Opinions on "Kerbal Experience"

[Ippo]

Only if you see the thrust/Isp tweak as an actual magical tweak to the spacecraft itself. Not if you see it as the abstraction - that it is - for a veteran pilot's skill in keeping his spacecraft under perfect control, which increases the mission's fuel efficiency. A USS Enterprise with Scotty in engineering is going to run smoother than one with a generic chief engineer. That doesn't mean Kirk is not in control, nor that the physics are violated.

[...]

That makes Kerbals numbers, instead of characters who help you run your ship more efficiently.

Sorry, captain: this is nonsense. It is not an abstraction for anything. If you take a spacecraft of a given mass, with a given engine, and perform a burn of a given duration in a given point in its orbit, you can only have ONE resulting orbit. You can't argue with that: it is a fact. Any game mechanic that breaks this fact is also breaking physics: period.

You can't justify it in any reasonable way. I've seen an argument tossed in this thread a lot of time, "an experienced pilot knows better where the safety limit of the engine is". No: an experienced pilot will just do what mission control (i.e, the player) is telling him to: if mission control orders a rookie to overthrottle, he will.

I will repeat it because to me it is the most important thing about this discussion: this game mechanic is not an abstraction for anything that can be done in real life, and it opens up holes in the physics simulation where the trajectory of the vehicle is not purely dictated by the physics of its component. And that's worse than bad.

As for the second point: I see your point, and I too would like kerbals to matter more at an individual level. That's why my mod is (afaik) the first mod to implement a perk system that makes kerbals non-interchangeable, and I also intendo to make that functionality available for other mods. RoverDude has already expressed support and proposed some very interesting applications of that to MKS. What I'm saying is that yes, kerbals should matter a lot more than numbers, but no, this is not the way to do it.

And next there'll be kerbal mages and kerbal druids, able to cast spell making pods to fly witout fuel and engines.

How about NO.

So much this.

I hate the idea of "this game mechanic is bad - just turn it off"... no fix the bad game mechanic.

This is going straight to my signature.

[Trentendegreth]

Turning it off would be the last resort of the desperate. I really hope Squad changes the implementation to something more agreeable. It's not as if experience was a bad idea from the outset, on the contrary.

Selective throttling of only those engines that need it, rather than the whole vessel? Excellent. Better science reports, more accurate readings from instruments? Great. A wide smile boosting reputation? Wonderful. A generic increase in thrust or ISP for no apparent reason? Please don't.

if its an option, why would it be the last resort of the desperate. you see i think what we have here is a difference of opinion, and while i get where your coming from, and i don't completely disagree, i also don't feel that its necessary to force my play-style on others because its "not realistic enough." having the skills set as an option to shut off, or turn on isn't a show of desperation in my mind. its a show of respect to those who have a differing opinion on what is good or not. by having it as an option you get your "realism" in the game, i get my "my kerbals are progressing." personalty i dont care that those two skills are unrealistic. it gives them a flavor other than green dust filled fodder. but based off your statement, im in the wrong because i don't want to play like you do...so i suggested Options, you get to turn off the +10 jockstrap of isp and boots of thrust +5. and get to have the stuff you want. and i will have my +10 jockstrap of isp and probably where them on my head too. look i do understand. really i do. but reality is reality dosen't always make a great game,

Basically im saying instead of trying to leave us who don't mind the isp jock-boots of thrust in the dust. consider and realize that we all have an opinion. and where we disagree, like in this particular instance, having options is the best middle ground. and the most respectful

[PDCWolf]

I'm not sure how Kerbal XP can be done at all if you take away virtually every avenue where it can actually affect anything.

After all, if one's position is effectively that you, the player, are playing the game and "the kerbal" has no impact, then whether the kerbal levels up or not is irrelevant to anything and everything. It serves no purpose because the kerbal doesn't "do" anything to begin with to alter.

I like how you defend your argument by going to extremes, it seems that for you it is either "the kerbals do it or you do it" and not the normal god mentality you get on every single tycoon game (roller coaster tycoon, zoo tycoon, prison architect, tropico etc).

You mean it's a mistake to cater to a wide audience instead of a very small niche of customers, specially in a product like software in which you do not have variable costs? Because, really, the mistake would be to try to limit the customer base, even if that makes some veteran players feel less elitists or something.

With that said, xp affecting ISP or thrust is a mistake. It's not just a matter of realism, it's a matter of immersion and coherence. There is no explanation as to why a pilot could make a rocket more powerful other than magic.

The problem of catering to wider audiences is that, when not paid much attention to, the methods used end up in discussions like these or things like Minecraft. You can indeed cater to wider audiences, but you need to think very well what you do to your game, because it may get a good amount of people that paid for your product mad, and that ends up in bad publicity in the future, you know, balance fast money with long run money.

[CaptainKipard]

You mean it's a mistake to cater to a wide audience instead of a very small niche of customers, specially in a product like software in which you do not have variable costs? Because, really, the mistake would be to try to limit the customer base, even if that makes some veteran players feel less elitists or something.

Actually what you should have taken away from that, and what I strongly implied is that in the short term it's surely a great decision... if KSP will be their only game. In the long term however Squad will need to gain a reputation in order to continue existing, and they wont do that by trying to make generic games. With all the crappy releases lately I get a feeling like the game industry might be slowly heading towards another crash like in the eighties, and what was the cause of that? A flood of lame generic titles. They can do better, and they should, not just for us but for themselves as well.

[Red Iron Crown]

if its an option, why would it be the last resort of the desperate. you see i think what we have here is a difference of opinion, and while i get where your coming from, and i don't completely disagree, i also don't feel that its necessary to force my play-style on others because its "not realistic enough." having the skills set as an option to shut off, or turn on isn't a show of desperation in my mind. its a show of respect to those who have a differing opinion on what is good or not. by having it as an option you get your "realism" in the game, i get my "my kerbals are progressing." personalty i dont care that those two skills are unrealistic. it gives them a flavor other than green dust filled fodder. but based off your statement, im in the wrong because i don't want to play like you do...so i suggested Options, you get to turn off the +10 jockstrap of isp and boots of thrust +5. and get to have the stuff you want. and i will have my +10 jockstrap of isp and probably where them on my head too. look i do understand. really i do. but reality is reality dosen't always make a great game,

Basically im saying instead of trying to leave us who don't mind the isp jock-boots of thrust in the dust. consider and realize that we all have an opinion. and where we disagree, like in this particular instance, having options is the best middle ground. and the most respectful

The problem with this line of thinking is that development resources are finite. In a perfect world everyone's pet feature would be implemented as an option, but the world isn't perfect. The devs have to focus on those features that most of their prospective player base will enjoy and use.

Whether ship performance-enhancing kerbal experience falls into that category is a decision for the devs.

[Darnok]

Why not thrust? (efficiency I can understand- there's no way to boost ISP in real life, other than possibly spiking the rocket fuel with certain dangerous additives...) They boost thrust in real life! Some rocket engines can be clocked up to 133% of their nominal thrust rating... (he "official" ratings are often a bit conservative)

Regards,

Northstar

Yes, but those clocked up engines are because someone made new calculations and built engine with new profile, in KSP it could be presented as new node in tech tree.

If you unlock new technology your lower tech engines can be overclocked a bit using tweakables in editor VAB, but it will cause faster overheating or damage engine slowly.

I'm guessing if a Kerbal has more experience, I will have less trouble keep my ship pointed straight, when following maneuver nodes :-/

If it has more experience, than maybe the ship could perform a maneuver "automatically" itself, as set by me. The more experience the kerbal, the more accurate it pilots.

Experienced kerbals could be like some sort of "autopilot".

+1

Edited October 22, 2014 by Darnok

[FleetAdmiralJ]

I like how you defend your argument by going to extremes, it seems that for you it is either "the kerbals do it or you do it" and not the normal god mentality you get on every single tycoon game (roller coaster tycoon, zoo tycoon, prison architect, tropico etc).

Wait...are aren't you justifying my "going to extremes" by turning around and saying that one plays the game with "the normal god mentality"? How is playing god not the same thing as "you fly the ship yourself"?

However, the larger point I'm making is this: Players seem to have two choices, or two interpretations of what is happening. Either:

A) The player controls everything, and the kerbal does nothing, and is just there. In that case, Kerbal XP has no point because the Kerbal isn't doing anything to influence in the first place. You can basically have a Final Frontier system to show where they've been, but not much else.

You accept the abstraction that, while you may tell the Kerbal what to do, it is still the actual Kerbal executing those commands. If you accept that it is the Kerbal him or herself that is doing the actual driving, then that opens the door to there being variations in how well or how efficiently or how "on the line" different kerbals can accomplish the command you give them.

Now, interpretation B doesn't have to inevitably lead to Kerbals being able to do things differently, but it makes that interpretation possible.

Here is another example: Let's say there is an electrical engineer kerbal type. And this kerbal is able to, in theory, more efficiently manage the electricity usage, or better aim solar solar panels, and thus allowing electricity usage to go down at a lower rate, or to recharge at a higher rate. This is still "changing part attributes" according to some here. But I'm wondering if people would be cool with that. Or if any and all parts must perform exactly the same in all circumstances regardless of experience? (which again, begs the question of why even bother having experience in the first place then)

[Kinglet]

I am already bored of useless career updates. I hated career from the beginning, and all updates never improved it, only added extra layers of tedium.

[Capt Snuggler]

It's only the engine enhancements that are the problem. The system for gaining experience points by taking crew out on missions and having their achievements recorded seems like it's going to be a lot of fun. I thoroughly approve of that part of it, and look forward to playing with it.

yeah, I have been looking forward to kerbal stats for a long time. just not ship performance changes described in the dev note.

[geb]

And next there'll be kerbal mages and kerbal druids, able to cast spell making pods to fly witout fuel and engines.

How about NO.

I would play that as a mod. It sounds like a great idea for a mod.

Play as normal until some of your crew have gained really high experience, and they start gaining the magic powers of Astromancy!

[Ippo]

Here is another example: Let's say there is an electrical engineer kerbal type. And this kerbal is able to, in theory, more efficiently manage the electricity usage, or better aim solar solar panels, and thus allowing electricity usage to go down at a lower rate, or to recharge at a higher rate. This is still "changing part attributes" according to some here. But I'm wondering if people would be cool with that. Or if any and all parts must perform exactly the same in all circumstances regardless of experience? (which again, begs the question of why even bother having experience in the first place then)

The problem is that the experience of a kerbal somehow affects how parts that have not been designed, built and tested by him, but by an unseen and implied engineering / manufacturing team.

Additionally, please note that this doesn't solve the "kerbals have nothing to do" issue: their list of possible activities is still limited to "they can float around on a jetpack".

That's why many, me included, consider this to be a magic buff: regarding your specific example, do you think that there has ever been an electrical engineer on the ISS that was specifically tasked with making sure that the solar panels tracked the sun better? The point is that the hardware is simply not in control of the crew, since most of the functions are automated.

Again, no one is there on the ISS to tweak the solar panels, they are there because they are trained scientists that are usually there to perform some experiment. Even when new hardware comes in, they are not going to tear it apart and optimize it magically on their own, which is what would happen with engines in KSP.

[eeveelution]

IMO, the XP of a crewmember should affect:

Response time (especially from going from 0 to 100 thrust and vice versa using X and Z, but also for things WSAD by nerfing the base response time by a tiny bit but still making the better crew somewhat noticeable)

RCS-Pack (better crews get slightly stronger jetpacks as they deserve them, and they shouldn't not be able to use jetpacks in some situations that much. What I mean is sometime when you activate the jetpack, it doesnt work, which should be less common for better crews)

Health (How much a kerbal can endure)

Science (what is being implemented)

To get a boost in fuel efficiency, engine thrust, etc. you should need to take special kerbals like scientists which would take notes while the ship is performing actions. You could either transfer "knowledge" points through antennae or by recovering the crew. Once you gather enough knowledge, you could upgrade engine thrust, fuel efficiency and such a little bit. Scientists could cost money to hire and have a much higher reputation penalty for dieing.

[Franklin]

For those curious what the poll is excluding the null votes of indiff/wait&see: Yes (18.9%) | No (81.1%)

[Trentendegreth]

The problem with this line of thinking is that development resources are finite. In a perfect world everyone's pet feature would be implemented as an option, but the world isn't perfect. The devs have to focus on those features that most of their prospective player base will enjoy and use.

Whether ship performance-enhancing kerbal experience falls into that category is a decision for the devs.

no i understand, so let me backtrack a bit....because i dont think my original idea got thrue... yes dev time is limited and finite. and yes there is going to be things that people disagree on, and yes the isp-jock-boots of thrust +10 are indeed hot issue, but....the idea that it breaks physics, that adding them will break KSP beyond repair... i disagree. let me elaborate. take a probe core... no skills.. no jock-boots... just the core a tank and engine. there is your baseline.... its perfect physics just the way you want.... now take an inexperienced Kerbal... ya know the ones actually flying the ship... his hands arn't steady... he dosnt "know" and its reflected in how he handles the craft. thru HIS Efficiency in piloting the craft... not ours. as he learns and becomes Experienced he gets more steady, and i think an inexperienced kerbal should have a negative modifier not an experienced kerbal having a positive one so as they progress it brings them up to "probe core level". now that being said the thrust skill makes no sense to me, so i would like to shut it off... if its implemented.... but someone my have a good reason to keep it in, on there save.... i dont see them as Wrong... so why take that option away from them just because it dosen't fit my idea of what the game should be...

and understand I'm not trying to attack your line of thinking, and i mean no disrespect, this is my Opinion, there are many like it but this one is mine...

IDK this topic is getting toxic, and to be honest this community is above that...

[BudgetHedgehog]

My biggest problem with 'it's the kerbals that are doing what you tell them, they're ultimately in control of the ship' is that they're demonstrably not. Go in IVA and increase throttle. Does the kerbals hand move the stick? No. There aren't even any kind of flight controls for them to use. You can tell them to do a barrel roll and the ship will barrel roll, but they won't move. Or are we saying that they have telekinesis now? That they can move the ship without touching it? Then why bother with engines and fuel, just lift whatever you want into orbit.

Kerbals do not control the ship. The player does. Any attempt to justify the opinion that kerbals are in control raises more questions than it answers.

"yeah, they're moving the throttle stick, the devs just haven't animated it yet" - I'm sorry, but my suspension of disbelief will only go so far. Having to believe that the kerbals are flying the ship while watching them not fly the ship is absurd.

[CaptainKipard]

But it doesn't work like that. IRL, if you throttle down a rocket engine, there's less pressure on the combustion chamber and thus less exhaust particle velocity, meaning overall less ISP. This is not simulated in KSP, but it doesn't mean it is suddenly logical.

Well alright, I wasn't aware of that. I'd prefer if it were simulated, however in the context of KSP as it is right now, it's still one of the more reasonable suggestions.

Here is another example: Let's say there is an electrical engineer kerbal type. And this kerbal is able to, in theory, more efficiently manage the electricity usage, or better aim solar solar panels, and thus allowing electricity usage to go down at a lower rate, or to recharge at a higher rate. This is still "changing part attributes" according to some here. But I'm wondering if people would be cool with that. Or if any and all parts must perform exactly the same in all circumstances regardless of experience? (which again, begs the question of why even bother having experience in the first place then)

Short of the implementation of failures where parts of the panel are damaged reducing maximum available power I'd want all parts to perform the same.

[Ippo]

My biggest problem with 'it's the kerbals that are doing what you tell them, they're ultimately in control of the ship' is that they're demonstrably not. Go in IVA and increase throttle. Does the kerbals hand move the stick? No. There aren't even any kind of flight controls for them to use. You can tell them to do a barrel roll and the ship will barrel roll, but they won't move. Or are we saying that they have telekinesis now? That they can move the ship without touching it? Then why bother with engines and fuel, just lift whatever you want into orbit.

Kerbals do not control the ship. The player does. Any attempt to justify the opinion that kerbals are in control raises more questions than it answers.

"yeah, they're moving the throttle stick, the devs just haven't animated it yet" - I'm sorry, but my suspension of disbelief will only go so far. Having to believe that the kerbals are flying the ship while watching them not fly the ship is absurd.

Also, let me add a small remark: even if the devs animated the kerbals to make them actually execute the commands you are giving them, there is still no way around the fact that the engine's throttle (and everything else) is still decided by YOU.

So either you are telling me that my commands won't be executed correctly, or you are telling me that somehow 100% thrust depends on who is holding the lever in that particular position. And this makes no sense: if I give the same exact sect of commands to the ship, it HAS to perform the same, because the commands that were given does not depend on who executed them.

You can tell me all you want that an experienced pilot flies better than a rookie, but as long as the commands are given by ME, they are effectively flying just as well as I can, and therefore the buff is magic.

[LethalDose]

I'm just glad we're finay getting DevNotes that contain real information instead of the "we're working hard" and "there are features" we've been getting for over a year now.

Re: the Kerbal stats affecting engine performance, I think it can be done appropriately. Modifying Thrust is fine (so long as it's <5-10%), but modifying ISP, which determines dV is a bit concerning.

I'm not going to say "I'm sure squad will do it right", because... Well, Squad. But they seem to be pulling their heads out of the sand on a number of issues, so maybe they won't make too big of a mess.

[Overfloater]

Of course the Kerbals are piloting the ships, just like it's your Skyrim character swinging his axe. It's the character's skill that determines whether or not the axe hits, rather than yours.

They aren't. BUT why not make them pilot the ship???

The more experienced the kerbal is, the better it follows the maneuver nodes you set, and less trouble you get pointing your ship straight.

(all with an option to override control of course)

And quit this silly talk about kerbals improving rocket stats :]

[FleetAdmiralJ]

The problem is that the experience of a kerbal somehow affects how parts that have not been designed, built and tested by him, but by an unseen and implied engineering / manufacturing team.

Additionally, please note that this doesn't solve the "kerbals have nothing to do" issue: their list of possible activities is still limited to "they can float around on a jetpack".

I'm not sure there is a "kerbals have nothing to do" issue. I'm just saying that if you use the interpretation that you are telling the kerbals what they should be doing as opposed to literally flying the ship that just happens to have kerbals on board, that opens up the possibility that Kerbals can do things in a better or worse fashion. Again, the effect is in how kerbals use the parts, not a change in the part itself (even if programmatically it's effectively the same).

That's why many, me included, consider this to be a magic buff: regarding your specific example, do you think that there has ever been an electrical engineer on the ISS that was specifically tasked with making sure that the solar panels tracked the sun better? The point is that the hardware is simply not in control of the crew, since most of the functions are automated.

Again, no one is there on the ISS to tweak the solar panels, they are there because they are trained scientists that are usually there to perform some experiment. Even when new hardware comes in, they are not going to tear it apart and optimize it magically on their own, which is what would happen with engines in KSP.

Since when has Kerbal followed the same procedures that NASA does? If KSP was like NASA, you'd spend an hour building a ship, and hour creating a mission plan, press enter to launch the ship, go away and come back 2 hours later with the capsule splashing down because everything was already pre-programmed. But that's not how KSP works. Now, granted, solar panels in the game generally work "automatically." But who is to say that the Kerbal ISN'T having to essentially manually track the sun themselves? Or perhaps having to enter calculations for it to that themselves. "Because NASA doesn't do that" isn't really an argument.

For those curious what the poll is excluding the null votes of indiff/wait&see: Yes (18.9%) | No (81.1%)

Nice, how that the poll isn't quite as overwhelming as it was last night, we have to now redefine the poll to try to make it appear as overwhelming. GG.

My biggest problem with 'it's the kerbals that are doing what you tell them, they're ultimately in control of the ship' is that they're demonstrably not. Go in IVA and increase throttle. Does the kerbals hand move the stick? No. There aren't even any kind of flight controls for them to use. You can tell them to do a barrel roll and the ship will barrel roll, but they won't move. Or are we saying that they have telekinesis now? That they can move the ship without touching it? Then why bother with engines and fuel, just lift whatever you want into orbit.

Kerbals do not control the ship. The player does. Any attempt to justify the opinion that kerbals are in control raises more questions than it answers.

"yeah, they're moving the throttle stick, the devs just haven't animated it yet" - I'm sorry, but my suspension of disbelief will only go so far. Having to believe that the kerbals are flying the ship while watching them not fly the ship is absurd.

Then why can't you control a pod that doesn't have a Kerbal inside if the Kerbal inside isn't doing anything?

Edited October 22, 2014 by FleetAdmiralJ

[fairytalefox]

it gives them a flavor other than green dust filled fodder.

Let's make things clear.

Nobody thinks XP is a bad idea. We all love our Kerbals, we want them to progress.

Nobody thinks giving Kerbals perks and abilities based on their XP is a bad idea. We all want our Kerbals to be something more than tinfoil dolls sitting in rockets.

There are tons of possible perks and abilities for our Kerbals, some of them are kind of implemented by the devs in their internal builds, others are proposed by the community in this thread. Nobody wants them all to disappear.

But as we can see, there are 2 (TWO) abilities MORE THAN HALF of the community is really pissed off of. And nobody even thinks these abilities are important. Some people just don't want them to exist, and they are many.

I want to ask other people, those who voted "for": are you so really really desperately want these, like, 5% to be added to your Isp? Is it SO important for you? Or you maybe would be satisfied by reputation, science, money and other innumerable proposed boosts NO ONE objects so far?

I know my English is horribly broken but I hope you've got the idea.

[Laie]

After all, if one's position is effectively that you, the player, are playing the game and "the kerbal" has no impact, then whether the kerbal levels up or not is irrelevant to anything and everything. It serves no purpose because the kerbal doesn't "do" anything to begin with to alter.

Finally you're arriving at the same point as almost everyone else, though from the other direction. Kerbals doing anything better only makes sense if they have something to do in the first place. That's why there's little objections to better science results or more rep: it's easy to imagine how a particular Kerbal could give more accurate readings or just have a more friendly smile. But fuel economy is achieved by (e.g.) flying a better or worse ascent profile -- currently, Kerbals have no part in this other than looking scared or happy.

Selective throttling has been proposed as one credible thing Kerbals could do. It's pretty much all they can do unless KSP is to include Mechjeb-like autopiloting.

If we could tell our Kerbals to point in this and that direction, then fire the main thrusters for ten seconds -- well, then they could conceivably do it better or worse. But as long as all controls are solely in the players' hands, the Kerbals have no business in affecting the outcome.

[CaptainKipard]

... now take an inexperienced Kerbal... ya know the ones actually flying the ship... his hands arn't steady...

... knees weak, arms are heavy. There’s vomit on his sweater already, mom’s spaghetti. He’s nervous, but then he realises that pilots don't actually control rockets in real life or in the game. IRL it's all pre-determined, and in the game I control the craft.

Edited October 22, 2014 by Cpt. Kipard

[Ippo]

But who is to say that the Kerbal ISN'T having to essentially manually track the sun themselves?

Probes. Probes said that.

Now, Would you mind telling me how a pilot can escape physics? Refer to this:

Sorry, captain: this is nonsense. It is not an abstraction for anything. If you take a spacecraft of a given mass, with a given engine, and perform a burn of a given duration in a given point in its orbit, you can only have ONE resulting orbit. You can't argue with that: it is a fact. Any game mechanic that breaks this fact is also breaking physics: period.

[tater]

Unless you don;t control it. Make AI kerbals, then have skill actually mess with the fidelity of the orbital maneuvers, not an abstraction of "efficiency."