refined pentaxid not in tank degrades like food

Discussion in 'Suggestions' started by imlarry425, Feb 4, 2023.

  1. imlarry425

    imlarry425 Captain

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    For ultra-high difficulty/resource pressure games consider using the food decay mechanic (and how a fridge stops it) to age refined pentaxid that isn't stored in proper containment.

    The combination of degraded crystals and pure would result in reduced purity- this could be used to impact maximum range or to trigger undesired consequences based on the condition of the reactant.

    A constructor recipe could be used to convert the refined contaminated crystals back to the original ore (at a loss) to purify it.
     
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  2. The Big Brzezinski

    The Big Brzezinski Captain

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    It would only mean a lot of inventory shifting. F4, move all, continue as before. Wouldn't actually result in new gameplay or challenge, just new bookkeeping.
     
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  3. imlarry425

    imlarry425 Captain

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    I don't agree. The inventory shifting already happens, the challenge would be (for people who liked that sort of thing), to make sure you had enough for the mission and you might consider carrying ore (more weight) and refining directly to the tank. Issues with degraded crystals would be a new mechanic. Pentaxid management is already one of the critical path things and making it harder to deal with (like actual fissile material) is a challenge. Having a range of issues with different levels of purity (range, damage to the drive, others) could create the sort of field problems that require resolution- a more complex game is more challenging.
     
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  4. The Big Brzezinski

    The Big Brzezinski Captain

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    So the optimal thing will be to only refine/transfer as much pentaxid as you need when you need it, either for warping to the next destination or recharging a shield. This doesn't sound like a challenge. It sounds like bookkeeping. Paperwork. A chore you have to do and have no good reason not to. All the challenge of remembering to put the mayonnaise back in the fridge after answering a phone call in the middle of making a sandwich.

    The challenge pentaxid already offers is one of logistics. It's useful for many things, hard to find in bulk, and very heavy when you do. It adds context and value to shipboard constructors so that ships equipped with them are better able to operate on foraged resources rather than stored supplies. Players must also decide how they wish to store pentaxid, as it stacks only to fifty in fuel form and several thousand as ore.

    If you wanted pentaxid to present news gameplay challenges, you'd be better off focusing on its application. For instance, it might be that different stars have different interactions with pentaxid-consuming devices. High energy white and blue stars might excite the crystals, making warp drives and shield generators more fuel efficient and increasing the damage of laser weapons. Dimmer red stars would have the opposite effect. Something like this would effect how players navigate between stars and sectors and which weapons they use in a given solar system. It presents both a problem and an opportunity.
     
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  5. imlarry425

    imlarry425 Captain

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    Actually, the optimal thing would depend totally on the context- it's not a min/max choice. What you're calling paperwork (resolving how to transport perishable goods, where to handle production, creating supply depots, etc.) are all classic logistics problems and having potential but unpredictable results from using material that <100% pure with some sort of complex multiparameter function means you can take measured risks.

    Like I said, I was suggesting this for a specific sort of resource limitation driven challenge. You can choose to play the game without food decaying but knowing it does impacts how you do things and presents opportunities to get too far out over your skis. The introduction of growing pentaxid made it seem reasonable to look at possible applications of food mechanics in places they aren't currently used.
     
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  6. The Big Brzezinski

    The Big Brzezinski Captain

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    Food and other survival challenges create context for creative gameplay. There are many ways to keep yourself fed, including different levels of greenhouse, foraging in rich biospheres, and buying food from traders. Storage solutions are even more elaborate.

    Can you illustrate some methods besides on-demand refinement that might successfully manage pentaxid decay?
     
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  7. imlarry425

    imlarry425 Captain

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    By allowing multiple pentaxid tanks on a base (yaml tweak), it would be possible to store pure refined material indefinitely limited by power. Solar can cover it, but systems/weather can and do fail so backup power would be required. Multiple tanks can provide a mechanism of refinement using a cascade- if negative impacts didn't occur until 80% then using 90-100% pure mix can raise purity. You might decide to accept losses in a given situation (enemy territory where supply lines are difficult) and carry more than you need, refine direct to tank, and use pure tank to supply intermix to raise storage purity. Maybe 70% just reduces distance per jump so you accept it, but that can put a return path out of reach. Damage occurs at 50% but the chance of rupturing the drive is low- just keep hitting it with the multi-tool and praying. If that doesn't work for you, no grief, I was suggesting something you set at a game level.
     
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  8. The Big Brzezinski

    The Big Brzezinski Captain

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    So if the ore is stable, and the refined pentaxid in the tank is stable, where does the decay come in?
     
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  9. imlarry425

    imlarry425 Captain

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    It takes time to refine pentaxid and the ore requires more volume and weight than the refined product.
    (raw 100 units = 8.89 tons, 1685 volume, 1 slot > refined 200 units = 2.56 tons, 480 volume, 1 slot in RE)

    Pentaxid tanks could also join the container controller style (raspberry colored) and CPU/power set to encourage controlling the size of the tank. Since shields use pentaxid you could introduce a link mechanism so that you had multiple tanks- an option to use high quality reactant in the shield generator and grade-b in the drive.

    It's just sticking basic behaviors already in the model together in a different way with pentaxid being a crop with an hours counter. I have no idea how many ways you could try to address the constraints, but I find working out solutions to those sorts of challenges interesting. Farming pentaxid could create a whole new way for people to build economy. In an early game mining rules but, with regen turned off, you have to shift and move out or farm. I trust the devs to decide if it's an easy lift.
     
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    Last edited: Feb 7, 2023
  10. The Big Brzezinski

    The Big Brzezinski Captain

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    Well the easiest way to get pentaxid is to buy it raw from mining stations. Then you just carry a few hundred in a container next to the ammo, oxygen bottles, and spare promethium fuel. You can queue the constructor to refine directly into the pentaxid tank when you want to refill it.

    This is already probably the simplest, easiest, and most optimal way of managing pentaxid. How would the pentaxid having a shelf like change things up?
     
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  11. imlarry425

    imlarry425 Captain

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    In a market with resource limits, costs rise over time. This thread is a suggestion for an optional constraint to limit available pentaxid in the field to force a resource crisis in later stages of an MP game to encourage situational or team interaction/cooperation.

    I am not sure why you are gatekeeping a suggestion box to block something you say would be simple, easy, and have an optimal way to work around. You don't need to since you wouldn't need to turn it on or join a server that enabled it.

    All that presumes a dev was even interested in picking up the story and that the people who wrote and maintain the software aren't able to look at suggestions with a critical eye when they decide if they want to take something up.
     
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    Last edited: Feb 7, 2023
  12. The Big Brzezinski

    The Big Brzezinski Captain

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    So it's an idea for a mechanic in a multiplayer scenario rather than the base game?
     
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  13. TwitchyJ

    TwitchyJ Commander

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    I don't think it could be done in a custom scenario unless the devs changed the base game first.

    The base game would have to be changed first to give the "spoilage" effect to refined pentaxid first.
    Then the base game would also have to be changed to make it so the pentaxid tank nullifies the spoilage.

    A scenario 'might' be able to give refined pentaxid a spoil timer, but the base game would still have to be changed by the devs to make it so a pentaxid tank nullifies it with a new property.

    Otherwise we would have to use a fridge...... Since that's what the game supports currently with the spoil timers.

    Or we would have to give the fridge property to pentaxid tanks, which would allow people to use it as a fridge to stop food spoiling
    (and would probably also break the tank from working with warping, since it would then be a fridge and not a warp tank, essentially).

    Base game has to be modified first to make this work the way the OP wants.
    I personally don't see it happening, especially with the lack of support so far in this thread by the community (no one seems to be biting).
     
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    Last edited: Feb 8, 2023
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  14. The Big Brzezinski

    The Big Brzezinski Captain

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    Maybe it would work better if you swapped the expiration timer for pentaxid tanks partially refilling with degrees of partially used pentaxid depending on distance traveled, mass of ship, and the nature of the destination. Still sounds overly complicated to me.
     
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  15. imlarry425

    imlarry425 Captain

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    bb>So it's an idea for a mechanic in a multiplayer scenario rather than the base game?

    I've only played solo and local co-op for years and only recently played in a large game- PvP is a turn-off for me (sorry guys, my twitch skills suck and I avoid stress with my drone) ... playing in a PvE multi (thank you @spanj , sorry about your very bad last couple of days in server admin hell) has been a lot of fun.

    t>I don't think it could be done in a custom scenario unless the devs changed the base game first.

    That's why I put it here rather than in the reforged, eden, ore re threads. It was the devs introduction of alternative recipes for pentaxid and pentaxid farming in a grow plot that made me think about the implications of resource shortages and refining. They were apparently thinking about it too. The best stories in a sprint are the ones that have a "do something you are already doing someplace else" .. in object models duplicating behaviors is more straightforward because of inheritance.

    Pentaxid is already a vegetable, just like ketchup. Making the pentaxid tank act like a fridge could be difficult or a three line add to a method- I've got no idea.


    [​IMG]
     
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  16. The Big Brzezinski

    The Big Brzezinski Captain

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    Well as far as custom scenarios go, the required functionality is pretty easy to imagine. It would mostly be about entry flags that replace group functions. Instead of "FoodDecayTime: 60" on a food item, you'd have "DecayTime: 60", "DecayType: Food", and "DecayedItem: RottenFood". The fridge block would gain "PreventsDecayType: Food" so that contained items with that flag don't decay. That DecayType could be anything.

    This way, scenarios could have all sorts of items with different storage needs. Pentaxid decay would be a snap, as different forms of it could have different decay timers. But that's just for starters. You could have passengers that you buy cheaply from booking vendors, store in passenger compartment blocks to prevent them quickly decaying into angry passengers, and finally sell at arrivals vendors for a profit. The scenario creator might have some advanced high energy fuel or ammunition that is volatile and needs to be stored in a special high tech ammunition container.

    How about if the DecayTime is a negative number, decay only happens inside the related block? Now the ersatz fridge is an incubator. Toss that Akua berry wine in for a few hours to decay into a much more valuable version. Produce cultures from a food processor to "decay" into rare materials for medical supplies.

    You might also want DecayedItem to result in different items, a la "DecayedItem: lameitem, lameitem, lameitem, coolitem". Now you've got something with a one-in-four chance of decaying into something desirable. Combined with the incubator function, you could have a constructor produce a research kit with a decay time of negative one hour, toss it into an engineering research laboratory, and have a small chance of it decaying into a weapon schematic or a tech point consumable. Chucks of scrap might be mined from SSOR junk piles and decayed into random materials, components, or even blocks in a recycling container.

    And there's nothing stopping Eleon from doing similar things in the default survival and multiplayer scenarios as well if these decay flag changes were made.
     
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