Friday Facts #429 - Vulcanus Demolisher Enemies

[EnerJi]

Looks cool, and I'm not generally a fan of biters / combat in the game right now. New enemy abilities like this will encourage me to leave enemies on when I play.

Is it me, though, or does there seem to be a lot of work left before the expansion launches in just one month? I hope they're able to finish it all up in time. I'm guessing there might be several significant patches post-launch to tweak things that don't make it for the 2.0 launch.

[Tooster]

demolishers on death just poofing out of existence feels very disappointing. would be much more interesting if they left wreckage behind or could be partially destroyed to slow them down or weaken their healing

It would be very nice. Also a need to clean it or blow it up to bits with rockets (now without regeneration), because they would have hitboxes and acted like walls. It could be a fun mechanic, like cleaning up after kaijuu (kaijuu no. 8 anyone?).

[morse]

There have been several mentions that there will be another planet besides (V)ulcanus, (F)ulgora, and (G)leba. That Fourth planet will have another exclusive science pack and will only be reachable once you have all the science backs from Nauvis, as well as V+F+G. They said the fourth planet will be furthest from the sun, and therefore a cold place.

That information is broadly scattered across several FFFs. It starts in FFF 373 with the main structure. In FFF 420 they specified the fourth planet being cold and far from the sun, therefore fusion being more useful there.

Also, the name "Aquilo" was leaked on several occasions.

[J_nas]

It might also be cool to have Worm size somewhat randomized and bigger Worms claiming larger Territories.
That might make it so you have to avoid These terretories until you get better wepons

[CheeseMcBurger]

Cool

[Karamel]

We need mod which makes these snakes 1 section bigger each time they eat a building.

And once they get big enough the only way to kill them is to trick them into running into their own tail.

[CheeseMcBurger]

demolishers on death just poofing out of existence feels very disappointing. would be much more interesting if they left wreckage behind or could be partially destroyed to slow them down or weaken their healing

They should start to rot and decompose, showing the bone structure before they vanish into dust. I bought a RTX 4080, so a couple more Gigs for these sprites are acceptable!

[Nagilum]

In terms of killing these enemies, was anyone else's first thought sacrificial nuclear reactors?

Build and fuel reactors in enemies path.
Wait.
Enjoy the fireworks.

The resulting nuclear explosions will hit many segments of the demolisher's body and should do enormous damage.

[Diablo]

Can we turn it off but leave "normal" enemies on?

[GregoriusT]

In terms of killing these enemies, was anyone else's first thought sacrificial nuclear reactors?

Build and fuel reactors in enemies path.
Wait.
Enjoy the fireworks.

The resulting nuclear explosions will hit many segments of the demolisher's body and should do enormous damage.

I really hope THIS was the unconventional way they mentioned in this FFF!

[mcmase]

I'm sorry to get somewhat salty, but I don't want to have real fights in Factorio. I didn't buy Factorio because of the fights. And now even a planet full of bosses. I hate boss fights, everywhere, in all games. I abandon games that contain them. An enemy with big texture and 10x more health that takes minutes to take down. This enemy is way worse than I ever imagined enemies would get in Factorio. Graphics are nice, but I simply don't want to fight. I guess the best solution would probably be to write a mod to adjust the health of all the non-trivial creatures to 10% or 5% to not completely waste 1/4 of the tech tree by completely disabling them.

What will await us at the final planet? A final uber huge boss? Please not.

They did confirm no enemies on the final planet.

Also, with how popular it is to have peaceful biters in the base game, I think you can rest assured that non- combat players like yourself won't be forgotten about in 2.0

That being said, the fact that the Destroyers don't spawn and are limited in number is cool to me and seems to work very well here. But I do wish there were enemies on the last planet and maybe it will never happen but I wish there were enemies that you had to farm for resources again, or at least very strongly protected the planets resources.

I imagine the last planet where the enemies, instead of pollution or territory, etc., are attracted to anyone moving the special "gold" resource (whatever it is, it's extremely valuable and rare and used for all the late game stuff and repeatable upgrades after a certain point). But these enemies have infinite evolution so they'll always overrun and kick you off the planet eventually. But then when not in combat the evolution quickly reverses and you make another run.

Also balances economy as even late game there will always be a place to mass produce weapons and they will get mass consumed

[CuriousBoyGeorge]

What happens if we turn of enemies? Does that setting affect the new planets?
Can you set the setting so that enemies dont attack you and that is still the case with the snake?

This is what I want to know as well. I don't enjoy playing with biters turned on, they just ruin the game experience for me. I hope it is still possible to have all enemies turned off or passive, otherwise I can't see buying the expansion.

[Krissy]

Targeting priority based on the "vibration" level of the building. Miners cause a lot of vibration and are therefore a high priority target, while belts and inserters don't vibrate much at all and are therefore low on the target list. While power poles don't cause any vibrations and therefore aren't a target at all. You could maybe sneak some power lines past them this way.

And train tracks might only look like a target while a train is moving on them?

Maybe it seems a little too much like Dune to have this mechanic, but they seem to already have a lot to do with seismic activity due to the eruption attacks and whatnot. It might seem like a rival worm is trying to encroach on its territory.

[porcupine]

The freezing planet had flying enemies and among them were the jelly-like enemy from FFF-367, however since then these enemies have been dropped from the game. The last planet has a delicate mix of challenges and although we found a way to add enemies to the mix in an interesting way, it would make progression much slower. It might be better as a mod.

This is so disheartening. I was really excited for the flying jellyfish enemies. Factorio enemies have always been incredibly vanilla, and it's the one thing that mods have absolutely struggled to add to any depth. "oh wow, you added effects to enemies, but they're the same ... everything, except a different color? Cool, I guess...."

I feel strongly that "more is more" in this case, 2 enemies, with identical behaviour was always a sore spot IMHO.

[bnrom]

That is very cool that. I'm looking forward to the expansion release!!

I'm interested to see how not needing any passive defense on Vulacanus will play out. It seems pretty antithetical to Factorio to me - as a big part of vanilla is that biters continually drain your resources, until you've invested quite a bit in a fully sustainable defense (e.g., lasers + flamethrowers). Having the starting area completely safe is very different from that.

I (like others) am disappointed there won't be any enemies on the final planet. I'd prefer the presence of enemies to be a toggle-able part of the expansion, rather than a mod - especially as you say you've already worked out how the enemies can fit into the planet mechanics.

[malecord]

It seems pretty antithetical to Factorio to me - as a big part of vanilla is that biters continually drain your resources, until you've invested quite a bit in a fully sustainable defense (e.g., lasers + flamethrowers).

Only that iron and copper are infinite on vulcanus so there is no point to add a resource drain on a timer mechanic like navius biters.

Btw, off topic question, I've understood that if you land on a planet, any planet, even if lose everything and remain stranded you have a way to start from scratch and build up a factory like on navius.

But if vulcanus has lava, and lava requires foundries, to process... how you build your first foundries from lava? Does it mean the engineer can manually process some lava into minerals? I had a similar question for fulgora a and recycle. We can manually reciclr stuff now?

[Ohz]

This is SO EPIC

[datkensign]

The Demolisher would have a roar or shockwave attack. If the shockwave hit you, you could be stunned or slowed. This would kick up a cloud of ash as the shockwave travels. The cloud would have a small slow effect. The main intention for the cloud can't be disclosed yet, but if Vulcanus is your first planet then the additional effect won't affect you.

So it's going to interfere with something you can do that you'll only gain after visiting at least one other planet.

Could that something be flight? Player flight? Like either an armour module or a "flying" spidertron type thing? What else could it be?

[Ohz]

Wait, which is the frozen planet? Has that been announced?

There have been several mentions that there will be another planet besides (V)ulcanus, (F)ulgora, and (G)leba. That Fourth planet will have another exclusive science pack and will only be reachable once you have all the science backs from Nauvis, as well as V+F+G. They said the fourth planet will be furthest from the sun, and therefore a cold place.

That information is broadly scattered across several FFFs. It starts in FFF 373 with the main structure. In FFF 420 they specified the fourth planet being cold and far from the sun, therefore fusion being more useful there.

Planet name is Aquilo. Source (right to the timestamp): Youtube

[Agamemnon]

Ooooh, I can feel it already. This is going to be fun!!! /serious

It is good that they don't grow back. Fighting them for territory and on your terms is sounding much less frustrating than fighting Nauvis biters forever just because.