Animals in Kerbal Space Progam

[Donterrio]

Hey guys, I came up with a suggestion of adding animals in Kerbal Space Program

How to get animals:

The first way to get animals is click on astronaut complex and at the top left corner, there's a hire animal button!****

The second way is accepting a contract that require's you to get animals to a specific destination!*

Animal Capsule:

This is where the animals go! There are two kind of capsules:

One is a cylinder shaped capsule and the other one is a cone shaped capsule, both of them have small radial size and have 5 monopropellant and 50 electric power! Please note that they are not able to control the ship so put a probe core on the capsule!

Animals:

There a 3 animals to choose from:

Dogs**:

Dogs are the least expensive animals to hire and are usually light green with yellow spots!***

They cost 20,000 funds to hire and recovering it from orbit gives you 10 science!

Cats**:

Cats are cute furry felines that are usually brown covered in green spots!***

They cost 40,000 funds to hire and recovering it from orbit gives you 30 science!

Monkeys**:

Monkeys are furry animals that are red and there the most expensive animals you can hire!

They cost 60,000 funds to hire and recovering it from orbit gives you 50 science!

Hope you like my suggestion!

*You will need to unlock the animal capsule in the tech tree

**Those names will be "kerbalized"

***They can come in different colors

****You will need to upgrade the astronaut complex to level 2 and you can only hire 3 animals!

Edited May 29, 2015 by Donterrio

[Grumman]

This seems like the kind of thing that would work better in a life support mod. I imagine they'd use less resources than a Kerbal but be more expendable, and produce recoverable science only as long as they don't run out of life support any time before they are returned to Kerbin - otherwise you only get the transmittable portion.

[r4pt0r]

While I like the idea of replicating early space missions before we had the know how to do human flights, for gameplay purposes its just extra science equipment, nothing that a probe core couldnt do.

Plus I would post some just horrifying animal murder-tower to crush the VAB.

[sumghai]

Animals such as the large mammals the OP mentioned would only be useful in early missions, where they would be used to test life support systems as well as physiological responses to the rigours of spaceflight. Once the necessary knowledge has been obtained for use with humanoid Kerbals, however, these large mammals become practically useless (Sending a Kerbpig to Jool offers no more data than sending a Kerbpig to LKO).

Smaller animals such as mice and insects would be more practical as experiments for mid-to-late game missions, but I suspect that they would be integrated inside a pressurized crew compartment that Kerbals would be able to access/observe easily (i.e the Mobile Processing Lab).

tl;dr - I personally feel that animals as the OP proposed have extremely limited utility in the overall scope of the game.

[Murph]

The proposed pigs are too expensive. I want to strap them into an external command seat during re-entry, for a crispy bacon roll after landing. Probably need a radial attach sauce dispenser as well.

Seriously though, while I like the idea of more types of science, more things to do in career, etc, I see a problem with this. It has to be capped, or people would just have an endless stream of flying pigs to max out the science tree. So, that's a whole load of implementation effort for possibly not so much use. Taking them to other SoIs, biomes, etc, I'm not sure if that really makes sense for a zero g animal study. Not saying it's a totally crazy idea and shouldn't be done, only that a lot of thought needs to go into how to do it in a way that isn't any of:

1) A 1 shot or 2 shot deal, then never used again

2) Pay 80k and get 40 science, repeat until tree unlocked

3) Completely fake and unrealistic to prevent abuse

4) Completely fake and unrealistic to provide an ongoing purpose

Edited May 25, 2015 by Murph

[kerbiloid]

There is a KSP pony. It's alive, just not moving.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/91835-Reliant-Robin-and-Pinkie-Pie

There could be missions "Deliver a mascot krokodile to the Jool-2 orbital station".

Also there was a chicken in some old science parts pack. Fried a little, but this doesn't matter.

Edited May 25, 2015 by kerbiloid

[McPoisoned]

I like the idea of killing pigs instead of Kerbals hehe

[Dooz]

Ethical issues might be a concern with people posting animal murder towers as r4pt0r said.

Mabye the kerbal equivalent of a animal rights group will make your agency look bad and you lose a large amount of reputation if you kill animals, the higher the reputation you have the more you lose if you kill animals.

Like a notification pops up saying.

(ARGname) thinks your space agency is treating animals wrongly! -randomnumber% reputation from total reputation

Edited May 27, 2015 by Dooz

[Rocketfeline]

I only feel like monkeys,Cats,And dogs on it. I doubt a pig can fly into space

[KrazyKrl]

I believe there are already animals in KSP, and they are used for testing already. Who's to say what is, or is not, a Kerbin animal?

The mystery goo seems quite judgmental at times, doesn't it?

[Murph]

I only feel like monkeys,Cats,And dogs on it. I doubt a pig can fly into space

Other than size and weight, and keeping it from getting distressed and/or destroying the capsule, I don't see why a pig can't go into space. They are commonly used as human analogs in science and medicine, due to the conveniently similar size and physiology.

Oh, and there is precedent for space pigs from other sources:

;-)

Historically, a flying pig named Algie has even been tracked up to 30,000ft on approach to London Heathrow. ;-)

[Donterrio]

Removed pig, Added monkey!

[DSKY]

I only feel like monkeys,Cats,And dogs on it. I doubt a pig can fly into space

[thereaverofdarkness]

and here I thought Kerbals were supposed to be chimpanzee analogs. Occasionally I feel like a rocket of mine is safe enough to put in crew who aren't expendable!

[Sky_walker]

I think we should have a long Size 3 capsule with vertically enclosed elephant.

Weight: 13.5t

Impact tolerance: 5m/s

Base unlock cost: 70000

Base part price: 17000

There. Done.

[michaelsteele3]

Let's make an equation, why not?

S=Science

C=Cost

A=Animal

For Dogs: C=20,000a Total Science Earned: 10

For Cats: C=40,000a Total Science Earned: 20

For Monkeys: C=60,000a Total Science Earned: 30

I wouldn't really pay 60K funds for 30 science points :/

[kerbiloid]

+ presence of a Cat increases data transmission speed 10x, because "the Internet is for Cats".

[Kuu Lightwing]

+ presence of a Cat increases data transmission speed 10x, because "the Internet is for Cats".

No, you just get 10x reputation for the mission if a cat is there

But if it didn't get back alive, you lose 10x reputation, too!

[Donterrio]

Raised the science provided by cats and monkeys!

Edited May 29, 2015 by Donterrio
Fixed grammar!

[Slam_Jones]

I could be wrong, but I recall reading that the "mystery goo" container used to contain a small critter, which would be exposed to the vacuum of space and observed (for science!)

I guess a lot of people found this 'cruel' and 'offensive,' so it was changed to it's current form.

[RuBisCO]

Why not somekind of distinkly kerbal animal? Heck why not a Tribble?

[Murph]

Why not somekind of distinkly kerbal animal? Heck why not a Tribble?

Tribbles are almost certainly copyright and trademark Paramount/CBS. I've certainly seen Tribble merchandise in the past, which I'm fairly sure was an official licensed product. Prior to the CBS takeover of Paramount, it would have been less of an issue, but CBS have reportedly been behaving in a much tougher way over Trek rights. I don't think it would be in Squad's best interests to try to license the use of them, when they could most likely just invent something suitable themselves.

[RuBisCO]

Tribbles are almost certainly copyright and trademark Paramount/CBS. I've certainly seen Tribble merchandise in the past, which I'm fairly sure was an official licensed product. Prior to the CBS takeover of Paramount, it would have been less of an issue, but CBS have reportedly been behaving in a much tougher way over Trek rights. I don't think it would be in Squad's best interests to try to license the use of them, when they could most likely just invent something suitable themselves.

Easy solution: we call them "kibles" and make them diffrent shades of green.

[hieywiey]

Cats can't handle microgravity as their "always landing on their feet" instinct kicks in. See here:

[Whirligig Girl]

Sending cats into space is inhumane, they feel like they're falling but have no wind rushing by them They think it's scary to be in a car. It's far worse in freefall.

- - - Updated - - -

I could be wrong, but I recall reading that the "mystery goo" container used to contain a small critter, which would be exposed to the vacuum of space and observed (for science!)

I guess a lot of people found this 'cruel' and 'offensive,' so it was changed to it's current form.

It's always been mystery goo. But that doesn't mean the goo isn't alive!