Friday Facts #286 - Pollution cleanup

[Ranakastrasz]

=
--SNIP--

That would be a lot of text for that box. Maybe a help button to go to a bigger explanation.

Makes sense. Currently it is about as descriptive as your own structure tooltips, maybe a bit less.
The main difference is that while "Pollution per second" or "Power Consumption" or "Crafting Speed" are pretty obvious in function....

Spawn values for current evolution factor (0.73)
35%: Medium biter: 20 pollution
64%: Big biter: 80 pollution

This may or many not be clear.
I looked at it personally, knew exactly what it was communicating instantly, and found it useful. But I also am a modder, and I frequent the wiki, and I use Evolution GUI mod (the one that shows evo factor, time, light level, direction to allies, all that stuff) and so on.
As such, I already knew what the data meant, I just never bothered to manually calculate that information, or even look it up. I was more on the lines of, Evolution factor hit 25%? Better expect medium biters, and ensure I have enough red bullets being produced to deal with their armor.
That, and watching my pollution bubble. It just doesn't apply to me properly.

[5thHorseman]

Knowing how much pollution the biter nest has available with which to make biters would probably help as well. How much exactly is 20? Or 80? Does the nest have 100 pollution or 5000? Or 6?

[Ranakastrasz]

Knowing how much pollution the biter nest has available with which to make biters would probably help as well. How much exactly is 20? Or 80? Does the nest have 100 pollution or 5000? Or 6?

Yep. You could watch it accumulate that way. Admittedly, I am unsure if it shows that like it did in that friday facts with debug mode. I only looked at it in the pollution statistics thus far.

[gacekssj4]

Its just past 5pm now, most of the team is winding down for the weekend. The count of bug reports on the forum is 366, which lower then the 372 of last week.

than?

[dee-]

Knowing how much pollution the biter nest has available with which to make biters would probably help as well. How much exactly is 20? Or 80? Does the nest have 100 pollution or 5000? Or 6?

Yep. You could watch it accumulate that way. Admittedly, I am unsure if it shows that like it did in that friday facts with debug mode. I only looked at it in the pollution statistics thus far.

For me this is a great idea, I also asked myself how "ripe" to hatching they are.
Then again it feels like cheating to look into the game mechanics and plan your strategy with this meta-information.

Maybe we could use a tech tree for "Xeno"-stuff.
Then this could be a researchable science, along with the %-values of what worm will spawn.
Later on you could get a display about the evolution factor, etc. Maybe motion detectors that have a larger radius than the radar, ...

That would also be a way to reintroduce the pink orbs which I miss pretty much.
They could be harvested from killed bases, processed into pink flashs (e.g. with Uranium and Acid) and then used for science.
That would be an optional tech tree, with no dependencies going out so you don't have to follow it. But if you're the Action Guy, run guns blazing, grab the loot and get insights about the Xenos, err, natives, then this is pretty satisfying gameplay

[EstebanLB]

https://factorio.com/blog/post/fff-286

What I think is that all of you work too hard...

[RMJ]

On the topic of pollution and biters.

Now sure what the future holds in regards to pollution. But personally i feel kinda sad that pollution is so superficial imo. I think it would be cool and interesting if it was more visual, instead of having to look at a map and see a red circle, which supposedly is pollution..

What is pollution actually affected the environment, ground would become polluted and change, tree would wither and die, water would become polluted turn brown/green.. if you go to far, it would even product thick smog...

Same with the nuclear bomb, i think it should be powerful, but if you use it, it should permanently make the specific area of a certain size into nuclear fallout wasteland, where you can go if you have radiation tech / suit..

It would also give us reason, beyond biters alone, to research renewable and clean energy, "ive always wondered why the game do not have windmills".

In short i just think pollution could be so much more visual and add to immersion but also add to the gameplay. Often times i forget to check on the map to keep track of the red circle and all hell breaks loose. Where as if it could see the ground pollution, thick smog of my factory moving in a certain direction, i would be more inclined to do something about it.

it would also be interesting to see pollution interacting with biters in a visual way, maybe they will actually start to mutate ? and freaking even more freaky.

[TheRaph]

https://factorio.com/blog/post/fff-286

What I think is that all of you work too hard...

Hey. They are young (and need the money).
At this point we don't need to worry about their healthy.

But you're right they should stop it when getting older.

Great job devs... Thank you.

[tag]

"emissions_per_tick_per_watt" and "pollution_absorption_per_second ".
Why ticks and seconds within the same context?

And what if the update rate drops below 60 ticks/second?

[BlueTemplar]

Yess, thank you ! *Especially* for the pollution statistics !

How they think we play:
Oh man that electric furnace will save polution.
I have enough ammo in that Outpost for 20 min.
Cliffs are a interesting gameplay.
Oh damn so much polution. Do something about it.


How we play:
Those furnaces are fast, require less space, no coal, are faster.
I build a giant wall around everything and just keep the biters outside the big red whatever.
Cliffs are total garbage.
I could build a useless machine to get to 99% evolution.

Jokes aside. No one cares about polution after 10 hours. The late game needs some more interesting and challenging stuff. The mid game got really extensive lately but for late... Let me grab mods cause the game delivers not that much. Just bigger values.

I hope that by this "we", you don't mean "everyone" ?
I'm not sure what are you proposing to do ?

I've already said it before, but I don't get people that consider biters a mere nuisance, but don't remove them completely OR don't dial them up to the point where they start to become a challenge again - (yes, you pretty much need mods after oil) - and where you have to be careful with your pollution, because scaling up recklessly will just get you killed faster.

(I guess that a game mode replacing all spawners by worms - as a temporary setback / immobile shooting targets - could be interesting...)

[BlueTemplar]

What is pollution actually affected the environment, [...] tree would wither and die

Already in the game !

Knowing how much pollution the biter nest has available with which to make biters would probably help as well. How much exactly is 20? Or 80? Does the nest have 100 pollution or 5000? Or 6?

Yep. You could watch it accumulate that way. Admittedly, I am unsure if it shows that like it did in that friday facts with debug mode. I only looked at it in the pollution statistics thus far.

For me this is a great idea, I also asked myself how "ripe" to hatching they are.
Then again it feels like cheating to look into the game mechanics and plan your strategy with this meta-information.

Well, it would be pretty cool to see spawners evolve / spawn growing eggs... but this might be a bit outside Wube's budget...

[BlueTemplar]

Going to see what I can do with this spreadsheet related to pollution. It does have a huge number of variables, but way better than doing it myself from scratch.
Main issue is that the research has changed, and also the resistances don't match the wiki, and I don't think they match the game either.

Main issue before was that it was *very* hard to evaluate how much pollution was absorbed by terrain.
It's probably still pretty hard, but at least you can get some idea, in the early game at least, when you still have a small base, for a specific chunk ?

That said, bases clearly spawn biters without being polluted first, so I really don't know the rules there. How much free pollution-worth do they get?

I think it's more that they all come with a "biter guard" determined by evolution, that get replenished pretty fast regardless of pollution ?

And when did medium biters get 8 armor? I thought it was 4, so it went 0->4->8->12.

Indeed !

[BlueTemplar]

"emissions_per_tick_per_watt" and "pollution_absorption_per_second ".
Why ticks and seconds within the same context?

And what if the update rate drops below 60 ticks/second?

In this context, I'm pretty sure that second := 60 ticks.

But yeah, I was already puzzled why it wasn't in PU/J before...

[SuperSandro2000]

I hope that by this "we", you don't mean "everyone" ?
I'm not sure what are you proposing to do ?

I've already said it before, but I don't get people that consider biters a mere nuisance, but don't remove them completely OR don't dial them up to the point where they start to become a challenge again - (yes, you pretty much need mods after oil) - and where you have to be careful with your pollution, because scaling up recklessly will just get you killed faster.

(I guess that a game mode replacing all spawners by worms - as a temporary setback / immobile shooting targets - could be interesting...)

We as everyone it applies to.
If I would know it I would have proposed it.

I have biters on standard and right now they are just.. yeah whatever... but I almost hit 100% already lol
Maybe I should experiment with scaling them up a bit.
Then i don't have time starting 20 saves and tuning them in just right.

And then comes the next problem: you just get more bullet sponges and the game just gets stressful not interesting.

[AntiBlueQuirk]

The pollution graph looks awesome! (I love graphs.) I also love the diligence you all put into making sure the game is as stable as possible.

But while we're adding new graphs... any chance we could get Circuit Graphs considered?

[Lubricus]

On the topic of pollution and biters.

Now sure what the future holds in regards to pollution. But personally i feel kinda sad that pollution is so superficial imo. I think it would be cool and interesting if it was more visual, instead of having to look at a map and see a red circle, which supposedly is pollution..

What is pollution actually affected the environment, ground would become polluted and change, tree would wither and die, water would become polluted turn brown/green.. if you go to far, it would even product thick smog...

Same with the nuclear bomb, i think it should be powerful, but if you use it, it should permanently make the specific area of a certain size into nuclear fallout wasteland, where you can go if you have radiation tech / suit..

It would also give us reason, beyond biters alone, to research renewable and clean energy, "ive always wondered why the game do not have windmills".

In short i just think pollution could be so much more visual and add to immersion but also add to the gameplay. Often times i forget to check on the map to keep track of the red circle and all hell breaks loose. Where as if it could see the ground pollution, thick smog of my factory moving in a certain direction, i would be more inclined to do something about it.

it would also be interesting to see pollution interacting with biters in a visual way, maybe they will actually start to mutate ? and freaking even more freaky.

Trees do wither and die, if you manage to pollute enough.

[Goose]

On the topic of pollution and biters.

Now sure what the future holds in regards to pollution. But personally i feel kinda sad that pollution is so superficial imo. I think it would be cool and interesting if it was more visual, instead of having to look at a map and see a red circle, which supposedly is pollution..

What is pollution actually affected the environment, ground would become polluted and change, tree would wither and die, water would become polluted turn brown/green.. if you go to far, it would even product thick smog...

Same with the nuclear bomb, i think it should be powerful, but if you use it, it should permanently make the specific area of a certain size into nuclear fallout wasteland, where you can go if you have radiation tech / suit..

It would also give us reason, beyond biters alone, to research renewable and clean energy, "ive always wondered why the game do not have windmills".

In short i just think pollution could be so much more visual and add to immersion but also add to the gameplay. Often times i forget to check on the map to keep track of the red circle and all hell breaks loose. Where as if it could see the ground pollution, thick smog of my factory moving in a certain direction, i would be more inclined to do something about it.

it would also be interesting to see pollution interacting with biters in a visual way, maybe they will actually start to mutate ? and freaking even more freaky.

Trees do wither and die, if you manage to pollute enough.

I personally don't see clean energy or balance changes working out, but the concept of slowly destroying the entire landscape (polluted waters, cracked sand, dead grass, nuclear fallout, and so on) sounds like such a blast to me! I hope the developers don't hold back when trying to make the player feel like the bad guy. :3

[Engimage]

Estimating Ammo consumption would be:
- Your electric miners generate 10 pollution per second. Let's say you have 100 miners on a patch of iron. That generates 1000 pollution per second.
- Therefore, you'll generate 50 medium biters per second, or 12 big biters per second.
- A piercing round does 8 damage by itself, and with bullet damage 3 it gets +60%, so 12.8 damage.
- A medium biter has flat 8 plus 10% damage resistance, so 12.8-8 = 4.8, 4.8 x 0.9 = 4.32 damage per bullet = 43.2 damage per magazine.
- A medium biter has 75 Hp, so it will take 1.74 magazines to kill each one.
- 50 medium biters per second will therefore require 87 Armor Piercing Round Magazines per second to clear the waves at steady-state.

The same math can be done for Big Biters, then use a weighted average between the two requirements to determine your actual bullet use rate.

Cheers!

Its not that simple.
First of all terrain and trees do also consume pollution and only a small portion is consumed by spawners.
Spawners do spawn biters at a limited rate so they can't just convert all your pollution into biters directly.
This might have changed tho...

[Peregrin_Tooc]

However quickly we saw a massive spike in crash reports, seems we had broken something with GUI's in multiplayer. After the first hour, we had over 100 crash reports, so it was definitely a big problem.

It was just a simple oversight, so it was a one-line fix. We quickly spun up the deploy script again, the final tally of crash reports was over 300 by the time the hotfix was out.

I'd rather like to know whether you added tests to your pipeline to avoid issues like that in the future

[bman212121]

So glad that pollution is finally getting some love. The entire premise of the game is based upon you landing on an alien planet, and the only reason why the aliens care is because you're generating pollution. They don't care if you chop down trees, they don't care that you build stuff all over the map. The only reason why they care about you is because of the pollution you generate.

The only way to even see that you're affecting them in any way is by turning on an alternate display mode underneath another menu. It's definitely not straight forward and I'd image most understand the mechanic simply because you get an achievement stating it, and then they start attacking you. Having some actual numbers definitely helps to show what kind of affect your having on pollution and if changes you are making are really meaningful or not. I've looked at the debug data several times before, but it was incredibly hard to read and difficult to quickly determine what is causing the most pollution. You could see the large numbers so you know you had a lot of pollution lingering, but there's really nothing that tells you how fast it's being made vs how fast it's dissipating. Having the graphs should really help with this. The one thing that would be nice however is some way to actually tell how much pollution is still lingering. Unlike all of the other resources, turn them off and you can instantly see the effect of it. With pollution you really don't know how much or how long it's going to hang around.

This is a very welcomed change though, and hopefully it puts a bit more emphasis on efficiency modules. They almost never seem to be used, and I'm sure part of the reason is there isn't much to really see how big of a change they make. Having data to track pollution generated could open up new possibilities. It would definitely be interesting to see if not generating pollution could potentially save more resources by not making turrets, ammo, walls, because you're not being attacked. I would imagine most just end up making sure their walls are outside of their pollution clouds, but rather than expanding to meet pollution, you could try reducing pollution to make the cloud smaller. I tend to do that for outposts, but given the way the game works most are likely just going to expand their base because you need resources / space anyway so it doesn't make sense to waste time making things more efficient.


As a side note, I'd love to see some additional scenarios build around things like efficiency. Maybe have a scenario where you attempt to keep pollution under x/s to prevent the aliens from attacking at all. If you can complete your escape without triggering any attacks you win. It would certainly change the dynamic of how people go about building their factories.