What are the most important things you've learned about playing KSP to pass on?

[bdito]

Always save a little deltaV for landing. Parachutes don't always bring you to a safe landing speed.

[gooddog15]

1. If you want to get science, use polar orbits. You can get a lot of data from this.

2. try to reuse old components that you normally don't really use, as you'll be surprised how much funds you will save.

for example, a had a few components from fasa I never really use, such as the Explorer parts (except the probe core, as its practically my best friend).

I reused the first stage in conjunction with a LV-909 + explorer fuel tank second stage and a tantareses pol SM as a third stage. It became my new dedicated small probe launcher, as it's so cheap and reliable.

3. flying aircraft around to gather science is handy (however I would recommend to not do this until you get a few scientific instruments). you can get some nice science out of hopping around.

Edited October 23, 2014 by gooddog15

[herbal space program]

Until you are actually stuck, which will almost certainly happen at some point, don't let everybody else show you how to do everything. Half the fun of the game is figuring out how to make a spaceship or space plane that can get the job done, and if you just go to the forums or YouTube to be shown how, you're cheating yourself out of the best part. Once you really can't figure out how to do something hard, like rendezvous and dock for the first time, then by all means avail yourself of the many tutorials out there. In fact, I would say that the ones on asparagus staging, basic orbital maneuvers, and the correct use of the maneuver node are fine to look at once you actually make it to space. They basically amount to user manual-type material.

Remember, there is nothing in this game more satisfying than successfully landing on and returning from another celestial body in a ship you designed and piloted yourself. The fewer crutches you employ in getting there, the bigger the smile on your face will be when you manage it.

[herbal space program]

As to MechJeb, I never used it, and the game is far from unplayable without it. If you spend 20 bucks on a basic game controller, you can learn to do every maneuver in the game manually without difficulty, especially now that they've fixed the horrible issues in previous versions of wobbly rockets and shaky SAS.

Having said that, I can understand why somebody who is building a 20 part space station on orbit would not want to fly every single mission by hand, but that's no reason not to learn how to do it manually first. That's where the fun is in this game.

[The_Rocketeer]

I don't know how well-known this is, but discovered it for myself not too long ago:

Landing (not Splashing) is possible in the Water biome - the islands off the shore at KSC are classed as Water.

Conversely, Splashing (not Landing) is possible in most other biomes with water in them, e.g. shorelines, rivers or lakes.

The main use of this is for science rewards, e.g. surface samples, EVA reports etc. I don't have an exhaustive list of those that are possible, but I would suspect that the Ice Caps and Mountains are unlikely to work out - if u find somewhere they do, let me know!

[eddiew]

- Build rovers in the spaceplane hangar, not the VAB, otherwise your navball will be 90 degrees out of whack, and possibly backwards. Not to mention the symmetry is more appropriate in the SPH.

- If you make rovers with a docking port for skycraning, make sure the docking port is the root element - this way you can save them as a subassembly and attach them to a rocket in the VAB later. (Look for the SelectRoot mod if you found this out too late!)

- If your rover is attached as a subassembly onto your rocket, double check you're controlling the rocket from the right place at launch... if the rover is upside down in the rocket, you don't want it controlling everything!

- If your rover is unmanned, consider making it as a hollow shell of panels (not necessarily a solid 6-sided box, 2 panels with a separator at each end is fine). This gives you room inside for batteries and mono propellant tanks, and protects them against impact, while leaving the external space for wheels, science widgets, and solar panels.

- If you use mods, Infernal Robotics adds awesome hinges that you can use to turn your rover's wheels underneath it, giving you a more compact object to launch (great if you use FAR!) which then spreads into a wide wheelbase when it gets where it's going.

(Can't tell that I spent 5 hours working with rovers last night, can you? )

[SmartS=true]

Try to land on Minimius for your first landing, not the Mun. It takes more delta-V to get there, but takes much less to land, thus it actually takes less fuel overall.

[SubzeroSpartan7]

Check lists. The most frustrating thing about this game is not the bugs or glitches, it is human error. Always make sure you have everything you need because it sucks to launch your new revolutionary Duna ship and forget parachutes for landing. I also highly recommend mods like Kerbal Engineer or MechJeb , personally I take Kerbal engineer as stock as all it dos is give you information. Also don't be afraid to quickload and quicksave especially if you are doing something for the first time.

[Starwhip]

Check lists. The most frustrating thing about this game is not the bugs or glitches, it is human error. Always make sure you have everything you need because it sucks to launch your new revolutionary Duna ship and forget parachutes for landing. I also highly recommend mods like Kerbal Engineer or MechJeb , personally I take Kerbal engineer as stock as all it dos is give you information. Also don't be afraid to quickload and quicksave especially if you are doing something for the first time.

So. Much. This.

Get out a sheet of paper. Write down your contracts.

Then write:

-Staging

-Parachutes

-Lights

-Ladders

-Wheels

-Canards

-Intakes

-Power

-RCS

-Crew

-Action Groups

One by one, check off each item before you launch.

Then write a flight plan.

-This contract in Mun Orbit

-That one on Minmus surface

-Science data from Kerbin

-&c.

And then profit.

[DrD]

RCS!!!

Now that I'm more experienced I use RCS a lot more to adjust trajectory.

As you know, the further away you are from your destination, the greater is the impact of small changes in trajectory on your eventual encounter.

When I burn for the Mun or Minimus, I find it very difficult if not impossible to burn exactly right, such that my final trajectory is not like my plotted trajectory. This is because being off even by 3-10 m/s can alter your final encounter significantly.

The solution, rather than trying small prograde/retrogade burns to fine tune, is to simply use RCS to fine-tune after your initial burn from Kerbin. Keep pointing prograde and fire RCS either prograde (H) or retrograde (N). You'll find that your plotted orbit changes slowly but surely and you can then fine-tune it exactly (although you may have to turn cap-locks on).

Last night I was leaving Kerbin to rendevous with my Munar space station, using RCS I was able to fine-tune my burn to get an exact perapsis at the Mun of 40K.

You can also adjust the other parameters. It's really nice that you don't have to rotate all around, just use RCS up/down for normal/antinormal, left/right for radial in/out. Using this technique you can convert your trajectory to a polar orbit or whatever. Since you're still far even relatively small RCS firings can completely change your eventual orbit. This is a lot better and more efficient than trying to burn your main engine once you're in orbit.

It's even better during rendevous. I had a hard time with my final tuning of encounter until I learned that the main engine, even at low thrust, is still too coarse an adjustment. It's awesome to burn RCS pro or retro and watch the encounter markers slowly move together. I can easily get my markers to 1-2 kilometers using RCS for final adjustment.

Interestingly this technique is used in RL. In Apollo the majority of mid-course corrections were made using RCS. They only used the main engine (SPS) once just so they could get data on its performance. They burned it for like 2 seconds (they called it a burp.)

Using RCS a lot more has really helped me in this game. I need a bit more monoprop but way less LF/Ox.

[Wyre311]

The most important things I have learned from Kerbal to pass on to new pilots is this:

1: start off small and try to keep it small. The more mass you have, the more energy it will take to move it.

2: Learn the navball and physical mechanics of the game. When you learn how to move, your battle is half won.

3: experiment in sandbox mode before you do it in career mode. Use sandbox to get to other planets with as little as possible, then mimic it in career mode.

4: Lights are your best friend

5: keep it simple. build your ships with a purpose. if you cant do it in one launch, don't do it at all.

6: Probes before manned flights... this gives you a look at how to get somewhere before going there.

7: Every kerbal comes home.. If you cant guarantee it, don't launch the poor guy.

[Itsjustrocketscience]

-Learn the navball, those numbers, they aren't for show, They ACTUALLY tell you your heading. Learn about the horizon line. Use all 6 symbols, and know what they do.

-Sometimes, you just have to start again from scratch.

-Learn how to orbital rendezvous and dock. It's more than helpful.

-When I first played, I only ever used small and tiny radial sizes, then I tried out large and put a small colony on the Mun. Then I tried huge and landed on Duna.

-Everything is dead weight, only really applies to escaping Kerbin, but the faster you burn your fuel the faster you can drop that giant piece of metal strapped to your rocket. (Use fuel lines to move fuel from liquid boosters to central rockets to get rid of fuel faster). Also, I'm not necessarily saying use rockets that burn fuel faster. If you replace an efficient rocket with a less efficient one, you'll lose fuel.

-Use Sepratrons! SRBs (the huge solid fuel boosters), they're great, except whey they slam into the side of your rocket and kill all your Kerbals.

-never give up! A mission seem hopeless? Too bad. I once had a pod with nothing but 3 kerbals and a large mono tank falling from 2km altitude over Kerbin, no RCS thrusters, no rockets. They all lived. bonus points if you can figure out how I did it.

-The prograde naturally turns toward your heading when you're using your rockets. And the retrograde naturally moves away. When landing on the Mun you need to keep your retro facing straight up. this knowledge can help when you need to move it around to get it to the top of the Navball.

-Wide landers = little tilting.

[Itsjustrocketscience]

I hope the "standard way" includes a gravity turn. because if it doesn't then you need to learn a bit about orbiting. I have gotten orbits with apoapsis and periapsis within 1km of each other. Around Duna.

[The_Rocketeer]

I once had a pod with nothing but 3 kerbals and a large mono tank falling from 2km altitude over Kerbin, no RCS thrusters, no rockets. They all lived. bonus points if you can figure out how I did it.

They jumped.

[SpaceJuice]

mine are:

1. lern how to mod; make a part using uinity

2. get mods; haveing mods gets the game more fun

[Norpo]

Play/watch/look at tutorials. You may think you don't need them early on, but you really do.

Or just spend your first day playing messing around with rockets and if you're lucky, getting out of the atmosphere (and surviving)

[jhousen]

There is one item I haven't seen listed yet...

Check your target, there is nothing like travelling halfway across the system, lining up a perfect rendezvous, maneuvering to dock...and

that's a piece of debris, where's the other ship...

a long distance away

[stumason]

1. MechJeb is an incredibly useful and time-saving tool - I use it all the time - but it is important to get to grips with at least basic orbital manoeuvring first. Why bother? Well sometimes MechJeb makes errors (e.g. putting you on a Kerbin escape trajectory that sends you through Kerbin XD) and when that happens you are gonna need to know how to fly by yourself. My confession is that I probably couldn't do Munar/Minmus landings without it; orbital manoeuvring, rendezvous and docking I have done without it, but not landing :/

Hi, I'm new around here but I've been playing KSP for quite some time. I thought I'd just chime in and say there is a middle ground with Mechjeb like this fellow alludes to above - I was a bit confused why there was a bit of an argument at the start of the thread about it.

When I first started playing, I didn't use any mods at all. It took many, many failed attempts (and even more dead Kerbals) to even get into orbit, much less anywhere useful, but I learnt how to pilot my ship, even if I wasn't particularly good at it. I already had a reasonable understanding of how spacecraft flew, so I got the theory ok, it was just the implementation that caught me out.

Then, a few months ago I installed KSP again, this time with several mods, including Mechjeb. Now I can get to orbit every time - I still plan the maneuver manually, but I just led Mechjeb orientate the craft and do the burn, which is something I struggled with manually.

I always plan my burns manually, I just let Mechjeb carry them out - this is what I mean by a middle ground. As for landings, I mix and match, depending on how bothered I can be to do it. My first landing on the Mun was done manually though and it was a good feeling, even if my lander toppled sideways and trapped Jeb there forever..... A rescue is pending, but budgetary restrictions mean it has been put on hold, for now.

[Red Iron Crown]

*snip*

Don't mind the MechJeb haters, if it makes the game more enjoyable for you by all means use it and don't look back.

[stumason]

Hmm, not sure what happened to my previous reply, it seems to have made an incorrect burn and gone off into deep space...

In a nutshell, I was just chiming in about Mechjeb. I'm new here, but I've been playing KSP for some time now. There seems to be an argument over whether to use it or not, both sides of the argument seem to be an all or nothing. There is a 3rd way!

When I first started playing, probably 18 months ago now, I used no mods and it took me an age to learn how to get into orbit, much less doing anything else. Through that though I built upon my pre-existing "knowledge" of space flight and I now understand exactly what Mechjeb is doing.

However, last month, I downloaded Mechjeb (and several other mods like KAS, the graphics mod and others). It has made my life so much easier! But I don't use it to work out the manoeuvres, I do that myself, I just get Mechjeb to do the actual burn as I find it hard (especially on that first burn to orbit) to get it done in time, to hold my heading and control the burn.

It is certainly a useful tool, but not one that should be relied upon as it can make a mess of things - surely, one of the best moments of my gaming on KSP came from a manual landing on the Mun, even if it did topple over and trap Jeb there - a rescue mission is planned, but it may be pushed back owing to a budget crisis.....

I justify using it myself as this - it's not me in the spaceship and any modern spacecraft will use computers anyway to do the actual flying, even if the manoeuvre was planned by a crew member, so I don't feel like it is "cheating" in any way, in fact, it is more realistic.

[stumason]

Aye, it does - I got by for well over a year without it and once I used it, it has made the game much less frustrating and I would recommend any new player to spend some time crashing their ships manually, then once they have got to grips with how they fly, get a hold of Mechjeb and give it a whir.

I also may have double-posted - I didn't realise that forum posts were pended for Mod review...

[Damien_The_Unbeliever]

The only time that two objects in space are stationary with respect to each other is when they're attached to each other.

If you want absolutely zero difference between those objects, then the word rigid also enters the discussion - i.e. struts. docks offer non-rigid connections.

So this is to say, you can try to park two independent objects into orbit next to each other, but it will inevitably fail.

[laythelover17]

What I learned, I it isn't broken don't fix it. I built a double asparagus stage rocket early on and I still use it even after I maxed out the tech tree,why because its capable of getting into minmus orbit and back! Its op but stock.

[the_omnitom]

Quick shoutout to Das_Valdez, i've learned a tons and tons and actually gained more enjoyment out of the game since watching his twitch streams and subsequent youtube vids(look up kerbal space academy for youtube) also my opinion on the mechjeb issue, the most satisfying moments of ksp come after a well executed land/transfer/docking, but if you want something to do all that for you and just sit back... to each they're own. 3 2 1 Sppaaaccee!!

[Shneb]

A haiku.

Quicksave is your friend

When the game crashed and shut down

Quicksave was your friend