Kerbal Poaching

[Sidereus]

We know there are other space agencies on Kerbin, given that we have to rescue their Kerbalnauts from time to time. This is currently the only way to "poach" (i.e. hire your competitor's employees) Kerbalnauts.

However, I suggest that you be able to recruit your unseen competitor's employees directly through the Astronaut Complex, and that these Kerbals come pre-leveled, as would be appropriate for an experienced Kerbalnaut. The level of the Kerbals you could recruit would depend on your reputation, along with the chance that a pre-leveled Kerbalnaut would submit an application. So someone just starting out and having <10% reputation might have a 1% chance of seeing a level-1 Kerbal show up in the astronaut complex, while someone who has a 90% reputation might see a 50% chance of a level 4 or 5 Kerbal applying. The cost of hiring leveled Kerbals would be commiserate with their level.

This would take some of the grind off of leveling Kerbals for career mode, particularly for players who have many active missions.

Edited May 4, 2015 by Sidereus

[dryer_lint]

That would be pretty cool. Higher cost for university-trained Kerbals. Or maybe even a strategy that allows you to spend funds to level up all your Kerbals?

By the way, just wanted to add: I don't think there are other space agencies on Kerbin. Those agencies are just manufacturers that forgot to disable their engines during a test

[Sidereus]

That would be pretty cool. Higher cost for university-trained Kerbals.

Oh yeah, I was going to put something in there about leveled Kerbals being more expensive to hire.

By the way, just wanted to add: I don't think there are other space agencies on Kerbin. Those agencies are just manufacturers that forgot to disable their engines during a test

LOL

[spinomonkey]

This is a great opportunity to use Rep! Awesome idea!

[MacroNova]

I do think recruitment could use a balance pass. Right now you are encouraged to get all your Kerbals from rescues. I rescued a couple of Kerbals to fulfill contracts and the price to hire more shot up really high. So now I'm stuck at this place where it's too expensive to hire anyone, but I'm short on a particular skill of Kerbal (pilots). That means I need to keep rescuing them until I get lucky.

[moronwrocket]

I approve this suggestion!

Also, as a penalty for not "growing your own" you should take a rep hit IMO. Stealing other kerbals instead of growing your own just isn't cool, but would be darned convenient!

[nholzric]

Love this idea! I think poaching Kerbals should cost money AND reputation. Nobody like the egomaniac that sucks up all the talent in a field to build their own empire! Not that I'm a big fan of making everything so expensive as to be useless - so the costs in money and rep obviously will be balanced somehow - but it makes sense to use both currencies.

So now I'm stuck at this place where it's too expensive to hire anyone, but I'm short on a particular skill of Kerbal (pilots). That means I need to keep rescuing them until I get lucky.

I'm not far along in my career, but I increased my roster to 5 by rescuing a pilot and a scientist over the weekend. Like you, I was thinking if I just went out and rescued a bunch of Kerbals I could build crews for "free" but what if don't get the right types?

Can't you just fire the crew you rescue if they aren't the type you want? Presumably this reduces the next hiring cost. This strategy still feels rather grindy - rendezvous for a 1/3 chance that you get the recruit you want doesn't sound very efficient and (playing on Moderate) the cash/rep rewards for rescue aren't very enticing on their own.

[MacroNova]

I just think the growth of hiring costs is overtuned.

[KSK]

I like this idea. I was also wondering about changing the rescue mission mechanics slightly so that the player has the option of either returning the rescued kerbal to his/her company for an additional rep boost, or hiring them at a discounted rate, rather than getting them for free.

Purely a personal thing - I can never bear to leave a kerbal stranded in orbit but (especially in the early game) I can't really be bothered clogging up my roster with a bunch of engineers and scientists that I can't do much with.

[klgraham1013]

Was never fond of the invisible other space program.

[Sidereus]

I just think the growth of hiring costs is overtuned.

Yeah...I noticed the costs went way up with each new Kerbal you hired. I suppose that's one way to balance it vs. having overhead operating costs that get deducted from your total revenue each month or year, but it gets to be a lot of cash to put up front...

Perhaps with this feature the price of the base level Kerbals could remain the same (or at least not go up nearly so quickly) so as to ease off the grind early in the game, while the leveled ones would give you a place to sink all your extra cash late in the game.

Was never fond of the invisible other space program.

Because they keep stranding their Kerbonauts, or just not liking they're never actually shown?

[klgraham1013]

The invisible other is just a way of justifying stranded Kerbals. I'm not a fan of things randomly spawning in my game, flimsy excuse or no.