Thoughts, Comments, and Suggestions after 300+ cycles

[jzrum]

Thoughts on Rockets:

• You can simply build storage bins in the command capsule of the rocket (mentioned in other posts), which, for short trips, you can easily build up to 5 in the basic capsule, and transport 100,000kg or so. At this point, I refuse to build storage bins and move cargo this way, because it just plain makes it too easy and boring. I’ve seen others discuss the 500kg per cargo bay, and tbh, I find this is actually pretty reasonable in that I typically ship high value materials (refined end products) like steel and plastic to my other asteroids, saving the need to set up the industry required to produce them. With only three return trips using a sucrose engine (plus oxidizer) required to get enough steel, refined metal and plastic to build an aquatuner and turbine (plus extra plastic for mini gas pumps and high pressure gas vents), each taking me about 2 cycles per trip, I find the limitation is more the building speed of my dupes on the other asteroid (though I play with small dupe populations); this might change with further asteroids of course.
• I think there should be a dedicated life support module, which contains (or could contain) things like a lav, bunk, oxygen, water, filtration, etc. (I think the command capsule should be separate from a passenger capsule). I think it would be awesome if the rocket interior expanded as you added components, and had a ladder than runs down the spine of the ship. For example, a life support module that lets you add a bunk, lav, filtration, oxygen tank, and food storage components (really looking forward to when rocket trips take more than ~0.5 cycles). As another example, a cargo bay or biological storage container adds space the dupe can move through to check on their cargo/feed critters/etc. I think this could be done as either a build out set-up or a pre-configured set up. If it’s a build out set-up, there definitely needs to be some way to prevent using storage bins (see above point) to transport stuff (and like wise for gases and liquids), otherwise the cargo module is i.e. useless unless you want everything automated (and that’s not even getting into fuel consumption per kg cargo transported); maybe you could include the mass inside the ship (perhaps anything above a set limit) in the calculations against distance travelled for fuel consumption. I’m sure there are many who would prefer to build out the interior of the rocket as opposed to being constrained. Personally, I like the idea of the modules being pre-configured, though so far I have found that I only need to fill the rockets with enough oxygen for the trip (or use atmo suits) and so there is no need to build anything but a canister emptier in the command capsule.
• I think it would be awesome if you could set the travel speed to reduce fuel consumption, and let the rocket 'coast' part of the trip. It would be pretty cool if you had to coast smaller less tech intensive rockets to make it to far out asteroids, instead of running at full speed with something like a hydrogen or petro rocket. Coasting or floating in space/orbit could make your dupe experience zero-gee, which could cause a debuf and/or injuries for prolonged exposure. I think this would pair well with a space exploration module. There could also be a high-gee exposure to the dupes, which could cause a debuf and/or injuries for prolonged exposure. The chance of high-gee injuries could increase if you’re flying rockets with too large of engines and not enough burden on the rocket. Maybe even increase the chance of injury if your dupe has a large zero-gee debuf and then experiences high-gee.  You could also add an artificial gravity (i.e. centrifugal force) module to give your dupes respite from prolonged zero-gee if you’re coasting a rocket out to a distant asteroid.
• I think it would be awesome if your ship had power production/consumption and energy storage, which would need to be considered when configuring your rocket. So for example, the power production could be a parasitic load that reduces the thrust of the rocket, which would limits how much / what type of equipment you could place on the rocket and contributes to limitations in how far the rocket can go. Maybe you could have a simple life support module to sustain one dupe with low power uses and a small battery (which maybe you could charge through your rocket pad before launch), a complex life support module for pro-longed trips with higher power uses and a large battery to sustain multiple dupes, a passenger module (which i.e. allows more dupes into the rocket) that would require a complex life support module to sustain a full passenger load and would have additional power consumption, an artificial gravity (i.e. centrifugal force) module that has a power use when the rocket is coasting/floating, and of course a base load for the command capsule. The batteries would have to sustain the power demands when coasting/floating as well (or you could maybe have a manual treadmill located in one of the modules). Of course, this could all be worked into both build-out and pre-configured rockets.
• Currently, it requires shipping to load cargo bays on rockets... it would be nice to have a way to manually load things onto the rocket, which could just take time to do  (so they have to carry the material there, and then perform the action much the same as using a metal refinery. Or if the dupe can see the interior of cargo bay, they have to carry the material into the rocket and then perform the action of loading it into the cargo bay from inside the rocket). Currently, to unload a cargo bay on the rocket you can simply click empty storage, and bypass the need for shipping to unload it; this should also be a duplicant action that has to be performed and take time to do, which would encourage using shipping to load and unload rockets but not make it necessary
• Currently, it requires manually filling the small command capsule with oxygen, which I’m not a fan of. It would be nice to have a gas input so you can simply pump oxygen into the rocket capsule and an automation signal that returns a green if below a pressure inside or red if above. I like having the automation signals on the rocket pad, since you don’t have to re-wire your automation every time you change your rocket, but perhaps it could pass out an automation ribbon with multiple signals (one for launch checklist, one for command capsule oxygen, one for cargo loaded, etc.).  It would also be nice to have a pressure limit on gas release from the canister emptier to allow you to just set each canister emptier in each rocket to auto-bottle (limiting the micro-managing of your rockets). It would also be nice to have an auto-bottle feature on the canister filler, so then your dupes will automatically make sure your rockets are topped up with oxygen if you have everything set-up accordingly. It would also be nice to be able to store full gas canisters inside the command capsule, so you have a reserve of oxygen on hand. Once I get to atmo suits, I find I basically just run the entire trip in an atmo suit (probably not feasible for long trips, but for the short 0.5 cycle trips so far it works fine), and have an empty suit dock on either side of the trip.
• It would be nice to have an auto-disembark selection, so that when you’re dupe arrives at the destination they automatically disembark and the rocket is set to allow all dupes automatically. The number of times I’ve gotten distracted with some or other and forgotten to change the crew to all so that my dupe disembarks (leading to said dupe making a mess of the command capsule or their atmo suit)…
• I’ve seen some debate on the CO2 engine vs steam engine, and I think both should be available (I mean, why not? the mechanic for steam engines is already there from the base game). The CO2 engine is a nice way to use up the CO2 from your dupes, but unless you’re using a lot of coal, petro, ethanol, or wood for power, its not exactly a great form of rocket fuel. The steam engine is a great way to use up some excess heat, such as from an aquatuner or a volcano or whatever.
• Should be able to rename the rockets.

Thoughts on Space/Vacuum:

• Space/vacuum is a too harmless at present. I’m not going to get into the meteorite debate, but I think another way to address this would be to add a debuf/injury (maybe decompression sickness) when dupes are exposed to vacuum for prolonged periods (more than say 30s or something). This would encourage the use of atmo suits for space, but not make it ‘mandatory’
• There is currently no need for bunker tiles/doors, unless there are going to be some asteroids which have meteorites. It’s kind of nice not having meteorites since it avoids all the infrastructure/industry and tonnes of steel to set up in space, making it more accessible early game; however, there was something extremely satisfying about having the bunker doors open up before launching the rocket out of its silo.

Thoughts on Teleporters/Warp Pipes

• When a dupe is assigned to a teleporter, teleport them automatically (or provide an option), otherwise if you forget they just stand in there until they wet themselves when you finally remember (or get an alert) and teleport them to the other side.
• Personally, I would prefer to have the teleporter transmitter/receiver and the warp pipe input/output all be located in one small area (perhaps teleporter transmitter and warp input on one level and teleporter receiver + warp output on other) (and I’m sure others like it as is, this is personal preference), and to have all of the glass removed (replace it with the regular tiles and drywall). The availability of so much glass really makes power a non-issue since you can just build a tonne of solar panels. I also think it would be nice to have the option of having or not having the teleporters and warp pipes. Personally, I think it’s more challenging, and thus more fun, to not use the teleporters and warp devices and have to rely on rockets exclusively. I think it would also be nice to have a setting to include/not include the misc. buildings/junk on the maps.

Thoughts on Automation:

• It would be awesome to have a radio transmitter / receiver for automation, which would basically let you avoid running automation wire across the map in those odd cases where you have a need for it. A small-ish power consumption on the transmitter would prevent it from being used unless necessary (say maybe 25 W). A good example of how you could use this is to transmit a signal from your rocket to a gas pump or gas shutoff inside your base that controls the CO2 flow to your rocket and automates filling the rocket. Perhaps there could be a low power and high power set, low power working only on one asteroid, and high power allowing signals to be transmitted between asteroids. I’m not quite sure how well this would work with how the map is set up, so maybe just transmitters with a high power demand (100W or greater) would be useful.
• Would love to have editable fields in the cycle sensor instead of just the slider (something that’s bothered me since vanilla).

Thoughts on the new Marsh Biome:

• Bog buckets are very useful early on as a food source (and in the general aim of sustainability) since they only consume polluted water; however, at 1840 kcal/6.6 cycles with 40 kg/cycle pH2O consumption, they produce 6.97 kcal/cycle/kg pH2O. In comparison, bristle blossoms at 1600 kcal/6.0 cycles with 20kg/cycle H2O, produce 13.33 kcal/cycle/kg H2O. When you consider the pure water economy of bristle blossoms vs bog buckets, it’s pretty much a no brainer to switch to growing bristles since you can grow twice as much food with the same water, especially with only the two water geysers on the starting asteroid (and no others so far), and the cooked version is the same quality (+1 grisly). Of course, this isn’t considering the light requirements of bristle blossoms, but with space being so friendly solar makes it easy to provide the power for this. I didn’t include sweetle tending in this calculation because it applies to both bog buckets and bristle blossoms at present. I also haven’t checked if there is higher quality food that can be produced from the cooked version of bog buckets; however, you can also just grow pincha peppers (currently available on the starting asteroid) with some polluted water and then cook stuffed berry.
• I do like the dynamic of the new critters (both sweetles and grubgrubs); however, I tend to mainly ranch sweetles in a ‘farm’ to produce sucrose for rocket fuel and increase growth speed (rather than using it to cook grubfruit into grubfruit preserve). My current strategy is to ranch a grubgrub in my typical drecko ranch with grubfruit so that when I ‘get lucky’ (which will happen eventually) and get drecklet eggs or a drecklet from my printing pod, I can quickly change over to a drecko ranch to produce reed fibre for atmo suits and then plastic (this would be somewhat harder if you didn’t have the warp pipes, since you wouldn’t have as easy access to mealwood to feed the dreckos, though definitely still possible). I also push for the third asteroid where I can get pips/arbor trees and dreckos/mealwood. Being able to produce atmo suits and plastic pretty much negates the need in the short term for oil from the second asteroid accessed through the teleporters/warp pipe (can generally work around not having oil until the late game, not to mention, the few games I’ve played have all had the oil biomes breaching the core, so that asteroid quickly becomes a race to simply insulate anywhere the oil biomes breach into other biomes so that the asteroid doesn’t become too hot all over, and then waiting on atmo suits before bothering to deal with it).

Thoughts on other starting asteroids:

• Would definitely love to have an oassise style starting asteroid. It could have maybe one oil biome with a single oil reservoir, one jungle biome with a few dreckos and a single cool steam vent (make water super scarce) (or one swamp biome with reed fibre and a single cool steam vent; might be better to have a swamp biome since it gives access to reed fibre but not plastic, requiring use of oil to produce plastic) and nothing else but desert (sandstone, sand, and copper ore) beneath the uppermost abyssalite boundary and sand above (not even teleporters/warp pipes). I think this would be a really fun starting asteroid because, being so resource scarce, it would really encourage the development of other asteroids.

General Thoughts:

• It would be nice to be able to change the names of the asteroids once we’ve discovered them (much like rockets).
• Would be nice to have all of the pre-existing buildings de-constructable (with the exception of things like the neural vacillator, AETN, etc.). There’s nothing worse than a bunch of junk buildings right where you wanted to build some part of your base. With the ‘smaller’ asteroids, it’s more likely to have stuff in the way of where you want to build (in vanilla you could usually just build around it and ignore it).

Bugs:

• Dupe made a mess of their suit in a rocket, I manually moved them into the asteroid where they un-suited, but retained the soiled suit debuf. I had to manually move them back through the atmo suit checkpoint (where they suited up), then back to the other side again (unsuited) to get the debuf to disappear. I think I saw a post about someone else having a similar issue.
• When selecting a rocket component to build, if a priority is selected, it doesn't actually set the priority on the build (you have to do so after setting the component to be built).

[KonfigSys]

radio automation is great. You can finally use this panel from automation to indicate problems not only in the home planet but from other planets as well. Imagine that you create an operator room with all these panels - one for each asteroid collecting vital information from sensors and displaying it in colors.

if I have 5000 kg transportation module I would stop using bins for cargo in the ship. I mentioned earlier 500kg is nothing. I do not know how you haul refined metal (gold and Al) to the main base. The base requires a lot of that and 500 kg it is just 5 tiles of HV wire. Just to put the wire from surface to the base it will require like 20 trips - boring.

Life support modules for rockets fully automated with in-out ports +++

Travel speed is not straight forward. If you have zero gravity, you are right, you can start at any speed and reach any destination (matter of time) BUT if you take into consideration gravity then you need to reach a curtain speed to escape the planet. Asteroid has smaller gravity than Earth but still same law applies. v=gt+ I do not understand what is the issue with fuel. I use pumps to recover CO2 while landing and take off and they collect more CO2 than I spend on rocket launchers. So I even send CO2 excess generated down to slicksters. Sucrose rockets in my view is at disadvantage (harder to automate and extra oxygen hassles does not make sense to get into).

Solar panels should be a must for every rocket. It is common now. I agree that it should be rocket modules (oxygen, food, power, toilet, etc) you can research (may be using points from nuclear setup) and then use to build new generation rockets.

Rename rockets and planetoids +++

deconstruct able POI ++

Bog buckets in my view are superior than bristles. pwater is not equal to water. Apart of energy consumption, you need to consider filtration materials that are limited (or require dup work to convert). You can boil pwater and go for cooling but then it is simpler to add more farms of buckets in my view.  At the end when you run all these drekko, puffs ranches you do not need many plants to care about. Paku is my number one.

You can run a game without a single plant (at least at later stages). All water can be converted to oxygen allowing 20+ dupes to live out of these two water geysers. Preserved food albeit is good for long space missions.

Teleporter should have a red alert warning. I got a dup dead waiting to be transported. I normally do not pay much attention on all these white warnings (all the time: the travel distance is too great, some buildings are waiting for resources, some POI are damaged which I did not even dig to, etc.) I would remove all these white warnings - I know there is a mod for that.

Oil asteroid is currently useless but I consider Klei has a view in the long run for it - petrol rockets we are waiting for you. I have never used oil to make plastic - plastic drekkos are great.

[Adirelle]

Life support module is a great idea. It could come with limited power, food, gas and liquid storage that could be filled and emptied before each trip, and could be extended using cargo modules, and even power-generator modules with different energy sources: solar panel, nuclear reactor, ... This could allow to build rockets for long trips (or a lot of passengers) at the cost of mass, i.e. requiring better or more efficient engines.

How these modules would connect is a great question : in one hand, letting the player do it using rocket interior would be fun at start but could become tedious past the 2 first rockets and allow for exploits. In the other hand, using only some UI controls could feel a bit lack-lusting.

Anyway, such rocket building system would open a host of fun things to do and to build (multi-stage rockets maybe ?), and I am looking forward to the next updates of the DLC.

[user32167]

On 12/12/2020 at 4:26 PM, jzrum said:

Space/vacuum is a too harmless at present. I’m not going to get into the meteorite debate, but I think another way to address this would be to add a debuf/injury (maybe decompression sickness) when dupes are exposed to vacuum for prolonged periods (more than say 30s or something). This would encourage the use of atmo suits for space, but not make it ‘mandatory’

In vanilla, I generally avoided the idea of going into oil biome, very code ice biomes, and space without atmo suits. This is mostly to try to keep things a bit more realistic to my expectation of what the elements _should_ do to people.

However, I find that I'd have to just throw away all that in the DLC because there's simply no way to get atmo suit before reaching the 3rd planetoid (which I just launched a first rocket to at cycle 150) beyond RNG giving you the necessary seed, egg, or the material itself.

So I ended up just sending dupes into 90C oil pockets to cut free some cramped slicksters, -60C cold biomes to build an SPOM, and the space biome itself to build that rocket. A visit to the hospital bed fixes all that bodily damage in a cycle or two.

I'd much prefer to have access to some early protective equipment with the game also making scalding heat, freezing cold, and vacuum exposure much more lethal/punishing.

[JaxckLl]

Good post! Here's my thoughts.

1. I agree as regards storage bins. They need to be unbuildable inside rockets for the Cargo Bay to be worthwhile. Alternatively the Cargo Bay needs to gain another function, such as the ability to pick up space debris.
2. This is a great idea! The "mini build inside a rocket" gimmick really doesn't work and this is a good solution that keeps the spirit (and allows us to look inside the rocket) without enabling the incredible exploitation that is arguably necessary with how crap vanilla storage units are.
3. I'm not sure a full mission profile is necessary or fun for ONI. It would be more interesting to my mind to abstract space movement to just tiles moved. Perhaps you could gain very slight gains in efficiency from doing the same launch over & over again, decreasing the fuel cost on a tile by tile basis (a tile would start unflown, but steadily gain efficiency up to 100%. A 100% efficient tile would cost next to nothing to move through). This would encourage early game rocketry as a means to late game rocketry, by making the inner system "explored" and thus reducing the load on later missions. Also, it's "low-G" "high-G" not "gee". The "G" refers to "Gravities" and is a mathematical constant.
4. Rocket power does not come from the main engines, except in very small space-exclusive rockets (such as the Apollo missions or contemporary satellites). The rockets in ONI are ALL big chemical rockets designed for high thrust & escape velocities. You're not going to be able to produce electricity from one of those machines. Having a separated power grid for the rocket interior makes sense, although I disagree that a dedicated power plant module is necessary. Mousewheels make a lot of sense in context. It would be nice to be able to build a Burner of some kind and be able to store the CO2 to reload your rocket when you land. Such a system might make early game rocketry actually fun & rewarding, because the player would not be required to frantically build up infrastructure on a new asteroid just so they can get their pilot home.
5. I agree on your proposed changes to the Cargo Bay. 2000kg seems right to me, since that makes a single trip capable of building the late game machines (Solar & Steam). There's just not a good reason to transport any less, especially since the world is fully sustainable with just the first two asteroids.
6. I agree with Command Capsule Oxygen. Perhaps the best way to implement this would be to add a new station which connects to the rocket pad, the Command Centre. The Command Centre would have a dedicated Oxygen input for any associated Command Capsules (so you only need a single gas line to connect the Command Centre, general gas input, and the Command Capsule's Oxygen. The Command Centre would just handle that automation for the player since it's going to be the same thing every time). Additionally, the Command Centre would have an Automation Ribbon input & output, the specific functions of which are controlled from within the station. The Automation Ribbon output would connect directly to the Rocket Pad (which would have both a single Automation Wire input and an Automation Ribbon input. These could potentially be combined into a single tile) while the input would be able to receive a variety of signals from different sources. Rockets can fly without the Command Centre, but are limited to simply "does the rocket exist T/F" and they do not generate additional efficiency on the space map. The Command Centre must be maned (duped?) for the entire rocket mission (though this could be in shifts), and would enable the rocket to build up efficiency for tiles on the space map making future missions more efficient & further reaching. The Command Centre UI would enable a variety of signals to be received via the Automation Ribbon input, the specifics of which can be manipulated by the player enabling a wide variety of builds.
7. I almost wonder whether we need additional scheduling tools for dupes on rockets versus dupes on asteroids.
8. Meh. We know we're going to get the Steam Engine at some point. It would be fantastic to have some mid game tech which lets us relate early game rocket infrastructure to late game rocketry. In other words, the player should be rewarded for building some Burners on another asteroid to get their CO2 rocket back home by making that CO2 still useful for higher tier rockets. It would be amazing to have a mid game option to convert CO2 to NatGas. This is the real world process which is going to be the foundation of the real world exploration of Mars. And yet it doesn't exist in ONI, a game all about converting materials into one another. Additional plus, such a machine would make the Gas Burner buildable before going through the effort of developing Oil. The huge gains from Petrol Boiling are a reward unto themselves, the fact that it also enables the Gas Burner is incidental.
9. Agreed, renaming is fun.
10. Strongly disagree that space/vacuum is too harmless. A poorly designed lock can cause the player to lose a huge amount of gas, and dupes already have debuffs from being in vacuum.
11. It's completely fine that Bunkers are not necessary on the first two asteroids. As you pointed out, Bunker doors are a huge drag on the exploration of the space biome. "Accessible & early game" Space means "cheap & affordable space which does not use Plastic or Steel". I'd almost say the Rocket Pad needs to be buildable with Metal Ore not Refined Metal, because that puts rocketry as a genuine early game option. Once you have Refined Metals, you can just build a Petroleum Boiler instead of going to Space. There's not a good reason to develop rockets at the moment because they come late enough in the tech tree to be competing with the most efficient & interesting mega builds currently available in the game.
12. Alternatively, give the teleporter automation. A teleporter which is automated could refresh faster, rewarding the player who invests in that strategy.
13. It's more interesting to have the teleporters spawn all over the map. Makes each base feel more unique. There are still issues with the teleporter spawning in the Space biome on the second asteroid which need to be addressed somehow. The availability of Glass is the best part about the new set pieces, even more so than the teleportation itself. Glass means Solar, Solar gives the player an incentive to explore the Space biome. Rockets aren't good enough right now because they are highly resource negative, so there has to be something else which encourages players to build out that infrastructure. Additionally, Solar is a natural progression from Plug Slugs since both require heavy battery usage (although the balance of Plug Slugs is a completely different problem so this progression is imaginary rather than properly realized in the current design)
14. I disagree on radio automation. I could potentially see some kind of dupe-operated station which allowed for signal transmission across the map (or more exciting, across asteroids), but as just a basic automation tool no. The best part about wires is that they are visual and they force association in builds by the player. This creates tetris-like late-game base building, which is very fun & rewarding. It's also the kind of gameplay Klei is clearly trying to encourage, as seen with the Command Capsule gimmick.
15. Hugely agree. Whenever a number needs to be set, the player should be able to set that specific number. Sliders are for grandmas & infants, not for people that know how to use a computer.
16. Bog Buckets are also much simpler & cheaper powerwise, since you don't need to Sieve or chill the Water. I think they're a very good option right now, although it would be nice to have some more late game options (and an additional source of Sucrose to make Preserve a more viable recipe long term). The difference in calorie output per unit Water is much closer than the comparison you're making, if you convert the power difference into Water. However you're essential conclusion is correct, Bristle Berries are better long term. My suggestion would be to make Bog Buckets benefit extra from Divergents (say +15% per tending. So +20% total with Sweetles, +65% with Grubgrubs). Bog Buckets would thus be a greater source of calories per cycle than Bristles when paired with those critters, but Bristles would have the advantage of being able to be used for higher tier food with simpler ingredients.
17. It's interesting you describe the second asteroid as a "race". I've had three starts in the current patch so far (two short games to explore mechanics, one 100+ cycles) and none of them have felt like a race. At most it's been two dozen insulated tiles, which are easy to build thanks to the abundance of Obsidian on the second asteroid. What I've found is in fact the opposite. The abundance of Oil on the second asteroid takes away any pressure to explore the third. Why bother, when I can just build a Petrol Boiler on each of my first two Asteroids and not have to worry about sustainability? As you pointed out, waiting for the Printing Pod to give you missing resources is a perfectly viable strategy. Perhaps even more so than in vanilla, considering the tremendous resource sink that is the current state of rocketry.
18. A start which is "escape to the second asteroid" would certainly make the teleporters more interesting. Right now the Terra & Swampy asteroids are both capable of being self sufficient, and thus high time cost of teleportation makes it non-existent mechanic past cycle 20.
19. Agreed, renaming is fun.
20. Agreed. Light Fixtures are especially annoying because they tend to be in taller ceilinged set pieces, and thus end up in the floor with a standard 4-tile ceiling. They're also useless in a way things like ladders are not.

[JaxckLl]

8 hours ago, user32167 said:

In vanilla, I generally avoided the idea of going into oil biome, very code ice biomes, and space without atmo suits. This is mostly to try to keep things a bit more realistic to my expectation of what the elements _should_ do to people.

However, I find that I'd have to just throw away all that in the DLC because there's simply no way to get atmo suit before reaching the 3rd planetoid (which I just launched a first rocket to at cycle 150) beyond RNG giving you the necessary seed, egg, or the material itself.

So I ended up just sending dupes into 90C oil pockets to cut free some cramped slicksters, -60C cold biomes to build an SPOM, and the space biome itself to build that rocket. A visit to the hospital bed fixes all that bodily damage in a cycle or two.

I'd much prefer to have access to some early protective equipment with the game also making scalding heat, freezing cold, and vacuum exposure much more lethal/punishing.

I don't know what all of you guys are talking about with no Atmo Suits. The Terra asteroid has Dreckos & Thimble Reeds in the current build of the game. I do agree that there needs to be some better gradation around suits, clothing, and masks. Oxygen masks I don't feel should cost any metal (the player will spend metal developing Oxygen management. Having a continuous cost to maintain the mask station makes it an unattractive build because long term it will have to be deleted). Clothing needs some more diversity (perhaps higher tier clothing requires Plastic as well as Reed Fiber, and at some point dupes get stressed from having "Inferior Outfits"). Atmo Suits are in a perfect spot costwise, but they tend to create a before & after feeling which isn't satisfying (it's frustrating before you have suits, but it doesn't get less frustrating when they exist. The frustrations then become associated with the associated infrastructure rather than the dangers of the environment). I feel that mask + clothing should be more than enough to explore anything up to 80C, and anything down to -20C. Perhaps dupes could get a "Better in a Suit" stress penalty when in environments to which AtmoSuits would be more suitable?

[user32167]

5 hours ago, JaxckLl said:

I don't know what all of you guys are talking about with no Atmo Suits. The Terra asteroid has Dreckos & Thimble Reeds in the current build of the game

It's not available to the Swamp start. In the future, I can see the game to have even more diverse starts. The issue that needs to be addressed is that Thimbleweed or Drecko are currently the single bottleneck to safe passage to hazardous areas. It doesn't help that they co-exist in the same biomes making them both or nothing.

[jzrum]

• I agree that travel speed for rockets is not straight-forward... orbital mechanics is not exactly simple. Yes, a rocket must reach escape velocity, but it can accelerate to a velocity beyond the escape velocity if its carrying sufficient fuel for it. My assumption was that because the rockets consume a quantity of fuel per tile of travel distance that they must be accelerating to the mid-point of the trip and then flipping and decelerating to the destination. The main reason I suggested adjustable travel speeds (which lets be honest, could just be a simple percentage of max travel speed, with a minimum fuel consumption to launch or land on an asteroid) was because it would give the option of using simple rocket tech to reach the 4th or 5th asteroid, which would allow for a wider range of play styles. Also, yes, you might not produce the power directly from the main reaction chamber/nozzle of the rocket, but you can certainly have an ancilliary component to produce power. For example, the CO2 rocket would just be compressed gas expanding to produce thrust, in which case you could use a small ancilliary expander (i.e. turbine) to produce power. If you have an ancillary component consuming reaction mass, then it's still a parasitic load reducing the total amount of reaction mass available for thrust.
• Regarding the harmless-ness of space, I can pretty much leave my dupes in a constant state of hypothermia working in low gas pressure environments with next to no consequences. I don't even bother treating them in triage cots. There is a popped ear drums debuf for high gas pressure, but I haven't seen a debuf for low gas pressure (maybe I missed it, but its why I suggested decompression sickness). You can also have a dupe be incapacitated from scalding, so I don't see why they shouldn't be incapacitated by prolonged exposure to hypothermia (at least I've never had a dupe be incapacitated by hypothermia, maybe they could add a freezing debuf that causes incapacitation).
• Regarding the second planetoid, my earlier seeds had huge gaps in the abyssalite next to the core while my newest seed had only a small breach. Calling it a race is a hyperbole, sure, but it doesn't negate the point that having the oil biomes breaching into the core can make it impractical to get oil until you have atmo suits which you may not be able to get until you reach the third planetoid or get a care package. Personally I mostly ignore the second planetoid and go for the third because of the wide range of resources available there (pips, dreckos, arbors, metal volcanos, etc.), though I'm sure this will change when they add in the petroleum rocket.
• Regarding radio transmitters/receivers for automation, I don't think having it available will remove much, if any, of the wiring playstyle of the game. If you made the transmitters/receivers have an overheat temp and a power consumption you won't go around using them all the time, plus you still need to use all of the logic gates. You could also have a limited number of radio bands available (for example, say 4), which would limit how many you could use. They would only really be useful when you don't want to run an automation wire across the map, or if you needed to transmit an automation signal from one planetoid to another. I'm sure there will be good uses for transmitting control signals between planetoids. Radio transmitters/receivers are used in real world applications for control systems, so I think it's a good fit. Another real world technology that would fit well due to the extensive use of wires is power-line communications.
• Regarding mid-late game sustainability, it's my understanding that Klei is planning the planetoids and resources available on each so that it requires making use of multiple planetoids and makes rocketry necessary. 
• Regarding bog buckets vs bristle blossoms, they use the same amount of energy for the water (pumping 40kg ph2o uses 960J, pumping/sieving 20kg ph2o uses 960J) though its a good point regarding the filtration medium. In vanilla there's i.e. an infinite amount of filtration medium from the regolith from the meteorites, so we will have to see if there are meteorites on some of the planetoids later on. You can also crush igneous rock emitted from volcanos to produce sand to have i.e. infinite filtration medium, though that would require power/labour (again, mid-late game I find power to be a non-issue). Bog buckets and bristle blossoms also have similar temp ranges, so if you have to cool your water for one you'd have to do so for the other, in which case it will take less energy to cool 20kg h2o than 40kg ph2o per plant. I do agree that the growth bonus from sweetles/grubgrubs should be greater for the plants from their native biomes than for other plants. 
• Swamp start doesn't have reed fibre, while Terra start does.
• Regarding the oxygen mask stations, I think one way to make those better would basically be to make the masks to be reusable, much the same as atmo suits. An oxygen mask station could bhave a rack of masks that are available to the dupes. My experience with the masks was that they basically use/store a similar amount of oxygen as atmo suits, and then vent any left over oxygen when they're dropped by the dupe using it. The fact that the masks vent unused gas means they waste power in addition to the metal that's consumed.

[JaxckLl]

1. Compressed gas and total-acceleration flip rocket styles don't make sense in the same universe. ONI pretty clear uses the first style not the second, with the fuel cost-per-tile an abstraction of the total thrust needed for both escape & the full mission profile. ONI rockets are bottle rockets, not the Expanse.
2. Sure. Perhaps there could be a "hostile environs" debuff which stacks & can hang around for several cycles and can seriously tank morale as it scales up.
3. Honestly I'd like to see Oil Reservoirs pushed to the third, if not the fourth asteroid. Petrol Boilers are so good, and we are given more than enough tools to set up multiple across the first two asteroids. Yes there are a lot of balance changes still to come, but that one I feel strongly is essential.
4. I like the idea of being able to send automation between asteroids (such as for controlling rockets). I don't like the idea of in-map tools which render other tools useless. Long-distance automation is meant to be a horrible challenge, which is why it serves to combine signals into pipes or vents whenever possible (like the inner workings of a cell. One organelle doesn't talk to another directly, instead they both look at the relative concentrations of nutrients in the cytoplasm. Each element of the cell behaves independently with behaviour derived from basic conditions to which each element has access).
5. Sure. Again, I'd like to see long term Oil pushed out.
6. Bristles are definitely better right now, but it's not a clean comparison to Bogs is my point. I suspect Bogs will pan out to be just as good in the long run, with the decision about in which to invest being one of availability rather than efficiency.
7. Huh. Well methinks that's a bug .
8. I really don't see why Oxygen Masks costs Metal Ore. Metal is already a high demand material used continuously to build things. Having a baseline drain on a key building material doesn't seem like good design, but instead a way to punish players who play with the new toys. Like with Plug Slugs, Metal Ore for anything other than Refined Metal or Construction is just a bad trade.

[TheKilltech]

On 12/12/2020 at 10:26 PM, jzrum said:

Thoughts on Rockets:

• You can simply build storage bins in the command capsule of the rocket (mentioned in other posts), which, for short trips, you can easily build up to 5 in the basic capsule, and transport 100,000kg or so.

No, a shuttle can carry any amount of resources, but not via storage bins because those have a capacity. use conveyor loaders + chute. There is no limit on how much lose materials can lie on a single tile. so if you have the time you could overload your shuttle to have transport the mass of a whole black hole. applies only to solid materials though. Well, for liquids you could potentially do something similar abusing mopping + continuous fluid resupply. but i don't know a way to achieve that for gases ... yet... (other then freezing them ofc)

[JaxckLl]

4 minutes ago, TheKilltech said:

No, a shuttle can carry any amount of resources, but not via storage bins because those have a capacity. use conveyor loaders + chute. There is no limit on how much lose materials can lie on a single tile. so if you have the time you could overload your shuttle to have transport the mass of a whole black hole. applies only to solid materials though. Well, for liquids you could potentially do something similar abusing mopping + continuous fluid resupply. but i don't know a way to achieve that for gases ... yet... (other then freezing them ofc)

There are canister-creating systems using Sweepy & a drip release valve.

[Hechicera]

On 1/4/2021 at 12:04 PM, JaxckLl said:

Hugely agree. Whenever a number needs to be set, the player should be able to set that specific number. Sliders are for grandmas & infants, not for people that know how to use a computer.

I agree. But with one caveat, just infants. I'm a grandma (Abuela) and do not want sliders. 

With regards to command capsule connections I think not only should they exist, but they should be part of the landing apparatus. An umbilical cord is a thing (at least with the Space Shuttle) and it does have a lot of sensors. So it makes sense it comes pre-built with whatever exchanges needed for engines and I would hope command O2, and sensors for full state and shut-off in prep for lift off.

I have a weird but ONI-like suggestion for remote automation signals. Based on RFC 2549, which was originally from RFC 1149 (IP over Avian Carriers), maybe it becomes something you need a critter for? Perhaps even a morph? Then stocking a pair at either end would work. Rather than fly back and forth (animation burden) have them quantum entangled as part of the critter/morph description?