Friday Facts #283 - Prepare to Launch

[Ranakastrasz]

Ah those were the days! I remember making my first flamethrower, and making my husband come play so I could show him how it worked, because as we all know flamethrowers are really cool... And then I, well you see, I sort of... set the forest on fire... and then we couldn't run back to the base quickly enough (of course no cars or tanks yet)... and to make a long story short... we died.
Yes Smokey, I know, only I can prevent forest fires. Sigh.
My husband reminds me of this every time I want to show him something...

So thank you for sharing your stories, and may we all have many more to share with 0.17.

How..... How did you not manage to escape the forest fire on foot? Did you get stuck on the trees or something? I mean, fire spreads pretty slowly.

[<NO_NAME>]

Ah those were the days! I remember making my first flamethrower, and making my husband come play so I could show him how it worked, because as we all know flamethrowers are really cool... And then I, well you see, I sort of... set the forest on fire... and then we couldn't run back to the base quickly enough (of course no cars or tanks yet)... and to make a long story short... we died.
Yes Smokey, I know, only I can prevent forest fires. Sigh.
My husband reminds me of this every time I want to show him something...

So thank you for sharing your stories, and may we all have many more to share with 0.17.

How..... How did you not manage to escape the forest fire on foot? Did you get stuck on the trees or something? I mean, fire spreads pretty slowly.

They were probably actively using the flamethrower the whole time.
I mean, how could you not? Flamethrowers are awesome.

[plokgi]

There is also mechanic that belts can transport items around your factory, you should check it out, it is pretty neat alternative use of belts

That cannot be, sure you don't mention a mod or something like that?

Using belts to transport stuff. pft. What comes next, using some demonic automatic stuff to mine iron ore not with your bare hands?!?

Greetings, Ronny

I heard about a mod where you could place down machines to "assemble" things... I'm thinking that I could use that to make copper wire and then the 600 circuits that I'm handcrafting will take much less time

[Simanova]

I read the friday facts 1 minute after publishing, and there was a clear statement: feb 25 / not after or in this week, i think the guy who has written this is now a head shorter

It would be nice if someone can give a release date AND time for us - so we can setup server and prepare the community

[lordaeron1]

I read the friday facts 1 minute after publishing, and there was a clear statement: feb 25 / not after or in this week, i think the guy who has written this is now a head shorter

It would be nice if someone can give a release date AND time for us - so we can setup server and prepare the community

Preach on brother!

[CDarklock]

the idea was to push oil tech behind blue science so that all the oil stuff can not be piled up in the middle of green science. Green science is big enough.

What is the compelling benefit to having these technologies in blue science?

I mean, I'm not seeing anything about that here.

Consider, say, sulfur. You research sulfur, but you don't have access to an oil field. You can't make sulfur.

To make sulfur, you will first need to find an oil field and set up your refinery process. Then you can make sulfur.

With sulfur in the green tier, you can do these things in either order. You can research sulfur first, and then set up your oil operation. Or you can set up your oil operation first, and then research sulfur.

If you move sulfur into the blue tier, you have to set up oil first.

Why is making the player do it in this order better than letting the player choose?

It's certainly different. You certainly need to do both things before you can make sulfur.

But you can't do anything with raw sulfur anyway.

Now, what you can do, if you've researched both oil processing and sulfur... is set up your refinery, your chemical plants, and your pipes. You can set the recipe to sulfur on one chemical plant, and to sulfuric acid on the next, and pipe in your water, and put pipes where the petroleum gas is going to be, and put your inserter between the plants, and once you research batteries you can drop the assembler at the end of your acid pipe.

Now when you find your oil field, you can run your crude supply straight into your refinery and batteries will just magically start falling out.

But if you lock sulfur and batteries up behind blue science, you can't do that. You can set up the refinery, but then when you put down the chemical plants they're blank and have no recipes. The pipes aren't labeled, so you might bork up your inputs and outputs. The assembler for your batteries doesn't even have a fluid input. Then you have to go find the oil, start processing it, and make blue science first. You can't make anything else until you make blue science. And you have to make enough of it to do your research, because only after you do the research can you set your recipes and start production. Which you have to do from right next to the machines, in your base.

How is that better? Why is it preferable? Why is it more fun? Why should the first option be forbidden? What is wrong with setting up production before you have the necessary materials?

I understand that you don't do it. I even understand that you might not see the point of doing it. But I do not understand why nobody should be allowed to do it.

[Drakken]

^^^^^ I agree with this ^^^^^

I played with the new science recipes and I think the game is in a pretty good place.

[Hanse00]

I read the friday facts 1 minute after publishing, and there was a clear statement: feb 25 / not after or in this week, i think the guy who has written this is now a head shorter

It would be nice if someone can give a release date AND time for us - so we can setup server and prepare the community

It would be nice if you could be patient.

[Sander_Bouwhuis]

I read the friday facts 1 minute after publishing, and there was a clear statement: feb 25 / not after or in this week, i think the guy who has written this is now a head shorter

It would be nice if someone can give a release date AND time for us - so we can setup server and prepare the community

It would be nice if you could be patient.

If we would all have been patient, we would handcraft everything up to the rocket.
We need automation NOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW

[Light]

I read the friday facts 1 minute after publishing, and there was a clear statement: feb 25 / not after or in this week, i think the guy who has written this is now a head shorter

It would be nice if someone can give a release date AND time for us - so we can setup server and prepare the community

It would be nice if you could be patient.

Not sure what you're expecting here, given this update is already 14 months in the making. When it seems like it's making great strides to completion, it gets delayed a little longer.

I'm a remarkably patient man, but even I understand the frustrations involved when it comes to getting friends together to play, only to be told "It might be a while longer!" without much of a hint as to when. Especially with regards to the last FFF raising hopes of a release, only to be dashed for another delay.

Some have already given up waiting and moved on to other things months ago, including mod developers. Several mods aren't updated for 0.16, so even fewer will be up for 0.17. That right there is the real blow to the game for me, but I most certainly don't blame them for throwing in the towel, given mods also take time to update alongside the base game. Bob's Mods alone may take a few weeks to become 100% operational again, so those who use mods have to twiddle their thumbs even longer for their lists to update, assuming the developers for all their mods are still around to even update them.

So I totally understand the frustration.

[bobucles]

Why is making the player do it in this order better than letting the player choose?

If you want to give choices, why not unlock the rocket silo at the very beginning? The player can't do anything with it, and even if they manage to build one it still won't do anything. After all, it would be rude to deny them that choice.

I don't get hot and heavy over giving bad choices to the player. If they research and build a non functional building, they only end up learning what not to do. If they're stumbling all over the place learning about things they shouldn't do, it means I dropped them in a maze. The whole purpose of the science overhaul was to NOT do that.

[Tricorius]

I'm a remarkably patient man, but even I understand the frustrations involved when it comes to getting friends together to play, only to be told "It might be a while longer!" without much of a hint as to when. Especially with regards to the last FFF raising hopes of a release, only to be dashed for another delay.

So, let’s be clear here.

There was no guarantee of a release this week. They *clearly* said they “aim” to release this week if there are no problems.

If you take that to mean “please feel free to take the week off work and invite all your friends over for a LAN party”, that isn’t Wube’s fault.

I’m as anxious to play as the next guy. But I didn’t cancel my son’s birthday dinner tonight just so I could play 0.17 if it drops.

C’mon, peeps. You must use balance in the Force. This is an in-development game. We are talking about an experimental branch with massive changes. As a software developer myself, I’m amazed at what they have accomplished.

They deserve accolades, not general grumpiness.

P.S. I’ll be at the dinner, but I didn’t promise to not reload the Releases topic 18 times during said dinner.

P.P.S. This kind of backlash is why most companies say “it will be done when it is done” and you get *no* advance indicators (even general guesses like “March”). Please don’t encourage Wube to resort to that. I prefer a general guess that slips to no communications about it whatsoever.

[TheBrain0110]

I'm a remarkably patient man, but even I understand the frustrations involved when it comes to getting friends together to play, only to be told "It might be a while longer!" without much of a hint as to when. Especially with regards to the last FFF raising hopes of a release, only to be dashed for another delay.

So, let’s be clear here.

There was no guarantee of a release this week. They *clearly* said they “aim” to release this week if there are no problems.

If you take that to mean “please feel free to take the week off work and invite all your friends over for a LAN party”, that isn’t Wube’s fault.

I’m as anxious to play as the next guy. But I didn’t cancel my son’s birthday dinner tonight just so I could play 0.17 if it drops.

C’mon, peeps. You must use balance in the Force. This is an in-development game. We are talking about an experimental branch with massive changes. As a software developer myself, I’m amazed at what they have accomplished.

They deserve accolades, not general grumpiness.

P.S. I’ll be at the dinner, but I didn’t promise to not reload the Releases topic 18 times during said dinner.

P.P.S. This kind of backlash is why most companies say “it will be done when it is done” and you get *no* advance indicators (even general guesses like “March”). Please don’t encourage Wube to resort to that. I prefer a general guess that slips to no communications about it whatsoever.

Exactly. Everything I read pointed to "Sometime this week, probably not Monday, and ideally before Friday". That leaves us with Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday as possibilities still. Maybe they have a more exact plan now than they did at their last update they can share with us, but most likely we won't get any more details until "Surprise! Here it is!"

[Light]

I'm a remarkably patient man, but even I understand the frustrations involved when it comes to getting friends together to play, only to be told "It might be a while longer!" without much of a hint as to when. Especially with regards to the last FFF raising hopes of a release, only to be dashed for another delay.

If you take that to mean “please feel free to take the week off work and invite all your friends over for a LAN party”, that isn’t Wube’s fault.

I’m as anxious to play as the next guy. But I didn’t cancel my son’s birthday dinner tonight just so I could play 0.17 if it drops.

Haha.

Calling up friends and family to play some Factorio over the weekend via online multiplayer for a few hours isn't unreasonable, is it? Have I and many others been doing it wrong all this time? Is that why some coworkers of mine quit their jobs, in order to play Factorio all day? I should ask them.

Not saying I disagree with the fact it wasn't guaranteed, since I also knew that. I couldn't stop laughing at the rest of what you said, especially since the coworkers who quit did play Factorio as well.

Also, happy birthday to your son.

[FatMcK]

It would still be nice if one of the devs would join this thread writing something short like "Sorry, we didn't made it today. We're working hard on it. Thank you for your patience". And everyone waiting would know to forget factorio for the evening and be patient for the next day ..

As great as Wube are as developers .. there is always a tiny bit you can try to shine a little bit brighter.

[CDarklock]

Why is making the player do it in this order better than letting the player choose?

If you want to give choices, why not unlock the rocket silo at the very beginning?

Because I do not see any compelling reason to do that. How would unlocking the rocket silo from the beginning of the game improve the player experience?

Similarly, answer the damn question. We have something that works and that people like. If you want to change it, the two major ways to justify that are "it would work better" and "more people would like it."

1. How would locking more of the tech tree behind blue science make it work better?

2. How would locking more of the tech tree behind blue science make more people like it?

If you have some reason that doesn't fit in either category, I'm perfectly willing to hear it, but I'm probably not going to agree with it. If it doesn't work any better and people aren't going to like it, you should probably not do it.

I don't get hot and heavy over giving bad choices to the player.

Then why remove this one?

If they research and build a non functional building, they only end up learning what not to do.

Then why block off the research?

If they're stumbling all over the place learning about things they shouldn't do

What, exactly, is on the tech tree that you shouldn't do?

it means I dropped them in a maze.

I don't know if you've noticed, but corn mazes are pretty popular in the American midwest, because an awful lot of people think stumbling around in a maze is fun. Exploration of the unknown is a popular theme in games. Especially when the unknown is static, and the path you learn remains useful in the next game.

Erasing the path people already know and making a new one they have to learn? That deserves a justification. Why would you do that to them? Why should they accept it? What's in it for them?

They don't actually care what's in it for you and your imaginary confused newbie.

The whole purpose of the science overhaul was to NOT do that.

Where, exactly, was that done? And to whom?

The existence of a fantasy person in your head does not justify your position.

If a problem does not exist, it does not need a solution.

[Koub]

There are people that should find themselves something to do - I mean something more interesting than continuously F5-ing the release subforum to see it the update is there.
The world will not stop turning if you miss the 5 first minutes - or 5 first hours, or days - of the release.
Get a good book, read it, and come back on friday to read the next FFF. If 0.17 is out, you'll know at that moment, and chances are there will already have been a few tens or hundreds bugfixes, so it's all for the better for you.

Seriously, if I were a dev, seeing the fuss about not keeping imaginary deadlines, I'd never say anything else than "you'll know when i'ts already out".

[Tricorius]

Not saying I disagree with the fact it wasn't guaranteed, since I also knew that. I couldn't stop laughing at the rest of what you said, especially since the coworkers who quit did play Factorio as well.

Also, happy birthday to your son.

It certainly isn’t unreasonable to call up some friends to play Factorio. 0.16 is perfectly serviceable for that endeavor.

Trust me, if I could find a way to play Factorio all day and earn a living wage, I’d quit tomorrow!

Thanks, I’ll pass it on (he likes Factorio too-so he will actually be happy someone from the forums wished him a happy b-day).

[Tricorius]

It would still be nice if one of the devs would join this thread writing something short like "Sorry, we didn't made it today. We're working hard on it. Thank you for your patience". And everyone waiting would know to forget factorio for the evening and be patient for the next day ..

As great as Wube are as developers .. there is always a tiny bit you can try to shine a little bit brighter.

Of course, strive for perfection.

But I could definitely dig back through the posts in this thread to find the purple post suggesting Monday and Friday were unlikely candidates...

But you know...”give a man a fish” and all that.

Feel free to push the previous button a few times and I’m sure everyone can find what I read over the weekend suggesting it is still likely this week, but Tue - Thur is the most likely timeframe.

[rldml]

There are people that should find themselves something to do - I mean something more interesting than continuously F5-ing the release subforum to see it the update is there.

But i have no life and want to play 0.17! I'm waiting since release of 0.16!!

The world will not stop turning if you miss the 5 first minutes - or 5 first hours, or days - of the release.

Are you really sure about that? I mean, come on. The next thing i'm waiting for is Anno 1800, and that comes two months later than expected.

Nobody loves me...

Seriously, if I were a dev, seeing the fuss about not keeping imaginary deadlines, I'd never say anything else than "you'll know when i'ts already out".

Yeah maybe. But to be honest (and to become serious now), a short little annotation in the official forum don't cost much time for the dev and most players would be completely fine with that and could understand the situation. I'm waiting for almost a year and a relevant change (for me) isn't even planned right now - not for 0.17 and not for any later version as far as known.

That's why i have to need even more patience than simply waiting for 0.17, and perhaps it will never come...

Greetings, Ronny