If you could redesign/improve the Kerbol System, what would you do?

[hugix]

A Small planetoid in a Sedna like orbit.

[KerikBalm]

I don't like that Mez planet idea... we could go with an oblate rapidly rotating moon though.... or another dwarf planet around where cere's is.... something that looks like vesta, but spinning much faster.... and maybe another "gilly clone" to round out the feel of that being an asteroid belt (random asteroids there is also a good idea)

The changes to Tylo and Laythe would make them much easier to visit. SSTO from laythe on airbreathers alone would be super easy.

Currently, there are 3-4 major challenges in the game:

#1) Land on and return from Eve (mostly the return)

#2) Land on and return from Tylo (mostly the landing)

#3) Land on and return from Moho (Mostly just getting there and captured with enough dV/doing the transfer right)

#4.. maybe...) Visit Eeloo (made a little harder with the solar changes.

The challenge of #2 would be dramatically reduced.

The challenge of Eve has already been reduced a lot by the aero update... somebody SSTO'd from Eve!!!!!

Shall we make tylo easier now? Its already pretty easy to single stage to and from orbit (SSTAFO?) with ISRU now...

FWIW, I would change Eve to be more Venus like... by that I mean its gravity should be more or less the same as Earth/Kebrin (maybea bit higher, as the planet's radius is larger than Kerbin's).... but the atmosphere should be much thicker.

Venus has a surface pressure 92x greater than Earth's.

Eve's surface pressure should be at least doubled.

Heat on the surface should also be much higher... enough that kerbals can't survive for a long time outside (right now, the overheat bar just barely shows up, but is stable)

I would also really like to see a double planet, but KSPs patched conics can't properly model that

Also, just to repeat my earlier desire... an ice giant with a moon like triton in a retrograde orbit.

Edited October 20, 2015 by KerikBalm

[mythic_fci]

I'd make Laythe more like Titan IRL, specifically by making it look more like Eve (but with different colors and without the atmo pressure) as well as making jets not work on it. I'd also add 1-2 more gas giants, each with their own moon system like Jool - no rings required, but if that could be simulated, it'd be great.

EDIT: Also, I'd make Moho like Mercury - hot lava that can damage your spacecraft with a tiny bit of ice at the poles.

[John FX]

I would make it procedural with zero giving you the current solar system if used as a seed.

I would make all of the system covered with a fog of scientific undiscovery which could only be removed partially with telescopes and more accurately with probes.

This would provide a good long-term replayability for advanced users.

[tseitsei]

I would make it procedural with zero giving you the current solar system if used as a seed.

I would make all of the system covered with a fog of scientific undiscovery which could only be removed partially with telescopes and more accurately with probes.

This would provide a good long-term replayability for advanced users.

This. So much this...

There would still be our good old kerbol system to use if we wanted to BUT you could always choose to start fresh and actually get to explore the new solar system everytime without knowing what you would find... that would be amazing...

[wossname]

I would make it procedural with zero giving you the current solar system if used as a seed.

I would make all of the system covered with a fog of scientific undiscovery which could only be removed partially with telescopes and more accurately with probes.

This would provide a good long-term replayability for advanced users.

Hell yeah. This would be excellent. The "Research Bodies" mod has hints towards this kind of behaviour, perhaps there can be development towards this.

[RuBisCO]

That would require n-body orbital physics simulation.

Why would it?

[oglommi]

Better planetary textures, another gas giant with lots of moons, proper astroids belt. Some lagrange points made with virtual SOI's. Maybe some random discoverable dwarf planets or something.

[Ethanadams]

Every time you get a new game landforms are randomly generated unique to that game

- - - Updated - - -

Never mind read the comments above me

[NovaSilisko]

I would make all of the system covered with a fog of scientific undiscovery which could only be removed partially with telescopes and more accurately with probes.

Oh yes, I forgot this in my post. That's an absolute essential. Players should be blown away when finding out Laythe has oceans after finally probing beneath it's clouds, for instance.

[r_rolo1]

Oh yes, I forgot this in my post. That's an absolute essential. Players should be blown away when finding out Laythe has oceans after finally probing beneath it's clouds, for instance.

Well, if you need to pierce the cloud surface of a planet to know if it has oceans, you're doing your astrophysics wrong For a RL example, it was widely known that Venus had no oceans ( or any liquid surface ) far before we even had launched a satelite, just by analysis of the radiation Venus sends back ...

That said, having acurate maps of the planets even before the first launch , especially of stuff that is barely visible from Kerbin ( AFAIK the only stuff you can see by naked eye from Kerbin is the Mun, Minmus ( if you squint hard ), Jool ( if you have good eye sight and a good monitor ) and maybe Eve ) is somewhat stupid. If that stuff was only revealed by direct observation, it would only add to the game ...

[klgraham1013]

I would make all of the system covered with a fog of scientific undiscovery which could only be removed partially with telescopes and more accurately with probes.

This is one of those things I was positive would be added before the release of the game. Think about how cool it was to see the New Horizon pictures. That sort of awe and wonder is missing from KSP.

[CaelumEtAstra]

IMO the system is pretty well laid out. But there are a few things that I'd like to change...

-Add a second Deimos-like moon to Duna, in a higher orbit than Ike

-Add a blue gas planet with rings, with shepherd moons as well as Titan, Mimas, and Iapetus analogs

-Make Vall the Europa/Enceladus analog

-Make Eeloo smaller and change the surface to reflect its nature as a Pluto analog

[Caelib]

Science is what drives us to explore space, but in my opinion this is one of KSP's most under-developed sub-systems. Finding and collecting science could be much more rich than its current form of simple "go to place and collect". I would like to see more randomness to science collection on surfaces ... micro-biomes and some surface-based science equipment would be a good start. Here are some essential science parts that I would like to see added:

Camera

Oven

Sample and Distribution Device (Drill/Mechanical Arm)

Laser

Magnetometer

Spectrometer

The most basic and very first and by far the most essential piece of science equipment is the camera, but it doesn't exist in (stock) KSP

[NovaSilisko]

Well, if you need to pierce the cloud surface of a planet to know if it has oceans, you're doing your astrophysics wrong For a RL example, it was widely known that Venus had no oceans ( or any liquid surface ) far before we even had launched a satelite, just by analysis of the radiation Venus sends back ...

Just was trying to give a general example. I know that Huygens was designed to float, just in case Titan turned out to be an ocean moon of hydrocarbons (almost right!)

[Findthepin1]

It was widely known that Venus had no oceans ( or any liquid surface ) far before we even had launched a satelite, just by analysis of the radiation Venus sends back.

They were designing Venus landers or descent probes for the possibility of landing in water until about 1964.

By the way, happy Back To The Future Day.

[klgraham1013]

Science is what drives us to explore space, but in my opinion this is one of KSP's most under-developed sub-systems. Finding and collecting science could be much more rich than its current form of simple "go to place and collect". I would like to see more randomness to science collection on surfaces ... micro-biomes and some surface-based science equipment would be a good start. Here are some essential science parts that I would like to see added:

Camera

Oven

Sample and Distribution Device (Drill/Mechanical Arm)

Laser

Magnetometer

Spectrometer

The most basic and very first and by far the most essential piece of science equipment is the camera, but it doesn't exist in (stock) KSP

... but mystery goo and generic science lab! That's good enough, right? ... Right?

off-topic alert

[r_rolo1]

They were designing Venus landers or descent probes for the possibility of landing in water until about 1964.

By the way, happy Back To The Future Day.

That I can't confirm or deny , but since the early 50's that it was known that Venus surface was hot and that had no ocean to speak off ( This book by Sagan and Shklovsky ( from 1966, in spite of the original version being from 1962 by Shklovsky ) has a nice chapter about the evolution on the knowledge about Venus since the first radiotelescope . Given that Sagan speciality was Venus , I assume that it is basically correct given the 1966 knowledge ). That didn't exclude the possibility of isolated liquid pockets and I assume that was the reason behind what you said.

[The Optimist]

Weather

[John FX]

Well, if you need to pierce the cloud surface of a planet to know if it has oceans, you're doing your astrophysics wrong For a RL example, it was widely known that Venus had no oceans ( or any liquid surface ) far before we even had launched a satelite, just by analysis of the radiation Venus sends back ...

That said, having acurate maps of the planets even before the first launch , especially of stuff that is barely visible from Kerbin ( AFAIK the only stuff you can see by naked eye from Kerbin is the Mun, Minmus ( if you squint hard ), Jool ( if you have good eye sight and a good monitor ) and maybe Eve ) is somewhat stupid. If that stuff was only revealed by direct observation, it would only add to the game ...

All that is fair enough, but for gameplay purposes I really would like to have to send a probe to get that sort of information. Maybe a space telescope would be able to establish that but only if it was within the orbit of Duna and Eve if it was in lko. Even then it would not give surface detail sufficient for a landing. That would require a probe to orbit the planet and map it, possibly with a new scanning part a la scansat.

As someone who landed a kerbal on every body in the system within 6 weeks of purchasing the game, the limited scope for places to go to and new exploration is a really important one for me.

Instead of the years of play I have received from the game I think I would have stopped after maybe 3 months had it not been for mods which have extended the life of the game for me many many times over.

Procedurally generated solar systems with a fog of science wood make the game much more than it currently is and with the unity 5 upgrade memory limits will hopefully be a thing of the past and therefore allow the game to expand in the directions it could go to become a wonderful awesome game unlimited by a 32-bit environment.

[r_rolo1]

Well, I see things slightly diferently, simply because you can know a lot about atleast close by planets simply by observation from where you are ... say, temperature, existance of major liquid surfaces, rough outline of the geography ( better if you can actually see it via telescope, but you can atleast have a idea via radiotelescopes ), atmo composition ( only high atmo if the atmosphere is dense and/cloudy, though ) and obviously, size,mass and orbital parameters... I would not even be against having a KSC building that ( pending updates to it and with scientific staff, OFC ) would give you some science just from observation of celestial bodies from Kerbin...

OTOH I agree with you in that atleast you should need atleast a flyby or a orbiting sat to have really detailed pictures of the planet in question, especially if far away or near the Sun ( it's hard to see anything else than the Sun, if you're looking directly in it's direction, right ? ). That alone would help a lot in increasing the veracity of the experience

Edited October 22, 2015 by r_rolo1

[Project Pluto]

I would like to see both OPM (http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/104280) and Trans Keptunian (http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/109125) integrated. Only think I would add in addition is a Sedna analogue.

All saves I play with have those packs added.

[TrainEngie]

A Charon for Eeloo so we can gravity assist our way onto Eeloo.

A big ring for Dres.

Otherwise, Kerbol system is just fine.

[jackboy900]

More Easter-Eggs and complete the side-Story NovaSilisko was working on (or had in his mind)

I also would tweak Jool's Moons a bit.

- Tylo a bit smaller or at least give it some atmosphere and a more interesting Terrain.

- Not sure about Laythe, but i like to have another planet where you can fly your Spaceplanes.

Tylo is specifically there for the size and no atmosphere so not really, maybe even bigger.

[Pthigrivi]

Eventually I'd love some submersible tech, at which point large submerged caves accessible through small pools on Vall would be amazing.

I generally feel like unless there are many small, special places with things like unique mineral formations and geysers and fossil beds that offer big science bonuses there will never be a real incentive for surface exploration or rovers.