Factorio Forums

So first off, maybe I'm just doing something wrong, if so, just tell me.

I simply find the tank and other stuff pretty useless compared to the cost and availability,
with that I mean not only building it and ammo cost but also what it takes to research it.

So for the tank, you can just as well get a Power Armour MK1 with shields MK1 (whereas MK1 shields are better anyways than MK2 due to their higher energy efficiency, which is ridiculous )

And a PA-MK1 with say 5 batteries MK1 (the MK2 batteries are not difficult to get though) and say 4 shields and a exoskeleton or 6 shields
is vastly more tanky than ...a tank, more manoeuvrable and easier to use.
The hand-held flame thrower is also more useful than the tanks main gun which has expensive ammo (by comparison) and low usefulness due to the low fire rate.

All the while you can use 3 exoskeletons to move around and equip the shields only when fighting, which makes the PA-MK1 also very fast,
and to charge up you simply remove the exoskeletons/shields and fill it all with solar panels until the batteries are full, which is quite fast during the day with around 1MW taking "only" 500 seconds to fully charge 5 MK2 batteries or 100s for 5 MK1 batteries.

Also the PA-MK1 provides a vast array of utility and is a basically necessary step in progression as you can easily run around with 3 exoskeletons all day with just a handful solar panels and a few batteries never running out of energy as you simply don't move 100% of the time,
while it also allows you to use personal drone ports for better building.

So, bottom line is, you need the PA-MK1 anyways, sure you could skip it if you really mean to, but it is a good help to have and use it,
while the tank has basically no use, outside of easily travelling through big forests, as it's slow, and vastly outperformed in combat by a PA-MK1.


So what is the point of the tank asides from "having a tank" in the game?
I'm not saying you could not destroy some mid-game nests with a tank, but it's a lot more work to do so, and it costs a fortune in ammo,
compared to using a PA-MK1, which is no work at all and very low ammo cost if using a flame thrower.

Hm, I like the tank as midgame clearing vehicle. Most importantly - because you can combine it with power armor.

Equip a powerarmor full of laser defenses without shields and exosceletons, and you get the mobility and protection of the tank and the fire power of your lasers and that of the tank weapons on top!

Sure, you need to set up the production of the tank ammo first - but fortunately I have a blueprint for all my weapon needs which covers that, so it's not such a big deal for me.

I think its simply the game offering different means to accomplish the same goal, with their own pro's and con's.

yea, that's probably it


...and yes you can use a power armour inside a tank, but the lasers take a few more research steps and you still have a (compared to a properly shielded PA-MK1) pretty squishy tank that you need to repair after every battle,
the flame thrower in the tank is bad, the machine gun is pretty useless against anything but the smallest biters, and the main cannon can only take out one target every few seconds,
whereas you can just walk in with a PA-MK1 and a handheld flamethrower and finish everything in one go, which also means a lot less spawned/killed mobs

it just feels weird that a dedicated, heavy military vehicle is worse than your mid-game utility armour...

I think both the car and the tank could use some upgrades, be it in the form of additional research, or better, an equipment grid with "low-tech-oriented" equipment only usable on those, like an extra engine or extra armour, automatic reloader (shoots faster) and the like, in contrast to the "high tech" theme of the power armours. Customizing/upgrading your vehicles would probably add something to the game.

[edit:]
especially as I consider this game a very thought-through and well designed one,
it feels weird to have important stuff like that which is only usable in early-mid game and becomes completely obsolete in the end.
One would expect ways to upgrade and customise them to keep up with the games progress, it would open a lot of variety if something other than the spider would be viable in endgame.

And there are more tricks to achieve the seemingly mandatory advantage of the spider that can just walk over everything:
simply offer a late/end-game advanced upgrade to turn the car/tank into levitating vehicles, just to name one thing.

Taipion wrote: ↑Mon Aug 14, 2023 12:57 pm for the tank, you can just as well get a Power Armour MK1

The tank is mid-game tech (early blue science) and costs 668 resources to make. Explosive cannon shells are only about 15 resources each (the same as a grenade and much less than a poison or defender capsule), and you don't need very many: the tank is primarily an armoured bulldozer that destroys stuff by driving over it rather than shooting at it.

Power armour is late-game tech (blue circuits required) and costs 3580 resources to make even with nothing in the grid. I tend not to bother with it: by the time I have the ingredients to make it I'm so close to the tech for Mk 2 that I just wait and make that instead.

MK1 shields are better anyways than MK2 due to their higher energy efficiency

Sort of true if you just consider the regeneration rate, but Mk2s have 3 times as many bonus HP to start with, which should mean that you don't need the regen as much. And irrelevant if you follow Premu's suggestion (which is also my habit) to wear power armour stuffed with PDLs and ride in the tank to provide protection.

If you use batteries to power the shields, which is basically the only way to do it,
then a MK1 shield will provide a lot more hp in total than a MK2 shield,
the actual buffer is pretty irrelevant as dmg tends to be rather constant than burst.

And a handful of blue circuits really isn't a lot, and again, necessary anyways,
all the stuff needed for a PA-MK1, batteries (even MK2) and shields (MK1) merely require chem science packs,
so it's as simple as it gets.

And as you mentioned capsules, I really, really.... really don't get these, I played around with them a few times,
and I was just astonished by how much you pay for how little you get, completely worthless crap in my experience.

Taipion wrote: ↑Mon Aug 14, 2023 9:10 pm I think both the car and the tank could use some upgrades, be it in the form of additional research, or better, an equipment grid with "low-tech-oriented" equipment only usable on those, like an extra engine or extra armour, automatic reloader (shoots faster) and the like, in contrast to the "high tech" theme of the power armours. Customizing/upgrading your vehicles would probably add something to the game.

I have a mod (Autoddrive) that does some of the things you suggested: The mod adds a minimal grid to vehicles that don't have one already. You can then research several techs that will unlock sensors to install in this grid. For example, vehicles equipped with an enemy sensor will automatically attack the nearest enemy within their range (IIRC this will also switch to the next weapon if the current one has run out of ammo). Vehicles without a usable weapon but an enemy sensor will enter panic mode and try to escape when they sense an enemy. Vehicles equipped with an ammo sensor will reload the weapons from the trunk when all weapons have run out of ammo; vehicles with a fuel sensor will refuel from the trunk; and vehicles with a repair sensor will be repaired on the fly as long as there are repair packs (vanilla or modded) in the trunk.

The mod is still work in progress, and not everything works the way I want it to yet, but perhaps it will make the tank a bit more useful for you.

Taipion wrote: ↑Mon Aug 14, 2023 9:10 pm the flame thrower in the tank is bad,

It should be noted that the tank's flame thrower was intended for tree clearing, not combat.

FuryoftheStars wrote: ↑Mon Sep 04, 2023 5:19 pm

It should be noted that the tank's flame thrower was intended for tree clearing, not combat. Vampire Survivors

That's right. We should use each weapon according to its intended purpose to achieve high efficiency. Try to learn the function of each tool