Friday Facts #375 - Quality

[StansTheMan]

Honestly this is better than productivity modules + beacons everywhere. Speed modules decrease quality for speed, quality modules decrease speed for quality. Both increase power consumption, efficiency modules decrease speed for power saving.

Honestly get rid of beacons, get rid of productivity modules.
Beacons make way for a recycling infrastructure. Productivity modules are replaced by higher quality machines made from higher quality parts via quality modules, and as such they then have their own productivity bonus. This is even more balanced because even without beacons, the effects of modules like the productivity module are extremely 'mobile' - they can still just be taken out of an old machines, and inserted into new machines far away, where as high quality machines are always stationary and need to be deconstructed first.

Please let ore fields have their own quality probabilites, so for example 1% of its total ore is of rare quality etc. This could be the natural start of the 'quality' chain. The planets then can have different general quality biases per ore type etc.

Also, 'assembling down' ie. recycling is a great addition. Overall, I can see great potential in this.

[MrGrim]

How will these qualities handle stacking? Especially wrt inserter hands. Will an inserter be slower, on average, if the quality levels are mixed?

In a similar vein, will this interfere with all the optimizations around saturated belts? It sounds like 10% (or more) of end-game outputs could be higher quality, which could effectively break up otherwise homogenous belts.

This is based on a common misunderstanding of how belt optimization was achieved. It does not require either saturation or homogenization. The variety of items and the number of gaps in a segment do not increase the update complexity of that segment.

[MrGrim]

The mechanic is optional, you can just disable it, don't whine!
Not really. Of course it's possible to disable it, but the game has to be balanced around it. Disabling it would be like building a megabase without using modules - technically possible, but significantly harder.

The game isn't balanced around megabases. That you brought it up indicates your need for perspective. The game is balanced around launching 1 rocket. You don't need to produce a satellite. You don't need to produce any space science. You don't need beacons, modules, combinators, uranium, trains, and a mess of other things to get 1 rocket launched in a few tens of hours. The rocket launch is the end game.

Megabases, along with other post end game challenges, are self imposed as part of self guided play. The game has many things to make that fun for people, which is why so many do it, but it isn't balanced around it.

The balance for the expansion was discussed in the first FFF announcing it. The devs listed their time goal for the end game state there, and if they say a feature is optional, then they mean it isn't required to reach that end game state in the desired average time. I expect much play testing will go into validating this.

[Tercicatrix]

Extremely skeptical of the quality system.

"Legendary Power Armor" screams tacky.

The game's incredible design already naturally makes getting power armor an incredible achievement and power boost!
There's an old admonition in English called "Gilding the Lily". It means to take something naturally beautiful, like a lily flower, and dip it in gold. An insult to the beauty that was already there.


For a lot of players, this just adds another layer of tedium to crafting as a player dedicates base footprint & resources to integrating recyclers -- eventually becoming a background chore that makes gameplay a little less engaging, like hooking up your 10,000th power pole.

You could just have the quality module massively increase craft time and resource requirements, and it'd be the same effect.


This whole business of how exciting it could be to produce a rare power armor from common ingredients is nonsense -- what's exciting about this game is feeling your brain expand as the game practically makes you smarter for playing it!
RNG diminishes the natural feeling of achievement the game already rewards to developing skill as a player.


Practically everything in Factorio has a distinct reason to be there, which is one of things I value most about the game.
You're not endlessly coming up with slightly bigger gun turrets that do the same exact thing as the last one but with +5% dps, and that's a good thing!
(The exception is the already-existing module system, and I'd argue that those could be flattened, too. 3 tiers of modules to do the exact same thing was already pushing it)

One of the biggest turn-offs I find in mods are the ones that just add a bunch of junk that does the same thing from the base game, but +x% better. It's so thoughtless and numbing to wade through...


I'm also skeptical of what this system is going to do to performance and save file size...


The recycler building is cool though.

[BrainlessTeddy]

Overall, I love this! But I also hate the names! I expect you will make them moddable though, right? I'd name them something like Crude/Low (and you only realize the quality wasn't even good before you unlock quality modules and see it), Normal/Nominal, High/Great, Exceptional/Superior and Pristine/Perfect.

Yeah, was my first thought. Feels kinda cheap Clash Royale-like.

My own take on this FFF: Also the random aspect I'm really worried about. Idk Factorio has always been such an awesome game since everything was deterministic and probably it will stay that way but now it get's unnecessarily difficult to actually do the math yourself. But on the other hand calculating with probabilities might be fun too. I mean having a huge building and recycling factory to farm those legendary (pristine) items can be kinda fun I guess. But I feel like it's close to going in a very wrong direction. Can't really put my finger on it. But the fact we are dealing with randomness and me instinctively using the word "farming" just makes me kinda uncomfortable.

I do like the idea of having the recycler tho.

[OdinEidolon]

I didn’t mean it would be foundational in that you HAVE to use it. Just that if you choose to set aside your bigotry of the like third freaking glimpse we have gotten into the expansion and keep your eyes open to see how this interacts with the rest of the systems it might make more sense and be fun.

All the hate this is getting is highly annoying to me. It is without much context and everyone is jumping down Wube’s pants and whacking them in the tender bits. Chillax people. Give them a chance to expand in the next like 49 FFFs.

Disliking something is not bigotry nor hate, it's very simple: I will not buy what I don't like. No hate or anything deep. If you are annoyed by a different opinion then feel free to ignore it. If I want such a system I can just play elder scrolls online or borderlands and enjoy my legendary equipment, it's not something I want in a factory builder game.

[Zaflis]

I'm also skeptical of what this system is going to do to performance and save file size...

The only part of the post i find maybe agreeable... The original post explained horizontal and vertical scalability. If there is a production that cannot be scaled vertically (beacons), then this whole mass recycling process can only be done horizontally (huge amounts of land). That is if one wanted to go against the recommends and use quality modules in science production. . . No, i can't think of a reason why quality modules would make sense in science, you only want them in the "mall" type production. There is no gain to be had in making legendary iron plates when you could just use the regular ones with that 300% productivity bonus and have higher SPM with constant rate.

But this is good thing, i do hope quality is not intended for science.

[Shadow_Man]

At first, I double checked this isn't April's Fools. No, it's Sep 08.

Now imagine what will happen on April Fools' Day FFF

[thermomug]

Disliking something is not bigotry nor hate, it's very simple: I will not buy what I don't like. No hate or anything deep. If you are annoyed by a different opinion then feel free to ignore it. If I want such a system I can just play elder scrolls online or borderlands and enjoy my legendary equipment, it's not something I want in a factory builder game.

No offence but, you know that Quality is not the only feature in the expansion, right?
Refusing to buy something because of ONE OPTIONAL feature you don't like seems totally idiotic to me.
U think the devs will change that feature because you threatened them not to buy their product? Grow up man!

[Terminus360]

Sounds great, but the actual names for the qualities trigger my fortnite PTSD.
:P

[BrainlessTeddy]

Not a fan. Sorry.

Factorio largely centers around consistency, particularly for blueprints. I'm already having nightmares of accidentally capturing a "legendary power pole" in my design only to later realize the design will not work with normal power poles. The entire point is that higher tier items are different items entirely. Adding a new invisible-until-later tier is just unfun complexity.

Rather than tell people to "just don't engage with it", maybe relegate this work to a mod instead.

Yeah that's another thing I was worried about. Having higher tier items as an byproduct and using them "where needed" just seems like having randomly a blue inserter in your yellow inserter production chain. But I wouldn't be particularly happy about it. Like you said it's probably gonna ruin blueprints and you can't rely on items being the same even if they look the same. So you can't count on your maths being correct.

And to people saying well It'S oPtIoNaL. Yeah but so are battle passes, cosmetics, loot boxes and so on. They are still annoying even if I don't use them.

[OdinEidolon]

Disliking something is not bigotry nor hate, it's very simple: I will not buy what I don't like. No hate or anything deep. If you are annoyed by a different opinion then feel free to ignore it. If I want such a system I can just play elder scrolls online or borderlands and enjoy my legendary equipment, it's not something I want in a factory builder game.

No offence but, you know that Quality is not the only feature in the expansion, right?
Refusing to buy something because of ONE OPTIONAL feature you don't like seems totally idiotic to me.
U think the devs will change that feature because you threatened them not to buy their product? Grow up man!

I'm aware about the other features but I like the core game as well, in the end it doesn't really matter whether i'll own the expansion or not, and factorio is not the only factory builder game.

If it's really optional then they can just add a toggle during the map creation and balance the game in a way you don't need it ever.

I don't know what the devs will do, but if I don't like something I will not buy it. I really don't understand why do you think this is childish. Do you tend to buy things you don't like?

[Siently]

This is such a cool idea
Once you have depleted all the ores in the starter base I assume you can just get the drones to disassemble it and use all that resource into a set up similar to the once shown and then into a factory to create them into higher tier builds!

If making higher tier sciences is possible, will that stack with a higher tier lab?
Are you able to make higher tier Solid fuel, Rocket fuel, Nuclear fuel cells?
Will crafts that require fluids be effected by the quality of fluids? If so will there be a way to refine fluids into higher tiers? Or will fluids not have quality at all?

[pointa2b]

I'm aware about the other features but I like the core game as well, in the end it doesn't really matter whether i'll own the expansion or not, and factorio is not the only factory builder game.

If it's really optional then they can just add a toggle during the map creation and balance the game in a way you don't need it ever.

I don't know what the devs will do, but if I don't like something I will not buy it. I really don't understand why do you think this is childish. Do you tend to buy things you don't like?

You can do whatever you want man, I don't think anyone is arguing that. Its just like... you have seen a tiny glimpse of the expansion in its totality, yet you've seemingly already decided you don't like the expansion. It just seems kindof silly. And add to the fact its an optional feature which the devs clearly state can be ignored and can still get through the game. I don't get it lol. But you do you.

[BrainlessTeddy]

Disliking something is not bigotry nor hate, it's very simple: I will not buy what I don't like. No hate or anything deep. If you are annoyed by a different opinion then feel free to ignore it. If I want such a system I can just play elder scrolls online or borderlands and enjoy my legendary equipment, it's not something I want in a factory builder game.

No offence but, you know that Quality is not the only feature in the expansion, right?
Refusing to buy something because of ONE OPTIONAL feature you don't like seems totally idiotic to me.
U think the devs will change that feature because you threatened them not to buy their product? Grow up man!

Yeah but no the "it's optional" argument doesn't really work. I dislike many modern games because of season/battle passes, cosmetics, loot boxes etc. even tho I have barely bought anything in game. So yes they are optional but they can still ruin a game and the experience. Of course the developers decide what to do with their game and there will be lot's of people still enjoying vanilla or the other aspects of the expansion. But the "downside" of involving the community into the development process is that the community is to a certain extend part of the development team. So if the team faces serious backlash when introducing a feature even if it's entirely optional, well you invited the community into the development process so you need to deal with the fact that they will take the chance to change the game to their liking. And tying into your second argument, yes the devs have actually already changed features and sprites *cough* beacon redesign *cough* because of the backlash from the community so if there's enough people threatening to not buy the expansion or just showing their disapproval of a feature they basicly have two options work with the community or take the risk of sticking to their plans.

[OdinEidolon]

I'm aware about the other features but I like the core game as well, in the end it doesn't really matter whether i'll own the expansion or not, and factorio is not the only factory builder game.

If it's really optional then they can just add a toggle during the map creation and balance the game in a way you don't need it ever.

I don't know what the devs will do, but if I don't like something I will not buy it. I really don't understand why do you think this is childish. Do you tend to buy things you don't like?

You can do whatever you want man, I don't think anyone is arguing that. Its just like... you have seen a tiny glimpse of the expansion in its totality, yet you've seemingly already decided you don't like the expansion. It just seems kindof silly. And add to the fact its an optional feature which the devs clearly state can be ignored and can still get through the game. I don't get it lol. But you do you.

It may be a tiny glimpse but today they showed a very ugly tiny bit, something that i would never want in a factory builder. I hope the game is really balanced in way that you don't ever need to use this "feature" if it's really optional.

[TheMafi]

I have to say, I signed up to the forums specifically to discuss just how deeply unimpressed I am with this particular expansion.

Quality seems like the weirdest of all mechanics to add to Factorio. Like, I get it, I can see it, and I understand how it makes sense as a base mechanic, but it seems so... unnecessary? Like, why quality when depth exists?

It's... hard to explain, but it doesn't carry the same weight and meaning in Factorio as it does in games like Borderlands, Diablo, or Terraria. In those games, you literally go out and find things, and magic exists, so does Unobtanium and Handwavium, so it makes sense to explain the quality in simple terms.
Here, it just lacks creativity and imagination, especially in the sense that it's following exactly the same style - common, uncommon, rare, exceptional, legendary... like, what legends? You're one survivor, nobody's going to read the legends, it doesn't make sense in-universe to call it that, and when you break the immersion that badly, it's a detriment, rather than an improvement.

Why not do ores by grade? Plates by purity? Gears by tolerance? Circuits by losses? Oil by contaminants? Structures by stability?
Weapons and armour by quality makes sense, but not following the CUREL model - why not Dangerous, Crude, Functional, Exceptional, Pristine, or something similar?

One of the main points about why Factorio as a game is so different to everything else on the market is how well considered every addition is. It's not normal for a Factorio update to present as "lol new skins BUY THEM IN THE STORE!" like every other game. It's held its own purely on steadfastly NOT buying in to the same meaningless drivel that CEOs use to "add playtime" to their little moneymaker.

Given the consideration that goes in to Factorio content, why not take the quality mechanic, and embed it so deeply into the game and gamelore that it would be weird to run without it? A basic looper for improving quality is expected, but it feels rushed - something Factorio was proud to claim it never did. Why not make the looping systems specific to the products? Shit quality ore? Cool, stick it through a crusher. Shit quality plates? Melt 'em back down in the furnace. Shit quality gears? Loop them back round to the furnace and start from scratch. Shit quality circuits? Oh look - we've a new space for another material, another step in the process - xenon gas and lasers for quality assurance. That's a whole new mechanic (gas! Like liquid, but with ADHD - bouncing off the walls and just won't sit still) which adds *depth* to the game beyond "lol items are different colours now and they have a dice ahaha money printer goes BRRRRRRRRR"

It just feels cheap and gimmicky to use the same system you find in FPSes and Survival Crafters (this is not a survival crafter, it's an automation and process efficiency game. )
Factorio can do better, and it should retain its own quality by doing better.

[SeruleBlue]

I'm willing to give it a try, but I definitely agree that the names should be changed. I acknowledge using "Rare", "Legendary", etc. is a convenient shorthand to clearly get the idea across, but these feel totally out of place for Factorio. They carry the connotations of RPGs or looter-shooters, and I find that really dissonant in Factorio's context. C'mon, doesn't having a "Legendary Copper Wire" sound a bit absurd?

I'm more partial to suggestions like "nominal", "superior", "pristine", "refined", "basic", "engineered", "precise", etc. Please, anything but "Legendary" for goodness' sake.

I'm also skeptical on how many items will actually be worth chasing higher qualities of. For example, electric poles. They give +1 reach/wire range per quality. Sure, that's cool, I guess, but why not just ... build more poles? Or use substations? It's not like they're expensive to begin with. They're very likely already being automatically mass-produced. Same with with, say repair packs. Sure, maybe an Epic repair pack lasts 90% longer than a Normal one. But, you could just ... carry more repair packs? They already stack to a huge number and aren't used that quickly.

I feel like chasing higher and higher quality levels makes sense for things that you can only have a limited amount of. In an RPG, for example, you can only wear one chestplate. So there's a bigger incentive to want to chase higher and higher qualities, since you'll only ever be able to wear the one chestplate. That is comparable here for, say, Power Armor. But for other things like Assemblers or Turrets ... you could just build more. So I'm not sure if it works for items like those.

[farcast]

So long as higher quality science packs give no benefit, quality modules would be exclusively useful in the mall and the supply chain for the mall. Beacon sandwiches with speed and productivity modules at every stage of science production would remain the meta for mega-basing.

Even if higher quality science packs did provide a productivity bonus for research, I think the bonus would need to be enormous to make using quality modules in the science chain better than the 100%(!) multiplicative productivity bonus per crafting stage, and the increased resource cost just for making high quality ingredients. That's without considering entity count.

As the devs said in the blog, the 56x increased resource cost is just for the simplest method of getting better quality. I think the optimal way would be to have a separate production chain for each level of quality, moving higher quality items that appear to the right chain, and exclusively recycle the final product. Since better methods of using quality modules can at most be as good as the base cost of a normal item, I think there's a point where it's better to use productivity modules again when the quality production chain is long enough. I haven't done the math on this though.

I do agree that the names seem out of place, but that's easy to fix.

[thermomug]

Yeah but no the "it's optional" argument doesn't really work. I dislike many modern games because of season/battle passes, cosmetics, loot boxes etc. even tho I have barely bought anything in game. So yes they are optional but they can still ruin a game and the experience. Of course the developers decide what to do with their game and there will be lot's of people still enjoying vanilla or the other aspects of the expansion. But the "downside" of involving the community into the development process is that the community is to a certain extend part of the development team. So if the team faces serious backlash when introducing a feature even if it's entirely optional, well you invited the community into the development process so you need to deal with the fact that they will take the chance to change the game to their liking. And tying into your second argument, yes the devs have actually already changed features and sprites *cough* beacon redesign *cough* because of the backlash from the community so if there's enough people threatening to not buy the expansion or just showing their disapproval of a feature they basicly have two options work with the community or take the risk of sticking to their plans.

I do not understand the comparison to season/battle passes, cosmetics, loot boxes at all.. The one thing about these mechanics is that you usually have to pay real money for them - which is understandably annoying and not fun. Games are made specifically not to interfere with the "real" world and its problems.
I understand that this features "feels" like mainstream gaming to some. While it is true, I really don't think it is something bad per-se. Maybe people are just gatekeeping factorio as a non-mainstream type of game or something...
Considering the involvement of community into the development process: yes, you are totally correct. I just think it is better to provide an elaborated argument on WHY you don't like a feature or HOW It can be improved rather than just "I won't buy it" (which is still better feedback than none)