How many of you play career vs sandbox?

[Logan Timmermann]

I have been playing mostly career ever since it came out. (In fact ever since career mode was really only science mode.) Do you guys play mostly career or switch between the modes a lot? Why do you play what you do?

[Vanamonde]

I run a save of each. The sandbox is where I test new designs, and once they're reliable, I copy them over to my "real" career campaign. 

[TheSaint]

I play sandbox almost exclusively. I set my own restrictions and goals. Every once in a while, about every year or so, I'd say, I go back and try a career game, just to make sure I still don't enjoy it. I don't.

[Superfluous J]

I only play sandbox when testing or doing a challenge. Actual play is in career or science mode depending on my mood.

I started before career was a thing, and I quit because I didn't like the lack of direction. I came back the day career mode dropped and never looked back.

[AlamoVampire]

I am sandbox exclusive. I was excited at the prospect of a career mode and a science mode when they were teased oh so long ago. Then they came out and I was extremely disappointed. Career mode lacked a hook for me. I saw and still fail to see a reason to play it. There is no story or reason connect with the game. Science mode when I last tried was so broken you could make 1 rover after a quick capsule parking on the pad unlock the entire tech tree from just roaming around the KSC. And like career there is no story, no hook, only go here click click click go home, now go there click click click go home. 
 

In sandbox, the universe is a blank canvas for me to paint with my imagination. Sandbox is my Neighborhood of Make Believe. I can write any number of stories, get hooked into the game in a way that neither career nor science are able to offer.

165004242020 ..

Edited April 24, 2020 by AlamoVampire

[RizzoTheRat]

I occasionally test stuff in sandbox but unless it's parts I've not unlocked yet, usually it actually easier to test in my main career game because i'll have the communication satellites in place .

[Lewie]

3 hours ago, Vanamonde said:

I run a save of each. The sandbox is where I test new designs, and once they're reliable, I copy them over to my "real" career campaign. 

Hey I’m not alone! I do that too! But I tend to do it in science mode. But it doesn’t count really, cus I just farm science. 

[EchoLima]

I alternate between science and career depending on how annoyed I am with career mode restrictions. 

Edited April 25, 2020 by EchoLima

[purpleivan]

Almost exclusively Sandbox for me.

For a while after Career was introduced I'd play it until I unlocked the full tech tree, each time a new major version came out, but that ended after 3 or 4 versions. Since then my only Career game game has been the one that was an entry for the No Contracts challenge.

[archiebald]

I have never played sandbox.  Have no interest in it, I only play career.

[Dafni]

Sandbox only here. Its all I need.

[hendrack]

I really like career mode with various mods, tinkering to build craft with the items I currently have unlocked. Alas, even with like 30% science rewards and all the science lab mods, science is so easy to gather and unlock the tech tree so fast.

[CBase]

I am in a single Career only, but since I racked up millions and unlocked the full tech tree, my career game plays mostly like sandbox propably. Actually I am only slowly following the career challenges and usually end up with some other stuff until at some moment I return to actually progress the mission line.

[N_Danger]

Played about 800 hours in sandbox and Science. Had a science game where I set a self imposed goal of landing on every body possible and returning the Crew back to Kerbin. 

Just started playing games in Career(finally). I trying the same goal as above in my current game. But now only land a crew via a contract for that body. 

[The Flying Kerbal]

Vanamonde answered for me.  I use Sandbox to test things, then transfer the craft over to my career game.

[Hotel26]

On 4/25/2020 at 5:50 AM, AlamoVampire said:

In sandbox, the universe is a blank canvas for me to paint with my imagination.

Stated exquisitely well.

Sandbox is similar, in my thinking, to the game, Go.  "Why am I here?  What should I do?"

 

[Curveball Anders]

On 4/24/2020 at 8:53 PM, Vanamonde said:

I run a save of each. The sandbox is where I test new designs, and once they're reliable, I copy them over to my "real" career campaign. 

Same here.

My sandbox is actually named JPL as an indication that it's for design and trials

 

[Bingleberry]

I tend to play career mode until I have a few million in the bank and the tech tree unlocked, then restart. I am the kind of player that likes to have goals, but lack the creativity to make interesting goals for myself... that said, a lot of the contracts in career mode are lame, and as somebody above me alluded to, there’s no point to it; career mode lacks any real cohesive goal to make it compelling. However, as you can see by my new member status, I am new to the ksp forum (and game, for that matter), and love how awesome the community is with the challenge board. I am finishing up a couple of the challenges, and just love how they make you think out of the box, and I also enjoy seeing the incredible level of creativity and ingenuity of the ksp community.

 

Right when I think I am getting tired of the game, I see something on the forum or YouTube, and just think “hmm, I wanna try that... but if I change these things, maybe I can make it better?”

Edited April 26, 2020 by Bingleberry

[AlamoVampire]

@Hotel26 There is nothing quite like the possibilities in a blank canvas is there?

062504262020

[Kazkar]

I'm playing almost exclusively career, seemingly sharing a lot of good reasons given by @Bingleberry.

I like the challenges of getting into orbit, or to the moons, with the most basic components. I like the challenges of building a cost-effective rockets, so that the problem-solving rule "MOAR BOOSTERS!" is not always applicable, because of money shortage. Sometimes it's even: "Hmm.. Shall I add this one more strut, or will it fly without it?"

By the way, the career can unwittingly create some very interesting challenges. For example: "Gene, we already have about ten useless satellites around Kerbin, and Mortimer has just signed a contract to launch yet another one. Can we do something about it?" - "Hmmm.. How about we deploy some Grand Slam Seismo units on Mun, and then crash all these satellites there?"

I feel like the career mode gives all my Kerbals a reason to exist. It gives them life.

However, when I was showing KSP to my nephew, I have started a science-mode game, to show him how you can make progress, and to let him feel the joy of "Yay! See how great engines we do have now!", but without him feeling the frustration of "Blasted! I cannot afford that."

[luizsilveira]

I only play and have only played career. 

I like the limitations and managerial aspects of it, even if it's not fully balanced.

Once I run out of things to do, my long-term dream is playing a whole career without reverts. I haven't been this brave yet, though I really try to only revert due to the Kraken and similar things. 

[Tonka Crash]

Career provides my with a enough of a challenge just juggling contracts, forcing me to focus on multiple missions constantly.  I've bumped up my contract limits and try to keep my queue full. I don't mind the lack of a coherent story, look at the US space program, how coherent is that?  The randomness feels more realistic.  I play with my own loose goals to build up an off Kerbin infrastructure to support building and maintaining ships and bases without launches through atmosphere.  I'm at the point that anything that doesn't need to launch Kerbals can be handled from Mun orbit.  Eventually crewed missions to other planets will be constructed in orbit to allow designs that don't need to launch through atmosphere.

If all I want to do is build a mission to Duna (or Joon or where ever) it's trivially easy in Sandbox. Build something with all parts available, cost is no object, timewarp to Duna, done.  I can do that in one session. In career, I'm constantly juggling my time between contacts that all require attention. I don't really find cost to be a factor past the early game.  Time is the bigger constraint.  I usually don't get to use timewarp for more than a day or two at a time as there are always other missions that need attention.  A mission to Duna or elsewhere will take me months of real time.  I have to launch when the window is available with whatever parts I've unlocked up to that point, hope I haven't overlooked something and in 3 or 4 months (of real time) actually arrive and do the mission.  Pulling it off feels like an accomplishment.  Even trips to Minmus have enough time delay to make it feel much more remote than trips to the Mun.

[The Space Dino]

I've been playing mostly career - almost done with my first playthrough. I seem to prefer having my science modules actually do something rather than just being cosmetics in sandbox...

On a side note, I can't seem to be able to see the target distance indicator on the main HUD so when docking I basically have to eyeball how far my target is - any solution suggestions?

 

[Bingleberry]

1 hour ago, Tonka Crash said:

I don't mind the lack of a coherent story, look at the US space program, how coherent is that?

As a scientist, I kind of take issue with this sentiment. NASA doesn’t exist as an agency for the sake of exploration, it is a science/engineering agency, first and foremost. Each mission exists as a means of furthering scientific inquiry, in some form or another. Ask the scientists/engineers who developed and controlled the Cassini probe if their life’s work lacked a coherent story... NASA doesn’t just randomly choose missions.

 

The problem with comparing the mission structure to that of a real space agency is that none of the ksp missions have purpose, aside from generating cash... if “perform a surface analysis on laythe” resulted in something meaningful, like providing a secondary mission that involved mining a particular type of ore from laythe, that resulted in a tertiary mission “research ore to unlock a special TT node,” that’d be something... but right now it’s for cash, reputation, and a broadly used “science.”

Edited April 26, 2020 by Bingleberry

[Tonka Crash]

51 minutes ago, Bingleberry said:

As a scientist, I kind of take issue with this sentiment. NASA doesn’t exist as an agency for the sake of exploration, it is a science/engineering agency, first and foremost. Each mission exists as a means of furthering scientific inquiry, in some form or another. Ask the scientists/engineers who developed and controlled the Cassini probe if their life’s work lacked a coherent story...

I'm an engineer and have worked with NASA in the past and my company currently has a few projects with NASA. You're reading a bias into my post that was not intended.. I was arguing the contract systems is not that different than NASA missions    To use your example: Cassini is but one mission among many for NASA. "furthering scientific inquiry" is a justification, not a plot.  

NASA programs are very much like the contract system in this game: launch a rocket, put a man in space, land a man on the moon and safely return to earth, put a orbiter around Saturn with xxx scientific experiments, land on Mars, etc.)  There is no overall narrative to these missions like some in this thread say is lacking from the game. 

If you want to argue about I'd say it's too narrow to focus solely on NASA as the US space program.  Space-X intends to colonize Mars. Virgin Galactic is looking at tourism. These are not strictly "furthering scientific inquiry".  To be cynical you could also argue Apollo's mission was more about politics and would have never happened if it were only about science (beat the Ruskies). 

Edit to add: I hadn't seen the second half of your post while I was typing this. I'm on the board while waiting for maneuvers to execute.  Your second half is arguing game mechanics that just add constraints to gameplay without really changing the overall structure of the game.

Edited April 26, 2020 by Tonka Crash