Factorio Forums

Hello,

I have played off and on for years. Often I want to find a "perfect" blueprint .... such as an optimal setup for oil, green circuits, science packs, etc. Is there a collection of these somewhere?

Googling for these things is problematic since a lot of people will label their work "best green circuit" but this is just something they use to boost their clicks. And also, google doesn't really differentiate between versions.

So, long story short, I am looking for a collection of blueprints that have actually been tested and are relatively current.

Thanks for any help.

Doesn't exist, probably never will.

that is a shame, it is very difficult for a noob to figure out what the best direction to go is

The best direction to go in is the direction that works. You'll learn, usually the hard way, that you need to keep expansion in mind, and then you'll learn the harder way that you didn't keep it in mind enough.

Some blueprints, like balancers or train stations, are relatively easy to find, because they are relatively standard, and don't change in modded play. A 4-to-4 balancer, for example, can be found very easily, and somewhere in one of my 0.16 saves I have a book of all 64 X-to-X balancers from one to eight, and another book with a few larger balancers. (I stole the first from one of Griswold's saves.)

Green circuits on the other hand: How many do you want? What belts, buildings, and productivity modules do you have? Which mods are you using? What stage of the game are you in? Do you want something that scales readily? Are you using bots, belts, or trains?

By most measures, the "best" blueprints will use blue belts, Assembler 3s, and stack inserters, and assume you have an infinite supply of bots. Most will also include modules and beacons. As a newb, you oh-so-totally have all of these when you're first trying to figure out the best way to make green chips.


I use Helmod to help me figure out the best way to do things, within the constraints of the available buildings and modules, and I've heard good things about Factory Planner. Factory Planner, in my experience, can't answer complicated questions about oil refineries. Helmod, on the other hand is really good at answering the complicated question you asked, even if that bears only a passing resemblance to the question you intended to ask.
Once I figure out how many buildings I need, getting them arranged is where ghosts and Picker Dollies shine. As long as you don't save your game with these mods enabled, you can export (or even screenshot) your carefully-designed factory that makes 60 green chips per minute in Assembling Machine 1s, with no bots or modules, unload the mods, and reload your save, while preserving your achievements.

Cronie wrote: ↑Tue Sep 24, 2019 11:24 pm that is a shame, it is very difficult for a noob to figure out what the best direction to go is

The best direction is having fun playing the game. Not waiting for someone to serve you the solution on a silver tablet. Learning is a process, you can't skip it if you want to get better.

Cronie wrote: ↑Tue Sep 24, 2019 11:24 pm that is a shame, it is very difficult for a noob to figure out what the best direction to go is

So who shall decide on "the best"? Who decides who shall judge? What circumstance are to be considered and what is actually your scale to measure "best"?
Is best
* exact ratios, irrespective of how large the setup is or just that a full belt comes out?
* Is bots usage faster and thus better even when it taks more energy or less UPS?
* is it nearly exact ratios, but tile-able, thus easily scaled to the actual needed output?
* Does it use beacons, and if so how many and which?
* Does the energy consumption matter to you?
* Does the footprint matter and do you need input by iron plates or do you input the gears into the machinery (just as an example) - or do you input ores directly?

If you play a few games, and possibly also on a few servers you will quickly find that there's good solutions. Bookmark those for you. But there certainly is not "the best" solution to problems. And every map needs different solutions as you might measure your success differently.