Would anyone be interested in limited science from bodies?

[Kielm]

I'm toying with an idea for a mod that would limit the available science from a given body. Specifically, it would take the amount of science required to complete a tree (e.g. 50,000), multiply by x, and divide that number up between celestial bodies based on their wiki science multipliers. So minus might end up with a total available science of 2,000.

 

Once you've hit the maximum allocation for a body, its science multiplier would be reduced to say, 0.1x. No more significant science returns from that body, time to move along.

 

The idea is to encourage exploration, and discourage farming a tech tree's worth of science from 1-2 planets (something I always end up doing).

 

Upside: you'd have to explore more

Downside: bases and stations lose value for science processing (I'm unsure if I can exempt labs from the limit), and it may hinder science mods a little.

 

Thoughts?

[Sharpy]

Well, if you're asking for thoughts - I wouldn't install it.

My personal opinion: the game begins "for real" once the tech tree is completed.

Instead, I'd love a mod with more, better goals. Something to exist in parallel with the current, purely commercial contracts - a special research program where you need to actually pay (big!) science points to take up the missions and they build up towards a more complex research.

[Hodari]

9 hours ago, Sharpy said:

Instead, I'd love a mod with more, better goals.

Yeah, much better to make a mod that ADDS something to the gameplay rather than taking it away.  If someone actually wants to explore all the planets for science instead of just farming one place, they don't need a mod for that.  They can just...do it.  Having a mod that actually adds a reason to go to the other planets would be good though.

[Streetwind]

Honestly this doesn't require a new mod. A MM patch that reduces science multipliers to half or even a third across the board would have largely the same effect.

[Yemo]

That sounds like a great idea!

 

Is it possible to use diminishing returns instead of a hard cap?

For example the first experiment while "landed on the mun" gives full reward. The second landed on mun (in a different biome) gives 80%, the third one 64% and so on. Each "same body, same situation, but different biome" provides only 80% compared to the one before.

More complex to implement, but soft caps feel more "natural" than hard caps in this instance and leave the player with a series of relevant choices along the line instead of a sharp cut-off.

Edited November 9, 2016 by Yemo

[paul23]

Actually I'm only seeing "KSP & minmus" as big offenders. If science yield of those two places can be reduced it would be great.

 

Though the idea of "exponential decay" on same type-different biome researches I actually think is amazing (so long as it's not a hard cap). -  In the same breath I would like to see also a "multiplier" for "difficult" biomes, special biomes where special experiments yield a bonus (independent of reduction) science.

[Thygrrr]

I would love a mod like this. With a more spread out tech tree (community TT?) so Progress can be a bit more gradual I would play the hell out of it.

Also a nerf to MPLs, maybe a modest 5x to 10x nerf