Is it true that most KSP players never go interplanetary?

[Superfluous J]

9 hours ago, Madrias said:

I can do almost anything without leaving Kerbin.

Things you can't do without leaving Kerbin (in no particular order):

• Gravity-assist your way into a Jool orbit with Laythe or Tylo.
• Do a Jool-5 mission.
• Do a Grand Tour.
• Dodge Ike on the way to Duna.
• Rescue some poor sod from a retrograde orbit of Sun (Actually don't do this one. If you get this contract just cancel it).
• Get off of Eve with a Kerbal.
• Land and return to orbit from Tylo.
• Nail a Dres encounter from LKO (okay technically you can do this one without leaving Kerbin's SOI by cancelling the flight once you get the encounter)

Essentially, you're prioritizing the destination over the trip. KSP - to me - isn't really about the destination. It's about how you get there. And in Kerbin's SOI there are scant few new ways to get anywhere for me.

[Madrias]

3 hours ago, herbal space program said:

-snip-

What if there were all kinds of novel terrain and conditions on the other planets and time warp were upgraded so you didn't have to wait 20 minutes or more to get to Eloo?

If, and that's a big if, the terrain and conditions were unique and timewarp was upgraded so that long travels could be done quickly (including warping through SOI transitions with reasonable transition accuracy - I don't mind spending extra delta-V to slow down if the trip's made quicker), then yes, I might spend more time off of Kerbin.  Also, they'd have to fix the terrain-seam bug where the default Unity wheels catch on the terrain tile edges and destroy rovers (yes, I know, we see a wheel, but it's really just a stick with a wheel on the end, and that's the problem - the default wheels catch on the slight imperfections in the map layout and cause problems) before I'd seriously consider the extra time of building rockets and figuring out how to land my contraptions on, say, Eve.  (Eve's a fun planet in its own right, but the pain of getting to it, getting through the atmosphere and gravity density, it outweighs the fun I can have driving around because there's just nothing to do there.  Now, if that super-gravity made the terrain more interesting, and the pea-soup atmosphere could make flying more interesting (which, I'll admit, it does.) and they worked together such that a mobile base with two or three foldable scout drones could be used to explore where you're going to drive to next, then I might consider leaving Kerbin for a while.  As it is, it's just Kerbin tinted purple with pea-soup atmosphere and high gravity.

2 hours ago, 5thHorseman said:

Things you can't do without leaving Kerbin (in no particular order):

• Gravity-assist your way into a Jool orbit with Laythe or Tylo.
• Do a Jool-5 mission.
• Do a Grand Tour.
• Dodge Ike on the way to Duna.
• Rescue some poor sod from a retrograde orbit of Sun (Actually don't do this one. If you get this contract just cancel it).
• Get off of Eve with a Kerbal.
• Land and return to orbit from Tylo.
• Nail a Dres encounter from LKO (okay technically you can do this one without leaving Kerbin's SOI by cancelling the flight once you get the encounter)

Essentially, you're prioritizing the destination over the trip. KSP - to me - isn't really about the destination. It's about how you get there. And in Kerbin's SOI there are scant few new ways to get anywhere for me.

Yeah, I'll admit to prioritizing the destination over the trip.  For me, getting there is not the fun part.  Building the rocket or spaceplane to get me away from Kerbin, yeah that's fun.  Driving around on the planet surface?  The first times I did it, it was fun, until I realized the only differences are the effect gravity has on my machine, and whether the ground is more flat or not.  But now, after having landed on each of the planets once or twice, the destination is no longer interesting enough to justify the trip.

I mean, yeah, some of the stuff on your list is difficult and a great engineering challenge, but I have done some of it.

• I have gravity-assisted into a Jool Orbit with Laythe.  Was planning on landing at Laythe, but didn't dare hit Laythe's atmosphere at interplanetary speeds.  So technically, it was a Gravity Assisted Laythe landing and return, just I used Laythe and Jool to slow down enough to land safely.  Only done it once, and fun though it was, I can't recall the conditions all the planets were in that gave me that slingshot.
• Leaving Eve with a Kerbal, I've done this, just not stock.  I have no interests in trying to do it stock.  In fact, it's one of the biggest reasons I ended up figuring out there's no advantage to going to other planets other than the mystery of the first landing, because bringing all that crap with me just to get basically a MK1 Cockpit, barely enough fuel reserves, and a nuclear engine back to Kerbin, well, I didn't find it quite as fun as it sounded originally.

I have little interest in Jool-5 or Grand Touring, just because of the above mentioned things.  Jool-5 might be interesting, but I've been, as mentioned, on all the moons before.  Grand Tour just doesn't sound fun to me.  One ship to all the planets and then back home, even with mod parts, is still a massive amount of sitting at 10 FPS waiting and waiting and waiting.  There's then the morality problem: there's two known problem worlds that have a huge difficulty for returning from, so do we consider this a one-way Grand Tour and leave Kerbals behind, or do we over-engineer our stuff to drag these guys back to orbit, and have room for them to ride home again?

It's why the big missions never really appealed to me.  But, then again, perhaps I'm just not into the numbers game as much.  I don't like sitting here calculating every ounce of fuel I'll need to get to Eve and back with a cockpit, fuel, and engine.  I'd rather throw a rocket stack together that I know will make it to Eeloo if I flew it properly, but I'll use that to fly to Duna because my dV window is huge comparatively.  Efficiency is not my strong suit.

[Van Disaster]

Getting near to the end of my first ever career game ( and I can remember science mode appearing, let alone contracts ) and I have to say that quite a lot of the problem is transfer windows. One of the first things I did was set all the future windows up in KAC, and with 6 nodes or so left of the tech tree I haven't even made it to the first window yet. I've been using everything in the Kerbin system for overly-complicated gravity assists anyway so I'm not even missing out on navigational challenges.

Also - as many vets have been saying for years - there's the lack of reasons to be on planets. I suspect I've already said that in this thread...

I'm also the sort of person who doesn't want to go to Mars because there's nothing there I can't see on Earth ( I trained in engineering, not exogeology!) which might have a little to do with it.

Edited June 23, 2016 by Van Disaster
Curse you autocorrect

[Slaghead]

I simply haven't gotten far enough in career mode, which is the only mode I play, to do it.  I always reset when I kill a Kerbal.  Like last night when I beat the odds and rescued a Kerbal and immediately burned her up during re-entry.  So tonight, I will probably take the night off.  But tomorrow, I will start a new game.

Plus, it's hard.  I don't *really* understand the node editor, have trouble making precise burns, probably waste a ton of delta-v on inefficient ascents...  Going to the Mun isn't terribly difficult but going to other planets feels like it's going to be really difficult because I have yet to not strand my ships on the Mun because I burned up all my delta-v just getting there despite having way more than enough when reading the charts on what it takes to get places.  So, I only send probes to the Mun now and that's only when I get far enough along in the tech tree which is all too rare.

I think the other big problem I have is the way the solar system is set up is static.  You're not going anywhere new or interesting so there really isn't a sense of exploration.  The planets themselves aren't all that interesting on their own outside of wanting to test things in environments that are different than Kerbin or the Mun.  There is no 'actual' science that requires you to send data gathering probes to learn about the planet to see if it's suicide to send a Kerbal there.  I think the lack of mystery just doesn't make the extra effort pay off enough.  Now, if the solar system were procedurally generated, at least outside of Kerbin itself, then people could brag about how they found something cool or interesting.  Right now, we're just limited to building awesome ships that take advantage of the fact that everything is known about the solar system from the start and that is really cool, even though I am a terrible ship builder, making a ship that makes it to orbit is still a nice accomplishment for me.

[Waxing_Kibbous]

5 hours ago, Van Disaster said:

Getting near to the end of my first ever career game ( and I can remember science mode appearing, let alone contracts ) and I have to say that quite a lot of the problem is transfer windows. One of the first things I did was set all the future windows up in KAC, and with 6 nodes or other left of the tech tree I haven't even made it to the first window yet. I've been using everything in the Kerbin system for overly-complicated gravity assists anyway so I'm not even missing out on navigational challenges.

Also - as many vets have been saying for years - there's the lack of reasons to be on planets. I suspect I've already said that in this thread...

I'm also the sort of person who doesn't want to go to Mars because there's nothing there I can't see on Earth ( I trained in engineering, not exogeology!) which might have a little to do with it.

A while back I started a thread that suggested the game start at a point where the first Duna window would happen a lot sooner, 30-60 days sooner (you could probably get it even earlier), around the time where you get the 2.5m parts and the rest of that tech level unlocked. Playing with 100% science you can get to that point pretty quick, but now as it stands you get to a place where you can either spend months simply spamming contracts or just time warp months ahead which is kind of a weird mechanic for some people.

[Corona688]

On 6/21/2016 at 6:42 AM, magnemoe said:

Yes, career kind of kill interplanetary missions if you keep accepting contracts for the kerbin system all the time. 
 

It's more the creeping feeling that you have to keep doing things, have to keep earning money, have to keep building science, and that timewarping for a few eons will eat up all your good contracts / opportunities for it forever.

Long term missions become really long term missions.  I've got sats being circularized, a probe to minmus being launched, a space station and refueling infrastructure in place all before my first mission to mun has even aerobraked home.

Edited June 23, 2016 by Corona688

[Madrias]

1 hour ago, Corona688 said:

Long term missions become really long term missions.  I've got sats being circularized, a probe to minmus being launched, a space station and refueling infrastructure in place all before my first mission to mun has even aerobraked home.

I think that, more than balancing a budget and unlocking science points off the tree, is why I don't play career mode.  Couldn't ever point out why, but that sounds like the reason.

I'm one of the KSP veterans who started in 0.18 (might've been 0.17, but I mostly remember airplanes being a thing, and that jet engines actually needed an intake now) and for me, flying a mission from start to finish is very satisfying.  Flying a mission from start to near finish, leaving things in orbit, was satisfying.  Starting a mission to orbit, having to then jump back to KSC and pick up contracts that just unlocked, launch a towering pillar of satellites into orbit, scatter those off toward their destinations, jump back to my first mission and start the transfer burn, settle into an orbit around the Mun, jump over to the KSC and grab a contract to deorbit a lost Kerbal, retrieve said lost Kerbal, move a satellite from the Mun to Minmus to satisfy a contract, make my Mun Landing, and then forget about the Mun mission for a while because we really need to pay attention to the probes creeping toward Jool now.  That is not satisfying at all.  I'm not saying that Career mode isn't capable of being fun, I'm just saying that I found no fun in it myself.

Career mode, in the early game, is grindy as heck.  Then when you think it's going to get better because you're able to go interplanetary, it's still grindy as heck.  The only time it stops being grindy as heck is when you end up filling out the tech tree before you've even explored more than Kerbin, Mun, Minmus, and one other planet.  And then it's just boring because you've got fifty-billion missions started and no desire to finish any of them because they're not worth it anymore.

 

I think that might also be a big chunk of why I don't go interplanetary in Sandbox: there's even less to do.  At least in Science or Career mode, you get to use those science experiments and get witty comments.  In Sandbox, you get a generic thinner-than-toilet-paper dialogue about how no-one's listening.

[Corona688]

8 minutes ago, Madrias said:

Career mode, in the early game, is grindy as heck.  Then when you think it's going to get better because you're able to go interplanetary, it's still grindy as heck.

Tell me about it.  I'm in the middle of trying to land on every building in KSC to get the science needed to unlock the legs I need to land anywhere to get the science I need to unlock parts which actually earn science.  The actual missions are enjoyable, but once you accomplish a set the game ramps things up a notch and gives you unreachable ones.

You can think ahead, set up infrastructure, etc, but that requires a certain amount of grinding too, just to get docking clamps.

Early game was quite entertaining though, I think the world record are hints (a "world record" for 1 meter underwater?  Really?) that there's more to explore in a certain direction.

Edited June 23, 2016 by Corona688

[Madrias]

Just now, Corona688 said:

I think the world record are hints (a "world record" for 1 meter underwater?  Really?) that there's more to explore in a certain direction.

Yep, except there's nothing to explore.  It all looks the same.

I mean, even if the other planets have nothing to start with, would it be impossible or impractical to dot Kerbin with a few major and a few minor cities, each with their own runways and a bonus to recovery for landing on a runway in a city?  And I'm sure if enough Kerbals were deposited on other planets, they'd start making an outpost with similar construction to the KSC, just so they had somewhere to live that isn't their space ship.

It'd solve a problem for me, which is that the only things I see on the planets other than the easter eggs are my own footsteps.

[Corona688]

18 minutes ago, Madrias said:

I mean, even if the other planets have nothing to start with, would it be impossible or impractical to dot Kerbin with a few major and a few minor cities

Given how much effort has been put into building the KSC, I think building a whole scale city -- even a little one -- isn't practical, not unless it were built from randomly-generated units like ground scatter.

I mean, what are we going to do there, sell girl-scout cookies?  No, we're going to land, look around, take soil samples and leave.  Maybe 30 minutes of gameplay, tops, unless we feel like grinding it for something, which we probably would, at which point the city stops being entertainment and becomes work.

I could easily imagine there being a 'farmland' biome, though, with more appropriate ground scatter within it.

The issue might be less the amount of stuff to find, and more the way short-term missions fight with long-term missions in career mode.  At some point innovation isn't valuable any more.

Maybe once you get enough reputation, you start getting longer-term contracts, ones which pay over time as well as per milestone.  Finally you could timewarp without feeling like you're literally wasting time.  It'd help make strategies more useful, too, if you're dead-ended you could turn a steady income into steady amount of science.

It shouldn't just be money and science for nothing though.  Maybe you have to build and launch something within a year, with a certain flag to prove you're following that contract.

Edited June 23, 2016 by Corona688

[DuoDex]

I certainly go interplanetary...maybe we should post a poll somewhere to see.

EDIT: I made a quick Google form to see what's up. I've made a new thread, too.

[Terwin]

38 minutes ago, Corona688 said:

Tell me about it.  I'm in the middle of trying to land on every building in KSC to get the science needed to unlock the legs I need to land anywhere to get the science I need to unlock parts which actually earn science.  The actual missions are enjoyable, but once you accomplish a set the game ramps things up a notch and gives you unreachable ones.

You can think ahead, set up infrastructure, etc, but that requires a certain amount of grinding too, just to get docking clamps.

Early game was quite entertaining though, I think the world record are hints (a "world record" for 1 meter underwater?  Really?) that there's more to explore in a certain direction.

While there is a great deal of entertainment to be had from landing on each building, you can get that science more easily by just touching your craft to the building.  

Just last night I got science from the flag pole, admin building and astronaut complex with a jet-powered 3 wheel cart piloted by Bob, who would get out after I pulled away from the building to collect and reset the experiments.

(I was trying out a mission from the '[x]Science!' mod)

[Corona688]

17 minutes ago, Terwin said:

While there is a great deal of entertainment to be had from landing on each building, you can get that science more easily by just touching your craft to the building.  

Just last night I got science from the flag pole, admin building and astronaut complex with a jet-powered 3 wheel cart piloted by Bob, who would get out after I pulled away from the building to collect and reset the experiments.

(I was trying out a mission from the '[x]Science!' mod)

3 wheeled jet carts are by far the best reason to invest in jet engines, yes

[AstroWolf]

I think that most people who play KSP never go interplanetary because,

A: There is no reason to, because you can unlock the whole tech tree by getting science from all the biomes of the Mun.

B: It is extremely difficult to plot a course in interplanetary space, while it is easy to just fire at the mun and hit it.

C: There is little to no reward for going to any of the other planets, as they have dull textures ans minimal science.

[Astrofox]

I used to be a bit of a Kerbin Hermit, but then I decided to go elsewhere at one point (aka yesterday to Dres).

Now I magically want to do everything possible in KSP.

Thanks Magic Boulder - you're the best!

[Mireru]

Disclaimer: I have done Eve, Duna and Laythe in the past.

Honestly though, in most games I spend 95% of the time on Kerbin. I entirely blame Firespitter. Propeller planes, helicopters, propeller rovers...

Then I found Hooligan and it was blimpcars, baloonplanes, etc. Add in Extra-planetary Launchpads and there was the month spent using blimps to build a 'second KSC' up in the mountains. Only to find Kolonisation and start building another one over in another mountain range. All culminating with a city-plate-colony airlifted to the South Pole.

Now with the GAP contracts...

..space? Meh. Maybe when I'm between coast guard rescues and submarine explorations :P

[Van Disaster]

Every time I've been to a distant planet I've immediately wanted to start building fixed structures - I actually made some models including a huge elevated runway at some point - but I seem to be still lacking the necessary knowledge to mod EPL to allow it. Mind you after 3 years of want if I ever do build my Laythe complex in-game I'll probably quit for not knowing what to aim at next

[Astrofox]

@Van Disaster You should land massive bases on Dres. Really, you could build massive complexes on the surface for the Dres Awareness society!

[Van Disaster]

23 hours ago, Astrofox said:

@Van Disaster You should land massive bases on Dres. Really, you could build massive complexes on the surface for the Dres Awareness society!

I don't think I'm landing a 6km elevated runway anywhere ( not much use on Dres ), but I guess there would be custom complexes to build. Adding interactable static buildings to EL ( so you get to actually build them ) is still a little out of mygrasp anyway.

Actually even in career now I have an issue that I could do about anything without finishing the tree, so now I'm stuck doing the odd not terribly interesting and definitely not related to anything else in particular contract ( and yes I have a bunch of contract packs ) - ther definitely needs to be more of a sense of taking part in a programme.

[Hevak]

Well let's clarify first. Like you mean I actually planned going interplanetary and made it? Or those few times early on when I messed some things up and sent some kerbals to infinity and beyond? Lol.  I had a few accident that sent some kerbals off in to some solar orbit/flyby that they were never returning from, enough to be interplanetary but I never encountered one.

then personally I have only been to the next closest body out from minmus. I'm sorry I don't know the order of planets in ksp of the top of head.

I think a few people have hit on why many may not. It takes a lot of planning. Some require utilization of launch Windows to really be successful. Plus I think it's difficult for the more avg players that may not use mods to build a competent rocket with enough delta v to get anywhere beyond minmus. Even minmus can be tough due to inclination.  And I think it does take a bit of knowledge to make those farther journeys happen. Also the whole maneuver node system isn't exactly what I'd called easy or intuitive for setting up encounters beyond the mun for the more average player.

Personally the reasons I haven't been Is because I am horrible at building rockets, and the bigger reason is probably I tend to play in a slightly hard career mode all the time. Less rewards, and well I've had almost every save that o was getting far enough to have parts etc to get out there get ruined by updates. Also I have an aversion to killing or stranding kerbals. 

Im always trying to get to that point.  As far as is it true that most don't? I'd say that's really hard to definitively answer. But it certainly is not easy, you need to learn at least basic orbital mechanics to have any real chance in my mind.

Edited June 26, 2016 by Hevak

[MalfunctionM1Ke]

I actually never went interplanetary when I started playing KSP.
It was a pain in the butt to find the right phase angle to even reach Duna.

But since Kerbal Alarm Clock came out, I love visiting all the planets and moons.

You are missing out if you restrict yourself to go interplanetary and see the ice valleys of Vall or the Sulphur Spikes of Pol, only the mention a few.

[nosirrbro]

On 6/22/2016 at 4:54 PM, Slaghead said:

I simply haven't gotten far enough in career mode, which is the only mode I play, to do it.  I always reset when I kill a Kerbal.  Like last night when I beat the odds and rescued a Kerbal and immediately burned her up during re-entry.  So tonight, I will probably take the night off.  But tomorrow, I will start a new game.

Plus, it's hard.  I don't *really* understand the node editor, have trouble making precise burns, probably waste a ton of delta-v on inefficient ascents...  Going to the Mun isn't terribly difficult but going to other planets feels like it's going to be really difficult because I have yet to not strand my ships on the Mun because I burned up all my delta-v just getting there despite having way more than enough when reading the charts on what it takes to get places.  So, I only send probes to the Mun now and that's only when I get far enough along in the tech tree which is all too rare.

I think the other big problem I have is the way the solar system is set up is static.  You're not going anywhere new or interesting so there really isn't a sense of exploration.  The planets themselves aren't all that interesting on their own outside of wanting to test things in environments that are different than Kerbin or the Mun.  There is no 'actual' science that requires you to send data gathering probes to learn about the planet to see if it's suicide to send a Kerbal there.  I think the lack of mystery just doesn't make the extra effort pay off enough.  Now, if the solar system were procedurally generated, at least outside of Kerbin itself, then people could brag about how they found something cool or interesting.  Right now, we're just limited to building awesome ships that take advantage of the fact that everything is known about the solar system from the start and that is really cool, even though I am a terrible ship builder, making a ship that makes it to orbit is still a nice accomplishment for me.

And this kids is why sandbox is superior in every way

Edited June 26, 2016 by nosirrbro

[Hevak]

32 minutes ago, nosirrbro said:

And this kids is why sandbox is superior in every way

This is a personal view. Because I think that's why sandbox is inferior in every way.. But that's the good thing, people get to play how they want, in every way.

Edited June 26, 2016 by Hevak

[KerikBalm]

On 6/22/2016 at 9:42 PM, Madrias said:

If, and that's a big if, the terrain and conditions were unique and timewarp was upgraded so that long travels could be done quickly (including warping through SOI transitions with reasonable transition accuracy ... then yes, I might spend more time off of Kerbin.  ...  and the pea-soup atmosphere could make flying more interesting (which, I'll admit, it does.) ... The first times I did it, it was fun, until I realized the only differences are the effect gravity has on my machine,

A couples things...

I found using mars as a template made for very interesting terrain... I made it more interesting by adding an ocean (and an O2 atmosphere thick enough to fly in), and a green tint around the ocean's edges... then made a biome map. I've had a lot of fun exploring this mars derived planet. Biome hopping brings me to new sites of "mars"... riverbeds, flood plains, deltas, the tharsis plateau, olympus mons. The cratered highlands, the rift valley, hellas basin.... etc.

They are new things to see with very different terrain... not like landing in the Xth large crater of Mun or the Yth flat or minmus. Mun biome hopping is so boring except for landing in the canyons.

The real thing is just more interesting. They did make duna a bit interesting.. it was un for a bit to fly though some of those valleys, but there are what... 3 of them? I also had fun doing some flying trips around duna to visit each of the easter eggs (modded electric flight, not ballistic rocketry)

If you admit the different environment (pea soup atmosphere) makes things interesting, then don't you find trying to fly on Duna interesting? What about OPM with Tekto (gotta love a large mk3 spaceplane landing at less than 20 m/s), or the opposite, and try to fly on Thatmo? (myself I modded Slate to be a mars analogue with mars' gravity and surface pressure).

very low gravity worlds are fun to do stuff on, no? The problem is... there's not so much to see, so you stay in one area to play... and you might as well play in low G at minmus.

 

I do disagree that the journey is not part of the fun. I could maek a submarine on Kerbin... but making a way to deliver a submarine to laythe is a lot of fun. Once I splash the submarine... I barely moved it a kilometer. I landed a rover on Eve once... roved it across a biome line, and stopped. Getting it there was the fun part.

My latest "fun" thing was building a modular surface base, and the craft to get them to a destination. Once at the destination: it sits there churning out fuel and science points. The fun was in the delivery and construction, but I did that at Mun first, and I'm not sure I'll go through with it to do the same thing on Duna and Laythe, or other destinations.... i dont know

[kiwi1960]

Well, for me, its true.

In fact, I have not been to any other planet or moon since 1.1 simply because.... well... I'm sick of it.

In the older versions, pre 1.1 I was actually getting somewhere. But with each new version, that go less and less because the game would break with each new version.

Jump forward to 1.1.3 and I am actually starting to make plans again. If they release an update any time soon I'll be totally annoyed.

1.1.3 actually seems playable, so, yes, I'll give it another go. New players jump in and want to go everywhere, us old timers hate having to restart each time so why put the effort into it.

Having said that... my game doesn't crash anymore, the mods all work.... so, yes, I'll take the chance and get into it again.

HOWEVER...... if they release an update any time soon then you will hear me screaming all the way down near in NZ!!!!

 

Edited June 26, 2016 by kiwi1960