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

[Sharpy]

On 16.05.2016 at 5:44 PM, Aubri said:

*Always shut off the battery in your first pod. I've never been disappointed that I didn't have 5 more EC to spend, but I've often wished I had enough to deploy a solar panel or get just a bit of rotation started. Also, as long as there's EC somewhere on the ship, you can still tweak tweakables.

Instead of blocking a battery, my construction checklist includes "One Emergency Unshielded Solar."

That's not always one. Sometimes two, rarely three. The lowest-level, small, simple solar panels. Even one will suffice but in rare cases you'll need to wait half a year before it helps, so two is always better. Regardless of all the rest, it will always provide enough power to extend the *actual* solar panels.

 

On 16.05.2016 at 5:44 PM, Aubri said:

 

*Learn how to use bi-elliptical transfers to make large inclination changes. It's counterintuitive until you turn your head and squint, but if you're going more than 45 degrees, you'll be glad you did.

Unless you have a moon along the way. Always use a moon for inclination changes.

That is, if you're not launching new. If you're just launching, launch into the correct inclination, or something close to it.

[NSEP]

1. I learned to always wait for the transfer window

2. I learned basic orbital mechanics

3. I learned that if you clip a part, it wont explode instantly (yay?)

4. I learned that after 1.0 you could not make a rocket with an instant slap-on car on it.

[kiwi1960]

You do not have to be insane to play KSP, but it really helps..

If you want to find a flat spot on the Mun to build a base, then build a cheap one way rocket but use I-frames to spread the legs wide apart, so if you land on a crater wall, chances are you will not tip over... once you find a flat spot... build a normal lander with all the bells and whistles... my way might be harder, but it reflects the true nature of space exploration.

Lastly.... for all the most dangerous missions.... send Jeb... if he dies, no big loss and everyone else (especially Val) can rest easier..

have a nice day!

[Magzimum]

Have a checklist. It takes only 15 seconds before you launch.

Mine simply checks:

1. Got control? (RSC/reaction wheels)
2. Got power (battery / solar panels)
3. EVA access: got ladders, hatches not blocked?
4. Landing gear: legs/wheels/parachutes
5. Staging sequence ok?
6. Got the right crew?

GO!

(Which boxes need to be checked depends on the mission, but I prefer to quickly run past this list, as it contains everything that has gone horribly wrong in the past).

[James M]

Have some guts! Go out and don't be afraid to make mistakes xD That's what makes the game interesting.

[Blaarkies]

On 5/16/2016 at 5:44 PM, Aubri said:

*Big drills are mostly useless. Unless you're limited on your drilling time or need the extra reach, the small drill will do everything you need with less weight and less radiators.

*In the last moments of a powered landing, Surface mode Radial Out is your best friend. Doubly so when you realize you're coming down on a hillside.

Small drills are limited to greater-than 2% ore concentrations. This shouldn't be a problem as long as the difficulty is not set to hard. So they are awesome for asteroids(just don't use the small ISRU on asteroids), but using small drills for a binome hopper could be risky.

Don't you mean "Surface mode - Retrograde"? The radial out vector will always point perpendicular to you trajectory, away from gravity...this isn't necessarily upwards, it twitches around as you burn towards it(not affecting your velocity at all). But retro-grade will kill velocity until you get to 0m/s(then it switches to SAS-hold mode)
* To dodge a hillside like you mention, burning towards Pitch:90'(center of the blue hemisphere of navball) will give the best chance at avoiding a crash

[Mycroft]

Bigger is not always better.

[eddiew]

The higher up your rocket you get, the more important it is to not add weight you don't need.

[Magzimum]

15 hours ago, eddiew said:

The higher up your rocket you get, the more important it is to not add weight you don't need.

Unless it is an extra fuel tank, and you just think you don't need it.

My missions, contrary to those of the professionals, hardly ever go according to plan, so a little extra fuel on the final stage(s) to get my guys home saves me a lot of rescue missions.

[Vermil]

For me, it all boils down to: Small Steps.

That's really it. I've glanced through this thread, but some of it is things I don't care for, ways I don't want to play. And the rest, well, it's small steps. That is how I found happiness in KSP.
And I test a lot. One of the things I decided even before I started to play this game was to do my damnest to keep my astronauts alive. So I try to make sure the rocket is immaculate before sending off a mission. There's almost always some small glitch somewhere anyway, but that just reinforces the importance of testing and checklists. That's one reason I've put off playing 'career-mode'. I wouldn't have budget enough for the testing (actually, I suppose one could do 'revert' and so on, but my immersion in my playing style could wander off).

...And moar boosters. Or bigger engines in the first stage. It's important for the fuel budget to get going early.

Edited August 19, 2016 by Vermil

[Clipperride]

The 10 biggest things I've learned are;

1. Have fun.  If you want a mod to take care of some aspects of the game use it, if not, don't. There's no "right" way to play the game, other than enjoying what you achieve.

2. Early in the game try heading for Minmus instead of the Mun.  It's so much more forgiving when learning the skills needed for a powered decent.

3. Have some spare power (locked off) just in case you run out.

4. Practice docking until becomes routine as it opens up so many possibilities.

5. A pen and paper is always handy. Especially, I find, when testing out a new design. That way you can note all the issues you want to address and fix them all at once. Write down your action group commands - you don't want to cut away a parachute when you meant to jettison a heat shield.

6. If you start to make changes to a working design, give it a new name when you save it.  That way you can always go back to something that worked if your "improvements" have unforseen side effects.

7. Learn to use the NAV ball as it gives you a lot of useful information.

8. Arrange your RCS thrusters an equal distance either side of your crafts centre of mass.  I use an extended ladder as a "ruler" to balance them fore and aft. Docking is so much easier that way.

9. Consult the forums. The wisdom of others has helped me out an awful lot, especially when trying something new.

10. If you use quicksaves, make sure you have one that you know you can return to safely. It's so annoying when your only save puts you right back into an impossible situation. Eg when landing, I use "safe" whilst still in orbit, "decent" high up when there's still plenty of options and "final" closer to the ground (especially when carrying out a"suicide burn" or landing on difficult terrain)

But, the most important point is 1. Have Fun!

[Sharpy]

Oberth Effect is not just for orbital flybys.

It works when you burn in LKO, where it can almost halve transfer cost to other planets.

It works when you're braking something not meant for airbraking - when you burn at the low periapsis, you'll spend much less than if you brake at the edge of SOI.

And it matters from moment one, seconds after leaving the launchpad: If your launch vehicle has poor TWR, something below 1.4 - you'll spend tons upon tons of fuel to reach the orbit. Add a lot of cheap SRBs, even plain old Hammers. Give your rocket a good initial kick - get it above 400m/s during the first 30 seconds of flight - and the same launcher that would be unable to reach orbit, will reach it with 2500m/s left in the tanks - all thanks to a cluster of SRBs that provided maybe 300m/s early on. If you get moving fast early, You can afford lousy TWR later in the ascent, but the initial 400m/s or so gained ASAP make a world of difference.

[Omegagoldfish]

Always use retractable solar panels in things you want to dock with. Also, add at least triple redundancy to everything. If you need two panels, have five.

[steedcrugeon]

On ‎25‎/‎08‎/‎2016 at 2:53 PM, Omegagoldfish said:

Always use retractable solar panels in things you want to dock with. Also, add at least triple redundancy to everything. If you need two panels, have five.

When I was first doing stations and dockings I learnt the hard way that you really need that extra little bit of weight and opt for retractable panels. The single shot type, whilst cheaper and lighter, is a false economy when you shave them off accidentally after a bungled approach or undocking (it also teaches you to get good at docking fast before you strip off all the stations power generation facilities!).

I also now set  all my panels to toggle on action group 2 for everything I build. That way when I do my final docking run mental checklist I never forget to retract them.

On the docking side of life a tid-bit I have found useful is to have all the vessel's reaction wheels ready to shutdown when you dock with a station or larger vessel (basically keeping the large section/axis the only part with running torque control, keeping it close to the overall CoG) it helps keep the kraken at bay.

[Palaceviking]

Never warp across a Soi, been the doom of so many interplanetary missions :'( 

[Diche Bach]

Never leave an RCS segment off of a stage just because you figure (I'll be ditching that before I get to the important part, no need to balance it out as if that will be the inferior end of the craft . . .): currently wrestling with my (otherwise well RCS balanced) Mun orbital service module trying to get a good docking rendezvous with the Lander returned with 4 Kerbals and several hundred science. The lander is nice and manueverable, but the orbiter (with one pilot aboard) has the lionshare of the fuel . . .

Always overestimate how much RCS you "might" need.

If you use Kerbal Engineer, NEVER forget to leave the module off every command pod in a complex ship (also that clumsy orbiter above has no KER module in it!)

[shadragon]

I'm definitely a noob, but after thirty hours of play I have an opinion on this topic. 

- The forums rock. A welcoming atmosphere (pun intended) with helpful vets helping us witless noobs. 

- Start career mode. You begin with a few pieces and build on that over time. Best way to learn the game and initial concepts. Avoid mods until you understand the concepts and can do the tasks manually. 

- By the time I've built something, I want to tear it apart and redo it because I always figure out a way to do it better.

- KISS principle applies, always. 

- Free return trajectory will save Jeb's bacon when your design bureau under specs the fuel supply and you run out. 

- YouTube rocks for tutorials. 

- It may only be simplified Kerbal rocket science, but it's still challenging. 

On 8/11/2016 at 5:08 AM, Mycroft said:

Bigger is not always better.

But it does help at times.

[Jonfliesgoats]

On Xbox I thought I'd be only mildly pleased with the game in comparison to my PC experience.  Like many I relied on Kerbal Engineer.  

Instead I find it easy enough to calculate my own delta v and even use my graphing calculator app to plot quick reference charts for remaining delta v in flight, burn time required, etc.. That, for me, is part of the fun of the game now.

Also, independent of mods I use alexmoon launch window planner for interplanetary travel.  

One thing I enjoy now that I am weaned off of Mechjeb is common sense.  Before I would fly missions almost to the very limit number of what was possible with the math that I ran.  Now I find that I build myself in about a fifteen percent fudge factor for orbital maneuvering/transfers.  I build in a large error margin for Gravity-turns during non atmospheric descents so I can correct to find terrain, etc..  These are all common sense things that I missed.  With MJ I would never interrupt warp mid flight to see if I need to make mid-course corrections.  Now I do.

[ZentroCatson]

After playing KSP for almost 2 years (though with some large brakes), I think I should make a list myself:

(Mind you, this is just my opinion!)

1. Calm down and have fun! Its just rocket science 

2. KER is love, KER is life. It is a lot easier knowing what your spacecraft is capable of, and what not with KER.

3. Always leave a margin for error. You will use more than 3500m/s of Dv for Kerbin ascent.

4. Always have an abort system on your manned rockets, even if it is just jettisoning the external tank.

5. Try challenging yourself and getting out of your comfort zone. Ask in the forums if you're stuck, we will be glad to help you!

6. If you're feeling burnt out, stop playing KSP and play something else. Come back to it once you have new ideas.

7. After a longer time not playing KSP, do a simple practice mission like an Apollo-style Mun landing to dust off some of your skills.

8. Tell your friends that you're playing KSP! Maybe you'll even get some girls interested 

Edited October 14, 2016 by ZentroCatson

[Wanderhoof]

I just started playing, sooo my ability to contribute will be minimal.  That said, here is what I have learned so far:

1. When docking, if you are close to your target (100m give or take) and with 0 relative velocity, just take it slow and easy from there.  If you have RCS thrusters (because, why wouldn't you?), it is better to creep up accurately on your target (0.5m/s, for example) and nail your approach the first time rather than yo-yo back and forth a dozen times.  Slow and steady, slow and steady...  This probably is considered "Well, duh!" level of knowledge for experienced KSP-ers, but it took me awhile to get the whole patient approach thing down.  I just 'felt' things should be moving more quickly.  That was not a helpful feeling.

2. Struts are your friends, especially when building larger vehicles that may want to wobble like a bowl of gelatin.

3. Learn the different key bindings and how they change from mode to mode.  Pressing the wrong key may or may not have lead to an explosive encounter between ships.  Maybe.  I admit nothing.  Anyway, even when things are moving slowly (relatively speaking), being able to press the correct keys with precision (versus guessing and hunting and pecking) helps.

4. Don't be afraid to try something - even if it seems weird, improbable, or difficult beyond reasonable safety parameters (let you Kerbals do the worrying).  I have 'failed' countless times, but each time I learned something new, adjusted for it, and got a bit better with each attempt.  Which reminds me...

5. When changing the build of a ship for better (or even just simply functional without unnecessary explosions) performance, changing one major structural component at a time between launches will help you understand how each thing affects your ship.  If you change a dozen things between launches, it can be hard to tell which one thing had which specific effect (good or bad).  The two biggest areas I have noticed this in are in figuring out fuel-thrust efficiency (it really, really sucks to be stuck in space with no fuel) and flight stability (I have had some wobbly ships like like to tumble through the sky like a fireworks wheel).

6. Finally, press ALL THE BUTTONS and use ALL THE PARTS!  There are so many features in KSP, it is fun to keep discovering new things!

OK, those are my noob suggestions.

[Tyko]

On 10/15/2016 at 8:37 PM, Wanderhoof said:

3. Learn the different key bindings and how they change from mode to mode.  Pressing the wrong key may or may not have lead to an explosive encounter between ships.  Maybe.  I admit nothing.  Anyway, even when things are moving slowly (relatively speaking), being able to press the correct keys with precision (versus guessing and hunting and pecking) helps.

I remapped controls to other parts of the keyboard. I now use the arrow keys and the neighboring Right Shift and Right Control for Translate controls. This allows me to give rotation (WASD) and Translation (Arrows) at the same time. It also assures that I don't accidentally translate when I meant to rotate because each key only serves one purpose and I don't have to track which mode I'm in.

[Guest]

• Include self-lighting on everything (B9's omni lights are the best for this imo), especially if you've got science experiments to click all over.
• Don't rush or trivialise any part of vehicle design or mission planning/execution. Even with Better Burn Time I've zoned out and started the engines too late on a lot of landers.
• At that, don't trivialise any part of the game. I've basically never done Apollo-style Mun landings, instead preferring to fantasize about nuclear powered multi-launch projects that always fell through, and have gone on to pay the price of being incredibly bad at return missions and having a limited experience base in simple and reliable spacecraft.

Edited October 17, 2016 by Guest

[Tyko]

1 hour ago, String Witch said:

• Include self-lighting on everything (B9's omni lights are the best for this imo), especially if you've got science experiments to click all over.

I've also learned to not go overboard on self-lighting. I had one of my well-lit motherships trying to dock at my well-lit Kerbin station and lights started winking out or blinking.

Turns out, there's a limit of (I think) 8 points of light in the scene. If it goes over that they start flickering. That number can be changed in the Settings menus, but probably impacts performance as you increase it.

[Kerbital]

I had the game for few weeks only. The first thing I learned: do not buy early access games unless you buy them, um... early. There is vast amount of documentation and tutorials that are horribly outdated and make finding pertinent information very hard for newcomers. A lot of community members, who played the game for years and adjusted to the changes as they happened, take stuff for granted. 

MechJeb

I would not be able to play without MechJeb. I would have returned the game.  It should be built into the game as an option. I was able to go to orbit and, with significant difficulty, go back to the Mun, land in a totally random spot an return to Kerbin and, again, land in totally random spot, but that was it. I would have stopped playing KSP if I didn't find MJ. I find the lack of updated and detailed documentation infuriating. I just got the game and most stuff I find is from 2012-2014. In-game help is laughably basic. This game is fun but frustratingly difficult and the controls are awful too. I enjoy building craft and see them fly but I have no interest and no inclination to perform mundane, tedious, complex and repetitive maneuvers and calculations. I see how some people may enjoy this but autopilot should be a built-in option for those who have no interest or no skills to fly 100% manual. 

Less is more indeed

Less is more but not for pure rocketry reasons. The game just can't handle larger ships and it's awfully buggy. It runs poorly even on high end hardware and bugs are really showstopping at times.

Action groups

Make flying and controlling easier if you have multiple components that needs to be toggled, deployed, etc.

Subassemblies

For rockets mainly so you can launch/test quicker. They save a lot of time!

[SR]

I would generally recommend testing with hyper edit.

Especially landers and ground vechiles.

For example before launching a drilling rig to Ike, test it on the surface.

Test the landing systems.

And check the transfer system works in orbit.