[COMPLETED] Beyond Home Space Race - winner! @jimmymcgoochie

[Barrackar]

Barrackar's First three "launches".

https://imgur.com/a/DjfN6IA

Milestones: First Kerballed launch @ 0 minutes. First Launch @ 2 minutes. First Kerballed Orbit @ 9min 17 seconds.

I recorded video as well which I will upload later.

[Barrackar]

7 hours ago, camacju said:

yeah... I can't really get the rescale to work. I tried reinstalling and the game just hangs before entering the menu screen with that extra cfg in the gamedata folder. I might have to drop out of this challenge

It might be working correctly. For me it adds almost two minutes (almost doubling load time) to the load screen but it does eventually load.

[jimmymcgoochie]

@GuessingEveryDay Rule clarification please- do you need to complete one milestone before starting on another? For example do I need to complete a Kerballed landing on Lua before launching a mission to land on another of Rhode's moons, or can I fire rockets around whenever I like?

[GuessingEveryDay]

2 hours ago, jimmymcgoochie said:

@GuessingEveryDay Rule clarification please- do you need to complete one milestone before starting on another? For example do I need to complete a Kerballed landing on Lua before launching a mission to land on another of Rhode's moons, or can I fire rockets around whenever I like?

Yes, you should do the milestones in the order they are presented.

[jimmymcgoochie]

AAARG(r)- A mixed bag of missions.

This is a pretty long update containing no less than 5 missions plus some minor 'launch-grab science-recover' stuff.

Spent the science left over at the end of the last report, unlocking the OKTO probe core and solar panels:

Then Ganymede 1 launched. Less than a minute later, the various pieces of Ganymede 1 were raining down around the launchpad and Bill was parachuting back to the ground having aborted the launch when the rocket began acting like wet spaghetti and nearly folding itself in half.

In the meantime, Callisto 3 launched a land and return probe destined for Lua's surface, and in the process proved that those Europa relay sats are actually functional:

Next up was Ganymede 2, redesigned to remove the draggy radial materials bays in favour of stack-mounted versions that would be used and then dropped with the spent stages. This limited the science that could be gained from Lua but gave it more fuel:

Then I decided to 'launch' all the science experiments possible on every available launch site, which brought in a tidy haul of science:

(Full reports are in the Imgur album, this is the last one with the final tally of science points gained).

A simple launch to get Bill and Bob their first star apiece by putting them in orbit, using a shortened Callisto launcher:

After this launch a new node was unlocked to give bigger and better (and bigger!) fuel tanks and fuel-related paraphernalia, as well as the ability to do fuel crossfeed on radial decouplers:

The crew level-upper ship landed in a new biome so it got some extra science:

Here we go again...

Ganymede 3 put the new fuel tanks to use and swapped the SRBs of its predecessor with methalox strap-on boosters which also feed fuel to the core stage. Everything was going fine, until about 5 seconds in when the side boosters began oscillating wildly and eventually caused the entire first stage to break apart:

Before Bill could even undo his seatbelt, however, the pod was stapled to the top of a modified version of that same booster, now much more stable, and Ganymede 4 was launched:

At this point there was a problem- Ganymede 4's transfer burn was within minutes of both Ganymede 2 and Callisto 3 reaching their Lua periapsis. Some rejigging was required, but Ganymede 2 pushed its periapsis back just enough and Callisto 3 managed to brake into orbit and get back out of the atmosphere within seconds of Ganymede 4's burn needing to start, so it all worked out in the end.

Ganymede 2 turned out to have a lot less fuel than it needed to land on Lua and then leave again; deliberately stranding a Kerbal doesn't seem like a good way to start the exploration of other celestial bodies, so Ganymede 2 was repurposed as an orbit and return mission with some science from the top of Lua's tenuous atmosphere gathered for good effect.

Callisto 3 spotted Rhode's outer moon Ash as it began its final descent to Rhode's inner moon Lua:

A successful landing was made in the Mossy Lowlands biome and science was acquired:

The probe then headed back to orbit and from there returned to Rhode:

And now to the main event: Ganymede 4!

First Kerbal on Lua at Y1, D3, 05:10 and he even had time to get some science, plant a flag and get a nice picture with the flag facing the right way round. Why Bill? To repack those parachutes! They'll be needed on his return to Rhode, but also came in handy for a little bit of biome hopping- even if they didn't quite work according to expectations:

Invisible parachutes? Weird. But more science was gained from the Atmospheric Midlands before Bill headed back to space and then back to Rhode:

Callisto 3 made it safely back to Rhode's surface, doing an impression of a TIE fighter or something on the way down:

So. Much. SCIENCE! Spent it straight away on the two additional nodes needed to build a deployable science site- I don't remember seeing any rule against that, and even if there is there are some additional parts that will come in handy:

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/WAaDDUr

Milestone:

• First Kerbal landing on Lua on Y1, D3, 05:10

As an aside- I'm working my way through the Jovian moons for my mission names and there are some real gems in there, like Callirhoe, Praxidike and Philophrosyne.

[jimmymcgoochie]

AAARG(r)- Any excuse for a rocket launch!

No milestones to report (yet) but the first lander to go to another moon besides Lua, Amalthea 1, was launched and sent on its way:

Europa 2, a relay sat with bigger and better relay dishes, was sent up to a 1000km orbit of Rhode:

Then Europa 3 was launched into a polar orbit to start doing some SCANsat scans of Rhode:

Spoiler

Yes, I added SCANsat, but I have several good reasons for doing so: a) more science, b) maps are useful for landings, c) they match the Restock/NFT art style because Nertea did the new models, d) it's another excuse to launch more rockets and e) others are using it too.

Then Bob went on a rampage, squeezing science out of anywhere and everywhere he could around the KSC:

Although it didn't always go according to plan:

The end result of all that driving around the KSC?

Over five hundred science!

Several nodes unlocked which contained useful things like struts (and by extension autostruts!), fairings and the 2Gm comms parts; I think the rescale config also boosts antenna ranges by 3.5x as they're all showing 7Gm range instead.

And yet it still wasn't quite enough to unlock all the nodes I wanted. But wait- Europa 2 had science experiments on it and I forgot about those!

Much better!

I also hired my first new Kerbal, Engineer Julbo, as Bill is still on his way back from Lua and I wanted to deploy a deployable science array:

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/HFTLScm

No milestones, but tech unlocked which will be very useful for future missions. Amalthea 2 will soon be heading for Ash, Rhode's outermost moon (the one with LAKES OF MOLTEN LAVA ) and Ganymede 5 (or maybe 6, since all odd-numbered Ganymedes have failed so far) will be going out to Armstrong once Amalthea 1 lands there.

[Barrackar]

Barrackar's second set of uploads: Munar Mayhem part1

https://imgur.com/gallery/X7hHhH2

Milestone Achieved: First Kerballed landing on Lua @ UT 6 hours 43 minutes and 41 seconds.

Umm, I notably did NOT follow the milestones in order. I skipped the comm system, and technically have not claimed the First Orbit milestone either. In fact, I was planning on skipping the interplanetary portion altogether and see if I could scrape together enough science to put together a "low tech" ship to go interstellar. I am not installing KSPIE because I skipped those milestones of course.

My Kerbals also did some extensive testing of Murphy's law. I had some launch instability, landers tipping, and unfortunately I lost Bob on reentry - see my part 2 post below.

Edited November 8, 2020 by Barrackar

[Barrackar]

Barrackar's second set of uploads: Munar Mayhem part2

https://imgur.com/gallery/D5JXMOL

No milestones achieved. Launch instabilities and ships headed for Ash.

Continued in part 3 below with further moon landings.

[Barrackar]

Barrackar's second set of uploads: Munar Mayhem part3

https://imgur.com/gallery/mVKe23G

Lua Lander2 tips over; Bob's Armstrong mission burns up, but a second attempt succeeds. An Ash flyby returns successfully.

MILESTONE: First Kerballed landing on Rhode's moon (Not Lua). @ UT Day 1, 19 hours, 3 mins, 17 seconds; Also First landing on Rhode's moon (not Lua) [second attempt might as well claim this for the launch.

[Barrackar]

Barrackar - Lua Resue

https://imgur.com/gallery/fHjJ6ds

No milestones, but science recovered and previously stranded kerbals on Lua were rescued.

My last post for tonight. A lander is enroute to Ash. I'll probably send a second to get another biome. Between the two of them I might be able to get the remaining science I need. Gametime is at UT 23 days, 15 hours, 57 minutes. Multiple flybys of Ash eats up in-game time.

[jimmymcgoochie]

Uh, @Barrackar, you do realise that you need to do the milestones in order, and complete each one before starting the next? I would also like to point out that that’s the stock tech tree, when I and others are using the much larger community tech tree.

[kspnerd122]

Does rescale work in 1.8.1, if not, I will hack gravity to be higher(so I have the same orbital requirements as you, also, atmosphere changed, but not the radius)

[jimmymcgoochie]

@kspnerd122 maybe you should have checked that before the race started?

I see no reason why it wouldn’t work, if you’ve downloaded compatible versions of everything you need (Kopernicus, Sigma Rescale, Beyond Home and the rescale config). You’ll just have to try it and find out.

Turning up gravity isn’t the same as rescaling the system as it will increase your required TWR as well as delta-V.

[kspnerd122]

Fixed problem

[jimmymcgoochie]

AAARG(r)- I really need to write these more often...

Some of the names in these missions might be wrong, because I keep forgetting what they are and many of them look the same because I use similar looking launchers each time.

I'm not going to cover everything in detail (look the Imgur album for that) but here's a greatest hits compilation:

Europa 4, launched to polar Rhode orbit to do scanning and mapping.

Amalthea 2, going to do the same thing to one of Rhode's moons.

Safe return of both Ganymede 2 and Ganymede 4, along with a whole lotta science!

New tech nodes unlocked.

Callisto 5, carrying deployed science doodahs and a 'ballute' to test if those are actually useful in Lua's pitiful atmosphere.

Ganymede 5, carrying Julbo and new hire Luner out to Lua to deploy those deployed science doodahs, plus a little rover to get more science.

Elara 1- the rover from Ganymede 5 stuck to a Callisto-class booster and lobbed at Armstrong for more science gathering.

And finally, something of note:

Amalthea 1 lands on Armstrong at Y1, D6, 3:06.

Full album and all the details: https://imgur.com/a/YbKdvcj

Milestone:

• First landing on a moon of Rhode that isn't Lua (Armstrong) on Y1, D6, 3:06.

Next up will probably be a crewed visit to Armstrong as well as some additional missions to start mapping out Rhode's moons and putting rovers on them. There's plenty of science still to be gathered so there will also be plenty of non-milestone related launches continuing to happen.

[kspnerd122]

I have a question, Is doing it on a different version fair, for everyone, because it means say, you wanted to avoid a increase in a part mass, well then avoid that version, this is just an example, but several bugs exist in stock ksp that mods multiply, for example, mass drivers MUST be banned, because they add delta V with less fuel than doing it with normal methods(asparagus/onion staging, moar boosters, etc.), they can hurl you at lightspeed when you are only using 1k parts, see the problem, they are too OP to exist, probs can get that down too, also, orion drives start to exist in this case(dropping a mass driver out the back and then firing it, with a heatshield on the back, it EXPONENTIALLY increases delta V, just because of how KSP works, you can get the same final speed with 1/10 of the fuel.

[Barrackar]

19 hours ago, jimmymcgoochie said:

Uh, @Barrackar, you do realise that you need to do the milestones in order, and complete each one before starting the next? I would also like to point out that that’s the stock tech tree, when I and others are using the much larger community tech tree.

That seems a lot like trying to change the rules after the race has started. Nothing said we had to do the milestones in order - those would be more like checkpoints than milestones. It doesn't even say we have to complete all the milestones. Until the milestones document was changed to clarify I was even under the impression we were sending 10 kerbals to land on Janus another 10 for each of the moons. I still plan on putting 10 kerbals on each because I think that makes for an interesting challenge. Landing only on Lond would be too easy - landing on Janus and Talon is much more difficult.

For the tech tree, it doesn't make a difference because I am only using stock parts. All installing community tech tree (CTT) would do is add a bunch of empty nodes. (This would change if/when I installed KSPIE which obviously requires CTT as a dependency. If you want to rules gripe, I think SCANSAT is definitely a parts mod. A pretty useful one too with biome maps and some extra science. I don't mind, go ahead - its a game.

If you want to disqualify me, fine. I'm not starting all over in any case. I'll keep posting my progress according the rules as I understood them when the race started because - well I'm doing this for fun and maybe somebody else will be interested in my designs or strategies. I am curious to see if I can get a conventional rocket to Janus before those using KSPIE get there using a warp drive or something similar. That poses and interesting question. I look forward to seeing the entries from everybody entering this race because everybody always has a different approach.

[kspnerd122]

Dude You dont need CTT for KSPIE, it works fine without it, 95% of the parts are available, the others are sorta useless, like a fuel tank that can be used a s a habitat, kinda useless.

What defines comm system, because I get that we need satelites, but the first relay antenna isnt acessible until AFTER you go to a moon(flyby works)

[kspnerd122]

Ok, did my first few launches, screenshots below

also, what counts as a comm system.

Going for orbit next

also, commnet sat 1a will be lifted into space soon, however, do NOT require relays because they take 160 science to get

Please do not require them, because otherwise there is a bottleneck on science

[kspnerd122]

tech after mission 1

 

missed mission 2, but didnt get any unlocks on that one, 2 was Identical to 1

just less science

Went to lua, it was BEUATIFUL

tech tree after first launch, mission reports next.

tech tree after launch 3

 

launch report for first launch

2nd launch

 

3rd launch

[jimmymcgoochie]

AAARG(r)- That could have been much worse!

Ganymede 5 headed out to Lua to deploy a deployed science cluster and a small rover. All seemed to be going to plan...

But then I forgot to stage the main parachute and some lithobraking occurred:

And yes, it's lying with the only crew hatch facing the ground. Time for some creative thinking! And by creative thinking I of course mean 'ramming the rover into it to roll it over', which worked out OK. (The rover was retroactively renamed Elara 2, as Elara 1 is already on its way to Armstrong at this point).

After that, Callisto 5 landed without issue and the deployed science setup was deployed and set up:

Followed by the hairiest takeoff I've done in a long time, including two more radial tanks which picked a fight with a moon (and lost), a chronic lack of reaction wheel torque and Julbo disassembling part of her own ship to make it fly, but fly it did!

Ganymede 6 was modified before launch to include some important upgrades, like a reaction wheel that can actually move the entire ship and decouplers for the radial tanks. It also carries a payload of deployable solar panels and batteries, but no experiments- they'll follow on Ganymede 7; in addition, it also has a small rover attached to the top, which will be Elara 3. That's right, I'm sending two crewed landers to Armstrong at the same time.

Speaking of landing on Armstrong, Elara 1 touched down safely without even using its final stage and the 2.5km/s of delta-V it contained. That's what happens when you re-use a launcher but with a much lighter payload.

Luner went out on EVA to grab an EVA report as Ganymede 5 parachuted down, but for some reason he let go and had to use his own chute. No harm done though, and some science gained after splashdown. (After checking his stats and seeing that he's got 0.007 bravery, I can only conclude that clinging on to the side of a spacecraft that's plummeting towards the ocean made him nearly faint in terror, which is why he let go...)

Lots of science gained, which was immediately spent:

More science, more deployed science, better comms- what's not to love?

Ganymede 7 was then launched carrying the science components for the Armstrong deployed science array, along with a seismometer for Bill to stick to the Himalia 1 rover.  Due to an oversight in construction, the secondary payload for Ganymede 7 (a relay with scanning and science bits) was attached to the second stage rather than the lander itself, which looked like it would be a problem until I realised that I could send the relay (now renamed Himalia 2) into a high polar orbit and the lander into a low equatorial orbit if I decoupled the lander but not the relay. For once a design mistake that worked out for the better!

After the launch of Europa 5 (magnetometer and resource scanner into polar Rhode orbit) I had just enough science to buy a couple of extra nodes:

No milestones yet, but Kerbals are about to reach Armstrong's SOI and landing will commence shortly afterwards.

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/OjrQ2Hs

I won't be transmitting any science from the SCANsat parts as that seems like cheating to me.

Deployed science, on the other hand, is entirely legitimate, and likewise if I find any ROCs to scan with those rover scanner arms; as far as I'm concerned, if it's made by Squad (and the DLCs are) then it's "stock" and I'm using it.

[kspnerd122]

Hey, Im gonna get comms next.

also, it seems like you didnt do that, so I will be ahead

[jimmymcgoochie]

12 hours ago, kspnerd122 said:

Hey, Im gonna get comms next.

also, it seems like you didnt do that, so I will be ahead

If you’re referring to the ‘3 satellite comms network’ milestone, I did that one a few days ago.

[kspnerd122]

sorry, but anyway, what have you NOT done yet, because I may do interplanetary, also, what classifies as interplanetary comms, soes that just mean an orbiter around another planet with a comms dish, or what.

OML MY SHIP JUST RANDOMLY EXPLODED OVER LUA, WHAT THE HECK.

[kspnerd122]

It did it again, if it coninues, i may just spawn a new lander with vessel mover and then delete the old one, because it keeps happening, jeb always gets killed, what the heck