WOW! Any vanilla hard difficulty career mode players get to the mun yet?!

[Cirocco]

About 7hours in total, finally did a munar fly by and upgraded the launch pad. 30th mission or so overall. The grind is real. Science is incredibly hard to come by until you can make a heavy SRB rocket that can break orbit / return (though this resulted in me making a almost entirely SRB rocket to get a munar flyby). Money isn't a real bottleneck since all the early stuff is so cheap (especially SRBs, which are pennies for a dollar considering what they can do), it's science that seems incredibly slow.

Not landing on the mun till I can EVA / Surface sample, which will take another dozen or so contracts till I have enough funds for both building upgrades.

seems like you're getting your science at a rather slow rate. Since money isn't a problem, try upgrading your astronaut complex ASAP to be able to do EVA reports, this wil help science gathering considerable. Secondly, focus on unlocking more science equipment in the tech tree and milk all possible spots/biomes for as much science as possible (EVA reports, goo and mat bay in flight, upper atmosphere, space and space high over kerbin for example. That stuff alone is worth a ton of science). also don't forget that EVA reports near Kerbin vary depending on which biome you are over and give a respectable amount of science points. Get a ton of them in one mission by going out, taking a report, storing it in the pod, rinse, repeat.

Using these techniques I got into orbit after about 1 hour, mun flyby after 2-3. I'm now on hour 4 and should have all the parts I need for a standard Mun landing and return.

[Starwhip]

Well, in my opinion, it certainly feels like less of a "grind" in hard mode, which I naturally started out with. That's only because I feel like I have options, what with the new contracts, new parts, new tech tree, etc. Back in 0.90.0 and 0.25, it felt like a grind because I'd done it many times before.

Not to say that I've made much progress. Still stuck in LKO. I really need a Delta-V calculator.

[EtherDragon]

I took the Stock Kerbal-X to a Mun Landing and full return without issue last night - first try! I did have some 1.0 Career Mode, so learning the capabilities of each part a little bit already. Here is the trick!

Speed Kills: There is not need to go rushing past terminal velocity as fast as you can! In fact, doing so is a recipe for a flipped rocket, overheating parts, or any other problem that will cause a rapid unscheduled disassembly.

With the Kerbal-X: Go up-ish to about 1,000m and push her over to 10degrees off of vertical. Now, here's the real trick - TURN OFF SAS. Don't use it, YAGNI. You are in a gravity turn, let gravity - turn you!

The Gravity Turn: Allowing gravity to turn your rocket is all about being hands-off. No control inputs! NONE! - don't do it, it's a trap! Instead, throttle back, it's really ok, you don't have to fly your ship - a well designed rocket wants to reach orbit. At lower throttle the rocket will naturally tip over to about 45 degrees above horizon. The lower your throttle at first (after initial ascent) the faster this happens, play with this a bit until you find a routine you really like.

Give'n Her All She's Got! Once you're at your desired ascent angle, "Z" it up - go whole hog until your Ap is where you like it. Orbital operations work just like they did before.

[ArgenTum]

I too find hard mode a bit grindy. In my opinion hard should be hard because of more "realistic" effects, ie stonger reentry heat, no saving, bigger penalty for crashing etc. Smaller marginals for error, quite simply. In fact, maybe you should earn MORE money than in normal, but also loose more money when failing.

I also (as someone else wrote) think it is grindy in the start because I'm already so experienced, so I don't really have to think when I design my first 10-15 rockets. The fun challenge is to get to the Mun with no manouver nods. That is hard, and its not grindy. Then, I found in 0.90 you hit a (dead end?)/wall when starting to go to other planets. With no dV calculator and no mods (since were talking stock here) it is just dead (too) hard to design a good enough rocket to take you to for example Eve, and if I somehow still manages to do that, it is too hard to aerobrake successfully around another planet. One little design flaw, or a periapsis a touch too low, and you lost a bunch of money with no way of reverting. I have a good solution for that problem, but this post is too long already. (And when I posted about this problem a couple of months ago noone else seemed to share my problem with aerobraking.)

[Renegrade]

I tried out a hard mode career - took only about 30 minutes to reach LKO, and am ready for mun orbiter missions (I'd do more, but gotta run to the bank, and they're only open between 1pm and 1:05pm or somesuch BS). I haven't tried a Mun landing with the tier 1 buildings in 1.0, is probably still doable though. Most of my time was spent floating around with a partly deployed chute.. those have way too much drag in that state.

Some notes here:

- an experienced player does not need solar panels without something like a lab or ion thrusters. Like.. EVER. Heck, I think Maxmaps did a Minmus trips with no panels or batteries, so an experienced player should be able to WITH batteries.

- while I'm not sure I'd want to go interplanetary without maneuver nodes and patched conics, it is also not required for Mun or Minmus trips for an experienced player. NOr is it required for rescue/docking operations.

While I'll agree that newbies will be rekt by this sort of stuff, they aren't the intended audience for Hard.

Not to say that I've made much progress. Still stuck in LKO. I really need a Delta-V calculator.

Here you go:

ln(mass_full/mass_empty)*isp*9.82

mass_full is the total mass of your craft. You can see it in the VAB very easily, or in map mode in flight under the 'info' tab. Every 90 units of liquid fuel means you have one ton of fuel left for an LF/O system. So if the current stage has 152 liquid fuel in it (and about 185 oxidizer), you subtract 1.688.. from your current mass (in tonnes) to get mass_empty.

(the 9.82 bug MIGHT have been fixed..)

This isn't rocket science, you know..er wait a minute.. in any case, the game provides all the necessary info for delta-v data. Just in a really poorly laid out manner, partly obfuscated with irrelevant "units".

Or, if that's too much work... KER and VOID are updated to 1.0 now.

[justidutch]

...I really need a Delta-V calculator.

A number of months ago I made my own schmelta-v calculator. I need to update it though, with all the new parts since 0.90. I've been lazy that way. Anyways, I hope it helps…

As for the OP, I am also a hard-mode stock-only guy. I don't have the time this week to begin a new career, but will do so soon!

[EladDv]

well i flew by the mun on hard after only an astronaut facility upgrade (for the extra science of EVAs)

[zarakon]

The big grind problem with the default "Hard" mode is something I can't believe they didn't catch and fix.

Income is reduced, and that's fine. That essentially increases the costs of everything - unlocking parts, building craft, upgrading buildings, penalties, strategies, hiring, etc.

But on top of that, it sets Funds Penalties to 200%. What's wrong with that? Building upgrades count as penalties for some reason! So you have less income, and on top of that building upgrades cost double, so those multiply together to essentially make it so building upgrade costs absolutely dwarf everything else.

So I run my version of Hard with 30 or 40% income, and maybe 50 or 60% penalties. This means I have to pay more attention to building cost-effective rockets without creating such a ridiculous grind for building upgrades.

Edited April 28, 2015 by zarakon

[X-SR71]

The big grind problem with the default "Hard" mode is something I can't believe they didn't catch and fix.

Income is reduced, and that's fine. That essentially increases the costs of everything - unlocking parts, building craft, upgrading buildings, penalties, strategies, hiring, etc.

But on top of that, it sets Funds Penalties to 200%. What's wrong with that? Building upgrades count as penalties for some reason! So you have less income, and on top of that building upgrades cost double, so those multiply together to essentially make it so building upgrade costs absolutely dwarf everything else.

So I run my version of Hard with 30 or 40% income, and maybe 50 or 60% penalties. This means I have to pay more attention to building cost-effective rockets without creating such a ridiculous grind for building upgrades.

Oh so thats why the launch pad upgrade costs like 75k on normal, but noticeable more on hard.. I was thinking upgrades were related to the difficulty per se.

[Mr. Scruffy]

Hmmm. Playing hard, too (iirc), and my issue seems to be neither cash nor science, but reputation. Having finsihed the records upto 2.5km/s, having orbited kerbin, i do not find anything mun-related in the contract menu (and i assume that´s because of lack of REP). I simply dont feel like doing any of those offered, which either give miniscule amounts of anything, or are not really suitable to my situation (VIPs and surveys). Should i go anyways?

[herbal space program]

But on top of that, it sets Funds Penalties to 200%. What's wrong with that? Building upgrades count as penalties for some reason! So you have less income, and on top of that building upgrades cost double, so those multiply together to essentially make it so building upgrade costs absolutely dwarf everything else.

Totally agree that this is too cruel. The cost of the initial building upgrades is just brutal, and you find yourself stuck with no way to do any of the more lucrative missions (how are you going to go to the Mun with only 18 tons and 30 parts?) or to get all the science you can get from EVA reports over different biomes. I found that I couldn't even orbit and recover a Science Jr. with the parts and restrictions you get using the starting buildings. I think I will start over myself and dial that parameter back a bit.

[nadreck]

I just posted this on another thread

[herbal space program]

Hmmm. Playing hard, too (iirc), and my issue seems to be neither cash nor science, but reputation. Having finsihed the records upto 2.5km/s, having orbited kerbin, i do not find anything mun-related in the contract menu (and i assume that´s because of lack of REP). I simply dont feel like doing any of those offered, which either give miniscule amounts of anything, or are not really suitable to my situation (VIPs and surveys). Should i go anyways?

I didn't have any Mun-related contracts either in a similar situation, but I think it's also because I didn't have the required techs. After making my orbital mission and before getting any building upgrades, I basically only had the first three tiers of the tech tree done. That leaves you with no lander engine and only the micro lander legs, which may not be enough for the contract system to give you a Munar mission.

[ghpstage]

Just restarted my stock hard career and got the Mun flyby contract after just 2 launches, first was an initial launch with the flea, second was into orbit with the first 2 techs.

That cleared all the records bar 2,500m/s in atmos, all the scripted contracts including the de-orbiting one which is easy to miss (only appears while your first rocket is in orbit!) and a science from near Kerbin space one.

Grand total of 430,000 funds from all that too

Just remember to decline a couple of contracts to allow the list to refresh.

Edited April 28, 2015 by ghpstage

[Scotius]

This ship got Jeb and payload of Science Bay plus 2 Goo Canister into low Mun orbit, with plenty dV to spare. I could probably land upper stage, if not for the lack of landing legs (and i was not going to risk my only experienced pilot trying to land on engine bell). I don't know why you people consider reaching the Mun hard

[herbal space program]

Just remember to decline a couple of contracts to allow the list to refresh.

That worked for me. I'm going to have to re-start this hard career game with better exploitation of the contracts system!

[Tobyz28]

http://i.imgur.com/SFSueYR.png

This ship got Jeb and payload of Science Bay plus 2 Goo Canister into low Mun orbit, with plenty dV to spare. I could probably land upper stage, if not for the lack of landing legs (and i was not going to risk my only experienced pilot trying to land on engine bell). I don't know why you people consider reaching the Mun hard

Pretty sure you're not playing on Hard OR you grinded a lot to have the funds to upgrade your launch pad & VAB.

The craft you have there is well over 30 parts, so you'd need to have upgraded the VAB, which on hard mode is quite a steep price.

I don't have KSP here at the moment but the launchpad and VAB were something like 150k and 350k to upgrade to launch you're craft there. Other buildings are also very steep (think the science center was something over 500k?)

With that said, this is hard mode and personally I kinda like it, but i do think the building cost is leaning more towards grindyness vs difficulty for building upgrades. The tech tree, income from missions, etc are pretty challenging and fun as is I have to make real hard choices for my tech trees because science isn't so easy to come by now, and a botched launch can leave your space program in financial turmoil for some time!

[Mr. Scruffy]

[PICTURE]

This ship got Jeb and payload of Science Bay plus 2 Goo Canister into low Mun orbit, with plenty dV to spare. I could probably land upper stage, if not for the lack of landing legs (and i was not going to risk my only experienced pilot trying to land on engine bell). I don't know why you people consider reaching the Mun hard

Cause we are the ones, who kept right-clicking and draging our mouse on that pic. ;P

"Damn it - it crashed again!"

[Behrooz]

The big grind problem with the default "Hard" mode is something I can't believe they didn't catch and fix.

Income is reduced, and that's fine. That essentially increases the costs of everything - unlocking parts, building craft, upgrading buildings, penalties, strategies, hiring, etc.

But on top of that, it sets Funds Penalties to 200%. What's wrong with that? Building upgrades count as penalties for some reason! So you have less income, and on top of that building upgrades cost double, so those multiply together to essentially make it so building upgrade costs absolutely dwarf everything else.

So I run my version of Hard with 30 or 40% income, and maybe 50 or 60% penalties. This means I have to pay more attention to building cost-effective rockets without creating such a ridiculous grind for building upgrades.

THAT explains it. I quit playing last night after going to do some upgrades and seeing that the level one upgrades cost 270,000 each and resolved to quit playing until the no-grind mod was updated.

[sedativechunk]

Some have questioned here why I chose to play the game this way with the "grind". Well, for me, I have played this game over 700 hours while it was still in alpha/beta (mostly alpha). For me, KSP was getting TOO easy. I could make a trip to the Mun look like going out to check my mailbox on the road. It was starting to get kind of boring, actually. I pretty much conquered every planet including Eve. This is a different challenge; being forced to use certain, lower-tier parts without maneuver nodes or flight engineer to try to get to some of these planets. I am enjoying the challenge so far. Once you get past the grind of the beginning and have the launch pad upgrade, things start to go more smoothly.

I just made my second trip to the Mun without the maneuver nodes including flying over a specific location, had to point the ship radial and figured it out on my own.

[Maolagin]

Yup, put me down as another "hard" mode fan. Been playing for about a year and pretty well have the hang of things, so first thing I did after downloading 1.0 was ... actually it was to whip up a Mun mining base in sandbox and figure out how to launch giant rockets with mammoth fairings. But after that, anyway, I dived into a new hard mode career (except with revert turned back on ... I'm not such a maniac as to put Jeb in a new vehicle that hasn't been tested in simulated flight).

First impressions ... yes, it's hard. The initial rush of automatic contracts from the worlds-first crew provides a nice cushion at the very beginning, after playing for an hour or so I've got the first tech tier unlocked and could upgrade the launchpad if I wanted. But after that it's all payouts in the low thousands, so if I want to head into deep space I have some hard choices. E.g. a Minmus-first strategy might be doable with only 30 parts, but I kind of doubt I can bullseye Minmus without conics in the tracking center. Or do I grind out enough biomes on Kerbin to unlock the Stayputnik and start with robotic Mun landers? This is the first version where these feel like real consequential gameplay decisions, rather than novelties to keep myself amused.

[Starwhip]

Here you go:

ln(mass_full/mass_empty)*isp*9.82

mass_full is the total mass of your craft. You can see it in the VAB very easily, or in map mode in flight under the 'info' tab. Every 90 units of liquid fuel means you have one ton of fuel left for an LF/O system. So if the current stage has 152 liquid fuel in it (and about 185 oxidizer), you subtract 1.688.. from your current mass (in tonnes) to get mass_empty.

(the 9.82 bug MIGHT have been fixed..)

This isn't rocket science, you know..er wait a minute.. in any case, the game provides all the necessary info for delta-v data. Just in a really poorly laid out manner, partly obfuscated with irrelevant "units".

Or, if that's too much work... KER and VOID are updated to 1.0 now.

You should see my three abandoned Excel calculators and my countless sheets of random readouts...

My motto is that if I've done it myself, more than once, then I can let something else do it for me. Like Mechjeb, though I don't really like it. (The only thing I ever use that for is in-space maneuvers, I'd never let it touch my controls on takeoff or landing... and handy ship and orbit info, of course.)

[Shalashalska]

Yeah, I really enjoyed the first... half-hour or so of career mode

Don't get me wrong: I love what they've done with it, no more cruising through the tech-tree, no more easy funding. However, there still is a ton of grind. Definitely a step in the right direction though!

There's not still a ton of grind. There's a ton MORE grinding involved in career mode. The massive engine nerfs mean that I haven't managed to get to the mun yet with a rocket under 50t. In old career, a single one of the huge SRB's, a 909 and a medium fuel tank could get you a moon landing and return.

[Musil]

I haven't gotten to the Mun yet because every time I get into orbit I get greedy, try to bring back a capsule with 2 material bays at the bottom, the thing flips and kills Val. I think I have to just give those experiments up and do the reentry with just the pod.

Getting to the Mun without patched conics is not hard. You need to start burning when the Mun comes up on the horizon and get your apoapsis up to munar orbit. You will almost certainly get a decent encounter.

The contract grinding on the first stage of the game is a problem for career, I think. I have hard settings, but I did give myself a bit more starting money and turned the money rewards up to 80%, because I prefer to grind science, not money. Career needs more contracts that can be done on early tech, on Kerbin, that are not "do this boring testing". The turists contracts are a nice start. I want the contracts to make me do things in orbit. Why is there no simple "do an EVA on Kerbin orbit" contract, and that sort of thing... hopefully better, but it just seems like it's "get into orbit" and then "land on the Mun" with nothing to ease the blow. As the game progresses, I expect more of that kind of thing to apear.

I am having a lot of fun, and expect the problems that I am having to be easily fixed by some mods that don't change gameplay too much.

Edited April 28, 2015 by Musil

[zarakon]

There's not still a ton of grind. There's a ton MORE grinding involved in career mode. The massive engine nerfs mean that I haven't managed to get to the mun yet with a rocket under 50t. In old career, a single one of the huge SRB's, a 909 and a medium fuel tank could get you a moon landing and return.

It's also much harder to re-use anything due to re-entry destruction, so margins on each mission are much lower than what you could get before.