Wish we had a mode to show belt direction better

[garath]

Every time I go to upgrade my normal transport belts with the fast transport (red) belts, I always do it this way:

1. Place a single piece on the ground and *squint* at it to see what direction it is going.
2. Rotate it a couple of times to make sure it is turned the right way.
3. Then, place a bunch of belt to upgrade the belts from normal to fast.

If I don't do that, then, it almost always seems I place the belt down in the wrong direction. I wish there were some mode I could turn on that would more clearly show me the direction of the belts before I place them.

I wish we had that for the underground belts as well. I can't tell you how many times I have to troubleshoot my factory because one of the lines is at a standstill. Eventually, I will find either a transport belt or underground belt or splitter facing the wrong direction. I wish there was a view more detailed than 'ALT' that would show me the directions of all my belts in an even more obvious way.

[ssilk]

The basic problem is, that you update your belts by hand.
Use a mod:

viewtopic.php?f=92&t=14781 Upgrade planner
viewtopic.php?f=92&t=25084 Upgrade planner - v1.1.10 - Bug Fixes

[silverkitty23]

Or, you know, have a key that hides the products and puts non-moving arrows on belts so you can tell if they're pointed the right way. The OP's issue wasn't with upgrades, but directionality - the blue on dark-grey for express belts is often hard to read, even if your system isn't covering all the useful info with stuff.

[Zeblote]

Make alt mode show arrows on belts similar to those when mousing over a train?

[bobucles]

Blue belts may be difficult to see for the color blind, perhaps. I wouldn't know much on that.

It is difficult to see a belt when it's jam packed with stuff. Perhaps a transparency circle should hide items near the cursor, making the belt easily visible? In fact such a feature may prove useful whenever the player is trying to build stuff.

[garath]

Make alt mode show arrows on belts similar to those when mousing over a train?

Yes. Exactly. This would be awesome.

[daniel34]

Make alt mode show arrows on belts similar to those when mousing over a train?

Yes. Exactly. This would be awesome.

Actually, they should behave like inserters. They show their pick-up and drop-off point when putting the mouse on top of them, even without the ALT-mode. It shouldn't be that hard to do the same for transport belts.

I've never run into that issue personally as I can see from the belt arrows how that belt moves items, but more inexperienced players might have problems with the current graphics on blue and red (or modded like 5dim) belts, a problem that can easily be solved by adding arrows to the belts, displayed when you mouse-over them.

[garath]

Expanding on this a bit more, I envision a mode for the game where you could see a red box surrounding all transport belt facing the wrong direction as an adjoining belt along the same line (either vertical or horizontal). In my own builds, I certainly have situations where I may intentionally put two transport belts on the same line facing opposite directions. (Though these cases are exclusively where there is a splitter involved.) But I think that in the majority of cases when I place a belt facing the wrong direction (meaning the opposite direction as the one next to it), it is a mistake I wish the game UI would highlight in some way--in some mode.

Particularly when zoomed out to view a larger portion of the factory, it becomes more challenging to see transport belt segments that are facing the wrong direction. Certainly, taking a look at a red transport belt while zoomed in, it is far easier for me to learn to see the direction it is moving before I place it. But as I zoom out to see more of the factory at once, it becomes harder and harder to see which direction it is facing. Thus, I wish there was a mode I could enter that would show a more well-defined sense of the belt direction.

[Shokubai]

I would like to see a sort of Glyph over the belt sections. A translucent Blue, Red, or yellow arrow that was visible but did not occlude the item on the belt. The Glyphs could be responsive....Fewer of them when zoomed out...More of the when zoomed in. To the OP's point this could be visible on held belt segments before placing.

Something sort of like this.

BeltGlyphs.png (897.65 KiB) Viewed 5644 times

[garath]

Thank you for the graphic. I like it!

The game supports multiple zoom levels, and I defy anyone to tell me they can see the direction a belt or splitter is pointing if the game is zoomed far enough out. I certainly appreciate the work the talented artists invested in the belt and splitter graphics. But at a certain zoom level, I would love an option to change the graphics to something just a bit more primitive that shows the direction better. Upgrading splitters manually last night, I replaced a number of yellow splitters with red ones facing the wrong way because I was zoomed out a bit too much.

[ssilk]

What I see here is not only a problem with the belts: Every entity has problems, when zoomed out far.

Take for example the oil refinery: Who is able to tell me with one view, if a refinery is currently working or not?
Same with chemical plant.

And a solution for all that problems would be to have another graphics, if you begin to zoom out. At some point a more schematic view begins to blend in. Best example for that is in my eyes Supreme Commander.

[garath]

Interesting!

I can't tell you how many times I'm playing the game and want to ask the developers if they are laughing at us as they write the code to always make the belts point the wrong way. Of course, I'm not serious (at least not completely). I saw a mod today that is supposed to automatically reverse the transport belt as you run along laying it in one direction. This sounds awesome. Maybe advanced players wouldn't like that. But I can't tell you how many times I lay down a long series of transport belts and later realize they are in the wrong direction. It would just be too awesome if there were a visual clue I could turn on that showed every item that faced a different direction from the item next to it--be it transport belt, underground belt or splitter. Showing mis-matched underground belts would be nice as well.