Factorio Forums

I wrote a small mod to add an artillery cannon to the game.

Patch is up as of 7-6-16 to 1.2.0
This is my first factorio mod, so there are many things I am not satisfied with, but any tips or suggestions are welcome!

sounds fun but got a json error when i put it in my mods folder any ideas

same error.. a little fix is required

Found the error. I was in a rush when I zipped it up and did not realize it needed to have a redundant folder inside the zip folder. All fixed now.

Mind if i add this to the modpacks ? Seems like a really nice addition! This should deal with the big spitters!

PS: Awesome sprite !

Yes, you may add this to any mod pack. I made it for people to enjoy!

Love it! Just wish it had a minimum range. Keeps blowing up all meh turrets lol.

SuicidalKid wrote:Love it! Just wish it had a minimum range. Keeps blowing up all meh turrets lol.

Yeh would like that aswell !

I did want it to have a min range, but everything I tried to make it happen failed. If anyone knows how to make it happen let me know so I can update it. For now just (try to) keep the creeps away from your base!

Buhamut wrote:I did want it to have a min range, but everything I tried to make it happen failed. If anyone knows how to make it happen let me know so I can update it. For now just (try to) keep the creeps away from your base!

Ill ask around a bit on the forum modding help You should also! We have a helpful community!

Buhamut wrote:I did want it to have a min range, but everything I tried to make it happen failed. If anyone knows how to make it happen let me know so I can update it. For now just (try to) keep the creeps away from your base!

What about a "don't fire at target if within this many tiles of a building"? I remember seeing about that somewhere and how the biters used it in migrating, so maybe you could "repurpose" it

This should work with most other mods right? Like Dytech for example? I think this might be the perfect solution for the problem me and a friend are having with killing stuff in Dytech.

Xterminator wrote:This should work with most other mods right? Like Dytech for example? I think this might be the perfect solution for the problem me and a friend are having with killing stuff in Dytech.

Yes, it is working with DyTech, as I'm using it in my save XD

This mod just adds 2 new items (the cannon, and the ammo) with vanilla recipe components. It should be compatible with any other mods. It does borrow the tank shell graphic for the ammo icon temporarily and the explosion2 sound effect from vanilla, so if a mod alters those it might cause something weird, but otherwise it should be fine.

Anyone got video of this thing working?

ZTStrike wrote:Anyone got video of this thing working?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkfY-Olt5nY

SuicidalKid wrote:

ZTStrike wrote:Anyone got video of this thing working?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkfY-Olt5nY

To ZTStrike: sadly that video does not have the new muzzle flash I put in, but the base functionality is the same.

General update: I think I may have a way to implement minimum range. I'm working on that now.

Mod thoughts about this mod from what I saw.
Pros:
-Great potential weapon system

Cons:
-Gun too big (3x3), I would recommend (2x2) or maybe a mortar to be added as well.
-As stated before no minimum range, they blow themselves up. Hope your idea works out.
-Physical damage is more than the explosion. (Not how real artillery works) Recommend 50 explosion and 20 physical.
-Blast range seems to be very large, (7x7?) I would recommend (5x5) or (3x3) at best.

let the forum know if you find a way to get that minimum range working!
could be used for so many situational weapon systems

ZTStrike wrote:Mod thoughts about this mod from what I saw.
Pros:
-Great potential weapon system

Cons:
-Gun too big (3x3), I would recommend (2x2) or maybe a mortar to be added as well.
-As stated before no minimum range, they blow themselves up. Hope your idea works out.
-Physical damage is more than the explosion. (Not how real artillery works) Recommend 50 explosion and 20 physical.
-Blast range seems to be very large, (7x7?) I would recommend (5x5) or (3x3) at best.

Still wresting with lua (learning how lua handles tables, and how factorio handles entities) to implement the minimum range, but making progress.

This weapon was designed to be large, its range is 200. Compare to a standard 2X1 turret with a range of 17. You need a large gun to put massive ammo that far downrange. Do a google image search for "train artillery" for some cool pics and size comparisons.
The damage numbers were based off the tank cannon shell, and are currently LOWER than the tank round (tank = 150 physical, 50 explosive / arty = 100 physical, 40 explosive). The tank round will even punch through enemies in its way with 300 physical damage. I feel that the increased range offsets the reduced damage fairly.
The physical damage is theoretically based off the shrapnel that such a large shell (not bomb designed for a massive explosion) would put out, explosive is just to propel the metal chunks, like a giant grenade.
The blast radius (10 radius circle btw) is to help make up for the inaccuracy of the artillery. Between the long reload time (currently over 8 seconds) and the inaccuracy the artillery would become useless without a high-damage, large blast radius. It takes almost a full 20 rounds before the first hive goes down, sometimes it is able to fully regenerate before the second shell scores a hit.

If you have ever played a real-time strategy game named Supreme Commander, I based this artillery design off of the tier 3 artillery, which allows base-to-base across map firepower at the cost of slow fire rate and terrible accuracy. That game also has smaller tier 2 artillery emplacements with faster fire rate, higher accuracy, but lower damage output and significantly less range. If this mod was successful, I was planning to make a variant based on the tier 2 arty, which is probably what you are after by the sounds of it.

All in all I think that I like the values I have, and while I appreciate the feedback, I do hope you understand where I was coming from when I chose the values I did.