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Can anyone explain why it was necessary to catch it chopsticks-style instead of landing it on the ground like they had been doing with the smaller boosters?
Weight. It always comes down to weight. Landing legs will add a lot of extra weight.
Plus it'll make it easier to quickly restack everything for multiple launches, for stuff like orbital assembly and refueling. We'll be able to replace the ISS in a week with this thing, once they get a small workhorse fleet going.