Item scarcity, Relative Value and so forth

[Noka]

Bottom post of the previous page:

The best possible nerf to storage right now would be making it so you can't drag open items in containers (aka, you can't open the box in your bag without taking it out, etc.)

People might whine and bitch, but right now it'd really help with reducing effective storage, but not quite nerf it into nonexistence.

[Cobby]

Stuns last longer if you have a bunch of items in your backpack (you’re like a ? on its back lol) :^)

[Steelpoint]

If you want to do this, your first best step is to decrease the inventory space for most of the crew.

You could look into other servers like Colonial Marines in terms of changing inventory, make Backpacks hold the current amount of items but you have to take it off your back to remove items, and have satchels hold three or four items but you can take them out whenever. Decrease toolbelts size to only hold three items, remove the ability to fit most items inside other smaller containers inside a backpack outside of certain circumstances.

But at that point you have to ask, is item scarcity something the playerbase here wants or is desired?

[cedarbridge]

If you want to do this, your first best step is to decrease the inventory space for most of the crew.

You could look into other servers like Colonial Marines in terms of changing inventory, make Backpacks hold the current amount of items but you have to take it off your back to remove items, and have satchels hold three or four items but you can take them out whenever. Decrease toolbelts size to only hold three items, remove the ability to fit most items inside other smaller containers inside a backpack outside of certain circumstances.

But at that point you have to ask, is item scarcity something the playerbase here wants or is desired?

Maybe I'm not seeing it but how does decreasing backpack usefulness resolve the "every department starts every shift with every useful thing they could need in abundance" issue brought up in the OP? And to the second, I don't doubt that players accustomed to always having everything waiting for them easy at hand would be opposed to having that removed. That's part of the QoL cycle. Once a change is added, people forget how to function without the "easier" time.

[Gamarr]

The station comes all set, prepared, with a fucking bow on it at every start. The single issue being power and no input, requiring solars or something, but otherwise the place is clean and pristine. This is against long-term gameplay and extremely many things suffer for it.

In the grim-dark future, every crewman is left wanting. Take something like meta-station, but remove majority of the 'actual departments.' Meaning the normal kitchen, bar, restuarant? Just remove (stay with me) this for majority of depts that have a maintenance counter-part in this way. A few likely remain untouched in theory as they don't have a counterpart (cargo mostly comes to mind). Now squish the station together of what remains, meaning connecting the maint-parts into a haphazard and badly designed jumble of hallways and what-used-to-be-maint. This should be the station. Maybe code in a way that a small handful of sections come powered, stocked, and ready to use at random. One round it'll be medbay, hydro, and the bar. Another, security, engineering, and hydro.

Just for one idea. But yeah, nothing has worth because the stations come stocked to the gills with shit. Maint, even more bloated (not even counting pointless depts like viro, genetics, and things that really don't add to the longetivity of the round and amount to a little dept for people to autism and pump out bullshit by the fuckton with no throttling). Zero/minimal effort is bad.

[onleavedontatme]

Maybe I'm not seeing it but how does decreasing backpack usefulness resolve the "every department starts every shift with every useful thing they could need in abundance" issue brought up in the OP?

Because by the 2nd post you'd said

> but if crew interaction is a real goal that the codebase wants

So people are now talking about other ways to encourage player interaction as well

[kevinz000]

because cedar I don't think items being common is the issue rather than than how you(I) can carry enough medicine to keep up a small militia and still enough guns to brute force a riot solo.

items being common won't be as much of an issue if people couldn't hoard as much

also every sentence I type about how storage is an issue hurts myself because I'm one of the biggest abusers of "I can carry 200 guns so I will".
sec players really do hate themselves.

[Steelpoint]

I'm going to dread saying this but in Lifeweb's OS13 game mode, as a example, the Engineering toolbelt can only hold three items, in addition finding a toolbelt can be hard enough as is let alone a Backpack or the holy Satchel. So from the immediate get go a Engineer (or Pilot) has to make some choices in which Engineering tools to take in their belt, and then they have to juggle on where to put whatever tools they can't fit in their toolbelt VERUS all the other items they need to carry such as flares (since the lighting is shit on station), flashlights, oxygen tanks, food, minerals, weapons, etc, etc. You may end up leaving some tools in Engineering since you don't have enough room to carry them. What about when shit gets serious and you have to juggle a lot of important items from ID cards, weapons, injectors, etc?

This is just as a Engineer, let alone a Doctor, Security Officer, Captain, etc.

The reason why I suggest looking at restricting inventory space to start with is because just having to force players to chose items that are critically important to carry significantly increases the value of all items on station. Once you've looked at that then you can start asking questions on restricting fluff items to only the most essential personal and then working from there (does ever Sec Officer need two or so flashbangs, do all Engineers need two or three stacks of Metal, etc).

[kevinz000]

(does ever Sec Officer need two or so flashbangs

this is why you're bad ;^)

[ShadowDimentio]

If you want to do this, your first best step is to decrease the inventory space for most of the crew.

You could look into other servers like Colonial Marines in terms of changing inventory, make Backpacks hold the current amount of items but you have to take it off your back to remove items, and have satchels hold three or four items but you can take them out whenever. Decrease toolbelts size to only hold three items, remove the ability to fit most items inside other smaller containers inside a backpack outside of certain circumstances.

But at that point you have to ask, is item scarcity something the playerbase here wants or is desired?

The removing backpacks to inventory thing got removed because it was fucking awful.

[Noka]

Maybe I'm not seeing it but how does decreasing backpack usefulness resolve the "every department starts every shift with every useful thing they could need in abundance" issue brought up in the OP?

Mainly, it addresses a separate but related issue: Players like being able to carry everything at all times. Personal storage being so high, players who want an item will seek out that item in their area because (frankly) they have no reason to not have it. Reducing personal storage will reduce the amount of things people can carry, and get them more used to adapting to picking up whatever is the most useful to them.

That would make adding in scarcity much easier. Players in a well-stocked area already have to try and optimize; making the area less well-stocked adds more elements.

As it is, I will note: I think toolbelts are fine. If they were nerfed, it'd be nice if they could hold more things in exchange. For example, I think it'd be cool if they could hold Hydroponcis gear - that'd allow botanists to actually make good use of the leather they get towards simplifying their storage space.

RE: CM packs, I think it'd be cool if backpacks did have to be taken off (or otherwise unshouldered somehow) to have items retrieved. However, I'd like to see a hotkey for removing them in exchange - right now, the only method I know of is dragging it to hand. Satchels not requiring that but having lower storage also makes sense; given, something else I think could be interesting is duffelbags being a mix of the two - shiftclick swings them down, slowing your movespeed but allowing you to freely access them without needing hand space.

Those are just throwing out ideas, but still, Might Be Cool.

As it is, I'd prefer item scarcity to be generated as a function of randomness rather than forced scarcity. This principle already exists for some things (ie, Botany needs to hassle Chemistry; etc), and what that tells me is that predictable scarcity will lead to people preemptively knowing what you want, which leads to some jobs just outright expecting you to Know what they'll want. Having randomized scarcity would, at the very least, make things more fluid...

And I'd be interested in seeing some kind of persistent system that encourages players to play less greedily, though it'd probably get some backlash as people get used to it/keep accidentally fucking everyone else over.