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Advice on a modlist to freshen the tech tree & career game?


Mister Spock

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Hi all,

I'm looking for a menu of mods that might rekindle my interest in career mode.  In the past, I've used MKS/OKS, ScanSat, RemoteTech, Kerbal Construction Time, Severed Solo's Kerbin Space Station contract pack, "Better than Starting Manned," and a little of KSP-Interstellar.  All fun mods, but I'd like a new experience, with a new tech tree and a focus on space stations and bases.  I'm using Windows 7, so RAM is a limitation, though I've had success with the OpenGL workaround in the past.  I always use KER, Kerbal Alarm Clock, Docking Port Alignment Indicator, PreciseNode, and Final Frontier.  Anyway, I'm thinking something like the following modlist:

Probus's Engineering Tech Tree

Severed Solo's Kerbin Space Station Contract pack

DMagic's Orbital Science

Nertea's Stockalike Space Station Parts

Something to spice up the middle-to-late game: KSPI-Extended?  Outer Planets Mod?  New Horizons?  Kerbal Galaxy 2?

Any advice or suggestions?  Thanks in advance!

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15 hours ago, Mister Spock said:

Hi all,

I'm looking for a menu of mods that might rekindle my interest in career mode.  In the past, I've used MKS/OKS, ScanSat, RemoteTech, Kerbal Construction Time, Severed Solo's Kerbin Space Station contract pack, "Better than Starting Manned," and a little of KSP-Interstellar.  All fun mods, but I'd like a new experience, with a new tech tree and a focus on space stations and bases.  I'm using Windows 7, so RAM is a limitation, though I've had success with the OpenGL workaround in the past.  I always use KER, Kerbal Alarm Clock, Docking Port Alignment Indicator, PreciseNode, and Final Frontier.  Anyway, I'm thinking something like the following modlist:

Probus's Engineering Tech Tree

Severed Solo's Kerbin Space Station Contract pack

DMagic's Orbital Science

Nertea's Stockalike Space Station Parts

Something to spice up the middle-to-late game: KSPI-Extended?  Outer Planets Mod?  New Horizons?  Kerbal Galaxy 2?

Any advice or suggestions?  Thanks in advance!

If you want a completely fresh experience, try @KillAshley's New Horizons mod. Changes everything. OPM was good fun too though.

@Angel-125's work is definitely awesome too, specifically Pathfinder in this context, for the bases. His other mods are nice too, I enjoyed MOLE very much.

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I would do SETI-CTT and related mods as a tech tree, far more diversity and balance, it also works with tons of mods. I do like 64k or Kerbin 365, they make the game much more challenging. For 64 though I recommend SMURFF, it makes fuel ratios and engine weights better and more realistic.

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Thanks for those helpful replies.

@inigma: Thanks for the link to your mod.  It looks very interesting.  Does it alter the tech tree?  It'd be interesting to have to develop flight before rocketry, say.  A new tech tree is one of my top interests.

@legoclone09: I'd never clicked on the SETI mod before because I assumed it had something to do with the search for ET life.  Not so!  It does look interesting, and I especially like that it features a new tech tree.  But development has apparently been halted, which gives me pause.  Also, it seems to involve lots of mods, which makes me nervous from a RAM standpoint.

@Randazzo: Yep, I mentioned New Horizons in my OP; but does it feature a new tech tree?  I wasn't familiar with Pathfinder until I saw your post and checked it out; that looks very interesting.

I welcome any further suggestions!  I'd really like a new tech tree, space stations, space station contracts (I'm thinking Severed Solo's pack, which I've enjoyed before), and maybe new planets.

 

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GAP does not alter the tech tree. It does however give you the option of joining SSI and earning for keeps an experimental Command Seat, rover wheels, and a few basic parts. Doing so is optional and not required. You are welcome to grind without accepting that contract.

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4 hours ago, Mister Spock said:

Thanks for those helpful replies.

@inigma: Thanks for the link to your mod.  It looks very interesting.  Does it alter the tech tree?  It'd be interesting to have to develop flight before rocketry, say.  A new tech tree is one of my top interests.

@legoclone09: I'd never clicked on the SETI mod before because I assumed it had something to do with the search for ET life.  Not so!  It does look interesting, and I especially like that it features a new tech tree.  But development has apparently been halted, which gives me pause.  Also, it seems to involve lots of mods, which makes me nervous from a RAM standpoint.

@Randazzo: Yep, I mentioned New Horizons in my OP; but does it feature a new tech tree?  I wasn't familiar with Pathfinder until I saw your post and checked it out; that looks very interesting.

I welcome any further suggestions!  I'd really like a new tech tree, space stations, space station contracts (I'm thinking Severed Solo's pack, which I've enjoyed before), and maybe new planets.

 

New horizons doesn't have a new tech tree, no it adds over a dozen new bodies and rearranges stock worlds. If you're looking for a complete change, my new Uncharted Lands pack might be a better pick...however there are still some problems with other mods that rely on the stock bodies being stock, which i plan to address asap.

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I'm also looking for such a modlist, my choice was for BTSM during a long time, but I got bored of it and I want more variety now.

I tried recently to make my own little compilation of mods to try a hard stock career and find mods that add a few elements from BTSM. I used No More Science Grinding to skip boring repetition of similar experiments, and lowered science earnings to 50% with Custom Barn Kit in hard mode, but in the end the balance is still wrong.

I think we should actually work on creating a community hard balanced career addon, following the concepts and balance logic of BTSM, but still being open to all other plugins. The goal not being on realism, but on an interesting career from the beginning to the end, having a tech tree that is slow and consistant to unlock (no more big mission that can unlock many nodes at once!).

Actually that's also a bit similar to SETI, but in my opinion the base SETI install seems to have dependencies on too many addons, with some of them apparently outdated.

Something lightweight, somewhere between SETI and BTSM, and compatible with a few planet packs, would be really nice.

 

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I highly recommend adding Holodeck to your career mod list if you're not going with Construction Time. It will give you a simple option to run any mission in a simulator. For hard mode. :) 

Finally, check out the alpha version of a new mod called NIMBY. NIMBY prevents vessel recovery anywhere except within range of a recovery beacon (KSC is its own default beacon). You can add additional recovery zones via the cfg file it generates.

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Thanks for the further replies.

 @KillAshley, I checked out your thread on Uncharted Lands.  Looks pretty interesting!  Pretty screenshots for sure.  I like the idea of rejiggering the worlds near Kerbin.  I've been to the Mun and Minmus many times.  Unlike other players, I haven't done much past Eve, Duna or Jool, so the stock outer planets are still new to me.  In other words, in some ways I'm more interested in new Inner Planets than new Outer Planets, so maybe Uncharted Lands fits the bill.    

@Valerian, sounds like our wishlist is similar.  I liked BTSM but I'd like a new challenge, and I agree that the SETI mod list is a bit daunting.  SETI has the right idea, though.

@inigma: Thanks for the link to Holodeck.  I hadn't heard of it before your post.  The one feature of KCT I really do love is the simulation, so it's good to know there's a "lighter" alternative.  But Holodeck's development has apparently slowed, which is worrisome.

What mods center around a completely revamped tech tree, besides BTSM and KSPI-Extended?  The Engineering Tech Tree looks interesting, for example.

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I'm not sure how long ago you used KCT, but it ships with a Preset now that turns everything off except the Simulations, if you'd still like to use that feature. Alternatively there's quicksaves + optionally HyperEdit :P

I'll second New Horizons, since it's similar in concept to Alternis Kerbol (which I played with in 0.23). Reparenting Kerbin can lead to a very different set of challenges. During that playthrough I also imposed that all probes had to be controlled entirely with RemoteTech's Flight Computer, which made for some serious challenges. These days I'd probably allow kOS and keep signal delay on (but I like programming).

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On 12/14/2015, 12:11:39, Mister Spock said:

I'm looking for a menu of mods that might rekindle my interest in career mode.

I know things are in early development but The MOD Docket is a place you could start and keep an eye on. The MOD docket is a thread Pinned to the TOP of  Add-on Discussions that is for people to post exactly this type of information.

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Magico13, thanks for chiming in.  I hadn't realized that KCT now has a simulation-only option; that sounds great!  I'll check it out. In general I loved KCT; I just thought I'd try a game without it for a change of pace.  But the sim feature is pretty awesome.

Thanks for the thread suggestion, mcirish3.  That looks like a useful thread.  Maybe I'll contribute to it if my current modlist works out.

And so far I'm quite happy with that modlist, which I developed thanks to suggestions in this thread.  The core mods are the Engineering Tech Tree and New Horizons.  I'm also using DMagic's Orbital Science, Nereid's Stockalike Station Parts, severedsolo's Kerbal Space Station contracts mod (which I think is being renamed Stations and Bases or some such), Planetary Base, Antenna Range, Final Frontier, and my usual utilities (KER, PreciseNode, Docking Port Indicator).  

I love seeing that ringed planet of New Horizons; can't wait to visit it.  

And the tech tree spices things up a lot.  I feel that I have more choices at every branch of the tree, and thus tougher decisions to make.  You start unmanned, which is cool.  Mind you, I haven't gotten very far yet; I got stuck because I failed to research the unmanned octagon thingie, and without its SAS I couldn't get my Sputnik craft to fly straight.  After a restart, I beelined toward the octagon thing, and now my rockets can reach space. :) 

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