Factorio Forums

Yes, a somehow matching suggestion to https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... ket#p18749
Take the post stations for the conversations of the markets.

The connection by track is new, I like that. The rules for the inserters needs to be set automatically. It's really not useful, to make the work twice.

...

Just for those, who read that and don't know what I mean: currently I've to set up one requester chest for one needed item in the other network. This is because I can't tell an inserter to insert this and that, if not enough. I can tell him only to insert, but cannot control what and how many of that.

The result is, that I need 20 requester chests and twenty inserters, which fill into a train with 4 wagons. To transport 5 belts, or one roboport, or 67 piercing bullets.

ssilk wrote:Kovarex & LoSboccacc: Yes, the direction is right. The details are the problem.

For example: I built a train station about 2000 tiles away, to see, which problems occur. I need over 250 green wires to connect that.

Big electric poles have a wire reach of 30 tiles. You need about 70 wires to cover that distance. And 70 wires aren't that many, and 2000 tiles is a long distance.

Btw, why do you actually need this? You seem to want to be able to request anything over a distance of 2000 tiles, is that correct? That's a big project, and the game shouldn't have features to make everything easy.

immibis wrote:

ssilk wrote:Kovarex & LoSboccacc: Yes, the direction is right. The details are the problem.

For example: I built a train station about 2000 tiles away, to see, which problems occur. I need over 250 green wires to connect that.

Big electric poles have a wire reach of 30 tiles. You need about 70 wires to cover that distance. And 70 wires aren't that many, and 2000 tiles is a long distance.

Yes it is long.
I must admit, I haven't really measured it (I write from iPad, so I can't do it yet), but when I read your answer I knew, that I've mixed the number up with something else. But well, it was about 100 green wires, cause the way is not completely straight, there are not always big poles.
For the other question I'll write an own article, because too much OT.

for the railroads it would be handy (and easy to implement in my opinion) to let them be re-nameable, random is not that useful for remembering. I know those are supporter's names, but they could be put on other places, on labs it is okay to have them as those names are not to be used in game, but on train stations functionality is more neat imho, i would think the same way if i would be a supporter.

mohreb wrote:for the railroads it would be handy (and easy to implement in my opinion) to let them be re-nameable, random is not that useful for remembering. I know those are supporter's names, but they could be put on other places, on labs it is okay to have them as those names are not to be used in game, but on train stations functionality is more neat imho, i would think the same way if i would be a supporter.

This is on our (very very very long) Todo list.

I find the railroad part of the game the most enjoyable and hope it gets more focus.

My suggestion would be to add "Crates and Cranes".

Its an obvious idea but I found it interesting to wonder how it might work. These are just my thoughts on it and I hope it sparks the imagination of others.

Trains carriages become flat beds that accept any crate. A carriage would carry a single crate. Crates would not be "smart" they would be simple dumb containers for items similar to the current carriages.

Cranes would be like ship dock cranes which can move around a road network the player builds. The devs would have to solve the collision free pathing problem since you would want multiple cranes on the same road network. You could simply decide that cranes do not collide with each other or whenever they meet they simply swap their crates or move around each other somehow. There are lots of simple ways and once you have a basis that within the road network any crane can move to anywhere then the whole thing would work with similar logic to the way drones do at the moment but for cargo containers / crates.

So the cranes would act like drones for crates. The road network itself would be the basis of specifying pickup, dropoff locations and any "smart" conditions like crate must be full / empty or contain a specific item type. There could be various crane road network items to make similar to requester / provider chests etc. The difference is they would only function within their connected network i.e. adjacent tiles. Dropoff/pickup locations would allow multiple crates stacked on top of each other ( where they all satisfy the same conditions ). The player could design huge storage depots with crates stacked high up with stockpiles of reserves.

It would present a basis where building a large scale railway based network would pay off with the advantages of massive storage and efficiently decoupled bases for individual tasks. The trains themselves would spend more time transporting and could better deliver and receive combinations of goods to and from multiple bases.

It perfectly paves the way for other forms of transport also i.e. cargo boats and planes. It also leads to the logical way that trains could be fitted out with weapons, radar, drones and other gizmos besides crates. You could have multiple parallel train stations and seperate inserter areas saving space and things could still work the way they do at the moment for smaller quantities of stuff or when trying to share items between bases.

I really love the idea with crates, but before it would be important to have electric engines, a chance to cross rivers/lakes and platforms that can connect under certain circumstances. New signals (eg go slow or attention reverse if you see enemies or attention stop if you see a player on your Track infront of you.) and sensors to detect problems what be cool! And maybe you could connect sensors with signals and/or trains via wireless (in reallife GSM-Rail) so if a sensor detects an enemy the train should stop.

reinforced locomotive, armored wagon to secured your train when he move around, that could be great

For the robot integration, check out the logistic wagons mod, it works quite well. It also massively simplifies building tracks through forests - I carry a ton of construction bots and a deconstruction planner, and they cut the trees and store the wood in another wagon. And of course, I can build a new train station in a pinch by having a wagon full of the necessary buildings. It might be worth it implementing something like that in the base game, it's very handy

eddiedeath wrote:My suggestion would be to add "Crates and Cranes".

How about Bridge Cranes? https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... f=6&t=4529

better make tanks with distant control for patrol or attack until you build factory but need 2-5x slow science time

I notice the train is called a diesel locomotive (in English anyway), but it runs on coal rather than a liquid fuel. It would be cool if there were two tiers of train, with a slower steam locomotive first that uses coal, and then the current train becomes fuelled by heavy or light oil (or a mix?) loaded by a special machine.
Also fuel tanker wagons would make a lot of sense.
And maybe a sort of guard's van-esqe wagon to put on the back of trains fitted with weapons, but that's more for the look of things than anything else.

Mangledpork wrote:I notice the train is called a diesel locomotive (in English anyway),...

This has been bothering me a bit for another reason. The current technology is an electric engine that uses diesel to charge the generators . It would best be labeled an electric engine and not worry about what fuel source is provided. To provide accuracy, the locomotive could have its name changed depending on fuel source ,coal-electric, oil-electric or wood-electric but I think hybrid electric would suffice (although some batteries should be added to the recipe).

Mangledpork wrote:I notice the train is called a diesel locomotive (in English anyway), but it runs on coal rather than a liquid fuel. It would be cool if there were two tiers of train, with a slower steam locomotive first that uses coal, [...]

Interesting thing is steam locomotives can be faster than diesel ones, the real reason they were replaced is that diesels can be maintained easier.

I really like the idea of a second tier (diesel) and a third (electric)

I would love to see customizable flatbed wagons, a flat wagon with 4x buildable spaces in a row on it so we put what we want on it like containers, turrets etc.

bulldog98 wrote:I really like the idea of a second tier (diesel) and a third (electric)

The existing Diesel engine is effectively a steam-electric engine, you burn a solid fuel to make heat to power an electric generator, which powers the electric engine.
Electric (powered from your power grid) SHOULD be possible with modding now, I remember someone complaining it wasn't in 0.9.8, and the devs aparantly made it possible, but I've never tried myself. (Something else that wasn't possible then, that is in the v0.10 series, is a burner powered assembly machine.)
Diesel should be possible in V0.13 when they implement the ability to use a liquid as a fuel. (and tanker wagons to transport liquids).

I have a proposal.

I have a large railroad. And very hard to catch some train and redirect it to another station. It wood be nice, if it was a list of trains where you can redirect selected train. And possibility to name and rename trains. And why in carriage is no limit like in chests?

Just an official notice here: anyone who disses steam engines will be summarily disciplined.

I can't remember if this was ever said but are we ever going to have to process oil into diesel for the trains? I had a feeling it was planned.

JackGruff wrote:I can't remember if this was ever said but are we ever going to have to process oil into diesel for the trains? I had a feeling it was planned.

AFAIK, that particular idea was scrapped because it would be too difficult for the tech level they want trains to be available for.
However, Liquid based fuels is a thing planned for the 0.13 release, basically 0.11 adds multiplayer, 0.12 finishs multiplayer, 0.13 adds a buttload of features.