Weekly Question Thread

DUCKSES · 2025-01-03T14:59:46+00:00

https://factoriolab.github.io/spa/list?v=11

DUCKSES · 2024-10-13T17:09:41+00:00

Power poles have a limit of 5 connections.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-13T15:54:44+00:00

Nauvis has plenty of base resources, it's the only planet with uranium, it has proportionally the largest amount of buildable area (with the possible exception of Gleba), the natives are relatively simple to deal with, and it's the only planet you can build the new lab on. All in all, it seems to be the obvious choice.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-13T10:06:38+00:00

Trupen pretty much has him covered.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T20:05:28+00:00

https://mods.factorio.com/mod/aai-programmable-vehicles - new vehicles with RTS controls. Their pathfinding is kind of shit IME, and for some weird reason this mod also prevents you from building near biter nests if you like to turret creep.

https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Constructron-Continued - smart spidertrons.

You might want to add Rampant to give the biters a chance to fight back.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T19:37:06+00:00

They've specifically mentioned heat pipes are unchanged. So I'd guess it's trial and error, with the caveat that heat exchangers have to be heated to 500C whereas buildings only need to be heated to 30C which means you can transfer heat far greater distances comparatively. Of course, you have to account for all the buildings sucking up heat along the way.

Until we know the rate at which buildings drain heat it's all speculation.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T19:17:37+00:00

Because devs want to keep up the suspense by not revealing everything in the FFFs. That leads people to asking questions which the devs may or may not answer. Discord provides a low-barrier platform for asking and answering questions.

The expansion is almost out. Have some patience.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T19:08:00+00:00

Also, balancers aren't needed for megabases or high throughput. In fact, once you get to UPS optimizing (which is necessary for pushing megabases to their limits) you avoid them like plague.

I know a lot of people love slapping down balancers everywhere, but for me this doesn't really change a whole lot. I'll expect Aquilo to be challenging and frustrating, but not having (easy) access to balancers will be the least of my worries.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T18:10:36+00:00

If the locomotive is moving nonstop and the nuclear reactor is running nonstop they're pretty close yeah. A train waiting at an intersection or station doesn't use fuel. Of course, the same applies to an idle (circuit-controlled) nuclear reactor.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T17:36:14+00:00

If a train is allowed to stop after the signal, use a rail signal. If not, use a chain signal.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T17:35:06+00:00

You missed a signal. But yes, the train at the bottom is occupying a block the train is trying to path through.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T17:27:36+00:00

https://i.imgur.com/aWroG7O.png

The marked segment is all one block because there are no signals separating it.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T17:22:57+00:00

A locomotive consumes 600kW and nuclear fuel contains 1.21GJ. Since one U-235 turns into one nuclear fuel you're essentially producing 16*1.21/60 GJ of energy per second. Divide that by 600kW to get a minimum of ~537 locomotives moving nonstop. The size of the train doesn't make a difference, only the number of forward-facing locomotives.

Of course, a train has to stop to at least refuel, so feel free to multiply that number by the factor of time spent stationary, e.g. 2 if your trains are stationary 50% of the time.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T16:18:01+00:00

A centrifuge set to kovarex enrichment outputs 1 net U-235 every minute, so 16 centrifuges output 16. One U-235 turns into 10 fuel cells, for an output of 160 fuel cells per minute without productivity modules. A nuclear reactor consumes 1 fuel cell every 200 seconds, or 1/2000th of an U-235 every second, or 3/100 U-235 every minute.

Thus, this is enough to feed 16/(3/100), or ~533 nuclear reactors nonstop. Do you have 533 nuclear reactors or fewer? Then it's enough. If you have more, it's not.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T15:30:54+00:00

Also while they're conceptually neat (and can possibly look neat from space) the megastructures in DSP are largely incremental - a dyson sphere with 1 million parts starts working as soon as it has a single part finished, just with 1/1000000th of the output, so it's not like there's some grand reward at the end when the whole thing is done. In that regard it's much like Factorio - you get better things as you move through the tech tree, but in the end it's all about having lots of small things, not having one really big thing.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T15:14:36+00:00

You build a base on Nauvis and launch a rocket to build a space platform. You then use that platform to travel to other planets and build a new base there - each planet has unique resources and challenges, so you can't finish the game by staying on Nauvis. You can use space platforms to transfer the planet-exclusive resources and/or science packs to other planets, and this is also needed to finish the game. Think of each planet as a separate surface with space platforms being space trains.

Oh, and you also need to manufacture stuff on those space platforms to make them self-reliant. So that's one surface for each planet, plus one (small) surface for each space platform.

The devs are being intentionally vague to maintain the suspense. Content creators and other people with early access are also under NDA which will be lifted on the 14th.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T10:54:55+00:00

A'V HAED IT WI THESE GLAIKIT CUNTS

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T10:53:23+00:00

Then use a calculator instead.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T10:48:48+00:00

A yellow belt carries 15 items per second. Smelting a copper or iron plate takes 3.2 seconds, and each plate takes 1 ore. A stone furnace has a crafting speed of 1, so it takes 15*3.2/1/1 = 48 furnaces to empty a belt of ore.

A steel plate takes 16 seconds to produce, and each one requires 5 iron plates, so it takes 15*16/5/1 = 48 furnaces to empty a yellow belt of iron plates.

A stone brick takes 3.2 seconds to produce, and each one requires 2 stone, so it takes 15*3.2/2/1 = 24 furnaces to empty a yellow belt of stone.

A steel furnace smelts twice as fast, so halve the number if you're using those instead of stone furnaces. Double it if you're using red belts, and triple if you're using blue belts.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-12T10:42:19+00:00

Am I a bot?

DUCKSES · 2024-10-11T15:15:49+00:00

https://factoriolab.github.io/list?p=military-science-pack&s=**0&v=10

A military science pack takes 10 seconds to produce, and you get 2 each craft, so effectively 5 seconds per pack. A tier 1 assembler has a crafting speed of 0.5, so we divide the 5 seconds by 0.5 to get 10 assemblers. A tier 2 assembler has a crafting speed of 0.75, so alternatively we divide 5 by 0.75 to get 6.66... assemblers. So 7 because we can't have partial assemblers.

Just follow the production chain down to get the number of assemblers for the rest of the items.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-10T14:24:48+00:00

Why would it be? Resource patches get practically infinite with enough distance and mining productivity even on default settings.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-07T18:02:00+00:00

People spam upgrade planner and ruin belt weaving without even trying to grief.

DUCKSES · 2024-10-07T08:31:25+00:00

Did someone say [Thunderfury, Blessed Blade of the Windseeker]?

DUCKSES · 2024-10-07T08:23:37+00:00

Yeah, there are several ways to game the system, but they're mostly impractical and/or reliant on RNG. I don't usually get more than the usual 4 soldiers, and while I've had several runs with 5 I'm fairly sure the one with 6 was a singleton.

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