How did you learn?

[skipper8472]

Hi im new here and got Kerbal Space Program on steam. This might seem a silly stupid question to some but how did you learn and at what stages and how to remember what goes where?. I have watched many youtube video etc but still can not seem to get pass the 1st tutorial bit with out exploding my ship. I can do a basic ship that is it then I fail. Command Module, Parachute, Decoupler under the command module and add fule or just that rocket like in the tutorial. Other then that when I try and do anything else it don't seem to work. I no its me and not the programme so how did you all learn and never mind making bases and rovers. lol.

[Epic DaVinci]

Just by experimenting, that's the beauty of the game its open to whatever you want to do. When you first start out most of what you try will end up in a flaming ball of death. But the first time you achieve a goal such as orbit or a mun landing is a very good feeling indeed.

Start simple.

Choose a 1 man capsual.

add a de-coupler to the bottom of it.

add a parachute to the top of it.

add an SAS module to the bottom of the de-coupler

add a fuel tank to the bottom of the SAS module

then add your rocket motor.

if you want add some fins to the bottom of the fuel tank to aid in steering.

Launch.

Press T to turn on the SAS and keep your craft pointing upwards.

when you are out of fuel, press SPACE and it should de couple the capsule, (it may also release teh parachute at the same time, if not press space again)

If all this has gone to plane you have completed your first simple flight, now to and add more fuel tanks, and engines, and experiment with staging.

[Vanamonde]

Learning KSP is the gradual process of making rockets that are less and less catastrophically bad, and then you try bigger ones that fail in whole new ways. I've been playing the game for almost a year, and this is what my last 2 weeks have mostly looked like:

[RunningGloves]

Trial and error. Mainly error.

Little steps at a time is the key I think, and the forums here are full of helpful information you might not have figured out by yourself. Try finding somebody's Mun landing tutorial, follow it to the letter (with their rocket design), and once you've done it their way start fiddling with the rocket design and see what happens to it's performance.

[lyndonguitar]

first try I don't know what to do or what to build, then I did the tutorials and I instantly got how to navigate around, the rocket building isn't part of the tutorial, so you will have to learn that all by yourself through trial and error.

[KSK]

Learning KSP is the gradual process of making rockets that are less and less catastrophically bad, and then you try bigger ones that fail in whole new ways. I've been playing the game for almost a year, and this is what my last 2 weeks have mostly looked like:

You are having a bad problem and will not get to go to space today...

[KSK]

The KSP wiki has a section on historical space missions with some nice rocket designs in. Complete part lists are included for all of them so that might be somewhere to borrow some ideas for your own rockets.

[xzaz]

I learned by a very simple principle.. crashing..

[Peenvogel]

I play KSP for 3 weeks now and I'm still learning. A lot is trial and error and learning from others by watching youtube tutorials. After 3 weeks, I'm not an expert but I'm starting to feel a little more confident. Two weeks ago I would never have believed that I could dock manually, plot my own courses or even build a station. It'll come... but it takes some patience; that's why I love this game... it's hard, but very rewarding!

[Aeshi]

I'd say 10% watching a Let's Play of the game and learning from the mistakes the person doing it made, 15% asking questions on this forum and 75% Trial-and-Error

Edited May 5, 2013 by Aeshi

[BaneOfPilots]

Looking around these forums. You'd be surprised at how much stuff is here. Also, a small rocket with two boosters can reach orbit easily. Bigger rockets are not necessarily better.

[Panichio]

Keep watching videos. Download crafts from the Spacecraft Exchange section of the forum, and examine how those were designed if you want. To learn how to fly, download MechJeb. It is an autopilot mod, and you can learn a lot by watching it fly a rocket.

[Sovek]

Mixture of watching others and playing the game myself. After about a month I made my first landing on Mun, though it was mainly for a lack of trying... Right now I like to play around with my Apollo style CSM and lander.. not really in any rush to go other places really.

[Pursuedtank]

Experimenting, the forum and Scott Manley

[omegamatrixhh]

that1guy has a great tutorial series on YouTube, he's also posted it here. Most of my learning has been done watching those vids for the basics and messing around between episodes.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/showthread.php/24570-tutorial-beginners-guide-to-KSP-%28reboot%29

[WhiteThane]

By the tried and true "This looks vaguely rocket-y, *spacebar*"

[Custard Donut (In Space)]

Scott Kermanley! that's how i learnt, here is his tutorial playlist:

[Kosmo-not]

I started learning with trial and error. I quickly decided to learn the maths behind this rocket business stuff. Kerbal Engineer Redux came along eventually and did a lot of the tedious calculations for me. The biggest failures I get these days are small things like forgetting to deploy solar panels before going into time warp. I'm usually drinking some kind of alcoholic beverage while playing.

Keep a curious mind and always seek to understand the underlying principles behind what you are doing and you will be an expert at it someday.

[Comrade Jenkens]

mixture of watching tutorials and trial and error. Many kerbals lost their lives in the quest to get to space.

Just keep practicing and youll get there

[The Destroyer]

Mechjeb, quit it, then explode kerbals, learn.

[Mars90000000]

Try to find 10,000 ways for it not to work, and in the process, you'll find some ways that do work.

[FritzPixel]

Learning from mistakes is a great teacher, but KSP is one of the rare games that also inspired me to do a good bit of research. Basic orbital mechanics translate pretty well to the actual game. If anyone was keeping tabs of my browsing history around that time, I'm sure they were thoroughly confused.

[Tada]

Well... I was playing orbiter a way back and I did pay attention during science class, so I got some basic knowlegde of orbital mechanics to start with...

Then it was trial and error, tutorials etc...

And I learned aircraft design while building flying model aircraft for most of my childhood and somwhere I have a book about how to build a real aircraft

[SDIR]

If you have any trouble, go look for some tutorial vids on Youtube. They always are good with step-by-step telling how to get things to work.

[Eric S]

It was mostly a combination of experimentation backed up by reading tutorials when I couldn't work it out myself. My last suborbital flight had an apoapsis a third of the way to the Mun, so I figured my gravity turn wasn't aggressive enough and read up on what it should be.

Once I got to orbit and could play around with it a bit, I experimented with asparagus staging and going to the moon. Let's just say that after an evening or two, I decided to try someone else's rocket, and it worked. I've since picked up enough that I fly my own rockets, but I still think that was a necessary step for me just to sort out the "Is this a rocket problem or a pilot problem?" issue.