This Sign Won't Stop Me, Because I Can't Read: A Caveman No Contract Challenge!

[AlSlea]

The sky burned bright that night. The night it took our wise woman from us. Ever since, we have sworn revenge against it - we will bang rocks together until we find a way into the sky, flying farther and further until we wind the gods responsible.

Then we will have our revenge.

Welcome! This is my first post on these fourms, but I've been around for years. Currently I am doing a Kerbalism/JNSQ run, but all of the complexities of trying to make Kerbals not die on short trips into the Black were giving me a headache. So that's when I found the Caveman Challenge! I love it! No thinking involved - just brute force, patience, and luck! The No Contracts addition was obvious to me, as by definition a Caveperson isn't going to be able to read. Plus, I've done a Grand Tour (or nearly one, I forget if I gave up near the end) with No Contracts before.

Here's a link to all of my mods - AFAIK, none of these affect gameplay. So hopefully I should qualify for both of these challenges. https://imgur.com/gallery/iWyFbyk
 

[AlSlea]

The banging rocks together crew has come up with some impressive achievements! The first atlatl is launched - this one teaches the tribe an important lesson about air resistance, but it does allow the pilot to return safely, at least. In the process, some useful science is achieved.

The Sky Gods will feel our wrath yet!

Also: I've decided to go with a Medium Difficulty Career for this one, as without contracts, Hard (and Diamond) is not even possible, to my understanding. And in any case, I don't want to lose the ability to revert.



https://imgur.com/gallery/zn9vpGg

Edited October 13, 2022 by AlSlea

[AlSlea]

Oh, and a small note- obviously I will not be able to complete the No Contract challenge while doing the Caveman Challenge, as No COntract requires an upgrade, while Caveman forbids them. No worries! I want to see how far I can get with a completely illiterate space program!

Valentina - granddaughter of the murdered wise woman - has just completed what was very nearly an orbit. Had these poor souls known anything about piloting, she would surely have made it. Nonetheless, that's money, science, and increased drive for revenge in the bucket!

Not sure why I can't insert images the usual way (perhaps I have to do my 5 posts first?) but anyway, here are some links to them:

Really digging being able to use the new Parallax 2.0 mod on this - it did NOT work on JNSQ. Such pretty grass.

https://imgur.com/gallery/NJDaBNN

Edited October 13, 2022 by AlSlea

[AlSlea]

Valentina manages a true orbit on her second try. Still no sign of the Sky Gods, but she looks at the distant Mun with deep suspicion.

Next stop, the Mun! In theory. I have to see if I can actually do that yet.

Edited October 13, 2022 by AlSlea

[AlSlea]

She did manage a brief flyby of the Mun - there was some momentary panic as she realized she had blundered into a collision course at first, but thankfully a small burn avoided this.



Now two projects are happening roughly at the same time - a plane has been built to first tool around KSC and grab science, and then to tour around the whole planet



And second, we're trying to figure out exactly what sort of stones need to be banged together to allow for an un-Kerbaled mission!

Edited October 13, 2022 by AlSlea

[AlSlea]

The first robotic mission was - and we say this without irony or hyperbole - GREAT SUCCESS! Not only did we land on the Mun, we even managed a flyby of Minmus on top of that. Getting close enough to send the data back home took a while (did you know that limited probe control sometimes lets you ignite engines? I did not!). But hey! ten years well spent.

Let's start with the craft design of The Spear That Threw Itself:

Straightforward enough, right? Well, my neolithic crew had a bit of a brainstorm. The best fire is in the hut, right? So what if the final state engines were INSIDE the payload bay?


Let's get a better look, shall we?


Here it is approaching the Mun


And an undignified landing!


Getting this thing upright again took a few tries, but eventually it was managed.


With no sign of the Sky Gods anywhere on the Mun, the decision is made to push for Kerbin's other notable wandering star - Minmus!


This took a *while*


Sadly, we had no control over the craft as it passed over. But in the end we were able to get the science back. These rocks get better all the time!

Edited October 15, 2022 by AlSlea

[AlSlea]

After a bit more flying in my new science plane, I've picked up some more science. Not sure I can hit the target at this point - how much else is there to do, really? But we shall see.

[king of nowhere]

1 hour ago, AlSlea said:

After a bit more flying in my new science plane, I've picked up some more science. Not sure I can hit the target at this point - how much else is there to do, really? But we shall see.

 

which target are you talking about? i didn't notice any.

if your purpose is to complete the caveman challenge - that is, just grabbing some more science - you can easily make a couple more mun landings in different biomes and get easy science.

if your purpose is to explore all the planets, you can make it at least as far as duna with the money you have. though for me going interplanetary in caveman was quite the challenge and it required learning on the fly

Edited October 16, 2022 by king of nowhere

[AlSlea]

On 10/16/2022 at 12:51 PM, king of nowhere said:

which target are you talking about? i didn't notice any.

if your purpose is to complete the caveman challenge - that is, just grabbing some more science - you can easily make a couple more mun landings in different biomes and get easy science.

if your purpose is to explore all the planets, you can make it at least as far as duna with the money you have. though for me going interplanetary in caveman was quite the challenge and it required learning on the fly

Yeah, I can probably just do the Mun thing. Not being able to get out of the capsule is really frustrating! I hadn't realized that would be a thing. I'm currently flying through Kerbin on a little science plane - grabbed another 90 science or so from that.

My target was to fill up the available science tree, like you said. Maybe I'll do that and stop, or maybe I'll go for another planet flyby, like you mentioned.

I have been learning a lot more about the game from doing this than I expected to starting out. More people should try this!

[AlSlea]

The challenge has been met! All it took was some tooling around in the old science plane, a Kerbaled landing on Minmus, an orbit of the Mun, and an accidental 30 years orbiting the Sun (with a safe return!).



The Minmus landing! Easier than I thought it would be. The secret to getting far in caveman seems to be MOAR STAGES. I later found a way to add one more to this, and it came in handy in the generational trip around the Sun. Honestly, the tricky part is not being captured by the Mun.



My Mun close orbit. Did not have the oomph to do an actual landing here, even with the new stage...



But somehow on the way back home, I got flung out into deep space. L1 scanners are garbage, I tells ya. They just LIE about orbital paths all the time. My hat's off to King of Nowhere for somehow doing Jool under these conditions.



Finally made it back, with some judicious use of the Ant engine and a lot of patience. Valentina spent 30 years staring into the black.



I'm fairly certain she's become the Sky God that they all feared at this point.