No life support in KSP2

[Sequence]

I'm glad they're not adding life support into the base game. I've played with lots of different life support mods over the years. My experience is that either you have to run resupply missions which get tedious when you have stations all around the solar system, or you make a closed loop which is ultimately a part count tax.

Sometimes I'm in the mood to go down that path, but I rarely include life support mods in my KSP1 runs anymore. I think it's best left to modders. 

[KSK]

Fair play if you don’t like life support mods but:

KSP2 will be apparently be including a mechanism for automated supply runs. I can’t think of an obvious reason why that couldn’t have been used to ship life support supplies around the system.

As soon as you get beyond a very basic rocket, then almost every gameplay feature is a part tax in KSP (1 or 2)

Need a bigger fuel tank but haven’t unlocked the next size up? Pay that part tax and add another small tank to the stack.

Heat management - part tax in the form of radiators and heat shields.

Power Management - part tax in the form of batteries, solar panels, fuel cells, etc.

Science - part tax in the form of numerous instruments.

Communications - part tax in the form of antennas.

Again - I have no beef with not liking a particular feature, but using ‘part tax’ as a justification for that dislike seems like a flimsy excuse.

[Sequence]

You make some fair points. I guess the real issue I was having was with too many mods and too little performance, so life support felt like an obvious thing to remove from my mod list. I hadn't thought about it in terms of the supply line features coming down the road. 

[asmi]

8 hours ago, KSK said:

I think concerns about life support being too complex for new players are vastly overstated and, frankly, a bit patronizing.

I agree. They probably used the same Squad logic "dV is too complex for newbros", "TWR is too complex too". I can't speak for everyone, but I for one was actually surprised that there was NO life support once I got into KSP1. And, being a long-time space enthusiast, I knew everything there is to know about dV, TWR and orbital mechanics, before I started playing KSP. And I'm sure there is quite a number of people like me, and therefore statements like "X is too complex for me" are frankly condescending. There is a BIG difference between a random game mechanics - which you can expect newbros to not be familiar with as it is game-specific by definition, and universal laws of physics, which can be known in advance because they are not game-specific.

Edited March 27, 2023 by asmi

[Observe]

If we don't have life support, then why bother having Kerbals at all? Might as well do everything with robotics - except we don't have that either.

[KSK]

3 hours ago, Sequence said:

You make some fair points. I guess the real issue I was having was with too many mods and too little performance, so life support felt like an obvious thing to remove from my mod list. I hadn't thought about it in terms of the supply line features coming down the road. 

That’s fair too. 

And, on reflection, depending what other mods you’ve got installed and whether they integrate with life support at all (I’m thinking RoverDude’s colonisation mods in KSP1 here), I can see life support being an obvious one to drop with KSP2 at its current stage of development.

[mattinoz]

4 hours ago, Sequence said:

You make some fair points. I guess the real issue I was having was with too many mods and too little performance, so life support felt like an obvious thing to remove from my mod list. I hadn't thought about it in terms of the supply line features coming down the road. 

Doesn't suggest that taking some of these mods pulling them in to the base game and optimising them would be a better plan. 

Then not only would you have fewer mods but they'd each have for interface frontage to stay out of each other ways and avoid battling for resources. 

[Fullmetal Analyst]

the game basically already supports life support:

you can abstract the fuel consumption from engines into food consumption on kerbals
you can abstract fuel storage into food storage or whatever u believe kerbals need to survive

happy modding everyone.

[Rosten]

Life support would be an annoyance and I have no idea why people keep wanting annoyances in games.  It's basically asking for timed missions.  How many people like timed segments in games?

[Sequence]

1 hour ago, Rosten said:

Life support would be an annoyance and I have no idea why people keep wanting annoyances in games.  It's basically asking for timed missions.  How many people like timed segments in games?

If they implement it, there would have to be options for self sustaining life support, else we'd never get kerbals to other star systems. 

[Rosten]

21 minutes ago, Sequence said:

If they implement it, there would have to be options for self sustaining life support, else we'd never get kerbals to other star systems. 

I don't see how self-sustaining systems would have any gameplay value as they'd just be mandatory parts to include with a command module.  The life support mods in KSP 1 were all effectively mission timers, as far as I know.

[pandaman]

2 hours ago, Rosten said:

Life support would be an annoyance and I have no idea why people keep wanting annoyances in games.  It's basically asking for timed missions.  How many people like timed segments in games?

Which is exactly why LS needs toggles and difficulty options.   Each to their own, as much as I want it in stock, I may well also want to have some saves with it disabled.

As for 'annoyances' running out of fuel, electricity or comms range are also annoying, and not fundamentally different to LS.  All are equally critical to mission planning both IRL and KSP.

Edited March 28, 2023 by pandaman

[Pthigrivi]

Aw this is sad. Not even snacks?

[mcdjfp]

I am really disappointed to here this. Life support was one of the three things I was really hoping for out of KSP 2. (the others being clouds, and built in support for multiple star systems). I assume that there must be complaints about CommNet being back too. How it is a part tax for unmanned probes. Too much of a complication for new players (even though it can be turned off). Life support is the tradeoff for crewed missions just like maintaining communications is the tradeoff for probes.

While hoping for more, I expected something along the lines of power (to run the equipment) and supplies (whatever they chose to call them). And that short flights (under a day) probably wouldn't need anything beyond the capsule. I was looking forward to the challenge of preparing for the longer duration missions where the high-end life support parts unlocked through the tech tree would be needed (Along with a ship massive enough to support them). I don't want to send a Kerbel to the next solar system by simply jamming him/her into the smallest pod I have and tossing them there without any concern. I bet the ion engine and large Xenon tank already available would be enough for that. I would have infinite time to get around to retrieving them. That is a big enough problem already without going past Duna and Eve.

And I really don't understand why both sides can't be served. There are already difficulty settings in the game. Easy could default to off, while hard would kill them if they ran out. Normal could sit somewhere in between, perhaps some sort of hibernation until resupplied (that could trigger some interesting rescue missions, especially with higher difficulties)

[Sequence]

4 hours ago, Rosten said:

I don't see how self-sustaining systems would have any gameplay value as they'd just be mandatory parts to include with a command module.  The life support mods in KSP 1 were all effectively mission timers, as far as I know.

That was my initial impression too, but I had my mind changed. When you think about it batteries, solar panels and reactors are basically the same thing. Batteries are a timer and power generation is making them self sufficient. The engineering challenge is to meet your mission needs with the lowest amount of weight and awkwardly sized parts.

With life support you might not even need kerbals to complete your mission and could use probes instead, assuming you have the infrastructure in place for keeping comms open. 

It depends how it would be implemented ultimately. But I'm coming around to the idea of life support being worthwhile, provided there isn't a significant performance impact that comes with it. 

Edited March 28, 2023 by Sequence

[mattinoz]

8 hours ago, Rosten said:

Life support would be an annoyance and I have no idea why people keep wanting annoyances in games.  It's basically asking for timed missions.  How many people like timed segments in games?

The challenge mostly, ie. the fun of beating a semi-realistic situation in different ways to see which one works the best. (replay value)

There are millions of dollars a year spent on games that rely on timing as a factor and KSP can't talk multi-player without people point out how fun a space race would be. 

[S_Coriolis]

I like the engineering challenge of life support, having big mothership with spinning habitats to keep the little green lichens alive (Kerbals are lichens ). It gives a reason to try to make missions as  fast as possible. I always find it very weird to wait 10y in space for the next launch window to save 100m/s of delta-v, would you really do that with real astronauts on board ?
I want the game to create situation were some crafts are better suited then others, to soft force me to innovate and diversify : far away telemetry -> probe, ressource prospecting -> unmanned rover, long term science -> manned station, large scale ressource extraction -> colony, resources transfert -> plane/cargo/train.
Otherwise it's just : do I want to stick a capsule or a probe core on this lander.

[pandaman]

Keeping crews alive (and functional) is such a key aspect of RL space travel that it just seems illogical to brush it aside.

Sure 'mods' can, and almost certainly will, cover LS in both very simple and highly detailed forms.  But that's not the point.

I do understand  Nate's point, and there are obviously bigger priorities.   But I do feel a fairly basic stock LS system should be implemented in time for v1.0.

[Lyneira]

Having watched the recent interview with Nate Simpson on Game Design Hour, I think that gives a good insight into why there is no life support in KSP2. Especially this portion (timestamped): https://youtu.be/nnudM_iIDr8?t=357

In the example he talks about what they see as the core gameplay loop they want to focus on: colonies, resources unique to other celestial bodies than Kerbin, delivery routes created by proving a delivery with a (likely purpose-built) craft and the construction of huge interstellar ships requiring those unique resources. That's a lot of complexity in the core gameplay loop already, and the question for the team is how many other layers of realism that will complicate matters further for the player are they willing to layer on top of that? In this interview he gives the example of the feature of radiation, but I'd say this thought process equally applies to life support. Life support is even explicitly mentioned in another question a bit later in the interview.

It's not that they don't believe players could handle the resource management of life support by itself, it's that they're choosing not to add that complexity to an already complex plan for the core gameplay loop.

I have no doubt that with the resource systems they're building, there is huge opportunity for modders to hook into that to add that life support layer on top.

As a side note, Nate mentioned that radiation is not ruled out for the future and given that it is core to much of the technology in the later parts of the roadmap, I hope we'll see at least that in stock at some point in the future!

Edited March 29, 2023 by Lyneira
Grammar, add note about radiation, add note about life support mention

[Royalswissarmyknife]

I think at the very least they need it for colonies.

Spoiler

Downloading Kerbalisim 2 as soon as it comes out. 

 

[Lyneira]

11 hours ago, Royalswissarmyknife said:

I think at the very least they need it for colonies.

  Reveal hidden contents

Downloading Kerbalisim 2 as soon as it comes out. 

 

They could easily give a nod to life support for colonies, but I would expect it in the shape of spending resources to construct appropriately sized habitats and greenhouses (They would look nice) for your colony's population. A colony would need a certain minimum of these (and power to run them) to be fully functional. It won't necessitate adding a system to track colony oxygen, water and food consumption that must be managed by the player.

[Periple]

I think the problem that different people mean different things when they talk about life support.

If they do add it, I think it ought to create fresh gameplay. If it’s just a dry mass tax or another supply line you need to set up, there’s not much point, you might as well role-play that, I do this on longer missions by including a berth on a hitchhiker can for every crew member. 

What kinds of new gameplay challenges could you build around life support?

[Pthigrivi]

6 hours ago, Periple said:

I think the problem that different people mean different things when they talk about life support.

If they do add it, I think it ought to create fresh gameplay. If it’s just a dry mass tax or another supply line you need to set up, there’s not much point, you might as well role-play that, I do this on longer missions by including a berth on a hitchhiker can for every crew member. 

What kinds of new gameplay challenges could you build around life support?

The main thing is the time element. It's not a flat mass tax, it's that there would be a gameplay tradeoff between mass and flight duration, with other dynamics surrounding ISRU and living off the land. This opens up a whole spectrum of strategies around fast vs efficient transfers, balancing engine/fuel mass and snacks storage vs ISRU equipment for when you arrive, etc. It just becomes a much fuller game not just about space traversal about actually living in space. Without it things like greenhouses are basically just cosmetic role-play parts which just isn't good game design. This is to me a huge disappointment about the direction and follow through of KSP2 and it would be the highest item on my list for a post 1.0 release. 

Edited March 31, 2023 by Pthigrivi

[mcdjfp]

The first thing that comes to mind is planning around time. Until you got late in the tech tree you would always have to be aware of how long a crewed mission would take.  Currently we have dV for the payload, and for probes can a link be tracked back to Kerbin. Also, for longer missions one would probably want to send additional supplies (perhaps even pre-staged) in case something goes wrong and the crew needs to wait for a rescue/refueling craft to get home. And of course for the first crewed missions to other systems there would be the question of how to get a supply chain for life support working with what you took along (or sent ahead uncrewed).

[Periple]

That could be interesting! It would need a really good trip planner though, so you could accurately plan mission durations.