So I understand that Rubia is designed to have its own challenges and limitations, but i dont really see how this one helps in the long run, specifically after cargo pods are allowed.

For context, i am way in over my head with far too many planet mods lol. Telelogistics is absolutely overpowered, but I realised with the insane scale of the playthrough ahead of me that i honestly needed a couple things to be "easier". I've been limiting their use mostly to science, setting up science to teleport back to Nauvis in bulk, while most unique buildings, belts etc are still shipped around by platform as the smaller quantities make teleporting less convenient.

Enter Rubia - i just unlocked project Iron Man, with the intention to rebuild my base at a larger scale, and have discovered that telelogistics is completely barred from the surface. While I absolutely understand not wanting to let players just import everything at the start - something Cerys shares is the initial ban on cargo pods, ensuring the intended playstyle is maintained - once rockets are launched and cargo pods allowed, why prevent them? The 'puzzle' has been overcome and the player can upgrade and continue onward.

Its obviously not the end of the world, but it feels like an unecessary block at the end of it all. I'll be launching plenty rockets for other resources and also of course to get myself off the planet, so its not like using them is taking away from needing proper rocket automation.

What you described is only one issue. While that issue could be resolved with more advanced logic, it would be substantially more complicated than you are thinking, because you cannot change the surface restrictions of an item at runtime. What you suggest would actually require coding a whole custom system just for this one mod.

The real major issue is that telogisitcs allows leftward item teleportation, and allowing that breaks the whole premise of a planet where leftward item movement is almost entirely banned.

I had a feeling it wouldnt be something that could be easily resolved, but felt I wanted to bring it up anyway. I personally don't think allowing things like that in the endgame would break things that much - if someone really wanted to they could just drop down all the resources they would teleport in anyway to the cargo landing bay - however its not my mod and im not gonna whine about it.

I'll likely dig into the files and make a tweak on my end just for my personal use case to allow them. Thanks for the detailed response, I do absolutely understand the reasoning behind it - and I do want to say that Rubia is a great planet! I'm looking forward to discovering what strange hidden techs there are still to be revealed.

if someone really wanted to they could just drop down all the resources they would teleport in anyway to the cargo landing bay

fyi Kovarex desgined rocket logistics to intentionally make it impossible to automate of rocket-based teleportation within a planet. You’d need to do it manually, and iirc manual item teleportation mods are already allowed on Rubia (if they can be limitted to before operation Iron Man).

Even after beating Rubia, leftward teleportation breaks Rubia’s postgame challenge of biofusion science.

Oh I was referring to dropping stuff down from other planets - like how Aquilo is supplied like 90% from other planets for any construction - not teleporting from one location on the planet to the other. However, I won't press the issue - I get the reasons for it, i just wanna port science home lol.