Factorio Forums

Posted: **Fri Aug 14, 2026 10:19 pm**

Add science cost option to signals output by labs (2.1)

Instead of only outputting 1 for a research requiring a science pack, it could instead output the current cost (such as 32k).

The change

Instead of only putting 1 on each required science pack as seen here:

: 08-14-2026, 16-39-53.png (74.81 KiB) Viewed 108 times

It could instead be like this (faked with an arithmetic combinator):

: 08-14-2026, 16-43-43.png (51.94 KiB) Viewed 108 times

Or a separate output such as (without removing level):

: Screenshot_20260814_165734.png (18.86 KiB) Viewed 108 times

Impact

With this change it would be easier to automate between technologies that scale differently such as mining productivity and steel plate productivity.
As an example the following all cost 32k: Mining 34, Laser/Projectile Damage 12, Robot Speed 11, Electric Damage 8, Artillery/Railgun Upgrades 6
This shows that just having the research level output makes it difficult to compare different research options. With formulas like 1.5^N, it is difficult to calculate these values with combinators that use integers.