Implement deconstruction chests.

[Molay]

Hello everyone,

My suggestion is pretty straightforward. Add a new "deconstruction chest" (better name would be welcome).
The deconstruction chest accepts all objects deconstructed by construction bots, thus becoming a place to stockpile anything you wish to deconstruct.
The chest will feature an option that can be ticked: feed into logistics network, making all objects in the chest available for pickup by any bots (logistics and construction).
The chest will never accept objects from logistic bots, thus keeping it free from clutter, as compared to the storage chest.

The reasoning: Deconstruction is neat little feature. It eases my life on a couple occasions. Taking down forests is faster and simpler than ever, just plop down a requester chest, set it to accept wood, and off you go.
Sometimes, though, deconstruction is very troubling. If I was to order my bots to deconstruct a derelict outpost, I'd have to configure multiple requester chests for that. They'd need to accept pipes, pipe-to-ground, inserters, fast inserters, steel boxes, rails, curved rails, rail stops, stop lights, belts, splitters, underground belts, electrical miners, power poles... You get the idea? It's more hassle than it's worth, sadly.
Now to some extent you can do this with a storage chest, as long as the network is disconnect from your factories. However, I'd like a possibility to use deconstruction in my main fabrication zone, too. Storage chests are no good, as they will end up utter chaos, taking everything I have in the logic system. A dedicated chest for deconstruction is the solution.

TL;DR:
Make new chest. Works as a provider chest. Accepts all objects from deconstruction jobs automatically.
(working as provider chest could be optional, an adjacent provider chest + inserter could do the trick)

Thanks for reading, and hopefully this will get implemented some day to make deconstruction a fun feature to use^^
Molay

[ssilk]

Hm. I don't see the need not to use storage chests for that.

Learn about difference between active and passive provider chest or explain your problem more detailed, cause I really don't understand, why you don't use the storage chests for that.

[Molay]

Sure, let me explain why storage chests are a bad idea (when used in my main base).
I do use quite a few active storage chests, as I need some good to be shipped. Due to the layout, which is rather odd, but I grew into it, I'm transporting different items from active chests to requester chests. The purple microchips, for example, get ferryed around quite a bit, as do batteries and a couple other items used in production. This avoids the massive backlog on huge conveyor belts for those rather expensive items, so meaning I only have to produce what I really need.

I'm also importing lots of oil in the form of oil barrels, which get transported to my refinery part (and the empty barrel back to the train chest) for processing. This all works kind of well, and with oil being pretty much at peak value at all times, transport is minimal for this system, more efficient than belts across a whole base - or pipes for that matter.
Now, seeing as I need to have all those items in active providers, they all get picked up as soon as I place a storage chest, logistic bots from all over the place run amok trying to fill that storage chest, then to empty it again. It gets even more crazy with multiple storage chests. It also defeats the point of controlling how much I want to produce (smart inserter, max 10 purple microchips in the active chest, for example) as all the chests are being emptied and put into storage all the time.

Basically, storage chests lift, as soon as placed, all production limits I put in place, causing the whole economy to pretty much collapse. That's why I'd like a chest where everyone can take from, but where logistics bots don't come stuff things in. Only out. Input reserved for deconstruction by construction bots.

I hope this clarifies!
Let me know if I'm still unclear or just plain mistaken about something!

[Coolthulhu]

+1
Being able to be filled to the brim is an essential feature of storage chests. Having free storage space is essential for valid functioning of deconstruction.

[ssilk]

@Molay: And why don't you just replace your active providers with passive? It's 3, maybe 4 clicks instead of 1000 of your post.

+1
Being able to be filled to the brim is an essential feature of storage chests. Having free storage space is essential for valid functioning of deconstruction.

I use smart inserters to stop production, when I have enough stuff in my logistic network.

[Molay]

@Molay: And why don't you just replace your active providers with passive? It's 3, maybe 4 clicks instead of 1000 of your post.

Huh. After you keeping on about passive chests I really had to have a hard think about it. Somehow in my mind, I was under the impression that passive chests would not feed into requester chests. I actually had to read the tooltip half a dozen times before it made click and I got it. So as long as I don't have a single active provider chest, and if I never build and active provider chest, I can use storage chests for deconstruction. As soon as I do build an active chest deconstruction is still lost, though.

This most definitely helps, as long as one doesn't want to actually use storage chests for actual storage. Thanks for pushing me into understand that^^
I do still think that a dedicated deconstruction chest is what would be most useful, instead of working around systems to get the effect.

[ssilk]

Well, the current first directive in the development is not to introduce stuff, which can be created by already existing.

Deconstruction is only half of the process. There are many ideas about chests and how they can help in construction/deconstruction, but it would say, they are all currently not really needed. There is always a way to built around the gaps you're currently missing, cause you don't have the deep knowledge of the game.

[Molay]

Well, the current first directive in the development is not to introduce stuff, which can be created by already existing.

Now out of curiosity, are you part of the dev team for this game? This sounds very specific, and it's nice to know if that's what they are shooting for. It sure does sound official how you state it. Although I kind of don't follow that logic, especially for an alpha? Why work around something that's a hassle instead of implementing a straightforward, handy and specific tool for a specific job?

[ssilk]

Well, I'm one of the moderators. Not a dev.
https://forums.factorio.com/forum/mem ... =group&g=4
But you can say I'm a bit involved.

Well, and what I said is a bit my interpretation of this post:
https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... 908#p20908

The logic is first to finish the promises, the devs made, the roadmap; then the goal, the game target, the story. Many discussions about that, if interested I can search. And then if we (the community) really know how to play with it, then the game is been altered, if needed or wanted.

This is a continous process and works really well.

If this is done too fast, we couldn't find out, if this is really the way it can work or not. Some kind of discovery, because there is in most cases a way around the limits, which is quite clever and surprising. The reason, why (I think) most of the forum members love this game.

[Molay]

Thanks for clarifying! With your obscene amount of posts I figured you had to be somehow involved, but I wasn't sure^^

I can better understand now the approach they are taking in development, which surely helps shift my expectations. You're interpretation of the post seems right, so I guess we'll work with what we have, and if it's still troublesome a couple months down the line, when we have total mastery of all gameplay elements, it might get attention then, if it is still needed, yes? That's how I understand it^^

As I basically am like a toddler in the Factorio universe, I have quite a bit of catching up to do. With what is planned. What is intended for gameplay and all that. If you can recommend some interesting threads about how the development will continue (roadmap seems pretty basic info - is there a more fleshed out version somewhere?) I'd sure like to read them. Also, anything you think I might need to do some catching up on would be appreciated. Perhaps there were announcements weeks or months ago that are very important and shape your understand of what is going to be, while I just totally miss that information. And digging forums for month old posts in an alpha is kind of a difficult thing to do, if you don't know what to look for^^
Also I'm really curious at how devs intend to implement the enemies (the current are just placeholders I figured). If there are threads about that, I would really love to pointed towards them!

Anyways, that is only if you have time for it.
Thanks!