Learning Curve

[bradwiggo]

Does this game have a difficult learning curve, for example, how long will it be before I am building moon bases and space stations?

[Choctofliatrio2.0]

It has a somewhat difficult learning curve. It depends on what you are trying to do. It takes some time to get into orbit, and from there, it takes careful planning. I'd recommend just taking risks and seeing where it can get you.

Moon bases and space stations would probably take some time, because docking is hard, but it just gives you a goal to work towards.

[Red Iron Crown]

Welcome aboard, bradwiggo!

The learning curve can feel a bit steep at first. The basic skills you should work on mastering:

1. Getting to orbit
2. Reentering safely
3. Rendezvous
4. Docking
5. Transfers to Kerbin's moons and returning
6. Landing
7. Transfers to and from other planets

Once you have those down you can do basically anything in KSP. Worth your time to check out some tutorials if you get stuck, you can find a good listing here: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/26220-the-drawing-board-a-library-of-tutorials-and-other-useful-information/

[Hupf]

 

The learning curve is moderately steep, but not frustrating. It will take a very long time however until you "know" KSP or even get to building moon bases as you mentioned.

First steps are: fly vessels that don't explode, get into space, get into orbit, get stuff done in orbit (more complex vessels!), get to the Mun, land on the Mun, practice docking with other craft, ...

[Starhawk]

Somebody once said "KSP doesn't have a learning curve,,, it's more like a learning wall."

But that's half the fun.   I'm still climbing that learning wall.

Happy landings!

[Rocket In My Pocket]

I would say that there is a lot of trial and error involved in learning KSP so it really depends if you enjoy that type of gameplay or not.

As far as a time frame I think it varys heavily per person, some people play for years and never leave Kerbin, others play for months and are already visiting the furthest planets. Depends on what your interested in doing/building really!

The learning curve is as steep or as subtle as you want to make it in my opinion.

[Tex_NL]

"KSP doesn't have a learning curve. It has a learning wall."

How soon you will be doing certain things or how long it will take you to learn other things is entirely up to you. There simply is no guarantee you will have mastered a given set of skills after so many of hours.
There are people here on the forum that have been playing the game for ages and have visited most planets and moons but still have trouble with rendezvous and docking. Others barely started and take to it like a duck to water.

Best advice I can give you is to just try it and have fun. Browse the web and forum for tutorials and knowledge. If you want to use mods, use mods. If you don't want to use mods, don't. How you play the game is entirely up to you. DON'T let other people tell you how you should play the game!

[One-Way Films]

I hated the game after my first week of playing. I had the same goals as you;

I wanted to build massive bases and massive-er stations and would do it all easy-peasy lemon squeezy. I was wrong and I'm glad I was wrong. 

I threw the game aside in rage after my first week of playing. "It's too hard" I said to myself. "Who'd want to play that?!"

 

After watching it sit there in my Steam Library for a month, I eventually set myself some basic goals that I collected from a variety of Scott Manley videos:

1. Learn to launch reliably
2. Learn to orbit Kerbin
3. Learn to get to Muner orbit and return
4. Learn to land on the Mun.
5. Learn to return from the Muns' surface.
6. Learn to dock

And here I am. Playing the game for 3 years, I think. T'is a learning cliff but the view's amazing from the top.

[bradwiggo]

is this game fun when you aren't an expert?

[Fearless Son]

25 minutes ago, bradwiggo said:

Does this game have a difficult learning curve, for example, how long will it be before I am building moon bases and space stations?

The curve is quite steep, but this is a game that rewards persistence and a willingness to endure failure for the sake of learning.  It is pretty light on the hand-holding, and largely dumps you into the shallow end of a big pool and lets you figure out how to swim from there.  

Some people might recommend you start with the sandbox for maximum freedom, but personally I find the freedom a bit too overwhelming at first.  I would recommend career mode first because it limits what you can do in the beginning, which gives you a chance to build up a few concepts before you can start seeking more ambitious goals.  

[Red Iron Crown]

4 minutes ago, bradwiggo said:

is this game fun when you aren't an expert?

I found it so. Just making rockets that fail in amusing ways can be a good bit of fun.  

[One-Way Films]

8 minutes ago, bradwiggo said:

is this game fun when you aren't an expert?

It is. It's a rewarding experience during the learning process. I remember the first time I made orbit well because of the feeling of achievement that the game provides. 

And even if you can't get to orbit straight away, you can build planes, boats and rovers and drive them around Kerbin. A guy named Wookie drove around the home planet of Kerbin. Another guy named Danny2462 destroys the universe from the comfort of the KSC (the Kerbal Space Center, the beginning of every journey you'll make). I can't really explain his videos through the medium of text, so browse his library of videos here (his channel)

Edited December 16, 2015 by One-Way Films
Spelling mistakes :P

[bradwiggo]

Is it possible to learn this game by only playing it and doing the tutorials, no looking things up on the internet?

And does it have fiddly controls?

[Starhawk]

5 minutes ago, bradwiggo said:

is this game fun when you aren't an expert?

In my experience, yes!

Every single experienced player here started as a complete rookie.  We all found it fun enough to pursue.  Many of us long-term.

Happy landings!

[bradwiggo]

1 minute ago, Starhawk said:

In my experience, yes!

Every single experienced player here started as a complete rookie.  We all found it fun enough to pursue.  Many of us long-term.

Happy landings!

I never know what any of the parts do, is that easy to learn, and does the career mode guide you through the game?

[One-Way Films]

Just now, bradwiggo said:

I never know what any of the parts do, is that easy to learn, and does the career mode guide you through the game?

The career mode does help a bunch. You start small and work your way up. Answering your question about learning the game through the in-game tutorials, yes. You can learn the basics without looking at a single video online. A friend of mine (who I've gotten to look at KSP) is using the tutorials and she's really improving as a result. As far as I know, she hasn't looked at a tutorial on youtube at all.

[Starhawk]

1 minute ago, bradwiggo said:

I never know what any of the parts do, is that easy to learn, and does the career mode guide you through the game?

Career mode helped me a lot with that.  At the beginning, you have access to only a few parts so it's easy to learn what they are and what they do.
New parts are unlocked gradually as you advance through the tech tree.  This makes it much less overwhelming than starting a brand new sandbox game with all those choices, but no knowledge to base decisions on.

Happy landings!

11 minutes ago, bradwiggo said:

Is it possible to learn this game by only playing it and doing the tutorials, no looking things up on the internet?

And does it have fiddly controls?

OK. I missed this post earlier.

You will definitely want outside references of various types at your fingertips when learning the game.  The tutorials have recently been updated, and I am unfamiliar with their current state, but I am certain that you will want to use various resources from outside the game to learn how to play.. One of the most valuable is this forum.  There is always the KSP Wiki.  Also youtube.

Happy landings!

[MrOsterman]

I would say that you can do SOMEthings without tutorials but there is a lot of information that is available in the game without mods that if you don't read through the tutorials and you don't watch YouTube videos you're going to miss.  I tried a few times to do an orbital rendevous and it was a hot mess the first 3 times.

I watched one video on how to read the gimbal and how to change targets in space and now docking is pretty much a breeze. 

I've looked up a lot but that's also how I play games; I like to research ideas, builds, advice when I'm not playing.

[Randazzo]

29 minutes ago, bradwiggo said:

Is it possible to learn this game by only playing it and doing the tutorials, no looking things up on the internet?

And does it have fiddly controls?

It's not an ultra-precise simulator, but it does rely on certain bits of rocket science and orbital mechanics. If you know nothing about either, you'll probably have a hard time getting started. Though I have not done a tutorial since 0.90, they may cover more aspects of getting to orbit now.

It's still amazing fun, and I've not gone a week without playing for nearly a year now. No other game has ever held my interest for this long.

Edited December 16, 2015 by Randazzo

[Scotius]

This one looks just about right. (Just joking It's not nearly so bad.)

[Terwin]

Watching Scot Manley KSP videos on Youtube helped me immensely, but you may need to be careful about how old they are, as some things(like aerodynamics) have changed

[Matt77]

33 minutes ago, bradwiggo said:

is this game fun when you aren't an expert?

The most fun I ever had in KSP was my first Mun landing.  The landing was more of a "crash", but the pod was intact.  I didn't know about quicksave at that time so I mounted a rescue mission.  I spent every evening for the next week working on a rescue mission, and without quicksave I was painstakingly testing every part of the mission with test flights.  The rescue was a success (although the lander was too tall and toppled over!  I got it upright again and WALKED the stranded kerbal 5km to the rescue ship, as I didn't know about the jetpack either!!)

Nowadays I just hold F9 down for a few seconds and try again.  Although I did allow Jeb to die the other day and take two rescuees with him, that was a major hit to my current space program.  He should have packed more ablative.

26 minutes ago, bradwiggo said:

Is it possible to learn this game by only playing it and doing the tutorials, no looking things up on the internet?

And does it have fiddly controls?

No, unless you're already a rocket scientist you'll need help.  I never did the tutorials but I did have an interest in space before, and I knew that orbit isn't up - it's actually falling in such a way that you keep missing the ground.  Getting two ships to rendezvous is VERY counter-intuitive, and until I got the Docking Port Alignment mod it was almost impossible to actually dock.

Nowadays all the above is child's play, but I use mods for knowing my delta-v, thrust to weight, docking alignment, landing site prediction, precise manoeuvre nodes, and calculating planetary transfers.  This is balanced by the realism mods I use to make the game harder in other ways.

The controls are ok for rockets.  For aircraft, it's fiddly.  Hard to fly with keyboard, and joystick support is so patchy you really need the Advanced Fly-By-Wire mod which enables joysticks (imho), but I tend to forget to switch it off after crashing the aircraft and then spend half an hour wondering why my rocket won't fly with keyboard controls...

[Red Iron Crown]

Merged duplicate topics.

[Hannu2]

1 hour ago, bradwiggo said:

is this game fun when you aren't an expert?

In my opinion this game was most fun when I made things first time. I had some theoretical knowledge about orbital mechanics but I had to learn how to do maneuvers in practice and how things work in KSP. I avoided videos and tutorials before I have done thing.

Now playing is more routine run to collect tech, science and flag all bodies. I know what kind of ship or maneuver is needed for every purpose (except when they change aerodynamics). Maneuver are so boring than I use MechJeb to calculate and execute them. Therefore I hope that there will be procedurally generated exploration system to give possibilities to find out new things. But there is some fascinating in orbital mechanics, planning of missions and building spacecraft. It get me start a new game again and again after couple of weeks or months break.

[Pecan]

1 hour ago, bradwiggo said:

Is it possible to learn this game by only playing it and doing the tutorials, no looking things up on the internet?

And does it have fiddly controls?

No (but see below).

Yes.

Career mode adds ALL sorts of complications that you really, really don't want if you're learning what the parts do.  Start with science mode, where you have similar part-restrictions but don't have to worry about money, reputation and - especially - (mission) contracts.

The first thing you'll want to learn is how to launch and get to space.  You can do that with the tutorials, but getting to orbit, so you stay in space is much harder.  You will need to practice and will probably want to read more about what a 'gravity turn' is and what 'apoapsis', 'periapsis', 'prograde' and other terms mean.  At a guess, you can be in space within a few minutes if you want to but you'll have no idea how and will fall back down spectacularly (which can be fun too!).  Expect getting to space in a controlled way you understand to take at least an hour or two, getting to orbit reliably several hours to a couple of days - game time.  Do NOT expect failure at this point - define your goals as 'learn a bit more before I crash this time', that way the only way to fail is by not learning anything :-)

Next is building your own vehicles instead of using the stock ones (which are fairly bad).  Again, the tutorials will get you started and making monstrous craft is only minutes away.  You'll probably be able to build rockets that fly reasonably well within a few hours but the finer points of staging, building any sort of 'plane and optimising for payload-delivery, minimum-fuel or whatever will keep you occupied for years, if you're into engineering.  Expect many, many launch-failures (try not to put the parachutes in the same stage as your main engine - we've all done it) but also expect to learn a huge amount about how a rocket (or 'plane, if you play a space-simulator to fly aircraft) actually works.  Isp, deltaV and TWR are the phrases to learn for design.

Once you can build and fly a ship to orbit, the next challenge is landing safely.  Landing can be dead easy on Kerbin (parachutes) or just dead (re-entry heating or 'lithobraking' which is joke-jargon for 'stopping by hitting the ground').  On vacuum bodies like Kerbin's moons it takes a bit more practice but is not awful.  Four or five attempts, if you have an idea of what you're doing, should get you down alive.  What is there not fun about falling 70km in a ball of fire?  The important thing for your sanity - and not having to start all over again - is quicksave and quickload in orbit so you can just practice the descent.

For most people rendezvous and docking are the last major challenge.  They take a bit more understanding of orbital mechanics than most people have and it took NASA a while to work it all out.  On the other hand - NASA didn't have the benefit of playing KSP for days (or weeks) in order to get all that understanding.  Every one of us probably has more computer power sat on their desks/laps than NASA had in total in the 50s/60s.  Practice!  And if that doesn't do it for you, you'll be looking at mods by now so install MechJeb and let if autopilot for you.

The thing is, you learn all these things as you progress, at your own pace.  Some failures are fun in themselve, some you learn from and, yes, some are frustrating.  Every success feels great though!  Especially your first 'Aha' moment when you understand how to get to orbit, your first moon-landing (Minmus is MUCH easier than Mun), your first docking/station and your first interplanetary.

Depending on the person I'd say:

• someone who can master KSP in a week will be bored of it in two
• someone who doesn't want to spend a month learning as they progress will not stick with KSP
• someone who enjoys doing new, and hard, things and is willing to learn and practice can be 'competent-to-good' in, very roughly, a month
• Everyone still crashes sometimes

For your originals questions - Moonbase in a couple of days (for a given value of 'base'), spacestations in a week, if you really want and have an apptitude for it.  Fairly good ones in a month.  Perfect ones, never.
You will make everything much harder for yourself if you don't use external sources of information.