Friday Facts #282 - 0.17 in sight

[Arkonor]

I really like the island setup for the starting area, and map in general. We should have an update focused on water based content, such as bridges, seabases, ships, submarines, etc.

We have a mod that already does some of that, but I prefer the quality of an official update

[Arathorn]

Will it be possible (in an easy way) to have two different versions installed at the same time.
I don’t want to upgrade my 16.51 (Steam) 300+ hours playthrough but I still want to try the new 0.17 when it is released.

[Serenity]

Speaking of the slider ranges: did you decrease the amount of resources you get with the lowest setting? You've included more slider positions for more granularity which is very nice, but as of now the even "very low" has quite a lot of resources. So with the added steps I think "very low" could be less and the previous "very low" could be step 3 or something

[Loewchen]

Will it be possible (in an easy way) to have two different versions installed at the same time.

You can have as many installations as you like when using the factorio.com download version. You can only have one installation on steam.

[pleegwat]

Speaking of the slider ranges: did you decrease the amount of resources you get with the lowest setting? You've included more slider positions for more granularity which is very nice, but as of now the even "very low" has quite a lot of resources. So with the added steps I think "very low" could be less and the previous "very low" could be step 3 or something

FFF mentions positions were 50% to 200% of baseline and will be 17% to 600%.

[ThorsDragon]

AWWEEESSSOOMMMEEEE!!!!!

Now that I got that out of my system XD -

Super excited for the .17 release- almost here!!! Very happy with what you best-devs-ever are doing. Factorio is my favoritest game ever!
Please keep up your amazing work!

[posila]

What is going to happen to existing 0.16 maps during the upgrade? Will these keep using the old noise function after upgrade, and generate new chunks which match the old ones, or will there be sudden transitions like we've seen in the past?

There will be sudden transitions like in the past.

So TOGoS messaged me the old maps will keep using 0.16 generator (with some tweaks), so there won't be so sudden transitions as in previous map generator updates.

[evopwr]

I like the Island startup option.

Would be awesome if there was something similar for a Ribbon World?

I tried specifying dimensions for a ribbon world recently, but after flicking through 50+ previews, trying to find one that had all the needed resources, and failing - I gave up. Would be awesome if there was a similar "option" for this, to make it easier to find a suitable map?

[adam_bise]

So exciting!

Is automated blueprint deployment on the radar? Will recursive blueprints work with the new library?

[funky.bibimbap]

First and foremost, I'm as always amazed at all the work done by the dev team, and the quality of the FFF every week (which no doubt takes a lot of dedication to be delivered in such good form).

Please keep your release process as sturdy as it is. The "release early, release often" philosophy might work for open source projects, but for a game like yours, what you've been doing so far is fine. Especially given that a single game can take hundreds of hours, I don't see the point of having a small change cropping up every so often that could modify the gameplay (doing that for the UI changes seems fine, on the other hand).

All this talk about water bodies reminded me of a little "inconsistency" in vanilla mode: we can use landfill, but we cannot dig wells or channels. So I know that there are mods out there, but I was wondering whether we could eventually have some vanilla terraforming tools of sorts.

[Light]

All this talk about water bodies reminded me of a little "inconsistency" in vanilla mode: we can use landfill, but we cannot dig wells or channels. So I know that there are mods out there, but I was wondering whether we could eventually have some vanilla terraforming tools of sorts.

The only way this could work is if the biters could walk over shallow water the digging would create, otherwise you create an impassible terrain that negates any threat.

I believe there's a mod that does permit shallow water walking, so it's a bit unusual that it's not a vanilla feature. It is funny how just a single tile of water between two islands is enough to stop biters that are longer than the tile itself. Much like seeing a person walk around a tiny puddle instead of just walking right over it.

[kovarex]

Please keep your release process as sturdy as it is. The "release early, release often" philosophy might work for open source projects, but for a game like yours, what you've been doing so far is fine. Especially given that a single game can take hundreds of hours, I don't see the point of having a small change cropping up every so often that could modify the gameplay (doing that for the UI changes seems fine, on the other hand).

Since the changes will basically be gui/mini tutorials or small things, it shouldn't interfere with games.

[Pinga]

The hand tool sounds great, and I think the idea can be extended for the bots themselves. For example, when deconstructing a huge forest, your inventory will quickly fill with wood, then the bots themselves can't go back in because it's full. Currently I need to manually allocate space for them.

factorio_2018-01-07_01-08-08.png (283.03 KiB) Viewed 8006 times

Speaking of which, perhaps the whole deconstruct logic could be improved in a way personal bots won't try to deconstruct stuff if there's no space in your personal inventory. A basic premise could be "if a bot goes out, it will always be able to come back".

[Bilka]

What is going to happen to existing 0.16 maps during the upgrade? Will these keep using the old noise function after upgrade, and generate new chunks which match the old ones, or will there be sudden transitions like we've seen in the past?

So TOGoS messaged me the old maps will keep using 0.16 generator (with some tweaks), so there won't be so sudden transitions as in previous map generator updates.

So to change that we'll have to use the map editor unless the generator can be changed by mods (I haven't looked that up yet).

I'm kind of unhappy about that, I am one of the people who have carried a map over many versions. Terrain changes are part of that and removing those from 0.17 feels like you are taking part of the 0.17 experience away from me. I'm posting this here because I'm wondering if I'm the only person who feels like that.

[Oktokolo]

I believe there's a mod that does permit shallow water walking, so it's a bit unusual that it's not a vanilla feature.

Shallow water has been presented in some earlier FFF as part of the new player experience. IIRC it is supposed to be walkable but would still need a mod to place it as part of map generation in vanilla freeplay.

[pieterhulsen]

The hand tool sounds great, and I think the idea can be extended for the bots themselves. For example, when deconstructing a huge forest, your inventory will quickly fill with wood, then the bots themselves can't go back in because it's full. Currently I need to manually allocate space for them.


factorio_2018-01-07_01-08-08.png


Speaking of which, perhaps the whole deconstruct logic could be improved in a way personal bots won't try to deconstruct stuff if there's no space in your personal inventory. A basic premise could be "if a bot goes out, it will always be able to come back".

I played for hundreds of hours and never thought about the great idea of allocating inventory space.... or realised that it was possible/to try it
I feel so stupid now

[5thHorseman]

I played for hundreds of hours and never thought about the great idea of allocating inventory space.... or realised that it was possible/to try it
I feel so stupid now

Don't. The lack of it in chests makes it seem like a trains-only thing.

PS can we have item slot filtering in chests?

[Raelf]

That are great news.

Will it be still possible to use different terrain for different surfaces? Like disable grass and desert?

Would be great if that is still possible.

[meganothing]

So TOGoS messaged me the old maps will keep using 0.16 generator (with some tweaks), so there won't be so sudden transitions as in previous map generator updates.

Great. This probably means the 0.16 generator is in as a game option too, right? If not, count me in as one who would like that to happen. It is an interesting variation, especially for train network building without using landfill.

[TOGoS]

What is going to happen to existing 0.16 maps during the upgrade? Will these keep using the old noise function after upgrade, and generate new chunks which match the old ones, or will there be sudden transitions like we've seen in the past?

So TOGoS messaged me the old maps will keep using 0.16 generator (with some tweaks), so there won't be so sudden transitions as in previous map generator updates.

So to change that we'll have to use the map editor unless the generator can be changed by mods (I haven't looked that up yet).

I'm kind of unhappy about that, I am one of the people who have carried a map over many versions. Terrain changes are part of that and removing those from 0.17 feels like you are taking part of the 0.17 experience away from me. I'm posting this here because I'm wondering if I'm the only person who feels like that.

I figured some people would want to switch to the new generator (I have 9-year-old Minecraft worlds that have been added to that same way), but that's what /editor or other console commands are for.