The Elcano Challenge: Ground-Based Circumnavigation (5th)

[damerell]

Vall caused me to write "why does the landscape have stretch marks?" and "Here I hit a chunk of very bland landscape" - but also that it was a pleasure to rove on.

[Mr. Kerbin]

On 10/29/2023 at 1:11 PM, damerell said:

You may send replacement vehicles. Game mechanics are not kind to ground vehicles.

• Your crew must be transferred to any replacement vehicle and it must be very similar to the original.  I understand this is a learning process, and will allow some design changes.

@damerell Is it okay if my rover blew up, then teleport the rover back? (It is the same rover, and the 4 died.) It exploded because I accidentally used timewarp when (accidentally) jumping off the side of a hill?

[damerell]

19 hours ago, Mr. Kerbin said:

@damerell Is it okay if my rover blew up, then teleport the rover back? (It is the same rover, and the 4 died.) It exploded because I accidentally used timewarp when (accidentally) jumping off the side of a hill?

The normal procedure is either to load a quicksave or ship a new rover, but no, not to teleport a rover with eg the Alt-F12 menu.

[Mr. Kerbin]

Just now, damerell said:

The normal procedure is either to load a quicksave or ship a new rover, but no, not to teleport a rover with eg the Alt-F12 menu.

Got it.

[Royale37]

Hello! 

It says you are disqualified from stock if you have ANY mods. I have visual mods - parallax(with collisions turned off), volumetric clouds, and restock(which is just a reskin) - I also have stockalike station parts  expansion redux but don't use any of the parts on this rover. Do I still only qualify for modded?

Thanks! 

Edited October 31, 2024 by Royale37

[Royale37]

On 10/29/2023 at 4:11 PM, damerell said:

This challenge is simple. So simple, it's easy.

No.

Well, here's my go at it. See my post above for the mods I used.

Thanks 

[damerell]

On 10/30/2024 at 1:28 PM, Royale37 said:

It says you are disqualified from stock if you have ANY mods. I have visual mods - parallax(with collisions turned off), volumetric clouds, and restock(which is just a reskin) - I also have stockalike station parts  expansion redux but don't use any of the parts on this rover. Do I still only qualify for modded?

You qualify for Stock Craft, the middle category, if I understand what restock does correctly.

(There's an argument that the challenge should distinguish between visual mods like the ones you list and assistance mods like KER or MechJeb - let alone ones used only to document your position - but I'm not going to fiddle with it now, we've come a long way with the existing categories.)

Thanks for the submission. I'm on holiday with dodgy internet but I'll review it as soon as I can.

Edited November 2, 2024 by damerell

[Royale37]

18 hours ago, damerell said:

You qualify for Stock Craft, the middle category, if I understand what restock does correctly.

(There's an argument that the challenge should distinguish between visual mods like the ones you list and assistance mods like KER or MechJeb - let alone ones used only to document your position - but I'm not going to fiddle with it now, we've come a long way with the existing categories.)

Thanks for the submission. I'm on holiday with dodgy internet but I'll review it as soon as I can.

Just looked back and saw it actually does use one long truss from SSPERX, the XXL truss. However, this truss is as long as 2 XL trusses, which are from the stock game, and weighs as much as 2 of them as well.  If I changed the craft so that it uses 2 XL trusses, would it still be okay to count it as stock craft, since it would technically make no difference to the physical vehicle?

Take your time and have a good holiday.

Cheers! 

Edited November 3, 2024 by Royale37

[damerell]

On 11/3/2024 at 1:48 AM, Royale37 said:

Just looked back and saw it actually does use one long truss from SSPERX, the XXL truss. However, this truss is as long as 2 XL trusses, which are from the stock game, and weighs as much as 2 of them as well.  If I changed the craft so that it uses 2 XL trusses, would it still be okay to count it as stock craft, since it would technically make no difference to the physical vehicle?

Well, you would have to run all the way around Minmus again (as in, I'm afraid I'm not recategorising it because the craft _could_ have been different)... but I wouldn't bother if I were you. The categories for this challenge are a bit odd; I guess they were copied from the conventional sort of challenge that's about going as fast as possible or using as little fuel as possible, but the main difficulty in Elcano has very little to do with whether or not you have modded parts available [1], it's about good rover design, roving technique, and persistence.

[1] Except the Kerbal Foundries wheels... but if I was setting up the challenge today, I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone from using _those_.

Edited November 9, 2024 by damerell

[damerell]

https://www.reddit.com/r/KerbalSpaceProgram/comments/1gr7pbf/has_anyone_ever_circumnavigated_kerbin_just_by/

Ah, sweet summer children.

(I replied telling the thread about the challenge, and if you're here as a result, hello! We look forward to seeing your rovers...)

[TriggeredSnake]

I’m about an hour of sailing away from circumnavigating Laythe, mostly by sea. I’m not sure if I’ll finish it tonight or tomorrow, but I’m really excited. I started this two years ago and it’s nearly finished now.

It’s been very interesting, my design is definitely not ideal for this and if I ever did it again I’d change it a lot, but it’s been quite usable and surprisingly fast, just finicky.

Edited November 27, 2024 by TriggeredSnake
More detail

[TriggeredSnake]

I completed the mission earlier today, how should I handle the photos? I made nearly 20 stops on the trip, should I post main view and map view photos for each one? (as well as the flight to Laythe)

I don’t know if I have screenshots for everything but I did take a named quick save for every stop so I can load them up to take photos if I need to.

After such a long circumnavigation I almost never want to see this moon again, but I do feel tempted to try and circumnavigate Kerbin next with an improved design.

Edited November 28, 2024 by TriggeredSnake
Forum duplicated my messages

[damerell]

I think my usual advice would be: post enough screenshots that we are sure you circumnavigated, post any screenshot you think is interesting in any way or pleasing, put them in a spoiler if there are a lot of screenshots in the main Elcano thread, you probably can't write too many words about the trip.

On Laythe, since quite a lot of Laythe looks very much the same, I'd probably incline to map view for a lot of them in open sea if you don't have something like ScanSat BTDT tracking your progress.

[king of nowhere]

I'm doing a circumnavigation of Kerbin trying to maximize the mountains I cross. I really like mountains, and Kerbin has some extremely challenging ones.

If there's anyone else out there who likes the challenge of driving a rover up a nearly vertical rock tower, I think I've found the single best spot in the whole core system - OPM too, probably, though maybe on Slate there's something comparable.

[damerell]

Besides the poles, which I think offer all kinds of horrors?

I did rather regret not driving up the vast mountain/crater north of the Crater Lake on Eve... but I would have regretted falling in and being unable to get out more.

[king of nowhere]

during my kerbin highland circumnavigation I encountered some particularly beautiful terrain I'd like to share with the community

the mission plan now entails going up and down each and every one of those crests, which probably marks me as either a masochist or suffering from some compulsive disorder...

[damerell]

I was wondering if it was possible to build a rover with a forward beam with a KAS winch at each end (ie, one at the rover end, one at the front of the beam) with a ground anchor suspended between them - then in very rough terrain the rover could winch itself up any slope.

[king of nowhere]

On 12/20/2024 at 3:00 PM, damerell said:

I was wondering if it was possible to build a rover with a forward beam with a KAS winch at each end (ie, one at the rover end, one at the front of the beam) with a ground anchor suspended between them - then in very rough terrain the rover could winch itself up any slope.

i was wondering the same, for an even harder task: a circumnavigation of statmun.
it's a tiny moonlet from the whirligig world planetary pack with a peculiarity: its rotational speed is greater than the escape speed. you can't stand still on the equator, you'll just be kicked away from the ground into escape orbit.

 

i was envisioning a walker robot with claws for feet or something like that. it's one of those challenges in the back burner of my brain

[damerell]

On 12/23/2024 at 11:04 PM, king of nowhere said:

i was wondering the same, for an even harder task: a circumnavigation of statmun.

Is Statmun small enough that a polar route with engines on the roof to stick you down at the Equator would do?

[king of nowhere]

7 hours ago, damerell said:

Is Statmun small enough that a polar route with engines on the roof to stick you down at the Equator would do?

abslutely yes, especially since you could get away with an ion engine in the low gravity.

nonetheless, a walking robot grabbing the ground at each step is way cooler

If I ever make it, I will call it Kerzinga. I call dibs on the name

Edited December 28, 2024 by king of nowhere

[TheKspEngineer]

Is this a good map? (For Minmus)

 

[damerell]

Looks fine to me, apart from the apparent teleportation at 180 degrees West (the north/south position on the edges doesn't seem to match up...) :-)

[TheKspEngineer]

I have some kind of a plan.

And some kind of a rover.

It's name is Théseus after the greek mythological hero.

(Eva sitting area)

Now I only need crew!

 

 

Edited January 11 by TheKspEngineer

[Kimera Industries]

10 hours ago, TheKspEngineer said:

I have some kind of a plan.

And some kind of a rover.

It's name is Théseus after the greek mythological hero.

(Eva sitting area)

Now I only need crew!

 

 

I love your rover! I should've thought of using the half-Mk2 pieces from Airplane Plus, that's clever.

[TheKspEngineer]

5 hours ago, Kimera Industries said:

I love your rover!

Thanks!  The only thing I'm worried about is that maybe the front wI'll bump into steeper mountains.