End game Materials need a use

[Smithe37]

Niobium, thermium, visco gel, super insulation and super coolant.

These are obviously powerful and end game materials. However, there there is a problem with them.
Every single one of these materials has a work around to replace them.

Super Insulation - Nice increase in efficiency but not needed
Visco Gel - Stack two or more different liquids on of each other for the same effect
Super Coolant - Increased efficiency but not required for anything. 
Thermium/Niobium - Needed in very few places. Some niche uses in steam/volcano and sour gas boiler setups. Can still be worked around with good design.

By the time you acquire any of these materials, you've likely already achieved sustainably and built infrastructure around not having these materials. At present there is no motivation or need for any of these materials and I very much feel that Klei should be looking at creating a real need/use for them as part of good end game content design.

Nuclear power
I'm also a bit skeptical of the need for nuclear power. Again, what need will we have for nuclear power? I can't really imagine what kind of power hungry beast will need the massive amounts of power that will be produced.

I'm really enjoying what's already been delivered - I just want to see this game be as good as possible. It seems like Klei has some awesome ideas for content in this DLC. I just worry that the content that is being delivered hasn't got the best incentive possible to build and use it in interesting ways - especially the end game stuff they intend on implementing.

[ZombieDupe]

If you are going to tame tungsten or niobium volcanoes better have insulation on hand because it has the least risk of melting. Super coolant is needed to liquefy hydrogen. The niche uses of thermium/niobium are kind of the point if you want to tame geysers that steel buildings can't handle without potential error, getting niobium to begin with is going to be tough regardless. Visco gel makes an exploit a feature, but it is true that it isn't really necessary for anything. Crude oil and petroleum liquid locks are probably better regardless. Nuclear power we won't really know until we get a glimpse of what it can be used for.

[Smithe37]

While thermium/niobium -might- be needed to tame those extreme heat volcanoes, I suspect the optimal solution is just throwing in enough water to act as a heat sink and providing a large enough area so your steam turbines can chew up the heat at the same rate it's created.

[Pulstar]

Optimal how though? For one you need large enough amounts of water which by itself might not be available. There are better and more urgent uses for water. Plus you need to pump it to the volcano, mine out everything, insulate the large area etc. I mean it sounds fun, but if you ask me slapping some high-temp resistant equipment out of thermium in the volcano area and sounds like way less of a hassle to achieve the same goal.

[Smithe37]

44 minutes ago, Pulstar said:

Optimal how though? For one you need large enough amounts of water which by itself might not be available. There are better and more urgent uses for water. Plus you need to pump it to the volcano, mine out everything, insulate the large area etc. I mean it sounds fun, but if you ask me slapping some high-temp resistant equipment out of thermium in the volcano area and sounds like way less of a hassle to achieve the same goal.

Yeah, easier to slap some insulator around it. However, if you've ever worked a build to deal with stupid amounts of heat, it's not that hard to do so for a volcano that spews out material an extra 1000 or so degrees hotter. You just have to scale up the thermal mass of the heat sink and throw in a few more steam turbines.
There's still no real incentive to use space age materials

[sheaker]

For me only the visco gel has hardly any usage. LH is probably the best example. I think You can not condensate hydrogen gas using hydrogen gas. Gathering space material without thermium would be quite a challenge while with thermium You can actually get free energy (passing conveyor belts through steam chambers of steam turbines). Some designs of refineries requires thermium aqua tunner and liquid/gas pumps. Self cooled petroleum power generators.
I think the point of having those materials is to increase design possibilities and flexibility and (at least for me) it is done well.

[Pulstar]

I agree with what sheaker said.

Also if real incentive means railroading so that "only X allows you to do Y" then I rather have no real incentive. Plenty of games hold your hand or force singular solutions to obstacles. ONI is different, it gives you options and you are free to use them as creatively (not necessarily "optimally") as you wish, and this is why I like the ONI sandbox experience.

Lastly technically there is no real incentive to anything that doesn't feed or oxygenate your dupes, with maybe the exception of seeing the ending cut scene. But if we agree the temporal tear cut scene is a goal then super coolant has real incentive already, since you need liquid hydrogen and can't get it otherwise.

[Gurgel]

You know, you can stabilize a colony pretty early to run permanently. That does not mean the game has to end there for you. The "survival" phase is just the start.

[Sasza22]

The point of those materials isn`t to be something you essentially need (maybe except super cooldant) but more of an end game super material to make stuff easier. Take visco gel. People have been using water locks forever. Klei gave us a fancy end game material that works like that. You never "need" thermium conductivity or the super overheat limit but it`s cool to have it and see what we can do with it. I don`t think they need a particular use. They are there to enable weird builds that would otherwise be too tedious or impossible to do but none of which is really needed.

[Smithe37]

2 hours ago, Sasza22 said:

The point of those materials isn`t to be something you essentially need (maybe except super cooldant) but more of an end game super material to make stuff easier. Take visco gel. People have been using water locks forever. Klei gave us a fancy end game material that works like that. You never "need" thermium conductivity or the super overheat limit but it`s cool to have it and see what we can do with it. I don`t think they need a particular use. They are there to enable weird builds that would otherwise be too tedious or impossible to do but none of which is really needed.

While I agree with and understand all of this, perhaps my view is more a product of what I want to see out of the DLC in future. I just really want more end game challenge and build/exploration incentives that incorporate these materials.

[Cybeon]

14 hours ago, ZombieDupe said:

Visco gel makes an exploit a feature, but it is true that it isn't really necessary for anything. Crude oil and petroleum liquid locks are probably better regardless.

Why are they better? Visco gel locks are much more reliable due to their high thermal mass and low thermal conductivity. Makes them much harder to accidentally boil/freeze by duplicant carrying some hot/cold stuff. Not saying that they are way easier to build/repair

[Gurgel]

45 minutes ago, Smithe37 said:

While I agree with and understand all of this, perhaps my view is more a product of what I want to see out of the DLC in future. I just really want more end game challenge and build/exploration incentives that incorporate these materials.

I get that and I think I would like that as well. I am not sure it is doable though. Klei would basically have to change things late-game like some catastrophes or the like and that would prevent people from playing this very slowly. 

[Smithe37]

 

6 hours ago, Gurgel said:

I get that and I think I would like that as well. I am not sure it is doable though. Klei would basically have to change things late-game like some catastrophes or the like and that would prevent people from playing this very slowly. 

Or have some biomes with incentive to drill them locked behind some well thought out challenges that require either super coolant, visco gel, thermium or some combination of these materials.
I can imagine it would be really cool to have to build and work around THAT DAMN BIOME for ages until you could could get a hold of end game materials.


Another solution to give a niche to visco gel could be to slightly broaden the vaporization/or freezing point of visco gel to be broader in relation to crude oil/petroleum/ethanol (possible even narrow the freezing/boiling points of oil/petroleum/ethanol).
Klei could then introduce machines that operate at very high/low temperature and require duplicant operation and use of a liquid airlock. This would introduce a real need for visco gel.

[Tsabo]

On 12/20/2020 at 8:01 AM, Cybeon said:

Why are they better? Visco gel locks are much more reliable due to their high thermal mass and low thermal conductivity. Makes them much harder to accidentally boil/freeze by duplicant carrying some hot/cold stuff. Not saying that they are way easier to build/repair

If you have ample petro and ample visco-gel then sure, use visco-gel, but it's a lot harder and more expensive to get ample visco-gel, and that's why petro locks are better.

[kerosene]

I would prefer if end game materials were required to fully stabilize a colony, and allowed more cool stuff.

 

 

[silverbluep]

Here is my take on the super late game items and DLC;

I think your points are sound. They are all efficiency boosts; except visco-gel. I see fluid stacking as abusing game mechanics. I just wish I could construct a special door that I could supply visco-gel to to create the airlocks; but building an airlock is not overly difficult on the base game with plastic tiles/tempshift plates and frozen visco-gel; and then building a pneumatic door on top of the seal. Visco gel is good as it is.

13 hours ago, Tsabo said:

If you have ample petro and ample visco-gel then sure, use visco-gel, but it's a lot harder and more expensive to get ample visco-gel, and that's why petro locks are better.

It does not take ample visco-gel for lock; only a little. And there is literally no other use of visco-gel.

Here is my take on hyper-efficiency.

Since resources are distributed across different seperate asteroids; the one solution fits all super power solutions don't work anymore. (Meteor showers will disable solar panels for some asteroids when it comes in; or make the setup barely power positive. Not all asteroids will have crude oil for the energy pipeline, etc. And space is more limited depending on what you do. Efficiency becomes much better now. There is legit a point in getting your hands on some thermium to reduce the size of your sour gas boiler on the oil asteroid; and using insulation to make sure your nuclear reactor cannot fail in the radiation asteroid.

Also; some planets you will probably want to branch into hydrogen rockets; for which it's a pain to liquify hydrogen without supercoolant. Yes you can do it but you need to micro much more. There is your use for super coolant there.

Also; since you can't connect power grids across asteroids; nuclear power is probably a super dense power storage for you to ship to worlds with otherwise no power. But I would let the DLC flesh out a bit first.

[evilcat19xx]

I agree with your points.

There are two groups of people here in Oni forum:

1. They love the current Sandbox format, and they are looking to build different contraptions without any essential purpose, or incentives. Eg., they would build Nuclear reactors even if they do not need additional energy on their power grids.
2. They (including me) love to do things (build. dig, space travel) because it is required and it is necessary. I wont even build showers/recreation stuff,  because it is not necessary to maintain the morals of dupes.

Most of Oni players like early games more than the mid and end game. Because in the beginning there is a goal (to survive). My motivation to continue playing the DLC dropped significantly right after I built the solar panels. We had enough power, water and Oxygen.... 

[avc15]

In my heat chimney there's plenty of incentive to retrofit with niobium when it's available and then thermium.

 

Really any machine that gains efficiency at higher temps.

[Kderosa]

Here’s a crazy idea. Let exosuits be made out of steel and thermium and give them the same temperature bonuses. That’s a legit use. 

It also seems like the magma planet will need more than a little thermium. 

[Smithe37]

Hey guys. Instead of just complaining, here's my idea for giving incentive and use to endgame materials in another thread. Thought it would be of interest to those this thread and wanted to try generate more discussion/traction for my idea.

 

[KonfigSys]

radioactive materials are not only about energy it is about research points that are needed to advanced beyond the current research tree....

so Klei addressed it very well we just need to wait and see.

Other HiEnd materials - oh, I love to use them in the end game. You can live without but it is so nice to use them. I missed them currently but they will come back.

[Yunru]

On 12/19/2020 at 9:51 AM, ZombieDupe said:

If you are going to tame tungsten or niobium volcanoes better have insulation on hand because it has the least risk of melting.

Any raw metal will never melt (or even heat), if it's an airflow tile in a vacuum.

[ZombieDupe]

On 12/26/2020 at 3:54 PM, Yunru said:

Any raw metal will never melt (or even heat), if it's an airflow tile in a vacuum.

That sounds like an exploit to me, shouldn't the tile transfer heat between the molten/solid metal? And besides that, how would you even go about making a build using steam, a gas, as your heat sink with such an approach?

[Yunru]

3 hours ago, ZombieDupe said:

And besides that, how would you even go about making a build using steam, a gas, as your heat sink with such an approach?

You just straight up don't :P

Tame it with a different heat sink, such as flowing coolant over it then pumping away said coolant for cooling itself. 

[The Plum Gate]

I know endgame materials have always been a strange thing to deal with in ONI, the whole idea usually revolves around building some one thing you need - and it feels like a letdown in any game in that regard.

It's the early game availability of odd materials that's got me stumped.

What exactly can I use refined carbon for? And if this is one of those middle materials why hasn't it got any other use?