Duh moments

[ItchyBrother]

Interested in hearing some "duh" moments you have had in KSP. Here is one of mine...

After several days of building the perfect craft to get the maximum science I could, launched, landed, retrieved tons of science and headed back to Kerbin. When I did the recovery discovered that I left the science in my landing module, now crashed and came home with a wimping .3 science for just recovering a launch. DUH!

[NecroBones]

Thankfully I don't have too many "duh" moments. But one that comes to mind is something I've done a couple of times: Thrusting in the wrong direction because I was controlling my craft from the wrong part (docking port on the bottom, for instance).

[Kasuha]

I had a duh moment when I realized that the inline docking port was "upgraded" from 0.125 ton to 1 ton with 0.23.5 and my beloved Kaeris I spaceplane almost couldn't reach orbit thanks to that change.

[undercoveryankee]

When I started adding Interstellar seismometers to my Mun descent stages, I started deorbiting my ascent stages to provide impacts. Never got any science with an ascent stage because all of the stages had the same name, but a couple of times I was so excited to see whether it would work that I forgot to transfer any of the stored science to the command module.

[Random Tank]

I had a duh moment when I realized that the inline docking port was "upgraded" from 0.125 ton to 1 ton with 0.23.5 and my beloved Kaeris I spaceplane almost couldn't reach orbit thanks to that change.

Wuuuuuut.... I didn't know that! No wonder why my a couple of my SSTO's have been very non-compliant; I hadn't noticed they changed it...

Dumb stuff? Errr... Well one time I had put the multi experiment B9 Science parts (a part that has all 4 mini science parts combined into one part that can do all 4 experiemtns) on a manned Eve flyby vessel; not realising that you can't remove the data from EVA... So I had to land the pod and the transfer stage with all the science parts just to get the science. Fortunately i had over-chuted the design slightly, meaning that fully deployed I was dropping at ~17m/s, so i just used its nukes to slow me down and land safely.

[Bishop149]

Thankfully I don't have too many "duh" moments. But one that comes to mind is something I've done a couple of times: Thrusting in the wrong direction because I was controlling my craft from the wrong part (docking port on the bottom, for instance).

Odd bug I run across not infrequently:

This happens to me sometimes even when I only have one "controllable" part on the ship.

Its very weird, usually happens when I just switch to the ship . . . . "control from here" on the part fixes all the markers again but I usually only find out when my orbit start changing in a way it wasn't mean too

[Shna_na]

Activating (A)SAS, checking my staging, setting target in the map, and launching. It's a shame I didn't throttle up.

[Duke23]

I know I already complained about this one but I'm still chapped about it. Second Mun flyby on my new save and after flying over 3-4 biomes getting the science I needed, I got on an escape trajectory and then had to separate one last time and go home. Except I had the last engine set to fire at the same time it decoupled itself from the command module to drop down on Kerbin. D'oh.

After ditching what was left of the ship and some nail biting usage of the jet pack to keep poor Jeb from getting slung into a ridiculous orbit by a second accidental Mun encounter, a rescue ship was sent and everything turned out okay, but holy crap. One little thing and an entire mission goes up in smoke. I couldn't just leave Jeb up there, and especially not with him carrying 250ish tech points which at my stage in the tech tree with this new save is pretty darn valuable.

The best part was when I sat there in complete disbelief (because the mission was going so well until then) just staring blankly at the command module as the engine slowly drifted away going "...Did that seriously just freaking happen?"

Edited May 1, 2014 by Duke23

[NecroBones]

One particularly good "duh" moment I had:

I had undocked my lander from the orbital stage, then went to map-mode to set up its landing trajectory maneuver. While there, looking at the trajectory, I used the nav-ball, spun around 180 degrees, and engaged the engines, forgetting that the orbiter was now in my flight path. BOOM.

Edited May 1, 2014 by NecroBones

[csiler2]

I had a moment like that in early career. Launched a mk1 pod w/science Jr and goo canisters for a great sub-orbital hop. Gathered some science from low orbit and was getting ready for a slow landing in the highlands for an EVA sample when BOOM, everything below the pod exploded despite coming in at something like 4 M/S. Apparently Science Jr and the pods don't like landing on inclines :-( Next time I'll aim for a flatter landing site or transmit/recover data before landing. I should've known better.

I couldn't even get an EVA sample because the pod landed hatch-down and the radial parachutes wouldn't allow it to roll over. Epic fail.

[XVeris]

That moment when I forgot the parachutes...

I had a large space ship go out, orbit the Mun, then (on accident, actually) orbit Minmus, gathering science like nuts. And then when I was entering Kerbin's atmosphere...I realized I forgot the parachutes...

[Tortoise]

When I kept trying to figure out why my node burn was going to last days long, and I kept going full throttle to see if the time would change. Then I found out my engine was off.

[Shna_na]

When I kept trying to figure out why my node burn was going to last days long, and I kept going full throttle to see if the time would change. Then I found out my engine was off.

I kept going full throttle to see if the time would change. Then I found out my engine was off.

Then I found out my engine was off.

my engine was off.

Too many times. I know them feels.

There's also the time where I landed on the Mun. I had too much fuel in my orbital stage, and dropped it ~200m from the surface so that I could use the lander stage (since that had legs and the other didn't). The orbital stage survived, but fell onto its side. No biggie, right? Wrong. I landed on the orbital stage. The fuel tanks exploded, which bounced me in weird ways. I lost a 3 kerbals that day... Then I quickloaded and no-one knew anything about it.

[Zylark]

Launch went fine. Got into orbit fine. Set up a node to go to Mun. Looks good, just got to do 3/4 of an orbit before burn. At node, ready to burn. Nothing happens. Forgot to deploy solar-panels, no electricity, no control. Revert to Launchpad...

[cantab]

One particularly good "duh" moment I had:

I had undocked my lander from the orbital stage, then went to map-mode to set up its landing trajectory maneuver. While there, looking at the trajectory, I used the nav-ball, spun around 180 degrees, and engaged the engines, forgetting that the orbiter was now in my flight path. BOOM.

I'm always scared of doing this. I tend to point zenith-nadir before undocking just to make sure. Or I'll set the ship tumbling then undock so the parts get flung away from each others.

When I kept trying to figure out why my node burn was going to last days long, and I kept going full throttle to see if the time would change. Then I found out my engine was off.

This, so much this.

Also, the number of times I've been fully aware of a burn coming up, maybe a minute or two away and I'm safely at 1x warp, only to MISS the node because of reading/posting on these forums!

[Dartguy]

Last night....

I have captured a huge roid into a 75 x 75 orbit, but it is very polar. Maybe 20 degrees. It has been there for a long time, about a month. So I design this tug that is a puller for the first time. I didn't figure out a way to launch it without putting the claw on top with a probe core. Launch went fine, Apoapsis got to around 100 km so I killed the rocket and tried to aim at the maneuver to circularize. The damn thing would not turn and I fiddled with it so long that the timer went by by probably a minute then I got to it and lit it up. I was watching the node and nailed it pretty well. I then went to map mode and planned a little burn to fix the inclination. I set up the node and waited for it....I got close and tried to move the ship towards the node and it would not move AT ALL. I fiddled with it and then I hit the map button to see what was going on...I was at about 30 KM burning into the atmosphere!! I missed the first burn by so much that my orbit was all messed up.

So I reverted to launch and got going again. Everything went well, got into a good orbit, decoupled from the first stage, made an Apollo style recocking to move the claw to the bottom and realized that I had no fuel. I failed to cut off fuel from the top to bottom. Had to spend a long time trying to re-dock with the launcher to get filled up for the mission.

At least this time I remembered to bring solar panels!! Except they were right next to the claw, which meant they were almost always blocked from the sun!!

Noob!!!

[timsfitz]

Got all the way to Vall to search for the Easter egg. Detached the lander from the drive section. Engaged the engines. ... The ship doesn't move. WTF? I put girders right below the engines. The ship couldnt move except for RCS. Had to abort and fly home with just orbital readings and try again . Duh!

[InterCity]

As posted to the "You will not go to space today", i regularly smash my head into the keyboard whenever i suffer from a tailstrike (for those who don't know, it's when an aircraft's tail hits ground during takeoff/landing, including SSTO's). It happens to me every 10 or so flights, the accidents are mosly harmless due to low takeoff speeds of my craft. However, when i design some of them badly, it sometimes ends like this:

This is an after-almost-takeoff photo of the stock B9 bradbury plane that was going to take some kerbals back from the island runway (funnily enough, they were stranded after a landing tailstrike).

And this is what was left after it collided with the water:

As you see, i managed to save Jeb. That was done by pressing the "eva" button several miliseconds before disaster. Thanks god for the strange kerbal dynamics

Edited May 2, 2014 by InterCity
Grammar mistakes

[MarvinKitFox]

That moment when I forgot the parachutes...

I had a large space ship go out, orbit the Mun, then (on accident, actually) orbit Minmus, gathering science like nuts. And then when I was entering Kerbin's atmosphere...I realized I forgot the parachutes...

That's not the end of the world!

I have a couple of times found myself in that same situation, and saved Jeb(or whomever), and the science by diving off the decending pod just before impact.

Hit the ground at an angle, jetpack firing, preferrably head-first, and Jeb can survive up to 130m/s. 80m/s is even *likely* to be survived.

My ultralight Eeloo lander (2.635 tons) was actually designed to use this mode of landing!

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/77034-See-Eeloo-on-5-a-day-%28image-heavy%29

[Frank_G]

I am good at forgeting to install RCS thrusters... I hate those moments when you see, the craft is filled with RCS fuel and you have no way using it.

[pauix]

I sent a probe to Jool to gather some science and (hopefully) unlock the SLS parts. Everything went fine, but as soon as I had my probe inside Jool's atmosphere I noticed a fatal flaw in my plan: I was landing on the dark side of Jool, and my batteries eventually ran out of power, leaving me with a mere 300 science on my first trip to the Joolian system.

[NecroBones]

One particularly good "duh" moment I had:

I had undocked my lander from the orbital stage, then went to map-mode to set up its landing trajectory maneuver. While there, looking at the trajectory, I used the nav-ball, spun around 180 degrees, and engaged the engines, forgetting that the orbiter was now in my flight path. BOOM.

I'm always scared of doing this. I tend to point zenith-nadir before undocking just to make sure. Or I'll set the ship tumbling then undock so the parts get flung away from each others.

Yeah, it was a mistake I made only once. I'm super paranoid about it now.

[Liowen]

A duh moment I had after undocking my lander from the science lab 2 days ago was that if you burn retrograde with the lab in front of you it will pass you, very closely if you are not paying attention. I think I had a couple of meter between the two, but had I not rotated the craft to level out the horizon I would have ripped solar panels off or worse. Lucky for me I got it on video as it was part of my career mode series I am doing.

[DogMeat]

I discovered, upon trying to dock the very last fuel tank to my Orbital Mun Base/Refueling Station/Mun Lander Truckstop, that I installed one of the Clamp-O-Tron Jr's on the main hub backwards and cannot dock anything to it.

That one.

Right.

THERE.

[James_Eh]

When I kept trying to figure out why my node burn was going to last days long, and I kept going full throttle to see if the time would change. Then I found out my engine was off.

Opposite for me. Lander mounted updside-down on main drive. Forget to shut down the lander engine prior to lighting off the main drive. Watch the fuel deplete alarmingly fast while strangely not moving very far... Surprising the ship doesn't collapse into a black hole.

This happens at least one in every 10 mssions for me. Clearly I do not learn from history.