I was doing an okay job keeping things organized until I had to start processing oil. That’s…a lot of steps, and I didn’t make enough space for it. I’m making a better factory elsewhere though, just gonna use that piss-poor setup for batteries only.
I’m on the verge of getting the robo-logistics set up, we’ll see how that goes. I just need to make some more batteries n shit
That’s normal at the beginning though.
You always screw up your “learning” bases, but eventually you pick up on some good design patterns. I’m personally a fan of a “liquid bus” of underground pipes with t-junctions for the refineries and liquid silos.
Of course, there’s always the option of starting a new base from scratch elsewhere on the map…
I really should check out free play. I tried to play the campaign/tutorial and bounced right off, even though I feel like this should absolutely be my jam
The campaign hasn’t been touched by development for at least a year and it really isn’t indicative of what the game is about.
Freeplay and Campaign are kind of misnomers in this case.
What the campaign is, more accurately, are learning/challenge scenarios. Meanwhile, the freeplay does have a definite endgame (launching the rocket), even though you can totally continue playing on the same map after that…
What’s the interest in a multiplayer server?
I’ve been having a hard time resisting starting a server based on comments in this thread over the past few days. I’ve been trying to hold out for the version that is no longer Early Access.
But I guess it’s close enough now. I’d play now if others are interested. I have not tried the game with monster aggression turned on, and that might be a fun challenge.
Also, I didn’t realize that this game had a campaign. Or if I did, I noticed and then forgot.
Alien attacks are kind of a bad mechanic IMO. I’m OK with the part where I need to go out and clear them to get more land, but not so much with the parts where they constantly distract me from what I’m doing and where I need to tediously establish a defensive perimeter. There is also delayed punishment/savelocking around over-relying on either non-armor-piercing-rounds or lasers without independent power supply. I enjoyed my playthroughs more with aggression set to minimum.
The main reason I don’t play with aggressive aliens are the potential for distractions from building your base yeah.
I often think how I’m missing out on a whole aspect of the game with defense building and automatic ammo supplies etc, not to mention a whole branch of the tech tree, but being left alone while working on your designs still weighs more
I’ve been playing the railworld map generation preset, where they evolve less slowly and don’t expand their nests. I’ve had very few attacks, seems like just the right amount honestly. They’re at about 30% evolution so I’m seeing some medium biters but I’ve got armor piercing rounds a-plenty and they go down quickly.
I like the pressure to continue developing military tech, but at the end of the day it does seem like a bit of a distraction. It does pressure me to try and build my base a little more quickly than I otherwise would though.
You guys are thinking about the bugs the wrong way. They’re merely an extra logistical problem to solve and there are different approaches. For example since I tend to make eco-friendly bases, they’re remarkably uninterested in attacking me even at default settings, but there are other ways to do it.
Solar panels are boring AF though and undermine the oilpunk aesthetic of the rest of the game, IMO they should just be removed now that nuclear plants exist
There are other ways to make an ecological factory than just cover the surrounding area with solar farms, just by ensuring your existing stuff is efficient. And removing them is silly, the game’s strength is it allows for different approaches and varying scales. And there are several approaches to securing your base against bugs, too. You’ve gotta let your imagination run free. I used to be a big fan of gigantic turret-lined walls, though these days I’m more of a proponent of forts and outposts, and securing nest-free space through artillery and the occasional nuke joyride.
Both solar farms and perimeter defense mostly amount to just building a large amount of the same thing in my experience, which is why I’m not a big fan. For similar reasons, my other least favorite thing about the game is smelting (why is iron and copper smelted exactly the same way?)
That didn’t exist last I played. That does sound like a more fun approach
Factorio is all about building large amounts of everything. It’s the core of the game and you should seek to automate it as much as you can. With adequate radar and roboport coverage you won’t even have to walk to the spot where you want to build stuff.
I started I freeplay game and okay I get what you’re saying
Like I just gotta automate this one more thing
Agreed. In my first base I blueprinted a solar array and automated the fabrication of its components and scaling your solar energy output was totally painless. Literally one click.
Nuclear plants have different enough dynamics that I don’t feel they completely replace solar power (not to mention you get them late game and are expensive to set up properly)
Well, by boring I don’t necessarily mean tedious (though it is that before you get bots), but rather that it’s trivial. “totally painless, literally one click” is also boring.
I enjoyed the dynamics of managing supply to my steam power plant, especially the challenge in bootstrapping after a blackout because your electric miners run super slow at partial power. Dealing with steam power blackouts in the midgame was one of the defining Factorio experiences for me – your massive factory suddenly becomes a liability and you comically run around hauling coal by hand and deliberately cutting off power. Of course you can prevent it with independent power grids and such, but that’s a fun litle logistical problem in itself (and easy to screw up with a stray extra power pole)
It may not cause as many potentially interesting problems as coal power supplies, but I think that the day/night dynamics and management of stored energy in accumulators add enough friction to elevate solar power from just trivial.
In any case, Factorio definitely isn’t a game that goes for minimalism of design. Trains or circuit networks could also be eliminated without fundamentally changing the core game, but the developers obviously prefer providing options even when they are redundant or superfluous.
Okay, I went ahead and set up a map on a server, in case anyone would like to play as a group. It’s totally blank at the moment.
I believe that all map settings are defaults, so bugs may attack based on pollution. I’d been wanting to try that mode anyway, but I think it can be changed through the console if it proves too much of a nuisance.
Here is the address:
64.58.123.196:34197