(OLD) The Ultimate Jool-5 Challenge:land Kerbals on all moons and return in one big mission

[EdFred]

So, it's MOAR PICTURES! that Ziv asked for. MOAR PICTURES! he gets.

I went and redid the mission (again), and this time there are THREE HUNDRED SEVENTY pictures in the album.

I have not gotten around to thumbnailing them or making a filmstrip yet, so if your internet charges you per KB used, be warned each screen shot is 1600x900 (scaled down 50% on the screen) but you can skip forward or back 10 or 20 screen shots at a time.

Behold the Ultimate Documentation of the Ultimate Jool-5 Challenge!

Um, click here, or something.

I let MechJeb do the ascents, and any long burns. Descents, landings, and orbital tweaks were done manually. All nodes were created manually with the exception of inclination changes once inside the planetary/moon SOI.

- Which game versions did you use?

0.25

- What mods did you use, if any?

KER, KAC, MJ

- How many launches was needed to start your mission from Kerbal?

One Launch

- Did you bring a Living Quarter (Hitch-hiker's Storage) for the guys during the long journey?

Yes - two of them.

- Did you bring additional stuff like satellites, rovers, etc?

No, but all landers are still orbiting respective moons, and all munar transfer vehicles are still in orbit around Laythe.

- Share the delta-V informations too, if you tracked it!

Somewhere in the neighborhood of 45,000dV

(when all dV was added from each vehicle)

- Any additional note or description?

No docking, no refueling.

I will see about making a filmstrip, but Photoshop (which has a nifty thumbnail maker) is at work, and I'm at home, so that may be a few days.

Edited October 18, 2014 by EdFred

[Ziv]

So, it's MOAR PICTURES! that Ziv asked for. MOAR PICTURES! he gets.

I went and redid the mission (again), and this time there are THREE HUNDRED SEVENTY pictures in the album.

I have not gotten around to thumbnailing them or making a filmstrip yet, so if your internet charges you per KB used, be warned each screen shot is 1600x900 (scaled down 50% on the screen) but you can skip forward or back 10 or 20 screen shots at a time.

Behold the Ultimate Documentation of the Ultimate Jool-5 Challenge!

Um, click here, or something.

I let MechJeb do the ascents, and any long burns. Descents, landings, and orbital tweaks were done manually. All nodes were created manually with the exception of inclination changes once inside the planetary/moon SOI.

Hahh, awesome! Give me some time to review. I'm happy to see you made the Eve Rocks Challenge, that's going to be an other (or THE other) hardest challenge in KSP. I'm working on my EVE+Gilly Expedition right now!

I'm sure you'll earn the JOOL-5 badge too! But first let me do the inspection in your album, looking for the smallest chance of a cheating!

[EdFred]

I left KER open for just about every screen shot, so it should be pretty easy to go through. I basically took a screen shot any time I made any burn, and you will see a screen shot of the dV left, and the dV needed for burns for just about every maneuver. Though I may have missed a couple here and there, but the dV is easily reviewable, and the screen shots are in order of how the mission progressed. There was jumping between ships, but it should be able to be followed. (Be warned in the 30's there's a series of an engine drop just because I thought it looked cool so you probably jump ahead 10 when you get to that.)

Edited October 18, 2014 by EdFred

[stanz25]

TA DA!!!!! The mother ship is done! Mission will continue today! And I'm planning on finishing Tomorrow! Can't wait!

[Tokay Gris]

A while back I did a mission to Jool and landed on four of the five moons.

Massiv mission, three vessels (two landers, one fuel tanker). Not efficient, but I had fun!

So I am currently working on an "all five" mission. So far, I don't see any way to build a lander that can tough down on Laythe and Tylo. (Bop, Poll and Val.. well. If you can land on one of the others, you can land on those three).

The plans for Tylo have progressed. Pretty lightweight. But to get the landing Kerbal as well as the science data up again, I am using a command seat. The current lander is slightly below 20 tons. Finished the tests with it and it needs to be the first target (Since I can't put anything atop of the command seat...).

The Laythe design, I am not happy with so far. Tested air breathers and rocket-only designs, but none that worked to my satisfaction. A design problem, so far.

Since my Tylomodule will basically stay on Tylo, I am trying to get the Laythe-lander to be able to do Bop-Pol-Val. Probably with a modular design.

This kind of determines the order in witch this mission will have to be done: First, Tylo. Second, Laythe. Bop-Pol-Val probably can be decided on site.

So far, only planning and testing. Just like the real world.

(Wait, KSP is NOT the real world?)

[stanz25]

Should I Aero-Break?! Its Getting Real! I've got a quicksave

Edited October 18, 2014 by stanz25

[Thunderous Echo]

Definitely Areobrake. Save kilometers per second of delta-v.

If you want to know which altitude, http://alterbaron.github.io/ksp_aerocalc/

[parzr]

Should I Aero-Break?! Its Getting Real! I've got a quicksave

That won't survive aero braking. I strongly recommend a Tylo gravity assist to get captured by Jool.

Its worth the research to understand it and use it.

Edit: http://wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com/wiki/Tutorial:_Gravity_Assist

Edited October 19, 2014 by parzr

[stanz25]

I prove you wrong!!!! I did it! It survived!!!!!!!!!!

[loch.ness]

I started, and ultimately had to abandon, this challenge in .23.5. Having only ever been to Duna once and elsewise not even having my feet-wet outside of Kerbin's SOI I fell into a perpetual planning trap and never got anything to actually work.

I've refined quite a few of my older designs and am seriously thinking of picking this up again now. I'm finding my career fun overall, but frustrating as most of the things I really want to do I can't for budget or tech or time related reasons.

I am running a number of mods, but most of them will make things harder not easier.

Aesthetics only: Better Atmosphere, Texture Re-placer, Kerb Paint, and Eve.

Difficulty: Deadly Re-entry, Snacks, Dang it!, Near*

Potentially cheaty: Universal storage (only being used to store extra Snacks for the trip and some extra monoprop which I likely don't need).

KAS - might be used to strut sections in orbit - but only if a single launch is rulled out. I know this places me in the "free-style" section, but I really only care about completing the challenge and earning the sticker.

Station Science, Custom Biomes, D-orbital Science - Its easy enough to just not include parts from the 2 with parts, and considering it is a sandbox mission I won't be counting science points anyway - but I will be taking all stock science parts.

I started a sandbox save today with the express purpose of experiencing every planet in the system at least once (and with meaning to return from each of them as well to document what does/doesn't work and begin designing better ships for things like this).

Moho is up first and I've got a proto-type Moho explorer cued up (and another one which needs to be scrapped because it has no solar panels).

The next transfer window after that is Jool, so I figured why not try this at the same time. If it becomes a bit too stressful again, I'll bow out for now and just go see the system for once, and get some useful data about what works and what doesn't.

[Cmdr. Arn1e]

KAS - might be used to strut sections in orbit - but only if a single launch is rulled out. I know this places me in the "free-style" section, but I really only care about completing the challenge and earning the sticker.

I believe that Ziv is now allowing the 'normal' struts from KAS to be used... I'm sure he will be along to set you straight on all your questions though!

Edited October 19, 2014 by Cmdr. Arn1e

[stanz25]

I have failed My Laythe/vall lander kinda exploded and I forgot to quicksave. My last qucksave was just before Aerobraking. I will have to re-design and Create a new mission.

Here is the album of what i did. Link ------> Leviathan

Crafts -------> Leviathan Crafts

I am going to create a new mission, thats more stable and efficient.

Edited October 19, 2014 by stanz25

[sedativechunk]

I am doing a trial run now of everything for this challenge. If this works out I will be recording my entire journey for this challenge live on Twitch in a second attempt. Here is my ship:

Main vessel is the Solarflare x-103 - 4 Skipper engines to break Kerbin orbit followed by 12 nuclear engines with enough fuel on launch to deliver 15,000+ m/s of delta V (that is without the vehicles docked at first). Because I take this game too seriously, everything has TAC life support installed (main ship is carrying enough supplies for 6,000+ days in space) plus the main ship is carrying a cargo container for the lonely space ridden Kerbals as well as a spacious science vessel for them to eat snacks in during the voyage to Jool.

First docked - Athena LEM - this ship will be my first Tylo-ready lander and once the fuel tanks detach it has retracted legs underneath to land on Val, Bop, and Pol.

Second docked - Delphin III - the third ship design of it's type, this is my Laythe capable ship which will be landing IN WATER and ascending using jet engines. It's my most efficient space craft I've ever built.

Third docked - the A.z.z n J.U.G.S lander (don't ask about the name): Additional fuel cargo to compinsate for the extra mass of everything, roughly 13,000 tons of fuel (or whatever units it's in). This is using the KW rocketry 5M parts which were also used to get the main ship in orbit.

More details to come. I am doing this as a trial though and then twich TVing the whole thing in a second so everyone knows this is legit.

[loch.ness]

Just re-read the rules, Strutting in orbit would disqualify me if I had to do that - luckily this time around I'm still at the testing of landers stage (working on a Tylo lander design).

The only mods I don't see direct mention of that I have which could apply would be Snacks, Dang It, and Universal Storage (of which I'd use exclusively to support Snacks. I can ignore Snacks but would rather not. Dang It doesn't change physics or introduce new parts, only new potential failures - leaks, - power outages, that sort of fun.

[Ziv]

So, it's MOAR PICTURES! that Ziv asked for. MOAR PICTURES! he gets.

I went and redid the mission (again), and this time there are THREE HUNDRED SEVENTY pictures in the album.

I have not gotten around to thumbnailing them or making a filmstrip yet, so if your internet charges you per KB used, be warned each screen shot is 1600x900 (scaled down 50% on the screen) but you can skip forward or back 10 or 20 screen shots at a time.

Behold the Ultimate Documentation of the Ultimate Jool-5 Challenge!

Um, click here, or something.

I let MechJeb do the ascents, and any long burns. Descents, landings, and orbital tweaks were done manually. All nodes were created manually with the exception of inclination changes once inside the planetary/moon SOI.

- Which game versions did you use?

0.25

- What mods did you use, if any?

KER, KAC, MJ

- How many launches was needed to start your mission from Kerbal?

One Launch

- Did you bring a Living Quarter (Hitch-hiker's Storage) for the guys during the long journey?

Yes - two of them.

- Did you bring additional stuff like satellites, rovers, etc?

No, but all landers are still orbiting respective moons, and all munar transfer vehicles are still in orbit around Laythe.

- Share the delta-V informations too, if you tracked it!

Somewhere in the neighborhood of 45,000dV

(when all dV was added from each vehicle)

- Any additional note or description?

No docking, no refueling.

I will see about making a filmstrip, but Photoshop (which has a nifty thumbnail maker) is at work, and I'm at home, so that may be a few days.

EdFred: Congratulations, you have finished the JOOL-5 Challenge on Level 3!

Ahh, I have wrote a review and when I sent it the forum said the token has expired. Anyway, at first I said your album was slow to review (edit: later with the thumbnails it's better! ).

About the mission: the main ship is well planned with good symmetry. Sending the landers parallel is rare and I guess it may need some good timing sometimes. And that made the review easier for me because it means that you have sent the different Kerbals to different moons for sure.

Using nuke tugs for all the landers was a good and safe idea to move them around, and also the no-docking solution was absolutely unique. That's a perfect idea for those who hate dockings! And it might be quicker too!

Landing two Kerbals on Tylo is also very rare and a big achievement. That's an odd looking Tylo lander too!

That's strange that they met in low Laythe orbit because it would be easier to meet in Jool orbit somewhere between two moons (edit: you said it was because of the very low dV of the main ship after Tylo).

You earned the JOOL-5 Badge too, and pairing that with an Eve Rocks Challenge badge...well, HELL YEAH! And you are the first one who have them both!

Edited October 22, 2014 by Ziv
I was rude and unfair at first

[Ziv]

I am running a number of mods, but most of them will make things harder not easier.

Aesthetics only: Better Atmosphere, Texture Re-placer, Kerb Paint, and Eve.

Difficulty: Deadly Re-entry, Snacks, Dang it!, Near*

Potentially cheaty: Universal storage (only being used to store extra Snacks for the trip and some extra monoprop which I likely don't need).

KAS - might be used to strut sections in orbit - but only if a single launch is rulled out. I know this places me in the "free-style" section, but I really only care about completing the challenge and earning the sticker.

Station Science, Custom Biomes, D-orbital Science - Its easy enough to just not include parts from the 2 with parts, and considering it is a sandbox mission I won't be counting science points anyway - but I will be taking all stock science parts.

Aesthetics mods are all right. Tell me more about Snacks and Dang it!, I don't know them.

Universal Storage is okay if you bring only snacks and some monoprop.

KAS struts are prohibited - the problem is that JOOL-5 become too easy already with the new updates: huge launch rockets (at the beginning there was only the orange tank and the mainsails), less wobbly physics, stronger ions, etc... so it's not so elite and hard anymore. At the beginning there was only 1 entry per month and it was a very big deal to do it successfully. Nowadays I spend a lot of time reviewing missions which doesn't really have any unique solutions...

And I like mods but many of them make it easier so I try to keep the balance. Mods which makes the mission harder are always appreciated!

[EdFred]

EdFred: Congratulations, you have finished the JOOL-5 Challenge on Level 3!

...., I have wrote a review and when I sent the forum said the token has expired. Anyway, it was about that your album is very slow to load per picture, the pictures were too small, always clicking on them was very exhausting, there were no thumbnails to review it quickly when I gather my thoughts and write me review and Hall of Fame section, the 10/20 jumps were sometimes too little and sometimes too much, and again too slow!, and I couldn't use the left/right arrows neither. Reviewing your mission was a pain in the ass.

The mission was all right, sending the landers parallel made it sure you have sent the different Kerbals to different moons. That's strange that they met in low Laythe orbit because it would be easier to meet in Jool orbit somewhere between two moons.

You earned the JOOL-5 Badge, thank you for participating!

I will redo the page to get a thumbnail filmstrip up now that I am at work.

The reason I went to Laythe - aerobraking. And near the end, as you saw, I had VERY little dV left with my main transfer ship.

Edit: Now that I've gotten to work, I've "filmstripped" my photos.

Edited October 20, 2014 by EdFred

[Cmdr. Arn1e]

KAS struts are prohibited - the problem is that JOOL-5 become too easy already with the new updates: huge launch rockets (at the beginning there was only the orange tank and the mainsails), less wobbly physics, stronger ions, etc... so it's not so elite and hard anymore. At the beginning there was only 1 entry per month and it was a very big deal to do it successfully. Nowadays I spend a lot of time reviewing missions which doesn't really have any unique solutions...

I stand corrected! Can't find the post where it was mentioned previously either, so oh well

[VincentS]

Hi there !

I just completed my first Jool-5 challenge. And noticed that my disk was full, and more than half of the story has not been recorded…

I'll try and salvage what I can and see if I can put together enough material to fill an official entry...

(This is a 0.25 carrier mod-free story -- not even an informational or esthetic mod, not even during planning. No dv was ever computed or approximated during or before this flight.)

Anyway, here is the story !

Ships part of the mission have been launched as soon as the paint was dry, even though some engineer was grumbling about "window" -- of course, we have to let the window open while drying !

The assembly

=========

The first ship in orbit was the mothership, designed for science (lab) and rest (hitchhiker), featuring a nice place to contemplate the cosmos (canopy). The first stage was also equipped with 3 engines and a bit of fuel and chutes for the return trip to Kerbin. Second stage had 9 nuclear engines (3x3 radial clusters). The 3 kerbal passengers had an uneventful launch and orbit.

The second ship was a big robotic tanker. It docked behind the mothership quite easily using RCS and but a fraction of its abundant monopropellant fuel.

Then came the Laythe plane. Unlike the two other ships, it launched itself from the runway -- and without launcher. Docking was performed without RCS, those being replaced by vernor engines under the plane belly, designed to produced some emergency lift (the lander is actually VTOL capable, even though I didn't used the feature because of oxidizer budget. It could however be useful in order to get away from some bad landing spot)

The typo lander was last. It was a multi staged lander, first stage built around nuclear engine, second stage 3-fold symmetric fuel tank legs ending with aerospike and landing leg. The third stage hold only additional fuel tanks. Once again, it docked with using only the main engine, beside the space plane on the mothership rear.

En route to Jool

==========

Even with 9 nuclear engines, Kerbin ejection burn required many orbits. The 4-sections ship was wobbly, but not uncontrollably so -- thanks to the design putting the engine on front, and balancing the landers. Kerbals aboard opened - and finished - the snacks once crossing Jool orbit, and had to make due without for the rest of the multi-year flight before actual Jool intercept… (Yeahh, I didn't use windows !)

The original plan was to aerobrake using Jool, and visit Laythe, Tylo and the other moons thereafter. Everything changed when the pilot managed a lathe intercept. It turned into a cheap - although retrograde - Laythe orbit. The plane was dispatched for landing (and science !), and had some trouble finding some land. The landing itself was skillfully managed on an island steep slope. But one big problem became apparent after take-off : chasing for an island had taken the plane south, and it was not possible to make an equatorial orbit. The rendez-vous with the mothership was compromised !

The Laythe mistake…

==============

However our courageous Kerbin tried to match orbit to the last oxidizer drop and got an intercept -- but docking with the plane was not possible, and docking with mothership would have been cumbersome and costly (in fuel budget). So our proud Kerbal had to jump ships in EVA.

Tylo

===

Tylo had been designed as the next stop. The mothership would sit in low orbit while various Kerbals would use the Tylo lander in turns to farm science in the system, beginning -- of course -- with Tylo. After refueling and separating the lander, it performed its landing uneventfully. The fuel tanks were dropped before landing, and the aerospike stage shortly after take-off. Even though the remaining lander was low on TWR, the initial push from the second stage was enough to make it to orbit and circulize. There was more than enough fuel to rendez-vous with the mothership, drop the science, refuel, change pilot and go for the another moon.

Moons

====

The now light lander was successfully used for landing and bring science from the other moon, although there has been some short calls. Fuel was usually very low on lander when burning for intercept and docking (less than a few units in some cases). However, fuel on the mothership was high enough to go for one last daring move…

Back to Laythe

=========

The Laythe near total failure had lead to an EVA last minute ship jump. And the Kerbal had saved itself, but forgot to bring the science results… So one last mission was launched to recover the lost science. It was a bit tricky to get to the ship (in retrograde oblique orbit…) and back with enough fuel to dock, but the science was saved !

Back to earth

========

Their mission duly completed, our Kerbals headed back toward Kerbin. After the ejection burn, it was obvious that the fuel was still plentiful, and Kerbin intercept was achieved without using the first stage fuel and engines… The nuclear engine stage was dropped only for not adding strain to the chutes, and the landing was uneventful.

[loch.ness]

Aesthetics mods are all right. Tell me more about Snacks and Dang it!, I don't know them.

Universal Storage is okay if you bring only snacks and some monoprop.

KAS struts are prohibited - the problem is that JOOL-5 become too easy already with the new updates: huge launch rockets (at the beginning there was only the orange tank and the mainsails), less wobbly physics, stronger ions, etc... so it's not so elite and hard anymore. At the beginning there was only 1 entry per month and it was a very big deal to do it successfully. Nowadays I spend a lot of time reviewing missions which doesn't really have any unique solutions...

And I like mods but many of them make it easier so I try to keep the balance. Mods which makes the mission harder are always appreciated!

I'll find the links in the morning for the mods so you can look up further but here we go:

Snacks is a simpler life-support mod for those people that want to get the feel of having lifesupport but aren't in all the way (or for people like me who are trying to get used to having a new design criteria and aren't ready to jump all the way into TAC).

Any part with crew capacity at take-off will have a number of snacks added to its resources. Kerbals will eat roughly 0.5 snacks per kerbal day (I think, I need to re-check the numbers). The actual time between snacking is somewhat random, so snacks can go faster or slower depending on how your kerbals feel. Unlike the "real" life-support mods, running out of snacks causes a hit to your Reputation every time a kerbal reaches for a snack and can't get one - but they don't die.

Currently I'm designing and testing in Sandbox so this wouldn't really matter to me. Hitch-hikers contain a big supply (I need to check if it is 200 or 2000) snacks while other crewed capsules only supplied 50. A universal storage compartment carries ~ 40 snacks. A test ship I made for Duna with a crew of 3 ran out of snacks on its way there with 1 hitch-hiker can and 1 3 man crew module. I haven't done the math about what I'd need for a 10 man ship on a mission to Jool.

If running it in Sandbox though, Snacks just allows me another meter-stick to measure my success with.

--

Dang It! is a mod which introduces random failures to the mission. Almost every part has a new stat MTBF (mean time between failures) which controls how likely a failure is to occur. Control capsules and probe cores come stocked with spare parts (I don't have the Universal Storage section for these). When a failure occurs a Kerbal (who is trained in mechanical or electrical repairs) will need to eva out, inspect the failure, acquire spare parts, and fix it.

Resource tanks (DRE heat shields, fuel tanks, snacks containers) can start to leak. Batteries can blow a fuse. Reaction wheels can get stuck - disabling their ability to produce torque. Engines can be damaged such that they produce no thrust, or have their gimbals locked. Control surfaces can be stuck.

In career training kerbals costs funds, though some come pre-trained (the smart ones). In sandbox I think those traits are random. A well trained mechanic might be able to repair a fused gimbals using half of the spare parts while an unskilled mechanic wouldn't be able to fix it at all. Batteries burning out and resource tank leaks are by far the most common failures and could likely destroy an otherwise successful mission.

On KAS - I caught the strut note on page one again shortly before you posted. I'm still playing around with designs. I'm favoring and impractical (but nice to me) long ship design. I'm going to try multi-docking for the first time to see if I can compensate for wobble and such.

Or to put it another way - I have a design in mind for a ship that I want to make work which would be "easier" to do with KAS struts - but I'll try to find creative solutions instead. At the end of the day, I'll be doing this for me, but I'll also want to make things fun.

My current Sand-box save is about trying out missions for different worlds and actually getting out to see the system. My next career save will be about building a space-program that can launch these missions and afford them (likely to use Moderate difficulty when its time, I might be able to do Hard, but I'm not sure).

Edited October 20, 2014 by loch.ness

[Oafman]

KAS struts are prohibited

Was this always the case? I did this challenge a few months back, but just haven't got around to sorting through all the images yet. I read through the rules before that and don't remember seeing that these struts were prohibited (I went on to use loads!). But I could have easily missed it. Anyway, nvm, because I'm working on a much less strutty alternative...

Nowadays I spend a lot of time reviewing missions which doesn't really have any unique solutions...

Well, we are on page 180, so most clever things have already been done. One of the downsides of running a popular challenge

[Cmdr. Arn1e]

Well, we are on page 180, so most clever things have already been done. One of the downsides of running a popular challenge

Yeah... I think Ziv may have a bit of fun reviewing what people may come up with using the new spaceplane parts and cargo bays, but they will get 'old' fairly quickly IMO!

[kookoo_gr]

Ok, Dres has fallen and one of the two rovers i sent on Eve is on its way to the launch site from Eve with less than 30km away, if nothing goes wrong i believe by the end of this week i'll have finished the Jool-5 challenge.

[Ziv]

I'll find the links in the morning for the mods so you can look up further but here we go:

Snacks is a simpler life-support mod for those people that want to get the feel of having lifesupport but aren't in all the way (or for people like me who are trying to get used to having a new design criteria and aren't ready to jump all the way into TAC).

[...]

Dang It! is a mod which introduces random failures to the mission. Almost every part has a new stat MTBF (mean time between failures) which controls how likely a failure is to occur. Control capsules and probe cores come stocked with spare parts (I don't have the Universal Storage section for these). When a failure occurs a Kerbal (who is trained in mechanical or electrical repairs) will need to eva out, inspect the failure, acquire spare parts, and fix it.

Resource tanks (DRE heat shields, fuel tanks, snacks containers) can start to leak. Batteries can blow a fuse. Reaction wheels can get stuck - disabling their ability to produce torque. Engines can be damaged such that they produce no thrust, or have their gimbals locked. Control surfaces can be stuck.

In career training kerbals costs funds, though some come pre-trained (the smart ones). In sandbox I think those traits are random. A well trained mechanic might be able to repair a fused gimbals using half of the spare parts while an unskilled mechanic wouldn't be able to fix it at all. Batteries burning out and resource tank leaks are by far the most common failures and could likely destroy an otherwise successful mission.

Yeah, both Snacks and Dang it! sounds good, they are allowed!

[Ziv]

Was this always the case? I did this challenge a few months back, but just haven't got around to sorting through all the images yet. I read through the rules before that and don't remember seeing that these struts were prohibited (I went on to use loads!). But I could have easily missed it. Anyway, nvm, because I'm working on a much less strutty alternative...

Well, we are on page 180, so most clever things have already been done. One of the downsides of running a popular challenge

Stock struts were never prohibited but KAS and some mods have some unrealistically too strong struts. When building big things engineers have to face the limits of the materials, it's true for big rockets too, so this is why I like to keep that real for this challenge too.

About the uniqueness of the entries: yeah, sure, most of the basic solutions for this challenge was already made by the contenders but many of them have some nice twist or a new idea. And there's a lot of variants on how you do the mission too, like 5 specified lander, one universal lander or modular lander with attached additional stuff for the bigger moons, some of them went to other worlds too, others brought rovers or some probes or brought more Kerbals, etc.

So it's usually fun, my only problem is that it became a lot easier with the new huge rockets and with some other parts, and with the big number of sample missions some people just copy some of the good solutions. But this is rare, fortunately. So I would like to ban everything bigger than the orange tank/mainsail and the new ion engine, and especially ban hyperedit testing (I did my first mission without testing). But I will not ban them, of course, they are in the game already....

And one more thing: if the player was never to the Jool system then it's the best, because closing to the Jool System at to the moons the first time gave me awesome thrill and I would be happy if everybody would go there like this...