1 dismissal Reduce the amount of meh items in the warehouse

[niennab]

I’ve noticed while playing cargo and ghosting a few rounds that the warehouse is seldom sorted or sent out in full. Cargonia aside, I think that the first and second floor to the warehouse, the bounty list, phoron bounty and orders means that if someone wants to RP, the warehouse is ultimately ignored or only high value items are searched for and sent out. On my own, working efficiently I think it took me 40 minutes to sort both levels, which can be quite draining.

After sorting the warehouse and moving about 3 mops into the pile for janitorial that I knew would never be used, I wanted to propose that the list of items that can spawn is instead changed to feature predominantly:

• Lore items such as the bone charm, Vysokan clothing, Ceres Lance dress uniform, Golden deep accessories and uniforms, and so on and so forth. Essentially anything beyond the default colored jumpsuits and hats that offer a bit of intrigue or role play in finding.
• Quality of life items such as the surgery improvement tools, nanopaste, blue space beakers, surgery kit, combat medical kit. More or less all the cool departmental stuff that either needs to be made or is seldom seen but provides a mechanic benefit.
• Antagonist related items. This one is hard because even a bar of soap could be reasoned to be used one way or another. However anything security or medical related, insulated gloves, departmental headsets etc etc.
• Bounty list items such as towels, briefcases, figurines etc etc. That way the bounty’s have a chance to be fulfilled if it is unobtainable otherwise. 

Things that I feel should be reduced:

• Items that are incredibly basic or there is already an abundance of: mops, small batteries, simple uniform items, fossil bags, crayons, cigarettes, etc etc.

If changed, I feel as though it will give a reason for departments to eagerly accept warehouse crates as well as give a reason for technicians to sort the warehouse in full.

Thank you for your time!

[restricted]

The warehouse exists to store junk. There might be gold in the junk. It might just be junk. You have to sort it to find out. I wouldn't mind if there was a greater amount of crap in the warehouse thus resulting in more sweet loot but I think the current ratio of sweet loot to junk is pretty decent. Speaking as some who sorts the warehouse every time I'm in cargo.

[Carver]

I prefer it being filled more with trash, as it currently stands antag cargo has it the easiest of any crew role with easily dozens of TCs worth of powerful kit sitting around in there (surgery kits, combat medical kits, armour, shields, engineering equipment, etcetera). I'd be fine with more weird jank stuff for bounties and mechanically useless lore items, but a departmental headset and uplink purchases (surgery/combat medkits) should never be so easy to get.

[niennab]

The warehouse might as well be deleted by that logic. Sorting items that no one will use is nothing more than a clicker game. Quartermasters will want it sorted, yet it’s a waste of time otherwise.

The antags don’t have to be in cargo to benefit from it. Say if someone in another department were to go riffling through the crate before others can see it or, in the case of Security, the warden doesn’t get to it first. Regardless the antag portion of the suggestion can be ignored if an issue. I only play extended anyway.

[NerdyVampire]

Possible unpopular opinion related to the warehouse: you don't have to and shouldn't send as much stuff out as you do. The purpose of the warehouse is to store the surplus equipment and materials, there is actually no logic in sending it to the departments if it isn't specifically missing. Sending out crates is just something cargo has become used to doing because noone ever needs anything anyway, so perhaps the real issue if any, is increasing the likely hood that a department might be missing something that cargo can deliver.

I don't think the warehouse needs to start with more unique or antag-friendly items than it does, but I wouldn't mind seeing such items as orderable through the cargo-ordering system.

 

[Doxxmedearly]

Agreed with above. I already sorted out the most egregious offenders (Stacks of 7 trays, you will not be missed) and added unique items in a PR some time ago, but intentionally left some degree of junk in there. It isn't a treasure trove; it's predominantly a mundane storage area that sometimes has some fun and unique things in it. If quantity is an issue, we can look into reducing the number of items overall. Frankly, though, the cargo culture of "everything must be sorted perfectly and sent out" is as ridiculous as it is irritating; however, I cannot deny that you are right and for whatever reason, it has been ingrained in the minds of QMs, HoPs, and cargo techs that this MUST be done and everything that can be shipped out should be. 

I can look into tweaking the amounts, items, and frequencies again, to reduce some of the tedium, but I am going to say this right now; the warehouse will always feature more or less useless junk as its majority. That's not going to change, because that's what the warehouse is for. No amount of coding is going to remove the frankly strange and irksome tradition of "you must sort fully, you must ship everything." That's up to the players.

Edited December 18, 2020 by Doxxmedearly

[niennab]

1 hour ago, Doxxmedearly said:

I can look into tweaking the amounts, items, and frequencies again, to reduce some of the tedium, but I am going to say this right now; the warehouse will always feature more or less useless junk as its majority.

That's fine by me! Thank you. I am uncertain how the player idea that it must be sorted can go away but maybe a reduction of items will make that process all the more easier on the brain.

Although, one issue with the current system is that it relies on the technician to know a good item from a junk item.

[Doxxmedearly]

2 hours ago, niennab said:

Although, one issue with the current system is that it relies on the technician to know a good item from a junk item.

Well, that's fine, isn't it? it's a roleplaying game. Sometimes someone isn't going to send a bluespace beaker to medical and it'll sit in a crate for the round. Someone might see high-capacity cell and think it's super important. Sometimes you think something should go to engineering but it's just a useless science item. Not sure how to make players more accepting of "non-optimal play" or mistakes other than trying to encourage it ourselves through our play (And stop mocking people in dchat for doing these things, as many are guilty of). Hopefully some of the players reading this discussion will take it to heart, as well. In the meantime, I will see what can be done about further adjusting the warehouse spawns, though I can't promise they'll change dramatically.

[Hendricks]

Totally not bragging or anything I promise but I can sort the Warehouse in less than 20 minutes but thats only because it's the role I play the most, I also agree it does have a lot of useless stuff, I don't even bother with Service stuff I just pile it because absolutely no one will use any of it for then a single second.

 

It's the only role I play q-q.

 

 

Edited December 19, 2020 by Hendricks

[KingOfThePing]

I think even more items can be in the warehouse, both junk and cool stuff. It's a wareHOUSE, not a wareroom, right? 

It's also not like you have to sort it  you can also just fish for the good stuff. Not like anyone will bug you for it anyway. Go wild!

[Zundy]

The thing is though, is that there's not really a point to any of the junk stuff. It is literally just junk. Some of it is low tech of which better versions can already be created elsewhere at round start. It'd be nice if the stuff in the warehouse was good so they people could come and actually get stuff from cargo.

Instead of just random junk in random crates, why not have set crates of goods which contain items? Like a food goods crate that contains all manner of junkfood refills. Drinks crate with drinks. Medical crate with medical stuff etc so the items are somewhat useful, with the odd cool random item/mob thrown in.

[Carver]

I wouldn't mind seeing the powerful shit replaced with more mundane supply crates so it's less feast or famine as far as warehouse items go. Moderate stuff that you'd be able to find within the department at roundstart (advanced medical kits, tear gas grenades, stacks of meat, etc.) that are still valued but not just blatantly pulled from the uplink.

Edited December 23, 2020 by Carver

[niennab]

I do still feel as though the issue of the warehouse is counter intuitive to gameplay and gameplay expectation. Which is why I feel many assume the warehouse must be sorted and sent out. Otherwise why have all the crates, and the system in place to easily deliver said items? People may say the warehouse doesn’t need to be sorted here, but that I don’t feel as though that stops a HoP or Quartermaster demanding it is sorted in game.

Maybe just halving the amount that spawns would solve this however? If say we want to keep the garbage items.

[Camellia]

Just incase this is forgotten.

Please no mind shields in the warehouse.

Having command distribute them out isn't fun for antags who had a gaslighting gimmick.

-- otherwise, yeah, def would want to decrease the amount of meh items,

Edited December 23, 2020 by Cylean

[Carver]

1 hour ago, niennab said:

Maybe just halving the amount that spawns would solve this however? If say we want to keep the garbage items.

Perhaps removing the upper floor?

[goolie]

God PLEASE at least filter some of the completely useless items out there are just so many that don’t even serve a purpose, mechanic or create an opportunity to roleplay. What am I going to do with a green crayon and five sticks of lipstick?

[DronzTheWolf]

8 hours ago, goolie said:

God PLEASE at least filter some of the completely useless items out there are just so many that don’t even serve a purpose, mechanic or create an opportunity to roleplay. What am I going to do with a green crayon and five sticks of lipstick?

Use the crayon to make securitea and sell the lipstick. Maybe to Central, maybe to some Eridani with more money than common sense. 

[goolie]

I don’t know what’s actually able to be sold, can everything be sold? If that’s the case then I’m probably just going to start making a “sell” pile when I’m sorting it out. I’ve seen people shift some items onto the shuttle but the credits never go up that high. 

[Boggle08]

38 minutes ago, goolie said:

I don’t know what’s actually able to be sold, can everything be sold? If that’s the case then I’m probably just going to start making a “sell” pile when I’m sorting it out. I’ve seen people shift some items onto the shuttle but the credits never go up that high. 

There's actually a complete list of what works and what doesn't somewhere in the repo. I remember the list being very small, and very stingy. Most of the junk items don't sell, so there's no utility there either.

[goolie]

I heard about that from someone, might of been in LOOC during a round some dude was just like "That doesn't sell, that doesn't sell... and THAT doesn't sell" do I never bothered to do it. Thought that the only thing that was able to be sold was ore.

[ThelonTV]

There's an export scanner in the lockers on the cargo surface. Scanning items with it reveals their sell value. 
Bonus (If it hasn't been fixed): The more you stack a sheet of material, the less an individual sheet in it is worth for some reason. . . according to the scanner 

Edited December 27, 2020 by ThelonTV

[Arrow768]

Voting for dismissal.

The current warehouse setup offers enough decent items to encourage looking through it.
At the same time the warehouse does not contain enough valuable items for it to become the new go-to place for antags / screw with them in a major way.

The guide to station procedure contains this:

Quote

The supply department is expected to store and distribute warehouse supplies to the station's departments as deemed appropriate.

While there is the expectation that cargo at least checks for valuable items, there is no need to clean up the warehouse and ship out everything.
Imho it would be better to change the directive so there is no longer the requirement that cargo ships out valuable items from the warehouse in them.

Currently we are also looking into a alternative, or addition to the cargo warehouse.