Factorio Forums

TL;DR

Option to disable walking speed bonus when wearing Mech Armor

What?

Here are four possible implementations, ordered from best to worst:

• UI toggle for getting movement speed (like the toggle for exoskeletons)
• Always flying mode for Mech Armor
• Tile immunity equipment which, like belt immunity equipment, renders you impervious to walking speed bonuses
• Settings menu toggle.

Why?

When wearing Mech Armor, you get walking speed bonuses while walking but not when flying. This has two major problems:

• It is frustrating to make small corrections in position, because the amount you move is inconsistent
• When moving at high speeds, I find the stutter caused by briefly switching to flying speed when moving over an obstacle to be headache inducing

(incidentally, in the past I've had a similar gripe regarding small corrections in position when riding the Spidertron)

And this has knock-on effects. E.g. I usually liked laying some amount of tiles in my factory to make pathways, or to make factory blocks look nice. But now I actively avoid laying any such tile specifically to avoid the problems it will cause when I get Mech Armor.

And I'm genuinely dreading Aquilo in my latest playthrough because use of concrete is forced.

Incidentally, granting the Mech Armor the movement speed bonus when flying would also solve my issue, but I'm led to believe that option is not on the table.

What about an "always fly" mode ?

> Always flying mode for Mech Armor

I didn't fully read I confess

Hurkyl wrote: Sun May 18, 2025 4:52 amHere are four possible implementations, ordered from best to worst:

• UI toggle for getting movement speed (like the toggle for exoskeletons)
• Always flying mode for Mech Armor
• Tile immunity equipment which, like belt immunity equipment, renders you impervious to walking speed bonuses
• Settings menu toggle.

Now that I've thought about it more, "always flying mode" combines with the first and third bullets. So, an UI toggle to tell the Mech Armor to always fly now seems like the best option.

I wanted to bump this for 2.1 consideration as well, should the devs still feel that giving jetpack flight the movement bonus is off the table.

Hurkyl wrote: Thu Jul 09, 2026 2:55 pm I wanted to bump this for 2.1 consideration as well, should the devs still feel that giving jetpack flight the movement bonus is off the table.

I guess it wouldn't make too much sense for an exoskeleton to give you extra movement speed while you're flying over concrete

atarihomestar1 wrote: Thu Jul 09, 2026 7:32 pm

Hurkyl wrote: Thu Jul 09, 2026 2:55 pm I wanted to bump this for 2.1 consideration as well, should the devs still feel that giving jetpack flight the movement bonus is off the table.

I guess it wouldn't make too much sense for an exoskeleton to give you extra movement speed while you're flying over concrete

You could just say that the mech armour also is affected by the ground via magnets as concrete does have iron in it

also +1 because the consent difference in speed is hard on my eyes and just would like a always on hover mode too

I'm sure this sounds crazy nitpicky because obviously mech armor is great for all kinds of reasons, but it is actually quite unpleasant running around inside your base because your speed wildly jumps up and down as you take off and land when using a couple pairs of legs. Turning them off entirely then just makes you slow all the time. Sort of the opposite of what this originally was concerned with.

Maybe something like retaining your legs speed for a few seconds when you take off, so that when momentarily stepping over a building or pipe or train and landing again you maintain speed? And if you stay airborne for a while you eventually slow down smoothly? That way you wouldn't maintain high speed endlessly over water but would avoid the rapid speed changes when walking around in the base.

This wouldn't conflict with an 'always fly' mode either since you'd quickly slow down to fly speed in that case too.

gridstop wrote: Sat Jul 11, 2026 1:51 am Maybe something like retaining your legs speed for a few seconds when you take off

I like this idea, basically "coyote time". If we could have a second or two where we keep our full speed before gradually easing down to the jetpack speed, it would completely solve the issue. We'd be able to quickly fly over the odd production line without half a dozen rapid speed changes, but flying for any prolonged time over a more densely built area would still slow us down as intended.

All movement speed bonuses should just be active all the time, whether you're flying or not. The whole point of mech armor is that it lets you ignore buildings and terrain. If it doesn't "just work" and you still have to think about what you're moving over, what's the point?