Quartermaster - The Thread

[atamusvaleo]

This thread is dedicated to changes and improvements to the Quartermaster department.  

Before you start slapping those keys, take a moment to read through the entire thread and get acquainted with what's being discussed and where we are in the process.

1. Discuss what needs changing
2. Prioritize those changes
3. Organize and take action

PHASE 1
Feel free to post ideas from other threads you have. This is just a brainstorming phase. We already have a lot of ideas out there, this thread is to organize all of it. (Deja vu?)

[awfulworldkid]

First of all, add some sort of blocker so that you can't just waltz in from the maintenance room.

[Arborinus]

First of all, add some sort of blocker so that you can't just waltz in from the maintenance room.

There's a shutter button on the wall, or should be. I use it every time I'm QM on Cog1

[misto]

heres a problem that has been around for a long time - im pretty sure the qm console is uncopyable, unbuildable and unrepairable in any way. correct me if im wrong. if im not wrong, this is an ancient shortcoming that should be fixed

also

https://forum.ss13.co/showthread.php?tid=8055
https://forum.ss13.co/showthread.php?tid=8155

here r a couple ideas threads regarding certain aspects of qm stuffs

[Sov]

heres a problem that has been around for a long time - im pretty sure the qm console is uncopyable, unbuildable and unrepairable in any way. correct me if im wrong. if im not wrong, this is an ancient shortcoming that should be fixed

maybe we ahould give qm a computer crates. One that has the boards for the simple computers like cloning, ai upload, qm etc

and another that contains modules for the fancier computers (storage drive, id scanner, wired / wireless cards)

afterall computer parts are in very limited supply

[elan_oots]

heres a problem that has been around for a long time - im pretty sure the qm console is uncopyable, unbuildable and unrepairable in any way. correct me if im wrong. if im not wrong, this is an ancient shortcoming that should be fixed

maybe we ahould give qm a computer crates. One that has the boards for the simple computers like cloning, ai upload, qm etc

and another that contains modules for the fancier computers (storage drive, id scanner, wired / wireless cards)

afterall computer parts are in very limited supply

There's a networking crate IIRC, it has random computer boards in it. It'd be nice to be able to get specific ones though, or there could be a trader that sells computer parts?

[atamusvaleo]

Don't derail please. If it exists already we'll get to that in the next phase when we give our support to ideas. We're just posting ideas for now.

[ferriswheel1]

More interesting/exciting and unique crates to buy. Things such as singularity parts, replacement/additional thermo electric generators, ABCU units and blueprints for essential equipment like the cloner. These could be locked behind traders, access-locked crates or high prices.

More delineated crates. Crates should contain the one thing I need and just that. The current crate setup means that a large portion of the stuff in a crate is left lying around, and it's harder to find the one thing you need. Examples of this include emergency equipment (I'm either using the floorbots or the internals, not both) and the hydroponics starter.

A better ordering system. An order should be able to specify where they want their order delivered to when requesting a crate, whether that be a belt hell dock or specific department. This saves QM's the headache of having to yell over comms or PDA every time something gets ordered.

These are just some general examples. I'll work on a few more concrete ideas soon.

[Frank_Stein]

• More wheeling and dealing. You should be able to make profit simply by paying attention to what merchants are buying and selling at acting as a middle man  
  
• More merchants with a greater variety of goods and more complexity to their moods and relationships between you and other merchants
  
• Personally, I think you should be able to buy and sell goods without having them delivered immediately to QM. Anything you buy goes to an inventory menu and from there you can have it sent to different delivery docks, or sell it to someone else
  
• Easier ways to accept goods from other departments like botany
  

[Superlagg]

Persistent station budget! Make a load of money one round, have it blown by the next!

But yeah, an option to order individual things off a list and have them arrive in one crate would be great.

[ferriswheel1]

So, some ideas for adding progression and general stuff to QM.

Fabricator Array:

Roll all of QM's underused fabricators into one large multi-tile building-machine, with a nearby console to control it. Should be able to build nearly anything, as well as accepting mechanics blueprints. Different categories of items are sorted underneath tabs for easier use. Makes fabricating stuff easier and quicker, rather than having to manage several different fabricators.

Reputation System: 

Building on Sundance's ideas (https://forum.ss13.co/showthread.php?tid=8155) a reputation system for traders. Different traders have varied likes and dislikes determined by traits, with consequences for pleasing or displeasing them. 

Adding on to this, the QM themselves also has a reputation bar/scale, measuring how "legitimate" they've been with their activities. Trading legally (selling ore, non-restricted goods and fabricated stuff) pushes the scale towards the "legal" end of the bar. Making shady or suspicious trades (Buying and selling firearms and alien artifacts without a licence, reselling NT supply crates on the open market) pushes the bar towards the "illegal" end.    

There's consequences for pushing to both ends of the bar, both bad and good. Going too far towards the illegal end means NT might withdraw your crate-ordering privileges, but also opens you up to more sweet black market trades for fun stuff and loadsofmoney.  Likewise, moving towards the legal end means some of the shadier traders will stop contacting you, but you'll unlock lowered supply crate prices and more useful gear to help out on-station.

Tying this in with Sundance's idea, traders have a trait that describes their "legitimacy", and affects their feelings towards you based on your reputation. If you have a somewhat illegal reputation, the more upstanding merchants will have a lowered reputation towards you, drop it too low and they'll leave for good until you patch it up.  

Communications Dish: 

QM's line to traders and NT. Now with a physical presence in-game, presumably being a big honkin dish and antenna  sticking out into space. Rather likely to get it blown up by a traitorous miner. You can trade for various upgrades to attach to it that improve your trading capacity, such as:

• Broad Wave Frequency Module: Increases the number of items for sale at all traders. 
  
• Long Range Stabilization Modkit: More traders per market shift. 
  
• High-Intensity Burst Relay: Unlocks a "comm burst" ability that instantly changes the market shift. You suffer a small rep penalty with the current traders. 
  
• Disruption Hardening Module: Allows trading and crate-ordering during solar flares. 
  
• Universal Translator: Cleans up weird alien language, vague trader-talk and other such stuff. Occasionally produces hilarious mis-translations when trading that cause reputation loss. 
  
• Tightbeam Communicator: Grants the "tightbeam comms" ability that ensures a trader will stay on until the next market shift. Uses an APC-draining load of power per use. 
  
• Anonymizer Modkit: Nullifies reputation change from illegal trades, disables crate-ordering and only allows trading with the shadier sort.
  
• Syndicate Encryption Key: Grants access to the "Syndicate Supply Network" trader, full of fun highly illegal goodies. Maybe a traitor item?
  

Transport Systems: 

• Universal barcodes:  

The belt-hell bar-coding system is now expanded to cover the entire station, with barcodes for each department. These barcodes 
work with MULES, Belt hell and mailpipes. 

Want to get a package to robotics? Slap a "robotics" barcode on it. If you shove it in a mailpipe, it'll come out at the robotics pipe. Put it next to a MULE, and it'll pick it up and take it to the Robotics MULE beacon. Shove it into belt-hell, and it'll come out at the closest belt hell dock to robotics. 

• MULE assignment to belt hell docks:  

MULEs can be set to have a "home" destination at a belt-hell dock, where they'll auto-pickup bar-coded crates and take them on to a MULE beacon closer to their barcoded destination. Taking the crate with a robotics barcode from earlier, if it arrived at the medsci belt hell dock with a waiting MULE, the MULE would pickup the crate and take it on to robotics. 

• Remove cargo-pads from roundstart, improve the other transport systems:  

Cargo pads are not included on the station from roundstart, and now must be ordered in a supply crate and built. I feel like cargo transporters are pretty boring, and outclass the other transport systems entirely. This gives QM much more of a sense of progression, and means the other transport systems will see more use.

[Sundance]

I'm going to make a big ol' table of what can sell/buy what, following on from ferris' idea. The "buying single items" was also heavily intended feature of my suggestion, along with more wheeling and dealing and exploiting traders (but not exploiting code) to make serious $$$.

[awfulworldkid]

I feel like there should be chutes in Botany and other departments likely to sell stuff that lead to a storage bin somewhere in QM, so that goods can be sold more conveniently for both the supplier and QM.

[misto]

i was just going to say something to the effect of "couldnt botany pile their produce in a crate, put in their pin number at the nearest barcode computer and slap it on to send to market but that only applies to cog2 not cog1.

i think and botany is somewhat divorced from crate supplies and morket pricing information, to say nothing of whether any specific traders may be buying stuff they could grow

in this case, qm feels almost like an unneeded middleman. how to promote and enable cooperation?

[Frank_Stein]

in this case, qm feels almost like an unneeded middleman. how to promote and enable cooperation?

Traders and merchants is how. Botany and mining could just sell what they have, but QM has the connections to merchants who will pay over double and higher on the same goods. Both departments could end up a little richer if they take the time to communicate and coordinate