Never Miss a Launch Window

[trepnick]

This challenge is pretty simple, you must launch a spacecraft to every planet at every launch window. You must also launch at least one kerbal per two launch windows, and you must return at least one kerbal per two return windows.

Base Score will be the number of days you manage to meet these objectives plus the number of tons you successfully transit, as measured in a stable orbit around the target (so any discarded parts and used fuel don't count).

Bonuses of 10% will be given to whoever currently has the most outgoing trips in one launch window for each planet (6 bonuses total)

A bonus of 10% will be given to anyone who can meet the primary requirements for every planet and moon in the game.

I'm thinking about additional bonuses, I may add more later.

Proof will be in the form of screenshots of your spacecraft with an intercept (or close, I don't really need to see the course corrections) and the absolute time. I believe the best way to get a screen of time is either Kerbal Alarm Clock or the Tracking Station. You will also need to have a screen of your craft in stable orbit around the target with the tonnage showing, whether it's an outgoing or incoming trip.

I HIGHLY recommend Kerbal Alarm Clock and Mechjeb, KAC for obvious reasons, and Mechjeb because KAC doesn't calculate transfer windows accurately in my experience. I make up for this by putting a permanent satellite everywhere and using Mechjeb to make a maneuver node at the transfer window, then adding that to my alarms. There'll be a margin of 2 days on each side of the Mechjeb-calculated transfer window, so that you can't build something with ridiculous delta-v and launch whenever you want.

I've just started a new save, and this is the challenge I've set myself this go-round, so I don't have anything yet as I'm mostly designing craft and testing in LKO at the moment. I'll refine the challenge based on my own experience, probably with more secondary bonuses. I'll also start a second save and launch my permanent satellites in it so that this can be judged accurately.

[trepnick]

Leaderboards:

[metaphor]

This is a nice challenge, but I can see a couple of problems with it. One is that Mechjeb or other mods base their launch windows only on phase angle and not on low delta-v requirement. This usually works well for planets like Eve, Duna or Jool, which have circular orbits close to the same plane as Kerbin, but not very well at all for Moho, Dres, and Eeloo, which have inclined, eccentric orbits.

For a really good low-delta-v transfer window planner, try this website: http://alexmoon.github.io/ksp/

Also, launch windows are generally pretty broad. For example, when you first start the game, Eve is a little ahead of Kerbin in its orbit, so not in an optimal configuration, but you can still get from Kerbin to Eve using only 1300 m/s, which is not too much more than the 1050 m/s of an ideal transfer.

[trepnick]

This challenge is more about architecture and scale than optimal transfers, and the window has to be put somewhere, so the best solution in my mind was to base it around Mechjeb's windows. For example, I have 12 launches and over 200 tons of final payload going to Duna at the first window, and frankly I don't want to fly 12x2-4 minute burns by hand. Besides, in my alternate save where I'm simply sending probes to get window times, I'm getting the same windows as on that calculator anyways, at least so far. The burns MJ sets up aren't optimal, but I just adjust the maneuver node to get the lowest dV I can.