Factorio Forums

I would like the map (not minimap) to be more interactive. There should be a lot we can do if we had an "on_map_state_changed" event called any time the user opens or closes the map. The map, together with the console, could be used for quick player to player communication. Like:

• ping a map location - indicating "we can meet here" or "build train station here" or "destroy that biter base"...
• playerA requests help - "HELP I'm attacking that biter base but I've deployed the last of my drones and I'm about to die!"*
• playerB requests [X number of items] be brought here - "I'm out of transport belts, bring me some"*
• "I don't know how to build [whatever], come show me."*
• [X job] is done.

*(some of these could be done now, but perhaps not very well)

I have a use or two where drawing on the map would be nice. I would like to use lua to draw stuff on the map. even have the map show some detailed information for the location as the mouse hovers over.
we could have better signs or notes that aren't modified train stations.

It would be useful to be able to show/hide the world map via script, and also to have events (or at least a property to check) so we can determine when a specific player as world map visible.

In terms of drawing stuff on the wold map, technically you already can. Define some entities that have their map_color set, which causes them to be shown on the minimap and world map. The you just put them on the game map to get some pixels on the minimap and worldmap. Text labels are also shown, although I think you'd need a dummy train station or character to display its name on the minimap or worldmap.

aubergine18 wrote:In terms of drawing stuff on the wold map, technically you already can. Define some entities that have their map_color set, which causes them to be shown on the minimap and world map. The you just put them on the game map to get some pixels on the minimap and worldmap.

That is quite rudimentary. As far as I can tell, while you can build a custom entity on top of existing buildings, these custom entities will not change the color that is displayed on the map. The entity underneath takes priority. So you are limited to "drawing" between your factories while running around - that'll take ages to write anything useful (lua would be quicker, but still quite limited). I want to draw on the map view itself with the mouse (ping) or with lua to highlight parts of the factory. dummy train stations are also quite limited.