Wagons capacity and weight

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Demongornot
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Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Demongornot »

I think the actual wagons capacity is too small, compared to the size an steel/logistic chest take, they should have way more inventory space.
And to balance a higher capability, why not making their weight growing based on the percentage they are filled, regardless of the object to avoid needing adding mass to each object.
It just have to be based on the percentage of stack size for each objects.

So some sort of :

Code: Select all

declare temp variable
if validation_boolean = false
{
    if selected_slot_item_count > 0
    {
        For each inventory_slot   
        {
            temp = temp + (maximum_stack_size_item.item_on_selected_slot \ number_of_items_on_selected_slot)
        }
    }
    wagon_weight = wagon_empty_weight + (temp \ slot_number_for_wagons)
}
For each wagons when the train is about to leave.
Of course this loop is heavy, it is only an example, just doing a simpler calculation each time an object is removed/added might actually be better resources wise.

This way, just before the train leave, the calculation is done once and the weight is stored in a variable, which mean no need for heavy calculations too often, and a boolean which validate the wagon as an optimisation, so only the wagons who had change in their inventory would need to recalculate the weight.

It would be better to see a completely filled train accelerate slowly than one with empty wagons.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Zool »

Well, a chest is a static item, standing at a single place - if you want to compare wagons with anything, then compare them with belts or drones.

And looking at any bigger base I have seen so far, they do a well-balanced job in that comparison.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Demongornot »

I personally feel that having them with the same capacity that Iron Chest have would be better...
But I also agree with your argument, this is a nice comparison !

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by posila »

Cargo wangon capacity was increased a little bit few updates ago. We didn't want to increase it too much, because even now people build trains with just two or three wagons. We are afraid, increasing cargo wagon capacity would result in people building less trains and building trains with just one wagon.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by JohnyDL »

More bigger trains and train stations are cooler maybe if you added capacity you'd have to limit the number of inserters that could empty or fill them like fluid wagons get only 3 (I'd go 12 can input but only 2 can output so you need 2-4 wagons to fill a belt and the extra cargo capacity has reduced benefit)

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Demongornot »

Well, as example, I am actually more developing endgame setup in creative mode than "really playing", but my actual train for my oil setup test have 10 wagons, 17 tanker wagons (tho one is for Sulfuric Acid output), and 16 loco just to avoid them accelerating for years...
Even with fully unzoomed view, barely more than half fit in the screen.
I have two trains like that for a single test endgame oil setup that I consider medium and with medium drain and whose circuit controller don't make them work a full capacity yet, and already the two giant train show their limits...

My future base will have a mainbus with probably have over 100 blue belts of mined (base) resources, and I expect full compression, imagine the train length I'll need for that, even with 4 of them it will be crazy long...
So I won't be the one to actually make train with single wagons user for sure, also I don't ask for the train having 10× it's actual capability, a lot of constructions I made, including mining outpost are/will be way bigger than they need to just because I need a lot of wagons to have the necessary components to construct or repair them...
Just adding a sweet sweet row or two to make them comparable to chest will be great.
Also, this is not my case, but keep in mind that some peoples actually use them as chest because they have the advantage of being loaded and unloaded with way more inserter than a chest could dream of, and for some logical circuit creations where we need to constantly move resources around as counting units for example alongside as storing the actual items or anything else, they quickly become useful for that and more capacity could be nice...

Or maybe adding a new wagon tier for end game or increasing their capability through research ?


Limiting the number of inserter would only increase the resource ping for huge megabases when the train is still in the station but a huge drain is applied, I think making the trains slower with resources will be a better balancing option.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by JohnyDL »

You might be better off running many more slightly smaller trains and learning about train stackers, given a train doesn't cost that much relative to say 1 infinite science pack, it's worth investing in them, I run around 60-80 trains on my current network and at any given time 95-100% of them are in stations or are waiting for stations to open. My standard length is 3 engines (more than enough to accelerate) and 8 Cargo Waggons or Fluid Wagons. Keeping my automated deliveries as best I can to 1 item per train.

I can understand having everything in one train my building train is about 2-3 times as long as my automatic trains, cause I want to head out once and not come back until I've set up a good number of mining outposts and I need a large number of items to do that, but having more trains in your case would be better, with a train that size I can't imagine you want to load it and unload it in the shortest time you possibly can and there will be occasions where you'll be waiting on 1 of several different inputs or outputs where having different trains for different products would actually gain you a lot off efficiency elsewhere.

Lets say for example you have 1 train and it picks up 10 wagons of copper ore and 20 waggons of iron ore and you want it all to smelt and go out in 5 waggons of copper, 5 waggons of iron and 1 wagon of steel this is okay and perfectly manageable except that you could end up turning 5 more pieces of iron into steel than you were expecting and end up with gradual imbalances, at first it's 5 lost iron but this could be 3 fewer gears which could be a whole mining drill missing which is 1 purple science down and now when you're waiting on your 1 wagon of each science to fill you've actually got to wait on a whole delivery for a whole new set. On the other hand if you have iron and copper and steel in separate trains you don't need to wait on all steel and copper when you only need a few extra iron at an outpost. It actually takes more planning and thinking about than sticking it in one train IMO.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Zavian »

posila wrote:Cargo wangon capacity was increased a little bit few updates ago. We didn't want to increase it too much, because even now people build trains with just two or three wagons. We are afraid, increasing cargo wagon capacity would result in people building less trains and building trains with just one wagon.
Personally I'm fine with the cargo capacity of regular wagons (except for the fact that a wagon full of barrels holds more fluid than a fluid tanker, and weighs only a third the weight). However I do think chests have too big a capacity in comparison to rail wagons. Personally I think chests would be more balanced in comparison to cargo wagons if wooden chests had 8 slots, iron had 12 slots, and steel/logistics chests had 16 slots. (I would also be fine with 8, 16, and 24 slots). I could see players also wanting a larger 2x2 or 3x2 chest/warehouse that had 64 or 96 slots, for longterm storage of stuff.

Regarding fluid wagons, I think you should drop their capacity to 24k (3 compartments of 8k each), their weight to the same as a normal wagon, and their build cost should also drop to only need one storage tank. Then nerf barrels to 100 capacity, and a stack size of 5. (Capacity of 50 and stack size of 10 would also work). That would mean a full wagon of barrels would only hold 20k. To me it is strange that a normal cargo wagon holds more fluid in barrels, and weighs only a third as much, than a special purpose oil tanker.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Demongornot »

Zavian wrote:...
OMG dude, no ! xD
I'll need a 1000 wagons long train with those idea :lol:
Tho I like the 2×2 and 3×2 chest idea, I had a mod like that and it was handy.

JohnyDL wrote:...
I don't think you realise how big my base will be, I'll probably have over 2000 of the 3 engines+8 wagons length style train...
And for my setup train stacker won't work, not only I need several train unloading at once, but I can't afford the delay of them waiting that another do it's unloading, in my setup all train will basically do a loop and really few rails will actually cross each others, all parallels...
Even a single of my mining outpost (which are already done in creative mode, only few circuits optimisation are necessary now) is bigger than a early middle game base...One of the reasons is the length of the train which will go to them.
I don't mind that it won't be constructed with a single train voyage (Actually they will be constructed with me not having to move from my main base anyway and I will be able to construct in parallels as fast as I can place my specials blueprints), the problem come from the number of different objects I require and the wagon capacity for a descent stack of them...Those trains will not only construct but also repair a lot of outpost, so I can't afford them to be too small, otherwise the number of time they'll need to repair a single outpost, another one might be lost, and with several small trains per outpost, I'll have a lot of resources uselessly sitting idle inside wagons, including expensive modules...

Also my megabase will be so huge, even my gaming/coding computer will struggle with that, so adding more wagons will only make matter worst, when there is hundreds of outposts in a single map, having 4 smaller trains rather than a single longer one probably have a huge impact on resources...

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by JohnyDL »

What size base are you going for? 10 rockets a second? Cause your base sounds madness

You're also at the point where you should consider mods to augment your capabilities rather than expecting Vanilla to support you

And the idea of train stackers is to have 1 train in the unloading station 1 in the loading and a third waiting to unload if you have say 6 trains unloading at once then you should have 6 loading and 6 waiting if you're filling up and emptying at full speed with the point being your unloading station is empty for only as long as getting one train out and a second train in.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Demongornot »

JohnyDL wrote:...
Actually this is the funny part, I have all blueprint in mind, the layout and everything, but I don't know what throughput I'll get with that, so I'll simply try as much rocket launch per seconds as possible...
Since my whole design is entirely extensible in every aspect it won't be a problem, and the thing is my design is compatible with multiple bases, so I can fill the map like crazy !
And that's the goal to do everything in vanilla, I've make some circuit contraptions that allow me to control "anything" anywhere on the map for the precise outpost I want to and other things like that, the only thing I'll need to do is placing some blueprint, putting some train on rails and copy their conditions and finally set some circuit conditions and voilà !
And I'll be proud to do it with 100% vanilla features (only cosmetic and non gameplay changing mods).

And actually my design can allow as many train to be unloaded as you want (since infinitely extensible), for the main base, the main train will be around 50 wagons I think, I'll need to test depending on the distance they are from the base, and they can cue, so if I need more resources per seconds, I build a new station, only two blueprints and few rails to put down, and if I don't have any resources throughput, I just cue more train on the same stop.
So I can easily have 8 train stop with 4 train with 80 wagons each and add as much as I want.
Loop take place and consume more rails, but they are the fastest way for a train to get thing done, train stacker have too many intersections, it slow the whole thing down and there is a delay between each trains in the stack, and it take a lot of place and therefore is difficult to make extensible, also it require manual train stop renaming and train conditions setting, with my design a simple copy/paste is enough.

I seek for the maximum automation, the two non automated things will be blueprint and placing down trains.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by ssilk »

Actually I would like to have bigger chests than bigger wagons, cause the chests are so soon empty/full.
:)

And there is an optimum between speed of trains and length, which is as far as I can say somewhere between 3 and 6 wagons. With 6 I would begin use two locos! With 16 I would use 4 or 5, which makes a train length 20. Which is a complete fuckup in handling, for effective train transport you need so much space with that!

Currently I play a map with trains size 6 (<LCCCC<L, one direction). Which feels a little bit too big, that makes much more problems with jams than smaller trains (LCCC).

So seen: The need for bigger wagons is in my eyes just a sign of having too less train transport capacity. With other words: Instead of bigger trains you need more trains. Faster filling/clearing. Faster trains. More space in front of the stations for waiting queues. Etc.

It's really so, that a train system with some small but fast trains is much, much more effective than one with only some very big trains. Factorio doesn't honor big trains - this is quite different to trains in USA or so, where the energy-effectivity is a big cost-factor.
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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by bobingabout »

posila wrote:Cargo wangon capacity was increased a little bit few updates ago. We didn't want to increase it too much, because even now people build trains with just two or three wagons. We are afraid, increasing cargo wagon capacity would result in people building less trains and building trains with just one wagon.
wait... AGAIN?
(remembers cargo wagon with only 10 slots)
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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by mrvn »

ssilk wrote:Actually I would like to have bigger chests than bigger wagons, cause the chests are so soon empty/full.
:)

And there is an optimum between speed of trains and length, which is as far as I can say somewhere between 3 and 6 wagons. With 6 I would begin use two locos! With 16 I would use 4 or 5, which makes a train length 20. Which is a complete fuckup in handling, for effective train transport you need so much space with that!
At the moment I have 4 wooden chest per wagon, which is enough to empty a full wagon with some spare. But you can fit 12 chests per wagon and make them steel chests if you need to. Isn't that enough buffer? I don't see much need to change sizes.

As for train length I totally agree with you. If you have junctions that are not separated by a block large enough to hold the longest train then you quickly run into deadlocks because a long train can entry the first junction but not leave it because it gets stopped at the second. And then with some of murphys luck the second junction won't clear because the blocking train waits for the first junction to clear. DEADLOCK.

I like having lots of small factories that take some items and produce a more complex item. Not just one mega complex that takes plates and produces finished goods. And placing them all at least 20 train cars apart would take an awful amount of space.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by SuicideJunkie »

posila wrote:Cargo wangon capacity was increased a little bit few updates ago. We didn't want to increase it too much, because even now people build trains with just two or three wagons. We are afraid, increasing cargo wagon capacity would result in people building less trains and building trains with just one wagon.
Oh... All my trains are single-wagon, except for my Uber train (which is zero)
Most of them other than the ore trains do run around below half capacity, so it isn't the wagons that are the issue, just my base being too small to cram in longer stations I guess?
This is my learning-trains map tho, so everything beyond my 2x3 segment starting area is railroaded.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Cribbit »

SuicideJunkie wrote:
posila wrote:Cargo wangon capacity was increased a little bit few updates ago. We didn't want to increase it too much, because even now people build trains with just two or three wagons. We are afraid, increasing cargo wagon capacity would result in people building less trains and building trains with just one wagon.
Oh... All my trains are single-wagon, except for my Uber train (which is zero)
Most of them other than the ore trains do run around below half capacity, so it isn't the wagons that are the issue, just my base being too small to cram in longer stations I guess?
This is my learning-trains map tho, so everything beyond my 2x3 segment starting area is railroaded.
Gotta mine more.

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Jap2.0 »

Cribbit wrote:
SuicideJunkie wrote:
posila wrote:Cargo wangon capacity was increased a little bit few updates ago. We didn't want to increase it too much, because even now people build trains with just two or three wagons. We are afraid, increasing cargo wagon capacity would result in people building less trains and building trains with just one wagon.
Oh... All my trains are single-wagon, except for my Uber train (which is zero)
Most of them other than the ore trains do run around below half capacity, so it isn't the wagons that are the issue, just my base being too small to cram in longer stations I guess?
This is my learning-trains map tho, so everything beyond my 2x3 segment starting area is railroaded.
Gotta mine more.
Yep :). In one of my bases, I have several 2-9 trains (which are quite inconvenient for several reasons, so for my next base I'm going with the standard 1-4-1s, although I think sometime I should try 1-8s, 2-8s, 2-12s, 2-16s, 4-16s, 2-12-2s, 4-16-4s, or maybe even a 2-12-1 or 4-16-2 or something :)). You'll get there eventually.
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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Joe78man »

If we expect the devs to scale the cargo capacity based on size, until we have a car, we are screwed.
The player has more capacity than a wagon, which has less capacity than a steel chest. The tank has more capacity than any other container and you can load it with as many tanks as slots you have free.

For the sake of gameplay I think we are good as we are. I could agree with increasing the cargo size of wagons up to steel chests, but if the criteria was to maintain a proportion we will get lost in sizes or will have to reduce drastically the player's inventory and it would impact negatively in the game. Maybe if you started with the car so you can use it for resource carrying but this game is not realistic. Belts work without any power source

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Re: Wagons capacity and weight

Post by Joe78man »

SuicideJunkie wrote:
Mon Oct 23, 2017 5:14 pm
posila wrote:Cargo wangon capacity was increased a little bit few updates ago. We didn't want to increase it too much, because even now people build trains with just two or three wagons. We are afraid, increasing cargo wagon capacity would result in people building less trains and building trains with just one wagon.
Oh... All my trains are single-wagon, except for my Uber train (which is zero)
Most of them other than the ore trains do run around below half capacity, so it isn't the wagons that are the issue, just my base being too small to cram in longer stations I guess?
This is my learning-trains map tho, so everything beyond my 2x3 segment starting area is railroaded.
I tell you what I started doing. I started a creative mode map and then designed blocks, to blueprint them and then use in my "survival" game.
1 module will be a Train terminal station, a setup where trains arrive, unload cargo, load fuel and departure back to the mines (the mines are just stations not far away where cargo is spawned to fill them). I watch the behavior and make the changes to get the final version.
You can use the creative mod to unspawn resources, you place a 'matter void' at the end of a belt and it will eat every resource so you can see everything work as if the resources were consumed.

Then another module for furnaces and used 'matter creators' to see how it works with full resources and try different belst, furnaces, layouts, etc.

etc. once you have everything as you like, with roads, deffence, etc. you can blueprint all and then use that to plan your base.

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