Career Lite

[Andem]

@SQAUD, can I ask a simple request that you could implement in less than a week? I want to have reputation and contracts in sandbox mode. Simpy allow me to see my rep and take contracts without trudging through early career mode. Please, this would make KSP infinitely better IMHO. I would make it a configureable option, because I know a few people who would disagree with me on that.

[Evanitis]

Umm... why don't you just set all positive looking sliders to the max, while lowering all that has the word 'penalty' in it in a new career? You could unlock the whole tech-tree before even leaving Kerbin... ok, maybe not that soon, but definately on the first Mun landing.

Or you could just open a save file with a text-editor and give yourself 10.000 science or so.

[Andem]

20 minutes ago, Evanitis said:

Umm... why don't you just set all positive looking sliders to the max, while lowering all that has the word 'penalty' in it in a new career? You could unlock the whole tech-tree before even leaving Kerbin... ok, maybe not that soon, but definately on the first Mun landing.

Or you could just open a save file with a text-editor and give yourself 10.000 science or so.

Not all of the mods I have installed work with Career mode (And by don't work, I mean they break the game.), but I still want the contracts and reputation without worrying about funds or science.

[Evanitis]

44 minutes ago, Andem said:

Not all of the mods I have installed work with Career mode (And by don't work, I mean they break the game.)

Just my wild, layman guess here is that if a mod breaks career mode, it will break the sandbox + missions variant too, as the main difference between the two is... well, the missions. Are you sure the authors of the mods in question didn't find a workaround? What mods are these by the way?

[Andem]

17 minutes ago, Evanitis said:

Just my wild, layman guess here is that if a mod breaks career mode, it will break the sandbox + missions variant too, as the main difference between the two is... well, the missions. Are you sure the authors of the mods in question didn't find a workaround? What mods are these by the way?

All of the mods (usually) work, but whenever I try using career it won't let me exit to the main menu, and then the game crashes. after, if I try to enter the save it just crashes the game. Also, I "mod" my mods, removing things I don't need to improve load times, so it becomes increasingly hard to determine. and I have been unable to determine which one, although it works on my KJR-Only game.

[Evanitis]

I feel with you.

In the meanwhile: random mission from a random player - land a plane on Duna. Bonus rep if it can take off and go home after that. Extra science if kerballed.

Edited January 30, 2016 by Evanitis

[Xavven]

Ah, what you want is the Alt-F12 menu. Start a new career, alt-F12 and give yourself a gagillion Funds and Science, unlock the whole tree, and now you've got sandbox with contracts. Problem solved!

[Andem]

3 hours ago, Evanitis said:

I feel with you.

In the meanwhile: random mission from a random player - land a plane on Duna. Bonus rep if it can take off and go home after that. Extra science if kerballed.

Interesting...

39 minutes ago, Xavven said:

Ah, what you want is the Alt-F12 menu. Start a new career, alt-F12 and give yourself a gagillion Funds and Science, unlock the whole tree, and now you've got sandbox with contracts. Problem solved!

Earlier in the thread I stated that some of my mods break career mode, and also, I feel kinda cheaty doing that. It just seems like something I want that would also benefit the stock game. The devs could do it by editing a few lines of code (If I was allowed, I would do it myself), and I just REALLY want it in stock or a mod, even.

[Snark]

I don't see that you've really given Squad any reason to implement a feature like this.  As Xavven points out, just alt-F12 and give yourself unlimited funds and science, and the problem is solved.  You'll have exactly the same gameplay experience that you would if Squad took the time to add the feature you're asking for.  With all the other problems clamoring for their attention, why should Squad take time to implement a feature that the game effectively already has?

When Xavven suggested this, your counterargument as to why this isn't an option was,

2 hours ago, Andem said:

some of my mods break career mode

...well, that's a problem with the mods (or with your manual tinkering with them), not with the game.  It's not Squad's problem if you're running buggy mods.  Have the mod authors fix the problem.  (Or fix it yourself-- most mods post their source code.)

And if the mods are so broken that they crash the game or whatever in career mode, what makes you think that they wouldn't do the same thing if Squad enabled contracts and such in sandbox?  More to the point:  there's no way for Squad to test that, either.  Essentially, you're asking them to make a bunch of code changes that are likely to not even solve the problem that was the reason you wanted the change.

The other reason you gave for not liking Xavven's proposed workaround was

2 hours ago, Andem said:

I feel kinda cheaty doing that.

Why?  It's exactly the same thing.  Essentially you're saying "I feel cheaty pushing a couple of buttons here so I don't have to worry about funds or science.  I'd rather push a couple of buttons there so I don't have to worry about funds or science."  Same thing.  How is it any less of a "cheat" to choose an easy, nerfed career mode that doesn't require you to have funds or science?

And finally,

2 hours ago, Andem said:

The devs could do it by editing a few lines of code

...have you ever worked in commercial software?  It's never "just touch a few lines of code and you're done."  You're asking for a new game mode.  New UI to deal with it.  Testing it in all sorts of configurations.  Maybe testing it with a lot of the most popular mods, too, I don't know how much (if any) of that they do.  There are so many ways that different pieces of UI can interact in a running program that covering all the interactions is a big job.

In short:  it's almost certainly a much bigger ask than you think it is.

 

...Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that your suggestion is a bad idea-- it seems like having a sort of "a la carte" menu for starting a new game would be handy in meeting different players' needs.  ("Do you want science?  Rep & contracts?  Funds?  Building upgrades? Kerbal experience?"  etc.)    Just that it's non-trivial, and I'd guess it's going to be pretty low on Squad's list of priorities.

Edited January 31, 2016 by Snark

[AlamoVampire]

Another random mission from a random player: set up the following at Eeloo, a 4 satellite system in polar orbit as well as an orbital station for 6 to 8 kerbals and a mining and fueling station on the surface with a ferry system to get the processed goods to orbit. 

 

Best of luck

[Andem]

13 minutes ago, Snark said:

I don't see that you've really given Squad any reason to implement a feature like this.  As Xavven points out, just alt-F12 and give yourself unlimited funds and science, and the problem is solved.  You'll have exactly the same gameplay experience that you would if Squad took the time to add the feature you're asking for.  With all the other problems clamoring for their attention, why should Squad take time to implement a feature that the game effectively already has?

When Xavven suggested this, your counterargument as to why this isn't an option was,

...well, that's a problem with the mods (or with your manual tinkering with them), not with the game.  It's not Squad's problem if you're running buggy mods.  Have the mod authors fix the problem.  (Or fix it yourself-- most mods post their source code.)

And if the mods are so broken that they crash the game or whatever in career mode, what makes you think that they wouldn't do the same thing if Squad enabled contracts and such in sandbox?  More to the point:  there's no way for Squad to test that, either.  Essentially, you're asking them to make a bunch of code changes that are likely to not even solve the problem that was the reason you wanted the change.

The other reason you gave for not liking Xavven's proposed workaround was

Why?  It's exactly the same thing.  Essentially you're saying "I feel cheaty pushing a couple of buttons here so I don't have to worry about funds or science.  I'd rather push a couple of buttons there so I don't have to worry about funds or science."  Same thing.  How is it any less of a "cheat" to choose an easy, nerfed career mode that doesn't require you to have funds or science?

And finally,

...have you ever worked in commercial software?  It's never "just touch a few lines of code and you're done."  You're asking for a new game mode.  New UI to deal with it.  Testing it in all sorts of configurations.  Maybe testing it with a lot of the most popular mods, too, I don't know how much (if any) of that they do.  There are so many ways that different pieces of UI can interact in a running program that covering all the interactions is a big job.

In short:  it's almost certainly a much bigger ask than you think it is.

 

...Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that your suggestion is a bad idea-- it seems like having a sort of "a la carte" menu for starting a new game would be handy in meeting different players' needs.  ("Do you want science?  Rep & contracts?  Funds?  Building upgrades? Kerbal experience?"  etc.)    Just that it's non-trivial, and I'd guess it's going to be pretty low on Squad's list of priorities.

I do understand that my personal issue is that with mods and (probably) my screwing around with them. I just thought that others might be able to appreciate those options being on the surface, even if it's only a cosmetic difference to most. And to answer your question, no I have not worked in commercial software, but it really depends on how you structured the code (at least when I have written programs, that may be different in the commercial setting, I don't really have a clear idea of how that would be different as far as modifying the code is concerned).

[Snark]

7 minutes ago, Andem said:

I just thought that others might be able to appreciate those options being on the surface, even if it's only a cosmetic difference to most.

Yes, and that's a good point.  Certainly it's a "cleaner" user experience to be able to choose more career options up front.  No argument with you there! 

8 minutes ago, Andem said:

And to answer your question, no I have not worked in commercial software, but it really depends on how you structured the code (at least when I have written programs, that may be different in the commercial setting, I don't really have a clear idea of how that would be different as far as modifying the code is concerned).

Because if UI is involved, nothing is ever trivial.  Being in a commercial setting doesn't make the code any harder to write-- but it raises the bar considerably in terms of the amount of polish you need to put on it, and the amount of QA you need to do before shipping.  And it's a royal pain in the posterior if you miss something and then have to push out a patch afterwards.

I'm not saying what you're asking for would be nightmarishly difficult for Squad to implement-- certainly I'd think it would be a lot simpler than, for example, the telemetry stuff that RoverDude is adding for 1.1.  Just that it's not a "gimme."  I wouldn't be surprised to see Squad get around to some feature like what you're asking for, eventually-- they do have a pretty good track record of making incremental improvements to the game over time, and what you're asking for is a pretty logical progression from what we have now.

Just that it's got to compete with a bunch of other potential features, and given that there's a pretty easy workaround right now, I'd guess it would be fairly low on the priority list.  I know I certainly have a long wishlist of features I'd like to see happen first. 

[Andem]

48 minutes ago, Snark said:

Yes, and that's a good point.  Certainly it's a "cleaner" user experience to be able to choose more career options up front.  No argument with you there! 

Because if UI is involved, nothing is ever trivial.  Being in a commercial setting doesn't make the code any harder to write-- but it raises the bar considerably in terms of the amount of polish you need to put on it, and the amount of QA you need to do before shipping.  And it's a royal pain in the posterior if you miss something and then have to push out a patch afterwards.

I'm not saying what you're asking for would be nightmarishly difficult for Squad to implement-- certainly I'd think it would be a lot simpler than, for example, the telemetry stuff that RoverDude is adding for 1.1.  Just that it's not a "gimme."  I wouldn't be surprised to see Squad get around to some feature like what you're asking for, eventually-- they do have a pretty good track record of making incremental improvements to the game over time, and what you're asking for is a pretty logical progression from what we have now.

Just that it's got to compete with a bunch of other potential features, and given that there's a pretty easy workaround right now, I'd guess it would be fairly low on the priority list.  I know I certainly have a long wishlist of features I'd like to see happen first. 

Yeah, I can see how getting a simple feature to a respectable state can be a serious challenge, even with smaller things. I also don't expect it to be implemented in the next cycle of updates either, as they have a lot to work on with the current systems for 1.1.

[Wjolcz]

And That's why I cheated my way through the tech tree and upgraded the whole KSC, and now I'm left with money and rep to worry about. The tech tree isn't really that fun to unlock. Should be more like in RO where you pay for the tech to be researched instead of paying with science gathered.

Edited January 31, 2016 by Veeltch