Poll: Loader vs. Heavy-Inserter

[nocommonsense]

Another way to balance this is to up the limit on inserter bonus research. As it stands follower robot research goes up to 20, I don't see why the inserters couldn't have theirs also go up to 20. Mind you I've been using the boxcar as storage trick to avoid belts all together so I'm biased, since that would also eliminate the the one bottleneck disadvantage of using boxcars in place of belts, throughput, which is limited by the inserters. Loaders have appeal, It may be necessary to require them to connect to a belt rather than to two storage containers, they would make the boxcar method of transport instantaneous and without any throughput limitation (though presumably even more ridiculously expensive to construct). As the throughput increases it will become possible to loop the boxcars together to form a shared storage space. Belt loops are limited to 4 shared item types, if the loader is instantaneous between storage containers then a storage loop would have no limit on the number of shared item types (currently trying to use even two boxcars as shared storage, even one way no loop, for as few as 3 item types results in deadlocks, though I haven't attempted to use combinators to alleviate it). If the loader requires connection to a belt to work then I don't see it breaking the boxcar storage strategy.

[sillyfly]

Follower robot research is for combat robots, and has no effect over logistic or construction robots.

[TheWesDude]

as a long time gamer and even MMOs, i have always seen the argument "dont nerf my class, boost other classes to my level!"

this is what i see as happening here. bots are simply more economical than belts unless you want constant medium distance movement of resources. especially if where the resource is being generated is not in a straight line to where it will be used.

the heavy inserter will help make inserters more competitive, but the heavy inserter i feel is not the best solution to the problem. i have actually wondered why the hell when you get to belts the inserters do not take advantage of their stack size anyway. then again, i have a few setups that rely on them not getting their stack bonus on moving to/from belts.

i feel that the loader is a good solution, but there should be some conditions. it should have a power drain comparable to a yellow inserter for usage/idle, and possibly only work on wooden chests. that would provide a use for them even in late game, and be useful still. you could still have requestor chests or such, but you would still have to get it into a wooden chest. say from unloading a train into steel/iron boxes using inserters, then from there to the wooden chests, to a loader.

if you nerf bots, all you will do is piss off a lot of people. this would provide a boost to belts which they do need, but still provide some balancing.

[Lupoviridae]

I said it in the FF thread and I'll say it here. I really want to see loaders fill at 1/4 the max speed for a belt. This would require a fully loaded belt to be split twice for full throughput. Inserters are for pulling off the side, loaders for in-line. The footprint here would be similar to current layouts, but it would look so much cooler. Storage and buffer areas would look like capillary networks. Parts are the life-blood of any factory!.

[againey]

i feel that the loader is a good solution, but there should be some conditions. it should have a power drain comparable to a yellow inserter for usage/idle, and possibly only work on wooden chests. that would provide a use for them even in late game, and be useful still. you could still have requestor chests or such, but you would still have to get it into a wooden chest. say from unloading a train into steel/iron boxes using inserters, then from there to the wooden chests, to a loader.

I made a similar suggestion over on the older Loader poll thread. Major difference being that instead of having the loader transition between a belt and a container (filling the same basic role as an inserter), merge the concept of a belt and a small chest into a single object (inspired by GoliathMrk's suggestion). And if you want to use a special type of chest, then feed the "belt chest" into (or out of) the desired chest using an inserter. Since the inserter is moving between two containers, the stack size bonus applies (exactly as it always has, as opposed to the new way of being applied to heavy inserters). And you can use whatever inserter type you wish, too.

All in all, I think this solution appears to provide a lot of flexibility and creative combinations, while still being open to balancing to prevent it from be OP, through methods like electricity usage, input/output delays, small container size, costly crafting requirements, et cetera. Here's a mockup of some various use cases (explained in my original post).

[MegaHamster7]

I like the way the game is now and would rather time was put into a proper end-game than this kind of thing. I've no objection to either being in the game but if the devs are pressed for time a solid end-game would be so much better!

[LucidMoses]

The thing with the heavy inserter is that it could be good or it could be bad. Depending on how you flesh out the idea. In a puzzle game you can quickly loose the puzzle part of it with things that are too O.P. in the post it looked like it did bursts. Given the rest of the game I don't think that's all you have in mind. So it's going to matter what complication or balancing you do with it.

Complications like;
Needing day light or lamps (for procession placement quickly).
Needing to be in radar range.
Needing coal and electricity.
or any other of a gizzilion idea's i'm sure you could come up with.