Friday Facts #305 - The Oil Changes

[bobingabout]

Also with the same argument... if on the oil refinery, a specific pipe is used for a specific fluid, and there's only 2 input pipes on the oil refinery, one for crude and one for water... which pipe does the current liquefaction ingredient heavy oil go into?

It's set per recipe, so the recipe for liquification would have the inputs set as well. But I agree with your sentiments overall.

the main reason why the new "set per recipe" thing exists is so that the pipe connections remain consistent between recipes. for basic -> advanced oil processing, that means reserving a spot for water, light oil and heavy oil. The output pipes would remain consistent for liquifaction too, just not the input pipes, as instead of crude and water, you have coal (not a pipe), heavy oil, and steam.

I guess if I was going to try and assign them logically, I'd use the crude pipe for heavy oil, and the water pipe for steam.
Something inside me is telling me to bet that it's the other way around.

[Adamo]

Also with the same argument... if on the oil refinery, a specific pipe is used for a specific fluid, and there's only 2 input pipes on the oil refinery, one for crude and one for water... which pipe does the current liquefaction ingredient heavy oil go into?

It's set per recipe, so the recipe for liquification would have the inputs set as well. But I agree with your sentiments overall.

the main reason why the new "set per recipe" thing exists is so that the pipe connections remain consistent between recipes. for basic -> advanced oil processing, that means reserving a spot for water, light oil and heavy oil. The output pipes would remain consistent for liquifaction too, just not the input pipes, as instead of crude and water, you have coal (not a pipe), heavy oil, and steam.

I guess if I was going to try and assign them logically, I'd use the crude pipe for heavy oil, and the water pipe for steam.
Something inside me is telling me to bet that it's the other way around.

I get why you would bet that, for sure. I'd go with your placement, I think, but it's a weird choice to be forced to make.

[RocketManChronicles]

Which leaves me with a big question actually... what is even the point in having heavy oil AND light oil? both are useful for exactly one thing each, and both become available at the same time. Why not just combine them into a single refined oil?

I thought about this a little more. If they go to one oil, let's just say Light Oil, then this leads down a scary path, one that takes me to the "Bots vs Belts" fiasco last year... No Heavy Oil? No Lubricant. Change the recipe of the Express Belts to no longer require Lubricant. And now, no Bots. The game now becomes more "Factorio" as it is only Transport Belts, just like the Devs desired a year ago.

Scary thoughts....

[_Attila_]

After reading most of the posts on this topic, I keep coming back to the question - who came up with the current system, why and what is his/her opinion about any of the changes proposed.

I am still in the camp that the current system works just fine. Add better feedback and/or tutorial on how to set up oil processing.

The current system is the most flexible, teaches the right things and it feels like it belongs. All the other proposals are compromises in a way that many people dislike for one reason or another.

Reducing the options on how to play the game is not a good idea.

[DanGio]

As 17.60 is out, I moved this post in the balancing section of the forum : viewtopic.php?f=16&t=73829

[bobingabout]

Which leaves me with a big question actually... what is even the point in having heavy oil AND light oil? both are useful for exactly one thing each, and both become available at the same time. Why not just combine them into a single refined oil?

I thought about this a little more. If they go to one oil, let's just say Light Oil, then this leads down a scary path, one that takes me to the "Bots vs Belts" fiasco last year... No Heavy Oil? No Lubricant. Change the recipe of the Express Belts to no longer require Lubricant. And now, no Bots. The game now becomes more "Factorio" as it is only Transport Belts, just like the Devs desired a year ago.

Scary thoughts....

You'd still have lubricant, you'd just make it from Light oil instead of heavy. or vica verca, if you only had heavy oil, you'd make solid/rocket fuel from heavy instead of light. Heck, they only added light oil to rocket fuel to give it something to do, otherwise it would have been completely pointless. (I'm not forgetting the solid fuel efficiency from light oil, but, that by itself isn't reason enough for it to exist, which is why it was added to the rocket fuel recipe to give it something to do)

[lacika2000]

So after going through the comments, I suggest:

• Basic Oil Processing outputs heavy oil and petro gas. This makes sense thematically as it is what the most basic distillation tower would do.
• Sulfur recipe uses heavy oil instead of petro gas. Again, makes sense thematically as heavy oil is where most Sulfur is trapped in real oil.
• Chem pack uses Sulfur instead of Solid Fuel. As in the FFF.

This way the basic refinery makes 2 products, both are used by the chem pack, it's just a matter of having BOP output the correct ratio. It's a step up in complexity, but much less than it is now. Also, no extra wall before robots.

You can still do all the other stuff the FFF talks about to make Light Oil useful, and maybe add Petro Gas to the Sulfuric Acid recipe to ensure it's still the prime requisite for megabases.

This. Adding to the list, as above:

• Sulfur can use petro gas at much lower sulfur yields. This allows late game balancing.

Just as above, please no extra wall before robots.

V453000: how is the modeling/balancing going?

[Yandersen]

Honestly, guys, I am sick to continue seeing "there is no much use for light oil". Feels like you don't see the fundamental design flaw here, just accepting things presented as they are in a game and you are fine with those, used to. Hello, are we living on the same planet? Can I humbly remind you that the whole oil industry on Earth raised just because of the huge demand of fuel?! What is that cars, plains, trains, generators and everything else with engines operate on, what all those require, huh? That is the thing presented as "light oil" in the game! Yes, in a first place, oil products are flammables for combustion engines, for god's sake!

No, seriously! BEFORE any changes made to BOP, AOP, recipes and everything, let's just all together request to let liquid fuels into things they belong - locomotives, cars and boilers. Note that I do not mean substitution of solids to liquids - the addition. Like reserving one or two of the locomotives' fuel slots for liquids, for example, or adding additional liquid input for boilers.

And only after the game got tested and balanced with this huge change should oil processing be rethought.

[Oktokolo]

BEFORE any changes made to BOP, AOP, recipes and everything, let's just all together request to let liquid fuels into things they belong - locomotives, cars and boilers.

That would be the actual right way to do it. But devs seem to really not like liquid fuel for some unknown reason.
In real life, making solid fuel out of light oil is so absurdly wasteful, that no one does it. In Factorio, it is the most efficient fossil fuel available.

[BlueTemplar]

My guess is that just due to the gameplay issues with fluids being much more "fiddly" than items.
You could just imagine that when you're using "solid fuel", it's actually "fuel canisters/tanks/bottles" of relevant liquid/gas fuels...
(See also how a "burnable" Nuclear fuel makes even less sense... I think it even pollutes and leaves no "used up Nuclear fuel cell" behind ?)

[Yandersen]

My guess is that just due to the gameplay issues with fluids being much more "fiddly" than items.
You could just imagine that when you're using "solid fuel", it's actually "fuel canisters/tanks/bottles" of relevant liquid/gas fuels...
(See also how a "burnable" Nuclear fuel makes even less sense... I think it even pollutes and leaves no "used up Nuclear fuel cell" behind ?)

Never went nuclear thingy so far, but raised eyebrow seeing it's recipe. But wouldn't, if the rocket fuel ingredient replaced with battery... But who cares, Factorio is a fantasy game, nothing need to make sense, right?

[Antaios]

As 17.60 is out

sigh of disappointment

[Adamo]

My guess is that just due to the gameplay issues with fluids being much more "fiddly" than items.
You could just imagine that when you're using "solid fuel", it's actually "fuel canisters/tanks/bottles" of relevant liquid/gas fuels...
(See also how a "burnable" Nuclear fuel makes even less sense... I think it even pollutes and leaves no "used up Nuclear fuel cell" behind ?)

The burnable nuclear fuel is the funniest thing. I redid the entire nuclear system (because I couldn't help myself as a physicist), but the nuclear fuel I left untouched. 1.21 GW. It's pleasantly whimsical. And yeah, makes zero sense.

[Adamo]

Honestly, guys, I am sick to continue seeing "there is no much use for light oil". Feels like you don't see the fundamental design flaw here, just accepting things presented as they are in a game and you are fine with those, used to. Hello, are we living on the same planet? Can I humbly remind you that the whole oil industry on Earth raised just because of the huge demand of fuel?! What is that cars, plains, trains, generators and everything else with engines operate on, what all those require, huh? That is the thing presented as "light oil" in the game! Yes, in a first place, oil products are flammables for combustion engines, for god's sake!

No, seriously! BEFORE any changes made to BOP, AOP, recipes and everything, let's just all together request to let liquid fuels into things they belong - locomotives, cars and boilers. Note that I do not mean substitution of solids to liquids - the addition. Like reserving one or two of the locomotives' fuel slots for liquids, for example, or adding additional liquid input for boilers.

And only after the game got tested and balanced with this huge change should oil processing be rethought.

I love your sentiments, here. I don't get the "no use for solid fuel" thing. By the time I have solid fuel, I'm suddenly in need of 20+MW forsome new lasers, suddenly I need 50MW... 80MW because my wall is growing and I'm at 85% evolution... try stuffing that with trees and coal. It's gone. Solid fuel is so clearly superior at keeping the power online. Maybe these people are playing on peaceful mode.

[DanGio]

As 17.60 is out

sigh of disappointment

I'm 100% sure most of us will eventually don't mind this change.

IIRC, I was disappointed at 2 changes in the game : removal of the separate tanks in the fluid wagon, and removal of the pickaxe tools. But in the long term, I have to admit this had 0 effect on the fun I have playing this game. You could argue that Oil is much more important than the Steelaxe or the Fluid Wagon, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't matter really.

I'm convinced the 17.60 Oil balancing will have a positive effect, but I can't be sure. Time will tell !

[FuryoftheStars]

I guess I should probably post this here as well in case anyone wants it:

Pre 0.17.60 Oil

[Yandersen]

As 17.60 is out

sigh of disappointment

Jeez, this V is just so special... Look even what version of his pointless two-weeks iterations he finally decided to put into the release! I am fairly shocked how much human-hours and brainwork vent in vain. "Built-in flare-stack is out of the question" he said? OK. What he did? A built-in flare-stack that just burns LO and HO completely to 0. Why giving alternatives, right? Just cut out confusing outputs and give kids one to do a single thing with it. Is that a new Factorio approach? To fuck with this feedback and "cooperation with community" illusion bullshit, just ban me to help me waste no more time here...

[Antaios]

As 17.60 is out

sigh of disappointment

I'm 100% sure most of us will eventually don't mind this change.

IIRC, I was disappointed at 2 changes in the game : removal of the separate tanks in the fluid wagon, and removal of the pickaxe tools. But in the long term, I have to admit this had 0 effect on the fun I have playing this game. You could argue that Oil is much more important than the Steelaxe or the Fluid Wagon, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't matter really.

I'm convinced the 17.60 Oil balancing will have a positive effect, but I can't be sure. Time will tell !

Yeah no

I still am not a fan of the removal of separate tanks in fluid wagons, but I can accept the work required to keep them that way versus their utility and their negligible impact on the game. The pickaxe is another change that has a negligible impact. This has a massive impact.

[BlueTemplar]

Except no yeah

As already mentioned in last week's thread, pickaxes/durability/hardness (and separate tanks I guess?) cannot be modded in again (without dirty hacks), while for this change it was so easy that there was a mod done in the hour !

[FuryoftheStars]

Except no yeah

As already mentioned in last week's thread, pickaxes/durability/hardness (and separate tanks I guess?) cannot be modded in again (without dirty hacks), while for this change it was so easy that there was a mod done in the hour !

And only cause I didn't see the release when it first hit. I think it took me 15 minutes?