Component assembly irony

[Pickle]

The component assembly bench seems really unbalanced. You need gold for the multi-analyzer, and a lot of time of research  (3000 research points, the maximum) then you need 400 steel and 30 components to build it, more than a geothermal generator. And in the end you use 30 steel to make a component ? The market price of steel is 2$, so each one cost 60$, but you can buy components for 16$ so four time less.

I don't get it, the component assembly is an investment, normally the time and money you use to get it should be pay back in the end. But here you loose time/money/materials to lose more time/money/materials in the end.

I understand that components should not be produced massively, but at the moment it doesn't make sense, the components should be OR easy to make but material intensive (so traders are more interesting), OR hard to research and everything, but cheaper in the end (or at least it doesn't cost an arm).

The first possibility makes probably more sense, there must be some facilities somewhere in this universe which produce components with huge economy of scale. And we'll keep the strategic side of the components even in well installed colony. It would also balanced the fact that you are in a lack of components when you begin, and you have too much of them after a few years.

[Kluge]

I like that something practical is actually difficult to achieve for once. I always run out of both machinery and medicine while buying everything traders have on-hand.


It seems to me the most obvious balance would be to set machinery value at $80. This way, I can't just buy all the machinery traders bring, further increasing incentive for the component bench (its primary function is to increase AVAILABILITY of machinery, not necessarily to let you do it cheaply -- it's assuming you're in constant shortage of it, which I almost always am).

Overall, I'd like to see much more resource scarcity. Maybe you start with just enough materials for a solar panel, a battery, ~50 tiles worth of conduit, and a turret, and you're on your own for everything else... reduce drop amount for mined metals to 5 or 10 so everything feels special rather than disposable.

[Pickle]

I agree with that, when I said cheaper, it was compared to the market price, sorry if it wasn't expressed correctly. I don't want it to be easy too, it's great to have something to limit the technological expansion of a colony.

[Jessi]

I think its fine, there tends to be a lot of steel on the map, so as long as you have a nice stockpile and a lack of components it's all good.

It's pretty vital that I use it, considering I have my colonists crafting weaponry to sell on, and traders are few and far between.

[Limdood]

if you skip the component bench, you're sorely hampered in what you can build and replace (remember there is also a component cost over time now, with breakdowns) and your colony will get to the point where even building nothing new, you'll use more components than you can buy.

[Pickle]

As I'm playing on an ice sheet most of the time, I need a lot of steel and buy it when I can. There were times where I couldn't even make an heater, not because of a lack of components, but a lack of steel. And I'm mining a lot, all my mountains look like that.




But that's not a problem, on the contrary I like this, it's more challenging. What I was pointed out here is the incoherence between the research and materials needed to make components and their actual market value. I should have taken the problem the same way as Kluge.

If the price of components stay low like now, they should be easier to make, if we keep the difficulty like that, they should be more expensive.

[Plasmatic]

Damn, Pickle, that looks like an infestation waiting to happened

[makapse]

no chance of infestation. the outside temp is -60 in spring, so it will never fall at -17C which is required for infesting

[Shurp]

I agree, given how rare and precious components are, they should be worth a heck of a lot more than 10 silver apiece (or whatever the base rate is)

[Klitri]

I don't think you're even meant to have tons of components, the bench is for making repairs and finishing products, if you can't take the heat then lower the difficulty.

[erdrik]

Is this method of mining common?

I only mine out the rooms I need as I need them.
Otherwise I dig out surface deposits and thats it...

[makapse]

thats strip mining.Its used to find ore deposits inside mountains. If you have ever played dwarf fortress or minecraft you will understand whats the best way to do it.

[Shurp]

The machining table is for making weapons and armor.  If I want to make a survival rifle, armor vest, and Kevlar helmet for each of my colonists, it's 7 components apiece.  That's 56 components for a modest colony of 8 colonists.

Now if we could scavange components from weapons and armor dropped by pirate raiders...

[Pickle]

I'm doing it to find gold and steel, in A12 I would never have done that. That's weird, insects hives have been add to reduce the mining based colonies, but I've never dig that much.

Now if we could scavange components from weapons and armor dropped by pirate raiders...

I already smelt a part of the weapons they drop when they're very bad, you earn 20 steel from each, so 2 weapons = 1 component. If only the tribals could use awful steel shiv... xD

[silenced]

I'm pretty sure there will be quite some reblancing regarding components, as they were just introduced with Alpha 13. Maybe in the end we end up with 1 component using 10 steel, 5 silver and 1 gold. Everyone happy then?

We will see what Alpha 14 brings in.

It's the same with smelting metal slags, they give 10 steel ... is that worth the energy it costs alone to have that smelter running?