ghpstage

Fired up KSP for the first time in a few months, and finished off a few probe missions on my challenge career save. No random contracts. No probes other than Stayputnik. No upgrades except those required for Manoeuvre nodes. Made my first successful landing at Tylo.... followed by a second after the game crashed before I could save. Landed at Vall too. The third probe I sent to Jool is sitting in an unstable orbit waiting on the Explore Laythe contract which hasn't appeared yet... which is odd as I had been very careful not to go near any SOIs pre contract. Is it possible that errors caused by time acceleration could have dragged a probe through its SOI without me knowing? Now just Laythe, Dres, Moho and Eeloo left to do in this game. Laythe seems dead, but I have a few designs to try throwing at Moho, and one already en route to Dres... its just taking the long route (6 years!) Tomorrow I will probably try Moho, and maybe finish the 15k fund manned Duna mission I sent on another save

The idea behind the second quote doesn't work. There is a maximum xp value available for any body, and the smaller tasks leading up to a flag planting simply take from the total for flag planting.In this case, the wiki tells me that a Munar orbit is worth 3xp, leaving just 2xp available for a later flag planting. If all the biggest missions Jeb has done at different bodies so far are, orbit at Kerbin, and Mun flag planting then he should be just short of level 2.

Another problem I can see in doing it this way, is that upgrades will come so rapidly that the limits imposed may as well have never existed in the first place. Will be interested too hear how this turns out! A few additional contract types that would be fairly difficult, and worth similar, or even more than the current satellite contracts would be nice. Some of the parts tests are already a candidate for this, e.g. testing a BACC on the Mun is significantly harder, and dramatically costlier than launching a small probe into some orbit! It was mostly an example of how low science, high funds rewards could work. I certainly wouldn't expect everyone to try it!It originally started as a scripted contract only challenge, the additional restraints were added because it was too easy. If I had added the odd random contract then a lot of the explorations (Duna, Ike, Gilly, Jool moons) could have been manned. As for Squad's vision, I haven't a clue what they are planning, nobody does. We might get a better idea with the next patch, hopefully the current career is mostly placeholder. I really hope better incentives for probe usage are included however. I just don't mind if the development in the game takes some time, provided interesting things are available to do (which there is currently a severe lack of), and also think it is possible to play without really grinding in its current state, but only if you push interplanetary quickly, or play with some self made rules. Time is another issue in career, for some inexplicable reason you could probably launch a thousand rockets by the time the Duna window arrives. The ability to launch a rocket to a local objective on a whim.When I first got the game I though this may have been controlled by something akin to the production time mod as I had seen stock counts for parts in the demo! It might not be a bad idea at all. Alternatively an instant time warp, to jump forward to a set point in Kerbal time might be needed to prevent it getting too boring. The rewards for those could do with being boosted, and doing so would be justifiable, considering their place as one time only contracts. I would like to see an expansion of these types of contracts, to include manned missions, either as part of the current ones, or as a separate contract opened afterwards. It would mean that seriously big money missions existed out there to grab, and going there ASAP could greatly accelerate your growth compared against spamming randoms. This would of course include the Mun and Minmus, which currently pay out a combined total of around 300k on hard, if boosted to 600-750k when including the new manned contracts then the need to grind could be cut considerably.

More form a sort of plausible reality and immersion angle than difficulty.Almost anything is going to be unchallenging if you have played the game long enough. The only kinds of things that could be done to achieve a challenge is giving contracts like, Moho, Eve, Tylo returns with multiple Kerbals, large payloads and random part limitations.... the sorts of things you are only likely to find on the forum I can't see how sending a probe somewhere is going to be any less interesting than doing the same satellite contract 3-5 times Grinding is generally accepted as repeating the same actions, doing the same number of different contracts would not necessarily be grinding (though better variety is sorely needed). The OPs suggestion actively enforces the grinding of the exact same contract by making the vast majority of other types marginal earners at best and a number will probably be losing propositions without SSTOs with runway landings. The 'reduction' in grinding proposed is purely to reduce the number of times you need to complete the games few remaining viable contracts.

Of course it doesn't invalidate the problems of grinding being easy, but the fact it can be done without too much difficulty (a lot of satellite contract designs people use will get to Duna, Eve and Jool, the explorations of which all pay out 250k+) does invalidate the idea that first building upgrades are far too expensive. Or that grinding is a necessity (which is a common train of thought).Exploring other planets and moons using probes should be a very important part of career mode, but right now most people will never bother with any, if any probes, as you can grind your way up to a manned mission with little effort fairly quickly. Some reduction in cost would be fine, but care would be needed to avoid completely removing the limits they impose by making them too cheap. The cost for the second upgrade to buildings really does need to be looked at however, especially as a lot add virtually nothing. For example 6 million for the R&D buildings second upgrade on hard, when all the tech you really need is available with the first upgrade that costs 1 million.... a lot of the building functions and costs need rebalancing anyway. This doesn't address grinding, it merely reduces the amount someone needs to do. There is no additional risk nor difficulty introduced as the satellite contracts are incredibly easy to complete, the only change that would result is that recovery would be considered much more important. While I would quite like progressive parts costs for difficulties, balancing them around the ROI of the most blatantly overpowered contract type would not be a good idea, especially as the proposed 5 fold increase wouldn't stop 80-90%+ ROIs being commonplace, or, if craft recoveries were included, the baseline.It would be much easier and effective to change rewards on a per contract type basis. There are a bunch that need a big buff, i.e. parts tests landed on various non Kerbin bodies, or flying at Kerbin, and several that need a nerf, satellites chief among them. Of course this is an issue, but one that could be curbed by reducing the availability and value of science points.As side note, in the game where I allowed myself only the upgrades necessary to get manoeuvre nodes, to use only Stayputnik probe cores, and to accept only the scripted contracts, this was one problem I didn't have at all! Funds came thick and fast, but science not so much. This would cause the need for a great deal more planning, and a need for multi tiered missions, adding a lot of depth to career. But to make it work, a random career would need access to KER like information readouts and a method of logging useful data e.g. gravity values obtained by probes, else the player would get overwhelmed by calculations and swamped by a need for written notes, and to gather info the player would need earlier access to gravity and pressure value measurement equipment.Its something I would like to see, even if its just in mods.

While I agree the balance of funds and science is currently broken, I would say its primarily because of the lack of risk, spammability and huge ROIs of several Kerbin SOI contracts. Its much too easy to max out your science and facilities without ever leaving the Kerbin SOI. You can achieve a great deal more than most people even consider within the limits the lower tier buildings set, the below is, in my opinion, nothing more than an example of grinding your way out of a potential challenge. If you upgrade your tracking station and mission control then you can send probes to almost, if not every planet and moon in the solar system with no further upgrades. they can complete the very lucrative exploration contracts, as well as satellite and scan contracts at those locations.If you add nothing more than a launchpad upgrade, then you can do manned missions to Duna, Ike and Gilly, possibly more. You don't need to upgrade R&D for any of that! You can, on hard, still complete every single scripted contract, thats altitudes, orbit, and explorations, one after another, while never taking a random one. So the potential for non grindy play throughs does exist (even if the core path will sadly be the same each time), but the path of least resistance seems too attractive too many. Removing science rewards from random contracts, adding actual time limits, rebalancing the funds rewards and adding difficulty scalable requirements to contracts may help to add some challenge.

Right click on the building

Under 30 parts is easy, you can land on Duna with that. Under 18 tons is the tricky part, but it has been done. This thread is full of them. All heavily reliant on one or both of jet engines and 48-7s however. You won't achieve that with the tech levels being talked about.

Its a block that can control components on its grid using by running code scripts the player creates. Thank you, but I am aware of all of this. However I still find it a bit tedious to have to drill and return ores manually agian and again though, even with a ship. I won't go capturing any cargo ships because doing so makes KSP's 48-7s engine look appallingly underpowered!Even with a ship, mining can get boring, the return trips to dump ore are annoying, and flying the ship yourself prevents you from doing other things. My plan is to reduce drilling down time spent returning to dump ore by having drills eject everything and collect it at base with a gravity funnel made from the rescue ship, and then to increasingly automate this mine-collect-refine process as fast as is feasible. The system is simple enough that full automation of asteroid destruction would be fairly easy. Cargo capacity limitations on the single collector intake and the indescriminate nature of drone mining will be the main obstacles to achieving it early, followed by low industrial capacity. I suspect with a decent small or hollowed out asteroid, I might be able to partly automate very early indeed! EDIT- Didn't go as well as I initially planned. Sensors have had the bejeebus nerfed out of them. They now take 6 trips to construct a single one on realistic with the astronaut and are probably an order of magnitude more expensive than the majority of small ship parts. An automation system wants 5 sensors, so your better off with a welder first.... Also, there was no nickel to be found in the nearest 3 large asteroid systems on infinite, high density.

Hard isn't very hard. The difficulty that was intended to come from restricting players assets is too easily overcome by repeating very easy, no risk contracts. This in my opinion being the real grinding problem, that grinding is the path of least resistance to progress, not that its in any way a necessity. Though even if you ignore all random contracts and exclusively take the scripted exploration contracts, it still becomes very easy after an initial hump.

I've played it a lot, though haven't booted it up since a little before programmable blocks came in. Time to start a new game I think. Tedium being brought up sounds like a challenge. Wonder how much of the early game grinding can be engineered away!

Orbit would be the best one to get done in my opinion. It'll give a lot of cash, opens up a bunch of very lucrative space based contracts, isn't difficult to learn and is the most fundamental lesson in KSP. The second Scott Manley video linked by DBT85 will be helpful for getting into orbit. Watch that vid and when you've gone into orbit a couple of times you will be surprised how easy it was!

Manned missions to a number of extra-Kerbin moons, as well as to Duna are more than possible with fewer than 30 parts. You won't be able to take much in the way of science equipment, but if you could then it would make the tech tree utterly pointless. All you need are manoeuvre nodes and a launchpad upgrade, and enough science of course. Starter cash would be a much better option then. Simply give yourself enough extra to cover the upgrade costs.

I run into a common bug like this, where, after returning to control a probe after going to the KSP or another ship, I can't turn it despite there being power and a reaction wheel. Reloading can fix it, as can swapping control to another ship and back. Its annoyingly common too...

It is mad to have it so bumpy. But with the current power of basic jets, and late appearance of landing gears, your going to be best off launching early aircraft vertically most of the time.

You start (with no science whatsosver) with the resources to complete all the altitude records, reach orbit, the science from orbit around Kerbin contracts that come available after completing orbit, and with the first tech, Basic Rocketry, most of the good orbital and sub orbital tests (radial and small engines) that come up soon after! I would strongly advise leaving the Kerbin surveys if your new to the game, as they are harder than any of the above to accomplish using rockets!

Some parts tests contracts have immense payouts, I just saw a test LV-1R in orbit of Laythe contract that paid out nearly 400k on hard difficulty, and the same thing for 800-900k at Jool, including the advances. Either could be done for considerably less than 10k using a probe. Combined with science around Laythe for around 230k and your getting serious cash. The same orbital tests seem to have a ludicrous range in their payouts however. Moho, Ike and Duna tend to give laughable returns for the same mission. Temperature or visual scans of bodies lacking an atmosphere tend to easy and pay out crazy amounts, temp scans in particular could done at a similar cost too. The downside of course is that interplanetary missions do take a long time in Kerbal timeframes.

Disclaimer, i've not used mechjeb so I don't know how it works. I do suspect the 170 days is just waiting for the window to open, which is when Duna reaches around 45 degrees ahead of Kerbin. To time accelerate to it, you could go to the tracking station, where you can use max time acceleration as your not controlling any ships. A Kerbol orbit would still need to wait for its own transfer window to open up in order to get there in a reasonable time frame, at a reasonable dV cost. It will also not have Oberth to help in the same way, and would suffer more gravity drag during escape due to the lower escape velocity. It can certainly be done. I did exactly this when I started trying interplanetary transfers, but it does waste a quite lot of fuel.

Unless you really like differential equations I would advise trial and error! A few tips. For altitude record contracts, a single RT-10 Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) placed under a command pod with a parachute can clear the 5, 11, 22 and 33km records. You just need to tweak the fuel quantities to avoid hitting 11km on the first flight, and adjust the thrust limiter to get the rest. With a little A pair of SRB's can get you through the 56km record and reaching space contract with the limiter set low. For parts tests, avoid using SRBs near the test altitudes as the high drag and inability to change thrust makes them difficult to control. Liquids with their in flight throttle are a lot easier to handle! Additionally, the terminal velocity values in the wiki could be useful as they will sometimes line up perfectly with your test requirements. When they do you can overshoot the altitude and drop onto it to achieve your requirements easily, and sometimes at a lower cost. For surveys, again liquid engines are much easier to control. Also useful to know is that 'above' an altitude, like your 15km, includes any altitude above it, meaning it can be done while in orbit.

Contracts already have advance payments. Even on hard, the advances on several contracts types (space science, satellites) will typically be more than enough to cover the costs of the mission. You can also take on further contracts and use the advance from them to cover any deficit in a different contract. I think loans would only really be used to rush upgrade buildings, and nothing else. Taking one out would also, with a time restriction imposed, kind of force the player to grind out contracts.

I've not seen the situation described in the OP before without killing contracts by entering SOIs Though, sometimes the explore contracts don't show up as soon as you clear the prerequisites. Rejecting a few random contracts can fix this.

Rovers Boats for Laythe (having watched Scott Manley it seems radial intakes float nicely!) Mini biome hoppers (something like an external command seat strapped to a small fuel tank and engine) With resource mods, you could probably throw some small extraction and manufacturing facilities together for less than 20 tons.

Too late for me to come up with something specific, but here's some hints that may help you. If you want to go up with 2 pods, then use two Mk1 pods, one piloted the other empty. Mk1-2 pods are really poor right now, three of the starter Mk1's placed on a rocket would handily beat it in weight and cost categories. But you would be much better with an empty pod and a probe core (OKTO, or better yet, QBE), as the cores have far, far lower mass than a whole extra pod. The first ones you get, OX_STAT being the best general purpose ones. Whatever you choose, don't forget to drain the command pod of monopropellant as you will want all the dV you can get (if you don't know how, right click on the pod when designing).

Started a new career and managed a manned landing and return to Minmus with this thing. Cost is just under 9k, and the only part I used that couldn't be built with Survivability was a single Solar Panel, that wasn't strictly necessary. Then I built a rocket for a Mun landing. Which came back with an unacceptably large amount of dV remaining, and at 18.6k it cost too much too! So I took a hatchet to it and came up with this, Its amazing how much cost you can cut while barely impacting the dV. This thing is missing less than 200m/s compared to the original. I intend to get ambitious, and send one to Ike, and a second to Duna. Duna should particularly interesting due to the need for an engineer! Also intend to see if an SRB heavy probe costing 5.5k can reliably land in the Jool system. Duna and back for under 15k would be a massive achievement for me, especially without upgrading the R&D building

People will generally take the easy route.If you can spam incredibly easy missions, that take very little time to complete, and have absurd payouts, then most people will. This is another major problem, having to fiddle around with timewarp in order to rush a planetary window is annoying, boring and goes against the natural drive to get as much as you can get done in as little time as possible.In order to solve it the rate of launches has to be cut, and by a lot. Perhaps the mod that requires time to build rockets has the right idea on this. I disagree on this.It would make perfect sense that the KSC would plan its own, independent science missions, and its perfectly balanced as they would be coming entirely out of the players pocket! Requiring scientists for experiments would make probes 100% worthless, and they are already limited enough as it is. It would also make the early game extremely difficult for those who can't fly without SAS. The real problem with science right now, is the easy, and infinite supply available from repeatable contracts. Once science from those contracts is gone, then biome science can be rebalanced as needed. I would say that this touches on a significant weakness of the game. A serious lack of useful information, and basic tutorials for new players.Once you have the basic idea of how to get into orbit, it becomes very easy, but as there is no tutorial that actually teaches it, it remains a massive obstacle for newcomers. Likewise, once you have even a vague idea about interplanetary windows, such as Duna when its around 45 degrees ahead of Kerbin, Eve when its around 50-60 degrees behind and Jool when its a little over 90 degrees ahead, then it becomes very reasonable to get to these places . Without that knowledge however, getting to any of these places reliably is just baffling!