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Your weekly reminder that while the game makes U235 seem extremely rare and something to be conserved the actual amount a reactor uses is minuscule. You get over 30 minutes of power from a single 235. All of those fancy steam banking setups are only for if you really need to scratch that 100% efficient itch. And solar sucks unless you have a major biter problem that you need some breathing room from. I’m now 80 hours into my completely vanilla 1.0 game and gotta admit that the standard biter generation is awful and it’s hard to believe that these were the settings that they decided to balance on. But alas
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Nov 24, 2020 01:21
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Also to repost why Solar sucks so much:M_Gargantua posted:One reactor (inefficient!) makes 40MW, and is equivalent to 952 Panels and 800 Accumulators.
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Nov 24, 2020 01:24
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Solar is more UPS efficient, which matters at megabase scale. Those fluid calculations add up
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Nov 24, 2020 01:24
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Paper Tiger posted:Oh yeah, I could've phrased that more clearly. This would actually be the offshore pump (which doesn't require power), not a separate powered pump regulating flow within pipes. I didn't know until recently that you could hook circuits to offshore pumps, before that I was using fancy pants S-R latches. Apparently offshore pumps could be connected to circuit networks as early as 0.12! Which was only five years ago, haha. I remember doing the whole set up a belt loop and a box with inserters on its own tiny grid that shares a single accumulator thing years ago, and boy I'm glad that a far simpler solution exists.
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Nov 24, 2020 01:43
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Why wouldn't you just use the accumulator to control a power switch? Disconnect steam power from the grid unless accumulator drops low.
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Nov 24, 2020 01:46
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K8.0 posted:Why wouldn't you just use the accumulator to control a power switch? Disconnect steam power from the grid unless accumulator drops low. If you do that, you should use some kind of latch circuit instead of a simple wire, or your steam power will just flicker like crazy until solar comes back
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Nov 24, 2020 02:01
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There's nothing technically wrong with the flickering, for boiler power. It looks weird but it is perfectly efficient.
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Nov 24, 2020 02:27
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I prefer the latch and power switch purely for aesthetics of the system kicking in to fill the accumulators instead of ticking on and off constantly. Also if you do it on the pump and set the trigger to low you could brown out or even black out before it catches up.
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Nov 24, 2020 02:29
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M_Gargantua posted:Also to repost why Solar sucks so much: Being passive gives solar a lot of benefits, no fuel setup, etc. It isn't as cost effective at the start, but when you get lazy and don't want to set up fuel stations, or rail in stuff to outposts it's super handy. Still, could do with a few solar tech upgrades, my only beef is you get them and that's it, solar tech is DONE. NO MORE!
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Nov 24, 2020 03:41
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Fishbus posted:Being passive gives solar a lot of benefits, no fuel setup, etc. It isn't as cost effective at the start, but when you get lazy and don't want to set up fuel stations, or rail in stuff to outposts it's super handy. Yeah, and it's extremely land hungry as you scale up. My current base is 100% solar and I'm up to about 8GW of solar now, and the solar footprint is much larger than all the rest of the factory combined. I'm seriously considering adding in a mod (Factorio Power Redux) to give me the ability to research better solar & accumulators so I can just start upgrading my vast solar fields instead of just paving the entire planet with them, even though that does work just fine.
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Nov 24, 2020 03:58
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The Locator posted:Yeah, and it's extremely land hungry as you scale up. My current base is 100% solar and I'm up to about 8GW of solar now, and the solar footprint is much larger than all the rest of the factory combined. I'm seriously considering adding in a mod (Factorio Power Redux) to give me the ability to research better solar & accumulators so I can just start upgrading my vast solar fields instead of just paving the entire planet with them, even though that does work just fine. Just do nuclear.
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Nov 24, 2020 04:05
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promising carl posted:Just do nuclear. I do nuclear all the time... just doing solar this time... because reasons?
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Nov 24, 2020 04:40
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The Locator posted:I do nuclear all the time... just doing solar this time... because reasons? I respect that. I'm debating if I should just stick to coal in my current game.
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Nov 24, 2020 04:46
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Well, circuit logic is still smarter than I am, but on the flip side, my rail network basically works now instead of everything getting jammed up by bad signaling. Still need to install some double-tracks and some loops, but I've future proofed some of the important bits (like the future uranium train). I've even managed to cut emissions enough to have two separate pollution clouds instead of one giant one, between removing the worst of the steam power & installing a ton of efficiency modules. The next big question remains, how the hell do I wage war across the lake effectively? Tank ain't cutting it, I took it back for round 2 and got stomped into the ground even with piles of gas bombs and defenders. Personal armor can't keep up power-wise to run personal lasers or whatever. Also solar has hit the point where I can basically sustain the new power plant off of existing fuel without new production for long enough to either get more coal/oil or nuclear fuel (not both), which is nice. Just cracked enough accumulators to keep running overnight. I'm actually getting pretty proud of this base, I had to take a couple weeks' break and then come back to it (shortly before I started posting) out of frustration but it's almost completely clicked since. Just the combat to deal with. (Y'all have been really helpful. Thanks.) 
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Nov 24, 2020 05:23
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The Locator posted:I do nuclear all the time... just doing solar this time... because reasons? Solar + Efficiency 1's (or 2's if you're rich) in your mining and low cost machines is a viable green strategy.
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Nov 24, 2020 05:29
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M_Gargantua posted:Solar + Efficiency 1's (or 2's if you're rich) in your mining and low cost machines is a viable green strategy. Lol.. I have biters on death-world settings, my only 'green' strategy is to make sure my defenses have enough green bullets.  I've been really lazy and never set up artillery outposts or even stops. I built a couple huge artillery trains and the stops to load them.. then just never built the defense stops... so the area outside my perimeter defenses is just bugs.. lots and lots of bugs.. Since I've paved a vast portion of the world to install solar, there is pretty much nothing stopping my factory pollution from spreading, so I've got a continuous stream of bugs pouring into the gun-line.
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Nov 24, 2020 06:23
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Fishbus posted:Being passive gives solar a lot of benefits, no fuel setup, etc. It isn't as cost effective at the start, but when you get lazy and don't want to set up fuel stations, or rail in stuff to outposts it's super handy. What are you going to do, upgrade the sun?
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Nov 24, 2020 08:27
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The Locator posted:Yeah, and it's extremely land hungry as you scale up. My current base is 100% solar and I'm up to about 8GW of solar now, and the solar footprint is much larger than all the rest of the factory combined. I'm seriously considering adding in a mod (Factorio Power Redux) to give me the ability to research better solar & accumulators so I can just start upgrading my vast solar fields instead of just paving the entire planet with them, even though that does work just fine. Yeah, pretty much, With some additional solar buildings and batteries it definitely becomes more competitive, I've got accumulator 2s (battery banks) and solar panels 1 2 and 3, giving nice large solar array buildings in the mod.
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Nov 24, 2020 08:30
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GotLag posted:What are you going to do, upgrade the sun? Unblock the sun!
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Nov 24, 2020 08:33
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GotLag posted:What are you going to do, upgrade the sun? By depleting the ozone layer? Yes.
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Nov 24, 2020 08:34
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VostokProgram posted:Solar is more UPS efficient, which matters at megabase scale. Those fluid calculations add up This is bad advice for 95+% of players and factories. UPS is best ignored until you literally have a megabase. Is your game running at full speed? If yes, build more reactors.
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Nov 24, 2020 08:38
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It'd be nice to upgrade the output of solar panels, but make it so the pollution factor of the chunk changes the effectiveness of it (say from 100% to 25% min).
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Nov 24, 2020 08:47
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All this talk of UPS when a majority of people don't come close to even reaching the scale where UPS becomes a limiting factor. When people say megabase, they mean megabase.
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Nov 24, 2020 08:50
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Teledahn posted:This is bad advice for 95+% of players and factories. UPS is best ignored until you literally have a megabase. Is your game running at full speed? If yes, build more reactors. It's still something nice to be aware of though. Just in case anyone ever reaches that point, it can be something to refactorio But yeah my one and only megabase was back in 0.15. I had no UPS issues and that was several optimization patches ago. What I did have a problem with, however, was laying thousands of solar panels since nuclear didn't exist back then.
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Nov 24, 2020 09:06
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Teledahn posted:This is bad advice for 95+% of players and factories. UPS is best ignored until you literally have a megabase. Is your game running at full speed? If yes, build more reactors. Yeah that's why I said "matters at megabase scale"
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Nov 24, 2020 09:32
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 I actually went and checked last night because i thought you couldn't do that, and somehow failed. I definitely should have been asleep by then.In other news, new stuff yay! Map pings!   Recipe icons and bot locations! I found hundreds of bots failing to cross a gap in a place i never visit!   Rail signal states!  edit: SPIDERTRON ROUTING WITH SHIFT-CLICK! NEATO!!!! 
Wallrod fucked around with this message at 10:13 on Nov 24, 2020 |
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Nov 24, 2020 10:10
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Fishbus posted:It'd be nice to upgrade the output of solar panels, but make it so the pollution factor of the chunk changes the effectiveness of it (say from 100% to 25% min). There is a mod for this. I'd link if not on mobile. Comes with the drawback that "polluted" panels are separate entities, and as such don't work well with copy/paste or, more importantly, getting replaced when they're destroyed. If you can work without those two things, you'll be fine.
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Nov 24, 2020 10:37
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Dancer posted:There is a mod for this. I'd link if not on mobile. Comes with the drawback that "polluted" panels are separate entities, and as such don't work well with copy/paste or, more importantly, getting replaced when they're destroyed. If you can work without those two things, you'll be fine. Yeah I'd thought as much, there is a thing you can do with entities that say what base entity they are if you copy them, although i don't think it works for blueprinting in my own experience. I'll probably have to look for it down the line, or just req it in the dev mod forums
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Nov 25, 2020 08:03
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Renegret posted:It's still something nice to be aware of though. VostokProgram posted:Yeah that's why I said "matters at megabase scale" You're right and I don't mean to be calling you two out but I get frustrated seeing advice about being 'UPS-Efficient' directed at players whom are operating nowhere near the relevant limits for factorio updates-per-second. I feel this results in players that avoid developing their own organic solutions and just follow along with 'wisdom' without considering the wider context. Solar vs Nuclear is an excellent example. Solar requires 10 to 20 (to more) times the resources and what may as well be infinitely times more real-estate to reach power equivalency. Yet most large bases we see are powered by solar. Why? I would argue that a much larger portion of players use solar because they think it's the required option than because they experience actual issues from fluid and heat calculations impacting their experience. This is not ideal. Players should use all the tools at hand and in particular new and less experienced players being pigeonholed into using the inefficient, less challenging, frankly boring option of infinite tiles of solar panels route is probably negatively impacting their enjoyment and stifling creativity in this fun multi-dimensional puzzle game we call Factorio. I should note, this is completely ignoring the pollution VS biters angle. I haven't played much with sufficiently aggressive and dense biters to pose much of a challenge once I got past Yellow/Purple science. Also, perhaps a third power option might be of value, because everybody retires their steam engines eventually. Maybe a power efficient but polluting power plant accepting a fluid input of light oil or petrogas? Teledahn fucked around with this message at 08:37 on Nov 25, 2020 |
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Nov 25, 2020 08:33
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Fishbus posted:Yeah I'd thought as much, there is a thing you can do with entities that say what base entity they are if you copy them, although i don't think it works for blueprinting in my own experience. I'll probably have to look for it down the line, or just req it in the dev mod forums There isn't a way to flag an entity as blueprinting as something else, but you can catch the events when blueprints are created or an area is copied, and then change the entities in that It's a pain in the rear end though GotLag fucked around with this message at 09:14 on Nov 25, 2020 |
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Nov 25, 2020 09:11
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Personal reactor + personal laser defense is a complete game changer, wow. From taking 5-10 minutes a nest to clearing 3 nests in a bit over 90 seconds. I can actually reach the uranium I was after now. I just have to figure out sulfuric acid supply now... while still running my entire base on a single 400% combined yield field. At least once I have it it'll relieve a lot of oil needs.
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Nov 25, 2020 16:22
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GotLag posted:There isn't a way to flag an entity as blueprinting as something else, but you can catch the events when blueprints are created or an area is copied, and then change the entities in that Yeah the closest is placeable_by which deals with the dropper tool, which is odd since that's what i'd think of the result when copied by blueprints too.
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Nov 25, 2020 17:26
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I actually don’t think UPS efficiency has anything to do with new players avoiding nuclear power. Nuclear power is tricky to learn and set up; you have to mine uranium and deal with a bunch of other new systems to get it working. There’s also a bunch of misinformation out there about how hard it is to set up; probably lots of newbies think you need Kovarex enrichment in order to power your base with a nuclear reactor. Players can use nuclear power almost immediately after blue science, but I doubt many new players do. Solar in comparison is easy to set up, and even if it takes more resources, getting more resources is easy in Factorio. I never use solar power when I play (because it’s boring), but it’s easy to see why people do.
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Nov 25, 2020 17:37
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Solar is great because you just divert some resources and when you need more power you just slap down a few more squares. No worrying about the amount of fuel on a belt or brownout power spirals or not noticing your coal mine dried up or the oil wells hit minimum and aren't making enough solid fuel. Nuclear is also awesome because all it takes to not waste fuel is a big enough battery of steam tanks or accumulators with a combinator hooked up to the inserter. I suck at everything in this game and it was easy. Currently playing k2+ space exploration. My main base on Nauvis is 100% solar, but all the mining outposts on other planets are nuclear powered. If they run out of fuel I just fire another stack of uranium from a delivery cannon. SynthesisAlpha fucked around with this message at 17:50 on Nov 25, 2020 |
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Nov 25, 2020 17:48
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I really wanna dive back into my save but I'm waiting on these mods to update, and I've no idea how quickly it'll be sorted. I was using the Lighted Powerpoles mod and 99% of my power poles were the lighted variants, and I've got no clue if that modder is even active anymore. I was also using Angel's mining mod so loading back in means my base has no power and no miners.
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Nov 25, 2020 18:31
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Unlucky7 posted:So I was taking the suggestion to turn on 200% starting area and turn off enemy base expansion for first game from earlier in the thread (Well, technically not my first game, but I still feel inexperienced.) and I have a few turrets up. How many ammo clips should I have on them before I should feel comfortable leaving it? One good thing to do is to put radars around your base. You can see in a small radius around radars regardless of how far you roam, and they will passively reveal unexplored map regions for you in a fairly large radius. You can even zoom in on the minimap to watch your factory through what a radar sees, and if I'm not mistake, you can eventually place ghosts/blueprints down so that any construction bots you build will install the machines remotely for you.
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Nov 25, 2020 19:49
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With regards to turrets and ammo, biters usually attack from the same direction. I usually give each of my turrets 10 ammo each, and then whichever one gets the brunt of the attacks, I'll give it more ammo (20-30) and leave the rest at 10. I check in on them periodically and if they're getting low, I'll slowly up the amount. I make sure all entrances to my base are covered by a turret though, because as pollution spreads, biters can attack from a direction you weren't prepared for. Eventually, you reach a point where you're mass producing turrets and ammo and walls and can just wall your entire base in and belt-feed all the turrets, so it becomes a nonissue.
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Nov 25, 2020 19:52
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Qubee posted:With regards to turrets and ammo, biters usually attack from the same direction. I usually give each of my turrets 10 ammo each, and then whichever one gets the brunt of the attacks, I'll give it more ammo (20-30) and leave the rest at 10. I check in on them periodically and if they're getting low, I'll slowly up the amount. I make sure all entrances to my base are covered by a turret though, because as pollution spreads, biters can attack from a direction you weren't prepared for. Eventually, you reach a point where you're mass producing turrets and ammo and walls and can just wall your entire base in and belt-feed all the turrets, so it becomes a nonissue. This is absolutely correct. You'll also unlock the tank and be able to clear out most biter bases that are in your pollution radius. Once you swap from coal to solar/nuclear, your pollution will drop massively as well. It's heretical advice, but I do like dropping 3 efficiency 1 modules (the bonus caps out at -80% power consumption) into all of my miners when I establish a rail outpost. The reduced power reduces pollution, so you end up with miners that are only creating 1/5 of the pollution cloud, which in turn means that you need to clear fewer biter camps and can mine in relative peace and safety. Efficiency 1 modules are only 5 green + 5 red circuits, so they're relatively cheap in the midgame when you start really look to expanding in earnest. You can reuse them for future mines once your first ones dry up. Edit: Once artillery becomes a thing, and killing biter bases becomes trivial, I no longer bother at all with the efficiency modules and switch to full on pave the earth mode. Dirk the Average fucked around with this message at 20:36 on Nov 25, 2020 |
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Nov 25, 2020 20:33
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With certain settings, the mapgen can make a really nice balance of map area + choke points. my friends and I usually fortify at the choke points, and when we need more land we'll seize another region up until the next choke. Each wall is a line of bunkers with laser + flamethrower turrets, a line of roboports behind that, and a train station that brings in the necessary supplies for this local network (repair packs, replacement walls & turrets, etc). It's pretty fast to set up, you put down the station blueprint and once it's built you can ghost place everything else and itll self-build the wall while drawing supplies by train On a more open map your perimeter is going to be too big to make this feasible, so instead you'll probably have a main wall around your central base and then each outpost will need to fend for itself. Biters tend to cut power lines if expansion is turned though, so be careful
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Nov 25, 2020 21:20
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I'm finally free of the oil engine (which is getting torn apart as we speak). The almighty atom has arrived at last! (Along with logistics research so I can actually supply my base properly!) Now to figure out how kovarex and reprocessing effectively work... and solve the oil issue for a third time...
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Nov 26, 2020 05:30
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