Gameplay ideas for things to do once you are actually at a planet.

[notcomplex]

It's no secret that once you've gotten everything down and done crazy challenges like Jool V or pulling off multiple flybys (Voyager style) the game doesn't have much else to give. So this discussion is for ideas that would give added depth to the game once you've actually gotten to the planet. A good example is MKS/OKS which adds a ton of new resources and the challenge of building a self sustaining colony. Science and contracts feel cheap, and new planets or *gasp* a procedural system (even though Squad decided this was a bad idea for some reason...) just give you a new place to land on and then a few minutes later leave. I'm not knocking a proc system, I'd play the .... out of it and I think the game needs way more procedural content (seriously the terrain sucks) but essentially the depth of gameplay hasn't changed since .18 days (they added some asteroids).

I wouldn't mind seeing a robust supply economy based on space mining with multiple independent AI actors and obviously multiplayer , and if the n-body mod ever completes (and figures out a stable configuration for KSPs wonky system) could see some really amazing flightpaths to hit up multiple mining sites (one day I'll find a use for Mathematica outside my physics hw). As of now the system feels really dead once you figure out how to get around, I think that should be a priority. ofc just my idea and it probably sucks, so post yours and have fun with it, think outside the box of what is practical or what ksp has been so far (a sandbox game with some misplaced game elements tacked on) and go wild.

Mostly I'm just looking for a programming project lol.

[Xavven]

Let's see how ISRU changes the gameplay. I personally predict that it will give us a reason to set up bases, orbital refineries, land and orbital tankers, etc. If that's not enough, then yeah maybe we need a colonization feature.

[Kegereneku]

I think anything close to commercial exploitation of space resources should be OUT OF QUESTION, for realism first (as it would take higher-technology and tremendous economy of scale to make it worth) and because it won't really fit a game where every single spaceship must be flown by hand. Same for Space colonization, it ask for technology beyond the modern-era KSP suggest.

By that's my opinion, no doubt people will keep insisting it would be the next best thing since the wheels.

On more reasonable subject, taking and storing physically sample in box, having experiments to deploy from toolbox to the surface of planet would be nice.

But I would like KSP to be less grindy on science first. The ability to generation science from Space station will surely help, but at that point maybe we could actually automatize lesser experiments (thermometer / the various detector...etc)

[notcomplex]

Eh resource mining has been around since Kethane and with the system being so small and LVNs being fairly OP I've always found it pointless.

I don't think we would need much different tech to pull off a mining economy. My line of thinking is you would mine asteroids which aren't that large and then ship it to various industries around the system for profit which would work under the mysterious forces of supply economics from multiple actors contributing. It would also be cool if you could set up actual space bases on planets so you can get to certain asteroids easier, which would require you to mine metals to build rocket parts on site as well as runways launchpads etc.

Honestly you could just scrap the economy bit and find a way to build functioning space bases on other planets (so you would build up a KSC on Laythe for the hell of it).

And the devs have stated gameplay > realism, not like anything in KSP is realistic.