All that technical gibber gabber offends the Beorn. All the Beorn wants to know is, will the Beorn be able to order new station modules mid game, or will the Beorn have to pity da foo?
Oh, mid-game loading?
Well, it would be overpowered if unlimited, as the new turf overwrites the old although items remain. This could be fixed by forcing it to only spawn on space or empty plating, and after, replace it all with a solid matter materializing animation for 30 seconds or so, before loading the actual thing.
Pipes, however, are the issue.
Everything else I could probably get working, but pipes are a messy subject that I have not touched. Ever.
So, I could set up a system to spawn in station modules without atmospherics, but pipes wouldn't work without research, and it should be a very rare thing to spawn a module.
However, they would be completely possible, maybe even easy. Ones I would reccomend would be a simple + hallway, and a square room. Additionally, there is the possibility of an emergency station that you would activate, and if you are in a sufficiently large empty area, the space turf you are on would turn to plating, the square around you would turn into the semi-solid materializing turf, and 60 seconds or so later you would be standing in the middle of a crude space platform. Additional ideas include a rapid-deployment solar panel set, in the shape of
+++|+++
+++|+++
++CCC++
==CCC==
++CCC++
+++|+++
+++|+++
With + as a panel, = and | a widow-walkway, and C the control room, with it's own SMES and computer.
But first, the question is is it balanced, and is it worthwhile? It is completely possible, but...
Well, it's a feature that the goons don't have, so it would negate almost every argument for releasing the code publicly, and it may have bugs, it would be so overpowered that only one or two should exist at all...
Many, many, posts...
Well, if you want structured development, the first thing to do is figure out where we want to go.
So, YOU, the NON-CODER must HELP by discussing what should be done. You can't just say "focus your efforts" and then slip back into the shadows and lurk in this topic, only resurfacing to complain about the lack of structured development...
Also, some easy method of synchronizing the code would be nice. I have only heard of it, but source control? Something where edits can be optionally included or excluded so that you don't accidentally end up debugging someone else's code or anything...
Part of the problem is that public servers attract the people who either play casually, or are banned from Data's/the Goonstation servers. It's generally best when only B12 people are aware of the server, but then there's at most half a dozen people playing.
That can be fixed by simply providing a consistant server. In time, it will diverge further, and start gaining good features and attract people for those features, but just by consistantly providing an alternative server, people will play, and some might enjoy it enough to pick ours over others.