Friday Facts #224 - Bots versus belts

[bobingabout]

Also, as and when changes are made, there's always an option to play on an old stable version as a result of Steam's beta selection capability together with the factorio devs retaining old stable versions on Steam (if I read this right):

Assuming you play through steam. I do not.

[Drury]

Also, as and when changes are made, there's always an option to play on an old stable version as a result of Steam's beta selection capability together with the factorio devs retaining old stable versions on Steam (if I read this right):

Assuming you play through steam. I do not.

Don't be a smartguy, you know you can download these from https://factorio.com/download too.

[batorfly]

For radicals I wanna propose another mental exercise
Removing logistic network capabilities is actually quite easy and is described in achievement “Logistic embargo” - just disable recipes for requester and active provider chests. This is extremely easily modded but for some reason I fail to find such mod and mods are considered to be first player voice. And necessity of changes is usually judged by popularity of such mods.

Wube’s success was earned by their ability to reflect player voice in their product. I really hope they will stay on this path cause with latest posts and patches they are really walking on steep edges.

Good point!
Thing is, we don't need to discuss removing bots anymore, it ain't gonna happen. Even in FFF removing is only hypothetical, and now after this discussion i can't see it happening. Also i think bots nerfing is secondary, main focus should be on belts buffs.

There is already 40 pages. I'm not going to join disscusion on that topic bc i haven't read all 40 pages. I don't want to post something that was already said.

[Mario]

if I'm not mistaken, the factorio team bothers: the factories are too boring. That's why they want to push players in the direction of conveyor belts. Correct?

If that's the reason. Would I introduce a new power network needed for robot ports. This would make the factories more interesting again. From high voltage to household voltage, so to speak. That could be done in two ways:

First, by "converters" that lose efficiency over time and need to be replaced or repaired. (Maintenance work)

Second, new generators that do the same thing as the old generators, but with less voltage. That would increase the cost of large robot fleets and mean more administration.

I like the first Ide better because I think things should go bad and factories need maintenance.

[obuw]

I try to avoid using bots as much as possible in a vanilla game, as belt optimization and factory layout is basically the only challenge in the game and logistic bots defeat that.

However when you start playing with, say, bob's / angel's mods, the amount of interconnected recipes quickly get out of hand, and bots are practically *required* once you get to the mid-game. So I'm glad that they are in the game.

I think limiting their usefulness could be done by encouraging more long-range transportation. The game is quite limited in this aspect and map generation is the real culprit here imho. The game needs new resources, that require the player to explore the world to find. In default settings, everything you need is already in your starting area. I usually play modded, with all resources set to very low frequency, so I need to go out and explore a lot of land to find things I need.

I was hoping the game would be expanded with different kinds of biters, different enemy bases that you could harvest resources from, different biomes with new resources, but unfortunately the past 2 years seem to have been 99% about optimization and high-res graphics. Instead of adding new biters, alien artifacts were actually removed from the game. Makes me real sad to see a fantastic game just going in a direction that is opposite of what I was hoping for.

Anyway, I'm hoping that at some point I'll have the time to make some new mod to improve exploration and strategy aspects of the game.

[malecord]

Personally I don't understand this "buff the belts" argument. What is the problem with current belts? You upgrade yellow to red, red to blue and then you put down multiple blue.

Putting down multiple parallel belts is not a chore is actually a nice evolution of the puzzle in the mid-late game. It's when you discover that you need to keep them balanced with balancers and circuits. And constructions bots are already there to take away a lot of the tedium from the player. When you can't add more parallel belts you start to duplicate entire production lines and factories and your puzzle moves on how to organize them and connect them with trains. It might just be me but I don't see how a purple or green belt can help making things more interesting. It's just about postponing a little more the late game challenges.

The devs concern is that bots pose little/no challenge and keep players away from a lot of the complexity (fun) content in the game like belt puzzles. How making belts less challenging is going to address this? Not to mention that no matter how buffed a belt can be, logistic bots will always overshadow them as they are implemented now. Belts will always have a maximum throughput per square, bots have no limits. Belts requires you to solve puzzles and pay with tile space the ability to achieve more throughput. Bots have nothing of this (or better not enough of this, since they do admittedly need to recharge from time to time and roboports can serve a limited number at a time). The only advantage of belts is that they consume no energy but energy in the game is like an infinite resource in the late game between solar and nuclear.

In my opinion a belt buff will not solve anything. It's really a bot nerf what is needed (removing them is nuts). Logistic bots gameplay can benefit a lot from a constraint/rule that force on them a max throughput limit in a given area so that the player is required to to invest more land to raise it and possibly optimize it by carefully designing and planning his factory. Alternatively electricity must be made a scarce resource. But this one is a dangerous route because it gives to the player not many options to go around it while the former has the benefit of posing more challenges without limiting factory sizes.

[Drury]

Personally I don't understand this "buff the belts" argument. What is the problem with current belts? You upgrade yellow to red, red to blue and then you put down multiple blue.

Putting down multiple parallel belts is not a chore is actually a nice evolution of the puzzle in the mid-late game. It's when you discover that you need to keep them balanced with balancers and circuits. And constructions bots are already there to take away a lot of the tedium from the player. When you can't add more parallel belts you start to duplicate entire production lines and factories and your puzzle moves on how to organize them and connect them with trains. It might just be me but I don't see how a purple or green belt can help making things more interesting. It's just about postponing a little more the late game challenges.

The devs concern is that bots pose little/no challenge and keep players away from a lot of the complexity (fun) content in the game like belt puzzles. How making belts less challenging is going to address this? Not to mention that no matter how buffed a belt can be, logistic bots will always overshadow them as they are implemented now. Belts will always have a maximum throughput per square, bots have no limits. Belts requires you to solve puzzles and pay with tile space the ability to achieve more throughput. Bots have nothing of this (or better not enough of this, since they do admittedly need to recharge from time to time and roboports can serve a limited number at a time). The only advantage of belts is that they consume no energy but energy in the game is like an infinite resource in the late game between solar and nuclear.

In my opinion a belt buff will not solve anything. It's really a bot nerf what is needed (removing them is nuts). Logistic bots gameplay can benefit a lot from a constraint/rule that force on them a max throughput limit in a given area so that the player is required to to invest more land to raise it and possibly optimize it by carefully designing and planning his factory. Alternatively electricity must be made a scarce resource. But this one is a dangerous route because it gives to the player not many options to go around it while the former has the benefit of posing more challenges without limiting factory sizes.

This is honestly the smartest post yet.

Yes, by nerfing the bots you would make belt users feel less like they're missing out by sticking to their principles, but at the end of the day the problem persists. Balancing belts is fun and all, but by the lategame it starts to feel like a chore. There's just too much micromanagement. Bots are an extreme alternative where they completely remove any semblance of planned transport. At the same time, the utility they provide is immense. What I'd subjectively like is something that is as useful as bots, but not as simple to set up. Something that could take items from anywhere and dump them anywhere else, en-masse, but not completely without player's agency. Preferably something that you could build contraptions out of using circuits.

[Alice3173]

The devs concern is that bots pose little/no challenge and keep players away from a lot of the complexity (fun) content in the game like belt puzzles.

And what about those who consider untangling belt lines to be tedious in the late game rather than engaging and fun? Why should they be forced to play in a way they don't enjoy because someone else insists it's the correct way to play? They shouldn't because it goes against the spirit of the game.

[seePyou]

[...] construction bots + laser turrets is broken OP too. Consider making turrets require ~30 seconds to boot up/apply targeting parameters/<insert flavor text> so you can't drop clusters in an active bug base and wreck it in seconds. Restrict or reduce effectiveness of repairs by bots on turrets being actively damaged.

While that might seem like a good idea, the creep will still exist. Just reach just outside the range of the biter base with turrets that do not attack them. Place the next row of lasers. Until they are ready to attack (30 seconds or whatever), the back rows of lasers can defend them.
This does not stop the crawl. It just makes it slower by a little.

[seePyou]

Possible belt buffs; general theme, do much more in the same space

• Belt multiplexer: End tier upgrade allows multiple belts to stack "vertically" on top of each-other so that more than 2 types of materials can go on one tile of belt. There would be a structure to combine multiple normal belts into the multiplexed one. Filter inserters could take from any layer.
• Stack inserter upgrades benefit belts. Every other upgrade (IE when non-stack inserters get an upgrade) also upgrade belts so that each spot on the belt can hold an additional item. Alternately, decrease the required space between items on belts to half, third, quarter of the original spacing. I imagine the latter would be easier to implement. Alternately, any variant on upgradability of belt throughput through research.
• Stack inserter researches can be buffed significantly. Many more levels and lower beaker cost
• Belt cost compared to bot cost needs to be lower since so many are required.
• Add more utility to inserters at end game, for example the best possible inserter could be a filter stack inserter able to pick up from and place into any arbitrary spot in a 2 or even 3 tile radius; it could be asked to pick from one or more inventories and place into one or more inventories. It could be asked to balance N chests. There are some huge buffs possible for inserters. They're robotic arms - utility and flexibility should continue increasing as the game progresses. Advanced/programmable inserters can compete with the bots for the global command and control resource mentioned below.

Bot rebalance; continue increasing utility, reduce scalability and increase cost

• Bots require global "command and control" resource. This is provided by "datacenters", an expensive structure requiring lots of power and made with processors. Players get some of this resource for free from their salvaged ship computer. This resource is consumed to control active bots. Additionally, roboports can control 2 or 4 bots each. Construction should require less of this resource than logistics.
• Requester and active provider chests also consume this C&C resource.
• Bots must queue to access an inventory rather than swarming. They shouldn't be able to access inventories faster than a stack inserter
• Bots have an internal temperature to their batteries which affects the efficiency of charging/discharging, as well as the rate the battery degrades. Lower duty cycles result in more efficiency and longer life. Bot batteries eventually wear out requiring replacement of the bot. Basically, add in some of the downsides real world batteries have. It's easy to insert into a roboport so it's only a minor inconvenience if bots become consumables, but adds resource upkeep in addition to power.
• Add a construction only roboport which is very cheap compared to the full logistics version. Allow construction bots to serve the player's inventory

I agree with all of these in principle. Some more than others, like the fact that belts are ridiculously expnsive. I'm also very interested in the consumable nature of bots, and it makes sence, as is the consumable nature of circuits from the central command and control (boards get changed, worn out, it's interesting, is all I'm saying). After all, I would be in favour of more consumables introduced in the game to increase the complexity of logistics planning.

[ili]

Personally I don't understand this "buff the belts" argument. What is the problem with current belts? You upgrade yellow to red, red to blue and then you put down multiple blue.

Putting down multiple parallel belts is not a chore is actually a nice evolution of the puzzle in the mid-late game. It's when you discover that you need to keep them balanced with balancers and circuits. And constructions bots are already there to take away a lot of the tedium from the player. When you can't add more parallel belts you start to duplicate entire production lines and factories and your puzzle moves on how to organize them and connect them with trains. It might just be me but I don't see how a purple or green belt can help making things more interesting. It's just about postponing a little more the late game challenges.

The devs concern is that bots pose little/no challenge and keep players away from a lot of the complexity (fun) content in the game like belt puzzles. How making belts less challenging is going to address this? Not to mention that no matter how buffed a belt can be, logistic bots will always overshadow them as they are implemented now. Belts will always have a maximum throughput per square, bots have no limits. Belts requires you to solve puzzles and pay with tile space the ability to achieve more throughput. Bots have nothing of this (or better not enough of this, since they do admittedly need to recharge from time to time and roboports can serve a limited number at a time). The only advantage of belts is that they consume no energy but energy in the game is like an infinite resource in the late game between solar and nuclear.

In my opinion a belt buff will not solve anything. It's really a bot nerf what is needed (removing them is nuts). Logistic bots gameplay can benefit a lot from a constraint/rule that force on them a max throughput limit in a given area so that the player is required to to invest more land to raise it and possibly optimize it by carefully designing and planning his factory. Alternatively electricity must be made a scarce resource. But this one is a dangerous route because it gives to the player not many options to go around it while the former has the benefit of posing more challenges without limiting factory sizes.

This is honestly the smartest post yet.

Yes, by nerfing the bots you would make belt users feel less like they're missing out by sticking to their principles, but at the end of the day the problem persists. Balancing belts is fun and all, but by the lategame it starts to feel like a chore. There's just too much micromanagement. Bots are an extreme alternative where they completely remove any semblance of planned transport. At the same time, the utility they provide is immense. What I'd subjectively like is something that is as useful as bots, but not as simple to set up. Something that could take items from anywhere and dump them anywhere else, en-masse, but not completely without player's agency. Preferably something that you could build contraptions out of using circuits.

@Drury, Balancing 2,4,8 or even 16 blue belts is fun, but one you go beyond that its gets:
1. just annoying.
2. practically Impossible do to UPS.
We need a way to make that 16 blue belts throughput better like plates/basket.
something like stack inserter technology that put all the items in his hand as one "item" on the belt and then split them back to individual items when piked back up

[js1]

I thought about it and I think the best would be to rate-limit delivery to/from a single logistic endpoint, such as chests. For example, each logistic chest could have a queue of robots waiting to load or unload, and it would serve these requests in turn so that the rate would be slower than inserting (or stack inserting) items to/from the chest (personally I would think a rate of normal inserter per bot would be OK, as it would force players to get more creative in increasing the throughput).

That would make the belts better option than bots, however, if you wanted to use bots for special stuff, you still could.

I think the ideas to make belts better are also good, but in general it is harder to make something better (in particular, I don't see how they could make the belts to scale to infinite throughput as bots do, and I don't think it's desirable either); at some point there is going to be a limit of what the computer can handle simulating.

[vanatteveldt]

Personally I don't understand this "buff the belts" argument. What is the problem with current belts? You upgrade yellow to red, red to blue and then you put down multiple blue.

Yeah, belts aren't the thing that needs buffing, its belt -> container insertion. For me at least, the main reasons for using bots are:

(1) infrequent items over long distances, just too much hassle to deal with belts. But I could, if I wanted (using more spaghetti. Delicious spaghetti!)

(2) train loading from short distances, especially for outposts; just too much hassle to deal with balanced loaders and balancing between wagons/stations. But I could, if I wanted, using a combination of circuit logic and splitters)

(3) supplying plants where belt inserters don't have the throughput for a single plant; read: cable to green circuit. A fully boosted marathon green circuit plant requires 5.5*2*10=110 cable per second. Inserting from a belt you would need 110/12>9 stack inserters to saturate it, which requires too much space for a beaconed design. So, the only real options here are direct insertion (inefficient in beaconed setups, and you need more than 2 cable plants per circuit plant), insertion via chests (maximum 4 chests, still not enough), or bots. So, in this instance bots are simply needed to get the throughput to saturate a single plant in a beaconed setup.

So, in my opinion they should buff stack inserters to be able to output to a fully compressed belt (e.g. with a belt buffer of sorts) and input from a fully compressed belt at the same speed as container->container (e.g. with a 'reverse belt buffer' -> visually it could buffer e.g. 12 items from the far lane on a platform above the close lane. The stack inserter can then grab the items from the buffer. Downside would be cost of the buffer and the 12 items "stranded" there.

[Mekronid]

While I personally dislike logistic bots, I believe they should stay in the game. To keep them balanced with belts is easy: add a "teleport" structure with a speed and cost similar to that of bots which fits on either end of a belt and feeds or retrieves from an inserter. Call it "pneumatic tube" and add a level-up path similar to what already exists for bots. Note that pneumatic tubes are currently in use by some real-life factories to transport items across factory floors which is instead one of the purposes bots currently serve. By removing the functional gap between these two item mobility tools a player is given more autonomy in how they want to lay out their base. Given that bots already fit well with the game's theme it only makes sense to expand upon that idea rather than quash it.

[Rylant]

Personally I don't understand this "buff the belts" argument. What is the problem with current belts? You upgrade yellow to red, red to blue and then you put down multiple blue.

Putting down multiple parallel belts is not a chore is actually a nice evolution of the puzzle in the mid-late game. It's when you discover that you need to keep them balanced with balancers and circuits. And constructions bots are already there to take away a lot of the tedium from the player. When you can't add more parallel belts you start to duplicate entire production lines and factories and your puzzle moves on how to organize them and connect them with trains. It might just be me but I don't see how a purple or green belt can help making things more interesting. It's just about postponing a little more the late game challenges.

The devs concern is that bots pose little/no challenge and keep players away from a lot of the complexity (fun) content in the game like belt puzzles. How making belts less challenging is going to address this? Not to mention that no matter how buffed a belt can be, logistic bots will always overshadow them as they are implemented now. Belts will always have a maximum throughput per square, bots have no limits. Belts requires you to solve puzzles and pay with tile space the ability to achieve more throughput. Bots have nothing of this (or better not enough of this, since they do admittedly need to recharge from time to time and roboports can serve a limited number at a time). The only advantage of belts is that they consume no energy but energy in the game is like an infinite resource in the late game between solar and nuclear.

In my opinion a belt buff will not solve anything. It's really a bot nerf what is needed (removing them is nuts). Logistic bots gameplay can benefit a lot from a constraint/rule that force on them a max throughput limit in a given area so that the player is required to to invest more land to raise it and possibly optimize it by carefully designing and planning his factory. Alternatively electricity must be made a scarce resource. But this one is a dangerous route because it gives to the player not many options to go around it while the former has the benefit of posing more challenges without limiting factory sizes.

As has been pointed out before, the “buff the belts” argument is to ensure that the mega base stays viable. If you don’t buff the belts so they can maintain a mega base AND you nerf the logi bot to the point where they can no longer sustain a mega base, well then it is no longer possible to have a mega base in game. Many players play with the intent of creating epic mega bases, and they would no longer be able to do that.

You can argue about whether or not buffing belts is right or wrong, or nerfing logi bots is right or wrong all you want. However, at the end of the day, if you nerf bots and don’t buff belts, players who want to create mega bases, will stop playing and Factorio will have just driven people away from their game. It’s just that simple.

Rylant

[MrHick]

It should never be Belts vs Bots vs Trains it should be Belts, Bots and Choo-Choo's.

Bot's seam a little easy late game but that could be fixed with maybe lock bot carry size research behind Space Pots.

In .16 I find more incentive to build with belts after nuclear fuel for smelters and belt optimization.
I find my self using bots as helpers, carrying fuel for smelters, ME stuff and very little actual mass production stuff.

Unloading from trains with belts directly in to steel smelters seams way less hassle then beaconed el-smelters and bots.
It losses 20% prod but no need for 100-200K solar panels and all that module grind.

And just spread it out, separate the builds and you will not need those 64 belt balancers.

[meganothing]

As has been pointed out before, the “buff the belts” argument is to ensure that the mega base stays viable. If you don’t buff the belts so they can maintain a mega base AND you nerf the logi bot to the point where they can no longer sustain a mega base, well then ...

He talks about "nerfing the bots", your reply is about "nerfing the bots to the point where they can no longer sustain a mega base".

What really everyone wants is a nerf that doesn't prevent mega bases, for example just making their use less care-free. Notice he talks exactly about that, using bots should need more "carefully designing and planning".

And that was already proposed from time to time in this mega-thread in different ways. Make bots a puzzle like everything else without directly nerfing that which makes them usefull for megabase design.

[malecord]

Personally I don't understand this "buff the belts" argument. What is the problem with current belts? You upgrade yellow to red, red to blue and then you put down multiple blue.

Putting down multiple parallel belts is not a chore is actually a nice evolution of the puzzle in the mid-late game. It's when you discover that you need to keep them balanced with balancers and circuits. And constructions bots are already there to take away a lot of the tedium from the player. When you can't add more parallel belts you start to duplicate entire production lines and factories and your puzzle moves on how to organize them and connect them with trains. It might just be me but I don't see how a purple or green belt can help making things more interesting. It's just about postponing a little more the late game challenges.

The devs concern is that bots pose little/no challenge and keep players away from a lot of the complexity (fun) content in the game like belt puzzles. How making belts less challenging is going to address this? Not to mention that no matter how buffed a belt can be, logistic bots will always overshadow them as they are implemented now. Belts will always have a maximum throughput per square, bots have no limits. Belts requires you to solve puzzles and pay with tile space the ability to achieve more throughput. Bots have nothing of this (or better not enough of this, since they do admittedly need to recharge from time to time and roboports can serve a limited number at a time). The only advantage of belts is that they consume no energy but energy in the game is like an infinite resource in the late game between solar and nuclear.

In my opinion a belt buff will not solve anything. It's really a bot nerf what is needed (removing them is nuts). Logistic bots gameplay can benefit a lot from a constraint/rule that force on them a max throughput limit in a given area so that the player is required to to invest more land to raise it and possibly optimize it by carefully designing and planning his factory. Alternatively electricity must be made a scarce resource. But this one is a dangerous route because it gives to the player not many options to go around it while the former has the benefit of posing more challenges without limiting factory sizes.

As has been pointed out before, the “buff the belts” argument is to ensure that the mega base stays viable. If you don’t buff the belts so they can maintain a mega base AND you nerf the logi bot to the point where they can no longer sustain a mega base, well then it is no longer possible to have a mega base in game. Many players play with the intent of creating epic mega bases, and they would no longer be able to do that.

You can argue about whether or not buffing belts is right or wrong, or nerfing logi bots is right or wrong all you want. However, at the end of the day, if you nerf bots and don’t buff belts, players who want to create mega bases, will stop playing and Factorio will have just driven people away from their game. It’s just that simple.

Rylant

There is no such a thing as a megabase limit. Even in a Factorio without bots. Scaling works in two directions, horizontal and vertical. Space in this game is infinite and as long as you an expand your factory you can scale your production capacity up by moving horizontally and duplicating lines. But here the difference is that scaling with belts requires planning and some space cost for the belt laces that connects everything whilst scaling with bots requires a click for the blueprint of the assemblers and little more. "Nerfing" bots is just about adding some "space requirement" to them. Which in turn will make your mega factory require more space (which is an infinite resource) and (that's the whole point) require you to think twice on how to do design it and expand it so that items are distributed efficiently. More complex? Sure. But in no way it will make scaling and mega bases impossible. It really is just that simple.

Then as for the "you hurt my playstyle argument don't use bots if you don't like them", I don't hurt anything. I didn't write the diary. I dislike devs removing logistic bots as anyone else here. I wrote what I wrote because I much prefer to see them regulated rather than scrapped entirely.

[bobingabout]

Personally I don't understand this "buff the belts" argument. What is the problem with current belts? You upgrade yellow to red, red to blue and then you put down multiple blue.

Yeah, belts aren't the thing that needs buffing, its belt -> container insertion.

LOADERS!!!

Except people complained that belts would be overpowered and it would make robots useless.

[seePyou]

what's a loader? A belt feeding directly into a factory? An extra entity serving as an interface between belt and entity, essentially replacing inserter?