End-Game Suggestions: Post Yours!

[Kegereneku]

Myself I'm partial to the one that fit KSP the most : Completing the Tech-tree and designing an End-game FTL engines for interplanetary travel (yes).

Ideally I would prefer it to have its own interesting gameplay (ex : gravity acting differently than in normal-space, needing to store kinetic energy/electricity/heat or else) but I would settle for anything that allow you to make your craziest project way easier as a reward.

Giving the mean to do even more than before is to me preferable to selecting what to do.

Colonization don't fit KSP for me as it imply to act on a larger scale than anything feasible withing the game's engine. Even interstellar travel is a stretch, you could nothing more than a flyby after many years of travel using an absurdly efficient engine and certainly cheating on the math (more than normal).

Resources exploitation too don't fit KSP, taken individually in only mean ferrying cargo or redirecting a particularly big asteroid, taken globally it also imply to automatize things on a greater scale.

Edited October 25, 2014 by Kegereneku

[tater]

FTL doesn't fit KSP at all.

Aside from that, anything too far out of scope would be a future game that they could charge for and this is their JOB, they need to make money, that's the point. End-game for KSP is something that would be a segue to the next game. Bases is about the best idea within scope, with colonization being the next step past that… so maybe a small taste of that, with a paid follow-on that illuminates that aspect further.

[Kegereneku]

I could argument for hours and demonstrate that "profit venture", large scale colonization, and interstellar travel in a way you would find fun or realist are all as magic-driven than FTL.

But gameplay-speaking I would ask for FTL because it would work within UNITY game engine with minimal work and allow you and other players to do whatever they want their end-game to be without wasting 20hours just moving the equipment around or remaking the game.

We could also discuss longly why would KSP need any "sequel". Short for me : Sequel are for story-driven games. Gameplay-driven game get Remake, else you are switching game style.

This all personal opinions anyway, you are entitled to promote your exploitation/colonization gameplay but let's not start bashing other ideas. I would GLADLY take a space colonization game that require you to turn asteroid into solar lens, divert ice-asteroid with orbital mechanic and globally alter planet atmosphere while protecting domed base. However I do not think it fit within KSP. You'll have better luck asking SQUAD to make it their next game.

"Civilization : Beyond Earth" seem to be going great, so there's a market.

Dammit, I'm starting to rant again, let's just stay respectful of other opinions, we are not competing for SQUAD attention.

Edited October 25, 2014 by Kegereneku

[CaptRobau]

After playing Kerbin-Side, I've become a big fan of alternate spawn points and exploring the accompanying buildings/infrastructure and it could be made into endgame content quite simply with upgradable buildings coming along. Most KSP players will have extensively explored KSC and its vicinity (islands and the nearby mountains), but beyond that? Effort and time constraints mean that areas beyond are sparsely explored. Beyond Kerbin this is even worse. With Kerbin-Side's alternate spawn sites I've flown around areas of Kerbin that I didn't even know looked like that cool from up close. But if you have to spend 15 minutes or more to just get there, it's just not as easy to explore and experiment around the area as one can with the KSC as a single crash or design oversight can mean a redo.

While I'm not sure how to get there, it'd be a big boon to exploration if people could construct/launch craft everywhere. Whether it be through a dynamically placeable mini-KSCs or something akin to Extraplanetary Launchpads, being able to after some effort explore every place on Kerbin, the Mun and beyond would be allow people to see the existing solar system in a whole new light. It'd also be a big boost to multiplayer, as many people just want to muck around near the launch pad. If that launch pad can also be on Duna, Tylo or Laythe than that will keep that mode much more interesting.

[Nemrav]

For the FTL idea, I kind of imagine a civ science victory... You send the mother ship to another planet, cutscene, end.... Credits, not much else other than an op engine to experiment with...

The problem with a game end is that KSP has no plot, you are the KSP and your goal is to.... nothing, no overall goal only the short term contracts and science collection.

So first we need to solve is what kind of plot the Kerbals could have.... maybe "Kerbal kind has been driven by technology etc. etc. , now you have to guide your fledgling program to be the first to do X and lead Y (probably Kerbal kind or the agency) to victory" and add an antagonistic system to drive the player along...

Then we could have end game, but for now KSP is sandbox career or not...

[Tery215]

Complete a contract to launch a 3.75 cylinder into orbit (that you get as one of those parts with a blue background, like test contracts)

Then, when you run "Test" on the cylinder, a scene begins where an evil-looking kerbal presses a button that causes the cylinder to unfold. It reveals a laser-looking thingy that thus destroys Kerbin.

[tater]

I could argument for hours and demonstrate that "profit venture", large scale colonization, and interstellar travel in a way you would find fun or realist are all as magic-driven than FTL.

But gameplay-speaking I would ask for FTL because it would work within UNITY game engine with minimal work and allow you and other players to do whatever they want their end-game to be without wasting 20hours just moving the equipment around or remaking the game.

What works in the game engine is not relevant. The scope of KSP is clearly past/current and at most near future space exploration. Interstellar travel is not out of bounds as long as it is plausible (orion, ion, etc). FTL is magic. Adding FTL to stock KSP would be like adding liftwood, ether propellers, reaction less drives, whatever. It is completely out of the scope of KSP. This is self-evident (my parts list has no ether propellers), it's not opinion.

We could also discuss longly why would KSP need any "sequel". Short for me : Sequel are for story-driven games. Gameplay-driven game get Remake, else you are switching game style.

There is a powerful reason for an ADD ON, which is that Squad can make money, which I'm fine with, this is their job, they need to put food on the table, shoes on the kids, etc. A follow-on/add-on sits right on top, it's not a new game from scratch, it's new content to the existing game. Other games have done this, look at the Il-2 series (they added Il-2 Pacific Fighter, then 1946… later there were free updates on top of that adding content, there were some engine changes, but no more than patches/updates would do.

The benefit of this model is that they can concentrate on content, and maybe a few game engine improvements/additions without having to start from scratch. All of us would buy it, too. Tomorrow.

This all personal opinions anyway, you are entitled to promote your exploitation/colonization gameplay but let's not start bashing other ideas. I would GLADLY take a space colonization game that require you to turn asteroid into solar lens, divert ice-asteroid with orbital mechanic and globally alter planet atmosphere while protecting domed base. However I do not think it fit within KSP. You'll have better luck asking SQUAD to make it their next game.

Pointing out that FTL is entirely beyond the scope of current KSP is not bashing, it's a statement of fact. If they were going to do magic, they could have not bothered with all this pesky orbital mechanics stuff. I'm not even against FTL, it's a useful mechanic for a sci-fi game, but it's not for THIS game given the scope of time it demonstrably covers. Aside from that, they'd then have to add whole nearby solar systems worth of content, the work load would be huge, and it would add nothing other than some new balls to land on after having pressed the "magic" button.

"Civilization : Beyond Earth" seem to be going great, so there's a market.

Dammit, I'm starting to rant again, let's just stay respectful of other opinions, we are not competing for SQUAD attention.

One, I disagree entirely with the assumption that disagreement and respect are even connected. Ideas are judged on their merits, and none deserve respect without earning it. FTL is a fun game mechanic in the right situation, but for it to be the end-game of KSP 1.0, they would have to massively alter the scope of their game, which seems rather a lot to ask given the next patch is version 0.9. Two, for the sake of Squad, anything beyond KSP scope that still has promise (FTL, for example) would be best served by either an add-on, or entirely new game, IMHO.

[Kegereneku]

I kind of expected your reaction.

You speak of scope as if it was some definite obligatory route you knew coming, maybe misunderstanding what SQUAD mean by "Scope complete" (which define the codes or features needed before they can start intertwining everything into an actual game) but you can't predict what will make the future of space exploration or a good video game.

On the matter of feature, this is a bad idea to suggest things that require to go beyond the gameplay the game-logic was developed for. (game-engine wasn't the most appropriate word, too low-level in programming)

To take your own analogy it would be like if IL-2 tried to go from an aircraft flight simulator to an abstract strategy game. This is what "colonization" or "large scale exploitation of space resources" are analog to for KSP.

This doesn't mean than we -in a constructive discussion- cannot find an equivalent that is fun to play, as long as we respect others point of view.

One, I disagree entirely with the assumption that disagreement and respect are even connected. Ideas are judged on their merits, and none deserve respect without earning it.

One certainly do not deserve respect if his vision of earning merit is to bash others idea in the hope that his opinion look better in comparison. This is also pointless as game-developers do not work toward satisfying one person nor one vision of "what their game should become".

An easy example is the minority asking to scale planet up to "real solar system" regardless if doing so would objectively change the main selling point of KSP and drive some player away.

Features are added to develop a core-mechanic, not the reverse.

So right now, I do not intend to bash your "space trader" idea, but to show you it is subjective, because if the developers ended up thinking that a good way to put into contrast their realistic gameplay was to reward the players with a FTL engine with stupid "Hollywood-physics" in a "space-trader" context and it work, our opinions won't matter.

Your vision of "colonization" (as gathered from the earlier pages) seem to point towards a very specific and personal interpretation of what space exploration lead to. -realistically speaking- there is other possibility than a remake of the American westward expansion or the myth of the self-made-man I see often.

- Scientifically speaking, robots are more efficient to pilot & explore, no colony or manned-base are needed except to avoid light-lag with remote-control.

- Economically speaking, exploitation of space resources might not ever become profitable OR a matter of private venture as we currently conceive it.

- Game-design speaking, KSP's core-idea is design&explore with credible space mechanic, not manage supply for colony or trade.

This is why I insist on respecting other ideas even if you don't like them and brainstorm toward a compromise. Myself I'm not overprotective of an FTL drive. (a size 2/5 or 3.75 Fusion thruster as the end-game would also fill me with joy)

However, I do think that it is a perfectly fitting as a KSP end-game reward, if executed by actual game developers. (better in any case than say : interstellar solar-sail, large-scale colony or anachronistic space-trader).

ps : saying "IMHO" don't match the arrogance with which you claim to be able to "judge the merits of ideas", IMO.

This will be all from me here, I fear to see our disagreement degenerate, feel free to continue in PM.

[tater]

FTL requires someplace to go. That means how many other solar systems to be worth it?

The scope is clearly 1950s-present (in a world where the doable stuff of the 1970s actually happened, there is no reason that we could not have had moon bases, etc by now).

What the future concepts of manned spaceflight might look like are debatable, clearly, but the only reason to send people vs robots… is to send people, "because." I remember a discussion in a lecture hall about this when visiting caltech/jpl back around the time of the Neptune flyby, and we were asked what people could do that robots couldn't do better… the one shout from the audience that nailed it (and got applause) was "have children."

A degree of self-sustaining habitat is needed, or it's pretty much not a thing that will happen. Who pays for it is debatable, and while I personally think that it will be private entities or not at all, I'm open to alternate possibilities (The kerbal universe seems to tend that way given the "contract" nature of their space programs, and the stated goal of the devs to have the game be "tycoon" like.

I'd be perfectly happy with a semi-hard SF game with FTL, BTW. A jump drive, warp gates (ideally some large distance from a gravity well would be required)… something that is discrete, and results in all the rest of the travel not breaking physics. You'd need something to do, however. That's why I think it's not a reasonable end-game for THIS iteration of KSP. As it is players reach "end game" in terms of the supplied content/tech in days. I'm playing a modded (DRE/FAR/snacks/etc) game in the Kerbol system right now. Career. Hard, with rewards dialed down to 30%. I'm trying to play methodically, I'm testing stuff for a Duna mission, day 130 or so. The entire tech tree is nearly done (I haven't bought any spaceplane stuff or ion because it's to magic for me). 130 days… my "end game will be maybe 3-4 years from first suborbital flight, lol. FTL? Really?

[Sirnanigans]

I like most of the ideas posted so far. It seems that the two most liked ideas (by a huge margin) are colonization and science fiction sized space travel. Clearly the game has its limitations as of right now. Without an economy written into the game, adding one is a matter of ground-up design on a whole new aspect and likewise a whole bunch of man hours. Creating travel systems which are capable of light-year scale distances which are both practical and behave within the realism of the current game is nigh impossible. Still, the ideas are both important, because a game can't survive without a meaningful endgame.

World of Warcraft, for example, desperately throws new content into the game because otherwise they have no endgame (unless you enjoy its mechanics). In a loot-chase kind of game, a player won't stick around after acquiring all the loot. KSP is far from World of Warcraft in concept, but if the game is about "discovering all the tech!" (*cough* loot chase *cough!*), then players will move on shortly after they do.

Simulators are awesome, but their demographic is relatively small. Sure, they have their fans, but their numbers are meager compared to popular games and SQUAD has indicated that this is a game before a simulator. Missions can easily be added but in a way that just makes KSP a simulator with a prompt. It's a good idea on paper, but ultimately players may catch on to the fact that there isn't more to do, they are only being asked to do specific, existing things.

Everyone is right to say that idea X is a lot of work, and idea Y changes the game, but I have seen fads come and go and I know that they all look very promising in the beginning. What makes them fads is that they don't have a permanent value to survive on after their players have experienced the whole of the game, or they put themselves in a positions to be trumped by a bigger and better version of themselves. I don't want to see KSP die for a lack of endgame or for the invention of a more potent parallel game.

In my personal opinion and in regards to recent opinions posted, the game would benefit greatly from a paid add-on. Interstellar space travel via worm holes with procedurally generated solar systems is a LONG shot from the current mechanics of the game. Accelerating to twice the speed of light is fine and dandy (just add a big space motor), but the mechanics of the game are going to make slowing to a stop and landing anywhere a real improbability. At a survivable G-force, slowing from 600,000,000Km/s is ludicrous. Adding some kind of feature to make it less ludicrous is betraying the nature of the game by adding sci-fi magic. However, something like an add-on with wormholes is much more reasonable, mostly because there's no need to explain it or betray the realistic systems of the game. Just say "it's a wormhole, you explain it" and add a loading screen.

Colonization is a HUGE addition to the game. Planetary resources, colony structures, survival challenges, environment variables, etc. etc. etc., it's all a lot of work and almost a whole new game attached. So don't attach it, develop it separately and release it as an expansion. Clearly people want these ideas, obviously people will pay for these ideas, so I think they should definitely see the light. How to implement them is a challenge likely to be unmet in the current game, but ignoring their potential entirely I fear will doom this game.

Edited October 26, 2014 by Sirnanigans

[Jouni]

FTL and wormholes are kind of boring, as almost every game, book, and film has them. If we want interstellar travel, something similar to the Qeng Ho from A Deepness in the Sky would match the spirit of KSP much better. Travel between star systems would take centuries, civilizations could fall or even wipe themselves out completely between the visits, and systems would be colonized and recolonized over and over again. The fleet would need civilizations, as it can't produce all the supplies it needs on its own, but no civilization would last indefinitely.

[Sirnanigans]

FTL and wormholes are kind of boring, as almost every game, book, and film has them. If we want interstellar travel, something similar to the Qeng Ho from A Deepness in the Sky would match the spirit of KSP much better. Travel between star systems would take centuries, civilizations could fall or even wipe themselves out completely between the visits, and systems would be colonized and recolonized over and over again. The fleet would need civilizations, as it can't produce all the supplies it needs on its own, but no civilization would last indefinitely.

I do enjoy the thought of creating a self-sustaining travel system that involves building a space faring village. I also see how with time warp such a transportation system may be possible by adding greater levels of warp speeds.

The only challenge is how to add it without belittling everything else. As you said, civilizations could fall and system would be colonized and recolonized between visits. So when you go to launch this behemoth what has all of your hard work thus far been worth? One might say the realization of this dream, but then what is even this epic journey worth if you plan to do another?

[Kegereneku]

For precision : Myself, I was never talking of FTL for interstellar travel, nor an easy to use Hax-mode.

An interplanetary FTL drive could be just as fun depending of how it is done.

I could make an entire thread out of fun "FTL-mechanic", from the discontinuous ones that require you to match velocity with your target anyway, to one that require you to be both outside planet-SOI & hidden from the sun, to one requiring to carry an anchor into position, to continuous ones whose precision depend of your piloting skills.

...etc...

You can say that I don't have "great plan" for end-game, no megastructure, no space elevator, no Event Horizon. But if Kerbun-science managed to build an exotic engine, then it might as well be exotic in every way possible.

I remember a discussion in a lecture hall about this when visiting caltech/jpl back around the time of the Neptune flyby, and we were asked what people could do that robots couldn't do better… the one shout from the audience that nailed it (and got applause) was "have children."

Some Panspermia concept involve not only growing but recreating human from their most basic component through machines. If I remember right it was the context of "The songs of distant earth", by Arthur C. Clarke.

In my personal opinion and in regards to recent opinions posted, the game would benefit greatly from a paid add-on.

I opine that we could as well consider that a stand alone if the code of the game must be entirely reworked.

I know we are all kind of... impatient... and wish to see new marvel sprout from it... cheaply. But KSP (worked on by a very small team) require all the attention of a conventional game (it's no AAA but those are overrated anyway).

So trying to force an add-on might not be a benefit. They are free to reuse their brand regardless if it's a new executable.

Btw, a lot have been said about UNITY not being the best engine for computation-heavy game.

C# is modular as hell, but C++ is quite efficient (if you have an engine of course, that's probably where it all fall down).

[wizzlebippi]

I vote for building/launching a fleet of ships to explore beyond the kerbal system. Each ship would need to be very large and something like DARPA's 100 year starship and require top tier tech to build. Basically, give each one enough a low relativistic dV target to escape the kerbal system, each on a specifc heading. Once the last ship exits the kerbal system, roll credits while showing a montage of happy kerbals landing on alien worlds.

[tater]

Some Panspermia concept involve not only growing but recreating human from their most basic component through machines. If I remember right it was the context of "The songs of distant earth", by Arthur C. Clarke.

Also the short story, The Big Space F***, by Kurt Vonnegut (in Again, Dangerous Visions)

[tater]

FTL would be a rather huge jump, even within Kerbol system given nothing past 1960 tech along those lines in game (Nerva). Fusion, either as reactors are not right around the corner (I know people working on it at Sandia, but I'm not holding my breath). Orion is a far more plausible option, and even that is at the very least fraught with some danger (if you want to launch from planet side).

I don;t see end-game as a "thing" you unlock, and more as something to do after you unlock everything. Hence colonies. It's at least something to do. Really it would be better with some kerbal autonomy.

[Kegereneku]

Technically Ions thrusters have been significantly refined since the 1970, we have brand new SLS-like engines, spaceplane and the RAPIER hint to technology that haven't been completed yet (SABRE engines), grappling asteroid is only being tested right now, we have still no actual idea how to make a temporary base on Mars, life support is primitive, and VASIMR is a perfectly valid and tested candidate to add into the game.

So unless you want KSP to regress technologically, a credible colony will require far future plausible technology like fusion-thruster. I'm not going to sell you the FTL idea but there's more in KSP than pretending everything you do could be real.

About the Orion nuclear pulse project, I'll never get why people believe it is/was anywhere plausible when it never made it past drawing board and fundamental flaws. As far I can guess it's because it look cool and have not -in fact- being worked on (due to said fundamental flaws) thus staying a dream rather than a debunked concept.

I don;t see end-game as a "thing" you unlock, and more as something to do after you unlock everything. Hence colonies. It's at least something to do. Really it would be better with some kerbal autonomy.

Players are already building their own ground base out of hitchhikers module, and once you have completed the tech-tee nothing keep player from doing whatever they can do with available feature.

if End-game have to feel a change of phase (or space), it have to bring a change.

Be it of possibility with the introduction of new parts (fusion thruster, FTL, deployable VAB...), of gameplay & game-logic (improbable switch from ship-focused simulation to system-wide management) or of the game economy (apparition of new administration strategy that give you tons of public funding or inversely allow you to make money)

Note : if by "kerbal autonomy" you mean out-of-focus AI-driven action, that definitely lean toward major code change (depending of what you are thinking obviously)

[tater]

Orion is only more plausible because it's slightly less complicated (depending on the iteration). They are all handwavium at the moment though. It's certainly more feasible than FTL drives as you could actually build at least part of one to test if it were not for the test ban on nukes (which is why it never went past the drawing board). Rover/Nerva should have been flown ages ago as well, but some nuts are afraid of RTGs, even, so good luck with that.

Mars doesn't require fusion though. Nukes are enough. As for KSP, Hitchhikers are not colonies. I'm thinking some in situ construction is more like it, but that's beyond the scope of KSP. System wide is exactly what their "tycoon" model is, however. The game already has a (not well done) economy anyway. Do space flights, get funds. They've already confirmed extra-kermin resources (fuel, though the most likely fuel/oxidizer is also life support) which is an obvious lead-on to settlements that require less constant resupply. Perhaps pork jet's inflatable habs will end up a thing. That's really the scope of the current game at best, sort of space-program directed continuous habitation.

Anything is worth considering if plausible, I'm not that fussy… but FTL is not plausible right now.

[dino1238]

There is already a mod in development for that, the warpdrive plugin, you go into Kerbol orbit and fire it up and it takes you to a randomly generated system via a seed.

[tater]

I should add (I mentioned it above a ways), that "end game" right now is basically when the tech tree is unlocked. Funds are not a problem in KSP. At all. I'm playing hard with 30% instead of 60% rewards, AND I have DRE/FAR/Snacks. I have well over a million in the bank, the entire tree unlocked, and my career is now day ~130-something (I'm sparingly using time compression as I need to make sure I either return, or resupply guys in orbit, or on/around Mun/Minmus). There is a Duna launch window in around 100 days, and I'm getting ready for that (I sent a higher dv ship with some supplies and no guys ahead, and will send a few more with empty hitchhikers as the window gets closer).

So while I have "exploration" to do just because, from a game design standpoint, my game is over, I've met the only "victory conditions" the game has (aside from just the fun of playing what is basically now sandbox).

That's really the fundamental question: is unlocking "sandbox" what they have in mind for the point of end-game?

I tend to think that it's a weak way to go as a game choice. I'd like to play with limitations that matter, just to make it interesting. A new thing to unlock would just be a new thing to unlock, moving the "end game" away by a couple minutes of play. I'm OK with sandbox, BTW, I'm just saying that you have a sense of completion, irrational or not, when the tree is done. I'm sure there is psychology around the way people complete game tasks we could look up. I sort of see a colonization mode as a kind of unlocked, novel gameplay that might add new challenges. FTL removes challenges… so there you are having unlocked the tech tree after a space program that has lasted maybe a couple game-years (only due to travel times to the outer system would it even be that long, you could easily do it in much less time, particularly in stock game difficulty settings where it would be hard no to unlock it in a couple months, game time).

President: "We've created a program to put someone in a tin can and throw them in the air. The first try is tomorrow!"

2 days later:

"We chose to go to the Mun, not because it is easy… (Werner Kerman whispers in the President's ear) OK, it's sort of easy, but we'll try to make it hard by sending really stupid astronauts!" (applause).

2 months later:

"We chose to go to another solar system because warp drive!"

[Wanderfound]

Everyone has their own tastes, and that's all cool, but as we're stating personal preferences here: no implausibly unrealistic SF.

Which means no interstellar travel, no FTL, no profitable interplanetary resource extraction (limited in-situ resource utilisation is fine, though), no large scale interplanetary colonisation, no sentient aliens other than Kerbals.

What I would like the "end game" to be...more of the same, just more and bigger and harder. Flesh out the contract system so that it runs the full spectrum from novice to expert; give us contracts to put giant asteroids into low Kerbol orbits, or do part tests at treetop altitude Mach 5 while pulling crazy high negative G's, launch ridiculously huge but fragile orbital telescopes, etc.

The latter stages of the tech tree should contain a great diversity of scientific instruments (and almost nothing else), and I would like to see missions along the lines of "get science instrument X to position Y in time to observe event Z". The Kerbal equivalent of the Royal Society sending Cook to observe the transit of Venus.

Making the science more meaningful would help a lot, too. I'm not exactly sure of the best way to do that, but "you have 100 science points" falls a long way short of capturing the wonder of scientific discovery.

[tater]

Yeah, well we may be stuck with the broken paradigm of "science" unlocking tech (which I think is actually backwards).

I think within KSP scope, large colonization is not something to pursue. More like early, permanent habitation. Really interesting space constructions (O'Neil type stuff) are not really doable realistically in KSP, as the mechanism for assembly in orbit is not designed for construction, just docking (aside from part count issues). That would really require kerbal autonomy. Design something, have the budget/whatever to do it, design launch vehicles, etc, and they just do scheduled launches and make it happen in situ. That's another game, though, IMO.

[Vallius]

Maybe the endgame could open up elaborate and difficult contracts that reward awesome parts (not really sci-fi, just bigger/better versions of our favorites), rather than the normal currencies. There could be one or two unique missions for every body in the Kerbal Solar system that have very restrictive requirements.

Examples of potential Endgame contracts and respective rewards:

Jool: Successfully do a grand-tour of the Joolian system from a single launch.

Unlocks a 2.5 m nuclear engine.

Eve: Manned mission to and from Eve's surface would open up deep-space refueling.

Moho: (May need to complete Duna Mission first) Set up a mining colony and return rocks to Kerbin.

Unlocks a larger nuclear battery, or maybe even a nuclear reactor for energy.

Duna: Manned mission to poles and various special locations.

Opens up Interplanetary Mining.

[O-Doc]

To be honest, I really don't think SQUAD has a clue what they're doing beyond sending rockets into space as a game, as evidenced by they haphazard way they have implemented career/contracts and then turned around and said, "OK guys, the game's basically done. Enjoy" They've indicated an endgame but that revolves around cliched gameplay mechanics like developing characters(Kerbals + buildings). There's no endgame there other than the style of tech-tree completion we've already got.

If no-one beats me to it I'll be doing my own endgame mod "Kerbal Origins". The short description is that it's a massive procedurally generated(random) easer egg hunt to find alien artifacts that explain the mystery the origin of the Kerbal race. This kills two birds with one stone because it provides meaningful goals above career mode so it can be seemlessly integrated into core gameplay, as well as, providing the much needed storyline without having to throw in cheesey cut scenes or characters.

The mod will require scansat, life support and remote tech to play. The basic idea is that you have to establish an orbital station/satellite network to find all potential planet anomalies and then send and expeditionary landing party to to take readings of each one. Next you have to establish a small surface base to run scientific tests to confirm the artifact's location. Once that's done you need to send in the mining equipment to dig it up and transport it back to KSC to run tests on it to uncover it's secrets and find out the planetary body on which the next one is located. You would have a mechanic to "activate" your artifact in the KSC lab so that the next one can actually be found.

This can all be done as a special career mission without having to build a whole bunch of coding architecture. It seems pretty simple to do and presents the advantage of forcing players to master each planetary body as they play through the game. Because the artifact locations are procedurally applied at the start of a new game, every play through is different.

Edited October 29, 2014 by O-Doc

[sal_vager]

If no-one beats me to it I'll be doing my own endgame mod "Kerbal Origins"....

...It seems pretty simple to do...

Sounds good O-Doc, I'll be looking forwards to it, should expect a playable alpha in a few weeks yes?