Science...

[AlamoVampire]

I will be the first to admit that I LOVE the idea of doing science in KSP, as it adds another element of realism in a semi-realistic game about little green dudes shootin stuff into space HOWEVER... I will also be the first to admit I hate grinding. Something that I learned to hate in an MMORPG I miss dearly. No, not World of Warcraft lol. Anyway. After spending 3 years, 219 days 8 hours and 14 minutes in a career mode game from start to unlocking ALL tech nodes on the stock tree and including the MJ node, the science here feels grindy.

Let me explain:

You launch a mission with say a capsule and Jeb, a goo canister a materials bay and orbit Kerbin or the Mun. You fly past biome after biome doing the same thing: crew report, eva, materials and goo. over and over until you see: 0.0 science earned. Then, you do this again with the thermometer and the other assorted science goodies. You do your landed EVA's, crew reports and so on, along with the previous stuff, and soil samples. In the end, you spend hours clicking away to the point where you stop reading what your doing and just watch the numbers and electrical warnings scroll past until you get enough science to unlock all nodes. While, I admit that I know this is the first incarnation of Career AND Science, it got tedious, especially on long duration flights where the goal was as many landings and biomes and what not as possible for as much science as possible.

Has anyone else experienced this sort of burn out on science as I have, or am I just unique and approached it wrong?

[SkyRender]

Assign your science experiments to action groups; it drops the tedium a lot. Unfortunately you still have to transmit manually, but that's not so bad.

[AlamoVampire]

wish I had thought about the science groups, as it would have made the last 3000 science needed to finish the tree a LOT less painful last night lol

[stupid_chris]

Science is pretty much grinding right now because it's literally the only thing to do in career. Once other career features get added, such as contracts, money system, etc, science will pretty much be overshadowed by everything else that you have to do in career, and it will feel much less grindy I believe.

Though I agree with you, science is grindy right now.

[jeti140973]

You think science could be turned into a minigame? I mean, to avoid the mindless clickety-click and make it a more interactive, conscious thing? Just thinking aloud...

I had the same experience as the OP.

[eskimo]

I'm going to have to agree with you a bit. I love that my missions have a purpose now. To go forth and acquire (god, doesn't that look like a strange word?) science. For the first time I have an actual Space Program. Notice the capitalization. I've got three or four iterations of three different base rockets, and that makes me really happy.

However, the set number of points with a multiplier marking down points really gets me the "grind" feel. You get a new science part, and the only thing you do with it is run it through the exact same profiles you did all of your previous launches, to maximize points gained. I feel like it's science by rote, which science should not be.

A possible "fix." The game gives you and your space program a certain low amount of Science per mission, with your instruments giving you a chanceTo: Breakthrough! This way, you just keep launching missions as best as you can, but sometimes, you get that little "Extra" that makes the game worth it. I dunno though, You're listening to the ramblings of an inebriated Eskimo, and I think I'm done here.

[AlamoVampire]

thank you guys for your responses, glad to see I was not the only one feeling this. I think you may be right Stupid_Chris, once we get MORE stuff in career mode to do, it may make it feel less grindy, but, i also fear, that if they leave it as it is right now, as far as how points are awarded and how transmitting works and the loss of data <which is wonky imho> it may still feel grindy while working for the upgrades, UNLESS, they do not break the save and what we all do now in .22 sticks for .23 and beyond...

[Merinsan]

A possible "fix." The game gives you and your space program a certain low amount of Science per mission, with your instruments giving you a chanceTo: Breakthrough! This way, you just keep launching missions as best as you can, but sometimes, you get that little "Extra" that makes the game worth it. I dunno though, You're listening to the ramblings of an inebriated Eskimo, and I think I'm done here.

In my opinion that would make it more of a grind. I think that one way to solve this is to remove the benefit of repeated transmissions, although then you'd may make it such that it's not enough. If you could only transmit once per area, and then only get the remaining science through sample returns, it would give more of an emphasis on complete missions (ie returning samples)

[FITorion]

gamers... and MMO players especially... I know because I am one... will find the most efficient way to do a thing... not necessarily the most fun way to do a thing...

Is the most efficient thing to do repeated transmissions of the same experiment over and over again from the same biome until all the science from that pool is gone? Yes.

Is that the most fun? matter of preference.

Is that the only way to play? No.

I have chosen to avoid that route. I'm doing predominately return missions. It takes longer... Each mission is worth less science over all... But it's more fun for me.

I never did return missions in sand box. There was no reason to. Science has given me a reason to.

[ScottyDoesKnow]

I think transmission should be a one time thing. Maybe increase the % a bit and then you transmit 60% back. If you want you can grab it again, but it'll transmit for 0 but can be returned for that 40%.

But anyways, what FITorion said. No one's forcing you to collect science this way, there's far more science out there than you need to unlock the tree. I didn't even use an antenna until after manned missions to the mun, minmus and duna.

[Merinsan]

gamers... and MMO players especially... I know because I am one... will find the most efficient way to do a thing... not necessarily the most fun way to do a thing...

Is the most efficient thing to do repeated transmissions of the same experiment over and over again from the same biome until all the science from that pool is gone? Yes.

Is that the most fun? matter of preference.

Is that the only way to play? No.

I have chosen to avoid that route. I'm doing predominately return missions. It takes longer... Each mission is worth less science over all... But it's more fun for me.

I never did return missions in sand box. There was no reason to. Science has given me a reason to.

I wanted to do that also. But I lack self control and am a Bad person....

Not only am I a gamer and (former)MMO player, but I am also a programmer.

Programmers are always looking for shortcuts, and anything that can be done more efficiently will be done more efficiently.

Lastly, something I am fond of saying that sums this up nicely for me:

"Necessity is not the mother of all invention, laziness is."

Edited October 24, 2013 by Merinsan

[KerbMav]

"Necessity is not the mother of all invention, laziness is."

I wholeheartedly agree.

I too slipped into the bad habit of adding four thermometers e.g., tap action group, speed click transmit, repeat once - repeat more often more richer for experiments.

But I also started to build planes to visit Kerbins biomes - although I should have tested landing at KSC instead of at the north pole ...

Another way to limit this behaviour is to only send small probes with the smaller gizmos (that ran out of science after a few transmits) and do return missions with bigger manned landers for the other experiments and manned expeditions (until someone discovers - or has already - the KSP module for surface samples and EVAs and ModuleManages it into the probe cores ...)

I do not know yet if the science container mod to do more than one EVA and sample return in one go is a necessity or laziness.

[FlamedSteak]

Grinding science is the unfun way of doing it.

When you start the career with the end goal of getting the tech tree maxed out as quickly as possible you're treating the destination with more reverence than the journey.

You're quite literally treating the tech tree as an inconvenience getting in the way of you playing in sandbox mode.

[FITorion]

Grinding science is the unfun way of doing it.

When you start the career with the end goal of getting the tech tree maxed out as quickly as possible you're treating the destination with more reverence than the journey.

You're quite literally treating the tech tree as an inconvenience getting in the way of you playing in sandbox mode.

Yeah... If I wanted to get through the tree quickly... sandbox is right there...

I suppose a game design argument could be made about preventing players from being able to grind... but that has it's own pitfalls as well.

I have not yet fully unlocked the tree. I have gotten to a mostly comfortable spot on it. Now I'm not doing missions to generate the maximum amount of science points to get the next thing... I'm doing missions because I want to see what amusing flavor text they've come up with and if any of it will reveal something about the Kerbal System. If that happens to help me on my way toward unlocking the tree... then so much the better.

Which reminds me... I need to spend 2 hours again flying to KSC 2 to check if there's anything interesting from eva and surface samples there... and this time not crash...

[Garek]

I agree with FITorion. Although I know you can grind many science points from repeated transmissions and stuff, I like to make every mission something different. That way, career mode gets very interesting, because I have to find a way to do the next step with the parts I have currently unlocked, or find a different "next step" I can do with them, instead of just grinding science until I have the parts I would've used in Sandbox. Those steps included:

- Sub-/orbital flight

- suborbital hop to the north pole

- probe lander on the Mun

- manned lander/return from the Mun

This got me about halfway through the tech tree, by tiers.

[kaesekuchen]

Hi,

I have to admit, that it took me about 8hours playtime into the career save to realize, that "spamming" the experiments until they are depleted is a viable way to generate science. I discovered this on last night's flight of my sun probe, since a sun probe has virtually unlimited power to continuously send out data.

Stating this, i have tried both ; trying to collect science data and returning it to kerbin and "maxing out" with the aforementioned method.

In my opinion the issue at hand is, that we have to consider that the tech tree is an introduction to get new(er) players accustomed to parts and gameplay elements in a smoother learning curve than to just expose them to the vast opportunities sandbox offers, but at the same time it should be done in a fun way.

Don't get me wrong, i was psyched for the science update and i'm not disappointed with the 0.22 update, on the contrary. I enjoyed collecting the science data and even more so, enjoyed the limitations of the early tech tree states.

Keeping in mind, that this is the first released science iteration, and just barely scratches the surface of what the career mode can and will offer in future iterations and updates, i think a nice addition would be some sort of "science map".

Imagine this: There would be some sort of map or grid overlay that would display the whole solar system, similar to what the biomes on the kerbin and mun offer right now.

This map would display the amount of science gatherable by a specific experiment in that sector/biome, but on top of this, there would be random anomalies spawning all over the solar system, that would award a specific "bonus" science value for experiments conducted.

If one would follow this idea further, you could reduce the overall science points available in these "exhaustible" areas and let the player focus more on hunting down these anomalies. This would open up new opportunies for upgradeable space telescopes and the like to detect this anomalies and so on.

Another, albeit more far fetched, opportunity would be to have a "global gameplay" mode, in which there are certain anomalies that spawn globally, meaning in a passive multiplayer fashion, for example:

At 7p.m. there opens up an anomaly in lower minmus orbit. This anomaly will be displayed to all players currently playing with the "global gameplay" option.

- Player 1 reaches this anomaly at 7.15, awarding him with the science points for the experiments conducted and a special score (let's just call these "achievement points" for the sake of this thought).

- As soon as the first player conducts certain experiments at the anomaly, it starts to decay, yielding less achievement points with progressing time (but keeping the science points gathered at the same value)

- Player 2 arrives 5 minutes later, he will still get the (same) science points for the experiments, but slightly less achievement points, since he wasn't the first one to arrive at the anomaly.

In my opinion, this would make for a motivating "space race" situation, since there would be a "leader board" with high scores and so on, and at the same time you would gain science points for your "local" space program.

Of course, these achievement points are only awared for the first time one conducts a specific experiment and there could be bonus/penalities depending on multiple factors, for example:

- tech used (did you get there with a tech 1/2 ship, or did you use more advanced technologies like atomic engines etc.)

- way of recovering the conducted experiment's data (did you bring back the vessel and recover it on kerbin, or did you just send them back?)

- specialized science equiment (did you use equipment, that is specialized for this kind of anomaly, or did you use generic science equipment? - specialized equipment could have more mass, making the ship desing more difficult)

TL;DR summary: Some sort of random element with higher rewards and higher diminishing returns on "spamming experiments" could spice up the science gathering, without bringing too many disadvantages to newer players. And the collecting of achievement points could possibly motivate veteran players to keep a lookout for these anomalies and launch a mission to reach them as fast as possible.

Sorry for the long post, just wanted to dump these ideas here

regards,

kaesekuchen

[Umlüx]

there should be a way or a mod to assign actiongroups after launch... this would be awesome. it would make science grinding much easier.

[Tw1]

You think science could be turned into a minigame? I mean, to avoid the mindless clickety-click and make it a more interactive, conscious thing? Just thinking aloud...

I had the same experience as the OP.

I would like science to be more than just a points system. I maximise the amount of data I get per mission not with earning more parts in mind, but because I want my kerbals to learn and discover stuff.

I made this suggestion in another thread, as an idea to make science more than a grind.

Science per planet

Currently, science points are the same no matter were they are collected. Moving on to a harder planet is simple rewarded by more points, making points gain the motivating factor.

In sandbox, the motivations where more a combo of seeing if you could do it, and to go explore there- we didn't need to be pushed along.

Perhaps science could be collected per body. This would make it seem more purposeful when you go somewhere.

Going to Duna to find out about Duna, not just because you need more points.

This would be on top of the point earning system.

Data collation, and analysis.

Rather than just collecting points, it would be cool if you could gather actual data about the body, such as mineral compositions in a certain area, gravity data, terrain info etc.

Though the "Value" would diminish, you'd still get something out of doing multiple experiments in the same area.

Over time you could build up a profile of the planet, accessible in the R&D building. These profiles could be done in a way so it doesn't feel like you're just unlocking info, but collecting it. It could have tables, maps, graphs and messages from happy kerbal scientists.

Some basic information sorting would be nice, maybe. But that could be overkill.

Variance

In real life, data from experiments isn't away the same every time- there can be variation.

For example, if soil data gets added, surface composition tests could return values like this:

Duna plains regolith analysis:

Haematite 76.54%

Quartz 14.23%

Goethite 5.70%

Hydration: 0.51%

Other:

Frozen CO₂: 3.02%

The amounts of different minerals could vary based on distance from certain points, so you don't have to travel for kilometers for different results.

This way, your rover could drill the dirt many times, and each time get a unique result after analysis.

Missions/contracts might be an interesting distraction, but I want to explore and discover when I venture out to space.

[magnemoe]

gamers... and MMO players especially... I know because I am one... will find the most efficient way to do a thing... not necessarily the most fun way to do a thing...

Is the most efficient thing to do repeated transmissions of the same experiment over and over again from the same biome until all the science from that pool is gone? Yes.

Is that the most fun? matter of preference.

Is that the only way to play? No.

I have chosen to avoid that route. I'm doing predominately return missions. It takes longer... Each mission is worth less science over all... But it's more fun for me.

I never did return missions in sand box. There was no reason to. Science has given me a reason to.

You could also do this the other way, instead of grinding Mun, send an probe into the Jool system, even an kerbal. You don't need neither skippers or LV-N to do this, anything who can land on the Mun and return could also reach the Jool system.

So probe core, some batteries and solar cells, one of each of the science items you have and 4000 m/s from LKO and you can do a lot.

You should probably be able to do flyby of Jool and the major moons.

[Garek]

there should be a way or a mod to assign actiongroups after launch... this would be awesome. it would make science grinding much easier.

There IS a mod for that. I don't remember exactly what it's called, something like "Actions on-the-fly" or "Actiongroups in Flight".

[nhnifong]

Make your own fun :/

Filling out the tech tree is not the goal. In fact, even in a game with a clearly defined goal, if you just play by the rules and try to win, it *feels* grindy, because you're not actually *playing* you're just following orders. As it is in games, so it is in life.

[McFarnsworth]

Instead of doing many grindy smaller missions to unlock new parts slowly, I try to pull off the most ambitious mission I think I can manage with the parts available to me. I get most of my enjoyment out of building rockets anyway, and career mode forces me to come up with some unconventional solutions.

First mission: Land on Minmus, fly by the Mun and return to Kerbin. I was only planning on a Minmus flyby, but then I saw Mr. Manley land on it with a nearly identical rocket so I shamelessly copied him.

Second mission: Fly past Duna and drop a probe on it, land on Ike, fly by Eve and land on Gilly, and fuel permitting a Mun landing as well before heading back to Kerbin. In theory the probe that gets sent to the Duna surface can get back to Kerbin under its own power as well.

I'm currently in the middle of my second mission, much science has been done, fuel levels are looking good and everything seems to be working as intended for once.

At this rate I'll probably unlock most if not all of the tech three after three missions. Three really long and complicated missions requiring a lot of planning that probably take up more time than just grinding your way through the tech tree, but that's sort of my point. Unlike an MMO where you can't hope to stand up to an endboss with a low level character, you can spank its ass in KSP with basic parts as long as you're ambitious enough and add enough boosters.

[Umlüx]

There IS a mod for that. I don't remember exactly what it's called, something like "Actions on-the-fly" or "Actiongroups in Flight".

oh my god.. *starts searching*

[Wallace]

But there's superfluous science points when you get out to the outer planets, so you don't need to milk every last drop of science from the Mun and Kerbin. I've only sent 4 manned (which were all different and didn't involve an tedious transmit grinds) and 1 unmanned mission to the Mun, 1 to Minmus, and flown about Kerbin in various planes and dumb constraptions, and I've bagged enough points to unlock all the science instruments, big rocketry, nuclear engines and landing things, everything I need to go to Duna and get a big fat science payout that will dwarf any repeated clicking of transmit while sat on the Mun.

Edited October 24, 2013 by Wallace

[KerbMav]

I somehow think that progression in the tree will be slower in the finished game. Currently an experienced player can gather quite a few points around KSC alone and unlock many parts enabling a far reaching space program. From then on it seems to go rather fast, if you want to.

So, either the science yield will drop or the prices will rise - balanced with a budget too - that is my guess at least.

Together with some more tweaks to science gathering, the game should not reach a presumed "finished" state as fast as it looks like now.