Factorio Forums

I realise this has been talked about before but I think the game almost begs for some RTS flavor. And yes I do realise there's some RTS mods but I think it could be done a lot better and a lot more... Factorio.

You might be wondering: why? Well, for one, the way combat currently works you can pretty much either 100% win or 100% loose and there's little in-between. Imagine you're attacking a biter nest in your shiny new car. Provided you have enough ammo the possible outcomes of this battle are either:
a) you wipe out the enemy(100% win)
b) your car gets destroyed but you manage to retreat(100% loss)
c) you die(100% loss)

Let's be honest, if b) or c) happens EVERYONE just reloads a save. Everyone savescums, me included. I know you do that too. But why is that? Well, getting a new car is barely even a setback, rather it's a trivial and menial task since you never need a car production line and the car itself costs very little. So we all know if we loose the car we can be back at it in like 5-10 minutes as if nothing had happened, and that makes loosing nothing but a waste of time - so we savescum. Because loosing is worth pretty much nothing, winning is not very enticing- and the only possible outcome with savescumming.

Now, imagine this - you have created an assembly line for autonomous drones you can control RTS style. This instantly requires more engagement to even design the assembly line. Furthermore this way you very rarely 100% win or 100% loose - Both sides will probably take some losses. But most importantly loosing a drone means loosing RESOURCES, not TIME. So even if you fail the attack completely and loose all your drones, you might still want to keep playing. Your assembly line will soon create new drones for you so you don't even have to do anything. You don't need to run around wasting time to gather resources and hand craft the drones like you do with the car.You can just wait for the new drones and do something else in the meantime, staying engaged. But loosing a bunch of drones has a very real cost in resources, probably substantialy higher than the cost of a new car, so you still want to avoid it. Replacing resources = more pollution = biters stronger, it's a very real long-term penalty that feels meaningful.

Okay, so that's why I think the game could use RTS elements. But the RTS elements should themselves provide interesting engineering challenges to mesh well with the rest of the game - which is what the RTS mods don't do well in my opinion. So here's the way I see it - When you manufacture a drone, it's an empty hull - if you deploy it like that all it can do is fly around. In order for it to actually do anything you need to equip it with modules,just like you can with modular armor or Spidertron (each drone has it's own module grid). But the twist is that you can't install these modules by hand - these can only be installed by machines (assembler/inserter/some new entity). So now you have to design the entire production line around what you want your drones to do! Your production line and your drones can be totally unique from everyone elses and you get to express your creativity in new ways - and then you get to watch the fruit of your labor murder some biters!

Anyway I hope you enjoyed my incoherent rambling and maybe one day I'll try to make this into a mod when I got the time - but feel free to steal the idea. And let me know what you think about the whole Factorio RTS thing

AAI is your best bet for this.

But, it does not really work. This is because the biters have basically one resource, Spawners. They keep spitting out replacement biters/spitters frequently until killed.

The ONLY way to have a “you both lost some” outcome is basically an incomplete win : you take out some spawners. If you fail to take out any spawners, the defensive units will be just as numerous on your next visit (they did not lose anything). Take out one spawner, and it can no longer contribute to defenses. Take them all out, and you’ve won. Take out somewhere in the middle, and you’ve won - albeit with a need for a return visit. If biter expansion is turned on, there’s little difference between having to return because it was an incomplete win, and having to return because they’ve expanded back into the area.

b)
↳2) You lose your car and are forced to retreat, but because you're a true Factorian, you whip another car, more ammo, and some fuel out of your pocket and get back to clearing before the nests/worms have a chance to regenerate their health.

astroshak wrote: Mon Oct 12, 2020 2:18 am AAI is your best bet for this.

But, it does not really work. This is because the biters have basically one resource, Spawners. They keep spitting out replacement biters/spitters frequently until killed.

The ONLY way to have a “you both lost some” outcome is basically an incomplete win : you take out some spawners. If you fail to take out any spawners, the defensive units will be just as numerous on your next visit (they did not lose anything). Take out one spawner, and it can no longer contribute to defenses. Take them all out, and you’ve won. Take out somewhere in the middle, and you’ve won - albeit with a need for a return visit. If biter expansion is turned on, there’s little difference between having to return because it was an incomplete win, and having to return because they’ve expanded back into the area.

Yeah that's basically what I meant, you loose some drones and they loose worms/spawners. You might be wondering how is this any different from the car situation - you loose a car, they loose some spawners. Well, with the car it's your only war asset, loosing it means the conquest is failed and you have to "restart" and make a new car. With drones, even if you loose all the drones you still have the assembly line, so you may loose a battle but the war continues.

Theikkru wrote: Mon Oct 12, 2020 3:16 am b)
↳2) You lose your car and are forced to retreat, but because you're a true Factorian, you whip another car, more ammo, and some fuel out of your pocket and get back to clearing before the nests/worms have a chance to regenerate their health.

Dam, true hardcore factorio player.

Usually a destroyed car results in a dead player. That’s why people reload I think.

There is also the ammo and fuel in the car that was lost. But I tend to ignore the two vehicular options anyway; I approach with AP ammo and some grenades, on foot, and clear what I can. What I cannot I defend against until I have power armor and a fusion reactor and personal laser defenses and exoskeletons.

Can clear a decent area on foot, at least until running into big biters and medium worms.

My vision of the RTS twist is :
- Destroy the spawners with automated artillery, which uses resources,
- Let the punitive attack vaporize itself on the regular defenses (turrets, mines, walls and whatnot), which uses resources or only energy
- Expand the defense perimeter in the direction the 2 steps above have been performed. Via roboports, blueprints, and stuff. Totally automated, most resources are recycled from previous defense perimeter, plus a small amount of new resources.

It just works (TM). And it's a very factorioesque twist on the RTS genre.

Koub wrote: Mon Oct 12, 2020 2:39 pm My vision of the RTS twist is :
- Destroy the spawners with automated artillery, which uses resources,
- Let the punitive attack vaporize itself on the regular defenses (turrets, mines, walls and whatnot), which uses resources or only energy
- Expand the defense perimeter in the direction the 2 steps above have been performed. Via roboports, blueprints, and stuff. Totally automated, most resources are recycled from previous defense perimeter, plus a small amount of new resources.

It just works (TM). And it's a very factorioesque twist on the RTS genre.

Yeah lol Factorio is the most Factorio RTS game there is can't argue about that

astroshak wrote: Mon Oct 12, 2020 1:05 pm Usually a destroyed car results in a dead player. That’s why people reload I think.

That’s why discharge defense is in the game. The most underused Omega 13 in the game.