A change of plans when playing career mode...

[sickboy]

Ive already been to other planets with no mods, no sandbox prebuild testing.... I think im doing pretty good and it is indeed easy.

Yup, the difficulty isn't in having a tool that tells you if you have good enough Delta-V, worst case scenario without engineer or mechjeb is you realise you're gonna be short on fuel, then you come back and build something that can get further, once you've done that a little, you become better at guessing how much you'll need, the rest of it is just a matter of ship design.

[Shadoworgon]

Yup, the difficulty isn't in having a tool that tells you if you have good enough Delta-V, worst case scenario without engineer or mechjeb is you realise you're gonna be short on fuel, then you come back and build something that can get further, once you've done that a little, you become better at guessing how much you'll need, the rest of it is just a matter of ship design.

^this. In the other versions i relied on mechjeb for launch and to keep things stable (before they fixed that), and the Delta-v stats alittle. But now i just use trial and error on my ships, but i still finish out their mission to gain some science. I learn from my failures, though in science nothing is really a failure

[Kerbart]

Without a mod to tell me the Delta V of any of the stages of my craft, I can't even get to the Mun anymore. Every craft I make veers off always to one side. Personally I think some people who say its easy are cheating by building a ship in sandbox then just copying it over to career. So little information given to you about how to build a successful rocket, I can't see how anyone can think its easy.

Preventing veering off is easy: use symmetry mode.

Reaching orbit isn't really that hard without those handy tools: either calculate by hand (using your trusty HP calculator with RPN) or just by trial and error. It takes less than a handful of fuel tanks and boasters to get into orbit so you'll get there pretty quickly. Just don't try to prettify things with escape towers, etc. That doesn't fit in the experimental spirit of Kerbal Science anyway.

[KatzOhki]

Stepping through the tech tree has helped me learn to be MUCH more efficient with my designs. It's actually helped me a lot. Also, loving that recover button. Really speeds up my missions.

[Grei]

I find that I'm able to (relatively) fly my rockets now just about as well as when I relied on MechJeb. The improvements to SAS and RCS have made a major difference in getting a rocket built with the basic parts into orbit...or even just bunny hopping over to the mountains. My only issue is that after months of using MechJeb, I'm having a harder time controlling the rocket off of the navball.

Grei

[Lone K.]

Without struts and large fuel tanks, I resort to having to improvise a lot. It's a very big learning experience (career mode), and I like that a lot.

[Tollazor]

As a start this Career mode is good. I like how it forces you to rethink builds and use parts you may not have previously, or better yet use parts in a different way than you used to. No speratrons? NP just use girder+separator and attach your boosters to that. Crude, but effective.

[soloz]

Freshened up skills learned from watching the Apollo program as in INJECTION stages! My subassemblies tab is growing with things like "5 tons to orbit with Mun transfer stage. These injection stages have the right amount of d/v for transfer and orbit burns.

[Mystic]

For me, starting Career mode has made KSP ten times as compelling as it was previously, even with just the science aspect being supported thus far. Unlike in the Sandbox, where I would just give up on flights if things weren't going perfectly, in Career I find that I have a reason to try to get my imperfect mission back to Kerbal safely ... because of all that juicy science I have on board. And the first time I managed to take Bob out for an EVA, get a report from out there, and then actually get him safely back into the capsule (which I'd never managed to do in Sandbox mode) ... oh baby, now that was a rush.

Now I am trying to figure out how to get a couple of Goo canisters safely back to the surface. Currently they are always breaking off when I splash down, so I am trying to figure out how to do a soft landing on land next time (thus far I haven't had enough fuel for that). Having the goal of getting that science payload home keeps me coming back and trying different approaches to the problem on a daily basis now, whereas in the Sandbox I would have gotten bored and gone on to something else.

Can you tell I'm liking Career mode thus far?

[boomerdog2000]

New career mode actually got me to do a stock Duna mission which I have never done before. Always have mechjeb helping with the aiming and the landing. All the crew made it home safely and I got 2000 science!

[Deusoverkill]

Awesome for me so far!, now it feels like i have a goal!

i just did my mun orbit and retuned safely with 400 something science. Nothing big i know But...

[Odo]

Awesome for me so far!, now it feels like i have a goal!

i just did my mun orbit and retuned safely with 400 something science. Nothing big i know But...

I just got back from my lunar landing, and I gathered a total of 1600 science points.

I was ecstatic

[sewerbird]

Significant usage of SRBs early on was something I hadn't done since the old demo, which was striking. Also has bloated by return-capsule size: gotta fit all those experiments on! Also, i had taken the LV-N for granted: LV-909 is pretty decent though!

[Dynamo]

I've always played with an RP idea in my head for my space program... but research has sealed the deal. I feel as though i'm building up from the roots of my space program, back when rockets were 'new'.

I slowed down my flight progress... I went atmospheric, then high atmosphere, then suborbital. I'm going at a very exhaustive pace to get all the science.

I'm writing chroncicles for near every flight, might make an AAR out of them on the History of Field Dynamics. Would anyone else enjoy that?

[samstarman5]

I have to say, career mode made me realize how spoiled to sandbox I got. CM has brought me back to the fun of the first days of my KSP experience, when I had to learn how to make orbit all over again. I felt rather proud of challenging myself to make a munar flyby with Tier 2 parts. Feeling that nervousness again in wondering if I was going to make a safe landing with the goo containers intact was like a breath of fresh air, as it was akin to my first Mun flyby and then wondering if the return was correct, as that was well before navigation planning as well as trajectory lines were implemented. All I had was my current orbit, and the hope that it intersected with the Mun in a safe manner. Those were the days, here again.

[Crush]

I already think that the tech tree made the game a whole lot more interesting. But I think the game will become even more interesting when money is added. Currently you can still solve problems easily by throwing lots and lots of hardware at them. No large fuel tanks yet? Just stack plenty of small ones. Rocket doesn't take off without Mainsails? Moar boosters!

When limited budget starts to force me to reach my goals with a limited number of parts I will have to get even more resourceful.

[7499275]

I agree with the OP. The style of ships especially in the beginning has changed massively. I have been doing the same here recently as I try to unlock more parts.

[TNM]

I played .20 and always tried to make "realistic" rockets, meaning i tried to take aerodynamics into account even though the engine wouldnt care.

Career mode changed my builds by mostly limiting them. For example, my first rockets have to rest on their engines before launch as no support struts are availabe. Then, no RCS which of course forms the basis of every spaceship, even the earliest ones. But ok, you can overcome these limitations quickly as science is gathered fast. If this changes in future updates then i would recommend reshuffling parts.

[Rickenbacker]

I love the additional challenge of trying to make do with limited parts. Unlocked the nuclear engine, sent a single Kerbal to Duna, and managed to get back safely - barely, after the final burn that put me on an aerobraking trajectory to Kerbin, I had 0.14 units of fuel left!

[Beowolf]

^This

People who rely on Mechjeb too much arent going to have a good time.

80% of MechJeb is calculator and heads-up display. 10% is tools to build and edit maneuver nodes, and 10% is an autopilot less advanced than the one in the last private plane I was in. I do "rely" on MechJeb, and had it up and running within an hour after downloading 0.22. I quit my game and looked up how to get it working soon as I had to manually edit a maneuver node. I'd forgotten how annoying those little push-pull handles are! [1]

What I rely on is delta-v calcs and having all my flight info on one screen. I do let the autopilot handle most KSC launches because they're boring. I have a set of standard boosters that are fully tuned and balanced and nothing ever goes wrong. Well, almost. But rendezvous[2], dockings and landings are all mine...or at least, mine and Jeb's.

[1] It just takes a 2-line change to the part.cfg files. See the last pages of the MechJeb thread in Add-on Releases forum for details.

[2] What the heck's the plural for rendezvous???

[Arran]

With 0.22 i noticed i getting alot further with alot less so to say..

Somehow i allways had huge big rockets, that barely got the out of kerbins SoI, and with 0.22 i made rockets that where small, compared what i made before, but got me all the way to Moho and Dres..

I used to build mostly 2.5mtr rockets that where massive, now i hardly touch those parts and get superefficien 1.25 rockets, using all kind of advanced tricks to get where i want to be, IE slingshotting Mun/Minmus to get fre Dv and aerobreaking Kerbin to get back into LKO for a KCS landing..

TO me using limited number of parts makes you think more on how to archieve some stuff you normally in sandbox would archieve by MOAR BOOSTERS

[Ohfive30]

Like a lot of people, I find myself trying to be more efficient. I also pay more attention to weights and numbers of parts, and I plan my missions more now too. I've kept my current lander for 1 minmus and 2 mun landings, improving it and the launch vehicle each time. It's so much more fun having this career mode .

[spacelemming]

I've found that I now try to squeeze as much as possible out of my missions. Previously I'd built a ship for one purpose, carry out it's mission, and send it home.

However, now I try to see what else I can do to get more science. For example, I sent a small rocket (covered in science equipment) into low Kerbin orbit, intending for it to just orbit a few times and gather some data. However, having been in LKO several time, my science levels were depressingly low... so I went for a Mun flyby and then landed on Minmus (I reeeaally overestimate the amount of fuel I'm going to need!).

[Shisouka]

Science increased the granularity of mission steps I think about when planning missions/building ships .. Can't wait for the "Kredits" update, because budget limitd will multiple the fun & challenge!

[marach]

I've found my early ships seem to have regained landing legs on the front just incase I need to send up a rescue tug...