Factorio Forums

TL;DR

Let every machine have one productivity progress bar per recipe instead of having a universal productivity progress bar that resets on a recipe switch.

What?

Current Behaviour

1. an electric smelter smelts an iron ore, increasing its productivity progress from 10% to 20%
2. the smelter gets a copper ore inserted, switching its recipe to smelting copper and resetting the productivity progress to 0%.
3. the smelter smelts the copper ore, gaining 10% productivity progress
4. the smelter gets an iron ore inserted, switching its recipe to smelting iron again and resetting the productivity progress to 0%.

Suggested Behaviour
I propose a change where on step 4, the smelter sets its productivity progress to the previous 20% again

Why?

You can create a factory that automatically balances the means of production by demand using logic.
If the player manages to do so, then that is a very impressive accomplishment.
But if you do so, you lose productivity every time a machine switches its recipe.
To the player it doesn't feel rewarding, instead it feels like she/he is getting punished for using her/his brain.
Saving the productivity per machine per recipe would fix the issue.

Disclaimer

• This is an original idea of mine. If someone else had this idea too, then that's unrelated to this topic.
• I did search the suggestions forum and could not find any topic expressing the same suggestion, which does not mean that it doesn't exist
• I did search the mods and could not find any which implements this, which does not mean that it doesn't exist
• Even if there was a mod, i still think the suggested change should be Vanilla behaviour
• I did think about how to express the idea as an image. The only fitting idea i could come up with is one GIF showing the process as described in the What? section, and one showing how it would behave after impementing the suggested behaviour. However i am not yet skilled enough to create such. One would have to edit the GIF to fake the suggested behaviour, because it doesn't exist ingame, which i can't do. If someone else wants to, then i'd be very happy to edit the results into this post, with a "thank you" note of course.

I do understand how it can feel frustrating to lose a productivity bonus that your machine has worked hard to gain, but I really don't think it is a punishment for being creative and learning how to use some of the cool new circuit network magic.
I see the current behaviour (losing productivity bonus when changing recipe) as a puzzle to solve. You can choose a single machine that can do the work of many machines, but loses the productivity bonus, or you can choose many machines that each gain the respective productivity bonus. There are pros and cons for each, and every player can choose which they prefer. They can choose the one that makes sense for different applications; a space platform, a mall, and a mining outpost have very different demands and constraints.
If there was no penalty for switching recipes, there would be a very strong incentive to require every machine to be set to swap recipes. Sure you could still choose to have many machines, but if you didn't set them all to switch recipes, you would be losing out on the flexibility to meet the current factory demand. Like the old fields of beacons in every build, there would be a 'best' way to play.
Also, can you imagine how much extra data would have to be stored for every crafting machine? Not so bad in vanilla, but think of mods that add hundreds of different ores, hundreds of new recipes, and each machine has to remember the bonus for every one of those recipes. No, it is probably something that could be done in a mod, but I don't see it for vanilla.

I see where you are getting with this.

But the reality looks like this: "Oh i loose productivity with this? Then i will do a static factory forever."
There is no balance between productivity and on-demand crafting. A player will choose to do it static 99% of the time.
Because automatically balancing by demand is not needed if you manually balance your factory by the correct ratios.
That means there currently is a best way to play the game right now, which is what you're trying to avoid.

Building a factory that balances the recipes by the demand is a very, very hard thing to do.
I think it is enough of a hurdle that most factories won't be able to achieve a full on-demand-crafting ever anyways.
At most it will be something like on-demand smelting, but static crafting for the average player.
And that would actually be a balance that the player could think about.
Where does it matter the most to use my limited brain power to achieve on-demand and where do i rather balance it manually by ratios? That would be an actual puzzle to solve.

I can see the reasons not to add it to Vanilla.
But i think it rather should be Vanilla, and there should exist a mod to go back to the old behaviour, than vice versa.
I think if mods introduce hundreds or thousands of new recipes, then it is their responsibility to think about the memory complexity and go back to the old behaviour, if necessary. It is only the responsibility of Vanilla to make it possible for mods to reduce the data memory load, not to actually reduce it for them.

Because not introducing this feature into Vanilla and making it a mod instead of vice versa is only keeping unnecessary frustration for people who want to play Vanilla for, let's say achievements. There's nothing to loose if we make it Vanilla, and make the old behaviour a mod instead.

Amarula wrote: Sun Jan 04, 2026 2:35 pm If there was no penalty for switching recipes

Also i've had an additional thought here. What about introducing an alternative cost for automatically switching recipes? Like an electricity cost.

That would make more sense too, because it would be always there and explicitly stated. The player would know the cost before even attempting to use that feature. The current "cost" only apply when there's productivity modules, and only when the recipe is switched while being at a non-zero productivity progress, and it is not obvious that it exists at all, and when the player discovers it, it feel like bug or an oversight. And a frustrating one as well. It is also very random in its severity. An electricity cost would always cost the same amount. It would feel intentional.



Should i edit that into the original post, or create a new suggestion, or just leave it here?

that would allow thing like charging your prod bonus with low cost rss than swap to high cost rss recipe and get extra item you don't deserve like legendary extra production. That a big no.

Stargateur wrote: Sun Jan 04, 2026 8:44 pm that would allow thing like charging your prod bonus with low cost rss than swap to high cost rss recipe and get extra item you don't deserve like legendary extra production. That a big no.

That is not true. Please read the original suggestion again.
One progress bar per recipe. Not one progress bar overall.

my bad

Lindor wrote: Sun Jan 04, 2026 5:36 pm Also i've had an additional thought here. What about introducing an alternative cost for automatically switching recipes? Like an electricity cost.

Oooh like when a roboport needs to recharge after a black out? That would make for some interesting builds!
I think you can leave the suggestion here, it isn't buried under 20 pages of comments

If it feels punishing to use your brain, use it some more and set the switching to happen only when enough cycles has be produced to gain the extra product. Should be possible with some more circuit magic. I don't know exacly how mind you, but I sure it's possible.

SirSmuggler wrote: Wed Jan 07, 2026 7:27 am If it feels punishing to use your brain, use it some more and set the switching to happen only when enough cycles has be produced to gain the extra product. Should be possible with some more circuit magic. I don't know exacly how mind you, but I sure it's possible.

"
Solving no Task will grant you 10 points.
Solving only Task A will grant you 0 Points.
Solving Task A and Task B will grant you 20 Points.
Also you won't know that solving only Task A will grant you 0 Points until you get the grades.

Task A is finding a continuous expression for the factorial function.
Task B is finding a solution for the Riemann Hypothesis.
"

"That seems rather unfair. I have solved Task A and got no Points?"

"Then why didn't you just solve Task B? Stop complaining, that's clearly a skill issue here."



I appreciate the tip for me personally. But i won't do that. I know that i can be quite perfectionist sometimes. But even i am not that extreme. And this topic is not just about me. I can make myself a mod that implements my suggestion. Even though i won't do that until i've finished space exploration Vanilla with all steam achievements that i can get in the run. This topic is not just about me, it is about the quality of the Vanilla game for everyone that runs into the same frustrating state that i did.

Amarula wrote: Mon Jan 05, 2026 1:29 pm

Lindor wrote: Sun Jan 04, 2026 5:36 pm Also i've had an additional thought here. What about introducing an alternative cost for automatically switching recipes? Like an electricity cost.

Oooh like when a roboport needs to recharge after a black out? That would make for some interesting builds!
I think you can leave the suggestion here, it isn't buried under 20 pages of comments

I'm glad you like it I feel the same way, it would make for an interesting and fun gameplay

Lindor wrote: Wed Jan 07, 2026 12:31 pm

SirSmuggler wrote: Wed Jan 07, 2026 7:27 am If it feels punishing to use your brain, use it some more and set the switching to happen only when enough cycles has be produced to gain the extra product. Should be possible with some more circuit magic. I don't know exacly how mind you, but I sure it's possible.

"
Solving no Task will grant you 10 points.
Solving only Task A will grant you 0 Points.
Solving Task A and Task B will grant you 20 Points.
Also you won't know that solving only Task A will grant you 0 Points until you get the grades.

Task A is finding a continuous expression for the factorial function.
Task B is finding a solution for the Riemann Hypothesis.
"

"That seems rather unfair. I have solved Task A and got no Points?"

"Then why didn't you just solve Task B? Stop complaining, that's clearly a skill issue here."



I appreciate the tip for me personally. But i won't do that. I know that i can be quite perfectionist sometimes. But even i am not that extreme. And this topic is not just about me. I can make myself a mod that implements my suggestion. Even though i won't do that until i've finished space exploration Vanilla with all steam achievements that i can get in the run. This topic is not just about me, it is about the quality of the Vanilla game for everyone that runs into the same frustrating state that i did.

Fair enough, I menat it as kind of a joke any way
... on the other hand, if productivity is saved per recepie, you get no points for solving Task B

SirSmuggler wrote: Wed Jan 07, 2026 2:16 pm

Lindor wrote: Wed Jan 07, 2026 12:31 pm

SirSmuggler wrote: Wed Jan 07, 2026 7:27 am If it feels punishing to use your brain, use it some more and set the switching to happen only when enough cycles has be produced to gain the extra product. Should be possible with some more circuit magic. I don't know exacly how mind you, but I sure it's possible.

"
Solving no Task will grant you 10 points.
Solving only Task A will grant you 0 Points.
Solving Task A and Task B will grant you 20 Points.
Also you won't know that solving only Task A will grant you 0 Points until you get the grades.

Task A is finding a continuous expression for the factorial function.
Task B is finding a solution for the Riemann Hypothesis.
"

"That seems rather unfair. I have solved Task A and got no Points?"

"Then why didn't you just solve Task B? Stop complaining, that's clearly a skill issue here."



I appreciate the tip for me personally. But i won't do that. I know that i can be quite perfectionist sometimes. But even i am not that extreme. And this topic is not just about me. I can make myself a mod that implements my suggestion. Even though i won't do that until i've finished space exploration Vanilla with all steam achievements that i can get in the run. This topic is not just about me, it is about the quality of the Vanilla game for everyone that runs into the same frustrating state that i did.

Fair enough, I menat it as kind of a joke any way
... on the other hand, if productivity is saved per recepie, you get no points for solving Task B

That's fair

I fully agree with the problem, but a hidden bar for each recipe does sound like a hell. My solution would be to add a "Read productivity bar progress" option and/or a checkbox for switching the recipe only if productivity bar progress is lower than productivity bonus given per craft. Ideally, it would allow players to solve the challenge for no significant RAM cost under the hood.

ITBM wrote: Wed Jan 07, 2026 3:34 pm I fully agree with the problem, but a hidden bar for each recipe does sound like a hell. My solution would be to add a "Read productivity bar progress" option and/or a checkbox for switching the recipe only if productivity bar progress is lower than productivity bonus given per craft. Ideally, it would allow players to solve the challenge for no significant RAM cost under the hood.

I don't know. It wouldn't work for smelters where the recipe is automatically determined by the input.
I don't like to sacrifice even small amounts of productivity. It will add up to a very significant amount over time if there are many switches. And it is a very counter-intuitive and hidden cost that many players already miss, myself included. I did miss it at first.
If we make it to only be able to switch on productivity progress of 0, it won't work either.
There are many many cases where the productivity bar will never reach exactly 0%. And thou shalt not use == with floats.
If we make it to only be able to switch on a very tiny progress greater than or equal to 0, then that prohibits the player from building setups where there are many changes on the same machine. I don't like that restriction.
And we don't know how significant the memory cost will really be until we test the optimized implementation with an actual average Vanilla factory.
Maybe it won't be that bad. I'm sure it can be optimized and compressed.
And as i said for mods there should always be a way to go back to the old behaviour.
I appreciate the alternative idea though.