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[shoi]

Is +25% hazard rating really that gamebreaking? As a player who doesn't cherry pick worlds to settle when I did bother touching colonization, I can't really tell if is or not. I want to say its really not that big of a problem, especially when there will be content to improve planet conditions anyway in this update

[Deshara]

"Nanoforges: add Pollution when installed; becomes permanent after three months"

Should be Heavy industry, not Nanoforges. If we are insisting on adding pollution. This is assuming Nanoforges are infact using Nanolithing, which one would think would be clean instead of the un-upgraded lower tech version of it that is Heavy industry.

Why is rare super tech producing pollution when low tech is clean? I don't agree with everything changed but this one thing feels counter intuitive to me.

Functionally/mechanics wise, I think penalizing baseline Heavy Industry would be a bit harsh. Though really you'd most often be using both at the same time so...

In-fiction wise, I think this is another case of "you can have a reasonable explanation for whichever way the mechanics shake out". So, for example here - and IIRC this is referenced in the item descriptions? not 100% sure offhand - what a Nanoforge does is let the industry be built out at scale. It's not that all of the production is performed using nanites, but rather the incredible scaling up of the production capacity, as well as replacing key parts that wear out, and so on. That scaled-up production - as evidenced by the Pollution condition popping up - is not clean.

(Also, the argument that nanite-based production would be clean... it could easily go either way, depending on which direction one waves their hands in.)

one of the defining features of heavy industry is that it has dedicated infrastructure built for it, meaning that if the infrastructure being built for heavy industry (electric freight rails running off wind/solar power connecting the factories, for example) is cleaner than whatever is being used to replace that lack of infrastructure in light industry (fossil fuel trucking & rocket fuel powered shuttles between factories), meaning that on a 1:1 scale heavy industry is more eco friendly. The reason that heavy industry IRL produces more pollution is just because, as Alex points out, if you do substantially more of it it'll produce more pollution, not because it produces more pollution but because of how much of it you're doing.
Personally I love Alex's handwave for nanoforges inflicting planet-changing pollution. IMO it isn't that you have a nanoforge creating products instead of factories, its that you have a nanoforge building factories, which allows you to blanket a planet with autonomous factories to a degree that isnt possible otherwise

[SonnaBanana]

In that case, shouldn't Heavy Industry without nanoforges cause pollution if it exceeds a certain planet size?

[Albreo]

Is +25% hazard rating really that gamebreaking? As a player who doesn't cherry pick worlds to settle when I did bother touching colonization, I can't really tell if is or not. I want to say its really not that big of a problem, especially when there will be content to improve planet conditions anyway in this update

25% more hazard really hit pop growth hard in the long run. Hazard rating is one of the decisive factors whether you can have a planet that can churn out 200k+ per month or not by the end game. But to consider if it's game breaking or not, I don't think it is. Just a little less money from 500k - 1m average monthly income.

As for the corrupted nano forge, it is so useless even without pollution. I kept 20 of it as a paperweight every gameplay.

[Golde]

I do not like this change either. Corrupt nanoforges are already useless as they are, this just makes them 10 folds worse.

It would be a lot more interesting if we were to bring the production bonus of the corrupted nanoforge in line, if not almost in line with the pristine nanoforge, at the expense of causing pollution; whereas the pristine, does not.

HOWEVER, none of us has yet to consider the possibility that Alex already has something in the unspecified list of applicable domain appliances to negate the pollution caused by nanoforges if found and installed.

Phone keyboard is ***

[Omega_Pi_X]

Personally, I feel like the proposed Industry/Nanoforge changes are exactly what the doctor ordered, especially with how there are going to be new, per-industry specialised items that boost their respective outputs. Thanks to the +pollution upon running a Nanoforge, there's now a slight push towards having either a planet with the basic Heavy Industry with other industries along it, or a planet with only Heavy Industry with a 'Forge. There's still some leeway based on your needs, plus the reworked Growth Incentive/Hazard Pay mechanic, which all leads into a sense of choosing a 'style' for your colonies - or, in other words, a specialisation.

Hey, wait a second, aren't specialisations (alongside the additional content, of course) the point of this update? The contacts mechanic will allow players to influence the number and type of contracts they're offered, the new phase freighter/tanker will allow for more use of the phase-focused skill over the shield-focus one, the new hullmods for civilian ships will encourage more use of those, alongside the changes to carrier and frigate skills. This Pollution mechanic is, in my mind at least, the logical step for colonies to meet the theme of this update, and honestly, I want all of the new Industry Boosters to bring their own long-term hazards to further encourage colony specialisation.

[Locklave]

Functionally/mechanics wise, I think penalizing baseline Heavy Industry would be a bit harsh. Though really you'd most often be using both at the same time so...

In-fiction wise, I think this is another case of "you can have a reasonable explanation for whichever way the mechanics shake out". So, for example here - and IIRC this is referenced in the item descriptions? not 100% sure offhand - what a Nanoforge does is let the industry be built out at scale. It's not that all of the production is performed using nanites, but rather the incredible scaling up of the production capacity, as well as replacing key parts that wear out, and so on. That scaled-up production - as evidenced by the Pollution condition popping up - is not clean.

(Also, the argument that nanite-based production would be clean... it could easily go either way, depending on which direction one waves their hands in.)

If it's for a balance reason I get it. But this feels really wrong to me.

Dominion tech is the best tech, literally everything in the game supports that. Now Dominion built tech destroys the environment on a valuable planet. More productive using the same raw materials. Zero increase to materials used, but more output. I can't understand that to mean anything but less waste which is pollution.

Nanoforge could prevent the pollution debuff and that's more in line with what I'd personally expect from Domain era super tech. Again baring balance, which needs to come before immersion.

[AcaMetis]

Do Nanoforges cause pollution on every planet they're installed on, or only ones that have the Habitable condition? Or at least some combination of conditions where adding pollution condition makes sense. For example I don't think a Toxic planet with an Inimical Biosphere would really notice the difference.

[SCC]

All tech is dominion tech, besides Scarab and probably Harbinger.
Nanoforge causing pollution change means mostly that heavy industry should go to the lowest hazard uninhabitable planet in the system, not the lowest hazard planet. Considering I don't colonise just a single planet in any system, this might affect me less than the change suggests.

[IonDragonX]

Nanoforge causing pollution change means mostly that heavy industry should go to the lowest hazard uninhabitable planet in the system, not the lowest hazard planet.

Logically, a barren, no atmosphere world could not gain pollution as a negative modifier... and probably could never gain decivilized either.

[Alex]

Hey, wait a second, aren't specialisations (alongside the additional content, of course) the point of this update? The contacts mechanic will allow players to influence the number and type of contracts they're offered, the new phase freighter/tanker will allow for more use of the phase-focused skill over the shield-focus one, the new hullmods for civilian ships will encourage more use of those, alongside the changes to carrier and frigate skills. This Pollution mechanic is, in my mind at least, the logical step for colonies to meet the theme of this update, and honestly, I want all of the new Industry Boosters to bring their own long-term hazards to further encourage colony specialisation.

Maybe not the "point", but it's definitely a strong theme! And, yeah, Pollution is definitely there in alignment with said theme.

Do Nanoforges cause pollution on every planet they're installed on, or only ones that have the Habitable condition? Or at least some combination of conditions where adding pollution condition makes sense. For example I don't think a Toxic planet with an Inimical Biosphere would really notice the difference.

Just habitable - this came up earlier in the thread and it made sense to make it so (number one).

If it's for a balance reason I get it. But this feels really wrong to me.

Dominion tech is the best tech, literally everything in the game supports that. Now Dominion built tech destroys the environment on a valuable planet. More productive using the same raw materials. Zero increase to materials used, but more output. I can't understand that to mean anything but less waste which is pollution.

Nanoforge could prevent the pollution debuff and that's more in line with what I'd personally expect from Domain era super tech. Again baring balance, which needs to come before immersion.

You mean "Domain", yeah?

"More productive using the same raw materials" is also a gameplay thing! And, besides, since materials used is on a logarithmic scale, the raw materials used could in fact go up several times over and still be represented by the same number. Part of the system being so abstracted is that it's a lot more flexible as far as things "making sense"; nothing there is too exact.

Logically, a barren, no atmosphere world could not gain pollution as a negative modifier... and probably could never gain decivilized either.

1) Radiation, toxic micro-dust getting *inside* habitats, etc
2) A few survivors keeping ancient life-support systems going by cannibalizing all the other systems (though, in-game, deciv on a non-habitable world IS more rare - but not impossible, precisely because I want to allow for this possibility)

Your imagination is the limit

[SCC]

Every planet receives deadly amount of radiation from space, Earth atmosphere just so happens to reflect most of that. Toxic micro dust is probably what any given planet's entire surface is. Living on a non-habitable planet isn't much different from living in space, you just get some annoying gravity.
Anyway, I already assumed (and have forgotten to mention it in the previous post) that only habitable planets can get "polluted" condition, since there's not much difference whether outside is deadly or super deadly today on other planets.

[IonDragonX]

Logically, a barren, no atmosphere world could not gain pollution as a negative modifier... and probably could never gain decivilized either.

1) Radiation, toxic micro-dust getting *inside* habitats, etc
2) A few survivors keeping ancient life-support systems going by cannibalizing all the other systems (though, in-game, deciv on a non-habitable world IS more rare - but not impossible, precisely because I want to allow for this possibility)

Your imagination is the limit

"IonDragonX was the Imposter" and no because my imagination already has his playable copy of v0.95

[Locklave]

So Nanoforges will be basically restricted from being on a habitable world realistically since the penalty only exists on them.

Okay.

[Zelnik]

So Nanoforges will be basically restricted from being on a habitable world realistically since the penalty only exists on them.

Okay.

I mean... That does make sense. You wouldn't want your main refinery, factory and assembly line to be on a world that has more value for population habitation. No one complains about smog if the normal atmosphere is sulfur dioxide with regular sulfuric acid rain storms.