Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Place to discuss the game balance, recipes, health, enemies mining etc.

Which of the following do you support? Mulitple choices possible.

Craftingpath: Burner Inserter -> Inserter -> Fast Inserter -> Smart Inserter
41
9%
Craftingpath: Burner Mining Drill -> Electric Mining Drill
43
9%
Craftingpath: Stone Furnace -> Steel Furnace -> Electric Furnace
78
17%
Craftingpath: Iron Chest -> Steel Chest -> Smart Chest -> Logistic Chests
56
12%
Craftingpath: Basic Armor -> Heavy Armor -> Basic Modular Armor -> Power Armor -> Power Armor MK2
94
21%
A general way of disassembling of Items that are no longer needed
142
31%
 
Total votes: 454

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing rec

Post by Jetlaw »

To bring this back from the dead, I think a reasonable solution is a Disassembly Machine that breaks an item down into the core parts it is made from. This could be similar to the assembly machine line and it should break an item down one stage.

Okay, so the concept is simple. Just like you have Assembly Machines, you can have corresponding Disassembly Machines. Anything that can be made in an Assembly Machine can be unmade in a Disassembly Machine. Of course there should be a loss of material as a result of this, say 50% or 75%. Anything below 100%. Contrast with the productivity module adding a second bar that, when filled, gives a boost to the disassembly of the item being disassembled to 100% recovery?

Item input will be similar to how furnaces work - In that you don't assign them a job. Inserters will automatically fill an empty furnace's input slot with any viable smeltable item - iron ore, copper ore or iron plates. This is mainly for the sake of convenience. You can put an input chest and fill it with useless junk, and the inserter will pull out anything capable of being disassembled and put it into the disassembly machine.

Output will be a hybrid of furnaces and assembley machines. Higher level disassembley machines can disassemble more complex items faster similar to the assembly machine 2 being able to take 4 inputs up from the assembley machine 1's 2 inputs.

As a natural consequence of only allowing assembly machine buildable items to be disassembled, chemical plant items can not be disassembled - Such as batteries or sulfur. Thematically I'd say this makes sense.

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing rec

Post by Xecutor »

atm you can 'disassemble' an item with my barter mod :)

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing rec

Post by bobingabout »

Hey Korvarex, the Expresss Transport Belt to Ground recipe still doesn't have Lube in it!
Can I call you a newb now?
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing rec

Post by xnmo »

bobingabout wrote:Hey Korvarex, the Expresss Transport Belt to Ground recipe still doesn't have Lube in it!
Can I call you a newb now?
I already know what Kovarex's reaction to this will be:

Image


:D

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing rec

Post by EDI »

Steel furnaces have an advantage over Electric furnaces, unless you are running the Electric ones on coal. As long as you are boiler dependent, you lose 50% of all energy, since boilers have an efficiency of 50% - Steel furnaces operate at 100%. That means, since Steel and Electric (without modules) operate at the same speed - Steel only uses half the fuel.

As for the iron chests becoming useless - why not make them "smeltable", even if they would produce only one bar of steel (or a few bars of iron), the problem of having iron chests dumped somewhere would be solved, and it would be slightly better compared to smashing them with a car^^

I also support the idea of assembling machines being able to de-assemble things like burner items - but I think that's rather a feature request.

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing rec

Post by fluffy_5432 »

I think it's excellent when early game items are used for late game items. But it doesn't make sense for everything. And there's also the possibility of creating items you don't need by mistake.

I think the best solution would be to add some sort of "recycler" which breaks down items into very basic components. It could be as simple as decomposing into iron/copper ore (scrap), and solid fuel (burnable waste).

The recycling recipes could be made automatic based on input and "amount of processing". Highly processed items should decompose into a much smaller percentage of their basic inputs.

Or maybe the devs could just add a way to delete inventory items. Don't forget a warning when trashing high-value items.

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing rec

Post by User_Name »

fluffy_5432 wrote: I think the best solution would be to add some sort of "recycler" which breaks down items into very basic components. It could be as simple as decomposing into iron/copper ore (scrap), and solid fuel (burnable waste).
Can be done by simple mod.
Or maybe the devs could just add a way to delete inventory items. Don't forget a warning when trashing high-value items.
Dump trash in a chest and use shotgun.
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by MeduSalem »

So... getting back to this topic once more. There's still the fate of some items to be discussed and if they finally should be changed or not:
  • Burner Inserters: Should they be a requirement for normal inserters? Would people use more burner inserters if they could upgrade them later on rather than dumping them?
  • Burner Mining Drills: Should they be a requirement for Electric Mining drills so you could upgrade them as well once you leave the nasty early game behind you?
  • Stone/Steel Furnaces: Should there be an upgrade path from "Stone Furnace -> Steel Furnace -> Electric Furnace" to encourage people to craft Steel furnaces rather than leaping right ahead to Electric Furnaces?
  • Iron Chests: Should they be a requirement for Steel Chests so they can be repurposed later on?
  • Or should there be a more general way to disassemble items and gain back some of their initial resources once they have outlived their usefulness?
I know that I'm pretty persistent on the topic... but also because the change of recipes for the Splitters to make them tiered worked quite fine for everyone since nobody complained about that. :D

(I'll collect the opinions on those above and give them a rest once enough people are for or against something)
Last edited by MeduSalem on Thu Apr 30, 2015 7:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by bobingabout »

Burner Inserters... I'd say not personally, no real reason, basic inserter seems to work well as the base inserter.
Burner Mining drills... again, probably not.
Stone/Steel furnaces, I'd say a Stone furnace could be required to make a steel furnace, and it would work okay, Electric would be a maybe
Iron chests... why not wood chests too? the fact that they're made from different materials would make me sugest not.

Dis-assembly/reclaim, I'm all for this.
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by MeduSalem »

Well decided to go with a poll for now... let's see how this is going. :D

Too bad that it's not possible to do a more in-depth poll with strength of support/rejection, but I guess the amount of votes or not voting will eventually show how much people are in favor of something.

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by Koub »

MeduSalem wrote:Burner Inserters: Should they be a requirement for normal inserters? Would people use more burner inserters if they could upgrade them later on rather than dumping them?
I feel it would be quite illogical to have a combustible powered item be upgradable to a fully electric item. I just don't feel it as being right. Personal opinion.
MeduSalem wrote:Burner Mining Drills: Should they be a requirement for Electric Mining drills so you could upgrade them as well once you leave the nasty early game behind you?
About the same thing as before : il don't feel like a burner something should be upgradable to an electric equivalent.
MeduSalem wrote:Stone/Steel Furnaces: Should there be an upgrade path from "Stone Furnace -> Steel Furnace -> Electric Furnace" to encourage people to craft Steel furnaces rather than leaping right ahead to Electric Furnaces?
Well if I try to imagine how to upgrade a stone furnace to a steel one, I'd see myself deconstruct completely the stone furnace and build a steel one to replace it. Not much an upgrade. And concerning the upgrade to electric one, it would have to be structurally so different that it would not be an upgrade either.
MeduSalem wrote:Iron Chests: Should they be a requirement for Steel Chests so they can be repurposed later on?
Nope, I don't see how you can upgrade iron to steel without melting it, and adding some carbon to it XD
MeduSalem wrote:Or should there be a more general way to disassemble items and gain back some of their initial resources once they have outlived their usefulness?
So much yes ! Depending on the object type, either deconstruct (if it's built with different parts), or melt if it's purely metallic.

I really feel, on the other hand, that tiered logistic items and tiered assembling machines were the right thing to do. I'd even love to see tiered mining drills, tiered refineries, chem plants, pumps, and many other things, that could be built bu successive upgrades. But :
- change of material
- change of energy source
should in my opinion not be possible via upgrade.
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by bobingabout »

Koub wrote:
MeduSalem wrote:Burner Inserters: Should they be a requirement for normal inserters? Would people use more burner inserters if they could upgrade them later on rather than dumping them?
I feel it would be quite illogical to have a combustible powered item be upgradable to a fully electric item. I just don't feel it as being right. Personal opinion.
MeduSalem wrote:Burner Mining Drills: Should they be a requirement for Electric Mining drills so you could upgrade them as well once you leave the nasty early game behind you?
About the same thing as before : il don't feel like a burner something should be upgradable to an electric equivalent.
MeduSalem wrote:Stone/Steel Furnaces: Should there be an upgrade path from "Stone Furnace -> Steel Furnace -> Electric Furnace" to encourage people to craft Steel furnaces rather than leaping right ahead to Electric Furnaces?
Well if I try to imagine how to upgrade a stone furnace to a steel one, I'd see myself deconstruct completely the stone furnace and build a steel one to replace it. Not much an upgrade. And concerning the upgrade to electric one, it would have to be structurally so different that it would not be an upgrade either.
MeduSalem wrote:Iron Chests: Should they be a requirement for Steel Chests so they can be repurposed later on?
Nope, I don't see how you can upgrade iron to steel without melting it, and adding some carbon to it XD
MeduSalem wrote:Or should there be a more general way to disassemble items and gain back some of their initial resources once they have outlived their usefulness?
So much yes ! Depending on the object type, either deconstruct (if it's built with different parts), or melt if it's purely metallic.

I really feel, on the other hand, that tiered logistic items and tiered assembling machines were the right thing to do. I'd even love to see tiered mining drills, tiered refineries, chem plants, pumps, and many other things, that could be built bu successive upgrades. But :
- change of material
- change of energy source
should in my opinion not be possible via upgrade.
I completely agree with everything you just said.

Dispite the fact that most of my mod recipes insinuate you're placing old parts of one material, with newer, almost identical parts of a newer material. I mean, why make the version with iron gears in the first place to rip them out and replace them with steel, then titanium, then nitinol versions, if you wanted nitinol, you'd just put nitinol in in the first place. I pretty much only did that in my mod because it felt like it matched a lot of the feel of the existing stuff.
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by bobingabout »

Actually... I've had an idea where I'd like to see more of this "chain" system implemented....

Personal Armors.

Basic armor
Heavy Armor
Basic Modular Armor
Power Armor
Power Armor MK 2

None of them require the previous versions to craft.

basic-armor, ingredients = {{"iron-plate", 40}},
heavy-armor, ingredients = {{ "copper-plate", 100}, {"steel-plate", 50}},
basic-modular-armor, ingredients = {{ "advanced-circuit", 30}, {"processing-unit", 5}, {"steel-plate", 50}},
power-armor, ingredients = {{ "processing-unit", 40}, {"electric-engine-unit", 20}, {"steel-plate", 40}, {"alien-artifact", 10}},
power-armor-mk2, ingredients = {{ "effectivity-module-3", 5}, {"speed-module-3", 5}, {"processing-unit", 40}, {"steel-plate", 40}, {"alien-artifact", 50}},

Okay, Basic -> heavy might seem a little strange considering the first is made of Iron, and the later from Copper and Steel, but if we move on.

Basic Modular Armor recipe. Remove the Steel Requirement, and replace it with {"heavy-armor", 1}
Power Armor recipe. Again, Remove the Steel requirement, and replace it with {"basic-modular-armor", 1}
Power Armor MK2 recipe. Remove the Steel requirement, and the Processing unit requirement, and replace with {"power-armor", 1}. Possibly even reduce the number of Alien Artifacts from 50 to 40.

The result of these changes DOES make the recipe more expensive down the chain, but at the end of the day, your heavy armors that you've been using to survive before your first power armor (Basic Modular) isn't wasted. And your Basic Modular isn't wasted either.

Part of the result of having each of these craftable seperately is that I often try and skip over the Power Armor and go stright from the basic modular to the MK2.




I am possibly missing ssomething here though... What if the Durabillity isn't 100%?
Last edited by bobingabout on Sat May 09, 2015 11:07 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by Koub »

I'd love to see this implemented : right now, I just skip on purpose basic modular and Mk1 armor to directly get to MK2, just because I feel to be a waste the tiers in between.
Upgraded armor could be of same percentage durability as the component armor used to craft it.
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by bobingabout »

Koub wrote:Upgraded armor could be of same percentage durability as the component armor used to craft it.
This might require new logic, but I agree.
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by MeduSalem »

Funny that I never thought about the Armor before... But probably that's also because I skip right ahead of some so they never end up in my waste chest.

I will add it to the original post.

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by Ailure »

I think that getting back nearly 100% of the resources when you disasssemble wouldn't be too exploitive even (or just any high percentage, like 90-95% rounded down or something), as long it gives back equivalent percentage to how damaged said item is rounded down (so you don't rebuild your expensive power armor by disassembling and assembling it again).

Being able to repair armor would be neat too, that said the armors never got damaged enough for me having to ever replace them so i admit it's not that necessary but still... :p

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by bobingabout »

Regular armors I've had damaged to the point of destruction before, but then you can have stacks of those equipped.

The most I've had a power armor damaged was about to half health I think. They're harder to break because of the shields, they only take damage when you mess up and the shields go down.
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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by McDuff »

Recycling would definitely need to be a hard-coded change rather than a mod, because recycling that just adds new recipes "in reverse" clutters up menus. It could potentially be an interesting addition to the game, but that seems more like a "suggestions" thing than a "balance" thing. (also probably been suggested 300 times before)

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Re: Some items becoming "useless" in lategame & changing recipes

Post by dood »

Disassembling items is pretty backwards and unneeded.
You just waste time and energy to deconstruct the thing and then waste more time and energy to construct the same thing again if you need it while you could instead store the thing until you'll want to use it which is a piece of cake with robots anyway.
And if you have chests full of chemical plants because you forgot to limit something, that's on you.
Furthermore, this could be used to compress items like for example, turn iron plates into belt to get more iron into your trains and then just disassemble them on unload so the stacksize of every item would have to be rebalanced around that which would be a huge mess unless you prevent that by having disassemby only return a percentage of the ingredients in which case what's the point, just stuff it into a chest and blow it up, jeez.

As for all those dead ends, either develop them into something worthwhile or take an axe to them.

I'd be in favor of deprecating iron chests as an unnecessary step between steel and wooden chests.
Wooden chests, you can burn and steel is what you'll be sticking with all the way so problem solved.

For burner stuff instead of being "upgraded" into electric mining drills, destroying every mall in existence and driving people insane because their electric mining drills now require 2 more intermediates only used by them as well as stones, I'd like for those to spin off into their own thing with their own science tree as a sidegrade to electric mining drills. Make later iterations larger, cover a ridiculously large area, have ludicrous mining speed but also all of the pollution and the requirement to fiddle fuel into them or something so it's not just electric mining drills forever until the end of time.
You know, variety.

As for armors, just get rid of everything below modular armor. Seriously.

Oh also screw the iron pickaxe.
Lose it and just give the player character iron pickaxe levels of mining speed, upgradeable by the steel pickaxe.
There's nothing fun, challenging or interesting about your pickaxe breaking and you crafting a new one.
Last edited by dood on Mon Apr 16, 2018 6:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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