Am I the only one who feels that people not moving between domes kinda ruins things?

[harishrajan96]

If it's a situation where there is disagreement about what the core mechanics should be, why can't mods be the solution?! Squad is fundamentally opposed to delta-v readouts in Kerbal Space Program. A huge percentage of the community uses a mod to display delta-v and we are all happy. Firaxis thought it was very important for game balance and pacing to have turn limits in XCOM 2, but a huge portion of the community found them frustrating and unfun, so lots of players use a mod that increases or eliminates turn limits. Everyone is happy. At the end of the day it's a game and what matters is that players are having fun.


You still have a cohesive colony with self-contained domes, because those domes all depend on each other. Everyone depends on the dome with the University to produce skilled colonists for all the facilities in the various domes. Everyone depends on the dome with the machine parts factory to supply maintenance resources for critical systems. You can make a similar argument for the dome with the research facility, the surplus food production, and the rare metal extractor workers.

Yes but they depend on each other indirectly which makes each dome needing its own requirement which need their own buildings. In early game when i have 2 domes, and i didn't have the fungi farm i had to build extra farms but i didn't have space in my two domes as it had other buildings, this may be okay in later stage but it still shows how each type of building in every dome is inefficient than all of them in one dome.

 

[Heradite]

That's the point. You're not supposed to be able to create have all comforts of home right from the start. It's supposed to be a new colony, under somewhat uncomfortable conditions caused by the space limitations, with more comforts coming as you research bigger and better domes.

But the people in the smaller domes are going to be stuck with limited services since they can't travel to the bigger domes for other services. I agree that services should be limited at the beginning. But if I build an electronics store in a small dome near another small dome, it's not beyond reasonable to expect the people in the other dome to occasionallly visit the electronics store. Same with a space bar which takes up to much space for a small dome to ever be built unless colonists from nearby domes can travel to it.

If you can't have all the comforts from home at start but eventually you can get them but some colonists living in the wrong dome can't use them....

 

[MacroNova]

Yes but they depend on each other indirectly which makes each dome needing its own requirement which need their own buildings. In early game when i have 2 domes, and i didn't have the fungi farm i had to build extra farms but i didn't have space in my two domes as it had other buildings, this may be okay in later stage but it still shows how each type of building in every dome is inefficient than all of them in one dome.

That sounds like gameplay to me! You are forced to carefully balance the services each dome provides to the people living there against what each dome is able to contribute to the overall colony.

 

[Falc]

Here's my fundamental problem with this (and some of the explanations given).

Domes already have an effect radius. People won't go to an outside job site beyond that radius.

But that radius is what? A dozen or so tiles.

So can someone explain to me why people are perfectly willing to walk a dozen tiles, outside on Mars, to go and work in a mine, but they are completely unwilling to walk ONE SINGLE TILE outside to go to work in a dome that is literally next to their home dome?

I'm not asking for mobility all across the map, the current radius is fine. But could we get a system that's a bit more sensible within that radius?

 

[harishrajan96]

That sounds like gameplay to me! You are forced to carefully balance the services each dome provides

In early game there isn't enough space in domes to do it, in late game i have lots of domes to balance which is more of a pain than enjoyment

 

[Wenli Lohengramm]

Just think in the micromanagement nightmare regarding to kids, in one dome you have nursery and other school and other a university, because will never be enough space to put everything on the same dome.

I don't think that isolation was intentional, there is no way the game would be better with it.

 

[Heradite]

So? There's nothing to be gained for the colony by leisure travel. So why should the colony's materials and efforts be diverted to entertain the wants of a few?

Because here's the thing: this infrastructure isn't getting built unless the colony project's management directs it to be. The colonists won't have access to resources to build this sort of stuff on their own without stealing it from the colony. How would you feel if you suddenly had no machine parts in the colony when it came time to repair the wind turbines because geologist Jim-Bob stole them to build a space-car so he could go shopping at the other dome and now both he and the car are now broken in the bottom of a chasm and all of your wind turbines are going offline?

The level of risk to the colony for this sort of infrastructure may be acceptable by individual colonists, but there's no reason to facilitate it for the colony management.

I would laugh and give this game 10/10 if that happened.

I mean come on these people moved to Mars but they aren't taking space walks to have fun? Like why move to Mars if you aren't going to leave the dome for fun?

 

[Disclaimer]

People are supposed to be able to travel millions of kilometers to Mars, but then are unable to travel a few meters to the next dome? Whatever the gamey reason for that, that‘s just nonsense.

Of course there is the additional question as to why anybody would build glas domes as habitates at all, but that‘s a different matter.

 

[harishrajan96]

I don't think that isolation was intentional, there is no way the game would be better with it.

I bet you there is a transportation DLC around the corner !

 

[Whitecold]

I bet you there is a transportation DLC around the corner !

I'd be kinda disappointed if that was DLC only. Put rails, aircraft into a DLC, put basic land transportation should be a core feature, as well as connecting domes. Also your game becomes essentially different, as you can fully use your entertainment buildings, and also if you add more services you will only be able to make use of them if you have transport

 

[Wenli Lohengramm]

I bet you there is a transportation DLC around the corner !

Maybe not, maybe is that way to prevent a AI bug

 

[Roversword]

I would pretty much expect that there is a way to interconnect domes (those being near each other maybe by tunnels and those further away with other means)....
It is indeed silly to treat every dome as "ark" with no interconnection with other domes and therefore other colonists.

While I understand that they might not want to live in one dome and work in another, I would expect them to go to other domes (at least close ones) to fulfill other needs (space bar, gym and so on). Those buildings might have also a certain range, where close domes can benefit from them (thus not needing to build several of these buildings close by) and further domes cannot....

I am a little disappointed by this limitations, as it makes no sense to me....

 

[jfjohnny5]

I'm glad to see how much traction this thread is getting. There are people on both sides of the issue, but the sheer amount of debate over something as simple as "connectors between domes" certainly seems to indicate there's something here that would warrant the devs attention. I'm not too familiar with Haemimont, as the developer, but I certainly trust Paradox as the publisher. I, for one, expect - well, I'm hopeful anyway - to hear something one way or the other about this.

 

[Aspen28570]

I really don't think they're going to turn around and change a core element of game play a day after launch. If the devs are going to change this I don't think it's going to be anytime soon if ever.

 

[Whitecold]

I really don't think they're going to turn around and change a core element of game play a day after launch. If the devs are going to change this I don't think it's going to be anytime soon if ever.

They certainly knew earlier than before, and I kinda assume it is some engine limitation. I really don't know why anyone consider it a good idea, and it seems I am not alone. Playing my first colony I really don't know what to do with my small domes. I have no clue what to remove to make things better with the mix of needs. So really the best option is to let them sulk and rush bigger domes, starting over.
It completely blocks of organic growth, and I still don't know how to get my scientist over stuck in the wrong dome despite the limitations I set. It is just frustrating micromanagement that does not even work.

 

[Salted]

This, it does seem like a massive oversight. While I do see and understand what they were trying to do with the way they have it. Making every dome kinda its own little city, it kinda makes sense with your first dome. But I was totally expecting after my first one or two domes I would start linking them together and make what we all invisioned.

It would be a cool thing to do, and easy to work into the tec teirs. Simple walkways/ tunnels to start. With options to build up to meglev trains and other modes of transport between domes.

I truly think the dev team over looked this, and how much people wanted this in the game.

The steam forums have had this all over it and I am glad to see here it here. I would love to have this in the game.

 

[Heradite]

I really don't think they're going to turn around and change a core element of game play a day after launch. If the devs are going to change this I don't think it's going to be anytime soon if ever.

They could always Stellaris 2.0 it.

 

[Malchore]

Is anyone else having problems with colonists distributing themselves between domes? I have people who are unemployed and homeless despite there being another dome with vacant properties and workplaces...

Yes! I wish I understood how the heck we can re-assign a colonist to a different dome.

I have two domes - Dome #1 is a small starter dome. It has very few earth-born colononists now and most of them are un-specialized and mars-born. Several of the citizens are children. I finally built a medium sized Dome #2 with a school and Mars Univerisity - but I can't figure how to transfer them!

You can "assign" which dome the reside in. There is text which says something to the effect, "...takes 5 sols to transfer domes and may require a flying drone to facilitate the move." To make it even more confusing you can manually assign where they work...in another dome. And they'll list that they work there even though they are still in a different dome.

I had two colonists dies while RUNNING from Dome #1 to Dome #2. My domes are at least 8 sectors apart. That's a long run! I guess they didn't want to wait to transport via the flying drones. They were even wearing space suits; with helmuts and everything! They were both botonists from Earth. You'd think they would've been better educated.

 

[harishrajan96]

Simple walkways/ tunnels to start.

Right now tunnels are a necessary hassle as tunnels are useless without the shuttle hub. With no shuttles you just have to manually bring materials. Tunnels can be buffed a lot in my opinion

 

[Barefoot]

Hmm... I can see both sides of this argument.

I do think that if each dome is meant to be able to provide a wide variety of services to its people, that the Space Bar needs to be medium instead of large. How many bars are just little hole in the wall dives compared to huge sprawling self-standing buildings the size of apartment towers or multi-home lots... or factories?

But overall I think the solution is a pressurized tunnel that can connect domes, maybe of limited length. That way when you build those, it links the domes' environments in every way and they act like one dome... and if you don't, then you get to build your isolated city-states. -And- it adds a gameplay element of the civil engineering of your colony as a whole mattering. Want to build a big metropolis of a mega dome and a bunch of small domes, like a downtown and a bunch of suburbs? You'll need at least four sectors of nearly 100% build area to do it.