Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

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Dreepa
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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Dreepa »

Guys, I didn't know that you can loot your corpse :)

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Tekky »

Dreepa wrote:Guys, I didn't know that you can loot your corpse :)
I believe that was a new feature in 0.15. At least in single-player in 0.14, you always had to revert to your last autosave after dying, so it was not possible to loot your corpse.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by bobucles »

The corpse collecting part of the game can definitely use some refinement. The biggest thing is the game hard pauses, which gives an immediate impression that the game is over when it's not. It should stay unpaused and begin respawning immediately (the continue button shows the countdown timer) and only pause if the game mode does not allow respawn. The corpse is also VERY difficult to find; the yellow colors on sand in a combat zone takes some real hawk eyes to catch. There needs to be a temporary map marker for the body (yet another indicator that there's loot to grab) and maybe a glow effect on the body itself.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by eradicator »

Rseding91 wrote:You can respawn in single player and multiplayer and go get all your stuff back from your body so all you ever lose is time.
The corpse despawns after a (pretty short) while though. Crafting emergency equipment and then trying to get to and recover your unmarked corpse from a biter infested forest in just 15mins can be quite difficult. And the game doesn't even tell you that there might be a corpse to recover at all.

Imho nobody would be hurt if the corpse timeout was on the magnitude of 10 hour-ish instead. And ofc with a map marker as suggested many times before.
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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Rseding91 »

eradicator wrote:
Rseding91 wrote:You can respawn in single player and multiplayer and go get all your stuff back from your body so all you ever lose is time.
The corpse despawns after a (pretty short) while though. Crafting emergency equipment and then trying to get to and recover your unmarked corpse from a biter infested forest in just 15mins can be quite difficult. And the game doesn't even tell you that there might be a corpse to recover at all.

Imho nobody would be hurt if the corpse timeout was on the magnitude of 10 hour-ish instead. And ofc with a map marker as suggested many times before.
It's short and unmarked on purpose. If it wasn't there would be literally zero penalty for death meaning combat would be even less important.
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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Engimage »

Rseding91 wrote:It's short and unmarked on purpose. If it wasn't there would be literally zero penalty for death meaning combat would be even less important.
I do like how it is now. But I see no harm in making this optional.
There are multiple examples of Factorio being used for education and also being played by kids (my son included). So there could be an option to make the game totally secure for a player. Now you can just turn biters off making combat irrelevant at all. But player still can die from trains. You could even go for an option of making player invulnerable to all damage including fire/grenades etc just to make it a kid sandbox. Why not? Make this off by default in most presets and create one for a sandbox...

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by mrvn »

PacifyerGrey wrote:
Rseding91 wrote:It's short and unmarked on purpose. If it wasn't there would be literally zero penalty for death meaning combat would be even less important.
I do like how it is now. But I see no harm in making this optional.
There are multiple examples of Factorio being used for education and also being played by kids (my son included). So there could be an option to make the game totally secure for a player. Now you can just turn biters off making combat irrelevant at all. But player still can die from trains. You could even go for an option of making player invulnerable to all damage including fire/grenades etc just to make it a kid sandbox. Why not? Make this off by default in most presets and create one for a sandbox...
That's what the sandbox scenario is. Only thing I would like to change is the option to have a body.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by bobucles »

There are multiple examples of Factorio being used for education and also being played by kids (my son included)
Isn't teaching your kids to stay off of train tracks an important part of education?

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Engimage »

bobucles wrote:
There are multiple examples of Factorio being used for education and also being played by kids (my son included)
Isn't teaching your kids to stay off of train tracks an important part of education?
Sure it is but at some point. However I have seen how the train threat easily discouraged my son from doing stuff. He was afraid to even walk near train tracks.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Dreepa »

Rseding91 wrote:
eradicator wrote:
Rseding91 wrote:You can respawn in single player and multiplayer and go get all your stuff back from your body so all you ever lose is time.
The corpse despawns after a (pretty short) while though. Crafting emergency equipment and then trying to get to and recover your unmarked corpse from a biter infested forest in just 15mins can be quite difficult. And the game doesn't even tell you that there might be a corpse to recover at all.

Imho nobody would be hurt if the corpse timeout was on the magnitude of 10 hour-ish instead. And ofc with a map marker as suggested many times before.
It's short and unmarked on purpose. If it wasn't there would be literally zero penalty for death meaning combat would be even less important.

The penalty for death is that you lose stuff that you have build. E.g. with a rewspawn timer, you would see the biters damage your base. That's what I would expect. It would be the natural thing for the genre.
Shouldn't the main goal of applying a penalty in a build up game ALWAYS apply to your stuff that you actually built while your avatar is just a tool and shouldn't be so important?

Creepers are feared because they destroy your stuff that you build. Getting to your corpse in minecraft is not so problematic usually. And then there are even mods about corpse management, showing the exact location etc.
Having to walk to your corpse and pick it up is already felt as punishment apparently.

Diablo, MMOs, you name it: The times of loosing all your equipment in a fast decay corpse are over for a reason. Those hardcore games are maybe for the old Ultima Online crowd. The full-loot Albion crowd. Or the Rust/Forest/Battleground crowd.

For me, there is a reason why normal games moved away from taking everything away from the player. First: It is not fun, and over the top. Second: People just load a savegame if they can. Unfortunately doesnt work on a server that you dont own...

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Zavian »

I don't think your comparisons of the cost of death in Factorio and Diablo/MMOs are valid.

In Factorio, most of what you have achieved in your playthrough is in the factory you have built. That factory is typically not at risk if you get hit by a train. The equipment you are wearing/the stuff you have in your inventory is typically only a minor part of what you have built. Losing fusion reactors etc does hurt, but typically your equipment and the stuff in your inventory can be replaced in less than 30 mins in most factories (especially if you don't mind stealing blue circuits from science). Death in Factorio is normally just an inconvenience. In many MMOs your equipment could take days or weeks of grinding to replace. Losing that really hurts, and could result in players rage quitting the game permanently.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Dreepa »

Zavian wrote:I don't think your comparisons of the cost of death in Factorio and Diablo/MMOs are valid.

In Factorio, most of what you have achieved in your playthrough is in the factory you have built. That factory is typically not at risk if you get hit by a train. The equipment you are wearing/the stuff you have in your inventory is typically only a minor part of what you have built. Losing fusion reactors etc does hurt, but typically your equipment and the stuff in your inventory can be replaced in less than 30 mins in most factories (especially if you don't mind stealing blue circuits from science). Death in Factorio is normally just an inconvenience. In many MMOs your equipment could take days or weeks of grinding to replace. Losing that really hurts, and could result in players rage quitting the game permanently.

And because death has no meaningful impact on the game patterns of how it challenges you or how it changes your playstyle, it is exactly the reason why games don't do it anymore. If you die (or fail) in a modernly designed game, you auto load to last checkpoint. You are not forced to grind your way back to the point you were at.
On top of that, also take into account that Factorio's core game is about building stuff. Not managing corpse runs or re-crafting your equipment, especially when it is about "waiting for it to be done" and nothing else there ZERO value in that feature... What kind of stupid game design would tell you: "And now you can either wait 10 min to re-craft your stuff, or load an old save game". No modern game would do that. And it is good that game designers realized that punishment is not about consistency within rules but a matter of psychology. E.g. Backtracking, corpse running, save-game managment, trial and error exploration, random death events etc. etc. the list is endless... is gone. Only survival games do it, and for them it is THE POINT of the game. For Factorio it is as needed as an appendix that just turns to acute appendicitis.

Just my 2 cent, ymmv.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Zavian »

In my last 3 months of playing I think I have died about 5 times. It's not like you are dying and respawning every 10 mins. (Although that could happen if you end up behind the biters evolution curve. I must also admit that I suck at combat, and tend to play railworlds. On deathworld settings I would probably die much more often). If the time to craft replacement equipment worries you could automate it, and have it sitting in a requestor chest right beside the spawn point. That way there is no need to wait.

In most games with checkpoints you are expected to die regularly. There it is important to reduce the friction of respawn/reload to the player.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by mrvn »

In my opinion you either can get your corpse quickly with very little to no recrafting or you have to craft a new power armor, personal shields, laser defense and after you duplicated all that who cares about the original? You already have all the stuff again.

Or do you craft a second set or armor and weapons and store it in your base so you can recover your corpse in case you die? If so then you are back to "can get your corpse quickly with very little to no recrafting".


That said the interval could be configurable. In a large explored map it can take a lot of time just to get to where you died. You might have to skirt around aliens making the way even longer. You might not have a train track going the right direction, no car left in the base to drive there. In train world maps distances are greater so the time should be greater too.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by Dreepa »

Zavian wrote:In my last 3 months of playing I think I have died about 5 times. It's not like you are dying and respawning every 10 mins. (Although that could happen if you end up behind the biters evolution curve. I must also admit that I suck at combat, and tend to play railworlds. On deathworld settings I would probably die much more often). If the time to craft replacement equipment worries you could automate it, and have it sitting in a requestor chest right beside the spawn point. That way there is no need to wait.

In most games with checkpoints you are expected to die regularly. There it is important to reduce the friction of respawn/reload to the player.

What makes you confident that your experience of death per time is relevant to my experience of death per time?
And that being said, it still is besides the point, because I was referring to multiplayer, where others die by my train tracks. So the point was about frustration of other people due to my activity. It is an entire different issue than what you describe. So I agree with you: In single player I also rarely die to my own trains, as I am very aware of their path and timings.
Just saying.

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Re: Option for trains to deal zero damage to players

Post by mrvn »

Huh? I die by my own trains all the time. More than from aliens for sure.

Trains leave when they are good and ready. So how am I supposed to know when they leave. Just because I build the trains doesn't make the schedule any more predictable than some other person building the train.

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