Eliminate Science Packs Altogether

[Chinchbug]

I've always felt that the whole "science pack" idea was a bit arbitrary and kind of a stretch. I thought that a more satisfying approach would be to make each technology have a unique set of actual resources be consumed in order to successfully research that technology. For example, in order to research Advanced Circuits, your labs might need a crapload of normal Circuits plus a lot of Plastic Bars.

Obviously, this would suck if each lab needed each resource, that would be impossible in the long run. But what if each lab didn't need each resource, rather all the labs shared their available resources? So we drop a lab down at the end of the Plastic Bar production and it would hang there until plastic bars were needed for research. Of course, we would have to come up with efficient layouts that uses labs for multiple resources and such...

[aubergine18]

(Copied from my post in the recent FF thread):

The way I see it is that the labs need equipment to perform experiments during research. But the fact that there's nobody in the labs, and early on there's no AI due to limited tech, it's weird that the labs are consuming these things.

IMO a better approach would be that doing certain types of task generates associated science points. So mining basic resources could generate red science points, smelting and refining could produce green, attacking biters could produce military, etc. Although problem with this approach is that it then becomes difficult for modders to add their own science tiers.

[Koub]

What about the science pack (which should obviously be a pack of things,not a liquid flask) allow the construction of devices in the science labs that allow unlocks the ability to build things when done ?

Like : Consider the science lab builds something every time you insert a science pack in it. and it's this construction that gives you the knowledge/ability to build new things. Don't see it as a discovery, but an innovation. The knowledge has always been there, and the player's character has it. The lab is only there to give the character the ability to crystallize it into technologic ability.

The "science lab" would become "tech lab". You wouldn't discover science, but discover how to do tech (the science being there from start). And then, providing stuff to the tech lab would make sense (provided the aforementionned stuff is not a colored liquid vial, but a kind of box full of devices and stuff).

[ssilk]

I added this to viewtopic.php?f=80&t=14645 Research-queue and -progress Visualizaton / Research-Overhauls
Which includes (I hope) also a lot of other ideas like I remember:
- Specialized research facilities (e. g. normal research- and infinite research-facilities)
- splitting research: You can do multiple research at once.
- More control over the research (a research queue for example)

Like : Consider the science lab builds something every time you insert a science pack in it. and it's this construction that gives you the knowledge/ability to build new things. Don't see it as a discovery, but an innovation. The knowledge has always been there, and the player's character has it. The lab is only there to give the character the ability to crystallize it into technologic ability.

I really like that. Makes total sense. But needs to be more specific: What should I do with this thing that is build? I really have no idea. (not true of course, but I want to hear first yours )