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I'm with slashy. Add in LS, and then you're looking at a different story. Note that Roverdude's next version of USI LS will include "homesickness" for kerbals, which is solved via having appropriate habitation space that varies based upon mission length. In that case, a large station with loads of dedicated hab space might well be worthwhile to have as a cycler.

Caveat: I see the "science" contracts (surveys, etc) as more appropriately coming from your own staff, not a 3d party. As such, I would prefer to see the survey contracts be arranged in a way that makes sense for a real program seeking out landing sites. Visual (we need a camera part for probes to do this) above a certain altitude, then below a certain altitude in the same region. Temp/pressure/gravity Same thing, higher to lower. Surface collection, temp, gravity, seismic, etc at sites within. With he proposed contextual contracts in 1.1, perhaps this is doable. Right now a visual has just a few places to take data. About about the above alt X versions have a WIDE area (so your orbit need only be roughly close, and it's not twitchy about clicking the crew report at the right instant), then have it have many such readings as part of the "contract." It will then pick a subset of these for "below alt X." Then, of this subset, it picks 1-2 landing sites as separate missions. Note that the first pass "above X" could be set so the system generates one set of survey locations per "biome" (should be geome or something, "biome" requires life).

Yeah, again, the primary utility, IMO, would be in some sort of space race. You could opt for improved reliability, or just go with what you have to try and beat the other side, but at some risk. What makes for fun gameplay are meaningful choices to make. Honestly, this is a primary problem I have with the mini-scale of the kerbol system. The Mun (given 2 moons of Kerbin) is more interesting when it is large enough that a 2-stage lander, or apollo-like (munar orbit rendezvous) vs direct approaches are choices that are not entirely aesthetic, but functional (direct works just fine in KSP, to the point it is wasteful to do otherwise).

That's actually a really interesting idea for a mechanic. Some probably significant mass increase. Take an orbital engine with redundancy (like Apollo), all but the engine bell has backup systems, engine mass up by 30% maybe, and gets a 2d chance if there is a failure. I really like that. Note that some systems can have things that engineers could repair (a use for skill). Another use for pilot skill might be to be able to deal with maneuver problems... say holding attitude with RCS/SAS when either (or both) of those systems have some failure. Say 1 RCS nozzle is not functioning, an RCS input using it would cause a spin, but the pilot can deal with it within some range based on skill. Science instruments could be repaired by a scientist (cause they need some use for skill)..

But his teen angst is real, even past his teen years.

Failures without a context don't actually add much, which is why Squad isn't a fan of the idea. I would say that in a CONTEXT of an entirely new game mode, it's not a "suggestion" for addition to the stock game as we have to now Lawyerly enough? The context I have suggested is Space Race. Such a mode would pit the player vs an AI (or novel form of offline multiplayer?) opponent nation/company. Time would have to matter (a simple KCT, with a "cost" per ton in time to make any given craft?), then failures would be setbacks so that every space race game would not be the identical, "ideal" set of craft to get to the Mun first, etc. You can have a good design, but a bad day, and have to reconsider your plans.

At some point in KSP, I switched over to FAR. I didn't notice it was installed, honestly. Why? I only ever built rockets that looked like rockets and were pretty hands-off in flight. Ditto the new aero model (or new FAR). I don't notice it's there. If you learn to game a really bad aero system, then switching will be more difficult that just learning that rockets that don;t look like real rockets don't work so well.

I've never used asparagus for anything, ever. Since funds have never seemed like an issue to me, I've never been careful about reusable boosters.

It was killed by the kind of attack that you'd expect would take out a Star Destroyer. Space stuff in SW makes no sense at all, and is in effect ww2 in space. All ships are vulnerable to the smallest of ships, so spreading out stuff makes more sense.

Set a custom difficulty level, and give yourself enough funds to upgrade the required buildings.

To me this functionality would be most useful in a new space race mode of play, vs the current game.

I agree about tatooine, and would add that the last place Luke would leave his daughter (I'm presuming that's who Rey is, but it would be true of any similar character) would be where the old Empire knew Luke and obi wan most recently came from.

Yeah, I suppose since I generally only take stuff I like that is coincident with my personal mission plans anyway, I haven't noticed mid career shortages, I'm always pretty flush. Of course I never upgrade the runway, hanger, or strategy office since I don't use them.

The issue with career I mentioned was really very on-topic to OP's post. Since funds are only ever in short supply early, and funds are the primary reward for contracts, the contract system is effectively unnecessary. This is not apparent without actually testing as slashy has done. I've been playing over a year and never thought about it. I think that having what is in effect the centerpiece of the career system (the contract office, aka "Mission Control") utterly unnecessary is a waste of effort on squad's part. This shows it to be explicitly a "side quest" system. Given that this is the case, the contracts should be more interesting.

Wow, that's interesting, and points out even more issues with career. I've been playing since 0.23 or 0.24 and never bothered to test this.

Regarding exploration paying better in career than contracts, I think I am unsure what the "milestones" pay out. Certainly the science rewards are virtually all from doing, not contracts, but what about funds? Honestly, funds are never a problem for me in career, so I think I have not actually paid attention to what if anything is earned by milestones funds-wise.

Yeah, I like the experimental parts notion... change the tech tree such that you get the parts provisionally as experimental parts, then a certain amount of player-testing (use), and/or parts testing (contracts) will eventually unlock the part totally, at which point it's reliable. Perhaps unlocking X parts could be cheaper, and to totally unlock you need to pay the full price (so you take X parts for your mun mission to unlock some stuff past tier 1 at a great discount in science, but they might fail).

Update seems to have solved the issue. Will continue to test. Thanks!

Or you take your list above, and instead of completion rewards, you get advances (a budget to accomplish that mission). The failure punishments (in some reasonable time period scale to travel time, perhaps, since time doesn't normally matter in KSP) would be harsh. Perhaps each mission has an initial milestone that must happen within a very short time period, like making a maneuver that results in an SoI interaction within XX days of accepting. So you could accept a contract to Lathe and Eeloo in tier 1 if you want, but you'd be required to succeed in setting up the encounter just a few days after you took the mission, which would be pretty unlikely in tier 1 (but would be spectacular success if you did).

Dang it! has failures happen far too often. I'd certainly use such a slider if it were available as long as testing/use improved the reliability over time.

Cool, glad to be of help (if I was at all). Happy New Year!

I reset death for non-vets to grouchy and retested. Now Jeb is grouchy upon leaving the VAB. I stuck a supply can on the side of his mk1 pod, and retested, and he was good for 92 days. Perhaps the 15 day thing is not working? When I played last night, I had added supplies my craft, as I knew my munar orbiter mission could take a while (the rescale is 6.4X distances).

I should have been clear that I am also using a Kopernicus rescale (k-365), KER, KIS. Let me know if you need anything more specific (and sorry if this report was at all incomplete).

I've been using this in a new career to test, and have set it up like this: NoSupplyEffect = 5 //Effect if a Kerbal has no supplies or EC NoSupplyEffectVets = 1 //Effect if a Kerbal is a vet and has no supplies or EC So Jeb, Bill, et al should not die, right? While the image is of a capsule from the HGR mod, I tested with he mk1 pod and it did the same thing. This happens with any craft upon leaving the VAB (worked last night, though). Here are the LS persistent bits before flying them: SCENARIO { name = LifeSupportScenario scene = 5, 7, 6 LIFE_SUPPORT_SETTINGS { STATUS_DATA { KerbalName = Bill Kerman LastMeal = 8762161.63406847 IsGrouchy = False OldTrait = Engineer LastUpdate = 8762161.63406847 } STATUS_DATA { KerbalName = Bob Kerman LastMeal = 681610.894688611 IsGrouchy = False OldTrait = Scientist LastUpdate = 681922.781973735 } STATUS_DATA { KerbalName = Jebediah Kerman LastMeal = 8762161.63406847 IsGrouchy = False OldTrait = Pilot LastUpdate = 8762161.63406847 } And here are the roster values: KERBAL { name = Jebediah Kerman gender = Male type = Crew trait = Pilot brave = 0.5 dumb = 0.5 badS = True tour = False state = Available ToD = 0 idx = 0 CAREER_LOG KERBAL { name = Bill Kerman gender = Male type = Crew trait = Engineer brave = 0.5 dumb = 0.8 badS = False tour = False state = Available ToD = 0 idx = 1 CAREER_LOG

I don't take any that don't interest me, or cannot be folded into the mission I have already planned for myself. In the latest 365 career I mentioned above (I think I mentioned it), getting to the Mun and back with Kerbals is non-trivial early career (I need about 10km/s dv assuming some slop in there to do so). So I took some contracts that were coincident with some probe missions I undertook to unlock stuff I require to get larger craft to the mun and back. In sandbox, I'd have just built my apollo-like craft and I would have accomplished it over a beer my first night playing.