Career Reimagined (CareerR)

Version 1.2 · A Kerbal Space Program career-mode overhaul

Career Reimagined replaces KSP's grindy, repetitive stock contract system with a deliberate, milestone-driven progression. Instead of accepting endless "test part X at altitude Y" contracts, you unlock parts and capabilities by achieving real spaceflight milestones: reach orbit, land a probe on the Mun, conquer Duna, capture an asteroid. It is built around a probes-first philosophy — you fly uncrewed missions to scout and explore before committing Kerbals to the void — and a rebuilt economy where every contract, science reward, and building cost is tuned for a steady, meaningful climb rather than stock's feast-or-famine.

CareerR is built entirely from ModuleManager config patches. It ships no plugins and no DLLs.

What This Mod Does

CareerR reshapes career mode across five pillars: a milestone contract system, a rebuilt tech tree, a rebalanced dual economy, a gradual mission-driven progression, and deep Near Future compatibility.

Milestone-driven contracts. Progression is organized around 162 hand-authored contracts. Main "milestone" contracts mark the real beats of a space program — first flight, reaching orbit, leaving Kerbin's SOI, reconnaissance and conquest of each body — and unlock the corresponding tech-tree nodes when completed. Optional bonus and feat contracts (rovers, stations, mining, resource surveys, long-duration missions, aviation challenges) reward science, funds, and reputation without disrupting the core path. You reach a body's sphere of influence and its whole slate of activities opens up, letting you tackle them in whatever order you like.

A rebuilt tech tree. The tree is redesigned from the ground up around progression and part capability, weaving milestone unlocks together with science-costed capability upgrades. Milestone nodes — unlocked by flying the missions they represent — form the spine of the tree, while branching research nodes group related parts (boosters, sustainers, fairings, decouplers, construction, electrical, probes, antennas, and the propulsion capstones) and advance by size and capability. Research nodes carry science costs banded to the R&D building level, so what you can unlock is gated by how far you have upgraded R&D, not just how much science you have hoarded.

A rebalanced dual economy. Both science and funds scale on a deliberate curve: a linear regional progression (Kerbin ×1, Mun/Minmus ×2, outer planets ×3) with a difficulty multiplier within each region (light / standard / major). Early missions pay meaningfully so the opening game never feels negligible, while the outward scaling keeps later missions rewarding without making early ones irrelevant. Total obtainable science sits a little above the cost to unlock the whole tree, so you make real choices about what to research. Building-upgrade costs are tuned to the funds curve so the KSC grows in step with your program.

Gradual progression across every kind of mission. The career is paced as a deliberate climb: the Tracking Station provides patched conics and maneuver-planning support early, so you fly capable uncrewed missions from the start — probe landings, orbits, and reconnaissance come first, with crewed missions arriving later as a meaningful step up, culminating in "Conquest" contracts (orbit, land, plant a flag, return a sample) for each major body. Around that spine sits a broad slate of optional challenges covering the full range of KSP activities: rovers, crewed stations, surface outposts, resource surveys, surface mining and fuel refining, long-duration missions, biome science campaigns, aviation records, asteroid capture, and more. Whatever kind of spaceflight you enjoy, there is a mission for it.

Near Future integration. The full Near Future Technologies suite is slotted into the tech tree, alongside Restock/Restock+, Breaking Ground, Cryo Engines, Cryo Tanks, and System Heat.

⚠️ Required Difficulty Setting (READ THIS FIRST)

CareerR needs one difficulty setting to work correctly. Without it, your funds income will be badly inflated by KSP's hardcoded "World Firsts" bonuses, breaking the intended balance.

When you create your career save, set the following in the difficulty options:

• Funds Gain Multiplier (rewards): 0.1

Leave Science Gain Multiplier at its default (1.0) — the science economy is balanced to work without any adjustment.

The funds setting is also adjustable mid-game via the in-flight pause menu → Settings → Difficulty Options.

Why just funds? KSP awards hidden "World Firsts" funds and science during flight that cannot be disabled by config.

• Funds: World Firsts funds payouts are large (tens of thousands to over a million each) and cannot be neutralized any other way, so CareerR sets the Funds Gain Multiplier to 0.1 and scales its own contract reward values up by 10× to compensate. The net effect: you receive the intended funds from CareerR contracts, while the hardcoded World Firsts funds are reduced to a harmless 10%.
• Science: World Firsts science payouts are tiny (a few hundred over an entire career), so no multiplier is needed. CareerR tunes its own contract science and reduces experiment science to 50% of stock, leaving World Firsts as negligible background noise.

You will notice that contract funds rewards display as 10× larger in Mission Control (e.g. a 50,000-fund reward shows as 500,000). This is intentional — the 0.1 Funds multiplier brings the actual payout back to the intended value. Science rewards display at their true values.

Requirements

Required dependencies (install these or the mod will not function):

• Module Manager
• Contract Configurator
• Custom Barn Kit

Recommended / soft dependencies (the mod works without them, but some parts will not appear if absent):

• ReStock + ReStock Plus — several spaceplane and structural parts in the tech tree reference ReStock+ parts.
• Breaking Ground expansion — robotics parts (hinges, rotor shrouds) reference Breaking Ground.

Supported mods (compatibility patches included; install any, all, or none):

• Near Future Aeronautics, Construction, Electrical, Exploration, Launch Vehicles, Propulsion, Solar, and Spacecraft
• Cryo Engines and Cryo Tanks
• System Heat

Parts from missing mods are simply skipped; no errors occur.

Installation

1. Install the required dependencies above (via CKAN or manually).
2. Copy the CareerReimagined folder into your GameData directory.
3. If you are updating from a previous version, delete the Module Manager cache: remove GameData/ModuleManager.ConfigCache, ModuleManager.ConfigSHA, and ModuleManager.TechTree so the game rebuilds them on next launch.
4. Start a new career save and set the Funds Gain Multiplier to 0.1 (see above).

CareerR is balanced for a fresh career. Loading it into an in-progress stock career is not supported and will produce inconsistent unlock states.

Building Upgrades (Custom Barn Kit)

CareerR retunes all the KSC facilities on a six-tier cost ladder tuned to the funds economy. A few highlights worth knowing:

• Tracking Station gives patched conics (the orbit display needed for maneuver planning) from the very first level, with deep-space network range and conic-patch depth scaling up as you upgrade.
• Mission Control must reach level 2 to unlock the maneuver-node tool (a stock requirement that pairs with the Tracking Station).
• R&D is the main science gate: level 2 opens the mid-tier research band, level 3 opens the endgame band. It also unlocks surface samples and in-flight fuel transfer.
• Astronaut Complex level 2 unlocks EVA on other bodies, flag planting, clambering, and EVA parachutes.

Compatibility Notes

• CareerR disables stock contracts and stock Administration strategies, since progression is mission-driven.
• A compatibility patch is included for KSP Community Fixes' recovery-refund behavior.
• The mod assumes a stock-scale system. It has not been tested with rescale mods (2.5×, JNSQ, RSS) and the contract difficulty and economy balance are tuned for stock scale.

Known Limitations

• Flag-planting parameters complete only after the Kerbal re-boards the vessel (a Contract Configurator behavior, not a bug). Plant your flag, then return your Kerbal to the craft for the parameter to register.
• Surface samples require both R&D and Astronaut Complex at level 2. Plan your building upgrades before attempting a Conquest mission.
• The fuel refinery contract requires you to arrive with nearly empty fuel tanks and refine fuel on the surface — launch your mining rig dry, or the "arrive empty" step will not register.
• After editing any CareerR config file, delete the Module Manager cache (see Installation step 3) for changes to take effect.

Credits

• Built on Contract Configurator by nightingale, Custom Barn Kit by sarbian, and Module Manager by sarbian/blowfish.
• Near Future Technologies and Restock/Restock+ by Nertea — CareerR integrates these parts into its tech tree, and the mods are warmly recommended alongside it.
• Stock-contract-disabling approach adapted from Malah's public-domain StockNoContracts.
• Some contract concepts were inspired by Career Evolution by pap1723.

License

Released under the MIT License. You are free to use, modify, and redistribute CareerR's configs, including in your own mods and modpacks, provided the license notice is retained.

Feedback

Found a contract that will not complete, a part in the wrong place, or a balance issue? Reports are welcome — please include your KSP.log and a description of what you were doing when the issue occurred.