[0.17.0] Campaign 1 Observations

[Dune]

I'm finding it confusing, and I'm an experienced player.

The smashed buildings, it's not clear that throwing materials at them, fixes them. A right click or hovering mouse over the smashed building, tool tip, that explains that would help.

While the bot is explaining the bits to the GUI, the GUI is faded, makes the GUI hard to see to understand what the bot is talking about.

It says to build a stone furnace far away from the iron ore. So it's not intuitive when you need 3 iron plates to craft a stone burner and a stone furnace. These steps are semi-backwards.
It should have you craft two stone furnaces, build one next to the iron ore, and use the other to craft the stone burner to be placed, direct inserted into the burner (or at least show you to build the burner inserter, and how to fuel it). There's no explanation for this step, other than that you need 3 iron plates, but not how to make them.

I find the use of burner inserters a bit confusing too. There should be a little tutorial on them. The tutorial gives you a few, but doesn't explain how to power them or what inserters do. It does show them doing something, so that could be it, with a little explanation.

There should be some more hand holding on the mining of minerals. At one point the bot says you need wood or coal to power the stone furnace, but not how to get either.

You need a ton of stone furnaces for this tutorial, but the idea of mining by hand the stone the whole time is anti-factorio. That also might be a tutorial step, right after getting some iron smelting automated, is get the stone mining automated. There should also be some coal mining automation. With maybe linking this whole thing together in some spaghetti fashion. Which would help to get some splitters and undergrounds going. I feel the patches of ore are too sparse, maybe thicken them a little. They are hard to see and I feel they might run out.

I'm at the point of the green circuits. There are no splitters or undergrounds, so I've got to figure that out the old fashion way. I looked at the research tree, you only research one item. What I did see, was an icon for an electric-miner, but it was for basic mining. I suggest changing the icon for basic mining on the research tree to be the burner miner instead - less confusing that way.

You have us doing research, but there's only one thing to research. Why build it for only one thing? Maybe research should be covered in a separate tutorial to explain the reasons for research, and the different tech trees. Oh, on research. I choose the item to research, and begin it. There's no explanation that the game is paused. I kept waiting for the progress bar to move, but nothing happens. Maybe overlay on the progress bar text to the effect "game paused."

I'll add to this thread as I complete the tutorial as I find more.

[abregado]

please keep playing and give me your full feedback at the end. If you can upload the screenshots that are the game makes for you that would help a lot too!

Once you are done I will come back and discuss.

Thanks for playing so soon!

[Dune]

C1 001.zip

Campaign 1 save file at this point

(2.06 MiB) Downloaded 143 times

Okay, some of what I said obviously isn't material, since I didn't know the campaign moved to another section, and the "game continued."

Up until the point I'm at, it says to build a science assembly to get 6 packs per minute.

A quick thought, is it is pretty intense. New players might find the attacks overwhelming while trying to keep production going. Though it will sure provide a fun experience either way It could be because I'm an advanced player, that my pollution is off the scale, so I'm seeing more biters as a result.

The quickbar shows up on this map, and there's no explanation to its use. I could have used it on the last map, fortunately I knew about the Q hotkey. New players won't know that trick and will find opening the inventory each time (perhaps) a little tiresome. The quickbar with some buttons already pre-configured could help with that.

PS I'm not seeing a screenshot control in the game settings controls list. I'll use print-screen.

This is my current base. I sure could use some splitters for the next step, but I'll give it a go as is. I've got to go to work, so I'm taking a break here, but I'll be back to finish up and continue the write-up.

[Dune]

A thought, since the attacks are so aggressive, if a player loses here. They probably won't have a save from the beginning of this Part 2. There might be from the menu an option to start at Part 2 and not have to restart from the beginning. Maybe give the Introduction Campaign its own sub-menu that will unlock the start of each part / map as the player progresses.

[abregado]

oh, the screenshots are found in the

Code: Select all

/script_output

directory in your Factorio folder.

There are also special autosaves made at key points during the scenario.

[gyorokpeter]

Just dumping my thoughts trying to think as a new player:

"New technologies available for research" pops up right after starting. This is not relevant info at this point.

When Compilatron moves out of the screen and it has something to say, an arrow should point at it. All too often he moves offscreen and even if he has something to say you won't notice unless you remember to go find it.
I hate the usage of the word "mine" for deconstructing buildings ("This cannot be mined"). It should only be used for extracting ores from the ground.

When iron automation is demonstrated, apparently too much is happening at the same time. Maybe the usage of belts and inserters should be demonstrated first on a simpler example.

The loader is referred to as "Feeder" in the objectives.

No need to point out that a structure needs fuel more than once or maybe twice. The player should make the association from the flashing symbol.

Stop consuming items on the loaders when the objective is full to avoid accidentally running out of resources?

When the goal is to craft circuits, you can't craft copper cables by hand. You only have one assembler, while you would need two for the recipe, and can't handcraft the 2nd one. I think this is somewhat confusing.

Well this is not a new player thing: the basic mining research shows an electric drill but only shows that it unlocks the burner one. There is a later tech with the exact same icon that unlocks the electric drill.

When the objective is to "obtain" a lab, I'm tempted to place it but that marks the objective as incomplete. Also the "obtain small electric poles" doesn't count any you might already have from before.

"Toggle Alt-mode" is not descriptive of what it does. I think it's so useful that it should be impossible to disable without digging into some obscure option windows.
The other options appear greyed out in the config menu with no indication on how to unlock them. The tooltip for the "undo" button is tempting as it says things like "Undo construction of Inserter" even though you can't use it.

"Provide a boiler with water and coal" insists on coal, even though you can find solid fuel and it works just as well.

It is not obvious how to replace things in the quickbar (middle click?!) (maybe it appears in the top-left info texts, I usually miss those as it's not so conspicuous when it changes)
Clicking on an empty quickbar slot brings up all the possible items in the game, which is a bit too early at this point.

I got to the point where I need to research green science but I have to leave for today, I'll continue tomorrow.

[Quicksteve]

I found the biters at the end pretty hard, and had to give it a second try, each side with around 10 turrets and 5 layer walls. I would like to upload the screenshots, but they are 30 MB each, so can't upload them. What should I do with them?

[BlueTemplar]

Convert them to JPEG, that'll cut down their size to 3-4 MB...

Ideally, they should have been saved in both formats in the first place !

[Desette]

I finished the campaign in around two hours (game time) while trying to do it without my past knowledge about what I should and shouldn't do and just trying to act like a new player. I died several times because I thought the game was going to end a lot quicker than it did.

The layout of all the terrain is an excellent way to help the player become more comfortable without being overwhelmed.

The resources are placed a nice distance and there is just enough space to do things, though a little more land on the water side should be available to make it easier on new players since I felt a little crowded.

The overall progress seemed to take a long time to get to the early tech. Maybe It is because I haven't played a lot since I have been waiting for 0.17 for months but it seemed almost to take to long of a time for such an early technology. I upgraded from 4 labs to 8 labs later on but this should have taken half the time it did or another main goal should be chosen.

I don't like the the toolbar was missing at the start, that the recipes are all lumped together and that it seems every technology seemed to be far more expensive then I remembered from before. It is a tutorial campaign, I think, therefore it should mimic the real game a little closer.

Overall this was aggressively hard for a new player. I would like to see an option to invite an experienced player before you begin the base or it tamed down for a new player or some better loot in the broken ships at least.

Overall though it sucked me right into the game again and I was happy with that.

[Xeorm]

Played a bit earlier, didn't get all the way through, but here are my observations:

The bits where the camera zooms over to look at the oncoming biters felt dull. Really seemed like a bit where I was expecting some sort of talk from the compilatron explaining what was happening. Something simple like "Oh dear, the alien fauna seems to hate our pollution. Best prepare for a future attack".

When you're "evacuating" the first section, maybe change the wording from "grab some of your equipment" to "grab what you want to bring with you" to make it clear that you're evacuating and should grab all the stuff. There's no reason not to, and it makes the next section a lot easier to have more stuff. I did reload so that I could grab more stuff.

I was rather frustrated when I placed my turrets to cover the western route into the new base, and suddenly following compilatron opened the eastern side, with biters coming in to attack immediately. Seemed like a cheap shot, especially as I didn't have any turrets built to cover that side.

Biters in general seemed fairly strong for a tutorial. The game goes from explaining how to mine to very quickly requiring that you maintain a decent beginning economy while getting attacked. Seemed a bit much. Would suggest at the least that you get the player used to defending one section before opening up the east side. And give some warning.

As far as positive feedback goes I really did like the inclusion of the little compilatron. Having another character do things was a big improvement. The basic tutorial seemed pretty solid.

[gyorokpeter]

What is "Nauvis"? (it appears in the mouseover of the alert icons)

I just finished the tutorial, but by that point I thought I was going to get overrun with the biters. They seemed to grow exponentially and my bullet production just couldn't keep up with them. My turrets already started dying when the green science research was done and miraculously the map ended.

[abregado]

The smashed buildings, it's not clear that throwing materials at them, fixes them. A right click or hovering mouse over the smashed building, tool tip, that explains that would help.

I will add more description to the tooltips. I am also petitioning to have the tooltip stuck to the cursor by default for new players a they "look with their mouse cursor"

While the bot is explaining the bits to the GUI, the GUI is faded, makes the GUI hard to see to understand what the bot is talking about.

Yeah, the code that makes those windows is super old (older than science packs), and is going to be updated.

I find the use of burner inserters a bit confusing too. There should be a little tutorial on them. The tutorial gives you a few, but doesn't explain how to power them or what inserters do. It does show them doing something, so that could be it, with a little explanation.

Ill add them to the list of things that Compilatron shows you are out of fuel

There should be some more hand holding on the mining of minerals. At one point the bot says you need wood or coal to power the stone furnace, but not how to get either.

It does show you, you just didnt wait long enough. Compilatron gives you time to figure it out on your own.

kept waiting for the progress bar to move, but nothing happens. Maybe overlay on the progress bar text to the effect "game paused."

not a bad idea. I thought that the technology card moves to the top left (previously an empty space) was enough, but I think you are right, it needs more.

[abregado]

"New technologies available for research" pops up right after starting. This is not relevant info at this point.

fixed in new version

I hate the usage of the word "mine" for deconstructing buildings ("This cannot be mined"). It should only be used for extracting ores from the ground.

true it is not a scenario specific text string so i did not update it. Noted and will be changed.

Stop consuming items on the loaders when the objective is full to avoid accidentally running out of resources?

It actually refunds you any excess items, but it does not tell you. I will have Compilatron give them back to you in a chest then.

When the goal is to craft circuits, you can't craft copper cables by hand. You only have one assembler, while you would need two for the recipe, and can't handcraft the 2nd one. I think this is somewhat confusing.

confusing yes, but this cleverly forces the player to discover how to change recipes. It is impossible to progress without discovering this for yourself.

Well this is not a new player thing: the basic mining research shows an electric drill but only shows that it unlocks the burner one. There is a later tech with the exact same icon that unlocks the electric drill.

All technology icons are placeholder

It is not obvious how to replace things in the quickbar (middle click?!) (maybe it appears in the top-left info texts, I usually miss those as it's not so conspicuous when it changes)
Clicking on an empty quickbar slot brings up all the possible items in the game, which is a bit too early at this point.

agree, but the quickbar is still under development. One of the joys of making a tutorial for an unfinished game

[abregado]

What should I do with them?

put them on Imgur and email me the link (ben.buckton@factorio.com)

Ideally, they should have been saved in both formats in the first place !

Yes, we will do that in the future. The programmer who does these things for me is also the build engineer, so you can imagine he had a bunch of other things to do yesterday!

[abregado]

When you're "evacuating" the first section, maybe change the wording from "grab some of your equipment" to "grab what you want to bring with you" to make it clear that you're evacuating and should grab all the stuff. There's no reason not to, and it makes the next section a lot easier to have more stuff. I did reload so that I could grab more stuff.

yes, i will make sure that the player has removed 3-5 structures before they can leave. Probably Compilatron can help too

Seemed like a cheap shot, especially as I didn't have any turrets built to cover that side.
...
Would suggest at the least that you get the player used to defending one section before opening up the east side. And give some warning.

I agree, i let the player decide when to move on, but a lot of players trigger it immediately without reading. Better to force them to build up first.

[robeja]

I know the campaign design and player teaching process is a difficult task, but I think is fundamental, or players will be discouraged.
For me, the most crucial (difficult) parts of the game were the beginning steps, the oil setup, and the advanced science.
Like the Compilatron concept, it's some kind of guide, and I would explore hsi construction abilites a bit more.
In the old campaign you had some ruins already placed so you know how were things connected and learned in the process.

As an experienced factorio player, I tried to be a newcomer again and play the campaign/tutorial as if I were new on this.
Here are my thoughts playing the 17.1, ordered by mission, some of them have been already posted:

1 - Craft a stone furnace from the character screen:

- You do not tell the player to press E to open his inventory/crafting menu
- You do not tell the player how to build (for example: select fom inventory and place in the ground)
- Should indicate player a proper place to build the furnace. He will try to build it near the stone and its useless there.
- Should indicate player to build some additional furnaces, because they will be needed later for the mining drills

2 - Gather resources automatically

- It would be nice to remember the player that CTRL+Click picks all the inventory from the container.
- If player builds a furnace next to iron ore, in the next misson Compilatron destroys it to build the iron automation, you should prevent this.

3 - Reactivate the assembler

- Should indicate player to build a belt line to the feeder, because is not very clear, and player will try to put iron plates directly on the feeder, on the assembler, etc.
- At this point, fuel is required everywhere (even in the inserters). Should indicate player to build more drills on the coal, and also in the stone (in order to make even more drills)
- Also you can tell the player to use the coal drill trick: put one in front of the other and they recharge each other automatically

- You put the hint 'can rotate with r key' but most of the items in the scenario cannot be rotated. Should specify which elements can be rotated. In the next mission is indeed clearly specified 'use r to rotate inserters'

4 - Reactivate the laboratory

- There is 1 output feeder, but 2 input belts (gears, copper). Should tell the player to join one belt to another (or else let Compilatron build it for him) and then go to the feeder.

5 - Research new technology

- Player does not know how to exit the technology interface, you must tell him to exit using T again or Esc. Also there is no indication that the game is paused.
- The basic mining icon is from an electric miner, and the player does not know them yet. Should be a mining drill icon.

6 - Craft advanced components/use a small electric pole to connect electricity

- It is confusing that pre-placed assemblers are automatically powered, whilst player created assembler are not. Should specify this to avoid confusion.
- You need 2 assemblers to craft circuits but you only have ingredients for one. Therefore player must use one assembler to build copper wire and then repurpose that assembler to build the circuits. This is confusing. Must give ingredients at the start to craft two assemblers (3 more circuits).
- It's a nice time to tell the player he can build 5 items (i.e: belts) using the right mouse button on the crafting menu.

7 - Repair minimap/build radar

- Its better to research electric inserters before Mapping, so the player does not have to feed the burner inserters with coal anymore.
- When first biters make their attack to the shipwreck, it dissapears instead of being destroyed.
- The onscreen alert says Nauvis, but the player doesn't know yet what Nauvis is.

8 - Research escape pod blackbox

- The icon of the tech is a containment unit with an biter inside, does not make any sense.

9 - Prepare to evacuate

- It seems so obvious that the biter attack is scripted, and there is no reason for it at all. ¿Why they attack only when you are watching? I have an idea. Make the biters surround the shipwreck but not attack it, then pump off some smoke from the shipwreck, and then make the biters attack the shipwreck in revenge. This way the players know tht biters don't like smoke and pollution.

10 - Leave crash site

- 'Collect some of your equipment' is not clear. Must be something like like 'Collect the most essential materials and leave the site'
- You have plenty of time to collect everything before biters come, so the need to hurry is not needed at all. Maybe after a certain time send some biters to start destroying, or make Compilatron defend yourself (he has shooting speed so he must shoot something, maybe laser? )
- There is one biter though but it seems frozen and does not attack even if you come closer.
- Dont' like how the biters attack your base, they act like roman soldiers, not like a swarm, they seem too well organized.

11 - Rebuild the factory

- Why there are new technologies available? Why they were not there from the start? Idea: Maybe make Compilatron scan the nearby shipwreck and get 'updates'.

Thats all, I'll leave it here, and continue later.

[abregado]

- You do not tell the player to press E to open his inventory/crafting menu
- You do not tell the player how to build (for example: select fom inventory and place in the ground)
- It would be nice to remember the player that CTRL+Click picks all the inventory from the container.

We do tell the player these things, but you did it yourself before it wanted to tell you. I specifically did not want to tell the player anything they already have figured out.

- Also you can tell the player to use the coal drill trick: put one in front of the other and they recharge each other automatically
- There is 1 output feeder, but 2 input belts (gears, copper). Should tell the player to join one belt to another (or else let Compilatron build it for him) and then go to the feeder.
- You need 2 assemblers to craft circuits but you only have ingredients for one. Therefore player must use one assembler to build copper wire and then repurpose that assembler to build the circuits. This is confusing. Must give ingredients at the start to craft two assemblers (3 more circuits).
- Its better to research electric inserters before Mapping, so the player does not have to feed the burner inserters with coal anymore.

Nahh, there should be some cool stuff that the player can figure out on their own. It increases the rewarding feeling when you think "Maybe this will work, but probably not... holy hell i am an engineering god!" #nowrongwaytoplayfactorio

- You put the hint 'can rotate with r key' but most of the items in the scenario cannot be rotated. Should specify which elements can be rotated. In the next mission is indeed clearly specified 'use r to rotate inserters'
- 'Collect some of your equipment' is not clear. Must be something like like 'Collect the most essential materials and leave the site'

Totally agree, ill add some updates to make these better

- It is confusing that pre-placed assemblers are automatically powered, whilst player created assembler are not. Should specify this to avoid confusion.
- When first biters make their attack to the shipwreck, it dissapears instead of being destroyed.
- The icon of the tech is a containment unit with an biter inside, does not make any sense.

I think these are caused by the placeholder artwork. Once we have new crashsite entities and new research icons it will be better.

- It's a nice time to tell the player he can build 5 items (i.e: belts) using the right mouse button on the crafting menu.
- You have plenty of time to collect everything before biters come, so the need to hurry is not needed at all. Maybe after a certain time send some biters to start destroying, or make Compilatron defend yourself (he has shooting speed so he must shoot something, maybe laser? )

I tested these solutions during focus testing and they didnt do well. Either the player was too overloaded or it caused them some other problem.

Thanks for the feedback, keep it coming

[robeja]

We do tell the player these things, but you did it yourself before it wanted to tell you. I specifically did not want to tell the player anything they already have figured out.

Oh! Ok, my mistake then.

there should be some cool stuff that the player can figure out on their own

Hmm you have a point here. Maybe I'm too focused on finding flaws in the tutorial that I missed the fun of it. Totally agree, part of the fun with the game was to discover things by myself. Forget what I said about the coal-drills.

the placeholder artwork

I guessed, but preferred to tell just to be sure.

tested these solutions during focus testing

Good to know. As I know how to play, my opinion is totally subjective. I'm sure you guys did a lot of testing, and the result will be as you see fit, of course.

Anyway thanks for the new campaign, there's a lot of work put into it, and although players go free-map most of the time, its is good to have it for the newbies. Furthermore, I liked the old campaign too much, played it a couple times just for the fun of it, and also to determine how much I had improved.

[Dune]

Finished the campaign, and I didn't die. If the game had gone another minute, I was dead. My defenses were just being overrun when I finished. There is no way a new player could survive this, unless the code behind is purposefully ramping up attacks there at the end to overrun just for the thrill that "If the game had gone another minute I was dead." My radars out by the turrets were gone, sorry, watch the stream linked at the bottom for how I played this.

Screenshots of map, unfortunately there's a big "Congratulations" pop-up that can't be moved in the center of the screen.






Twitch Stream of this second day of playing the map - https://www.twitch.tv/videos/387609447

Thoughts.

Permit more tech on gun speed / damage.

It's doable without splitters / undergrounds. I'm guessing you don't permit the undergrounds, since that'd void the cliffs and people would stick their base where the biters couldn't get to. You could put tiers of cliffs, to make building in that "mountainous" region untenable.

The game is certainly a challenge. New players would find juggling production and defending difficult. Fortunately for me, I had production nailed (except right there at the end). If I needed more of something, I just added more assemblers. If I'd had to do this as I'd originally played without knowledge of smelting lines, I'd have been toast.

Personally, I'd hate to see this "dumbed down," for new players. It's a fun challenge. I suggest it be saved as a hard-mode version.

Others mentioned the map is tight. I found it was plenty of room, and almost too big. You hear me talk about having to run back and forth without power armor in my stream.

I like to play with biters enabled in my sandbox games. Because they provide the right stimulus to "have-to-do-something-now" momentum to a game, early on. Here, they have that balance. I can't just work assembly, because there are turrets out of ammo, etc. Nice going there.

Nice sea-dragon in bottom left corner of water. That little bit of water inlet with tiny islands is a nice immersion feel for a campaign map. You need to get the 3d guys to give you a waterfall cliff for rivers.

Without some kind of endless tech, the 6 ppm science requirement might not be doable if the science had been finished before reaching the 6 ppm.

I'm not sure what else to say. You wanted to discuss, and I'd be willing to go on discord for a chat anytime. After you make changes, I can play this again.

[Dune]

Just as the final tech completed, some of what looks like debug text showed up on screen, seen in upper right corner of screenshot.