Multi-Purpose Goo

[lordpalandus]

You mention having no desire to use MPG. What was MPG used for in Outpost 1? Was it used like Recycled Plastic, and thus could be reused in certain applications such as consumer products, or was it used identically to metals?

[Sirbomber]

I believe MPG could be used in place of any missing resources, and the amount of MPG generated used a bad formula, so you could easily end up with unlimited quantities of the stuff.  One suggestion regarding it, leeor: you're forgetting that (at least from a "lore" perspective) MPG also included organic waste.  Maybe have it output MPG (organic waste) and slag (metallic waste) which can then be refined (at a very poor rate) into a resource of your choice?  That way it still works somewhat like the original resource, but isn't as OP and requires some thought from the player.

[Sirbomber]

The one thing I would consider is, allowing the player to pick which resource to turn the "junk" into would allow them access to otherwise unavailable resources.  This way not having access to, say, rare ore goes from "crap, now I have to restart" to "well I can still get it by turning 100 units of scrap into 1 unit of rare; it's not ideal but at least I can live long enough to relocate" (allowing for a self-imposed challenge run).  Whether this is a good thing or not is, of course, your decision; as I said it can salvage an otherwise unwinnable situation, but it gives players the opportunity to game the system.

[leeor_net]

Hmm... not a bad idea though I think I'll stick with a somewhat simplified system in that say, 100 units of waste can be converted into say 5 units each of common metals and minerals and 1 or 2 units each of rare metals and minerals.

[chris2222]

Multi purpose goo from Outpost is a really silly name anyways.  I don't know why they just didn't call it Recycled Materials.

The original SPEW facility recycled waste into this MPG.  I think waste was meant to be everything from food scraps (green cart waste), septic tank waste (in the real world known as gray water), and of course paper/plastic and metal recycling. 

Initially I wouldn't think you could use recycled waste to produce rare metals from worn out circuit boards as they probably haven't been recycled yet.  You would have lots of green cart and gray water waste which could be used to increase food output.  If say a structure is destroyed in a disaster scenario, recoverables from the structure could include some of the more precious materials and rare metals to recover.  It wouldn't be until later in the game that you could recover rare metals from recyclables.

Just a thought, not sure of the particulars but I was thinking it could be broken into just plainly a sewage facility, green cart facility and recycling facility.  The smelter could be used to recover metallic waste if it had the technology to do it - that could be something additional.

[leeor_net]

I was thinking that there would be a very small amount of metals and other base resources that could be recovered from ... colonist waste ... but that more importantly it would need to be dealt with or morale and mortality rates would take a huge hit (who wants to live in an over crowded filth filled residence?). I was intending on repurposing the SPEW facility from the original game as a Recycling Facility which would basically take care of the waste generated by the underground structures. Each one could handle probably 20 structures with research improvements allowing each structure to handle more (up to 40 perhaps?)

Materials from structures would be sent directly to the smelters for reprocessing -- atm I have the return rate on these at 90% but that'll be affected by difficulty (from half up to 90%).

[Hooman]

Err, septic tank water is generally from a toilet. That would be blackwater. Greywater is from things like sinks and showers, or washing food. Blackwater may contain feces or urine, and may be contaminated with pathogens. The two are often separated in eco friendly constructions, as greywater is considerably easier to treat or reuse than blackwater.

But yes, multi purpose goo is kind of a silly name.

[White Claw]

I guess I'm in the minority in that I didn't mind the "multi purpose goo" name.

And yeah, if I recall, it was generated on a per-building basis regardless of what those buildings actually did. So the source was unlimited once you got it up and running. I recall specifically challenging myself to get MPG production up and running as quickly as possible, which then eliminated much other challenges.

[lordpalandus]

I prefer the name Omni-gel, but it is essentially the same thing. Except in the Mass Effect 1 universe where it is a universally used healing gel.

[leeor_net]

It's ultimately a moot point. There's no magical goo or gel or slime that can be used for everything. OP is an understatement for this and completely destroys any challenge involved. Eh, I feel like this has been beaten to death... also I'm tired.

[lordpalandus]

Duct-Tape comes close, but you are right that having an all purpose goo would be game-breaking. Then again, as there was so much wrong with the original Outpost 1, having at least one saving grace in the way of a resource made from waste products, being a reliable resource, was a good thing.

[leeor_net]

Pretty sure that was implemented because of how badly broken the resource system was. It wasn't unheard of to lose immediately because of some obscure resource that you couldn't mine for one stupid reason or another, not that the game would tell you about it.

But yeah, I want OutpostHD to be challenging without being impossible. I figure it's better to have a good resource system in place vs. a broken one and a band-aid solution slapped on top that can be abused (e.g., build a ton of residences and you get basically free resources).

[chris2222]

It's ashame all that research they did for outpost and they couldn't nail down the resources properly - and then created a multi-purpose goo that defied logic (whodda thought you could run a whole colony off of recycled waste indefinitely) or maybe that MPG was there from the beginning.  Anyways completely agree with you on the challenging but not impossible aspect of it.

[Hooman]

Why am I thinking of Soylent Green here? You know what, just put that in the game. Made from ocean plankton. Produced by residences.

[leeor_net]

Well, I suppose they will need to do something with the bodies of those who died...