More levels of robot speed research

[Nova]

The idea is good, but it should not be fast. It's a flying roboport, it has to be slow. Not too slow, but slow. To be honest, I like that idea. It would make it easier to create big solar fields.

[ssilk]

Perhaps a definition of "fast" for this: Faster than construction robot. Slower then the car. Somewhere inbetween.
Then it could be used for creating rail tracks and small outposts.
The speed is needed, because you have only one in the beginning (this is quite expensive) and it will construct only that part, that it covers, so it has only that many items in it's stacks. Then it needs to return. Or you bring the needed item more in place.

So the speed of building big solar fields is depending from the distance to the item-source. Quadratic.

Let's say you have only one roboport. The covered distance is 100x100. The flying roboport has also 100x100. If it was stationed at the roboport, he needs to fly 150 tiles to build the next part of the solar field. And back to refill.

Code: Select all

|<----- about 300x300 tiles -->|

XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX
XXX 1 XXXX XXXX 2 XXX XXXX 3 XXX
XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX

XXXXXXXXXX            XXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXX            XXXXXXXXXX
XXXX 4 XXX      R     XXXX 5 XXX
XXXXXXXXXX     CCC    XXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXX            XXXXXXXXXX

XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX
XXXX 6 XXX XXXX 7 XXX XXXX 8 XXX
XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX

R = Roboport
C = Logistic chests
One field is 100x100 tiles

Understood: The Flying Roboport needs to fly from roboport R to the first "field" (1) and back, then to field 2 and back, then to field 3 and back. And so on.
For easier calculation - it needs to fly about 8 x 300 tiles. A bit more, cause of diagonals, let's say it is 2500 tiles altogether.

Now let's think how long this last for the best case. Assume, the chests are really full, there are more than enough items and we have also plenty of logistic bots to fill the flying roboport.

- Refill takes 10 seconds.
- Construction takes 35, cause the construction bots need to fly 100 tiles in maximum (50 forth and 50 back, if it is at the border). That takes in the worst case 100 tiles / 1.2 tiles/sec = 83 secs and in the best case (with full robot speed) 100 tiles / 2.88 tiles/sec = 35 secs

So in the best case, without traveling time, the construction will take 8 * 45 secs = 360 secs = 6 minutes.

Lets's say, it should last not longer than 10 minutes, so we have 4 minutes of traveling time. How fast should it be?
2500 tiles / 4*60 secs = 2500 tiles / 240 secs = 10,41 tiles/sec
That is not very fast, in realworld about 37 km/hour. I think it should be faster. About 16.

There are more ideas, which come into my mind:

- maybe it can load for more than one construction area? It looks for a good route through all open constructions and loads as much as possible. Or it is reloaded during construction/travel? Some kind of transport robots? That would reduce the construction time drastically.

- This flying roboport searches for orders (deconstruction, construction in that order), which is not covered by roboports and fly to it (after 10 seconds) to construct it. I think this area they are searching for is limited somehow. It should work more or less like the roboport but on factor 10-20 more scale. Therefore this speed is really needed.

- And where do they dock and refill? I think to this idea: https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... f=6&t=7150
Pneumatic tubes (or some other quite fast transport system for single items). Some kind of "Master roboport", which contains a delivery station for pneumatic tubes and the flying roboports docks on the top and is filled more or less directly.

[Garm]

How about instead of flying roboport we would have a train roboport?

Frankly I believe that every new step should either give us new opportunities or/and use established base structure. This is one large gripe we had with robots as soon as they were introduced: They were too detached from the rest of the factory design (except the production part) resulting in making factories obsolete.


Even now I find myself rushing towards roboport research because i know it will change the way I build my bases too much so making stuff before hand would be irrelevant.


I am afraid having simply flying roboports would cause similar effect.

[immibis]

Character Logistics Slots is another research that could have more levels for the end-game.

[SHiRKiT]

I agree with you ssilk, that would be a great idea for construction robots. But I still think that layered logistics systems is the way to go for the logistics ones.

[DevilXD]

There was a mod called "PocketBots", which included a power armor with a roboport mounted to it (author wanted to make it as a power armor module, but there isn't an API for that)...

It would be great, if instead of having flying or train roboport, we could actually BE a roboport Just put a roboport module in your power armor and go

[ssilk]

I used that mod a lot and I patched it a bit for my uses, more reach for example, but I was never really satisfied with this, cause it is only about 50% faster to build the stuff like so. There are several limits:

- You nearly never have the right items with you
- if you have all items, you need exactly double as much as expected. Always.
- You need to run to that "center" of your construction. That takes time. I would like to place just a blueprint anywhere and the robots will do the rest
- you need to wait, until all construction bots come back.

And some more issues. I'm sure, Kovarex is aware of all this issues, but for me - provided the awaited personal roboport works more or less similar to the current, it is still not fast enough.

Speed can be obtained by
- Building with much more speed. That is more or less this suggestion and the personal roboport.
- Building in parallel and/or half-automatic (place blueprint and forget). This is what I want.

[immibis]

This thread is not about personal roboports.