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At least you will get the sick QOL upgrades even if you don't care for the expansion. Tbh I believe the devs when they say they weren't inspired by SE and they don't want to copy it. The game "ended" on launching a rocket, going up with a rocket is the next logical step. It's just SE and SA are both about continuing Factorio after reaching space, and there's only so many ways you can spin that. I feel like SE is a big barrel of wank for every good idea, and reading the dev logs I feel like they're well aware of that and with SE existing it makes them work harder to justify anything going into SA. Eediot Jedi fucked around with this message at 05:33 on Dec 7, 2023 |
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Dec 7, 2023 03:51
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| # ? May 19, 2024 17:25 |
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SE was inspired by what was always intended to be Factorio's end game, which is now being implemented in Space Age. You can read all kinds of stuff the devs wrote about many of these core ideas long ago.
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Dec 7, 2023 04:22
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Yeah the DLC is just stuff that was talked about in like 0.14 but didn't get included prior to 1.0 that mods did in the meantime.
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Dec 7, 2023 04:36
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Rescue Toaster posted:Is anybody else nonplussed quote:adjective
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Dec 7, 2023 07:31
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Can’t you manage the planets remotely though with map? You can at least add blueprints etc remotely, and robots will do the job.
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Dec 7, 2023 09:28
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I'm not at all sure about the space portions of it. The new logistical challenges on each planet do appeal to me, especially since they give you new tech to take home. But mostly, I trust Wube to create an experience that I will enjoy, even if I don't know it yet. And if somehow I don't enjoy the planets, then I'll still have elevated trains and the other QoL features.
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Dec 7, 2023 09:55
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Would you feel better about these changes if all the new planets were just new environments you could reach on the normal world by just travelling far enough?
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Dec 7, 2023 10:34
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Tenebrais posted:Would you feel better about these changes if all the new planets were just new environments you could reach on the normal world by just travelling far enough? I wonder if it will be possible to make a mod that puts all the new terrain generation on the starting planet.
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Dec 7, 2023 11:03
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Ihmemies posted:Can’t you manage the planets remotely though with map? You can at least add blueprints etc remotely, and robots will do the job. Yes one of the first new fff posts talked about improvements they were making to allow better remote management. They also talked about making it fairly slick to move your view between the planets and such
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Dec 7, 2023 12:31
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Ihmemies posted:Can’t you manage the planets remotely though with map? You can at least add blueprints etc remotely, and robots will do the job.
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Dec 7, 2023 13:42
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Think of planets as train outposts and the rockets as trains. Space is tight on planets, right? Gotta send that stuff back home into the main factory machinery.
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Dec 7, 2023 14:29
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Inserters allow you to connect individual machines together, belts allow you to connect batches of machines together, trains let you connect outposts to your factory at a greater distance, and now the goal is rockets connect distinct factories together, in this case across planets. They said the goal is that you don't just have Nauvis as a "main" factory and the other planets as outposts but each one becomes its own complete factory. Kinda hard to define the difference I guess, but that's the goal.
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Dec 7, 2023 14:41
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EVGA Longoria posted:They said the goal is that you don't just have Nauvis as a "main" factory and the other planets as outposts but each one becomes its own complete factory. Kinda hard to define the difference I guess, but that's the goal. The idea being that instead of using Vulcanus to mine tungsten and then shipping raw tungsten home as an input into your megafactory, you do all tungsten-related production there on Vulcanus and just bring home the science packs and any unique finished goods. I don't think anything's stopping you just shipping the raw material but it'd be inefficient, especially if you need to ship out the supplies to get that tungsten into orbit too. So far with the way the raw materials work they seem to be trying hard to make sure the factories you build on the other planets feel materially different even when you're making mostly the same stuff. I think they could do this more effectively with a system of alternate recipes, I'm disappointed they gave up on that, but what they've shown off so far still looks pretty fun.
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Dec 7, 2023 15:12
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Tenebrais posted:So far with the way the raw materials work they seem to be trying hard to make sure the factories you build on the other planets feel materially different even when you're making mostly the same stuff. I think they could do this more effectively with a system of alternate recipes, I'm disappointed they gave up on that, but what they've shown off so far still looks pretty fun. Given how popular that approach is with mods, I have a strong suspicion they spent a good amount of time trying to make that work before deciding to avoid it.
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Dec 7, 2023 15:55
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I'm kind of glad they didn't do the alternate recipes thing because it makes the craft menu look like vomit. But then again maybe they could have modified the menu to make it work better, which in turn would have helped all those mods using alternate recipes too.
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Dec 7, 2023 16:08
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I think the big reason they didn't do alt recipes is that it turns recycling into a magical matter converter, transforming one set of materials into a different set. And given that recycling is a big part of the other tentpole mechanic (quality), it makes sense that alt recipes get dropped.
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Dec 7, 2023 16:10
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Manyorcas posted:I'm kind of glad they didn't do the alternate recipes thing because it makes the craft menu look like vomit. But then again maybe they could have modified the menu to make it work better, which in turn would have helped all those mods using alternate recipes too. Jabor posted:I think the big reason they didn't do alt recipes is that it turns recycling into a magical matter converter, transforming one set of materials into a different set. And given that recycling is a big part of the other tentpole mechanic (quality), it makes sense that alt recipes get dropped. These are a big part of why I'm disappointed they gave up on it - they're both solvable problems if you have access to hard-code the UI. You can change the way recipes are displayed/selected to support giving you multiple options, and for recycling you can have your different alternate recipes give techncially different items that are fully interchangeable for filters and inputs. The only challenge after that is figuring out how to make them stack together, which is again approachable if you have full liberty to recode the game. And once that's done it'd be a powerful tool for mods to hook into too. But also I think alternate recipes are an objectively good feature and work wonderfully in Satisfactory (at least once you've unlocked them in that), and Space Age would have been a great opportunity to bring that to Factorio. Oh well.
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Dec 7, 2023 16:28
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I'd argue exact opposite, that alternate recipes are a bad idea that mods use only because they don't have the ability to modify the engine the way Wube does. Without source access, you can't just introduce new mechanics to have two options for accomplishing something, so at some points you wind up having to merge your product lines via alternate recipes to enable interaction of older and newer processes.
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Dec 7, 2023 16:39
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I'm not too worried about remote management of other planets. SpaceEx already has something that works decently enough, and that's cobbled together without real engine access. The actual devs should be able to work this out much better. It's actually an interesting point. Since Space Age is similar to Space Exploration, and they have the maker on the team, it a pretty neat resource to have. Not necessarily that Earendel is designing gameplay features, but that they know a lot of the pain points that this type of content runs into. It can save a bunch of Dev & QA time if you deign a feature and have someone who can say "Yeah, tried that and people hated it / it was a massive pain to implement." PancakeTransmission posted:
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Dec 7, 2023 20:06
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Alkanos posted:I'm not too worried about remote management of other planets. SpaceEx already has something that works decently enough, and that's cobbled together without real engine access. The actual devs should be able to work this out much better.
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Dec 7, 2023 22:06
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Rescue Toaster posted:Is anybody else nonplussed with the expansion plans? I don't care for SE. As another comparison, in Oxygen Not Included Spaced Out, the rockets are moderately fun, but trying to manage different planets just doesn't flow well gameplay-wise. You're either switching back and forth in a way that breaks my train of thought, or you're just ignoring one or the other I guess. I guess in factorio if the base you're leaving behind is actually self-sufficient and not like suicidal dupes in ONI, you are free to ignore it. But on the other hand I'm not sure I want to? The second worst part of SE (after the godawful recipe design and just edging out the pointless tedium mechanics like CME's and robot attrition) was forgetting to bring things along to other planets and the general difficulty of running around to fix things, which is a big part of any game of Factorio. The satellite view worked for most things but only made it more glaringly obvious when it didn't. It led to a lot of decision paralysis, procrastination and just not wanting to play when problems were made so difficult to act on. So no, I'm not looking forward to multiple planets. I guess it is a somewhat mitigating factor that they seem to be planning to avoid SE's problem that the non-Nauvis bases can never be more than glorified mining outposts, but I'm still not optimistic. SE badly tainted the whole idea for me, it was just not fun. I will try it, but I don't have high hopes. The quality system is just baffling. It seems bad and I don't know why they think it'll be fun or what problem it's solving. It's not a great look that they've already had to say "well, you can just ignore it entirely if you want". The other QoL changes do sound amazing though. I would probably pay money for the raised rails alone. TheFluff fucked around with this message at 13:24 on Dec 8, 2023 |
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Dec 8, 2023 13:00
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yeah I think it's kind of rough to figure out how to balance other planets so that they feel like a different place but aren't a huge pain in the rear end to go mess with. i think the remote configuration style mostly gets it right, but one thing i'm interested in seeing is that like, in SE you had two methods of getting from a to b: a spaceship, which you could set up so it did not require any resources at one terminus to refuel or anything but could take loving Forever, or a rocket which is instant but you've gotta be able to make one. it seems like space age will only have the spaceship equivalent. i wonder how long they'll make it take to get places, because in SE it could easily take like 20 minutes to certain destinations and even though you can still use satellite view to poke around that is a long rear end time
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Dec 8, 2023 13:44
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Factorio enables realistic progression: recreate the history of humanity.
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Dec 8, 2023 14:40
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TheFluff posted:The second worst part of SE (after the godawful recipe design and just edging out the pointless tedium mechanics like CME's and robot attrition) was forgetting to bring things along to other planets and the general difficulty of running around to fix things, which is a big part of any game of Factorio. The satellite view worked for most things but only made it more glaringly obvious when it didn't. It led to a lot of decision paralysis, procrastination and just not wanting to play when problems were made so difficult to act on. So no, I'm not looking forward to multiple planets. I guess it is a somewhat mitigating factor that they seem to be planning to avoid SE's problem that the non-Nauvis bases can never be more than glorified mining outposts, but I'm still not optimistic. SE badly tainted the whole idea for me, it was just not fun. I will try it, but I don't have high hopes. When you say the satellite view worked for most things, the devs realized that too which is why they have improved it significantly https://factorio.com/blog/post/fff-380
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Dec 8, 2023 15:25
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Doing one last run without overhauls before the DLC comes around. Finally got to the point where I can feasibly farm out smelting to satellite outposts instead of having it all connected directly to my bus. Built iron smelting, no problem. Sure, I'll build copper smelting next to it, on this dark grey earth from Alien Biomes, at night - what's the worst that could happen? Just slap down a blueprint over this forest and go! Built a full smelting complex directly over 22 million coal. Oops.
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Dec 8, 2023 15:31
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Squibbles posted:When you say the satellite view worked for most things, the devs realized that too which is why they have improved it significantly https://factorio.com/blog/post/fff-380 Yeah, it is significantly better than SE, and does fix most of the gripes, but it still doesn't address that you can't do anything about things outside of robot network range unless you have a spidertron, and SE of course gates spidertrons to super late game (and since the DLC will be gating even cliff explosives behind expanding to other planets I don't have high hopes for spidertrons). One of the things that made me incredibly mad was when something would happen to a bit of rail or a mining outpost way out in the middle of nowhere and I just couldn't do anything about it if I didn't want to place one roboport at a time (while also taking into account the possibility of bot pathing getting them stuck). Then again they are making bot pathing smarter too aren't they, so maybe they've actually patched all the holes... 
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Dec 8, 2023 15:40
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That's my biggest worry so far. If you don't want the staircase ghost nagging in your ear about your iron train or remote power poles getting cutoff by stupid biter migrants getting mad they can't path through a power pole you need 100% wall or loginet coverage. Which I guess is popular in the community and arguably the right way to play but is slightly rigid and will definitely define checklists of things to do before blasting off to the exploding butthole planet. Rigid checklists are not guaranteed but definitely on the rail way to making this style of game feel like work.
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Dec 8, 2023 15:48
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If you have some neuroticism about not leaving anything to chance, then don't. Build excessive defenses, don't do infinite research while you're gone, install the day one mod that gives you teleporters that cost two green circuits, whatever it takes to make you happy. I feel like some of these posts are crazy, honestly. Wube have demonstrated an unparalleled devotion to good game design, and you think they're just going to gently caress it all up now? Most of the point of playing with biters on is that it provides pressure separate from your internal source. It's actually one of the things I'm looking forward to most about my first playthrough, having to make decisions about when and how to move forward in ways that temporarily restrict me without having perfect knowledge about how to optimally do so.
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Dec 8, 2023 15:52
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Today I accidentally learned electric drills mine at 5x5 area instead of 3x3. Heh.
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Dec 9, 2023 11:36
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That's true but you still get more ore per second if you butt them up next to each other, the resource will just exhaust faster.
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Dec 9, 2023 11:57
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Bobsledboy posted:That's true but you still get more ore per second if you butt them up next to each other, the resource will just exhaust faster. If you want to use a huge number of undergrounds, you can stagger-step them to increase the belt capacity also to get even more resources out of a patch. This is only if you are mining fast enough on large patches that your belts are saturated and some of your miners aren't working.  You can probably increase the output even more using a bot-based setup and mining into chests, but I've never done that. Edit: Another way to do this without so many undergrounds would be to have belts start in the middle and exit on both sides of the patch instead of trying to get all of them to output on the same side like my staggered setup does. The Locator fucked around with this message at 17:59 on Dec 9, 2023 |
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Dec 9, 2023 17:57
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you can also have each one output directly to a provider chest and really squeeze them in
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Dec 9, 2023 18:32
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You can also mine directly into trains, but you need a bunch of mining productivity and modules to make it fast enough to be worth it
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Dec 9, 2023 18:40
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For late-endgame triple-digit-mining-productivity outposts I've had to arrange miners in a way so they were outputting on every single side of the patch, double-woven like that screenshot but exiting from all 4 sides. And it was still saturating the belts. Moving bulk items like ores with bots is for people who don't automate and devote a large amount of iron production to blue undergrounds asap. e: Tamba posted:You can also mine directly into trains, but you need a bunch of mining productivity and modules to make it fast enough to be worth it Unless you've got patch size cranked way up, the density of ore patches increases much faster and this doesn't really work for the scales of ores you need at that stage of the game - you just can't fit enough miners around your trains to make it work. Plus if you want to use beacons to speed it up more, you then also have to tear up and rebuild the outpost multiple times since you're going to have dead spots. Xerol fucked around with this message at 19:00 on Dec 9, 2023 |
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Dec 9, 2023 18:58
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Tamba posted:You can also mine directly into trains, but you need a bunch of mining productivity and modules to make it fast enough to be worth it I did the math a while ago, with just speed 3 modules you need a LOT of research to reach blue belt speeds. https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3629545&perpage=40&noseen=1&pagenumber=8#post498470090 But at some point it’s still viable even before those speeds (and without beacons), you just might want more trains. Which works out because you can fit a couple per (larger) patch!
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Dec 9, 2023 18:58
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That is so optimised. I probably should start using modules in my miners. And in my smelters.
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Dec 9, 2023 19:05
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Ihmemies posted:That is so optimised. I probably should start using modules in my miners. And in my smelters. Speed3 moduling miners like that (and of course hundreds of blue undergrounds) is *incredibly* expensive in resources. It really only makes sense to do in the late mega-base stage of the game where you just have so much stuff (modules in this case) being made constantly that the cost doesn't even matter to you anymore. The good thing is that when that patch starts running dry, you can reuse everything in the next one.
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Dec 9, 2023 21:23
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I will once again stan my favorite mod pairings for making mining outposts: TA miners + Warehousing + Loaders (I use loader redux) Just giant Total Annihilation sprite inspired mining machines to plot down on ore instead of a bunch of individual electric miners. Due to engine limitations miners can only have one output, so you need to output into a container. Which is where warehousing comes in. You can hit 12+ blue belts worth from one mantle extractor at endgame. I just throw a basic latch circuit to run until the train station is nearly full and leave it off until the station only has two train loads of ores left. They aren't even *that* imbalanced, since you're still paying the power cost of all the individual miners it's replaced.
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Dec 9, 2023 23:41
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One of the reasons people mine directly into trains in megabases is they want to optimize for UPS by minimizing the number of interactions between inserters and containers. Big containers with lots of slots are particularly undesirable since each inserter swing apparently has to iterate over every slot in the container. This is also why miniloaders are bad for UPS; each loader is three very fast inserters in a trenchcoat with stack size locked to 1 by default. That's a lot of inserter swings. The vanilla loaders (available through many mods, AAI is one) are better but plain old stack inserters are generally better still for container-to-container. For most regular big bases this doesn't matter much if at all, but if you wanna really go as far as your computer can make it then you might have to think about these things. A lot of people do things like relatively small city blocks (meaning lots of stations) unloading into 512-slot warehouses and still seem to do pretty okay though so this is really some minmaxer stuff. TheFluff fucked around with this message at 00:51 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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Dec 9, 2023 23:52
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I've also been playing with a mod that extends almost every extendable research to infinite science (I think it's called infinite technology expanded? idr it's been a while since I've loaded the game) and one of those is inserter capacity. It's configurable but I've got mine set up to have +1 stack inserter capacity and +0.25 regular inserter capacity per level. It was almost miraculous how much it improved my UPS on my 4500spm base, with enough levels to unload half a stack from a train in one swing, as well as just having many fewer swings on my regular machines. Kind of tempted to spin up a game that has huge, but much less dense, ore patches, and go full train mining from green science onward. Regular mining speed will take ages to fill up a train car but it won't matter as much when I've got 200 trains loading up at once. Maybe I could build the whole base around train-to-train production chains too, reduce the number of belts and bots to a bare minimum.
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Dec 10, 2023 00:26
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