Friday Facts #431 - Gleba & Captivity

[freakycheeseman]

Okay I'm late but here goes:

The biolab isn't the answer - it only improves the end of the chain, which is less interesting, and it being Nauvis-only makes Gleba just inherently less rewarding. Instead:

- Bioflux should be an additive to a bunch of consumable final products that makes them better but also spoilable. Ammo, fuel and science packs could have bio versions which are several times better than the basic kind, but also spoil, making for new designs where setting your production close to you final use site is highly incentivized.

- As a bonus, a bio- module could be added as a super-module that improves multiple aspects (speed + productivity + quality) at a fraction the price of regular modules, but which spoils (and must be continually re-inserted by robots).

- the advanced lab should be space-only, not Nauvis-only. This would be hard to implement, but it would be cool to have "migrating" science ships that go to where the science is produced rather than the other way around. My idea of how to do this would be to have bio-<something> science packs spoil *very* rapidly, but be immediately consumed by the advanced lab (without needing all the other packs). This makes it worthwhile to always process them at an advanced lab over the planet they're built on. The advanced lab would then have a slowly decaying buffer for each science type, so you want to move them around as quickly as you can to collect science from each world.

- - as a last idea, the advanced lab should have adjacency bonuses like nuclear reactors, so you get more efficient science by building science ships that are big *and* fast as an endgame challenge.

[Stalinlover22]

Finally !! Time to make biters capitalism!

[Managor]

One thing that came to my mind while reading this was: What if you were forced to airlift the captured nests to move them like you can do with Terran units in Starcraft. First you need to go hunting for nests and then you need to bring them back to your base via air. It would be unique, but would that be too tedious?

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[naahuc]

I'd just like to leave something regarding the Embargo, even if it's way too late to do anything about it at this point.

I feel it is very unfortunate that the Embargo lifts without any restrictions this early. I can fully understand why a press embargo lifts this early, but that's a very different format to what content creators will be able to do in a weeks time, especially considering the time some people probably had to pre-record footage. I am sad to say that I fully expect that we're going to see at least one person release a full run on the youtubes before the expac even releases to the public. The reach for keys given out, though I am aware that those are also used for beta testing, seems so far that quite a few people I have talked to are planning on media blackouts for streaming and youtube for the next week as a minimum.

My general expectation would have been that press can do their reviews a week before release or so, that'd be pretty normal anyway, and then content creators maybe 2-4 days before the release. But even then with restrictions on what can be shown when, or going into more themed presentations with idk, watch Anti for speedrun stuff on Sunday, watch Will for trains on Friday, watch Nilaus for mall combinators on Saturday or something.

While I will fully admit that I am being salty about this, I do still hope that you have a look around at what people do in the coming week and keep that in mind for the next release. It might well be that people have a lot more self control than I tend to attribute to them and my fears turn out to be overblown, but the worst case is still people having a full series with blueprints out by the time most people will get their hands on it.
Over all I am honestly surprised that this does not seem to be a concern for more people.

[GregoriusT]

I am sad to say that I fully expect that we're going to see at least one person release a full run on the youtubes before the expac even releases to the public.

That one is guaranteed, Trupen has already scheduled a 24 hour Gleba livestream on embargo release day.

[XT-248]

That one is guaranteed, Trupen has already scheduled a 24 hour Gleba livestream on embargo release day.

I plan to completely unplug from social media until I have played Space Age Expansion to a satisfying conclusion.


Unironically, I will have very little time to keep up with anything for next week. I plan to unplug from social media next week for an undisclosed wonderful reason. Before I plug back into social media, I will have two or three days to play around with it with fresh eyes (minus the FFF contents revealed so far).

[morse]

Over all I am honestly surprised that this does not seem to be a concern for more people.

Why should it be? If a game can be permanently spoiled by a single screenshot - that would be quite a shitty game. And if you can't resist watching a 24-hour marathon for a week, it's kinda on you. The fact that there would be people who already finished the game by the time you even buy it shouldn't be detrimental in any way. If anything, it might be helpful, in case you need some advise. So no, I don't see any problems with a whole week. I might even go see some content creators whom I trust not to spoil too much.

[Molay]

Over all I am honestly surprised that this does not seem to be a concern for more people.

Why should it be? If a game can be permanently spoiled by a single screenshot - that would be quite a shitty game. And if you can't resist watching a 24-hour marathon for a week, it's kinda on you. The fact that there would be people who already finished the game by the time you even buy it shouldn't be detrimental in any way. If anything, it might be helpful, in case you need some advise. So no, I don't see any problems with a whole week. I might even go see some content creators whom I trust not to spoil too much.

Personally I'm worried that video thumbnails and titles will give away too much. Maybe they have a soft agreement with content creators to make spoiling content strictly opt-in, by being able to show whatever they want, but keep thumbnails and titles modest enough and not plaster yet undisclosed stuff front and center. "Optimal setup for X undisclosed process" as a title would be similarly bothersome to me.

I don't think most of the content creators would do that, but it would be nice if they could be reminded to be mindful perhaps. It's fair for them to show whatever in the videos, just leave an option for those trying to avoid it. I don't want to mark everything factorio as don't recommend in the future and unsub channels I'm interested in, it will just mess up my youtube recommendations down the line when I actually want to see that content again. A lot is known already, so it's not like they have to make their video titles cryptic, just don't put front and center say what the special mechanic on the final planet will be (unless it is shown today, it's just an example).

[morse]

Personally I'm worried that video thumbnails and titles will give away too much.

Well, just like I said, if any sort of media can be spoiled by a single phrase "the butler did it" that probably means it was worthless to begin with. The main attraction of factorio is not to discover what kind of production chains there are, it's to implement them by yourself. If anything, knowing about these chains in advance is a requirement, you can't plan your base without it. Take this exact FFF we're discussing. Does it spoil a new mechanic? Oh, yes. Is it a bad thing? Not at all. Now when you'll be deciding which planet you want to go to first you can do an informed decision, since you have some idea about all three of them. You might decide to leave some spawners intact for future capture, if it is located conveniently. So I'm glad I know this info, otherwise I'd probably destroyed all the spawners in 10 km radius around my base before learning that I actually might need them. "Trial and error" gameplay has its appeal, but factorio is not exactly a game about exploration. You are not expected to find anything new by roaming the maps. Maybe in space age you are, in which case, again, I'd like to be informed about it in advance, otherwise I'd miss this part completely, since I have no intention of going further than the nearest rich deposit.

[VertebreakHER]

I have strong feelings about the difference in visual design between the synthetic biter nest and the biolab. In contrast to the biolab, having the organic parts of the synthetic biter nest directly exposed and getting to see more of how it ripples and warps is extremely visually satisfying, and its a more direct progression from a regular biter nest to a sort of stroggified machine horror. I don't hate the biolab at all and I can really appreciate that the organic component is more subtle, but both buildings have distinct vibes that would feel extremely satisfying alongside a complex factory, and I'd hate to lose out on the more explicitly gross synthetic nest when it looks so perfectly visually realized. I know problems like this tend to pop up now and again, there's probably quite a few people kicking around who yearn for the old beacon design. But I can't help but want the synthetic biter nest to have a place, and there's a certain appeal to a building focused around science pack production looking visually similar to an advanced lab. Those two being part of the same production chain feels conceptually satisfying.