inverse the logic of launchpads

[Teovald]

Having to put all the goods you want to sell on launchpad is a pain and necessitates to tune the different stockpiles priority. 

I would largely prefer empty launchpads. 
When you enter the trading interface, the content of all your stockpiles is accessible (instead of what is on launchpads). It will need an interface a bit more adapter to filtering. 
You agree on the trade (let's say 200 silver + 100 metal vs a big gun). Immediately, your colonists start loading the launchpads with the silver & metal. Once everything is loaded, it is beamed up & the trader send down the gun.

What to you think ?

[Basroks]

I concur. Having all those valuables lying out in the open makes me uneasy, even though I know raiders won't actually touch them. Anyway, it tends to be inconvenient, in terms of logistics, to have storage spaces outdoors.

[JonoRig]

i also agree, the wildlife keeps eating my food surplus, i eventually sealed them out and exterminated what was trapped, unfortunately, they were boom rats...

[TimMartland]

Yeh, the current system makes me spend ages fiddling with my warehouses and priorities to get a trade ready. By the time im done, the ship has usually vanished.

[ousire]

The biggest issue with the launch pads in my opinion is the lack of storage or holding items, your colonists just pile everything directly onto the pad.

In Dwarf Fortress, for example, the trade depot building is only five by five tiles. But the difference is that you can store things inside crates and barrels, and each can hold many many many items inside it. You can easily buy out a whole caravan of goods with your one depot of random fortress made stuff if they're high enough quality.


Until the launchpads get changed, my current "solution" to the problem is to build three of them. I have one pad that holds nothing but silver, a second pad where I pile all of the weapons I don't care about, and a third pad where I store things like food, which is set to slightly lower priority than my hoppers and food storage, so my colonists will always be properly fed before trading away their excess food.

[DeMatt]

I just consider my launch pads to BE (most of) my storage space.  Then I don't need to worry about whether my stuff is on the launch pads, because it's already there.

This philosophy might need to be revised if raiders started "borrowing" equipment or resources from said launch pads.

...and now that I type that, maybe it could become a suggestion of its own...

[Tynan]

In truth, pads work as they do now because I haven't had time to do anything better. But there are a lot of conceptual/logical issues with any multi-step trading process.

Consider these questions in your scenario:

1. What if you strike a deal not long before the trader would ordinarily leave? Does he just cancel the deal and leave as usual? How do we feed back that this is going to happen? Does he stick around? How long? How do we feed that back?

2. If you trade multiple items (as is almost always the case), when is what swapped? Say you buy two pistols and some medkits. Your guys get half the silver to the pad. Does the trader immediately swap the silver for half the order? Which half - the pistols or the medkits? Or does he wait until it's all done? Does that make players execute a series of tiny trades, to optimize them into resolving sooner?

These sorts of problems can consume inordinate amounts of time, which is why I'm deprioritizing them for now. Trading will be revisited - some day, after there are not so many easier and higher-impact improvements to make.

[OobleckTheGreen]

I just take the easy route and do my launch pads up like the screenshot. They're fully enclosed (with no roof) and there's enough of them to hold some pretty large surpluses.

[Teovald]

In truth, pads work as they do now because I haven't had time to do anything better. But there are a lot of conceptual/logical issues with any multi-step trading process.

I realize that my proposal (or any real improvement to the existing trading process) means a lot of coding/refactoring. I just wanted to make sure that it will get addressed at some point. 
The existing system is a good placeholder but nothing else.

[Basroks]

1. What if you strike a deal not long before the trader would ordinarily leave? Does he just cancel the deal and leave as usual? How do we feed back that this is going to happen? Does he stick around? How long? How do we feed that back?

2. If you trade multiple items (as is almost always the case), when is what swapped? Say you buy two pistols and some medkits. Your guys get half the silver to the pad. Does the trader immediately swap the silver for half the order? Which half - the pistols or the medkits? Or does he wait until it's all done? Does that make players execute a series of tiny trades, to optimize them into resolving sooner?

1. A time limit can be given for each deal struck. If your end of the bargain isn't ready on a launch pad within, say, one hour, then the traders will cancel the deal. This way they can delay their original departure by one hour, but no more, and no further deals will be made during this delay.

2. I think it's best to not split up trades. The swap should only be carried out after all of the agreed items are ready.

But I understand why this is not a high priority at the moment.

[Dr. Z]

To me the trade system is one of the most annoying things at the moment (after the lags), because you have to constantly watch them so they don't place too much of a resource on the launchpad and in most cases the trader leaves before they're finished.
An easy way to avoid this would be to set a counter, which says how much of a resource you're colonists are allowed to place in a stockpile. So if you have a trade which costs you 200 Silver you type 200 and they place just 200 units despite the hihgher priority. This would be good for splitting resouces to multile stockpiles too, e.g. if you have a large base and want your metal at different places.

[Tynan]

I suggest you just make a tiny stockpile that only holds the amount you want.

Want 150 silver on the pad? Make a 2-square storage zone that accepts only silver.

Anyway, that's a usable temp solution. As I say, trading will be revisited.

[keylocke]

i think i agree with the suggestion of adding crates and barrels to store larger amounts of items. this should also prevent food stored outside from being eaten by vermin. plus it looks more organized rather than something that looks like a dump site. lol.

[Vas]

In truth, pads work as they do now because I haven't had time to do anything better. But there are a lot of conceptual/logical issues with any multi-step trading process.

Consider these questions in your scenario:

1. What if you strike a deal not long before the trader would ordinarily leave? Does he just cancel the deal and leave as usual? How do we feed back that this is going to happen? Does he stick around? How long? How do we feed that back?

2. If you trade multiple items (as is almost always the case), when is what swapped? Say you buy two pistols and some medkits. Your guys get half the silver to the pad. Does the trader immediately swap the silver for half the order? Which half - the pistols or the medkits? Or does he wait until it's all done? Does that make players execute a series of tiny trades, to optimize them into resolving sooner?

These sorts of problems can consume inordinate amounts of time, which is why I'm deprioritizing them for now. Trading will be revisited - some day, after there are not so many easier and higher-impact improvements to make.

I have another theory on how to handle trading that might make this a little more efficient.
Rename the launch pad to docking pad, landing station, trade post, something along those lines.  This is where ships will land for trade.  You won't be able to launch supplies into space anymore.  Instead, if you open your trade console and initiate a trade, the ship will spend 20-30 seconds landing, and once landed, a timer directly on or above the ship will tell you how long you have to get everything there before he leaves and gives you nothing.

In the trade console, there will be a status for "landed ships" and a button to alter your order, you can then alter the order in case you can't get 100% there on time.  It'll have some columns that show you what's currently there out of how much you currently have in stock piles "230/563 Silver" and then you can alter what you want then and there.  If you give a large order, the trader will wait longer for you to get the supplies to him.

Their ship will be 2x2 to 3x3 in size, maybe even rarely a 4x4 ship.  Next to the landing pad, you'll have a holding area pad with the same graphics as your launch pads, this is where you bring resources to for trade.  Anyone designated hauler with a priority of 1 (max) will start immediately hauling those resources to the pad.  If it fills up, you have another pad above, beside, near that.  All pads must be connected to each other and one of them must be connected to the landing pad.  These pads will no longer create or need zones, they'll just be dependent on the trader who is landed there and your colonists will haul resources there when the trader is waiting for them or before he even lands.  After this trade, all of the stuff you got from him will appear on the pad as well.  If not enough pad space (I doubt you'll get more stuff than what you gave xP) then the other items will appear on the ground around the pads.

If a raid is detected, your trader will give you a warning, and say he is leaving in 10 seconds whether you complete the deal or not.  If the raid begins, he leaves and cancels the deal.

Any resources on these pads while no trader is around, will be hauled back to your normal stock piles.

I prefer this option really, because if you build a base, you don't want to go outside, just to leave stuff out in the open all day hoping a trader shows up.  This especially sucks when you have food sent to your launch pads and then someone else immediately the instant you put that food there goes and takes it to another hopper somewhere else, or even to the hopper in the same room as where you harvested the food.  This means you can build a room with your trade pads with a ceiling above them, and just have a tiny mini opening big enough for a ship to get through, a 4x4 sized hole in the roof with your "no roof" zone, to allow a ship through.  Has to be a metal roof, one you can cut a hole in.  Or a shallow rock roof which you can pretty much also modify without to much trouble (get a really useless colonist to poke a stick up there for a while till it falls inward, 2 birds with one stone!).

One more alternate method for connecting trade pads to a landing pad, is a shipping lane floor tile, which allows you to place a road of sorts from the landing pad to your trade pads and connect them all to the landing pad that way, so you can set the landing pad outside and keep your stock piles inside.  With this method, you can even set zones on these pads to keep resources like the launch pads, so you wouldn't have to move anything, he just lands, completes the trade, and leaves, all resources would appear on your pads, or nearest ground tiles.  If no more space inside, then it would be dropped around the landing pad.  If no more space there, it would be dropped from orbit where ever there is land that can handle space.  If no where on your map has space left, then all over the place, like raiders do when you enclose the entire 100% of the map in roof tiles like I did and then havoc happened.

Hows that?  I know it may not be a simple easy idea, but it is an alternate way of doing launch pad trading that might be more interesting than the current, and priority of the hauling would still be done through your normal hauling.  If someone has hauling as priority 2 set and mining priority 1, they'll keep mining, unless there is nothing to mine, then they go hauling resources to the trader.  This might spark you to having some people designated haulers to deal with trade ships.