Fundamental Design Flaws in Career

[milosh]

@Sauron: thanks for the hint, I suspected there is a way to cheat it but as I'm spending almost all my time in sandbox I didn't look into it. But I'll give it a try

...which leads to the next question: what todo with a completely unlocked techtree in career? In my opinion, tieing career with part availability is the major flaw in CM. How about you have all parts available right away but need todo science in atmospehre to reach orbit, science in orbit to reach mun, science on Mun to reach the next planet and so on. Not only would this be much closer to reality (after all, rocket drive was invented many years before a rocket ever launched into space) it also wouldn't limit your imagination in an arbitrary way. Tie that together with a ranking system, where you start off as a science officer, when you reach Mun you become second in command, the next Planet you become Commander and so on. And when you've reached the last planet you progress by doing missions. Now that'd be a career mode I'd like to play

[Corw]

One argument I really hate in discussions like this is "BUT IT IS BETA", like the final version will magically remove all failures in design. But... The things you are worried about should be balanced by features that are yet to be implemented. I'll try to argument it.

-I don't object to capsule-first or probe-first or some combination. Either works fine IMO, and I don't think it matters. What does need to happen is for each option to have unique advantages and disadvantages that also open up new gameplay options.

Currently you have no limits or penalty for for throwing whackjobian designs at any problem. If you have limits on either cash or number of parts or astronauts you will have to balance you choices. Will you throw no return manned missions if that discourages new astronauts from joining? I doubt it.

-@Vanamonde on RCS and control surfaces: I have never found the need to use RCS for fine course corrections. Not to say I haven't done it, but that's because RCS came in excessively large quantities before tweakables. RCS landers are not particularly better than bipropelant except on the extreme low end of the size scale. In other words, reaction wheels should not be the be-all-and-end-all of control (not helped by trivially easy to get electricity). Which they uncontroversially are (except in planes, obviously ). I can build an ion lander for minmus too but it's pretty clearly not the best solution.

I use RCS for fine tuning course corrections. To be precise, I use it for planet intercepts. It is much much more precise (and fuel efficient) to make corrections way ahead of time and you just can't do that stuff with main engines. I also use RCS as main propulsion system for probes/satellites. They are small enough to have huge amounts of delta v just from the RCS. What I wish is main engines that use monopropellant so I can really cut part count on small probes. Such engines already exist in mods like Kosmos.

-@Vanamonde on useful payload: hopefully cost fixes this, but weight and cost penalties are the main factor limiting what we do or don't send to space. Currently it's too easy to build all-in-one things because weight penalties are trivial with enough brute force, and there's no financial limits to discourage brute force.

This is same as first point. As you said, you can brute force anything now because there are no disadvantages to do so. Implementing new stuff like money or reputation should balance this.

-@Vanamonde on probes: Yes, but we're talking about optimal ways rather than possible ways. There is one very clear optimal way of doing things, and that's not good. Probes and manned missions should feel different with their own unique quirks and gameplay features. Each should be an equally valid way to approach the game with no clear 'better' approach and each having something that actually sets them apart

Well, this one is like the first and like the one before this one. Missing penalties. Once you have to ask a question "do I really want to allocate all my available resources for few years to have a manned mission to Jool with only few meaningful science gear on board?", probes should become valid and appealing answer.

-@Vanamonde on tech tree order: that's not my main issue. Lack of good game design logic (small tanks and service module engines before launcher tanks is the strongest example) is. It's very clear that not enough thought was put into how the tech tree plays, especially for new players.

I'm not saying that current implementation of tech tree is perfect, but main guideline was to slowly introduce new parts to new players. Considering launcher tanks are just 2 smaller tanks glued together, they don't add anything significant to gameplay while increasing the noise. From practical point of view they are interesting only for lowering parts count.

-On Iterative changes in general: I can't stress this enough: if changes are slow to be made the bad stuff tends to stick around (we still have that old SAS wheel without changed stats after 2 versions ). You can't do one game balance pass at the end and get a good product. Also, the stuff before the end product will suffer as a result. This does take some extra work, but that's part of what it takes to do game design right. I'm not suggesting large changes every release cycle. Small changes each cycle (to the 48s, the old ASAS) are trivial time-wise and there's no excuse not to make them. Larger changes aren't going to happen every release (and I don't expect them to) but they do need to happen or too much winds up being built around bad mechanics, and can't be untangled from those bad mechanics because there are too many connected bits. Better planning and more systematic play-testing for gameplay is another solution, but the community is a tad unpredictable in what goes over well or not

I agree that balance changes should be more frequent, but when is the right time to do it completely depends who you ask. It completely depends on amount of time required and what you thing deserves higher priority. It has always been clear that finalizing all planned features have been a major priority for HarvesteR above all else. Personally, I don't think "it hasn't been changed for 2 whole patches" is huge amount of time.

[Boris_T_Roach]

What the OP is forgetting is that KSP career mode is NOT complete

Squad more than likely looking at the feedback and seeing about making balancing decisions based on that feedback.

How many tweaks did they make to the rocket parts while KSP was sandbox mode only.... the game updated sometimes and your classic rocket you used for mun flights fell apart at 30Km up because something got tweaked.

You over came that with more struts, then find out the next update makes the engines you use now over heat and explode if they are on the bottom of a jumbo64 fuel tank....

But always remember , returning any science is good science...... as my Ike base crew found out... well it was supposed to be a sample return mission.... that has to wait for the rescue mission to get there

Boris

[Brapness]

we're talking about optimal ways rather than possible ways.

Why? No one is forcing you to do things in the optimal way. If you want to use probes, use probes. At the moment, yes, there is one optimal way of getting science, but at least you are getting the choice. If you edit the career so as to discourage all except a certain style of gameplay, you're going to alienate players who don't want to play it that way. I like career mode, most likely because I don't see it as my duty to max out the science I can get; instead I get to run a developing space program, starting with low tech and moving up.

That said, the tech tree could probably use another look, but that's a small edit that isn't particularly urgent.

[Brapness]

I also had a thought. We could do with some more interactive experiments. Just as an example (made up on the spot whilst i sit here at work at 7:00am after getting in at 4am last night after alot of booze) packing onto the side of your ship 3 seismic detectors which you have to setup in a triangle of a certain size with each point being 1km apart and then detonating some sort of explosive in the middle for the sensors to detect and then getting an actual reading so we can learn actual physical properties about a planets surface. This would add a whole new layer to things. Think about it, more EVA interaction, a use for rovers, a purpose to exploring the surface, the decision to take a rover with you or just huff it on foot. Again, I refer to Take on:Mars as whn you finish a contract on that you get a little insight to some of mars's properties.

This is a very good idea.

[Sauron]

More random replies:

@Corow RE tank size: actually large tanks first does serve as a form of challenge in that you can't control your size and mass as precisely whereas you can tack on as many small tanks as you like (this is an upgrade). Obviously an advanced player can still get around this with gigantic, absurd rockets, but as you say, money will hopefully reduce this.

@The general perception that the tech tree and changes are minor: They really aren't. Currently 100% of career mode is the tech tree and questionable science mechanics. Ultimately that proportion will shrink as new features are added, but science and tech tree nodes are going to remain a large part of the game. It's important to get them right. And if we (advanced players) are breezing through career mode that suggests that it's not well designed. Regardless of what it does now, career should provide everyone, regardless of experience, an opportunity to play a polished, well designed (alpha) game.

@Frequency of balance changes: The logic behind the poodle has stuck around since it's creation without a change. Simple config edits don't get done for several updates. That's bad. Also, that work doesn't detract from the zero-sum parts of development (much). Big changes like how science is handled? Those can wait several updates, but the way SQUAD handles the small things doesn't reassure me that they'll handle the big ones at all.

@Control: I do almost all my course corrections and fine tuning of approaches at my ejection burn or at the AN/DN. I've never needed RCS to make that happen, and the penalty of carrying extra RCS fuel and thrusters outweighs the 1 or 2 m/s more I spend on other minor corrections. Reaction wheels are too powerful in that they replace both RCS and control surfaces, and minimizes the usefulness of thrust vectoring.

@RE Fancy science experiments:

Hell yes! That needs to happen. Even if SQUAD doesn't do it, it might be possible to do with that contract-creation plugin. Maybe a new thread for those type of ideas is in order.

[Whirligig Girl]

I agree with the OP.

[Whirligig Girl]

Here's some ideas.

Accelerometer gives only basic seismic data, to get more data, you can set it up to measure seismic data with an impactor probe.

Thermometer can give different readings at night and day, and shade or light.

Barometer can be used even on bodies with no atmosphere, like detecting a thin whisp on Eeloo or LKO.

Gravioli detector is good as is.

Instead of biomes, situations have science reports. Re-entry at 1000 m/s or more will not make the goo feel cold, for instance. This would make sub-orbital flights yeild less science than orbital flights.

Situations must be sustained for some experiments, like materials studies or biological experiments, so you could get more science from being in orbit than suborbital. You could time-warp, fine, but as long as you are IN orbit, it works, and it is not how long it takes that matters, just that you are in space long enough for it to finish.

[Stratoroc]

Since the career mode is designed first and foremost as an unguided tutorial why not reward science milestones in flights complexity? Currently the science rewards for flight components are much smaller than experiments, which really just means attaching a part and grinding routine missions.

The key here is to balance science rewards such that after 1-2 missions of one 'class' the rewards are enough to progress to the next complexity and to arrange the tech tree such that a logical next step is the most obvious with the newly unlocked parts. For example after a probe on an SRB launch the next step would be an SRB, capsule and parachute. After that basic liquid rockets to get out of the atmosphere and make an orbit.

[sal_vager]

Also since career mode is a work in progress, incomplete and KSP is itself still in development, it's fair to say that what you are seeing so far is not the end state either career mode or the game.

Kinda bad passing judgement on something that's not finished yet don't you think

[Sauron]

Also since career mode is a work in progress, incomplete and KSP is itself still in development, it's fair to say that what you are seeing so far is not the end state either career mode or the game.

Kinda bad passing judgement on something that's not finished yet don't you think

If we didn't pass judgement on it these issues wouldn't be fixed. SQUAD has demonstrated that they're quite slow to make even small and (fairly) uncontroversial balance changes. And since one gameplay element is built on the foundations of previous mechanics errors and bad decisions tend to compound to the point where they can no longer be changed because of all the dependencies. So yes, it is right to pass judgement on an unfinished product in this case. That argument is more compelling with something like graphics or performance optimizations. Gameplay is a whole different animal.

[sal_vager]

Remember they are working on major updates between versions too, we aren't seeing patches or hotfixes like for a finished game, balance is coming but so is a lot of other stuff

[Sauron]

Yes. Well aware. Which is why I'm not fussed by (for example) incomplete biomes, science reports, ugly parts that haven't had a new model in eight versions, bad aerodynamic model, etc. Alpha. That stuff will come. But game balance specifically is iterative (I cannot stress this enough and I'm sorry to repeat myself). If the tech tree/science mechanics are seriously flawed everything tied to them will be flawed as well to the point where it becomes impossible to fix. Also, the current approach as it was initially implemented suggests some flaws in the mechanics-planning department that should be called-out. Worth noting too that game design doesn't take nearly as much time away from coding as other coding does (that is, adding new features).

In any event, the purpose of this thread is to discuss these balance and game design issues, air them, and provide some constructive input or at the very least principled criticism. So far there's not been a whole lot of random undirected hate. People are pointing out issues (or pointing out issues with the people pointing those issues out's arguments) and then suggesting ways to handle game balance better (more complex science, different tech tree philosophy, other approaches to science experiments...). That's a productive discussion that needs to happen and can generate some useful points (which this thread most definitely has). Shutting that discussion down with "it will come" is unproductive.

Edited March 1, 2014 by Sauron

[Red Iron Crown]

The development process is closed to the community at large other than the broad goals for each release, so we cannot take what they are working on into account. We can only offer feedback on what's been released.

Note I'm not saying the process should be open, I completely understand and agree with the reasons for keeping it closed.

[sal_vager]

By all means discuss, I just don't want people forgetting the state of the game, and I agree on the points raised here

[Nemrav]

well, the parts in the tech tree aren't in the order that they were added to the game for 1..

2 : if you developing technologies, you would have one section of the r&d develop 1 thing and another section develop another, and they would come out with new stuff in a similar time, so it makes sense the tech tree as it is... imagine, you are simply telling the r&d where to put their focuses,

the exception comes with probes, the stayputnic probe core should be available when basic rocketry is researched, we sputnik into orbit first, not a human, didn't we ?

really, I feel that contracts will balance stuff out a lot, as probes will undoubtedly be much more cost effective over a Kerbal, meaning that fly-bys (less fuel) with a probe will be common first steps...

[Whirligig Girl]

1: Please use grammar and punctuation and capital letters properly.

2:The parts are in the tech tree roughly based on when they were added. The Devs even said this.

Edited March 4, 2014 by GregroxMun
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[DragonShadow]

1: Please use grammar and punctuation and capitol letters properly.

.................capit-A-l.........

In general I agree with the OP, and in particular the tech tree seems way out of whack, but I think I remember reading somewhere that Squad will be adding a good number of new parts soon? It doesn't make sense to reorganize the tech tree until those are implemented, that would just pointlessly increase the work load. Same with balance, unfortunately.

In the meantime I pretty much just play sandbox anyway until Career is fully featured.

[Dunbaratu]

Also since career mode is a work in progress, incomplete and KSP is itself still in development, it's fair to say that what you are seeing so far is not the end state either career mode or the game.

Kinda bad passing judgement on something that's not finished yet don't you think

It's better than passing judgement on something that's already set in stone because it *IS* complete. If you do that, then it's just whining for no good effect. But if you raise those issues BEFORE it's done, then there's a chance the complaints may affect development.

While there's still time to change things is exactly the right time TO register complaints like this.

I don't agree with much of what Sauron complaints about, but the idea that people should wait until it's a finished product before saying anything is defeating the entire point of having user feedback during the alpha stage.

[Dunbaratu]

I do think that the tech tree items appear in the wrong order. And yes, it is pointless to have landing gear and wings in different parts of the tech tree far apart from each other because neither one can be used *at all* without the other. And there's often something a bit anticlimactic about the tech tree, as so many of the nodes just give you differently sized versions of what you already have. (And weirdly, you apparently have no idea how to make small girders until late in the game, as if the technology to build a nuclear fusion engine is somehow easier than the complex technology behind the metal I-beam.)

I don't think the nodes are in the right order. On that I agree.

[DaRocketCat]

And that's why I only play Sandbox. There is literally no reason (IMO), to play career until they revamp the tech tree as you detailed (gave you rep for that ), add money, contracts/missions, maybe mining, etc...

[Paul Kingtiger]

Probes come into their own if and when we get life support. At that point any manned craft has a mission time limit that makes probes very appealing. Another reason to probe would be if and when a penalty for killing kerbals comes into the game.

As for overloading every mission with instruments I've been wracking my brains to find a way to introduce interesting decisions. Cost is pretty much a requirement here and splitting instruments up by tech level would encourage you to send follow on missions with newly available tech. Using power requirements and weight are two other ways you can encourage people not to fill their probe with all the things! I do wonder though if we can get around the economy of scale in game so that there is a reason to have 2 probes rather than one large probe with more instruments.

One option might be to take away free access to instruments and have them given to you as a payload for a contract along the lines of: "Company X have designed a new gravimetric sensor, they want you to take it to Duna and survey the polar areas!"

[coolitic]

This is alpha. It is meant to have flaws.

[Red Iron Crown]

Of course. And those flaws are meant to be discussed.

[Whirligig Girl]

.................capit-A-l.........

Damn that's ironic.