Focus on Resources - Jebediah has used all the fuel in Sandbox mode

[roguelycan]

The Scenario

After years of Jebediah being allowed to run wild with his pursuit of space, snacks, and explosions Kerbin is now suffering from a wide scale fuel shortage. The local 7-11 has officially run dry and all that is left is the fuel stored in the tanks at KSC. Bob has now taken command of the KSC with a bold plan to supply their own fuel through widespread mining operations.

The Idea

An optional difficulty setting to start out in sandbox mode with a limited amount of fuel requiring mining and recovering resources to keep your rockets fueled up.

The Execution

There would need to be an option under the Sandbox difficulties that you could enable to start the game with finite resources. The starting amount would be adjustable depending on the level of difficulty you want. This could range from allowing a Mun/Minmus mission or 2 to only having enough for atmospheric flight with jets. Options for removing ore from under KSC as well as a range around KSC should also be included. Ore and fuels recovered on Kerbin would be added into the tanks at the KSC but would fall under the same recovery rules for parts in career mode so Ore/Fuel recovered from far away will only give you a percentage of it. There would be an ISRU at the KSC to handle on the spot ore refinery. This could run at less efficiency than the actual ISRUs which would make refining the ore into fuel before recovering beneficial in some situations.

I would love to hear peoples ideas and suggestions for my idea. I only ask that we keep the topic on this idea for sandbox and not on ideas on how to make this work for career mode. The amount of changes that would be needed to make this work in career is enough to warrant a separate thread.

[moronwrocket]

Add in a Class E asteroid aimed for Kerbin with an impact in 5 years, and call it "No way to run, nowhere to hide". The asteroid adds in a time urgency to your scenario - otherwise just sit at KSC and refine. Now you have to go ramp up an ISRU empire within a limited time. Throw in a couple of other objects within the "swarm" that arrive a year or two earlier, with or without a Kerbin strike.

[roguelycan]

Lol while it is a little more than I was imagining with this idea that does sound pretty awesome. It feels a little outside the scope of stock KSP though but could make an interesting scenario or mod type of game mode. I am thinking of something more in line with the regular sandbox mode but with just enough of an objective to give your designs some purpose without limiting creativity too much.

[zxczxczbfg]

I think a "limited resource storage" option would be nice (perhaps even allowing you to ship resources back to the KSC), but it might be too difficult (running out of resources would essentially end the game).

I think that there should be a "resource management mode" where all the parts cost the same but the resources contained within them are drastically more expensive; this makes it more economical to mine for resources but less likely to accidentally expend your supplies (you can always just buy more, albeit at a huge markup).

[roguelycan]

I think a "limited resource storage" option would be nice (perhaps even allowing you to ship resources back to the KSC), but it might be too difficult (running out of resources would essentially end the game).

I think that there should be a "resource management mode" where all the parts cost the same but the resources contained within them are drastically more expensive; this makes it more economical to mine for resources but less likely to accidentally expend your supplies (you can always just buy more, albeit at a huge markup).

Being able to recover mined ore and fuel would be CRITICAL for this game mode to work. As to the difficulty question that is why this would be an optional sandbox option with options to adjust its difficulty. If you like the idea of limited resources but without the possibility of "losing" you could simply keep ore enabled underneath the KSC and just build a miner on the launchpad, then recover it for more fuel.

The "resource management mode" is a good idea but would only work in career since funds dont exist in sandbox mode.

[Hobbes Novakoff]

This would be really cool. I like the idea of limited fuel. Add a new sort of dynamic to the game.

[roguelycan]

I think this would be the perfect thing to add into the game now that resources have been added to stock. It would create an entirely new game mode with minimal work having to be done on squads side. The only thing that would need to be done is coding in a limit to the fuel storage at KSC and include resource recovery to the vehicle recovery option. All of the mechanics and features are already in the game.

[moronwrocket]

Yeah it seems like a natural companion to Kerbal Construction Time/Stage Recovery

[roguelycan]

Maybe not stage recovery so much since this would be a sandbox feature and thats a career mode mod.

[Tw1]

Running a space program with only fuel from space?

Try it and see how long you can sustain it for.

[roguelycan]

Running a space program with only fuel from space?

Try it and see how long you can sustain it for.

You wouldn't just be using fuel recovered from space. You would still have ore on Kerbin. You would use aircraft to mine ore and could return the ore/fuel to KSC or recover from the mining site for a % based on your distance form the KSC. A large cargo plane full of empty ore containers would recover a significant amount of fuel if recovered full of ore. The idea is that it would add a level of difficulty to the sandbox mode for people that wanted to use it. It wouldnt be a mandatory feature of sandbox mode.