Bootstrap problem (the hull parts to advance composites thing)

[thedavid]

About the new materials needed to build Hull Parts factories and Claytronics factories.

I’ve seen several players of X4 express disagreement with the new system. Honestly, I’m ok one way or the other but I do like solving problems and bringing peace.

The new system is basically A can make B and B can make A. Therefore, if you have either you can eventually make everything. This makes sense but it occurs to me that if someone has neither, how are they even supposed to get started? Like, if the Xenon have completely destroyed the one of the two kinds of stations you need for A and one of the two kinds of stations you need for B, then the player can only get half of each recipe. I think this is very unlikely to happen but not impossible.

Now, before I proceed, I do not work for Egosoft. I’m just a guy who plays their game. I don’t expect my ideas to have any impact or cause any changes. Perhaps at most someone who makes mods (which I don’t use) might be inspired.

Solution 1: The Xenon method

Xenon stations don’t require a builder ship and they build themselves from raw ore, silicon, and energy cells. I think this is a bad solution. It would work but it is a bad solution.

Solution 2: The Elite Dangerous method

So for this we give a mining ship the ability to refine a small amount of material. Maybe all mining ships or maybe only a select special subset of mining ships. Perhaps a Magnetar mineral can only carry 10% of its usual amount but can refine that 10% into refined metals. The Vanguard can do refined metals and the Sentinel can do silicon. Then the refined metals and the silicon wafers or whatever combination can then be used to build a claytronics factory to get things going.

As for me, this sounds like a nice excuse to reuse ship models but just give the ships a new name and a new function and see what players can do with it. However, I like that mining ships in X4 are mining ships. They aren’t cargo transport ships. They are mining ships. I don’t think this is the best solution for the bootstrap question. If those ships don’t exist anymore, then we end up with the same problem. However, it could be an interesting system to set up that lower tier stations are made from lower tier materials and you add more advanced materials to the more advanced stations. That makes things more complicated instead of simpler though.

Solution 3: The recycling method

This is kind of already in the game and it sort of was how the game was before the update. You could recycle scrap to get hull parts and claytronics and then use that to build your first hull parts and claytronics factories. That was always what happened to me since I always set up recycling first before I would get the HQ once I knew that recycling existed.

I think this should be an option again. However, using recycling to skip investing into the lower levels of production might cause some players to never get around to ever building an advanced composites factory. I only ever put an advanced composites module on a self sufficient wharf or on a missile components factory. It was never its own station out right.

Here is the breakdown.

Stations that get to be their own station out right:
Energy Cells
Recycling
Hull Parts
Missile components
Smart chips
Scanning Arrays
Engine parts
Shield Components & Field Coils (I put them together)
Weapon Components
Advanced Electronics
Claytronics
Antimatter Converters
Turret Components
Drone Components

Modules that simply get added to another station to make it self sufficient and are not allowed to be their own station out right

Refined metals
Silicon wafers
Antimatter cells
Superfluid coolant
Graphene
Advanced composites
microchips
Plasma Conductors
Quantum tubes

Basically I design my stations to mimic Terran stations. Raw material from mining ships goes in and the end product that will be sold to a shipyard come out.

With the new requirements for hull parts and claytronics factories, I need to think again about advanced composites and plasma conductors.

Solution 4: Builder Ships

Let’s break the problem down. In order to build a station you need certain things. In the old formula you needed hull parts, claytronics, and a builder ship. You need the builder ship. If the Xenon destroy all the builder ships we can use a shipyard to build more. The Xenon would have to wipe out not only all the factories but also all of the shipyards to remove builder ships. And even then, a faction could rely on a builder ship from a different faction to build their station for them.

So, A can make B and B can make A is a fine solution. I think a better solution would be Builder Ship can make what it needs. You have to have the builder ship anyway. You have to have it. So make that the solution to the bootstrap problem. If you don’t have any stations at all then let mining ships deliver raw resources and the builder ship has to use energy cells to do refining. This will make building take longer but is possible. If you have only refineries then deliver the refined goods and the builder ship can use that to make the higher level items it needs to build stations. It will be longer than just delivering hull parts but the builder ship can still do its job. If you deliver the actual hull parts and claytronics then the build time is the fastest it can be.

The builder ship is the solution. Just make a rule that any materials it has to refine itself can not be sold but have to be used for building or they stay on the ship. Then we avoid the Elite Dangerous problem, we avoid just copying the Xenon, we can side step the A makes B issue and just have the game work for everyone.

If we don’t want to make every builder ship work this way then we pick one, copy the frame, rename it, and give it the ability to refine materials for building. Then we take one of the big recycling ships and do the same thing to it so that instead of recycle cubes, it actually produces a very small amount of hull parts and claytronics. Then, with all of these multiple options to get going, the economy can’t come to a halt.

Really really the builder ships are the solution. You have to have it anyway to build a station in the first place.

[vvvvvvvv]

I think in a situation where player managed to end up in a world state with no builders and not a single factory left producing ANY building materials and no way to recover, the game should show a gameover screen. Because that requires long and dedicated effort and doesn't happen by accident.

From the listed methods I'd prefer to have old factory modules available through closed loop.

--edit--

I'll explain. In situation of resource shortage, player can still get construction resources by deconstructing station modules, disassembling equipment an so on. AI may be doing something similar. So in situation with resource shortage, players first goal would be to build scrap processor and a single tug and scrap everything else down to make this construction happen. Past that point player can hunt pirates, because they're infinite. There are also several exploits that allows one to recover.

[Nanook]

...
Modules that simply get added to another station to make it self sufficient and are not allowed to be their own station out right

Refined metals
Silicon wafers...etc.

This is an absolutely terrible idea, and it seems pointless to me. Some of my game starts often go like this: mining ships, refined metals station with energy modules added as I can afford them, then maybe hull plate modules. I'll build a few of these to get cash flow going before moving on to more complex stations.

If you're going to do this, why not go one step further and not allow independent mining ships, as well. Only start mining after building your complex station. That's a logical extension of your proposed play style.

But don't force other players to play your way. What you propose you can do presently just by limiting your own build order. I don't see what's to be accomplished by forcing other playes to do the same. It's a sandbox game. That means the devs gave us a bunch of toys to play with as we, individually, see fit. It's not nice to take that away from us.

[jlehtone]

...
Modules that simply get added to another station to make it self sufficient and are not allowed to be their own station out right
...

If you're going to do this, why not go one step further and not allow independent mining ships, as well. Only start mining after building your complex station. That's a logical extension of your proposed play style.

If taken to extreme, there will be only one module on offer and it converts mineables to S/M/L/XL ships. Every station would be a shipyard -- but what would be used as material to build them? Ships?

We had an another extreme during Xbtf -- X2; every station did different thing, so we had to have (equivalents of) Refined Metal and Hull Parts productions separate and haul the "intermediate product" with ship.

The fact that X4 allows both individual productions and longer production lines is awesome.

---

Yes, if the faction has been nuked to stone age, then recovery is impossible. We have seen that with Xenon. I almost got Terrans to that spot too as nobody else can offer build materials for them -- but I had some and ANT was willing to assemble PIO stations. For most Community of Planets factions there are allies, so the scorched-earth must take most of them before that are completely beyond recovery. That is very End Game.

Regardless of the actual fall-back solution, IMHO it should be clearly more expensive, i.e. less efficient than the standard production. Something that one would not use if there were any other way.

However, an issue with fall-backs can already be seen with VIG. Some people would like to wipe that faction (for whatever fancy) and do not like that the faction logic has a fall-back to at least try to rebuild "guppermint buildings". "I want them to stay dead", they say.

[thedavid]

...
Modules that simply get added to another station to make it self sufficient and are not allowed to be their own station out right

Refined metals
Silicon wafers...etc.

This is an absolutely terrible idea, and it seems pointless to me. Some of my game starts often go like this: mining ships, refined metals station with energy modules added as I can afford them, then maybe hull plate modules. I'll build a few of these to get cash flow going before moving on to more complex stations.

If you're going to do this, why not go one step further and not allow independent mining ships, as well. Only start mining after building your complex station. That's a logical extension of your proposed play style.

But don't force other players to play your way. What you propose you can do presently just by limiting your own build order. I don't see what's to be accomplished by forcing other playes to do the same. It's a sandbox game. That means the devs gave us a bunch of toys to play with as we, individually, see fit. It's not nice to take that away from us.

I think you've misunderstood what I want to say.

I was not suggesting that refined metals be changed so that it can not be its own station. I was pointing out that by using recycling in early game to kick start station construction a player naturally sees a benefit in skipping over earlier production modules.

In a normal playthrough when I'm not doing anything outside the box I would likely create a refined metals stations but it will not stay that forever. As I get other blueprints I will modify that station to produce a higher tier product that will eventually be sold directly to a wharf.

And yes, I do restrict my stations to only accepting raw materials from my own mining ships. In my fleet of mining ships I have the ones that supply my own stations and I have the ones that supply my allies. I set up mining stations and mining ships set to do trading to harvest raw resources and distribute them. That is all normal stuff that has nothing to do with what I was proposing. I mentioned what usually happens in my games as knowledge to help inform the discussion, NOT to ask that it be imposed on everyone.

So to be clear, the information about a hull parts factory being in independent station and advance composites just being an extra module I add to another station that has a different end product is extra information to help everyone understand. It is not the suggestion in and of itself.

The actual suggestions were :

0: Keep the current system of A can make B and vice versa.

1: Copy the Xenon, which I again think is not the way to go.
2: Copy Elite Dangerous, again that does not feel like the best solution for X4
3: Just let players use recycling to build a hull parts station, which I like but I also pointed out some player behavior we would get from this.
4: Let builder ships do limited refining with restrictions just to be able to bootstrap construction if the situation gets dire.

Ok. So please don't jump to conclusions. Read again and you'll see I wasn't suggesting cutting out refined metals massively overhauling the Argon economy. I was building up to explaining that letting builder ships do limited refining is likely the best solution instead of the "A can make B". I think that would have been the least intrusive solution that would have caused the least headaches for players.

Take for instance a player like me who develops my economy past the point of having an independent refined metals or advance composites factory. Then I need advanced composites to build new hull parts factories causing an imbalance I hadn't previously calculated for. Now I have to calculate again with advance composites changing from a purely intermediate product to an end product.

Now, I'm not necessarily against the new system. Honestly, if the goal of the change was to bootstrap station construction, either recycling or letting builder ships do refining would be easier to get going and would be less of an imposition on players who already have a game they've been playing for a long time.

If the goal of the change was to convert some of the purely early stage products or intermediate products into an end product in certain circumstances I think that would actually be a good idea. To do research on my HQ, beyond buying what I need to hack productions, I build the modules that produce the products I need for research and then when all of the research is finished I dismantle them and build the modules I need for terraforming. If the player had a need to use advanced composites for something other than just turning it into something else, then the player would have a reason to stockpile that product, meaning it gets its own station instead of being a component in a bigger station. This is why energy cells, the most basic lowest tier item, can have its own station. Energy cells are useful as both an intermediate product and an end product in its own right. Right now, microchips are not useful as an end product in their own right. They are only used to create higher tier products so after I add a microchip production module to a silicon wafer factory I start looking to acquire the blueprints for advanced electronics because that's the next thing I'm going to add. Smart chips by contrast are an end product. They are not used to create anything else. So my Smart Chip factory has an energy cell module, a silicon wafer module, and the smart chip module. I take in raw silicon and the end product that gets sold to other stations comes out. It is efficient and easy for the AI to know what to do.

Like seriously, if you have a plot and it is only producing refined metals, is that really the highest and best use of that plot? Maybe if it is very far from the jump gate in the Reach and it would be too much time and hassle to ship in other materials to make a higher tier product I could see it. However, if the plot is reasonably near the gate in the Reach then that plot is going to produce energy cells (cause the reach has 400% sun) refined metals and something else based on what I can ship in. I am not going to waste a great plot like that just doing the bare minimum.

And again, I don't say everyone should play that way. I'm not suggesting for anything to be taken away. Honestly I don't even see how you got that from what I wrote. It's a non sequitur. The mechanics of the game work more in the player's favor if the player acts this way. The player is in a race against the other factions, especially the Xenon, to build up enough of an economy to start producing ships. Just yesterday I had been doing a Terran start and just chilling in Sol for a long time enjoying taking out my mining ship and making deliveries. Then I decided to go see how Hatikvah was doing and maybe do that mission chain. I found that Argon Prime, Hatikvah's Choice 1, and Silent Witness had all fallen to the Xenon. The Argon were stupidly sending ships from the Reach to Hatikvah's Choice 3, and most of them were getting slaughtered. They still had their shipyard but it was under attack and would fall any second. I looked around in the sectors the Argon still had for an advanced composites factory and I didn't find one. Antigone were too busy fighting with HOP in Frontier Edge to help. So it looks like I left the universe alone for too long. So now I have to decide if I want to save them. If I do want to save them, this change in how we make a hull parts factory is a concern of mine.

[jlehtone]

The player is in a race against the other factions, especially the Xenon, to build up enough of an economy to start producing ships.

There is no "race against the other factions". All you need is one decent ship and you can wipe anyone; no "economy" required.

If I do want to save them, this change in how we make a hull parts factory is a concern of mine.

Sadly, you can befriend all factions that could have claytronics and hull parts, so your chance to make a Hull Parts factory is far from 0, regardless of what materials that act requires.