Some thoughts on storage overhaul proposals:
Why I'm not in favor of no_stack proposals: This removes almost all of the current nuance to storage utility decisions, and reduces it down to a few simple options. As much as we think people are using too much storage currently, when people share their builds I actually see a lot of build variety between speed, propulsion slots, storage slots, and inventory capacity. With no_stack we will be limited to only a few options with little flexibility. With no_stack you lose the ability to add storage temporarily in cases where you might want a few additional inventory slots at the cost of equipping armor or such, for maybe half a floor until it is no longer needed. With limited inventory you lose some ability to make a planned future transition, perhaps by carrying some alternate propulsion until the time is right. And as already mentioned, the no_stack proposal removes the balance between utility slots spent on storage vs utilities (which is something that doesn't only apply to storage, all of the utilities you find are always competing for your slots).
For any proposals that increase mass or decrease inventory capacity, keep in mind that most players seem to use multiple storage units, so any changes will have a cumulative impact. Small changes will be multiplied by two or three on most builds. Doubling storage mass feels a bit too far to me. A 64 mass hcp storage unit for +8 inventory slots seems like something people should never use. If we want to increase storage mass I'd start at 25-50% max, depending on how harshly we want to penalize it. For sml/med/lrg/hcp storage units, this yields values of 5/10/20/40 or 6/12/24/48 mass at 25% and 50% respectively.
If you don't double the masses, I'm not sure combat even notices.
I personally already feel pressure from current storage masses and they influence my decisions. I currently don't like running hcp storage on legs. I was playing a wheel build yesterday and was using lrg instead of hcp because it represented a worthwhile increase in speed. Not everyone plays extremely slow high-storage builds, and doing so comes with downsides.
One of the issues causing this storage perception is how it factors into the treads meta, where you effectively double your mass for a relatively small decrease in speed. Consider this: If you have two pairs of hvy. treads equipped for 140 total support (a very common treads build), and you go overweight by some amount, let's say 150/140 -- you now have 130 additional support to use at no cost. Of course you'll want to upgrade all of your lrg storage to hcp. The actual mass/support numbers here aren't important, the fact is that once you get to the point where you need to go overweight or are comfortable with it, you suddenly gain *a lot* of additional support to spend. Other propulsion types feel changes in mass at much more gradual intervals and often at steeper penalties. This is why I'd like to see how an increased treads overweight penalty would impact gameplay. Other propulsion types already have a lot more to consider when changing mass (and storage), but when treads hit OX1 there is suddenly a wealth of additional support to fill.
With this in mind, the proposal to make overweight bonuses apply at smaller intervals is an interesting one (although perhaps a complicated one). I'm starting to like more and more the idea of further incentives to staying at Ox0, through changes like the increased overweight penalties on treads and the Ox0 leg perks that have been discussed. Overweight penalties on legs may also need a look. Maybe even increase support values of some prop but also increasing overweight penalties to achieve this. Wheels' niche could remain being a prop with small overweight penalty. Flight and hover are already heavily penalized for being overweight, with large speed penalties, loss of evasion bonuses, and -- in flight's case -- the loss of the hopping special ability.
At a glance, underweight bonuses feel a bit awkward to me, assuming they are consistent with how current overweight level is tracked. Currently while underweight you gain speed, trap avoidance, and stasis resistance. To gain additional underweight bonuses you'd have to evolve more prop slots compared to current builds. And wheels will never be underweight if you are playing seriously. This might also behave oddly at extremely low mass, or on core hover. I guess I'm open to ideas but it doesn't seem needed -- we can't even get most people to stay at Ox0 currently
By the way, I find wheels to be most effective when you use them in the ~120-150 speed range. You don't have to run them at 250+ speed and 300 mass; and being massively overweight is not their niche, it's just one thing they happen to be capable of.
And a final closing thought based on some of the storage and hacking propsoals I've seen on here and on discord: I don't know how others feel about this, but I think Cogmind -- overall -- is for the most part reasonably balanced and quite fun. I'd be very careful about making any large overhauls to fundamental parts of the gameplay experience.
The shroud of balance has fallen... Begun, the nerf wars, have.
