Ability to craft lower quality with higher quality

[quineotio]

There's literally no difference. The post-game in 1.0 was all about making the big number go up.

Not true. In 1.0 you probably have a bunch of tech still to unlock and have no infinite research when you hit the end screen, and you're probably still in your starter base. When I'd finished space age I had no tech left to unlock and my infinite techs were all at at least level 10. And in 1.0, expanding was relatively easy, whereas it takes much longer in space age (because you have to scale up 5 factories).

In 1.0 SPM was a meaningful measurement, but in space age it's meaningless - it goes up without you needing to do anything. And as I said above, in 1.0 you could build something to a set number, but in space age you can't because you keep getting higher quality and additional productivity. The only tech you get post end screen invalidates scaling, because you literally get the same result without any effort by just leaving your computer on.

[quineotio]

Your entire comment is extremely misguided, IMO.

"It makes infrastructural progression into a real problem with complex solutions, rather than being completely trivial like in 1.0."

No, the opposite. As I said in my initial post, I didn't need to scale AT ALL in space age. I upgraded my steel furnaces to uncommon and my inserters to stack and that covered me for the whole game. In 1.0 I needed to "add additional furnace stacks", which was a logistics problem - more stuff to move around. In space age, I set up trains right at the beginning and never had to touch them. If I'd wanted I could have "made number go up" much further without doing anything difficult.

"it actually makes the post-game harder because it's an additional system you have to solve in order to maximize the output of your factory."

No, it makes the post game take longer because you need to wait for all the quality items. The builds are actually easier, because you need less machines.

"It doesn't trivialize anything pre-victory either"

If the game is balanced around normal quality, and you have rare, then it's much easier, yes?

"If you're engaging with quality to any meaningful degree before the victory screen, you're probably just wasting time"

I agree, and this is one of the reason I think it's a dud system.

"quality is not trivial to work with"

Yes it is - you just set up some bots. It's very easy.

[nzer]

As I said in my initial post, I didn't need to scale AT ALL in space age. I upgraded my steel furnaces to uncommon and my inserters to stack and that covered me for the whole game. In 1.0 I needed to "add additional furnace stacks", which was a logistics problem - more stuff to move around. In space age, I set up trains right at the beginning and never had to touch them. If I'd wanted I could have "made number go up" much further without doing anything difficult.

You didn't need to "scale" at all pre-victory in 1.0 either. I know because I never did. I just set up a bus that I knew would be able to handle 45 SPM and plopped down monolithic science blueprints. Zero thought needed to be given to logistics, because the required output to "win" in a reasonable amount of time was absurdly low, even if you were doing there is no spoon. Maybe you'd throw down some rails if you were feeling cheeky, but you didn't need to, because two or three patches was more than enough to get you to the rocket.

The same is true in SA. Quality is so unnecessary to win that engaging with it at all is a waste of time if all you're trying to do is win. A fun waste of time for most people, but a waste nonetheless. I guarantee it took you more time to upgrade to uncommon furnaces than it would have taken you to just paste down another furnace array. You don't even avoid the logistical implications, you still have to handle the increased consumption and production of your uncommon furnaces.

No, it makes the post game take longer because you need to wait for all the quality items. The builds are actually easier, because you need less machines.

You are misunderstanding what Factorio's post-game is about on a fundamental level. You do not "need less machines" when your machines are more powerful, because the goal is not to hit some arbitrary level of output. People didn't build 1k SPM, 5k SPM, and 10k SPM factories in 1.0 because there's any special significance to those numbers, they built them because those levels of output required a factory roughly the size of what they wanted to build. If you multiply the outputs of all the machines by 10 people aren't going to sit around complaining that it's so easy to build 1k, 5k and 10k SPM factories, they're going to build 10k, 50k, and 100k SPM instead. And they're going to have to work harder for it, because in this particular analogy they have to engage with a whole new game system to get those fancy 10x machines.

Yes it is - you just set up some bots. It's very easy.

This could be said about literally everything in the game, both in 1.0 and SA. It's a completely unserious argument.

[quineotio]

[Moderated by Koub : Off topic]

[nzer]

[Moderated by Koub : Off topic]

[quineotio]

[Moderated by Koub : Off topic]

[Koub]

[Koub] Please behave, thank you.

[h.q.droid]

I think a simpler solution would be a "quality downgrader" that takes anything with a higher quality and changes it to a specified lower quality, like a recycler but with 100% output. That would also fix the usability problem of quality seeds / holmium ores / ice and enable less cumbersome upcycler designs when you have legendary chips overflowing but not enough uncommon / rare ones for upcycling foundries and stuff.

[Orum]

A quality downgrader would be wonderful, and probably the simplest and easiest way to handle this. Whatever the solution though, I've already run into a couple places where I really want lower quality versions of items over higher quality. Namely omnidirectional turrets when used on platforms, but also fusion reactors.