[Effortpost] QM Revamp

[Sundance]

Responses:

Speaking of merchant shuttles, I really like the idea of letting every trader have their own shuttle. Being closer to the station, they'd be able to offer more interesting items, and it gives people more places to spend their money, which is always good. 

The idea is that traders arriving on the station are already set to "good" mood, so they would have "good" stuff unlocked. This would make market items more lucarative naturally.

One critique would be that QM needs to be more of a vital resource for the crew in order for the traitorous aspect to hold any sway. This ties into the old criticism of supplies being too abundant on cog2.

Agreed completely, but with map rotation this may be less of an issue, and they would still be able to take advantage of bad crates.

Though new items will probably need to be introduced - everything else you can get somewhere else.

This is actually a pet peeve of mine in general, but there many things on the station that are limited, an example is magboots which I don't think you can get from another source?

*Ideas*

The first 2 points could literally be RNG based on the round. Bulford doesn't like vulderak who likes pianzi. Trading effects the "temperment" of either. Would spice things up quite nicely.

The 3rd point could be fairly easily implimented, mad libs kind of nonsense, but a smart QM could make shift through all the shit and find some nuggets of information that could serve him well.. theoretically

The last point could literally be slotted into personalities, and these illicit traders could be random, like the ones currently (the ones with no portrait) and could be tagged [Illicit]. The personality, could result in a station announcement of a hefty fine, or like you said no money or goods recieved. Its a gamble for QM's, one that could pay off if RNG favors them.

I like this, but, good luck coding it! I think. I dunno. It's an entirely new game mechanic.

It's actually not a new game mechanic at all. Alot of this idea is grounded on the current code that's already there, it's just expanding on it. Check out the QM code if you don't believe me, it's fairly straightforward.

It'd be tricky to fit all this interaction into an average round

Nope, it shouldn't be any more tricky than genetics is currently. There are obvious pitfalls, on a non-extended round, QM's are going to have to be picky about who they trade with. This is not a bad thing at all, it makes them use their brain a little? It also means they won't be able to unlock all the good items, which to me sounds balanced? If throwing in Frank Stiens idea, a little bit of RNG with traders could spice things up so it's not always the same. And being meta with items; this will always be the case no matter what. The way to combat that is to make the "good" item pool also RNG, so you're not certain to get the items all the time.

quickedit: I'm strongly against anything round persisting in general (other than extremely gimmicky stuff)

*Ideas*

Like last time, I'll commit to sprites if ye commit to a code :cb: 
*Backscratching intensifies