0.17 Coal Liquefaction

[bobucles]

One of the stealth balance changes (because only losers read patch notes) in 0.17 is a buff to coal liquefaction. I had cried many sweet and delicious tears because liquefying coal was really odd in terms of whether or not it was better than burning straight coal. The name of the game is building factory so let's see if the new liquefaction makes more factory worth the effort.

So the old coal cracking was

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10 coal, 25 HO, 50 steam =>
35 HO, 15LO, 20P
I.E.
+10HO, 15LO, 20P

There was a lot of math involved. For a straight apples to apples comparison, you simply could not profit in terms of direct energy from this process. Play with modules all you want, you always barely didn't break even and lost just a little bit. But if you investigated the larger scale factory, a profit could be found. Direct the petrol output into the factory, and in exchange crack less light oil from advanced processing. Less light oil gets cracked overall, leading to more solid fuel and thus an eventual energy profit. But it was a complicated setup and if the situation changed the outcome could still be ambiguous. How much light oil do I need to crack for it to be better to burn coal, or crack coal? If my petrol peaks out should I stop coal cracking all together? I'll leave that dilemma for someone else to solve.

None of the other oil processes appear to have been changed, unless I'm blind.

New coal cracking sees a HUGE buff. The inputs stay the same, but the new outputs as of 17.0 are

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90H 20L 10P
I.E.
+65H, 20L 10P

The petrol output gets nerfed by 10. That's not so bad, because you have advanced oil and can always make more. The big buff is the huge increase to heavy oil output.

First off, how much petrol do we get if we straight up crack everything?

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Old:
10 H * 3/4 = 7.5 L
7.5L + 15L * 2/3 = 15Petrol
15P + 20P = 35P.

New:
65 HO * 3/4 = 48.75 L
48.75L+20L *2/3= 45.8P
45.8+10P = 55.8P

Wow. That's about 60% more petroleum straight up. A very nice buff that if you don't care about anything else, means more petroleum for your factory. But is there more energy output as well? Yes there is! It's always a good idea to crack heavy into light oil for fuel. You have the tech by this point, so I'll start there.

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Old:
7.5L + 15L = 2.25 Solid Fuel
20P = 1 Solid Fuel

New:
48.75L+20L = 6.875 Solid Fuel
10P = 0.5 Solid Fuel

The yield of Solid Fuel was slightly reduced in 0.17 (25*50% = 12.5MJ vs. 12*100% = 12MJ). Generating energy profit was super borderline before, you lost less than 10% overall. Now, the amount of solid fuel output has more than doubled. So even despite the SF nerf, we have gone from just barely losing energy into now having a clear and impressive energy profit to enjoy. If you want more energy from your coal, CRACK IT! Are you ready to build more factory?

[SyncViews]

Wonder if this was intentional.

Coal liquefaction to oil to solid fuel to energy never really made sense to me, but from a pure gameplay perspective, getting something better for a more complex solution is interesting.

Coal liquefaction however was and still is very useful when you have an oil starved start, its just unfortunate that the tech requirements means you still need a reasonable amount of oil anyway so I only used it a few times (oil pumps being infinite, means at some point its always easier to just use oil).

[Serenity]

This BS again? This only comes from your silly power creep fantasies and your inability to comprehend that some things can be situationally useful even if it's not the best or most energy efficient solution.

Coal liquefaction shouldn't be energy positive and doesn't have to be to be useful in some cases

[bobucles]

your inability to comprehend that some things can be situationally useful even if it's not the best or most energy efficient solution.

Wow, rude! Please explain these situations in exhausting detail and show your math proving that it was the best choice. Also please explain how you use it in your factory right now, because

"I never needed or really cared to use it"

Is kind of a damning defense.

I personally don't mind the switch to producing a lot of heavy oil. It gives players a good recipe for when they want to use a lot of lubricant. If players don't want lubricant, they can produce a lot of petrol instead. It's still a bit of a strange tech because the problem it attempts to solve:
- I ran out of oil
Gets solved by
- Just spend a lot of oil to research this lol
But you can probably beeline the tech before the early pumps start getting dangerously low.

[CDarklock]

This BS again? This only comes from your silly power creep fantasies

Um... I did the math on coal liquefaction in 0.16 and concluded it was not worth it.

Now bobucles has done the math on it in 0.17 and says it is, with a few caveats.

That is useful information to me. And while I will still double-check his math, at least now I know it is worth double-checking instead of just ignoring coal liquefaction as worthless. Plus in a forum like this, there are lots of math people, and anyone doing math knows that when they post it someone is going to double-check it. So chances are very good that the math is 100% correct.

I, for one, am grateful for this post. It has value, and I'm glad it was made.

EDIT: A quick back of the envelope look reveals that at the very least you can cycle this. Water and steam are definitely available to everyone, and once you have some oil you can just cycle it back into the process and generate an ongoing supply. New coal liquefaction means that if you have somehow lost access to your oil fields, perhaps because of biter attacks or something, a small amount of heavy oil is enough to convert your coal fields into oil fields. That means when I find one lonely little patch of oil that is producing squat, I am just a little research away from having ready access to oil products in large quantities.

I haven't looked at how much research, tho

[Serenity]

it least now I know it is worth double-checking instead of just ignoring coal liquefaction as worthless.

And again the fallacy that some thing has to be energy positive to be worth it

[CDarklock]

And again the fallacy that some thing has to be energy positive to be worth it

It's not a fallacy, it's axiomatic. I want my investment to provide a certain level of return. There is no rational justification for that level of return being "enough." It is an arbitrary choice that I make for myself. If you make a different arbitrary choice, it is no less arbitrary and no more rational.

[Ranakastrasz]

it least now I know it is worth double-checking instead of just ignoring coal liquefaction as worthless.

And again the fallacy that some thing has to be energy positive to be worth it

Uhm, no. If the process, for generating energy produces less energy than it consumes, it is worthless.
If it produces as much energy as it expends, its still basically useless, unless it comes with convienence like higher stack size or w.e.
If it produces slightly more energy, it may be worthwhile.
If it produces significantly more energy, its very much useful.

If something costs more than it is worth, it is not worth it. If it costs less than it is worth, then it is absolutely worth it. If it's cost and worth are equal, then it is worth it, but only just.

I think.

[SyncViews]

It isnt just for coal -> oil -> soild fuel -> energy though.

If you dont have much oil around it gets you red circuits, electric engines, batteries and other essential items. If there is a problem there its the amount of oil you need to get the tech itself.

Potentially solid fuel for rockets, but by that time on any standard map you will have enough oil pumps by then to not need liquefaction any more.

[Vegemeister]

Coal liquefaction is not an energy generating process. It is a liquid fuel and chemical feedstock generating process. You don't liquefy coal because it would get you more energy than burning it. You liquefy coal because the oil is over there, you're over here, and the royal navy is between here and there.

"Solid fuel" appears to be petroleum coke, which is essentially the same stuff as charcoal or regular coke. Regular coke is what you get if you heat coal to a high temperature in the absence of oxygen. It's almost entirely pure carbon. Liquefying coal to make petcoke out of it is just an excessively complicated and inefficient sort of coking oven. (Coke, too, is not made because you get any more energy than you would from burning the coal, but because it burns cleaner and hotter.)

[CDarklock]

If it produces slightly more energy, it may be worthwhile.
If it produces significantly more energy, its very much useful.

The real question, of course, is what distinguishes "slight" from "significant." The ROI from coal liquefaction in 0.16, strictly in terms of heavy oil, is 40%. The ROI in 0.17 is 260%.

It can be argued whether 40% is significant or slight, but I don't think there's any confusion over 260%.

The amounts of light oil and petroleum always seemed really small. 15 light oil is either 10 petroleum, or 1.5 solid fuel; that's it. It has the value of one or the other. Now it's 20 light oil, which is more: either 2 solid fuel, or a little over 13 petroleum. I don't really think 3 petroleum and half a solid fuel matters much.

Meanwhile, we used to get 20 petroleum, and now we get 10. So we've lost roughly seven petroleum, overall, which doesn't make sense to consider as solid fuel. The value of petroleum is sulfur and plastic, which are 15 and 20 petroleum respectively. (EDIT: That's for 2 plastic. So really 10. Sorry about that.)

So in 0.16, we had what amounted to 2 sulfur or 3 plastic. Now we have just under 2 sulfur, or just over 2 plastic. That's a minor reduction; the value of the light oil and petrol are roughly the same. It doesn't actually matter what you're doing with the light oil and petrol. Whatever it is, it has about the same value now as it did before.

And if that was enough then, it is probably still enough now. If your bar is that low, which is totally fine and not in any way a value judgment, then you didn't need this change and indeed might be upset that light and petrol have been mildly nerfed here.

But the only material difference between 0.16 and 0.17 is the amount of heavy oil, which is dramatic. But most people seem to regard heavy oil as a nuisance, so "MOAR HEVY OILS" is not much of a selling point.

The thing is, we have now got an additional 55 heavy oil over and above the 35 we used to get, which is enough to triple the amount of coal liquefaction you're doing. With room to spare. So each cycle has a dramatic multiplication of the production, which is enough to make pretty much anyone sit up and take notice. The major cost, of course, is that now you need to do something with all that heavy oil. It's going to pile up even faster at these rates.

The value of this, however, is that coal tends to be closer to your main factory. So you need relatively little oil to get started, which matters if you have a crappy map, and then you can produce your oil products in a much more convenient location. That's a HUGE value to me.

To someone else? Well, it depends. Some people probably don't care. But the value of this is certainly not a question of how much solid fuel I can make and whether it is energy-positive. Coal liquefaction was already energy-positive, anyway. I just didn't think it was energy-positive enough.

[bobucles]

And again the fallacy that some thing has to be energy positive to be worth it

Okay, but being realistic always takes a secondary seat to good gameplay. Perhaps you have a good reason for why better cracking generates bad gameplay? After all the tech is gated after the entry point to nuclear power. Solid fuel is already in danger of dying out at the time coal cracking hits the field. So even if the tech is strong, it's buffing a dying breed of fuel.

I'm of the opinion that strong cracking is good. If it's worth building, then players will build it. More factory is good. If a tech doesn't warrant building more factory, it probably doesn't belong in the game. I do think the original situation was that players didn't even look at coal cracking because the benefits didn't warrant grabbing it.

There may be some disagreement on the raw numbers of course. My original stance is that coal cracking only needed a modest buff to become a valuable resource under most (as opposed to niche) situations. The current buff was certainly much more than I expected. It jumped from "maybe kinda no" to "definitely try this out". Is the new cracking ultimately worth seeing out as a technology? That's what game testing is for!

[Koub]

I haven't had time to test 0.17 yet, but if the math is correct, it's something I'm not fond of.
I liked how coal liquafaction offered a tradeoff. For more energy output, use your coal as is, for more oil products, use coal liquefaction.
Getting both at the same time kind of makes coal liquefaction mandatory-ish (assuming you have too much coal, and you want to optimize).

[GrumpyJoe]

could you add something to the title?

Reading all this im still not sure if its about producing energy "only" (with a little gas as a side product)
Or if CL is worth it for only making petrol products

That being said, im still going to burn nuclear fuel, i dont care about energy efficiency

[Serenity]

Uhm, no. If the process, for generating energy produces less energy than it consumes, it is worthless.

It's not an energy generation progress, Jesus Fucking Christ. The main application is to turn everything into plastics. And maybe some sulfur

Coal Liquefaction is supposed to be more inefficient and less economical than just pumping oil from the ground. You only use it when you don't have oil, but need it. Historically it was only done for geostrategic reasons on a large scale. By Nazi Germany and South Africa.
More recent technological innovations have made it better and even somewhat economical. But pure thermodynamics dictates that you can't get more energy out of it than you put in. If you do, something is very broken

[Ranakastrasz]

Reread the first post? The OP was talking about the energy applications, not the plastic applications.

[CDarklock]

It's not an energy generation progress, Jesus Fucking Christ. The main application is to turn everything into plastics. And maybe some sulfur

But the main cost is energy.

The 10 coal has 80 MJ of energy. The 50 steam has 1.5 MJ of energy, probably generated from coal. This is their primary purpose and use.

Are the outputs worth the inputs?

You have to convert them into similar entities to make that determination. And there's nothing you can convert steam into except energy, so that's literally the only available common denominator.

You're complaining that the only way to make a meaningful theoretical comparison isn't a practical use case.

For God's sake, take an economics class.

[bobucles]

Reading all this im still not sure if its about producing energy "only" (with a little gas as a side product)
Or if CL is worth it for only making petrol products

It's about both energy AND plastic output, because both outputs are relevant. Players probably want to get extra plastic (as they probably get the tech to cover an oil=>plastic shortage), but at the same time coal may also be their primary energy source. So it's important that players can increase their plastic output without crippling their energy supply. The old version did kind of do that, if you REALLY looked for it and needed both outputs in tandem. You can find the math buried somewhere around here. The new version is much stronger and is unambiguously effective. If you want more plastic it can do that, and if you want more energy it can do that too. If you want more of both, the buff can very clearly give that.

As CDarklock mentioned, the primary input cost is energy. The tech costs a lot of energy going in, so getting energy out is a nice thing to have.

[bobingabout]

I'm not going to get into a debate about if it should be energy positive or not, I have enough of that with Hydrogen from electrolysis in my mods, because the only resources used to make hydrogen are water and electricity. though now you need to distil the water into pure water first, and making fuel blocks from hydrogen now also costs coal. That shut up most of the whiners.

Anyway

Getting more heavy oil and less PG is a good thing in my opinion, because it means you have more options. I do enjoy factories where you have to crack down, because you end up doing it based on an overflow system. more HO than LO? crack it. More LO than PG? Crack it. More PG than LO? can't do anything about it, more LO than HO? can't do anything about it, so having a high HO output means you have better control over your factory flow.

Also from a more selfish opinion, My mods have a much higher HO consumption than base game, so this helps with that.

[Vegemeister]

It's not an energy generation progress, Jesus Fucking Christ. The main application is to turn everything into plastics. And maybe some sulfur

But the main cost is energy.

The 10 coal has 80 MJ of energy. The 50 steam has 1.5 MJ of energy, probably generated from coal. This is their primary purpose and use.

Are the outputs worth the inputs?

You have to convert them into similar entities to make that determination. And there's nothing you can convert steam into except energy, so that's literally the only available common denominator.

You're complaining that the only way to make a meaningful theoretical comparison isn't a practical use case.

For God's sake, take an economics class.

You will find that the laws of thermodynamics are much more rigid than those of economics.

Also, one principle of economics is that value is subjective, and that trades are possible when people disagree about the relative value of two items. Coal liquifaction converts coal and energy into oil, and is of interest to people who have coal and energy coming out of their ears, but no oil. It is an imaginary trading partner who has a surplus of oil but for whom coal and energy are dear. Demanding that you be able to convert the product back into energy for overall energy gain is missing the point. If you would rather have energy, don't take the trade.