Suggestion for a Power Overhaul Mod - Interest?

[Boldar]

Hi,
as someone familiar with writing various mods for other games (although i haven't done anything ith factorio yet), and also being a physics student with having electronics as sort of a hobby, it came to my mind that one thing which factorio really needs is a more complex power System, in Terms of being more realistic.
Of course one rather obvious thing missing is losses.
So if your comments show some interest, and i get someone to volunteer for making graphics later on, i look into the api if it is possible to make a mod that:
->Introduces Voltage and Current instead of the "demand-Satisfaction" system
->Introduce power losses based on Current (so that the voltage declines)
->Introduces Transformers (several tiers with increasing maximum voltage and efficiency)
->make the machines have a maximum voltage, as well as a minimum voltage at which they can operate (at a slower speed)
->make sort of a resistance curve for machines, so that when there is not enough production, the voltage declines, and so does the current and power, so in an high demand situation the Voltage declines just like it would in real world
->if i still got time after that, introducing a complex impedance for the machines, so that an induction smelter needs for blind current compensation.
So what do you think of that?
Would you use such a mod?
thanks for any comment,
Boldar

[Rseding91]

While such a mod would be interesting it's simply not possible. None of the Factorio electric network is configured to run on anything but demand/satisfaction. The electric network in fact isn't even aware of what entity owns the consumption or generation of the energy. It doesn't know where they're located and it doesn't know what electric poles are connected to what entities.

All the electric network knows is that it has energy sources producing and energy sources consuming and that it should transfer the energy between them.

[Boldar]

While such a mod would be interesting it's simply not possible. None of the Factorio electric network is configured to run on anything but demand/satisfaction. The electric network in fact isn't even aware of what entity owns the consumption or generation of the energy. It doesn't know where they're located and it doesn't know what electric poles are connected to what entities.

All the electric network knows is that it has energy sources producing and energy sources consuming and that it should transfer the energy between them.

Well - i am aware of how it currently works, but i am not shure if it might be possible to rewrite it from scratch. The Algorithms for that are not trivial, but the time-intensive graph operations could be cached pretty well and only run when the electric network is modified. But as i have not looked into the possibilities of modding in factorio, i am not shure how much you can change. I will take a look and see.

[Rseding91]

While such a mod would be interesting it's simply not possible. None of the Factorio electric network is configured to run on anything but demand/satisfaction. The electric network in fact isn't even aware of what entity owns the consumption or generation of the energy. It doesn't know where they're located and it doesn't know what electric poles are connected to what entities.

All the electric network knows is that it has energy sources producing and energy sources consuming and that it should transfer the energy between them.

Well - i am aware of how it currently works, but i am not shure if it might be possible to rewrite it from scratch. The Algorithms for that are not trivial, but the time-intensive graph operations could be cached pretty well and only run when the electric network is modified. But as i have not looked into the possibilities of modding in factorio, i am not shure how much you can change. I will take a look and see.

The electric network is not modable aside from being able to change input/output flow limits and energy source types from burner to electric and back. I wouldn't consider what you're looking to do to be modding - it would be more re-writing how a core part of the game engine operates (writing your own version of the game engine).

[joe_da_cro]

the only way you might be able to get it to work would be using the power poles as a new conveyor system. basically power plants produce "electric" items. the items are based of voltage. i guess you can have each power pole act like a fueled building and consume electric items at a certain rate simulating the current loss. then use transformers like crackers where you input one type of electric item to produce more smaller electric items and reverse for step up.

the main challenges would be making the conveyor system act properly in a power standpoint i.e point to point. also each electric building will need to consume like power poles also making everything fueled. but this is a quick brainstorm of how i would attempt to do it with the current state of the game.