Let's play: Buzz Aldrin's Race Into Space

[That_Guy]

Hi there, im new here and a good friend of Eternal_Freedom (he introduced me to the site). Im interested in joining the game, however im gonna have to get some background reading done.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Just so everyone is sure, That_Guy is indeed a friend of mine. PeZook, is there a spare Class II astronaut we can mod him in as?

[PeZook]

Yeah, there's three spares I think. It's not like this game is all that RP heavy.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Excellent....

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have extensive planning for the next season to do. And bread to make for lunch.

[PeZook]

MISSIONS LAUNCH
VOSKHOD V, APRIL 1965

"Whoever's tapping the pencil...if you value your life, please stop.", the comissar growled. The annoying tapping stopped imeddiately, and suddenly, for just the slightest moment, people in the launch control center were thankful they had this angry man with a gun in here.

The comissar didn't care, though. He paced over to the flight control console and its occupant, "How many more of those test launches are you planning on, comrade chief designer?"

Syrgy Pavylyvych took a momentary break from observing status lights on his console. He considered the answer for a few moments and then finally replied, "As many as are necessary, comrade comissar. We are still finding new problems and kinks with the capsule, and it is to be expected: it is a radically new design, after all."

Syrgy saw this explanation as sufficient, and since all the lights were green, he turned the ignitiion key.




It was a perfect liftoff, but unfortunately, Commienist computer technology once again proved it wasn't quite up to snuff.

***

RANGER I, MAY 1965

"Whoever's tapping the pencil, if you value your life, please stop."

The tapping didn't stop. The engineer doing it glared at director Gray, as if challenging him to do something about it. The Director really, really wished he had an angry man with a gun with him at this time.

Maximilian von Shapp dealt with the problem, though. He might not have had a gun, but an angry German Shepherd with a maw full of sharp teeth sufficed.

The engineer whimpered and curled up into a fetal ball.

"Ja. Can ve get on with ze program, director? Mein little astronauts, ja, they are impatient.", Maximillian's owner, Wehrner von Shapp, had little to do the last season. He pretty much signed of on various papers and proposals, and had to deal with one strange occurance, when an astronaut had disappeared, only to be replaced by someone else entirely.

Not that it took much fixing: except for von Shapp, nobody saw anything happen, and the paperwork seemed to have been in order.

"Yes, yes, we'll resume the manned program at some time in the future. You know perfectly well we had to shut down Mercury after the Johnson disaster."

"Jawohl, jawohl. I'm just complaining, you know? Otherwise you'd throw me out and I wouldn't get to watch first close-up pictures of the Moon on ze big zcreen, ja?"

"Uh...you do know it will be a week from now until we get any pictures, right?"

"No worries. I brought lunch."

Director Gray couldn't comment on that, as both men had their attention turn towards ze big zcreen, where the first ever Titan launch was happening. The massive rocket lifted off with no problems, giant writing sliding majestically in front of the cameras.



An engineer commented, "Is there a reason we sign our rockets?"

"It's so that the Zenobians can't claim they're commienist space junk!"

"Fuck yeah! They'll, like, fly to space and BAM, Murcan rockets!"

"Right! And they'll flip them off! We need to draw giant middle fingers on them!"

"Somebody write this down, quick!"



With their banter, the three engineers almost managed to miss the mission step they actually took part in - the trans-lunar injection. Fortunately, all was wrapped up on time, and launch controllers could imagine their rockets flipping Zenobia off from space during lunch.

Or six lunches, for that matter. Unmanned missions were so boring.



Somehow, however, the first blurry, unfocused images of the Moon made even the most meat-headed people in Mission Control just...shut up.

"Wow.", the engineer who first proposed Murcan rockets carry giant flip-off signs said.

"The Moon..."

"Wow. The Moon!"

"Holy shit, people. Do you know what we did here? There's a satellite orbiting the Moon. Our satellite. Holy shit. Man."

Even more surprisingly, the solemn mood was not broken by a high-school level comment for entire fifteen minutes.



Which was enough for journalists not to report on what happened next, thankfully.

***

VOSKHOD VI, JUNE 1965

The mission launched. The rocket flew. The capsule separated, activated and re-entered.

People called this flight routine ; But for Syrgy Pavylyvych, routine was good. He could use more routine.

[PeZook]

CHAPTER 8: WOW! THE MOON!
Time is: Fall 1965



MURCA
ROCKHARD CORPORATION FUEL TANK FARM

The fuel tanks stretched as far as the eye could see. Giant hoses penetrated their soft skin, pumping their fluids with great pressure from the huge cracking towers in the distance. Here, the Rockhard Rock & Rocket Corporation stored most of Murca's rocket fuel.

And Murca needed its fuel. It needed it so much now, especially with newer, larger, harder rockets coming into production. Yes, without rocket fuel, Murca's rockets would deflate and become limp and flaccid.

Yes. That's exactly what would happen.

Da, though a strange, stocky person wearing a trench coat, as he sneaked past the perimeter fence.



Da

MURCA
TEDDY SPACE CENTER

"HOLY SHIT!", Johny von Braun yelled as he fell out of bed. The ground shook, and somewhere in the distance, a giant fireball rose into the sky, "HOLY MOTHERF-"

A secondary explosion blew out all the windows in the MASA Employee Hotel, showering the director with shards of really, really sharp glass. The fireball kept rising, turning night into day, making people gasp and scream and street doomsday preachers yell, "I TOLD YOU SO! I TOLD YOU SO!" in joy.

Trucks rode out onto the streets. Soldiers in gas masks disembarek, yelling and running in circles and then leaving again just to repeat the spectacle somewhere else. Nobody knew what was going on.

Nobody except MASA employees: they knew perfectly well what went up. They visited the ROCKHARD CORP. facility often enough.

Johnny von Braun called an emergency meeting of all department heads within half an hour. And the news were dire.

Murca would only be able to do one launch this year.

Code: Select all

Current funds: 45 megabucks

Astronauts in Mercury program:
MODEMJR - CAP 3, LM 0, EVA 2, DOCK 1, END 2 (Mercury/I) - will retire next season
FLASHHEART - CAP 1, LM 0, EVA 4, DOCK 1, END 1 (Mercury/II) ; MOOD: 32
BARNESTI - CAP 2, LM 0, EVA 2, DOCK 2, END 4 (Mercury/III) ; MOOD: 71
REXMODEM - CAP 3, LM 3, EVA 3, DOCK 1, END 0 (Mercury/IV) ; MOOD: 58
RAVENSBURG - CAP 3, LM 3, EVA 0, DOCK 0, END 2 (Mercury/V) ; MOOD: 66
CONRAD - CAP 4, LM 1, EVA 1, DOCK 0, END 3 (Mercury/VII) ; MOOD: 74
BROWN - CAP 4, LM 2, EVA 0, DOCK 1, END 2 (Mercury/VIII) ; MOOD: 76

Unassigned astronauts:

BORMAN - CAP 2, LM 1, EVA 1, DOCK 0, END 3 ; MOOD: 80
KNIGHT - CAP 2, LM 1, EVA 1, DOCK 0, END 1 ; MOOD: 70
OLDS - CAP 2, LM 0, EVA 0, DOCK 3, END 3 ; MOOD: 80

Other astronauts:
CUNTSER - retired fall 1965
KELLY - retired spring 1965
MCCAIN - retired fall 1963
HARDBEEF -  retired spring 1963
OHJESUS - DECEASED, MERCURY IX
JOHNSON - DECEASED, MERCURY XVI

Programs running: Explorer, Ranger, Atlas, Titan, Mercury, EVA Suits

Launch pads: 3

Scheduled missions: 
Launch Pad A, unmanned lunar flyby, Ranger/Titan
Launch Pad B, unmanned lunar flyby, Ranger/Titan - scrubbed, lack of fuel
Launch Pad C, none

ZENOBIA

[/size]

BAIKONUREK

It was a very empty and very dark room. There was a single table with two chairs and a very small lamp. The plans were on microfilm, and had to be read with a magnifying glass, and there were only five minutes to look them over.

But still it was enough.

So that's what we were doing wrong..., Syrgy thought, attempting to memorize as much of the brilliant solution to fuel pump vibration problems as was humanly possible. Yes...the Murcans were vile,degenerate capitalist dogs, but the idea was brilliant. Who would've though to place a simple protrustion inside the fuel lines? Utterly, utterly brilliant.

"Time is up!", the comissar yelled and yanked the plans from Syrgy. The Chief designer took off, running as fast as his injuries allowed towards the nearest piece of paper. The department head for unmanned exploration would have to postpone his report on Lunar and Venus flybys. This was more important. Far, far more important.

Code: Select all

Current funds: 37 megarubloids

Cosmonauts in Voshkhod program:
NIKOV - CAP 4, LM 0, EVA 2, DOCK 0, END 2 (CREW I/PILOT) ; MOOD: 34
MAMETOV - CAP 2, LM 0, EVA 2, DOCK 2, END 2 (CREW I/SPECIALIST) ; MOOD: 82

KARZANOVSKI - CAP 4, LM 1, EVA 0, DOCK 0, END 3  (CREW II/PILOT) ; MOOD: 66
YEBANOV - CAP 3, LM 2, EVA 4, DOCK 0, END 1 (CREW II/SPECIALIST)  ; MOOD: 66

DIGADITCH - CAP 4, LM 1, EVA 2, DOCK 2, END 3  (CREW III/PILOT); MOOD: 49
BORISOV - CAP 3, LM 0, EVA 2, DOCK 1, END 1 (CREW III/SPECIALIST)  ; MOOD: 58

PETROV - CAP 2, LM 1, EVA 0, DOCK 3, END 2 (CREW IV/PILOT) ; MOOD: 48
BEREGOVOY - CAP 2, LM 1, EVA 1, DOCK 3, END 0 (CREW IV/SPECIALIST) ; MOOD: 59

Cosmonauts not assigned to programs:
FAAABIO  - CAP 2, LM 0, EVA 2, DOCK 0, END 3 ; MOOD: 43
BRZECZYSZCZ - CAP 3, LM 2, EVA 0, DOCK 3, END 3  ; MOOD: 48

Other cosmonauts:
DOSTAROVASKI - Forcibly retired, Fall 1964
TITOV - Retired Spring 1964
IVANOVICH - Grounded due to lung cancer
VLADIMIRENSKY  - Deceased, training accident
IVANOV - Deceased, VOSTOK VII

Programs running: Sputnik, Cosmos satellite, A-Series, Proton, Booster stage, Voshkhod, EVA Suits

Launch pads: 2

Scheduled missions: 
Launch pad A, Unmanned lunar flyby, Cosmos/Proton
Launch pad B, Unmanned Venus flyby, Cosmos/Proton

GM Notes:

I went back to sillier tone just to give people a breather from the constant doom&gloom.

Well, the Murcans seem to have won the race for the Tier II rocket booster. However, with another act of deft sabotage by comrade Badenov, they won't use it to its full extent this season

As it is a new chapter (with the launch of the first unmanned probe), I posted full information about all your programs, rather than just the ones of interest.

Planetary launch windows for this season's flyby planning are Venus and Mercury.

ALSO: That tank explosion was not something I was able to foresee despite my gazings into the future. Hmm...

[FaxModem1]

Spoiler

Where are agents Moose and Squirrel when you need them?

Rex fell off his cot from the boom that came outside.

"What the HELL was that?" He yelled. Rex quickly put on his pants and ran outside to see the fire and the smoke emerging in the distance. Near by, he was a woman in a purple dress who driving away with a truck, behind her was her latest victim.
Spoiler

A squirrel with a flight cap had been run over. Rex didn't understand what was happening, and he wondered if he was still dreaming.

[Shroom Man 777]

Wow. Man, looks like this shit just got real.

[fnord]

You wouldn't have happened to multiply it by its complex conjugate and BANG YOUR SHOE ON THE TABLE, would you, Shroom?

Hot damn, A-series reliability at max. Simon, perhaps shoot for duration B & C shots (or C & D, if B has already been done) with docking and EVA next season assuming you have the cash to start the docking program? The "next milestone" penalty is only -1, so Nikov would more than offset it, and the penalty for skipping past a milestone (going straight to Duration C/D if B/C hasn't come off) is -4, compensated by Digaditch's skill.

PeZook, if/when group 3 rolls open, could you add a Boratistani submarine captain, Captain K. Fillyereski, to the mix (who bears a more-than-suspicious resemblance to a certain B. Sagdiyev)? Exactly why Captain Fillyereski ended up in the space program - well, why not? Perhaps the Navy is feeling a little left out. (Yes, I AM taking the piss). BTW, Digaditch's parents were relocated Lithuanians who russified their last names.

IC - After the euphoria of the manned flight had worn off, a still clean-shaven Nikov was back to the "Patience hell, I'm gonna kill something" stage.

The VVS had confirmed his (non-fart-steam-assisted) promotion to Lt. Colonel after his trailblazing flight, and Shroomanski had speeched at him liberally (giving him the impression, very quietly, of "Where's the General Secretary?" "Around the bend, I'm going that way"), adding a Hero of Zenobian Socialist Labour to his medal collection. Shroomanski had also confirmed, yet again, that the line between genius and madness was blurry, thin and fractal.

If asked, Nikov would be forced to reply it is not his place, as a junior Party member, to comment on such an exalted personage.

From what Nikov understood, the moon shot would be a good week or so in all, yet no Zenobian ship had yet shown it could endure that long up in the Big Black.

Stalking into the cafeteria, Nikov collided with the hard-drinking midget Digaditch, upending himself and his train of thought. The Zhtalingradite fought down the urge to be short with Digaditch, helped him back to his feet, and collared him for an earbashing.

Digaditch, helping Nikov appropriate an unused table, got interested despite himself as Nikov sketched out his idea to push development of EVA suits, the not-yet-started docking module and the boosters all along a bit. Two flights next season would obviously require two sets of crews, with Nikov and Mametov flying first, befitting their experience, while the midget and the loudspeaker followed on the longer flight.

After an hour or so, the two exited, stage left, to go find the Chief Designer, collar him, and convince him to let the plan come off.

[PeZook]

PeZook, if/when group 3 rolls open, could you add a Boratistani submarine captain, Captain K. Fillyereski, to the mix (who bears a more-than-suspicious resemblance to a certain B. Sagdiyev)? Exactly why Captain Fillyereski ended up in the space program - well, why not? Perhaps the Navy is feeling a little left out. (Yes, I AM taking the piss). BTW, Digaditch's parents were relocated Lithuanians who russified their last names.

Group III has been available for some time now (14 astronauts for 15 megabucks), and yeah, it won't be a problem at all to add a guy there

[Simon_Jester]

Will try to come up with a plan soon, but on a preliminary basis:

All salute Comrade Badenov! Our answer the the Angliannian Agent .0069 or whatever they call him! Who needs a tuxedo and a shaken martini when you have... the big round bomb?

Also, manned docking tests. Um. What happens if one goes wrong? Because docking module reliability ain't gonna be pretty until I've flown at least a few unmanned docking tests. That splits into two questions, really.

1) Is the docking phase flown first, or after the duration phase? Because a low-reliability docking phase could screw our chance to reach the milestone.

2) Is the docking phase likely to cause lethal failures? Because, again, that really hurts our chances of completing the mission and endangers the cosmonauts and the program.
__________

Note that the duration flight is appealing even without any thought of docking flights, though there is still the worrying prestige balance we get from, say, a mission with a 50/50 chance of success that grants 3 points for success and costs 10 points for failure... lemme think.

[PeZook]

1) Is the docking phase flown first, or after the duration phase? Because a low-reliability docking phase could screw our chance to reach the milestone.

Docking is flown first ; If it fails, the mission is aborted.

2) Is the docking phase likely to cause lethal failures? Because, again, that really hurts our chances of completing the mission and endangers the cosmonauts and the program.

There is supposedly a chance of a failed docking causing an explosion which destroys the spacecraft, but I NEVER had it happen. A failed docking makes you abort the mission (you still get +1 prestige as a consolation prize, though, no -10 slams) and slightly improves reliability of the docking module.

I just ran a bunch of manned docking flights and nothing exploded. As an aside, the Voskhod is suspiciously non-explosive as well.

Note that the duration flight is appealing even without any thought of docking flights, though there is still the worrying prestige balance we get from, say, a mission with a 50/50 chance of success that grants 3 points for success and costs 10 points for failure... lemme think.

A failed docking doesn't slam you with -10 prestige.

[Simon_Jester]

Factored in, and thanks. Lemme take some time to think it over.

EDIT: one more thing, before I post my plan for Fall 1965, I'd like to know what planetary launch missions are open in Spring 1966, as I alluded to earlier.

[Scottish Ninja]

1) Is the docking phase flown first, or after the duration phase? Because a low-reliability docking phase could screw our chance to reach the milestone.

Docking is flown first ; If it fails, the mission is aborted.

Are you sure? I thought I've had plenty of docking/duration missions where the docking failed and they went on to the duration steps normally - even in the case of "Docking failed, craft is spinning wildly" (i.e. Gemini VIII) or something like that.

For Group III cosmonauts - all right, here are the lame, corny ones:

Mickey Garbagechew (Garbachew? Garbagev?)
Boris Smellsin
Vlad Dracula Poutine

[Scottish Ninja]

On further investigation, it seems that you're right. I could have sworn that I've had loads of missions continue after a docking failure though...

[PeZook]

On further investigation, it seems that you're right. I could have sworn that I've had loads of missions continue after a docking failure though...

It's possible this might happen with a "green" failure mode. I quickly ran about a dozen manned dockings two hours ago and always got the yellow failure mode, which ended in an abort.

No astronaut death in any of the runs, though. I'm really starting to think there's more to missions than just rolls: even a simple pseudorandom number generator shouldn't give me twelve ideal re-entries in a row.

[Simon_Jester]

For a true random number generator running my Voskhod with a CAP 4 pilot, you'd have a one in four chance of getting twelve consecutive ideal re-entries in a row. Now, the chance of getting thirty-six consecutive capsule successes (no failures on reentry burn or reentry or recovery) is another story... which would argue for evidence that should change the following analysis, but I don't want to rewrite it.

...

The problem with a docking/duration flight is that even if the mission simply aborts with no -10 prestige-killer on a docking failure, I'm incurring all the risk of an orbital flight (which still comes with at least a 50% chance of one or more rocket/capsule stage failures, even with a CAP 4 pilot and the rocket reliability increase) for none of the reward. The reward for duration flights B and C isn't very impressive in any case, mind you, but it's one hell of a lot better than "+1 point for attempted docking."

So the risk/reward structure looks like, um. What's the prestige for a successful First Manned Docking mission? Call it eight points since I can't remember.

So the mission profile for a failed docking, with a CAP 4 pilot goes:

Rocket stage (90% chance of success for boosted A-Series)
Insertion Burn (89% chance of success)
Fail Docking Stage
Reentry Burn/Reentry/Recovery (three capsule stages, .89^3 ~= 70% chance of success)

56% chance of not having a rocket/capsule stage failure, in which case I get +1 prestige for effort... versus 44% chance of a stage failure, with large concomitant risk of losing cosmonauts and getting -10 prestige.

Profile for a successful docking/duration flight, and I'm just going to assume the duration stage succeeds:

Rocket stage (90% chance of success for boosted A-Series)
Insertion Burn (89% chance of success)
Pass Docking Stage (get credit for first manned docking)
Orbital Activities (89% chance of success, get credit for Duration B)
Reentry Burn/Reentry/Recovery (three capsule stages, .89^3 ~= 70% chance of success)

~50% chance of walking away with 8+3 = 11 prestige, versus ~50% chance of a stage failure which would carry a large concomitant risk of -10 prestige and dead 'nauts.

Now, if the docking stage is nearly certain to succeed, this is a good deal, especially since there's always the possibility of a rocket/capsule stage failure not preventing a crew from completing the mission safely, and thus getting more points.

But if the docking stage is nearly certain to fail, I'm left with a 50% chance of winning 1 point and a 50% chance of losing 10 points. Which doesn't sound very bright to me.

(To make matters worse, the duration B flight itself is a 50/50 shot of winning 3 or 4 points, versus losing 10 points. I took a comparable gamble on Voskhod 1 and got away with it, but that was because the payoff was going to be very high, much higher than the incremental bonus for flying Duration B or First Manned Docking)

One thing I'm going to want to do in any case is unmanned orbital docking tests. Run a few of those, and reliability of the main systems involved (Voskhod and the Docking Module in particular) will improve further, making things a bit safer and shifting the odds of the gamble more in favor of flying the mission.

[Akhlut]

Manshuk was confused: all the cosmonauts were angry, depressed, or otherwise just plain unhappy! Yet, not Mametova! No, he was at home here, in his native Boratistan, her wide open plains as big as his heart and his thirst for potato-vodka.

He was especially bemused by the fact that even Nikov, who had been into space was unhappy.

Eh, Ztalingradites, what will you do about them? Perhaps the Great Salvation War had made them all pissy. Even the Boratistanis who had fought in the war were rather indifferent about it. You shot a few Thanasians, you got a medal, you came home. Maybe you got shot and were buried in some strange foreign land. Who knows? Who cares?

Of course, it was mainly Zenobians and everyone who wasn't a Boratistani who was killed, because those idiots didn't know how to fight a war, but, eh, what can you do?

However, Manshuk was rather disappointed in the EVA suits. They chafed like you had a goddamn squirrel nesting in your taint. He'd have to talk to them about that...

[OmegaChief]

Spoiler

It's good to see the Zenobians still have the edge in the Angry-Man-With-Gun race at least. Well in important spaceflight facilities anyway.

More importantly it seems PeZooks future gazing is not infallable :O

The Commissar grumbled, they may have A Series rockets that were the most reliable in the world, but the foul Muricans had a satalite orbiting the moon! Poisioning it's pure untouched surface with degenerate Murican Rock music no doubt.

The carrot had been used a lot recently, it was time to break out the stick, sighing he began writing a formal statment, that would be copied and sent around the base shortly.

"Comrades, as I am sure you are aware the Muricans have started to pull ahead again, and unfortunatly this reflects badly on our space program, as such it becomes harder to requesition certian objects.

As such I regret to inform you all, that until we pull ahead once more, all Vodka rations are halved. That is all."

[PeZook]

Ouch.

The Comissar better watch himself, though. Many opportunities for terrible and unfortunate accidents exist at Baikonurek

[Simon_Jester]

Two questions.

Can I get the available planetary launch windows for next season?

And can I schedule a docking mission before purchasing docking hardware?

[PeZook]

Two questions.

Can I get the available planetary launch windows for next season?

You can plan flybys for Mercury and Venus this season. I included it in the update.

And can I schedule a docking mission before purchasing docking hardware?

Yes, you can in fact schedule a docking mission without starting the docking module program.

EDIT: Also, remember that you only need to send up a docking module once per year. If the launch is a success, the module will stay up for two consecutive seasons and can be used for any further docking missions.

Also, Zenobian can loft a docking module and Voskhod on an unboosted proton

[Simon_Jester]

Sorry, I didn't see it. I also didn't see your comment on how the tank explosion was not foreseen.

Comrade Badenov's powers are such that he can elude even the very gods!

[Simon_Jester]

Ghetto edit:

Also, Zenobian can loft a docking module and Voskhod on an unboosted proton

I know. Thing is, it's significantly cheaper (and, at least for the immediate future, quite possibly safer) to do it with a boosted A-Series.

I don't expect to hit 90% Proton reliability until some time in 1966; boosted A-Series is already there.

[OmegaChief]

Ouch.

The Comissar better watch himself, though. Many opportunities for terrible and unfortunate accidents exist at Baikonurek

Well of course! But that makes the game more interesting!