Research and general Sci department thoughtboard

[Supermichael777]

What to do about the motile feature creep that is R&d?

My though is to move its core station interaction of "upgrades" into an expanded robotics and make R&D into something that can justify its rewards based on its own effort rather then following a checklist, hoping the miners didn't get memed and turning into a 3d printer for loot.

An archeotech restoration thing is my idea. Xenoliths trapped in the surface of lava-land and its orbiting debris field contain artifacts that can be extracted by examining the stone to determine the age and materials of the object and using the corect setings on an reconstructive anyliser to rebuild the item.

[D&B]

Remove the shit that allows them to bypass the "department interaction" they were supposed to get from other departments.

They can get combat levels past six without combat shotguns and keep getting weapon grades shit with no restraint.

[Bombadil]

Remove the shit that allows them to bypass the "department interaction" they were supposed to get from other departments.

They can get combat levels past six without combat shotguns and keep getting weapon grades shit with no restraint.

Wait what how?

[D&B]

Some bullshit mech weapon that got added a time back allows them to bypass this.

[Anonmare]

I remember having an idea of departmental protolathes (and circuit imprinters for one or two).

My idea was that R&D do the research like usual, but, almost every department also has a console + lathe. R&D's console would be special in that it can produce anything but the other departments consoles are locked to only being able to produce certain items. Like giving every design a set of tags (I.E. Engineering circuit boards have the engineering tag, weapons and firing pins have the security tag, BoHs have the research tag, Mining equipment has the Cargo tag and so on). Some designs could have multiple tags, like stock parts could have the cargo and engineering tag.

Minerals would be stretched a bit more but it would mean that R&D's designs get proliferated across the station and they can help everyone, even if they go full autism (unless they disconnect everyone's consoles via the R&D server console)

[XDTM]

For research itself:

I was thinking along the lines of a "pick-from-three" style of research, like stellaris, where every tier of research you can pick from a set of research projects, each with particular levels and unique benefits/gear, and missing out on the others; so as the levels go on you can hyperspecialize in, say, medical tech and get an actual reviver implant, but little from other categories, or go with a jack of all stats and miss out on the powerful stuff to get a more broad selection of utility items, weapons, and tools.

There were other elements which could be attached, like global upgrades, like autocloning, that would no longer require swapping stock parts and would be part of the machine's functionality once the particular research is completed.

As for the research itself, i thought of putting it into a time-gate and a resource gate for the later levels, so you can start the, say, Bluespace Storage research, and leave it running while you build some machinery or prepare an experiment or produce some gear for the crew, instead of being stuck pushing buttons. The research itself wouldn't be exciting, but it would be strategically significant instead of following a flowchart to get everything.

As for department protolathes, i think they're a great idea (as soon as we find a good way to also distribute materials). Plus, they coould have specialized equipment without necessarily giving everything to rnd as well (laser guns only in sec, hand drills only in engineering, syringe guns only in medbay etc)