Wjolcz

Uh, I didn't think that previous post through, did I? I knew something was not right. Let's re-imagine the tree layout. Ideally it would look like this. Each branch themed. EC parts with EC parts, wings with wings, liquids qith liquids, solids with solids, etc. Well, yeah. That's what desirable. You want to focus on one thing, not on many at once (unless you want to). That way even the new players wouldn't be overwhelmed with the mission objectives. What current Mission Control does now is generates random objectives based on how far you went. I really disliked that the first time I saw it. It really made me not want to accept most of the missions offered. I'd rather build myself a small station for a start instead of going here and there to fetch that science, reputation and money in order to progress. It wouldn't be one node though. And it would be cheaper than rockets. I agree that planes are really complex. That's why people shouldn't be forced to deal with them if they didn't want to. Well, yeaaaaaah. That's the problem with my post there. WT-like tree would be best for this. Aaaaand it's my fault again. Back to the WarThunder way of doing this. That's one of the problems. I agree, they are pretty clicky. That's why (IMO) it would be best to make them gather science as long as they are active. They eat EC anyway. That's not true. The only reason of this happening is the way strategies work. Gameplay testing is for things like this. It's simply a matter of balancing the whole thing. And by the way, isn't this the exact way the current science system works? The further you go, the more science points you get. Are you serious right now? Do you really want to give even less options of how to start the tree? It does, because the only way to obtain more science points is either: cheating them in, maxing-out the rewards or doing what the game tells you to do, i.e.: going places that yield you the most science points available. If you want to progress other ways (doing low-reward Kerbin missions for example), prepare for grind. A lot of it. Without the science points the only thing that matters is cash. Just like IRL. It works there and does so way better than KSP's "research points". Al that needs to be done is simply adjusting the reards and prices for different nodes. Want to stay here, on Kerbin and fly jets? You won't earn much to leave the atmosphere, but enough to keep flying them. The gameplay and sense of achievement stays the same. The only thing that changes is the way you pay for things. You still unlock the tree, except you decide what you want to go and in what order. Once you've got it all it's the same "Yay, I completed the tree!", except all the resources stay relevant. No need to exchange science to money every time you grab some, because there's none such thing. By doing so we also eliminate the need of strategies (somewhat bizzare and most of them useless), because the system auto-refills itself. All you have to care about is to accumulate enough reputation and/or money for the next month. And the best thing is that you have a choice: Earn money or reputation. You do missions that yield money only, missions that yield reputation only, do missions that yield both (not sure what kind of mission would do that though) do science experiments that yield reputation only. And you always get money out of that, which keeps your Space Program active. Call me a materliast, but it's all eventually comes down to money. You need it whether you want it, or not. Yes, I agree. I agree, but the players could also set their own goals with the help of different programs being available. How do the World's Firsts make that possible? I'm really curious about it. EDIT: Done editing. Also someone remind me why we're still discussing this? It won't make it to the game anyway and I'm losing the interest in replying to comments here, as most of people commenting seem to be satisfied with the current career. I would like to see this implemented as a new game mode, but let's be realistic: this will never happen. Not enough people are interested in this and SQUAD has other things to do now.

It's not that simple. You can't just "tweak" two things to make it work, or give more options to exchange them (we already have enough) "Tweaks" is what we've been delivered in the past and the whole mode is still inane. I just edited the post above yours. I'd call the current one more confusing than a tree with themed groups (which IMO would satisfy most of the players as they would simply pick their own progression instead of the one SQUAD picked for them). And the argument about new players being confused is just plain silly. How is a tree that let's you clearly see what path you can take confusing? You either go jets, manned into space, or unmanned into space. The only option the current tree and science system offers new players is "manned into space" and nothing else. If they had a choice of three they would simply go for the one they know best. There's the sandbox and tutorials to experiment with parts if they really need to practice building planes. No reason to force them doing it. And we are assuming they have at least avarage level of intelligence and don't get easily confused when looking at a tree with three clearly visible branches. There would be no need for strategies at all in the career overhaul I propose. Everything would exchange itself automatically. I've provided plenty of examples. You either don't care about reading them, or simply refuse the idea. But I'll try again: It's not a "I want this for that" situation. I want to have a choice. I want to go into R&D, look at the tree and see three paths there (jets, manned, unmanned). I want to start a research of one of those with the starting money I have. I see the branch with jets. Let's now assume I've picked the jet branch. I go into the Admin Building and see programs there (just imagine Strategia being implemented). Each strategy for each body. I pick the "Kerbin Program" which generates me missions in the vicinity of Kerbin. Now I go into the Mission Control and I see missions influenced by the program I've picked. I accept the ones that tell me to do things in the atmosphere only (because I just started to research jet planes). I've waited for some time (2 days should be enough, I guess) and I got some wings, a Juno engine and a cockpit. I go into the spaceplane hangar and build myself a plane. I take-off, fly around, complete the missions and go back. Now I've accumulated enough money to keep the jet branch rolling. And I decide to do so (because I'm still not bored with planes). After some time I decide it's time to go for sounding rockets. I start the "Unmanned rocketry" branch in R&D, go into the Mission Control and pick some orbita/sub-orbital missions ("Kerbin Program/Strategy" is still active). I go out, launch the rocket, do the stuff and get paid more money than for completing an atmospheric mission. Now I have enough money to either: keep going for new tech in jets' branch, or keep researching the rocket parts (rockets are more expensive than jets). THE END. Something like this is not possible with science points, unless you cheat them in (or max out the rewards, whatever), as the game tells you to go directly into space to aquire more points in order to progress. And please, don't start the argument about new players being confused. They would simply go for the manned just like they would in the current version of the tree. EDIT: Whoops. Fixed a few things.

Good for you. Have some rep for pulling that off. But I see a problem here. By many the tree is considered a tutorial. I'm pretty sure we've already discussed it, but if the tree is a tutorial then the time spent on creating proper tutorials was wasted. I'd rather have the tree giving you a choice of what to research next insead of being guided from it every time I play career mode. I'd really like to pick if I want to go manned, unmanned or planes first, but the, as you call it "tutorial phase" tree doesn't allow for that. I also feel we are going a bit off-topic here. The original concept of this thread was to discuss a system that would allow for paying money in order to research tech. That would keep the money currency relevant even after the tree is finished unlike it is with science points now. Not only that, but if the tree was redesigned the player would have a choice: go into space or stay here and research more atmospheric tech? I guess these two things are directly connected with each other, so maybe it's not that much of an offtop. Eh... It's kind of complicated, but not as much as the current system. I'll probably draw it in paint at some point to make it as easy to understand as possible. EDIT: Ahhh, screw MS Paint. Here's the whole thing. So, maybe instead of reputation staying the same/decreasing with time it should accumulate as you complete missions/milostens and auto-exchange every X days directly into money. Iif it worked like proposed in the linked post ALL of the currencies (money and reputation) would stay relevant even when the tree is finished. No need to leave the atmosphere to unlock parts you want and no irrelevant resources after the tree is finished. Basically, experiments would keep your program running even after the tree is finished. Right now there's no point in using/hauling them when the tree is done.

You'd be better off using Alt+F12. Easier, faster and you don't have to drive anything. And the result would be the same. You are missing the point though. We don't want the game to be easier. We want progression to make sense. If I wanted the game to be easier I would just cheat myself tons of science, max out the rewards, or whatever. The problem is once you do that there's no point in progression, because there's simply no progression by then. It just becomes sandbox with contracts. That's something completely different fram what I would like to play. I don't want to play sandbox with contracts. I want to play career and progress in a way I see suitable. And everyone should be allowed to do the same. Everyone should pick their own path of progression and follow it. More flexibility, not more science and cash.

I am the saltiest person in this thread! Don't you dare taking my merits from me! Seriously though, I had a bad day. I'll try to keep my tone down this time. Mods are probably watching me already. I need to get back to Silent Hunter at some point. Even though I was too young to understand how to reload torpedos and what was going on I remember having fun. And nobody says it should, but real life economy works. KSP's doesn't, because there's too much to deal with. We have to juggle that science currency after the tree is done. Why? The whole thing could work perfectly without it. The whole strategy system was introduced to deal with the problem of science points being useless after some point. If we didn't have them there would be no need for strategies, as the whole system would autmatically balance itself instead of needing player's input all the time.

Poor argument. As if in 20th century we stopped using money and started investing science points into technology research instead. True. I'm not saying it should be just like real life, but there are certain things in KSP that are not like real life (science points) that become useless after a while. Why create a currency that becomes useless after the tree is done if the whole system can be designed so it doesn't need it in the first place and works perfectly fine? Seriously, am I the only one here seeing that science points actually limit the gameplay instead of improving it and giving more flexibility? Been doing that since version 0.11. When was it released? 2010, or 2011?

I'll read this as "KSP doesn't need to be a quality product. It has mods to get the job done".

Well, yes. But what's the point of progression if you can just give yourself enough points to unlock the nodes you want? And don't tell me "but he actually went around KSC and didn't cheat". That's not much different, except cheating science in is less tedious.

Well, kind of. Either one tree branching out early on, or multiple trees like the WarThunder ones. Some would be cheaper (time and money wise) to unlock, but you wouldn't be able to go very far with them (jets/SSTOs/rovers), some would be more expensive (rocketry in general) but would also give you higher rewards. (exploring a crater on Tylo is more of an achievement than taking samples from in a nearby pond on Kerbin). And same about programs: you want to do bigger things, you get more funds to do them. And missions' (generated by the program; much like Strategia does this) rewards should also be higher if you want to go exploring Laythe's oceans than Kerbin's.

Of course! We can make it happen if we believe! After all, KSP is a gaem! Who cares about realism? Anything will be added as long as a lot of people requests it!

Funds and time. A system that uses these things to unlock the tree. And depending on what kind of branch you've picked you do things that make you progress in that branch. So here's an example: You want to do jets first. That will involve exploration of Kerbin. You go into the Admin Building and pick a program that focuses on that. It won't give you much money for doing this, because it's here, on Kerbin, but that's fine. Jets are cheap. So you go down the tech tree's jet branch and have fun on your home planet. Doing missions that interest you, flying there and back, scanning things, hopping out of the atmosphere for science and stuff like that. But then you decide it's time to explore those round things in the sky. You pick a program titled "Kerbin Orbital Program", or "Mun Program", or sth like that and it gives you enough money that let's you open either manned or unmanned rocketry tree branch. And then you go out exploring space. As simple as that. That can't be done with science points.

Well, I really stopped caring about all this career nonsense, but here's a thing: KSP's science system doesn't allow for roleplay. And as you may, or may not be aware of sandbox games is all about roleplay. I guess you can just yell at me "THEN PLAY SANDBOX!", but the problem is this whole game is one big sandbox. So let's look at this scenario: you start a fresh career save and what you want to do is a bit of roleplay. You have three options: go jets first, go unmanned into space first, or go manned into space first. But wait... That doesn't seem right, does it? The real options are these. 1. Go manned into space first. 2. Go manned into space first. 3. Go manned into space first. Want to go jets? Better go grab all that orbital science! Want to go unmanned first? Better get science! And I guess you could just set the science reward sliders to the max, or Alt+F12 the whole thing (both options are no different). But what's the point of progression if you can do that. And that's not the problem with the tree layout only. You would have to go orbital sooner or later to unlock more of it. What I would like to see is a progression that when you decide not to leave the atmosphere and/or LKO you don't get so much funding to unlock the tree as quickly as you would by exploring other planets, but enough to keep your program running and doing what you've been doing so far. But that will never happend. So yeah, there's the sandbox for me that I've been playing since KSP 0.11. Or mods.

You say "future technologies" as if KSP was supposed to be historically accurate. It shouldn't be, but it seems like the devs couldn't make up their minds and that's why the tree is a mess now. It also depends on how you look at it. Not all space companies start with a sounding rocket, or a Mk1 capsule. Some go directly for SSTOs, like that british company working on Skylon. But there's no point in discussing all this as career will never change, so let's just sit and watch devs add more adobe blocks of different colours. AFAIK, career mode is considered "good enough", so who cares?

I honestly don't care anymore. The basic mechanics of this game will never change. Only more things will get added. Same thing happened to Minecraft.

Eh, who am I even kidding? I'm in the clear minority here. SQUAD will do nothing about career mode because the game is moddable. Lock the thread, or whatever. I don't care anymore.

Even private companies get partial government funding. The ideal approach would be if players could pick whether they want to do science (AKA government-driven) missions, or if they want to be a private company (selling ore, tourism, putting satellites in orbits). I really dislike this argument. If career is meant to be just another tutorial, then what's the point of in-game tutorials? You missed my point. I didn't mean it as "Kerbal Go Jet Planes First Program", but more of a "Kerbal Have A Choice Of What You Want To Do Next Program". That's the exact problem with science. After the tree is done there's not much you can do with it. It just becomes useless. As if the devs said: -OK, so the idea needs to based around three basic resources -Why three though? -I don't know. It's a game. We will somehow deal with it later. I am not annoyed about KSP because it's a game. It's just the fact that it was not thought-out well. And I don't feel like "didn't have money and time" argument really fits well here. They still seem to be developing the game, which would imply they still have both. It's just that they decided to not do anything with the current state of career, because the majority either thinks it's good enough, or there's a mod for that. And also, it's a 100% finished product you paid for, guys.

Yes...? You probably misunderstood me though. Imagine you are a space company (one of the many on Kerbin; the rescue contrats imply that you are anyway). You work on your own technology and launchers. Now some people want to be ULA (Lockheed + Boeing) and build planes and rockets (that's what both companies do), some want to be like SpaceX and focus mainly on launchers and some (like me in this SSTO example) want to be like Reaction Engines Limited and build SSTOs. Since KSP isn't historical (I'm not saying it should as it would limit the tech progression even more), it should at least provide the flexibiliy needed to follow your own playstyle. Well, not exactly. That too, but it's also about the science-to-tech research mechanic. You can't buy tech (as it is done IRL), instead you have to gather unrelated scientific data (that can be only obtained "out there") to unlock more parts.

I just wish they weren't "an introduction". There are already scenarios and tutorials (and KSPedia) that serve that function.

Did I say I can't? You can't easily progress the way you want. You can't easily pick the objectives you want. You have to follow the tree provided by SQUAD and fish out for the contracts that have the exact objectives that interest you. I want to do one thing and focus on it, not complete a bunch of unrelated objectives tht I don't care about. Please, do illuminate me about it. I'm totally fine with it if it was part of the game. Great arguments. Career was meant to be a part of this game since like forever. When I played this game for the first time I thought "This is great! I can't wait to see what they do wih the career mode!". So I waited, and waited and it finally came out! Aaaaand it was not what I expected, so I thought "OK, this is the first release. There's still room for improvement. I can wait." So I did. And all that ever came out was more "tweaks". Parts got moved around the tree, contracts got penalties for declining and useless strategies became a thing. I've played enough of sandbox mode. I want a real experience now. I'm just curious and want to know as many opinions as possible. Yeah, pretty much this. The problem with this analogy though is in KSP you start with a spade, dig the gold and then buy a pickaxe, because that's the only thing available and you need it to get a better spade for some reason. And that makes no sense.

I am totally aware of that, but I'm also sure that this will never happen. I mean, I'm not against the idea, but let's be honest, SQUAD couldn't even create a proper career mode with a sensible progression. Imagine if they tried to make some sort of story in this game. Kerbals would die before they get born, or sth like that.

I do want to go into space, except I want to do it my way, not your way, or SQUAD's way. I want to pick the path of my own, not the one that SQUAD, or you, or other fanboys think is good enough. What? scientific research has EVERYTHING to do with R&D. You CAN'T progress if you don't go somewhere and gather the science points. Does anyone have to say it to make it true? KSP's budget system has nothing to do with the way governments fund space programs. Government funding implies there's a certain organization that gives the space program money every X days/weeks/months. Not only KSP doesn't have that, but also it has some sort of mission slot machine hidden in the Mission Control. That's far from how government funding works. It's more or less like this: 1. The space agency makes a program of what they want to do and where they want to go. 2. The Government then looks at this plan and decides whether it wants to fund it or not 3. The space agency gets money/doesn't get money to fund the program Or, a lack of developer's vision, kin to the "it's good enough" approach, or simply being lazy. Well, I actually do know what I want to do in the game. The problem is it's something else than it was previously. I've been there, done that. Now I want something else. It's not the "I don't know what to do" approach. It's more like "I want to go my own path this time". KSP's career simply doesn't allow for that. We have a tree which progression is inane and contracts are still random. You can't even filter them properly. I want to pick my own objectives and research things that interest me, not be a slave to the progression SQUAD created and approved by people who think "it's good enough/I got used to it".

That's soooo taken out of context. He also said about atmospheric science helping in the research of wings. Except there's no government and real funding from it.

Eh, you guys. I'll edit the poll It's restricting and not challenging. You do what the game tells you to do early in the game and if you don't massively screw up it only gets easier later. Oh, yeah. Or mod it.

There's a mod for that lololololo Only if procParts became stock.

The question is pretty simple, I think. I feel like the way science is traded to tech is limiting. Couple that with the tech tree we have and it's a real chore (going though all those nodes I don't need to get what I need). What I would love to see is a tech research mechanic that gives you the choice over what you want to research next providing you the kind of progression you want. For example, I want one day to go full atmospheric/SSTO career. The SSTOs would be used to go into space and launch satellites Shuttle-Galileo style. The problem is, I can't do that, because I have to go to the Mun first to gather enough science points (AKA rubbish points), then accumulate enough money to upgrade the R&D and only then I would be able to unlock the nodes I need to make my dream come true. Or I could go for the mods... But that's not a good argument anymore (it never was, frankly), because we have the console version of the game. And there you can not use mods. IMO such freedom of choice could be achived by using money to unlock technology and reearangment of the tree itself (with themed branches instead of the senseless mess we have now). So what do you think? Is there any particular progression you would like to perform yourself?