KAS and Kerbal Engineers, its only logical

[MKI]

For those that have gotten their hands on Career and used the Kerbal Experience I'm sure you found how how far reaching the Engineer Skills are. For the most part engineers are useful when you screw up, or something breaks. But thats about it, beyond that they sit around and don't help the flight like the pilot or help your science gains like the scientists.

Its pretty clear that the game lets:

Pilots impact the Flight part of the game

Scientists impact the Science/tech part of the game

But engineers hardly can affect anything in the Building part of the game.

There really are a few ways squad can buff out the engineer roles so they are more than "We need this fixed".

1. They can add "flight engineer" type boosts, acting as data relays to help pilots fly. Think of a cut down Kerbal Engineer (makes sense hu?) with more levels adding more detail to the data. Such as true altitude, AP, PE heights, what biome you will land in ETC.

2. They can add more things that can break and be fixed. Maybe engines can malfunction (THAT WOULD BE BAD!) Or struts can break? This is a very gray sort of suggestion, but entirely possible.

3. They can add something in line with the Kerbal Attatchment System Mod. Which adds utility parts and the ability for Kerbals to do minor building on ships. Such as adding struts, lights, fuel lines, and small parts like batteries or science gear. Along with that the mod adds winches and grapple hooks. All of which an Engineer would be able to manipulate.

The third option seems like the most interesting(at least to me) as then the Engineer would be more a representative of the building aspect of the game. Being able to rig together ships in space with struts, or bases on land with fuel lines. It's also not really a question as if this is in the "scope" of the game, since nearly half the game (or a third in career) is building things. Why not move some of the building into the flying/simulation part of the game for a more dynamic experience.

I would be pretty disappointed if the Devs neglect adding something like this. They have even been quoted as saying they would like to look into this mod. So I hope to see some move toward getting this kind of mod into the game in the future.

[Alias72]

I wouldn't be too worried. The engineer was obviously the least thought out class. I wouldn't be surprised if a majority of his functionality is dependent on parts of the game not yet implemented. He very well may serve as a form of Kerbal Engineer. Telling you your current mass and DV in flight. And I wouldn't be surprised if KER values become accessible from the hanger. It only adds to the game.

[FishInferno]

I just want to be able to attach struts via EVA. thats all I really care about (not that id complain if the other stuff was added)

[MKI]

Struts alone would be an excellent addition. KAS offers a lot that might be outside of the scope of the game. Such as anchors or magnets (never really figured out how those work) but the general fundamentals (building with kerbals) is the main addition.

[Rook116]

I suggest they truncate the repair skills and allow for resource efficiency (electrcity, fuel consumption) improvements for engineers.

Level 1 - Repair Parachutes, Legs, wheels

Level 2 - Improve resource efficiency by 2.5%

Level 3 - Improve resource efficiency by 5%

Level 4 - Improve resource efficiency by 7.5%

Level 5 - Improve resource efficiency by 10%.

EDITED - So apparently this idea caused a kerbal spare parts war in another thread. I'm going to gracefully attach this post to the rear of a rocket and just let it burn up in re-entry.

Edited December 19, 2014 by Rook116

[Kesa]

I suggest they truncate the repair skills and allow for resource efficiency (electrcity, fuel consumption) improvements for engineers.

Level 1 - Repair Parachutes, Legs, wheels

Level 2 - Improve resource efficiency by 2.5%

Level 3 - Improve resource efficiency by 5%

Level 4 - Improve resource efficiency by 7.5%

Level 5 - Improve resource efficiency by 10%.

EDITED - So apparently this idea caused a kerbal spare parts war in another thread. I'm going to gracefully attach this post to the rear of a rocket and just let it burn up in re-entry.

Yeah it breaks physics.

Currently, only lvl 1 pilot are usefull, engeneers should be able to repair chute an lvl 1.

[NWM]

Yeah! And repairable solar panels.

"KAS" with spare part system should be integrated, and gives good opportunity for the engineer level scaling. Leave resource efficiency alone!

[Carmoldu]

KAS idea sounds cool! They should amke the rovers go faster too, this would make everyone reserve a seat to an engineer for sure hahaha

Point number 2, no please, I already have enough explosions o.o

About the orbit info, even though I really like it and I use mods which will display that info for me, for what I read in the past squad doesn't favour this idea. MMaybe now that this could be expanded slowly through gameplay maybe thy reconsider, who knows...

[Mutex]

Bear in mind that engineers can repack parachutes, take a moment to consider that. It means that if you bring an engineer, a craft that lands using parachutes can be 100% reusable. I was about to start designing a spaceplane to be able to repeatedly land on Laythe and re-orbit, but now I'm considering a more conventional lander with parachutes instead (it might not have enough dV though). Other possibilities are planes/spaceplanes that use parachutes as brakes when landing.

It's a pretty important ability, so I wouldn't necessarily say they're currently underpowered or useless. Some KAS-like ability would be good though, if only the ability to connect fuel lines between craft.

[Nemrav]

Thinking of KAS, I think final tree would be like this...

lvl1: repack chute

lvl2: repair leg/wheel

lvl3: repair/ deploy solar panels

lvl4: place struts

lvl5: place fuel lines

[Pulstar]

Placing struts, fuel lines, static solar panels, small sensors or batteries in EVA would be great. They could use the old toolbox part Claira designed as a generic junk, i mean spare parts container that eventually depetes itself. Or allow kerbals to pick up those parts from one vessel and attach them to another (kerbal jury-rigging, it's fun for the whole family!). Or maybe allow kerbals to salvage small parts from old vessels to refill the toolbox (have debris flying/lying around in deep space? can't let perfectly good junk go to waste!).