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Okay, I think it's time we talk about this. Balance of gun turret is completely out of hand, first I already said it but they don't have enough range they should have more range than laser to reward logistic and cost of ammo. Then, okay I always know turret bonus damage was multiplicative with ammo bonus. And I was like, well who care ? but this become a problem of balance.

Except for gun turret, EVERYTHING that use physical ammo SUX. Cause dev balance bonus of ammo according to the gun turret. IMO, that a problem cause sub-machine gun feel under-power, tank sub-machine gun feel totally under-power. They nerfed a lot turret bonus damage in space age, but for vanilla they didn't nerf them.
* LvL: Level of Physical projectile damage (research)
* Ammo (V): Bullet damage bonus in vanilla
* Turret (V): Turret damage bonus in vanilla
* TT (V): Total Turret damage bonus in vanilla
* Ammo (S): Bullet damage bonus in space age
* Turret (S): Turret damage bonus in space age
* TT (S): Total Turret damage bonus in space age

You can see in space age number are lower but go up pretty fast. This is not very intuitive at all for user too. It's very hard to balance it with this multiplication effect. Vanilla a bullet of uranium at Lvl 15 do 1159.2 + 24 damage laser turret lvl 15 go 172 + 20

Anyway, not completing about turret damage but more completing that it's affect too much the balance of bullet damage themself. I wish we could have more way to balance submachine gun, turret, etc... cause currently all that use physical ammo more or less sux pass early game except gun turret.

Number could be wrong. I made a mod https://mods.factorio.com/mod/BalanceAmmoDamage I feel it's still too much damage but I tested only for vanilla not space age.

PS: don't get me started on flame thrower turret... that the same problem, the flame thrower of tank feel SO WEAK when the turret is completely overpower.

As a counterpoint....

Gun Turrets are a complement to your static defenses, so it makes sense for them to scale in a way to allow them to fill that role.

But the submachine gun? You're using that instead of a different weapon. It makes much less sense for that to scale in a way to be competitive with later game weaponry.

I assume the rate of infinite researches was nerfed to push off the point where gun turrets become viable against asteroids they shouldn't be really far into the future, whereas vanilla doesn't have a reason to limit damage in such a way.

Hurkyl wrote: Tue Aug 12, 2025 3:29 am Gun Turrets are a complement to your static defenses, so it makes sense for them to scale in a way to allow them to fill that role.

Who decide that lol ? Most defense don't include them at all cause laser are just better since they just use energy. And anyway that not at all my point, I really don't care about what you use as turret my point is the rest that use physical ammo.

Hurkyl wrote: Tue Aug 12, 2025 3:29 am But the submachine gun? You're using that instead of a different weapon. It makes much less sense for that to scale in a way to be competitive with later game weaponry.

Yeah how dump of me who want to use my tank submachine gun ! I mean how dare I am ? There are also mods that use physical ammo https://mods.factorio.com/mod/kry-spidertron and it's a joke that doesn't do any damage. If you tell me "just don't use them after some point in game" I would just say that sux cause I love the sound of bullets (Specially with https://mods.factorio.com/mod/bullet-trails). Also, if my tank submachine gun is obsolete like almost as soon as I unlock it, what the point of having it ?

Anyway please focus on my points, how to balance better the game. Don't just tell me, "you must do that".

Stargateur wrote: Tue Aug 12, 2025 4:35 am Yeah how dump of me who want to use my tank submachine gun ! I

I think the proper spelling is "dumb" , but otherwise i kinda agree with the idea that the balance is done for turret as static defense, it's normal that tank machine guns with yellow ammo feels underwhelming late game when there's spidertron with rockets available.

The proposed change sounds like a unfinished table with different numbers for the sake of it unfortunatly. There's much better analysis out there considering the balance of turrets for defense comparing different turrets, and some more specifics about the different ammos and showing the cost of the research in relation the effective damage against the different ennemies, in Nauvis Gleba and Vulcanus, also the asteroids, because otherwise it's too superficial to me. Plus you say it yourself the numbers you provide aren't balanced ...

Imo if you want to make the tank more powerful because you like using the tank submachine gun, it would feel more logical that you make a mod to increase the damage or shooting speed of the tank machine gun, rather altering the ammo for the other things too, like space platform or your usual vulcanus worm. Not saying "you must do that" , just throwing the idea in case it didn't crossed your mind since you haven't done balancing for space age yet, it may spare you some trouble.

I don't think vanilla behavior has to changed, but adding Modifier::GunAttackModifier (https://lua-api.factorio.com/latest/types/Modifier.html) would make mods be able to add the desired changes for you

Stargateur wrote: Tue Aug 12, 2025 4:35 am

Hurkyl wrote: Tue Aug 12, 2025 3:29 am Gun Turrets are a complement to your static defenses, so it makes sense for them to scale in a way to allow them to fill that role.

Who decide that lol ? Most defense don't include them at all cause laser are just better since they just use energy.

While my personal preference is also to use laser turrets for this role, I do see more than enough people tout the strength of gun turrets, especially with uranium ammo, to think it's reasonable to just completely dismiss them in a discussion on game balance.

And anyway that not at all my point, I really don't care about what you use as turret my point is the rest that use physical ammo.

Hurkyl wrote: Tue Aug 12, 2025 3:29 am But the submachine gun? You're using that instead of a different weapon. It makes much less sense for that to scale in a way to be competitive with later game weaponry.

Yeah how dump of me who want to use my tank submachine gun ! I mean how dare I am ? There are also mods that use physical ammo https://mods.factorio.com/mod/kry-spidertron and it's a joke that doesn't do any damage. If you tell me "just don't use them after some point in game" I would just say that sux cause I love the sound of bullets (Specially with https://mods.factorio.com/mod/bullet-trails). Also, if my tank submachine gun is obsolete like almost as soon as I unlock it, what the point of having it ?

Anyway please focus on my points, how to balance better the game. Don't just tell me, "you must do that".

You can't really just say "early game weaponry sucks late game", because the response is "Yes, and?". That is fairly common way for game balance to work; after all, why play with any of the late game toys if your early game toy is just as good?

My response was supposed to be a launching off point for you giving your reasons why this is would be an exception and how/why making the submachine gun remain competitive late game would make the game better.

I infer that this is not really an issue of game balance but more so that you really enjoy the submachine gun, even to the point of installing mods to enhance the experience. I concur with the idea that what you're looking for would be more at home in a mod to further enhance your experience, rather than as a change to the vanilla game.

Stargateur wrote: Mon Aug 11, 2025 10:29 pm Balance of gun turret is completely out of hand, first I already said it but they don't have enough range they should have more range than laser to reward logistic and cost of ammo.

Balance is always something where you compare something to some other thing. Your article starts with the right motivation, but you end up with "gun damage isn't balanced, see this table", and that's not helping to establish balance.

To see if some weapon or ammo is balanced well, you need a view how these are being used and how efficient they are in what they do in comparison to other weapons and their ammo. You completely lack comparison to other ammo - you just write "gun damage sux" and compare gun damage with itself.

Every weapon and each ammo has its intended use case. There are alternative weapons, but actually you don't have much choice. It's not the design to be able to freely use all weapons/ammo against all enemies equally. Usually you have a primary intended use and a backup use if the player cannot/doesn't want to use the primary.

You need to see which weapons, which ammo and which enemies are available in which game stage. To encourage change, there should be the need to use different weapons across the different enemies and tactical situations, and all in all the difficulty for whatever combat situation should be "well balanced".

So you need to make tables in which combat situation which weapon is a candidate for use, and how good or bad one weapon and ammo is for this situation.

It's very complex to measure balance, because it's difficult to get numbers for comparison. For example, a measure could be dps (damage per second). A weapon/ammo with more dps is the better weapon/ammo. But is the higher cost for a better ammo justified? That depends on the game stage (early/mid/late game) and the location (planet or space platform). Also dps is dependent on enemy type due to resistances. May be a better measure is "how many hits do I need to kill that enemy?". Or "how many ammo of this kind do I need to kill that enemy?" Or if it comes to resources: "how much ore do I need to produce ammo to kill one enemy?"

Just a table with scaled ammo damage bonus isn't telling anything. While the game progresses the enemies get stronger, so that will even out any damage bonus. And you need to switch weapons while the game progresses. There are 3 stages for encounters with some specific enemy: 1st stage is "wow, there's a new enemy. What do I need to kill it?" 2nd stage: "it's becoming stronger. What do I need to upgrade to still kill it?" 3rd stage is domination: "What do I need to finally defeat this kind of enemy once and for all?" The 3rd stage (domination) is required to be able to move on to the next challenge. The flamethrower turret is a weapon for this for example, and it's well balanced for this role, despite its huge damage that seems unbalanced first.

You need to sort the enemies by the game stage where they appear, and sort the weapons/ammo the same, and see how good or bad the weapons/ammo are against the adversaries appearing the same time.

And if it comes to personal weapons, there is player preference. For example, I'm unable to use some weapons efficiently because I'm unable to aim correctly with the given combat mechanics. I'm unable to hit anything with the shotgun. I'm unable to hit anyhing with the tank (or if I do, I'm unable to drive away and not lose the tank, because I'm unable to properly steer the tank. I usually hit too many nests or a cliff or a tree, than I'm stuck and the tank is destroyed). I'm also somehow unable to use thrown weapons - either I kill myself or cannot aim or the weapon is exhausted and I only realize this when I'm dead. This limits my weapon choice. But other players are different.

In my opinion, and from my personal play style, damage done by using the submachine gun using yellow ammo can be boosted early game to improve my personal game experience. That's where I have the most and frustrating issues. However, I cannot put this opinion into numbers. How this can be improved with a change of game parameters and if any improvement is reasonable I cannot tell. May be better armor would be the better balancing instead of boosting damage, as far as I remember the frustrating moments go away with modular armor with energy shields.
Everything else later is ok. It's just a choice of the proper weapon and proper research.

Stargateur wrote: Tue Aug 12, 2025 4:35 am Yeah how dump of me who want to use my tank submachine gun !

Use its cannon? The tank's MG is very much meant for mediums and below. And maybe stray large spitters.

Stargateur wrote: Tue Aug 12, 2025 4:35 am Also, if my tank submachine gun is obsolete like almost as soon as I unlock it, what the point of having it ?

How late are you unlocking it? In a normal settings map I'm almost always unlocking it well before the biters have fielded their first large biter.