Friday Facts #289 - Character GUI

[irbork]

I like the new character GUI very much. Nice job. Can't wait for it to be in the game.

[TheBloke]

I was so pleased to see the new Logistic UI in today's FFF. I'd been hoping it would get a revamp along these lines and was especially glad to see it'll have a merged requests/trash UI and infinite request slots. This is going to be such a time saver for me in late-game, where before it felt like I spent a lot of time juggling logistic requests as I moved between different areas and tasks.

The new UI is going to be so much nicer to use, and of course looks so much cleaner and sharper. I can't wait to try it out.

Like others have mentioned I would also love it if we could have:

1. Toggle buttons for enable/disable of Logistic Request and Trash, so that I can disable these when I'm in places where I don't want the bots to provide or remove items.
2. Presets for requests/trash slots, kind of like we have multiple quickbars; a way to define multiple sets of requests/trash and swap between them (I did wonder if that was what those mysterious +/- buttons, marked 9, were in the mockup. Plus/minus pages? Probably not, but I can dream.. )
3. A way to confirm or 'lock-in' a request/trash amount, rather than the bots starting to fly the moment the value is changed.

These are purely nice-to-haves, especially 1 and 2 because mods can definitely provide those features (and already do). But I believe they would be used quite a lot if they were considered worth adding to vanilla.

Thanks again for all the amazing work you guys are doing.

[LFarquaad]

Another QOL improvement would be the ability to organize the logistic slots. Currently – except if I missed it – it is not possible to move around the logistic requests. Instead you have to do the following:

1. Remove the current item request you want to move – because you can't have two requests for the same item
2. Re-add a request for that item at the right place – with the need to find it back somewhere either in your inventory or in the selector
3. Restore the request size – which is often easier to do by typing the amount because the selector is difficult to use for precise amounts

I often end-up not bothering but then I have a hard time finding back if I already have a request for something and where it is. Moreover it completely messes with everyone's OCD, making the game completely unplayable!

[egocarib]

under logistics: Items requesting 0 and max set to 0... instead of having nothing on them, how about having a tiny trash can icon?

Yeah, I think that's a good idea

I also came here to give this feedback. The way it is currently described, it will be confusing to players. There needs to be some better indication that these items are being "trashed" / never allowed in the inventory. Otherwise it looks like you've set them up to be requested in your inventory.

(In general, the UI updates look awesome, though!)

[SpwnX]

Can we have one extra logistics tab that displays the whole logistics network inventory (and maybe some statistics) that you are in range of?

[MrGrim]

Like others have mentioned I would also love it if we could have:

1. Presets for requests/trash slots, kind of like we have multiple quickbars; a way to define multiple sets of requests/trash and swap between them (I did wonder if that was what those mysterious +/- buttons, marked 9, were in the mockup. Plus/minus pages? Probably not, but I can dream.. )

... I believe [it] would be used quite a lot if they were considered worth adding to vanilla.

If I had to guess, one reason this may not make it to vanilla is that is discourages end game divestment from the character as builder and supplier. The "ideal" end game scenario is for the player characters inventory to be composed mostly of blueprints and most if not all building to be achieved via ghost placement. At least, that's what I feel compelled to strive for as it provides the most flexible and streamlined feel.

I put the time into making sure I can place ghosts and blueprints from map view anywhere in my base or outposts, and a train will "magically" appear with all of the supplies for bots to fulfill the requests. If personal logistics were made "too powerful", I may not have bothered...

The devs may disagree, tho.

[Lubricus]

I still think it's hard to find stuff in the inventory, especially when playing with crazy mods as angelbob.
Can't we have a search option in the inventory? It's more needed than the search in crafting menu. The crafting menu is neatly ordered in different tabs in contrast to the big heap that is the inventory. Something like the possibility to pick up stuff directly from the crafting menu would also be great.

[DaemosDaen]

*sees FFF*
This will be released tomorrow? Yes?

Seriously though, I love this and there are very few things I would suggest (All having to do with Logistics request/trash):

It looks as thought the request/trash slot will two separate number, I like this, but instead of the normal white color for the trash limit, change it to something else like Cyan. I would say blue, but I think that would be too dark against the current color scheme. Blue would be the default color used when you have less than or equal to the limit for that item. Once your over that limit, it should change colors to indicate that bots are on the way to pick them up. I'ed use red for this. but as long as it's significantly different it should be fine. I would also place this in the upper corner of the request/trash slot

I love the color idea on weather bots are on the way with stuff or not, but I wild simply change the color based on that alone, white for not on the way, red for on the way. If more information is needed that could be provided in a tooltip like it is now (How did I not know that was a thing) There's no need to over complicate a small feature that not everyone is going to use.

I would also suggest removing the extra section of trash slots and simply merge that into the standard inventory. That's the normal use for trash slots anyway Temporary items storage, or a place to put your wood.

I also hope that successive request/trash slots are an infinite research. Hopefully costing a lot less than stuff like productivity and damage but would give people with biters off something else to spend space science on.

(Also wouldn't mind inventory space being an infinite research, a guy can dream can't he?)

I did notice that your inventory screen has a lot more space than my character with T2 power armor. But I guess that's because it's a mockup.

[Azzinoth]

I like the idea of merging requests and auto-trash, but the way the numbers are in this mockup is a bit confusing in my opinion. The fact that the way each is displayed depends on the state of the other makes it more complicated than necessary, in my opinion. I think it would be better if they each had their own style, and used it all the time.

For example requests could be at the top of the box and maximums at the bottom. Or Requests could be green and maximums red. They could either both be visible all the time, or when one isn't set it could just be blank, rather than showing 0 or ∞.

The way you have it now, almost seems to assume that most items will have both, which is probably not true for most players.

I don't understand what confuses you. There are two numbers, min and max. If they are both the same, only one number is shown. Otherwise both numbers are shown, min at the top and max at the bottom. Isn't that already what you are proposing?

It would be amazing to see things taken one step further as demonstrated in this 0.16 mod: https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Logistic_Slot_Manager

I love that idea. You would just have to put a checkbox to the left of every row in the requester gui, which would activate/deactive all requests in that row. Everything else could still work like in the FFF. It's amazing.

[R3vo]

Ewww durability.

Amazing changes all around, the number of personal requests is not nearly enough right now, so happy it will be infinite.
It's missing one thing though, what happened to the sort buttons idea?


Source: FFF #191

The use case: When I want to pin items to my inventory, if I put it in the bottom, they will drop to the floor if I ever unequip my armor. But when sorting is on, I can't move them to the top. So what I need to do is, go to settings, turn off auto sorting, move the items to the slots I want, pin them, then go to settings and re-enable auto sorting. A button in the UI to sort at will would be much nicer.

In fact I would like to see sort buttons for all inventories. Chests, as well as personal inventory and train cargo.

[dgw]

Can we have one extra logistics tab that displays the whole logistics network inventory (and maybe some statistics) that you are in range of?

Press L in the current version of the game and have your mind blown.

[IronCartographer]

Another QOL improvement would be the ability to organize the logistic slots. Currently – except if I missed it – it is not possible to move around the logistic requests. Instead you have to do the following:

1. Remove the current item request you want to move – because you can't have two requests for the same item
2. Re-add a request for that item at the right place – with the need to find it back somewhere either in your inventory or in the selector
3. Restore the request size – which is often easier to do by typing the amount because the selector is difficult to use for precise amounts

I often end-up not bothering but then I have a hard time finding back if I already have a request for something and where it is. Moreover it completely messes with everyone's OCD, making the game completely unplayable!

Organization of the request slots definitely causes some headache. Either auto-sort or something to organize it similar to the crafting menu would be a welcome addition.

[GrumpyJoe]

I still think it's hard to find stuff in the inventory, especially when playing with crazy mods as angelbob.
Can't we have a search option in the inventory? It's more needed than the search in crafting menu. The crafting menu is neatly ordered in different tabs in contrast to the big heap that is the inventory. Something like the possibility to pick up stuff directly from the crafting menu would also be great.

pretty much this, not being able to search the inventory is crazy.
This should be on top of your list
Actually for a loooooong time now imho. The workaround by searching for it in the crafting menu so it gets higlighted in the inventory (if you have it) is questionable at best)

and i guess you never played pY, finding something in pY crafting tab is even harder than spotting it in the inventory

[IronCartographer]

Like others have mentioned I would also love it if we could have:

1. Presets for requests/trash slots, kind of like we have multiple quickbars; a way to define multiple sets of requests/trash and swap between them (I did wonder if that was what those mysterious +/- buttons, marked 9, were in the mockup. Plus/minus pages? Probably not, but I can dream.. )

... I believe [it] would be used quite a lot if they were considered worth adding to vanilla.

If I had to guess, one reason this may not make it to vanilla is that is discourages end game divestment from the character as builder and supplier. The "ideal" end game scenario is for the player characters inventory to be composed mostly of blueprints and most if not all building to be achieved via ghost placement. At least, that's what I feel compelled to strive for as it provides the most flexible and streamlined feel.

I put the time into making sure I can place ghosts and blueprints from map view anywhere in my base or outposts, and a train will "magically" appear with all of the supplies for bots to fulfill the requests. If personal logistics were made "too powerful", I may not have bothered...

The devs may disagree, tho.

If logistic requests can be too powerful with presets, then the personal roboport must be in a world of its own.

It would be amazing to see things taken one step further as demonstrated in this 0.16 mod: https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Logistic_Slot_Manager

I love that idea. You would just have to put a checkbox to the left of every row in the requester gui, which would activate/deactive all requests in that row. Everything else could still work like in the FFF. It's amazing.

Hmm.. Okay, that mod is perhaps two steps further as there's something you didn't address: It has the ability to make a preset request list into a preset trash list instantly (not just disabling, but inverting to clear it from inventory without trashing manually), on top of creating hybrid compositions of multiple profiles at once.

[TheBloke]

If I had to guess, one reason this may not make it to vanilla is that is discourages end game divestment from the character as builder and supplier. The "ideal" end game scenario is for the player characters inventory to be composed mostly of blueprints and most if not all building to be achieved via ghost placement. At least, that's what I feel compelled to strive for as it provides the most flexible and streamlined feel.

I put the time into making sure I can place ghosts and blueprints from map view anywhere in my base or outposts, and a train will "magically" appear with all of the supplies for bots to fulfill the requests. If personal logistics were made "too powerful", I may not have bothered...

The devs may disagree, tho.

Yeah I guess they might, and maybe that is a risk for some players. But that's not how I've experienced things.

I build the same way as you describe, but I like to use logistic requests to keep small numbers of a wide range of items with me. Which varies depending on what I'm doing, hence the desire for presets. I like to be able to start designing a new base component at any time, wherever I am, and not have to wait for trains to arrive. When I am ready to build it at scale, then everything is done automatically by bots supplied by trains.

So for example all my outposts/modules have a supply station, serviced by a supply train that brings bots, inserters, logistic chests, walls, turrets, radars, repair packs, etc. A big list of items. They're set up so that once the train arrives bots are unloaded and automatically added to roboports. Then the construction bots can start building using the supplies of the train.

All my outposts are built from blueprints, and primarily built automatically. However I always do the first part of building each outpost myself, using my personal roboport. At a minimum I need to build the rails, signals, power and roboport infrastructure, inserters and chests for the supply station, and the combinators needed for supply station enable logic. I can't rely on existing logistic networks for this because I am now making sure to keep each logistic network small and separate - in earlier games I did have much bigger networks, but now I am keeping them small, focused and with short bot travel distances.

Once that initial building is done the station will turn on and a supply train will automatically head over, and then the rest is built automatically. Though I also carry some turrets with me so that the outpost is immediately defended. And if I stick around my bots will often also build some of the other entities, which the outpost's logistic bots can then reimburse to me once the supply train(s) first arrive.

Generally I like to carry with me 1 or 2 stacks each of quite a wide range of general building items. Belts/undergrounds/splitters, inserters, rails, chests, power, roboports, beacons, modules, drills, assemblers, furnaces, combinators, lamps, landfill, cliff explosives, etc. Plus combat stuff (grenades, nukes, fish, etc). And of course the 200 construction bots I use with my 4 x personal roboports. I'm usually averaging about 100 slots used at any one time (out of 120 max at late-game.)

I keep all this with me both so I can kick off the building of new outposts as I just described, but also so I can start designing and building new base components wherever I am. Like a new type of outpost, or improving an existing design. Usually this is also supported by my personal supply train which carries most items on board. Wherever I am expanding to I put down a BP of my personal supply train station and then send one of my personal trains there, and it then unloads a variety of item types into logistic chests and deploys some logistic bots which then service my personal logistic request slots. Then I can go building and designing anywhere in that area without having to keep going back to the train too often, and without having to immediately build rails so the train can follow me everywhere I go. If I need a large amount of an item - like a huge amount of landfill to fill in a lake - I will call in a specialist train. But for general purposes, my personal supplies are usually enough.

So it's never seemed to me that my use of logistic request slots was stopping me from using trains, or implementing automatic re-supply, or making heavy use of BPs. Because I'm always limited by my inventory size, use of logistic requests doesn't feel like it stops me wanting to build the best possible designs. It feels like it supports me in doing that.

And therefore expanding the concept with multiple presets just seems to me like it would be even more convenient. I feel that if a feature is going to exist at all, it should be as usable and powerful as possible. Kind of like the quickbar, which went from being max two rows of 20 slots in earlier versions to providing 100 slots with up to four visible rows in 0.17. Once the devs turned it into a pure UI element it made sense to make it as powerful as possible.

But I take your point - maybe other people will see it differently, I don't know.

Anyway, even if the devs do agree it would be useful, it may not be a high priority given it can already be done by mods.

[<NO_NAME>]

Wow, a lot of really good changes. Good work!
I especially like the personal logistics GUI. It cures all the pain in the ass I had with the old version. You could use a yellow-red gradient for the situation when robots are on the way, but there isn't enough in the logistic network.

The only concern I have is the infinitesimal search button. IMO the search field should be just visible all the time. It often requires a lot of searching to find the search button. Especially on the technologies screen, I cannot quickly find it even though I know where it is. Visible text field would be much easier to pinpoint.

RETROACTIVE EDIT:

I like the idea of merging requests and auto-trash, but the way the numbers are in this mockup is a bit confusing in my opinion. The fact that the way each is displayed depends on the state of the other makes it more complicated than necessary, in my opinion. I think it would be better if they each had their own style, and used it all the time.

For example requests could be at the top of the box and maximums at the bottom. Or Requests could be green and maximums red. They could either both be visible all the time, or when one isn't set it could just be blank, rather than showing 0 or ∞.

The way you have it now, almost seems to assume that most items will have both, which is probably not true for most players.

Overall all though, I like this redesign. Putting an easily accessible color changer in there is a plus too. I've noticed new players frequently have to ask how to do that, since the /color command isn't very obvious.

Oh yeah, this is a good point. I guess I have two concerns then.

[zOldBulldog]

This looks very promising. Looking forward to trying it.

[IronCartographer]

The only concern I have is the infinitesimal search button. IMO the search field should be just visible all the time. It often requires a lot of searching to find the search button. Especially on the technologies screen, I cannot quickly find it even though I know where it is. Visible text field would be much easier to pinpoint.

Thankfully Ctrl-F makes this fairly painless once you know it's there.

[5thHorseman]

This is excellent. One thing that concerns me, many times I make logistic requests for items I need a lot of, but I am happy if I have more than that amount. So requested amount does not equal auto trash over requested amount. If I've requested 300 belts while relaying belts and pick up a lot more during deconstruction I'm happy to hang onto those even though I end up with a lot more than the requested amount.

Unless I misread they're not changing the functionality, just the display and interface. You can still request say 200 belts but not have a trash request, and then be holding 3000 belts.

[Chukles]

One thing that i would really like to see is the ability to save a configuration for the Logistic Tab. With its increasing amount of functionality its a pain to set it up for every multiplayer map i join.