Map gen puts enemies too close

[Koub]

75% vs 100% is a huge difference. The day I get a 25% raise in my job, I'll definitely feel the difference (not likely to happen unfortunately ^^).
it means that with equal pollution produced, the closest nests will start to produce biters and send them to you a lot earlier.
Also, if on default, nests are meant to spawn right further away the starting patches, with 75% it's understandable that the nests spawn closer.

You can get an idea of the "can't spawn closer to center of map" radius by pushing size & frequency to maximum on Enemy bases settings, and activating preview.
Check the difference between starting zone at 100%, and, for the same seed, drop it to 75%, you'll see the nests move ... within the reach of starting ore patches.

[Zaflis]

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

The extra 33% in size (1/75*100) makes this "big" difference

spawn.jpg (17.08 KiB) Viewed 3586 times

[BlueTemplar]

I'm not sure this works exactly like that - the OP seems to be the worst case for Default settings ?

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.

Again, using Preview for that is cheating - and you can already hit Play - view the map that you have been dealt, and hit Restart for as long as needed (which is generally faster than Preview.)

"all maps being just barely doable" sadly doesn't work with the wildly varying player base that would be expected for Default settings...

Otherwise, variety is good - but maybe there should be a mention in the starting message about this variety and the resulting game experiences ?

[zOldBulldog]

"all maps being just barely doable" sadly doesn't work with the wildly varying player base that would be expected for Default settings...

Otherwise, variety is good - but maybe there should be a mention in the starting message about this variety and the resulting game experiences ?

I totally agree.

Experienced players can adjust New Game settings and get exactly the kind of gameplay they like.

New players on the other hand do not think of these things. They just hit play. If a large percentage of new players get stomped so badly that they give up: They will quit, not buy the game if they were smart and tried it with the Demo version, they will badmouth the game to their friends to vent some of the frustration and... sales will drop. Common sense.

What the devs and most experienced players often forget is that it takes a lot of time and effort to learn how to build even a simple factory like a smelter. It isn't one try... it is build, realize you don't like it, tear it down, rebuild... possibly several times. You just can't learn this properly under the pressure of a biter invasion. So, the defaults - when you start the game for the first time - need to be quite peaceful. Only after you are ready and start tweaking should *your* defaults ramp up to a new level.

And perhaps this is what Factorio needs most: Save the settings you used in your last "New Game" and make them the player's default for the next "New Game". That way the defaults can start as very easy when you first install, and get tweaked over time to match your playstyle.

[BlueTemplar]

Ok, I've tried that Deathworld seed 1710435349 from above... without going to another iron patch.
Managed to kill one spawner
(which means that it should be in theory possible to kill the whole nest, as it only gets easier from there),
but it was somewhat tedious :

preview.jpg (505.59 KiB) Viewed 3560 times

Also, you start far enough that brute-forcing your way through using respawns doesn't work - the spawners regenerate about as fast as you're able to damage them - I instead had to prepare myself by dying a few times to gather ammo, and go fishing for a bit before assaulting the nest.
I also had to keep perpetually moving : without any armor, if you get surrounded by biters, even a stack of fish won't save you...

P.S.: took me 9 minutes, with the false start of trying to brute-force the nest,
evolution at 1.3% : 85% time, 15% for the first spawner kill.

[greep]

I'm not sure this works exactly like that - the OP seems to be the worst case for Default settings ?

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.

Again, using Preview for that is cheating - and you can already hit Play - view the map that you have been dealt, and hit Restart for as long as needed (which is generally faster than Preview.)

"all maps being just barely doable" sadly doesn't work with the wildly varying player base that would be expected for Default settings...

Otherwise, variety is good - but maybe there should be a mention in the starting message about this variety and the resulting game experiences ?

Hitting preview to find out if a map is literally unplayable is cheating? Well, if you want to play that way go for it. Play and then restart is just a longer form of using preview, so that is basically cheating in your book ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ You need to go real hardcore: play a map and then uninstall if you lose. No second chances.

Edit: sarcasm aside, playing and then hitting restart won't solve the large island or no oil/second iron in radar range possibilities. Which are rare, but they do happen and you don't find out for like an hour. Not using preview is ideal, but I'd rather not waste time.

Anyways, I do agree default map is way more important to balance, although sensible balancing makes sense for any preset map. And since biters are too close around the board, it's probably easiest to just push it all back rather than alter every biter setting for every difficulty.

[BlueTemplar]

You know what I mean...

I've yet to see a really unwinnable map with vanilla presets.
Large island can be solved by landfill - you start with stone after all !
I don't see how no oil in radar range is an issue, my current game :

UbfjxmY.png (470.91 KiB) Viewed 3535 times

Bottom left is the oil spot that I picked - because there were no big nests nearby, and a nice, big forest.
It's twice farther than my closest oil field, but IMHO it was worth it - I did the first half a dozen trips with car (don't underestimate how fast they are, especially with solid/rocket fuel !), then set up a train line...
Same would go for second iron.
I'd say that quirks like these are what actually makes each game different (assuming no/same mods).

And finding out in advance in preview "the ordering of your deck" takes IMHO all the fun out of the exploration part of the game !
You might as well play on a "fixed" map like this :

I'd say that it's better not to use preview, but considering the typical game length, still allow yourself a way out via map editor/cheat codes if you think that you're really stuck... (and not at the first difficulty !)

[SirSmuggler]

With the random nature of the terrain/resource/biter generation, it will be next to imposible to get a "default" setting that allways generates a properly hard game. It will inevitably some times produce a "to hard" map and other times a "to easy" map, even if most of them will be okish.
The randomnes is a great appeal to many players though, so we want to keep it.

One solution could be to make the default standard game only pick randomly from a number of fixed seeds that the devs have reviewed and deamed good enough. And to get a totaly random seed you need to tick some box in the settings?

[BlueTemplar]

Ah, yes, there's often an "equalizer" option in games relying on random starts - though these options tend to be designed for PvP.

The starting resources, starting area being free of spawners, and getting a free gun and 10 magazines upon death are such features already in the game.
But the respawn feature is too obscure for new SP players, and the default starting area should probably be made bigger - it's not like Death World can't stay as hard - there's still a lot of room between 0% and 75% !

[zOldBulldog]

With the random nature of the terrain/resource/biter generation, it will be next to imposible to get a "default" setting that allways generates a properly hard game. It will inevitably some times produce a "to hard" map and other times a "to easy" map, even if most of them will be okish.
The randomnes is a great appeal to many players though, so we want to keep it.

One solution could be to make the default standard game only pick randomly from a number of fixed seeds that the devs have reviewed and deamed good enough. And to get a totaly random seed you need to tick some box in the settings?

The problem of too easy / too hard "defaults" is not difficult to solve. For example:

- Set *initial* defaults (when the game is first installed) easy enough for the most inexperienced beginner to successfully survive and launch the first rocket.

- Remember the last New Game settings as the default. . Of course the player can change those the next time he starts a game.

It is that simple... the default becomes whatever is right for the individual player.

Then, optionally (because it is not necessarily easy to program), it is possible to challenge the player by analyzing the player's past game style and success level and popping up a prompt that offers a list of setting changes. If the player accepts (or tweaks then accepts) those changes are used for the game and become the current defaults. Of course there would have to be the usual checkbox to say "stop prompting me" and a settings option that allows turning the feature on and off.

[Zaflis]

It's a problem if experienced players feel like "default" is perfect for them. They should tune things harder to compensate.

Say Starcraft 2 for example. Do people keep playing against medium level AI after first few days? No, that's far too easy for anyone experienced. Factorio is set hard from the get go, that's the only reason we still find the default challenging. And that's why it's harmful setting for new players. We want to increase the community, not shrink it by people getting frustrated and quitting.