Ability to craft lower quality with higher quality

[terradus]

Dear Factorio Developers,

I would like to share a suggestion for improving the item rarity/quality system in the Space Age expansion.

As a player, I appreciate the depth and complexity of Factorio, but the current rarity/quality system sometimes feels overly restrictive. The need to switch between recipes depending on the quality of the ingredients creates inconvenience and can be frustrating.

Suggestion:

Allow crafting using the same recipe, regardless of the rarity/quality of the ingredients used. Instead of dividing recipes into many separate entries, group them into a single, hidden recipe that accounts for the quality of the ingredients.

Calculation Mechanism:

I suggest pre-calculating the probabilities of obtaining items of different qualities at the output, based on the quality of the input ingredients. This would avoid overloading the real-time computation system and maintain performance.

Liquids: Introduce a quality system for liquids and use the existing logic for mixing liquids of different temperatures as a basis for mixing liquids of different qualities.
Ore Smelting:
When smelting a single ore with quality modules, the behavior remains unchanged.
When smelting multiple ores of different qualities, the quality of the output product is determined by a weighted average. For example:
1 legendary iron + 1 common calcite: probability of each quality (common, uncommon, rare, epic, legendary) = 20%.
10 legendary iron + 1 common calcite: probability of common quality = 9%, uncommon = 9%, rare = 9%, epic = 9%, legendary = 64%. The formula can be adjusted to achieve optimal balance.

Benefits:

Player Convenience: Simplifying crafting, eliminating the need to switch between recipes.
Flexibility: Ability to use any available ingredients.
Attractiveness: Reduction of the "annoyance" factor, attracting new players.

Assessment of Resource Impact:

I understand that you are concerned about the potential load on the system associated with calculating probabilities. However, I am confident that pre-calculating all possible combinations and storing them in the game files is a viable solution.

Recipe File Size: Even considering the large number of recipes and five quality levels, I estimate that the file size will not exceed 400 MB. This is an acceptable price to pay for increased convenience and flexibility. Roughly speaking, each recipe is a data structure containing probabilities; the total number of such structures equals the number of current recipes in the game. Each data structure, each recipe, will include 5^N elements, where N is the maximum number of materials in the recipe.

Calculation of the Number of Crafting Variations:

For example, consider a recipe with 6 components. Each component can have 5 quality levels. Thus, the number of possible combinations (and, accordingly, internal recipes that need to be hidden behind one external one) will be:

5 (quality of the first component) * 5 (quality of the second component) * 5 (quality of the third component) * 5 (quality of the fourth component) * 5 (quality of the fifth component) * 5 (quality of the sixth component) = 5^6 = 15625 variations.

This number may seem large, but, as I said, these calculations can be done in advance and saved in the game file. Most importantly, the variety of recipes will remain hidden from the user, and in the end, they will only interact with 1 visible recipe.

Thank you for your time and attention.

P.S. The calculation mechanism that I proposed is just an example solution. There are various ways to optimize and improve this system. For instance, a more efficient mathematical formula could be developed to calculate probabilities in real-time, avoiding the need to pre-calculate all combinations.

Alternatively, the implementation of a quality system with the ability to mix ingredients of different qualities could be optional. Players who enjoy the current system could disable this feature in the game settings. This approach would satisfy the needs of different player groups.

[Koub]

[Koub] Merged into an older thread with a similar suggestion : variations on adding a way to craft a given quality recipe with different quality inputs.

[Linsanga]

Downgrading quality just doesnt make any sense why would you want to do that. In reality a better quality component could always be used as substitute, you're not going to 'relabel' it first. You cherry pick out the higher qualities but if the warehouse is full you just run em through the production chain.

I have to strongly disagree here. If you want to send surplus high-quality through the production chain, relabeling it first is the simplest solution and solves all problems. "The production chain" involves not just the assemblers it could end up at, but also the entire logistic chain to take it to the assembler.

My preferred solution is a tunnel-like entity that a belt goes through, and downconverts (relabels) the quality of items that flow through it. Think like an underground belt that reduces quality.

If you relabel a quality part, and merge it into your normal-quality production chain, your job is done. It can make its way through any filter splitters, filter inserters, logistic bot systems, trains, space platforms, circuit conditions, AND assemblers/chemplants/EM plants, exactly as a normal part would.

But if you can't relabel, logistics becomes a nightmare.

• Are there any trains between your quality surplus and the assemblers? Better rework the train conditions, because "full cargo" won't work if there's a mix of quality in your train.
• Is there a space platform between your quality surplus and the assemblers (e.g. the part is getting shipped to other planets)? Better duplicate and rework all your space platform requests and landing pad requests and departure conditions.
• Are there any filter splitters, filter inserters, or circuit conditions between your quality surplus and the assemblers? Better make sure those are all updated.
• Are there any stack inserters between your quality surplus and the assemblers? Those are going to get clogged holding one epic item, unable to pick up anything else.
• Is there a logistic network between your quality surplus and the assemblers? You need to add some complicated circuit conditions on all the requester chests, so they only request high-rarities when you have a surplus, and don't drain you of the high-rarities that you want to keep.
• Are there multiple paths the item could take (e.g. a splitter sends some items to space, some items onto a train, some items into a provider chest)? Better make sure every single one of those paths is updated.

In the simple case, where all your quality surplus goes on a belt to nearby assemblers, both solutions (relabeling or assemblers accepting higher quality) work perfectly well.

In the complex case, where your quality surplus is getting shipped to one of several far away assemblers through various means of transportation, relabeling is far superior.

[Panzerknacker]

No.