[0.23] Tutorial: Mission Planning and Ship Design for SCIENCE!

[Geschosskopf]

MISSION PLANNING AND SHIP DESIGN FOR SCIENCE! FOR 0.23

PART 1: BACKGROUND INFO

NOTE 1: This tutorial is for folks who want to progress at a reasonably realistic, evolutionary, yet efficient, pace. If you want to know how to build monster interplanetary ships with starter parts, look elsewhere.

NOTE 2: This is all stock. However, I do recommend a few non-part mods that add instrumentation. Enhanced NavBall, Navyfish's Docking Indicator, Kerbal Engineer (when it's updated for 0.23), RCS Build Aid, Kerbal Alarm Clock, etc.

0. PURPOSE

The purpose of this tutorial is to plan missions and design ships so that you only have to go to the same place (zone, biome within a zone--see below) once. That is, each mission should get somewhere between 85-100% of the points available in a given zone/biome, with the instruments available with your current technology. Note that you will at some point probably have to make multiple trips to the same body, but you shouldn't ever have to land in the same place twice.

1. TARGET INFORMATION

First thing, you need to know how the game works. See Trigger_Au's post on "Understanding Science Points" for an excellent and highly detailed rundown of all the variables that go into determining how many points you get for doing what. But if you can't find it or it's too detailed for you, here's a VERY basic summary.

Each body in the Kerbol system has several "zones" where science is available. The list below goes in order from furthest away to the surface. Not all bodies have all zones. Many don't have atmospheres, some don't even have surfaces you can reach. Anyway, the zone:

• High orbit ("in space high above"), from edge of its SOI down to some arbitrary but low orbital level. Everything has this zone.
  
• Low orbit ("in space near"), from where high orbit stops to some arbitrary point closer to the surface where you still have orbital velocity. Everything has this zone. If the planet has no atmosphere, this zone extends nearly to ground level.
  
• Flying high ("upper atmosphere"). When high in the atmosphere (if present) and moving at less than orbital velocity. Aerobraking passes that will carry you back into space do NOT qualify as "upper atmosphere" because you're going too fast.
  
• Flying low ("flying above"). From just above the ground to the arbitrary change to upper atmosphere, at less than orbital velocity.
  
• "In space just above" is the same as flying low for bodies without atmospheres. Can be reached by a Kerbal simply hanging onto a lander's ladder without touching the ground. Also possible by jumping and jetpacking.
  
• Surface. The ship or EVA Kerbal is on the ground or in the water.
  

Some bodies have multiple biomes. All biomes do is subdivide the surface and flying zones up into multiple zones. Bodies with biomes thus have more science available because each biome has its own supply of points. The various biomes on the same parent zone typically have about the same point value. This means that if you can make a ship to get to 1 biome, you can just repeat the same mission to different biomes, thereby getting beaucoup points before having to develop a more complex mission to a different destination.

Note that even without official biomes (yet), some bodies effectively have multiple biomes already. For instance, Eve has surface and ocean.

2. CHOOSE YOUR WEAPONS

0.23 puts a premium on returning experiments due to 1) only allowing an experiment to be transmitted once per ship per mission from the same zone/biome, and 2) limiting the total of transmitted data to about 40% of the total points available for that experiment a given zone/biome. Thus, this tutorial will focus on returning, not transmitting. The goal here is to equip your ship so you only have to make 1 trip to each zone (or biome within a zone).

Your available tools are:

• Capsule: Allows crew reports, EVA reports, and surface samples. Also holds a Kerbal who can move data between capsules, science parts, and other Kerbals, which is very useful for getting info home. Capsule can only hold 1 copy of each type of data PER zone/biome combination, but can have multiple copies of the same type of report from different zones/biomes. As such, NEVER use anything except 1-man pods/cans because multiple Kerbals cannot each store their own data from the same zone/biome. Crew reports and EVA reports transmit at 100% efficiency so we can transmit these no problem if desired. Until we get the Mobile Lab, these are the only things we'll be transmitting and that's not even required.
  
• Mystery Goo: In 0.23, whether transmitted or returned, it can only be used once per mission unless cleaned out by the Mobile Lab. Because of this, we'll always return the Goo. It takes 4x returned Goos to get 99.9% of the Goo points for a given zone/biome, so we'll need 4 Goos per ship per zone/biome we want to visit on the mission.
  
• Science Jr. Material Bay: Same as Goo but gives more points. Also need 4 of them per zone/biome.
  
• Other Instruments: Thermometer, seismic, barometer, gravity sensor. Returning 1 of these per zone/biome gets like 80-85% of its points so you need 1 per zone/biome you'll visit. NOTE: It's never worth the time and expense to make a return trip to a zone/biome just to use a new instrument you unlocked since you 1st went there.
  
• Antennae: The starter antenna uses the least power but has the slowest speed. Because speed isn't an issue until we get the Mobile Lab, but electricity is always an issue until we get solar panels, the only antenna you should use to start with is the 1st one. And as mentioned above, transmitting is not necessary at all until we have the Mobile Lab, so you don't even need this. Once we get the Mobile Lab, then put the 3rd antenna on it. This uses the same low level of power as the starter antenna but is much faster.
  
• Mobile Lab: This adds 15% to the efficiency of transmitted data, although it's transmissions are still limited to 40% of the total available points for that experiment in that zone/biome. It also allows transmitting the same experiment in the same zone/biome multiple times, and allows Goos and Materials to be reused after transmitting. This all cuts down on the number of Goos and Bays you have to take somewhere to get all their points.
  

3. STRATEGY

The value of science increases with distance from Kerbin. Kerbin is chump change so while it has all these biomes, it's a real grind going to them all because they don't pay very much. The real points in the Kerbin system are on Mun and especially Minmus (now that it also has multiple biomes): you can unlock all or most of the tech tree just by grinding out all their biomes. So the goal is to ignore Kerbin as much as possible and get to Mun and Minmus ASAP. But I don't like grinding so the idea here is to finish off the tech tree with "simple" missions to Duna and Eve.

As such, when cashing in your science points, you want to stay along the top (rocket parts) and bottom (science/lander parts). Ignore the middle (airplanes and probes). Airplanes are only good for milking Kerbin which doesn't pay enough to justify the trouble, and probes short you on science because they don't carry Kerbals for EVA, crew reports, and surface samples. The only reason to use probes in career mode is to land on Eve (if you're remorseful about stranding Kerbals there) or to fly crewless modules for multi-part, crewed interplanetary ships.

So to start with, do what you have to do on Kerbin until you unlock both the Goo and the Material experiments. You'll also have some better rocket parts by now, too. From this point is where the planning and ship design tutorial really starts.

TO BE CONTINUED:

Edited December 20, 2013 by Geschosskopf
Include link to Triger_Au's tutorial

[Geschosskopf]

MISSION PLANNING AND SHIP DESIGN FOR SCIENCE! FOR 0.23

PART 2: MISSION PLANNING AND SHIP DESIGN

4. SHIP DESIGN

OK, so what we want is to return ships with all the points our currently available experiments allow. As noted above, this requires 1 capsule to which we attach 4x Goo, 4x Material, and 1 each of any other instruments we have (and that will work where we're going), PER ZONE/BIOME visited. This cluster of parts will be our basic payload for all future missions. I call this assembly the "Science Pack".

The ultimate goal of every mission is to return a Science Pack to the surface of Kerbin for each zone/biome visited. Therefore, the Science Pack must also include sufficient parachutes for a safe landing on Kerbin. So that's how we'll build it, just enough chutes for the capsule and science parts. Everything else will be held on by separators and jettisoned during re-entry.

Because the Science Pack will be used in everything from sub-orbital hoppers to Eeloo landers, during which time technology will improve, the basic design must be capable of upgrading without having to rebuild it totally. It's also a good idea to save the core module of it as a subassembly.

There are of course as many ways to arrange these parts as there are KSPers. But this is post needs some pics so here's a step-by-step guide on how I build the Science Pack. Feel free to do things totally different, or modify my design to suit your tastes.

EDIT: Text in above pic is WRONG. It should say "Rotated 45^", as in 9x shift-Q or shift-E taps.

This is how I start. The box girder is the backbone of the whole Science Pack, and is what you should grab to save a subassembly. Note the rotation of the girder and the 3 chutes on the capsule.

Next step is to add 4x Materials to the box girder. It's vital to put them as far up as you can to leave the bottom of the box girder sticking out below so you can attach the rest of the rocket to it.

Next add a small chute atop each Material and add 4x Goo around outside. You want the Goos on the cardinal directions because when we eventually turn this into a lander, the engines will go on the diagonals.

Complete the Science Pack by adding whatever electric power and other science instruments you have available, and put the 1.25m Reaction Wheel to the bottom. Add an antenna, too, just in case. Now save everything below the capsule as the Science Pack subassembly.

This entire assembly will be what returns from every mission. The chutes will set this whole thing down unharmed at about 4.3m/s. As she stands now, this contraption is an orbiter and fly-by ship.

You can easily turn the Science Pack into a lander for Mun, Minmus, and beyond. Just put the small radial separators on the diagonals of the Materials, and hang fuel, engines, and legs on them. The size of the tanks and engines will depend on where you plan on landing, and other aspects of the overall rocket design and flight profile. But this version here can start from low Minmus orbit, land, and return to Kerbin with plenty of fuel to spare. Mun's a bit harder so to be safe, either use bigger side tanks or put a Soviet-style "crasher" stage for the descent underneath. In any case, once you de-orbit at Kerbin, fire the radial separators to ditch the tanks/engines/legs because the Science Pack doesn't have enough chutes for them.

You can see how this basic system is upgradable. Swap the batteries for solar panels. Swap the capsule for a 1-man lander can to save a bit of weight. Engines and tanks of different sizes to land on different planets. Add a docking port and RCS for the interplanetary mothership that will lug it to these other planets. Put a docking port between the capsule and Science Pack, and a probe core on the Science Pack, so 1 capsule can take multiple Science Packs to different zones, with each pack returning independently. All sorts of things you can do with this.

Note there is no ladder. This is because jetpacks suffice for Mun, Minmus, Duna, Ike, and Gilly. And by the time you get to all of those, and probably before, you'll have the whole tree unlocked, at which point there's no more need for such little landers. Go built permanent colonies and monstrous bases . In any case, don't bother unlocking ladders unless you've got nothing better to spend your points on.

EDIT: FORGOT STEP 5:

5. MISSION PLANNING: KERBIN SYSTEM

OK, so we've done a few mindless hops around on Kerbin with the primary objective of unlocking the Material part. Now we have it so it's time to go to space. The goal is to land on Mun and Minmus but there are 6 zones we can conquer on the way, namely high and low orbits at Kerbin, Mun, and Minmus. So we'll do those first.

Make the basic orbiter version of the Science Pack and shoot it out of the atmosphere twice, once to about 100km, then to about 400km. At apoapsis, run all the experiments and reports. So much for that. Don't bother slowing down en route to anywhere else again.

Now we can do the same for Mun. Here you have a choice. You can send 1 ship and do 2 each Goo and Material at Ap and Pe (thus leaving some points on the table but not enough to worry about). Or you can send 2 ships and fire their full broadsides one high and 1 low, with the option of doing them both at once or separately. I really recommend doing both at once because everybody needs to learn how to control flotillas and this is a good place to start if you haven't already. You'll definitely need a rather large flotilla to do Eve in 1 launch window so might as well get used to it now. Once you've done Mun, you should have no problem (with better rocket parts) doing the same for Minmus.

Now it's time to for landers, so slap some radially mounted engines on the Science Pack and go for it. I recommend Minmus first because 1) it takes less of a lander due to its lower gravity, and 2) it pays more than Mun. Land there a few times. Each big flat area is a separate biome, and there are also midlands, highlands, and slopes. The points earned from a couple of Minmus landings will unlock bigger rockets to make a Mun landing easier. Once you think you have the hardware, do the same thing there. I recommend getting into somewhat inclined orbits when you arrive at Mun and Minmus so you'll fly over multiple biomes. Also, plant flags at every landing and put the biome's name in their title so you can easily avoid going to the same biome twice.

TO BE CONTINUED

Edited December 20, 2013 by Geschosskopf
noted error in 1 of the pics

[Geschosskopf]

MISSION PLANNING AND SHIP DESIGN FOR SCIENCE! FOR 0.23

PART 3: BEYOND KERBIN

After you've been to Mun and Minmus several times each, you're probably getting bored with the repetition. You're also getting pretty far up in the tech tree where the 350-450 points you get per Mun and Minmus landing aren't going as far as they used to. You COULD keep on grinding this (there are plenty more biomes to loot) but by now you've no doubt got Mainsails, orange tanks, LV-Ns, and docking ports. And the Mobile Lab, too. It's time to put them to use.

6 PLANNING FOR DUNA

Duna is the 1st launch window that comes up, about Y1D59 of a new game. Even with multiple trips to Minmus, you're by now probably only to day 20-something, so if you want to go to Duna, now's the time to prepare.

Let's assume you don't feel comfortable yet landing on Duna (which is a bit difficult and scary) but you can do Ike no problem other than getting there and back. So, this means you have 6 zones you can hit on this expedition: high and low orbits and Duna and Ike, "in space just above Ike", and Ike's surface. You of course always have the option of saving some for a later trip, but if you want to land on Ike, you have to go through all 5 other zones to get there, so you might as well grab their data as you go by.

Going through all the zones lends itself to doing Duna with 1 ship. A big mothership, probably assembled by docking, with onboard science for all 4 of the orbital zones and a lander or 2 Ike's surface and just above it. The lander (or 2) is the easy part; just upgrade your Mun/Minmus workhorse as needed. The real question is how to handle the science for the orbital zones. Here you have several choices:

• A flotilla of 4 Science Pack ships, 1 for each orbital zone, which go out and come home individually. So no need for a mothership and the lander(s) are also individual things. So that's 6 ships in the flotilla, but only 2 designs.
  
• A mothership with 4 Science Packs for the orbital zones. Assuming the mothership can't land in 1 piece, these packs must have a way to get back on the ground at Kerbin by other means, and will probably need probe cores.
  
• A mothership with the Mobile Lab. This doesn't need any Science Packs because it can use and reuse the instruments on the lander(s). It does need a crew of 2, however (not included by default), the big, fast antenna, and some big solar panels to power the antenna.
  

The thing about transmitting with the Mobile Lab is that it won't get all the available points, due to the transmission cap at about 40% of returned value. That means to get the rest of the points, you have to go there again and return what's left, which is something you want to avoid in general. HOWEVER, by this point in the game, you've probably only got a few more boxes to unlock and probably don't care too much about all of them anyway. Besides, you can always get them next time when you land on Duna itself, in the unlikely event you haven't finished off the tree before then.

So of these options, the least complex is using the Mobile Lab. And while it DOES leave points on the table, just transmitting the 4 orbital zones at Duna and Ike (with the ML's buff) will still get you about 1400 points. A lander for Ike's surface will do about 1200. So that's 2600 points for this mission using essentially 1 ship. Of course, you'll have to be able to dock at least to get the lander back on the Mothership, if not to assemble the whole contraption in orbit to start with. But docking's a breeze with Navyfish's instrument so don't let that stop you.

But however you do Duna, you'll probably finish all your experiments within a few days at most. Then you'll have to wait about 150 days for a window to come home. You COULD just fast-forward to that point, but why do that when there are other places you can go? Which brings us to Eve.

7. PLANNING FOR EVE

In a new game, the 1st Eve window comes up about Y1D145, while your Duna expedition is twiddling its thumbs. Might as well take advantage and go to Eve. This is because the way things work out, both the Eve and Duna expeditions will return to Kerbin at nearly the same time. Since you won't get any more (non-transmitted) points until that day comes, you might as well get 2 batches of points .

The Eve system has 12 zones at present: high and low orbits at Eve and Gilly, Eve dirt and ocean surfaces, Eve high and low flying over both dirt and ocean, Gilly's surface, and just above it. Problem is, returning any science parts from Eve's surface is pretty much out of the question for most folks. So rather than even try that, we'll send expendable probes down to Eve and transmit their data, while a manned, returning ship will do the orbital and Gilly zones.

The Eve probes are simple things. They only need 1 experiment of each type you have because of the transmission limits, which makes them to need only a couple of radial chutes in Eve's thick air. The main question is, how many of them do you want to send? There are 6 non-returning zones and to get even up to the transmission cap, you probably need 2 probes per zone. So that's 12 probes for all the points they can get this way, which ain't enough (about 100 points each for the 1st probe in each zone, way less for the 2nd) to justify a flotilla that big. Even 6 probes is pushing it (remember, you'll have at least 1 other ship for the orbital zones and Gilly). 3 will work because after the Duna mothership's transmission, we don't have much of the tech tree left. 1 on the dirt, 1 in the ocean, and 1 in the air (while parachuting).

Getting these probes to Eve again presents options. You can do them as individuals or carry them out on a mothership. Your call. The more probes you want to use, the better the mothership option becomes. Large flotillas are trickier at Eve than anywhere else because it's so close to Kerbin that the ships don't spread out much during the trip and tend to arrive all at once, which makes for some tense aerocapturing . If you use a probe mothership, it's probably best to have it manned and return it with Eve's orbital zones. That way, you can keep the Gilly ship totally separate.

The reason to keep the Gilly ship separate is because of the delta-V required to get from Eve to Gilly and far enough back to Eve to have a reasonably easy shot back to Kerbin. Big inclination changes, plus huge orbit size differences. If you try to include all this delta-V in the same ship that carries the probes, you'll ended up with a real monstrosity. Which is cool but....

Thus, doing Eve pretty much requires a flotilla of at least 2 ships. That would be a mothership with however many probes and 2 Science Packs (probably droppable) of its own for high and low Eve orbit, plus a capsule for EVA and crew reports there. The other would have 4 Science Packs and a capsule for all the Gilly zones. Gilly's got such low gravity that you can land the mothership itself there without too much trouble, so no real need of a separate lander. Just remember, though, that you still need to get all that data back down on Kerbin. Of course, if you love flotillas, you can break this up into a massive invasion fleet . However you do it, though, you'll get over 2000 points for this, too, and that should finish off the tech tree for you.

NOTE: I mentioned above that the Duna and Eve expeditions would arrive at nearly the same time. Usually, they're a few days to a week apart, but sometimes at least 1 Eve ship will come back the same day as the Duna ship. This is pretty cool--a race to the base . But be warned, you might have to do some juggling here. Still, by this point, you should be up to it.

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

This concludes my ramblings. I hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to humiliate me over errors, suggest better ways of doing it, and all that. This is just one way of doing things, not the only way.

Edited December 18, 2013 by Geschosskopf

[rottielover]

Well written and well thought out, I really enjoyed reading your guide.

[steamypete]

Thanks for your post.

I was having trouble understanding science.

So if you do a return trip to the mun and want to collect every science point there is to grab in the zones/biomes you are passing through on your trip you will need an impossible amount of Goo cannisters and Material bays? If I'm correct you pass through these zones on such a trip:

- Kerbin Low orbit

- Kerbin high orbit

- Mun High orbit

- Mun low orbit

- Mun Biome you have landed in.

So 20 Goos and 20 Material bays needed to gather all science right?

Is this how it works?

[Geschosskopf]

So 20 Goos and 20 Material bays needed to gather all science right?

Is this how it works?

Yeah, pretty much, which is why you don't do it all in 1 trip.

When you 1st start a new game, you don't have much in the way of rocket parts. Sure, if you know what you're doing, you can use them to build an interplanetary ship right off the bat, but in general most folks progress in baby steps. So first they just want to get out of the atmosphere either on a big suborbital flight or maybe even achieve low orbit. Then a higher orbit, and then fly-by of Mun and/or Minmus, all on separate flights.

Note that you don't actually have to achieve a closed orbit for any of this. All the science cares about is your altitude when you run the experiments, which is probably why it says "in space high over X" instead of "in high orbit around X". Anything that can make low orbit can also make a suborbital hop with an Ap high enough to qualify for the high orbit zone.

But anyway, don't sweat it if you don't get all the points for zones in space. They don't pay that much even at other planets, compared to what's on the surface. You might have noticed I ddn't even mention 1 space zone, "in space high over the sun" which you can en route to Eve or Duna, or make a separate trip for.

[Specialist290]

Very well thought out. I've been giving a little thought to optimizing my own science output in Career Mode and come to some of the same conclusions as you have, but I didn't take the extra time to gather them all under one umbrella for review like you have. Kudos

[Geschosskopf]

Very well thought out. I've been giving a little thought to optimizing my own science output in Career Mode and come to some of the same conclusions as you have, but I didn't take the extra time to gather them all under one umbrella for review like you have. Kudos

Thank you, sir .

I'm not saying this is the "best" way, however you want to define that. But it will unlock the whole tree for you in a reasonable amount of time without an excessive amount of grinding, which is how I like to do it.

[johngault007]

Awesome tutorial. You almost have me wanting to start over my career mode and work my way back up the tech tree. But since I sorta did the grind method I'll pick up at Minmus/Duna.

[Somtaaw]

Gonna say, your science pack is the bomb. I've been using it the past 2/3 weeks in numerous career restarts, and it works like a charm. I've done a little tweaking to it, and added 4 extra goo containers, and 2 extra legs per engine addon. It definitely helps for more stable landings, and my proof is below.

I had a colossal screw-up today, I landed nice and soft on the Mun, in a crater. Ran my research, EVA and samples, and then knowing another biome was approximately 500m-1km away I lifted off and flew to the Canyons. Did a HARD landing, saw a bunch of explosions (more on this later), and seemingly survived. All the science pods and mystery goo survived. So I ran the experiments, and then also knowing a third biome was spitting distance, ran Jeb over on his EVA pack to collect a third biome's eva/samples.

Upon lift-off from the Mun canyons, I was using less than 100 units of liquid fuel and it's corresponding oxide to get home, and I realised after lift-off my engines weren't working properly. I was spinning like a top trying to achieve breakaway thrust. As I somehow made me way out of Mun orbit and limp/crawled into a very high Kerbin orbit, I finally got around to retracting my 12 landing pods.... or I tried to. I only had 3 retract at all, so I re-extended thinking perhaps some locked. Upon closer examination, I realised I no longer had 12 landing legs, I had 9 total and only 3 were still functional. Flipping my camera around to the underbelly, I found I had 0/4 lights, no reaction wheel, and only 3/4 of my micro 48-7S engines had survived the impact.

When I finally got out of Mun orbit, I had a periapsis of 650,000 km, and an apoapsis of 10million km, with only 30-ish units of fuel left. Somehow achieved an aerobrake orbit around Kerbin with less than 1 unit of fuel. And it's all thanks to your rugged science pack being ungodly tough. Poor Jeb is now drinking away at the bar from his experience with a crippled bird.

[Geschosskopf]

Gonna say, your science pack is the bomb...

Thank you! I'm glad it's working well for you.

That was quite a story about the near-disaster in the canyon.

As an alternative to putting gear for multiple biomes on 1 lander and doing several surface hops, you can instead make a mothership with the Mobile Lab on it. Then you can totally pillage every biome on Mun or Minmus in a single mission, with less total play time spent because you're not always going back and forth to the moons. Land on 1 biome, grab the data, return to the mothership, stuff the data in the ML, use the ML to rearm the experiments, and repeat on the next biome. At the end, you return the ML instead of the lander. Here's an example, which also leaves a useful fuel station in Minmus orbit afterwards, so the mothership is rather larger than necessary:

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/80041-Pillaging-Minmus

As far as the lander goes, because the lander doesn't have to come home, you can do without the engine decouplers and chutes. However, it's a good idea to attach the short ladder segments to each side of the Science Pack so the EVA Kerbal grabbing the data has something to hold onto. Either that or use the Ship Manifest mod to just pipe the data into the ML without need of EVA .

And if I didn't mention it above, it's also a very good idea to put all the science toys on a single action group, which I call the "Science Bomb". This would include the crew report, observing the Goos and Materials, and logging all the other instruments.

[Somtaaw]

Indeed, the ML would have been more helpful, but in some of my career experiments, I've been toying with how to efficiently run experiments while also ensuring one has sufficient launch power. By blitzing straight for Mainsails, Rockomax ship parts, and the Science Lab to make your science pack. Then adding in Nuke engines, I did a whopper of an orbit only science run, and pulled in about 2400 science from orbits of the Mun, Minmus, Kerbin, and a quick hop out into the Sun SOI before decelerating back to land on Kerbin.

I thought I'd taken a screenshot but it apparently didn't save. 3-4 quick and dirty landings on Minmus & the Mun, doing tandem flights. Whenever possible, polar orbits to get more eva/crew reports of the biomes. Minmus I now commonly tag 3 full biomes in a single expedition, thus your 4-pack is just amazing. In one trip, I can snag 3 different Minmus biomes, and a high/low flight, leaving plenty for the followup flights to snag still more.

With the general basics tagged and having done that science barrage when I got temperature, pressure, and gravity scanners all in one fell swoop, I no longer need the 4-pack to collect most data. So now I do have the "science bomb" as you call it setup, and I'm working out an orbital mothership that will hold an ML.

[Geschosskopf]

With the general basics tagged and having done that science barrage when I got temperature, pressure, and gravity scanners all in one fell swoop, I no longer need the 4-pack to collect most data. So now I do have the "science bomb" as you call it setup, and I'm working out an orbital mothership that will hold an ML.

Hmm. The reason the Science Pack has 4x Goos and Materials is use them all in a single biome. For Goo and Material, 1 biome has more points available than you can carry back in a single part; it takes all 4 to get all the available points. Of course, there's the law of diminishing returns. The 1st run is worth about 65% to the total, the 2nd brings you to about 85%, the 3rd to 95% and the 4th gets whatever's left. Technically, 85% of 2 biomes might be more points than 100% of 1 biome, but OTOH as you get further along and tech nodes become more expensive, the little bit you left behind in all the biomes you've already been to adds up to a lot and thus ******s your progress.