New approach to difficulty levels

[mikegarrison]

The difficulty level methodology is problematic. A few of the adjustments are sort of traditional for video games (ie. no quicksaves). But most of it is basically just adding more grinding to the game (reducing science awards, reducing contract payments, making parts cost more, etc.).

It occurred to me that a real "difficulty" process would be adding more gameplay complexity, not just more grinding.

1) Simple: Nothing but thrusting and fuel. Infinite electricity. No re-entry heating. No monetary cost. No science. All engines, tanks, capsules, parachutes, structural parts, landing legs, ladders available right from the start, but nothing else. Basically a simple sandbox. [Similar to the sandbox game, but not with all the parts.]

2) Easy: Same as above, but add science requirement and tech tree. Add Kerbal experience and skill differentiation. Still free. Still infinite electricity. [Similar to the science game.]

3) Normal: Add electricty (and all the parts associated with it). Add re-entry heat (and all the parts associated with it). Add money. Add contracts for exploration and science. Researching parts still free. [Similar to the career game in an easy mode.]

4) Harder: Add life support (and parts associated with it). Add tourism. Add parts and contracts for bases and stations. Researching parts costs money. Add research lab.

5) Hardest: More complicated life support (and associated parts)? Add com relay system and parts. Add more complicated mission requirements (like to establish a base, keep it going for X amount of time, research X amount of science in a lab, rove a certain distance, etc.). Parts need to be prototyped and tested (maybe they have two stages of efficiency and only get to the second stage after being used several times). Part failures can happen during testing. Designs that have been prototyped and used before are cheaper; customized launches with designs you have never made before are more expensive. Etc.

Yes, I know that individually most of this stuff can be done with mods and roleplay, but that's the point. It's doable. And it's a real progression of difficulty and gameplay, not just more grinding of the same "land in a new biome, collect the science, fly home" stuff.

Edited February 17, 2016 by mikegarrison

[StrandedonEarth]

This certainly sounds better than "Do the same things with less money and get less science"

[Blaarkies]

So what happens after a few hours in Easy mode, when a player realizes he is getting the hang of it and wants to build bases and stations? He is going to regret not choosing Harder from the very start, because now he has to start all over again, after he sees his friend doing interesting tourism contracts

[mikegarrison]

1 hour ago, Blaarkies said:

So what happens after a few hours in Easy mode, when a player realizes he is getting the hang of it and wants to build bases and stations? He is going to regret not choosing Harder from the very start, because now he has to start all over again, after he sees his friend doing interesting tourism contracts

And that's a bad thing?

I guess some people fall in love with their career saves. But me, I start a new one every time I want to try a different mod.

Besides, when I play a video I game I usually start on at least the "Normal" setting. If I do start on "Easy" it's specifically because I want to get the feel for it, then start over again on a harder setting.

Edited February 17, 2016 by mikegarrison

[jdcr]

I like it. Sure, there are a lot of details to be figured out and tweaked, but the general idea of adding complexity instead of grindiness is great. It's always been one of the main problems of career mode that the "difficulty" is mainly more grinding. At the other end of the spectrum, no matter how far left a beginner puts the sliders, if they haven't figured out the science system, they won't get anywhere in the current career mode.

Of course seasoned Kerbonauts like us would probably always choose the hardest setting and I see nothing wrong with that. On the contrary, the fact that even the best players usually go with normal settings, is a strong indication that there's something wrong with career in its current form.

There are more things that need to be fixed in career mode (e.g. the balancing, especially towards the end game), but your suggestion is a good start.

PS: I really hope science mode will stay forever. The more I play career the more I'm convinced that science mode is the "real" KSP game. I mean we dream of working for NASA because we want to build and fly cool stuff, not because we like accounting, right?

[tater]

Yeah, I agree completely that the current "difficulty" is in fact a grind selector.

A fundamental problem with KSP "career" in this regard is that the game becomes easier and easier as a career progresses and you unlock better stuff.

As you say, Life Support is a real game-changer.

The comm relay is just a grind, however (assuming it is anything at all like RT, which seems to require complex satellite networks for stuff a Ham Radio operator on Earth could do with no extra equipment given the short ranges of the kerbol system). If it was properly done, and there was a way to program stuff (i.e.: the player sets maneuver nodes, and the craft executes them itself), then sure.

 

[Sir_Robert]

How is easy supposed to work? There's no science or tech tree, but there is also not all the parts unlocked? So you never get all the parts?

That's that a difficulty, that's a demo

[jdcr]

3 hours ago, Sir_Robert said:

How is easy supposed to work? There's no science or tech tree, but there is also not all the parts unlocked? So you never get all the parts?

Why not? It flattens the learning curve which in a game like KSP is not a bad thing.

Or you can solve it differently, for example by unlocking a bunch of parts each time some basic goal (touching space, getting into orbit, landing on the Mun etc.) is reached. That way, you still have some progression without having to learn how to earn science, which by the way is not very intuitive for beginners.

[Sir_Robert]

7 minutes ago, jdcr said:

Why not? It flattens the learning curve which in a game like KSP is not a bad thing.

Or you can solve it differently, for example by unlocking a bunch of parts each time some basic goal (touching space, getting into orbit, landing on the Mun etc.) is reached. That way, you still have some progression without having to learn how to earn science, which by the way is not very intuitive for beginners.

The learning curve is orbital mechanics. It has nothing to do with electricity or science. Those are just added sprinkles

[Kerbart]

15 minutes ago, jdcr said:

Why not? It flattens the learning curve which in a game like KSP is not a bad thing.

Or you can solve it differently, for example by unlocking a bunch of parts each time some basic goal (touching space, getting into orbit, landing on the Mun etc.) is reached. That way, you still have some progression without having to learn how to earn science, which by the way is not very intuitive for beginners.

The main issue is that career mode is totally unfit to learn the game, IMHO. From that perspective, "learning curve" is irrelevant. Learn the game in sandbox mode, play career for a challenge.

And then we run into the issue that, indeed, harder means “more grinding” and as the game progresses the grinding gets worse and the challenges get less.

[tater]

The challenge in the early career game for those of us who already understand the mechanics is entirely the limits placed by lack of "stuff" or facilities.

One real modifier for "hard" career mode would be to have the Kerbol system change with a new game. Players should be given KER-like data (as they should with stock KSP), but the specifics of each world should only be what is known from ground observation from Kerbin. There's a planet that looks like it should be Venus/Eve like? Good luck with planning a landing without first sending a probe to determine the relevant facts about the atmosphere. This would make the player have to explore.

Another way to create difficulty that is not a grind would be to make time meaningful (there are a few ways to do this), then dump most "contracts" in favor of a budget (in both funds and points to buy tech), and have your next budget predicated on what you can get done the this year. 

Really, with the paradigm of "running a space program" as career, it currently fails, IMO.

What I'd also like (for HARD mode) would be "experimental" parts that can fail. Not a high % like the couple mods I have tried, but X% for the first use in different situations (for engines: pad, staged in flight at some min velocity, staged in space, restarted), then a reduced chance on subsequent uses for a certain number of uses, then once "fully tested" the part is what we see now. Combined with finite budgets, and a requirement to meet certain goals, it might have a more challenging feel.

Edited February 18, 2016 by tater

[Blaarkies]

6 hours ago, tater said:

What I'd also like (for HARD mode) would be "experimental" parts that can fail. Not a high % like the couple mods I have tried, but X% for the first use in different situations (for engines: pad, staged in flight at some min velocity, staged in space, restarted), then a reduced chance on subsequent uses for a certain number of uses, then once "fully tested" the part is what we see now. Combined with finite budgets, and a requirement to meet certain goals, it might have a more challenging feel.

That is going to be awesome for the first few times, building test flight specific craft to do this cheaply...but at some point it will become grinding.
Unlock a new part -> stick it to this tester craft -> watch the new piece fail -> only then start building the mothership that needs this piece.

However, that is kind of what happens in real life, and if i understand correctly it only needs a single flight...that is a lot of entertainment for very little effort, a good idea

[tater]

In current KSP, time is not a factor. Ideally, there would be a competitor. Then, you might choose to send your Mun flight with X-engines in order to beat the competition to the milestone. We'd need a "Space Race" mode for that.

[jdcr]

9 hours ago, Sir_Robert said:

The learning curve is orbital mechanics. It has nothing to do with electricity or science. Those are just added sprinkles

I beg to differ. Orbital mechanics is just one of the things (albeit an important one) you have to learn in KSP. Others are, just to give a few examples: dealing with the atmosphere (during both launch and return), construction (highly non-trivial, look at videos of beginners playing KSP), planning ahead for a mission (staging, docking, finding good ways to split up your ship into landers, transfer stages, return capsules etc.), understanding the science system (finding the context menu in the first place, then learn about biomes, find hidden things like EVA to hold multiple crew reports), and many more. Not to mention flying the things, which is something I still struggle with, after [some 4-digit number] hours.

9 hours ago, Kerbart said:

The main issue is that career mode is totally unfit to learn the game, IMHO. From that perspective, "learning curve" is irrelevant. Learn the game in sandbox mode, play career for a challenge.

That might become the case in the future if Squad adds meaningful tutorials. Right now, career is the default selection, indicating that beginners should start there. The point is, career on easy difficulty could be made into a good starting point. It doesn't have to be, there are of course alternatives.
In any case, I don't think sandbox is the right mode for beginners. At the moment, I'm recommending science mode. In sandbox, people build ships that are way too large (if they can find parts that fit together at all) and then run into stuff they cannot possibly resolve without knowing about struts and fins and center of mass/drag etc.

9 hours ago, tater said:

What I'd also like (for HARD mode) would be "experimental" parts that can fail.

I'm not sure how I feel about the solar system changing, but I do like this. Finally, a use for launch escape systems!

[Sirad]

On 17.2.2016 at 1:32 AM, mikegarrison said:

Yes, I know that individually most of this stuff can be done with mods and roleplay, but that's the point. It's doable. And it's a real progression of difficulty and gameplay, not just more grinding of the same "land in a new biome, collect the science, fly home" stuff.

Thumbs up. This is a good suggestion. i must admit that i too sometimes get bored with the 'land in a new biome, collect the science, fly home' stuff.

another spin of it would add too various possibilities.

[Vim Razz]

While I appreciate the thought and effort that goes into proposals like these, they always seem much better suited for mods or optional content.  The problem (which I think the OP's suggestion also suffers, though it's doesn't have any terribly bad ideas) is that they tend to over-dictate the course of the game when compared with the current stock system, forcing you into some specific predetermined path that can be fun once or twice but quickly get just as tedious as the "grind" it's supposed to be replacing.

There's just too much variation in player experience and interest to try and set fixed paths or progression based on "skill level".  The current system may not be perfect, but I think it has some strengths that are under-appreciated and I'd hate to lose them.

I guess part of the issue may be differing opinions of what constitutes a "grind".  What's tedious and grindy to me is being forced to run completely trivial missions over and over again in order to progress.

I can hit orbit (and return) at 5 science, and land on Minmus (and return) or the Mun (and not return) for 30 science plus an LV-909 test contract.  Launchpad lv 2 fully opens up the Mun, and Tracking Station lv 2 then allows landing on Duna, Ike, and Gilly as well as flybys of Eve and the Jool neighborhood.  Playing under these kind of margins with tight slider settings is always tense and uncertain (I leave quicksave and reverts for sandbox), and never feels like a grind to me, though sometimes it can take quite a lot of missions to hit the next benchmark.

Playing under normal career settings, it's nearly impossible to go anywhere before you unlock the the tech that makes that voyage completely trivial.  The game just throws the money and science at you too quickly.  Even though "progression" is faster, I find playing under these sorts of conditions to be extremely tedious because every step feels like pointless repetition by the time you've been down that road once or twice before.  That makes things a lot more grindy to me.

Locking content by skill-selection is kind of an interesting concept to consider, but don't think it would be an improvement for everyone.  It would frustrate many new players because it would force them to abandon everything they've accomplished whenever they want to try exploring a new aspect of the game (even if you allow changing "difficulty settings" mid-game, their stuff probably wont be equipped to handle the next tier and will often need to be scrapped completely), and it would frustrate many experienced players by locking them into an arbitrarily determined gameplan that might only be considered "hard" by newer players. (stations, life support, etc -- these things are really quite easy once you get the hang of them.)

Edited February 19, 2016 by Vim Razz

[jdcr]

1 hour ago, Vim Razz said:

What's tedious and grindy to me is being forced to run completely trivial missions over and over again in order to progress.

In my opinion that sums up the current career mode perfectly.

In the end, I'm not even sure if it's possible to solve the career mode problem. Maybe KSP is inherently sandboxy. But that's why I appreciate new suggestions.

[Kosmognome]

22 hours ago, Kerbart said:

The main issue is that career mode is totally unfit to learn the game, IMHO. From that perspective, "learning curve" is irrelevant. Learn the game in sandbox mode, play career for a challenge

I have to disagree. When i fist touched the game, career mode ws brand new. I started playing in sandbox, and was immediately overwhelmed. So I switched to career (at the time, it was what now is called "science" mode) and got to learn the game with just a few parts, figuring out how to use each new part on the way.

 

After I had learned a lot, I switched back to sandbox. When career with funds was added, I switched to career mode, and it made me a better rocket builder, because I had to learn that "moar booster" works, but that there are often smarter approaches.

I still prefer career mode over sandbox.

 

I also disagree with many other statements in this thread. if you don#t like to have to watch your funds, don#t play career, but don#t complain over the grind. I a normal difficulty career game, you doN#t need to grind, ever, if you manage your funds wisely - which is one of the main objectives of career mode in the first place.

 

The harder difficulties add significant gameplay value, and not just "more grind". Yes, you *can+ beat the harder difficulties by grinding - but that is your choice, and if you think that is boring, then don#t grind. Careful design, careful contract selection and pushing for contracts that seem out of league at the first glance provides with a steady flow of excess funds while doing interesting stuff on hard. Screwing up, wasting funds or scrwing a complete mission means a setback in funds, which might mean you have to grin a bit. Thus, the game works perfectly, it punsihes mistakes. Without punishing mistakes, there is no difficulty.

 

Some things that got suggested here don#t add difficulty - they just add gating.

[Buster Charlie]

I just wish there was a way to play career without reverts or quicksaves, and not end up with no kernels or negative 10000 reputation.

 

Call it Soviet game play style, everything is like normal career,  but you're always flush with fresh "volunteers" and nobody really cares if they die.

 

I tried to play card core mode, but I just ran out of pilots.

[Evanitis]

14 minutes ago, Buster Charlie said:

I just wish there was a way to play career without reverts or quicksaves, and not end up with no kernels or negative 10000 reputation.

Consider Kerbal Construction Time mod. I kinda' overlooked it because it's main feature didn't interest me much. But it has a simulator mode (that costs some funds to use). It's nice to test if a rocket will explode on the launchpad, but it wont take the edge of 'real' missions. It was the final thing I needed for a hardcore career.

Also with 30% financial gains, I nearly got broke just by running simulations for 100 funds each.

[Buster Charlie]

I don't really want a simulator in that regard because it doesn't seem any different than reverting.  I've had some situations where I thought I was doomed but managed to save the crew, so I kinda like the challenge and loss,  it just feels very artificial to avoid any failure, but it's hard to play career  that way and sandbox doesn't interest me.

[Evanitis]

9 minutes ago, Buster Charlie said:

I don't really want a simulator in that regard because it doesn't seem any different than reverting.

I feel with you. Doing simulations is a compromise on my end too. Most of my launches are 'fake', but this way at least the real ones are really tense.

I'm pretty sure I -could- play a hardcore game without such feature, but it would require me to triple-check everything and not to take take risks or untested solutions. And to pay attention in general. That's pretty much the complete opposite of how I enjoy playing.

[Kerbart]

1 hour ago, Kosmognome said:

I have to disagree. When i fist touched the game, career mode ws brand new. I started playing in sandbox, and was immediately overwhelmed. So I switched to career (at the time, it was what now is called "science" mode) and got to learn the game with just a few parts, figuring out how to use each new part on the way.

I will disagree with that. When I started, there was just sandbox. It didn't overwhelm me, but then again I didn't try to start with an SLS/Orion mission to Eeloo either. Crawl before you walk; stick to 1.25m parts first and see if you can get those in orbit.

Does career have the potential to be a good way to introduce players to the game? Yes. But not having any batteries, or solar panels, is not making it easier for a player to get accustomed to the game. If “don't get overwhelmed” is a concern for new players, the best advice I can give right now is to play the demo version (or, as it was called at the time, the “demo” version). You get a good selection of parts that will allow you to land on Mun and Minmus and get back, without artificial difficulties like not having solar panels, decent landing gear or a part count limit that will force you to grind out some funds first before you can upgrade your launch pad and VAB. And if the mantra is learn the game by building light, then why are the Spark, Oscar-B and the toroidial fuel tank burried so deep into the tree?

Science mode doesn't make that much of a difference. The tech tree is the same, and it provides the player with rather arbitrary challenges, instead of a logical progression through bigger and better technology.

If the tech tree was built with easing the player into the game, I'd agree with you. But it isn't. It appears to be designed around providing a challenge to grow towards a mature space program, which it does in the beginning before the grinding aspects take over.

[Buster Charlie]

1 hour ago, Evanitis said:

I feel with you. Doing simulations is a compromise on my end too. Most of my launches are 'fake', but this way at least the real ones are really tense.

I'm pretty sure I -could- play a hardcore game without such feature, but it would require me to triple-check everything and not to take take risks or untested solutions. And to pay attention in general. That's pretty much the complete opposite of how I enjoy playing.

All good points, my basic premis is I enable reverts and quicksaves because sometimes a bug in KSP or a crash cause me to lose crew or mission and that is unacceptable.

I tend to err on the side of quicksaving to save a crew ,because im sentimental, but I also because of the practicality of early career where you're really hurting for money. Also I noticed how much it tanked my reputation and I realized I couldn't play with 'realistic' casualties and ever expect to have a positive reputation.

Sometimes I'll revert because of a simple oversight that's just annoying and not 'exciting failure. For example if I adding a subassembly messed up the staging and the rocket decouples the launch tower, and just slams into the pad and explodes, i'll revert, or if there is a bug in the VAB that causes a part to randomly fall out (had this happen a few times).

 

But in my eyes, i deserve to lose a crew for stuff that is my fault and is realistic in the game context.

For some reason I had a kerbal outside my jet while crusing, and she fell to her death, it wasn't a bug it was just me being dumb.

Or more hilarious was on EVA on a suborbital, and realizing the ship was deorbiting, and using the EVA pack to try and catch the ship but it kept on getting further and further away, I was chasing it james bond skydiving style, alas right before I almost reached it, it really started hauling ass and the kerbal and ship were lost.

Or how about just a really dumb ship design that turns into a snake and breaks in half on takeoff, it's not a bug, it's just bad ship building, If I really wanted that crew to survive I hope there is a launch abort system!

 

But really ,the reason I WANT to play with consequences (But not so much that it destroys the game) is because of situations like this:

 

I built my first SSTO MK2 space plane, it after many failed experiments that didn't get into orbit I made a MK2 liquid fuel only SSTO with LV-N for orbital maneuvering, I Was so full of Hubris that I said "Now to make a REAL cargo space plane". SO I build this giant monstrosity,  I can't remeber if it was using MK3 or MK4 parts, I think MK4. Long story short, It's climbing and climbing higher and higher, everything seems fine, untill... it wont climb any higher, this thing can barely turn at all, and I want to say around 30 or 40k it starts tumbling hard, it's just uncontrolled stall death spiral, Not enough command authority to recover any control i'm just dropping like a stone, thousands of kilometers fly by as this giant monster of a ship just tumbles to the seat... But then... slowly I start to gain control, i've stopped the tumbling but i'm still falling like a rock, i'm stable but aiming straight down, 3000k to impact! Slowly... so slowly.. i'm just nosing up a tiny bit at a time, still falling fast, and finnaly with just a few hundred Kilometers to go I level out an start climbing again.

 

So in reality, It was almost certainly going to be a messy death for the crew, through some luck and some skill I recovered it, but if I just played it as a simulation, or just revered at the first sign of trouble, I think I would have sold myself short.

 

So for me part of the fun of the game is life or death challenges, sure i'll revert if it's a really cheap annoying bug or a simple oversight (like you said I don't really want to do a full flight checklist) but I just wish there was a way to have the financial restraint of career mode, where you need to mind the cost of a ship, it's mission, limited parts unlocks, without being too worried about failure. I'm not looking to have a kerbal holocaust, I just want to play it straight, and sometimes you loose astronauts, but just because people die in space, the mission goes on. Early air travel and commercial airline flights were very dangerous by todays standards, I want my early attempts to have casualties, it'll be a good motivator to invest in surviability and unmanned drones.

 

On the other hand, I don't want to go bankrupt buying crew that cost more than a rocket.

 

BACK ON TOPIC!

I'm, all for non-grind based difficult as mentioned! There are a lot of ways to add challenge without it being too grindy.

 

Make take inspirations from some of the user made challenges, stuff like open ended air speed records. Records hit with points assigned for parts count and vehicle cost.

 

So take a lot of the stock missions, add modifiers.

 

Set air speed record under 30k, beat your previous record, beat your previous record without rocket engines, beat your previous record with a jet that costs 20% less than your record breaking jet.

Set reentry speed record, beat rentry speed record with a ship that weighs 20% more than your previous record breaking ship?

 

I dunno maybe simple stuff like that, it's open ended so you don't have to accept or decline it, and you can do it at your own pace.

 

And maybe some of the part test missions could include that?

Instead of 'test X rocket on the launch pad, or over the mun' it could be 'set need land speed record with X rocket motor' 

 

or "launch payload of X tons (where X is 25% more than your previous record) to to 100k circular orbit.

 

 

 

 

PS, I found career much easier to learn the game on, I do find the complete parts list intimidating at first, im sure now after so many hours it isn't as big of a deal, but at first I liked the simplicity of focusing on a few parts at a time, and really getting to put new parts through their paces.

Edited February 19, 2016 by Buster Charlie

[tater]

If career is to be about "management" of a program, it needs to be almost entirely replaced, IMO. The kerbals need to become autonomous if the player wishes (allowing them to be tasked with certain routine operations, like resupply). Time needs to be meaningful, and something more like budgets, and other costs (abstracted, I have no desire to micromanage that). The gameplay would be adjusting what you can do with what you have, or are given. You'd LIKE to send kerbals to Duna, but you just cannot afford to, you'll need to skip the next couple launch windows, though maybe you can send a probe.

My "random" solar system is for a career mode that is about exploration. To actually explore, you need a sense of surprise. If the first time you could make out features of Tylo was your first flyby, it would be kind of exciting.

My suggestions regarding a "Space Race" mode are another kind of gameplay, that incentivizes the player to take calculated risks to "win" given objectives. Totally different play than stock.

I think that the broad goal of career needs to be looked at. IMO, career/campaign modes exist to present the player with novel problems to solve that exist within/because of a context. In a military game, you get stuck fighting a bad engagement where you are not remotely matched sometimes, while other times you luck out and come across an inferior force. Using that analogy KSP is always the same. Failures might add needed variability... you can get your Apollo 13 moment.