Well Doccumented Space Program

[Kuansenhama]

I'm not sure which direction I'm going to go with this. But the basic plan is just to document my playthrough that I'm starting up. This might be a bit 'boring', as its going to be an unmodded playthrough on normal career difficulty. I know I plan to divide it into "chapters" and set some custom goals. Some months ago I took a random challenge for a single launch to Dres mission. I might try to weave other challenge missions into this career playthrough if I can.

This is really more for me than anyone else. I've heard that journaling your progress will help to stop you from losing interest in your saves, and that is a frequent problem I have here. I was planning to do a full playthrough and land on every planet grand tour etc etc before KSP2 came out, but that didn't pan out. The save actually wound up getting corrupted (probably due to one of the mods I was running)

Anyways I think we all know how this starts...

Chapter 0: Boom Buckets

Regardless I jokingly called my first rocket the "boom bucket". Things might have more cool and serious sounding names down the line.

This got me 30 science. Enough to unlock the thermometer, barometer and liquid fuel tanks. I took two more contracts, one to test the parachute and another to test the swivel on the launchpad. I'm thinking I'd like to try exploring kerbin with planes once I can. Usually I go straight to space. 

Boom Bucket 2 flew over to the grasslands. 

Took a few EVA reports from around the KSC so I could unlock the materials bay and really get science production going.

The Boom Bucket 3 flew twice. With the better science returns from the materials bay I was able to get the aviation node in the check tree.

On the second flight I managed to land with the upper liquid fuel stage on the grasslands.

There we go. Hopefully I can scrounge together a half-decent plane with the pretty basic tech in the next chapter.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 1: Playing With Planes

Don't ask me why we started with chapter 0. Regardless, I've never played around too much with planes in this game. For all the maniac hours i've put into it, I've mostly built rockets. It might just be that I'm inexperienced, but it seems like planes are hard.

I created four designs (Condor 1, Condor 2, Condor 3, Condor 4). The general review was as follows:

Condor 1: Probably the best design. Didn't really have any flaws besides randomly exploding when I tried to land it.

Condor 2: Exploded if I so much as sneezed in its general direction.

Condor 3: Liked to wobble off its wheel base when taking off. I put parachutes on it to help me land at remote locations.

Condor 4: Similar design to Condor 1, but with retractable landing gears. This seemed the best at landing without exploding, but I still crashed it several times. I also found out way too late that the hatch was obstructed by a wing.

Regardless these survey contracts seem to actually pay decently well considering most of the markers spawn very close to KSC.

Took jeb in the Condor 1 to visit the island airbase and the old school parts.

This is the only image of the Condor 2. No matter how hard I tried to gently land this thing, It would explode, it was made out of tissue paper and dynamite. I had ambitious plans of exploring kerbin biomes by bringing bob along to reset science experiments as we went. Didn't pan out.

I also got jeb to the top of the steep mountain. (I forget what the community here calls it, 2K i think). There were several harrowing failed attempts.

After Jeb was ready for a break from my antics, I took Valentina on a long-distance flight. Buzzed one of the comm network dishes on the way (this screenie isn't the best tho, I dont know what that turquoise triangle is...)

Valentina was on a mission to visit the northern launch site. I've never been here but this pad actually has a pretty cool model and a working ladder.

Val and the Condor 3 I sent her in.

Val also flew to the south pole. I discovered that the Kraken lives yet as kerbals love to stand sideways right at the pole.

"Any touchdown you walk away from is a landing" -Jeb

This was a Condor 4. This seemed to fly and land the best of all my plane designs. I still managed to crash this one though.

Jeb arrives at the north pole, confirms santa claus isn't real and that he isn't getting a 3.75m command pod.

I also took this contract. This actually pays out pretty well considering I already have working airplane designs and that this is still the early-game.

Easy peasy with a condor 4.

There was also the flight of the boom bucket 4, to test some parts.

Success on that part.

[AtomicTech]

Looking forward to see where this goes

[Kuansenhama]

So... I'm flying some missions for chapter 2 right now and I remembered seeing this challenge when I first wanted to do a fresh KSP playthrough. It seems pretty barebones more of a concept or roleplay type thing than anything else. But I think I'm actually going to try and pursue using a set of standard launch vehicles once I go to space. I'm not going to count the boom buckets twoards the total because those kind of had to be built out of necessity...

Plus my old wheel challenge I never got around to. So this is at least two objectives that I will be working twoards.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 2: If I had a million kerbucks...

Well i'm back. Anyways normally in any other playthrough, I would try to get into orbit or go to the moon now. I've done it before with only the tier 1 space center buildings and no patched conics, though it's hard to do. I actually think I'd like to try something less ambitious (maybe more ambitious, depending upon how you look at it) and try to get some upgrades done on the KSC. All I have is the tier 2 runway and tier 2 astronaut complex, so I could get EVA reports while faffing around with planes.

And for that we need money.

The upgraded research center is 451,000
The upgraded VAB is 225,000
The upgraded tracking station is 150,000
The upgraded mission control is 75,000
The upgraded launchpad is 50,000

We only have about a quarter million funds. We need almost a million. (951,000 + a cushion for craft) So lets see what contracts are available...

These survey contracts pay quite well, and if you have a decent plane you can complete them on huge profits. some of the contracts require you to be above a certian altitude (typically 16-19km). That is far too high for the Condor 4 to reach, it can only get to about 12km.

Took two more doable contracts. I didn't realize until after I accepted it that it was a quarter way around the planet. Though throughout playing this morning I got remarkably good at the niche skillset of leaving a plane flying on x4 warp while I get up and do other things. The condor 4 has the range to get just about everywhere on the planet but it is not particularly fast.

"Another Happy Landing"

Third contract. Took Jeb with me this time, the locations were clustered up by the north pole. Jeb has already flown to the north pole once...

Actually managed to set down a Condor intact and get science data. Interestingly, Kerbin has 3 distinct polar biomes and I did not know that until. There's the northern ice shelf, southern ice shelf and just generic "ice shelf" which judging by the online map I looked at, the generic ice shelf is portions of both the north and south poles.

Also just noticed Minmus photobombed this picture.

I then built this abomination hooptie rover to do some science around the KSC and complete some more scientific survey contracts. The downwards facing Juno engine existed merely as an electric generator as with limited part count, no solar panels and only the smallest batteries, there isn't much I can do.

Apparently this is a valid way to take a surface sample.

Between the advance, individual payouts and final payout these contracts can pay over 100k kerbucks. And doing them is super easy and less time consuming than flying around in the condor. Seriously if you ever get soft-locked in career with next to no money, decline contracts until you can get one of these.

Also the amount of early game science you can grind out of the space center is pretty insane. 

For the final condor flight of the day decided to go 3/3

Success and second successful landing. Jeb seems to have better luck than Val.

Managed to grind out all the funds needed to upgrade everything I wanted to except the tracking station. I won't really need it until I start flying munar missions. But I want to keep in line with the contract progression so just doing an orbit first will satisfy that. Since I want to follow through on that launcher challenge, being in this position means I can begin to prototype rockets that I could use for a good long time. The 300 science from around KSC plus scraps from contracts and landing in various biomes around kerbin means I'm quite high tech for someone who hasn't even left the atmosphere yet. I should be able to post the tech tree soon. If I have more time to play tonight I will begin launcher development and post on that.

 

[Kuansenhama]

17 hours ago, AtomicTech said:

Looking forward to see where this goes

Oh by the way, thank you for following this thread. . I see by your profile picture, you are also an appreciator of the best Disney movie ever made.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 3: More Boosters

Well, this is Kerbal SPACE Program, so maybe I should stop faffing around with planes.

After much more agonizing than I am willing to admit, I decided to settle on the first of my ten launchers. Since as per the standard lifter challenge I am to use the same ascent stages over and over, I wanted to make sure the design was a winner.

I ultimately went with this simple asparagus design using swivel boosters. I'm not a big fan of SRBs and the lack of control they give. The cost savings aren't worth it. But I will take full advantage of the Kerbal's ability to rig up unrealistically complex fuel crossfeed systems to make efficient rockets. This launcher is actually a bit overengineered for the spacecraft as I discovered I'm putting on it now, but I want flexibility in my launchers. The launcher is only ~21,000 kerbucks, and especially as I unlock more expensive science and communications parts that will be more than enough to orbit any probe or satellite and not even be the lion's share of the cost.

As for naming. I wanted to reference the Mercury program. Mercury is a planet, but not one that exists in the kerbol system. But Mercury is an element, a metal that is liquid at room temperature. So logically following that weird train of thought I decided to name my rocket after another metal that is liquid at room temperature. So my launcher got christened the Gallium. I figure I can probably not only fufill my promise of not naming everything "boom bucket", but establish a naming scheme using the periodic table.

Additionally, this isn't clearly defined in the challenge thread, but for the sake of my own sanity I will simply assume any engines on the first stage count towards the challenge. I am free to modify the upper stages and payload spacecraft.

Gallium 1 Liftoff. I had to focus on flying the rocket as this spacecraft seemed a bit unstable. I brought Bob along to do space science stuff.

Orbit

Typically once you get into space, you get a contract to return from orbit. Some players might miss it, because they bring their spacecraft back before checking the mission control for new contracts. But in the early game, its a good way to earn a lot of extra cash. This time the contract was slightly different though, as it also asked that I rendezvous and exchange crew between vessels. I took it anyways, figuring that an in-orbit crew exchange would happen sooner or later.

Bill and bob went to a higher orbit to do high space science.

Reentry

Jeb and Bob. They look happy to have survived their first jaunt into space. I haven't told them they have to walk home yet.

Now then. I didn't want to have to launch two spacecraft just to get the small payout for an in-orbit crew transfer. Luckily a rescue contract came to my rescue and I was about 99% certain that transferring the kerbal would fulfill the transfer requirement (it did). Rescue contracts are some of the best ones, because you get free astronauts out of the deal. 

Regardless, modified the upper spacecraft. Jeb and Bob's jaunt in orbit earned another 300 science and as I continue to fill out the tech tree I unlocked the Gemini capsule. I know the thing has some other name in the game, but its the recreation of the Gemini capsule so that's what I think of it as. I don't think i've ever even used this thing, and its a nicely modeled part. It seemed fitting for this first rendezvous mission (and actually has built in reaction wheels, unlike the spherical pods.)

Guess who completely forgot about upgrading the tracking station. Luckily i was able to set Leah's pod as a target and just preform the rendezvous with brute force.

Leah safely onboard. It did fulfil both contracts as I had hoped. This thing was hilariously overengineered. It had a whole upper stage that I didn't even use.

Leah: "My Hero"

Jeb: *Puts on Sunglasses and walks away

Edited April 6, 2023 by Kuansenhama

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 4: To The Rescue

This launcher is OP for its size and cost.

Off in space. I brought bob along to reset the mun science.

Orbital Stuff. I was able to get all the way to the Mun on the center launcher stage.

Remember to check yo contracts once you get in the Mun's SOI. There is some extremely lucrative stuff you can do on the same mission.

Got bob and Val out. Despite the fact no landing was involved it looks like they had a blast.

Reentry with the orbital stage exploding in the background. I will never not enjoy intense reentries.

Splashed down safe. Munar orbit mission was very successful.

Now I'm lined up to land on the Mun. Another lucrative contract, but I'm not going to do that JUST yet.

I ended up building and testing this rocket, with this vaguely delta-like triple orange tank setup. This would be the second of my launcher variants. I may add seperatrons once I have them unlocked and consider it the same rocket. It doesn't really need them, it launches fine without exploding. Additionally in my experimentation and back of the envelope math, just using clusters of seven LVT-45 Swivels gives you basically the same thrust as a Mainsail. Its a few tons heavier but when your rocket is 100+ tons you don't notice the weight. But its only about half the cost in funds. I don't really need to save funds at this point. The thing is of course crossfed. I'm going to reveal whats in the fairing in just a minute... (Tho the name kind of spoils it)

Deciding to follow through on my plan to name launchers after periodic table elements, this launcher was christened the Bismuth launch vehicle.

Liftoff of the Bismuth-1, carrying the kerbal rescue bus.

So this gameplay session was from a few days ago, and I realized I never took a good screenshot of the actual payload. But what it basically is is a core with twelve radially attached single-occupant spacecraft. These can be remotely operated with a probe core. The usage is rescue contracts, as it saves me from having to launch a new rocket for every rescued kerbal.

Rescue contracts are fantastic, because they give you free astronauts and pay you to do it, all you have to do is go get them. Historically I farm them to get a large corps to staff all the stations and bases I end up building.

I put this thing in a ~300km circular orbit. Good enough for getting the LKO rescue kerbals without having to orbit phase too much or spend too much DV. But it should also be good for to the higher orbit kerbals, since I wont have to dig my way out of the gravity well quite as much... I then proceeded to do at least one more rescue contract. I might not document every kerbal I rescue, so don't be surprised if new names and faces just appear on the registry.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 5: A Dark Discovery

"We choose to go to the mun, not because it is easy, but because... actually it is easy because I've played this game wayyy too much."

First of all, here is an up close at the 'Kerbal Rescue Bus' so you can get a good lock at this thing. In some sense it's ridiculous but I also like the roleplay element of it. Even though I'm not using the (uhh I forgot what it was called, the mod that makes rockets take real time to build before you can launch them. I don't even know if that mod is still maintained...) I would assume if someones stuck in space after an accident you don't always have a ground-side rocket ready to launch. But having an orbiting rescue station with ready return spacecraft is somehow 'more realistic'.

Anyways, I have the contracts for landing and planting a flag on the Mun and mun rock recovery. So its time to go.

This rocket is hilariously over-engineered. I didn't want to struggle to get a decent mun lander on the smaller Gallium launcher. So this thing just has a lot of extra DV it doesn't need. It only costs 72k kerbucks and the contract payouts will more than cover that...

Bismuth Launcher booster separation. I of course brought along the OG orange suits for my first Mun landing on this save. (No room for Val)

I know vanilla KSP graphics are not the best, but I still think these swivel clusters look cool. The Bismuth launcher was so overpowered for this mission that the center stage wound up being used as a munar transfer stage.

Made our lord and savior Matt Lowne happy by dropping the booster on a collision course with the mun.

Coming in for landing. 1800m/sec on the upper stage.

The touchdown was quite harrowing, but I dont have screenshots for obvious reasons. I overestimated the TWR of this design and hit the mun at about 50/sec. Miraculously bounced and flipped all crazy like. But managed to recover and took no damage.

I kept the science pretty basic. I could have probably hopped around in different biomes but I don't have all the experiments yet. So that means at some point in the future Id wind up having to biome-hop again just to do gravity readings and seismometer readings. I recognize the counter-intuitive-ness of that, since I need the science points to unlock the advanced experiments. Bob grabbed a surface sample and a mun rock for the contract, and I ran the reports, goo, mat, thermo, and barometer. I still scored over 600 science points.

So what was the "dark discovery" that I made? That you are no longer able to stack kerbals on top of each others heads. That was an absolutely hilarious feature and Squad needs to patch it back in.

Either way I gave Jeb the honor of planting my first flag on a body other than Kerbin.

Gratuitious Reentry Explosions.

I would like to issue a warning. These spherical pods are cheap, compact and low mass and its tempting to use them. But not only do they have no inbuilt reaction wheels but they also like to roll if you land on a slope, especially if you decouple the bottom ring section. They start rolling then they hit a polygon in the terrain and there goes the entire mission. I didn't have that happening here but I suspect I would have had a problem if I had detached that component. The only reason I used it here was because I wanted to bring all 3 of the OGs along for the ride, but this was still the most nail-biting part of the mission (mostly due to my trauma from prior missions) ...

[Nazalassa]

1 hour ago, Kuansenhama said:

They start rolling then they hit a polygon in the terrain and there goes the entire mission.

Or planting a flag right into them. I've stopped using their built-in decoupler for a while now (sad, as they have some ablator and make very good reentry capsules). Or I guess you just need to aim at the sea...

[Kuansenhama]

Minor Update. I'm going to fly some more missions today. But first I have a confession. I have done some very minor cheating.

Mirbeth and Bobsy Kerman were save file edited onto my roster. Who are Bobsy and Mirbeth? They are my own personal legacy kerbals, from old saves. I honestly got more attached to them, and imagined more of a character for the both of them than I ever did with the OG 4. I wanted reincarnate them into this playthrough.

Bobsy was from a save in 0.90 probably. I remember there was no female kerbals yet when he was around. He was a scientist I took on a grand tour which ended with him getting stranded on Eve, and the first kerbal I ever got to level 5. I specifically remember the experience being a thing but not female kerbals, so it must have been a 0.90 save. Bob had died in that save, and I considered bobsy his very skittish and intelligent brother.  He loved science. He did not like rockets.

Mirbeth was from my 1.0 career save. I remember she was right when they added the female Kerbals. the total opposite personality wise. Not the brightest bulb in the shed, but perfectly willing to fly whatever insane contraption I strapped her into, and very lucky too. Mirbeth had a remarkable ability survive insane stuff. I do remember her somehow surviving bailing out of a massive exploding rocket and landing on her helmet (this was before parachutes were a thing). There were also several highspeed plane crashes that she somehow miraculously survived. I think at some point I ended up launching her on an escape trajectory out of the Kerbol system when I got tired of the save file.

Regardless, I wouldn't really consider this cheating consider how I've already demonstrated that I can very easily rescue kerbals and farm the contract. Whats two more with my specific names and traits? I don't think it would void either of the challenges that I'm participating in, and it makes this more fun for me so that's all that matters.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 6: The Dynamic Duo

Well, time to send Bobsy and Mirbeth on their way. I reused a design for a two seater science spacecraft on the Gallium LV. The Mission was for a Minmus orbit and to grab the science there.

I may have done something wrong because Bobsy didn't panic on the flight up.

Mirbeth: "Sure looks like mint ice cream."

Bobsy: "Please, I am tired of dispelling this myth. The myth that Minmus is a huge ball of mint ice cream is preposterous for several reasons. It couldn't be any sort of ice, it is inside the frost line and it would evaporate like a giant comet. The likely, and more scientifically accurate proposal is that Minmus is made primarily of glass or quartz. The slightly green coloration might come a trace amount of copper or chlorine."

With that done, I got a contract to rendevouz above the Mun. The mission to Minmus earned me enough science to get the lab, so I decided to start a station. I declared it 'Easter Station', since today is Easter.

Night launches aren't the best for screenshots.  But the Bismuth launcher was more than up to the task of getting the lab station up in one go.

Easter Station in orbit of Kerbin. I took some experiments to fire up the lab. I moved it into Munar orbit but I didn't take screenshots.

Once I had the station up, I decided I wanted a crew spacecraft that I could use to send crew to and fro. While I'm not a fan of the spherical command pods, this design fit nicely on the Gallium LV, and I didn't feel like designing a new launcher or sending up a Bismuth just for a crew vehicle. I figure this spacecraft will be a stop gap until I develop something else.

The nice thing about this design is the payload and DV are such that you end up dropping the last Gallium stage as you get into orbit so it doesnt't rampantly make space junk. The top stage has about 2.7km/s to play with. Enough to go places. For only 30k kerbucks a pop not bad.

Docked to Easter Station, Munar Rendevouz contract complete.

So good I sent a second one. I have five Kerbals on the station now. I rotated the monoprop tanks 45 degrees. Though the tanks don't actually block the thrust plumes from the RCS blocks, I liked the idea of the thrust plumes not clipping through the the monoprop tanks.

Once that was done, I got my contract for surface science on Minmus. Time to send Mirbeth and Bobsy out again.

Bobsy did EVA science along the way.

Landed at the Minmus north pole.

Bobsy smashed a frozen banana for surface EVA science. Didn't know that was one of the things they could do.

Gratuitious high speed reentry.

The minmus landing mission provided tons of science. Enough for me to finally unlock the most overpowered science experiment of them all, the Gravioli detector.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 7: Surveying the Mun

So things started off pretty simply, taking the Gallium spacecraft off of Easter station to go get Sidden Kerman, who had gotten himself into a pickle in munar orbit.

Only for me to realize that he was retrograde relative to the station...

 

I did get him though, only after stealing fuel from the station and inverting my orbit...

I decided to mine the Mun for science points. It has lots of biomes and now that I have the gravioli detector, I can clean out every biome. I made a reusable lander I called the dusthopper and put it on a Bismuth rocket to explore the Mun.

Dusthopper Launching

Landers with wide bases are always a good idea.

Bobsy and Mirbeth set up surface science.

The canyon landing was particularly harrowing...

But lifting off flying down the canyon like the mun death star trench run was fun.

Docked the Dusthopper to Easter Station.

And sent everyone save the scientists home with the data.

3635 science from one lander and I can reuse it to hit more biomes...

Somewhere along the way I rescued a Valdin Kerman from LKO using the rescue station.

I then created this new large lifter with a 3.75m core to get a Kerbodyne tank (at least a more-than-half-full one) to Easter Station. I'm thinking Tellurium for this Launcher name but I'm not settled on that yet... Tellurium? Rhodium?

Obligatory reminder to check your staging.

Turned out to be not quite enough to get this thing into orbit, but the Wolfhounds give full thrust up here so...

Now I have ~4,000 liquidfuel and ~5,000 ox on the station, enough for several trips to the surface. I just need to transfer Kerbals back out to the station...

[Kuansenhama]

I flew a bunch of munar landings, sweeping most of the science out of most of the biomes. I didn't take screenshots as I realized it would be the same lander, same kerbals each in a different gray biome on the mun. Just trust that I did 12+ landings in different biomes. I used up pretty much all the fuel in that giant tank I sent.

Enough to rendezvous with the station? Only 39m/sec...

When i finished my last science run, the lander didn't have enough fuel to make it back to the station. So I sent an orbiter to go get the Kerbals.

Bobsy is the only one I trust to handle 100+ science reports at the same time.

6727 science returns from one mission. Enough to clear the tech tree?

No, unfortunately...

[fulgur]

This is an excellent report! I like the slower and more methodical approach, building up infrastructure around Kerbin and the Mun (not something I do very often).

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 8: Mostly Successful

Big report today. First of all I made a spreadsheet to catalogue all the launches and the launcher used for each one, as part of the standard lifter challenge. I don't know If as I continue to work my way along I will end up making variant launchers or end up with more than 10. But thus far I have found I greatly enjoy playing with standard launchers. It actually saves me a lot of time designing rockets when I can just slap the launch stage on underneath.

Ga-10, launching to munar orbit to preform a rescue and return a spare kerbal on Easter Station.

Bloody comm net blackout made this annoying.

But I eventually managed to get to Gilbrett in a scary low munar orbit.

Stopped and picked up Burdock Kerman at Easter Station.

Once those two were safely home, I took a look at my contracts. I have a lot of contracts I've picked up or were available for stuff on Minmus, so I think now that the Mun is mostly mined out of science, It's wise to switch our efforts there. I have a contract for basic Eve exploration but were nowhere near a transfer window...

I actually put one of these up around the Mun and somehow forgot to screenshot or record it here. But I designed a survey satellite, which I have been referring to as the "Insight" spacecraft. It does double duty as a resource scanner and relay, and can be launched on the Gallium rocket.

Scan Complete.

The Minmus Insight spacecraft had a gravioli detector, mostly so I could use it to pick up a very lucrative gravity survey contract.

There actually seems to be a fair few typos in the contract messages. No space between 'these' and 'gravimetric'.

I then wanted to start testing a high capacity orbiter. I really, really wish we could get a stock 4-5 kerbal command pod to fit with the 2.5 meter parts. Something like the MK1-3 but maybe with a longer shape and heavier mass. Could be modeled after the Orion or Dragon capsule. I went with putting 3 of the Mk2 plane fuselages together to get a sort of starship like design. I brought along a couple tourists who just needed "orbit around Kerbin" to complete the contract. Because, you know, using tourists as crash test dummies is about the most kerbal thing you can do.

Yep. The Bismuth booster isn't the best design. Partially because it lacks separation rockets (it was designed before I had them)... The kerbals landed safely though, the 3 parachutes are more than enough for the ~10 ton final stage of this thing.

Ultimately tried a completely new launcher. This one dubbed Thorium. It costs about the same as a Bismuth, but seems to have better TWR and since I used soyuz carrots to build the asparagus boosters, it has a much lower risk of exploding during launch.

 

Further testing showed that fins were needed. But I will probably proceed to canonize this as a middleweight lifter.

ultimately got the tourists and this "starship lite" spacecraft works quite well.

Now, time for some serious Minmus Exploration. Broke out the heavy Tellurium launcher for this mission.

Big rockets are always so much more fun to fly...

So what I put in that fairing is both a science outpost, and a nuclear engine lander... The Tellurium preformed way better than its first use. I'm not sure if the payload was slightly lighter (they were both around 90-100 tons iirc) or I just flew a more efficient ascent profile. It seemed to work best flying more or less straight up, maybe tipping a little until the mainsail boosters are ready to drop, then turning over to about sixty degrees.

Wolfhounds are fantastic and possibly slightly OP.

I spare you all most of the boring orbital transfer stuff so here we are...

This nuclear lander is a bit sluggish but it has an absurd amount of DV.

Touchdown. Had to do it with partial probe control due to lack of relays... I didn't really care where I landed this stuff.

Sending down the base, which lands horizontally. Disposed of the transfer stage.

It was at this point, an hour into this mission that I realized the base was supposed to have a docking port. The lander has a docking port in case I ever want to refuel it. But the base was just designed to be a support system for a surface lab. I couldn't think of a situation where I would need to dock with or expand it. You apparently get bonus science returns from labs if they're on the surface of a body. And it had to be fully assembled on launch, no taking an engineer to go weld one on and having it count for the contract.

Whatever, we still have a usable base and lander. I shouldn't worry too much, I have over two million spare Kerbucks at this point. Thorium rocket on the pad. Time to send the crew. I could have sent them in the base and lander. But neither of those can return to Kerbin, and I liked the lite-role-play element of sending the crew in their own spacecraft.

Thorium rocket is fun to fly.

Had to stop and pick up a Staman Kerman in Minmus orbit.

Thorium Starship on approach for landing.

Touchdown. Can we make it back to Kerbin with only 426m/sec in the tank? Well... that's a problem for future me. I'm planning on doing some fueling infrastructure here too, so I can make amends on the contract and hopefully get a good use. Also this screenshot got photobombed by a discord message please ignore that.

Surface science set up. Flag planted (Minmus flag contract done. Surface science contracts now in the works...) I got the lab crunching data. This, coupled with the one in munar orbit will probably be enough for me to soon fill out the tech tree...

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 9: Extended Deployment

So last time we left the Thorium spacecraft on Minmus with most-likely not enough DV to get back. Normally I think the ISRU is a bit overpowered but in this case, I'm going to use one to set up a fueling station. Thats what I've got in this fat fairing on the Tellurium Rocket.

Booster sep, Tellurium is fun to fly.

Side tangent, the skipper is a serious sleeper engine. Cheap, relatively efficient and quite powerful. This center stage can get into orbit with a ~90 ton payload...

Faring Deployment.

Enough DV to land on Minmus... we shall see.

Made it with only 154m/sec in the can. Put bill in the command seat. The lander has four cupolas to clear that minmus base contract, and because it looks cooler that way. As well all know cool looking ships work better.

Cleared a quick EVA survey contract. Wound up having to fly Bobsy to four locations. Almost ran out of propellant.

Filled up after only 2 ingame days.

Sisted and kathul will be staying on the base without a means to return, at least for now. Luckily those two lovely ladies don't mind staying on the minty little mun for awhile doing research.

Set the refueling lander and the Thorium spacecraft into orbit and refueled it. Then decided I would stop by Easter station and pick up the kerbals on the way home. The refueling lander can be piloted remotely, it just has crew accommodation so I can put engineers in there to speed up mining and refining.

Normally I keep orbital stuff out of this but Minmus-Mun transfers are pretty rare.

Docked to Easter station. It was at this juncture that I realized that I had forgotten the 80-some-odd science reports on Minmus. They were still in the nuclear lander...

The Thorium still had over 1km/s. I transferred back to Minmus, and took two rescue contracts along the way. Agager and Cordrin will be joining the crew. The Thorium has seating for 15, might as well use it.

Landed back at Dragonfly base (Again) and Mirbeth got the forgotten science.

Even though I copiously quicksaved with now 3 rescued kerbals and an entire Mun's worth of science reports, this return and reentry was still a nail biter. Regardless the Thorium spacecraft held up.

Tech tree cleared, still almost 6k science in the bank.

Upgraded the administration building for the first time. I think this is the first time (ever) that I've used this facility. But since I had the tech stock tree maxed out, science is pretty much useless now. Sadly I could only invest in the strategy 95%, apparently my reputation is still too low. But that's good enough for now, as pretty much all the science I bring in will now just convert to more money.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 10: Easy Money

Quick short chapter, might upload more tonight. Anyways I found this contract. I don't remember this type of contract being available back in the day. It seems new with the engineer konstruction ability. I was curious about what doing it might entail so I went ahead and took it. I was mostly curious because of the absurdly high payout. Regardless

(We actually have almost 4 million, over 4 million now. I should probably be playing on higher difficulty. But in my experience higher difficulty just makes career more grindy.)

Alright heres the rover it spawned. Looks like it just needs a power supply to be usable. I was worried it would be flipped or id need to jack it up and add wheels or something.

Sending a 3-man Throium rocket was probably overkill. But getting almost 700k for a 70k rocket. Its still like 900% profit. Plus its a chance to get the OG Krew together for a very classic feeling mun mission.

Was this low orbit plane change inefficent as heck? Yes. Did I care when I had 3kms in the can? No.

I've gotten quite good at landing close to things. Came down within 50 meters.

Few static solar panels was all it took, the rover was charging. Not sure why the wheels are cantered like that, but its no my rover so...

The drive turned out to be about 3km to the target zone. But it was over very easy terrain so no biggie.

Success. Sent the Krew home, no screenies of that though.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 11: An EVE-ntful Mission

Okay so when I used to play this game back in the day I had a nasty habit of spending all my time faffing around in Kerbins SOI and not exploring the other bodies in the system. So when I started this playthrough I made it a goal of mine to get a flag on every planet and bring the kerbal back safely. I didn't fly an eve-return mission yet. But I did fly out there. The contract I had called for returning from Eve, so I figured I might as well crew the mission. Hence the Thorium spacecraft on a Tellurium rocket.

Liftoff

Orbital insertion went a lot better than a certain recent spaceX flight. The Tellurium was mostly up to the task, only needed a small apoapsis kick from the nuclear engine stage.

Am I good at making efficient transfers. Err... not really.

Arrival at eve.

Night side insertion burn.

Deploying the eve lander. I have very little experience with other planets, so I wasn't quite sure how to optimally engineer this thing.

I seem to have lost my aerobraking screenshot. Regardless the 3.75m heatshield with full ablator defeated eve's atmosphere just fine.

Unfortunately the Kraken lives yet. Especially here. It took me some save scumming to get the rover out from under the lander without everything exploding. Eventually I got it with one broken wheel and decided that was good enough.

The rover liked to jitter around which messed with the surface scanning arm, probably due to the high gravity. The best trick seemed to be to wedge the rover up close to surface features to scan them.

I found both basalt hexagons and a volcanic rock, and scored the science for both. The rover lost a second wheel along the way and it had become rather difficult to control at that point so I called this section of the mission complete. Regardless I got science readings from two different biomes and had driven about 6km from the landing site. 

Am I the only one who likes reading these? I like learning about the fictional scientific history of the kerbin system.

I brought the Thorium spacecraft along and decided it would be used as a gilly lander and return vehicle.

Landed on Gilly. Bobsy hit a golf ball to escape velocity.

Getting the surface science set up required me to tip the ship over. (but... its Gilly so I could just bring it back to upright with the reaction wheels) Since kerbals have just-not-enough inventory space to move surface science parts and use the jet pack. I became surprisingly proficient at using a jet-packed kerbal to bonk a non-jet packed kerbal back into the ground to save me from having to wait a few minutes each time one of them decided to yeet themselves off into space. Regardless heres a publicity photo.

The mission also came with two these little mini relays. While they are a cute design they aren't powerful enough to send a signal all the way back to kerbin. I just deployed them anyway...

I was worried I wouldn't have enough DV to make it back to kerbin. But my concerns were unfounded. Having ditched the landing stage of the Thorium, the Eve Lander and the relays I had DV for days on the nuke stage. I came back in to find I was heading for a mun encounter.

Dont mind the radioactive mess of deorbiting an unneeded nuke stage.

Sci returns were pretty good. OFC they mostly turn into money now with the strategy I have invoked. Up to 7 million and back down to about 5.7 million after I max upgraded the remainder of KSC.

[fulgur]

Awesome mission! Eve descent is the one thing I hate the most in KSP - my singular Eve Ascent Vehicle had a nailbiting landing, especially since I did it about 3 times (I have clouds installed so I kept hitting the sea).

If you know when a transfer window is, it's surprisingly easy to get an efficient transfer, just by playing with the nodes. I use the Transfer Window Planner mod (and Kerbal Alarm Clock) but you can also use https://alexmoon.github.io/ksp/ in your browser.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 12: The Grandest Slam

I sort of did this as a joke. So I had a contract to get the science from the ground science seismometer instrument on Minmus. But in order to get it you need to actually crash something into the planet. I wound up making an asparagus staged nuke torpedo, deciding I wanted to hit it as hard as possible and be absolutely sure I got the science. (With the payout from the contract, I still pulled a profit even though this was probably overkill.)

Targeting Minmus, beginning acceleration.

First set of nuke tanks away.

Second set away, now we're really picking up speed.

Dropped the final set early as I started accelerating too close, and wanted to see how fast I could get going.

>8kms enough going to hit hard enough?

Yep that will do it.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 13: Contractual Obligations

I feel like I'm learning more about the contract system than actually how to navigate space travel. Regardless I saw this contract for taking a craft to four separate bodies. My only question was did these have to be in order, because three are relatively easy to get off of. That and I didn't want to have to fly to gilly, back to kerbins SOI and then back to eve. But the payout was incredibly tasty.

Extremely high DV ships arent hard to build with fuel crossfeed and a nuke engine. It doesn't need to carry any science so the final payload can be quite light...

Yes. Looks like I can do these in any order. Mun landing was a bit dicey, started falling over immediately upon touching down. But I had the contract checkmark so I just carried on.

Minmus was much easier.

Much easier transfer to Eve than my previous attempt.

Touch on one leg like a tip-toe (Gilly moment)

Aaand as far as contracts for 1.7 million kerbucks go that wasn't too hard.

I also had a whole bunch of kerbal rescues, most around Minmus. Some of the contracts called for me to recover the pods too. So I sent up a very odd spacecraft to bring them home.

Welcome aboard, Rosbal Kerman

Did I mention one of the kerbal's names was Arson Kerman. Had to add her to the krew.

We also had 'Podman's Pod' (Screenshots are out of order.)

These heat shield crafts I used to bring back the kerbals with contracts that also called for me to return the capsule were a little harrowing, but they got the job done, no F9's required.

I also put up a sentinel telescope and mapped some asteroid but forgot to take any screenshots of that mission...

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 14: A Long Time Coming

After almost three months of silence (and almost three years of in-game time) I have finished this mission. I have a silent goal of getting flags and footprints on every planet in the kerbin system. For the amount of time that I have spent playing this game, I haven't actually been everywhere and I would like to pick this project up again. Regardless I flew most of this mission in april and just came back to finish it now. So I'm going to be guessing at what I was actually thinking/doing at each stage.

Also this mission is a submission for the spin the wheel challenge. I must fly a single launch mission to Dres, plant a flag (so crewed) and not use ion engines.

I am not a big fan of ions to begin with. And I wouldn't use them for a crewed mission in career due to the xenon costing an arm and a leg. (Yes I know I have like 7mil kerbucks I'm greedy)

Landing on dres isn't hard to my knowledge. It's pretty similar to the mun. But getting out there has been a nightmare in my experience. In my intermittent attempts to make interplanetary transfers over the years, I always end up running out of Delta-V. 

Which is where getting there in one launch with enough nuke fuel becomes a thing. Never said how big the rocket had to be. Laughs in 200t to LKO launch vehicle. Meet the Vanadium booster.

The Vanadium booster is surprisingly well behaved.

I don't remember what this disaster was. I strongly suspect it resulted in me making a last minute change to the rover and reverting the mission, one that would bite me in the bum later.

Nuclear spacecraft in orbit. This thing was poorly designed. Coming back to this after a few months of having not played I am wondering what I was thinking keeping the lander docked between those two prongs, it made rendezvous and docking a pain in the patoot.

Well... its a transfer all right.

Already the side pods (which were hybrids of cargo bays and staged fuel tanks) were almost empty.

I really started getting nervous when I saw I needed a 3kms burn to get into dres orbit.

One of the cargo/fuel side pods of the transfer vehicle had a quartet of comms satellites stashed inside. These work alright, their comms barely reach when kerbin and dres are opposite each other but since I plan on going everywhere eventually they can contribute to the interplanetary network quite nicely.

Deploying the lander.

Regardless. This was it, challenge complete, flag planted. Now the only part is landing the crewed/uncrewed science rover I had stashed on the other side of the transfer vehicle. Though its really easier for me to show what the problem was.

Re-Docking

This was the problem. The mission was mostly successful. But apparently (this may have been related to the disaster pictured above and the last minute changes) but I only found out there was no means to decouple the rover from the inside of the bay. I tried to have Halfrod decouple it. But unfortunately, Halfrod is unable to half a rod of parts.

With that I just decided to scrub the science-gathering portion of the mission and chart a course for home. I had completed my long-overdue challenge of getting to dres. I put the transfer ship on a sub-orbital trajectory since there was no means of getting the rover detached and burned for home.

E

Entering the kerbin system at 4.5kms. Not using my copious DV reserves to slow down? Lets see how it goes.

Was very surprised that reentry speed was survivable. 

-+- Bonus screenshots// not related to the challenge. I tested a janky SSTO that I don't think i'll be using. Its a pretty exotic design. Though the mission (which these screenshots are helping me to remember) was a kerbal+pod recovery mission in kerbin orbit. This thing was falling apart and generally having problems throughout the mission, though if memory servers I did land it first try. I don't feel like doing much typing or explanation so I'll let the pictures tell the story.

Edited July 9, 2023 by Kuansenhama

[Kuansenhama]

Anyways I've seen several people do this and I thought it would be fun to incorporate this idea into my playthrough. That being AI generated missions. So here is what our robot overlord chat GPT had to say and I think this is going to be the next big challenge that I work towards. It even gives me a snazzy name, that I think is appropriate. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes I will revive my KSP playthrough.

Mission Name: Project Phoenix

Mission Objective: The objective of Project Phoenix is to establish a sustainable colony on the surface of Duna, the fourth planet in the Kerbol system. This ambitious mission aims to lay the foundation for long-term human habitation and scientific exploration on Duna.

Mission Parameters:

1. Launch Window: The optimal launch window for Project Phoenix occurs when Duna and Kerbin are in the correct alignment. The launch window opens every 687 days, which corresponds to Duna's orbital period. The next launch window is scheduled to open in 23 days.

2. Payload Configuration: The payload for Project Phoenix consists of three components:

   a. Crew Module: A specialized habitation module capable of supporting a crew of four Kerbals for an extended period. It includes life support systems, communication equipment, and scientific instruments.

   b. Lander Module: A descent module designed to safely deliver the crew to the surface of Duna. It is equipped with parachutes for atmospheric braking and landing legs for a soft touchdown.

   c. Return Vehicle: A separate module designed to return the crew safely back to Kerbin. It includes a heat shield for atmospheric reentry, a propulsion system for the journey home, and parachutes for a controlled landing.

3. Launch Vehicle: The launch vehicle for Project Phoenix is the Kerbodyne S3 KS-25x4 "Mammoth" liquid fuel engine. It provides the necessary thrust to lift the payload into orbit and perform the trans-Duna injection burn. Additional boosters, such as the S2-17 "Thoroughbred" solid rocket boosters, can be used to augment the launch vehicle's performance.

4. Trajectory and Course Corrections: The mission will utilize a Hohmann transfer orbit to reach Duna efficiently. During the transfer, multiple course correction maneuvers will be performed to ensure a precise rendezvous with Duna. The mission control team will calculate the required delta-v and timing for each burn.

5. Surface Operations: Once the lander module reaches Duna's surface, the crew will initiate surface operations, which include:

   a. Setting up a base camp: The crew will establish a base camp to serve as the central hub for scientific experiments and resource utilization. The base camp will house a laboratory, living quarters, and storage facilities.

   b. Resource utilization: The crew will deploy mining equipment to extract and process resources, such as water and minerals, for life support and fuel production.

   c. Scientific exploration: The crew will conduct experiments to study Duna's geology, atmosphere, and potential for supporting life. They will collect samples and perform experiments to gather valuable scientific data.

6. Duration and Return: The crew is expected to stay on the surface of Duna for approximately 400 days. After the completion of surface operations, the crew will board the return vehicle and perform the necessary burns to initiate the journey back to Kerbin. The return trajectory will be carefully calculated to ensure a safe reentry and landing.

7. Communication and Support: Mission control will maintain constant communication with the crew throughout the mission. A network of relay satellites will be deployed around Duna to ensure uninterrupted communication. Supplies and additional equipment can be sent from Kerbin to Duna if needed.

Note: The success of Project Phoenix relies on careful planning, precise execution, and effective problem-solving. Unforeseen challenges may arise during the mission, and the mission control team will work closely with the crew to address any contingencies. Safety and the well-being of the crew are of utmost importance throughout the mission.

I want to try and follow the spirit of the challenge as closely as possible. I actually tried asking it for KSP challenges a few months ago and it tended to come up with impossible or bizzare mission parameters. This seems to be one of the most sensible responses I have gotten out of it.

-I feel like the launch window its telling me about is the first ingame launch window when the planets are at their default positions. I'm about eight years into the game at this point so we'll just be waiting for the next one, whenever that is. We will at least be trying to fly precisely and keep the crew alive as we generally do.

-It asks for specific parts on the launch vehicle. I've already played with a few configurations and I might throw up a screenshot, as a launcher that can put 120 tons in LKO using 4 thoroughbreds and a mammoth and is a pretty sensible vehicle that will slot in nicely with the family of launchers that we have already developed. It never says this has to be a single-launch mission so I am giving myself full liberty to use the lifter to fly multiple missions in orbit and build a large interplanetary transfer vehicle to send everything we need over in one big mission.

-It mentions having a lander, a return ship, a network of communications satellites and a surface base. It mentions specifically that the base should have a lab, living quarters and storage (I interpret this as inventory storage or spare parts).

-The lander and the return ship may be able to be bundled together, possibly with an upper stage to the lander which can send the pod back to kerbin. It also mentions mining capabilities on our landers. This would be very good if we want to biome-hop. (I am thinking we maybe want to snag all the Ike science while we are there.) The lander can have a science bomb, hop around once or twice and refuel and then do it again. I think we will bundle those onto our lander(s) rather than making a seperate ship. I will play with some designs and think about it.

[Kuansenhama]

Chapter 15: A Brief 'Inter' Mission.

Decided I wanted to have a fresh stock of crash test dummies astronauts, and the duna transfer window isn't anywhere near. Part recovery, rover repair and kerbal rescue are good ways to make money. One mission I took was a rover repair that paid out well over a million dollars. I have been tracking how many launches have been conducted with each type of lifter. We have had 17 launches on the Gallium lifter after all of this. Many kerbal rescues were conducted with the orbiting rescue station I put up way back when.

 

Bringing home this lander can netted me 400k.

Rodock Kerman (1) was rescued from around the Mun, using the old gallium orbiter.

Raylas Kerman (2) and his lander can was also brought home from Munar orbit.

Erinand Kerman (3) was brought home from a rescue station ship.

Another empty command pod rescue. I don't know what a rover cockpit was doing in Minmus orbit. Here at Hunter Space Program, we don't ask questions as long as we get paid.

Halzor Kerman (5) coming home from another rescue station ship.

Luwise Kerman (6) coming home along with a plane cabin.

Kerner Kerman (7) Low orbit rescue ship cabin.

Wehroly Kerman (8)

Phofurt Kerman (9)

Timy Kerman (10)

Anyways this contract... ... Plus theres one more kerbal to pick up.

I made this new Thorium orbiter that fits on the appropriate booster.  I'm thinking these might be the lander/return ships for the phoenix project.  (This was a test launch, I took bob off for the actual mission cus I needed a seat for Desus)

Oodles of orbital DV.

Desus Kerman (11)

Now to get the rover. It needs control point so I brought some seats (in the service bay) to duct tape on. It has solar panels too.

And that's that. That should be sufficient funding and crew for project phoenix.