Oil Research Tree First Impresssions

[KyCygni]

Ignoring overall completion rates, here are some thoughts:

Negative:

• Putting Manual Airlocks in tier 2 is devastating. What's the point of even sectioning off rooms if you don't have access to blocking gas flow? This is the one change that really, really hurts. I'm OK with having to research manual airlocks, but they shouldn't be behind advanced research. Here I am, trying to make oxygen for the person researching in the power/station room, and it's just flowing into the rest of the cavern, wasted. Putting airlocks in tier 2 implies that air management can just be randomly ignored for awhile.

 

• Deodorizers are tier 3....... .....why exactly? A bathroom starts creating polluted oxygen from the moment you start to have polluted dirt, a few cycles in. Should you dare to wash your hands, you’ll make more. This a pretty low-tech way of dealing with polluted oxygen; it's resource intensive and doesn't bother with water, temperature, or pipes. There is no reason for it to be this heavily gated.

 

• The dual-paths don’t mean anything. Environmental Protection requires everything from its preceding two paths, but Home Luxuries does not, despite being connected in the exact same way. Healthcare requires both, but Decontamination does not. This is silly – if you want to gate something like Environmental behind more research, throw it in a tier 5 or vastly increase its research values. Or even make a 3rd research station and tack on a 3rd research for all the crazy endgame stuff like plastics and suits.

Positive:

• The overall separation of research tiers and categories, to me at least, is a plus. I would even be happy with 5-6 tiers, and you can always lower the numbers overall.

 

• Thank you for moving Mesh Tiles down a tier. It probably didn't bother too many people, but I hated building water basins without Mesh Tiles. You even made it optional, so that someone who doesn't care can go straight for Water Distillers.

Other:

• Making Advanced Research a requirement for anything is a red herring. It should just be a lone tile by itself, not connected to any other research tiles.

 

• Advanced Power Regulation is Tier 3, yet so are things like the loom and pharma chamber. Perhaps you can't see someone going for transformers without automatic power; would it hurt to just have all of it in the tier 2 tile? I don't hate it, but it feels like the Manual Airlock problem.

 

• I foresee myself being unhappy at having to research topics that do nothing. The Apothecary is tier 2, while Hand Sanitizers are tier 3. What of the man that diligently crafts a disease-free utopia? He wastes his time researching medical! Artistic Expression also poses an annoyance for the stress-free colonizer who wants to craft clothing.

[SchlauFuchs]

Have a look at my idea at 

I think the whole Research thing gets out of control, and I guess we will see some 20 more buildings/stations within the next few months.

[Michi01]

On 7.10.2017 at 12:25 AM, KyCygni said:

What's the point of even sectioning off rooms if you don't have access to blocking gas flow?

Mesh doors are better for rooms because they allow airflow. For example if you want to make a barracks to get the stress bonus and close it off with an airlock, the oxygen pressure will eventually get pretty low in that room because the door doesn't allow airflow.

On 7.10.2017 at 12:25 AM, KyCygni said:

and it's just flowing into the rest of the cavern, wasted.

It's not wasted unless you're planning to seal the rest of the cavern.

On 7.10.2017 at 12:25 AM, KyCygni said:

A bathroom starts creating polluted oxygen from the moment you start to have polluted dirt, a few cycles in.

It produces small and harmless quantities of polluted oxygen and the food poisoning germs can't even multiply in it. Deoderizers are only really needed to deal with polluted oxygen from swamp biomes.

[goboking]

I agree with the manual air locks and deodorizers.  I think the former should be the default door and numatic doors should be added back to one of the decor researches.  The latter is all we've got for dealing with polluted air early in the game and it's not exactly a high tech solution, so having to beeline is unfortunate.