Pollution Problems

[Syrchalis]

I think the mechanic is generally a good concept, because it has lots of interesting aspects about it. But I also think it comes with a few problems in it's current form.

What I think is good about it:

• It dynamically alters the enemy to your progress (more progress, bigger factory = more pollution, higher evolution)
• It opens up interactions, so you can take precautions to reduce pollution in order to reduce the negative effects of it
• It also has a nice aesthetic, because factories do pollute in real life as well

Some Problems:

• Desert/Taiga Maps are considerably harder than Forest maps (you get attacked A LOT more and evolution rises much faster)
• Pollution controlling enemy attacks makes for very weird attack patterns
• It also causes you to suddenly not get attacked anymore when you start using efficiency modules
• You cannot affect pollution in a meaningful way early/mid game which robs the player of most interactions with it

What I think would improve the experience would be to make enemies attack after a certain time has passed with random intervals, no matter your pollution. The pollution should still affect the enemies - evolution, attack size, etc. but not be the main trigger for attacks.

The reason why I think this has no or nearly no negative side-effects is because there is just two types of games I had so far. Either there was a large forest and I didn't get attacked at all, so in that case I could have used peaceful mode instead or I was in a less green map with small starting area and got attacked constantly anyway (so there would not be much of a change, except maybe smoothing out the attacks, which would be positive).

The next reason is because you have so little control over your pollution until late-game. If there was meaningful interaction with the mechanic I would see merit in the idea of pollution-based attacks, but you cannot really control it. All you can do is play on a desert map for more attacks or a forest map for no or nearly no attacks. What and how you build has nearly no influence at all.

[vtx]

There are 3 ways that alter the evolution of ennemies :
-time
-pollution
-number of ennemies you killed ( or spawns ) not sure on that.

Actually what most people do in early/mid game to prevent pollution to affect ennemies is to destroy a large area of spawns ennemies around the base.

[Syrchalis]

There are 3 ways that alter the evolution of ennemies :
-time
-pollution
-number of ennemies you killed ( or spawns ) not sure on that.

Actually what most people do in early/mid game to prevent pollution to affect ennemies is to destroy a large area of spawns ennemies around the base.

Killing spawners can be tricky early if they have medium/big worms.

That said, I know what affects evolution - this wasn't about that, it was about pollution triggering attacks. When a spawner is in a polluted area it absorbs pollution and generates biters and spitters which then go attack your base. Problem is that it makes forest maps super easy and others much harder. Also because the spawners absorb pollution it means if you are really polluting the area, you will still only get attacked by the first "row" of spawners. Kind of like a cap on how many alien bases you can trigger to attack you, which is bad, because it means that at a certain pollution level it just doesn't matter if you increase pollution.

[ssilk]

I know what you mean... the game should be a bit more overwhelming, dependent on how much attacks you have defeated in a row.

[Syrchalis]

I know what you mean... the game should be a bit more overwhelming, dependent on how much attacks you have defeated in a row.

Can't tell if you are being sarcastic or not (I assume not, enlighten me). But this was half about balance between maps with lots of trees and maps with little trees and half about keeping the game challenging. If one doesn't want this, you can always opt out of enemies (peaceful mode, mods, etc.).

[ssilk]

No it was pointed to the forrests: the enemies come in a row and you have just to kill one after the other. So Increasing attack speed and size until they destroy something is a good idea in my eyes. With increasing size they take different paths through the forrest or make existing paths bigger.

[vtx]

You should try hardcore survival https://mods.factorio.com/mods/Mylon/Hardcore_Survival . It do exactly what you wish for being attacked at regular interval.

There are a few others mods about ennemies https://mods.factorio.com/?tags=enemies

[Syrchalis]

You should try hardcore survival https://mods.factorio.com/mods/Mylon/Hardcore_Survival . It do exactly what you wish for being attacked at regular interval.

There are a few others mods about ennemies https://mods.factorio.com/?tags=enemies

I tried hardcore survival and I can say that the general idea definitely works and makes it more fun (and challenging) however, the mod itself has some severe problems. It doesn't attack you in waves regularly, it's more like a marathon attack that lasts nearly longer than the game.

Essentially what happens - at 16-17min they start spawning really close to your spawn. 1-3 biters per second and they keep coming for minutes and minutes. You lose all your miners because you have to hide with 2-3 turrets that you can build by this point. I don't even know how long they attack because I never bothered to afk until they stopped (too boring). Challenge? Definitely. Implementation? Not good.

I tried fiddling with the config, but there aren't any options that do what I want.

What I need is them attacking regularly, but with one or two large waves, not throwing enemies at you for minutes. And especially not at the very start of the game like this. Hm, how to put it in better words - a harsh timing push at the start of the game is fun and challenging, that way you prepare the first 15-20min for an attack. Makes the early game more worthwhile. But sitting at turrets for 10 minutes, watching all your progress get destroyed and then having to rebuild it... nope, that's not the way.

[Nich]

lol

"Please make the game harder"

"Complain because you made the game too hard"

Reminds me of people in KSP forums concerning career mode

Oh and FYI the amount of pollution absorbed by a spawner determines the kind of Bitter/spitter sent (small, medium, large, behemith). The pollution absorbed by a spawer is limited to 20 per tic so if you are producing more than that it will go deeper into the biter territory.

[orzelek]

lol

"Please make the game harder"

"Complain because you made the game too hard"

Reminds me of people in KSP forums concerning career mode

Oh and FYI the amount of pollution absorbed by a spawner determines the kind of Bitter/spitter sent (small, medium, large, behemith). The pollution absorbed by a spawer is limited to 20 per tic so if you are producing more than that it will go deeper into the biter territory.

Small correction - biter composition is random with chances dependant on your current evolution level. Spawner absorbing pollution doesn't matter for it I think.

[Nich]

Those are the randum one that just hang out the ones that attack you are based off pollutition absorbed

10k for a behmith spitter and 20k for a bitter

https://wiki.factorio.com/Pollution

[greep]

I think at least something needs to be done with desert biomes for newbies. It's not really cool to have the game be exponentially harder for reasons completely unknown to the player. Either a straight up reduction in desert difficulty, or a warning on map creation or something along those lines.

[Syrchalis]

lol

"Please make the game harder"

"Complain because you made the game too hard"

Reminds me of people in KSP forums concerning career mode

Oh and FYI the amount of pollution absorbed by a spawner determines the kind of Bitter/spitter sent (small, medium, large, behemith). The pollution absorbed by a spawer is limited to 20 per tic so if you are producing more than that it will go deeper into the biter territory.

What is funny about it? If it's 10°C in your room you're freezing and if it's 40°C you will sit in the fridge. There is too little and too much - and there is something in between.

Right now SyncViews and me are using the scary nights mod with a mod he made that makes trees absorb zero pollution, all tiles act like desert and biters expand far more aggressively. It is impossibly hard at the moment, even for two experienced players. So we are tuning it down bit by bit.

I think at least something needs to be done with desert biomes for newbies. It's not really cool to have the game be exponentially harder for reasons completely unknown to the player. Either a straight up reduction in desert difficulty, or a warning on map creation or something along those lines.

This is what I am talking about. Anyone who doesn't know exactly how pollution and enemies work and interact will have no idea whether the map he is playing on is easy or hard.

[Nich]

What is funny about it? If it's 10°C in your room you're freezing and if it's 40°C you will sit in the fridge. There is too little and too much - and there is something in between.

Right now SyncViews and me are using the scary nights mod with a mod he made that makes trees absorb zero pollution, all tiles act like desert and biters expand far more aggressively. It is impossibly hard at the moment, even for two experienced players. So we are tuning it down bit by bit.

I think you meant 22 C (72 F) is shorts and tees for Eskimos and winter jackets for Somalians. Although this is a very pleasant temp for most people the range of skills can very drastically. Impossible to make it balanced for everyone. My first map was a desert map. I lost some facilities because I did not understand the basics of defense and underestimated the bitters ability to run around defenses. What really messed me up that game was once I had blue science set up I just started killing bitters to pass the time. Not knowing this causes bitter evolution I got my self in a position where a large portion of my base was destroyed continuously being destroyed while I attempted to do military research to catch up. In reality biters are nothing more then a small annoyance in the desert in the same manner as having to clear trees in a forested map.

The reason I find it funny if because "hard" is so poorly defined and impossible to achieve. Concerning KSP I am very good at the game. Probably better then 98% or the players out there. A game that they would find hard would be easy for me. To make it even more ironic and funny the people who are even better then me are not 2% better then me but 2000% and continuously achieve things that I would have sworn were impossible i.e. a 3.8t elloo mission and return or a 28.6% playload fraction on rocket fuel. A game balanced for me will be "impossible" for most and yet if the game were balanced for people above me it would still be "impossible" for me even.

I guess what I really find funny is the ironic use of the word "impossible". If people said "so hard it is no longer fun for me" I probably would not find it funny.

P.S. After re-reading the wiki I now see that bitter attacks are based off pollution absorbed AND evolution. Thus if a nest absorbs 20k with low evolution it will send a TON of small bitters. If it does that with a high evolution there is a chance it will send 1 behemoth. In the end 100 small bitters have 1/3 the health of a behemoth but do 600% more dps so I think it would pretty much be a wash.

[Franklin45]

Pollution occurs in different forms; air, water, soil, radioactive, noise, heat/ thermal and light. Every form of pollution has two sources of occurrence; the point and the non-point sources. The point sources are easy to identify, monitor and control, whereas the non-point sources are hard to control.