Goonhub
06-10-2025, 12:38 PM
(This post was last modified: 06-10-2025, 12:54 PM by Scaltra. Edited 1 time in total.)
I am going to be frank, as I am tired of beating around the bush and do not have the time to directly address and respond to the individual points and claims made at separate times.
The manifold system was something that completely bypassed the intended mechanics of how pressure functions in pipes, and in order to maintain balance with all atmospheric-related systems, TEG, Toxins, and Nuclear, it needed to be changed.
The TEG is not some scorned black sheep who has been destroyed by this change, nor does it take significantly more effort to get more performance out of it than other engines comparatively. Arguably, it takes considerably less.
Knowledge and out-of-game research should not be a way we look at how a certain mechanic is balanced, and arguably reflects poorly on our transparency with the system and the bad design of how opaque the learning process about it can be. If you know how to do something and it takes you ten to 20 minutes to set up, an infinitely scalable power production method that uses nothing but the tools and resources you can source all from inside the same place at Roundstart and the barrier is almost exclusively knowing that IMO is just flat out bad design. People would have found out how to exploit this more and better, given time, and regardless of whether it's only two people who figured it out first or not, it still needs to be addressed.
The reactor had its flow rate nerfed because it was too easy to just increase it infinitely and just add more gas. Singularity had repeat feeding nerfed so that feeding it the same thing, like laser tripwires, gave less. When an engine or mechanic overperforms for the effort put in, it gets nerfed/ reworked.
I am all for suggesting changes and ways we can tinker with these things more and be clever and brainstorming new mechanics, but I think lamenting about the change and claiming it wasn't warranted or shouldn't have come before a new thing is just wrong.
On that note, I think cooperation should be the main focus; you shouldn't be able to get to the absolute heights and literal limits of the heat and power system with just one or two people. These sorts of events should be possible, I agree, but it should be because of the cooperative effort of everyone involved. Hell, it doesn't even need to be that across departments either. There are other power production methods you can use to supplement that you can have someone grab and set up super quickly to work with solar and meet required power demands, like a portable gas generator or a power furnace.
With the singularity, you will struggle to get to this terawatt you keep mentioning without scampering around sourcing materials, talking to cargo, etc. It's not just cooling plasma, it's MORE plasma. You just need to cool it to fit more in the tanks. And even fitting a 22k tank of plasma in there that is full is a big jump, but not as much as I feel like you are thinking it is. On top of the fact that it also consumes the plasma, which most people don't actually know about. Even reaching 1 terawatt on a singularity can be a process, and when it does it is almost always because mining has been commished to send half their ore into the damn thing.
The point mainly being to emphasize that the higher end of TEG? It is honestly fine, it may be one of the easiest even still to actually do once people adapt to the new changes. And canister bomb stuff is arguably still in a fine place once new methods are figured out to wall up the pipes, coat them, etc, quickly. And honestly, that is how it should be. The heights of pipe burns should not be so easily achievable that it's the pipe layer and you are done.
I think there are also at least a dozen methods to still bypass a lot of this that people aren't even mentioning, on top of that.
Pipe burns should not be trivial, but I do think the TEG could use some love, and I would like to see more mechanics for cooling down gas than anything in terms of optimizing the TEG. Honestly, the TEG needs more interesting mechanics and things to mess with that don't just wide getting this material thing so you can mess with the stuff you want to. Because, unlike some engines where you can go out and source your own thing, some of the materials are a lot rarer for the TEG or require specialized tools or synthesis to acquire. which can be annoying, but honestly? It does happen with every other engine aside from maybe geothermal, too. Except for geothermal, you need to go to the station and deal with repairs constantly. Unless someone else is handling it all for you, which feels pretty nice when it is the case.
Just mainly trying to say that the TEG is honestly fine, but between it being a thing that scales up instead of being an immediate change, because plasma fires are the main way you normally source your heat. It takes time, so you are incentivized to do things and set things up as fast as possible so it can scale faster. I think it all would feel MUCH better if it were easier to start your "seed" for a pipeburn for the TEG and then transition into actually hooking these things up, so the time pressure and finding resources didn't feel as bad. Because I feel like that is the actual pain point here. Because Singularity scales far worse than a pipeburn TEG, with much more significant in-game effort. However, the singularity can feel much better past the initial setup point. It's done, it's there, you aren't going to rollback and lose power (aside from the plasma being consumed) unless it is lost, and you can focus on purely sourcing things for it from getting more plasma as well as more stuff to feed it, or even expanding its containment (although most people opt for just doing the basic big set up and being done at that and even delaying to add more even if there are ways to add more without delaying)
I think either finding a method to do that or changing the TEG so that the pain point isn't as bad is honestly what the high-end problem is. Since it applies the time constraint and makes everything that follows feel more pressing and annoying that you can't just "set it up and be done" basically.
Although I think cargo should just be able to order more junk in general, honestly. Like GHC or other weird exotic important chems for niche uses and the like. The chef can order produce for when botany decides not to, so why not?
Edit: and to focus on pipe stuff specifically, which is what I was honestly hoping this whole thread would be about instead of bashing the change (passively and not so passively) and then responses to that, I just want to see new cool pipes that we can buy or involve chemicals. That would be cool. Pipes that produce oxygen but need to be cleaned out because of the carbon being removed, or can directly add or remove heat. Honestly, if and when Cringe does build pipes, some sort of network where you can integrate the two, like liquid-cooled gas pipes or feed certain chemicals to do certain things, could be cool and make the whole thing more engaging.
Or telecrystal pipes that are expensive could be cool, that teleport the gas to the other end of another telecrystal pipe network So you could set up something like a pipeburn where you have space to do so and wall the thing off and make it really secure while then transmitting it to the TEG or something else
The manifold system was something that completely bypassed the intended mechanics of how pressure functions in pipes, and in order to maintain balance with all atmospheric-related systems, TEG, Toxins, and Nuclear, it needed to be changed.
The TEG is not some scorned black sheep who has been destroyed by this change, nor does it take significantly more effort to get more performance out of it than other engines comparatively. Arguably, it takes considerably less.
Knowledge and out-of-game research should not be a way we look at how a certain mechanic is balanced, and arguably reflects poorly on our transparency with the system and the bad design of how opaque the learning process about it can be. If you know how to do something and it takes you ten to 20 minutes to set up, an infinitely scalable power production method that uses nothing but the tools and resources you can source all from inside the same place at Roundstart and the barrier is almost exclusively knowing that IMO is just flat out bad design. People would have found out how to exploit this more and better, given time, and regardless of whether it's only two people who figured it out first or not, it still needs to be addressed.
The reactor had its flow rate nerfed because it was too easy to just increase it infinitely and just add more gas. Singularity had repeat feeding nerfed so that feeding it the same thing, like laser tripwires, gave less. When an engine or mechanic overperforms for the effort put in, it gets nerfed/ reworked.
I am all for suggesting changes and ways we can tinker with these things more and be clever and brainstorming new mechanics, but I think lamenting about the change and claiming it wasn't warranted or shouldn't have come before a new thing is just wrong.
On that note, I think cooperation should be the main focus; you shouldn't be able to get to the absolute heights and literal limits of the heat and power system with just one or two people. These sorts of events should be possible, I agree, but it should be because of the cooperative effort of everyone involved. Hell, it doesn't even need to be that across departments either. There are other power production methods you can use to supplement that you can have someone grab and set up super quickly to work with solar and meet required power demands, like a portable gas generator or a power furnace.
With the singularity, you will struggle to get to this terawatt you keep mentioning without scampering around sourcing materials, talking to cargo, etc. It's not just cooling plasma, it's MORE plasma. You just need to cool it to fit more in the tanks. And even fitting a 22k tank of plasma in there that is full is a big jump, but not as much as I feel like you are thinking it is. On top of the fact that it also consumes the plasma, which most people don't actually know about. Even reaching 1 terawatt on a singularity can be a process, and when it does it is almost always because mining has been commished to send half their ore into the damn thing.
The point mainly being to emphasize that the higher end of TEG? It is honestly fine, it may be one of the easiest even still to actually do once people adapt to the new changes. And canister bomb stuff is arguably still in a fine place once new methods are figured out to wall up the pipes, coat them, etc, quickly. And honestly, that is how it should be. The heights of pipe burns should not be so easily achievable that it's the pipe layer and you are done.
I think there are also at least a dozen methods to still bypass a lot of this that people aren't even mentioning, on top of that.
Pipe burns should not be trivial, but I do think the TEG could use some love, and I would like to see more mechanics for cooling down gas than anything in terms of optimizing the TEG. Honestly, the TEG needs more interesting mechanics and things to mess with that don't just wide getting this material thing so you can mess with the stuff you want to. Because, unlike some engines where you can go out and source your own thing, some of the materials are a lot rarer for the TEG or require specialized tools or synthesis to acquire. which can be annoying, but honestly? It does happen with every other engine aside from maybe geothermal, too. Except for geothermal, you need to go to the station and deal with repairs constantly. Unless someone else is handling it all for you, which feels pretty nice when it is the case.
Just mainly trying to say that the TEG is honestly fine, but between it being a thing that scales up instead of being an immediate change, because plasma fires are the main way you normally source your heat. It takes time, so you are incentivized to do things and set things up as fast as possible so it can scale faster. I think it all would feel MUCH better if it were easier to start your "seed" for a pipeburn for the TEG and then transition into actually hooking these things up, so the time pressure and finding resources didn't feel as bad. Because I feel like that is the actual pain point here. Because Singularity scales far worse than a pipeburn TEG, with much more significant in-game effort. However, the singularity can feel much better past the initial setup point. It's done, it's there, you aren't going to rollback and lose power (aside from the plasma being consumed) unless it is lost, and you can focus on purely sourcing things for it from getting more plasma as well as more stuff to feed it, or even expanding its containment (although most people opt for just doing the basic big set up and being done at that and even delaying to add more even if there are ways to add more without delaying)
I think either finding a method to do that or changing the TEG so that the pain point isn't as bad is honestly what the high-end problem is. Since it applies the time constraint and makes everything that follows feel more pressing and annoying that you can't just "set it up and be done" basically.
Although I think cargo should just be able to order more junk in general, honestly. Like GHC or other weird exotic important chems for niche uses and the like. The chef can order produce for when botany decides not to, so why not?
Edit: and to focus on pipe stuff specifically, which is what I was honestly hoping this whole thread would be about instead of bashing the change (passively and not so passively) and then responses to that, I just want to see new cool pipes that we can buy or involve chemicals. That would be cool. Pipes that produce oxygen but need to be cleaned out because of the carbon being removed, or can directly add or remove heat. Honestly, if and when Cringe does build pipes, some sort of network where you can integrate the two, like liquid-cooled gas pipes or feed certain chemicals to do certain things, could be cool and make the whole thing more engaging.
Or telecrystal pipes that are expensive could be cool, that teleport the gas to the other end of another telecrystal pipe network So you could set up something like a pipeburn where you have space to do so and wall the thing off and make it really secure while then transmitting it to the TEG or something else