Science is pretty much stupid. Just get rid of it.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

1 hour ago, Bej Kerman said:

Reduced from what? A rat in a cage waiting for a blinking box to click five buttons?

 

1 hour ago, Superfluous J said:

As one of those people, I wholeheartedly disagree

I'm struggling to distil down what the 'sides' of the argument might be.

Let me know if I'm moving in the right direction.

I see three themes being expressed here:

1. Players like me who want a more immersive 'science' experience from KSP2, where the 'science' that the Kerbals / Probes do is reasonably related to real science and advances gameplay in a meaningful way
2. Players who like the progression system, but don't care about the 'fake science' of the game and are okay with a simplified interface to acquire science points to unlock progression steps
3. Players who dislike the way that science is tied to the progression system, and who don't like having to do any of it, but will put up with a simple system if that's what the devs have given us.

What am I missing?

[HebaruSan]

Huh, they took advantage of the science button light to encourage new players to let their Kerbals get out and stretch their legs. Nice.

[Superfluous J]

44 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Players like me who want a more immersive 'science' experience from KSP2, where the 'science' that the Kerbals / Probes do is reasonably related to real science and advances gameplay in a meaningful way

I don't think anybody would dislike at least seeing that. I've never seen a description that sounds fun, though. I don't want to fly sounding rockets before I can do this for "real". I don't want to have to look up engine stats on a wiki because I didn't "test" them enough. I don't want to not be able to use in-game tools to transfer to Jool because I didn't take the temperature on the night side of Laythe yet.

I need concrete, descriptive examples of "reasonably related to real science and advances gameplay in a meaningful way" that are actually FUN before I can get behind this. Seeing as people have been clamoring for it since Science mode came out in KSP1, I expect what you want and what I want are never going to match.

47 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Players who like the progression system, but don't care about the 'fake science' of the game and are okay with a simplified interface to acquire science points to unlock progression steps

This is pretty much me. I want to build and fly rockets, and I want the game to give me reasons to do so. That's how games that I enjoy work. Factorio gives me tons of things to do and a handwavey reason to do them. Boom. 4000 hours on Steam. Mass Effect gives me guns and things to shoot them at. Bam, over a dozen playthroughs of the first game, half a dozen of the second, and well we don't discuss the third but I did play it through twice. Both of those games have "science" where you "research" or "find" stuff and it makes things go better for you. Yay numbers go up and I'm happy. The last thing I want to do in a game is run a mini-game experiment that I know the outcome of just so the game knows I know the outcome of it.

50 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Players who dislike the way that science is tied to the progression system, and who don't like having to do any of it, but will put up with a simple system if that's what the devs have given us.

I don't know of these people so *shrug*.

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

5 minutes ago, Superfluous J said:

run a mini-game experiment that I know the outcome of just so the game knows I know the outcome of it

Fair enough - and thanks for that.  Will have to ponder this.

[dmsilev]

The problem with mapping the process of real-world space science to a game is that the loop is inverted. In the real world, the process goes (roughly) identify scientific goals-> perform engineering research and development to build spacecraft/rovers/whatever that can carry it out -> launch ship and make the measurements. The gameplay progression step, of acquiring the new parts etc., happens before the flight, not after. Sure, the engineering experience of one flight can sometimes feed into others when there’s a direct sequence (e.g. the progression from Sojourner to Spirit and Opportunity and finally to Curiosity and Perseverance), but that has little to do with the experiments that are run and in any case learning about how to operate Mars rovers tells you very very little about how to design an unfolding sunshield for the JWST.

How do you you translate that in any reasonable way into a gameplay loop, especially in an open-ended game? Sure, you could have some sort of budget-ish resource where missions are proposed or accepted, granting R&D points to enable the necessary techs , but what happens if the player chooses poorly or just decides to use the Duna lander budget to go visit Dres instead? If NASA tried that in the real world, there’d be a lot of people in a heap of trouble, but dragging the player off to jail for misappropriation of funds doesn’t seem like it’d fit the Kerbal Way.

[Scarecrow71]

1 hour ago, Bej Kerman said:

Of course you enjoy progression, I'm not debating that. I am saying that the devs chose the laziest, least dignified way of creating progression they could have done that effectively leaves science mode players as rats in a maze.

Ok, so what would you prefer to see?  What idea do you have to make this better?

I like the idea of a science mechanic...but I don't think the current implementation is right or perfect.  I also don't know what the right one would be.  So I simply play with what we are given.

Edited December 27, 2023 by Scarecrow71

[Vl3d]

I'm having fun designing missions and building vehicles. That's the main gameplay loop and I'm focusing on that.
Everything else is a minimalist reason to do it. There is no scientific exploration - the celestial bodies are the same wasteland they've always been, the "science" has nothing to do with actual science and it teaches you nothing.

My opinion after 45 hours of getting science is that:

• I have to *go  there* to *get the stuff* and then *bring it home* to *unlock more parts*. Do not expect more.
• I have to remember to put the science experiments on the vehicle and press the flashing button from time to time. Actually, I would automate it entirely - there's not point in manually pressing that button. It's only real use is to display the biome.
• If you don't bring samples back, you are wasting your life;

Yup, that's "For Science!" in a nut shell. It's just another reason to design and execute diverse KSP mission profiles. So just don't focus on the science, there is no fun there.
The more I play, the more I feel like the game really needs colonies, resource collection and logistics...
 

Edited December 27, 2023 by Vl3d

[cocoscacao]

I'd still like to manually manage where the soil samples are being stored...

[Vl3d]

3 minutes ago, cocoscacao said:

I'd still like to manually manage where the soil samples are being stored...

I'm sure there will be realism mods. It's now becoming more and more clear that KSP 2 is meant to be played quickly: bang out a vehicle, use it for as many missions as you can, then on to the next one.

There's really no time to get lost in the details - there's an entire interstellar civilization to build!

[cocoscacao]

1 minute ago, Vl3d said:

There's really no time to get lost in the details - there's an entire interstellar civilization to build!

Maybe you're right. Can't tell what v 0.3 will bring to the table.

35 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

The more I play, the more I feel like the game really needs colonies, resource collection and logistics...

Pretty much. KSP 1 essentially became boring for me upon unlocking the tech tree. Sure, I could create my own challenges, but they were all pointless.

[Vl3d]

21 minutes ago, cocoscacao said:

Maybe you're right. Can't tell what v 0.3 will bring to the table.

Pretty much. KSP 1 essentially became boring for me upon unlocking the tech tree. Sure, I could create my own challenges, but they were all pointless.

I guess the vision is this:

1. you explore and get some science points for new tech;
2. you survey and find resources;
3. you build the colonies and extractors;
4. you build all the vehicles for the logistics network;
5. repeat using resources;

So that means we will have to build a lot of vehicles.. science vessels, mining equipment, transporters, colonies, interplanetary crew ferries, interstellar motherships.. build build build vehicles and fly exploration missions and set up logistics networks.. it never stops.

So there's no time for the very small things we used to focus on in KSP1. We have to think BIG.

Edited December 27, 2023 by Vl3d

[PDCWolf]

36 minutes ago, Scarecrow71 said:

Ok, so what would you prefer to see?  What idea do you have to make this better?

I like the idea of a science mechanic...but I don't think the current implementation is right or perfect.  I also don't know what the right one would be.  So I simply play with what we are given.

The idea that you have to say something nice first to get permission to criticize something is nothing more than an internet cope, and I'm pretty sure some form of a fallacy too.

The current system is puddle deep, uninvolved, and shows minimum risk was taken when creating it. It is the minimum viable thing you could add to the game and barely justify calling it a "mechanic". 

Blue light, clickable flask button, science point dispenser, and there isn't even an electrified grid because so far there's no semblance of a consequence for doing anything wrong in the game.

[Superfluous J]

35 minutes ago, cocoscacao said:

I'd still like to manually manage where the soil samples are being stored...

This is a problem that I can see, but haven't experienced yet.

If I have a vessel that cannot return home full of science, and one that can return home but has no science in it... I have no clue how to get the science from one ship to another.

The one time it happened, I had a ship that couldn't make it back to land on Kerbin, but got into orbit. I sent up another ship, and the Kerbal who got out of the original ship and EVA'd over to the new ship, he took the science with him.

Which is nice because that's what I wanted, but what if I was just transferring him to send him somewhere else, and I had actually wanted the science to stay in the original ship?

11 minutes ago, PDCWolf said:

The idea that you have to say something nice first to get permission to criticize something is nothing more than an internet cope, and I'm pretty sure some form of a fallacy too.

The current system is puddle deep, uninvolved, and shows minimum risk was taken when creating it. It is the minimum viable thing you could add to the game and barely justify calling it a "mechanic".

Okay then I won't say anything nice and just point out that you didn't even come close to answering the question you quoted.

Edited December 27, 2023 by Superfluous J

[Scarecrow71]

10 minutes ago, PDCWolf said:

The idea that you have to say something nice first to get permission to criticize something is nothing more than an internet cope, and I'm pretty sure some form of a fallacy too.

What exactly are you talking about?  Bej stated they didn't like the mechanic, so I simply asked what they would like to see.  I then even stated that while I like the idea, I am not sold on the implementation AND I don't have any ideas of my own.  Your response and its point, if there is one, is lost on me as I don't know why you responded in this tone.

[PDCWolf]

2 minutes ago, Superfluous J said:

Okay then I won't say anything nice and just point out that you didn't even come close to answering the question you quoted.

Exactly, I was making my point that offering an alternative or saying "something nice" before making a point is not really required for an argument to be valid.

Just now, Scarecrow71 said:

What exactly are you talking about?  Bej stated they didn't like the mechanic, so I simply asked what they would like to see.  I then even stated that while I like the idea, I am not sold on the implementation AND I don't have any ideas of my own.  Your response and its point, if there is one, is lost on me as I don't know why you responded in this tone.

As I said above. As for the tone, all I can say is don't take it personal, I'm just extremely disappointed with how bad the feature is, and kinda disappointed too that there's people enjoying what's the best example of a minimum viable product disguised as a full feature.

[Vl3d]

17 minutes ago, PDCWolf said:

there's no semblance of a consequence for doing anything wrong in the game

Yes there is: if you do something wrong, you don't progress in the game and you don't have fun.
Let me give you two examples:

1. I always build my first stage / LKO boosters before doing missions - because I just recycle and slap them on depending on the upper stage weight - quick and painless. If you design a unique first stage for every mission, the hard consequence is that you do not make progress and you do not "explore";
2. Solving the physics and accuracy puzzles - if you want to land somewhere with pinpoint accuracy on Kerbin, you either build a plane, a shuttle... or stacked landers (see below). If you don't build the right thing, the hard consequence is that you don't get there or you waste hours walking.
   Spoiler

   

The point is that there are many consequences - when you don't play the right way, you waste your precious time.

Edited December 27, 2023 by Vl3d

[Superfluous J]

2 minutes ago, PDCWolf said:

disappointed too that there's people enjoying what's the best example of a minimum viable product disguised as a full feature.

So we're having fun wrong?

All I needed KSP2 to have, to make it fun, was direction. The FUN isn't doing the science. This isn't Kerbal Science Lab Simulator. The FUN in the game is building and flying a rocket. The problem I personally have is that without SOME goal, there's no reason to make a rocket. Is Science a paper-thin goal? Maybe. But it's a goal, which is what I need.

If it makes me enjoy the game tenfold more, that's a win for me. If my enjoying the game disappoints you, well I don't really care.

[Vl3d]

12 minutes ago, Superfluous J said:

If I have a vessel that cannot return home full of science, and one that can return home but has no science in it... I have no clue how to get the science from one ship to another.

I think all science is copied between docked vehicles' science containers or is copied to a kerbal on EVA automatically.

[Superfluous J]

1 minute ago, Vl3d said:

copied

I suppose that covers all the bases, though is weird conceptually. Considering you only have to return samples once, it doesn't make any appreciable difference.

[regex]

9 minutes ago, Superfluous J said:

I suppose that covers all the bases, though is weird conceptually. Considering you only have to return samples once, it doesn't make any appreciable difference.

On the contrary, if it's copied it means you really don't have to worry about losing it.

[Superfluous J]

2 minutes ago, regex said:

On the contrary, if it's copied it means you really don't have to worry about losing it.

No I get that. It just seems odd... I guess conceptually is vague. It seems odd PHYSICALLY.

Like if all 3 Astronauts on the Moon were carrying every experiment they all ran, and they all had copies in the lander too, which upon re-docking with the module somehow reproduced to get copied there too.

[PDCWolf]

3 minutes ago, Superfluous J said:

So we're having fun wrong?

All I needed KSP2 to have, to make it fun, was direction. The FUN isn't doing the science. This isn't Kerbal Science Lab Simulator. The FUN in the game is building and flying a rocket. The problem I personally have is that without SOME goal, there's no reason to make a rocket. Is Science a paper-thin goal? Maybe. But it's a goal, which is what I need.

If it makes me enjoy the game tenfold more, that's a win for me. If my enjoying the game disappoints you, well I don't really care.

You like and enjoy what you like, no one can get in the way of that.

On the other hand, I am 100% confident in saying enjoyment alone is not a good metric to judge a feature by, which is closer to the point of the thread. The OP didn't ask about enjoyment, he asked for the feature to be removed because it is so basic it's almost entirely pointless. In fact, what direction does this update even give you? For example, do you need the tech tree to get direction? That could be done away and you can definitely get enough direction with just the missions tab. In fact, outside missions, there's no "direction" as you can get pretty far with just the initial parts, and even further after your first two missions, thus you're right back to where we were before this update, being able to do most stuff in the game.

As for keeping track of your "direction", there's no way to track your scientific progress other than the light not flashing, there's zero sense to how some parts are unlocked, there's no point to unlocking it all (currently, will change in the future hopefully).

15 minutes ago, Vl3d said:

Yes there is: if you do something wrong, you don't progress in the game and you don't have fun.
Let me give you two examples:

1. I always build my first stage / LKO boosters before doing missions - because I just recycle and slap them on depending on the upper stage weight - quick and painless. If you design a unique first stage for every mission, the hard consequence is that you do not make progress and you do not "explore";
2. Solving the physics and accuracy puzzles - if you want to land somewhere with pinpoint accuracy on Kerbin, you either build a plane, a shuttle... or stacked landers (see below). If you don't build the right thing, the hard consequence is that you don't get there or you waste hours walking.
     Reveal hidden contents

   

The point is that there are many consequences - when you don't play the right way, you waste your precious time.

Time is the most basic consequence of literally taking any action in life, even just being alive. There's no way for the game or any action in your life to not have that consequence. This is me basically saying if you want wasted time to be your consequence, just live, you don't need to spend $50 to feel that. Further on, at some point, you will learn to play the game (as most of us here, and you, already have), and there's no game left. Lastly, if you're young and don't care much about time, then that's your entire argument gone.

 

[cocoscacao]

8 minutes ago, PDCWolf said:

ou can get pretty far with just the initial parts

Except if you're a noob. This way you get introduced to the parts, one at the time. 

15 minutes ago, regex said:

if it's copied it means you really don't have to worry about losing it.

I still think soil samples should not be copy-able. 

Edited December 27, 2023 by cocoscacao

[Scarecrow71]

39 minutes ago, PDCWolf said:

As I said above. As for the tone, all I can say is don't take it personal, I'm just extremely disappointed with how bad the feature is, and kinda disappointed too that there's people enjoying what's the best example of a minimum viable product disguised as a full feature.

Well, I can either play the game peacefully, or I can complain about it and still play.  Guess which one I'm choosing?

The more I play, the more I find that I don't like about 0.2.  But apart from filing bug reports, there isn't much I can do.  Easier to just plow ahead and do what I can.

[Mickel]

16 minutes ago, cocoscacao said:

Except if you're a noob. This way you get introduced to the parts, one at the time. 

I still think soil samples should not be copy-able. 

Makes zero sense to be able to copy physical samples.  Bring back samples to your Kerbin orbiting station.  Transfer to shuttle to return to Kerbin.  Screw up landing and lose samples.  Doesn't make sense to be able to go back to the station to retrieve a copy.  Surely you'd have to go back to the source.