Lathe tax - digg free comment thread

[RikuTheKiller]

Bottom post of the previous page:

Here with the whole you know "economy really doesn't matter", which I do agree with.
I already said something along the lines of having an access-based system on printers, protolathes and such:

Just add a fucking access type thing that's hackable. Just like with vendors. Except there's a wire for electrocution AND one that disconnects it from the ore silo alongside the one that makes it accessible by everyone. This means that while
your insuls may make it more likely you can do it successfully, failing makes you pretty much fucked. You've disconnected it from the ore silo and the entire department is going to be fucking mad at you. You're going to die, 100%. (Unless the department just doesn't exist.) Why involve the economy in such matters? Involving the economy here just fucks over everyone. If you somehow get an alien tool for it, good job, you're the ultimate tider.

Alongside this change we could change how the ore silo links to things. Having to run across every. single. goddamn. department. just because some guy broke a single machine is fucking ridiculous. You should be able to scan for machines from like, an ore silo console that can be built next to the silo and be capable of linking the ore silo to all unlinked things on the same z-level at once. Then have a similar system to telecomms where you can get a resource transfer relay on another z-level to connect to it. How are the transfer relays connected to an ore silo? Whenever an ore silo is created, it gets an unique 4-digit code that can be changed. The roundstart ore silo code should be stored in the RD's office to avoid having to link an entire serverful of relays. (No-one is going to make 9999 ore silos, make me regret saying this please I want to see it.) Adding this code to a resource transfer relay automatically connects it to the ore silo the code belongs to. This allows the console to search for machines on that level for machines as well, eliminating any issues with places like the mining base.

Overall if all of this was added instead of Arconomy (lathe tax), people would likely be happier, tiding would be a little harder and the ore silo system becomes more than a multitool and a goddamn single machine in a room. Alongside the fact that we no longer have to pay for something that needs resources already.

Also, the other parts of the PR I agree with still. Just not the fucking lathe tax.

[Turbonerd]

Here with the whole you know "economy really doesn't matter", which I do agree with.
I already said something along the lines of having an access-based system on printers, protolathes and such:

Just add a fucking access type thing that's hackable. Just like with vendors. Except there's a wire for electrocution AND one that disconnects it from the ore silo alongside the one that makes it accessible by everyone. This means that while
your insuls may make it more likely you can do it successfully, failing makes you pretty much fucked. You've disconnected it from the ore silo and the entire department is going to be fucking mad at you. You're going to die, 100%. (Unless the department just doesn't exist.) Why involve the economy in such matters? Involving the economy here just fucks over everyone. If you somehow get an alien tool for it, good job, you're the ultimate tider.

Alongside this change we could change how the ore silo links to things. Having to run across every. single. goddamn. department. just because some guy broke a single machine is fucking ridiculous. You should be able to scan for machines from like, an ore silo console that can be built next to the silo and be capable of linking the ore silo to all unlinked things on the same z-level at once. Then have a similar system to telecomms where you can get a resource transfer relay on another z-level to connect to it. How are the transfer relays connected to an ore silo? Whenever an ore silo is created, it gets an unique 4-digit code that can be changed. The roundstart ore silo code should be stored in the RD's office to avoid having to link an entire serverful of relays. (No-one is going to make 9999 ore silos, make me regret saying this please I want to see it.) Adding this code to a resource transfer relay automatically connects it to the ore silo the code belongs to. This allows the console to search for machines on that level for machines as well, eliminating any issues with places like the mining base.

Overall if all of this was added instead of Arconomy (lathe tax), people would likely be happier, tiding would be a little harder and the ore silo system becomes more than a multitool and a goddamn single machine in a room. Alongside the fact that we no longer have to pay for something that needs resources already.

Also, the other parts of the PR I agree with still. Just not the fucking lathe tax.

Reconnecting it back to the ore silo isn't hard. Don't forget CE's blueprints exists, which shows what every wire does for everything that can get hacked. Making it possible to print things for free by just hacking will never work, because people will ALWAYS go for the free method, and that just invalidates the lathe tax and economy.

[Pandarsenic]

What if we simply did not have the lathe tax

[Omega_DarkPotato]

After playing with this a bit, I really, really still just dislike it
I do not see a reason for it's existence and hearing people tell me that they spent their entire ID on 10 sheets of some alloy is absurd.
Why are people being taxed to use materials that the station produced for itself?

I'm fine with the rest of arconomy and I think that a lower original balance with a paycheck definitely adds a way to tie economy to a round and its duration, but the lathe tax will never sit well in my mind, even after the removal of the cost for members of their own department.
if an assistant wants to actually assist they are now taxed for attempting to do so.

[Ziiro]

Except there's a wire for electrocution AND one that disconnects it from the ore silo alongside the one that makes it accessible by everyone.

Hey there's an idea. Make it so lathes that are connected to the ORM have a tax, but if you build a local only it's free, because you are supplying it with materials.

This makes it so it's an actual tradeoff to having it connected to the ORM. Convenience costs money. Make it so that the QM can set the tax at the ORM itself.

It will also definitely make players even less likely to work with each other, but that's actually the goal of every economy. So big W for Space Capitalism.

[cacogen]

I coded something enabling items to be recycled at techfabs and protolathes like they can be at autolathes, which also added a recycling rebate for non-sheets added to them based on the values of the materials recycled. Didn't come up with an adequate solution to prevent people from just printing things and recycling them though.

The impetus was seeing a huge pile of tools lying beside the protolathe in engineering, and the inability to recycle them without first building an autolathe (something other departments can't do for their own piles). But by paying players to recycle, you also incentivise players to clean up their departments and recycle materials, and offset the lathe tax somewhat.

I might still PR this if I can code a decent solution to people exploiting it by printing stuff to recycle, but I guess by sharing it here it means somebody might make some version of this if I don't.

[Ziiro]

The other part of the equation is definitely paying players for recycling, as well as contributing materials to the lathes and ORM. This would also lead to people tearing apart the station to sell back to the company, which, lmao.

[Pandarsenic]

These all seem like patches to a problem (lathetax) that need not be one at all. A recycler (in disposals, a machine for it, whatever) that returns crap to the ore silo for money is cool, but it's cooler when balanced for itself instead of for the unnecessary lathe fee.

[Ziiro]

I mean true to the standard, people need to make their peace with the fact that this is happening, and all we can do now is propose ways to patch the bad parts.

[Scriptis]

The lathe tax has been merged: https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/65795

I give it 31 days before ArcaneMusic completely burns out on upgrading the economy because of the PR disaster this has been, and we're left with a self-fulfilling prophecy of the old economy plus an obnoxious lathe tax that makes it unreasonable or impossible for people to build silly things.

[Arcanemusic]

The lathe tax has been merged: https://github.com/tgstation/tgstation/pull/65795

I give it 31 days before ArcaneMusic completely burns out on upgrading the economy because of the PR disaster this has been, and we're left with a self-fulfilling prophecy of the old economy plus an obnoxious lathe tax that makes it unreasonable or impossible for people to build silly things.

Appreciate the confidence that I'll be the only one trying to add anything to economy in the following month. That, I guarantee will probably happen, and will be politely surprised if I'm wrong.

[Pandarsenic]

Appreciate the confidence that I'll be the only one trying to add anything to economy in the following month. That, I guarantee will probably happen, and will be politely surprised if I'm wrong.

I mean, yeah, that sounds about right

[cybersaber101]

I love wasting my time "interacting" with monopoly money, this sure makes a world that resets every hour engaging!

[Sexmaster]

The internal maintainer vote is complete.

he results of the vote are done - https://app.rankedvote.co/elections/182 ... 23/results

Why not put this to a player vote, this shouldn't be decided by a few coders, this is clearly large enough to warrant it's own thread and discussion on what is 1 part of a single PR. Announce it somewhere in the discord, just give it reactions for each vote or use a website again. It'd nice to actually feel like we're being listened to for once.

[Rohen_Tahir]

The internal maintainer vote is complete.

he results of the vote are done - https://app.rankedvote.co/elections/182 ... 23/results

Why not put this to a player vote, this shouldn't be decided by a few coders, this is clearly large enough to warrant it's own thread and discussion on what is 1 part of a single PR. Announce it somewhere in the discord, just give it reactions for each vote or use a website again. It'd nice to actually feel like we're being listened to for once.

It absolutely should be decided by a few coders because most players are fucking stupid.

[cacogen]

just do what i said which i'll never pr which is reward people for contributing materials to the ore silo via the lathes (while figuring out how to avoid rewarding for materials that have been ejected and re-inserted) which will help offset the tax and incentivise people to contribute

or give all jobs a more fun way to earn money than bounties

[oranges]

It'd nice to actually feel like we're being listened to for once.

you are not though, and I would be very interested to know why you believe otherwise

[sinfulbliss]

So essentially, only doctors now can do full revivals + organ replacements. Means if you want to save someone you're kind of SoL.
Only engis and scientists can upgrade things.
Tools are now at a premium to assistants so engi is 100% going to be tided even harder than it is. You might say that's an admin issue, but breaking in and stealing tools will never be disallowed on LRP, you should look at the practical ramifications of a PR too.

I think if assistants already didn't assist now the 1% of assistants that actually want to aid in departments will be completely disincentivized to do so. Imagine earning money so you can buy organs and surgery tools to help medbay revive people. Or earning money to repair a simple breach as a nonengi. It will never happen I think and simply disincentivize helping and aiding the station as a whole.

[TheFinalPotato]

Tools are now at a premium to assistants so engi is 100% going to be tided even harder than it is. You might say that's an admin issue, but breaking in and stealing tools will never be disallowed on LRP, you should look at the practical ramifications of a PR too.

Most tools are sold for 100s of credits at the vending machine. Suck it up.

[Misdoubtful]

If you want interdepartmental cooperation, this is the perfect way to discourage that. "I'm not wasting my money helping this idiot/upgrading that machine. I'll probably need that money later."

It also makes a lot of my favourite clown gimmicks prohibitively expensive.

I very fondly remember a time on certain servers and still to this day on some servers there not being anymore like the ORM (Which I still to this day believe is a blight on the economy of the game and is one of the few actual spaceman opinions that I do have). If you wanted materials or something made you had to try and get the department to cooperate with you, maybe trade for it, or attempt to steal it who knows. mats were scarce, items were even scarcer. You would actually have to go through a process of working with various people to get what you wanted unless you wanted to do it the hard and long way.

Its great to want to build a more realistic economy in spacemans that's great, I commend that I do, but what does this do to:

• The fun factor of the game

• The amount of inter-departmental interaction

The internal maintainer vote is complete.

he results of the vote are done - https://app.rankedvote.co/elections/182 ... 23/results

There was a clear overall preference for an economy to exist, but not to affect the costs of doing business for staff

Economy exists, individual items purchased by staff costs money, but items from their dept autolathe, dept cargo gear they are authorised to buy etc, are all free "paid by NT"

Below is a proposed path forward for the lathe tax part of the Arconomy changes:

On that basis, I think if we accept the autolathe/protolathe tax, it should only apply when users are printing things that are not related to their dept.

Ideally, I think tying this to accesses gives the best outcome, as this encourages people to get more accesses, or illicitly obtain cards from other departments to avoid the tax.

This also encourages staff to cooperate on projects so they can print items out for the relevant depts without incurring a monetary tax.


this is subject to maintainer discussion as we speak.

If this is the outcome, it seems like it aims to build on exactly what I'm nitpicking about, departmental interaction rather than flying solo, just in a different way, so cool.

Do many people here even remember or have experienced pre-ORM economy?

People seem concerned about being able to do things on their own for the most part, and not the department interaction part to get things, isn't that the point?

[toemas]

lathe tax discourages player creativity by making it far harder to build anything for the sake of "making the economy important" (something literally nobody has ever asked for or wanted) i used to like to upgrade and build machines and stuff as assistant. im not going to bother anymore. It wouldnt be so bad if bounties were actually fun, but they really arent.

Most tools are sold for 100s of credits at the vending machine. Suck it up.

I think i'll just steal them for free.

[massa]

This is dumb stop doing things like these that are clearly to the detriment to the game.

Not one line of this code is original or adds anything. It just adds a parasitic loop to already existing content that only punishes people creating things or attempting to access the bare minimums for engaging with the game (tools, materials). Lathes, everything in them, is a tool for creation and construction. If you guys want to facilitate RP, or bolster player engagement with creative mechanics/each other, this is just ????????? as far as 'content' goes.

I haven't played in a few weeks and assumed this would have gotten reversed or something within a day. The lack of critical thought is weird. At best, the supporting arguments are that it's "no big deal bro" and "such a small cost bro nbd". lol? fuck the economy if it isn't related to cargo/food service onboard the station, do something cool instead of cuck fun shit because of one clearly unwanted, unneeded, and unloved 'mechanic'.

[MooCow12]

This is dumb stop doing things like these that are clearly to the detriment to the game.

Not one line of this code is original or adds anything. It just adds a parasitic loop to already existing content that only punishes people creating things.

Couldn`t agree with this statement more. There are only 3 scenarios where economy should be relevant.

1. Cargo because you`re purchasing items from sources outside of the station.

2. Vending machines, they are stocked with a limited inventory of items, and many of these items can actually be produced or substituted by a station made counterpart, so what role do vending machines play? They let you use money to cover an inconvenience rather than being the inconvenience itself.

3. Given that the station is mostly isolated along with the community on it, the only other way economy should be relevant is if the PLAYERS THEMSELVES CHOOSE if its relevant or not by selling eachother goods and services for money.


All the arconomy lathe tax has done is put an unequal drain on everyone`s money to justify the passive paychecks that we used to have without lathe tax.

Humans being affected the least since they can law 2 silicons to just print stuff for them + humans have the largest paychecks giving them alot more buying power than other species than what was probably intended.

[iamgoofball]

i haven't had any problems with the lathe tax, get good? idk

[thebleh]

i haven't had any problems with the lathe tax, get good? idk

[cacogen]

I hadn't really experienced it until today being a naughty Assistant on Manuel and helping myself to tools from the Engineering protolathe and it being like 70 cr for the belt, which as Meloninthedark points out is a pittance compared to the bullshit the vending machines in tool storage charge you but when you only have 150cr it does cut through your balance pretty quick. The only reason that sucks though is because the means that most jobs have to get more money, bounties, is shit.

Like I did the clown box one, and this one is on me, but there was no clown and so I had to spend the next 5 minutes regretting my decision before I could get a new bounty and then the server froze up and booted me and any attempts to get back in were met with unfathomable lag that didn't seem to affect anyone else.

So I just think it'd suck less if there were easier or more enjoyable ways for most jobs to get cr than fetch quests that have no regard for the availability of the items they're asking for, the amount of time it'll take for you to find them or your access to them.

Like the dollar is weak as shit because there's fuck all to buy and fuck all FUN methods of making money, so you either have too little money or you have too much and the difference between this dichotomy is a few successful bounties (or just scanning the cubes as a cargo tech, or doing the tourist bots as bartender but not as cook because it takes too long).

One additional method of making money I can think of off the top of my head is just rewarding people for delivering crates, with a payout that decreases based on time taken once the crate is off the shuttle. You could somehow let anyone do this, not just cargo techs, so other jobs have a method of making money in addition to bounties.

[Sexmaster]

you are not though, and I would be very interested to know why you believe otherwise

I'm guessing you meant to say we are being listened to, but that reads otherwise.

unhappy.PNG (2.3 KiB) Viewed 4774 times

This got merged, people clearly weren't happy about it, there were several compromises that people tried to suggest for the PR, and lots of people just outright saying they didn't want the change. We weren't listened to :/

[cacogen]

No, he's saying the opinions of the playerbase don't matter and never have. He is being honest about his realpolitik approach to the server, and it's a lot kinder than stringing people along with false expectations.

[Itseasytosee2me]

I'm guessing you meant to say we are being listened to, but that reads otherwise.

unhappy.PNG

This got merged, people clearly weren't happy about it, there were several compromises that people tried to suggest for the PR, and lots of people just outright saying they didn't want the change. We weren't listened to :/

Yeah, orange tends to not be a fan of other peoples opinions. He's adaptively built a mental barricade against other people's ideas so he doesn't die of all of the brain damaging stupidity that you have to deal with as headcoder.

[Mothblocks]

you are not though, and I would be very interested to know why you believe otherwise

I'm guessing you meant to say we are being listened to, but that reads otherwise.

he very much did not mean to say that

[Pandarsenic]

1) Just stunprod and cuff an engineer and take their toolbelt, then let them replace it. Ezpz.
2)

I'm guessing you meant to say we are being listened to, but that reads otherwise.
snip
This got merged, people clearly weren't happy about it, there were several compromises that people tried to suggest for the PR, and lots of people just outright saying they didn't want the change. We weren't listened to :/

Having two Maintainer Headmins means that this is the closest we've ever had to the codebase involving actual input from people who play the game since hornygranny's headmin term.

[Ziiro]

1) Just stunprod and cuff an engineer and take their toolbelt, then let them replace it. Ezpz.

Why stop there. Specifically start unbolting and recycling everything you can. Steal mundane and replaceable items from people and throw it all in the trash to force them to interact with the economy.

The bigger fuck you is to actually just steal and shred IDs because it's even worse now! Pretty cool.

[Jonathan Gupta]

1) Just stunprod and cuff an engineer and take their toolbelt, then let them replace it. Ezpz.

Why stop there. Specifically start unbolting and recycling everything you can. Steal mundane and replaceable items from people and throw it all in the trash to force them to interact with the economy.

The bigger fuck you is to actually just steal and shred IDs because it's even worse now! Pretty cool.

you dont throw it away you use it, dumbass.

[FantasticFwoosh]

you dont throw it away you use it, dumbass.

Its not about the ids, its about sending a message. Don't believe that someone wouldn't deliberately crash the economy by destroying people's attached funds in a grief prevalent enviroment as a twisted form of disgruntled feedback or just to make people mad. Some Spessmen just want to watch the world burn.

(img attached, honestly quite nostalgic for me honestly)

► Show Spoiler

[cacogen]

I remember thinking The Dark Knight was the best film ever made when I first saw it in 2008. I hadn’t seen a lot of films or TV shows then. It was quickly supplanted by Children of Men, which is the best video game movie in front of Edge of Tomorrow and The Last of Us.

Also destroying the ID doesn’t destroy the account, you can put the number into any ID to access the account and the number is stored in your memories so you can’t lose it.

[Sexmaster]

Also destroying the ID doesn’t destroy the account, you can put the number into any ID to access the account and the number is stored in your memories so you can’t lose it.

Better to just take IDs for more money and free discounts at department lathes I guess

[Nabski]

I remember thinking The Dark Knight was the best film ever made when I first saw it in 2008. I hadn’t seen a lot of films or TV shows then. It was quickly supplanted by Children of Men, which is the best video game movie in front of Edge of Tomorrow and The Last of Us.

Also destroying the ID doesn’t destroy the account, you can put the number into any ID to access the account and the number is stored in your memories so you can’t lose it.

I watched edge of tomorrow, wifes first time, my second. We just skipped the entire last act where he woke up a day earlier and as a result my viewing experience was greatly improved.

I didn't realize that the lathe tax came with a return of paychecks over time, so I hate it less than I originally did. My biggest annoyance is as roboticist because I have to pay money for proximity sensors since they don't come from science.

[iwishforducks]

i still do not understand the goal of it. is it to punish tiders? if so, then i dont give a damn about some tider breaking into medical bay to Print Something (i would prefer they print than steal). if the goal of it is to encourage cooperation then i can only say that the only cooperation it's encouraging is a bullet to my brain as the 10th tider asks me to print them parts and an RPED. if the goal of it is to make it so people don't waste mats then... lol?

instead of encouraging some kind of interaction with players by making it so departments could sell items, we're stuck with... whatever this is.

[iwishforducks]

also adding that scientists in this game (and im guilty of this too) will literally ignore me when im knocking at science desk. i will be pointing at them, trying to get their attention, and they will still find the closest exit. because no one wants to play bus boy.

[Pandarsenic]

Also destroying the ID doesn’t destroy the account, you can put the number into any ID to access the account and the number is stored in your memories so you can’t lose it.

Better to just take IDs for more money and free discounts at department lathes I guess

Loot their paycheck every time it comes in since there's no way to cut off the old ID