Something to replace the "steel axe" character slot

[n7m6e7]

We need a tool for the tool slot besides the steel pickaxe.

Weapons are interesting. There are straight upgrades, and side-grades for weapons. Shotgun < combat shotgun. Flamethrower vs machine gun

Armor is a bit less interesting, with nothing but straight upgrades. Reinforced armor <Modular armor < Power armor.

Tools are..... Iron pick<steel pick....thats it.
With armor, you may not go to power armor due to cost.
With tools... Its steel. Who doesnt have enough steel to build a lifetime of steel picks within 10 minutes?

So why not a a pick that mines even faster, but uses blue circuits in its recipe? Or using repair packs as a tool instead of holding it with your curser? Maybe tools that are better at specific tasks (mining ore, mining trees, mining belts, tracks, buildings)

[Aeternus]

Well...
By the time you're done with the steel pickaxe, how much manual mining will you still be doing? You'll rapidly have a personal roboport and a helpful gaggle of construction bots that do all that manual labor for you. I can see what your idea is but... isn't it sort of pointless?

[dood]

The iron pickaxe is dead weight in your crafting menu already.
Adding another tier of pickaxe would only serve to relegate the steel one to the same fate.
More dead end product bloat doesn't seem very helpful.

[bobucles]

It'd be pretty cool if we could place the deconstruction planner there.

[n7m6e7]

Well...
By the time you're done with the steel pickaxe, how much manual mining will you still be doing? You'll rapidly have a personal roboport and a helpful gaggle of construction bots that do all that manual labor for you. I can see what your idea is but... isn't it sort of pointless?

Well there is a fairly large chunk of time before you get the modular armor, robots, and personal roboport, where some other tool could be useful.

Also, mining a full chest manually lets you poof its contents into your inventory, while bots need to pick up the items one by one.

The iron pickaxe is dead weight in your crafting menu already.
Adding another tier of pickaxe would only serve to relegate the steel one to the same fate.
More dead end product bloat doesn't seem very helpful.

I suggest some kind of side-grade to the steel pick. One where you eould still want the steel pick to destruct quicker. So if you are testing a new design, and are constantly un-doing stuff, you want the steel axe. But if you decide to build a satellite base, and dont bring enough material, you could bring a handheld drill, to mine ore faster.

More situational items.

[ManaUser]

Since manual mining does become irrelevant fairly quick (though it should be noted that mining speed affects removing buildings too), here's an "out there" idea: The picks also serve as melee weapons should you be otherwise unarmed, so upgrades could take it more in that direction. This would probably require adding a way to intentional use your melee weapon though.

[bobucles]

Attacking without ammo automatically calls upon the mighty pickaxe. Unfortunately because of enemy armor and a lack of personal upgrades it fails to effective against anything bigger than medium biters.

[dood]

Actually, I'd be in favor of losing pickaxes altogether.
When I started playing factorio, I came freshly off terraria and expected to be upgrading that pickaxe with new materials so I can mine more materials so I can make a better pickaxe but factorio is obviously not that type of game.
That space could be better utilized holding blank blueprints and the deconstruction planner imo.

[jamiechi1]

I think it would be nice if all these slots were configurable in the game options. I don't make maps anymore with the 'aliens' enabled so I don't need weapons. Using these slots for deconstructors or creating a new blueprint makes more sense. The only thing I use consistantly is the armor configuration. Using one of these slots to toggle the minimap would also be useful.

[Maddhawk]

It'd be pretty cool if we could place the deconstruction planner there.

Add a fifth slot column for New Blueprint and Deconstruction Planner that can be hot keyed?

I could dig that, though, the whole blueprint UI system needs to be overhauled.

[QGamer]

Since manual mining does become irrelevant fairly quick (though it should be noted that mining speed affects removing buildings too), here's an "out there" idea: The picks also serve as melee weapons should you be otherwise unarmed, so upgrades could take it more in that direction. This would probably require adding a way to intentional use your melee weapon though.

How about a sword or a spear? Something that's long enough to damage biters before they can get their teeth on me, and something that does enough damage to make it worthwhile. If it was a sword it'd be cool if I could use it to block acid spit from spitters and worms, at the cost of damaging the sword.