Seems like some prototype information in AutoplaceSpecification is not available at control runtime:
Compare:
https://wiki.factorio.com/Types/AutoplaceSpecification
and:
https://lua-api.factorio.com/latest/Con ... cification
coverage, starting_area_amount, and starting_area_size are not included in the latter. This does not seem to be a documentation issue, as they are nil when accessed via game.entity_prototypes["a-resource"].autoplace_specification
Exposing all the autoplace specification as presented in the prototype stage would allow my mod to be much more effective at overriding the autoplace mechanism for potentially arbitrary other mods it is combined with.
Missing AutoplaceSpecification information at control runtime
Missing AutoplaceSpecification information at control runtime
Shameless mod plugging: Ribbon Maze
Re: Missing AutoplaceSpecification information at control runtime
starting_area_amount is sadly not known at runtime. I added the other things/fixed the doc.
I'm an admin over at https://wiki.factorio.com. Feel free to contact me if there's anything wrong (or right) with it.