Touch The Sky!

[Lou]

The Challenge: Have one or more Kerbals outside their ship during aerocapture.

Stock Parts Leader Board:

1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

Non-Stock Parts Leader Board:

1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

From wiki.kerbalspaceprogram.com: Aerocapture is special form of aerobraking which is used to go from escape velocity into an orbit instead of adjust an already stable orbit."

The Rules:

1) Use a single launch from Kerbin.

2) Launch at least one Kerbal.

3) Conduct aerocapture at one or more of the following targets: Eve, Duna, Jool, Laythe, Kerbin.

4) At least one Kerbal must be outside the ship during aerocapture. Sitting in an external command seat does not qualify as "outside."

5) Return all Kerbals to Kerbin safely.

6) Post images showing the following:

6a) The starting mass of the ship prior to launch from Kerbin.

6b) All major events during the flight (stage separation, etc.).

6c) Pre-aerocapture and post-aerocapture trajectories.

6d) The Kerbals outside the ship during aerocapture.

7) List all the mods you used. To be eligible for the Stock Parts Leader Board, the only acceptable mods are: MechJeb, MechJeb 2, Kerbal Alarm Clock.

8) No use of the F12 menu, glitches, exploits, etc.

Note: During aerocapture, Kerbals will be pulled away from the ship. I built up a "catcher" to keep the Kerbals near the ship during my demo mission; you are not required to build something similar, but you might want to!

Scoring:

Your Score =

10x(10 + Kerbals outside during Eve aerocapture)

+ 5x(10 + Kerbals outside during Duna aerocapture)

+ 15x(10 + Kerbals outside during Jool aerocapture)

+ 5x(10 + Kerbals outside during Laythe aerocapture)

+ 1x(10 + Kerbals outside during Kerbin aerocapture)

For example, my demo mission had 2 Kerbals outside during Duna aerocapture, and I did not attempt aerocapture anywhere else, so my score is 60 = 5x(10+2).

Earning points for Kerbin aerocapture requires the ship to approach Kerbin from outside Kerbin's sphere of influence (just like all the other targets).

You only get points once for each target (for example, doing ten Kerbin aerocaptures in a row won't help your score).

If you don't visit a particular planet/moon, then you get zero points for that target.

In case of a tie score, the entry with the lower starting mass wins.

My demo mission started with a mass of 327.38 T. It sent 2 Kerbals to Duna and back, and both Kerbals were outside during Duna aerocapture.

Click here for all images

Why are the scores for various destinations what they are? I tried to factor in the difficulty of getting to each planet/moon, and also the difficulty of returning from that location (delta-v from Kerbin, depth of gravity well, etc.). It's not very objective, just "Jool seems harder than Duna, if you get to Jool you'll probably pick up Laythe too, etc." Delta-v needs to get to Eve and Duna are comparable, but Eve has a deeper gravity well and Duna is sort of "on the way" to Jool/Laythe, so I give more points for Eve.

Edited October 22, 2014 by Lou

[Cmdr. Arn1e]

can I just suggest Rule 8) No use of F12 menu?! As it stands, I could launch a 3-part ship (rocket engine, small fuel tank, pod) to do all 4 planets... and I think the scoring might need a little tweaking (why is only Jool worth more than the others? Why can't we include aerocapture at Kerbin when we return?)

Otherwise, nice and well-thought out challenge, I approve

Edited October 22, 2014 by Cmdr. Arn1e

[Lou]

can I just suggest...

All good points, I've made updates. Hope you give this challenge a shot!

[Cmdr. Arn1e]

Seems like a fun quick one to do... I will have to make time between cargo bay experiments to have a go

EDIT: quick compared to, say a Jool-5 Challenge attempt, that is

Edited October 22, 2014 by Cmdr. Arn1e

[Kulebron]

This is "who has more RAM" challenge. Basically, you need to stick ladders retrograde to your ship and put kerbals on them.

[Wavechaser]

I am very not happy about the all-stock policy. B9, KW, ProcFarings, ProcDynamics, FAR/NEAR are all good stuffs to have... ...

(NF and Interstellar Packs are indeed good, but their engines with insane Isp may be considered cheating)

Edited October 22, 2014 by Wavechaser
Fixed some minor problems

[Lou]

I am very not happy about the all-stock policy...

Fair enough, I've made a separate non-stock leaderboard. Is there a good way to know which mods have "fair" parts and which ones have "overpowered" parts? I have zero experience with mods.