Map gen puts enemies too close

[BlueTemplar]

Duplicate :
viewtopic.php?f=16&t=67249

[zOldBulldog]

I found this thread when I posted my own and someone provided a link.

Problem:

- Using default settings the starting nests are so close (and strong - with many worms!!! - so that they can't be destroyed easily with the minimal tech at that stage) and pollution *can* spread to them very early in the game even with a very small base.

- This might not be a big deal for experienced players, but beginners can't cope with it and do not even know they can change the map settings for a 600% starter area and no expansion... as a way to make things quiet enough to learn.

- Some might point to the so-called tutorial as a way to learn, but the 0.17 tutorial is even worse than the 0.16 one. It does not teach enough, cripples so many technologies that makes it utterly unpleasant (doesn't even have splitters or underground belts) and in general it is harder to play than the real game... Meant for beginners, yeah right! Sorry, but the devs really messed up bad on this one.

Band-aid solution while learning (or if you don't care for constant battle):

- 600% starter area size
- Disable expansion

[Zaflis]

The 0.17 tutorial ain't that bad anymore, they nerfed the biters. Agree on lack of underground belts and splitters though. A building game should start with extensive amount of learning on building, and bring in the fights much later on second or third map of the campaign.

[BlueTemplar]

It would seem that the lack of underground belts/splitters is only hard for experienced players. (Also, this is offtopic here.)

[zOldBulldog]

It would seem that the lack of underground belts/splitters is only hard for experienced players. (Also, this is offtopic here.)

Off-topic up to a point, because "too close" applies to beginners (experienced players know to either manage pollution or to change the New Map settings.

So, some may then say that beginners don't belong in New Map and that should be playing the tutorial/campaign. But without splitters/undergrounds beginners don't yet have the skill to layout a base effectively so that everything can go where it needs to go AND still be able to have belts feeding ammo to the turrets.

The result is that there is NOTHING left in Factorio that is adequate for beginners at "default" settings. That is wrong.

[BlueTemplar]

No, off-topic because the "Tutorial" and Freeplay are too different.

At least one of the first-time players streaming on Twitch figured the belt layout out... (by himself?)

[zOldBulldog]

No, off-topic because the "Tutorial" and Freeplay are too different.

At least one of the first-time players streaming on Twitch figured the belt layout out... (by himself?)

OK.

What about the other 99% of new players? Do they also manage to figure out the belt layout fast enough to build it before getting overrun by biters?

Do think the DEVs don't care about losing a lot of players to frustration and bad reports because most beginners can't survive the "tutorial" and Freeplay gets them overwhelmed by biters when using *default* settings, before they ever had a chance to even learn how to play?

I understand that biters are one thing that can keep the game interesting once a player masters it, but in a game that is mainly about design I don't understand this constant focus on making warfare an overwhelming part of the beginner experience. It only hurts the game's future to make it too hard too early in the player's experience.

That is the basic issue with "default settings" Freeplay enemies, and it is an issue that continues even in the tutorial. Because of it the ideal "beginner gameplay / learning environment" is Freeplay + change starter area to 600% + disable expansion + use YouTube tutorials. Unfortunately very few new players know to do that, and many experienced trolls actively promote to beginners using default Freeplay settings or playing the campaign.

[BlueTemplar]

This is the post linking to the recording of the first-time player that I'm talking about :
viewtopic.php?p=402922#p402922

Where are those 99 first time players that you're talking about ?

[Xelephant]

I Think this just boils down to what should be the "default" difficulty, and should it cater to new players and how much should it do?
Maybe they should just add in a "Easy Start" setting with a bigger starting zone.

I think the default is good as it is, you can get a challenging start if you dive in blind. Or you can play around with map gen until you
find your sweet spot of challenge.

[Koub]

[Koub] Merged into older topic with same suggestion.

[Iggy_OG]

This is a bug report for 17.17 . If you try to play in a death world in particular, there is a lot of odd behavior with the map generation. What is noted in particular here is on death world you will get enemies immediately on top of resources or so near resources that any basic production will endlessly trigger them--resulting in a map that is impossible with the basic ruleset. They are not removable via pistol, they will spawn with let's say 4 nests + worms.

The first map I got on .16 for death world marathon was playable and seemed to have a much better balance of how close enemies spawned. So this appears to be a new issue.

As a workaround I tried moving the starting area to be larger. It altered the balance too much (either there's no early threat or the threat is still in the starting zone/too early).

[BlueTemplar]

Save / map seed please ?
How many maps did you try ?

You can totally kill starting nests without any research, it's just a bit tedious :
viewtopic.php?p=404389#p404389
(And I didn't even abuse the respawn mechanic !)

[BlakeMW]

This is a bug report for 17.17 . If you try to play in a death world in particular, there is a lot of odd behavior with the map generation. What is noted in particular here is on death world you will get enemies immediately on top of resources or so near resources that any basic production will endlessly trigger them--resulting in a map that is impossible with the basic ruleset. They are not removable via pistol, they will spawn with let's say 4 nests + worms.

On Deathworld it's even possible to have nests that prevent you hand-mining a starting critical resource, for example seed 1710435349

oh now we see the violence inherent in the system.png (33.81 KiB) Viewed 4498 times

In that seed you can't mine from your god-given iron patch at all without stirring up the nest and having it stream dozens of attackers at you. I still beat that map, by doing the obvious thing: I ran off and mined from a more distant iron patch which wasn't occupied by biters then once I had turrets took out the oppressive nest.

I also beat another Deathworld (also a desert) seed 4218402958 where the biter nest had claimed my iron patch, but I could mine the bottom fifth of the patch without stirring up the nest. Of course the biters were pissed off about the pollution but nothing my pickaxe and a stack of fish couldn't handle (I think the pickaxe actually does more damage than the pistol).

I have yet to find a theoretically unbeatable Deathworld map and it seems the biter nests are sparse enough in the wider starting area (before you hit much larger, more densely packed nests with Big Worms) that you could pretty much always establish yourself by relocating your burner mining drills to an unclaimed resource patch. Once Turrets have been researched you can take out the problem nest and start building your factory properly.

So these maps certainly aren't unbeatable. To certain extent I actually like the deathliness of seeds that put a biter nest on your starting resources.
It's like: this world is trying to kill you, and isn't holding back.

[greep]

Eh, I'd say spawns are just too close across the board. Playing on a deathworld marathon, I'd say the majority of maps are basically unwinnable, whereas in previous versions, nearly every map was winnable. Maybe on deathworld some early shenanigans can allow a victory in weird situations, but you're just not gonna make it to flame turrets on DM before blue biters without a somewhat decent mining speed right from the start. A map where you have to handmine from the start because you can't even afford one mine worth of pollution feels a bit too oppressive, but the majority of the maps are this way Map preview means the situation isn't too bad, just won't hurt to push back the spawns on all difficulties.

[Koub]

Isn't Deathworld Marathon meant to be an extremely difficult experience with low chance of survival ?
It's a Death ... world. In Marathon mode.
It's like running a Marathon barefoot on piled glass, and complaining it's hard. It's meant to be hard.

[Zaflis]

Isn't Deathworld Marathon meant to be an extremely difficult experience with low chance of survival ?
It's a Death ... world. In Marathon mode.
It's like running a Marathon barefoot on piled glass, and complaining it's hard. It's meant to be hard.

That makes Default pretty hard then, no? Death world spawn size is 75%, and default 100%.

[BlueTemplar]

No, this means that nests start farther out on Default compared to DeathWorld...

greep, are you suggesting that I just got lucky with my map ?
Same game :
viewtopic.php?p=417937#p417937

(Also using map preview for this is cheating, use Restart instead.)

[Zaflis]

No, this means that nests start farther out on Default compared to DeathWorld...

Exactly what i meant. 75% and 100% is almost no difference. And we already know now that deathworld can have nests on your starting iron field.

[BlueTemplar]

Why do you think that it's almost no difference ?
(In 0.16 that was Starting Area : "Small" to "Medium" - "almost no difference"?)

EDIT : Though, as I already said :

But yeah, spawners probably shouldn't ever start so close on default settings...
Should start to be affected by pollution... if say, you go over 10 burner drills total for a red science base ?

P.S.: In 0.17, 15 burner drills = yellow belt lane of ore.

[greep]

Isn't Deathworld Marathon meant to be an extremely difficult experience with low chance of survival ?
It's a Death ... world. In Marathon mode.
It's like running a Marathon barefoot on piled glass, and complaining it's hard. It's meant to be hard.

Meh, bad starts just means more hitting seed reroll. Ideally all maps would be just barely doable and the majority of the difficulty would come from what generates further out and how well you play it, so you could just hit play without having to preview. One map allowing no pollution at start, and another in dense forest with spawners far away allowing 30, is not so great, though.