[Beta 2] Suggestion - Allow player to set limits on number of visitors?

[HangarPilot]

Consider allowing the player (station manager) to set limits on the number of allowed visitors.

This could be done via "Services Offered" ... just as you set quantity limits for auto-trade of resources ... allow a player to enable medical/entertainment/sleeping/dining and specify how many visitors ships can send for that service. This could either be per-ship (i.e. "3" per ship) ... or total (i.e. "3" total and if another ship beat you too it, the next ship is just out of luck).

Alternatively, you could do this "behind the scenes" and limit the number of visitors based on the number of services available. Why are they sending 10 people for Medical services when I have 2 med beds? Or sending 10 people for Sleep when the station only has 6 beds marked for visitors?

Another reason for this suggestion is that I've done "something" to trigger the next level of difficulty. Over night it changed and I'm now getting big-boy 2x3 ships that are sending like 20 people each. They're literally sucking all the oxygen from the place because my visitor population suddenly tripled. My only option seems to be to just turn off services until I can expand enough to accommodate them all.

[Death Approaches]

PLEASE YES DO THIS

at least under the my services info box, put down what an average per-ship visit is costing you in resources, and exactly what's going to be consumed, not just the output objects. things like repair work should tell you in advance, not just award them their repairs and then your low resource warnings start popping up.

re: overcrowded visitor area, same exact thing just happened; cute little visitor area, 4 bunks, table for 4, 4 med beds, 2 toilets, 1 arcade, 1 jukebox, beer machine, various windows decorations seats and whatnot... all bright green comfort values, happy happy... now it's so cluttered in there I can't read the individual names. (it seems the thresholds are 1/4 points, 25/50/75/100, but I could be wrong.)

we need caps, capacity limiters, holds on resources, not just one but multiple mechanisms that basically say FSCK OFF GO AWAY. Sorry, dinner service at the hotel is from 4p-6p but if you tip nicely I'll see if we can rustle up a space meal for you. also we're out of stock on just about everything because your starving buddies ate everything and drank all my space beer and I got to grow more, come back in a week. hey where did my hull blocks go?! wow your ship was really damaged, you owe me more.

in fact, new rule! if you spacejocks bring your own repair and assembly blocks, we'll facilitate the actual work at a discount, otherwise I want a sliding fee scale, the less resources I have, the more it's gonna cost you, and you can decide if you want to pay it or DIY.

there's a few dozen tweaks that have always been asked for that will need to be implemented eventually, too, especially now in station mode, because what was a slight annoyance and "just the way SH does things" are now feeling more like -- immediate concerns.

it's infuriating when a crew comes uninvited, without having DINER or ENTERTAINMENT to your shared break area, when they were down for MEDICAL... uhh, you're healed, go home. and if you're trading with them, they stay longer?! why?! the shuttle is right there! get on it! I'm charging you for the air you're breathing if you stay a minute longer!

it's even more infuriating when their shipmates are suiciding against a well-enforced derelict of alien hive or rogue bots, and you're down here playing my arcade games and drinking my beer, didn't even leave ONE CREW on your ship fight invaders or power Ops, so your PDTs are offline and your ship is getting wrecked by 3 little bots you could easily destroy, so now if I don't send out fighters to help you, you'll have an un-livable ship to return to, assuming I or another visitor can rescue your dumb buddies, and I don't get paid for that particular service, nor the fighter repairs, nor compensate the poor pilot who's runnin on low energy / stamina all day with the shakes from stabbing stim twice because I forced him out of his bunk 3x in one night.

hell I just found a way to trigger a glitch were I can put as many PDTs as I have system points for, no HC node required. you could ring your asteroid with 32 of them, not a node in sight, and they'll all fire. that'll be fixed, of course... the rest? hmm. who knows if or when. there's many.

I guess we're at the "features" stage, and the "balancing" stage comes later. the challenge of it is fun, gotta say, but micromanaging the station services takes so long, need hotkeys and overlay icon for station services on the main upper-left panel, for what services are currently on/off at the minimum.

[Nebelbiber]

+1

We can only accommodate for so many visitors and thus should be able to set caps.

[HangarPilot]

One additional note: In an ideal galaxy, it would be "nice" if new ships warped in and actually hailed you and asked for permission to come down (Can I send 3 people for Medical services?). I'd like to be able to say "no vacancy" and have them go on their way with no penalty.

In reality though ... that would probably become real annoying real quick with the sheer quantity of ships coming. You'd be interrupted and running to the Ops console every few minutes.

On the topic of:

Originally posted by Death Approaches:

...
there's a few dozen tweaks that have always been asked for that will need to be implemented eventually, too, especially now in station mode, because what was a slight annoyance and "just the way SH does things" are now feeling more like -- immediate concerns.
...

There's been a long-standing "bug-ish" report of people getting "stuck in a loop" getting in-and-out of something. Often I feel this is environmental ... they will sit/lay down ... decide the "environment is bad" ... stand up ... decide it's ok ... repeat.

I had an occasion earlier when this happened. I was playing at max speed and saw them climb in and out of a medical bed 50 times. However it was so crowded (back to my OP) I couldn't even tell if it was the same person getting in/out of the medical bed or if there were multiple people all trying to use it at once (there was probably 5-6 people in the 2x2 room with a single private medical bed ... my suspicion is low O2 caused this behavior). Regardless, the reason this is a bigger concern for Station mode is I got paid EACH time they laid down! I racked up a tidy profit by them glitching out.

Another is issues that just don't make "logical" sense. Each game mechanic works great in its own right ... but sometimes they combine in odd ways. NPC shows up and buys a ton of "Fuel Service" ... yet the RNG trading system has them selling fuel super cheap because they already had a ton of it. Or I'm offering "Medical Services" yet the RNG mission generator generates a mission for "Medical Assistance" instead of just sending them down. Again, in a vacuum (pun sort of intended) each mechanic/system works great. They just sometimes combine in "illogical" ways. I just usually ignore it, enjoy the exploit, or rationalize it away (the Captain of that ship must be drunk) ... but as you're marching toward 1.0 next year ... something to potentially throw on your "polish" list.

[Death Approaches]

hah it's that collective experience thing I guess, we're all getting them. I just had one of those loopy people in the same exact scenario! flops on a med bed, environment was perfect; plenty of temp O2 and scrubbers running, environmentals are perfect, but still, she was bleeding and wanting bandaging... guess it was trying to decide to let my crew give em the + symbol or run to a medicine cabinet for some bandages?

she went from standing to horizontal like she was on alien enzymes; 2x a second, but each time the nearest med-leveled person starts walking, they gets confused because she's out of bed, waits for the task assignor to give em something else, oh she's back down again, so not only is the NPC spazzing out, the doctor is kind of frozen and not doing anything, essentially idling. but as you say, you get paid when they hit the bed, and made like 9k off her. :-)

had to "stop" the bed to get her and the med personnel to move normally again...