Tier Structure Ideas and Overall Game Ideas

[buzz66boy]

As a veteran kerbal player (I am not a Kerbal, but playing since 0.17), I really love the new update! Career is finally challenging for me and the upgradable buildings are a step in the right direction. It was mentioned that the devs were working on changing the tiers a bit, and I want to give them a few suggestions from my experience so far in .90.

Overall:

Suggestion: When one scrolls over a building's upgrade button, give them a preview of what it will look like upgraded a tier, this could be useful if the size of the runway changes based on tier (read runway suggestion).

Suggestion: Be able to skip tiers on buildings and make it *slightly* cheaper to upgrade. For me at least, this would be useful for the admin building or hangar, both of which there isn't much point to upgrading early game. This might also affect the launchpad.

Suggestion: To make more use of the spaceplane hangar and runway, perhaps add plane-only contracts requiring to stay in atmosphere.

Contracts in General:

Suggestion: make station and outpost missions have longer "maintain" times, perhaps more than a couple days. Though gameplay-wise there wouldn't be much difference (timewarp!) it would make more sense to give time for the kerbals to "Run Experiments" or do the mission (Eat snacks). The hindrance to this would be calculating station keeping in case the user switched to another craft, depending how the code is setup now.

Suggestion: Add speed record contracts. Not necessarily space program related, but it would be neat to get a contract to get fast land-speed or water speed goals (or in-atmo speed). This is reasonable because Kerbals associate rockets with speed and would want to make things go fast and explode.

Suggestion: Make a "return surface sample from" contract that relies on biomes. This would encourage accurate landings and also not require science experiments to drag along. Another benefit of this is that one could have contracts to collect surface samples on kerbin, encouraging runway and sph use. NOTE: I'm not sure, this may be implemented already and I haven't come across one.

Hangar:

Problem: The Hangar is nearly useless for the first few hours of gameplay, and only becomes truly useful once Survey missions start popping-up, likewise for the runway.

Possible Solution: As soon as tech-tree unlocks plane parts, start offering kerbin survey missions

Runway:

Problem: The base tier is too bumpy to be useful, I end up taxiing off into the very much smoother grass beside the runway

Possible Solution: Make the first tier runway a shaded grass area (many small airports have grass runways), fairly smooth, with a couple bumps (kind of like the tier 2 except grass). Tier 2 could then be upgraded to and be completely flat, albeit short and narrow compared to tier 3. If tiers are added (the Barn tier anyone?) a grass runway would be a good fit, followed by the dirt which needs to be less bumpy, but can be short/narrow compared to tier 2.

Launchpad:

Suggestion: Make it easier/harder to destroy based on tier (tier 1 is dirt so it's hard to destroy, tier 2 should be more fragile?).

Problem: Too small a limit on weight on Tier 1, it was upgraded after 1st contract completed. I'd like to play more with the dirt tier because it looks awesome too.

Possible Solution: Make it Barn tier level

VAB:

Suggestion: Add more tiers, each tier having a bigger/better building which can support a taller rocket based on door size.

Admin Building:

Suggestion: Make strategies reap better rewards as tier increases, starting at semi-crappy exchange rates at tier 1. This makes sense because at lower tiers, a company (or space program) has less staff and less prestige in the industry, as they get better buildings they can hire more people and have presumably done impressive things, leading to better bargaining power.

Problem: Once a strategy is set, it's commitment level cannot be changed without un-selecting the strategy and re-selecting it.

Possible Solution: Make strategy commitment level variable while you're already committed to the strategy, with an "Apply" button or something to confirm the change. Also have a setup cost for change in commitment level, you could charge based on % changed, regardless of less or more commitment.

Astronaut Complex:

Suggestion: Train Kerbals based on vocation, not as XP giving as experience and costs money, but you could grind out some top tier guys with enough $ and time.

Suggestion: Cross-Training could occur with a "training" system. Kerbals could never exceed 1/3? the experience of anything besides their main specialty (i.e. Pilot could be 5 star pilot, 2 star scientist and engineer). This makes sense because real people can learn things beyond their primary vocation, but excel in what they specialize in (WAIT, THIS ISN'T A SIMULATOR?!?!!? ).

Problem: Doing the same thing multiple times with a kerbal does not increase experience. For example if I launch a kerbal and have them navigate to the mun then return, and send them again, they would definitely still learn from the second trip, albeit not as much.

Possible Solution: SOI changes and landings (even orbits?) could be logged each time the kerbal returns home and contribute logarithmically, to avoid exploits like flying in and out of an soi just for experience (scaling each time, not necessarily logarithmic).

Problem: All Kerbals level based solely on where they have been (ok, flag planting is a bit different).

Solution: Have Kerbals level based on vocation. Pilots level by flying missions, engineers from repairing parts, scientists from gathering and analyzing science. For engineers, they could start out being able to do most of the things at the base level, with a chance of permanently breaking the part (a new part state would need to be added) or fixing it, depending on how high level they are.

Mission Control:

Suggestion: Have more limited/complicated contracts available based on tier. Tier 1 could be only plant flags, test parts, achieve records and do surveys (crew/eva reports). Tier 2 could add orbital bases, satellite contracts and complex science surveys. Tier 3 could add surface bases, asteroid grabs and more complicated things. The reasoning behind this is that you can conduct larger/more complex missions with a larger staff.

Tracking Station:

Suggestion: Add more tiers. Tier could limit how many soi changes ahead you can see, maybe add a limit to tracking range based on raw distance for non-radio equipped craft.

Science Building:

Suggestion: Add more tiers. Make contracts that are required to get specific science nodes, like space testing contracts for engines, drain testing tanks, living in habitable modules for a couple days etc.

Again, love the game and I'm not trying to criticize it, just improve it.

Feel free to add your own suggested fixes to these problems below.

Thanks,

buzz66boy

Edited December 22, 2014 by buzz66boy
Added a few things

[Rusty6899]

I think the problem with the buildings is that Tier 0 buildings are... not good. I enjoyed the challenge of flying without Patched Conics, and seeing how far I could fly with an 18t limit etc. but they are restrictive. After upgrading almost all of them, I don't actually feel like I really need to do it again any time soon (255 parts is probably plenty for almost anything, I can't remember the launchpad mass limit, but it's high, unowned object tracking isn't that important, 12 Kerbals on mission is manageable, strategies... meh).

I think there should be cheaper, but more tech levels. the total cost of fully upgrading may be the same, but there should be more of a gradual increase than a spike.

Also, the problem with engineers is that very few parts get damaged. They could be given other abilities, for example only engineers can alter thrust limiting during flight. Alternatively, overheating engines or re-entry into atmosphere could have effects on the fuel efficiency of engines. They might lose thrust for the same mass flow rate, or could start leaking and have a higher mass flow rate without gaining any extra thrust.

[Anquietas314]

I can't remember the launchpad mass limit, but it's high

It's 140 tonnes, which is enough for most 1-man missions, but if you want to launch, say, a multiple-landing Mun mission - namely reusable lander, science lab, fuel tank - you need the top tier launchpad. Some of the harder "Build a base on ___" contracts can't be done without upgrading it either.

[thereaverofdarkness]

I like Rusty6899's ideas.

I think perhaps a better way to do the runway would be to make it shorter and smooth it out a bit. Even a newbie should be able to take off on a short runway when they are flying a very small plane. And if they have to keep going further, they just land on the sand ahead of it and still have plenty of room before they reach the ocean.

[Anquietas314]

I like Rusty6899's ideas.

I think perhaps a better way to do the runway would be to make it shorter and smooth it out a bit. Even a newbie should be able to take off on a short runway when they are flying a very small plane. And if they have to keep going further, they just land on the sand ahead of it and still have plenty of room before they reach the ocean.

Yeah, at the very least the tier 2 should not have what I think are supposed to be potholes - certainly not immediately after you just built the damn thing. Length aside, I think the tier 1 runway's mostly okay. Odd that it's the tier 1 runway, rather than tier 0, but otherwise mostly okay.

[Dunbaratu]

The runway problem is largely the grasses' fault, not the runway's fault. Grass is smoother than level 1 runway because grass is lacking the bumpiness it should have. All grass should default to bumpy everywhere on the KSC and then only be smooth at exception locations.

[thereaverofdarkness]

Might be nice for a runway upgrade to include an alternate shorter runway that curves upward gradually and launches you upward at a 15º angle with respect to the horizon. That would give more purpose to upgrading the runway and make having a better starting runway not as bad of an idea with respect to upgrades.

Another thing I thought of was to have the smoothest part of the runway at the start, and for it to gradually get bumpier as you run along its length. If your plane can get in the air early, you won't have to worry about those bumps.

[buzz66boy]

I like the idea of an inclination to the runway. It would be cool if buildings had tweakables like that, costs X to change by X percent.