Solar flares deactivateing electronics.

[Ryaja]

This of course would be enabled in difficulty settings. But I think solar activity would be cool. It would of course require part upgrades to counteract this ie a faraday's cage.

[jastrone]

the thing is they are random. that makes for really unfair gameplay since one can hit before you even unlocked the part upgrades

[Ryaja]

14 minutes ago, jastrone said:

the thing is they are random. that makes for really unfair gameplay since one can hit before you even unlocked the part upgrades

Yes, that is why it would be enabled in difficulty settings. It would make a much faster iteration of craft as you are launch each probe for only a few science at first until you get upgrades.

[darthgently]

On 7/9/2022 at 9:54 AM, Ryaja said:

Yes, that is why it would be enabled in difficulty settings. It would make a much faster iteration of craft as you are launch each probe for only a few science at first until you get upgrades.

It doesn't matter if you put "enabled in difficulty settings" in big bold red letters, you will always get blowback when suggesting that a game should realistically reflect random events from reality.  Some want more reality, some less. Same story since the beginning of time in every culture.

I really like idea, but would add that getting some kind of solar science instrument/telescope into solar orbit would allow predictions of solar flares and solar weather to ag greater degree.

[Ryaja]

8 hours ago, darthgently said:

It doesn't matter if you put "enabled in difficulty settings" in big bold red letters, you will always get blowback when suggesting that a game should realistically reflect random events from reality.  Some want more reality, some less. Same story since the beginning of time in every culture.

I really like idea, but would add that getting some kind of solar science instrument/telescope into solar orbit would allow predictions of solar flares and solar weather to ag greater degree.

Exactly 

[whatsEJstandfor]

I dunno, having random events that brick a spacecraft doesn't make any sense to me. It's not even that it'd add difficulty; it'd just be a nuisance. In other words, when my vessel crashes, I want to know it was because of something I did. Either through picking the wrong parts, or not checking staging, or not keeping track of fuel, or negligence during timewarp even. But a mission failing because of something entirely out of a user's control gives the user nowhere to go. They can't learn from it and adjust. They just have to roll the dice and hope it doesn't happen again. At that point, you could put your computer's power outlet on a random timer so it shuts down at random intervals and get the same effect (and the same amount of fun).

Edited July 14, 2022 by whatsEJstandfor

[Ryaja]

On 7/14/2022 at 3:34 PM, whatsEJstandfor said:

I dunno, having random events that brick a spacecraft doesn't make any sense to me. It's not even that it'd add difficulty; it'd just be a nuisance. In other words, when my vessel crashes, I want to know it was because of something I did. Either through picking the wrong parts, or not checking staging, or not keeping track of fuel, or negligence during timewarp even. But a mission failing because of something entirely out of a user's control gives the user nowhere to go. They can't learn from it and adjust. They just have to roll the dice and hope it doesn't happen again. At that point, you could put your computer's power outlet on a random timer so it shuts down at random intervals and get the same effect (and the same amount of fun).

I think it would start out with at least basic prediction and you would just choose when to launch

[Bej Kerman]

Just now, Ryaja said:

On 7/14/2022 at 11:34 PM, whatsEJstandfor said:

I dunno, having random events that brick a spacecraft doesn't make any sense to me. It's not even that it'd add difficulty; it'd just be a nuisance. In other words, when my vessel crashes, I want to know it was because of something I did. Either through picking the wrong parts, or not checking staging, or not keeping track of fuel, or negligence during timewarp even. But a mission failing because of something entirely out of a user's control gives the user nowhere to go. They can't learn from it and adjust. They just have to roll the dice and hope it doesn't happen again. At that point, you could put your computer's power outlet on a random timer so it shuts down at random intervals and get the same effect (and the same amount of fun).

I think it would start out with at least basic prediction and you would just choose when to launch

How does choosing when to launch protect a spacecraft intended to spend years in solar orbit? How does this make gameplay any more fun?

[JadeOfMaar]

On 7/9/2022 at 12:35 AM, Ryaja said:

But I think solar activity would be cool.

Nah. This is one of those things you "think" you want but would get annoyed if it was actually there. If you think about it for a bit, all you get is "The Sun randomly kills all your ships. Any ship that is protected just has this tihng on it that you only use once and it just drains your battery most of the time."

Same thing as n-body and wind on Kerbin. You think you want this but then when every planet tries to deorbit your station and it needs to basically have infinite RCS fuel on it to last the length of your playthrough, or 4 out of 5 days you have to scrub your Space-X-alike launch (and you miss in-game opportunities or kerbals die) you'll change your mind very quickly.

Kerbalism does it right as there's more to dealing with space weather than just random flares and slapping something onto your ship that perfectly protects against that.

[Ryaja]

It would of course be limited by planets magnetospheres. And there would be forecasts.

[darthgently]

On 7/14/2022 at 6:34 PM, whatsEJstandfor said:

I dunno, having random events that brick a spacecraft doesn't make any sense to me. It's not even that it'd add difficulty; it'd just be a nuisance. In other words, when my vessel crashes, I want to know it was because of something I did. Either through picking the wrong parts, or not checking staging, or not keeping track of fuel, or negligence during timewarp even. But a mission failing because of something entirely out of a user's control gives the user nowhere to go. They can't learn from it and adjust. They just have to roll the dice and hope it doesn't happen again. At that point, you could put your computer's power outlet on a random timer so it shuts down at random intervals and get the same effect (and the same amount of fun).

If you don't have an engineer with repair kits on board, or ignored the solar weather forecast from the probe you maybe didn't launch at all, then it would be the players fault.  Finally, if you didn't turn it off in the difficulty settings when you knew you didn't want it, well, there ya go...

[Guest]

1 hour ago, darthgently said:

 Finally, if you didn't turn it off in the difficulty settings when you knew you didn't want it, well, there ya go...

This always comes as a proposal under complete change in the design philosophy for the game.

"I'd like to have the game focusing on sword fighting, and having mages as a new class of Kerbonauts"

"But, I don't think it goes well with the gameplay"

"Make it an optional difficulty setting!"

 

I don't like random events with little to no control from the player, that's not the right kind of difficulty for a game like KSP, but sure enough if the devs thinks that's what the game needs they need to implement it fully, not doing the things halfway and put it in some setting as an additional mode.

I want the game to be a cohesive design unit, I want that whoever is designing the antennas and the new commnet system has clear in mind that plasma blackout exist, because that's not just a hardcore option buried somewhere but a main design feature of the reentry system.

We're used to have everything being a completely isolated toggle-able system because KSP1 features were implemented over the course of a decade and every new thing couldn't just change how the game worked, it would have caused riots in the community, so everything had to be optional and disjointed from previous features and systems.

We're lucky the old Souposphere and the Kerbin-Mun only solar system aren't options in the settings, but sure enough science and career were kept separated for no reason other than not being able to fully commit to either of them (and in fact both feel like placeholders, not real gamemodes of a 1.0 game).

[darthgently]

3 hours ago, Master39 said:

This always comes as a proposal under complete change in the design philosophy for the game.

Optional solar weather described as a "complete change in design philosophy" for a game centered on interplanetary travel.   I'm squinting real hard and still not able to steel man this statement

[Guest]

9 hours ago, darthgently said:

Optional solar weather described as a "complete change in design philosophy" for a game centered on interplanetary travel.   I'm squinting real hard and still not able to steel man this statement

Random failures are a complete change in design philosophy, whether you call them with their name or hide them behind one of the thousands of things KSP doesn't simulate.

Yesterday was lightning strikes, today is solar wind, tomorrow is going to be the reliability of the assembly lines based on the mood of the assembly line workers. Doesn't matter how you cleverly rename random parts failure, we're back still to the same design element and argument around it.

[JadeOfMaar]

10 hours ago, darthgently said:

 I'm squinting real hard and still not able to steel man this statement

What I believe @Master39 means is that these suggestions have far greater impact on gameplay than the suggester thinks. They don't see beyond the first point that gets them interested. Random solar flares bricking your ship goes under Part Failure. What more does a proper Part Failure gameplay dynamic consist of? At least these:

• Planning your launches further ahead and budgeting time to testing and improving reliability.
• A progression dynamic concerning said integration.
• Launching the same craft several times and expecting them to fail.
• Designing your craft with redundant parts to resist being crippled or bricked when a failure event happens.
• Packing a repair resource or replacement parts and minding their taxation of your dV.
• The risk of losing kerbals on the affected ship due to systems failure (in BARIS, you can have engines randomly explode or the throttle jams. Your kerbals could get stranded or uncontrollably flown into the ground or the Kuiper Belt).
• Finally, there has to be some kind of clear reward to work your way up to after all of the previous points, and it probably shouldn't be perfect/infinite.

[Pthigrivi]

On 7/17/2022 at 5:12 PM, JadeOfMaar said:

Nah. This is one of those things you "think" you want but would get annoyed if it was actually there.

Pretty much how I feel. I think it's one thing if later in the game some planets had fixed toroidal regions with intense radiation belts that you would want to shield against or navigate around, because that's something players can plan for or engineer around specifically. That would add an actual gameplay challenge. Adding a chance of random failure to every craft you launch sounds like a lot of frustration for no real gain. 

[Ryaja]

I just had a thought what if they made more unstable stars that had emps in them but not in the kerbolar system

[JadeOfMaar]

33 minutes ago, Ryaja said:

I just had a thought what if they made more unstable stars that had emps in them but not in the kerbolar system

Actual angry flare stars?

Spoiler

TRAPPIST-1

That would be legit. On the subject of cosmic radiation based dangers, that would potentially make whole regions of star systems possibly unplayable... but you could look at it from the angle of how you could (try to) engineer around it, survive or make a noble sacrifice, get special science and even bragging rights.

KSP1 sorely lacks in celestial hazard dynamics. I hope KSP2 doesn't.

[Ryaja]

10 minutes ago, JadeOfMaar said:

Actual angry flare stars?

  Reveal hidden contents

TRAPPIST-1

That would be legit. On the subject of cosmic radiation based dangers, that would potentially make whole regions of star systems possibly unplayable... but you could look at it from the angle of how you could (try to) engineer around it, survive or make a noble sacrifice, get special science and even bragging rights.

KSP1 sorely lacks in celestial hazard dynamics. I hope KSP2 doesn't.

ya they have said with interstealler they had a lot more possibilities to make things so we will have to wait and see