Disable alerts for damaged walls

[Holy-Fire]

tl;dr:

Alerts for a damaged entity are useless when it's a wall, so in this case it should be disabled or demoted to a yellow notification.

What:

Currently, whenever any kind of entity is damaged or destroyed, a red alert triggers. A red alert shouldn't trigger when a wall is damaged, at the most it should be a yellow notification. There are some possible variations, which would be easier to explain in the context of the "Why".

Why:

Alerts are supposed to trigger when something bad and unusual happens that requires your attention. Walls being damaged are not that, their entire goal is to be damaged; the alerts are distracting and their frequency is numbing, discouraging checking alerts at all, even those which could be more important.

Having it as a yellow notification makes more sense.

Turrets being damages is also usually not very interesting, so this change could apply in general to military entities.

Alert preferences could change over the course of the game - at some point I might not want to be notified when a wall is destroyed, for example - so the best option would be to have settings for customizing the kind of notifications you get for different events (damage, destruction) concerning different types of entities (wall, turret, civilian, etc.)

Further thoughts:

I've taken a break from Factorio in the last ~2 years while waiting for the expansion. I haven't gotten very far yet in Space Age, but you can imagine my disappointment when I saw that something I (and others) have complained about over a decade ago apparently still hasn't changed.

I tried to search for any relevant recent developments, but couldn't find any. Solutions discussed in the past include using commands - which can disable certain types of alerts entirely, but without distinguishing entity type; and modding the entity properties, but AFAICT this doesn't distnguish damage from destruction, and can only disable, not change alert type. And I'd rather not use a mod for this to not mess up with achievements.

If there is any solution within the currently available methods, I'll be happy to hear. I will also appreciate any thoughts about why something like that hasn't been done - too difficult to implement? Everyone except me likes alerts for damaged walls?

[BlueTemplar]

Looks like you previous suggestion (of not sounding an alarm when a wall is damaged) has been implemented (at least partially) ?
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=5453
(I've just tried it out : no sound until a wall is destroyed.)

For instance :
Need Audible Alerts Mod
viewtopic.php?f=88&t=70165

So was your suggestion about other military entities, though I'm to lazy to check for that right now...
viewtopic.php?p=139294

Bunch of very related requests :
viewtopic.php?f=80&t=16566

Disabling all alerts for an entity, including destroyed ones, via modding that you mention :

It's kind of a heavy handed 'fix' but you can add

Code: Select all

alert_when_damaged = false

to any damageable entity to completely prevent being alerted when that entity type is damaged or destroyed.
For example, if you wanted to disable alerts for the walls, open the

Code: Select all

data\base\prototypes\entity\demo-entities.lua

file, search for "wall", around line 2300, and add the field.

Code: Select all

    type = "wall",
    name = "stone-wall",
    icon = "__base__/graphics/icons/stone-wall.png",
    flags = {"placeable-neutral", "player-creation"},
    alert_when_damaged = false,
    collision_box = {{-0.29, -0.29}, {0.29, 0.29}},

Again, a bit heavy handed, since you won't even be alerted when it is destroyed, but if you have are secure in your defenses it certainly cuts back on the unwanted alerts. This was a sanity-saver for me when using the force-fields mod. Just don't forget when you start a new game that you may want to change this back.
I honestly don't know enough about modding to know how, but given that other mods can change vanilla prototypes, I'm sure a mod could be made that can setup/control this kind of thing for you.

Edit: Aaaaand I just realized I necroposted -.-

The most detailed suggestion seems to be this one :
Configurable Alerts
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=23242

[Holy-Fire]

I've done a bit more testing.

It seems there is no difference at all between walls, other military entities, and civilian entities. When any of them is damaged, you get a red notification without a sound; when any is destroyed, you get a sound.

So, insofar as I wanted a distinction between walls and civilian entities - so that I can ignore things that happen to walls but not things that happen deeper in the base - it can't be said to have been implemented.

However, it seems there is indeed a difference between how it was a decade ago and now (not sure when that was done) - back then, any red notification would make a sound (which, as I recall, went something like "trr trr trr"). Now there isn't a sound for damage, but there is a distinctive sound for destruction (something like "too-ing").

So, if you want to ignore damage alerts completely, that is certainly much easier to do now.

I still maintain that there should be a difference between entity types; and ideally, that it can be configured, with multiple options. For example, I might want there to be no sound for a damaged wall, a soft sound for a damaged turret, and a loud sound for damaged civilian entities.

In any case, thanks for the reply, and for making me appreciate that things are much more tolerable now