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What's a New Guy to Do?


lex starwalker

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Hello all!

I'm relatively new to Kerbal. I've gotten into orbit (many times), landed on the Mun, and put some satellites in orbit of the planet and the Mun.

I'm curious where some of you have gone from there.

Also, I'm wondering what add-ons you guys like. I've got MechJeb, Protracor, Alarm Clock, Subassembly Loader. I've been playing around with MapSat, but can't seem to get it to work.

Anyway, any tips or pointers as to what I should try to do next would be appreciated. I've been thinking about going for the planets, but it would be cool to build something, whether a space station or lunar base, I'm not sure.

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Look beyond the Mun, at Eve, Duna, Jool etc. Each one is a different challenge to reach and land on along with their moons.

Spacestations too! Probably the most infuriating thing to do is docking parts of your spacestation together! Failing that, you can always build some wacky contraptions on the surface. (I know I do from time to time).

As for Mods, I only really have Mechjeb and Alarm Clock. Mechjeb for those massive launches that murder my PC until orbit and a bit of other ship information. alarm Clock is really useful if you want to leave a ship on a trajectory and go away to do something else, just set the timer and bam, when it hits 0, you're immediately notified. Really good if you're dealing with multiple ships on the same trajectory.

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Duna is probably your next best bet. It's got enough atmosphere to make a parachute helpful, but not so much as to make take off impossible. It's easier to land on than the Mun, but slightly harder to get back off of. You should also practice doing orbital docking as it makes getting Kerbals back from missions to other planets far easier. Stations and bases are interesting challenges, but not actually too useful as the game currently stands. If you can get the ISA Mapsat working then you get the goal of getting a mapping probe into orbit around every body and actually getting a useful map out of it as well. ISA Mapsat is seriously my favorite mod in this entire game, and I've held off updating to the newest version due to reports that it doesn't work quite right under it...

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Find easter eggs, one or two can be found IIRC if in a polar orbit around Mun. you'll probably need that area to be on the light side, and a fair ways down, but a 5 km orbit is possible (not that you need to be that low).... there are actually lots of easter eggs on Mun. ISA sat map mod can reveal the locations for you.

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Mapsat was a big inspiration for me to actually go to all the planets. I've currently got everything mapped except Ike, and I put probes around all the Joolian moons with one mothership and 6 probes (one spare that I didn't actually need). Gilly is still the only place outside Kerbin and its moons that I've landed a Kerbal. Maybe someday I'll either get good enough with spaceplanes to actually take one somewhere, or perhaps I'll just accept that my planes are failures and go back to rockets.

About it not working: You have to be below a certain altitude (500km?) for it to map, and you have to have the flag to draw the image turned on (or you can record to csv and build the maps with the utility provided, but it's more interesting to see the map being populated as you orbit). Also, you have to be at 50x or lower time accelleration.

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Well, it's an interesting choice: send ships to other planets straight from Kerbin, or assembly refuelling station in LKO first and use it as a hub of your interplanetary activities? Also, you might play with Kethane mod on Kerbin's moons, build refuelling station in moon orbit and thus create industry network that will keep you occupied for a long time.

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About mapsat, I sent a satellite up that had the dish on it. It was orbiting Kerbal at 250 km, but I never saw the interface to map or anything. I think it must not be installed or running correctly, but I uninstalled and reinstalled it and still no dice.

Thanks for all the suggestions! I have a lot to think about.

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After I was comfortable circularizing Kerbin orbits, I sent probes to orbit the Mun and Minimus. Then I practiced docking around Kerbin. Then sent probes off to Duna, Dres, Eve and Jool to practice interplanetary transfers. Just got a rover on the Mun. Next are some landers I guess.

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About mapsat, I sent a satellite up that had the dish on it. It was orbiting Kerbal at 250 km, but I never saw the interface to map or anything. I think it must not be installed or running correctly, but I uninstalled and reinstalled it and still no dice.

Thanks for all the suggestions! I have a lot to think about.

The Icon is hidden by the map view button. Press M, and you'll see it at the bottom, unless the plugin .dll is not installed in the Plugin folder.

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Hello all!

I'm relatively new to Kerbal. I've gotten into orbit (many times), landed on the Mun, and put some satellites in orbit of the planet and the Mun.

I'm curious where some of you have gone from there.

Also, I'm wondering what add-ons you guys like. I've got MechJeb, Protracor, Alarm Clock, Subassembly Loader. I've been playing around with MapSat, but can't seem to get it to work.

Anyway, any tips or pointers as to what I should try to do next would be appreciated. I've been thinking about going for the planets, but it would be cool to build something, whether a space station or lunar base, I'm not sure.

Best addons for me are KWRocketry, Novapunch, KSPX Parts, Engineer Redux and Crew Manifest. But I also like look of the Home bases and the DEMV rover is great for taking to planets. I also have the dragon capsule and a couple of Service Module addons. I love lots of parts, there are lots more I could add as well!

For you next stage I would think learn to dock first - then take a rover to the Mun using a separate command capsule and lander arrangement to save fuel. Then it could be onto Minmus with the same. After that possibly build an orbital refuelling station for a trip to Duna and further afield (I am at this stage presently). I am also messing about with spaceplanes because to try to get into orbit with one would be a challenge the way they fly. I was half thinking about a Mun base next as well with a proper large VTOL lander and a specially made rover instead of the DEMV. What about visiting the sun as well?

Loads to do!

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