Slagless refining overpowered?

[loganb]

Hello,

I'm playing through Bobs + Angels (all mods) now and enjoying it. Thank you for all your hard work. One thing that has always bugged me is I can't understand why I'd ever invest in slag-producing refining when slag-free production comes so early in the tech tree.

In my 0.15 game, I'm at the point where I have to build out my first big refinement setup and this is what I'm running into:
1) Until I get rail out to Jivolite, the 2/3rds yield from direct smelting crushed ore into iron is the best option because Ore Sorting only yields 50% Iron, so I skip any ore sorting in the early game
2) Once I get jivolite, there's no reason to invest in the more complex refining systems in high volumes since iron/copper yield goes *down* per unit ore
3) Eventually, I'll need small quantities of "exotic" metals, so I'll have setup a low volume refinement system for that, but it will be small and therefore I won't need to put any effort into good design

Am I playing this right? I guess the problem I'm running into is that I'm always Stiratite-starved in the early game, so I have no incentive to take up any of the refining, slag processing, or ore processing techs. Even the first level of ore sorting reduces the Iron Plate yield from 2/3rd to 1/2, at best.

Once I'm well into the rail phase of the game I'll need to do a minimal amount of ore sorting for the rarer metals, but I never have incentive to setup the complex ore sorting systems for the high-volume metals because I'll already have a slag-free process for iron and copper and that is overwhelmingly the best option for the entire time of the game.

So my question is, am I playing this right? If the answer is "yes," my feedback is that maybe the yields need to be balanced a bit to encourage adoption of the tech tree as it is unlocked.

[gosensgo86]

I've been wondering the same thing, actually. I only got as far as the Chunks sorting stage in my game, but I kept asking myself if I should keep rebuilding my sorting base or just keep the Crushed Ore sorting as my primary source of ore.

I was under the impression that the decreased yield in Iron ore was offset by the advanced smelting recipes that required the other metals, and that it was balanced to require less raw iron as you progress. I'd love to hear from the more experienced players on this, as I have to redo my base for other reasons anyway.

[BlakeMW]

I think that the basic crushing+sorting and some of the hydro refining recipes are quite useful - for example saphirite makes 2 iron, 1 copper, 1 silicon and 1 nickel - the silicon can be alloyed with 1 iron, and the other can be alloyed with nickel + chrome, making ultimately 5 iron to 1 copper. Manganese/chrome being produced in unlimited quantity from water is also in general a wonderful way to stretch iron, and iron/steel alloys can be used to dispose of surplus silicon, nickel, cobalt and tungsten which increases the usefulness of many sorting recipes (really only aluminium, titanium and gold can't be disposed of usefully, being useful only directly).

This kind of approach results in plenty of sulfuric waste water and plenty of slag for crystallizing into any other desired metals. Iron, copper, tin and lead should be produced directly, with silicon and zinc being very useful byproducts of this direct production. The priority schemes to prevent blocking and to dispose of surplus byproduct are relatively simple, and the refining setup is overall simpler than with the combining recipes - being mostly just crushing+sorting.

I get the feeling that exploiting manganese is more powerful than the pure iron recipe, although there is of course no reason why the pure iron couldn't be combined with manganese - except that you just don't need that much iron. Simply adding manganese to 2 iron + 1 copper from basic sorting already results in a 4:1 iron:copper ratio which is plenty of iron - alternatively the copper ores can be turned into 2 iron : 2 copper if a more balanced output is desired. The main pure recipe which would be worth considering would actually be copper, which can't be stretched via alloying nor can it really be substituted (unlike lead which is optional in solder, and silicon which is optional in glass) - if a lot of iron stretching is performed with alloys, this might mandate production of pure copper to keep up.

[gosensgo86]

Thanks for the info Blake, it confirms what I thought about the alloys. That's one of the things I love about the advanced smelting, no ore really goes to waste. I got as far as Hydro refining before I screwed up my base and started over, but I'm still wondering if it's worth it to go all the way to Thermal Refining. You'd still get iron and copper from at least 4 of the ores, but you don't have to deal with the slag. I'll have to try that out, but there's always the option to setup a small combining area to get more copper.

I do wish we'd get more cable from coils than by making it from plates. That could be a way to stretch copper a little, since it's used mostly for cable and circuit boards as far as I can tell.

[aklesey1]

Exotic metals...... hmmmm......
Who and where using - tungsten, cobalt, zinc, lead, nickel?
Most using metals - iron, copper, aluminium, tin and may be titanium

[foodfactorio]

hi, in my game with Angels and bobs, Slag Processing was a necessity, and it saved my base

these are 2 screenshots from my 0.14 factorio game, but essentially in the picture you can see the following:
Bobmonium going up the left side of the screen, and getting crushed, and then chunked.
and then turning into crystals (for later storage in a warehouse for Purifying)

+ to the right of the bobmonium cyrstal processor, Red Rubyte gets crushed, and chunked, and then a belt takes it to be turned into crystals.

the other picture just shows the machines making slag into slurry, and then into Mineral Sludge for tank storage, and it was this whole storage area that ran out, and luckily i had enough crystal slurry to mix i think with Mineralised Water, to be able to start making more Mineral Sludge in the right hand side storage tanks.

they were key for me, at least in my solo campaign as i ran out of Lead and Gold plus Tin (and i can happily tell you that sludge process was fun, and in my case, helpful)

(the Red "!" Signs are not there to show Low Sludge, but are just there to let me know that the Electric Pylon next to it can be moused-over, to give me a total of all remaining sludge in all tanks

[aklesey1]

All these are good, foodfactorio, but how to get many many geodes for crystal slurry that then to mix it with mineralized water?
I want to get a new method to get more geodes or new to use mineralized water

[foodfactorio]

oh hi i think lots of these these came from making ore Chunks, but my factorio updater didnt quite work
(tried to update from core-win64- 0.15.28-update to x.31 and ran out of permission so will need some more time to install and check for you

[fractalman]

All these are good, foodfactorio, but how to get many many geodes for crystal slurry that then to mix it with mineralized water?
I want to get a new method to get more geodes or new to use mineralized water

You can also turn mineralized water into green algae (add a bit of carbon dioxide), which turns into wood fiber, which can be used to make wood bricks to get your carbon dioxide back, or turned into boards, or turned into plastic.

[foodfactorio]

hi i checked my geode sources, and aside from maybe 1% from nearby large rocks, it pretty much comes from all of the Chunk Hydro Refining im doing... (currently have about 200k unprocessed geodes in logistics system) (but just a reminder that this is in my 0.14 factorio campaign with angels and bobs, as i havent tried the latest angel mods in 0.15 yet (cant wait to try the full set including petrochem, and smelting and bioprocessing)

[mtilsted]

Hello,

I'm playing through Bobs + Angels (all mods) now and enjoying it. Thank you for all your hard work. One thing that has always bugged me is I can't understand why I'd ever invest in slag-producing refining when slag-free production comes so early in the tech tree.

In my 0.15 game, I'm at the point where I have to build out my first big refinement setup and this is what I'm running into:
1) Until I get rail out to Jivolite, the 2/3rds yield from direct smelting crushed ore into iron is the best option because Ore Sorting only yields 50% Iron, so I skip any ore sorting in the early game
2) Once I get jivolite, there's no reason to invest in the more complex refining systems in high volumes since iron/copper yield goes *down* per unit ore
3) Eventually, I'll need small quantities of "exotic" metals, so I'll have setup a low volume refinement system for that, but it will be small and therefore I won't need to put any effort into good design

Am I playing this right? I guess the problem I'm running into is that I'm always Stiratite-starved in the early game, so I have no incentive to take up any of the refining, slag processing, or ore processing techs. Even the first level of ore sorting reduces the Iron Plate yield from 2/3rd to 1/2, at best.

Once I'm well into the rail phase of the game I'll need to do a minimal amount of ore sorting for the rarer metals, but I never have incentive to setup the complex ore sorting systems for the high-volume metals because I'll already have a slag-free process for iron and copper and that is overwhelmingly the best option for the entire time of the game.

So my question is, am I playing this right? If the answer is "yes," my feedback is that maybe the yields need to be balanced a bit to encourage adoption of the tech tree as it is unlocked.

You are correct that if you burn the iron/copper after sorting that is a waste.

But there is a way to get more iron/copper plates out of the iron/copper ore by turning them into ingots and then turning the ingots into plates. If you do this for both basic ore types, you end up with more iron plates and copper plates then you would otherwise.