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Original post by Icefox This would be a fun tool in an RTS-type game ... your fabber-bots could wander around and squirt buildings into existance wherever you wanted, as long as you had the energy and metal to do so.

Actually, this is EXACTLY how Total Annihilation worked. Construction bots stood in one place spraying things into existence.

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In an RPG-ish game... hmm. It still depends heavily on resources; you could simply have it so that you don't use it to build a wall around each enemy because that would cost too much.

How about this: I see a cloud forming a lattice (the glowing outline of the shape); then the shape begins to fill in. What if there's a very simple rule that if the object you're building takes damage, the whole structure is destabelized? So you not only have to get the right stuff to build, you have to guard it.

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You could simply restrict access to how large and how fast you could make things

Agreed. Yes, the handheld units wouldn't even have the processing power to accomodate building-sized templates, so that should be an easy and natural restriction. If you're building buildings, you've got at least a tank-sized constructor and a half-dozen resource-goop trucks connecting to it.

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"Hey, I could use my fabber-gun to build a bridge across this chasm, but it would use 10 units of Fuel Goop and I only have 20 left, and I'm only half way through the dungeon; maybe I should look around for another way."

Okay, if you're given something like this, do you ever think the player should be allowed to paint themselves into a corner with it? That is, they cross a chasm with it, the bridge gets destroyed somehow, and now they're out of resources for it and stuck on the other side. (You can't die in this design, so at worst it would result in some loss scenario where you lose time or resources you care about.)

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1) Either everyone has fabbers and can use them to build more fabbers, or they're heavily restricted by some government/corperation/something else. If you have such a powerful tool, there's going to be people who don't want everyone to have them.

I think the fab technology isn't restricted, but the building plans technology is heavily regulated & licensed. So you either have illegal duplication, open-source duplication, or per-creation fee duplication.

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2) Physical resources would cease to be as much of a concern, except for certain rare and important things. You could build a nuclear reactor in your back yard, but you still can't fuel it without uranium.

Good point. It might be interesting to bring some of the "special resources for unit/building X" philosophy of RTS games into an RPG.

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3) Building things like this would probably take massive amounts of energy, which means massive amounts of infrastructure. Someone has to control that infrastructure. And in the chaotic world you seem to be thinking of, finding enough energy for large fabbers would be hard to do.

Exactly as I see it. Either you're in civilization where they have loads of power (fusion), but strong laws, or you're in either the wasteland or the frontier, which is always hurting for power/resources/etc.

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"Grey goo" may be another problem in the world: nano-disassemblers, that take everything apart and build more nano-disassemblers. Now, this is either a problem that can be solved trivially by nano-disassembler-disassemblers, or a major scourge that threatens humanity as a whole. It might be interesting to have battles fought with such tools, and to counter them you need to have the correct templates and combinations for your fabber...

Yes! What if the dangerous parts of the world were plagued by flying black storms of "deconstructors" that looked like this:


or this:


These would be post-war nanite clouds originally used by the US & China, now out of control.

Since the danger of rouge nanotech should be a pretty big concern in the futuristic would, wouldn't the companies making the Construction Cannon try to limit the danger of their nanobots?

For example, suppose they make Constructor nanites so they can't break down local material to use in construction(thus eliminating the danger of them going grey-goo on everyone). So whatever material that would be used in building the structure would have to be specialy treated in order for the nanites to use it.

Introducing compressed-matter.

Raw material is gathered from local mines and garbage dumps to safely controlled facilities where it is broken down by dissasembler nanites and then reduced into tiny pellets through futuristic shrinking technology. The compressed matter can then be loaded into the Construction Cannon and sprayed along with the nanites to wherever you need it. The nanites then can unshrink the matter and use it to build the structure.

Also the matter has varying degrees of purity, the cheap stuff is only suitable for building crude structures while the pellets of pure silicon, gold, titanium, plastic, etc... can be used to build robots or electronics.

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This puts a few bearable limitations on the construction cannon:
1. The player has to buy all the material they use so they need to use their resources wisely.
2. The colony might not have the facilities to produce high-quality material to build all the robots or machinery the player wants at first.
3. There could be a limitation to how much material they can carry around at once.


Ways it can affect gameplay

1. Since the local material-refinery is responsible for producing most of the players "building ammo" they have to take an interest in its development. Make sure they have the facilities to produce enough material or get the equipment to produce high-quality material.

2. Since refineries are the safe way to aquire material, you could have bands of leechers who create hacked versions of the Construction Cannon along with Leecher Cannons. They either try stealing valuable material from structures, or produce structures using nanites that use local resources (which colonists fear might go rouge and businesses dislike because that means they don't get money).

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Original post by Wavinator How about this: I see a cloud forming a lattice (the glowing outline of the shape); then the shape begins to fill in. What if there's a very simple rule that if the object you're building takes damage, the whole structure is destabelized? So you not only have to get the right stuff to build, you have to guard it.

Hmm, that was how it worked in TA... buildings were a lot easier to damage while they were being built, and you could even shoot into factories to blow away whatever unit is being constructed before it was done.
However, in an RPG-ish game, this would seriously limit the fabber's application during battle. You're in trouble, you fab up a wall to hide behind... it takes a hit and disintegrates, wasting resources. I think it would require a balance; simple items like walls would probably be a lot more durable while being built than complex ones like, say, handguns. So yes, that sounds like a good idea, but make sure it doesn't gimp the battle-usefulness of the fabber in general. It should be a matter of "This could work if I plan it right" rather than "Gah, I can't do anything fun 'cause they keep destroying my stuff!"

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Quote: "Hey, I could use my fabber-gun to build a bridge across this chasm, but it would use 10 units of Fuel Goop and I only have 20 left, and I'm only half way through the dungeon; maybe I should look around for another way." Okay, if you're given something like this, do you ever think the player should be allowed to paint themselves into a corner with it? That is, they cross a chasm with it, the bridge gets destroyed somehow, and now they're out of resources for it and stuck on the other side. (You can't die in this design, so at worst it would result in some loss scenario where you lose time or resources you care about.)

Of course! My idea was that the bridge isn't NECESSARY, but it's CONVENIENT. If the bridge gets destroyed, the player thinks "Oh smeg, now I have to go around anyway... maybe I should have built a stronger bridge, or something to defend it". Now, if a player digs a hole that's deliberately impossible for her to get out of, that's their problem, but every non-pathological problem should have some way of getting out of it.

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Quote: 1) Either everyone has fabbers and can use them to build more fabbers, or they're heavily restricted by some government/corperation/something else. If you have such a powerful tool, there's going to be people who don't want everyone to have them. I think the fab technology isn't restricted, but the building plans technology is heavily regulated & licensed. So you either have illegal duplication, open-source duplication, or per-creation fee duplication.

And, of course, the attendant quality-control issues in knockoffs, and the possibility of the regulators rigging their plan files not to work with non-licensed fabbers, and so on...

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Quote: "Grey goo" may be another problem in the world: nano-disassemblers, that take everything apart and build more nano-disassemblers. Now, this is either a problem that can be solved trivially by nano-disassembler-disassemblers, or a major scourge that threatens humanity as a whole. It might be interesting to have battles fought with such tools, and to counter them you need to have the correct templates and combinations for your fabber... Yes! What if the dangerous parts of the world were plagued by flying black storms of "deconstructors" that looked like this: (images)

Ooo, pretty. That would be a great plot-tool to set all sorts of things in motion; evacuations, wars, treaties, trade-routes, and discoveries of ancient technology could all be catalyzed by one of these sweeping through. And one might end up having certain natural borders like oceans and mountains... Looking at a map of wind currents might be interesting. Of course, if nanites take a lot of power, you'd have to have some way for these things to be powered too. Old automatic military satellites? That would be another fun plot-toy to play with...

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Original post by The Shadow Nose Since the danger of rouge nanotech should be a pretty big concern in the futuristic would, wouldn't the companies making the Construction Cannon try to limit the danger of their nanobots? For example, suppose they make Constructor nanites so they can't break down local material to use in construction(thus eliminating the danger of them going grey-goo on everyone). So whatever material that would be used in building the structure would have to be specialy treated in order for the nanites to use it.

I think you got it. Clouds of rogue nano would pretty much destroy any planet very quickly, they wouldn't just roam the planet looking for something to eat -- they would literally eat the planet. Hey, that's cool: a planet completely disassembled by nanites, so now it's a huuuge trap for travellers! Like a black hole.

So this restriction makes sure this doesn't happen too often. However, there are still clouds of rogue nanites: completely uncontrollable ones, that devour entire planets (for background story only, they wouldn't actually "exist" as nano in the game), and rogue nano that still obeys the rule of only messing with compressed matter -- so instead of destroying a settlement, they would destroy its compressed matter stockpiles! It's still a serious matter to suddenly be out of resources.

I also thought about another restriction, nano could be active only around a field generated by special machinery, so it only works around a specific area. Turn off the field generator and the nano is deactivated. Could be a good plot device!

Though in the case of Compressed Matter, it wouldn't just be running out of resources. Imagine going to the store and buying ten tons of steel that had been reduced into a portable canister that you can carry confortably in your pants pocket. Then a swarm of rouge nanites come and start dissasembling it.

Now, while the nanites can't technically hurt you, they are messing with the Compressed Matter and if they decide to de-compress it then the steel change from being a convenient hand-held canister to ten tons of steel ingots... which really isn't something you want to carry around in your pants pocket :P.


Of course, it that was a problem then the company that sells Compressed Matter could design their canisters so that rouge nanites can't get inside of them. The Canister would have to be inside a Construction Cannon or a similar device before the contents can get out.

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Also, when an object is being constructed and somebody attacks it... wouldn't the nanites try repairing the damage since they are already building it? So when an enemy destroys an object that's being built, the nanites will either keep trying to build it (if it's destroyed completly) or they will try to repair it. They will keep trying to do so until they run out of energy.

So if you wanted to make a wall... the Cannon could determine how much material the wall would use and then how much time it would take to build it in a best case scenario, the Cannon gives the nanites enough energy to last TWICE as long and sends them to do the job.

Instantly, the nanites build an incomplete wall with a small percentage of the complete walls hit points. As they build it, the wall gets more HP until it's complete. If somebody destroys it before then, the nanites will keep start over with whatever material they have left and if they run out of material (and they can use local materials) they cannabalise the broken remains of the destroyed wall. They only stop if the wall is complete or they run out of energy (read time).

So, with this system. When you order the nanites to build something, you're going to get something. It could be what you want (if the nanites can finish it in the amount of time) it could be an incomplete object (if the enemy can stall the nanites long enough) or it could be a pile of rubble (if the enemy stands there all day blasting the structure faster than the nanites can build it).

I think this would work good with walls because even a semi-complete wall is better than nothing... but if you get an incomplete robot or weapon then you'd have to give it another dose of nanites too complete it before you could get it to do anything usefull.

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Original post by Jotaf [...]rogue nano that still obeys the rule of only messing with compressed matter -- so instead of destroying a settlement, they would destroy its compressed matter stockpiles! [...]

Brilliant. What if nano could only consume objects made of compressed matter? You land on a planet with minimal tech readings, nano dissolves your landing craft, your guns, and all your comms gear, and you're taken hostage by spear wielding natives, who may or may not be distant descendants of a colony that was wiped out with nano. Can anyone say un-neutron bomb?

Edit: Can anyone say thread hijack? Sorry Wavinator.

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Original post by The Shadow Nose Introducing compressed-matter.

Compressed matter?!?! o_O Wait a second, weren't you warning me away from magical nanotech, or was that someone else? [grin]

It's a cool idea, but I think it kills a bit of the science in science fiction. Having enough matter to build a bridge in your back pocket would surely violate conservation of mass, unless you're dragging around several thousand tons.

I do like the idea of landfills and mines being raided by nano, though, as well as having varying degrees of resource purity. But if you kept the limit closer to realistic physics, it would make things like power armor, aircraft and ATVs all the more important as resource transports.

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This puts a few bearable limitations on the construction cannon: 1. The player has to buy all the material they use so they need to use their resources wisely. 2. The colony might not have the facilities to produce high-quality material to build all the robots or machinery the player wants at first. 3. There could be a limitation to how much material they can carry around at once.

Do you think this can be achieved with normal blocks of matter that you have to carry around? You would basically have a vehicle convoy on normal land, with the need to protect resource carriers. Or you'd have a shuttle or aircraft dropping things in.

The only problem I see is not having enough access to material when you're in some dungeon base or whatever. Then there might be lots of back & forth to your ATV or vehicle outside.

The convoy MIGHT be applicable to robot porters if the indoor pathing and ordering problems can be solved, though. But I've really only seen one game where you accrued a bunch of allies from a 3rd / 1st person perspective, and it was cumbersome to manage.

Maybe this could be fudged like automatic travel. If there are no enemies / obstacles between you and your vehicle, then you're simply said to automatically be connected to the inventory of your vehicles? It's sort of montage handwaving like we see in the movies.

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1. Since the local material-refinery is responsible for producing most of the players "building ammo" they have to take an interest in its development. Make sure they have the facilities to produce enough material or get the equipment to produce high-quality material.

Again, using normal matter, you could do this, and it would be very cool. In fact, you could be responsible for spawning recycling centers and whatnot near the ruins of cities. Maybe automated scavengers build up stuff while you're away.

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2. Since refineries are the safe way to aquire material, you could have bands of leechers who create hacked versions of the Construction Cannon along with Leecher Cannons.

Hahaha! Good one! I didn't even think of the reverse. I like it.

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Original post by Icefox However, in an RPG-ish game, this would seriously limit the fabber's application during battle. You're in trouble, you fab up a wall to hide behind... it takes a hit and disintegrates, wasting resources.

I seriously need to think of how this should affect combat, but wouldn't your example place more emphasis on pre-battle planning? For instance, you spawn a bunker before going over the hill.

This, OTOH, could lead to wasted resources... so I'm not really sure.

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I think it would require a balance; simple items like walls would probably be a lot more durable while being built than complex ones like, say, handguns. So yes, that sounds like a good idea, but make sure it doesn't gimp the battle-usefulness of the fabber in general. It should be a matter of "This could work if I plan it right" rather than "Gah, I can't do anything fun 'cause they keep destroying my stuff!"

The wall issue is especially tricky because I've seen games ruined by having "autoblocking" defenses. Either the enemy has some huge kite shield-like defense, or you do, and so a lot of the game then turns on splash damage and timing.

You also don't want to get into a pathfinding/AI nightmare. It might be better to balance the CC toward building, rather than fighting (with some trap laying as an inevitable result). So it might be best to intentially gimpit for battle.

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Of course! My idea was that the bridge isn't NECESSARY, but it's CONVENIENT. If the bridge gets destroyed, the player thinks "Oh smeg, now I have to go around anyway... maybe I should have built a stronger bridge, or something to defend it". Now, if a player digs a hole that's deliberately impossible for her to get out of, that's their problem, but every non-pathological problem should have some way of getting out of it.

I meant to be more specific about this: Do you think that there should ever be a solution which is completely equipment dependent? Or do you think that there should always be a way to cross a chasm or whatever using the most basic, default outfitting that you have? (i.e., practically naked)

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Quote: Yes! What if the dangerous parts of the world were plagued by flying black storms of "deconstructors" that looked like this: (images) Ooo, pretty. That would be a great plot-tool to set all sorts of things in motion; evacuations, wars, treaties, trade-routes, and discoveries of ancient technology could all be catalyzed by one of these sweeping through. And one might end up having certain natural borders like oceans and mountains... Looking at a map of wind currents might be interesting. Of course, if nanites take a lot of power, you'd have to have some way for these things to be powered too. Old automatic military satellites? That would be another fun plot-toy to play with...

I think the bordering by mountains and ocean is just perfect, and the power source could even be solar or thermal, with this stuff settling into the ground at night and taking off in the morning. That way, you have a kind of exploration rhythm in the deconstructor plagued areas. You would explore by night, then try to get back to the safety of your camp or vehicle by day.

Or I could reverse it, making night more ominous. Maybe a stealth feature of deconstructors is that by sundown they start taking the energy that's radiating from the earth as fuel to form their huge storm clouds. So you've got to get out of dodge by nightfall? (It doesn't have to be perfect from a science point of view, just reasonable).

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Original post by Jotaf Clouds of rogue nano would pretty much destroy any planet very quickly, they wouldn't just roam the planet looking for something to eat -- they would literally eat the planet.

Whoa, this gives me a mid-game stage plot idea. However, I've got enough questions to drag this severely off-topic, so I'd better make (another!) new thread.

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Original post by The Shadow Nose Also, when an object is being constructed and somebody attacks it... wouldn't the nanites try repairing the damage since they are already building it? So when an enemy destroys an object that's being built, the nanites will either keep trying to build it (if it's destroyed completly) or they will try to repair it. They will keep trying to do so until they run out of energy.

I think you could make an argument either way, so the balance comes down to whether you want the focus to be on preplanning or RTS style "build while attacking." You could easily say that to build a structure requires construction of several stages of sub-machinery and even monomolecular work lattices which attacks can throw out of wack.

It depends on if RTS style gameplay fits the pacing of an RPG-like game. Unfortunately, I'm not sure, given the genre ghettos we insist on staying in, that it does.

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Instantly, the nanites build an incomplete wall with a small percentage of the complete walls hit points. As they build it, the wall gets more HP until it's complete. If somebody destroys it before then, the nanites will keep start over with whatever material they have left and if they run out of material (and they can use local materials) they cannabalise the broken remains of the destroyed wall. They only stop if the wall is complete or they run out of energy (read time).

Hmmm... you could get into some sort of race condition where an enemy could deplete you just by attacking the wall every once in awhile. That would then foster micromanagement.

I don't mind you recovering the remains, btw. I just think it might be better to force the player to plan ahead and keep this a non-battle tool. (If it were an RTS like TA, though, I'd say otherwise.)