Factorio Forums

This idea is fairly simple: What if each biter corpse temporarily absorbed pollution from it's chunk, and when it had absorbed more than a certain amount, the corpse disappears and all of the pollution it had previously absorbed is instantly re-emitted to the chunk.

As far as I know, long range biter path finding uses simple "hill climbing", trying to move from less-polluted chunks to more-polluted chunks, until it reaches an area with player buildings which are either pollution-emitters or military, which are then attacked.

If biter corpses absorb pollution, then after an attack wave is stopped, the next attack will be a different chunk, since the corpses make the live biters see that first area as unpolluted.

Having biter corpses eventually blow up and re-release their stored pollution means that they don't act as a permanent defense, and ensures a future wave will seek that area in the near future. Also, I would expect a chain reaction, if each exploding corpse emits enough pollution to make another corpse in that chunk absorb enough pollution to blow up.

How much pollution per game tick a biter corpse can absorb, and how much total it absorbs before blowing up and re-polluting, would both be configurable at world creation. Also, what percentage of re-emitted pollution gets added to the global pollution level (influencing evolution) would be configurable.

This idea can be compared to the Rampant mod, but it's far simpler, leveraging the existing pollution mechanic instead of adding pheromones.

Not sure if normal corpses are entities you can interact with. If they are, I could see how you might do this via mod. If not you could still simulate it.

That said, I have no idea if their pathfinding works that way or not. I wouldnt be surprised at least.