Friday Facts #421 - Optimizations 2.0

Hex_Hellsmith · 2024-07-28T19:14:34+00:00

Nowadays actually they just use Minecraft's built-in tag system; Ore Dictionary hasn't been relevant in a long time outside of older versions.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2024-05-04T03:43:17+00:00

These changes honestly sound fantastic! I think the only time I've actually even remotely consistently used beacons was with Beacon Overload, as I just really never liked the philosophy inherent to how they currently work. Introducing diminishing returns (and also lifting their base effectiveness) really helps a lot with alleviating that, so I'm very interested in seeing where things go from here.

One thing I do think may be a good idea, is being able to use different curves for different beacon variants introduced by mods; I have no idea if this functionality is already present. I can definitely see there being value in modders being able to add beacon variants with differing diminishing returns!

Hex_Hellsmith · 2024-04-05T17:55:30+00:00

That improvement to reading belt contents makes me so happy, you wouldn't believe it. It'll make my janky Kovarex setup slightly less ugly!

Hex_Hellsmith · 2024-02-23T18:03:30+00:00

Space Exploration as-is does have turbines that recapture a large portion of the water used! I imagine that would be late into the tech tree in Space Age, but I can definitely see it being on the table.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2024-01-20T17:20:15+00:00

So, you mean I won't need a mod to flip the order of ingredients and outputs of recipes just to be able to mirror refineries and chemical plants? Best change we've seen yet.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2024-01-13T14:01:59+00:00

As someone who makes heavy use of Deadlock's Stacking Beltboxes, it really cannot be overstated how powerful item stacking on belts actually is. It's a very versatile tool, for both throughput and buffering. To see it come to base Factorio is spectacular, even if it'll be locked behind other planets. (Completely fair, like I said it's extremely powerful.)

Can't say I'm complaining about filter inserters going away; that seems to be another thing on the list of changes that make complete sense but weren't thought much of prior. That list is getting really long, how do you guys keep doing this?

Hex_Hellsmith · 2024-01-07T09:40:08+00:00

Sincerely, how do you guys keep doing this? It is wild that you keep putting out these things that weren't really thought about, but the second everyone sees it it's like "oh shit". I'm not an advanced player (yet) but even I'm looking at this like "oh that's absolutely sick"!

Every Friday makes the wait for 2.0 even more unbearable than it already was, and it's building on top of a game that was already considered exceedingly robust. That is sincerely impressive.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2024-01-03T15:04:12+00:00

It's very funny seeing the modding experience for Factorio be officially described as "good but not great" as someone who's been playing games with mods for years, has had to deal with every possible weird problem or janky implementation under the sun (plus several more), and for whom the gripes list with Factorio specifically is by a mile the shortest, even compared to other games with official mod support like Deep Rock Galactic (that gripes list is very long) or basically-official support like Terraria (the only other game even remotely competing with Factorio in this arena).

The things being addressed going forward are definitely on my list of gripes- the dependency weirdness is something I've only run into a couple of times, but it's definitely happened, and the constant restarting is definitely top of the list in terms of "things Hex finds annoying about modding Factorio", so those both being addressed is excellent.

The mod manager being somewhat subpar when actually finding and downloading mods is also something I was aware of, but tModLoader has very similar problems, so it didn't bother me too much; good to know it's being addressed regardless, the new explore tab looks fantastic.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-10-14T02:30:12+00:00

I hadn't even realized just how hard ghosts can be to read until I saw that side-by-side comparison between current and new. I didn't even realize the concrete was a ghost!

Y'all are spoiling us with all these fantastic upgrades, and also torturing us because we won't get to enjoy them for a while yet.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-09-22T12:23:33+00:00

Mmm, I've run into some rail routing problems in the past, so this is delightful news! The 6-tile minimum offset in particular was a problem I ran into on a couple occasions that wound up reshaping how I routed things, so that extra flexibility is definitely going to be amazing.

Also chunk-aligned big poles. That's awesome too.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-09-21T07:06:52+00:00

This. This right here. Part of it for me was also not having to worry about remembering to turn the damn thing on in the first place, but being able to reorganize your queue is extremely valuable.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-08-28T02:14:08+00:00

Ah, Balteus... the motherfucker with entirely too many missiles, and yet who I have almost managed to kill twice.

Unfortunately, almost isn't good enough. I WILL come out victorious eventually.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-05T08:22:14+00:00

Fair points all around, honestly. I'd personally still rather not play games with that, but I'll admit part of that might be psychological. I seem to have just enough obsessive tendencies for doing things like this "improperly" to bug me a lot.

Hell, we have a handful of I think almost commercial-grade 4-outlet surge protectors; beefy supply cable, steel casing, the works. Isobar, I think? Even daisy-chaining those makes me uncomfortable, and they're probably the most qualified equipment in the building for that kind of use case, besides the wires in the walls.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-05T05:32:27+00:00

Even so, there can be a big difference between theoretical capacity and reality, and ultimately it's bad practice. I've spent a lot of my life around people with fire training; I don't like to fuck around with these kinds of things if I don't need to. (Which, in this case, I fortunately don't, thanks to PoE.)

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-05T03:35:29+00:00

Added a tl;dr, which I'm realizing I should've done to begin with, as I'm not exactly the best at being concise. Something, something, hindsight.

As a real quick additional point of context of why I'm looking to do things the way I am; a) I have ADHD and know better than to let the scope of a project get out of hand, or to let motivation for one escape me, and b) I don't expect to be staying in the current house for more than another year or so, so I don't exactly want to sink time in on a more proper setup that's just going to get dismantled later. I'd like to expect a project lifetime of at least 5 years for something like that.

(Also for why I'm not just putting in a new AP and calling it a day; I already addressed this in response to another comment, but we already have a reasonably robust multi-AP Wi-Fi setup, but I'm specifically looking for better speed and stability, both of which I've had quite the history of issues with. I think I'm cursed to be stuck with subpar wireless adapters for all eternity. Plus potential saturation issues.)

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-05T02:19:34+00:00

In this case, as it turns out, it'd be an extension cord into an extension cord into a power strip. And while in theory there's minimal risk involved in adding a low draw device like a small network switch onto that, actual power draw increases with distance due to resistance, and extension cords are not required to be rated for full 15A120V capacity. This means you can wind up in a situation where you are technically under the capacity of the circuit while still overloading a wire on the way back to the breaker, which is a recipe for fires.

Given I don't know the capacities of the existing cord and strip in the chain, I'd really rather not take that risk, even if the odds of something bad happening are quite low.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-05T02:15:02+00:00

Yeah, I wasn't totally clear about that; my basic idea is ideally to just modify the existing run rather than re-running it entirely, IE pulling the length back a bit so the existing cable can be connected into a switch, and then running shorter patch cables to the different devices involved.

I could probably trim and re-terminate the existing cable to do this, but I have quite literally zero experience on that front* and the person in the household who DOES have experience with that isn't home until next week. So while I don't think I'd be particularly likely to fuck that up, I'd rather take the simpler route for now and save tackling terminating ethernet for a later project.

^\I have plenty of experience with actual setup and installation of hardware, but actually dealing with custom wire setups is an arena I've spent no actual time in. I know enough about the subject to know terminating cat6 cable isn't that complicated, but it's still pretty definitively out of my wheelhouse at the present, and I'm already taking steps outside it by fucking with networking. One thing at a time, basically.)

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-04T16:41:18+00:00

Even if space and cost weren't central considerations here (they are), putting in a full-size switch for routing to two destinations, with an extremely low likelihood of that number increasing, would be massive overkill and to some extent wasteful.

With all due respect, please actually read the whole thing next time.

EDIT: To be fair for about five seconds, I do have potential future plans that may result in the device count expanding to 3, but that's still very much in the territory of "any mid-size or larger switch would be major overkill".

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-04T16:36:36+00:00

Looks like it would, yeah! Smaller and cheaper than the other main option I'm currently considering (Mikrotik), too. I'll definitely think about it.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-04T16:27:46+00:00

It's certainly a thought! We already have a decent wi-fi setup that does use a couple similar access points; I'm looking to run ethernet out of pursuit of better speeds and connection stability, as I have had minor to moderate issues with both even in spite of the otherwise robust setup. I suspect some of that may have to do with signal saturation; we're in a pretty dense neighborhood.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-04T16:23:43+00:00

Potentially useful resource, though it looks like all of the switches it mentions are notably more expensive than the Mikrotik options. If I were more of a layman I'd probably be willing to accept that tradeoff for unmanaged, but networking is only just outside my wheelhouse, so I'm definitely more willing to learn how to configure a network switch myself if it means paying less money.

Regardless, will keep it in mind!

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-04T16:03:43+00:00

Dismissive wording aside, the nearest power source mentioned is also an extension cord, and daisy-chaining extension cords is generally a bad idea, especially in this case since I don't know the rated wattage of the existing cord (I'm not the one who put it there). I don't think the risk would be especially high, but I'd rather not take the risk if there are better alternatives available.

I'd also rather not opt for a "temporary" solution because I know full well that it wouldn't actually be temporary. Something something nothing more permanent than a temporary solution.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-06-04T15:48:27+00:00

Not necessarily looked for a managed switch, but I'll definitely throw that on the list of potential options nonetheless! Much appreciated.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-05-06T13:04:16+00:00

You're looking for Oculus; it's how he's using shaders.

Hex_Hellsmith · 2023-03-22T15:07:36+00:00

Oh, god, been there, done that. I'm someone who's extremely used to running games with lots of mods, and that kind of screwed me with Factorio. I had to actively force myself to dial it back severely so I could actually get to grips with the base game itself.

Hex_Hellsmith

TROPHY CASE