Room bonuses.

[cyberwarlord]

Just curious what people think of the rooms and bonuses provided. If you had any comments or thoughts. Something aside from more moral options, already a bit op I think. I'd just like a few more that improve the dupes efficiency and down time.

Examples:

A Privet bathroom increases use speed. Decreased shower/sink times/water use.

Recreation/Garden: Decorative plant room that increases your chance for overjoyed responses.

Kitchen: provides a freshness 'buffer' on foods before freshness starts decreasing. Storing cooked foods quickly allows for them to be put away at 100% and stack better in storage.

Recreation/Break room: 50% faster use speed for recreational buildings that provide drinks. It takes a long time to drink a soda or cup of coffee, almost too much time considering the bonuses.

Museum/gallery: Increase experience gain.

[Henlikuoth]

Yes, I would like further improvements and more features to the rooms.

 

[Henlikuoth]

One addition:

The rooms provide a bonus to morale, which is great. As mentioned, other bonuses/features should be added.

This reminds me of the difficulty setting for morale, namely "Draconian" (the highest).

It doesn't seem to be doing anything in the game, at least as far as I can see. 

Or am I missing something?

[cyberwarlord]

3 hours ago, Henlikuoth said:

One addition:

The rooms provide a bonus to morale, which is great. As mentioned, other bonuses/features should be added.

This reminds me of the difficulty setting for morale, namely "Draconian" (the highest).

It doesn't seem to be doing anything in the game, at least as far as I can see. 

Or am I missing something?

Maybe?

[axxel]

The starter rooms latrines or barracks were likely included to give the player the opportunity to give new dupes protection against incoming stress.

As long as the game doesn't change some smaller mechanics I cannot really see other practical uses. Barracks could recover stamina faster if stamina decreased faster over time. If a dupe uses a toilet outside of a latrine only about 70% of the bladder is emptied (instead of full 100%).

[Henlikuoth]

1 hour ago, cyberwarlord said:

Maybe?

But there are two different difficulty settings, namely "Morale" and "Stress."

The stress setting only increases the amount of stress the dupes incur.

And the morale setting, even on "Draconian," doesn't seem to have any effect in the game.

Can anyone help out and explain? Am I missing something?

Regardless, Klei should look at all difficulty settings and improve/adjust them where needed.

 

[KittenIsAGeek]

The room bonuses do a lot already.  They're noticed more as the dupes gain skills.  For example, in "Spaced Out!" when you send a dupe to another planet, that dupe no longer has access to the rooms you have made.  If you send a highly-skilled dupe, you quickly run into crippling morale problems.  The "fix" is to either wipe skills from an old dupe, or send a new dupe.

1 minute ago, Henlikuoth said:

And the morale setting, even on "Draconian," doesn't seem to have any effect in the game.

I haven't done much with the morale settings, but I do know that morale and stress are based on what needs the dupes have.  Many of the rooms will boost morale, which in turn reduces stress.  If the stress reduction is greater than the stress taken, then your dupe won't get stressed.  

For example, let's take a look at Freja.

Freja doesn't get stressed out. Ever.  The required morale is based on some base number, plus a value per skill.  A rank 1 skill adds 1 morale needed.  A rank 3 skill adds 3 morale needed.  If the skill is a desired skill (with a heart), then the skill gives a 1 point boost to "interested skills learned."  What "Draconian" does is decrease the base morale of the dupe.  That will make the early game trickier, but once you've built up your base with rooms and the bonuses they provide (like "Played Video Games"), the initial base morale needs of the dupe become less of a factor.  Or if you send the dupe somewhere they're no longer getting all their nice morale bonuses such as another planet.

Because Freja has such high morale, little problems like "wet feet" and "irritated eyes" don't cause stress reactions.

 

I have another dupe, Gizmo.  He's a bionic.  

He doesn't get a lot of the room bonuses that Freja does.  Currently, he's unstressed and happy because his morale is high.  That's because for the past couple of cycles he hasn't actually left the base, so he is getting a decor bonus of 12.  If he loses that decor bonus, he loses 12 points in morale, which puts him down to 13/15.  That means he loses his -20% stress reduction for having 'high morale.'  In fact, if he spends his entire 3-cycle schedule other than downtime outside of the base, he'll end up having a stress reaction before the end of his second schedule rotation.  If I had started this game with "Draconian" morale, it would be even more difficult to keep Gizmo from getting stressed because the margin would be much closer.  If he, say, missed out on playing video games and dancing because of the recreation room rebuild...

So the choice of "normal" or "draconian" would make life much different for Gizmo than for Freja, simply because of the fact that Gizmo doesn't get the same morale bonuses that Freja does.  He doesn't get bonuses for eating, or for using the latrine, and he can't sit in the hot tub.  It does not take a lot for him to lose that -20% to stress from "great morale."

 

So the settings DO make a difference, but you're not noticing because of how you play the game.  Keeping morale high gives a big bonus to removing stress.  Having facilities like latrines and showers clean up stresses like radiation, food poisoning, and wet feet.  Putting dupes into atmo suits when they leave the base reduces or prevents factors like overheating, chilled, or suffocating.  If you're a skilled player, you know how to prevent the problems that generate stress while also generating a higher morale.  This means those settings only really affect the early game, before you can get your base researched and built.

[Henlikuoth]

1 hour ago, KittenIsAGeek said:

What "Draconian" does is decrease the base morale of the dupe.

Hm, I did not even notice that.

I usually play with all difficulty settings on max. It is just more fun for me.

1 hour ago, KittenIsAGeek said:

This means those settings only really affect the early game, before you can get your base researched and built.

I hope that Klei adds more things to the difficulties. "Draconian," for example, has no noticeable effect if you know how to play and have some morale bonuses running. 

For example, if the dupes' requirements are really "stringent," as the description suggests, I would want a system in which you must build a lot of decor throughout the map only to please them. 

We have had discussions about the difficulty settings several times before.

[cyberwarlord]

On 2/24/2025 at 3:16 PM, Henlikuoth said:

Hm, I did not even notice that.

I usually play with all difficulty settings on max. It is just more fun for me.

I hope that Klei adds more things to the difficulties. "Draconian," for example, has no noticeable effect if you know how to play and have some morale bonuses running. 

For example, if the dupes' requirements are really "stringent," as the description suggests, I would want a system in which you must build a lot of decor throughout the map only to please them. 

We have had discussions about the difficulty settings several times before.

Unfortunately that's kinda how it's designed.

Program in a problem and a solution. Repeat.

On 2/24/2025 at 1:28 PM, KittenIsAGeek said:

The room bonuses do a lot already.  They're noticed more as the dupes gain skills.  For example, in "Spaced Out!" when you send a dupe to another planet, that dupe no longer has access to the rooms you have made.  If you send a highly-skilled dupe, you quickly run into crippling morale problems.  The "fix" is to either wipe skills from an old dupe, or send a new dupe.

I haven't done much with the morale settings, but I do know that morale and stress are based on what needs the dupes have.  Many of the rooms will boost morale, which in turn reduces stress.  If the stress reduction is greater than the stress taken, then your dupe won't get stressed.  

For example, let's take a look at Freja.

Freja doesn't get stressed out. Ever.  The required morale is based on some base number, plus a value per skill.  A rank 1 skill adds 1 morale needed.  A rank 3 skill adds 3 morale needed.  If the skill is a desired skill (with a heart), then the skill gives a 1 point boost to "interested skills learned."  What "Draconian" does is decrease the base morale of the dupe.  That will make the early game trickier, but once you've built up your base with rooms and the bonuses they provide (like "Played Video Games"), the initial base morale needs of the dupe become less of a factor.  Or if you send the dupe somewhere they're no longer getting all their nice morale bonuses such as another planet.

Because Freja has such high morale, little problems like "wet feet" and "irritated eyes" don't cause stress reactions.

 

I have another dupe, Gizmo.  He's a bionic.  

He doesn't get a lot of the room bonuses that Freja does.  Currently, he's unstressed and happy because his morale is high.  That's because for the past couple of cycles he hasn't actually left the base, so he is getting a decor bonus of 12.  If he loses that decor bonus, he loses 12 points in morale, which puts him down to 13/15.  That means he loses his -20% stress reduction for having 'high morale.'  In fact, if he spends his entire 3-cycle schedule other than downtime outside of the base, he'll end up having a stress reaction before the end of his second schedule rotation.  If I had started this game with "Draconian" morale, it would be even more difficult to keep Gizmo from getting stressed because the margin would be much closer.  If he, say, missed out on playing video games and dancing because of the recreation room rebuild...

So the choice of "normal" or "draconian" would make life much different for Gizmo than for Freja, simply because of the fact that Gizmo doesn't get the same morale bonuses that Freja does.  He doesn't get bonuses for eating, or for using the latrine, and he can't sit in the hot tub.  It does not take a lot for him to lose that -20% to stress from "great morale."

 

So the settings DO make a difference, but you're not noticing because of how you play the game.  Keeping morale high gives a big bonus to removing stress.  Having facilities like latrines and showers clean up stresses like radiation, food poisoning, and wet feet.  Putting dupes into atmo suits when they leave the base reduces or prevents factors like overheating, chilled, or suffocating.  If you're a skilled player, you know how to prevent the problems that generate stress while also generating a higher morale.  This means those settings only really affect the early game, before you can get your base researched and built.

Yes, the moral is great but also very strong as it  reduces stress as well. Trying to think of more specific use reasons, improvements on use timers, some building are long use or hard to establish for minor +1boosts or a few more moral that's not as useful. A dupe can only do so much in a day.

[KittenIsAGeek]

22 hours ago, Henlikuoth said:

For example, if the dupes' requirements are really "stringent," as the description suggests, I would want a system in which you must build a lot of decor throughout the map only to please them. 

I know that for some of my dupes, venturing outside of the base is a real hazard -- only because of the low decor hits.  Its crazy how fast they get stressed when there aren't pretty statues and paintings all over the place. 

[cyberwarlord]

5 hours ago, KittenIsAGeek said:

I know that for some of my dupes, venturing outside of the base is a real hazard -- only because of the low decor hits.  Its crazy how fast they get stressed when there aren't pretty statues and paintings all over the place. 

Yeah, the decore moral loss can add up quickly.

Pump in floral germs to the suits for a bit of help.

Carpet patches / Gold metal tiles. The max difficulty does require some decore everywhere if relying on it for moral.