Factorio Forums

I love this game and I love its odd little quirks. I like the international vibe of the game and its players.

But the phrase "It can also be used to mine any kind of path" does sound like translationese to me, almost meme-like, on a par with "It's dangerous to go alone, take this". Especially when it appears on item tooltips:

Used to build Stone path.
Walking speed: 130%
It can also be used to mine any kind of path.

Any kind of path? What kinds are there? Just one - "stone paths". And they're not paths. They're tiles. Concrete tiles are not called concrete paths.

Do you "mine" paths, anyway? Not really. You don't "mine" a building or a power pole.

What the phrase is trying to say is "It can also be used to remove any placed tile".

Afaik, picking up *anything* manually in the world of Factorio is called mining, for the consistency of language. It may sound odd at first, but it's correct.
When using bots, it would be called deconstruction. As such, you also *build* tiles, you don't *place* them.

Xeanoa wrote: ↑

Sat May 04, 2019 11:27 am

Afaik, picking up *anything* manually in the world of Factory is called mining, for the consistency of language. It may sound odd at first, but it's correct.
When using bots, it would be called deconstruction. As such, you also *build* tiles, you don't *place* them.

It's marked language. You can have English as commonly used by its community of regular users, or game-speak, pick one.

"Mining" isn't just about consistency, it also represents the "mining" bar that appears whenever you go to "mine" something, and why the process is not instantaneous like bot-mediated deconstruction is. The terminology "tile" and "path" is also very precise, with the former referring to the location and terrain underneath, while the latter refers to user-placeable pathable objects occupying the "path" layer above tiles. Concrete is path, landfill is tile.

As for the "common" or "game-speak" bit, I'm pretty sure that in the highly technical community of Factorio the two are one and the same, but if you insist on a choice, game-speak. Consistency is clarity. Train stops and train stations are different things.

Well, the devs seem to think it's an issue. I consider "mine any kind of path" to be a remnant of internal nomenclature that no native English speaker would ever, ever utter. I played the game for over a year before I had the first clue what it was supposed to mean.

Um... in that article they talk about how they want to make things MORE consistent, i.e. the game-speak. Case in point, the last FFF talked about the recent change of a lot of internal references from "player" to "character" to make things more consistent (despite the breaking of many mods).

Theikkru wrote: ↑

Sat May 04, 2019 4:45 pm

Um... in that article they talk about how they want to make things MORE consistent, i.e. the game-speak.

No, they say they want it to be more consistent and make more sense, and that the nomenclature that the pre-1.0 playerbase uses is not necessarily the best nomenclature. They say they want to avoid using "internal names". Who ever calls stone bricks a "path"? Is it a "path" when it covers a square kilometre?

Oh, look. No-one has ever used the verb "mine" with the object "path" in the history of printed English literature. Quelle surprise.

Theikkru wrote: ↑

Sat May 04, 2019 4:45 pm

Case in point, the last FFF talked about the recent change of a lot of internal references from "player" to "character" to make things more consistent (despite the breaking of many mods).

That's completely different. That's Lua, for modders. I'm talking about actual words that actual people actually say, write, read.

In Factorio, internal/external consistency is especially relevant because mods are so integral to the game experience, and modders are exposed to internal terms on a regular basis, so the internal ones better be consistent with external ones or modders and players that use them wouldn't be able to talk to each other! As for your question, yes, a square kilometer of concrete or bricks is still "path". To be precise, stone bricks and concrete only become "path" after they are built.

Deadlock989 wrote: ↑

Sat May 04, 2019 4:52 pm

[Google]

I see no reason a game community or developers cannot define terminology with definitions or syntax local to the game. It happens all the time.

Well, I hope you have fun fishing those squarecakes then.

Yeah, I'm now using words that mean something to me personally, in my internal schema, without thinking for a moment how native users of the language might interpret them. Because that's bound to go well.

Theikkru wrote: ↑

Sat May 04, 2019 5:07 pm

I see no reason a game community or developers cannot define terminology with definitions or syntax local to the game. It happens all the time.

Really? You can't think of any reasons that communities of people or developers shouldn't use common nomenclature rather than redefine their own terms? I mean... certainly there can't be any loss of readability if we just ignore the english language and redefine terms as we feel like it...

Seriously, it may be a minor thing, but the offending line of text really is offensive to the english language. Those are far more commonly referred to as tiles than path and people far more commonly think about 'picking up' a building, entity, structure, tile, etc... not 'mining' it. Changing that line to 'It can also be used to pick up any kind of player-placed tile' is consistent with the game language in most other locations and far more consistent with the english language. Do not that it says player-placed tile, because technically speaking every form of terrain in the game is a tile. Actually, technically speaking the game tracks two different types of tiles for every square because it tracks the terrain tile and the tile that gets placed over it... but this distinction is irrelevant to players.

Darinth wrote: ↑

Wed May 08, 2019 12:50 pm

Actually, technically speaking the game tracks two different types of tiles for every square because it tracks the terrain tile and the tile that gets placed over it... but this distinction is irrelevant to players.

I think this terminology confusion for "tile" clearly explains why a unified "game-speak" system can be superior at times to enforcing "generally-used English" in a prescriptive way.

The game distinguishes the two clearly by only calling the underlying surface (water, grass, desert, landfill) a "tile", and the artificial surfaces (stone, concrete) a "path".

To be fair, I do agree with OP that "mine a path" is confusing, and I had assumed that paths can only be replaced by placing different paths on top of them, until I accidentally held right click (the mine action) while holding stone bricks, and saw the existing brick path get removed. In this specific case, I agree that changing the phrasing would likely be better, I envision something along the lines of "Performing the mining action while holding this item will remove any kind of path"

Darinth wrote: ↑

Wed May 08, 2019 12:50 pm

Really? You can't think of any reasons that communities of people or developers shouldn't use common nomenclature rather than redefine their own terms? I mean... certainly there can't be any loss of readability if we just ignore the english language and redefine terms as we feel like it...

Seriously, it may be a minor thing, but the offending line of text really is offensive to the english language. Those are far more commonly referred to as tiles than path and people far more commonly think about 'picking up' a building, entity, structure, tile, etc... not 'mining' it. Changing that line to 'It can also be used to pick up any kind of player-placed tile' is consistent with the game language in most other locations and far more consistent with the english language. Do not that it says player-placed tile, because technically speaking every form of terrain in the game is a tile. Actually, technically speaking the game tracks two different types of tiles for every square because it tracks the terrain tile and the tile that gets placed over it... but this distinction is irrelevant to players.

I do not see how the line of text in question is particularly offensive in any way. It is grammatically valid, and makes sense in context. Asking any more is absurd, since no more is required of regular speech or writing.
Factorio (re)definitions are not arbitrary; they are a matter of necessity to maintain consistency. As you demonstrated yourself with conflation of the term 'tile', common nomenclature is too ambiguous to be used directly in Factorio. It would be inaccurate to say that 'any player-placed tile can be picked up', because landfill would fit that description, and cannot be. The verb 'mine' is also a term with a precise, consistent definition within Factorio, and is in fact a sufficient and complete instruction to the player, as not only is it introduced to the player in the tutorial, it is also used in the hotkeys menu. Conversely, the pick-up key performs an entirely different function, and would not work for that purpose. If the English language must be modified in order to communicate directly and precisely, then so be it; there is nothing sacred about it.

Just use a personal pronoun so the tooltip is the item talking to you. With a smiley face, of course.
"I can also be used to mine any kind of path =)"

"Thank you Mr. Stone Brick sir!"

(Turns to Mr. Assembler #43402)

"Technically Stone Brick isn't a male, but he likes to think of himself as such."

(Skips away with a smile on face)

With no human contact in the foreseeable ever, and nothing but hostile aliens expanding perpetually in all directions, you start making friends with whatever you can.

(Pans out to space)

It is a dimension as vast as your available memory and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between your flashlight and night vision goggles, between science packs and fish rockets, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area which we call the Fwilight Zone.

For me the confusing part comes not from 'mining' but from the use of 'path' rather than 'flooring.' The tiles themselves aren't necessarily a 'path' if they cover a large area. I think the use of 'path' comes from Devs disapproving of extensive wall-to-wall concrete use... at least from what I've heard anecdotally.

adam_bise wrote: ↑

Wed May 08, 2019 6:35 pm

Just use a personal pronoun so the tooltip is the item talking to you. With a smiley face, of course.
"I can also be used to mine any kind of path =)"

"Thank you Mr. Stone Brick sir!"

(Turns to Mr. Assembler #43402)

"Technically Stone Brick isn't a male, but he likes to think of himself as such."

(Skips away with a smile on face)

With no human contact in the foreseeable ever, and nothing but hostile aliens expanding perpetually in all directions, you start making friends with whatever you can.

(Pans out to space)

It is a dimension as vast as your available memory and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between your flashlight and night vision goggles, between science packs and fish rockets, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area which we call the Fwilight Zone.

+1

Deadlock989 wrote: ↑

Sat May 04, 2019 10:25 am

Used to build Stone path.
Walking speed: 130%
It can also be used to mine any kind of path.

Any kind of path? What kinds are there? Just one - "stone paths". And they're not paths. They're tiles. Concrete tiles are not called concrete paths.

Stone path, wood paths, concrete path, hazard concrete to name some in vanilla. Cement, asphalt roads, Musk solar cells to name some modded ones.

Not all paths lead to Rome, some lead to my factory.

In my opinion, a simple change to "It can also be used to replace any kind of path" would be clearer, and should be sufficient to keep everyone happy. Perhaps the word "path" could be replaced with "ground cover(ing)" or something clearer as well.

As a native English speaker, I always did think the wording was confusing, and I never fully understood what they meant until this thread began.

Ah, but it can be used for more than replacing. You can use it to remove any kind of ground covering.

I also had to google how to remove concrete, as I thought it to be impossible.