Factorio Forums

I think gleba is really good idea but just not work because you got gate keeped in everyway that limits how you can even produce basic ores, and before you know it stomper will come and kill you and your defense only make them attack whole base instead of just the tower.

At the root of it all, it all came down to one problem: ores, without it we can't build anything, and in gleba we have no other choice but getting it through bacteria, and to getting it from bacteria means you have to get bioflux, that mean you have to build a two farm at first, that is fucking bullshit, in nauvis build anything only really require iron and some of copper, in gleba we have to enjoy build things from low density structure just to get iron ore?

Indeed, bioflux center of gleba recipe, just like green circuit is center of all crafts, but that challenge just came too fast, in nauvis starting iron and copper patch is within mile, it should have a meaningful loop in both farm before you connect two into a first bioflux loop.

In current system both using bioflux to deterministically make fresh bacteria, and we have a spoil fruit recipe to have a 7% chance to get a bacteria,jus imagine burning mining drill only produce such amount of ore when you just put tons of coal you collected manually.

My suggestion is shift it a bit, instead we produce first bacteria using bioflux, nutrition and ore to make a bacteria 100% this time, but the duplication process no longer refresh bacteria, but it is now cheaper, just crushed fruit+bacteria=2bacteria

Please notice, THERE ARE NO FRESHNESS RESET,even the one you made from bioflux is depanded on freshness of bioflux and nutrition you put in, Player need to seek out ways to make bacteria duplicate more in a set time frame, fresh product means you have more time to make it more ores, in its worst, you can always start again by going back to another agricultural tower and make another bioflux and try again without manually seek out the bacteria rocks that will be removed over time by player.

Oh, and maybe a bioflux spoiling recipe, just bioflux+spoilage->bioflux(90%fresh)+spoilage will be cool, so we can wait less.

meifray wrote: Thu Aug 14, 2025 6:13 pmAt the root of it all, it all came down to one problem: ores, without it we can't build anything, and in gleba we have no other choice but getting it through bacteria, and to getting it from bacteria means you have to get bioflux, that mean you have to build a two farm at first, that is

My experience is that there is more than plenty of iron/copper ore/bacteria available from the rocks for the purposes of bootstrapping from local materials. And for people who want to jump right in with large builds... shouldn't that be a matter of bringing materials on the space platform?

Are you not finding those options adequate?

My suggestion is shift it a bit, instead we produce first bacteria using bioflux, nutrition and ore to make a bacteria 100% this time, but the duplication process no longer refresh bacteria, but it is now cheaper, just crushed fruit+bacteria=2bacteria

I rather prefer the model of bootstrapping a self-sustaining reaction. And it fits the general theme of the planet since you do that for pentapod eggs, and at a higher level, the whole Gleba factory is like that.

I would consider changing the production chain like this to be a massive downgrade.

Current system is fine. Gleba is hard, and great fun at that. Thanks for your thoughts anyway.

Hurkyl wrote: Thu Aug 14, 2025 8:29 pm

meifray wrote: Thu Aug 14, 2025 6:13 pmAt the root of it all, it all came down to one problem: ores, without it we can't build anything, and in gleba we have no other choice but getting it through bacteria, and to getting it from bacteria means you have to get bioflux, that mean you have to build a two farm at first, that is

My experience is that there is more than plenty of iron/copper ore/bacteria available from the rocks for the purposes of bootstrapping from local materials. And for people who want to jump right in with large builds... shouldn't that be a matter of bringing materials on the space platform?

Are you not finding those options adequate?

My suggestion is shift it a bit, instead we produce first bacteria using bioflux, nutrition and ore to make a bacteria 100% this time, but the duplication process no longer refresh bacteria, but it is now cheaper, just crushed fruit+bacteria=2bacteria

I rather prefer the model of bootstrapping a self-sustaining reaction. And it fits the general theme of the planet since you do that for pentapod eggs, and at a higher level, the whole Gleba factory is like that.

I would consider changing the production chain like this to be a massive downgrade.

Well, I play gleba start without heating tower and bioflux to rocket fuel recipe...
the self-sustaining is a good point I have to give it to you.

meifray wrote: Thu Aug 14, 2025 9:32 pm

Hurkyl wrote: Thu Aug 14, 2025 8:29 pm

meifray wrote: Thu Aug 14, 2025 6:13 pmAt the root of it all, it all came down to one problem: ores, without it we can't build anything, and in gleba we have no other choice but getting it through bacteria, and to getting it from bacteria means you have to get bioflux, that mean you have to build a two farm at first, that is

My experience is that there is more than plenty of iron/copper ore/bacteria available from the rocks for the purposes of bootstrapping from local materials. And for people who want to jump right in with large builds... shouldn't that be a matter of bringing materials on the space platform?

Are you not finding those options adequate?

My suggestion is shift it a bit, instead we produce first bacteria using bioflux, nutrition and ore to make a bacteria 100% this time, but the duplication process no longer refresh bacteria, but it is now cheaper, just crushed fruit+bacteria=2bacteria

I rather prefer the model of bootstrapping a self-sustaining reaction. And it fits the general theme of the planet since you do that for pentapod eggs, and at a higher level, the whole Gleba factory is like that.

I would consider changing the production chain like this to be a massive downgrade.

Well, I play gleba start without heating tower and bioflux to rocket fuel recipe...
the self-sustaining is a good point I have to give it to you.

The heating tower is unlocked very early on Gleba. If you are running into issues with fuel I would recommend .

Ok, now I make the mod so you can try:
https://mods.factorio.com/mod/gleba_simple_bacteria Compare to the pervious purposal, this version keeps original bioflux based farming intact, but you now have new recipe to both make bateria and breed them without bioflux.

Bacteria creation recipe no longer gamble and no longer produce spoilage directly, but now it will spoil part of their product.

Now introducing new bacteria recipe that seems useless, just turn a bacteria+fruit into spoiled bacteria, but if you place it in biochamber, their productivity will produce extra bacteria.

The mod looks great. And the pictures helps get the idea quickly. It does look like to me that it adresses the mentionned difficulties, early game it makes it easier to bootstrap the factory without using external supplies, just from bacteria. The yield difference between the 2 recipe should disqualify the "easy" one later, in favor of the one that uses bioflux, but it's still possible to scale up with the "easy" receipe to remove the need for logistic connexions between area that grow one or the other fruits, you could have isolated "fieds" where the only products exchanged between them is "not spoilable" => ore , instead of the bioflux recipe. The bioflux is still required for all the other use. That SOUND balanced on paper to me, but it's possible that in practice it yields to situation where players that rely a lot on those recipe face much more challenging ennemies than player using a recipe with better yield like currently. So there's a risk that it backfires and make the experience "more difficult" due to stompers arriving earlier. Good thing there is a mod to test

You don't need bioflux. You can get it directly from the mash, just less efficiently.

After some trys with any planet start with strangers, I have gathered some reaction and thoughts, that is my old system is still too complex , having spoilage on the creation recipe is a massive burden that require player make some spoilage, which is not exactly what I wanted; And forced biochamber will also gatekeeping the production, for those reasons, I decided to just make it simply produced more and can be handle in assember2.

The spoilage percentaged is also changed, 50% means it always decay, 42% is barely a loop and 25% means you can actually keep the cycle if you always feed them fresh input, to incentize the players, I just make it easy.

Regarding balancing... in vanilla space age, it averages 60 jelly / 30 mash to produce a bacteria from scratch, so you're definitely making it a lot cheaper.

I also feel like the proliferation recipes are strong enough that a lot of people would just completely ignore the cultivation recipes, especially for copper (since you can make nutrients from mash): the throughput is faster, you only need a quarter of the buffer space to allow bacteria to spoil. Only producing 42% as much bacteria is a penalty, but not an overwhelming one.

Also... it looks like these recipes give you an upcycling loop for mash and jelly. Is that intentional?