Factorio Forums

The ghost timer bars(assumption!) cause can_place_entity to return false when checking a ghost entity.

/c game.player.surface.create_entity{name="entity-ghost", inner_name="transport-belt", position={x=0,y=0}, direction=2, force=game.player.force}
/c game.player.print(tostring(game.player.surface.can_place_entity{name="entity-ghost", inner_name="transport-belt", position={x=0,y=1}, direction=2, force=game.player.force})) --returns false, I think the timer is the issue


/c game.player.print(tostring(game.player.surface.can_place_entity{name="entity-ghost", inner_name="transport-belt", position={x=0,y=0}, direction=2, force=game.player.force})) --returns false, expected
/c game.player.print(tostring(game.player.surface.can_place_entity{name="transport-belt", position={x=0,y=1}, direction=2, force=game.player.force})) --returns true, expected it is an empty tile
/c game.player.print(tostring(game.player.surface.can_place_entity{name="transport-belt", position={x=0,y=0}, direction=2, force=game.player.force})) --returns true, expected as you should be able to place over a ghost


Also a question. if the answer is no then it is a bug or a feature request
Is it possible to create ghosts without the timer? The same way they appear when shift-clicking to place a ghost or placing a blueprint.

The issue is you're asking if you can build at exact tile positions and because you already built a ghost at another position and it corrected the position you gave it you're now checking if you can build a ghost belt half way over another ghost belt and it's telling you: no.

If you adjust you can_build checks to the correct center-of-tile then they all pass.

Thanks for looking into this and for the center of tile check.