Your Cheapest Ideas

[Tynan]

UPDATED: This thread is still great for players to discuss ideas and modding concepts with each other, but it's not being reviewed by developers. Please see this thread for more info.

What ideas do you have for the game that are really cheap to implement? Ideally these are things someone could do in less than half a day. Try to think of things that re-use already-existing systems with minor tweaks to create new variations.

What are your cheapest ideas?

An idea is cheap if a modder could sit down today and have the feature finished in four hours or less. If your idea is at all complicated or uses game systems or AI behaviors that are not already in the game, it is not cheap and should be posted in its own thread.

[turnip]

Adding of turnips as a growable crop.

In all seriousness, adding some more happiness items (Coaches, televisions, bookshelves, weight benches etc), since the game could use some more objects to boost happiness and they should be fairly easy to put in seeing as the mechanic's already there.

[Tynan]

Pretty good, guys, but think cheaper!

A lot of these suggestions require entirely new classes of behaviors (e.g. using entertainment objects, carrying shells to heavy turrets), which would have to be integrated into the AI and prioritized against everything else. New kinds of behaviors are really expensive.

Or, they require entirely new systems to do properly (e.g. I wouldn't do air conditioning on its own in a cheap way; I'd only do it if I was doing a temperature system that could also handle refrigeration/overheating from fire.. and such a system would be expensive.) Single-cases of what should be broader systems aren't the best suggestions.

Keep 'em coming guys!

[Spike]

Structures
* Indoor Walls - as current walls in the game.  Conduct power, will be roofed over when an area is enclosed.
* Outdoor Walls - Simple barrier that does not conduct power, nor is a load-bearing structure.  Enclosed areas will not be roofed over.
* Window - (Either two versions as Outdoor/Indoor, or separate item like a door).

Windows: The occupant of the room is a bit happier as he can watch the outside, and you can shoot out of it, defense as a sand barrier (pos. or neg.)

Buildings
Wind Generator - works day and night, cheaper to build, lower power output (an average, instead of having to track of wind speed), 2x2 size (like a turret).

[Spike]

Build the Research Tree.  At the very least, you could figure out what branches you want available and set them up.  No need to actually add any new research items, just set the basic layout in some way.  That would let us suggest things that fit your ideas better.

[GC13]

Cheaper, eh?

• Trading beacon: Makes trading ships come by more frequently during the light season. Maybe can be configured to only make certain types come by (like the graves can forbid certain corpses)?
• Solar Efficiency: A research project to bump up the efficiency on solar panels.
• Street lamp: A big light for outdoor use.
• Planter: A big version of the potted plant (4x1 rectangle?) that beautifies a larger area.
• Fancy walls: More expensive walls that make the area "prettier".
• Armored turret: Defense turret with more HP.
• Decoy turret: Cheap turret with low HP and reduced accuracy.

[salt1219]

How about new ores, they would all count as metal when mined but look different in game and require more/less time to mine.

You already have grenades, how about landmines? You would build it like a turret and it would detect enemies (only at a much shorter range) and explode instead of firing.  Actually most of the code could just be turret code.

Rock pile/wall basically a sandbag wall only its stacked rocks and holds up a little better to explosions.

Bigger battery, does the same thing as the small ones but holds more power.

Prison door, only lets colonists in and out.

Dartgun, doesn't kill raiders.  Takes several shots to capture enemies

Fence and gate (same as a door), keeps animals out of crops

[Tynan]

Good stuff up in here!

[Pheanox]

Gravestones on the graves that say how the person died and lists their name.

[Conti027]

Being able to hunt and cook (grill/fire pit) animals. (might be going deep on this part but being able to gate up animals having them breed so you have have a supply of meat and not have to grow or harvest crops.

Items
- Hanging lights
- Bigger doors. 2 units big
- Restrooms
- Laser turret
- More animals. maybe alien like
- Different building materials
- Flame thrower
- Med bay so people just don't heal while in bed
- Different kinds of food

I have a lot more ideas but most are cosmetic and without an artist I'm not sure if you wanna spend time on it.
example: nicer walls, flooring more plants/trees.

[Finjinimo]

 * Ditch: It would really just be an aesthetic thing that would work something like a poor-mans version of the sandbag (similar movement costs, less cover provided) but not require resources to build -- aside from time I suppose. And perhaps much later down the track it could be utilized for irrigation etc. But for now, just a plain old dirty ditch.

* Anger the Herd: I am not sure how your muffulo act in game, but if you shoot one dead it'd be rad to see at least one other muffulo get angry about it.

* Menacing Spikes: I see you have a gibbet cage or whatever, perhaps some additional things to increase fear.

* Noise Maker: Increases fear. (I'm thinking tribal warnings, rather than electronic).

* Dust Storm: I saw on one of the vids that people were tracking sand around (or filth or something?). Perhaps a Dust Storm increases filth or whatever in exterior areas.

* Wash Basin: Can be used to remove filth.

* Personal Locker: claimed like a bed, increases happiness.

* Reinforced Door: A more expensive door that is harder to breakthrough.

* Inquisitive Squirrel: It's taken a liking to your "Home" area. Depending on your current ability to attack things other than colonists, perhaps it could also be incredibly curious about trying to eat your power supplies...

* The Creep: A plant that increases the rate that you get sleepy within its radius.

[miah999]

Bunker Walls - Walls with double HP, that have "Gun Ports" the colonists can shoot through.

Fire Trench - A trench that slows movement that you can set on fire to really screw with the Raiders.

Furniture add-ons -
Small 1x2 table,
Double sided equipment rack (2x4),
Smaller Nutrient paste Dispensers,
Larger Solar Panels (maybe research-able),
Privacy Screen (cheaper then a wall to separate beds, but less effective then separate rooms.),
Sofas?,
Some different potted plants for visual variety,
Maybe some colored furniture for more "pretty environments" (again that might need research).

[Matt.All]

Difficult to dig/undiggable rock -- When digging deep into rockface, you might get to areas that are harder or impossible to dig. The limitations could be overcome with higher pickaxe tech.

CB/portable radio tech -- Allows a colonist to have social interactions when not next to other colonists. (Takes up the weapon slot maybe?)

Workbench -- Allows a colonist to improve equippable items, like weapons.

Melee weapons -- Gloves, brass knuckles, bats...

[Starkiller]

I have a question: implementing in the game a sewer system is difficult? I already written an example in another post:

Sewer pipes are similar to electric conduits (already in the game), connet on one end to toilets and the other to a black water tank; so you have a simple sewage system. Add some other thing like a "Hi-Tech something purifier" for clean water reclamation and maybe a few "algae-vats" for food or biomass production ; then you have a waste disposal/recycling system. Otherwise you can simply dump it somewhere. A grey water removal system maybe is an overcomplication, so the showers (for health and morale) could be linked to the sewer.

Maybe this isn't the right place to ask, but i really want to hear Tynan's and other's opinion on this subject.
Aside that, here other ideas:
- robotic surgery table (like in Prometheus film): rapid healing, basically a type of bed where you can't sleep with another skin.
- 3D printer: faster equipment production, similar to a workbench.
- walls and/or ceilings lamps: providing illumination without taking space.
- refrigerator/"stasis pod": long term food and other perishables (like dead bodies) storage.
- vat grown meat - like hydroponics but giving more energetic food.

[mumblemumble]

Colonist behavior :
*Sadism / "dark minded" : People with this stat are not bothered by dead bodies, or watching people die, and can in fact gain happiness from it. Could also make them more prone to mental breaks of a violent nature, or frightening people around them.
*Animal person: Can have limited control over some animals (yaks, boom squirrels) Not guaranteed, but could for instance convince yaks to haul supplies, or even convince boom squirrels to help in combat on rare occasion. Down side could be wasting food on animals.
*Pyro : Enjoys the sight of fire and flames, seeing them will brighten the persons mood, and perhaps has a combat bonus with fire weapons. may try to play with fire on occasion if on a mental break though. (lighting fires at random)
*Night owl : person prefers being up at night over daytime, has chance of having their mood better for being up late.


Items :
*Fire bombs : similar to demolition charges, but can start fires.
*Fire extinguishers: carry-able items which give a bonus to putting out fires.
*Tranquilizer gun : A weapon with a high chance to take someone alive. Low damage and lower range, but good for capturing alive.
*"hardened" wiring : A much more expensive wiring setup, but is immune to solar flares, and perhaps resistant to explosions / fire.
*Towers / elevated platforms : Provides combat bonus of better aim from high vantage point, as well as being harder to hit. If the tower is destroyed while someone / a turret is inside it, the person / turret dies, or is injured horribly from the fall.