I tried the Dres challenge yesterday and completed most of the objectives. (after the obligatory orbit decay, missing orbit lines, restarts and resets) I forgot that Kerbal parachutes don't exist yet in KSP2, so I wasn't able to return to the ground. (although the 'Return to Kerbin' objective is a little subjective) It was the first of the 'Val-level' mission I've been able to do. I spent this morning reveling in my glory, only to ponder how I could improve on my success.
I am in the process of replaying my mission. (adding parachutes, optimizing trajectories...) To my great surprise, my craft seemed almost magical. 20 FPS on launch was delightful, and my craft seemed to breeze through the atmosphere (~5FPS is what I'm expecting with a simple craft). It wasn't sluggish, and my parts manager opened almost instantly. Is there any chance that a bugfix was implemented overnight?
I'm a little hesitant to save my game and reload so I'll finish this out, but i'm curious if anyone else has noticed anything different
