Kerbal Space Program

[ADevilishPotato]

oh that last one made me lol a little too hard

[Will T.]

Is orbital docking super-necessary for reaching other planets? I was planning to use those electric + xenon-powered engines for interplanetary travel - they don't output much power, but they run basically forever, meaning that once you're in space you can accelerate to virtually any speed if you're patient.



I had more Mun adventures today. Got a manned lander there pretty easily using what I learned from the rover landing! I even recycled my rocket design from the rover, which ended up working very well. It suffered a near-fatal structural failure while still trying to reach Kerbin orbit, but ended up making it to the Mun anyway - it just lost a stage early and thus ran out of fuel slightly earlier than anticipated, forcing the lander to go solo in reaching the landing site.

Pictures:

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On the approach, and almost out of fuel! Luckily the last rocket stage proved unnecessary by the time it ran out.

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Aside from a brief scare when the SAS was shut off at the wrong moment and the lander turned to plummet head-first toward the ground, the landing went quite smoothly. I was lucky to have finished aerobraking near a flat, level area.

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Who else but Jebediah Kerman could be the first to step onto another world?

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Now no one will forget that there were TWO crew members on the Mun that day!

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They landed less than 11 Km from the rover site. I might try to have them walk there sometime ... or I might send a bigger, Kerbal-operated rover for them to drive over there.

They are stranded, of course. Someday I may mount a rescue mission, but that will be entirely on an if-I-feel-like-it basis.

[F13ND]

Is orbital docking super-necessary for reaching other planets?

It definitely isn't. To be honest I could have done the trip without the extra fuel, but I was trying out my docking skills and wasn't sure exactly how much fuel I needed. I jettisoned my escape burn stage with about 2/5 of the fuel left.

[ADevilishPotato]

What Fiend said. I currently just finished a rocket design that can get 2 full orange tanks into orbit WITH a payload on top of it. That amount can get you to jool and back (but squirrely as heck to get it into orbit ).

[F13ND]

What Fiend said. I currently just finished a rocket design that can get 2 full orange tanks into orbit WITH a payload on top of it. That amount can get you to jool and back (but squirrely as heck to get it into orbit ).

Asparagus OP

[Cpt._Keyes]

just wait till they fix the drag model! then you asparagus people will be sorry!

[F13ND]

I like how adding nose cones atm has no benefit -.-

[ADevilishPotato]

just wait till they fix the drag model! then you asparagus people will be sorry!

well at that point re-entry is gonna be the most annoying thing since you can't land anything that doesn't have a heat shield on the bottom of it

[Will T.]

Update 0.22 is coming! What does it add? Science.

Looks like missions will now be able to serve actual purposes beyond simply getting someplace, with research equipment being capable of gathering data from experiments which scientists on Kerbin can use to develop more ship parts. Just another step towards Career mode.

Also, you can save ship segments in addition to entire ships. Good news if you want to recycle rocket designs for multiple purposes! No more having to pop back and forth between your current vehicle-assembly project and your existing rockets to mimic their designs, or remember from the start to build off of an existing design rather than start from scratch.

[F13ND]

Also, you can save ship segments in addition to entire ships. Good news if you want to recycle rocket designs for multiple purposes! No more having to pop back and forth between your current vehicle-assembly project and your existing rockets to mimic their designs, or remember from the start to build off of an existing design rather than start from scratch.

This is what interests me the most about the update. The tech tree as far, as far as I could tell, just seemed to delay access to parts we already have, which will be good for the career side of things, but a bit of a pain if it's mandatory. Hopefully they'll only put it in the career mode.

[Boss Llama]

Also, you can save ship segments in addition to entire ships. Good news if you want to recycle rocket designs for multiple purposes! No more having to pop back and forth between your current vehicle-assembly project and your existing rockets to mimic their designs, or remember from the start to build off of an existing design rather than start from scratch.

This is excellent! I have a couple of nice control compartments I'd love to be able to replicate as a final stage across designs.

[Cpt._Keyes]

SCIENCE

[ADevilishPotato]

Also, you can save ship segments in addition to entire ships. Good news if you want to recycle rocket designs for multiple purposes! No more having to pop back and forth between your current vehicle-assembly project and your existing rockets to mimic their designs, or remember from the start to build off of an existing design rather than start from scratch.

Very nice, I was hoping that they were gonna do that. Kinda annoying after a while of having to rebuild launch units to saved craft.

[Cpt._Keyes]

we arent the only ones with rocket launch hillarity!

[ADevilishPotato]

we arent the only ones with rocket launch hillarity!

What a well placed dust spot!