Self-adjusting contracts - Issue with Rescues?

[XrayLima]

The recent Devnote talks about contracts self tuning to give you more of what you like to choose.  To a point that sounds fine but here's a thing, I will always rescue Kerbals,  A call for help is a call for help.  So at this rate I will eventually have a contract list of nothing but rescues, even though I actually don't like them!  Have I understood this mechanism correctly?

 

Thoughts?

[monophonic]

4 minutes ago, XrayLima said:

The recent Devnote talks about contracts self tuning to give you more of what you like to choose.  To a point that sounds fine but here's a thing, I will always rescue Kerbals,  A call for help is a call for help.  So at this rate I will eventually have a contract list of nothing but rescues, even though I actually don't like them!  Have I understood this mechanism correctly?

 

Thoughts?

I am afraid of that too. Although if that happens, I will just mod the rescues out of the game, and save-edit me new kerbals from the applicants as I need them. That way I can keep my free kerbals without my space program degenerating into Interplanetary Rescue.

[Borsek]

You could always... You know... Just not do the rescues?

[XrayLima]

You, sir, are a monster!  A monster I tell you!

[Scotius]

Early in the Career Mode rescue contracts are the best way to get crew cheaply. Hiring Kerbals in Astronaut Center gets expensive really fast. If you lose the craft and the crew a couple of times and fail to complete the contract, you can run out of money and get Game Over.

[XrayLima]

I don't disagree with that, I think rescue missions are valuable and a really good way of building a kerbonaut corp quickly and cheaply.  It's just that right now in my newish career save I have 8 kerbonauts in the KSC and missions for three more.  I've only just landed on the Mun and have low tier tech.  Now, I will go rescue these idiots, because you don't leave folks stranded but eventually with the new mechanic it will think I LOVE rescue missions and feed me as many as it can.  Rather I think these rescue missions should remain as random occurrences, which keeps them fun, different and valuable.

Edited January 21, 2016 by XrayLima

[regex]

What it means is that contract generation will be weighted for rescue missions, not that it will only generate rescue missions.  Of course, if they don't up the number of available contracts it'll certainly end up feeling like there are only rescue missions...

[Choctofliatrio2.0]

I like rescue missions, to a degree. Sometimes I'm just too lazy to spend the half hour or so it takes for me to get close to them. I'd hate to get a bunch of them.

[Scotius]

Well, as a fan of Thunderbirds - both old and new, i don't mind rescue contracts at all Also, no one gets left behind in my saves - so it's just another reason to go there and bring the green ones home.

[Norcalplanner]

The more I think about the weighting mechanic, the less I'm worried about it. Why? Because it means that there's a "hook" into the contract system for modders to use, and everything will turn out OK in the end.

[regex]

11 minutes ago, Norcalplanner said:

The more I think about the weighting mechanic, the less I'm worried about it. Why? Because it means that there's a "hook" into the contract system for modders to use, and everything will turn out OK in the end.

It always seems up to the modders to "correct" the base game.

If you want to weight contracts right now you can easily make a ModuleManager script to change the parameters in Contracts.cfg.

@Contracts
{
	@AverageAvailableContracts = 30
	@ISRU {
		@MaximumExistent = 0
	}
	@Test
	{
		@MaximumExistent = 0
	}
	@Station
	{
		!RESOURCE_REQUEST[XenonGas] {}
		!CREW_REQUEST[*]:HAS[#Trait[Tourist]] {}
	}
}

This one increases the average number of available contracts to 30 while removing any chance of part testing and ISRU contracts being generated, and removing the XenonGas and Tourist requirements from showing up in station contracts.  At least, it should, I haven't tested it.

[John FX]

To my mind if you want players to have the contracts they prefer then let the player weight them by hand.

You could have sliders for each planet and the type of contract then the player actually gets what they would prefer instead of guessing what they would prefer from their previous actions which could be unduly affected by choices they made which had benefit at the moment but were not the contracts the player would prefer moving forward.

You could allow the player to say "I never want tourist contracts" or "I only want missions to Jool at the moment" and so on.

[regex]

28 minutes ago, John FX said:

To my mind if you want players to have the contracts they prefer then let the player weight them by hand.

Yeah, but then you'd have players doing nothing but the most lucrative contracts that they enjoy, or chaining satellite contracts together, or some other exploitative behavior, making career mode meaningless.  You pretty much have to penalize the player for wanting to do things their way when the only source of income is random contracts.

[John FX]

21 minutes ago, regex said:

Yeah, but then you'd have players doing nothing but the most lucrative contracts that they enjoy, or chaining satellite contracts together, or some other exploitative behavior, making career mode meaningless.  You pretty much have to penalize the player for wanting to do things their way when the only source of income is random contracts.

 

I already do nothing but contracts I really enjoy or the most lucrative ones, that behaviour is not stopped by the current system. I already chain contracts together, just not exactly the same type unlike RL where often you get multiple satellites going up on one launch to reduce costs. You would say this makes career meaningless yet I still find great enjoyment in it.

This does not make career meaningless, it stops it being so boring or grindy it is avoided altogether. There is nothing worse than having to do a series of contracts you do not enjoy when playing a game, an activity which has a primary purpose that is enjoyment and satisfaction (often that bit is missed by a lot of people when talking about KSP)

Having the sliders would not stop someone playing the game exactly as it is now (or is proposed to be) it would just allow those players who would find the game much more fun played that way to play it that way. Not having the sliders will not stop exploitative behaviour.

If repeating contracts for funds is bad then simply make the returns less on repeated contracts.

You`ll never stop exploits but you can make a game less fun by trying to...

[regex]

3 minutes ago, John FX said:

snip

I should probably learn to use "sarcasm" tags.

[DoToH]

1 hour ago, regex said:

I should probably learn to use "sarcasm" tags.

Probably. I was concerned after reading your previous post.

On topic: Player should have the ability to filter or control the contracts offered by body, type, ... If I'm planning a mission to Duna I should be able to ask the system for things to do there, and not get a bunch of surface scan on minmus contracts, even if I did hundreds of them before. IMO, the (bad designed) contract system wont be better with weighted contracts.

Edited January 21, 2016 by DoToH

[John FX]

3 hours ago, regex said:

I should probably learn to use "sarcasm" tags.

Ah. I see. Maybe

It was very good, so good in fact that it sounded exactly like the sort of thing someone would say. Now I read it back in my internal sarcasm voice it sounds much different.

[problemecium]

I share the OP's concern. Currently my remedy to unwanted rescue contracts is to "save" the Kerbal but never actually return them to KSC. Okay so they're doomed to a life in space, but hey, it's a lot better than dying. Or a life in space alone in a derelict capsule.

I expect I'll just have to continue using said remedy in 1.1, although I do hope for an alternative.

[suicidejunkie]

In regard to the player weighting the contracts, that sounds like it could be in the form of bidding on the contracts.

If you are going to do any rescue contracts you see, but don't want too many of them, then set your price to 3x normal.

If you want more satellite contracts, you can lower your bid, and then try to do them with even lower costs.

 

Perhaps keep it simple with a third button on the contracts:

[ ] Accept (contracts like this become slightly more common with slightly lower rewards)

[X] Demand more money (+10% reward for this contract, contracts like this become less common but with slightly higher rewards)

[ ] Decline (contracts like this become much less common, but with notably higher rewards)