Career Mode suggestions.

[Couger99]

Hey Guys and Gals, having played KSP for a while now I've enjoyed every minute of it and with the release of the career mode I've felt like a child in a sweet shop however, i have thought of a few things that in my opinion would open up areas of detail unique to a space program simulator.

Now i am aware that everyone has said science is too easy and being able to simply spam 1 test over and over to achieve the desired number of points is ridiculous so I will refrain from mentioning that if only to avoid the troll spam.

I have several suggestions so to make it easier to read I'll simply bullet them and add in a short explanation:-

Science over time.

Think voyager 1 and 2, satellites roaming the cosmos sending back data as they go, for this to work science equipment would be required to work even when the player is not in direct control.

To avoid people from simply setting up several satellites hitting time warp and going to bed the science obtained this way would and should be minuscule, (perhaps as low as 1 science per 10 real life minutes)

This is meant to supplement science experiments not replace them.

To take this further, manned bases (Mun base) with science equipment and at least one Kerbal would also provide a science over time bonus,(perhaps 2 science per 10 real life minutes), this could be slightly increased by having different science equipment within range. For example one Kerbal on the Mun with a habitat module and a goo can can send back 2 science every 10 minutes, if you land a science lab within a predefined range (5km?) than that one Kerbal could begin sending back 2.5 science per 10 minutes, increasing by .5 for every unique piece of science equipment within range.

The Ability to repair or even build vessels outside of the Assembly Buildings

OK this might sound a little over the top but hear me out first.

Imagine if you will, having spent several Kerbal years building an unmanned base on 1 of the outer planets, you decide its time to send a Kerbal there to begin more experiments when upon landing s**t hits the fan and your engine falls off, now you were planning on using your lander to return to orbit and eventually back to Kerbin but now its trashed, now imagine if you had the ability to move pieces of ship with your Kerbal.

You decide rather than going through all the effort of sending a new lander to rescue the now stranded Kerbal you decide your going to fix the ship yourself, you grab the engine and prop it up in place with your shoe while you use Kerbal Jam to glue the engine back in place ready for the return home. Kerbal ingenuity for the win.

"But what if the engine explodes!?" I hear you ask, well we could simply send a new engine up for the Kerbal to use to fix his ship.

"But surely even Jebediah cant lift an entire engine (or other spaceship part) on his own!?" Well... no maybe not, but that's not to say a rover fitted with a robotic arm can't.

Now as for building entire vessels in space (or on another planet) that would simply come down to sending the parts you require up on board a rocket (or similar pre-built vessel) and using a Kerbal and a combination of robotics to fit pieces together (think an orbital shipyard).

(Now OK i have to admit actually building entire ships in space would be somewhat complex but being able to repair them would be amazing).

The rewards from Transmitted Data should scale with distance. (scale down that is)

It currently takes over 17 hours for data transmitted by the Voyager 1 probe to reach earth, in KSP time means nothing. Instead imagine if you have a Kerbal on 1 of the outer planets, or even a satellite outside of the solar system, if you were to perform an experiment and transmit the data back to Kerbal the % of the total science would be the same as if u were in orbit of Kerbin. Instead imagine if the distance reduced the % of the science.

A quick example, an EVA report around Kerbin would provide you with 20% of the total science earned if the data was transmitted however, an EVA report around Eeloo would provide a much lower % (5% or even less)

A way around this would be to provide relay satellites, each satellite would need to be fitted with a large comms array and enough power generation to run it, (it would also need to be able to run without the player being in direct control). For every Planet with a comms sat in orbit between Eeloo and Kerbin would improve the % reward upto a maximum equal to that of the same experiment being conducted on the Mun.

In my opinion this would provide the bases for infrastructure the same comms relay satellites could be the bases for the science over time idea, a comms relay sat would need to be in orbit of the planet the manned base is on (including the mun)

Finally

Resources

Very similar to the Kethane mod but with a few small improvements which tie in nicely with all of the above ideas.

Firstly automated scanners, harvesters and refineries that would work regardless of the player being in direct control, multiple forms of fuel, ranging from basics found on Kerbin and the Mun to more exotic forms found on Eeloo.

These resources will fuel various things from engines with improved ISP to science experiments and who knows what else in the future!

Final Thoughts

Remembering that Kerbal Space Program is a Space Program Simulator and not a generic Space Sim i feel that all of the above would make lovely additions to the game, please however keep in mind that these are ideas and nothing more, if you don't agree with them then please explain why don't just troll me for taking part in the community, if you feel that these ideas deserve merit then please say so. There are also several ideas i have floating around regarding to the science tree however, as said earlier i'll wait until the next update and see how its been changed.

Thank you for taking the time to read this rather long post and God Speed on your journeys into Space

Regards

Couger

[UbioZur]

Science over time.

Suggested lot of time already. (search "science time")

The Ability to repair or even build vessels outside of the Assembly Buildings

Part of the what not to suggest list.

Resources

Part of the what not to suggest list.