Move Epic Quality Research Unlock to Fulgora

[Dr. Dog PhD]

Currently Epic Quality is researched from Gleba's science pack, I suggest moving it to be researched with Fulgora's science pack. Below are some pros, cons, and considerations.

Why it should be moved:

1. Gleba is the planet where quality is the least useful and Fulgora where it is most useful.

For me, Gleba was the planet I used quality least on and Fulgora the planet I used quality most on (until Volcanus in the late-game).
On Gleba, since most items (fruits, mash, carbon fiber) recycle into themselves, it is not worth it to try for quality since upcycling is impossible.
While on Fulgora, since you are encouraged to sushi belt everything anyways, adding quality modules to miners and scrap recyclers can produce good quantities of worthwhile rare resources in the mid-game.
Also, Fulgora unlocks many of the personal equipment items which benefit greatly from quality.

2. Thematically unintuitive.

On Gleba, the name of the game is maintaining a high throughput of disposable items. This is well served thematically with the stack inserter as it quadruples the throughput of belts.
On Fulgora, you are taking fancy garbage and recycling it into advanced resources - a perfect fit for the quality mechanic.

3. New player experience.

I imagine that most players will start engaging and experimenting more thoroughly in the quality mechanic on Fulgora once they unlock the recycler and the T3 quality module. This could include making blueprints for upcycling or rolling for higher quality armor and personal equipment. By making epic quality unlocked on Fulgora, it helps ensure that players anticipate epic quality items and eventually legendary quality items in their builds.

Also, epic and legendary unlocks are basically the only researches that could actively harm production when researched. That happened to me my first playthrough and what I imagine is a risk for similar players who visit Fulgora before Gleba. Since I was only getting at max rare items from scrap and upcycling, I didn't anticipate how the future quality unlocks would affect my builds. So later when I was on Gleba, I accidentally researched epic quality too soon and it bricked some of my Fulgora builds since epic quality items were jamming the belts. This could have been prevented with foresight, something new players will not have and should not be overly punished for lacking.

Why it should stay:

1. Gleba is the hardest planet. Volcanus has enemies but little production difficulty. Fulgora has production difficulty, but no enemies. Gleba has arguably the hardest of both. Players should be rewarded with higher quality stuff for tackling a more difficult planet before potentially easier ones.

Counterpoint: Gleba is already highly rewarding (stack inserters, spidertrons, biolabs, and T3 efficiency and productivity modules). Also, how much of a reward is epic quality before the recycler or T3 quality modules? Getting epic quality items would be too much of a resource sink. As of now, even with the research, epic quality is still effectively unlocked on Fulgora because only with the recycler and/or T3 quality modules does it become practical to aim for epic items.

2. It would be difficult to update existing saves.

Honestly, no idea how this could or should be solved. Maybe if it's already been unlocked it stays unlocked, but if not it moves to Fulgora science packs? But again, any good solution to that problem wouldn't come from me.

Cheers

[Green Cat]

I add: remove the Epic and Legendary quality

No one enjoys rebuilding a factory just to now add the epic, then later the legendary belts.

Why are they behind research anywhats?

even with 4 module 1, you only have 4% to get a higer quality. Then repeat and repeat and repeat until you finall have some legendary

For anyone who dosen't get what I mean

Use a mode that unlockes epic and legendary from the start. No other non space age mod

Start a Sandbox mode, use the console /cheat so you can use everything

now, place minners for max amount of resources.

Use the cheats to give yourself power and more so energy is not an issue

Now, from thoes miners

wait until you have everything needed to craft the modul 1 quality

now stat adding them to building

and keep repeating and repeating

the resoult? you will waste a lot of time. A LOT

Aka they don't need to be behind any research, because getting legendary is already a massive grind.

We paid for the DLC, and we can't even have access to them until we are end game???? How exactly are they supposed to repleace mods in this case?

We should have a better experience, however, because someone decided to add a gacha element in factorio, now we need to either do massive amount of resource managment to hopefully get a rare one..... while in that time we could have had already unlock the epic one... so we could spend the same time to build a farming for epic... but copy paste for legendary. So in the end, it's actually a waste of time to create a factory for any quality before unlocking legendary.... unless you enjoy GAMBLING. Then yeah, so much yep if you get a Rare before epic is unlocked. And of course, once the epic is unlocked, let's start the gacha gambling once again for the new tier.

There is 0 fun in gambling in factorio.

The epic and legendary should have not be behing a research, what should have been behind research would be to increase the misarable % the moduls give. People want legendary and such, not to gamble. We want to build factorie to create them, not gambling halls where we recycle stuff that are below.

The gambling element in space age is not wanted.

The gambling element being removed is NOT canceling quality.

Quality can exist without the need to add gambling in factorio.

As an exemple, all gambling issues could be solved if, in fulgora, legendary seeds would create legendary plants. Like this, we can farm legendary bacterias, plastic, sulf, without the need to do upcycling or other recycling until we get "lucky".

And what I wrote is just 1 exemple out of hundrends how the quality could have ben a 100% product and not a % chance

[jaylawl]

I add: remove the Epic and Legendary quality

No one enjoys rebuilding a factory just to now add the epic, then later the legendary belts.

Why are they behind research anywhats?

even with 4 module 1, you only have 4% to get a higer quality. Then repeat and repeat and repeat until you finall have some legendary

For anyone who dosen't get what I mean

Use a mode that unlockes epic and legendary from the start. No other non space age mod

Start a Sandbox mode, use the console /cheat so you can use everything

now, place minners for max amount of resources.

Use the cheats to give yourself power and more so energy is not an issue

Now, from thoes miners

wait until you have everything needed to craft the modul 1 quality

now stat adding them to building

and keep repeating and repeating

the resoult? you will waste a lot of time. A LOT

Aka they don't need to be behind any research, because getting legendary is already a massive grind.

We paid for the DLC, and we can't even have access to them until we are end game???? How exactly are they supposed to repleace mods in this case?

We should have a better experience, however, because someone decided to add a gacha element in factorio, now we need to either do massive amount of resource managment to hopefully get a rare one..... while in that time we could have had already unlock the epic one... so we could spend the same time to build a farming for epic... but copy paste for legendary. So in the end, it's actually a waste of time to create a factory for any quality before unlocking legendary.... unless you enjoy GAMBLING. Then yeah, so much yep if you get a Rare before epic is unlocked. And of course, once the epic is unlocked, let's start the gacha gambling once again for the new tier.

There is 0 fun in gambling in factorio.

The epic and legendary should have not be behing a research, what should have been behind research would be to increase the misarable % the moduls give. People want legendary and such, not to gamble. We want to build factorie to create them, not gambling halls where we recycle stuff that are below.

The gambling element in space age is not wanted.

The gambling element being removed is NOT canceling quality.

Quality can exist without the need to add gambling in factorio.

As an exemple, all gambling issues could be solved if, in fulgora, legendary seeds would create legendary plants. Like this, we can farm legendary bacterias, plastic, sulf, without the need to do upcycling or other recycling until we get "lucky".

And what I wrote is just 1 exemple out of hundrends how the quality could have ben a 100% product and not a % chance

You are heavily focused on the word "gambling" as if it were something unpredictable. If you create higher quality items by gambling, then you're doing it wrong. Yes, quality is based on chance (as it should be), but the chances/odds are predictable and you should use the odds to your advantage if you have knowledge of them.

[NOiZE]

I agree with OP, seems like a solid suggestion to me.

[evanrinehart]

By moving rewards to a planet where it would be most useful you make that planet better and the other planet worse. Last month everyone found many reasons to avoid gleba at all costs. This would be another one

And this would seem to make fulgora really really good and an even more obvious place to go first. I like how there's some semblance of a choice right now: Go to vulcanus first if your brain can't handle new mechanics. Go to fulgora first for all the goodies. Go to gleba first if you want a challenge, but your rewards are greater.

[Dr. Dog PhD]

I add: remove the Epic and Legendary quality

No one enjoys rebuilding a factory just to now add the epic, then later the legendary belts.

Why are they behind research anywhats?

even with 4 module 1, you only have 4% to get a higer quality. Then repeat and repeat and repeat until you finall have some legendary

For anyone who dosen't get what I mean

Use a mode that unlockes epic and legendary from the start. No other non space age mod

Start a Sandbox mode, use the console /cheat so you can use everything

now, place minners for max amount of resources.

Use the cheats to give yourself power and more so energy is not an issue

Now, from thoes miners

wait until you have everything needed to craft the modul 1 quality

now stat adding them to building

and keep repeating and repeating

the resoult? you will waste a lot of time. A LOT

Aka they don't need to be behind any research, because getting legendary is already a massive grind.

We paid for the DLC, and we can't even have access to them until we are end game???? How exactly are they supposed to repleace mods in this case?

We should have a better experience, however, because someone decided to add a gacha element in factorio, now we need to either do massive amount of resource managment to hopefully get a rare one..... while in that time we could have had already unlock the epic one... so we could spend the same time to build a farming for epic... but copy paste for legendary. So in the end, it's actually a waste of time to create a factory for any quality before unlocking legendary.... unless you enjoy GAMBLING. Then yeah, so much yep if you get a Rare before epic is unlocked. And of course, once the epic is unlocked, let's start the gacha gambling once again for the new tier.

There is 0 fun in gambling in factorio.

The epic and legendary should have not be behing a research, what should have been behind research would be to increase the misarable % the moduls give. People want legendary and such, not to gamble. We want to build factorie to create them, not gambling halls where we recycle stuff that are below.

The gambling element in space age is not wanted.

The gambling element being removed is NOT canceling quality.

Quality can exist without the need to add gambling in factorio.

As an exemple, all gambling issues could be solved if, in fulgora, legendary seeds would create legendary plants. Like this, we can farm legendary bacterias, plastic, sulf, without the need to do upcycling or other recycling until we get "lucky".

And what I wrote is just 1 exemple out of hundrends how the quality could have ben a 100% product and not a % chance

I get this post is 100% sarcasm and full of straw man arguments, but I'll still try to respond to some of the satirical points.

* I've got no issue with the "gambling" aspect of quality, never said anything about modifying the quality mechanic itself. Not sure why you made a big deal of it.
* You act as if my suggestion is intended to make the game much easier. I don't believe it would (see my first counterargument that you ignored).
* The note about having to rebuild bases is probably your only point that actually engages in anything I said. But I never say that players should never have to rebuild their bases or upgrade things or redo builds or whatever. All other reasons to rebuild your bases (getting better belts, stack inserters, Foundries, Electromagnetic Plants, Cryogenic Plant, etc.) are Positive Feedback, i.e. you are rewarded for doing a certain behavior. Not updating Fulgora bases for Epic and
Legendary qualities is both Positive Feedback (you get higher quality items) but also Negative Feedback (if you don't update, your belts will get clogged with items your base can't handle). Not to say that Negative Feedback is bad or shouldn't exist, but it is a mode of player incentive much different than most others in the game and should be examined carefully.

[Dr. Dog PhD]

By moving rewards to a planet where it would be most useful you make that planet better and the other planet worse. Last month everyone found many reasons to avoid gleba at all costs. This would be another one

And this would seem to make fulgora really really good and an even more obvious place to go first. I like how there's some semblance of a choice right now: Go to vulcanus first if your brain can't handle new mechanics. Go to fulgora first for all the goodies. Go to gleba first if you want a challenge, but your rewards are greater.

I don't think unlocking Epic quality is a good reward at all until you have the recycler and/or T3 quality modules.
If you go to gleba first hoping to get Epic quality stuff, you are stuck with (at max) Epic T2 quality modules that give 3.8% quality. Not the worst, but without the recycler, your only option is producing tons of stuff and wasting tons of resources on hundreds of crafts. I don't think that's a good use of resources and overall not a great reward. So I don't think that taking the Epic Research from Gleba will make the planet less rewarding, because the Epic unlock wasn't all that rewarding to begin with.

Now the unlock becomes hugely valuable once you hit Fulgora and unlock the recycler, but then it's not much different if you just had Epic unlocked on Fulgora.

If instead, it should stay on Gleba because it would make Fulgora too good, then that seems more an issue with Gleba (not surprising).
And if the problem is that Gleba is too unrewarding, then making other planets less rewarding is not a fun solution.

[angramania]

I don't think unlocking Epic quality is a good reward at all until you have the recycler and/or T3 quality modules.
If you go to gleba first hoping to get Epic quality stuff, you are stuck with (at max) Epic T2 quality modules that give 3.8% quality. Not the worst

Alternative is rare T3 that give you 4% which is 0.2% more. Huge boost!!!
You should talk about electromagnetic plants instead. They really make big difference. Without them it is not worth to concentrate on quality quality modules at all.
I do not think that T3 quality is good at this stage of game. Too little increase for its price. It is quite opposite to productivity and speed modules where T3 is obviously better than T2.

but without the recycler, your only option is producing tons of stuff and wasting tons of resources on hundreds of crafts. I don't think that's a good use of resources and overall not a great reward.

Lol. Quite opposite. Recycler is what make resource wasting possible. Without recycler you just can't waste them. Even with spoilage mechanic cause it affects mostly intermediate not final products. Also resources are renewable on Gleba, so it is hard to waste them anyway.

And if the problem is that Gleba is too unrewarding

Gleba is the most rewarding of three planets even without epic quality. And it should be most rewarding to motivate rigid players to learn something new.

making other planets less rewarding is not a fun solution.

It is not about lesser rewards but about synergy between rewards from different planets. Of course you will get most by combining all three. But before you get to this point you should peek one planet as start point. And after that you should peek second one. That is where synergy plays its role. You need to choose what rewards combination suits you best. And this choice should not be obvious.

[Dr. Dog PhD]

I don't think unlocking Epic quality is a good reward at all until you have the recycler and/or T3 quality modules.
If you go to gleba first hoping to get Epic quality stuff, you are stuck with (at max) Epic T2 quality modules that give 3.8% quality. Not the worst

Alternative is rare T3 that give you 4% which is 0.2% more. Huge boost!!!
You should talk about electromagnetic plants instead. They really make big difference. Without them it is not worth to concentrate on quality quality modules at all.
I do not think that T3 quality is good at this stage of game. Too little increase for its price. It is quite opposite to productivity and speed modules where T3 is obviously better than T2.

Good points. Overall I agree that going for quality without Fulgora's rewards is really not worth it at all.

but without the recycler, your only option is producing tons of stuff and wasting tons of resources on hundreds of crafts. I don't think that's a good use of resources and overall not a great reward.

Lol. Quite opposite. Recycler is what make resource wasting possible. Without recycler you just can't waste them. Even with spoilage mechanic cause it affects mostly intermediate not final products. Also resources are renewable on Gleba, so it is hard to waste them anyway.

By "wasting resources" I'm not talking about voiding ingredients like what happens with the recycler, but rather the mass of unwanted crafts from getting quality stuff. Like if you want rare exoskeletons without the recycler, @ 10% quality, you'd need to make on average 100 normal crafts to get 1 rare exoskeleton. So if you aim only for rare stuff, that's 99 crafts worth of ingredients that are "wasted" because you get unwanted products. Though, these ingredients aren't actually wasted because they can always be recycled later.

And if the problem is that Gleba is too unrewarding

Gleba is the most rewarding of three planets even without epic quality. And it should be most rewarding to motivate rigid players to learn something new.

making other planets less rewarding is not a fun solution.

It is not about lesser rewards but about synergy between rewards from different planets. Of course you will get most by combining all three. But before you get to this point you should peek one planet as start point. And after that you should peek second one. That is where synergy plays its role. You need to choose what rewards combination suits you best. And this choice should not be obvious.

I would agree that Gleba can be the most rewarding especially if you can make good use of the spidertrons and stack inserters. I wasn't claiming that Gleba was too unrewarding but rather responding to the previous post.

The point about synergy I like a lot. As I was considering this change I considered the different orders that players could take.

Case 1: First Fulgora, then Gleba (Ignoring Volcanus for the moment)
- This was the route I took for my first playthrough and what I imagine is one of the most popular order.
- Fulgora rewards Recycler, EM Plants and T3 Quality Modules. This makes quality quality modules realistic, as well as many other quality items.
- For me, I think the best use of quality at this point in the game is small upcycling builds for production buildings and personal equipment.
- Unlocking Epic on Gleba is a nice reward but can involve issues for new players (see point 3 on my original post)

Case 2: First Gleba, then Fulgora
- Unlocking Epic quality here is basically worthless for the moment, but becomes valuable on Fulgora.
- The Epic unlock is a delayed reward more than anything else, since going for Epic quality at this stage in the game is not worth it for reasons we've both mentioned. There are basically no other technologies that work like this, where they only become valuable later instead of being useful immediately.

I think I would also be in favor of a change in which Epic research requires both Fulgora and Gleba packs. As it plays into the same synergy while resolving some of the issues.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading your response, you brought up several good points.

[aka13]

Quality is on Gleba, because Gleba would have even less rewards playing it.
Literally that simple. Also you could play for even longer, without having to touch Gleba. Same for the t3 module rebalance, where 2/3 suddenly need Gleba to function, and the productivity module is somehow not related to the productivity planet. Doubt it will change, best case scenario would be 2.1

[R060]

Quality is on Gleba, because Gleba would have even less rewards playing it. Literally that simple.

If planet sucks (in progression, not in difficulty, because I believe 90% of the time it's just a skill issue and lack of patience), putting sciense pack over there to unlock completly unrelated tech does not fixes that.

[angramania]

By "wasting resources" I'm not talking about voiding ingredients like what happens with the recycler, but rather the mass of unwanted crafts from getting quality stuff. Like if you want rare exoskeletons without the recycler, @ 10% quality, you'd need to make on average 100 normal crafts to get 1 rare exoskeleton. So if you aim only for rare stuff, that's 99 crafts worth of ingredients that are "wasted" because you get unwanted products. Though, these ingredients aren't actually wasted because they can always be recycled later.

I see now. I've never done it in this way, so have not thought about it. If I need rare exoskeleton I use recipe with rare ingredients. And this rare ingredients are side effect of mass production. I do not produce steel/engines/circuits/etc to get quality ones and recycle normal. I produce them to get normal ones and use them in further mass production. So quality intermediates are only side production that can be stored in chests and occasionally used to manually produce some equipment. So there is no waste at all.

I would agree that Gleba can be the most rewarding especially if you can make good use of the spidertrons and stack inserters. The point about synergy I like a lot.

Both are insignificant to me. Main reward for me is biolab. Second is T3 productivity. These rewards have tremendous effect without any other planet and are main reason for me to visit Gleba first. After that either synergy of advanced asteroid processing with foundry from Vulcanus or synergy of epic quality with EM plant from Fulgora.
But this is my way, I never go to megafactories. For someone else main reasons can be synergy of stack inserters with green belts from Vulcanus and getting T3 production+speed combo. And of course there are reasons for other planet combos.
I suppose that current tech tree is not about "what planet has better rewards" but about "you should not get all good stuff from only one planet". That's why tesla, mech armor and artillery are not on Gleba where they are most needed.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading your response, you brought up several good points.

Same here. I like that you have provided good argumentation for your proposition.

[evanrinehart]

Correction, if you went to gleba first you would not be limited to T2 epic quality. You could unlock efficiency modules 3

Actually I like the quality system without setting up the cheesy recycling loop. Makes it feel more diablo-like where you choose where your epic stuff goes best. Of course you can swing by fulgora for 5 minutes to get the recycler and leave, since it's so handy to just have regardless.

Gleba first!!!