you, so it's what I'm going with.

However, KER is only reporting about 250 m/s of dV more than the first version... we'll see what happens.

9 minutes ago, StrandedonEarth said:

Well, as Snark said, you really want the small Terrier engine since it is intended as an early small lander engine.

It's got the terrier on the lander.  I'm starting to not like these new default textures making everything look too similar.  Is it a tank?  A decoupler?  A shroud?  Who knows!?

[Interstellar Yeet]

Well, then I got no clue what I can do. I need extra fuel and I got no idea how I can launch myself into orbit faster, while at the same time using less fuel. I guess the only way to do that is to actually unlock a better engine? 

[qzgy]

2 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

Well, then I got no clue what I can do. I need extra fuel and I got no idea how I can launch myself into orbit faster, while at the same time using less fuel. I guess the only way to do that is to actually unlock a better engine? 

Part of the challenge is a good ascent. In real life and KSP the ideal ascent is a thing called a gravity turn. Basically you want to slowly tip your rocket over so that while you do go high enough, you also spend most of your actual ascent trying to go sideways quickly. This is a pretty good guide to do so.

Doing this well maximizes efficiency so you can actually have more fuel and thus more dV when in orbit.

[Interstellar Yeet]

4 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Well that could just mean you're not turning enough during the launch, not necessarily that it's overpowered. 

A few things before I even launch this guy:

The game hates sudden diameter changes, and it will cause a ton of drag.  So those nosecones on the twinboars are not only silly looking, but they're not doing much.  You have the same problem with the skipper at the bottom.  Imagine the rocket flying through water instead of the air.  Large, flat surfaces perpendicular to the direction of travel resist a lot.  When you're running your hand underwater sideways, so the side of your index finger is in the front, it's pretty easy, right?  What happens when you turn your hand so that your palm is the leading edge?  It becomes a lot harder to push.

You can pretty much consider the lower atmosphere to be water.  So if have the 2.5m nosecone, or the structural 2.5m to 1.25m adapter, you'll want to use it.

Well... actually, yes.  This is A LOT of engine.  You're looking at a TWR of roughly 4.4.  That means the rocket is producing over 4 times its weight in thrust, which is pretty high.  That's why you get going so fast so quickly.  Your first rocket had a TWR of 1.87, which is a pretty nice place to be.

So I think this is what I'm going to do before launch.  I'm ditching the skipper in favor of getting the swivel back, which had no problem pushing your rocket into orbit.  It's also just as fuel efficient as the skipper in space... which translates to more dV as the swivel half the weight.

I'm turning the thrust limited on the twinboars down to 50%.  This puts the TWR at a little over 2.  This will help you not explode in the atmosphere and they'll run twice as long.

I'm also enabling the crossfeed so the swivel is left with a full tank when the twinboars depart.  I might consider not even lighting the swivel until that happens... as it's not as efficient in atmo as boars.

Honestly it's still not the best way to go, but I don't know what other parts you have available to you, so it's what I'm going with.

However, KER is only reporting about 250 m/s of dV more than the first version... we'll see what happens.

It's got the terrier on the lander.  I'm starting to not like these new default textures making everything look too similar.  Is it a tank?  A decoupler?  A shroud?  Who knows!?

Alright I read ya captain. So what you just said about the aerodynamics of my new rocket makes a whole lot of sense to me. Now I just went back to my original save to get my science back, to try something different. But if you manage to figure something out with the twin boar engines just let me know and I'll research those again!. 

[Geonovast]

7 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

Well, then I got no clue what I can do. I need extra fuel and I got no idea how I can launch myself into orbit faster, while at the same time using less fuel. I guess the only way to do that is to actually unlock a better engine?  

Well, no.  And I think your brain is going the wrong direction, which is understandable.  Things work differently in space.  This, after all, rocket science.  Unfortunately SciFi TV has ruined the reality of space travel.  And since you've been able to get something into orbit... you're a few steps ahead of most SciFi TV writers out there.

How fast you get to orbit is pretty much meaningless.  Everything is about efficiency, which is why you'll so frequently find that less is more.

I just launched with the changes I mentioned.  It was dicey, I was still accelerating a bit too fast through the lower atmosphere.  The antennas got HOT, but didn't explode.

Made it to a 108 km x 107km orbit with 4,203 m/s remaining according to KER.  Which is more than enough to land and get home.  I don't think you needed the bigger tank on the lander, as you can use the transfer stage for almost all of the descent. In fact, I had to ditch the transfer stage early with a good amount of fuel left in it just so I could land. And since going back to the original tank would make the lander lighter... you'd need less fuel to get it there...which would mean a lighter transfer stage... which would mean less fuel to get that into orbit... which would mean a smaller lifter stage... you get the idea.  It's about finding the balance for each rocket.

Touched down with 1751 m/s left!  This will not only get you home, but you could probably do a flyby of Minmus on the way while you were at it.

 

Tomorrow I'll record a quick video of the thing making a round trip if you want, so you can kinda see what I've been doing with it.  But I gotta get to bed.

 

Good luck.  You've got a lot to learn, but we all did.  Given what I've seen, I don't think you'll have a problem figuring this stuff out, and within a week you'll be on your way to Duna.

[StrandedonEarth]

20 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

It's got the terrier on the lander.  I'm starting to not like these new default textures making everything look too similar

Whoop, my bad, that's what happens when I post generic info without taking a close look at the images. I just read the part about the bigger engines...

1 minute ago, Geonovast said:

In fact, I had to ditch the transfer stage early with a good amount of fuel left in it just so I could land.

Been there...

[Interstellar Yeet]

6 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

Well, no.  And I think your brain is going the wrong direction, which is understandable.  Things work differently in space.  This, after all, rocket science.  Unfortunately SciFi TV has ruined the reality of space travel.  And since you've been able to get something into orbit... you're a few steps ahead of most SciFi TV writers out there.

How fast you get to orbit is pretty much meaningless.  Everything is about efficiency, which is why you'll so frequently find that less is more.

I just launched with the changes I mentioned.  It was dicey, I was still accelerating a bit too fast through the lower atmosphere.  The antennas got HOT, but didn't explode.

Made it to a 108 km x 107km orbit with 4,203 m/s remaining according to KER.  Which is more than enough to land and get home.  I don't think you needed the bigger tank on the lander, as you can use the transfer stage for almost all of the descent. In fact, I had to ditch the transfer stage early with a good amount of fuel left in it just so I could land. And since going back to the original tank would make the lander lighter... you'd need less fuel to get it there...which would mean a lighter transfer stage... which would mean less fuel to get that into orbit... which would mean a smaller lifter stage... you get the idea.  It's about finding the balance for each rocket.

Touched down with 1751 m/s left!  This will not only get you home, but you could probably do a flyby of Minmus on the way while you were at it.

 

Tomorrow I'll record a quick video of the thing making a round trip if you want, so you can kinda see what I've been doing with it.  But I gotta get to bed.

 

Good luck.  You've got a lot to learn, but we all did.  Given what I've seen, I don't think you'll have a problem figuring this stuff out, and within a week you'll be on your way to Duna.

Yikes. This is a whole lot information to swallow at once but sooner or later I'll figure it out. Thank you a bunch for the help, and I would appreciate a video! For now I'm just gonna take it easy, maybe make a simple probe and do some fly bys of the moon and minmus to earn some more science and some more funds, without risking my dear scientists life. Have a good night man! Thanks a lot again.

[Superfluous J]

36 minutes ago, Interstellar Yeet said:

Yikes. This is a whole lot information to swallow at once but sooner or later I'll figure it out.

To misquote Douglas Adams:

Quote

Space is hard. Really hard. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly hard it is. I mean, you may think nailing all the achievements in Nightmare mode of a AAA game is hard, but that's just peanuts to space.

Just remember through all of this - You're learning frickin' ROCKET SCIENCE. In a video game. There are learning curves, and there are learning walls. A lot of the stuff you're going to encounter will seem like a learning precipice at times. But you CAN do it. And it WILL be rewarding. You're already considering Mun and Minmus missions to be simple so you're well on your way.

LKO is kind of like a learning tool for the rest of Kerbin's SOI. You can launch quick rockets to practice rendezvous, docking, plane changes, and things like that. Mun and Minmus are learning tools for the rest of the system, where you can learn what happens when you change SOIs, how to nail a low Periapsis from far away, and even how to do interplanetary transfers because you can transfer from Mun to Minmus just like you'd transfer from Kerbin to Duna, only a mistake or confusion costs you a little probe that you probably had up there anyway and not your whole first interplanetary mission.

Be happy with what you've learned. Heck be PROUD of what you've learned. "Just" going to Mun and Minmus is quite a feat that we tend to take for granted, but it builds a very solid foundation for understanding all the concepts you're feeling overwhelmed by now. The more comfortable you are tooling around Mun and Minmus, the easier it will be for you to see how (and why) you do the things necessary for interplanetary missions.

tl;dr nothing usable in this post but a pep talk

[Interstellar Yeet]

13 minutes ago, 5thHorseman said:

To misquote Douglas Adams:

Just remember through all of this - You're learning frickin' ROCKET SCIENCE. In a video game. There are learning curves, and there are learning walls. A lot of the stuff you're going to encounter will seem like a learning precipice at times. But you CAN do it. And it WILL be rewarding. You're already considering Mun and Minmus missions to be simple so you're well on your way.

LKO is kind of like a learning tool for the rest of Kerbin's SOI. You can launch quick rockets to practice rendezvous, docking, plane changes, and things like that. Mun and Minmus are learning tools for the rest of the system, where you can learn what happens when you change SOIs, how to nail a low Periapsis from far away, and even how to do interplanetary transfers because you can transfer from Mun to Minmus just like you'd transfer from Kerbin to Duna, only a mistake or confusion costs you a little probe that you probably had up there anyway and not your whole first interplanetary mission.

Be happy with what you've learned. Heck be PROUD of what you've learned. "Just" going to Mun and Minmus is quite a feat that we tend to take for granted, but it builds a very solid foundation for understanding all the concepts you're feeling overwhelmed by now. The more comfortable you are tooling around Mun and Minmus, the easier it will be for you to see how (and why) you do the things necessary for interplanetary missions.

tl;dr nothing usable in this post but a pep talk

Damn this is motivational, and you know what you are right. I actually feel proud now. By watching a few tutorials I can actually build my own space ship that can launch itself into orbit around kerbin by taking advantage of gravitational pulls and shooting yourself out there at a speed around 2250 m/s, and then proceed to launch myself out of orbit and into a new orbit around a new planet. Pretty crazy huh? Also just now i sent a probe to the mun  cus i wanted science, but then I saw that i didn't get more than 5% back from transmitting it so i had to fly back to kerbin, and I did. But i forgot that i wasn't planning on actually landing on kerbin again so I didn't have a decoupler or a heatshield under my probe but somehow I managed to throttle full speed towards my retrograde vector (or whatever its called) to just barely speeding down through my descent through the atmosphere and somehow I landed my probe without smashing it to bits. Crazy how much you can learn in just a couple of days when you put your mind to it. These past few days have been a steep learning curve, and my next move is to land on the mun and plant my heckin flag!

[Interstellar Yeet]

https://imgur.com/a/whB7kFJ I LANDED ON THE MUN, I DID IT!! Now the only problem is as I've been told a billion times before is, I don't have enough fuel to get back. But that's fine! I will either go back to my old save and improve my rocket, or i will fire a new rocket to save my scientist. Anyhow, I managed to land and I know I'm sideways but I still landed so heck yes.