[SPOILERS] The Outpost

Game Talk The Lab
1

So, I was experimenting with having an NPC camp over the weekend since I really haven’t heard much feedback about things in the vault (too hard/easy/not rewarding?)…

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A labeled image…

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There are a number of interesting elements that I’m testing but I could use a bit of brain storming on how to expand the general camp/town/outpost. I have a number of long term goals but the small stuff while the population increases adds flavor. The development of the camp is focused on a never ending supply of missions focused around the construction foreman in the garage. The main limiting factor for his work is large quantities of resources. You just have to pull your truck into the garage and he’ll pull quest items right out of your trunks. In DF fashion, migrants are assigned jobs as they arrive that will subsidize the cost of major projects or make other improvements while you focus on priorities. The timing of growth is attached to missions which will shorty occupy the quest giver to prevent quickly spamming them to blitz through growth stages.

There are lots of things going on with the NPCs in the background that I’ll leave out for now but what do you think would be the next priority for construction if you were in a serious/low science fiction/rebuilding situation?
Rough Mission Line for Construction Foreman

  1. 2x4’s to enclose barn
  2. Blankets for beds
  3. Nails for continued construction
  4. Salt to trade for agricultural supplies
  5. Fertilizer for the crops
  6. Stones for the well and fireplaces
  7. Pipes for the pump and sawmill machinery
  8. Motors for the sawmill
    ->Not included is the next growth stage including outhouses, tool shed, and finished sawmill

Quick Background:
Refugee Center too full -> Send team out to establish agricultural outpost to support the refugee center w/ Old Guard assistance -> Migrants diverted to outpost as it is developed to handle them

2

i would raid a hydroponics lab and a lab of electric science and make my own giant hydroponics farm running on nuclear of solar power

3

Looks amazing!

4

Very, very cool :slight_smile:

[quote=“acidia, post:1, topic:9295”]There are lots of things going on with the NPCs in the background that I’ll leave out for now but what do you think would be the next priority for construction if you were in a serious/low science fiction/rebuilding situation?
Rough Mission Line for Construction Foreman

  1. 2x4’s to enclose barn
  2. Blankets for beds
  3. Nails for continued construction
  4. Salt to trade for agricultural supplies
  5. Fertilizer for the crops
  6. Stones for the well and fireplaces
  7. Pipes for the pump and sawmill machinery
  8. Motors for the sawmill
    ->Not included is the next growth stage including outhouses, tool shed, and finished sawmill[/quote]

Personally, I would think stones for the well and fireplaces would be higher up on the list, maybe before salt.
As for what comes next, I would think a search for weapons and ammo, perhaps explosives even, would be some kind of goal.

5

I think you did too good of a job hiding the vault. Seems a lot of people believe there’s just sewers under there. NPC quests directing people there might help them explore more though.

I’d have the quests work in a less linear manner. Have the foreman say something like “We have too many needs to count. For now, we need 2x4s to make the barn liveable, blankets to keep our people warm through the winter, metal sheeting to build a wall, concrete for expansion, and any seeds you can bring us.” Then you have the choice of whichever supplies you want to bring first, and different portions of the outpost get updated faster depending on what you bring. You could allow the player to turn in as much as they want at any point, but the actual construction would be time-gated to prevent the blitz upgrading. Then, once you’ve hit a certain level of stability for each of those original needs, the supplies become more complex, including tools, motors, storage batteries, pipe, wire, radios, crafted items and that sort of thing.

It would be interesting if we could include vehicles in quest turn ins as well. Something like “We need a way to safely move a large group of people. A school bus will suffice, but if you find one of those large troop carriers that would be ideal.” And dropping one of those off would increase the rate of npcs coming around.

I would imagine the quest line could be furthered, once enough people have come around, you need to expand further. Then the player has to clear a structure meant to hold a lot of people (apartment building or hotel), and everyone not necessary to run the farm will be moved out there. The situation would be something like: refugee center is the old guard stronghold and their headquarters in the area, the farm provides food to the center and the apartment, and the apartment building is where the average person lives. Your role as the player would be to assist the old guard in establishing secure transportation and communication networks between the three facilities, and expanding the safe zone around each facility. I dunno how realistic this would be (splitting people up away from the food source when gas is a relatively limited resource), but it’s a thought.

6

The refugee center has vehicles already (they used school buses to move there) so perhaps fuel/charged batteries might be a better trade than whole vehicles.

Agreed that the vault isn’t easy to find, even if you know it’s there and are debug-equipped to check it out. (Perhaps you’re testing a PR or something. :wink: ) One thing I’d suggest is making sure there’s a way that vehicles could–theoretically–get from the vehicle lift at the vault, to the surface. I’m not sure whether there is one and I missed it/it got Demolished as part of the Cataclysm, but that sort of thing (hmm, what’s an elevator/this large ramp-down behind a secured door/etc doing here on z=0?) might get people looking.

vache’s idea about running the needs in parallel rather than sequence is good and I’d second it.

7

How about a watchtower Requiring a donation of binoculars, radios and building supplies. to allow them early warning should a horde be incoming.

Maybe a local power-grid project allowing them electrical upgrades like fridges or lights. which could work off different types of energy like:

Solar arrays if there’s an npc with high electrician skills around (maybe a rescue or recruitment mission to get one)
Gasoline generators.
etc.

Maybe the camp could eventually build things like a motor-pool where the player can have her vehicles repaired in exchange for supplies. (requiring a skilled Mechanic)
or a chem-lab for your drug/gunpowder needs.

8

Keep the good ideas coming, a lot of this so far will make it in eventually.

On a side note, how do ya’ll foresee investing in agriculture? I was trying to create a way for the player to invest in crops as a form of low risk return. What I was thinking was having the crop foreman let the player select from a number of fields constructed by the NPCs, the player would pay them to plant whatever crop you desire but there will be a number of factors that would determine the amount of plants that actually sprouted. At harvest time, you have three options: harvest the plants yourself, pay the NPCs to harvest the plants, or have the NPCs liquidate the crop and net you a significant financial return on the crop. The NPCs would be all for it because they get their cut whether you make a hefty profit or you accidentally burn down your field and have nothing to show for your work.

I like the above idea because it is literally the simplest (there are no new values that I need to save associated with the player, just transforming terrain) and makes sense. The only thing I might want is a menu to display potential returns and when you are planting out of season. Everything else would work just like the player planted the crop themselves.

9

[quote=“acidia, post:8, topic:9295”]Keep the good ideas coming, a lot of this so far will make it in eventually.

On a side note, how do ya’ll foresee investing in agriculture? I was trying to create a way for the player to invest in crops as a form of low risk return. What I was thinking was having the crop foreman let the player select from a number of fields constructed by the NPCs, the player would pay them to plant whatever crop you desire but there will be a number of factors that would determine the amount of plants that actually sprouted. At harvest time, you have three options: harvest the plants yourself, pay the NPCs to harvest the plants, or have the NPCs liquidate the crop and net you a significant financial return on the crop. The NPCs would be all for it because they get their cut whether you make a hefty profit or you accidentally burn down your field and have nothing to show for your work.

I like the above idea because it is literally the simplest (there are no new values that I need to save associated with the player, just transforming terrain) and makes sense. The only thing I might want is a menu to display potential returns and when you are planting out of season. Everything else would work just like the player planted the crop themselves.[/quote]

It would probably be best to use the underused faction menu.

As for the vault, you need a to build a legend, because not everyone would get the reference(I haven’t played any of the fallout games), so maybe some survivor notes, lab notes, a newspaper page(or something like the national enquirer) hinting at the existence of a vault, a advertisement in a flyer. For bonus points you could have a few bodies with ‘tickets’(or orders) to the vault. Even better would be a ‘vault’ access keycard that works like the military and science cards, which lead to the players to question-“A vault access keycard, I wonder what it does?” Then with the pieces of clues a player could find their way to the vault.

10

This all sounds pretty great. There’s a huge amount of potential there so my brain’s getting a bit of opportunity paralysis, but a small thing that came to mind is that for something to collect for the outpost, people would probably appreciate soap. Maybe towels as well? But definitely soap.

11

A flaw I see in the layout is that the camp hasn’t got a centralized cafeteria area nor an armory. The perhaps wouldnt be there from the start, but I think they should be one of the first things to appar.

12

I like these ideas:

  • vault notes and corpses
  • soap and towels
  • cafeteria
  • armory
  • investing in crops
13

Love this concept! Its the “fort mode” of Cataclysm haha. This game needs an “end game goal”, I think this is perfect. Finding NPC’s and recruiting them, giving loot runs meaning (need antibiotics or people will die), and a sense of accomplishment when you build up this base.

Some ideas:

A blacksmith’s shed. Needs outfitted with all the typical items for forging. Main benefit of this shop is that gives you the ability to melt down scrap metal for nails quickly. Helps with all sorts of building projects there.

Supply warehouse: Where all generic supplies are stored. Would be NICE to have a bunch of labeled crates here. After supply runs, when you perform your item dump to the foreman. All items will get brought to warehouse and sorted into the proper crates automatically. For example, hand tools in a crate, chemicals in another crate, ect ect.

Makeshift Infirmary: Med supplies are stored here. Will have beds, tables, and scattered crates. Injured NPCs can be found resting here. If you are lucky enough to get a migrant doctor NPC they will set up shop and it boosts the healing process.

Meeting Hall: Central building where town meetings are held at. Maybe have this as start location with scattered blankets and the foreman comforting the random NPCs. Once you get the barn rebuilt, blankets are removed and beds are built there. If there is a raid, people go to the meeting hall for protection. Perhaps this is a church with random NPCs praying for help?

Outhouse: Can be upgraded to bath house: For general cleanliness. Without these, its more likely to have random disease outbreaks due to poor hygiene and lots of people.

Makeshift school / library: For book storage. Has chairs / desks. Lets the NPC children (if implemented) go to school, and used for general learning. Might help with town boredom.

Smokehouse: Small shed with brazier. Needs metal hooks / rope for hanging meat to cure.

Raids: With any established area, there should be hostile NPC’s that want to raid it for hard earned supplies.

14

What vault are you guys referring to, above?

15

Oh, uh… If you ever see some irradiated wanderers, you might want to very thoroughly search the sewers under that portion of town. If you aren’t sure what you are looking for, you’ve found it if you are at z-2 & z-3.

16

Has this been added to latest version? if so how would one find it? :slight_smile:

17

Not yet, I’m waiting to get a decent bit cobbled together so that it is worth building up for the player.

I’m currently looking at getting trade caravan guard missions to work like they do in fallout 2. No tedium for the player and extremely simple AI.

EDIT: Hmmm, reversing it to hunt caravans would also work if you joined the bandits…

18

Re folks not finding the vault, we recently added a few text blurbs about it (including one dead-giveaway note). Give people a week or so and they ought to start making their way into the Dead Zone.

19

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(It’s a slow animation)

This is a debug test for the outpost/colony mission system I’m looking at for the ranch commune at the moment. Trying to use the existing system is nearly impossible, I don’t even know if an NPC can actually handle having two missions at the same time. I’ll give the window merchant in the refugee center a comparable menu so you can transit back without walking. General idea would be to have the commune missions focus on labor and food production, the refugee center act as a caravan hub, and necropolis (or somewhere else) become a combat mission hub. Might add a ‘Assign Ally to Salvage Mission’ that converts houses to looted house on the map in exchange for some profit… but that might fit the atmosphere of a different camp better. Thoughts?

I also need a better name… [SOMETHING] Commune

EDIT: Trying to simulate time quickly without breaching the main game loop… I wonder if I could temporarily teleport the characters to the -10 z level for safe keeping when everyone is on their missions? It would keep them stationary and allow time to pass properly in the main game loop without having the game lag to hell if you need to pass multiple days ‘in mission.’ The only other thing I could think of is creating an empty X/admin dimension but that would be a lot more work. Hey, it might even be fun… dig down far enough and you’ll run into your NPC buddies (or just their corpses) that died on bandit patrol rotting in hell. This sounds a feature the more I think about it.

20

Supposed to be able to handle multi-missions, but IIRC we’ve never tested 'em. Looks impressive, in any event; I’m curious re the field displaying that terrain-looking info (current state of field?) and don’t have a great name for the commune. “Agricultural” doesn’t do much, I’m afraid.