Do we care about Kerbals? (sincere question, not a troll)

[TerranceFarrel]

I'm curious.

In real life, seeing an astronaut die is a painful, tragic, gutwrenching experience.
Definitely on my list of ten things I'd most rather not see ever happen.
(excluding maybe in bed after a long and good life...on their way to somewhere better)

I'm wondering if we care about our Kerbals. Do we send them out on probability zero missions for the sheer slapstick? Or do we share NASA's squeamishness and do our utmost to do right by our brave kerbals?

Or...do we do both?

[goufalite]

Well, there's a setting where you can choose to "respawn" a deadmissing Kerbal. Just timewarp a few days and Jeb (or any other) will be available again in the administration building.

Kerbals don't die of starvation (yet), they can suffocate and die when you remove their helmet before leaving the atmosphere (since 1.6), they don't age and they don't die of high-G forces (they only pass out). So they will drift for ever in space or on the planet they crash-landed on.

One thing though : saving a stranded Kerbal is so much fun and sometimes epic (as in Watney's rescue in the Martian) wether (s)he is on the surface of a planet or in orbit around the Sun. In career mode you can even make money by saving a Kerbal or by doing a crew transfer near a celestial body.

Or simply click and "cancel flight" in the control center to shorten their pain...

[TerranceFarrel]

My answer to myself is... I tend to be squeamish.
I never kill a kerbal for laughs I have done it a time or three by mistake. I don't try direct ascension to the moon any more.

On one occassion I landed on the Mun. Apparently I was on some kind of tilted ice plain.

Eliponde Kerbal got out, did her thing, went to go back to the craft and found it very hard to get back. She would almost get to the ladder...and then she'd slide a great distance away.

But worse, the mission had gone poorly to this point. Fuel was dangerously low for a return.

Even so, my kerbals took off a short distance and re-landed, so Elipond could climb in. "We will all go together..."

The return mission ran out of fuel. It was in an eliptical orbit, and the periapsis was just barely inside of the atmosphere. The mission went on orbiting, losing about 500 or so feet of altitude every periapsis...then finally the orbit decayed.

The chute deployed.

They landed on a cliff and slid down ...managed not to die.

There was a heat shield and seperation collar... both?... and went the capsule finally landed the part blew up, making me jump right out of my skin. The capsule ended up okay though...

[Dimensional Traveler]

#KerbalLivesMatter

[kamikazi21358]

I personally always try to keep my Kerbals alive. I even use LES and stuff for takeoff if I have it available, and do program out the ‘abort’ action group.

[Mightylink]

I do, I've never lost a kerbal in space, I've always recovered them.
Except for Jimbob here, he knew it was a one way trip, he volunteered.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1562114896

[RoofCat]

yeah, plain perfect record by NASA
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spaceflight-related_accidents_and_incidents

[Supermarine]

I care about my Kerbals. Not a single death ever.

[PSYCHIC HIVEMIND CYCLIST DEATH]

Usually I just throw together a rocket, launch it, and if somebody dies I just yell "♥♥♥♥!" and revert.

[kamikazi21358]

Also for one way trips and stuff, I probably launch more probes than I do kerbaled missions.

[wired_airpods]

the only times i have killed a Kerbal was my first trip to the surface of the mun, and when i ran out of fuel trying to get back home from orbit (that was VERY early game). every time i screw up, i ALWAYS revert because i would never harm a kerbal unless i had to. they are just so cute sometimes! even tho their hands are really messed up when they don't have gloves on.

[TerranceFarrel]

Actually Roofcat, I think that does pass for perfect.

My real point isn't that they are perfect, but that they are extremely adverse to human loss. A lost mission can ground the space program for years.

That doesn't happen with boats, trains, airplanes or anything else. Back in the early days of airflight we had barnstormers doing all manner of crazy stunt and if someone died everything was put on hold for an entire eyeblink.

[Brandon_Lee]

In the very beginning, I made it a rule not to reload manned missions. In all my time I only lost a kerbonaut once. It was Jeb. At ~year 10. He was already 5-stars, back on Kerbin. Transfer window for Jool was in like ten days, I was planning Tylo landing mission with rover and two refuels. He crashed during a test flight, piloting my new SSTO. A design flaw led to that crash, and I could easily revert to launch since it was on Kerbin and less than 10 minutes from the start without switching, but I decided not to break the rule. I had to go without him, it was really hard.
Except for this, I never lost my little brave men, some had to wait weeks for the rescue, once I had to dock a huge tug to the biggest of my interplanetary ships, not only to bring them home but to bring them there ASAP. The other time, I had to return three kerbals from a ship that was out of fuel and monopropellant which I barely pushed into Kerbin SOI with EVA RCS. I had to bail them out - there were no docking ports... Rendezvous was very short because of extremely high flyby speed (that's why I didn't even try aerobraking - entering upper atmosphere at 5k km/s wouldn't do much difference and going deeper with that ship would definitely kill them). But I always managed to save them all. Now I'm on my second big playthrough, everyone's alive and well.

[☭Woodsman☭]

I usually play with life support on and respawns disabled, so I care very much

[Toastie Buns]

If any of my kerbals die it's their own fault. Anyone stupid enough to sign up to a mission where you EVA at Mach speed for a crew report protected only by a cubic strut cage knows how high risk my missions are or they're too dumb to ask a veteran

[goufalite]

I wrote a few days ago that saving kerbals was so much fun, well

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1660839022