Life Support 3: Intuitive, Logical Resources

Garry's Mod general
#1

I’ve read (and experienced) many complaints from SB2 users about overcomplication and general disorganization of the Life Support 3 systems. Resources exist with no purpose other than to drain off into space to make room for oxygen (Nitrogen, I’m looking at YOU).

Meanwhile, self-sufficiency of ships and offworld bases goes right out the window, as the only ways to create oxygen involve shipping resources across space. While some may argue this is good for cooperation in roleplay, which is true to a point, I find that it can be a bit of a hassle when all you want to do is build your base. A solution to this up until now has been Gas Systems 2, which introduces MORE resources which can be converted directly into needed resources. I feel that if you need to have a separate mod to overcome the original’s shortcomings, perhaps it’s time to re-think the systems of the original.

And that’s what I’ve done here. I’ve tried my best to make sure resources and their uses make sense and are used in a logical way. I believe that this modification will provide the simplification many SB2 users are looking for, while preserving (and perhaps enhancing) the depth that SB3 enthusiasts enjoy.

Oxygen collection

Air Compressor -unchanged
HydrOx Recombiner -converts hydrogen to oxygen
NitrOx Recombiner -converts nitrogen to oxygen
Water Splitter -splits water into hydrogen and oxygen

Hydrogen collection

Hydrogen Compressor -unchanged
Hydrogen Ramscoop -can now be used in space
Water Splitter -splits water into hydrogen and oxygen

Nitrogen collection

Nitrogen Compressor -unchanged
Nitrogen Ramscoop -can now be used in space

Water Collection

Water Pump -unchanged
Water Creator - combines hydrogen and oxygen to make water. Formerly the Hydrogen Fuel Cell

Energy Generation

Solar Panels
Wind Turbines
Hydro Generators
Fusion Reactor -now requires hydrogen, heavy water and liquid nitrogen. only outputs energy

Steam and steam using SENTs have been removed (or modified in the case of SENTs). Other tools such as the CO2/CO2 scrubbing SENTs, liquid nitrogen and heavy water creators have mostly been untouched. as I feel that they are adequate at the present time.

These changes are by no means perfect, and there are probably bugs. Please report any bugs pertaining to this modification either here or in a PM.

All credit for the original code goes to the SB3 team.

DOWNLOAD!

http://www.garrysmod.org/img/?t=dll&id=78010

Installation Instructions:

  1. Back up your old LS3 Entities folder
  2. Open your LS3 Entities folder and delete the lua folder
  3. Replace your lua folder with the one in this .zip
  4. Play
#2

Ok. Sounds fine.

#3

I could get this running on our i7 dedicated server.

#4

Looking good so far!

Two suggestions, though:

I’m not sure if that’s very realistic. Space has a lot of Hydrogen just floating around, but Nitrogen is much rarer.

I think this should go back to being a Hydrogen Fuel Cell and output both water and energy, since that’s how real fuel cells work.

#5

I’m not too worried about realism. Since Liquid Nitrogen is required for the reactor, I thought this would still be useful. Perhaps a lower yield would be more adequate?

#6

Errr… So now you can make oxygen out of anything. That seems to be the only significant change…

Honestly, you just made life support so easy, there’s almost no point to it. If you don’t even have to worry about planets for air, you can just sit around in space for eternity. I agree there should be some other way to make oxygen on a planet, but the hydrogen and nitrogen to oxygen converters are just absurd.

#7

I don’t play spacebuild purely to spend my time gathering resources. I wanted to have a system where I could get my resource network up and running and then get on with building my base or ship.

#8

That’s Spacebuild 2 for you :S

#9

Ehh…no. Spacebuild 2 was “abuse the ‘I can compress more air from my climate reg than I put into it’ glitch”.
In combination with coolant compressors and solar panels (or fusion gens if you felt safe with them).

[editline]07:51PM[/editline]

And In all honestly, I don’t get the point of this. It like saying “There’s generators for resources I don’t use so I removed them” just because it there doesn’t mean you have to use it. And in all honesty, when I released the hydrogen ramscoop, people wanted the nitrogen one as well, even though it makes no sense. Even hydrogen is sparse in space, that’s why it’s “space”. And converting anything aside form water into oxygen is absolute bollocks. And why NOT keep the hydrogen fuel cell. You give it H and O, it gives you water and energy. It’s just makes no sense it all. Just go and get yourself the black hole cache if you one dumb-shit simple.

[editline]07:54PM[/editline]

Oh, and normally addon creators appreciate it if you’d at least ask when you decide to blatantly copy code and do nothing more than change values for most of it, even if you do give credit, thank you very much. (Please note that I’m not the whole dev team, just a small part of it)

#10

I’ve never tried, but I believe it is possible to disable LS altogether in CAF. Or you could just get a blackhole cache (The SVN one might not work anymore, haven’t tried it, but it should be a simple edit).

#11

It is indeed possible. You just open the menu and click “disable” and viola! No more need for resources to live.

#12

I’m not saying I don’t like the life support aspect of SB3, I just don’t want it to be all-consuming

#13

But Spacebuild is all about gathering resources then filling up your ship with it, landing on another planet and develope a base or a home there. By making LS easier or more “fun” to play with is like turning the mod from “normal” to “novice” difficulty. What’s the point?

#14

It does take waaay too much time to gather up enough resources, in my opinion. I need to spend so much time getting energy, oxygen, and such in ways that don’t get me booted for using the atmosphere that I can never even get my ship anywhere. Of course, I also have bad luck with server crashes… I guess I’d like to see a balance between Bynari’s modifications and the current setup.

#15

Does this make Gmod boot slower? It sounds cool but My PC is crap and takes a while to load as is.

#16

I don’t see why it would. It only really modifies the input/output of existing SENTs and removes a few others

#17

Uh, it also adds a ton of SENTs that have to be initialized.

#18

By a ton, you mean…two?

#19

The page on garrysmod.org looks like more than 2 SENTs to me.

Also, like others have said, this basically makes it too easy to make resources.

[editline]02:26PM[/editline]

In clarification: The addon, edited or not, adds a lot of entities that have to be initialized.

#20

What the fuck are you talking about? He added two entities.