My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

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kovarex
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My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by kovarex »

Trains are good:
Some time ago, I thought, that trains are not very good option to transport belts, and the current reason for their usage is to play with the mechanics for the sake of it.
In the last game, I found out that it is not true, and trains are actually very useful even in my speedrun freeplay games.
When you play game with not enough resources that are far away from your base, you need to setup some transport, and you need it to not be too expensive, you are making expansion because you don't have much resources, and it should have reasonable flow of resources.

Using basic belts would limit the flow of items to small rates, so lets compare fast transport belts and rails.
Rail costs approximatelly 6 iron per 2 tiles.
Fast transport belt costs 26 iron per 2 tiles.

I played with two way rails and two way trains (one locomotive on each side and 2 wagons), it was quite easy to setup, I didn't have to make turns, they just went back and forth and stations were little, so it didn't take much time to build these.
Minimalistic train station
The only thing I might want to change about trains would be to extend the transport wagon capacity.
Also the advantage of trains is, that it is fun to look at for me, and the factory is more diverse.

It is tradition for me, to play the game, and then list things that are the most important to make the gameplay better experience.
(I remember very well the moment, when I said that "something like transport belt to ground, is really needed :)"
So here it is:

Blue prints:
Blue prints have been discussed elsewhere already, but I really feel they should get into the game early.

Repair robots:
It becomes bothersome to repair individual wall pieces, or destroyed parts of the factory after attack, I believe that the secondary tasks of the building robots used for the blue prints should be repairing damaged buildings, they could even reconstruct destroyed buildings.

Teleports
I believe there should be some personal teleport building, that would allow you to get quickly to some parts of the map you already colonised.
I think, that simple system of pairs of buildings connected would do the trick, the player could get overview of the area on the second part of the teleport in the entity info.
It took me too long time to travel between different expansions to check if everything is working.
The building would be usable only for player, it would cost a lot of electricity, and it would cost even more with full inventory.

Balance fixes
Beacons https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... 524#p10524
Don't allow attack with turrets somehow, using laser turrets to attack is kind of cheaty way to remove enemy bases.
Not allowing to build turrets nearby enemy structures seems like very simple and effective solution, it could be explained somehow :) This would allow us to do some long range rocket turrets for example without braking the game by letting the player to use these as attack structures.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Nirahiel »

Blue prints : I want them as fast as possible :)
Repair : I was even going to implement this in my mod :P
Teleports : Same ^

And I love trains :)

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Balinor »

kovarex wrote:Balance fixes
Beacons https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... 524#p10524
Don't allow attack with turrets somehow, using laser turrets to attack is kind of cheaty way to remove enemy bases.
Not allowing to build turrets nearby enemy structures seems like very simple and effective solution, it could be explained somehow :) This would allow us to do some long range rocket turrets for example without braking the game by letting the player to use these as attack structures.

If you were to change this then you'd need to implement some form of long range weaponry for use too. I'm pretty much not playing at all currently due to finding the spawns annoying.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Imp0815 »

kovarex wrote:Trains are good:
Blue prints:
Repair robots:
Teleports
Balance fixes
Blue prints:
I really just want them to see building robots fly around and build them(add an Animation that goes like: fly there - make cool blue welding sparks with lighting effects , fly here - make cool welding sparks with lighting effects)

Repair robots:
WELDING SPARKS!
Ok funny things aside. The repair aspect is just what the game mechanic is really missing at the moment.

Teleports
Its a nice idea but what should i do with my car then? And whats about the trains?

Balance fixes
That would be a game changing mechanic. You get in front of an alien base out of detection range, set up your artillery pieces and set up a defense line and then start to pound on there base. Then the creepers swarm out to kill you and die in a horrible death of leasers, bullets and mines (that would put finally a good use to those). I could see this would be a funny thing but it would be very repetitive after the 10th base or so. You should make more options to kill off those aliens then its on the player to decide how to deal with them. The only problem i could see that after a while some perfectionist figure out whats most efficient way and just use it only and then go to the forums and complain uhhh its always the same and too easy.
So on every method to attack there should be a trade off Maybe the artillery takes longer than rushing with a robot army but a robot army is expensive and not very reliable and save than a setup long range outpost. And just dealing yourself with the thread its harder but more rewarding like double the drop when player kills off the buildings.
So i can see there is potential and most of this is already in the game but its on the developer side to decide what fits there taste the most.

EDIT: I don't use Beacons at all, i like my factory with over 120 assembly machines.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by cube »

Imp0815 wrote:Teleports
Its a nice idea but what should i do with my car then? And whats about the trains?
Cars would still be useful for exploration and trains for mass transportation of cargo.
I believe that teleports should be fairly slow to recharge after every use and that they should eat up quite a lot of energy.
We were also talking about teleports begin able to transport items -- at high energy cost and in low volumes.
This would be ideal for transfering some hypotetical rare resources from far away mining sites. Although it could also mess up the game ballance a lot :-)
Imp0815 wrote:Balance fixes
That would be a game changing mechanic. You get in front of an alien base out of detection range, set up your artillery pieces and set up a defense line and then start to pound on there base. Then the creepers swarm out to kill you and die in a horrible death of leasers, bullets and mines (that would put finally a good use to those). I could see this would be a funny thing but it would be very repetitive after the 10th base or so. You should make more options to kill off those aliens then its on the player to decide how to deal with them. The only problem i could see that after a while some perfectionist figure out whats most efficient way and just use it only and then go to the forums and complain uhhh its always the same and too easy.
So on every method to attack there should be a trade off Maybe the artillery takes longer than rushing with a robot army but a robot army is expensive and not very reliable and save than a setup long range outpost. And just dealing yourself with the thread its harder but more rewarding like double the drop when player kills off the buildings.
So i can see there is potential and most of this is already in the game but its on the developer side to decide what fits there taste the most.
+1, i think that automated artillery is the factorio way to conquer bases.
I have no idea what I'm talking about.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by ficolas »

I agree with everything but teleports, I think that ~30secs-1min with the car/a train is enought for travelling, and 1min of travellimg is quite far...

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by ssilk »

ficolas wrote:I agree with everything but teleports, I think that ~30secs-1min with the car/a train is enought for travelling, and 1min of travellimg is quite far...
Yea, but have you ever been driven so far and then you see, that your base is attacked?

To the other suggestions:

Blueprints: now is the time for that. And I have some ideas. Another theme. ;)

Repair: welcome. But how could they repair a destroyed building?? And how to set the production type?
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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by kovarex »

ssilk wrote:
ficolas wrote:Repair: welcome. But how could they repair a destroyed building?? And how to set the production type?
Simply, they would just remember the building position and configuration when it is destroyed, and they would build it again.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by SilverWarior »

ssilk wrote:Yea, but have you ever been driven so far and then you see, that your base is attacked?
Right now this is a problem as you need to check every part of your base for damage. But once repair bots are implemented it won't be such problem as repair bots would be in time able to fix all the damage by themselves.

But yeah I would still be up for having teleporters as and end game technology.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Dysoch »

Repair bots!!!!! Mesa likes.

Teleporter is ok, but make it expensive and very long to build or research (or both)
And expensive like in the range of 50.000 iron plates, 40.000 copper plates and 15.000 steel. That way it is not to overpowered. Also electricity should be somewhat in the range of 10 Kw per transfer.

Make it in tiers 1,2 and 3

Tier 1:
66% price reduction, but uses 250% more power. And long cooldown (5-10 minutes?) for the uses. Downsize is that it creates 50 pollution.

Tier 2:
20% price reduction, uses less power that tier 3 (thinking 25-50% less) but cooldown is 20 minutes. Makes 40 pollution.

Tier 3:
The pinnacle of tech! Costs normal resources, uses more power than normal (50% more) but doest make pollution as it uses qantum tech. Cooldown is 5 minutes or less.

Make it a prime target for the biters, as the first tier makes alot of pollution as it is not as advanced as the later tiers

I know, that is hard to get, but will be very rewarding.

What you guys think?
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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Nirahiel »

50 pollution every 5 minutes is even less than what a regular furnace produces if you keep it smelting items for 5 minutes :)
Just saying.
Also a miner makes 9 pollution, wait like 10 seconds and you already made more than 50 pollution.
A good number would be 500 pollution, if the cooldown is that long.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by ssilk »

SilverWarior wrote: Right now this is a problem as you need to check every part of your base for damage. But once repair bots are implemented it won't be such problem as repair bots would be in time able to fix all the damage by themselves.
Well, I tried to play it friendly and had problems to find iron. I drove around, and then they attacked. And because I didn't had any attack before, because all enemies where far away from starting position (I played with defaults!), and too less resources, my base was heavily underdefened and I lost nearly all, before I could come back. ;( 10 furnaces, dozens of solar panels/accus, two dozen assemblies and the most hurting hundreds of finished items in chests.
So, my problem was, that I couldn't find out how "dangerous" the natives are currently. How long it may take, that they are attacking.

And back to the theme: I was at a point, where repair bots didn't make sense. :) but it would be much sense to install a teleport and take the other end with me in the car. And that means also, that the first "shot" with the teleport should be free. This also means, that before placing the second portal it needs to be coupled with the first teleportal with the already placed. This can also be explained with the quantum nonlocaleablity. Otherwise it can be cheated.

Edit: removed unneded quoting
Last edited by ssilk on Sat Oct 19, 2013 6:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Dysoch »

Nirahiel wrote:50 pollution every 5 minutes is even less than what a regular furnace produces if you keep it smelting items for 5 minutes :)
Just saying.
Also a miner makes 9 pollution, wait like 10 seconds and you already made more than 50 pollution.
A good number would be 500 pollution, if the cooldown is that long.
I never said 50 pollution per 5 minutes, i meant 50 pollution per SECOND. That way biters will be drawn to machine.

I knwo the effects of having more than 1000 pollution per second. Had a playthrough where i had 30 electric furnaces with all 2 speed modules mk 3 and about 200 mines(result was 2000-4000 iron plates PER minute). The result: very fun, but they broke through my defenses in 5 minutes (had 100 laser and 20 gun turrets) they were swarming me with 200-300 every 30 secondes. ( freeplay with ultra much bases ;)

That is what i think is balanced with the teleporter. If you want it, be prepared for the consequences
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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Nirahiel »

50 pollution per second ? So the teleporter will pollute even when it's not being used ?

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Dysoch »

Yes, simply because it has to maintain a connection with the other end. Therefor it uses 1 kw when inactive.

It is just an idea.

I also suggest if they implement it, that the teleporter should be the lowest in the electric network, therefore, if not enough electricty, the teleporter shuts off
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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by ssilk »

Sorry, but what part of the teleporter should pollute? Be realistic! :)

Realistic: uses much power. Not realistic: is fired with coal and pollutes the air.
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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Dysoch »

Granted, a teleported that pollutes.

But the point is, it should be a place that the biters will attack no matter what. Once it is build, they will always go to the teleporter and ignore everything else (except the player)
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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by ficolas »

Dysoch wrote:Granted, a teleported that pollutes.

But the point is, it should be a place that the biters will attack no matter what. Once it is build, they will always go to the teleporter and ignore everything else (except the player)
No

If they only go to get the teleporter, tgat could be easilly exploited.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by Holy-Fire »

kovarex wrote:Trains are good:
Using basic belts would limit the flow of items to small rates, so lets compare fast transport belts and rails.
Rail costs approximatelly 6 iron per 2 tiles.
Fast transport belt costs 26 iron per 2 tiles.
What about having 2 lines of basic belts in parallel?

It costs 6 iron per 2 tiles of length.
It carries 24 items per second (as opposed to 18 for a fast belt).
And I'd say it's easier to set up than trains.

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Re: My observations from playing the game (Trains/wishlist)

Post by ficolas »

Holy-Fire wrote:
kovarex wrote:Trains are good:
Using basic belts would limit the flow of items to small rates, so lets compare fast transport belts and rails.
Rail costs approximatelly 6 iron per 2 tiles.
Fast transport belt costs 26 iron per 2 tiles.
What about having 2 lines of basic belts in parallel?

It costs 6 iron per 2 tiles of length.
It carries 24 items per second (as opposed to 18 for a fast belt).
And I'd say it's easier to set up than trains.
Trains look cooler :)

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