Prospect Mod

[Finndibaenn]

Hi,


after having enjoyed some of the wonderful mods that i found here (Bob's, Dytech's, Treefarm, RSO, FARL, ResourceMonitor to only name a few), i've tried to make one too, starting from my experience in my recent game with RSO and Bob.
I found that ores were too abundant and too close (no need to expand very much), BUT when i was looking for Rutile, I didn't find it fun running around for maybe 30 min or 1 h withough finding anything.

So ... I made a mod that allows one to build Geology Lab, able to produce "ore maps" for a given ore. Gameplay wise, this is achieved using a ResourceMonitor inspired GUI that displays direction and distance of surveyed deposits.

The mod currently works, eg, allows to track deposits (survey happens in a square area of a maximum size = 20 000, this is configurable in config.lua), but all resource costs are still placeholders, as are graphics (taken from recycling mod).

The source code is on github, release is available here

The mod currently supports iron/copper and BoB's ores, but it's pretty easy to add new ones.

I'd be interested by any feedback

Screenshot

prospect-gui.PNG (318.88 KiB) Viewed 13141 times

console commands

IF you want to test , issue any of (or all) the following commands in the console
This will give you 10 maps for any ore
game.player.insert { name = "copper-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "iron-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "rutile-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "tin-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "tungsten-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "bauxite-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "gem-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "gold-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "silver-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "lead-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "zinc-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "cobalt-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "nickel-ore-map", count = 10 }
game.player.insert { name = "quartz-map", count = 10 }

Changes
0.2 : now triggers generation of chunks as needed. can take a while if resources are scarce (several minutes), (but it works in the background, it doesn't freeze the game). Supports multiple simultaneous prospections but due to performance requirements, resources are prioritized towards the older prospections
0.1.1 : support for Dytech. also added missing Gems/Oil/Stone/Coal. Tech now costs 100 red/100 green
0.1.0 : initial release, support for Bob's ores
edit : added a screenshot of the GUI

[Koncookie]

Really nice idea.
But it looks like I found a bug. If I use one map (e.g. Quartz) and close the GUI, it won't open up if I use another map of the same type. But it does if I use a new type (e.g. Iron).
Also, is it possible that a map searches for the nearest and not yet mapped deposit? Because for now, if the nearest deposit is just 4 patches big and I search for a bigger one, I waste a lot of maps if I'm not far away enough.
It also would be really cool if we could see the size of the mapped field.

[Finndibaenn]

Really nice idea..

Cool at least one person is intrigued

so...

But it looks like I found a bug. If I use one map (e.g. Quartz) and close the GUI, it won't open up if I use another map of the same type. But it does if I use a new type (e.g. Iron).

well that was quick !
The way it works right now, is that the UI appears if a new deposit is found or a new "failed" action happens.
I assumed (wrongly I guess), the user would only minimize if he's still interested in the results. But even then I should get rid of the remaining results when closing I guess, which would bring the UI back if you prospect again.

Also, is it possible that a map searches for the nearest and not yet mapped deposit? Because for now, if the nearest deposit is just 4 patches big and I search for a bigger one, I waste a lot of maps if I'm not far away enough.

Everything is possible, but that would imply pretty important changes, and also would make the prospection much more cpu intensive, so for now, you'll have to exhaust the already discovered deposits

It also would be really cool if we could see the size of the mapped field.

I'd like too, but considering the area is LARGE (to give you an idea, 1K unit is about 45s car driving distance. The prospection scans a square 20K wide), it would require using the minimap, and I don't think this is open to mods (yet ?) It's actually the reason why I included the failed prospections too . Even though the prospection range should probably be mentioned in the gui too

[wahming]

Any support for DyTech ores?

[Finndibaenn]

support for Dytech added, see first post for download link

[orzelek]

It could be possible to tie this with RSO to prospect for yet undiscovered resources.
Would need to do some nice remote interfaces on RSO side to allow access to prepared but not placed resources in the chunk and also to trigger chunk generation without ores spawning so that it rolls the resources. Would you be interested in playing around with this?

[Finndibaenn]

Hi,

To be honest I'm not sure what that means, probably because i'm not familiar with FActorio's plugin model.
The way the plugin looks for deposits is using the API game#findentitiesfiltered, here https://github.com/thibaut-fagart/facto ... ol.lua#L70

IT seems to work with a pretty wide range (i'm using range 10K) so i was assuming the game was generating the map if needed ?

[orzelek]

Hi,

To be honest I'm not sure what that means, probably because i'm not familiar with FActorio's plugin model.
The way the plugin looks for deposits is using the API game#findentitiesfiltered, here https://github.com/thibaut-fagart/facto ... ol.lua#L70

IT seems to work with a pretty wide range (i'm using range 10K) so i was assuming the game was generating the map if needed ?

Did you try to run it near unexplored area and see if anything will be found there?
RSO reacts to game tile creation event - I'm not sure if search would trigger this to check the tiles. That would take lots of time - generating area 2kx2k tiles takes long time - 20k by 20k would take 10+ minutes easily.

[Finndibaenn]

well, being able to spot deposits in black areas (not explored) is the whole point of that mod, and yes, it seems to be working


edit : it was too late to test this yesterday but i just did, and i'm now pretty sure it doesn't work :\ I created a new game, didn't move ans prospected for every mineral. THe only minerals I found were at distance 100

[orzelek]

well, being able to spot deposits in black areas (not explored) is the whole point of that mod, and yes, it seems to be working


edit : it was too late to test this yesterday but i just did, and i'm now pretty sure it doesn't work :\ I created a new game, didn't move ans prospected for every mineral. THe only minerals I found were at distance 100

I could make it work with RSO probably due to way it generates resources itself.
It's a bit of coding I think to make it work properly so not sure when I'll work on it.

I do think it would be especially useful with RSO - it will keep the drawback of not seeing already generated resources or showing you places where deposits where but are already mined. Would that be ok for you?

[Finndibaenn]

From tests I've done on a long running game, the previously depleted deposts were not reported by game#findentitiesfiltered, so that should be ok.

And i guess i'm not familar enough with the way RSO works to understand what you mean by "not seeing already generated resources".

However if Prospect was enough to requests RSO for not explored yet areas that would enable it to be usefull (and TBH i was expecing the game engine to generate the chunks if findentitiesfiltered targeted some non already generated areas). I guess otherwiss it's kind of useless.

So yes, if you feel like it, that would be great !

[Wyrm]

Really? Raw ore to craft a geology lab and maps? I know ore has little use, come on.

I recommend that your materials be a little more refined. Something like the radar, maybe, only replacing iron plate with copper plate or something.

As to the maps... how about a copper plate plus an electronic circuit?

[Finndibaenn]

Hi

as I said in the OP

The mod currently works, eg, allows to track deposits (survey happens in a square area of a maximum size = 20 000, this is configurable in config.lua), but all resource costs are still placeholders, as are graphics (taken from recycling mod).

Also, contrary to what I originally thought, and as discussed above, the mod can only currently detect ores in previously generated chunks (eg, not deep into the unknown as I was expecting it), so untill we override that limitation (which may not be possible for non-RSO games) I'd say the mod is not that interesting

[Wyrm]

I guess I came across a little more snipey than I thought. I was, in part, just giving you a hard time. However, while I like the concept of the mod, I can't really abide by a placeholder cost. I play with mods to have fun, and that includes some attempt to balance cost against usefulness. I already changed my local copy to what I think are appropriate recipe costs.

[db48x]

Great idea for a mod! We tried it in a multiplayer game, however, and it caused an exception which brought down the game; I didn't copy it down, but it complained that it used game.player in a multiplayer game.

[Nafen]

This is an excellent idea, one of the things I dislike about using mods with extra ores in them is that you have to get lucky to get each ore you need at a decent distance. I don't mind going far to find the stuff I need but if you go far and don't find it, then you have to go 'far from far' and then it's just a headache. At least knowing HOW far I have to go would let me plan ahead

It is a shame that it doesn't search for ungenerated, and that it seems to not work in Multiplayer

[Finndibaenn]

After noticing the introduciton of new apis in the Modding API allowing to trigger generation of new chunks of the map, I brought this back from afterlife.

It now allows starting prospection asynchronously and will trigger map generation if required. It won't trigger charting

[Valdrake]

Any chance of an update for 0.13? I like this idea a lot =]