Hard mode is great!

[Mesons]

I'm doing 30% in Hard with DRE and FAR, it's still trivial to keep going.

trivial

I sincerely doubt a mentionable fraction of the player base would agree with you there.

I thought hard mode ended up just about right. It forces me to be careful with my funding and work fairly hard for my science. It also forces me to budget for missions with a decent payoff, lest I bleed away my funds landing far from the runway.

[Joonatan1998]

Hard mode can be hard, but only as long you avoid the exploits.

-Canceling contracts when you have used all your funds to build an rocket on the launch pad and then recovering.

-The strategy that converts money to science extremely efficiently.

-Satellites around a few planet/moons transmitting science for contracts.

-Kerbals landed on planets/moons planting flags.

[Linear]

Hard mode can be hard, but only as long you avoid the exploits.

-Canceling contracts when you have used all your funds to build an rocket on the launch pad and then recovering.

-The strategy that converts money to science extremely efficiently.

-Satellites around a few planet/moons transmitting science for contracts.

-Kerbals landed on planets/moons planting flags.

Agree with all but satellites around planets and moons, that one seems to fit pretty well i think. Sure there should be a multiplier for how many times you've done it, but the actual idea of it is good, in my opinion.

[Sky_walker]

Hard mode can be hard, but only as long you avoid the exploits.

I think you're meant to say something different:

Hard mode might be hard if devs fix major issues with balance we have now.

BTW: Yesterday I finished career on a Hard difficulty.

3 afternoons. Got 1.6M funds spare, network of satellites, few landers (including Moho one lander that doubles as a satellite - leaps few meters above the ground to take a science sample from "space" ). I did use money-to-science but only for a moment before spotting how stupidly broken that thing was, do I didn't pump much science from it. I also didn't bother with a space station like I always do, so it went bit quicker than usual, but still....

I feel like I had more fun playing Battlefield 3 single player than KSP in it's current iteration.

Edited October 13, 2014 by Sky_walker

[Tail_TL]

I feel like I had more fun playing Battlefield 3 single player than KSP in it's current iteration.

Whhooaaahhh... I even quit battlefield 3's single player at the third mission.. I couldn't handle it. Too hard for me... (Seriously though.. it tried to be so cool and badas* that it ended up being pathetic.. felt like it was put together by a 6 year old) But yeah, I agree with you.

[tater]

How is hard mode close to .24 in any way?

Anyway, i respect you've lowered everything quite a bit but how on Earth is playing with 30% science fun?

In a "career" it is no more difficult to play/manage, at all. I've only had the chance to play maybe an hour, and it's totally clear that "Hard" while certainly slower than .24 in terms of racking up "science" is not qualitatively different, and honestly, only slightly slower. Once you hit the Mun, it does't matter, because in either 0.24.2 or "Hard" you start rolling in everything at that point.

I'd not call it "fun," but I tested .25 on straight hard, which I found impossible to distinguish from 0.24.2, so I decided to test with it set "harder." Meh.

[[email protected]]

Playing in an ironman hard mode last night I finally went bankrupt and had to start over. Hard Mode Mods used are FAR, Remote tech, TAC, and DRE.

I play a heavily modded version of the game and I finally broke my year long launch safety record. One of my rockets appears to have stalled tipped over and blew up killing Jebediah and blowing the launch pad to pieces. There was so much smoke (hot rockets) that I couldn't really see what was happening but the rocket didn't go up, it started listing to one side and I think it might have gotten stuck on a launch clamp somehow but I don't know.

KSC never recovered from the tragedy. In my hubris I had spent most of my funds unlocking new parts and only had a small budget remaining with which to salvage the program. I had to launch a stripped down rocket as a last ditch effort to save the program. I knew it was going to be risky, I had to launch from the runway, sans-fairings and in order to guarantee a proper center of thrust sacrificed other aerodynamic properties of the design. At 6,000 meters under high dynamic pressure the rocket started to roll nose down. I throttled down in an attempt to reduce dynamic pressure but it was too late. It rolled nose down and the main stage snapped in half propogating an enormous explosion. I initiated the abort sequence and managed to save Bob but the space program was finished.

The game hasn't carried this kind of risk before and I am loving it!

[tater]

While it's nice to see something that is actually "hard," your mod installation is the difficulty.

In my limited experience, FAR/DRE is almost a non-issue 99% of the time (probably because I already built rockets that looked like real rockets). It's a very slight difficulty modifier if at all (really it's different, not harder). TAC, or even Snacks is considerably harder than stock, OTOH (IMO, YMMV). It means you have to lift more into space, and missions further afield start requiring some planning in terms of having enough "stuff" to keep the crews alive. RT has it's own difficulty modifier WRT transmitting "science." Really with difficulty we're looking at the rate of funds/science increase per unit game time. At a certain point "difficult" corresponds in this case to "tedious." If there were non-currency related difficulty modifiers, then this might not be the case.

I'd rank "Hard" as negligibly harder in terms of science gained per unit time played. Cranked down to lower returns, it's a little harder. I don't see FAR/DRE as hard, just different. Some might consider it a little harder, <shrug>. Life support is qualitatively harder, which is why I think it should be in the game, and on a slider (slider can be mass of LS needed per man-day of flight, basically).

[bobcook]

Playing in an ironman hard mode last night I finally went bankrupt and had to start over. Hard Mode Mods used are FAR, Remote tech, TAC, and DRE.

Playing this way too, and loving it, the game has new levels of difficulty. I'm also using Fine Print for more interesting contracts. I just managed my first Mun landing and return mission, have done a Minmus flyby for science, and nobody has died yet. There was a close call with Jeb on the first Mun landing attempt, but we both panicked and aborted when the landing site turned out to be on the side of a very steep crater. I haven't had that much heart-racing thrill in the game since my first-ever Mun landing in 0.19!

[[email protected]]

While it's nice to see something that is actually "hard," your mod installation is the difficulty.

In my limited experience, FAR/DRE is almost a non-issue 99% of the time (probably because I already built rockets that looked like real rockets). It's a very slight difficulty modifier if at all (really it's different, not harder). TAC, or even Snacks is considerably harder than stock, OTOH (IMO, YMMV). It means you have to lift more into space, and missions further afield start requiring some planning in terms of having enough "stuff" to keep the crews alive. RT has it's own difficulty modifier WRT transmitting "science." Really with difficulty we're looking at the rate of funds/science increase per unit game time. At a certain point "difficult" corresponds in this case to "tedious." If there were non-currency related difficulty modifiers, then this might not be the case.

I'd rank "Hard" as negligibly harder in terms of science gained per unit time played. Cranked down to lower returns, it's a little harder. I don't see FAR/DRE as hard, just different. Some might consider it a little harder, <shrug>. Life support is qualitatively harder, which is why I think it should be in the game, and on a slider (slider can be mass of LS needed per man-day of flight, basically).

FAR almost never gives me any trouble with the exception of the flight I risked because I was broke due to my own hubris and took off sans fairings with a pretty bad aerodynamic design. I had to build it in the aircraft hanger and didn't want to risk SRB's being off balance so I used a 3x adapter (which has horrible drag). Dynamic pressure tipped and split the rocket. Not a common occurence, but when funds matter and you can't revert it certainly adds a level of risk. Nevermind what FAR can do to your spaceplane budget in hard mode.

Also I fail to see how the game could be increased in difficulty without making it grindy or 'tedious'. Thats not saying it isn't possible, but it would require significant changes to the structure of the game. I have no problem with the game being grindy. I play with Interstellar, B9, KW (engines only), Novapunch (engines only), procedural fairings, procedural parts, orbital science, KAS, IR, and others so I have to spend a lot of money to unlock the parts I need (want?). I also play with some self imposed rules such as not unlocking any of the next tiers until all the nodes and parts from the current one are unlocked, this gets really expensive with all the mods I have. So sure, a lot of my difficulty is self imposed, but so what? I like the new mechanics and how they incorporate into how I was playing the game anyway. It adds difficulty to what I was doing and I like that.

Edited October 13, 2014 by [email protected]

[boolybooly]

10% no sandpit is good. Makes every dollar matter, also must land as much as possible at KSP, makes for some harebrained schemes.

This is my sub 20k Mün lander.

[Mrbobmcwilly]

Hard mode is way to hard for me now...now, but when I start to get board I will now know how to make it more interesting!!!! Great idea on squads part!!!

[tater]

Just to be clear, I wasn't bashing your mods at all. My point is that life support alone makes gameplay qualitatively harder, which is far more interesting than the quantitative slider stuff (rewards, penalties that never happen, etc). I agree with FAR, it's not really harder (as I said).

People keep posting that the difficulty levels are great, or actually do, well, anything at all, but I'm not seeing it, and I'm a total noob to KSP.

As for how to scale without being tedious… yeah, that's the million dollar question. It's challenging, to be sure.

I think in general, it's not as simple as "sliders." For really addressing meaningful difficulty settings I think the game needs a few things:

1. If there are to be penalties for failed contracts, then the time limits need to be challenging. For example, 5-10 years to rescue a kerbal in orbit? How about 5 days or even 5 orbits, lol. (they can vary this by making some of the rescues a kerbal in a command pod, out of fuel. Then the time limit might be a few days. More difficult versions could be a stranded lander (appears possibly only after your own first munar landing). That might have several days, etc.

2. Life support. As I said above, a really qualitative change in how you think about spacecraft. If LS is added (with a slider in diff settings for about required mass LS per unit time), then rescue missions are scaled to that. If a suit is good for 1/2 a day, then you have 1/2 a day, etc. That's in addition to the inherent difficulty of LS.

3. Novel contracts. Make contracts that make sense, and require really specific goals. Some contracts for any exploration/science should be linked to a manufacturer, and require some use of their equipment on the mission. (i.e.: Moving Parts Expert Group (lander legs) has what is now a "plant flag on Mun" mission. It would say you need to land in a munar canyon with their legs to test how they deal with possible dust.) Again, the idea is for meaningful missions, that have some innate challenge to actually fly. If you want a "cost" challenge, you might have some "X Prize" type contracts that pay off for landing a probe on Duna for under XX,XXX funds cost, or something. Orbiters, stations, etc. All dictated by contracts, with specific challenges for gameplay (polar orbits, geo-Kerbin orbit, etc, etc). Assuming LS added, contracts can be available to maintain a habitation module for XXX days, weeks, whatever as well.

4. Time? Perhaps there is some expense per month of operating KSC. Contracts appear, and you can dismiss them, but you only get so many per month (determined by a slider). So if you wait for better contracts, you lose operating funds every day. There is a mod that adds building times for rockets, this is a good idea as well. Once you design a rocket that works, you could make it a standard type, and it gets built faster. If you want to take a rescue mission, then you better have one waiting to go up NOW… This is a huge change, but an interesting one (for people wanting a more management-like game).

5. Kerbal skill. Take the courage/stupidity and make it mean something. Allow the astronauts to actually pilot ships. Like MechJeb, but minus the mech. Have the ability for at least a few standard actions. Rendezvous and docking, landing, reentry… whatever makes sense, but I'm thinking a short pull-down sort of list. Stupidity alters science collection, efficiency (how much fuel used to rendezvous, land, etc), and it also alters the chance of some mishap (hard landing, hard docking, reentry failure, etc). Courage would modify stupidity based on conditions (landing mishap in progress… high courage would bump stupidity down a little, low courage would make him even dumber and more likely to choke. Lots of tweaking possible here). Again, you can toggle this in settings, and even if on, the player can always chose to pilot themselves, anyway.

Note that all these alternate requirements are similarly controlled in the difficulty settings, so you can start a custom game, with 5000 science to start, life support set to easy (none tracked, as it is in stock), etc.

Edited October 13, 2014 by tater

[[email protected]]

I agree there needs to be some kind of time limit for completing contracts. A five year time limit to pick up a kerbal stranded in orbit is nuts. I'd also like to see something akin to construction time implemented into the game, but maybe an exception for recovered aircraft which can just be refueled. This would force you to carefully plan your launches to account for contract time limits and operational support.

I tell you though I don't want the time limit based on the complexity of the rockets, I'd probably launch once a year under those conditions. Maybe a cost function, capping out at one week for anything over 250k in cost (could be adjusted with a slider). This would allow me to support my stations with life support and satellite network (for RT) along with launching interplanetary missions and test missions while still putting some appropriate pressure on me to perform.

I gave up on the stock game ever being sufficient for me to play unmodded a long time ago. I play with somewhere around a minimum of 40 mods now. I know squad is a small team of DEVs but I think the community has grown to the point of warranting a larger team, but I don't know the numbers exactly. KSP has been in development for something like 3 years and is just now actually starting to look like a game. I'd have stopped playing almost 2 years ago if it weren't for mods.

[tater]

Yeah, Construction Time (a version of that) would be interesting. Some abstraction of time, anyway.

I edited in another thing I forgot in my list above, BTW.

[FishInferno]

[FishInferno]

oh i just realized i forgot to give 0 starting funds

[g00bd0g]

In "hard mode" I managed to completely unlock the tech tree before even going to the mun. Just running basic test and science gathering missions. Leaving science gathering probes or kerbals in orbit and on the surfaces of the mun and minmus provide for constant decent income. Now hard mode, isn't....

[tater]

I should add that ANY addition of struts across any 2 parts that are designed to be separated is utterly non-intuitive, and should never happen. If you stack a rocket on clamp-o-trons, it either needs to stick together, or if you strut the 2 sections, they should be glued together forever.

If such a struct is needed, explicitly define it in the parts description as being a decoupling strut with explosive bolts or whatever, and add a new strut that does really weld stuff together in a meaningful way.

[Duban]

http://i57.tinypic.com/2uyrpld.png

Meh, I can't stand lowered science. Doesn't make the game harder, only more of a grind. The rest is fun though.

[Kesa]

1. the time limits need to be challenging.

2. Life support.

3. Novel contracts.

4. Time? Perhaps there is some expense per month of operating KSC.

5. Kerbal skill. Have the ability for at least a few standard actions.

Note that all these alternate requirements are similarly controlled in the difficulty settings, so you can start a custom game, with 5000 science to start, life support set to easy (none tracked, as it is in stock), etc.

Yes, tweakables are great, but aren't the most interssing way of increasing level.

Fine Print (if not stock) should have tweakables for point 1.

4.and income (TV sat, duna photos tweeting...). Sadly, I don't know any mod that does it.

6. Communication network

Remote Tech also is a great mod for making satellite usefull, and interplanetary mission more difficult in an interessing way

[Slam_Jones]

Love hard mode, but hate the bugs. In my most recent attempt, I put 50% of my funds (about 400k) into testing a new ship section. I sent it to the launch pad, tested the components, and recovered it. Normally this gives you back the funds you used, but no, it decided to take ALL my funds. Literally down to 0 funds.

This was in a game where I was about 90% of the way thru the tech tree, too.

So I started a new game :\

[Aragosnat]

Love hard mode, but hate the bugs. In my most recent attempt, I put 50% of my funds (about 400k) into testing a new ship section. I sent it to the launch pad, tested the components, and recovered it. Normally this gives you back the funds you used, but no, it decided to take ALL my funds. Literally down to 0 funds.

This was in a game where I was about 90% of the way thru the tech tree, too.

So I started a new game :\

Sorry to hear that. You could have used satalites around Kerbin, Mün or Minmus, and have colonies of Kerbals on Mün and Minmus to plant flags. Doing such contracts gain funds back and very very little science increase.

[aleis]

For all these people that do hard mode and call it easy I have to ask if they use a dV calculator of some sort, or space craft they Previous launched and know work in other games

A player without this aid, or some similar mood, i think would find it very difficult.

[Slam_Jones]

Sorry to hear that. You could have used satalites around Kerbin, Mün or Minmus, and have colonies of Kerbals on Mün and Minmus to plant flags. Doing such contracts gain funds back and very very little science increase.

This is true, and usually I would, but this time I was trying to go for a little more "realism" in that I wouldn't:

A) Repeat contracts (Science data from Kerbin/Mun/Plant flag/etc) without launching new vessel (or crew for a station)

Use the insanely OP contracts.

Either way, I've gone thru career enough times that it doesn't bother me