Machine scaffolding

[Roodvlees]

Considering how big the machines in Factorio are, especially when you use Sea Blocks combined with Bobs ore and Angels smelting, it's strange to see these are being crafted in thin air. I'd like a mod where they are build in a scaffold.
- Machine scaffolding can be hand-crafted and moved around like current buildings.
- When placed scaffolding looks like a ghost version of the machine, like with the upgrade planner.
- There would be several variations of this for the differently sized buildings costing more wood.
- Any machine larger than 1 tile cannot be hand-crafted or queued.
- These machines also cannot be placed in an inventory, produced by another machine or placed on a belt.
- The same materials are needed as for normal construction and are placed in the scaffolding.
- While machine the character spends the normal build time in some rudimentary animation over the scaffold.
- If the machine is deconstructed it returns to a scaffold of size for that machine with the materials in it.
- In order to construct multiple machines at a time, construction bots are needed:
-- Can be placed in the scaffold to do the construction work.
-- Can be fitted to the scaffold and connected to the electricity network.
-- So the cost should be somewhere between an inserter and a construction drone.
-- Doesn't have to be placed on the ground, so maybe make it's size 0 tiles? Like a regular item.

Edit: Added more details on how this can be implemented.

[dog80]

draw it plz

[Roodvlees]

It's inspired by Age of Empires 2, here's a screenshot of a 2x2, 3x3 and 4x4 building.

Of course this is for buildings, where Factorio is about machines.
So I really don't care about the graphics, it would be fine if different.
It's about the game play concept.

[darkfrei]

Looks pretty complicated.

[Roodvlees]

Just thought of another solution:
A ghost of the building.
We could use the same graphics used in the construction planner.
Just now it's an object that construction materials can be placed in.
The animation could simply be that your character pops in the machine to set things up.
When everything is done, he pops out and the machine is finished.

[mrvn]

Parts of this you could mod.

Your scaffolding is a special assembler and the recipe is the entity to build. That makes it automatically display the entity (with alt enabled) and accept the building materials. But you have to prevent inserters from inserting stuff as they would insert too much.

The tricky part is checking when it is done and replacing the scaffolding with the real entity. Checking every tick won't scale well. And only entity that generates events when done is the radar. Maybe you could place a hidden radar below the scaffolding using the item the scaffolding produces as fuel and a hidden inserter to transfer the item. Set the radar to finish scanning in one tick and when the event comes in you know you have some scaffolding to tear down.

I don't see any good way for having the player work on only one scaffolding. For construction bots they could be made parts of the recipe and can be returned or set free when tearing down the scaffolding.

PS: Look at Angel's Warehouses how to scale the icon to a good size.

[ZombieMooose]

If I'm understanding correctly, something like this but for all buildings?

https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Rocket-Silo-Construction

[Honktown]

I think the simplest way to do it would be a building like the rocket silo which requires ingredients, but when it is completed, it triggers a deconstruction, and then building placement event over itself for the next stage. If you used the default "deconstruct" control then you'd get the benefit of dumping unused ingredients and modules. Could also write a little hack that transfers modules into the next stage, if you wanted that at all.

You might be able to tweak the item table and control event, so that you can use one construct for multiple things. The original object would store what it was supposed to turn into, and a script would use that data, instead of needing a completely new entity for each assembler/etc you want to scaffold.

[Roodvlees]

Thanks for the tips.
Yes, something like the rocket silo construction for other buildings.
They would only need 1 stage though.

[L0771]

Hi, check this: Cursed Realistic Construction