Make these two female Kerbals stock

[adsii1970]

Just now, Hotaru said:

All they'd have to do would be:

-Make all kerbals default to status "Applicant" rather than "Available."

-Add a few more preset names and sets of stats that are guaranteed to show up (or remove the existing ones so you get only randoms).

-Make the "Veteran" flag always default to "False," switching it to "True" later on based on kerbal experience.

-Possibly change hiring costs so that the first few are free.

None of the above should have any effect on the syntax of save files. Done with a bit of care, I can't think of a reason why any those changes would break existing saves. Already you can edit your persistence file to not contain Jeb, Bill, Bob, and Val and it'll still work fine. I did that in my current career without ill effect: I started with Kerzer, Burmin, and Melxie, all pilots. I didn't make them "Veterans," but I probably could've and it would have registered them correctly as orange suits.

Squad assured us the same exact thing when Valentina was added. And it didn't work that way last time.

I'd lose four saved games if something were to go wrong in the process and I really would hate to have to start all over. And I know there are others who feel this very same way. It would be catastrophic for one of my saved games.

3 minutes ago, Hotaru said:

Personally, the way I'd go would be to add a few more "preset" kerbals--enough for, say, 3 of each class--and let the user have their first 3 or 4 hires for free. That'd give us plenty of room to sneak in a few more girl characters without stopping anyone who still wants to start with good old Jeb, Bill, and Bob for old times' sake.

This was brought up once before. The thing was, if I remember correctly, they thought that four astronauts were enough. Personally, I think they need two crews of three. All they should add is another scientist and engineer to round things out.

4 minutes ago, Hotaru said:

As far as their names goes--personally I'm not crazy about naming them after real people. While I've certainly gotten attached to Valentina since she was introduced, her name was not the one I'd have picked. And I have to agree that naming them after real people could potentially be much more of a political statement than just including them would be. I'm not really strongly opposed to it either, but if it were me, I'd just pick a few random names that I thought were cute and leave it at that.

In .18, they were all just random named and I don't understand why that wasn't left alone. Oh, it was fun having Jebbert, Billybob, and my favorites, Ralph and Fred (and the half dozen mutations of those two names). But when they added Valentina, they did something to the generator and it started throwing out "real" names such as Gus, Gene, and Neil (or at least they popped up in my roster). I agree, no real names should ever have been used for Kerbals. I'm kinda partial to the strange ones like Kerny, Thompberry, and Podgas.

 

[Spricigo]

5 minutes ago, adsii1970 said:

Because the way the game starts would fundamentally have to change.

Correction: that will change the way the game is set up. And it will change absolutely nothing about game mechanics.

Once the game start is exactly the same gameplay, had you picked Huey, Dewey and Louie or Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup. A few textures and text will change and that is it.

 

Actually one reason that I prefer the idea of selecting the starting crew is to maintain the possibility of start with the "classic crew".

6 minutes ago, Snark said:

Some posts have been removed...

Please.  Just don't.  Thank you.

Maybe I just saved the trouble of removing mine. ...Welcome, I guess. . 

1 minute ago, adsii1970 said:

Squad assured us the same exact thing when Valentina was added. And it didn't work that way last time.

I'd lose four saved games if something were to go wrong in the process and I really would hate to have to start all over. And I know there are others who feel this very same way. It would be catastrophic for one of my saved games.

You are in this long enough to know that the fist step of an update is to backup the old version.

 

Yes, is annoying to lose a save (or several) because something the update broke the game. But that could happens with ANY new feature or tweak implemented. Unless the idea is to stop development there is nothing that make it issue particular to changing the starting crew or how it is selected.

[Hotaru]

17 minutes ago, adsii1970 said:

Squad assured us the same exact thing when Valentina was added. And it didn't work that way last time.

I'd lose four saved games if something were to go wrong in the process and I really would hate to have to start all over. And I know there are others who feel this very same way. It would be catastrophic for one of my saved games.

I'm not saying it's easy (that depends mostly on how well-written the existing code is) or even that it's advisable, just that it shouldn't be impossible. I do agree that on the off-chance they were to implement it, they should only do so if they could be sure of not breaking saves.

 

17 minutes ago, adsii1970 said:

This was brought up once before. The thing was, if I remember correctly, they thought that four astronauts were enough. Personally, I think they need two crews of three. All they should add is another scientist and engineer to round things out.

I could go either way here. Fewer is arguably simpler, and having too many more would sort of dilute the importance of each individual one, just by virtue of having a longer list of names to memorize. On the other hand, more would give us more flexibility--like my preference to start with three pilots and no scientists or engineers at all.

In any event, if they added two more and one or both of them were girls I'd be more than satisfied. I myself might actually make only one of them a girl (giving 4 boys and 2 girls) just so the original group doesn't feel quite so neatly composed and symmetrical. (In a group of six random people , you're as likely as not to have more of one gender than the other, just like flipping a coin six times isn't always going to yield 3 head and 3 tails.) Not that I'd complain about having 3 of each, mind you.

 

 

PS. I believe the addition of female kerbals did change the syntax of persistence files by adding a "Gender=" line, which might be what broke saves back then (although why they couldn't just detect the missing line and add "Gender=Male" to every existing kerbal when loading an old save is beyond me).

 

Edited April 18, 2018 by Hotaru

[Waxing_Kibbous]

Honestly, if one was playing career mode on normal difficulty you could have plenty of male and female kerbals after the first 8-10 missions between hiring and rescues, it becomes a non-issue pretty quickly. I generally prefer hiring females because I think the models look better, the male kerbals sans helmets kind of bothers me... I also play with EarnYourStripes for the ability to earn orange suits, an idea which has been suggested here.

  As far as adding 2 more kerbals to the start game, IMO maybe a bit of a balance issue but at the same time as I've mentioned building up a crew early on is pretty easy anyway so it won't make any difference in the long run.

Seems like the issue people have is with motive, adding because feminist rubs some the wrong way, adding because more fun and personality is my vote.

[Nils277]

I'm also on the side that adding more female Kerbals to the game would not hurt anyone but will increase identification with the game for some of us.
It is not about forcing a political/whatever mindset on the other player but to allow others to become more immersed into the game. E.g. letting one choose the veterans at start does not force any kind of "*ism"  but simply gives more options. 

I'm quite sure that many of the ideas, e.g. letting the user select three our four Kerbals as veterans at the start of a save instead of having the same four every time can be done with mods. There are already several mods out there which allow changing characteristics of the Kerbals. 

[steve_v]

5 minutes ago, Nils277 said:

letting the user select three our four Kerbals as veterans at the start of a save instead of having the same four every time can be done with mods.

Sounds reasonable to me. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
One could even pick the names... I think I will take three: "Rapid", "Unplanned", and "Disassembly".

Edited April 19, 2018 by steve_v

[Snark]

Okay, folks.  Had to prune out a whole bunch of content because despite moderator instruction, twice, in the last 24 hours, no politics please, someone just had to drag politics in again.    Accusing people of having agendas, making slippery-slope arguments, talking about political correctness... nope.

Also, a lot of the "arguments" were ascribing motives to people.  Also not okay.  That's being accusatory, which is also against forum rules (2.2.d).  Look, nobody can speak for anyone else's reasons.  It's fine to say "I like this idea because <my feelings>."  It's also fine to say "I hate this idea because <my feelings>".  It's not okay to argue about the idea because of anyone else's supposed reasons-- because you don't speak for them.  If you want to talk about your "agenda", fine-- don't go talking about what you think someone else's supposed "agenda" is.

So, had to go in and heavily prune the thread.  Alas, the removed posts include not just the blatantly political ones, but, alas, plenty of others that then responded to them, so unfortunately they had to go, too.  Which is a pity, because several of them contained some interesting (and non-political) commentary.

Leaving this thread locked for a while to give folks some time to cool off.

And, seriously:  when the moderators say "stop doing this thing", it means stop it, okay?  A word to the wise:

• Don't post politics.  (Or other forbidden content.)
• Don't respond to someone else posting politics (or other forbidden content).

Thank you for your understanding.

[Vanamonde]

Thread re-opened, and please don't give us reason to close it again. 

[Mr. Peabody]

Personally, I think no other female kerb will be able to take Vall's place. She's an icon, just like Jeb. That's why it's a bad idea to try to add more default female kerbs. We like our "big four" just the way they are.

[Gargamel]

The option to select the first four sits ok with me, but I do think Jeb needs to be default, regardless.  He's always been the THE kerbal in the game. 

I also think it would be a good idea to switch Walt with a female kerbal.  He's the PR guy in the Admin building.  He's got a scruffy goatee and wearing a hazmat suit.  He's the LAST guy I want doing my PR. 

[LoSBoL]

1 hour ago, Gargamel said:

The option to select the first four sits ok with me, but I do think Jeb needs to be default, regardless.  He's always been the THE kerbal in the game. 

I also think it would be a good idea to switch Walt with a female kerbal.  He's the PR guy in the Admin building.  He's got a scruffy goatee and wearing a hazmat suit.  He's the LAST guy I want doing my PR. 

Great idea! I'd say Squad should give @Darth Badie the job! Without helmet due to IP infringement off course, liked her better without the helmet anyway.

[Nils277]

1 hour ago, LoSBoL said:

Great idea! I'd say Squad should give @Darth Badie the job! Without helmet due to IP infringement off course, liked her better without the helmet anyway.

Why not go the whole way and add the names of each current and past Squad member at least to the list of random Kerbal names? Or has this been done already?

[steve_v]

2 hours ago, Gargamel said:

He's got a scruffy goatee and wearing a hazmat suit. He's the LAST guy I want doing my PR.

I suspect that is the point

Then again, how long does anyone spend looking at him anyway?
If you hadn't said:

2 hours ago, Gargamel said:

He's the PR guy in the Admin building.

I wouldn't have known which one you were talking about.

[LoSBoL]

42 minutes ago, Nils277 said:

 Or has this been done already?

Well, at least we've already got Bob. 

[Pthigrivi]

Another way to do this is to mete out orange helmets with each astronaut complex upgrade. You could start with Jeb and Val, (you don't really need engineers or scientists for the first couple of launches anyway), and then give Bob and a new orange female engineer on the first upgrade, and Bill and a new female scientist on the second. Starting out with 4 is probably too many as is.

Edited April 20, 2018 by Pthigrivi

[severedsolo]

On 19/04/2018 at 12:32 PM, Nils277 said:

I'm quite sure that many of the ideas, e.g. letting the user select three our four Kerbals as veterans at the start of a save instead of having the same four every time can be done with mods.

Tbh it's so trivial to do, I might just sling it into Earn Your Stripes as an option

[Guest]

Wow. What a lot of ugly replies to my OP. Thanks mods for trimming this.

Perhaps this lady could use a Kerbal naming honorarium this week: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2018/04/19/sully-was-just-a-hero-why-label-the-southwest-captain-a-female-pilot/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.e6bd244d165f

[Rokker]

I just gotta say I disagree with this whole idea on a number of levels.

[snip]

I've always seen the adding of Valentina as a sorta tokenizing measure. An unnecessary one at that, seeing as Kerbals were mainly meant to be asexual.

Also, I fail to see the equality in naming female perhaps after famous historical femaled in the field while the male kerbals have no such thing with their names.

I didn't see the point of adding a 4th kerbal when Valentina was added (regardless of sex) and I see no point in adding 2 more. We might as well just remove hiring Kerbals at all if you are gonna stack the initial crew so much.

As for rhyming, Val Sal and Hel don't rhyme.

Also with your weird post about the SWA 1380 pilots that's completely off topic, I'd say that comparing her to sully is hardly a fair comparison. She followed a pretty basic training procedure that pilots perform many times a year. Sully had to basically write the training procedure in his head in a few minutes. Kinda a big disconnect. But as I said, that's off topic and I'm not quite sure why it's in this post.

[DoctorDavinci]

So just an observation ..... when you are in sandbox mode go to the astronaut complex and hire all the kerbals shown, then leave and enter the complex again then hire all the kerbals again

Do this a couple times and then count the male kerbals and the female kerbals .... 3 out of 4 times will result in more females than males

[steve_v]

23 hours ago, Alrightythen214 said:

Perhaps this lady could use a Kerbal naming honorarium this week

And all the other heroic pilots through the ages as well, regardless of their gender? It'd only be fair...

 

13 hours ago, Rokker said:

I fail to see the equality in naming female perhaps after famous historical femaled in the field while the male kerbals have no such thing with their names

Agreed. Furthermore, I fail to see the point of naming any kerbals after famous historical humans at all.

 

13 hours ago, Rokker said:

I'd say that comparing her to sully is hardly a fair comparison.

Indeed. There are well-rehearsed checklists for both single-engine landings and cabin decompression. Landing on a river, with no power at all, from ~3000ft... not so much.

[The Flying Kerbal]

What about the other 29 genders officially recognised in New York?  Or Facebook who after hitting 70+ genders have now left it so you can call yourself whatever you like?  Should we have 70 genders in KSP?

On 18/04/2018 at 3:08 PM, Hotaru said:

All I know is, I pretty much only play games where I can play as a girl character. Not on principle or anything like that, just because if I'm stuck playing as a boy I lose interest. Back in 0.90, I looked at KSP and what I saw was a game with only male characters. So I didn't buy it, and I never would have if if I hadn't learned you could use Texture Replacer to (sort of) add female ones.

I was seriously excited when the devs added them properly in 1.0. Especially because the design they came up with was really nice and cute, and not a silly caricature with cartoon makeup. Of all the features they've added since I've been playing, girl kerbals are by far the one that I appreciated the most. And that had nothing to do with feminism or political correctness or gender equality or any of that sort of thing--it had to do with me enjoying the game.

Right now we have 1 named girl kerbal and (I think) 9 named boy ones. While it's hardly as important as having female kerbals in the game in the first place, adding a couple more girls (or changing one or two of the boys) would nonetheless be appreciated--again, not for political correctness, just for making the game more fun for those of us who care about such things.

 

PS. And I'm not saying the ratio has to be exactly fifty-fifty or you're all horrible misogynists. Just that making things a bit more even would be nice and wouldn't hurt anybody.

I don't "play" as any named Kerbal, I'm more in the roll of the mission commander allocating the best Kerbal for the job, regardless of sex, the way it should be in real life as well as in KSP.

[mikegarrison]

On 4/20/2018 at 12:57 AM, Gargamel said:

I also think it would be a good idea to switch Walt with a female kerbal.  He's the PR guy in the Admin building.  He's got a scruffy goatee and wearing a hazmat suit.  He's the LAST guy I want doing my PR. 

Just checking in here to see if you got the joke about who Walt is supposed to be....

In case you didn't:

Spoiler

 

[NSEP]

I have nothing against adding adding a few extra veterans, although we shouldn't include too many. I also would suggest replacing Helen Sharman with Mae Carol Jemison.

Im not saying its a good idea, but its not a bad idea either. I really wouldn't bother if these changes were added in.

But i do have an opinion about the topic. Making everything 50/50 doesn't mean equality. Even if you have 100% equal rights between Men and Women, that doesn't mean that there will be the same amount of female and male Astronauts. Keep in mind that the primary reason there aren't as much female Astronauts as there are male, isn't because they don't have equal rights, but its because of interest and preferences.

Edited April 23, 2018 by NSEP

[MarvinKosh]

As a note to the OP, the third lady you would like to add is called Yang, not Liu. Liu is her family name, it says so in the article.

I have no problem if more people want to pick up Kerbal Space Program and play it because a few more models get added to the game. Nobody complains when more rocket parts get added, unless they're bad parts.

 

[Cassel]

We should replace the imaginary characters of men with the names of real astronauts. For 560 astronauts only 60 were female, we should honor those 500 male astronauts for their achievements.