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[Sordid]

Sooo, anyone up for some good old fashioned dogfighting?

[Aqizzar]

Sooo, anyone up for some good old fashioned dogfighting?

Oh my God.  Pack downloaded.

[TheBronzePickle]

That is just epic. I can't wait until we can recolor parts and add decals, god knows someone's making the Red Baron.

[JacenHanLovesLegos]

And then figure out how to make rockets out of solid fuel engines and detachers.

[Sensei]

I've tried that, they always spin around because of the detacher frame...

[LoSboccacc]

when it spin around for no reason (as in: you're using the symmetric construction and no tricouplers as those are bugged) then usually you have two components too close that are considered colliding.

[DrPoo]

I hope there will be a 3d first person cockpit view in a future release, imagine watching Bob fetching for a cup of cofee, or Jebediah turning up his MP3 player full of heavy metal.
This cockpit would be like a 3d cockpit in orbiter, where you can click stuff to make stuff happen, like stage seperation, all kinds of displays and BLINKING LIGHTS.

[Ultimuh]

I hope there will be a 3d first person cockpit view in a future release, imagine watching Bob fetching for a cup of cofee, or Jebediah turning up his MP3 player full of heavy metal.
This cockpit would be like a 3d cockpit in orbiter, where you can click stuff to make stuff happen, like stage seperation, all kinds of displays and BLINKING LIGHTS.

And the occasional "I wonder what THIS botton does.."

[NRDL]

Just recently got this fun ( actually it should be FUN ) game, I still have yet to achieve orbit.  I'm not the best designer, or the best pilot, anyone got any tips and designs for a vanilla user? 

[LoSboccacc]

Just recently got this fun ( actually it should be FUN ) game, I still have yet to achieve orbit.  I'm not the best designer, or the best pilot, anyone got any tips and designs for a vanilla user?

start with something simple, this can get you in orbit with no problems:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

you go up until 30k then move at 45deg and keep going that way for a while. then get at 90deg and keep pushing speed. once your vertical speed is 0, read your speed: if it's over a certain threshold, then you're in orbit!

you can find more information about what speed you need at what altitude to achieve orbit there:
http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/~kerbalsp/wiki/index.php?title=Tutorial:Orbiting_(Basic)#Orbital_Table

there is an orbit calculator that you can use after you get the hang of the orbiting basics to achieve specific paths, altitudes or maneuvering between various altitudes
http://code.google.com/p/ksp-calculator/
(it's currently a bit off because the planet radius has grown of 60 meters)

you can read about transfer orbits there once you can get into a circular orbit and want to change your altitude on a specific other altitude:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hohmann_transfer_orbit

the calculator above can tell you what speed you need for the transfer you're planning

[Fikes]

Anyone get their joystick to work in game? It doesn't seem to recognize my old Sidewinder.

I think I'd like to mod some parts and create an equal weight external fuel tank, aka, space shuttle. I used the C7 and Sunday punch packs to make a really cool looking plane... that crashes at lift off.

[NRDL]

Huh, with the SAS, i can fly straight up with no real problem, I just have to add more fuel tanks in order to increase flight-time. 

[LoSboccacc]

addendum: the main thing is that fuel weights a lot. each stage that is not powered on at start is a dead weight for the other stages to lift.

things gets pretty heavy pretty quickly. you should not just expand vertically your stages, because once your weight grows one stage will get you just over the first 1000 meters, and that's pretty useless.

try expanding horizontally too, so that lower stages are more powered than upper ones. that means having always more fuel actively being used in lifting instead of being there unused.

here is the spacecraft exchange, where you can get some inspiration about rocket designs:
http://kerbalspaceprogram.com/forum/index.php?board=15.0

look at this:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I don't personally like this one, but shows off how you need to add more engine the more weight and stages you add.

[Itnetlolor]

I think one time or another, I managed to accidentally pull off a Farscape, and do a semi-orbit in order to gravity whip myself one hell of a distance.

The original intent was to go orbiting, but instead I made it halfway around the world, and several thousand Ks distance from the world.

Average ascent rate after 1000K was still above 2500 m/s, and descending a tenth per second.

EDIT:
Intentionally forcing a gravity whip at it's greatest degree (by descending from an adequate distance with lower gravity resistance and air friction intentionally at roughly 5-degrees below horizon at full throttle) almost succeeded, but by the end, I ended up spinning out my craft and had to abandon mission (due to wonky controlling and a bit of spinning while adjusting heading). Made it halfway around the world though.

[LoSboccacc]

gravity slingshots don't really work because the planet isn't moving and craft speed is given relative to the planet anyway.

But if you fly away and get back it does give you back all that potential energy. That is, until you achieve escape velocity: at that point to get back you're actively burning your cinetic energy off