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The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 2:36 pm
by calzilla1
I think the mining situation is quite fucked up. Miners rarely come back with minerals anymore, and even when they do they do the bare minimum, more focused on SWEET L00T GUYS! I say make the ORM upgraded less retarded or/and make drop rates of ore per rock be a lot more. Also give science a shuttle to lava land so if the miners fuck off/die science wont be fucked over

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 3:01 pm
by Knaive
Go to toxins, make bombs. Go to HoP, get mining access. Go to lavaland, blow rocks and pick up the ores. Materials for days.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 3:15 pm
by Wyzack
On one hand, Lavaland really takes a lot of the focus away from the station.

On the other hand, it is because it is interesting and cool and fun as fuck. This is a game, it is supposed to be fucking fun, limiting content because you think the fun has the wrong focus is pretty dumb. Not in response to this post, just my thoughts in general on Lavaland. I think the big issue is that miners get cooler loot from killing monsters and hunting ruins than they do from the mining vendor machine

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 3:44 pm
by AnturK
One of the ideas i was considering to help with the miner gameplay/role dissonance was switching around cargo and mining roles as tech and resource sources for R&D. Miners would be there to collect unique high tech items from ruins and cargo to order steady supply of materials and parts. Would need a pretty big overhaul of cargo points though.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 3:53 pm
by D&B
Why mine if RnD is never doing research.

There's more sides to it rather than just "phat loot."

They can die to monsters, ash walkers, other miners, ash storms.

Mining is easily the deadliest job. I guess it's just easier to assume all miners are just power gaming and hunting, no?

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 3:54 pm
by Saegrimr
D&B wrote:I guess it's just easier to assume all miners are just power gaming and hunting, no?
Well you kind of have to. That's literally a requirement unless you want a 5 minute round.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 4:07 pm
by D&B
Saegrimr wrote:
D&B wrote:I guess it's just easier to assume all miners are just power gaming and hunting, no?
Well you kind of have to. That's literally a requirement unless you want a 5 minute round.
If the person is smart /not knuckle dragging stupid, they can learn after their first death, tops. Problem is most don't have the first requirement.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 6:53 pm
by Remie Richards
D&B wrote:"phat loo."
what's this got to do with big toilets?

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 6:57 pm
by D&B
Remie Richards wrote:
D&B wrote:"phat loo."
what's this got to do with big toilets?
Don't reply to me or my quote ever again

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 7:27 pm
by MrAlphonzo
If the ORM is loaded up, and the poor scientist working R&D is currently experiencing a life or death situation that prevents them from getting to the ORM, the cargo techs swing about and hoard all the minerals for PHAT LOOT. So many things can go wrong with the minerals.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 7:40 pm
by D&B
The true solution is to remove ORM access to cargo and maybe install a machine that allows the redemption of ores in lava land and their teleportation to Science.

When emmaged make it send monsters too.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 7:43 pm
by Cobby
No one wins if miners believe science won't do RND and science believes miners won't give them adequate minerals.

Someone needs to step upto the plate.
D&B wrote:The true solution is to remove ORM access to cargo and maybe install a machine that allows the redemption of ores in lava land and their teleportation to Science.

When emmaged make it send monsters too.
you mean fulton beacons

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 7:46 pm
by calzilla1
D&B wrote:The true solution is to remove ORM access to cargo and maybe install a machine that allows the redemption of ores in lava land and their teleportation to Science.

When emmaged make it send monsters too.
But muh plasma points

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 7:53 pm
by D&B
ExcessiveCobblestone wrote:No one wins if miners believe science won't do RND and science believes miners won't give them adequate minerals.

Someone needs to step upto the plate.
D&B wrote:The true solution is to remove ORM access to cargo and maybe install a machine that allows the redemption of ores in lava land and their teleportation to Science.

When emmaged make it send monsters too.
you mean fulton beacons
Pls delet this

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 7:58 pm
by iamgoofball
he's coming too?

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 7:59 pm
by D&B
ExcessiveCobblestone wrote:No one wins if miners believe science won't do RND and science believes miners won't give them adequate minerals.

Someone needs to step upto the plate.
D&B wrote:The true solution is to remove ORM access to cargo and maybe install a machine that allows the redemption of ores in lava land and their teleportation to Science.

When emmaged make it send monsters too.
you mean fulton beacons
See the thing is this is just a cycle of roundstart scientists just cramming into xenobio, miners refusing to mine for ores sinve nobody is doing Science's main job. This causes miners to die or just hunt, or interact with golems or sodomize ash walkers. Then you have the late join scientist that comes and tries to work on RnD but won't get more shit since miners at this point are dead/dying. And then we have these threads

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 8:05 pm
by Jembo
Just default it to five miners. More miners = more of a chance you'll get your shit... You lazy good for nothing never having research done scientist.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 8:32 pm
by Fiz Bump
Be the change you want to see on the station. If you think miners are all power-gaming lootmongers, play a miner and gather minerals. Or go get mining access and do it as a scientist, while shit talking the current miners.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 8:36 pm
by D&B
I am the change I want to see.

Getting lynched for building RnD in mining is not gucci

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 10:31 pm
by oranges
Anturk's solution is right - remove mining as a job

Lavaland explorers are just that, explorers.

Replace mining with regular arriving mineral shipments to cargo

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 10:37 pm
by lzimann
Maybe it's just me but I never have problems delivering all types of minerals 15 minutes into the round while also had a drake killed... Regardless of me, most of the rounds I watch/play I see minerals being delivered.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 10:46 pm
by onleavedontatme
oranges wrote:Anturk's solution is right - remove mining as a job

Lavaland explorers are just that, explorers.

Replace mining with regular arriving mineral shipments to cargo
The biggest RD powercreep of our lives.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 10:59 pm
by oranges
That would implyi dripfeeding materials to RnD is somehow more powerful than an expert miner turning up with all the minerals they'll ever need 15 minutes in.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 11:05 pm
by onleavedontatme
Fair point.

Giving up and automating something because relying on other players falls through too often feels like a cop out though.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 11:12 pm
by Cobby
You could separate the job into Explorer and Miners.

MinerVends have stuff exclusively to benefit them from mining
ExplorerVends have stuff exclusively to help them ward off / fight monsters

If everyone chooses explorer and not miner, then the Scientist can at least see that in PDA and say "well shoot, gotta get it myself or just twiddle my thumbs" instead of flip coins on whether or not the current miners are actually mining.

The REAL solution, however, is to bring back the goof recycler that poops out diamonds and whatnot.

D&B wrote:
ExcessiveCobblestone wrote:No one wins if miners believe science won't do RND and science believes miners won't give them adequate minerals.

Someone needs to step upto the plate.

D&B wrote:The true solution is to remove ORM access to cargo and maybe install a machine that allows the redemption of ores in lava land and their teleportation to Science.

When emmaged make it send monsters too.


you mean fulton beacons


See the thing is this is just a cycle of roundstart scientists just cramming into xenobio, miners refusing to mine for ores sinve nobody is doing Science's main job. This causes miners to die or just hunt, or interact with golems or sodomize ash walkers. Then you have the late join scientist that comes and tries to work on RnD but won't get more shit since miners at this point are dead/dying. And then we have these threads


It's a cycle, not a one way problem. Miners AND scientists are to blame.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 11:14 pm
by onleavedontatme
Except if you have explorers+miners you now have 6(?) people on lavaland, which I can't imagine will go over well if
Lavaland really takes a lot of the focus away from the station.
Is already a common sentiment when you only have 3 guys out of ~60 there.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 11:17 pm
by kevinz000
Let's all code lavaland compound so it's public access.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 11:36 pm
by Cobby
Kor wrote:Except if you have explorers+miners you now have 6(?) people on lavaland, which I can't imagine will go over well if
Lavaland really takes a lot of the focus away from the station.
Is already a common sentiment when you only have 3 guys out of ~60 there.
You could do 2 and 2, so at least they have a partner if they want to team up.

Or you could just remove lavaland and bring back asteroid so people who complain about lavaland stop complaining about lavaland :^)

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 11:50 pm
by MrAlphonzo
kevinz000 wrote:Let's all code lavaland compound so it's public access.
I've actually considered doing sprites for the lavaland compound. Haven't learned dreamcode yet, but I know my way around pixel art. It also seems like the lavaland compound would fix most of these problems.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 12:15 am
by onleavedontatme
ExcessiveCobblestone wrote:
Kor wrote:Except if you have explorers+miners you now have 6(?) people on lavaland, which I can't imagine will go over well if
Lavaland really takes a lot of the focus away from the station.
Is already a common sentiment when you only have 3 guys out of ~60 there.
You could do 2 and 2, so at least they have a partner if they want to team up.

Or you could just remove lavaland and bring back asteroid so people who complain about lavaland stop complaining about lavaland :^)
I've tried, believe me I've tried.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 12:16 am
by D&B
Why not make goldgrubs eat slimes and shit out ores

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 12:25 am
by Alipheese
Calzilla. Have you played and experience this? Recently been playing on both Bagil and sybil and Bagil never fails to bring ores unless a megafauna is right outside or ashwalkers.

Now sybil I see no one ever plays miner really. Often or not when im miner (100% time on sybil cause it's a garen teed chance) my fellow miners are either new, tator tots, or just retarded. Basing this off about 25 games in the past 10 days.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 12:30 am
by calzilla1
Alipheese wrote:Calzilla. Have you played and experience this? Recently been playing on both Bagil and sybil and Bagil never fails to bring ores unless a megafauna is right outside or ashwalkers.

Now sybil I see no one ever plays miner really. Often or not when im miner (100% time on sybil cause it's a garen teed chance) my fellow miners are either new, tator tots, or just retarded. Basing this off about 25 games in the past 10 days.
I guess mostly on low pop, been playing QM a bit and see miners leave and comeback totally kitted out with about half a sack of ore

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 12:32 am
by calzilla1
I do just say make ore drop alot higher (like 2 or 3x) like what /vg/ did

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 1:11 am
by MimicFaux
D&B wrote:I am the change I want to see.

Getting lynched for building RnD in mining is not gucci
This wouldn't be bad, but the handful of times I've seen you try to do everything yourself, you end up locking away resources and technology behind several doors worth of access most scientists don't have, or will be unable to get because HoP went AWOL, or Sec brigged them for hacking in.

The best solution would be to bring the resources back to the station and do the science there so late join scientists/existing scientists won't be left with their thumb up their ass because a single player absconded with the entire department.
And yes, they could get the spare circuit boards, but so could the miners.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 1:43 am
by Arianya
Making science not rely on mining removes one of the few departmental symbiotic relationships in the game and makes mining either just hunting or totally pointless.

If miners are overfocusing hunting over mining, perhaps look at the reward loop: Why do they prefer loot off mobs over loot from the vending machine?

Perhaps we need to include more, higher point loot in the vending machine. Perhaps include stuff that science has no replacement/copy for. So far the only things I can think of that are truly unique in the vending machine is the jaunter, and that costs about as much as a few chunks of plasma, and various mining tools which are inferior to the KA or to the advanced plasma cutter.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 2:29 am
by D&B
MimicFaux wrote:
D&B wrote:I am the change I want to see.

Getting lynched for building RnD in mining is not gucci
This wouldn't be bad, but the handful of times I've seen you try to do everything yourself, you end up locking away resources and technology behind several doors worth of access most scientists don't have, or will be unable to get because HoP went AWOL, or Sec brigged them for hacking in.

The best solution would be to bring the resources back to the station and do the science there so late join scientists/existing scientists won't be left with their thumb up their ass because a single player absconded with the entire department.
And yes, they could get the spare circuit boards, but so could the miners.
>They never bother to get at least a couple levels
>I take science down to brute force everything to the max and make tech disks for later rebuilding but upgrading comes first.
>Somehow they feel entitled to the research products I explicitly say I will pass out as soon as I finish.
>They get brigged for coming down on me with killing intent.

I even explicitly remember a round a fucking CE of all roles tried to kill me and destroy the machines because I took science down to lava land because no one else was working on it.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 3:40 am
by DrPillzRedux
Funny because whenever I mine a lot of ore, science just lets it sit in the machine and never gets it.

It goes both ways.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 4:07 am
by bandit
Splitting the job into Miners and Explorers/Xenoarchaeologists/whatever is a good idea. But it doesn't address the core issue, which is people do not play basic station roles anymore. In before "it isn't a space office simulator" but it is a space station simulator, and the high-RP servers certainly don't have an issue with it.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 4:18 am
by MrAlphonzo
It certainly doesn't help that the loot gotten off megafauna/necropolis crates is 100x better than the stuff in the mining vendors. It encourages miners to shirk mining ore so they can get much cooler shit.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 4:23 am
by Saegrimr
Am I the only miner that shoves all my minerals in a box and mails it to R&D?

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 4:28 am
by DrPillzRedux
bandit wrote:Splitting the job into Miners and Explorers/Xenoarchaeologists/whatever is a good idea. But it doesn't address the core issue, which is people do not play basic station roles anymore. In before "it isn't a space office simulator" but it is a space station simulator, and the high-RP servers certainly don't have an issue with it.
Hello errorage.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 5:11 am
by D&B
Saegrimr wrote:Am I the only miner that shoves all my minerals in a box and mails it to R&D?
I put everything in a crate and deliver it personally.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 5:31 am
by onleavedontatme
bandit wrote:Splitting the job into Miners and Explorers/Xenoarchaeologists/whatever is a good idea. But it doesn't address the core issue, which is people do not play basic station roles anymore. In before "it isn't a space office simulator" but it is a space station simulator, and the high-RP servers certainly don't have an issue with it.
So make those jobs more interesting (most of them are very boring mechanically and have no real purpose) or go to the "high RP" servers that have the style you enjoy instead of periodically complaining people are having fun wrong.

But for what its worth every time I've been on Basil in the past couple weeks I've seen every department full and active.
DrPillzRedux wrote: scientists aren't doing science
Don't have any hard starts to back it up, but I noticed RD wasn't getting finished for a while after the RD level rework, and I have not played miner recently but it seems better lately.

Maybe miners should get science as a channel on their radio so miners know when scientists are actually doing RD, and scientists are in the loop when all the miners are dying on the radio.
Arianya wrote:Why do they prefer loot off mobs over loot from the vending machine?
Not only are the items more fun, but dodging death is more exciting than hitting some rock walls and then RD not giving you anything but items to hit rock walls better (for minerals they no longer need because they have enough to last the whole round after the first run).

If we actually split it into explorer vs miner you'd probably get even few minerals as nobody signed up to mine again (the current mining job is three times as popular as the asteroid one) or they'd sign up as miner and tag along with the explorers.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 6:11 am
by onleavedontatme
Also, while I'm sure there are miners that ignore the mining aspect and just hunt for treasure, most of the time I don't see minerals making it back to station it's because all the miners have died due to the environment/monsters/a single antagonist because they're so isolated. Their workplace being being a ton of locked airlocks, a shuttle ride, and on another z level means most people that could help them (medical, security) can't be bothered to do so.

But I'm also worried that letting people reach them easier will just end with half the crew vanishing into the wastes every round.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 9:20 am
by Danowar
Some dumb suggestions off the top of my head:
  • Relocate Science to the mining station. I haven't played Goon in ages, but I recall that, ages ago, Science was located on its own mini-station. It had its own nuclear device for self-destruction, and I believe virology was also staged there? I liked the concept, and maybe something similar to it could be applied here. It would make more sense to have Plasma research (REMEMBER PLASMA? THE ENTIRE FUCKING REASON WHY WE'RE HERE?) in particular as close as it can be to the source. If the scientists want to do their own mining, then maybe they could do what Knaive suggested and bomb the place for ore. Explosions are uncapped on lavaland, right?
  • Ore-based monsters. Watchers already drop diamonds. Why not make the rest of the monsters drop ore as well? Goliaths could come in different flavors, with each one dropping an ore-based plate. Said plates could either be added to suits like usual, or broken down into minerals to stash in the mining satchel.
  • More convenient revival/cloning options. Granted, I'm not trying to say that miners should be able to respawn with no penalty. Having a little insurance around for their inevitable demise might be nice, though. Along with the Science relocation idea, maybe mining should have a Paramedic office to assist with retrieving and cloning miners.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 12:23 pm
by Super Aggro Crag
Why don't we just remove lavaland and make kor buy his own surver to run Lavaland Station that's nothing but lava, land, and dying to computer enemies. Bring asteroid back 2017

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 1:41 pm
by Kraso
D&B wrote:I even explicitly remember a round a fucking CE of all roles tried to kill me and destroy the machines because I took science down to lava land because no one else was working on it.
lol

You're a fucking idiot, the only thing I wanted was to take the ORM back to the station that YOU took while I was making room for the BSA, and YOU were the one who attacked me by trying to set me on fire.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 1:42 pm
by Kraso
Super Aggro Crag wrote:Why don't we just remove lavaland and make kor buy his own surver to run Lavaland Station that's nothing but lava, land, and dying to computer enemies. Bring asteroid back 2017
Yes please, mining is about digging rocks, not fucking off to some fuckoff planet to dress yourself in shiny drake armour 5 minutes into the round doing fuckall for the station.

Re: The over reliance on miners

Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 1:47 pm
by letshavecake
Kor wrote:But I'm also worried that letting people reach them easier will just end with half the crew vanishing into the wastes every round.
If anyone wants to go there, it's already pretty easy for them to do so
Just making it easier to get in wouldn't change that much