What actually will colonies do?

[regex]

17 minutes ago, SolarAdmiral said:

Maybe you play science mode instead of 'career' where the resources are unlimited and you don't need to bother with colonies at all.

What evidence do we have of multiple different game modes? If the main progression gameplay basically boils down to "create colonies to go interstellar" then I really can't see myself laying out $50USD (or whatever it's priced at for full price). And as stated, a dev house doesn't create assets to see them go to waste.

14 minutes ago, Master39 said:

if that's what you actually want, you should have titled this thread "I don't want colonies".

I don't want to ever want to build ground-based structures from specialized, dedicated parts or worry about optimizing my production/gathering chain in order to complete the main progression gameplay. I have zero interest in management gameplay. I played KSP1 to explore, KSP2 seems to offer much more of that but I apparently won't be able to enjoy the progression gameplay because I really don't see how it won't become a management sim.

Unfortunately I also have very little information on how the main progression gameplay will be organized, which means giving them my money is a crapshoot. I really enjoy KSP and would love to see their updates but if the game has no life beyond early access then it's kind of a waste.

E: And if it isn't clear, I really want the progression gameplay. The last game was a serious letdown on that front, for both modes, but fortunately I only shelled out something like $13USD for it.

Edited December 15, 2022 by regex

[SolarAdmiral]

Just now, regex said:

What evidence do we have of multiple different game modes? If the main progression gameplay basically boils down to "create colonies to go interstellar" then I really can't see myself laying out $50USD (or whatever it's priced at for full price). And as stated, a dev house doesn't create assets to see them go to waste.

I don't want to ever want to build ground-based structures from specialized, dedicated parts or worry about optimizing my production/gathering chain in order to complete the main progression gameplay. I have zero interest in management gameplay. I played KSP1 to explore, KSP2 seems to offer much more of that but I apparently won't be able to enjoy the progression gameplay because I really don't see how it won't become a management sim.

Unfortunately I also have very little information on how the main progression gameplay will be organized, which means giving them my money is a crapshoot. I really enjoy KSP and would love to see their updates but if the game has no life beyond early access then it's kind of a waste.

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure they have said exactly something along the lines of, there will be three modes, sandbox mode, science mode, and something replacing career mode called adventure mode. I would hazard a guess that sandbox and science will be similar to how they are in KSP1, and adventure mode will add the resources.

I think they are pretty comfortable with assets being unused. They'd rather everyone play the game as they want to. Just starting from KSP 1, most people have never left the kerbin system. Does this mean all the other planets are unused? Most people haven't been to or captured an asteroid or comet, are they unused? There's no reason to use every engine. I've played for thousands of hours and never touched the Puff engine, or the Thud engine.  Lots of people don't do resource mining or fuel refining. At it's core, KSP is a box of rocket shaped lego for you to build whatever you want. I don't think the devs will make you play with specific bricks. They just want to facilitate everyone, or as many people as possible having fun with their game.

So, if you aren't interested in colony building or logistics at all, it might be that science mode suits your play best. And if you don't want to give them money until progression is laid out in full, you might have to wait for the first EA update to see what the science is like.

And I also agree, don't buy an EA game based on what it will be, buy it based on what it is at the moment. Only buy an EA game if it is currently something you want. Buying it based on promises of future content in most cases is a setup for disappointment. But, for myself, I've put enough hours into KSP1 and seen enough to happily buy KSP2 day one. For you, it might mean waiting a bit to see how it's shaping up. And you have to realize that while it might not be for you, lots of folks are very excited for the colony and transport gameplay. But, you'll probably also be safe with a science mode that cuts out the resource game loop that you're not interested in.

 

[regex]

2 minutes ago, SolarAdmiral said:

So, if you aren't interested in colony building or logistics at all, it might be that science mode suits your play best.

Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of. Science mode in KSP1 is pretty hollow, the tech tree was a joke and there were no VAB constraints or advancement to play with. If it's just the same thing in KSP2 then again, it's not worth my time.

Just really wish we had more information.

[SolarAdmiral]

2 minutes ago, regex said:

Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of. Science mode in KSP1 is pretty hollow, the tech tree was a joke and there were no VAB constraints or advancement to play with. If it's just the same thing in KSP2 then again, it's not worth my time.

Just really wish we had more information.

Well, if KSP1 science mode is too simple to interest you and adding simple colony and resource management is too complex and tedious to interest you, it might be true that KSP2 won't have much for you in those regards. If what we describe for the colony, transport, and resource management isn't interesting, but you also don't want to play simple science mode, what would you have wanted to see?

[Guest]

24 minutes ago, regex said:

I don't want to ever want to build ground-based structures from specialized, dedicated parts or worry about optimizing my production/gathering chain in order to complete the main progression gameplay. I have zero interest in management gameplay. I played KSP1 to explore, KSP2 seems to offer much more of that but I apparently won't be able to enjoy the progression gameplay because I really don't see how it won't become a management sim.

Unfortunately I also have very little information on how the main progression gameplay will be organized, which means giving them my money is a crapshoot. I really enjoy KSP and would love to see their updates but if the game has no life beyond early access then it's kind of a waste.

E: And if it isn't clear, I really want the progression gameplay. The last game was a serious letdown on that front, for both modes, but fortunately I only shelled out something like $13USD for it.

Point is, the "management gameplay" was already a part of KSP1, it was poorly implemented and basic, but still the main progression mode.

KSP2 is only expanding on that, and likely moving the management part away from Kerbin SOI, so, instead of having to deal with resources (Money and Reputation) when you're trying to learn the orbital mechanic required, you'll deal with more resources but later on, in the interplanetary / interstellar phase.

But the core of the experience doesn't change, we're still talking about management gameplay.

On top of that, if you're not interested in optimizing stuff, well, good news, you're not forced to. The whole thing is designed as "place and forget" anyway, don't want to deal with optimizing? Plop down more modules and things and timewarp a little longer.

 

Anyway the devs repeated multiple times that the colony gameplay will be subservient to the rocket portion and that micromanaging or accidentally killing a colony because you timewarped is not going to be a thing. Any more step away from managing gameplay would actually mean to remove it altogether.

 

BTW I still don't get your point, to me it just look like you have a preference for orbital management instead of ground-based one. Which is ok, but you have to understand that that's completely arbitrary and a personal preference.

[regex]

6 minutes ago, SolarAdmiral said:

Well, if KSP1 science mode is too simple to interest you and adding simple colony and resource management is too complex and tedious to interest you, it might be true that KSP2 won't have much for you in those regards. If what we describe for the colony, transport, and resource management isn't interesting, but you also don't want to play simple science mode, what would you have wanted to see?

An exploration game with advancement constraints. Progression based on getting out and seeing things, having to make further and more dangerous expeditions in order to expand the repertoire of available experience, seeing what happens, doing actual science. Being able to be clever and get there earlier. Getting to a new solar system and doing it again.

6 minutes ago, Master39 said:

On top of that, if you're not interested in optimizing stuff, well, good news, you're not forced to. The whole thing is designed as "place and forget" anyway, don't want to deal with optimizing? Plop down more modules and things and timewarp a little longer.

I can't actually see that as intended gameplay, why spend time and money creating all those assets if you can simply ignore them?

17 minutes ago, Master39 said:

BTW I still don't get your point, to me it just look like you have a preference for orbital management instead of ground-based one. Which is ok, but you have to understand that that's completely arbitrary and a personal preference.

Ultimately it really doesn't matter, I just don't want to play a colony-building management sim.

[SolarAdmiral]

5 minutes ago, regex said:

An exploration game with advancement constraints. Progression based on getting out and seeing things, having to make further and more dangerous expeditions in order to expand the repertoire of available experience, seeing what happens, doing actual science. Being able to be clever and get there earlier. Getting to a new solar system and doing it again.

I can't actually see that as intended gameplay, why spend time and money creating all those assets if you can simply ignore them?

Ultimately it really doesn't matter, I just don't want to play a colony-building management sim.

That's all well and good as a wishlist item. But in practice that's really hard to achieve. How specifically would that progression work? Are a bunch of parts locked behind a wall until you land on the Mun, then land on, minmus? Are you hamstrung to a specific set of parts until you see and experience things in the order the developer intends? That doesn't sound super interesting. How would you propose setting it up?

Further, specially designing things around sights and experiences is pretty difficult for ksp. Ultimately, planets are just too big to make every part of them interesting. Star Citizen has dumped 12 years and half a billion dollars into building and rebuilding a single star system and they've barely scratched the surface. The Outer Wilds and Subnautica are exactly that sort of experience, but they're tiny, small enough to be hand crafted. There simply isn't enough time and money to apply that kind of design across a game the size of ksp. No Man's Sky is procedural and all the planets just blend together into an identical mush. So maybe they could hand craft a handful of interesting places on each planet. Just enough so we could all go to each planet in turn and have exactly the same 'experience' everyone else does and move on to the next. Not something I find particularly compelling.

So again, my question would be how exactly would you apply that kind of experience to ksp? If what you're after is progression for getting to places, making difficult landings. That's already in there as the sandbox mode. Set challenges for yourself. Go to Tylo, go to Eve, do it with a SSTO, do it with solid fuel. But that sort of thing cant really be built into the game, you have to come up with what you want to do yourself. Because if the game requires you to do something you dont want thats a whole different kind of tedious. You're dissatisfied with the existing science mode. But you want to do actual experiments? Like what, and how would setting up those experiments not be repetitive and tedious. And if you're managing experiments how would that be different than managing a colony? And ultimately, for a large majority of realistic planets, there's not a lot of cleverness involved in getting there. It's literally a two check box list. Have enough delta v and have enough acceleration. Engines have ISP and Thrust. And there's only a limited amount of different and realistic possibilities, not enough to unlock them based on planets. Ultimately out there in the universe, most moons are no more difficult to land on than ours. Most planets are no more difficult to land on than earth. There's not a lot of unique challenges like that out there. It sounds like the ksp2 team is looking to include as much as they can. But ultimately they'll run out.

In contrast, adding a resource, colony and transport system can add a lot of depth. Going to new places, finding a new set of resource deposits in a different arrangement. Setting up new routes to connect them together. I think it's a rather ingenious and exciting route the ksp2 team is taking. Where there is the gameplay of exploring new places. But also a gameplay of taming them. You can blaze a new trail first. Then come back and set up the mines, factories, trucking routes and truck stops.

 

And the point of creating all those assets is other people are looking forward to it. Just because you're not interested doesn't mean everyone isn't. You can play your game and ignore them. But other folks are looking forward to it and are going to be using those assets a lot. The ksp2 team is building a big game and trying to appeal to a lot of folks. Me and lots of others are thrilled and looking forward to the colony management and mining and transport. They're creating those assets because lots of folks really want them. You don't want them, that's ok. You can ignore them. But just because you're ignoring them doesn't mean everyone is ignoring them. The game isn't made just for you.

[Pthigrivi]

1 hour ago, SolarAdmiral said:

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure they have said exactly something along the lines of, there will be three modes, sandbox mode, science mode, and something replacing career mode called adventure mode. I would hazard a guess that sandbox and science will be similar to how they are in KSP1, and adventure mode will add the resources.

I don't think thats been confirmed. It sounds more like Exploration mode will be something between science mode and career in KSP1--resources instead of money, science to unlock parts, other thus far undetailed goals/boom events that will be more hand-crafted rather than procedural. I'd be very surprised if there was not also a sandbox mode(s). 
 

26 minutes ago, regex said:

Getting to a new solar system and doing it again.

In this instance yes, in a default save you almost certainly will have to build a colony. Whether it's in orbit or on the ground you will have to harvest and process resources in the new system to build new vessels there. 

It sounds more like you'd just like to turn resources off and build everything for free? If that's the case you'll know what your experience will be like after the first update when they introduce science and tech tree progression.

[regex]

45 minutes ago, SolarAdmiral said:

That's all well and good as a wishlist item. But in practice that's really hard to achieve. How specifically would that progression work? Are a bunch of parts locked behind a wall until you land on the Mun, then land on, minmus? Are you hamstrung to a specific set of parts until you see and experience things in the order the developer intends? That doesn't sound super interesting. How would you propose setting it up?

I think the old tech tree needed some work but is an okay template. Hard choices, building upgrades, better life support, more unlock nodes, not focused on more and more cost for the sake of grind but instead on more choices. It's not about the order you do things in either but if you are clever you should be able to subvert the tree to some extent, go further earlier. It's all about individual goals but with built-in gains. You could get some of that in the older game but it was never that good. Adding more interesting things to do would be a start, different science experiments that are more "tactile" than clicking a button and being done. There was an old KSP mod that did something of the sort, they had at least one new experiment that required an impactor, I'm sure others could be imagined. And yes, building bigger and more capable ships sounds right up my alley.

45 minutes ago, SolarAdmiral said:

Further, specially designing things around sights and experiences is pretty difficult for ksp.

KSP has never been about the eye candy, although the new sights look pretty amazing by themselves. I was never in the "handcrafted waterfall on Laythe" camp.

45 minutes ago, SolarAdmiral said:

And the point of creating all those assets is other people are looking forward to it. Just because you're not interested doesn't mean everyone isn't. You can play your game and ignore them. But other folks are looking forward to it and are going to be using those assets a lot. The ksp2 team is building a big game and trying to appeal to a lot of folks. Me and lots of others are thrilled and looking forward to the colony management and mining and transport. They're creating those assets because lots of folks really want them. You don't want them, that's ok. You can ignore them. But just because you're ignoring them doesn't mean everyone is ignoring them. The game isn't made just for you.

No, you're not understanding my point. It has nothing to do with crapping on other people's playstyle, it has to do with the game ending up being a management sim by default. I have a real hard time believing Intercept are going to act like FromSoftware, creating a bunch of assets that the player may never interact with and being perfectly okay with that, especially since they want to encourage people to get out of Kerbin SOI. That, by necessity, implies that the management elements will be a requirement for advancement as an impetus to leave the nest. And if the game isn't for me then so be it.

41 minutes ago, Pthigrivi said:

It sounds more like you'd just like to turn resources off and build everything for free? If that's the case you'll know what your experience will be like after the first update when they introduce science and tech tree progression.

Not necessarily. If it's just old KSP1 "science mode" without resources then that's not really a game, there aren't any constraints aside from available parts. But ultimately I think you've got a point, temper the FOMO and just wait for a few updates, because right now I can't see how they will make a progression-based game without introducing management sim stuff.

Edited December 15, 2022 by regex

[t_v]

2 hours ago, Pthigrivi said:

I don't think thats been confirmed. It sounds more like Exploration mode will be something between science mode and career in KSP1--resources instead of money, science to unlock parts, other thus far undetailed goals/boom events that will be more hand-crafted rather than procedural. I'd be very surprised if there was not also a sandbox mode(s). 

In the PC gamer interview when taking about the roadmap, Nate says that the first step of the roadmap, the “Science” step, introduces the mechanics that make up science mode, which is separate from sandbox and Adventure mode, which comes at the end of the roadmap

Edited December 15, 2022 by t_v

[Pthigrivi]

10 minutes ago, t_v said:

In the PC gamer interview when taking about the roadmap, Nate says that the first step of the roadmap, the “Science” step, introduces the mechanics that make up science mode, which is separate from sandbox and Adventure mode, which comes at the end of the roadmap

Oh you're right, I must have missed that. So it looks like sandbox first, then science, and exploration mode wont really be complete until resources are introduced toward the end. 

[magnemoe]

On 12/15/2022 at 12:48 AM, SolarAdmiral said:

If we look at the ore and refining in KSP1, I think the new system will be similar, just built out and expanded. Certainly there would be no reason to go backwards from that.

And there were a lot of options. You could build a surface refinery, and haul fuel to orbit. You could have your refinery in orbit and haul up ore. You vould have your refinery equipment on the lander itself. You could have a huge fuel station you keep topped up. Or you could deliver fuel directly to a vehicle. The fuel could come up from kerbin, at the cost of having to exit heavier gravity.

Ksp is a game of parts at its core. There will be parts to mine raw resources, parts to refine resources. And parts to use the resources to build colony buildings or vessels. Now, some parts might be so large they have to be in a permanent colony, on the surface or in orbit. But apart from that, I don't expect we will be told you must use the parts in a certain way, this must be here and that must be there. So that naturally will create lots of different ways of doing something.

Agree, ISRU as in production of liquid fuel / oxidizer on other bodies and from asteroids is an game changer in KSP 1. It was even the Kerthane mod who predated it. 
An basic colony should be able to do this, I'm a bit curious if the liquid fuel / oxidizer plant shown in the video about it can be mounted on an beefy lander or an mobile base. Has has huge success mobile bases on the Mun and Moho
Places there jumping an lander around is not practical because the dV cost but if you can do ISRU underway its much more practical. 
But you have more advanced fuel and production of nuclear bombs or metallic hydrogen require large factories, this is good for balance as the lower tech fuels are still useful. 

I guess the next step is  production of simpler parts for expanding bases, add more solar panels radiators and crew quarters. 
Final step is extraterrestrial launchpads, yes its an KSP 1 mod with this name.  
This get me hyped, much simpler to launch something from Laythe rater then Kerbin if you want to play in the Jool system. 
Now I don't think you has to micro manage colonies much unless you want to and just want an forward base to operate out of. Yes you need to expand the colony so just throw down some new modules. 
Or KSP 1 for me

From left front, a tanker for LKO or just topping off in Minums orbit, small launchpad, nuclear reactor and uranium renrichtment, storage silo for resources. 
Habitation for kerbals waiting to get sent outward. Mining and fuel and oxidizer storage, an Minmus science and utility craft. 
Two modules with a lab multiple workshops and greenhouses and housing. 

From the other side, main main construction plant, the two primary hab modules with the high-rise behind  and then the freighter. 
The pipe to the right is to an standard base who will be sent somethere. 

[Fullmetal Analyst]

after putting 6 years of development time into colonies i doubt they will be optional lol

[Drakenred65]

What will colony’s do? Probably build  support basses  for building and manning new launchpads and VABs away from Kerbin on other worlds. 

[Catto]

they will look cool and fulfill many of my fantasies

[Drakenred65]

19 hours ago, Fullmetal Analyst said:

after putting 6 years of development time into colonies i doubt they will be optional lol

Maybee. It could be entirely possible to build interstellar capacity in High Kerbin orbit. Especially if you get mods that let you basicaly do that, heck just 5 science parts mods in KSP 1* made total hash out grinding  science even on Its hardest settings just because of all the science that happened with them added on. Note that the added mass will cause problems with early launches (Yes plural) as you need more re action mass to offset the added weight of all the additional science parts,  and ever increasing part counts

 

* in no particular order

1)

 

 

2) 

 

3) 

4) 

 

5)