Are the life support mods like usi actually challenging now?

[paul23]

In the past (v1.2-1.3) I've played ksp quite a lot, however one thing that always struck me: was that it was way way too easy to complete missions without thought. I could at any stage just accept any mission and never have any repercussion due to missions failing. It was trivially easy to make a profit of any mission and we never had to be "clever" and "combine missions" to cut expenses.

 

This was mainly due to our unlimited time: so I combatted this by adding life support mods (TAC & USI), as well as kerbal construction time. Combined with remote tech & the various realism mods. However even with these it was quite easy to lift off and reach space and after just a few initial bumps you can basically do anything you want without challenge, once you can launch a permanent base it's all trivial again.

 

Are there any mods that add some difficulty to the latter part of the game (post Mun/Minmus exploration)? Or is there a life support mod that makes also missions harder so that we have to do other transfer orbits than hohman transfer orbit just to 'be in time'? 

[Dante80]

Kerbal Health makes you think a little more about both your roster and your mission planning and ship building.

Another way to up the challenge (or at least the complexity) a bit would be to move to RSS.

In the end though, this is a single player game, where you are the sole fiduciary of your own playing experience. One of the most satisfying things when using a sandbox game like KSP is to be able to set your own challenges and limitations, and surpass them. Or to take on the myriad creative challenges that the community has produced over the years.

[paul23]

Yeah setting own goals is indeed "something": however having a good challenge->reward system helps a lot. Just setting idle goals which do not progress my space agency is boring after some time, on top of that all goals I set (build a fully self sufficient base on eve, where dock and launch vehicles) were trivially easy. So I tried doing that with "base" materials, still easy except for my computer which then had 2-8 frames per second. (This made me actually quit).

 

That made me thinking: "what if there are indeed advanced elements like we have here, but they are just not that good compared to the first rockets, just providing a bit more thrust or specific impulse, yet weighting equally more". So that to reach end goals I need to take the heavier elements (fewer parts), however those elements actually make it *more difficult* to reach orbit/get enough delta v.

I tried implementing it myself, but was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of updates for the module manager.

[goldenpsp]

Why not take a look at the current versions and see what their current features are.  For example USI-LS is fully configurable in terms of LS and habitation as well as penalties (death or no death).

[theJesuit]

3 hours ago, paul23 said:

In the past (v1.2-1.3) I've played ksp quite a lot, however one thing that always struck me: was that it was way way too easy to complete missions without thought. I could at any stage just accept any mission and never have any repercussion due to missions failing. It was trivially easy to make a profit of any mission and we never had to be "clever" and "combine missions" to cut expenses.

 

This was mainly due to our unlimited time: so I combatted this by adding life support mods (TAC & USI), as well as kerbal construction time. Combined with remote tech & the various realism mods. However even with these it was quite easy to lift off and reach space and after just a few initial bumps you can basically do anything you want without challenge, once you can launch a permanent base it's all trivial again.

 

Are there any mods that add some difficulty to the latter part of the game (post Mun/Minmus exploration)? Or is there a life support mod that makes also missions harder so that we have to do other transfer orbits than hohman transfer orbit just to 'be in time'? 

Kerbalism.  Also, in the next version of kerbalism the issues that it has had around high time warp will be fixed. 

Kerbalism includes stress, radiation, part breakdowns, the next version will include part breakdowns on engines.  You lose some resource needed if you EVA.

Peace.

 

[JadeOfMaar]

@paul23 KSP is at its core a rocket builder game with the use of "science points" and its own form of in-game currency to drive its progression systems. The kerbals give soul to the game but little else, I think, so matters of life support, socialism and the individual's mental faculty are out of its scope (unlike The Sims and every RTS game out there where the population and not the physics, are at the core of the game).

As previous folks have pointed at, what you're looking for include habitation mods (these increase the mortality of, and add mental and social needs to the kerbal) and part failure mods (what it says on the tin). Habitation is separate from life support so to be clear, most life support mods are not also habitation mods.

Life support:

• Kerbalism (Effectively TAC with extra resources and situations for them wrapped around it, namely the uses of Ammonia and radiation shielding materials.)
• USI (Two resources in (EC + Supplies), one resource out (Mulch). Allows death.)
• TAC (Three resources in, three resources out. Allows death.)
• Snacks! (Is even more easy mode and simplified than USI but allows death.)
• Air! (Part of Snacks!. Can operate standalone.)

Habitation:

• Kerbalism (features availability of crewed space, cabin pressure and resource loss, loneliness and mental degradation, atrophy in microgravity, space radiation and solar flares.)
• USI (features availability of crewed space per kerbal, time spent in differing ships affects mental degradation, ability to toggle
• Kerbal Health (features availability of crewed space per kerbal, loneliness, atrophy in microgravity, space radiation, random illness and outbreaks/quarantine, social chemistry between crewmen. )
• Stress! (Part of Snacks!. Can operate standalone. features stress buildup from [microgravity, starvation, suffocation, loneliness, no homeworld connection], random illness.)

Part failure:

• Kerbalism
• BARIS! (also produces random events where your space program directly experiences gains or losses including: new hires, sudden profits, budget cuts, political swings, ragequits, deaths, breakthroughs...But it's in hard mode by default and very configurable.)
• DangIt!
• Oh Scrap! (Requires ScrapYard)

Un-rapid planned assembly:

• KCT
• ScrapYard (superior inventory system to that of KCT)

Edited October 3, 2019 by JadeOfMaar

[JadeOfMaar]

4 hours ago, paul23 said:

That made me thinking: "what if there are indeed advanced elements like we have here, but they are just not that good compared to the first rockets, just providing a bit more thrust or specific impulse, yet weighting equally more". So that to reach end goals I need to take the heavier elements (fewer parts), however those elements actually make it *more difficult* to reach orbit/get enough delta v.

I tried implementing it myself, but was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of updates for the module manager.

What you described sounds like alcohol rocketry and ammonia rocketry, past and inferior means vs what we have now (hydrogen and methane rocketry). Unfortunately I don't think there's any mod that makes these a thing in-game (apart from Realism Overhaul which is far too much of a game changer for your needs).

What you may be looking for includes:

• For the early game: more 1.25m parts, preferably with MonoPropellant or SolidFuel engines (perhaps "Streamline" and MOLE);
• For the mid-game: parts that focus on Hydrogen and Methane such as Nertea's Cryogenic Engines, NF Launch Vehicles (part of the NF Tech suite), and mods that enable/encourage cryo-fueled rocketry: CryoTanks (bundled with Cryogenic Engines) and Rational Resources which, in itself, adds some of that fat you mentioned, onto the MM cache and tries to reduce the dependence on Ore and LiquidFuel.

 

4 hours ago, Dante80 said:

Another way to up the challenge (or at least the complexity) a bit would be to move to RSS.

Raising your planetary scale may be very necessary as well. I wouldn't push for real-scale, though, just up to 2.5x, or 2.7x (quarter real-scale) where stock parts are said by many to be perfectly balanced and SSTO spaceplanes are no longer insultingly easy. At this scale it's refreshing but not yet overwhelming to have to reconsider dV requirements to get anywhere, and hydrogen engines start to show their worth. Stepping up to real-scale only makes dV calculation and time expenditure a major issue, but once that is conquered, the original problem of "things becoming easy once a permanent base is deployed" returns.

Edited October 3, 2019 by JadeOfMaar

[paul23]

I'll be looking into rss once that gets updated to 1.7(.3). The fact that I could reach orbit with just about any scrap parts, and land on minmus/mun with just a swivel is part of why I don't see much challenge in the base game.

 

But the main axes I was looking at is "time": I think adding time as a true difficulty makes the game more fun/exciting: make it so that there are very lucrative contracts. However to complete these you need to quickly build something (kct), or you need to rescue someone before their life support runs out... I've tried adding time in the form of kct+scrapyard and a life support. As well as remote tech (to not just ignore kerbals).

 

I'm not really sure I like a random failures mod. I don't like the idea of very fundamental parts failing at critical moments (I'd be happy with failures during orbit which can be recovered from, but if a parachute can fail it just means I slap twice as many parachutes, increasing the part count even further... And the limit in part count is why I start looking for different challenge in the first place).

[panarchist]

On 10/3/2019 at 12:05 PM, JadeOfMaar said:

Un-rapid planned assembly:

• KCT
• ScrapYard (superior inventory system to that of KCT)

BARIS indirectly supports un-rapid planned assembly. You can technically just launch without going through the integration period, but it's VERY unlikely with the default settings that a non-integrated rocket will make orbit.

[Foozle]

On 10/3/2019 at 2:05 PM, JadeOfMaar said:

...

Un-rapid planned assembly:

• KCT
• ScrapYard (superior inventory system to that of KCT)

Also, recently, KVASS by flart.

I've been using it lately, very simple and works well.