I'd argue not that much actually _riding_ on this, it might just blow up on the launchpad or it might go up in the air. Either way they will try again in a few months.

So the difference between success (defined by musk as getting far away enough from the launchpad not to damage it) and failure (rud on pad) is a few months on the development timeline and money to rebuild the (quite complicated) tower.

Will be fun to watch either way, unless its a scrub.

If they have, like, 3 consecutive launchpad explosions over the next few years, then maybe we'd start talking about the whole project being in trouble.

If it actually does the whole flightpath then that will be pretty amazing.

The other question, why is this important: Its the biggest, most re-usable most ambitious rocket ever made. The 33 engines, apart from being numerous, are of a design more ambitious/challenging than any other rocket engine we've ever seen.

(edit: engine adjectives)