Friday Facts #159 - Research revolution

[kovarex]

Are the new science pack recipes set in stone?

I ask this because the High Tech science pack puzzles me. It already has 3 PUs which contain a total of 240 copper cables and a speed module which contains 49 copper cables, then you have to add another 30 additional copper cables.

Is that just to have an additional input (belt, swarm of drones, whatever) to manage?

Also, the FF shows that it will be buildable in an assembler 2, is that just a mockup error since 4 inputs requires an assembler 3?

Nothing is set in stone.
The point of the extra wire is trolling Just kidding. Or not?
The point is to force little bit different setup than just 3-4 ingredients on belts. From playing the game, I feel that the high tech + production science packs should probably be cheaper, so we might make them doable in pairs ...

[aubergine18]

It would be great if tech tree prerequisites could facilitate OR operation, for example:

Code: Select all

-- in a tech prototype...
prerequisites = {
  { "tech-a", "tech-b" }, -- both a and b
  -- or...
  { "tech-c", "tech-d'"} -- both c and d
}

This way player could be presented with different strategic paths through tech tree.

Likewise, if recipes could be enabled with AND operator (so they need tech-a and tech-b for example. This would facilitate special recipes that are harder than usual to obtain as they require research in more than one branch.

Some previous discussion on this topic: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=33147

[TigBits]

It will be interesting to see what the final recipes will be for the various science packs. I'm curious to know what the total cost (in raw materials) of completing all the research will be compared to now.

[Kevin Ar18]

To kovarex:
Any chance you could include a "slider" that lets us increase/decrease the science rate on a "per game" basis?

I found that by increasing just 3 settings: (lab power usage, beaker amounts, and research time) you can create games that last much longer and give you a reason to build larger factory setups.

This could be done as a mod, but ideally it should be built into the game so you can set each save game to different settings.

Details here: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=28900

[kovarex]

This is already being worked, didn't we mention it? We probably should. In a little bit different way, but something like that. We will also add different level of recipe costs and maybe other things.

[Deadly-Bagel]

lol, 100x recipe costs but standard lab setup. You'll need 250 Assemblers to feed a half dozen labs xD

[mr_rieper7]

Has anyone thought of using alien artifacts in the Military science packs?

The idea is that if you want to pursue combat in the game you need to actually take part in combat (with the aliens) or you can forgo combat and then you don't need to fight to upgrade weapons.
The lower level military techs would require only red / red/green but higher levels require military science packs which would in turn require alien artifacts.

This would create a positive feedback loop of the more you fight the better you can get at fighting.
I think this will be a more rewarding setup than pure automation of weapon upgrading.

On the topic of turrets;
People often compare laser and gun turrets and have come to the conclusion that gun turrets have better damage but laser has more range.
Why not emphasize these differences between turrets?

The gun turret benefits from it's own damage research path and the ammo path, why not give the laser turrets a range upgrade research?
This would emphasize that even though they have some overlap the turrets have synergy when used together.
Perhaps even an HP/armor/whatever upgrade path for gun turrets so they can be used more effectively in front of laser turrets.

I use the "Beam laser' mod so I don't have to worry about delay to hit but maybe this can be made native instead or requiring a mod?

As for turret creep, I have no ideas at this time.

[hoho]

We will also add different level of recipe costs and maybe other things.

So, basically, when you turn sliders to 11, you get Marathon mod-like experience in vanilla?

I hope it'll work out-of-box with mods as well or at least will be trivial to support.

[kovarex]

We will also add different level of recipe costs and maybe other things.

So, basically, when you turn sliders to 11, you get Marathon mod-like experience in vanilla?

I hope it'll work out-of-box with mods as well or at least will be trivial to support.

We decided, that changing recipes automatically would be too uncontrollable, so every recipe will have optional cheaper and more expensive version definition. Mods would have to change their definitions to take advantage of this, but it should be pretty easy.

[hoho]

every recipe will have optional cheaper and more expensive version definition

Does that mean up to three definitions in total and the two optional ones are respectively "easy" and "hard" mode with default being "normal"?

[Kaufcraft]

Hello, is there already a mod available somewhere that uses the new research system as suggested in this Friday Facts. I would very much like to already play the game with that. Ideally the developers could provide kind of a preview mod for this system. I dont know how much work that would mean and, thus, how bold exactly this request is. But it would be really nice.

[steinio]

Hello, is there already a mod available somewhere that uses the new research system as suggested in this Friday Facts. I would very much like to already play the game with that. Ideally the developers could provide kind of a preview mod for this system. I dont know how much work that would mean and, thus, how bold exactly this request is. But it would be really nice.

Peppe has a Christmas present for you: https://mods.factorio.com/mods/Peppe/ResearchRevolution

Greetings steinio

[Gotcha_The_Spider]

One word: Garbage cans.

Inventories get full of junk you never use all the time, it would be useful to destroy your leftover burner mining drills, burner inserters, steam engines, etc. Please add a garbage can to compensate for this so you don't just have to either fill up a chest with junk or go out and throw the stuff on the ground somewhere or do the first one I named but set the junk chest on fire. Please just add a garbage can.

[Syrchalis]

SyncViews and me played some days with the new science packs and we had a bit trouble with them here and there.

First, the change to blue science is appreciated. The complexity feels a lot lower and the transition is smoother.

However, we had huge trouble to get enough Assembly Machines 2 made. They cost 44 iron each, which is just ridiculous. By now we have about four blue belts of iron and even our high tech science gets produced faster than the blue science.

In terms of resources the transition feels just too harsh, nearly like it felt too harsh in complexity in 0.14. Red Science needs 2 iron 1 copper, green science needs 5.5 iron and 1.5 copper, blue science needs 46 iron and I think 7 copper or so. Especially if you take into account military and production science it becomes clear that blue science is a bit out of place. They both need about the same iron, more copper and production needs steel as well in huge quantities (30 steel), but both of them produce two science packs per craft. Blue only gets one.

Maybe filter inserters are a better pick than assembly machines? They require lots of green circuits and would push players to get a good green circuit production up - something they will need afterwards anyway. Raw material wise they are also pretty even in iron and copper. The extremely iron heavy assembly machines force you to build an enormous iron production, while you are going to need copper instead afterwards.

Production science also felt a bit too expensive, mostly due to electric furnaces requiring so much iron and advanced circuits, but it was more or less manageable with 30k advanced circuits per hour.

[steinio]

Well you play with a mod and not with the official 15.0.
The author created this mod as a playable version of this FFF.

Since then the whole concept could have changed and nobody knows but the developers.

I don't like to use end products instead of intermediates for science. This makes it unnecessary complicated.

Greetings steinio

[bobingabout]

Has anyone thought of using alien artifacts in the Military science packs?

Yes. I will probably end up doing something like that for my mods.

[Syrchalis]

Well you play with a mod and not with the official 15.0.
The author created this mod as a playable version of this FFF.

Since then the whole concept could have changed and nobody knows but the developers.

I don't like to use end products instead of intermediates for science. This makes it unnecessary complicated.

Greetings steinio

I am aware, but since they aren't giving us any updates we have to assume it stayed as it was. I merely want to give feedback so they can work with it. What they do with my feedback is their thing, but without any feedback they have a harder time developing and balancing things, because they need to base everything on their own experience.

And I know from personal experience how hard it is to make something truly balanced and good in a game without someone from the outside giving you an opinion.

For me blue science is simply too much of a cost jump.

(Engine = 1 steel 4 iron plate) so a total of 50 Iron plates, 14 copper plates 1 steel plate and 2 plastic bars.
Red -> Green is +175% Iron, +50% Copper
Green -> Blue is +810% Iron, +833% Copper, addition of plastic and steel

You see where I'm coming from? The +833% for copper doesn't matter, because the base value was so low (1,5 copper plates) but for Iron it's pretty ridiculous.



Even compared to the other two sciences (military being more early than blue and production being more late) it just is not really proportionate. You need to take into account that you get two sciences per craft for these.

This also nicely shows why I think the electric furnace is a bit expensive for this science (it's not too expensive as an item, just as an ingredient) - it adds stone to the already complex recipe, it requires 5! advanced circuits and to top it off it requires tons of steel. We had to expand our steel to pretty insane levels when we did production science. Currently we are creating 6,7k processing units and 43k advanced circuits per hour, and our 30k steel per hour pretty much entirely go into science.

[mrvn]

One word: Garbage cans.

Inventories get full of junk you never use all the time, it would be useful to destroy your leftover burner mining drills, burner inserters, steam engines, etc. Please add a garbage can to compensate for this so you don't just have to either fill up a chest with junk or go out and throw the stuff on the ground somewhere or do the first one I named but set the junk chest on fire. Please just add a garbage can.

Garbage cans are easy although not reusable: Build a wooden chest, place it, fill it, burn it.
You can also let aliens take out the trash.

[Rseding91]

Inventories get full of junk you never use all the time, it would be useful to destroy your leftover burner mining drills, burner inserters, steam engines, etc.

No they don't. You have to purposefully make a ton of extra of those items constantly for your statement to be true. In any normal game you might have a handful (less than a stack) of each of those things by the time you finish a given map. Hardly worth making a dedicated feature to get rid of them.

[Syrchalis]

I usually destroy 20 wooden chests of junk each game. They are usually not full, sometimes only one item is in there. But you can also just make a chest (any type) and use that as a garbage container for the whole game. If it's a steel chests I guarantee you it will not get full, ever.

Only if you throw wood in there, then maybe. But you can burn wood if necessary.