tater

Wow, awesome.

More types? Sure. But far, far , far fewer of them. Most missions in my list are now rescues, it's absurd. They should be varied and RARE. They should also have varied goals (dock and refuel, for example---lump them in a type of mission that is really "rendezvous" and then have rescue or resupply.

This, right here. Almost the entire KSP is in fact virtually coincident if placed in a real life timeline. Yeah, yeah, this isn't RL, but it's hard to suspend disbelief when ladders come after photovoltaics, etc. Most everything in the entire tree was available for the first manned spaceflights.

Discovery would require a sea change. I think it really requires randomly generated solar systems (Kerbin could be basically the same, but with 1 to n moons). Then "fog of war" that only gives the player information he should have. Then have science tied to stuff the player can use (say an aerobraking tool that shows proper trajectories if the player has done certain science at that planet).

I'm totally spammed with rescue missions right now. More are offered right now than I have sent astronauts into space in total up to this point.

It really is it any harder, and the dv to orbit is now lower, right? I noticed no difference at all, but I usually play with FAR (that said I never noticed much difference with FAR, either).

The new rescue missions are really dumb. The contract system needs a way to check what the player has actually accomplished before assigning missions/contracts. I had a PROBE in orbit around the Mun (I used a lv909 test contract to build it fairly early). I now get stranded kerbal missions around the Mun. I guess there is no rush for me to land on the Mun as some other agency has already gotten there, right?

Actually, that seemed like a pretty measured, and diplomatic response to me. If something that the devs have no control over is updating more slowly than you'd like, do it yourself.

I'd hardly call the very first spacecraft any new player is going to build (a mk1 capsule with a heat shield and chute) an "edge case." Also, remember that most all people posting here are huge fans. We want KSP to be as successful as possible.

This happened to me at KSC, but with Bob. I think there are some issues. When I first had him killed upon EVA, it said he'd collided with girders (I made a testing rig for a ground test that he could get out and EVA a little).

I suppose that might be my problem as well. Of course in other versions pod orientation doesn't matter even a little (without mods like FAR or DRE).

LOL, I don't normally QS ever. Guess I will now. I should add that I have never had something like this happen before in earlier versions. I've had some isolated weirdness, but nothing catastrophic.

Anyone else have a problem where an EVA basically kills the save game?

Had a parts test contract landed, and figured I'd give Bob a job to EVA and walk around a little (needed a couple points for the tech tree for my mun mission). Did tests, EVAed, and screen went black. Reverted to VAB, tried again… in space, but nothing else shows. Quit, reloaded save… no Kerbin at all, gone. So much for my 1.0 career.

The obvious answer to me would be that you very quickly get the micro landing legs, so if you want a larger engine you need to make a kooky contraption if you don't wish to land on the engine bell itself. That said, I think landing with a mk1 capsule is sort of absurd, as there is no possible view of the ground (try flying a landing in such a craft in pure IVA).

I think that the entire tech tree/science/contract/career paradigm is not well thought out, and needs a fundamental change.

I think the OP post lacks the appropriate context. If this were update 0.91, testing would not have been mentioned at all on the forums. The fact that it is arbitrarily 1.0 sets the standards very much higher. In a normal update, the lot of us would be beta testers, and the QA people Alpha testers. By going from a successful beta test, to an expansive alpha with no beta testing… you will see exactly the reaction you have seen, and it's entirely appropriate. It is NOT the fault of the QA testers, it is the fault of not having a wider testing of something that is "release version." YMMV, but that's how I see it.

Grinding is a thing in KSP because the only mechanism to secure funds is the contract process. A budget system would allow for more concentration on "space program," and less on the grind. 1. Make time a thing. I suggest a Minmus month (50 kerbin days, I'll call it a "Minmonth") as a basic budget unit. Add a "warp to next fiscal month" next to the warp to morning button. 2. Have the "space program" missions (explore and many other science or base missions) come with all funds in advance, but paid per Minmonth. So you take a 30 Minmonth contract to Explore the Mun, and the 300k budget is paid 10k per month. You can take commercial contracts to boost funds as per now, or you can warp a few months if need be (say to get funds to upgrade a facility). This would change the dynamic from grinding contracts to selecting a goal, then working towards it.

I always start a new version in stock career. It plays no differently than previous career, frankly. Science/tech/contracts/career need to be rebuilt from the ground up, IMO. Together, as they all interact.

Yeah, missions (contracts) need to make more sense. Right now the reward in KSP is new stuff (tech), and the currency to buy it is science points. The contracts deal out funds (and now seemingly less science), but are the same grindy contracts we are used to now---repetitive contracts that often make no sense whatsoever. Testing parts in ways that are idiotic, for example (jets on the Mun). Or we get survey contracts, but however Fine Print did it, they have a group together (sensible), then usually one outlier that makes mission planning pointlessly annoying. I want career to be decent… but it simply isn't.

So you get tons of tourist contracts. TONS. You've done a few orbital missions, and now tourists are half the options. Then the rescues. You have world record altitude, but so does someone else, apparently. There is no sense to the entire contract system at all. 3d parties want "science" or station missions, your own program has none, and other programs are losing more astronauts than you have sent to space. It feels slapdash.

They'd be given the supply from the supplies aboard. So Jeb is "fed" and can last 3 days (or whatever on EVA), he leaves with 1 supply from the rescue ship, and either enters, or places it aboard (like science storage). He goes back to his craft, and one of the rescued crew hits the snacks, and wakes up… long enough to walk to new craft. Rinse, repeat.

This. There needs to be a vision, or even different visions. "Science" could just as well be an alternate "career" mode, for example. I know this is a "tech tree" thread, but I think it is a fundamental mistake to treat the TT as something that exists outside the context of science, "contracts," and career since they are so tightly woven together. Any attempt to mess with the tree without messing with everything else WILL fail, IMO. It'll just be differently grinding. Tech is NOT developed by doing space science, sorry. That disconnect is a fundamental flaw of the entire tree system. It can be partially a function of this, but I think in a very specific way (certain kinds of science required for certain kinds of improvements). I'd ideally have a time-based system (a budget to spend every XX kerbin days (I was thinking a 50 day minmus month)), and you assign funds to research. Funding generates research points, and buying tech takes those points, plus possibly specific science missions. So a Hitchhiker part might require a certain amount of science (crew reports) from orbit. Maybe science over time like a lab, but keeping track of time on orbit. Some might require part-testing contracts (sensible ones). ISRU parts might require research and sample returns from any world (asteroids might all count as 1 world for this) where ISRU is to function. You'd then pick a path to research, and that would sort of drive your program for a while (as you need to wring out issues with that tech). Honestly, there needs to be more "upgrades" for parts. Squad was willing to have astronauts buff parts, why not have research buff parts, instead (improved engine with better Isp, or gimbal range, etc)?

True. My point is that people usually mischaracterize US spending as being "50% military" when in fact only ~20% of US federal spending is military, and that drops a bunch of you include even just State spending. The US is better compared to the entire EU. Also, people fail to realize that the majority of US spending is social programs by a long shot.

Most non-direct welfare spending is another kind of welfare… NASA is a jobs program, basically. It's like military bases, the Pentagon wants to dump most of them, and so do congress critters… as long as the bases are in another district, then the base is critical to national security. A new space race with China would be cool, because it would be a rationale for cool, manned stunts (like the Moon). Otherwise, we'd be better off with robots---and probes are vastly more capable now than they were in the 60s and 70s due to modern computing and electronics. You could possibly argue in the 1960s that men were the best way to collect rocks (particularly a geologist), but that's simply not the case any more. I'm for humans in space… just because it is cool. Just because I think it is inspiring. I don't delude myself that it's "for science," however.