circuit network connector for hidden loader entity basegame missing

[SteveMacGyver]

Dear Factorio Devs

Recently I discovered the existance of the loader objects via the loaders mod.

After some further investigation, I learned these are actually existing game objects that are hidden in the base game.

I would be extremely grateful if these loaders - even though they are deemed over powered - could be setup the same as a filter inserter: I can change the value of the filter via a constant combinator somewhere in a blueprint, but it is not possible to set the filter values for a loader.



Since these are officially base game objects, could you please consider writing the logic for these objects?


In the following image album, you can see the difference:

https://imgur.com/a/5memr5F

The important difference is, that in the filter inserter, I can determine the items it 'filters' from a crate by circuit/constant combinator/..., but the loader is missing the option to have this set by circuit network.



Say, you create a blueprint which works with multiple ores, and the loader unloading stuff has a filter in place, based on which ore is used inside the blueprint.

If you want to change the ore type, current situation forces you to change all the filters of all the loaders.

When you use filter inserters, you can actually take a constant combinator, and change the output of the combinator, so all filters in your entire circuit network are automatically changed.

If you want, I can make a blueprint for you to try this out.

In case people are wondering: I am using bobs and angels mods on default cost (data here: https://factorio.rotol.me/pack/bobsangels-f15-normal/ )

The real scenario behind this, is the angels/bobs mods, with multiple ores being "sorted" by the bobs/angels ores.

The loader has to set a filter, so every loader filters one specific ore.

I want this to be done by constant combinators in a blueprint, so the same blueprint can be reused for the different bobs/angels ores.

An example is the sapphirite ore crystal, which can be processed into 6 different ores. setting the filters by hand is tedious, and so very unautomatisable. (https://factorio.rotol.me/pack/bobsange ... -ore1-pure) But yeah, a chest with multiple items is possible, but then I'd rather use the new filter-enabled splitters

Cheers!

also on reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comme ... en_loader/

[Rseding91]

That's not a bug. Loaders don't support circuit network or logistic network connections.

[SteveMacGyver]

Then why do they contain filters, if you cannot set them?

[Lav]

You can set them manually, just not with a circuit.

[SteveMacGyver]

Since when do we live in a manual world

[Lav]

Since when do we live in a manual world

Not sure about myself, but you're living there since the moment you enabled game functionality that wasn't in active development for many years, ne?

[SteveMacGyver]

Since when do we live in a manual world

Not sure about myself, but you're living there since the moment you enabled game functionality that wasn't in active development for many years, ne?

You do of course have a point, but since the base objects are still in the game, shouldn't they represent the same functionality as their less-overpowered counterparts?

[Tekky]

Since the developers have decided that they want to support loaders (at least for mods), it would make sense that, by default, loaders can be connected to the circuit network. I'm not sure how easy it is (or whether it is even possible) for mods to add this feature, without sacrificing too much performance.

However, in my opinion, it would be more important for other entities to be connectable to the circuit network, such as splitters (suggested here), nuclear reactors (suggested here) and possibly also assembling machines/furnaces (suggested here).

[McDuff]

It seems to me that this is a small bit of a much bigger question that keeps being asked (I last saw it being put this way in a post by Deadlock on some other topic).

Factorio is a "puzzle" game and the devs have stated quite often that they don't want to simply add things that will take away the clever solutions players have come up with to solve things like, eg, belt lane splitting.

However, some of these things, though they are clever and used by lots of players, also seem somewhat arbitrary and more a result of players working around alpha/beta omissions that became elevated to the status of "features" than cohesive designs.

There is a circuit network we can use to perform all manner of intricate and complex programming tasks - but sometimes we can measure things directly and sometimes we need to do a kludge like measure an inserter rather than the thing we want to measure.

Similarly the "use half an underground belt to split off a lane" solution is accepted as "the right way" but it makes very little sense, and seems to be left in purely because people playing the alpha game figured out how to do cool-looking things with it and the devs don't want to spoil it.

It's appreciated that the "puzzle" aspect of Factorio is indeed part of what makes it fun, but at the same time "you can connect wires to this but not to that" seems to be arbitrary, meaning that when solving a "puzzle" it's not just a straight analysis but involves various workarounds. Not that "immersion" is really that big a deal in a game like Factorio, but it also seems to be a little peculiar and arbitrary that your engineer can build an entire nuclear reactor but not a way to hook it into a circuit network.

Of course one solution in this instance would be to take the capacity to filter things off loaders altogether, making them "dumb" chutes and meaning you don't need to wire them up - although you can still wire belts up so it would still be nice to be able to wire loaders up too.

But really I think the overall point I'm trying to make here is that there doesn't seem to be any *reason* for some things to be wireable and some not to be other than "we like the way it makes players have to build interesting solutions." That's fair enough as it goes, but why *here* and not *there*? Why is it trivial to measure some things but complicated to measure others?

[eradicator]

But really I think the overall point I'm trying to make here is that there doesn't seem to be any *reason* for some things to be wireable and some not to be other than "we like the way it makes players have to build interesting solutions." That's fair enough as it goes, but why *here* and not *there*? Why is it trivial to measure some things but complicated to measure others?

The main reason is not of a gameplay nature i think. Many times things are not implemented simply because they would cost too much performance/memory (the number one reason for denyed requests as far as i can tell). And the devs don't want to ruin megafactories just because someone somewhere wants to measure a single assembler. The second reason is - for things that would have ok performance - that implmeneting things takes dev time, and they're all busy doing sooo many things that some other things simply don't get around to "being implemented". And i bet there's at least some voices in the dev team that would be quite happy to remove loaders from the game completely, they don't always agree on everything, like you can read in all the FFFs, where often they find a compromise or someone says that they got overruled, or some concept simply wasn't fun enough and got abandoned after the test phase :).

[SteveMacGyver]

But really I think the overall point I'm trying to make here is that there doesn't seem to be any *reason* for some things to be wireable and some not to be other than "we like the way it makes players have to build interesting solutions." That's fair enough as it goes, but why *here* and not *there*? Why is it trivial to measure some things but complicated to measure others?

This is the underlying thought I had/am having when I talk about the circuit network. It is so frustrating that so many of the entities don't have connectors, that if you use a big modpack like the bob/angels pack, so many new entities are based on vanilla items underneath that are lacking the connector, hence leaving the modder unable to add the functionality in.

I love playing with all aspects of the game in one factory: trains, circuits, robots, blueprints... with high optimization. But sometimes I just as much appreciate overkill production for a single line of electronic circuits for no reason at all, but the mere "because I can".

Your post formulated somewhat better than I did, the core issue I came across, and I do hope that this idea/suggestion/(bug, yes maybe I do dare call it that on a scratching-the-surface level) is evaluated and more people, players and devs alike, can find them being behind the story.

Cheers