Can i just say?

[chaos_forge]

My main gripe with the current tech tree is that it's too short. I think the current tech tree is more-or-less a good early-game starting point (although I agree that probes should be unlocked from the beginning as well). However, the tech tree is missing a mid-game and late-game progression. I think it should work something like this:

• Early game: All of the structural/aero parts and "normal" (liquid fuel, solid fuel, or jet) engines are able to be unlocked using the science you can collect in the Kerbin system. (same as it is now)
  
• Then you enter the mid-game stage. More and more of the research nodes start being upgrades instead of part unlocks. Upgrades could be things such as improved ISP for engines, lighter parts, and more durable landing legs, or maybe even tweakables. Maybe you would have to unlock steerable landing gear? Also, interspersed with these upgrades would be unlocks for a few of the more speculative parts that KSP has, such as the LV-Ns or RAPIER engines.
  
• By the time you reach the late game, your weights, ISP, etc for parts would have reached real-world levels. The research nodes would start coming slower now, and you would start unlocking technology similar to KSP Interstellar mod: reactors, heat sinks, plasma (VASIMR) engines, maybe even Orion drives at the very end of the tree.
  
• The very last node would be some kind of STL interstellar engine (now that FTL is confirmed as not happening): something along the lines of a pulsed nuclear fusion rocket, or maybe a Bussard Ramjet
  

[Skyrunner27]

As you can see with the game you are currently playing money will be a part of R&D have you looked under the parts unlocked. Those numbers will be the cost it takes to do research on a certain part. Science will allow you to gain discoveries but parts will need to have a development fund.

[spyker92]

Mostly what I hate ( and what stopped me playing 0.22 actually, aside from general busyness ) was that the tree locked all your vehicular components, things that you'd expect to have developed outside a space program. I like the progression idea, I just want to progress in directly space-related areas like sensors, or comms, or exotic materials or something along those lines, not "wheels".

However it's made me look at making new trees, which is a whole game in itself.

Rovers, aircraft (atmo planes) and rockets should all develop independently in their own sub-tech trees, tbh.

[nMitch]

Another Point, I wish the R&D was open in sandbox so i don't have to to unlock parts but i still get access to the Archives.

[Beowolf]

I too dislike the tech tree, though mostly just the first tiers having no connection with reality. We're expected to believe Kerbals got all the way from the stone age to rockets without ever building a wheel or learning one needs tail feathers on an arrow? Here on Earth the Chinese learned how to stabilize solid-fuel rockets in the thirteenth century, for heaven's sake.

If we're going to get points from science done on Kerbin's surface, the tech tree should start with planes. If we're starting with rockets because that's what the game's about, then the tech tree should at least allow us to start with a V2-equivalent. But no, we have to start out with a design that was rendered obsolete in (if Wikipedia's correct) 1233 AD. It frustrates me so much that after a couple of flights I ragequit, start another sandbox game instead and happily build 21st-century space stations and such.

According to a pdf I just looked up, the very first V2 test flight included recording thermometers, barometers and spectrometers...not to mention steerable tail fins, gyros and a battery. Oh, and I strongly suspect it was transported to the launch site with wheels!

But I'm confident the tree will look quite different by release. 0.23 is already better than 0.22. One of the best parts of playing with KSP is that Squad actually listens to us. They can't do everything we want, and don't do what they do in the order some of us want, but they definitely listen.

[Beowolf]

Rovers, aircraft (atmo planes) and rockets should all develop independently in their own sub-tech trees, tbh.

An excellent idea!