Modular Settlement Machinery gameplay mechanics discussion

[cadpnq]

I was pleasantly surprised by the interest everyone showed in MSM. You all seemed to have lots of ideas about components and how they should work together. I have some ideas of my own, but I'm concerned about how complicated using MSM might be. If you have seen Advanced Settlement Power (http://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/11165) you know that I'm a big fan of complexity. The problem with ASP is that the learning curve is so steep that most people are too intimidated to try it. I'd like to avoid that with MSM.

 

The attached diagram is a basic overview of how I'm thinking everything would connect in a simple nuclear power plant. The components are:

• Tank: holds water (...duh)
• Pump: pulls water from tank and produces pressure/flow
• Reactor core: produces heat at some given rate. has connectors for water to flow through and heats said water
• Boiler: has two sets of connectors. one set is the heat input and the other is for the feedwater/steam produced
• Cooler: dumps heat from the water flowing through it into the environment
• Turbine: turns incoming steam into torque. lowers steam pressure/temperature
• Condenser: turns steam back into water

The tricky part is how they all interact from a gameplay point of view. It needs to be interesting/fun but not too complicated for J. Random Gamer to actually use. I could go crazy and compute the resistance/pressure in each loop to determine the flow rate. Then with a little math you would pass some volume of water through every component each simulation tick, but I'm afraid that might make designing things with MSM too difficult for some people.

 

So, given what I have said so far, how do you think everything should work together? Don't worry about how it will all be implemented. Figuring that out is my problem. Focus on the game mechanics

 

edit: If you're not logged in and you can't see the diagram you can find it here: http://i.imgur.com/RrLE4uV.png

Edited October 12, 2016 by cadpnq

[Kainschilde209]

This just gave me an idea for a much larger scale mod that may not even be possible within the game mechanics. Specialist settlements. Say you've got a settlement with large-scale access to water, such as Sanctuary or Taffington Boathouse. Set these settlements up with large-scale water purification plants and they can provide clean water for multiple settlements throughout the commonwealth. A settlement has a lot of open land and not much else? Production farm, nothing but a couple bunkhouses and crops as far as the eye can see, providing food for up to 5-10 settlements nearby. Then other, smaller settlements could specialise in production via the contraptions workshop factories or perhaps be trade hubs or whatnot.

 

The part where game mechanics becomes a problem is distribution. And that's also where this mod comes in. It'd be cool if you could make a settlement that specialized in power production. Instead of every settlement having power generators cluttering up potential crop or work space, have one settlement build 10-20 Fusion Generators from Wasteland Workshop, then run power lines between the settlements. I actually tried this once between Sanctuary and Red Rocket using powered light poles to check the power flow and Place Anywhere to build the power lines between settlements. The power line lights all lit up along the road, but once they crossed the line into Red Rockets territory no juice.

 

Me an my random ideas, feel free to ignore if I'm being too out there.

[montky]

this is interesting stuff for sure!

apologies for a novel - you inspire a lot with the scope of this idea.

 

lore-wise;

it is a lot of fun to see such complex fleshing out of the FO universe,

and how 'immersive' it can be, if people want to play that way.

if folks learn a little about fusion and nuclear power/power real world,

and ERoEI etc... all the better!

 

FONV poseidon power was awesome -

you could allocate power to New Vegas, or to other projects -

it was a key decision in the game.

the absence of the karma and morality system, the absence of those wicked choices/sophies dilemma...

it is partly what make FO4 very much unlike previous games.

power to boston, to hangmans alley, the castle, or institute...

it will harsh relations in a no-win scenario...

 

quests associated with this kind of mod,

would be awesome content -

folks at a settlement would probably have a town meeting on what power source they want to go with

"not in my backyard" etc...

there is a risk that they become more of a target, at the benefit of easier living etc.

"Candy" workers (gigolo and strumpets) complaining about losing customers if they mutate due to a reactor,

science savvy farmer or robot wanting more power...

 

'prevent the raiders from causing an overload' as a recurring settlement raid mission,

that would be a fun ambient quest,

rather than preston garvey

"a settler has been kidnapped... again. I'll mark their location on your map"

(how does preston know where they were kidnapped habitually?)

 

or, people thinking the reactor is going to meltdown or go boom...

but a steam pipe or turbine breaks down instead, and there is no boom or extra rads...

heheh.

 

game-mechanics wise:

Adv.SettlementPower was a lot of fun,

though after seeing mods such as 'Any Door Anywhere" (a pair of doors that connect,

door A can be somewhere in a cell in the commonwealth, door B is in a developer level world, which is rad-free etc)

why not merely

make an object that is mapped to another object?

sorta like Basement Living entry doors...

power box A is connected to Power Box B.

if I put power box A at V111 and have 400 power,

400 power is available at power box B...

 

rather than stringing powerlines everywhere with cell-reset issues and other glitchy goodness to deal with...

(even though, proper above ground or underground power lines would be 'in-universe' how they do it)

-----

before you can make the parts to build the reactor...

do you need a supply line from a resource site in order to build the reactor?

ie - you have to have a supply line from a quarry or from sentinel site etc,

to supply the fissile materials and control parts...

 

turning to this immersive powerplant idea -

what happens if your terminal is destroyed?

does it start a timer...

and, if your reactor explodes, will it 'the nuclear option' your settlement?

anyone there becomes a ghoul, or dies?

 

what happens if multiple parts of the system are damaged?

do you have to repair them manually -

or , can settlers be assigned to the part, to repair it for you?

eg -

if say "Nuclear Powerplant Basement V111" is attacked, and settlers cannot repair the reactor...

would that be a 'drop everything and fix that before timer reaches 0" event?

 

where does the waste go?

do you have to assign settlers to supply-line the waste to a dump-site?

that could be fun for quests too

"protect the goo - raiders want your depleted waste to sell as ghoul-narcotic,

or, ghouls are attracted to that fresh sludge in the wasteland..."

or

"bad karma - dump the goo into the institute"

or "contaminate water supply down stream - dump waste into taffington boat house"

 

----

do all the components act like the in-game timer for the light or sensors?

eg - there are a range of tolerances for the parts in the console,

and you have to run a diagnostic to determine if the parts are in-tolerance,

ie

reactor is running at x,y,z pressure and x,y,z temp; producing x,y,z rads per minute.

(these are all array/struct and enum of values it random picks from for each component).

so,

if there are 12 components in the system,

if at any time t, there are 4 or more components out of tolerance,

or a critical component is offline,

the countdown timer begins?