[1.3.x] SETI, Unmanned before Manned [Patreon]

[Yemo]

With the latest unmotivated disimprovements to the already not-so-good stock tech tree layout and thus the forced workload without benefit when supporting it or other tech trees based on it (eg CTT), I decided to start working on my own tech tree, independent of unmotivated meddling for its own sake.

So that I waste less time in future updates and have more time for gameplay improvements.

[Lord Aurelius]

@Yemo

Unmotivated disimprovements. I like it.

If you need some help with the tech tree I might be able to lend a hand.

Are you planning on starting out with just stock parts for now since procedural parts is no longer a core SETI mod?

[PeterPan]

I appreciate your effort of building your own tech tree. Please follow your way like in the last updates, which i liked a lot. And please keep up the support for using stock parts. I found out that i don't like the procedural parts that much, but i like a lot your adjustments of gameplay.

[Lord Aurelius]

There's a great discussion here on the progression and tech tree issues in 1.0.

[SwGustav]

Ugh, I'm taking my words back, progression isn't any better really. There is more stuff to do but tech tree prevents you from it. This was worst Mun mission ever, I had to push my spacecraft in EVA for 15 real minutes to get back home simply because all 2.5m essential parts are in 3 different nodes. Then it's a science snowball all again...

[FreeThinker]

With the latest unmotivated disimprovements to the already not-so-good stock tech tree layout and thus the forced workload without benefit when supporting it or other tech trees based on it (eg CTT), I decided to start working on my own tech tree, independent of unmotivated meddling for its own sake.

So that I waste less time in future updates and have more time for gameplay improvements.

Your own Techtree? are you sure, because that means you have to make sure all parts from all parts are put in the correct nodes. which is a lot of work

I would suggest to use at least the same node name used in CTT, that way if I would put a new part in an exiting CTT node, it would also be avaialble with your Techtree

- - - Updated - - -

Ugh, I'm taking my words back, progression isn't any better really. There is more stuff to do but tech tree prevents you from it. This was worst Mun mission ever, I had to push my spacecraft in EVA for 15 real minutes to get back home simply because all 2.5m essential parts are in 3 different nodes. Then it's a science snowball all again...

Well people should first try to gather most Science on Kerbin before attempting to go the Mun

Edited April 29, 2015 by FreeThinker

[Yemo]

Your own Techtree? are you sure, because that mean you have to make sure all parts from all parts are put in the correct nodes. which is a lot of work

I would suggest to use at least the same node name used in CTT, that way if I would put a new part in an exiting CTT node, it would also be compatible with your Techtree

I supported the CTT so that I have less work with it than doing another tech tree and because it offered a solid basis.

Now Squad decided to change the stock tree in a modding unfriendly way (shifting nodes around for no reason, creating dead ends, removing experimental nodes not used by stock parts, creating superficial choices like extra tank nodes), while making it non-MM moddable, not fixing serious layout/progression issues (unmanned tech for 1000 science gives a single probe core with a bit larger diameter) and decreasing functionality compared to TechManager.

And CTT seems to be set to change with it.

So I have to recheck everything just to get a worse state than before? That is seriously aggrevating and a non acceptable basis for future development.

Also I can not use the CTT nodes, because 1. they are license restricted and 2. I would make myself dependent on the CTT again.

I do not want to have to jump every time squad decides to make parts of the game worse than before, just because they feel like rushing an update without community feedback for monetary reasons.

Also, the tech tree seems to be non-moddable at the moment with MM and I still can not find configs to alter the building upgrade progression, which was introduced 4 months ago. I guess fancy new IVAs and shaky cam were more important than moddability, at least for selling copies.

So at the moment, there simply is no SETI development. Cant make a balance mod without half way proper and stable tech tree. And squads priorities (which are always spottable by changes in quality control) seem to have shifted from moddability to stuff which looks good in videos and pictures and feature lists.

It is not like there is effort involved in externalizing the building upgrade parameters, if you construct it around that. The only reason for hardcoding those parameters is a strategic decision to make them non moddable, which should have been a warning sign for a "balance" mod when 0.90 was released. Now they release a tech tree config, apparently without consulting the people who made the previous basis for modded tech trees (TechManager) or the person who makes the tool for changing configs for KSP (ModuleManager).

On the other hand, they give out the prereleases to twitch streamers, who seem to have looked at KSP for 2 minutes before doing the stream, for marketing reasons...

Edited April 29, 2015 by Yemo

[Lord Aurelius]

So at the moment, there simply is no SETI development. Cant make a balance mod without half way proper and stable tech tree. And squads priorities (which are always spottable by changes in quality control) seem to have shifted from moddability to stuff which looks good in videos and pictures and feature lists.

I'm sad to hear that's there's no SETI development at the moment, but I totally understand. I've not been happy with Squad's priorities either for quite some time, and 1.0 is a disappointment on almost all fronts (I think the only really new, useful feature is kerbal clamber, the rest are basically mod integrations). There are some major bugs and balance issues that need to be properly fixed (at least the stock bug fix modules is already updated to fix the worst of those) and really show that Squad was more concerned with adding features as selling points and getting the game out the door than doing a proper release. Hopefully they'll address these issues in the next update (the fact that they've already announced that they're working on 1.0.1 shows that they know 1.0 has major issues even if they won't acknowledge it directly).

I tried playing career a bit only to get frustrated with the awful tech tree and progression balance, if SETI is on hold for now then I'll likely take a hiatus from KSP for awhile until after 1.0.1/1.0.2 fixes and new/updated mods hopefully resolve some of the issues so we can have a proper SETI release. My offer to help out with SETI if needed still stands, I'll still check in here periodically to see where things are at.

Edited April 29, 2015 by Lord Aurelius

[Dimenus]

Now Squad decided to change the stock tree in a modding unfriendly way (shifting nodes around for no reason, creating dead ends, removing experimental nodes not used by stock parts, creating superficial choices like extra tank nodes), while making it non-MM moddable,

In what way is the new tree not MM moddable?

This has been an awesome change of pace mod btw. I really enjoyed/enjoy my 0.90 setup with FAR/DRE/Remote Tech.

[Yemo]

In what way is the new tree not MM moddable?

This has been an awesome change of pace mod btw. I really enjoyed/enjoy my 0.90 setup with FAR/DRE/Remote Tech.

Hm, seems the new module manager is capable of changing the tech tree. Although there is still the issue of the unused but required nodes.

I'm sad to hear that's there's no SETI development at the moment, but I totally understand. I've not been happy with Squad's priorities either for quite some time, and 1.0 is a disappointment on almost all fronts (I think the only really new, useful feature is kerbal clamber, the rest are basically mod integrations). There are some major bugs and balance issues that need to be properly fixed (at least the stock bug fix modules is already updated to fix the worst of those) and really show that Squad was more concerned with adding features as selling points and getting the game out the door than doing a proper release. Hopefully they'll address these issues in the next update (the fact that they've already announced that they're working on 1.0.1 shows that they know 1.0 has major issues even if they won't acknowledge it directly).

I tried playing career a bit only to get frustrated with the awful tech tree and progression balance, if SETI is on hold for now then I'll likely take a hiatus from KSP for awhile until after 1.0.1/1.0.2 fixes and new/updated mods hopefully resolve some of the issues so we can have a proper SETI release. My offer to help out with SETI if needed still stands, I'll still check in here periodically to see where things are at.

Thank you for your offer.

However with squad strategically placing looks and feature list before modding friendlyness (building upgrades, techtree and so on) or bug fixing and gameplay balancing, I m hesitant to put time into a new tech tree.

So I ll maybe just support the new CTT, when it works and correct some stuff for basic compatiblity with 1.0, but will not develop SETI further under those circumstances.

I m sorry for that, but I can not and do not want to work against the the devs direction for the game, because I can not win and the costs in terms of workload will only increase.

And the last update made pretty clear where the train is heading, for those who did not pick up the hints from 0.90 and the cancellation of a proper beta.

Short term monetizability/marketability is now the benchmark for development.

Edited April 29, 2015 by Yemo

[Svm420]

Short term monetizability/marketability is now the benchmark for development.

This is what i feared as well. With most customers playing stock we don't even have a chance for our voices to be heard and get changes made. Sad really. I won't play 1.0 career without out some balance mod as it feel stupid how it is now. Aero is still crap. Improved crap, but still crap. NuFAR can't come soon enough at least then I can play career pretend in sandbox and I hate non career mode. I just don't get how they can even be proud let alone ok with career mode. They should have removed it if they don't really care about it. You mod was what made me play as much as I do. damn damn damn

[Lord Aurelius]

I haven't really seen any reviews on any gaming sites of 1.0 yet, in some ways I hope they really put Squad on the spot and highlight the issues with the game so they'll have some real incentive to fix them. From reading through the forums I'm seeing a lot of new posters highlighting these issues with accessibility and progression, so it seems the new players aren't happy with the new update either.

I agree with your quote about the new benchmark, I actually think it started even before 0.90 when curse was arbitrarily chosen as the new mod host with much protest from the community. I've gotten the impression as well that they don't particularly care about community building, just more sales and reaching new players instead of building a solid foundation for the game. I really hope they learn their lesson quickly before more experienced modders start leaving the scene (I believe I heard something like this happened before and a lot of the early modders are no longer part of the community).

I'm still hoping that the lack of promised modding support for buildings is primarily a symptom of the rushed release (which is still disconcerting) and will be included in the 1.0.1 update or soon after.

I'm still waiting to see what happens over the next few weeks/months, with the promised future updates and a modding community as resourceful and capable as what we have for this game, I'm tentatively hopeful that these issues will be resolved. Many other early access games have launched prematurely with community protest and still ended up being quite good, but it often took several months as the devs finally got around to doing what they really should have done before release. I'm going to try to stay positive and hope for that outcome, and probably take a break from KSP for the time being to preserve my sanity. I've got plenty of other games to play in the meantime.

Edited April 29, 2015 by Lord Aurelius

[Svm420]

It looks like buildings may be moddable. This would drastically improve career progression.

[Enceos]

@Yemo, I think you haven't yet puzzled out every change Squad has made. And jump to accusations too soon. API has been vastly extended for moddability, if you are into programming. If you had known how to write plugins you'd understand.

Edited May 1, 2015 by Enceos

[Lord Aurelius]

@Svm420

That's great news, I hope that the career modders can get together and write a building configurator type plugin that can read values from a cfg file.

As far as my impressions with KSP 1.0, they're more positive than they were initially now that I've calmed down a bit and some mods have been updated (stock bug fix modules and real parachutes fix the worst of the bugs that made it into release) so I can at least play sandbox now (I'm avoiding that tech tree for now, it's too painful to look at), although I still think that Squad really jumped the gun on this release. The good news is they're working on a hotfix and modders appear to be busy updating mods (and hopefully writing new ones to take advantage of all those new programming methods) so I'm hopeful this will all blow over soon and we can get back to enjoying KSP with a shiny new SETI for 1.0.

[Yemo]

@Yemo, I think you haven't yet puzzled out every change Squad has made. And jump to accusations too soon. API has been vastly extended for moddability, if you are into programming. If you had known how to write plugins you'd understand.

@Svm420

That's great news, I hope that the career modders can get together and write a building configurator type plugin that can read values from a cfg file.

As far as my impressions with KSP 1.0, they're more positive than they were initially now that I've calmed down a bit and some mods have been updated (stock bug fix modules and real parachutes fix the worst of the bugs that made it into release) so I can at least play sandbox now (I'm avoiding that tech tree for now, it's too painful to look at), although I still think that Squad really jumped the gun on this release. The good news is they're working on a hotfix and modders appear to be busy updating mods (and hopefully writing new ones to take advantage of all those new programming methods) so I'm hopeful this will all blow over soon and we can get back to enjoying KSP with a shiny new SETI for 1.0.

While I have not figured out every change squad made, I still have not found configs for the building upgrades.

Putting a few simple values behind programming is not very modding friendly. I unfortunately doubt something like contract configurator and filter extensions is published for that speciality topic.

Seeing the new flavor of the week aero model (after release/beta, rofl), I do not think that overall I jumped to conclusions too early, about the state of 1.0.

NEW Download: SETI-Contracts for KSP 1.0.2

In other news, since I can not base a balance mod on a flavor of the week stock "balance", I decided to split it up and make those spin-offs available in the OP of this thread as well, to keep the discussion in place.

In a first move, I launched the SETI-Contracts as a separate mod. This way, they can be combined with other TechTrees or even with stock without having to dig through the zip.

At the moment, only the previously available contracts are included, but it works with 1.0.2 and the latest contract configurator and module manager version.

Edited May 4, 2015 by Yemo

[Lord Aurelius]

@Yemo

FlowerChild made some comments about looking into modding the upgradeable buildings for BTSM, it might be worth asking him if he might be interested in making a more general plugin for editing the buildings that could be used by all career mods. But I definitely agree that this functionality should have been exposed in a cfg, it seems kind of silly to lock up this specific aspect when pretty much everything else is in cfgs.

Yeah, when I made the comment earlier I was expecting an actual hotfix, not a spur of the moment major change to a new system. It is likely wise to wait for things to settle down before putting a bunch of work into updating the mod. While I'm still positive about the long-term future of KSP, I agree that 1.0.2 is still very much an alpha/beta product (and that Squad still doesn't really understand software development or community management).

Anyways, glad to see you have an action plan for SETI going forwards, stock just feels like it's missing something every time I play it now due to the lack of balance and polish. You've really added a lot to this game for me, I didn't realize how much until I tried to play 1.0 without SETI. Keep up the good work!

[Papa_Joe]

Just a note to SETI users. Ship Manifest 4.2.0.0 released. Gender bending, Multi Resource and multi part transfers. LF+O anyone?

[Enceos]

@Yemo the building upgrades are there, in KSP API there are commands to return building levels for mods, KSP 1.0 even exposed GameVariables which stores stock values related to the building levels. We need a dedicated plugin to make these things changeable by configs.

Yes. Mu made all GameVariables 's methods virtual, so you can create a child class, overload them all, and replace the existing instance.

FlowerChild is delving into it more than any other modder.

Aerodynamics and thermodynamics are an experiment for Squad, I'm not putting my hopes there. I'm really hyped for nuFAR and Deadly Reentry, these people know what they do.

Edited May 4, 2015 by Enceos

[Yemo]

@Papa_Joe: Thank you, cant wait for the "gender bending" ;-).

I will definately keep a look out for the building changes FlowerChild comes up with.

Also, I m working on the SETI-CommunityTechTree spin-off. While I m not really liking the new stock tech tree and the CTT based on it, it is just the least work to use that as a base.

I will have a basic version for the stock parts tomorrow, so users can at least begin a new game starting with probes (and the SETI contracts).

There will be some minor probe rebalancing (mass, SAS, costs) to go with it, but only as much as needed for a credible probe core progression...

The rest of the mods should follow soon, based on the last version of the 0.90 BalanceMod.

[Lord Aurelius]

@Yemo

Excellent, glad to see that SETI is almost available for 1.0.

I might actually play through the career mode now.

[Yemo]

@Yemo

Excellent, glad to see that SETI is almost available for 1.0.

I might actually play through the career mode now.

Well, only the TechTree changes and the contract progression is planned for 1.0 so far, in the form of spin-offs.

All the rest, like science, parts and procedural rebalancing will have to wait until KSP is out of beta, not only by name but by actual status.

But those 2 should make (modded) KSP 1.0 progression at least bearable...

[Lord Aurelius]

@Yemo

Those two things alone at least address the main shortcomings of career mode, individual part balance in 1.0 has improved from earlier versions so it should be tolerable for now. My science tweaks still seem to work fine in 1.0 so I can just use those as-is for now with the stock science values.

[Jahnri]

Thank you so much for the work Yemo! I had just got back into Kerbals right before 1.0 released and I tried you mod compilation with .90 and honestly I can barely play with the way the game is now. I look forward to tomorrow and using your tech tree changes. I have really big plans as far as a full scale colonization of minmus and your project will be the backbone

[Yemo]

I decided to make some adjustments to the CTT itself and put some parts in other places compared to the 0.90 SETI-BalanceMod, but I hope to finish the basic (stock parts) tech tree within the next few hours.