assembling machine

[PITEC]

A nice improvement for the assembling machine would be if you can give from the outside the information of what it has to produce. (Circuit Network)

e.g. you have a chest and a assembling machine. Both are connected with a wire.
So the assembling machine would produce the item the same which you put in the chest before.


The idea for this improvement comes from my world.
So in my world i only have one furnace-park which can produce completly only iron plate's and in the next second only cupper plate's and in the another second only steel plate's or stone brick's.
The function of my furnace-park is quite simple because the furnace melts what it get. So with my circuit network i only put on the transport belt what i wish to melt.

But a assembling machine produces only this what you are saying to it before...

[Gertibrumm]

The furnace is actually smarter than an assembling machine, you dont have to tell it what to do - it just does it.
Maybe the assembler should work the same way -> not by telling it via manually or circuit network but just by giving it the items for a product

Only issue is, many recipes for example the belt and the inserter overlap. Both need plates and cogs, give your assembler both and it will never produce inserters, lacking the green circuits.

But thanks for the suggestion "set assembler recipe via circuit network" PITEC, together (by overwhelming the devs) we can get what we all want

[aober93]

This topic is a dupe, the feature is somewhat popular. Search for: set recipe via circuit network

[Gertibrumm]

This topic is a dupe, the feature is somewhat popular. Search for: set recipe via circuit network

couldn't be better

[Rseding91]

It won't work. Every time you switch the recipe it would end up deleting everything in the assembling machine that can't be used by the new recipe and nobody would want that.

Additionally it would just cheapen the entire experience if you could setup 1 assembling machine to produce every single item. There wouldn't be any factory left to build.

[Yoyobuae]

It won't work. Every time you switch the recipe it would end up deleting everything in the assembling machine that can't be used by the new recipe and nobody would want that.

I personally would prefer if the machine would refuse to change recipes, if there's anything left inside. It makes a bit of a challenge and exactly the sort of thing circuit network would be good for controlling.

[Gertibrumm]

It won't work. Every time you switch the recipe it would end up deleting everything in the assembling machine that can't be used by the new recipe and nobody would want that.

I personally would prefer if the machine would refuse to change recipes, if there's anything left inside. It makes a bit of a challenge and exactly the sort of thing circuit network would be good for controlling.

+1


The limit to

if you could setup 1 assembling machine to produce every single item.

will be wet recipes! fluids just cannot be handled like items and nobody really wants this assembling machine to be a breeze. Actually I never found anybody comfortable with the idea of deleting items inside the assembler except myself (that changed quickly though). Also this whole thing is a circuit network addition, not another super-OP-assembler, the limit to the OP-ness is the players creativity and skill in circuit handling.

The gameplay benefits are huge, there is basically a whole new field of possibilities.
It is like the next generation of factories that yet have to be discovered.
The use in small scale early compact smart-factories will benefit the early game circuit experience.

If your only issue is

Every time you switch the recipe it would end up deleting everything in the assembling machine

then just don't delete assembler contents! We never did and nobody really wants that. Smart assemblers are a challenge you have to cope with if you embrace them and so at least item clog ups should raise the difficulty of this new yet to come feature so many of us want.

[vipm23]

One thing that might work is, the assembling machine goes into a 'jammed' state when the recipe is changed and unneeded items are inside, during which inserters can pull out the items stored inside, and goes back into a working state with the new recipe when the jammed items are cleared out.

[ssilk]

Hm.
We had all that discussed already.
The next will ask if that should be handled as alarm. Then some dev says, that it's currently not possible to take things out of input slots. Then some makes a suggestion to add waste stacks, where remains are filled into and needs to be taken out first. Some suggests specialized inserters for that job.

Ok, I exaggerate a bit. But please read all the linked posts.

And all ignore the fact, that Rseding and me sees low to no game-improvement with that.

It's like a printer: it would print just what you want to see.
Nobody plays with a printer that just works...

[Gertibrumm]

Well then question your selve what is the game improvement for the circuit network in general? I guess close to none since you can do "logic gates" with the old smart inserter.
I dont know any statistics but my guess is that all features for circuit network will only effect only a very small part of all the players.

The circuit assembler could be an addition for few people if the devs decide to limit it on all ends, or it could become a changer for the whole circuit experience of many more players if the devs decide to make the circuit assembler a powerful consideration!

People will start ciurcuit-networking once the benefits of the circuit assembler can be seen!
It could make factories powerfull early on, just let the players figure out how!

Oh by the way if you havn't forgotten:
- Factorio is still in some sort of alpha state, it is there to experiment, the game is not yet finished.
- Factorio is about the diversity of factories, and all I am seeing in the forums are perfected main-bus-factories. I want to see smart factories not just smart furnaces!

[ssilk]

Sorry, Gertibrumm, but you post is full of self-delusions.

- Circuit assembler would be an enhancement to gameplay, but there is no good solution, how the problems with remains might be solved. Especially liquids.
- The devs might consider implementing it, but they said many times, that the circuits will never be needed to win Factorio.
- People will start using it, but you cannot explain how that will be a game-changer.
- Factorio is in alpha, but you can smell the beta-phase in the air.
- Factorio is about diversity (questionable), but you cannot explain how this would change the game to more diversity, cause that is is just taste.

This is normally the moment, where discussions should be stopped and real implementation should be made. I hope the devs enable more modding possibilities to the assemblies, so that there might be a mod, that tests this hypothesis out.

[Yoyobuae]

This is normally the moment, where discussions should be stopped and real implementation should be made. I hope the devs enable more modding possibilities to the assemblies, so that there might be a mod, that tests this hypothesis out.

Mod:
https://mods.factorio.com/mods/theRusty ... combinator

Sample build making use of it:
https://youtu.be/cGfAFxHplnE

[ssilk]

Interesting, indeed. My impression from the video is, that this has to be done once, and then you can blueprint it every time.

[Yoyobuae]

Interesting, indeed. My impression from the video is, that this has to be done once, and then you can blueprint it every time.

Well yeah, you can blueprint it and use it every time you want to make green science pack.

I didn't get to the part where I make it configurable. Anyway, I feel more and more like set-recipe feature might not make it into vanilla any time soon, so I stopped improving that kind of setup.

[Deadly-Bagel]

Well, this is how I would see this working.

Let's say it gets implemented. Someone posts a blueprint for an ideal setup that's easy to use, produces everything, and can easily be expanded. Your game then becomes a bunch of furnaces, this array of assemblers, and oil. Very few players would actually use this feature due to the necessary complexity of implementing it, and the ones who do are basically going to use it to bypass gameplay. The only beneficial gameplay comes from the extreme minority of players who take the time to work it out in the first place.

[Yoyobuae]

Well, this is how I would see this working.

Let's say it gets implemented. Someone posts a blueprint for an ideal setup that's easy to use, produces everything, and can easily be expanded. Your game then becomes a bunch of furnaces, this array of assemblers, and oil. Very few players would actually use this feature due to the necessary complexity of implementing it, and the ones who do are basically going to use it to bypass gameplay. The only beneficial gameplay comes from the extreme minority of players who take the time to work it out in the first place.

Quite often I hear players saying: "that is nice, but I couldn't use because I don't understand how it works".

A portion of the playerbase doesn't care, they'll copy the designs of everything to get their factory up and going easy/fast. They usually aim for RPM megabases and such instead.

Another portion of the playerbase want to at least understand what they are using, even if the design is copied from blueprints someone else made.

And the last portion of the playerbase wants to make unique stuff, which is not a copy of anything anyone else has done before.

So personally I don't think what you mention is as big of of a problem as you put it. There will always be players willing to create new stuff, or at least understand the stuff they use.

The real issue is the complexity barrier. That's a general problem with circuit network, which kinda need some fixes (there's that other discussion thread).

[Gertibrumm]

Sorry, Gertibrumm, but you post is full of self-delusions.

I just really really want this feature in vanilla, I am a purist, sorry

And the liquid-problem could be much less of a problem if we were able to drain pipes (and assemblers respectively) with pumps

[Deadly-Bagel]

I see where you're going with that but I still think that it would negatively impact gameplay for 95% of the players who try to get involved. The only two people who would get anything out of it are those who successfully put something together that at least sort of works, and those who copy working ideas and tinker with them. There will be a lot of players who try and fail, and a lot of players who just copy designs with no desire to understand. I don't see the point in doing the development for such a poor result, especially when there is already a mod for it.

[ssilk]

Interesting, indeed. My impression from the video is, that this has to be done once, and then you can blueprint it every time.

Well yeah, you can blueprint it and use it every time you want to make green science pack.

Got you.

That is what I think will happen: instead of that players will build an own factory they copy one of the blueprints from internet.
50% of the players don't understand how it works and either don't move it or brake it. 30% of them will ask in the forums what's wrong with their layout. The rest is frustrated.
25% understand it after a while how it works, but will have no idea how to use it otherwise which frustrates them a bit cause they think they miss something important.
15% understand it and make own creations
10% understand it and make own creations and post the blueprint into internet which will be used by others players, that are mostly frustrated.

O.K. It will of course not happen exactly like this. But I wanted to show, that this is one of those suggestions that sound beautiful but will destroy fun for a majority of the players.

Edit: Need to mention, that I hadn't read Deadly-Bagel's answers when I wrote this. It's astonishing, that we both came to very similar conclusions.

[Deadly-Bagel]

Great minds think alike =D