Space Race! Idea for KSP game with friends

[Captinfannin]

Note, this is just an Idea and has not been tested... If you have ideas that could improve this, please share!

SPACE RACE!

Summary

In this game, you and a friend (or multiple friends), come up with a set of missions to be completed in order. Each of you create a new career or science mode save, depending on what your team agrees on, and begins to try to do these tasks. Who ever completes a mission first gets a certain number of points, and those who completed it after him/her get no points but still have to do the mission to move on to the next one. Note that time is Game Time, not Real time. For example, if you ship takes 1 "day" to get to mun, but in real life takes a few minutes because of time warp, then you use 1 day for the purposes of this game. Since all the players will be at very different times due to warping, you may either want to wait for everyone to finish a mission or group of missions by pausing or quitting the game, or compare you times when you all finish. Obviously, when someone completes the last mission, the person with the most points wins.

Example

Bob and Jeb decide they want to play Space Race! (If you noticed, KSP is running on a computer in the background of one of the astronaut complex upgrades.) They decide to play on career mode, and device this mission list:

1. First Unmanned Craft in Orbit- 2 point
   
2. First Kerbal In Orbit- 2 points
   
3. First ship in high orbit around Kerbin- 1 point
   
4. First Probe orbiting the mun - 2 points
   
5. First rover on the mun- 3 points
   
6. First Kerbal on the mun- 4 points
   

Bob gets the first unmanned craft in Orbit in 1 hour, getting 2 points, but Jeb still has too get one in orbit before he can launch his manned ship. He takes an hour 30 and gets no points, but manages to get the first Kerbal in orbit before Bob, getting 2 points. Bob won first ship in high orbit and first probe orbiting the mun, but Jeb got the first rover on the mun, so they both have 5 points. Bob gets to the mun with his manned ship in 2 days and waits for Jeb. When Jeb gets to the mun, it turns out he took 1 day, the time discrepancy due to using slower warp speed. So Jeb wins with 9 points and Bob loses with 5 points.

Reverting and Quicksaving

1. ​No reverting allowed
   
2. You can choose too have no quicksaving, or one quicksave and load back per mission at the cost of a time penalty. (2 hour? 2 day? 2 year?, length probably should depend if you are in the Kerbin system or not, penalties being longer outside of it.)
   
3. No loading back to an earlier save game.
   

​

Kerbal Deaths and Stranded Kerbals

1. You can optionally take a 1 point penalty every time a Kerbal dies or is stranded in space, excluding bases and stations of course.
   
2. You can also optionally make it so that a manned mission does count as completed if you get a kerbal to the destination but can't get him back (again excluding bases and station missions.) This would prevent people from making one way rockets. I highly recommend this option. If you use this option, you should probably record the time you arrived at the destination and then start heading back, instead of waiting for the other player.
   

Mission Tiers

If you would like, you can make it so that there are mission tiers, with multiple missions, that you have to complete in order rather than individual missions, where either you have to complete all the mission in that tier in any order before moving on, or only have to do a certain number of mission in that tier. Example:

1. First manned ship in orbit and First full orbit around Kerbin: 2 points
   
2. First surface sample on the mun or first seismic scan on the mun: 3 points
   
3. First probe around Duna, First Probe around Eve, or First Probe around Moho, 2 required: 6 points
   

​If you have an and tier, such as number 1, or an or tier with more than one missions required, such as number 3, then take the time that you complete all required missions in that tier, rather than the times of the individual missions, to avoid confusion. For example, if you didn't take the time that it took you to complete the entire mission tier on number 1, one player might have gotten the first Kerbal in orbit, but the other player had the first full orbit around kerbin because his distance from kerbin was like 70,001, neither player would be able to complete the mission tier since both players completed one of the missions, preventing the other player from getting credit for that mission. I you take the time it took you to complete the entire tier, than this won't happen.

Ship Requirements for Missions

Every mission in kerbin system should be completed with a new ship built and launched from kerbin after ​completing the prerequisite missions. Also, one ship can't complete two missions. For example, if you land something on the mun when you are suppose to be building a space station, then after completing your space station you next mission is to land something on the mun, you don't complete the mun mission with the thing already landed there, and you can't land you space station there to complete it, you instead have to launch another rocket to complete it. For mission in the Kerbol system, instead of having to launch a new ship, you can have ships already waiting in orbit around Kerbin, but there is still one ship limited per mission. There is exceptions to these rules of course. For example, if you do the first example mission tier in the section above (First manned ship in orbit and First full orbit around Kerbin) then you would probably want to let one ship be able to complete both missions. Also, If you the mission get to Minimus from the Mun (I don't know why you would want use that mission), then you would probably want to let a ship already on the Mun to be able to complete that mission.

Mods/Plugins

All players should use the same mods. Some mods that might be useful:

• Kerbal Construction Time, http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/92377-0-24-2-Kerbal-Construction-Time-Release-v1-0-0-%288-29-14%29, to add greater emphasis on time management and reward low cost efficient ships (shorter building times) to increase the competitive factor alot. This mod makes it so that building ships and researching takes time. Suggested by JordanL
  
• Science Funding, http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/102911, if you want to play career mode with this game, but want to focus on this game's missions rather than the ingame contracts. Gives money based on science collection.
  
• Kerbal Alarm Clock, http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/24786-0-90-Kerbal-Alarm-Clock-v3-2-3-0-(Jan-20), if you want to get really competitive and manage multiple mission at once. Allows you to set alarms that kill warp, either at a set raw time, or at important events, like a nearing maneuver node.
  
• Tech Manager, http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/98293-0-25-TechManager-Version-1-5, if you have missions that require a change in the tech tree, like if you have unmanned ship to orbit before you have manned ship to orbit. Allows you to edit and add new nodes to the tech tree. Says its only .25 compatible, but I think it should work on .90 too, at least, it did for me and a some people on its forum post.
  
• Contract Configurator, http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/101604-0-90-Contract-Configurator-v0-5-8-2015-01-20, if you are playing career mode and want your mission to actually be contracts in the game. Allows you to add custom contracts to the game, but be warned... this requires so time and knowledge of how to use this mod.
  
• DarkMultiPlayer, http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/79111-DarkMultiPlayer-0-1-0-0-KSP-0-23-5-Alpha/page1. Allows multiplayer on a single server. Perhaps with this you could have cooperative missions, such as building the K.I.S.S (Kerbal International Space Shantym) where each module is a point. Ty TechincalFool for clearing up my confusion on this.
  
• Any mod you think is essential or great. Any suggestions?
  

Honor System

It is very easy to cheat on this game. You can tell your friend false times, play on sandbox mode, say you completed something when you didn't, use grav hacks, or use a mod your friend isn't using, all without the other player knowing. So... Honor system, don't cheat... and if you do... you are a horrible person! Let all your rockets crash! ...but, if you don't trust your friend, or don't trust yourself, you could make it so that all players have to send each other recording of their gameplay, so if someone cheated, you would know.

Again, I'm going to repeat, this is an untested idea, so I don't know if it will work or not. Please, Please, test this out and give me your advice to make this game better, because I can't test it, I don't have any friends that play KSP . Also, does any one know a mod or cheat that allows you to change your funds? As you can imagine, something like that would be good for this game.

Edited January 26, 2015 by Captinfannin
Removed DMP's ? due to Technical Fool

[JordanL]

For this kind of thing Kerbal Construction Time is an absolute MUST.

[Captinfannin]

Good one! I never actually used that mod, but its obvious it would improve Space Race!'s gameplay a ton. Also... if you end up playing this with somebody, could you please tell me how it was? Sorry, I just put a lot of thought into this idea and I wanted to see how people liked it.

[JordanL]

Good one! I never actually used that mod, but its obvious it would improve Space Race!'s gameplay a ton. Also... if you end up playing this with somebody, could you please tell me how it was? Sorry, I just put a lot of thought into this idea and I wanted to see how people liked it.

I would if I had friends that played. :/

[technicalfool]

I do like to pimp DMP a lot, don't I?

It would be very useful for any multiplayer shenanigans though. Real-time chat, craft sharing, you can sit back and spectate what your friends are doing, or perhaps launch together and chase each other into orbit.

Quite fun!

[Captinfannin]

I would if I had friends that played. :/

You too, huh. Ty anyways.

I do like to pimp DMP a lot, don't I?

It would be very useful for any multiplayer shenanigans though. Real-time chat, craft sharing, you can sit back and spectate what your friends are doing, or perhaps launch together and chase each other into orbit.

Thanks for clearing up my confusion on DMP. It would allow for cool cooperative missions too, such as, building space station together where each module is a point. You could build the K.I.S.S (Kerbal International Space Shanty.)

[Brotoro]

Long before SCIENCE or Career modes, I wanted to have a Space Race on the Forum with a friend of mine. The idea was that we would be competing space administrations (each using the neutral ground of the KSC for launches). Each round, the players could build a rocket with n+1 parts, where n was the part count from the previous round. This was the limiting mechanic, since there wasn't any balanced money system yet. There were also some limits on the use of 2.5 meter parts until a certain time, length of time per round, etc.

There would be no scoring. The players would each post Press Releases in the forum thread, extolling their glorious achievements from each round (including trying to 'spin' any failures into partial successes). The reports would be for the amusement and edification of the readers (who could vote on the winner after the end).

But then my friend got busy and quit playing KSP much...so the project never took off.

[Delrey]

What if I don't have any friends? Please advise.

[Captinfannin]

Long before SCIENCE or Career modes, I wanted to have a Space Race on the Forum with a friend of mine...

...There would be no scoring. The players would each post Press Releases in the forum thread, extolling their glorious achievements from each round (including trying to 'spin' any failures into partial successes). The reports would be for the amusement and edification of the readers (who could vote on the winner after the end)...

I like this Idea, mind if I post it under a new subtitle?

What if I don't have any friends? Please advise.

I hope you mean friends that play KSP. Ask someone on the forums maybe? JordanL and I don't have any friends either...that play KSP I mean.

[Nitrous Oxide]

I started playing KSP with my ex-roommates actually... the three of us had a race to the Mun (I lost... badly, haha). I've gotta say admittedly, that nothing I've done since in KSP has been as much fun. Oh, how I miss the days when I thought shooting straight up into the sky would lead me to orbit...

I'd be down for some kind of online space race. Might actually force me to play beyond Kerbin's orbit again.