Kyparos wrote: ↑Fri Mar 22, 2024 9:34 pm
I don't really like solar and nuclear in cart either, but as I said, I really like idea about grid because of accumulators (not big enough? add bigger one in game for bigger cart grid) with station chargers (like pumps for liquids we have) making possibility to make power bank on rails and guard cart with laser turrets for building tracks in frontier.
Ok, though this wasn't all what you were suggesting in the first post, so that explains where my mind was originally.
(Keep in mind that what follows is all my opinion/feeling on this.)
Just to recap what I had already said, I wouldn't want to be able to load power generators into it without it contributing to the locomotive (which would then be free energy, invalidating fuel), but neither do I see creating special grid items that instead are free to use or require new (and possibly not trivial to ups) mechanics to allow feeding from the locomotives of the train.
Using wagons as accumulators is something I think I have mixed opinions on. It's certainly interesting in concept and I think could be great in some situations (getting power to small islands without having to landfill for power generation or wires across the water), but this very easily becomes something that you just include on everything and suddenly all of your outposts are no longer at risk of losing power (unless the rails get cut, which the original proposal would fix, too). Further, unless you prevent the placing of power generators into the grids, these can then just generate free energy for you to distribute.
PDLs... PDLs I feel like are just way over powered. I don't like them. Instead, I'd rather see a purpose built, armored gun/turret wagon that requires ammo to operate. Either a single turret with 360 degree coverage, or two "guns" that only have partial coverage to each side of the wagon (and perhaps lack some of the additional bonuses that normal turrets get). And yeah, I feel like the max speed on these should be lower, thus discouraging you from just including them on all of your trains.
For the roboports, because I feel as though there shouldn't be power generators in the grid and that they should get their power from
somewhere, being in the locomotives themselves seems the better idea as it would allow the roboport to take energy directly from the entity its in vs searching the whole train for all locomotives and then pulling energy from them that way. But then the question: should this just be added to the current locomotive, or should a new one be added? If the current, then all trains are going to have it. If a new one, then this allows for the addition of more fuel slots to compensate for the roboport's energy usage, but if there isn't a down side, then all trains are going to have it. So that leads to here:
Kyparos wrote: ↑Fri Mar 22, 2024 9:34 pm
Making locomotive slower doesn't turn it into something different, it makes it being slow locomotive. Basically it would make the thing that copy feature of two already existing mechanisms and merging them together. Factorio is frequently referred as a programming game, and programming games should provide you with a tool box but not ready solutions.
About slow speed for bots being able to keep up -- could be just an option for a normal locomotive. Slow locomotives would clog up the train network.
I feel like you misunderstood me (or I'm misunderstanding you). Only the
new locomotive with the roboport coverage (or whatever would be using the roboport) would be slow, not all. As such, these would
not be ideal for use in
all trains and instead be best for dedicated repair/construction trains, which is the point. So there would likely only be a few and dispatching as needed, and as such they'd have minimal impact on the train network as a whole.
Kyparos wrote: ↑Fri Mar 22, 2024 9:34 pm
Alternatively I find idea about electric locomotives quite interesting, it's something new, we already have electricity everywhere we have trains and this could "free up" space for module grid wich would be powered by our global electric system. We already have seen superconductors in FFF, why becoming electric trains with magnetic levitation wouldn't be possible?)
Yeah, I'd like electric locomotives, too, but as their own, new entity that would have their own pluses and minuses. As a special wagon with a grid, this also runs into the same issue as the roboports with power... this wagon needs to search the whole train for locomotives to affect, which costs more on the ups than what I'd imagine a new, dedicated locomotive would. And as a wagon (or if it's just a grid and new grid item on existing locomotives), then there's no reason not to use it on all trains (or locomotives).
All of this, of course, is all my opinion on what I would find fun and engaging with the game.
Great job.