Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 12:58 pm
by trad_emark
space casino is the only interesting approach to quality.
making it is something new, it was a lot of fun to design well working casino.
all other approaches are just flat out boring, just copy the same shit all over again.
you have removed fun and innovative part of the game in favor of stupid grind.
this completely overshadows all the other stuff mentioned in the fff.
if a change was really needed, then it should have been the other way round. keep space casino, and nerf lds shuffle.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:01 pm
by Hurkyl
Nova wrote: Fri Jun 12, 2026 12:51 pm
@Hurkyl: Asteroid productivity doesn't buff the reprocessing, but the crushing, yes. The central point for this is the reprocessing recipe because you lose only a much smaller part of the asteroid in comparison to recyclers.
That doesn't math though. Yes you only lose 20% rather than 75%, but you lose it every step, and only get two quality modules per step. It's been a while since I calculated it out, but IIRC (with legendary tier 3 modules) the rate of return was comparable to craft-recycle loops with 4 module slots, better than having 0% productivity, but worse than having 50% productivity. And that's before counting the loss due to having to reprocess asteroids of the wrong type.
Every reprocessed to legendary asteroid gives more legendary ores with higher amount of productivity, but the productivity is only from the crushing recipe.
You also get 20% of the asteroids back from the (basic) crushing recipe - but with max productivity you get four times the amount back, which means you five times the amount of ore that you would have got from without productivity.
It's 16 times, isn't it? Without productivity, you consume 0.8 asteroids (on average) for one batch of ore, and with 300% productivity you consume 0.2 asteroids for 4 batches of ore.
This is, incidentally, the step I think there is a balance problem on, similar to (pre-productivity research) LDS: your loop spits out endless quantities of ore in addition to the quality loop.
EDIT: I always understood the problem with quality in reprocessing was about the fact you make base materials, which lets you trivialize the logistics by doing all of your upcycling in one central loop. But with the FFF talking about productivity, it doesn't sound like that's the aspect they care about. And with talk about productivity affecting reprocessing, I'm just left with being confused about what they actually plan to implement and why.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:02 pm
by wampir
Wow, never thought about usefulness of lane switching, bet than it hit me: underground belts, directly under the inserter
Could you consider quality storage tanks?
Could you consider gatekeeping space casinos behind promethium science instead of removing it completely?
Could you consider - as you did with the recycler - moving planet specific buildings into small separate mods? Big mining drill, belts, stack inserter etc. Whichever would be possible, so we could use them separately in vanilla game, or mods, without loading whole space age? I guess their cost should be adjusted, but it would be fun to have those available:D
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:05 pm
by Arcani_Victus
Looking forward to this very much.
Couple things I would still like to see:
1. Quality fluid tanks....because all chest increase capacity with quality so why not fluid tanks?
2. Way to color train stations automatically.
3. Fix heat pipe rounding up to 501 yet still not allowing steam production.
4. Underground pipes reach extended by one.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:05 pm
by Viidi
Could you tell me if this plant would work with the new pipes?
Note the output from the oil refineries. And the fact that the refineries below have a variable recipe depending on gas reserves.
What's your take on this? Is it possible or is it a misuse of a glitch?
06-12-2026, 16-02-09.png (5.01 MiB) Viewed 1237 times
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:12 pm
by Terrahertz
While I am not too thrilled about loosing my favorite bit of cheese in the game, I am fine with it as long is I can still cycle asteroid chunks through the recycler. Thats probably less complicated anyway and still gives me the nice feeling of utilizing all these asteroid I would otherwise just throw away or ignore.
I am very glad to see quality now have meaningful effects on Trains, I just hope that in order to deal with the increase in Tanker capacity the storagetanks will now also scale with quality.
Graphicswise stellar work as always, especially adding ruins to the oil ocean.
I wonder if the new circuit connections to the fluid system will help in better thrust control on platforms, but either way it's nice to no longer need to build an entire storage tank just to get a reading on your fluid amounts.
All in all great job as always guys!
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:16 pm
by raiguard
Viidi wrote: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:05 pm
Could you tell me if this plant would work with the new pipes?
Note the output from the oil refineries. And the fact that the refineries below have a variable recipe depending on gas reserves.
What's your take on this? Is it possible or is it a misuse of a glitch?
Smoothie pipe setups such as this one will continue to work. The fluid mixing prevention only occurs on machines with passthrough ports, such as boilers, steam engines, and electromagnetic plants.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:20 pm
by Dogmai
Viidi wrote: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:05 pm
Could you tell me if this plant would work with the new pipes?
Note the output from the oil refineries. And the fact that the refineries below have a variable recipe depending on gas reserves.
What's your take on this? Is it possible or is it a misuse of a glitch?
Yes, they specifically stated this would still work.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:29 pm
by Panzerknacker
Very happy to read this FFF, and to a lesser extend the previous one also. Good to see that balance changes regarding the space casino are made, that you guys just stick to what you feel is best. Also happy about the fluid system improvements, especially removing of the strange hidden buffer.
I was never really a fan of flipping the machines in the first place and to be able to change the outputs around. Still think the 2.1 proposal is better than what we currently have.
After reading all of this, FFF #440 was just a troll post tbh, nice one tho you got me there.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:30 pm
by Hares
Woa! Red/Green output wire setting!
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:37 pm
by vemusa
Notably, fluid mixing only occurs on bidirectional connections; you can still create smoothie pipes by connecting pumps or unidirectional machine outputs with different fluids in them, and the game will not get in your way.
What about setups that use bidirectional connections as unidirectional connections and just don't put anything on the other side?
For example, can this setup work with the new fluid mixing prevention system?
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:47 pm
by craig_g
06-12-2026, 14-46-30.png (459.07 KiB) Viewed 1039 times
Wondering if you are going to put in this minor fix. We can connected even pipes now following your latest changes
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:53 pm
by TheDash
All great sounding updates, can't wait.
Things I would love to see:
Change distance between planets from 0-15000 KM to 0.0-1.0 AU or something sensible. The diameter of Earth is about 13000 KM!
Let Storage Chest specify multiple filters, blacklist/whitelist, and option to trash unfiltered items.
Option to show precise amount of items/fluid in storage/blueprints/requests/circuit conditions rather than "24k".
Copyable space platform/train wait conditions between other destinations (just ctrl+click+drag would be enough)
Diagonal rail ramps.
Flippable space thrusters.
Flippable blueprints containing stations and signals - just flip everything except the station/signals - only the rest of the blueprint (e.g. which side of the rail the inserters and chests are on)
Space platform speed dependent on mass, not width - no more pencil thin space platforms.
Decider combinators with multiple sections - 1 combinator that can do the work of many (e.g. actually deciding between Asteroid Crushing vs Advanced Crushing without requiring 2 combinators)
Overextended pipelines telling you exactly where you need to place a pump, rather than random divide and conquer.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:55 pm
by yura881
Reading this news was really exciting, and I am very happy about almost all of the announced changes.
Could quality trains also become more deadly when hitting biters? Since higher-quality locomotives will have better acceleration, perhaps they could also receive increased mass or collision damage.
I really like the concept of remote, autonomous outposts supplied by trains. More powerful trains would make this type of gameplay much more practical. At high evolution levels, trains can currently be stopped and destroyed by large groups of biters, so the safest option is usually to clear all nests around the railway first.
It would be great if high-quality trains could break through larger groups of enemies
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 2:09 pm
by Alendo
yura881 wrote: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:55 pm
I really like the concept of remote, autonomous outposts supplied by trains. More powerful trains would make this type of gameplay much more practical. At high evolution levels, trains can currently be stopped and destroyed by large groups of biters, so the safest option is usually to clear all nests around the railway first.
It would be great if high-quality trains could break through larger groups of enemies
Early on I remember trying myself at a railworld, wanting my trains to travel vast distances of biter infested forests before arriving at a well defended outpost with supplies and bringing the resources back. Running into my first pack of behemoths stopped that lol. I really wish for this playstyle to become viable as I really like the idea of safe places with unsafe places between. Maybe I should check if there are any armed and armoured trains mods out there.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 2:17 pm
by ChickenCombo
Excellent update, love the new graphics direction, they fit their planets very well.
Features mentioned are also top notch QoL, can't wait to play the experimental!
My only feedback is about separating the new rocks from their background a bit more, I think their readability could be slightly improved, they're now even harder to spot because they blend into their environment so well, I'll go into a bit more detail.
On vulcanus, they all pass the squint test well and are relatively brighter than the previous, and almost easier to spot when squinting/blurring because that removes the high frequency detail in the rocks. Maybe make the hairline cracks in the rocks a bit wider to bring out the contrast a bit more?
The gleba rocks are relatively less bright than the previous because of the additional detail and shadow, this may make it difficult to know that they are important for gameplay vs just another set of rocks. Maybe they could glow slightly at night? or the shadows could be made a little brighter to bring them up out of the already highly detailed background? or they could have some additional doodad sprites below them to separate them from the background using color/contrast?
I think for both of them it's a tough call because you want them to blend in well but also want them to be separate enough from the background to easily let players read the environment at a glance, even if they're unaccustomed to what they're looking for, and it has to work at all zoom levels which is an additional challenge.
I remember running into things on gleba and vulcanus in my first play through because I couldn't tell what would stop me and what wouldn't and I can't tell how much of that was having thousands of hours on nauvis vs the specifics of the art assets.
Maybe I'll just get used to it and this feedback will age like milk!
Keep up the good work!
Ya'll continue to make this my favorite game of all time
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 2:20 pm
by The Phoenixian
On the one hand, I will honestly miss the puzzle elements with inserters placing items on belts moving directly towards or away from themselves.
On the other hand, the move from 1.1 to 2.0 broke the "inserter drops to it's own right" interaction anyways, so if anything my favorite solution for placing items on each lane in that case have come back in 2.1. (namely, using undergrounds to drop on both lanes from a single building)
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 2:27 pm
by quineotio
RocketManChronicles wrote: Fri Jun 12, 2026 12:32 pm
Getting rid of the "Space Casino" is the best thing to see here. I always viewed it as a cheaty exploit and refused to ever do it.
How will the change make the game more fun for you?
How do you feel about other people being upset at it's removal?
I've never heard an answer to these questions that satisfies me.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 2:36 pm
by bhzy
TheDash wrote: Fri Jun 12, 2026 1:53 pm
Change distance between planets from 0-15000 KM to 0.0-1.0 AU or something sensible. The diameter of Earth is about 13000 KM!
You do realize that the speeds of space platforms would have to become absurdly high in order to reach other planets in reasonable time? I wouldn't want to wait real days to get to Gleba with my 300 km/s platform. I think having unrealistically small distances is a fine compromise here, otherwise you just get unrealistically high velocities.
Re: Friday Facts #442 - Flip, Flow, and Fresh Paint
Posted: Fri Jun 12, 2026 2:38 pm
by deer_buster
Inserter lane flip is amazing. Would be even better if you could also choose the near or far side of the belt when you are inserting perpendicular to the belt...so 4 positions.
