Passive providers chests are useless when you get them

[korda]

It's like this: "here have some logistic robots, and new chest which won't work until you get requester chest that will cost 3 times more packs to research than robots and you need blue packs now too. your robots kind of suck without them too. why this way? because we don't like your face."

IMHO logistic robots should come with requester chest from start and simply cost more to get.

[daniel34]

Passive provider chests are earlier in the tech tree because they can also be used by construction robots. Put a few repair packs into passive provider chests and the robots will repair your factory. Or put some entities (power poles, assemblers, inserters, ...) in them and have your robots expand your factory using blueprints.
This can all be done on red and green science.

[_aD]

Things to do with only passive provider chests:
Supply repair packs to fix biter damage to walls
Supply walls when the biter damage was really quite severe
Supply turrets when whoops, I didn't think the biters would come from that direction
Supply solar panels + accumulators + power poles to perform blueprint-based power upgrades
Run out of green circuits? Supply assemblers, belts and inserters to add on a few modules of your blueprint-happy green circuit Factories

[korda]

Things to do with only passive provider chests:
Supply repair packs to fix biter damage to walls
Supply walls when the biter damage was really quite severe
Supply turrets when whoops, I didn't think the biters would come from that direction
Supply solar panels + accumulators + power poles to perform blueprint-based power upgrades
Run out of green circuits? Supply assemblers, belts and inserters to add on a few modules of your blueprint-happy green circuit Factories

And yet I never did that - since I preferred to get blue chests to make building all that stuff you mentioned easier.

And I definitely didn't think about all that stuff when I was going through first playthrough. I believe that concept of provider and requester chests is easier to grasp that coming up with all the use cases you mentioned. Also it makes automating all that stuff easier.

[BlakeMW]

As well as all the construction and repair uses, Passive Providers can also be used with character logistic slots.

[Lallante]

It's like this: "here have some logistic robots, and new chest which won't work until you get requester chest that will cost 3 times more packs to research than robots and you need blue packs now too. your robots kind of suck without them too. why this way? because we don't like your face."

IMHO logistic robots should come with requester chest from start and simply cost more to get.

Sorry just because YOU dont use them doesnt make them useless. I use them almost exclusively, rarely if ever using active provider chests.

Anyone who uses their own personal logistics slots a lot gets use out of them from the second they are researched.

[korda]

It's like this: "here have some logistic robots, and new chest which won't work until you get requester chest that will cost 3 times more packs to research than robots and you need blue packs now too. your robots kind of suck without them too. why this way? because we don't like your face."

IMHO logistic robots should come with requester chest from start and simply cost more to get.

Sorry just because YOU dont use them doesnt make them useless. I use them almost exclusively, rarely if ever using active provider chests.

Anyone who uses their own personal logistics slots a lot gets use out of them from the second they are researched.

I think you misunderstood me. I'm taking about provider chests being pretty much useless without requester chests, at least for someone new to logistic system.

[bobingabout]

Construction robotics unlocks passive provider and storage chests... you don't really need BOTH for them to work, just the storage chest would do.
Logistics robotics unlocks only the passive provider chest... which means robots are allowed to take anything out, but put nothing in... Yet at this point we are allowed to research personal logistic request slots, makes sence, things that are build can then be delivered stright to the player. You can also research logistic trash slots... which are useless because you have no storage chests yet, you need to research construction robots to unlock the required chest.

Much later, (MUCH later, because you have to build your oil chain and get batteries and advanced electronics to be able to build science pack 3 before you can research this) you can research the logistics system that give the requester and active provider chest... if you never research construction robotics, you don't have the storage chest yet... where are things from the active provider going to go?


The order that these chests are unlocked in does need looking at, because it's possible to unlock at least 2 things that won't work because of the missing storage chest(Logistic trash, and active provider if you don't research construction robotics). And without requesters, it does make having logistic robots at all a little redundant, because the only direction they can carry things is from a passive provider chest to the player.

At the very least we need to have the storage chest added to either the logistic robotics research, or to the logistic trash slots AND the logistics system, otherwise, if you don't research construction robotics, there is this hole.

[siggboy]

At the very least we need to have the storage chest added to either the logistic robotics research, or to the logistic trash slots AND the logistics system, otherwise, if you don't research construction robotics, there is this hole.

Yes, completely agree. I've just completed my first play through, and I was utterly confused about the "logistic trash slots". They did nothing, except for being additional inventory slots. Only much later did I discover that I have to put down a storage chest in order to make use of them. (I did have construction robots for my personal roboport, covering my needs, so never bothered with logistic robots until much later.)

Given that the game itself does a very poor job of explaining the things in it, at least the tech tree should be organized in a way that you cannot unlock useless technologies -- as that only adds to the confusion.

[omega_haxors]

Different strokes for different folks.

Either you can have a basic passive system where everything is requested when needed at the cost of sometimes efficiency. Or you could design a fully automated pseudo-belt system to allow complete control over the entire network and keep things moving very quickly.

Not to mention all of its other handy uses, such as acting like a backup for active providers and various other useful things. You'll always know when productivity is unbalanced when one of your active providers suddenly spills into a nearby detector chest. You can also use it like a smart chest, if that's your sort of thing.

[SirRichie]

I like the split between "basic building capabilities" and the tremendously powerful "moving goods around" parts.
However, I do agree with bobingabout that the techtree needs some tweaking here. Probably a basic research for robotics, after which you can go for the construction branch (red/green science) and/or the logistics branch (red/green/blue).
Each research should unlock all the required items for it to work.

As a final note: I think just because a concept is hard to grasp does not mean the techtree is wrong. The techtree is not your primary usability tool, it is a good balancing tool. Factorio is very oldschool in the way that it requires players to inform themselves about the mechanics outside of the game. Not everything is taught by the game (but can be explored rather safely within the game).