Devnote Tuesday: It’s All In The Details

[Dunbaratu]

I'd like stupidity to be a multiplier for the existing skills (or a divider, whichever makes more sense) so that a kerbal with low stupidity would pilot a craft with less error and jitter, a scientist would get more science from experiments and an engineer... um... what is it that engineers do anyway, is it just fix wheels and repack chutes?

What I was envisioning wasn't that it changes the effect of the skills, but that it affects skill progression. The stupider the Kerbal is, the less experience points it gains for the same activities.

[fat_cloudz]

I'd like stupidity to be a multiplier for the existing skills (or a divider, whichever makes more sense) so that a kerbal with low stupidity would pilot a craft with less error and jitter...

Good idea: Skilled pilots would have finer control of their crafts (divider) whereas unskilled pilots would constantly over-input on the controls (multiplier).

I'd like to see scientists be able to reset the goo container and the materials bay when at highest skill level, but have the data only be transmittable through the science lab

Engineers could have Kerbal Attachment capabilities at highest skill (e.g. reattach broken lander leg)

[Superfluous J]

I'd like stupidity to not be a stat. Courage either.

I'd also like "Gender" and "Profession" to be stats. In the persistent file

[CaLVin-K]

I often wondered why "hiring" a kerbal never meant anything in the game, but now I see it's because they were planning on making it cost something but hadn't gotten around to it yet.

One question: Shouldn't Reputation score matter a lot for the wages you have to pay astronauts?

High Rep = Kerbals excited and happy to become astronauts, jumping at the chance.

Low Rep = Kerbals want more hazard pay to get on one of your rockets, given your past results.

And of course, killing kerbals would lower rep.

Or, better yet, the more you kill your Kerbals, the higher and higher the "stupidity" rating is on your pool of potential new recruits. The smart ones aren't volunteering.

That would be awesome if... "stupidity" did anything. Does it? Does it affect, say, experience and skills?

It affects the facial expressions they make during flight

[FormulaRedline]

Sorry for being a couple days late, but excited for TrackIR support! Thank you, devs!

I will also voice my support for Oculus support someday. Read: full stereoscopic support as well as headtracking. Nvidia 3D vision works alright today (docking is 100x easier when you have depth perception!), but many of the overlays are at the wrong depth and the map is unusable. Still, I am excited to try out 3D Vision + TrackIR with the IVAs when this patch hits!

[Twreed87]

Good idea: Skilled pilots would have finer control of their crafts (divider) whereas unskilled pilots would constantly over-input on the controls (multiplier).

This is not a good idea. The player is the one who inputs the controls, the Kerbal having a different level should not override that. I would hate it if i'm flying a craft perfectly, staying right on my marker, and the ship suddenly jerks around when I didn't do anything. This is why they made pilot skills into just Smart SAS instead of anything like this. This would just be like random errors.

[Dunbaratu]

This is not a good idea. The player is the one who inputs the controls, the Kerbal having a different level should not override that. I would hate it if i'm flying a craft perfectly, staying right on my marker, and the ship suddenly jerks around when I didn't do anything. This is why they made pilot skills into just Smart SAS instead of anything like this. This would just be like random errors.

Agreed. It would be just as bad an idea as that one proposal (that thankfully was dropped) to have engineer skill affect the ISP.

[Capt Snuggler]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. The pilot skill should be linked to their ability to stay conscious during high G forces. If you (the player) pull a 9G turn your rookie kerbal blacks out and you loose control until they come to.

Fly safe = stay awake.

[TMS]

This is not a good idea. The player is the one who inputs the controls, the Kerbal having a different level should not override that. I would hate it if i'm flying a craft perfectly, staying right on my marker, and the ship suddenly jerks around when I didn't do anything. This is why they made pilot skills into just Smart SAS instead of anything like this. This would just be like random errors.

Agreed. I'm not sure how people come to the conclusion that sabotaging existing control systems represents a good mechanic for game progression???

It's an example of having classes (pilot, engineer, scientist) and desperately trying to find a function for them.

The game needs to be adding things, not taking them away via arbitrary limitations.

Regarding the notes... FOV sounds useful. As do the dialogue boxes.

[Twreed87]

On the note of Kerbal skills, does anyone wish leveling them up was a bit easier? Perhaps repeating an objective (landing on the Mun, planting a flag, etc.) could provide diminishing returns. So a trip to Jool would provide a huge boost, but you could also get it with multiple Mun missions, it would just take a lot.

[klgraham1013]

I'd also like "Gender" and "Profession" to be stats. In the persistent file

I am all about this.

As far as Courage and Stupidity goes: Having highly visible stats, which do nothing in the game, is not good design, and does little, but confuse new players.

- - - Updated - - -

It affects the facial expressions they make during flight

Ok. So they do that.

Edited April 3, 2015 by klgraham1013

[Robotengineer]

As far as Courage and Stupidity goes: Having highly visible stats, which do nothing in the game, is not good design, and does little, but confuse new players.

Agreed, if it had some influence in generating the profession of the kerbal, it wouldn't be to bad, but it's pretty useless right now.

[TMS]

<b>Felipe (HarvesteR):</b> Also, Kerbonauts now cost Funds to hire. The cost of hiring more crews increases for each additional crew member in your active roster, that is, hiring your 30th Kerbal is much more expensive than hiring your 5th one. This cost increases based on your current active crew count. That means, for instance, that going through 100 Kerbals would be far less expensive than having a roster with a hundred active ones.

Why?

[fat_cloudz]

I mis-wrote that. Not overriding it, just affecting the sensitivity of the controls.

I was thinking that it would have you put some thought into which Kerbals you send on which missions, performing maneuvers (docking, landing rovers, etc.) or testing experimental craft.

[micr0wave]

concerning the crafts in VAB/SPH, will there maybe an option to sort them when you attempt to load, like .. sort by date/price/parts or smthng like that ?

[Greenfire32]

http://ps3-hack.pl/forum/images/smilies/facepalm.gif

Why?

Do YOU work for free?

Also, it makes sense. It's called "Career" mode for a reason.

[TMS]

Do YOU work for free?

Only when I'm first in line, it seems.