Contracts at their finest :)

[Terwin]

How difficult is it to make automatic missions like the altitude and orbit ones?

I think it would be nice to have a comprehensive Flyby then Explore script starting from the current 'Achieve orbit' auto-mission.

Basically add a Fly-by mission any time you enter a SOI that touches a new SOI, and add an Explore mission any time you complete the fly-by mission.

Ideally, any ore/tourists/test at location/etc missions would only become available for a location after the 'Explore' mission is completed, but that would probably take a lot more work than just adding the above missions with their pre-conditions.

The only exploit I see coming from this is sending out a probe to visit as many SOI as possible, except that this 'exploit' sounds an awful lot like most NASA interplanetary missions...

Even if the payout is low, it is still an encouragement to all career players to go and visit all the planets and moons.

[Sharpy]

I dunno. Some of these contracts suggest fun activity.

Build a ground station on the Mun.

Have the facility support 11 kerbals.

Have a research lab in the facility.

Have 20,000 units of liquid fuel in the facility.

Make the facility on wheels.

Since I have zero intent landing a 20,000 units of LF on the Mun, it implies "Have a working mining operation and refinery on site".

In coming weeks expect a Munar Railways post. The train currently undergoes Kerbin tests.

[Rocket Farmer]

@ tater

Well aren't you just a ray of sunshine. Something isn't perfect in your world so it's "stupid." KSP was designed by professional game developers to encapsulate the traditionally difficult topic of orbital mechanics blended with humour to make it enjoyable. Before seeing kerbals I would have said this was impossible. Forgive me if I take their professional opinion over yours as they have made it work and work well.

Secondly KSP owes you nothing. Your recouped your investment in he 1st couple hours of play. Any "demands" of changes beyond that is due to your unfounded self entitlement. There is so much self centeredness in your above discussion it's amazing in your game that the planets don't orbit around you.

Making suggestions is fine. Better yet is realizing that there are Multiple avenues of development for s game like this and if it doesn't fit your style then there are other games that probably do. Personally I enjoy the entire mad scientist slightly illogical theme as it is consistent throughout the entire game with the crazy missions fitting in just fine.

That's me. I'm not saying your thoughts and ideas are bad but your delivery and my way or he highway mentality does nothing for anybody.

Be constructive.

[Hcube]

@ tater

Well aren't you just a ray of sunshine. Something isn't perfect in your world so it's "stupid." KSP was designed by professional game developers to encapsulate the traditionally difficult topic of orbital mechanics blended with humour to make it enjoyable. Before seeing kerbals I would have said this was impossible. Forgive me if I take their professional opinion over yours as they have made it work and work well.

Secondly KSP owes you nothing. Your recouped your investment in he 1st couple hours of play. Any "demands" of changes beyond that is due to your unfounded self entitlement. There is so much self centeredness in your above discussion it's amazing in your game that the planets don't orbit around you.

Making suggestions is fine. Better yet is realizing that there are Multiple avenues of development for s game like this and if it doesn't fit your style then there are other games that probably do. Personally I enjoy the entire mad scientist slightly illogical theme as it is consistent throughout the entire game with the crazy missions fitting in just fine.

That's me. I'm not saying your thoughts and ideas are bad but your delivery and my way or he highway mentality does nothing for anybody.

Be constructive.

this is very fun and all, but how about argue through MP ? this is about funny, stupid, and annoying contracts, not about you two arguing over what KSP owes you and highway mentality

[keeper]

I thought the contracts were alright, the absurdity of some of them need declining immidiatly, no worries.

The challenge for me is making them profit, piling on as many contracts as possible then pulling hair out trying to achieve them all in one flight heh heh heh

Should be able to make demands or negotiate for some of those contracts though, ugh.

[322997am]

I am doing like 10 contracts when I plop my mobile base on Minmus (properly equipped don't scream at me for "rover wheels are crap on Minmus and stuff")

[AbacusWizard]

Rover wheels might not be all that useful on Minmus, but landing gear wheels on the bottom and rocket engines on the back are AWESOME on the flats of Minmus. VROOOM!

[ajburges]

Crazy contracts are part of the game! It's the players job to identify and reject them.

If someone went to SpaceX and asked for a suborbital trip to the Sun for a billion dollars, Musk would laugh him out. Just like NASA would refuse your request to test your jet engine in orbit for half a million.

Edit: right contribution. How about those high polar orbit satilites? What reason would you have for a polar satilite that high? I could understand elliptical and resonant orbits, but high, circular, polar gives nothing new!

Edited July 9, 2015 by ajburges

[A_name]

I would have no problem if i didnt have to perform any of these stock contracts ever again. The whole system is crap imo. It needs direction. 'Test SRB on a suborbital flight on the Mun." ... Im so sick of that crap ive given up completely on career mode.

Its not fun for an experienced player. Its just not. At all. Maybe for the "lol so kerbal" newbie, but.. not me. Squad needs to completely do away with the current contract system and instead provide one that has direction more along the lines of a tech tree like experience.

I recommend the science funds mod for you.

[samstarman5]

That's not career play. Career play shouldn't involve utterly stupid contracts like this one (or your SRB example). Why would anyone move ore anywhere, for any reason? How is vacuum on the moon, orbiting the moon, or suborbital differ from any other vacuum?

Dumb contracts are just dumb, and saying "play sandbox" is simply lazy. Career is a cruddy afterthought, and almost all contracts should be scrapped and redone properly.

Then show you aren't being lazy. Write up a list of suggestions for contracts and submit them to Squad. Just complaining about it is just a lazy a comment as the 'play sandbox' is a reply.

- - - Updated - - -

Crazy contracts are part of the game! It's the players job to identify and reject them.

If someone went to SpaceX and asked for a suborbital trip to the Sun for a billion dollars, Musk would laugh him out. Just like NASA would refuse your request to test your jet engine in orbit for half a million.

Edit: right contribution. How about those high polar orbit satilites? What reason would you have for a polar satilite that high? I could understand elliptical and resonant orbits, but high, circular, polar gives nothing new!

There are a lot of satellites in polar orbit, and researching on them would tell you why there are good reasons for them. For one, a polar orbit allows a satellite to stay in sunlight all the time. (Excluding eclipses, of course)

And I can think of a number of reasons for testing a jet engine in space, especially when you remember that in LEO there still is a measurable amount of atmosphere. It won't mean jet travel in LEO, but it can open up ideas for jet control in turbulence and air pockets. If you want to sit on the ground and pretend like being practical is the only way to go, then the ground is where you will remain. Scoffing at a game like KSP about weird and odd contracts is downright weird in itself. KSP isn't meant to be taken that seriously, and having opportunities to try weird things in the game and get paid for it is not something to pass up.

- - - Updated - - -

I would have no problem if i didnt have to perform any of these stock contracts ever again. The whole system is crap imo. It needs direction. 'Test SRB on a suborbital flight on the Mun." ... Im so sick of that crap ive given up completely on career mode.

Its not fun for an experienced player. Its just not. At all. Maybe for the "lol so kerbal" newbie, but.. not me. Squad needs to completely do away with the current contract system and instead provide one that has direction more along the lines of a tech tree like experience.

*It's not fun for you. Making out like your opinion is the popular opinion is ignorant in itself, especially when you give no apparent sign that you have any motivation to give ideas to improve the tech tree and contracts. Self-entitlement does nobody any good, and is a good feature for a person to have less of.

[tater]

Then show you aren't being lazy. Write up a list of suggestions for contracts and submit them to Squad. Just complaining about it is just a lazy a comment as the 'play sandbox' is a reply.

I can only presume you haven't bothered to check if I had done this, in great detail, on numerous occasions.

[Tw1]

I can only presume you haven't bothered to check if I had done this, in great detail, on numerous occasions.

I can vouch for this. Tater has been one of the more active contributor in many discussions.

You are sitting at a computer steering little green men while they explore space and explosions. You seem concerned with it being "dumb," "stupid," and "cruddy" and yet you still spend time on it. You are fine with imaginary vacuum in different imaginary locations as measured on your imaginary science devices and yet consider there being differences between these items "dumb."

You miss his point entirely. The part he considers dumb is the contract system, and the way many of the things you're asked to do make little sense:

Career play shouldn't involve utterly stupid contracts like this one (or your SRB example).Why would anyone move ore anywhere, for any reason?

Yes, we're doing it with goofy kerbals, and the game is an "imaginary" simulation of space conditions. But that's no reason for it to sell itself short.

The kerbals add a nice touch of whimsy to the game, but that touch needn't take over the core of the game, which until lately, has always been player vs the cold realities of physics. This game is hard, kerbals take the edge off.

I have mostly given up on the current career mode. The game is advertised as "game where the players create their own space program".

It hasn't lived up to that. It's a building game, and spaceflight sim, with some space program themed challenges tacked on.

Contracts like "deliver 5000 tons of ore to X", or "fling an asteroid out of the system", etc, don't make me feel like I'm running a space program. At best, it makes you a space services provider like SpaceX, at worst, it breaks immersion completely.

IMHO, contracts would be better as one part of a bigger system. KSP could be/could've been developed into a far more complex game, where exploring, setting up bases, etc, all benefit the player directly. This would give you motivation to set them up on your own, rather than just because you're being paid to do it. The direction of your space program would be yours

to chose, rather than set by the contracts.

At the moment, contracts is being used as a shortcut way to include many aspects of a space program which could be better done in other ways. IMHO, KSP could be a much more sophisticated game, with time based budgets, more involved science, and planets worth exploring in detail.

If these features eventuated, the odd silly contract would seem more like an optional extra, and not a bizarre job you must do for funding.

It is true Squad is not required to do what any of us says. But, if someone a feature lacking, and wants to propose improvements, why should they not be allowed to express themselves, if they do so in a reasonable way?

Edited July 9, 2015 by Tw1

[Kegereneku]

Contract don't even need a Story to be improved,

They need to actually FILTER what is generated and STOP FILLING ALL FINE PRINT out of idiotic-automation !

See, the game is already generating contract automatically, this is not a list.

All filter need to do is :

- Never ask for stability-Enhancer test anywhere else

- Never have Booster test outside Kerbin Atmosphere (and only starting landed, not in flight at 50km and 400m/s)

- No engine test outside their capability (jet engine at speed they can't reach)

- No pointless altitude-range and speed-range unless it serve a gameplay purpose.

- Forbid tourist-contract from asking for stuff you never did with a manned-mission of professional.

Next, the above is just to AVOID stupid contract. But you could also use said filter to make the progression more intelligent.

ex :

- tailored survey and science contract from place you didn't get said science already.

- have engine-test that hint at their most efficient use.

- Design-development (ex : reaching orbit with a vehicle that have a cargo bay and back).

- suggest IRSU base at place that are good for Infrastructure.

- new contracts that encourage to visit coolest relief of the various planet.

- barely-paid contract the players can choose to accomplish everywhere (ex : Land a manned rover anywhere except Kerbin)

That's all.

I don't know if working with those filters are an hassle, but that's needed for Contract to stop looking like half-done. As much as I appreciate the new heat-system and radiator, we wish we could count on a finished game.

[tater]

Contract don't even need a Story to be improved,

They need to actually FILTER what is generated and STOP FILLING ALL FINE PRINT out of idiotic-automation !

See, the game is already generating contract automatically, this is not a list.

All filter need to do is :

- Never ask for stability-Enhancer test anywhere else

- Never have Booster test outside Kerbin Atmosphere (and only starting landed, not in flight at 50km and 400m/s)

- No engine test outside their capability (jet engine at speed they can't reach)

- No pointless altitude-range and speed-range unless it serve a gameplay purpose.

- Forbid tourist-contract from asking for stuff you never did with a manned-mission of professional.

Next, the above is just to AVOID stupid contract. But you could also use said filter to make the progression more intelligent.

ex :

- tailored survey and science contract from place you didn't get said science already.

- have engine-test that hint at their most efficient use.

- Design-development (ex : reaching orbit with a vehicle that have a cargo bay and back).

- suggest IRSU base at place that are good for Infrastructure.

- new contracts that encourage to visit coolest relief of the various planet.

- barely-paid contract the players can choose to accomplish everywhere (ex : Land a manned rover anywhere except Kerbin)

That's all.

I don't know if working with those filters are an hassle, but that's needed for Contract to stop looking like half-done. As much as I appreciate the new heat-system and radiator, we wish we could count on a finished game.

For clarity, I don't mean a scripted story, I mean that in retrospect the player can create a story in their mind that makes some sense. If the contracts are or seem entirely random, their is no way to rationalize them into a sort of storyline in your head. For example, when you send a probe to Eve, then immediately start getting contracts to rescue kerbals there, ore transfers to or from Eve, or tourists asking for rides there. Sure, you ignore them, but as "director" of a space program, you are turning down contracts which are telling you "other kerbals are already at Eve," "Acme Corp needs ore Moved to Gilly from Eve" (which implies they must have a base or something on Gilly which bizarrely needs ore from Eve, and you as player have only managed a probe at this point), or that many tourists demand trips that are effectively suicide trips since you've not demonstrated the ability to get there, much less return. All of those examples kill immersion, which kills the internalized "story" of your space program.

I agree on filtering out bad contracts, that would help a lot. I am reading you suggestion as something that ALWAYS happens (the game removing really stupid contracts), vs a filter where we as players turn off seeing tourism, etc (which would also be a good idea).

The whole career paradigm is broken. Talking about tourism makes me want the "strategies" to actually be strategies. I would like "Tourism" to be a strategy in that office, and if I don't pick that as a strategy, I don't get tourism contracts. You could do this for sat launches, base construction, etc (though for 3d parties, the player should not own the result, but he could get resupply/expansion/repair contracts for that facility).

I've typed many pages on this in other threads though, I guess I'm too lazy to retype a year's worth of posts mostly on this very subject in this thread .

[Rocket Farmer]

@ Tw1 & Keg

I disagree but respect your constructive opinions. More flesh into the contracts would be nice but I don't see it as a priority at all.

I see Kerbals more as a traditional Lego set. The ones where you got a bunch of random pieces and you had to engage your creativity to determine how to proceed. I hauled out my old Lego set for my 6 year old nephew recently. He looked in the box for 3-4 minutes before he came over to ask where the directions were because he didn't know what the set was designed to build. When I said there were none build what you want he seemed confused.

I don't see the contract system as a guide to your space program development. I see them more as an optional have you tried this crazy idea. It seems that Keg above especially wants a reward system built into Kerbal. Why isn't coming up with your own mission plan and executing it well sufficient for reward? Why do you need s contract that also says good job?

[tater]

@ Tw1 & Keg

I disagree but respect your constructive opinions. More flesh into the contracts would be nice but I don't see it as a priority at all.

I see Kerbals more as a traditional Lego set. The ones where you got a bunch of random pieces and you had to engage your creativity to determine how to proceed. I hauled out my old Lego set for my 6 year old nephew recently. He looked in the box for 3-4 minutes before he came over to ask where the directions were because he didn't know what the set was designed to build. When I said there were none build what you want he seemed confused.

I don't see the contract system as a guide to your space program development. I see them more as an optional have you tried this crazy idea. It seems that Keg above especially wants a reward system built into Kerbal. Why isn't coming up with your own mission plan and executing it well sufficient for reward? Why do you need s contract that also says good job?

The entire point of a "career" mode is exactly that sort of limitation and storyline. If you want the contracts basically random and pointless, as they all are now (the few "Explore" contracts excepted), then why not do sandbox? Add a "generate a random, stupid project" to sandbox. Done. The point of something called "Career" is explicitly to trace a career. A career is a professional progression, basically. The player is presumably the director (for life) of a space program. If the career mode does't feel like a career, it needs a new name. Perhaps the current "career" mode could be renamed "random kerbal hijinks" mode, anything more descriptive than career (which it isn't).

The goal of campaign/career play in a game like KSP that lacks any real management content (not a necessarily a bad thing) is really to set up novel craft design and piloting situations that feel like they have a context. Being spammed with rescue contracts constantly with no context of a space race, or competition with other programs is bizarre, for example. If you want to feel like you are exploring, you better send the first mission to any SoI manned, because sending a probe will trigger rescues there. Send a probe to Jool, then 5 minutes later 5 other companies have kerbals there. Yay, contracts! Career! Immersion! Great game design!

[Terwin]

For clarity, I don't mean a scripted story, I mean that in retrospect the player can create a story in their mind that makes some sense. If the contracts are or seem entirely random, their is no way to rationalize them into a sort of storyline in your head. For example, when you send a probe to Eve, then immediately start getting contracts to rescue kerbals there, ore transfers to or from Eve, or tourists asking for rides there. Sure, you ignore them, but as "director" of a space program, you are turning down contracts which are telling you "other kerbals are already at Eve," "Acme Corp needs ore Moved to Gilly from Eve" (which implies they must have a base or something on Gilly which bizarrely needs ore from Eve, and you as player have only managed a probe at this point), or that many tourists demand trips that are effectively suicide trips since you've not demonstrated the ability to get there, much less return. All of those examples kill immersion, which kills the internalized "story" of your space program.

Yep, no one would ever pay to go one-way to places that professional astronauts have not yet gotten to...

I have yet to see a contract mission that I could not easily explain as reasonable scientific curiosity(if perhaps a bit short-sighted or overly-enthusiastic some times).

Sub-oribtal Kerbol: We want to do some Kerbol observations, but we need to be going slower than a sustainable orbit to make them

Ore from eve to Gilly: we want to do some material comparisons to determine the origin of Gilly, (large volumes of ore): we also want to test long term storage/out-gassing/low-pressure weathering/etc

Components in odd/specific places: testing design tweaks in specific environments that should highlight the effects of the changes that were made(and where the analysis tools are set up to observe them)

Components in places where they 'can't' work: Testing adaptation technologies in hopes of designing more effective rockets or some sort of material science experiments

Remember: Rocket science is not the *only* type of science out there, and not even the only type of science done by NASA.

I think the only ones that really need to be avoided are the non-possible ones(stability enhancer in orbit), and those seem much less frequent than they were in 0.90 (I saw some in 0.90 but none since 1.0)

[MassoudGL]

The last step of maintaining stability landed on Gilly is harder than you think.

I have to use claws on landers for Gilly because I'm too impatient to wait 4 minutes for things to settle after already waiting like 15 minutes for the lander to fall from 1000m. Unless I use a bunch of fuel just shooting myself down.

[Sharpy]

There are a lot of satellites in polar orbit, and researching on them would tell you why there are good reasons for them. For one, a polar orbit allows a satellite to stay in sunlight all the time. (Excluding eclipses, of course)

Ones with orbit beyond the Moon orbit?

LOW Polar orbit is extremely useful. But with orbits that are 10 times Earth radius, you're getting 5% time eclipse/night at worst. At that distance observation of anything useful is nearly impossible. Transmission doesn't benefit from the orbit being polar in the least. If you absolutely need 100% sun exposure at that altitude, tilting the orbit by 6 degrees from equatorial gives you a constant exposure. Seriously, give me one good reason for a circular polar orbit of more than 100,000km.

[tater]

Yep, no one would ever pay to go one-way to places that professional astronauts have not yet gotten to...

MarsOne is a scam. Aside from that, they'd basically have to pay the actual cost of doing the real mission, the tourist contracts pay about what first class to asia costs from the US vs many billions.

I have yet to see a contract mission that I could not easily explain as reasonable scientific curiosity(if perhaps a bit short-sighted or overly-enthusiastic some times).

Reasonable scientific curiosity? Test any engine on a suborbital flight over the Mun. Explain using reasonable science why an engine test would care if it is in space arbitrarily above the Mun vs arbitrarily above Minmus, Kerbin, or any other body. Every single one of those contracts is dumb.

Sub-oribtal Kerbol: We want to do some Kerbol observations, but we need to be going slower than a sustainable orbit to make them

Nonsense. Suborbital requires an arbitrary height of 70km. If you need data from some particular altitude, then state it. Suborbital is silly. (sorry, I read Kerbol as Kerbin. Suborbital from the Sun? Irrelevant. Set an altitude for the observation. You could argue perhaps moving slower than Kerbin with respect to Kerbol... for reasons. Not terribly reasonable. Meanwhile, good, interesting scientific missions are mostly nonexistent.

Ore from eve to Gilly: we want to do some material comparisons to determine the origin of Gilly, (large volumes of ore): we also want to test long term storage/out-gassing/low-pressure weathering/etc

Makes no sense whatsoever. The game has no actual difference between ores (add the difference, and comparison becomes meaningful, but presumably you'd need a lab to compare them). In addition, you are not to collect ore at the other place, just to "bring it there." Why not sample returns from each? All ore movement contracts are idiotic, period.

Components in odd/specific places: testing design tweaks in specific environments that should highlight the effects of the changes that were made(and where the analysis tools are set up to observe them)

That would be nice if any of them actually made sense, but they mostly don't. Testing landing legs on the Mun would be sensible, for example. Testing a engine landed might be reasonable (worried about sending debris into the bell, etc). They've already gotten rid of the "test X splashed down" and "test a basic jet engine on the mun" nonsense, I'd expect them to do the same with the other bad contracts.

Components in places where they 'can't' work: Testing adaptation technologies in hopes of designing more effective rockets or some sort of material science experiments

See above, silly.

Remember: Rocket science is not the *only* type of science out there, and not even the only type of science done by NASA.

Since science buys technology advancement, rocket science really should be the only science that matters, since a crew report from orbit above Jool does exactly nothing to help design a new rocket engine.

The contracts FEEL random (because they are). The goal should be random contracts that feel like they are part of a progression (note that many "contracts" should really be "missions" internal to your space program---if you launch something by "contract," you should lose ownership).

Edited July 9, 2015 by tater

[Tw1]

I see Kerbals more as a traditional Lego set. The ones where you got a bunch of random pieces and you had to engage your creativity to determine how to proceed.

Why isn't coming up with your own mission plan and executing it well sufficient for reward?

That lego style gameplay is what sandbox is for. KSP does that very well. In fact, I tend to recommend friends skip career, just play sandbox, and do their own thing.

IMHO, career should have continued with that kind of approach, giving us a framework to work in, rather than a bunch of tasks to work through.

Personally, I think Career should not have been built around earning points. It should be about the experience.

If it where my decision, I'd put in several more gameplay systems to represent other space program activities, like running stations, exploring planets, etc, and give each of them their own benifits (like scientific gains) and costs (such as needing life support and crew salary.)

Indicators of success would be more abstract, such as meters indicating how much you'd contributed to each feild of science that year.

(That's another thing. I'd make it more about sustaining, and continually improving your space program, so there wouldn't be a loss of focus when you inevitably finish unlocking the tech tree, building the space center, and other finite aims.)

One thing I've always liked about KSP, is how you do get to be involved in the space program at multiple levels. You're the engineer of all spacecraft, the astrophysicist who plots the course, the pilot who executes it. You also get to be the astronaut hopping about on another world, and the one directing the whole thing, but these roles still feel lacking.

It saddens me to hear how your nephew responded to lego. Best of luck inspiring him to make some things of his own.

Explain using reasonable science why an engine test would care if it is in space arbitrarily above the Mun vs arbitrarily above Minmus, Kerbin, or any other body.

If you launch something by "contract," you should lose ownership).

Perhaps the types of radiation or heat, tentative atmosphere, or other things coming off the body could have an effect ? I think contracts are a perfect way to represent some types or experiments, without needing to fully model things, (my fave example, cassini's relativity test), but yeah, atm, it's not up to scratch.

Definitely agree about the delivery/launching stuff contracts. It makes sense for you to loose control once everything is in place, (contract should be failed of you then go and damage it,) and disappear from the tracking station soon after.

With the tourists, I had hoped you'd need to set up stations and basses to gice them somewhere they could be accommodated first. That'd keep you in charge of possible destinations, and be a real reason to build them.

In general, contracts would work better if they were grounded in reality, then given a bit of Kerbal-silly flavour, rather than completely pulled from a hat as they are.

But, I'd still rather see them become part of a more elaborate system, where you'll also be doing things because it's useful to you, rather than being told to.

Edited July 9, 2015 by Tw1

[tater]

I get your point on contracts as a way of doing "real" science, but they should be designed with that in mind, and sensible. Polar orbiting sats to monitor global land use as a contract. Or for communications (no need for more than just a statement that is what it is for).

This is where writing, etc matters. Hence my concentration on "story."

I'm open to a complete gutting of career, frankly. I mostly play career, BTW, though I also mess with sandbox.

The science buys tech thing is a problem I think. I'd rather have the goals be set more by strategies (I posed a long thing about this some other thread a while ago, and sumghai has good (different) ideas as well). So you decide that the program will concentrate XX% on Space Exploration (might be sub-divided manned/unmannded), YY% on commercial launches (sats and parts testing for funds), and ZZ% on tourism. This drives the relative abundance of missions presented. Space Exploration would not be "contracts" from 3d parties, but internal missions that would pay funds (a budget) and points to buy tech (to complete the mission). In such a paradigm I would have a massively parallel tech tree, so you'd have to spend those science and budget point carefully. So you take a manned Duna mission, you need to buy the right tech with he available tech/funds available. The goal of the mission might include specific science to be gathered, else you fail those mission subsets, and lose future funds, rep, etc (making that the "you lost" moment).

Other ideas are possible.

[Sharpy]

I do mind the fact that all stations and bases once done get forgotten.

There should be far less missions of "put station in orbit" and more: "Transfer Kerbal to station X", "attach [module] to station X", "Fetch [experiment] results from station X lab to Kerbin", "Refill fuel of station X", "Move station to orbit" or even "Undock [generated] craft and land it on Kerbin."

Generally, make the stations and bases an actual important part of the game, not something you keep for 10 seconds before deorbiting.

[Arsonik]

I would very much enjoy a system where I can specify my own mission parameters piecemeal. So you have a list of varying objectives and flight conditions recognized by the game, much like the current contract system does. But when you opt to take a "mission", you, as the leader of this space agency, can choose what parameters to include in your mission. If I want to go to the Mun with 3 Kerbals and bring back surface sample, perhaps test some parts while I am there. Basically the current system just modified to give the player control of the mission.

The Mun mission outlined above would look something like this when you are planning the mission

You have a list of options you select from to form the mission

[X] Explore The Mun

[ ] Explore Minmus

[ ] Explore Duna

[ ] Explore Eve

........

[ ] Perform Surface EVA with 1 Kerbal at Destination

[ ] Perform Surface EVA with 2 Kerbal at Destination

[X] Perform Surface EVA with 3 Kerbal at Destination

[ ] Perform Surface EVA with 4 Kerbal at Destination

........

[X] Collect Surface Sample at Destination

[ ] Perform Goo Experiment at Destination

[ ] Conduct Science Jr. Experiments at Destination

[ ] Record Atmospheric Data at Destination

.......

[ ] Test X Product at Destination

[ ] Test Y Product at Destination

[ ] Test Z Product at Destination

[ ] Test N Product at Destination

This is about as clearly as I can outline my idea so I hope the concept is clear because I think this would suit both styles of play ("hardcore" "realistic"/ "arcade" "casual"). Giving the player more control of their experience is always the best solution, no? That way, people that want LOLSOKERBAL contracts can make their own. And those of us trying to simulate a space program can simulate a space program. Of course, each objective you opt in for would have an associated reward (funds/rep/sci) and perhaps a multiplier towards your total mission reward for taking on multiple objectives.

[tater]

I do mind the fact that all stations and bases once done get forgotten.

There should be far less missions of "put station in orbit" and more: "Transfer Kerbal to station X", "attach [module] to station X", "Fetch [experiment] results from station X lab to Kerbin", "Refill fuel of station X", "Move station to orbit" or even "Undock [generated] craft and land it on Kerbin."

Generally, make the stations and bases an actual important part of the game, not something you keep for 10 seconds before deorbiting.

Yeah, that makes them make sense and feel like part of a real program.

A fundamental issue to me has always been the whole third party nature of contracts. NASA buys stuff from contractors, they are not paid by contractors to launch a probe to Pluto (which would be the ksp model). Kills suspension of disbelief. Imagine a ww2 combat flight sim where your mission to bomb an enemy airbase came as a contract from Pratt and Whitney.

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Nice ideas arsonik. I'd perhaps tie part testing in as a way to get new tech needed for the mission as well (perhaps all parts require some test for unlocking?).