[Idea Discussion] Cargo Gameplay

[Solenoid]

I think Cargo sadly feels very limited in its scope, even with major changes to requisitions which have helped a lot with gameplay. Almost any shift with more than 1 QM is guaranteed to be relatively uneventful for everyone who isn't directly running Cargo, and it sometimes leads to shifts with 3 QMs where only one of them actually processes orders and the other 2 act like glorified staffies with easy access to contraband and unlimited credits.

So, what am I waffling on about all this for? I want to gather community ideas on how to expand the responsibilities of Cargo, and see if there's anything that people think could fit well with the department! I think that if we're gonna give stations more than 1 QM slot, it shouldn't feel useless. Ideally, at least to me, it'd be best if these new responsibilities would be simple to implement with existing code and mechanics, rather than the creation of completely new systems. The big thing that stands out to me is maybe making more things recyclable, with it being Cargo's job to recycle the various trash items around station and sell them or turn them into more valuable items, rather than them all just getting thrown out. 

I dunno though, QM sometimes just feels like a Roboticist situation, where they have a little work at the start of the shift, then their job becomes largely unimportant during the vast majority of rounds. Of course, there are some exceptions if people wanna buy a bunch of stuff, but most rounds I've played in have cargo budgets >150,000 credits at all times, and just selling artifacts and opening mail crates is enough to keep any spending balanced. Also, let me be very clear and say that QMs themselves do not feel useless! Rather, having multiple of them really just feels like a waste of manpower, since Cargo is relatively easy to do entirely alone, and often lacks the sort of work necessary to have 3 people in Cargo working on things. I've made this thread mostly to just figure out if I'm alone in this feeling, and to see if other people have any ideas on how to make Cargo feel like a more engaging job.

[Vulwin_Gilran]

Could it be reasonable to up the amount of reqs cargo gets when there are more people working cargo? or even some way to just like ask the CE to increase it, maybe even pay money to increase how many reqs you can get?

[Solenoid]

Could it be reasonable to up the amount of reqs cargo gets when there are more people working cargo? or even some way to just like ask the CE to increase it, maybe even pay money to increase how many reqs you can get?

A sort of upgrade system could be cool, like getting more req slots, or even just having the # of reqs scale to the number of people playing cargo like you said would probably help a lot! There's only so much to do with like, 5 reqs(or so, I don't remember the specific number) per cycle.

[Kotlol]

I think every department should have a way to strife for upgrades or better stuff.

So far only Botany, Rancher, Genetics, Mining, Engineering (via mining), Robotics (via mining), have what I call an upgrade loop.
And two of those is because mining found good upgrades.

I find it more fun that insted of just "doing a job" by "doing your job, you get more options and streamline the process."
WICH HELPS EVERYONE OUT!
If mining mines faster, every department that relies on mining to get good stuff gets upgraded by default.
This is what I want to see more.

[JORJ949]

(personal opinion)
I want cargo to earn less money so they actually have to consider if its worth ordering a crate or not instead of being able to just purchase literally every crate ever ordered. And they should have to leave their room for requisitions, probably via removing most of their fabricators.

[Lord_earthfire]

I'm with Jor here.

a single QM can pump out enough money that they can fully stock up everyone's needs. It's also contributing that most departments don't need much over what they start the round with, so there aren't much orders where prioritization is required.

That creates the problem Solenoid describes: One QM is sufficient to drive the department to its maximum, even on high pop.

We just got the problem we can't put too much pressure on one QM. I often enough saw QM's who were scrapping by money wise, because they weren't as experienced.

This means we also have a skill gap-problem here.

[Ikea]

I'm down for making it harder for quartermasters to make money. That being said if you can get a bunch of money just from fabricating a basic item then I don't think the problem is cargo being able to print out basic items but instead the fact that you can get a lot of money for doing something basic. Personally I'm fine with quartermasters being able to put in the work themselves when push comes to shove because that's still them doing work, part of the issue is just that there's not much work required currently and there's not much reward for the station for that work.

For a more specific requisition system, more of them would be good but I'd also like to see more that are explicitly like, 20-30 minute projects that grant a lot of money.

Requisitions are a really cool system and I do wish to see more of them, however I think the shipping market needs to be expanded as well. Requisitions should be more powerful and reward more money as you have to go out of the way for them, but the crew should be able to get money by just doing their job. Make organs be sellable outside of requisitions, make every type of produce have it's own value adjusting based on the work it takes, allow players to sell excess chems.

Also let cargo buy departmental manudrives with better job gear with limited print amounts (with discounts/some exclusives from traders)

[bamlord]

What I've always thought would be cool is a kind of online auction house system for cargo. Where they can bid on all manner of items, including maybe rare/exclusive stuff. QMs could try get a bargain and then relist on the auction house for profit, export them normally or as part of a req, or keep the items/ sell them to the crew. Essentially space facebook marketplace where you can lowball NPC sellers. Maybe item names/descriptions could be unreliable as well so you could end up with complete garbage.

[Kotlol]

I do like the idea Jorj is putting up.
Yea... it makes enough SENSE to make it harder and make the REQ's much higher pay outs will make it better.

But I do want 1 change added, Higher starting budget or have some items be much cheaper or be on the station already.
Like the floor/wall planner. On Donut 3 I can always grab it, but anywhere else if I want to redecorate the bar, chapel or make a custom room... I do not want this to stiffle that gameplay loop.

Otherwise most people who have a fun gimmick that won't take away time from any department will end up being constantly denied by cargo or having to go into late the round to start decorating their room when most antags are in "Im gonna blow stuff up mode."

That's all.... if we "nerf" cargo's money income, then things we expect that do not fully change the gameplay... Should be made accesiable then.
Can we agree with that?

[mercurynever]

Give cargo some kind of money sink, It sucks having 2 million credits with nothing to buy. Also every cargo bay should have the same fabricators.

[Lord_earthfire]

Give cargo some kind of money sink, It sucks having 2 million credits with nothing to buy.

Wait... you mean you can have enough golden thrones?

[Frank_Stein]

More logistical concerns

Shipping and receiving is very streamlined, just shove things in a crate and launch them into space. You don't have to worry about things like packaging breakage and insurance, weight and shipping fees, tariffs duties and customs, item class restrictions, etc.

I'd start with having QM have to pay fees for ordering and sending things, but with different cost options depending on expediency

In ye olden days, you used to have a ship that would come in with purchased goods and then you'd load up what you were selling. I think bring that back as a lower cost option, with the ability to save on goods by bulk ordering them while keeping the current system as a higher cost priority shipping.

Ideally you'd give QM a dock, which might require remapping, though maybe you tie in visiting merchants into this and use that space?

[Danger Noodle]

There's a lot of overarching issues which make QMs just not really useful, needed or often fun in the majority of situations.

Money is effectively meaningless and the numbers on pretty much every way of spending and earning money would need to be adjusted in some way to make cargo not able to either ignore the fact crates cost money or just buy things from bank accounts.

Departments have everything they could possibly ask for and the very few things they don't are somewhat easy to provide or make themselves. Cargo also doesn't need to interface with transport at all since the mule and transporter exist (the mule is much less egregious in this regard though and I kind of like it) so they end up sitting there all day unless they leave for a req.

Personally I also feel like sending stuff out the belts is just... clunky. It feels bad and cargo tends to be really cramped if there's more than one person there and I am partial to the idea of maybe trying cargo docking again. Also god don't even get me started on trying to play QM on nadir.

Sidenote: requisitions with rewards tend to leave a bad taste in my mouth, the rewards themselves are explicitly designed to at most be minor QoL upgrades like bigger botany bags and the majority of the time feel like a waste of time and a let down since they earn you less money and just aren't really that useful. The single worst example of this is probably the unique space suit which is just a nanofabbed one with a unique material with mediocre stats. And it doesn't even look good!