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I've been playing Factorio for the past 2 weeks and already tested a fair amount of mods. Recently I've felt the urge to contribute to this awesome community.

I've always been excessively organized in video games, would it be in minecraft/skyrim/whatever I've always used hundreds of chests to manage my stuff. Then it seems rather evident it wasn't going to be different in Factorio.
My base is very segmented (divided in different areas), i got huge amount of modules being produced somewhere, military products somewhere else, train-related products got their own area, etc....while it's obviously not the best setup if you're looking for the most optimized production ever, i find some perks to this :

• My base is good-looking, something i appreciate considering the amount of time i spend walking in...
• i can easily focus on one area after the other, and a lack of resources on one point doesn't shut down all my production (each area often has her own extraction/melting lines).

Also, I plan to start a multiplayer gameplay with some friends where we're going to start on different areas and separate the production. Each of us is going to have his own expertise field (mining/military/etc), therefore, only one of us will be able to craft mining drills/furnace/etc, while another one may be the oil-derivate products expert.
The goal is to have to heavily rely on each other via train lines, if we wanna be able to reach the endgame.

This being said, I started creating a mod adding specialized assembling machines. Roughly, this mod will had more or less a dozen of assembling Machine, each of them being able to craft only some specific items :

• Train/Wagon AM (Assembling Machine)
• Rail AM
• Circuit/PU AM
• Module AM
• Science Packs AM
• Inserters AM
• Gun AM
• Ammo AM
and so on.....

Separating the production like that should also allow me to have different entities for each AM, therefore enhancing the visual aspect of the game. I've always found quite disturbing that Cargo Wagons were produced on assembling machines not even half as large as the product itself...

After some thoughts, I came up with this :
1 - The player will be capable to craft almost any item by hand (vanilla-like), maybe with an increased crafting time.
This should allow the player to start any factory without worrying of being "blocked" by a lack of AM

2 (1rst option) - The Vanilla AM will be left to craft any item non-affected to one of the Specialized AM.

2 (2nd option) - The Vanilla AM will still be able to craft any item (vanilla-like), Specialized AM will have increased crafting speed.

3 - Technology shouldn't be an obstacle, each AM will be unlocked fairly easily
- Modules-Specialized AM unlocked with "Modules" tec
- Gun-Specialized AM and Ammo-Specialized AM unlocked with "Military 1" tec
- oil-derivate-Specialized AM unlocked with "Oil processing" tec
- etc

I did a bit of code today. and I got the Rail Specialized AM working. I shall continue developing this mod because...well, I like it BUT I'd really like to hear your thoughts about this Dear Factorio Community

PS: First post here, I honestly didn't know where to post this considering the post doesn't contain any mod (yet) properly-speaking...I do hope I didn't mess up by posting in the wrong section

Sounds like a neat idea. Now combine this with Bob's Mods, Dytech, and Marathon, and you have the Factorio Quartet of Hellish Difficulty.

Imagine having to make 4 different components in 4 differently-sized assembly machines just to make the tier 2 electronic circuit.

Well, the main goal isn't really to bring more difficulty to the game, even if I guess that's a way to see it

The main objective is more to bring some 'diversity' in the factory.

But I plan to add some compatibility with other mods, yeah

I love the idea. The friend I play with has suggested we do something similar as well, maybe for our .13 restart.

I'm not sure if it would look good, but I'd consider adjusting the crafting tabs. Instead of the current "Logistics, Production, Intermediate, Military", you could split it by your roles. This would give an extremely clear breakdown for each player.

worked a bit on the mod today :

• I got 14 assembling machines ready (details below)
  I'm currently working on the customization aspect (allowing the player to choose wether the vanilla AM or the player should be able to craft the concerned items or not, etc)
  fr/eng localization on its way

Next step will be to include the support for other mods/overhaul (bob, yuoki, dytech, 5Dim, etc). in fact, I already use some modules from some of them but my goal is to get this mod as adaptable is possible.
Concerning your idea, I agree that the vanilla crafting tables are rapidly overwhelmed when you play with a good bunch of mods. I personally use a version of 5Dim core I tweaked a bit to fit my own tastes. However, i won't include in this mod a re-categorization of the crafting tables especially because most of the overhauls are already doing it.

At the moment, my vision is as follow :

• Trains
  • 1- Locomotives/Wagons
    2- Rails
    3- Train signalization
  Weapons
  • 4- Guns
    5- Ammunitions
    6- Capsules/Grenades/Mines
  Basic Structures
  • 7- Walls
    8- Floors
    9- Statues (from a mod I use)
  Military Structures
  • 10- Turrets
  Vehicles
  • 11- Cars/Tanks
    12- Shells
  Modules
  • 13- Modules
  Science
  • 14- Science Packs

I'm currently wondering if I shouldn't give each module/Science pack his own AM. I could also merge the "Statues", "Basic Structures" and "Military Structures" together since having an AM only useful to craft turrets may seem a bit overkill.

My main problem is the graphics...I'm definitly not good enough in this field and i currently use the default AM-3 icon/entity graphics. And i don't have the slightest idea of where I should go to find some help on this matter...

Then don't bother, just use photoshop to recolor existing graphics. You can slap some icons on top of it too, with "screen" blend mode or something, if you feel like doing something fancy.

Already done that. However, some AM will be bigger than vanilla ones (locomotive AM, for example, will be at least 4*4).
Also, one of the main goal of this mod is precisely to improve the visual aspect of one's factory.

So, i'll need new icons/sprites, sooner or later...

Worry about the graphics once you have the mod essentially usable. At that point, you don't expect to change buildings/graphics much more, and you can get help from the modding community. I know that there is at least one talented graphics artist that just randomly comes by and donates graphics.

Shouldn't you be more concerned with things like small wooden chests' ability to store 80 locomotives or wagons? Or player's ability to carry on him even more stuff than that?

of course, I've already thought of that. I may even start in the future a mod to bring a bit more realism on these aspects but I'll have to find a way to do it without shattering Factorio playability (and fun).
At the moment, I'm focusing on the crafting aspect because, well, it's my first mod and I don't wanna start by something too big for me to handle.
Also, separating my ideas in different mods will give ore flexibility to the player.

Mod almost finished, by the way

Are these specialized assembling machines able to construct final products with just the raw materials (eg copper/iron plates => electronic circuits); or do they also need to be fed intermediate products like vanilla assemblers?

Either way your mod sounds like it can make AM farms look much more interesting.

first version will have (already has, in fact) the same recipes. Second version will include the "advanced crafting" mechanic you're talking about, but I'm worried about the balance as it may simplify the automation too much.
Maybe i could try to balance that by raising the cost of the specialized AM, or increase the cost of basic resources in the "advanced" recipes.

Of course, as always, the player will be able to choose wether he wants this "advanced crafting" or not via the config file