Career Mode Goals / Science / Money

[TechRon]

I love the game.  I've been playing since before there was a mun.  That said I also really like the idea of career mode.  It would be nice to have more challenges than just altering multipliers for science, money, reputation gain and what not.  So with that in mind I have a couple ideas and others feel free to add to this or state if any reason why it wouldn't work.

The thing is that the way it is now you never have to even leave the Kerbin sphere of influence to gain all the science you need to unlock the entire tech tree.  At which point you 'basically?' won right.  I mean after that you are playing in sandbox with something of a limit on money which at that point is pretty easy to get doing massive missions made easy by all of your tech.

So like I said you can do the entire career mode just hitting Kerbin, the Mun, and Minmus.  Once you unlock the lab which can be done by with some messing around on and around kerbin and a single trip to the moon.  I'm sure someone else has a faster way than that.  After which you just dump all the science you get into the lab and process it.  The tech tree falls open pretty quickly after that.

So my idea.  You could consider this a hard mode or and option in career mode.  Put some milestones into the tech tree.  For example restrict certain points in the tech tree until certain objectives have been accomplished.  Without mapping it out an initial suggestion would be that
1) You can't unlock any radial decouplers until after you have at least achieved a stable orbit.

2) No jet engine parts until you have successfully laded a vessel from "high" above kerbin (propeller based engines should be added as an early science stage with obvious high restrictions for operations)

3) The advanced grabbing unit is restricted until after you have successfully returned a surface sample from an asteroid.

4) No probe bodies which allow completely unmanned flight until after you have successfully complete 30 stable orbits and 5 transfers to another sphere of influence.  (whatever on the numbers)

5) The graviolo detector should be restricted until you have returned (not transmitted) several bits of science data from low solar orbit including jr science, goo, temp, and pressure (gravioli is the most overpowered of the science instruments)

6) no rover wheels until science data has been collected from 3 adjacent bioms other than kerbin

7) nuclear engine restricted until science data successfully returned from landing on another planet or moon other than kerbin, mun, or minmus (sending a probe is fine)

8) no ion engines until surface samples returned from at least 5 bodies (obviously kerbin, mun, and minmus would be first 3

These are just some suggestions but the point is for career mode to require you to do more than just rinse and repeat the same old missions over and over and float around kerbin to win.

[Xavven]

I like the idea of unlocking some parts through specific missions or achievements, but I think the bigger fish to fry is actually the Mobile Science Lab that you mentioned first. There's no more challenge once you've built one -- as you said the rest of the tree just falls open. It needs to cost the player something in return for the gobs of science it provides.

[rocketbuilder]

I think the mobile science lab should have a huge penalty in the Kerbin system and a quite high penalty on Duna and Eve, as in the kerbin system it doesn't accept science and in the Duna and Eve system science takes up 3x as much data space.

The mobile science lab is the only 1.0 change that I think was regrettable. OLD MSL!

Anyway, good idea.

 

Edited December 1, 2015 by rocketbuilder

[Wanderfound]

The career mode is not defined by the tech tree. Unlocking the tree is just stage one (and usually achievable with a couple of Mun/Minmus trips and maybe some interplanetary probes).

Once you've unlocked all the toys, use them. Colonise the solar system. Decorate KSC with landed asteroids. Find all of the easter eggs and make up your own theory for what connects them.

[Commander Jebidiah]

Just my Opinion and reasons.

 

1) No. the first ever orbital space flight was Sputnik 1, which was launched on a rocket which used radially mounted strap on boosters that were detached.

2) Yes and No. Yes props should be added for early game but jet engines should not be restricted as we had jets before space flight. We should have rover wheels earlier. 

3) Why? Whats the point in launching two missions to an asteroid?

4) No. Sputnik 1, 2. 3 and Vanguard 1 did not have a person on board.

5) Not bothered.

6) No. Rover wheels should be early game but should require combustion engines.

7) Not bothered, I've never really been interplanetary.

8) Again not bothered. All I use Ions for is for space fighters or station tugs.

 

Career should of been, all parts unlocked, Undertake science missions for companies, take contracts for the military (Spy sats...) limited funds and these contracts would pay you.  

[RocketPropelledGiraffe]

I am not sold on your points, why would you want to make career mode more restrictive. KSP is about enjoying the sandbox freedom and I think it is nice that this is somewhat carried over to career mode. Especially since they start to rework the "Explore" and other limiting one-time contracts into the milestone system, it seems that more freedom of choice is also the route Squad is following at the moment.

The nice thing is that everybody can play career to his preference at the moment:

Like to build planes? There is plenty of science on Kerbin alone to get far in the tech tree.

Like to stretch yourself and send interplanetary probes as early as possible, even with limited parts available? You can do it and continue the tree with transmitted science.

Like to be a completionist and get all the tech before going interplanetary? Explore the moons first, no problem.

 

I agree that there is no reason why the R&D guys would be able to develop a better engine after they finally got the new temperature data from Jool. But this is really a general problem of science points and tech trees. Any way to improve this would be great, but on the other hand it should not be too restrictive...

I think the major improvement possibilities are in the contract system. After the tech tree is complete, there have to be interesting contracts to keep the game exciting - but that is only fo the end game.

At the start of career it might be possible to somehow connect the new parts with a series of developing contracts. Let's face it, new parts and better technology is only invented when there is a need for it.

Example: The task is to explore Jool with a probe (1st contract), the engineering guys say they need more delta-v and a better engine, the R&D people say they need better scientific equipment. The 2nd and 3rd contract in this scenario would be to test a prototype engine and a prototype science equipment in Kerbin orbit to support the development. Then a 4th contract to test the actual probe you want to send. If all goes well (maybe prototypes would have a possiblity to fail randomly), you get the needed parts unlocked for the Jool mission and after doing this you have the 1st contract completed and also the parts available permanently.

Does this sound reasonable or am I just babbling nonesense here? Not sure.

 

Edited December 1, 2015 by RocketPropelledGiraffe

[Kerbart]

Consider the audience. While technically possible to "win" the game like that, how many will? If one is that desparate to "win" the game why not use the debug menu instead?

 I figure most of us play Career because it offers some fun challenges. Artificial restrictions to force the player to play it in a certain way doesn't make it more fun. Yes, Career needs some work, but in much more creative ways than "lets limit the science you can gather"