Is your pride talking or are you really that good? (Sentimental questions)

[TimePeriod]

I've come to terms with the fact that I suck at KSP. My planes crash and burn, my rockets are inefficient and overpowered. I overshoot my interplanetary encounters and I can't see to figure out the dV equation. I'll face it:

I - suck.

However despite this I have managed to make some killer space stations even when people convinced me that it was folly. I've built rovers that hauled around hundred of tons of cargo for hour long drives. Even when I (finely) managed to get an encounter to Eve I crashed straight into the planet and put a car sized crater on the planet. Now I am not much for boasting my skill to something like Scott Manly, my question to you is..

Are you boastful?

Do you proclaim yourself as a god among men? Can you do perfect encounters, land without quicksaving or get 4000 science after tech-tree 2 in carrier mode? Ask yourself the question.

[Themohawkninja]

I like to think of myself as being as good if not better than Scott Manley at playing the game with regards to docking (maybe) and hauling really large things into orbit, however I am much less knowledgeable about orbital mechanics than he is.

[NASAFanboy]

I've come to terms with the fact that I suck at KSP. My planes crash and burn, my rockets are inefficient and overpowered. I overshoot my interplanetary encounters and I can't see to figure out the dV equation. I'll face it:

I - suck.

However despite this I have managed to make some killer space stations even when people convinced me that it was folly. I've built rovers that hauled around hundred of tons of cargo for hour long drives. Even when I (finely) managed to get an encounter to Eve I crashed straight into the planet and put a car sized crater on the planet. Now I am not much for boasting my skill to something like Scott Manly, my question to you is..

Are you boastful?

Do you proclaim yourself as a god among men? Can you do perfect encounters, land without quicksaving or get 4000 science after tech-tree 2 in carrier mode? Ask yourself the question.

Perfect Counters? I can do, so yes.

Land without quicksaving? I got this annoying function thing in the way of my quicksave buttons, so I have never quicksaved in my life. So yes, I can do that.

Getting 4000 science after two missions? What the heck is the fun of that? It kills the fun of the game for me, atleast.

With my mastery of powered landings last week, when you match it with my old mastery of interplanetary counters and manuveur nodes, has allowed me to conquer the entire Kerbol system with ease (Think of it as an hot knife cutting butter. It was that easy). My first docking was several months ago, and docking is now such an rountine operation that I literally eat snacks and read an novel while performing resupply runs to my stations in LKO. Heck, I've even played a chess game with my little sister while landing on Duna while eating popcorn and watching Frozen. I used to be very serious about KSP, but in the recent weeks, I've become more of an laid back stance to my missions, and even have orbital burns running while I go out and get coffee, then come back to an perfect orbit from my timing, an tatic which I have refined over and over.

Pretty nice. I'd rate myself as an 9.86 out of 10 on my KSP skill.

Edited February 3, 2014 by NASAFanboy

[Prince of Rockets]

I never even knew about the quick save function until after I no longer needed it. For some reason, landing has never been an issue for me. I guess all those hours playing Lunar Lander and Solar Jetman as a kid paid off.

[FITorion]

every landing, every rendezvous is quick saved. I don't usually need to use them but I don't have the confidence not to have that layer of safety.

I don't really like really long missions so I might do 2 biomes but I'm not going to be hopping all over the place collecting science...

interplanetary encounters are easy. Much much easier than docking. I can go anywhere in the system no problem... getting back however is something I just haven't attempted yet. My ships are always over built. If it's worth doing it's worth over doing. So maybe I could get back if I tried... don't know. I can't do aerobraking.

I'm fairly confident I can land anywhere... getting back up again is another matter.

[Pecan]

I have a better than 90% success rate at clicking the right button to tell MechJeb what to do ^^.

[The Destroyer]

I'm not perfect. I rely on quicksaves because of bugs and really crappy errors that I make. But I can do pretty good, I get into orbit every time... assuming the rocket is designed right. I would say I'm the master of "Near kerbin" (AKA Duna/Eve) But still early on other planets.

Edited February 4, 2014 by vexx32

[Bothersome]

I think the only proper way to play this game is to play it in a way that is the most fun for YOU. If you're having fun playing it, then you ARE playing it correctly. Forget about what other people think about how you should play. Play it your way, and when you grow tired of playing it, then play it a different way.

If setting and making goals is your thing, then do it. If crashing rockets is your thing cause you like to see lots fireworks, then do it. Just my opinion.

[Merinsan]

I use the quicksave frequently, however I seldom use the quickload. These days I find I am forgetting to quicksave more and more when doing critical maneuvers.

Most of the time I use the quickload when I am testing something.

I frequently over engineer my ships, because I never work out delta-v requirements or the ships delta-v, though I have a good sense of what is required to make Kerbal orbit.

I have no trouble with encounters/rendezvous/docking - I take pride in my ability to set up encounters - I can do so without maneuver nodes, though I like the nodes for the countdown on delta-v.

[qromodynmc]

I cant say Im good at ksp but,Im not that bad either,I landed on all planets (not their moons) Gone to duna and came back,Docked lot of times,gone to sun,Sent rovers to Duna,landed on eve,laythe,orbited jool and eeloo etc.

Im not that great about going to planets but,I think Im great at making spaceplanes,they can look beautiful and useful at the same time.

[Thomas988]

I've come a long way since I began KSP. I didn't even know throttle was a thing! Though I've done what many newer-players would say is amazing, I still have a looooooong ways to go to be something spectacular. I've never gone interplanetary with my Kerbals (except when I mess around with hyperedit and cheats, but besides that I've never professionally, seriously left Kerbin with a living crew).

[Comrade Jenkens]

To be honest I'm a pretty average player and have required help from the forums many times in the past. Though I can do most things now, I can't do them well or efficiently.

[leax256]

Inniffencient and Overpowered rockets eh, may I introduce you to wackjob.

[xrayfishx]

I would say I'm good at this game. I mean really good. Like, I could probably have some mad rep on these forums... if I wasn't so damn lazy. I could (probably) go to Eeloo and Moho with the same craft, but I cba to try it, I rarely go interplanetary and if I do, it's actually a quick hop out of Kerbin's SOI to get the high Kerbol science. I've landed and returned from Duna and I've visited Eeloo (with a Duna lander. Not the same one that I returned from Duna with, but a different design). The most remarkable thing I've done, though, is my only Laythe landing (also with that Duna lander). I overestimated its atmosphere and landed in water. But I just had to plant a flag. So I pointed a kerbal towards the closest land, left my phone on the shift key, balanced a tv remote on a dice and left that on "W" key, put it on 4x and took a nap. A few hours later I woke up to see that I was swimming about 90 degrees the wrong way (probably caused by Laythe's rotation or sth), pointed it the correct way and ate dinner. Came back to see the kerbal about a klick from the beach so I waited that out and planted the damn flag. Iirc it was a total of about 5 hours real life time (anyone want to try calculating that? I think I could give you an approximate landing location and swimming path).

But now I went off-topic. Sorry.

I think I am quite good at KSP and I know it's not just pride. Because I don't have much pride. Bullying does bad things to people.

While writing this I realised that I am a master at going off topic and derailing threads.

[Max Grant]

No, I practiced docking and got really good at it. I have only had trouble here, recently, when I one time forgot to remove a docking ring I had attached facing the one I was using, for a reason i can't remember now. I had to remember to "undock" that single part so I sailed into docking at 0.4 m/s and bounced off, and was scratching my lil' head until I remembered the wayward part. Other than that I almost never fail to dock the first time. I've got rendezvous and docking down . . . they do get difficult when working with extra-small gravities since the slightest impulse has a gigantic impact but I've internalized how to properly build a stable ship with good control, which is IMHO 90% of successful docking, having a ship that doesn't wobble like crazy.

Something I got relatively good at too before the 0.23 update was estimating my rocket sizes on the fly, after building so many. That's 2 1/2 years of rocket-building experience, not some quirky talent, though. I finally got Kerbal Engineer because 0.23 didn't introduce quite so much in the way of new functioning, so I kind of got bored and decided to see if I could do better with some numbers.

I also was doing this over a year ago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VPc3eqRwLc

I searched for Kerbal-style Curiosity landing and either mine is the highest-rated, or it put mine on top because I'm searching for it Either way, the picture-perfect landing of my rover is still something I'm really proud to have accomplished. You can also see me kvetching about wobbly docking and I realized it's because this was the first introduction of docking and as is my way, I took the idea completely out of control and made the biggest monster I could manage before attempting to see if it was spaceworthy. Wow was that thing exciting to drive!

The thing is, this is not an ordinary game, and the headroom for developing skill is really really large. So, I have not gotten tired of what I'm learning here. I cannot think of any game I've ever owned that I could spend this much time with and not get bored. I spent scores of hours playing one or the other half-life or portal or duke nukem or jedi knight years ago but no one of them ever occupied my attention for two and a half years so relentlessly. I did get better at it and that's why it is such an awesome game. Most games with this kind of difficulty level make me work like the dickens to hop over the correct pixel, which I find insulting. This game makes me work for my every achievement entirely on my own merits, which I greeted with a kind of "FINALLY SOMEONE GETS IT" and have never looked back.

When I achieve something really spectacular, like that Curiosity landing, it is a goal I set for me, as high as I want, as out-of-the-ordinary as I wanted, and I was able to hit it. There were no boundaries outside of the credible, believable, not-insultingly-limiting physics. So yes people are getting very good at this because it in the best way actively encourages us to creatively solve very difficult problems, on our own initiative. I think it self-selects people who thrive on this.

[Whackjob]

I'm a fool that does everything the wrong way. Sure is fun, though. I'm pretty sure that's all that matters.

[maccollo]

I'd rate myself a 7 out of 10, perhaps an 8. But I have an unhealthy obsession with this game. If you do something often enough and long enough you will get good at it XD

[Kasuha]

My rockets are inefficient and overpowered but they do their job.

I don't use the dv equation not because I couldn't figure it out but because I don't want to bother.

My planetary encounters are decent I think.

I think gravity slingshots are fun.

Rendezvous and docking is a non-issue to me.

I never land without quicksaving, but can pretty often land without quickloading.

I never get 4000 science at tech level 2 because I don't think that's how the game's meant to be played.

Am I good? Who'll be the judge?

I am happy with my skills.

[Lone K.]

I'm not too good, but I'm pretty well set in the game. Orbital maneuvers? I'm okay. Docking? Boom, done, easy. Flying? No problem. Transfers? Eh, it's easier said than done. Quicksaving? I screw up with this. A lot. I tried landing a probe on Duna in January and I screwed it up, so I pressed F5. And back to the mission before that one. Building? Heck, I haul either too much or too little fuel into orbit every time. Let's just say that one is a decent skill.

I haven't gotten to any other planet besides Duna. I'll give myself a 7/10 if I please.

[TheDarkStar]

See my signature. I've done everything short of an Eve and Tylo ascents (and I'm going to do those soon). I can rendezvous without any maneuver nodes (I actually learned to dock before docking nodes were added). I can get perfect interplanetary intercepts, not counting floating point issues that cause the numbers to move a bit. I can do SSTOs (not in my sig yet), and have tried both large payload rockets and minimal rockets. I've made many "messing around" projects. I've also done a near-perfect suicide burn before (but that was really just luck) and found several easter eggs. I've done two multi-part missions so far. I've done many, many rescue missions. My record is only about 1000 science because getting too much at ones takes the fun away. I quicksave a lot, but I almost never quickload unless I'm trying something new out.

Of course, I've been playing for a really long time, so part of it is practice.

Edited February 4, 2014 by TheDarkStar

[Guest]

I'd say I'm a mediocre player. I'm still learning, but I am quite competent at the game, having played since .18. I can easily do Munar/Minmus missions and I can go to other planets (Duna, Jool, and Eve are easy, Moho was a one-time thing, Dres and Eeloo have not been touched) with the help of kerbal alarm clock and ksp.olex.biz. When it comes to the spaceplane department I'm not good, though. I can make SSTO's (only 4 made) but still need to master balancing and wing placement.

So, I'd say on a ksp "scale", going from knowing how to press space to "Scott Manley" (or whatever is at the top, perhaps not Scott Manley), I'd rate myself a 7-8

[xrayfishx]

I'm a fool that does everything the wrong way. Sure is fun, though. I'm pretty sure that's all that matters.

Define "wrong". If you got it done, you did it right.

[Xacktar]

I used to suck.

A lot.

Then I watched some videos, learned about gravity turns and how orbits work.

Then I sucked a little less.

Then I got to the Mun. Things clicked. Soon I was shooting for Duna, Eve, massive bases, space stations, ect. I still have a lot I can't do. SSTO's mystify me and Tylo and Moho have a mutual hate agreement against me. Most of my ships are pretty less than efficient, but I'm competent enough to have some crazy fun along the way.

[Rusty6899]

I'm getting into the swing of building efficient craft at the moment. I had had enough of watching a 0.2 fps slideshow as my juggernaut, 600-part crafts struggled against lag with barely enough juice to go interplanetary.

I learnt the delta-V equation and made a spreadsheet to calculate the minimum amount of fuel needed for a stage with a given engine/mass etc. From then on I have been a lot better. I managed to get to Mun and back with a 33 ton rocket, and to Duna and back with a 220 ton rocket.

Initially I had to learn to dock, simply because I was so bad at making efficient crafts that I needed to refuel as often as possible. My first return trip to Duna consisted of sending up countless rockets up to a create a fuelling station (it probably took about 5 launches just to get a couple of orange tank's worth of fuel in there), fly it to Duna, then repeat again for another fuelling station in LKO and finally send a massive ship, which after two refuels, managed to limp back to Kerbin.

I haven't actually done any docking in quite a while (I have been trying to design missions so they don't need to), so I'll probably be pretty rusty at it when I try again. I'm currently designing a ship to complete the Jool-5 challenge. It has the required specifications (or thereabouts), but it is a structural nightmare, which is cripplingly embarrassing for (in the rather grandiose terms that my degree certificate uses) a Master of Civil Engineering.

I'm reasonable at achieving encounters. What really surprised me, though is that I had never heard about efficient ejection angles until a few weeks ago. That certainly helped, and generally playing the game tends to give you an appreciation of the principles of orbital mechanics.

I still haven't used any mods yet. I'd quite like to try kethane, deadly reentry and a few others.

I would say that I have learnt how to play the game well, but that just means that I need to find some harder challenges.

[Zuni]

I suck at KSP. I mean, my ships are good, but I can't build a launch vehicle for the life of me and my piloting skills are like that of a drunk, unconscious walrus. I just use mechjeb to do all my flying