Kerbal Space Program

[Wyld Karde]

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Jebediah Kerman reports his Mun landing was mostly successful.

What's all this then?

It's a realistic orbital spaceflight simulator done in a cartoonish visual style.  Players design and build their rockets in the Vehicle Assembly Building by choosing and snapping together a wide variety of components.  Capsules, probe cores, fuel tanks, rocket engines, solar panels, batteries, sensor arrays, RCS thrusters... it's a long list.  And the game's very moddable so that list optionally keeps getting longer.

So what do I do with it?

Whatever you want to!  It's a total sandbox, so feel free to slap together your own Apollo clone and head for the Mun, maybe send a manned mission to Duna or explore the outer planets.  Download a resource mod and set up your own extra-planetary  mining program.  Or just head for the spaceplane hangar and see how hilariously you can break and exploit the really dodgy aerodynamics coding.  Seriously, it's terrible, but in a fun way.  Luckily the main meat of the game is spaceflight and the physics engine for that part is spot on.

Obligatory disclaimer
The game's out on an early release program, similar to the way Minecraft was sold.  Right now it's far from feature complete (although it is very playable) and the dev team plan to raise the purchase price with each milestone until the game reaches completed status.  So if you buy now while the game's incomplete it'll cost you less than waiting for release, but you are going to have to be willing to cope with missing or poorly implemented features (aerodynamics) and some bugs as the game is worked on.

Andon and I have been having a great time swapping tips over Steam, and I know LT Spinx has the game as well, so I figure if nothing else we can use this thread to discuss the game in general, and maybe convince some of our fellow RTs to give the game a shot.

So pitch in!  Share your KSP adventures if you've had some, or ask questions if you're thinking of giving it a whirl!

[Andon]

I am currently building a deep-space mission, using Kethane to refuel myself as I go along. Now, if only I manage to not to destroy all my rockets on the way up...

[Andon]

Also, a game where we pass around the save file could be neat. IE, goal is "Build a space station" - Each player takes the save file, adds on their part of the station, then passes it to the next person.

[Andon]

Here's a screenshot of my current project: Interplanetary Vehicle III. I and II haven't left orbit, but I may use them later.

From left to right:
1x "Poodle" main thrust engine.
6x Ion engines (with 2 Xenon canisters each) for secondary thrust.
2x "Hitchiker" cans and 1x Landing Canister for total crew complement of 10 (Currently only 2)
2x 750l Mono tanks.
Some obscene number of generators
Some equally obscene number of batteries
Giant-ass Kethane tank
Large Kethane converter

And yes, I DO have lights pointing on my solar panels. It does absolute LOADS for visibility while docking. I also have lights pointing towards the six Ion pods. It really helps me know what orientation I'm in relative to the ship.

Planned additions:
-Docking module. Will carry 4-8x Kethane Survey Probes/general-purpose satellites and 4x... something? Normal sized docking ports, although I'm not sure what I'll drop on there. I want at least one rover, although it'll likely be two for mass balance and redundancy.
-Kethane mining pod. Drop down, land, mine kethane, bring it up. I think I'll hit up Mun/Minimus for some practice/fueling before heading out. Close enough that I can send replacements if I fubar things.

Ideally, I'll be leaving with full tanks of everything - Monoprop, liquid fuel, oxidizer, xenon, and Kethane. Also hopefully I'll be able to add on enough power to run all six Ion engines at the same time without relying on solar panels (They get weaker as you go out further).

[Mordechaj]

I fooled around with it when it was free. Managed to get into orbit!

Great game.

[Wyld Karde]

Nothing wrong with slathering your craft with lights, Andon.  It helps with docking and keeps the screen interesting when Kerbol is occluded by whatever planetary body you're orbiting at the time.
I'm not sure about your supplementary ion drive though.  Those things give tiny thrust.  They're fine for tiny interplanetary probes when you're not in a hurry, but for a craft this big I don't think even racking up six of 'em are going to give you much joy.  For the low power/high efficiency combo on large craft you should look into using NERVA engines instead.  If you're planning to use the Poodle for your big burns then you're gonna need more fuel if you're planning to go any further out than Minmus.
Not that I have much experience with these large interplanetary operations.  I've still not managed a successful rendezvous and docking since Mechjeb 2 spazzed out on my rendezvous burn last night and set an intercept orbit with a periapsis of 34k over Kerbin. 

[Andon]

I haven't used MJ2 yet. And I think you're right about the engines. Might ditch that stage and send up a replacement main stage. I do plan on adding a bunch more fuel (I think I could lift a completely full orange tank with the lifter that got the kethane into orbit), and perhaps redesigning the whole thing. The Kethane tank's staying in orbit, though. It's fantastically large!

[id3nt1ty]

Nice spaceship there Andon! I spent my entire Sunday afternoon on this and haven't managed to get my first space station into orbit. I've had practise getting into orbit with other ships, but can't get this one to work. I can get up, but I always fail on my prograde burn at Apoasis to flatten out my orbit. Generally I run out of fuel. Would be great to see a screenshot of your lifting vehicle!

[id3nt1ty]

Oh I just saw your video post, will check those out

[id3nt1ty]

TRIPLE POST!

So I see you're using mods, for the first video I totally thought you were cheating, but seeing the second and third I can see how they are useful and remove some of the frustrating complexity out of the game.

As for getting my orbits, it looks like I was doing it totally wrong! Picked up some good tips though! Thanks for the videos!

[Andon]

For the stupid payloads that I like to do, MechJeb makes things a lot easier. On smaller rockets it can seem like cheating, but I pretty much just use it for keeping my orientation (As seen in the docking video), launching into orbit, and adjusting orbits. Once I'm in space, most things are manual.

[Wyld Karde]

Here's a little something I dug up for all us interplanetary travellers.  It's a couple of versions out of date but the numbers should still be good:



That's the delta-v numbers for landing, rendezvous and capture for every body in the Kerbal system.  Not sure your ship can make the trip?  Use the Mechjeb engineering tab to check your available delta-v and compare to your planned journey on here.

[Wyld Karde]

Karde Space Industries is proud to reveal it's latest payload and most ambitious project to date.



The Minmus Refinery Platform is intended to land on Minmus, refuel by refining native Kethane and return the upper stage to Kerbin while leaving the refinery running autonomously ready to service later missions.  On the back side of the refinery stage is a Buran manipulator arm capable of locking to nearby vehicles to facilitate the transfer of resources.

I'm about to strap this bad boy to a launch assembly so I figured I'd get a screenie beforehand so I have something you all can point-laugh at when I land and realise I forgot something important.

[Andon]

Vertical solar arrays are a little less effective on surface objects. Also, kethane mining things are power hungry. You may wany more batteries for nighttime. Landing it on minimus shouldn't be a real big deal though.

[Wyld Karde]

It's got four RTGs as a supplementary power supply, and I'm not too fussed if it runs out of juice during the night, which is only about 5.5 hours long anyway.  The main problem so far has been steering the damn thing.  I think I'll slap an SAS on the nose above that inline battery and try to find a way to squeeze some RCS arrays on there somewhere.