Custom Contracts in Career Mode

[Ruarc88]

What the creative Kerbals need is a way to create custom contracts in career mode. These contracts don't need to actually award anything but basically serve as a way of giving us "this is exactly what we want to do, these parameters need to be completed for it to be considered complete." Primary use of this IMO would be orbital stations. On some bodies, it's near impossible to create for example a pure equitorial orbit as there's no reference point to know where the equator is. With custom contracts, we can go, ok, we want a station at this apoapsis, this periapsis, this inclination, at this longitude and the game will then highlight the exact orbital path required. Exactly the same as the random-gen contracts, but we have full control of the parameters.

By extension, also a way of marking a specific point on the surface of a body for a surface station or even a point where we want to land. This latitude and this longitude, even with this orientation. 

This would serve purely as a reference for our own custom endeavors allowing us to get creative with what we do outside of actual contracts.

[Gargamel]

10 hours ago, Ruarc88 said:

On some bodies, it's near impossible to create for example a pure equitorial orbit as there's no reference point to know where the equator is.

What's the reference point on the other ones?  I don't see a dotted line around Kerbin...

But this idea kinda defeats the general concept of a contract anyways.   A contract is some outside agency requesting your KSP to perform a certain task.   Once you have done this task, then they pay you.  

If you create a custom contract, who's requesting this work, and who's paying you?    NASA didn't get paid to go to the moon, but they have been paid to launch commercial satellites into specific orbits for customers. 

[Ruarc88]

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What's the reference point on the other ones?  I don't see a dotted line around Kerbin...

Mun is on inclination 0. Set as target and you get an ascending and descending node, even if you aren't going that far out. This, unfortunately is the only reference point for a planetary orbit. Kerbin is the only other reference and only functions for a solar orbit.

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But this idea kinda defeats the general concept of a contract anyways.   A contract is some outside agency requesting your KSP to perform a certain task.   Once you have done this task, then they pay you. 

Contracts become incredibly pointless very early on if you know what you're doing. I just did a fly-by of Duna, Ike, Mun, and Minmus with the same vessel, suddenly I have over a million funds with all buildings fully upgraded. Without ever landing on any body outside of the Kerbin system. You really can only do so many tests of decouplers on the launchpad and rescues of Kerbals in orbit before you stop playing the game because it's not fun anymore.

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If you create a custom contract, who's requesting this work, and who's paying you?

Like I said, these don't need to offer any reward. They would be there solely for the purpose of "I want to say create a mesh of relays orbiting Eve at 60 degree spacings." This would let us add place-holder orbital paths that we need to match with our own space crafts. Nothing more.

I guess "contract" may not be the right term for what I'm suggesting, but a way of creating our own custom guidelines for an orbit. I don't know about you, but everyone I know who plays KSP has OCD to the point we have to re-dock station parts because they aren't rotated exactly right. I'll re-dock a fuel tank cause the texture doesn't line up. If that's an issue for players, imagine the efforts we'll go through trying to make orbits 60 degrees apart. This makes that easier.

Once you unlock all the science, visit even just 3 of the planets, and upgrade all the buildings, contracts have precisely zero impact on the game because there's no reason to actually do them. It's the same orbit, same landing, same science, the only thing different is the color of the dirt. Career mode as a whole is pointless then unless we're able to create our own goals. This would simply help in that regard.

[Gargamel]

18 hours ago, Ruarc88 said:

I guess "contract" may not be the right term for what I'm suggesting,

Ok, that's where you confused me. 

Actually, this might be a cool mod or feature.    Somewhere in mission control, A really in depth mission planning screen, where you can set planned orbits, maneuver nodes, etc etc.  You can then assign that mission plan to a vessel so that you can try to fly the mission as planned.  As we used to say in the SCUBA world, "Plan your dive, dive your plan". 

[Superfluous J]

This is basically what I thought Missions were going to be when they first announced Making History.

I'm still a bit sad they're not.

[klgraham1013]

3 hours ago, 5thHorseman said:

This is basically what I thought Missions were going to be when they first announced Making History.

I'm still a bit sad they're not.

The disappointment reached many of us.