Research Overhaul Suggestion

[SchlauFuchs]

Hi,

I really would like to recommend a Research Overhaul Upgrade. The current four-tier system is convoluted and it is very repetitive and usually just an annoyance for the first 10-20 cycles, consuming your water, power and your dirt and that's it. It also is not very realistic, as scientist in RL usually do not go out with the set target invent Agriculture because the boss told him so. 

What would be much more fun if Scientists would have to doodle around with resources and items and come up with something on a random chance, like he sees the ration box and some rotten food and that triggers the idea to develop the fridge, and while he is investigating at his science station he uses some foods and some metal until he comes up with a  and then you can build the fridge.

In a similar way he can observe people bottling up water and carrying it to the wash basin, and thinks about automating that then he fiddles around with some metal and comes up with the pump and the pipes and the liquid vent.

And then when he is around when a machine breaks down because of the wrong fluids going in, he things about filtration and goes with some sand and metals to the lab and comes up with the Water Purifier or the Liquid Filter.

There are lots of ideas where that comes from, like the Scientist gets the idea of the Air Scrubber when he has spent a certain amount of time in CO2 flooded area, and he things about water purification when the colony is short on water supply. Idea to develop protective suits and buildings when going into poisonous or too hot areas. Idea to develop insulation when his bed gets too warm or too cold.

Idea to add paintings or statues when his average decorperception drops below -50 or so.

That would be much more fun to witness, takes a bit away the need to micromanage, and the user only needs to act when the scientist has more than one idea to work on (prioritize) or telling him to do something else.

 

[God 2.0]

The fun old game, Evil Genius has a research system such as this, and it is quite interesting, but at times frustrating when your minions are not inspecting the items you want them to inspect.

[Coolthulhu]

20 hours ago, SchlauFuchs said:

takes a bit away the need to micromanage

Not really: you'd need them to observe the thing you want improved. Say, you want a filter to set up a gas generator, so you'd need to set up an "experiment" where something gets damaged, then bring the scientist to witness it, then dismantle everything.

[SchlauFuchs]

 with a bit of intelligence the Scientist does not need to witness everything himself. he could overhear other dupes talk about their problems at the mess hall, or a pissed off dupe complaints directly to him. Every time he sees something himself or hears about something, his curiosity about this issue rises until a certain threshold where he starts to do something about it.

Of course it means problem first, then solution, but it also adds a lot more dynamics. 

[Tobruk]

1 hour ago, SchlauFuchs said:

 with a bit of intelligence the Scientist does not need to witness everything himself. he could overhear other dupes talk about their problems at the mess hall, or a pissed off dupe complaints directly to him. Every time he sees something himself or hears about something, his curiosity about this issue rises until a certain threshold where he starts to do something about it.

Of course it means problem first, then solution, but it also adds a lot more dynamics. 

That would be interesting for beginners since it reflects their own learning curve, but it will be super fustrating for anyone who spent at least 10-20 hours into the game. Such a person would already know which solutions are good and which aren't and wouldn't like to set up experiments and then dismantle them just for the sake of a mini-game.

[SchlauFuchs]

Have you ever played Doodle God? As soon as the number of combinations reaches a certain limit, you would not remember all of them. And you don't really need to remember as the dupes would care for it mostly themselves. all you need to do is wait for ideas to appear on the blackboard in the Research screen and give them priorities. A little bit of randomness and maybe influenced by the Scientists level, things might just pop up when he is idle.