Friday Facts #275 - 0.17 Science changes

[morsk]

I wonder how much of the current Gun Turret balance is intended, and if they'll be weaker at endgame without the double-dipping from 2 techs. They're completely OP with Uranium bullets and 1-2 Space upgrades, and I don't even put walls in front of them. https://imgur.com/1sp27fX.png But the lasers are so easy to use, and so easy to just tile more of, that the gun turret has to be really good for me to consider it at all. Already most people don't use it.

[Rythe]

Please stop accusing us of awful things because of minor disagreements.

That's 27 pages of "minor disagreement" which only wound down when it became clear that Wube couldn't care less.

How about we accuse you of bad faith arguments and deliberate myopia? Because those charges your team has earned, V453000.

I stepped away previously because I read between the lines and figured out you were pretending to have principles around a simple lack of interest in other viewpoints, the 'pretending' part amounting to a lot of words where you cast your failings onto me and others who shared my viewpoint to one degree or another.

Just to keep the record straight, and to explain the hard feelings that keep cropping up from a few.

But that's not entirely why I'm here.

The naming convention for the new science packs is almost serviceable but not there yet. 'Utility' is just bad. 'Automation' could be better; you're trying too hard on the suggestion with that. 'Manufacturing' is better in that it's clearer and people generally have a better idea of what that means as opposed to tossing 'Automation' at them, particularly when the automation process involves a lot of logistics items.

Kinetic would be better than Physical. Right crowd for it too.

Using rails as a science pack ingredient is...very flawed. People have explained why in their own ways. I agree and could add more reasoning, but you don't care about the things I care about, so deaf ears and all that.

[5thHorseman]

I've read all the arguments and I still don't see why rails are such a bad choice for science packs, assuming that science packs made of semirandom stuff from the game is a good choice.

I can understand the argument against 30 of them, but I like how - from a gameplay perspective - two science ingredients require two different things that require two different forms of rock ore.

[Darkehart]

I like everything described in this FFF, except some of the names. A lot of people have complained about red and green already but I can see where you're going with them. Utility, however, is an awful name. Hi-tech is perfectly fine for what it covers and meets the design goal of having a unique first letter.

The use of rails seems contentious a bit but I honestly don't mind it as such, it's just kinda simple, donchya think? Some other railway related item might be a more interesting alternative, though I haven't really crunched numbers on the options. This is just going off my intuition.

I dearly love the military science pack recipe change. Bring on the death worlds! <3

I will say, though, that this multiple routes idea is kind of weak. Don't get me wrong, I really like giving them clearer identities, but Production and Hi-tech science are pretty simple to build together (as I usually do), collectively forming what I think of as "phase three" of my factory's growth since you need both of them to launch rockets anyway. On that note, red and green do the same thing as "phase one," so it would be nice if they can be made more distinct in the future, as well.

[Rythe]

I've read all the arguments and I still don't see why rails are such a bad choice for science packs, assuming that science packs made of semirandom stuff from the game is a good choice.

Oh fine, since you asked so nicely.

Some of the arguments are about the type of puzzle that rails present. It doesn't fit neatly into the groove of certain players in one sense or another, like maybe it doesn't allow for the sort of optimizations/construction ratios they're hoping for. I'll leave that be.

But the others are about theme, and this is a worthy complaint. Rails are an intermediate-level, logistics staple end-product like belts are. Putting thirty rails into the Production science packs is about the same as putting in thirty red-ish belts. Where yellow belts work for Logistic science packs, it breaks the theme or pattern for the tier 3 Production packs. Too low tech; wrong domain of item.

Now Wube won't care because they've made the decision based on purely mechanical factors, as in, thirty rails are about the right production cost and feed complexity they're hoping for. The bit about wanting to emphasize train networks to allow for greater material throughput for larger production base is post-hoc rationalization to pretend it's in theme when it really, really isn't.

Amusingly enough, this argument is, in fact, an echo of what happened with the pickaxe. It's a ripple from the choice they made there. For all I can tell, Wube's making these sorts of choices in the echo-chamber of a group of programmers. Who, as a group of programmers, don't appreciate or understand theme that well. See Microsoft's infamous UI designs for longest time, and similarly, the UI of Factorio for the longest time. They'll high-res the graphics as a surface-level nod to theme and its importance to people in general, but they can't perceive/appreciate how it filters down and matters at the mechanical level.

So I don't see Wube changing it. Rails tick the right boxes per them, and that's as far as it goes.

[ske]

I've read all the arguments and I still don't see why rails are such a bad choice for science packs, assuming that science packs made of semirandom stuff from the game is a good choice.

The thing bothering me the most is waste management... it's just not there. Rails are massive. You put in 30 of them and get out something tiny. The more stuff you need to produce something the more tiny it seems to get half the time. Where is all the waste going? Where are the side products?

This is what you get if you don't think about something very hard up-front and instead build it and try to deal with the mess later... at least we have a game now. Inconsistent, yes, but playable... yes. Results trump over consistency.

[#endgame]

I think this all looks quite promising. Specific comments:

* I never liked how speed module 1 was used as an "alternate circuit" in a bunch of end-game recipes. Having productivity modules in the science pack recipes makes it feel less weird, though now efficiency modules are the odd one out.

* It would be really cool to have a fluid input for blue (chemical) science packs. Lubricant (or just heavy oil) is a possible choice, since then you have an input from each product that comes from refining crude.

* Turn down the crafting time for chemical science, imho. It doesn't help anyone.

* Some uranium-derived product in one of the late science packs would be welcome, I think. Nuclear isn't so well integrated into the game yet because it's still comparatively new.

* 30 rails is a really silly number for purple (production) science packs. I can't think of a good fit here, but assembly machine 2 seems to be the least-bad option. Concrete or refined concrete could be an option, too. If chemical science gets a fluid input then having a bulk input for production science feels less odd.

* Speaking of bulk inputs/outputs, having loaders as a late-game way to move bulk items on belts would help with production science, and add another level of throughput above stack inserters that isn't just a hive of upgraded bots.

* Reworked military science recipe is good.

* Utility science is not an evocative name. Hi-tech did a good job of positioning it in the tree.

* Pipes in green (logistics) science packs sound good, but that recipe is already pretty iron-heavy. Copper pipes feel like an unsatisfactory answer, unless you did something to justify their existence. Maybe put them in more recipes, or prevent iron and copper pipes from cross-connecting so denser plumbing becomes possible?

[m44v]

Infinite research is mostly military upgrades, so except for production upgrades they lose their appeal very quickly once bitters reach their evolution cap. V453000's Gridlock map really highlights this as he really didn't take any of the space science upgrades and his outposts are just defended by lazily build line of laser turrets (you have to load his game for see that, since there are no screenshots of the defensive lines, obviously because it wasn't interesting to look at). And that's it, that's just what is needed for keep bitters at bay.
Adding an infinite evolution difficulty level (that continuously increases bitter's stats) would help to give utility to infinite research.

Also I want to echo the concern that some people made that since uranium isn't used in science then there aren't enough sinks for it, although maybe is just that uranium is too abundant with the current map generator.

In any case, I think the changes shown in this FFF are an improvement over the current state.

It's true that past some point it gets trivial. You still do need to do something to address them though, with defenses, probably automated artillery, maybe nukes.

However, IF it was getting progressively harder, you would probably see hundreds of hours long saves suddenly come to a point of being simply impossible / or there would be a certain line of average SPM that you would have to keep up in for example laser turret damage in order to survive in the long term. I don't think that's a great idea.

Yes, that's why I meant it as a difficulty setting, like a deathworld mode that's actually true to the Deathworld book. It doesn't have to be like I suggested, but give some purpose to infinite combat research because as it stands now you just research mining productivity and nothing else.

If biters are making you spend time with defenses - researching and improving them, automating repairs, sending supplies, automating artillery etc, they already did their job.

I'm digressing since this is more of a balance issue than a science one, but I'm going to disagree that they are going their job properly when "spending time with defences" is mostly about supplying energy and repair packs to laser turrets. Supplying gun turrets and flame throwers is a more interesting problem to solve but they're largely overkill, so unless you go out of your way to use them you just play with laser turrets. I'm ignoring artillery and nukes because they're offensive weapons not used for defence.

Thanks for replying.

[5thHorseman]

But the others are about theme, and this is a worthy complaint. Rails are an intermediate-level, logistics staple end-product like belts are. Putting thirty rails into the Production science packs is about the same as putting in thirty red-ish belts. Where yellow belts work for Logistic science packs, it breaks the theme or pattern for the tier 3 Production packs. Too low tech; wrong domain of item.

I suppose I can see that. I'm not hot on there being 30 of them that's for sure, and the fact that they're low tech is likely the cause.

I still don't understand why it's such a huge problem, though. I mean, we're stuffing junk into an assembler and popping out "science packs". When you dissect it enough it doesn't make sense anyway and it's all just there to give our factories purpose. Which I'm totally fine with, I mean you need a reason to pump out so much product.

The thing bothering me the most is waste management... it's just not there.

Well no, but waste management isn't anywhere in the game at all. Think of exactly how much mass you shove into those little bottles NOW, without rails in the recipe, and the fact that those bottles go into labs and vanish. Why is that fine and the extra mass from the rails is the breaking point?

[Philip017]

yeya science packs now all have proper names, would have prefered logistics to be the one used for .... the logistics system, aka robot logistics, yellow science... and call the green science transportation.

pipes in green science is fine with me, you balanced out the other sciences that use less iron, so having this extra sink seems appropriate.

i totally agree with moving military to the third position in the set, i always set up military before blue because blue requires setting up oil and that takes a while. as for walls instead of turrets, i have no problem with this move, as i usually already have automated stone smelting done at this point.

i always rush advanced oil, usually making a simple oil starting setup to get some plastic and solid outing the other products, to hand craft the necessary blue science to complete it, long before i have any robots. switching blue science to use solid fuel will put an even higher strain on oil processing, also adding 3 advanced circuits means even more plastic. oil being one of the highest pollution generating and least rich product in the game, i hope that you balance this a bit better allowing even higher oil richnesses. the max setting on the richness meter at current is still too low for me imo. and once the pumps get drained it's speed modules and beacons all around to try and get the oil out. i would recommend dropping the advanced circuit count down to 2 to keep that item in line with previous and add something else if you feel the need to make it use more iron/copper, pipes here maybe?

also no one would use heavy oil to make solid fuel once cracking is available, use light oil, it's the best on crude oil, using only 10 light to make 1 solid instead of 20 heavy or gas. imo light oil icon should be shown on the tool tips instead of heavy oil.

the reason that blue science takes so long is because setting up oil takes a good long time.
rails to the oil site, because now spawns don't have any oil. pump jacks, storage tanks and pumps. then set up receiving oil at the base with more storage tanks and pumps. set up oil refineries, with planned locations for cracking and solid. running pipes for all the inputs and outputs of the refineries; and i usually run the water in preparation for advanced processing.
water on the heavy oil side. which so many times i have to try and remember which one does the water go in again? maybe you can just disable (leave without accepting any input) the input on basic oil processing that accepts water on advanced oil processing, so there is no guessing later, unused at this time basically.

don't know if i like the change to using rails in purple science. but it will produce an interesting logistics challenge, and now i'm gonna will need a ton of stone coming down the bus to feed into production science. also i never use productivity 1 modules, i don't use any modules at all until i have a decent solar or nuclear power setup complete, i will get them started making however, as i know i will need plenty of them, processors get modules first, followed by green then red circuits.

with the stone sink fully loaded now adding more stone to purple science and adding stone to military, importing stone for concrete and landfill will mean having a long train for stone and more depots necessary. never cared for setting up outposts for mining resources, and these changes means hopefully more interest in a mod that will help you set them up, i can think of a few i have tried, and none really did the job well.

low density structures in yellow science? interesting change there and now they are much more expensive on copper 20 vs 5... will have to see how it plays out. also i usually have personal robots long before i even start creating yellow or purple science, because at the point where i begin creating blue science, i stop and begin making personal construction robots so i don't have to place everything by hand any longer. this is also why i rush cracking, even though i will spend alot of gas on red circuits, i need the lube for making robots and gas for sulfuric to make batteries for robot frames. not bad changes here.

as for my usual creation, i build red and green, almost completely research red and green science before i finish my main bus. once i finish my main bus with my toolbelt, and belt maker, aka shopping mall, then i set up proper red, green and military science, and do the remainder of military, red and green science while setting up oil production, once a partial oil is setup and the blue science is started then i get advanced oil FIRST, then usually robot speed because by this point i usually have personal robots. i have personal robots very early, despite not being able to power them, i mine them by hand, it's alot faster than building the entire blueprint by hand most times. i then finish off setting up my steel smelting and the rest of my green circuits, red circuits, oil processing, batteries and processors. finally i build both purple and yellow science at the same time and get to the robot logistics system asap. finally after all that i begin adding additional outposts and start a major robot based factory while the belt based factory supplies very slow modules, science, and the components to make the roboted bases supplies until finally the belt based factory is out of materials and the new robot based factory is running at full speed.

lol on the rocket science but yeah it is still going to be called that because you have to get them from a rocket silo, and send the "parts" into the rocket to get the science out.
maybe someone will make a mod where you actually have to build the rocket/shuttle/satellite in a separate assembly plants. transport the shuttle to the launcher pad, and then wait for the satelite to do its job and fly back down to the earth and land before collecting the science it discovered instead of a silo doing everything. a little more interactive than current.

using his spreadsheet... and summing it on the costs of the science changes over all:
iron: uses less about 70% of 16
copper: also less 70% until you do space science then about 94% (the same)
coal is the same more or less.
stone: more than twice as much 217% ... previous was only 20 in production now 35 but gives 3 so about 7% more stone used. but military now uses 20 stone, so anything military related science will cost more stone in the form of bricks.
crude oil: more is used at 110% ... let us hope the optimizations of fluids helps, and i wish for better richnesses of crude as well! although once you get prod 3 modules out it will be closer to the same. but that will come later, so get out those modules!

cant burn small poles/chests any more? wow! i still like the idea of recycling the old crap. i do use a recycling mod that takes apart the old crap and turns it into the product it previously was, although i have had friends that have cheesed this and used the reverse factory with productivity modules to produce free items, i have never used it like this, only used it to take apart junk and get useful items back, as for vanilla the items that are never used again like the burner miners/inserters, iron chests, they get sucked up into the logistics system after i get the logistics system running and forgotten about, just would be nice to be able to do something with these left over items. instead of recycling then, perhaps the previous generation would be required to make the next item? small pole is needed to make medium, and medium to make big. same with chests, wood box is needed to make iron, and iron to make steel chest. and again same with personal armors. this would then require vanilla to have some form of automated wood production, i would love to be able to plant trees in vanilla, it would certainly help with the pollution problem. on the final hand, you could simply remove the icons on the entities that show fuel. you can still burn wood poles and boxes and could even remove the listing of the fuel value, so unless you already know you can burn them, then until you place them in the burner manually where they can be burned for fuel, you would never know.

as for the change to win the game by launching a empty rocket. i suggest that the satellite still be available to send up regardless and be it that it was included or not, you can still "win" / "finish" the game without the satellite, but for me i will set the rocket to auto launch with satellite and set up some automation to get it to automatically launch under the conditions i want by inserting the satellite. i ignore the "victory" screen as i want to launch hundreds of rockets and maybe we can get a "victory" screen for launching xxx number of rockets, or maybe just an achievement, i might suggest a number greater than a hundred, maybe you want more than one achievement to launch 100, 500 and 1000?

anyway hope you keep on making improvements and look forward to giving it all a go!

[fur_and_whiskers]

Just spotted this thread on Reddit, all credit to those concerned.
https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comme ... condition/

~~You can enter the rocket silo like a vehicle once a rocket has been built. The rocket can hold up to 8 people. You launch yourself into space. No additional products / research required. Only one person needs to make it to space to have everyone in-game win. ~~
Once in-space, everyone gets a cutscene of a rocket orbiting a planet. You get the victory cutscene, congratulations, and the achievements. You now have a choice:
* "Take me home, captain" - the rocket flies back to earth / your home planet of choice. Save and exit.
* "Wait! I left the furnace on!" - return to the planet, keep building the factory. Save and continue.
* EDIT, from /u/Gabernasher : More heartstrings: “This is my home now, I want to stay with my factory” Save and continue

Please consider Wube!!

[Tricorius]

I'm ignoring artillery and nukes because they're offensive weapons not used for defence.

I use artillery primarily for defense. If you pound the goo out of any bugs that try to get close, they stay a lot further away from your pollution cloud.

I deliver artillery shells to every wall. And every wall has artillery turrets. It saves on a lot of turret ammo.

Sure, when I want to push out to a new resource deposit, I’ll often send out an artillery train to soften the region. But sometimes, if I have to personally go out anyway, I’ll just load up on some combat bots and take a PAX train as close as possible. Then just go melt all the bugs in the region.

:: shrug ::

In general I’m amused by arguments against something for the sole reason of it “not making sense”. (I totally understand the personal emotional component, I strongly dislike the belt-weaving mechanic due to it being physically impossible in any universe that works like ours.) But I do realize that a “realism” argument in a game like Factorio is a pretty slippery slope.

Luckily, I’m able to abstract a lot of the graphical elements as tokens representing something. I don’t actually assume that all those labs are literally pouring out a bunch of different colored liquid from a bunch of bottles into giant vats and turning it into knowledge sludge.

Using rails doesn’t bother me. I get the symbolic (and gameplay) reasons.

[Arzorth]

Hi everyone!

I’m very happy with the proposed changes overall, but I’ve always thought from the beginning (from my first run basically) that the Portable fusion reactor is not justified.

Let me explain myself:

Fusion energy is quite more complex to achieve than fission energy, so for me it makes no sense that while you still need to power up your base with fission reactors you (somehow) get the technology to develop a fancy portable fusion reactor.

Technology downsizing is just a step ahead “normal size” technology. For a portable fusion reactor you should previously master regular fusion technology.

The problem of this technology chain (fission energy -> fusion energy-> downsized fusion energy) is that it would take so much time to have enough portable energy and then personal roboports, exoskeletons and so on.

So my idea is to use RTG (Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator) instead of Portable Fusion Reactors, at least as a first portable energy tier (after solar panels). It is much easier to justify as it is even simpler than fission nuclear energy. It could need Uranium-235 in its recipe (although in real life it uses mainly Plutonium-238).

Here the link to the Wikipedia site:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisot ... _generator

RTG has been used in the space industry (in which I work) for a very long time, especially for long missions around and out of the solar system where sun light is not enough to power a space probe with solar panels. It is (as its name suggest) a radioactive technology so it is not very healthy to carry it in your backpack but since you can hold U-235 in your hands... who cares? xd

Its lifespan is huge so it can be made as a permanent item but to do it more realistic you could implement an overtime degradation (very long time) so that when it ends its life it just breaks and disappear (as damaged armours) and you have to craft a new one.

I’ve been thinking about how to introduce fusion energy in the game as very late game source of energy but it would be hard to balance (as fusion energy, if we manage to achieve it someday, is too overpowered). It may be nice to power your entire base with just fusion energy but I let that in your hands =)

I hope you like this little change (Portable fusion reactor -> Portable RTG), at the end is not a big modification and it gives a bit more realism to the game. Maybe you just have to modify the recipe to use some U-235 instead of only processing units.

Best regards!

Arzorth

[Robib]

Hello.
After reading about the Science change i must say, it give me some thoughts.
This is based on that i'm only playing Train World.

As other have pointet out, the greater need for rails and walls as part of research, give some concerns about the stones or lack of it.
In an earlyer change in the map generator it seems that stone fields was downsized. So in the start game the fields are small if they are nearby players start point. There can be a very long way out to a field with a good amount of stone, if settings had not being change prior to map generating.
So smal amount of stone couldt be a "killing point" as they become essentiel to the research progress.

I'm not sure that understand the choice been made for the use of productivity module in research. I'm never use that module because it dosen't make any sense to me. I uses more energy and pollute more with a very litlle gain. Therefore i'm only using speed modules. So i think it would be more appropiate that it is the speed module that would be used, as they also could support the production.

I think it could be nice, if the request chest could be unlocked earlyer than it do now. There are pretty long time where logistic robots are only servants to the player but can't support production. The player almost have build the hole production line of items, before the request chest gets into game.

I think i was my 10 cent.
Keep up the good work.

[V453000]

I've read all the arguments and I still don't see why rails are such a bad choice for science packs, assuming that science packs made of semirandom stuff from the game is a good choice.

Oh fine, since you asked so nicely.

Some of the arguments are about the type of puzzle that rails present. It doesn't fit neatly into the groove of certain players in one sense or another, like maybe it doesn't allow for the sort of optimizations/construction ratios they're hoping for. I'll leave that be.

But the others are about theme, and this is a worthy complaint. Rails are an intermediate-level, logistics staple end-product like belts are. Putting thirty rails into the Production science packs is about the same as putting in thirty red-ish belts. Where yellow belts work for Logistic science packs, it breaks the theme or pattern for the tier 3 Production packs. Too low tech; wrong domain of item.

Now Wube won't care because they've made the decision based on purely mechanical factors, as in, thirty rails are about the right production cost and feed complexity they're hoping for. The bit about wanting to emphasize train networks to allow for greater material throughput for larger production base is post-hoc rationalization to pretend it's in theme when it really, really isn't.

Amusingly enough, this argument is, in fact, an echo of what happened with the pickaxe. It's a ripple from the choice they made there. For all I can tell, Wube's making these sorts of choices in the echo-chamber of a group of programmers. Who, as a group of programmers, don't appreciate or understand theme that well. See Microsoft's infamous UI designs for longest time, and similarly, the UI of Factorio for the longest time. They'll high-res the graphics as a surface-level nod to theme and its importance to people in general, but they can't perceive/appreciate how it filters down and matters at the mechanical level.

So I don't see Wube changing it. Rails tick the right boxes per them, and that's as far as it goes.

I have tried to explain both in the article and here earlier that the “are rails advanced enough” is not just whether the recipe and item unlock consist of early parts (technically it is green tier without oil which is early). It’s also important when do you actually want to use the item - you can start setting up rails early, but there is never too late for that, and at any point adding in the game the rail network is almost certainly allow your factory to scale like crazy (and scale = production). That’s why I think the rail is a fitting ingredient into a science pack all about production.

If you claim that trains do not have this effect on factories, I don’t find that correct.

I would not compare rails to belts. Belt is what a factory consists of, rails are what connects multiple factories. Belts can be replaced by robots, pipes or even the direct inserting from wagons to machines directly. But if you want to get big production without trains, it’s prety tough. If we can agree that rais are what connects factories, it should come obvious that parallelizing or outsourcing production will lead to more in total. On top of that for example an external smelter will likely be more expandable or parallelizable again, so the potential grows massively with rails.

Why it is so many rails I also tried to explain. It’s not meant to be trivial and a full yellow belt of rails can get you 1,33 science per second - that’s a very decent amount for normal factories. Not to mention that Logistics 2 are a mandatory prerequisite for unlocking the science pack, so you can get double the amount quite easily.
Sure, if you want hundreds or thousands of science packs per minute, it gets a bit more complicated. Getting that much production is a bit more complicated in many other parts of the factory so I believe that is ok.

I’m not ignoring what you say, I just do not find some of your points true - and I am trying to explain why, and that’s a big difference.

You could say that I’m just defending my decision just because it’s my decision, or accuse me of anything you want if it makes you happier, but defeat those arguments first. You only stated that it does not “feel right” to some people, not “evoke the right puzzles” or “just not fit the theme”, but you barely said why. If your only resulting point is “I don’t like it”, I am sorry but many other people do like it.

[aka13]

I, a 2101-hour-player (and counting) say that pickaxe removal was good

Removing pickaxes saves you approximately 30 seconds in 2101 hours, costs Bob a few hundred hours extra work, and hurts thousands of other players.

Removal of pickaxes is extremely not good.

A possible good solution for those who want Factorio to be simpler would have been to default pickaxes to not wearing out in Vanilla while retaining the underlying game mechanics for use by modders.

Tbh while I like that there are a ton of different mods and modders, as a user I do not give a shit about a mod I do not play. I do not see why the devs should leave something in, because "future versions of a specific mod will be hard to update". Sure, it will be a bummer for the mod autor and users, but you can't keep everybody happy at the same time.

[Serenity]

I’m very happy with the proposed changes overall, but I’ve always thought from the beginning (from my first run basically) that the Portable fusion reactor is not justified.

Agreed. It always seemed too advanced, but with the introduction of nuclear it's very out of place.

There could be more done with portable power generators in general. Like a portable burner power plant. Pretty huge so you don't get many useable slots out of it, but unlike with solar panels you could some good energy from it

[Rythe]

I’m not ignoring what you say, I just do not find some of your points true - and I am trying to explain why, and that’s a big difference.

You could say that I’m just defending my decision just because it’s my decision, or accuse me of anything you want if it makes you happier, but defeat those arguments first. You only stated that it does not “feel right” to some people, not “evoke the right puzzles” or “just not fit the theme”, but you barely said why. If your only resulting point is “I don’t like it”, I am sorry but many other people do like it.

To vent a bit of my own frustration with these discussions - y'all are so damn dense. I have to wonder if you don't see the real point I made because you don't want to or just more of that 'group of programmers' dynamic.

The theme or pattern with the science packs is to put in ingredients appropriate to the domain of research in order to pretend that your science labs are doing something like engineering developments of tech with the odd bit of pure discovery on the side. Labs develop process for steel production then develop useful designs to capitalize on the availability of steel. But more - logistic science eats belts and inserters as a way to pretend they're doing development work on improving belts and inserters by going through a design iteration and experimentation process that would naturally consume such items on the path of creating a new and/or improved design. Then hand wave this for items related to the logistics domain but aren't belts and inserters. Military uses grenades, ammo and walls as a way to say its research into various ways to cause damage and improve defensive fortifications.

That's the theme and how science pack ingredients create the theme.

The 'you are pretending' part is when you string a logistics item into a gameplay effect (train networks drive availability of resources which allow for larger production numbers) to say that a logistics item fits in the science pack theme of 'engineering-style design iteration of items in domain provides new development in said domain'. But rails are not in the production domain like smelters and even production modules are. They're a logistics item. You broke the pattern and theme, and are using a game mechanic, extrapolated effect argument to pretend that you haven't. It should have been obvious that this was the point I was making, but here we are with me having to explain what 'theme' and 'wrong domain of item' means like I'm surrounded by children.

And I'm really, really tired of bad magician-style dodges where you hand wave what I said to try to imply that I might have denied the link between the player's logistic network and their ability to mass produce things so we can have merry little chase down that rabbit hole of stupidity.

Or to put it at your level - you are arguing against things I haven't said because you can't argue against what I did, and you are continuing on with Wube's tradition of saying that a theme is this mystical, emotional thing that's purely subjective and can't be argued about and so I somehow haven't made a real point.

[V453000]

The theme or pattern with the science packs is to put in ingredients appropriate to the domain of research in order to pretend that your science labs are doing something like engineering developments of tech with the odd bit of pure discovery on the side. Labs develop process for steel production then develop useful designs to capitalize on the availability of steel. But more - logistic science eats belts and inserters as a way to pretend they're doing development work on improving belts and inserters by going through a design iteration and experimentation process that would naturally consume such items on the path of creating a new and/or improved design. Then hand wave this for items related to the logistics domain but aren't belts and inserters. Military uses grenades, ammo and walls as a way to say its research into various ways to cause damage and improve defensive fortifications.

That's the theme and how science pack ingredients create the theme.

This form of a theme is nice to have and yes it does happen in many cases which is good as it does “make sense” or invoke this kind od immersion you speak about. But by no means it is a hard rule or a design goal we have set to obey, and it does not always happen. Green science is far from just logistics, engines in blue are only for a tank and solid fuel is barely built upon by advanced oil processing. I guess you could find more weak connections, but I’d say that rails going to train braking force or logistics 3 is similarly weak. In final non-intermediate products this is obviously a step worse, but there is not an infinite amount or intermediates we would have and would fit in this context.

Both because this theming is not the only priority and because I don’t think this is breaking much the weak consistency in this regard, and there seems to be a substantial number of people who feel ok with this, I believe it fine.

[morsk]

About "theme", where are the Braking Force techs? Because we would learn how to make trains stop ridiculously fast without destroying the track, exactly by melting very many tracks into purple goo to see what happens.

I agree rail doesn't fit the theme for the same reasons, but I just think of it as a "novelty" and then I don't care very much. The beacon would be the ideal representation of production science, but it's unavailable, and I don't like the recipe.