Sounds fine to me.Repofme1 wrote:More specific work so far -
This mainly covers the issue of things with two different recipes, like simple coils, basic electric motors, and regular inserters. After looking at these, I came up with some improvements to hopefully simplify them, like removing circuits from the motor recipe, and increasing the yield of the steel inserter recipe. Now the steel versions of coils, motors, and inserters are slightly cheaper than the iron versions, *after* the best tech (ratio 1 iron -> 1 steel) is unlocked. Since that is not until you have electric furnaces, which takes a while, the steel versions are the same cost as the iron ones *even* in the end of the early burner era (when the Bessemer tech gives 2 iron -> 1 steel). I also switched the order of the "Electricity" and "Induction 1" technologies, so that the parts came before the machines, not putting the metaphorical cart before the horse.
Here it would be nice, if inserter would have a durability property and the bad ones would stop working earlier...(just thinking)Repofme1 wrote: Also, a short word again on some of these double recipes: the trouble is that I need to make the regular recipe for things (as used in the middle and late game) of a certain minimum quality, to logically justify the durability, power, etc. of the part. In the electric motor, for example, this is a steel shaft with bronze bearings (well, bushings actually, but that's just a technical name). But the trouble is, that good enough parts are not available in the very early beginning, when you first need the things that are made with them. With the motor example, the steel shaft is not available as early as I would like, because the motor is needed earlier to make inserters. Having to wait for steel parts just to make a few electric inserters would be too much tie and effort. And the lower-quality parts (like iron shaft) would still sort of work, for the purposes of starting out, just not well enough to use through the entire game. Therefore, I have to limit their manufacture to the lower-tier machines, to force upgrading to the good version.
You could also consider to remove the bad recipes for motor and inserter. They are there to bridge the gap, where you need circuits and steel parts. Steel parts are quite early, but expensive, and circuits are also a certain effort to reach. But I think, they are not crucial to progress and burner inserters run long, if you provide 10 coal or such. (Please dont hate me, guys, just want to help to straighten things out and reduce confusion)
And in my opinion, you should not limit the recipes too much, generally. Let the player decide, which recipe is the best. And rather make the advanced recipes more efficient or at least same efficient and faster (f.e. clay/limestone) . If the early recipe is better, then I would use it regardless, if it works only in lower tier machines, with a bitter taste, that something seems wrong
Nice I will collect the recyclable stuff, when all is switched over and check, how much it actually was.Repofme1 wrote: Oh, I also made lamps and repair packs cheaper - I had not gotten to the point of using either of those, so they still had the original too-expensive versions. That will most likely be true of the whole mod, at least for the first time that I reach it in actual play. I also don't ant to discourage aesthetic things like lamps and paving, because I like them, so I might make the lamps draw less power if I find the use too much.
The research cost for recycling tech is lower too, I felt like I had a TON of early stuff leftover but maybe it's not actually that much.
In my opinion, circuits are meant to be quite challenging. They are for me like milestones, similar to science packs. The first circuits could be slightly less complicated, though. So, I think, its a good plan.Repofme1 wrote: Circuits are another active topic of my focus, I agree that the current ones are way too hard to set up, and the ones after that are kind of a mess also. So I'm completely re-working the circuits, and I've got a pretty good tier 1 now. No sulfuric acid, tinned sheets, or solder wire (just the bar). Also fewer recipes for components because I lumped them all into one Basic Components Set. I would like to figure out tier 2 circuits too, since they introduce a lot of the real manufacturing techniques, but we'll see. Speaking of that, an example here also relates to the idea of part upgrades required for better automation: connecting individual wires on a circuit board is slow and tedious, while etching patterns with a mask and acid is more difficult to set up (more complexity & harder to produce materials), but much more suited to mass automation.