Upkeep costs, salary, daily income through satellites, sciene mining...

[ThePan]

These Ideas are probably better suited for a mod as they would noticeably increase the challenge and could lead to financial dead ends without proper planning.

I really like the idea of economics in career mode. So far however I never really had to care about money in 0.24.

I would love it to see economics becoming more complex and putting some pressure on the player.

Steady outcomes:

• You start with a loan and have to pay Interests for it

• Daily Upkeep for rockets/satellites - a small percentage of their initial building costs.

•• Less upkeep costs when landed on a planet

• Salary for each kerbin hired

•• Increased salary for kerbins that haven't been home for a long time

•• If you can't afford salary affected kerbins refuse to work.

• Upkeep costs for the facility

Income opportunities:

• Convert science points into money

• Satellites / Stations orbiting a body

To prevent unlimited money via satellites there should be a diminishing return for each satellite.

Let's say a satellite around mun makes 100$ per day.

Having two satellites would grant 150$ (+50) per day.

Three would only grant 175$ (+25).

(The diminishing effect doesn't have to be this drastic).

To make it more interesting there should be different categories of satellites with different requirements.

Let's assume two categories, science and gps.

Science satellites would require a height between 80 and 120 thousand km.

GPS satellites would require an apoapsis and perioapsis of 2868750 +/- 1 (geostationary orbit).

Having 2 science satellites would grant you 150$ daily. Adding a GPS satellite would grant you 100$ and you would still get 150$ for your sciencesatellites as they are of different categories.

More requirements would possibly make sense, for example having at least 3 gps satellites to get any money of them which are at least X km apart and media satellites only working when in orbit around kerbin. Or Science satellites having at least X° more/less inclination than other science satellites to count.

If a satellite fulfills the requirements for different categories he might count for all of them. As you unlock more tech nodes you would gain more modules that you could attach to you satellites so that they can count for more and possibly more profitable categories

(you might start with radio, mobile-communication, GPS, different Internet speeds, television broadcast, HDTV...)

Satellites might also generate science points. I thought about Planets behaving like "goldmines", meaning that they can exhaust.

Let's say mun has 500 science points and a satellite generates 2 per day. After 250 days it would no longer generate any science

for you because you exhausted the 500 science points. More or better satellites would only speed up the time until mun

exhausts but would not offer additional science points overall.

Other:

• Losing money instead of just losing repetition for losing a kerbal.

• Unlocking tech nodes should cost money based on science points. Making the cost high would possibly be a good way to give the player a reason to grind money at the later stages of the game without him having to worry about not having enough money for parts/launches.

How it might affect gameplay:

You would at least in the early stages of the game be under some time pressure because of a steady outcome. That shouldn't be too drastic but it should for example discourage to just speed up time to constantly generate more contracts. For interplanetary travel you wouldn't just want to speed up time until you arrive but but do other launches while you're vessel is flying in the background.

It also further encourages using probes as you save salary (especially for longer flights). Satellites and stations would become useful for both science and money, I personally really love setting up satellite networks or assembling stations.

Balance:

I think for balance reasons it might make sense to make the most important spending factor unlocking tech nodes. So far money only

works as a limiting factor and in the worst case you can't do anything and if you have too much it just doesn't matter anymore. Increasing

costs for the later tech stages could be a good way to make you grind and be generally more careful about money without having

to fear too run out of it and not being able to do anything at all (which should however be a possibility if you are careless).

Because of the constant upkeep costs based on building costs you would also have reason to built cost efficient to maximize profit, especially

for vessels that are supposed to stay for a longer time in space (satellites, stations...).

Also a difficulty setting is obligatory.

[Coccalime]

I really like the idea of having constant income from satellites and stations. One extension to this that i think would be great would be to also allow for science point mining. This would work only with manned stations with the science bay. While manned it could constantly generate small amounts of science, this would simulate basic experiments being done in the station. To prevent this from being abused with time warp and what not, there could be a time limit stating that a certain kerbal could only "work" in the science bay for 15 days or something before they no longer generated research points.

The reason I really would like to see this is because it would give a reason to rotate crew members in stations just like they do in real life. Unlike in KSP where a kerbal can man his post forever.

[Sirrobert]

I love the idea

It would also open up a nice gateway to difficulty levels in the same style as Simcity 3, where you can pick how with what money you start (50k, 20k, or a loan of 10k I believe in that game)

Sidenote: The science--> funds (and back) conversion is actually planned already

[Javster]

Does it cost money to hire Kerbals now?

[Red Iron Crown]

Does it cost money to hire Kerbals now?

No, kerbal HR has not been implemented. Free to hire and no salaries.

[hawk_za]

+1 i really like this idea anything that adds more verity to contracts and and functions to satellites

[Guest]

• You start with a loan and have to pay Interests for it

• Daily Upkeep for rockets/satellites - a small percentage of their initial building costs.

•• Less upkeep costs when landed on a planet

• Salary for each kerbin hired

•• Increased salary for kerbins that haven't been home for a long time

•• If you can't afford salary affected kerbins refuse to work.

• Upkeep costs for the facility

• Cool so long as you can pay it off.

• Not cool unless you can designate and undesignate debris (ISEE-3). Also upkeep should be more when landed on a planet depending on local conditions (sand on Duna, rust on Kerbin/Laythe, pressure/heat on Eve, etc...). Matter of fact, why upkeep at all?

• Cool except for the cost increase over time. They're signing up for the job in the first place.

• Cool

• Convert science points into money

• Satellites / Stations orbiting a body

• Already slated for inclusion into the game

• Already in the game in the form of science gathering contracts

• Losing money instead of just losing repetition for losing a kerbal.

• Unlocking tech nodes should cost money based on science points. Making the cost high would possibly be a good way to give the player a reason to grind money at the later stages of the game without him having to worry about not having enough money for parts/launches.

• Makes sense.

• Hopefully handled through unlock cost.

Notes: While I get that people enjoy setting up satellite networks I have to argue that they should never be mandatory because they are literally the most boring thing to do in game for some of us. Requiring repetitive launches is a terrible to do to a player.

I will also always maintain that this is Kerbal Space Program, not Probe Space Program, and that no mechanics should ever favor probes over Kerbals. Probes are already lighter, cheaper, and safer than sending a pod full of Kerbals somewhere. I can get behind salaries, but probes should never be able to do the things a Kerbals can. In fact, we need more reasons to send more Kerbals places.