Why too much money first mission hard settings ?

[boolybooly]

I just started a new career for 1.0.5 and selected 0 starting money and 60% rewards.

The first two missions were for a crew report and a launch and offered total rewards of about 10k funds.

After completing the mission which consisted of Jeb surviving a launch which accidentally activated the parachute as well as the SRB at the same time (capsule needs a bit of rewiring) the total funds were 33k.

Something about this doesn't add up! Is there a first mission bonus or something I am missing or is the game bugged here?

Edited November 13, 2015 by boolybooly

[KerbMav]

You receive the usual World First awards, like launched the first vessel, reached altitude x or speed y ...

[Streetwind]

Even before the milestone revamp in 1.0.5, KSP has always thrown huge amounts of cash at you during the first couple missions. In 1.0.4 and before, that dried up pretty much by the time you achieved your first orbit, and you'd then find yourself consuming that buffer again - especially if your income settings are low.

I've not spent enough time with 1.0.5 career mode to determine whether or not it behaves the same.

[boolybooly]

Ah OK I see it now that little blue circle on the right hand side under the contract notifications, thanks.

Would be nice if there was something in mission control about these.

[tseitsei]

My question regarding this topic is:

Where can I see all the things that grant me this "worlds first" prizes?

[boolybooly]

Agree with tseitsei, with these world firsts you have no idea what you are shooting for, would be better to know beforehand.

[Streetwind]

I expect this to be a limitation of the existing UI. They are redoing it for 1.1 anyway...

[Snark]

Agree with tseitsei, with these world firsts you have no idea what you are shooting for, would be better to know beforehand.

Yes, it would be nice to have a display for this sort of thing.

FWIW, I started out strongly feeling the same thing. However, I've gotten a little ways into a new 1.0.5 career (just unlocked the first science facility upgrade, am snarfing down science from Mun/Minmus), and I find that in practice it's not as big a deal as I thought it would be.

The reason is that there are a lot of World First achievements. Basically, there's one for just about nearly every new thing you can do as your capabilities progress in a career. And the achievements are not some special missions to "shoot for", but rather they're the things I would be doing naturally anyway in the course of a career. For example, one of them is "fly by the Mun". Well, that's not something for me to "shoot for", it's something I would be doing anyway. The only difference is that I get cash for it when it happens. And if I skip it, for example if I decide to focus on Minmus instead, then there's a different set of rewards waiting there.

What it boils down to is that you don't need to worry about it. Just do your career and go where you want to go, and trust that the game will reward you for your ambition whenever you push the envelope. And if you're more of a self-directed player who prefers to just go out and explore new places as you see fit rather than following contracts, then the admin facility has a new strategy available in 1.0.5 that will reward you for that.

I really like this new dynamic. It makes the game less grindy and gives me more freedom to play my career the way I want to play.

- - - Updated - - -

Even before the milestone revamp in 1.0.5, KSP has always thrown huge amounts of cash at you during the first couple missions. In 1.0.4 and before, that dried up pretty much by the time you achieved your first orbit, and you'd then find yourself consuming that buffer again - especially if your income settings are low.

I've not spent enough time with 1.0.5 career mode to determine whether or not it behaves the same.

So far, it seems like it's been doing a better job of sustaining income, at least into the mid-game. I seem to recall that the first hurdle "grind" that I had to get past, pre-1.0.5, was the first upgrade to VAB and science facility. The initial financial "surge" at the start of a new career would suffice for a launchpad and mission control upgrade, maybe tracking station too, but then I would have to spam a bunch of grindy contracts to scrape together the cash to upgrade the VAB and R&D.

Now in 1.0.5, however, it seems a lot smoother. I've upgraded to level 1 of basically every building except the three I never ever use (admin, SPH, runway), and I've done only a small handful of contracts. Most of what I have done is just the usual do-new-thing-to-get-new-science-opportunity stuff, like getting to Kerbin orbit, landing on the Mun, etc. Gotta say I'm really loving the rebalancing so far. Career just got a lot more fun and less grindy. Bravo, Squad, well done.

Edited November 13, 2015 by Snark

[Claw]

My question regarding this topic is:

Where can I see all the things that grant me this "worlds first" prizes?

There isn't an "in game" list. Some of the old contracts were converted to World Firsts, such as "reach XXX alt" or "Reach XXX speed" early contracts. Also, the old "explore XYZ" contracts are also a good example of world firsts (flyby, orbit, land, etc on a given body). There are some others too, but I won't spoil them all.

Cheers,

-Claw

[Pecan]

What impresses me is that you managed to build and launch any vehicle with zero funds!

Perhaps the excessive thing here is the amount of advance payments you received?