Factorio Forums

Exploration of mind and thinking.

SO, I've played Factorio now for 136 hours.
A curious thing is happening.
I like small compact bases, designed for the logistics bots to be used in them.
No conveyors, only requester and provider chests.
In the search for a good base design,
I am discovering that I need to spread out more.
My "compactness" mindset, is hindering the effectiveness of my base building.
My current mindset hinders movement and flexibility, at the goal of usage of small space.

But in an infinite map, I don't need to limit my space.
So why do I?
I come to the conclusion, surprisingly, that I have a poverty "limited space mindset", and this is really showing up in an unlimited playing field.
I don't NEED to think this way, anymore, so I'll be spreading out some more.

Really really curious, perplexed and delighted, to see this change happening in my mind, simply because I'm playing a game.

Nevertheless, knowing how to be compact can be helpful when you have too many... let's say Welcoming Parties from the Natives.

Building compact is an advantage when an inserter can move things from one assembler into the next, etc. Using logistic bots not always the most efficient/simple thing. But yes I've also had a tendency to end up with very cluttered areas.
I think the mindset is contagious, wanting to make efficient use of space is natural.

My solution was to come up with a path/road scheme and stick to it. It becomes a nuisance sometimes but the mobility is very rewarding.

Indeed, players tend to make their factory very condensed, cause they are used to build so in games...

I build also roads: I plan my factory by having "broad paths", which I won't be used for building anything on it. Two "paths" crossing each in the center for example.
It doesn't matter how the paths look: Straight or curvy... they just need to be broad. 10 tiles, 20 tiles or so. To make sure I don't built something on it I set walls.

Later, in the middle game, when space becomes a problem (cause there are too many biters sometimes), I just mine the walls and built on that space, but that is then just infrastructure: pipes, belts... makes things a lot easier and is nice to easily drive into your base by car. It gives your base also a lot more functional systematic.

I, too, find it very difficult to leave enough space. In my experience it's mostly so that my belts and buses are shorter, but in reality it's usually not a problem to run the bus for 100 tiles longer, it just feels wrong.

Arumba makes nice bases, and he doesn't give a damn about space. He builds a long bus and then everything gets lined up along that bus. When I saw it for the first time I found it really odd, but now I think it's actually the best way unless you have a floorplan of an end-game factory in your head already (or some other advanced scheme like a modular factory).