math-and-meta

[vapid gorge]

or there are plenty of peeps that can help with basic coal set up too if I'm not around

[harsh thorn]

im forgetful

right got it cya lad

[fair glen]

I need help making 40 radio control units. I have 30 for 10 super computers and the other 10 for general use. I just need an efficient recipe because I've been trying for 3 hours and came up on nothing.

[vapid gorge]

depends what you mean by 'efficient' and if you've alreayd chosen a location right?

[fair glen]

still deciding depending on the amount of resources

What I mean by efficient is it doesn't take up too many nodes and doesn't have overflow of resources

[vapid gorge]

well overflow on resource is easy since you can clock miners how you like

as for recipes - have you used tools? this is the no alt option for 40 pm https://www.satisfactorytools.com/production?share=aJgPvWuhb9NLEExomNOZ

[fair glen]

I have used that and I can't quite find the one

[vapid gorge]

find the one?

[fair glen]

A good mixture of recipies

[vapid gorge]

ah right. well what alts do you have access to and are you willing to go find more hard drives?

[thorny cedar]

do you know where u want to build this facilities for a start?

bcs how i understood you would lik to use the nodes in the area efficient for this and try to plan the rec you use around this

[fair glen]

I'm willing to use any alt

[vapid gorge]

location pick I find kinda works in tandem with a few things ime

[vapid gorge]

ok well using that link as a base - first I'd use sloppy solution for bauxite and electrode scrap - removes the need for coal and is a bit more effiicient

and then Pure Al ingots so less messy on silica

[fair glen]

Alright sounds good. Anything else to add on to?

[vapid gorge]

oh lots probably

for example there's 3 recipes for RCUs

[fair glen]

true...

[vapid gorge]

let me have a look at what I've done with them briefly

ok I used Radio Control System - I suspect because it uses less bauxite since that was my concern

and I'd guess by eyballing it uses less crystal, but more of the resources for cuircuit boards and rubber.

I think either of the two alts are probably more resource efficient in resource types that are often easier to get so lets just play with the idea one of the 2 alts will be used

[fair glen]

I've had my eye on the radio control sytem since the resources seem better

[elfin nebula]

radio control system here in the plans as well

[vapid gorge]

so I've plugged in the bauxite here, the better oil recipes and the system for a pretty tight resource budge https://www.satisfactorytools.com/production?share=yVYMtWdj0Nb3K20VO1GV

[elfin nebula]

holy people always have such enormous charts

ours is just

[vapid gorge]

yeah but this is a start to finish chart

[elfin nebula]

yeah, wouldnt ever build anything past early midgame in one stage

[vapid gorge]

so from the last link I shared to you further changes could be the RIP recipe, screws, or stitched plate, however you like.

You could change the Circuit board recipe to silica or caterium - I wouldn't suggest electrode unless you pick a spot with TONS of oil

And your choice for wire - cable alts

most of these are tweaks - the cuircuit board recipe woudl be the biggest change

[elfin nebula]

yeah, would definitely use one of the two boards

[vapid gorge]

in this particular instance I wouldn't say its super critical to swap to a CB alt unless they want to use the local resources for something else. It's not a TON of cbs being made pm

and at 720 copper ore needed thats just one pure node needed -which could be reduced with pure copper or some steemed sheets, or iron wire

to make it only a Normal node needed

[elfin nebula]

two types of rubber is oof, would stitch the plates

[vapid gorge]

actually yeah, iron wire would on it's own take it down to normal copper node

[vapid gorge]

yeah the plan is listing Residual rubber in an odd way - I'd keep the numbers but use the Residual Rubber as the Feed rubber to get teh recycled system going

but I understand why calcs like this with loops dont incorperate residual rubber into the loop

[vapid gorge]

oh on this topic building a dedicated hub for a new project is pretty common. Now that I'm doing permanent final factories I only build hubs like that

[fair glen]

@vapid gorge @elfin nebula Thank you so much for the help. Really do appriciate it!

[vapid gorge]

nw 🙂

[wind spade]

You lose the resoirce optimisation step this way

[vapid gorge]

Yeah I suspect it's working off pre existing hubs

[frosty owl]

I'd be putting vehicles and particle accelerators on a "secondary" power grid, with geothermal when aviable

[thorny cedar]

idk how much the power diff is for 1% particle accelerator

but due to the high process time low peaks and huge numbers its prob pretty even

[elfin nebula]

well, we do it as one and then split later

as much larger plan

so it is optimized across factories, since we make the parts for all factories at one place like circuit boards

they would be really scuffed when done at several places

works so nice when doing them only once

[wind spade]

well it's your game, but I'd do it the other way around - every item from raw resources

that way I can adjust recipes based on local availability

[elfin nebula]

well, its also on local availablility

doing the circuit boards with perfectly using 100 % of the local resources

[civic pasture]

can anyone tell me how i can split 50 items per minute into 5 different belts?

[thorny cedar]

is your input belt at maximum?

[civic pasture]

Its 50 items per minute. 60 is max

[thorny cedar]

if your input is max 50 items per minute this works

🙂

input is in the merger

made it a bit more clear 🙂

[prisma kraken]

the other solution to dealing with 5-ways is to clock everything to 125 or 250% which turns it into a 4-way or 2-way split 🙂

[thorny cedar]

or manifold

[prisma kraken]

yeah, it depends on what you're doing

nuclear often ends up needing stuff split into 5, and for that it is much better to oc

for something like ai limiters, manifold

[thorny cedar]

i split my nuclear into 100.8 >_>

[prisma kraken]

of course, for that there's a nicer solution

you know, that number (100.8) is burned into my mind

number of beacons/min you need for max nuclear 😄

[thorny cedar]

i split the last .8 into 2 to get an even number of reactors tho 😄

[prisma kraken]

i.hate.that.number

[thorny cedar]

and the last 2 just run at 100%

bcs of .4

[prisma kraken]

well, if you manifold nuclear it runs really hot

[thorny cedar]

i can stand in the middle without a hazmat

[prisma kraken]

so much easier just to oc it and split it properly

once upon a time, you couldn't wear the hazmat & hoverpack

so you had to keep nuclear fairly radiation-free

[thorny cedar]

once upon a time i was sinking waste with my sugar cube into the gras field manhole

[prisma kraken]

that never really worked, did it?

[thorny cedar]

it does the car just never despawns it goes into the void parking lot

[prisma kraken]

yeah, kills your cpu

[thorny cedar]

0.0.0 or smth

under the map

[prisma kraken]

anyway, i'm off to bed

[civic pasture]

alr ima tell you when it works

[thorny cedar]

it should work you split 60 into 30 and 30 you split 1 30 in 3x10 and 1 30 in 3x10 and one of the 10 go back to merge with the 50 belt 🙂 but let me know if you got issues

[civic pasture]

so i just put it on and it seems to do its job perferctly

thank you

[thorny cedar]

no problem i like belt balancing .3

[round sparrow]

i have 17 refineries that producing 40 fuel per min each . how can i connect the fuel to mk2 pipe?

[swift robin]

a junction in front of every refinery that connects to a pipe that connects all the junctions together in a line

when you max a pipe, just start a second pipe and raise it a little over the first one

the second pipe will have very little fuel this way compared to the first tho so it may be kinda awkward this way

[harsh thorn]

@vapid gorge

i did the coal gen thing you told me about

it works well, ty

[vapid gorge]

fantastic! I'm glad 😄

[harsh thorn]

ye

also theres this weird part of the map

i take insane damage

when i walk near it

[true junco]

Do you hear clicking?

[harsh thorn]

no

[true junco]

Ok. Then it wasnt radiation.

[prisma kraken]

if your talking about the kill border, that's just part of the game

[harsh thorn]

oh

ohhh ok

ty

[tropic cape]

Do you hear buzzing and popping?

Nah yeah there's a border (which I think has an odd shape?) that starts damaging you heavily around the edges of the map, and beyond that is another that's instant death

[versed violet]

post a screenshot of your location on the ingame map and we can check if thats the border for you

[harsh thorn]

nono its the border

[versed violet]

map border is square, except two bottom corners that are cut off.

notably Paradise Island has border running diagonally through it.

and thats the only one you can cross on foot I think. devs promised to move the border tho.

[deft lichen]

Irregular hexagon

[vital charm]

i've got 68.5 coal power gens and 26 fluid extractors. how am i supposed to make it so all gens get enough water? got mk1 pipes

[snow dove]

lots of pipes

[wind spade]

Hook them in 3:8 groups, e.g. like this

..G  G  G  G
E-+--+--+--+
E-+
E-+--+--+--+
  G  G  G  G

[frosty owl]

We get it, it's an example ... One "EG" suffices

[vital charm]

i did a 5 extractors to 2 pipes ratio @wind spade

i can power 6.67 coal gens per 5 machines. what would be my best way to distribute the water so the last 3.33 gets used too

[wind spade]

8:3 is just easier

[median heath]

5 * 120 / 45 =/= 6.67
So I am confused on the math here.

Extractors * Amount Extractors Produce / Amount Coal Gens Take =/= Amount of Coal Gens

(If you need the words version @vital charm)

[vital charm]

english please

[median heath]

Where did you get 6.67 from?

6.67 Gens * 45 Water per Gen = 300.15 Water

300.15 Water / 120 Water per Extractor = 2.50125 Extractors

2.50125 Extractors per 6.67 Gens is NOT equal to your stated 5 Extractors per 6.67 Gens

[vital charm]

yeah i just found out my math wasn't mathing indeed

[median heath]

Just use the 8:3 ratio.

[vital charm]

so 3 extractors to 8 gens?

[median heath]

Yes.
8 * 45 = 360
360 / 120 = 3

[vital charm]

alr ty

[median heath]

Pro tip: do your best to never have your machines at 6.666666666 or 8.333333333 or any other repeating decimals, given the game truncates them and you're not actually making the amount you think you are.

[vital charm]

yeah pipes confuse me a lot

i understand conveyer math but pipes are not for me

is my 26 extr. to 68.5 gens math correct?

[median heath]

68.5 * 45 = 3082.5
3082.5 / 120 = 25.6875

[median heath]

First step in understanding is never thinking about pipes in terms of belts.

But they can pretty much be avoided all together if you just package immediately and you unpackage directly before the building that needs fluid.

[vital charm]

so if i got 26 extr and i use 8:3, how do i connect the remaining 2 extr.

[median heath]

Don't force it to be 26.
Just build 24 and keep it clean.

[vital charm]

@median heath this better?

[median heath]

Sure?

[vital charm]

just making sure

[median heath]

If you built 24 Extractors in sets of 3 it will work out just fine.

[vital charm]

so 69 gens / 9 pipes in total is 7.67 so do i hook up 7 machines per pipe or 8

[median heath]

Why......

Just do 64 Gens.

24 Extractors = 64 Gens

Simple math. No headache. No repeating decimals.

[main dirge]

Is there any use to tractors once trucks (bigger?) and explorers (faster and mobile?) are unlocked? Or am I missing something

[median heath]

The fit in some places Trucks do not.
But otherwise not really, Truck is just a straight upgrade, one of the few things in the game that makes previous stuff obsolete.

[main dirge]

I mean trucks struggle when not on flat terrain right? So not quite direct

[median heath]

Have you trucked anything in U8?

[main dirge]

Not yet, just starting on it now

[median heath]

Believe me, Trucks are a direct upgrade to Tractors now.

[main dirge]

👍 will give a couple a try

[median heath]

Trucks can drive straight up the 8m incline wall (steeper than the 4m ramp) from a dead stop without issue.

[main dirge]

Dang nice

That's v good to know actually bc I've got 8m walls directly across the swamp and need to get resources across 😂

[vital charm]

so all of these pipes are going to the topright. should i worry about headlift on horizontal distance

[median heath]

Headlift is for vertical only.

[vital charm]

and how is headlift counted

from source?

[median heath]

Yes.

+10 from any building.
Pumps are +20 or +50, but it is NOT additive.

Fluid going into a pump will have headlift reset to 0 and then gain the +20 or +50 when exiting the pump.

[true junco]

And buffers are variable. Which is one of several reasons buffers are best avoided in almost all possible use cases.

[median heath]

And buffers are <never to be used outside of fluid trains or pure aesthetics>

😉

[true junco]

Well. Thats a whole other discussion. And i agree 99.9999% with that statement. 😆

[median heath]

Pure aesthetics is a great reason to do many things in this game.

[open mango]

Hope the maths are correct ... Enjoy 🧑‍🏭

[deft lichen]

what's this about?

you can share the link to the plan instead of sending a screenshot

[open mango]

https://www.satisfactorytools.com/production?share=Qx25QSc0eYH0bSwE0Oax

I didn't know it was accepted on this discord 😉

If it's not, sorry

[deft lichen]

do you have questions about the setup?

just confused as you shared it out of the blue

[open mango]

Not really, i share what i found myself. I plan to realise this setup after finishing the phase 4 (searching something new to do and nuclear plan IS)

I play since 2 months, so hm, yes > new to the game (well, not so now)

Just need more, you know ..

[deft lichen]

Ah. Best of luck then

[open mango]

Thanks, big deal for sure

Hope also this can help someone

Or if this setup is false in any sense, please > say to me

And there is another chat entry "questions-and-help", i'd post there if this was the case (questions or doubts)

[main dirge]

Should've just used belts 😫 it's immensely struggling

[thorny cedar]

are you with us in u7 right now?

[main dirge]

Nah U8

I'm in red jungle though so that's probs part of it

[thorny cedar]

and it struggles? 😦

[main dirge]

Path is completely cleared, it just struggles with the ditch paths

[thorny cedar]

i dont know how good the beaming improved

but if you not around they more or less beam around

so try stay away come back after some time and have a look in the station itself

watch the thouput in you factory

[main dirge]

Path in red

Abt 8.5m round trip

[thorny cedar]

just stay at the intake and watch it the throuput suffers

[main dirge]

Is that the same as they teleport whilst you're on top of them? Bc they did a good couple dozen times lol

[thorny cedar]

no they literaly derender

and just beam around

more or less

[median heath]

Feel like yellow would be simpler.

[main dirge]

... yeah I thought that lake would be deeper oop

It's a bit thin at parts for two lanes though

soggo doggo

[median heath]

If red has issues going up, just use yellow to get up and red to get back.

Making your routes a full loop is better practice than trying to shove things into side-by-side lanes.

[main dirge]

It had more issues going down tbh xd

[median heath]

Then flip what I said 😄

[main dirge]

It loses traction on one side on uneven terrain, then can't get up tiny bumps

Will try changing some stuff around though

[median heath]

Finding loops is a practice you can use even if you don't want to redo this one.

[teal summit]

is there a good way to conveyor stuff to really high locations?

chained lifts look gross

is there a way to chain them nicely

[thorny cedar]

i use floor holes

and encase them into a corner stone coundation

with a beam

[teal summit]

i tried using floor holes, but i cant chain two floor holes together

[thorny cedar]

yes you can

[teal summit]

o

[thorny cedar]

its just a bit tricky

[teal summit]

omg

this is a game changer

[thorny cedar]

ill can show u if you want just give me a scnd

[teal summit]

i got it 🙂

[thorny cedar]

would need to travel there

ok good 🙂

[thorny cedar]

BUT make sure u did it correct

bcs debugging this after you turned on your factory can be not that pleasent

[teal summit]

: D

[thorny cedar]

yea and i use some case to cover the thing

esp the round corner stone and a beam on the round side

[main dirge]

Noticing the trucks aren't taking a full inventory from stations

Do I need to set a higher wait time at the node

6:30 while close, 2m while far away 🤔

Also did explorer inventory get nerfed? Seeing 12 but says 24

[thorny cedar]

idk tbh i did use trucks farly low but trains need a buffer container bcs they stop theire intace while loading idk

best to ask the wiki?

[vapid gorge]

by full inventory do you mean the station isn't emptying? the only reason that should be is if the truck isn't completely empty

[main dirge]

Nah as in like only a dozen stacks move from the station to the truck when the station is full

[vapid gorge]

but what is the truck's inventory like when it's picking stuff up? there shouldn't be anything stopping the truck from filling up all it's stacks

if yo ucan follow the truck around with it's inventory ui open , showing it's empty, and only picking up part of what is in the station? that needs to be a bug report I think

running multiplayer or dedicated server? u8?

[thorny cedar]

idk you said smth about it takes the truck 9 minutes

trucks only got 48 slots or smth? im nt rly sure

maybe its to long for him alone

yea it did not read

is your recieving station recieving?

[vapid gorge]

As I'm understanding the issue - the station is full on inventory - it tries to load the truck , but only some of the inventory transfers.

The only non bug reason for that should be that the truck picking up stuff is, itself, partially full

so the truck delivering the items wasn't able to offload everything

[main dirge]

Yeah that's what I was doing, only picked up a small portion. Truck empty, station full

[thorny cedar]

thats why i said check the recieving station if its full

[main dirge]

Singleplayer U8

[main dirge]

Also no

[thorny cedar]

replace the truck

[vapid gorge]

ok I'd try saving and reloading and see if anything changes. Weird visual stuff can happen.

Also u8 is buggy as balls

[main dirge]

Seems to be behaving happier when it's far away

[thorny cedar]

first intuition i would have

even befor asking sorry

[main dirge]

This truck has been replaced several dozen times now 😂

[vapid gorge]

and youv'e saved and reloaded?

not using mods right?

[thorny cedar]

and u restarted?

[main dirge]

Vanilla

Not restarted yet, still building, seems to be working fine when I'm not on top of it so

[vapid gorge]

ok go to the #faq , find hte bug report link, make a report and you'll probably need to upload your save. even if it fixes on reload it needs to be reported as that's fairly serious

[thorny cedar]

or press esc go to feedback and do it there

[vapid gorge]

from what you're saying you're doing everything right and that should not be happening

[thorny cedar]

unless its not loaded

as he said if hes away it seems to work

sound like the same as drones

[vapid gorge]

possibly? worth pointing to the devs anyway even if it's similar to another thing

[thorny cedar]

but there it was as long as i observed they took the right ammount of bats

and if i went away the drained all

[vapid gorge]

u8 will need more patchwork than any of hte updates

[main dirge]

I mean it's kinda hard to get a screenshot now

Just gonna leave it, if it's working now shouldn't be an issue

[vapid gorge]

I think you'd need to upload the whole save file in the bug report

[thorny cedar]

yea and make a detailed report

[main dirge]

Have set all the loading nodes to 10s as well so that may be what's fixed it

[vapid gorge]

but could you tell if the production line was disrupted when you were nearby? was it just visually not moving items?

[thorny cedar]

when i was nearby they consumed normal

when i was away and it was not loaded

[vapid gorge]

so the backup drones didn't back up the producers?

[thorny cedar]

it consumed like crazy baldur pointed out there was an issue with batterie consumption for homeports

but i couldnt figure because it was inconsitent for me

bc when i was standing on the homeport it behaved normal

as soon as i went away it acted up like crazy

and thats sounds like reverse

so i observed the droneports on one end and all was normal

but observing on the other end did not work at all

[main dirge]

Also, just want to take a moment to say fuck those indestructible bushes and rocks in bamboo forest

[thorny cedar]

at least in terms of fuel supply

tru diff circumstance diff math but "same behavior" more or less

orits just a DAU problem idk could you share a screenshot maybe 😄

[thorny cedar]

if u deconstruction your truck you see the ammount in cargo can you provide a screenshot of this when its departed from the port and a screenshot of the ports iventory after departure?

[main dirge]

Fills up that much

Then just stops filling

[thorny cedar]

i see a full port and a half filled truck

thats not substantional... screenshot right after depature

and why is your port mixed in the first place

[main dirge]

cba to wait to fill

just made that to test

[median heath]

Because there is nothing wrong with mixed ports?

[median heath]

What is the wait timer set to?

[thorny cedar]

but still he provided a screenshot of a full port and a half full truck

plz explain

[median heath]

I'm getting to that 🙃

Also just noticed the ribbon, so this shouldn't be here. This should be in #satisfactory-experimental

[main dirge]

1s - my question was whether it needs to be higher and what to set it to xd

The yellow one at the station I assume you mean

[thorny cedar]

you prob know the solution to this i hope :c

[median heath]

1s is supposed to default to "take everything", but it is having issues on exp.
Which is why if you posted an exp question in the exp channel you'd get an immediate answer to the issue instead of multiple lines of discussion 😭

[main dirge]

It's truck math I didn't know it was an experimental issue 🥲

[thorny cedar]

it has nothing to do with math

[median heath]

You're on exp.
Everything that happens is exp-related until proven otherwise.

[teal summit]

im on t5 rn and need to transport something from a factory kinda far away (3 ish km range). is it worth setting up trucks rn or should i just conveyor the whole way and wait for trains

[hybrid star]

Using an online resource like satisfactory calculator or whatever else is there a way to tell how many items are on a belt per minute. I think I have a factory producing 1800 plastic, the battery factory I made is eating like 800 plastic to make around 400 batteries per minute and nothing is going into the sinks that are onsite in the plastic factory so it should be 1000 plastic. Very occasionally a building in the plastic factory turns off though. I think its due to too much fuel being produced. I might need to sink excess rubber which is where the excess might be building up but is there a way to tell how there is on a belt per minute that isn't an eyeball test

[true junco]

There are mods. But the closest to what you can actually get without mods is to look at the efficiency in the interface of machines.

[hybrid star]

the belt work got a little complicated. Is there a mod that would help out here?

[brisk shore]

Official Modding Discord

Learn all about modding and join the community here!
<3 @mystic moon

[mystic moon]

There is a mod that allows you to view belt thoughput, no idea what it is ^

[true junco]

@median heath this was the flow chart for it. A lot of overclocking. Ends up with 2 refineries and 4 smelters. Ill try to remember to get on tomorrow and open it up for screen shots.

[median heath]

Actual screenshot required for belief.
Because fitting in something to do Ingots alongside 3 Refineries does not sound possible.

[true junco]

Its 2 refineries

The smelters are in the middle if i remember right. Half day tomorrow. Yay. Going to play factory game to relax on break from factory.

[elfin nebula]

imagine bringing oil to alu factory

[true junco]

I didnt.

[elfin nebula]

yeah, i mean even thinking it would take 3 refineries

[median heath]

🤷‍♂️

[true junco]

There is a BP i use for all the Coke.

[elfin nebula]

and 2 refineries and 4 smelters is easy

[median heath]

Also this isn't bringing Oil, just HOR.

[true junco]

So if you want to start from crude oil. Then yes my Sloppy Electrode Aluminum Ingot set up is 2 blueprints with 5 refineries and 4 smelters total. One of those refineries is not a requirement tho.

[median heath]

Multiple-part BP's are encouraged given the new U8 functionality for that feature.

So I guess I would see if you could take yours and actually make it fit together as 2 parts so you just plug oil + bauxite and let it run.

The focus of all the ones I have made is simplifying input as far as possible so it truly becomes a "plug and play" environment when using them.

[true junco]

Well and water.

[elfin nebula]

since there is no place with bauxite and oil, that would make no sense

[median heath]

Just because something doesn't make sense to you does not mean it doesn't make sense 🙂

[elfin nebula]

its easier to bring the really low amount of coke there

well, you claim simplifying while you make it far more complicated

[median heath]

No... but ok.

[elfin nebula]

its just your really weird understanding of what simple means

bringing a ton of a hard to move resource to a place is way more complex then just bringing some coke

[true junco]

Its easier to move 120 coke than 30 crude?

[median heath]

No... but ok.

[median heath]

😄

[elfin nebula]

by several scales, yes

[median heath]

And I am the one with the weird definition of simple 😄

[true junco]

By no scale is more easier to transport than less.

[elfin nebula]

also polymer handling as well complicates it further

[elfin nebula]

liquid vs solid

[true junco]

Polymer overflow to sink

Liquids are easy

[median heath]

So that's why I have it at the HOR level.
Where it is still easier to transport 40 than 120.

[elfin nebula]

still need sinks etc as well in your alu factory

[elfin nebula]

its harder to transport 40 liquid than even 1200 of solids

[median heath]

That is simlpy untrue, but I respect that it is harder for you to make that kind of transport.

[true junco]

If you say so. Ive never had a problem with fluids outside of game glitches. Which happens with everything.

[elfin nebula]

also still needs additional polymer handling in the factory what makes it more complex

even when just sink

[true junco]

How is a sink complex?

[hybrid star]

fluids are a pain in the ass if you are dealing with any verticality

[elfin nebula]

its more than nothing

[median heath]

Not really.

[hybrid star]

Power is a resource, its a drain to pump it

[elfin nebula]

it is very easy to fail

an simple seems to mean for you, simple to fail

[median heath]

If you build power at so minimal a scale you care about power... yes?

[elfin nebula]

power isnt the thing. its the additional stuff inside a factory that already is quite large

so we building a megabase here again when doing everything in it

[hybrid star]

ah yeah, at no point in the game is power an issue at all

[elfin nebula]

i guess just never did a large alu factory so is able to stuff all that useless stuff in there and call it simple

[median heath]

It's sort of an issue in T1-2, but after that no.

[hybrid star]

autism.txt

[median heath]

huh?

[elfin nebula]

wanting to waste stuff whereever its possible and then calling it simple

still doubt you ever tested that in actual use

just made blueprints an call them decent

while it wont actually work in any scale above tiny

[vapid gorge]

best way is to know what it's supposed to be making on that belt/pipe and then look at the machines producing it - if they are always green then they are making that amount. If they go yellow they are making less than that amount

[red river]

my jank solution is to feed the contents of the belt to a train station, deliver the goods to another station, sink all of it, then see what the train station says about the transit rate after a few trips. It's not exact, but it's served its purpose for me.

[night narwhal]

Hoping this is the right channel, but I seem to be having a slight problem oil being distributed to my refnerys.

I have 12 refineries making Fuel (40 fule/ 30 resin) which requires 720 oil per min.

I have 3 oil pumps, 1 outputting 120 oil with a pipe that goes to two refinerys. and 2 oil pumps overclocked to output 300 per min attached to the remaining 10 via mk2 pipes.

This then outputs 480 fuel which I then pumped into 40 fuel generators (480/12=40). The polymers then go to plastic and rubber creation, if the plastic/rubber overflows it gets sinked so I know the polymers haven't backed up.

However, and this is the issue, my power is fluctuating as some fuel gens aren't getting a steady stream of fuel. I've routed this back to some of my refineries not getting a steady stream of oil. Which I find odd as my math seems to be correct.

[wind spade]

Did you loop the mk2 pipe?

[night narwhal]

Loop?

No, it just ends.

[wind spade]

Yeah, loop it back to start and prefill the system

[night narwhal]

Sorry, that doesn't make any sense, there isn't even enough oil to fill all of the refineries let alone pre-fil the pipe?

How far back does the loop need to go?

[vapid gorge]

just the length of the manifold, like this https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1142247093528961156/1142273544005357628/image_13.png

so fluid comes in from the left on top, and the machines are fed by the junctions on the bottom

[night narwhal]

Alright, I'll give it a shot.

[vapid gorge]

keep 1 machine off at first so that you're over producing fluid and floods the whole system, when every machine is flooded turn the last one on

or keep it at 50% and then push it to 100%, as long as you're overproducing and it gets flooded

[wind spade]

@livid forge see #math-and-meta message for alt recipe choices

[median heath]

Also just try to use mk1s when possible as they actually behave. 🤷‍♂️

[night narwhal]

Yeah I was wondering about this lol.

I have a set up right next to this one that does the whole oil -> hor -> plastic/rubber -> Petrolum coke -> coal generator and I've not had an issue with that and it uses pure mk1.

[median heath]

When you're extracting from a pure node at 250%, you can always just make like a 1m mk2 pipe and then immediately split it into x2 mk1s.

[night narwhal]

Yeah I might have to replace my Mk2 pipes with Mk1s as even after letting it all back up I'm still having the ones in the middle of the manifold run out.

[vapid gorge]

if you build it right mk2s are absolutely fine. And I've seen back flow on mk1s as well

[night narwhal]

define "built it right" because I have:
2 oil extractors over clocked to output 300 oil that output into an mk2 pipe. An Mk2 pump deals with all headlift so I know that's know that's not an issue and 10 refiners making fuel need exactly 600 oil a min.

So unless there is some seriously wonky fluid physics going on I have no idea what's going wrong.

[median heath]

How do you overclock a pump?

[night narwhal]

edited

[median heath]

👍

[wind spade]

not a "must have" list, but general steps to make pipes work:

• build pipe systems as simple as possible (least amount of junctions, merging, etc.)
• make pipes as short as possible
• loop pipe manifolds
• feed from above or level
• do not use buffers or valves
• use pumps only if you need headlift
• prefill the system before running it

[night narwhal]

See I've never had to worry about that.

I have near exact set ups using Mk1 pipes and they work flawlessly. The only difference between one pipe set up and another is the type of pipe. :/

And pre-filling didn't work. Refinerys started running dry again not long after it filled up.

[wind spade]

as I said, it's not "must have"
it's "if you do this, you have a high chance of pipe setup working properly"

generally pipe issues start to appear when

• people feed from below
• people don't loop pipes that are close or at their limit
• people use valves or buffers

[night narwhal]

I've re-worked the loop at little, and seems like the 4 refinerys in the middle are only getting around 40pm flow rate whereas the other 6 are getting 60+, which would explain why they stop working.

What really confuses me is right up until the loop the flow rate is perfect 600 - checked every pipe segment between the extrators and the manifold loop.

[wind spade]

did you prefill the system?

[night narwhal]

am about to try that now - note I have already tried it and it ended up back to where it currently is very quickly.

[wind spade]

well if you prefill the system but not loop the pipe, it'll do that

you have to do both

[night narwhal]

This was with a loop.

[vapid gorge]

what greeny said basically.

[night narwhal]

System backfilled and everything is back on. Let's see if it holds.

[vital charm]

is it possible that i get more MW when i turn my heavy oil into petro coke instead of fuel?
if my calculations are correct i get 4800MW on petro coke and 4500MW if i would switch to fuel

[night narwhal]

Subtract the amount you need to power the water extractors from the petro coke total

[vital charm]

that would end up being 4280MW on petro coke

so i would win a whole 220MW

[night narwhal]

Also, fuel has less steps then petrocoke.

[vital charm]

yeah but i got the petrocoke set up already

so it would just take me a bunch of extra time rebuilding just to get 220mw

[night narwhal]

Ah well, if you've got petrocoke set up then go for it.

I have a petrocoke set up back when I needed plastic/ rubber and before I had the ability to make fuel gens and I 've just kept it around.

[vital charm]

yeah exactly my issue right now

64 coal gens with petrocoke :') so it would be a PAIN to rebuild to fuel after setting all of this up

[night narwhal]

I burn like 90% of my petrocoke and siphon off the over 10% as fuel for the tractors moving the plastic and rubber back to my main base.

[vital charm]

im not even gonna bother with tractors. im going straight for trains

[night narwhal]

I then only sync any if the truck stop backs up.

I said that, now I have 6 tractors.

I have skipped trucks tho

[vital charm]

hahah. trains look better imo

it doesnt look good having trucks driving around the world

i saw kiblitz (i think thats how you spell it) his videos and he used trucks inside of the base to move stuff around i think

might've been trucks to export but not sure

the machines wont stay stable past this point and i dont know why

i let all of the pet coke fill up before i turned them on

the first machines use too much

[wind spade]

math error?

[vapid gorge]

Floor holes can be buggy as well as feeding from below

[vital charm]

indeed.

[night narwhal]

Prefilled the system after redoing the pipe beween the extractors and the loop, even managed to remove 5 turns in the process.

With 9 machines on everything was working fine, so I let it fill up. After I turned on the 10th and waited 20/25mins the amount of oil getting to the 4 in the middle again dropped to the point where they were using more oil then they were getting.

At this point I'm thinking of ripping out the whole mk2 pipe and just running 2 mk1 pipes directly from the extractors.

[vapid gorge]

Share some overhead shots of the system, sounds like you’ve made a simple mistake. And if that’s the case mk1s prob not going to help

[night narwhal]

It'll be a couple, I can't get high enough right now to get it all in one screenshot.

[vapid gorge]

Use some scout towers from different spots. Prob quickest

[night narwhal]

Only one I'm having issues with is the Mk2 pipe

both Mk1s work fine

[vital charm]

@night narwhal can u quickly explain ur issue

few words

[elfin nebula]

did you connect different pipe types to each other? so mk1 on an mk2?

[oblique hollow]

You could turn the pipes that go into the machines to mk 1

but just those

[elfin nebula]

if yes, that mostly doesnt work for us, it uses throughout at junctions

[night narwhal]

Set up:

Two oil extractors, over clocked to 300 each, these feed into an MK2 pipe.

Mk2 pipe takes this to 10 refinerys making fuel. fuel needs 60 oil per min, so 60x10=2x300=600.

Up until the manifold every pipe segment is full and has the max flow rate.

Issue:
Not enough oil is getting to refinery 4,5,6 and 7 in the manifold so they're flickering between green and yellow. Which means my power generation is fluctuting as the amount of fule being made isn't consistanct.

I have tried:

• making the manifold a loop (as you can see in the screenshots)
• removing any unnecessary turns, valves and pumps.
• turned machines off to let all of the pipes pre-fill before running them
• I've gone through and made sure that every pipe is mk2.
• made the pipes that go into the machines mk1.

[oblique hollow]

Ah well in that case yeah its time to give up and not merge it into a single mk 2

[vital charm]

yeah maybe try 2 mk1 loops powering 5 machines per loop

[elfin nebula]

we experienced that you cant ever combine two different pipes. a junction with mk1 and mk2 almost always fails for us

[vapid gorge]

It’s a bit hard to tell - have you merged multiple manifolds?

If you’re in u7 you can dm me the save I can have a look

[night narwhal]

No, there are a total of 12 refinerys, but the last 2 are fed by an Mk1 pipe that leads to an extractor running at 120 pm

[oblique hollow]

no reason to merge those 2

with the other 10

right?

[night narwhal]

That was actually the first thing I did, didn't fix it so I put it back

[oblique hollow]

still, seperation is better

those 2 now are isolated

[vital charm]

i had a similair issue i think. i connected all of my pipes to the front of the machines like this and the machines at the end wouldnt work.
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ] <machines
| -|--|-|--|-|--|-|--|-| < manifold
|/ < input of oil

later i tried it like this and it worked
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ] <machines
| -|--|-|--|-|--|-|--|-| < manifold
|-----------------/ < input of oil

[oblique hollow]

they dont depend on anything else

[night narwhal]

Yeah this is a looping manifold, which is exactly what I was suggested to do and have done

[vital charm]

so try to evenly distribute the input to both the front and back

[oblique hollow]

thats what a loop does

and it failed it seems

[elfin nebula]

loops never changed something for us

[night narwhal]

All it did was move the issue from the last 4 to the middle 4. 😄

[elfin nebula]

yeah

[oblique hollow]

If all the iffy workarounds for mk 2 at 600 fail, its time to stop. Cuz by then you already wasted enough time. At that point converting to mk 1 is easier and faster

[night narwhal]

This is exactly what I'm thinking.

[oblique hollow]

Yeah, go through with it

[elfin nebula]

my question is still open. is there any junction that has mk1 and mk2 at the same time connected?

[oblique hollow]

How many minutes or hours have you been messing with this already

[night narwhal]

My whole morning loooool

[elfin nebula]

if yes, mk2 loses flowrate

no matter how much above 300 is in there

[night narwhal]

I loaded up the game to continue working on my trainstation, but my jetpack was out of fuel. But my fuel container in my shopping center was out of fuel. So I went to where it was being made and shipped in and... now my morning is gone. XD

[oblique hollow]

Average experience with oil

[night narwhal]

Not with my old set up that uses mk1 pipes! 😦

[vital charm]

im also working on oil and also wasted my whole morning because stuff wasn't working

[oblique hollow]

Next time, if you do use mk 2, dont go near the cap

[night narwhal]

I have an old set up from before I unlocked fuel generators that goes the whole oil->grape juice -> plastic/rubber/petrocoke->power. All uses mk1 pipes and it works like a dream.

Only had a small issue cause the petrocoke backed up, which I fixed in like 5mins

[elfin nebula]

you can go near cap, just dont connect any mk1 anywhere to it

[vital charm]

mk1 belts with petrocoke? damn. im also building that same setup rn all mk4 belts

[elfin nebula]

also no upgrade. a directly built mk2 holds the 600

[night narwhal]

pipes pipes, christ no I wouldn't do petrocoke on mk1 belts

[vital charm]

ohhhhh

LMAO i was so confused

but yeah i run everything on mk1 here aswell

[oblique hollow]

The question is if its worth it taking the risk

most would say no

[night narwhal]

Right, I'm gonna leave one of the refineries off for now so I can get at least some consistent power generation and build up a stock of fuel canisters whilst I do some IRL productive shit.

[elfin nebula]

it worked consistent so far as long as you follow both rules

[night narwhal]

And thenI'll come back and replace the mk2 pipes with mk1.

[oblique hollow]

For you only or also for everyone you know?

Because this is an old topic with nobody finding agreement on it

[elfin nebula]

on our server that should be more unstable. and some people when talking about that last time

no one has problems when everythings mk2

[oblique hollow]

2 people discussing it doesnt rule out the thousands of other players. So im not willing to completely close the case on mk 2 and to just say "everyone is silly and cant build pipes right".

And the devs are aware enough of it that they consider pipe rebalances, so something IS scuffed

[elfin nebula]

well, what means right.
you should be able two combine mk1 and mk2 in one network as well as upgrading pipes. also how you place junctions also makes a different sometimes.
so thats clearly not bugfree

[night narwhal]

Yeah, you shouldn't need to know specific angles and tricks to get Mk2 pipes working.

I can lay mk1 pipes down without a care and they work fine.

[elfin nebula]

i use mk2 for design without needing them

[oblique hollow]

Hence the general tip "dont use mk 2 at cap"

Almost every single mk 2 issue ever is when its uses at the cap

[elfin nebula]

well its the same with everything above 300

so even 301 will fail some day

its just less noticable it seems

[oblique hollow]

If you use 450/min in a mk 2 the pipe can catch up.

thats the whole thought behind it

[elfin nebula]

that also has problems when mk1 somewhere

it seems the whole junction limits to 300 some times

[oblique hollow]

Hmmm... makes no sense tho they have no limit. or rather its way higher than the pipes

[elfin nebula]

so when having a straight 450 going through and then attach an mk1, all sides sometimes get set to 300, the mk2 cant get that anymore as well

[oblique hollow]

Junctions are also really scuffed sometimes tho, yeah

Especially when it comes to head lift lol

[vital charm]

my machines dont wanna take water all of a sudden

its just 1 pipe network that doesnt wanna work

[oblique hollow]

is this on experimental?

[elfin nebula]

usual scenario is that straight mk2 line and then mk1 to generator.
not needed and risky

[oblique hollow]

I dont know what but something in experimental chnaged and a lot of stuff pipes used to be able to simply does weird stuff now.

Guess they keep shadow-patching them

[elfin nebula]

vips are gone and its great

[oblique hollow]

Everyone being forced to do aluminum properly again. That will reignite some old discussions for sure lol

[median heath]

Hi. Haven't been forced to change a thing 😁

[vapid gorge]

eh, I've seen sloshing issues w/o loop and floods trying to run them at 500.
with those things getting full 600 is simple.

[night narwhal]

Hey all - replaced the pipes with mk1s.

It's slowly re-balance its self out, but seems to be working.

So yeah, I'm gonna stand by the "don't use mk2 at cap" rule for the time being.

[oblique hollow]

sloshing isnt a concern at 500 cause it can just catch up

it will be slow, but it has the time for it

[vapid gorge]

sloshing causes stutters though, I've had systems that wouldn't get up to speed because of it after hours/days.
Easier to run at 600 and just build loops and floods

[oblique hollow]

Id rather not approach 600 in any capacity

[night narwhal]

Which is kind of against the point - so I hope this is a bug and will be fixed.

[oblique hollow]

We can hope. Else we will have to cope

[vapid gorge]

ime it seems like a big part of it is when machines pull fluid from the manifold creating a gap allowing fluid to flow backward.
I think that's why often I can get away w/o looping turbo fuel as machines pull very little each minute from the line.

I don't think it's a bug, just how bidirectional fluids work.
That's where loops and flooding comes in. If you send X fluid pm from point a to point b, with not vertical branching or splits and merges you can get easily run systems at 600, even bottom feeding it

[oblique hollow]

With mk 2 it definitely is a bug in how junctions give priority

Aka they dont give priority and pressure just builds up in the side connections and then flows bacl into the junction

[night narwhal]

Could valves fix the issue?

[oblique hollow]

Nah, valves cant

[night narwhal]

what's the point of them then?

[oblique hollow]

you just move the issue from one side of the valve to the other side

[vapid gorge]

thats odd.

[oblique hollow]

So in the end valves are pointless

[vapid gorge]

yeah atm valves don't really have a point

[oblique hollow]

Kinda a failed design

[vapid gorge]

Except maybe in u8 for vop or something you mentioned Mcgal?

[oblique hollow]

VOP is for any version

its just an overflow junction

with multiple outputs

or a sev puts it "overflow is VOP with just 2 outputs"

[opaque halo]

can i ask? how many hours have yall clocked in the game? and what makes u comeback to play more?

[oblique hollow]

i have like.... 2000 so far?
Its just neat and decoration is fun too

[opaque halo]

bro how 😭

[oblique hollow]

i played since EA launch in 2019

4 years of time

[opaque halo]

really? damn

did u keep up with the updates of all items they add?

[vapid gorge]

3k+?

[oblique hollow]

Yeah

[opaque halo]

jesus

[oblique hollow]

I was there for every update

When i first played, conveyor lifts and pipes didnt exist

neither did a majority of decorations or zooping

[vapid gorge]

I came in later than Mcgal, just meant I tried harder 😛

[oblique hollow]

And nuclear and aluminum were unfinished

[vapid gorge]

decorations are fairly recent though

[opaque halo]

okay so lemme get this straight

[night narwhal]

Same - was around for the pipe reveal trailer. I don't know how they made a video about pipes so hype.

[opaque halo]

how are yall not engineers by now istg i struggle making a rotor and have enough power for it 😭

[elfin nebula]

i would have more hours if i only played that game.
in parallel got other games to few k hours

[oblique hollow]

Fun thing i am a mechatronics engineer by trade

[opaque halo]

no wonder haha nice

[oblique hollow]

But in this game i am a plumber for some reason

[elfin nebula]

like 1k per year goes into genshin since 2020

[night narwhal]

Hours or cash?

[vapid gorge]

just practice, you'll get there 😄
and I'm just a nerd with engineer adjacent stuff. Maths/physics ect

[elfin nebula]

hours

[opaque halo]

that i can relate too haha i play genshin on the daily as well maybe 1-3h a day tho

[night narwhal]

This game is my "I need a break from FF14" game.

[opaque halo]

i love complicated things but my brain doesn't it does make my brain happy seeing a machine work on its own

[vapid gorge]

offer to look at your save is there if you want btw, I've done a lot of large/weird pipe systems like this monstrosity https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/932761153703149659/1139847014574727178/big_r_2.jpg

[night narwhal]

Ah yeah, thanks for the offer but I have already ripped it all out for Mk1s.

[opaque halo]

bro what is any of this and why is it blue 😭

[night narwhal]

And it's now working fine

[vapid gorge]

Look, one of the best tips for the game? be zen about mistakes and just kinda flow past it. Use the lessons from your previous factory on the next and don't try to to perfect things. I still learn new things every factory I build

[oblique hollow]

I remember troubleshooting a 900 generators turbofuel plant for Maroon

Never again

[vapid gorge]

it's 500~ refineries making 9000 rubber/plastic and 10000 alum ingots

the blue is glass reflecting

[oblique hollow]

Since that day i swore to call anyone who builds more than 100 generators a lunatic

[vapid gorge]

fair.

[opaque halo]

yeaaa ill love learning too its nice, i got maybe to stage 4? and thats when i stopped and now i cameback

[elfin nebula]

oh cool, im building 900 gen as well

[oblique hollow]

Why am i not surprised.

[elfin nebula]

so when something doesnt work later, ima ask you

[opaque halo]

and you use those for what?

[vapid gorge]

yeah I restarted a few times. Like phase 3, 5 and 7 I think. I'm doing some permanent systems now

[oblique hollow]

And i will run away screaming

[vapid gorge]

Well that factory is gone now actually. I didn't like the design. It worked but was ugly and not what I wanted. I changed my whole approach to building too

[elfin nebula]

nah, im sure its fine anyway

[oblique hollow]

If you subgroup it well enough it should be fine

[opaque halo]

nice, so i should prob comeback to ask you help about a few things in early stages hah

[elfin nebula]

its 2x25x18

[vapid gorge]

if you like? my early approach isn't for everyone though

[oblique hollow]

but 8 generators per mk 2 pipes is something i wouldnt ever do

[elfin nebula]

so 18 lines, two sides, 25 each

[opaque halo]

oh i see, and as for structures doesn't the game lag if u start making things really large?

[oblique hollow]

way too many dependancy issues

[opaque halo]

whatever is optimal haha saves me some time would work for me 😆

[vapid gorge]

depends on your computer and how large is large. That one in the image? if you had a potato running things you might have issues on anything but low graphics. But if your comp is reasonable it shouldnt be a prob

[vapid gorge]

'optimal' is in the eye of the beholder.

I often suggest making production lines that are NOT optimal while going up the tiers

[opaque halo]

no no i have a reasonably good pc 3090 and so on but yea just wondering if the game would still lag with bigger structures which would make sense

[elfin nebula]

dunes doesnt lag for me at all despite being a 30 mb large 2400 hour save with limitbreaking unreal engines object limit

[vapid gorge]

should be fine, it's getting more optimised every update

3090 is more than I have

[opaque halo]

i see, do you change the factory based on what the obj asks you to do? or make new ones?

[elfin nebula]

i feel the respaghetti in the question

[vapid gorge]

what's the context? is this factory somethign I'm building to go up the tiers or a final permanent factory?

[elfin nebula]

#satisfactory message
milestone base

can do everything

[opaque halo]

so ur in stage 3 requires you to make something and now ur done with that, it requires to make something else that ur current factory isn't built for, do you edit the current one to fit the needs of ur next tier make a new one next to it?

[elfin nebula]

i respaghetti and rushed all milestones with that base i posted

[true junco]

Old feeds the next. A lot of tiers require parts from the previous.

[wind spade]

build completely new factory from raw resources

[opaque halo]

yea i just checked its massive

[elfin nebula]

its really small

[vapid gorge]

mind if I dm you? chat is a bit busy tonight

[opaque halo]

trust me i dont play enough to comprehend size 😭

[elfin nebula]

just expanded and changed each time abother item was needed

[opaque halo]

sure of course

[elfin nebula]

it looks larger than it is

[fierce ruin]

Im being silly, but for once i want to split this up nicely.

i have 300, 600 and 780 bauxite comming in, want to split it into 4 times 420.
How?

[opaque halo]

perhaps based on the view yea

[wind spade]

best to just use what you have on belts, build sets of machines that need 300/600/780 respectively

[fierce ruin]

i normally do just that, but on alu production the backflow of recycled water always kills me, so i have split the factory in 4 modules

[elfin nebula]

split 480 off the 600 and 780,then split 60 off again.
gives the first two with 420

[wind spade]

just don't recycle water back 🙂 use it for some other production that needs water 😉

[fierce ruin]

yes, but they would have to work 100% (otherwise just pack the water and dump it)

[elfin nebula]

add both split 60s to the 300

[wind spade]

all your factories should work 100%, otherwise it's time wasted not producing 🙂

[elfin nebula]

so that actually not that hard, just no pc atm so cant draw that

but thats a basic overflow splitter

[fierce ruin]

agreed, but then i need to rework my nuclear facility first, cause there is something wrong there and i produce half of my max needed

[fierce ruin]

no need to draw, i know what to do, thank you, its just me going at it wrongly 😛

[elfin nebula]

smart splitter, any on a 480 belt, overflow to get the rest

and then split the 480 with normal splitter and mk1 belt

overflow splits save the world

[fierce ruin]

correct

[wind spade]

overflow splits direct input 😛

[fierce ruin]

yes yes

[elfin nebula]

well, direct input doesnt always work.
and 300,600,780 clearly are nodes, so nothing direct here

works at later stages

[wind spade]

it does work here, you put 300 node into machines requiring 300

[vital charm]

i got 7 coal gens that need 315m3/m. they're getting 360m3/m but the water wont stay inside of the machines for some reaon. they keep going dry. the other grids work tho its just 2 grids of 7 that are down

[lethal prism]

Double check if the pumps are all connected, check for headlift issues, and send a screenshot if you can

[vital charm]

...

3 machines weren't hooked up

[lethal prism]

Lol

[vital charm]

thanks

[jovial spindle]

how can you do a 120/90 split

[wind spade]

one splitter

[oblique hollow]

90 is a mk 1 belt plus half a mk 1

120 is just a mk 2

[elfin nebula]

smart splitter any on an mk2 belt, overflow to any other

[summer flare]

The ratios involve mean the input is split to two outputs, 4 parts to 3.

[elfin nebula]

tf, just build an overflow splitter

thats a single splitter and its done

done

[magic island]

seven boxes? pff, it can be done with five

[magic island]

this may or may not work depending on the consistency of the source belt's flow. ie, if you're making something like steel screws or fused wires that come out in big batches, the source belt will alternate between full and empty stretches. as such, the priority output belt will alternate between getting 120 and getting 0, rather than getting a consistent 120 all the time.

to counteract this, the priority output should have a length of Mk3 for a bit before throttling down to Mk2

[prisma kraken]

or you can just let backpressure from the consumers even out a normal 2-way split 🙂

doesn't work if you're pushing stuff into a train station or storage, but otherwise

[vapid gorge]

5? pffft I've done it with zero

[elfin nebula]

there is no situation where you use this with resources that behave this way

[magic island]

it wouldn't come up with directly mined resources, but it can totally come up in production chains

easy example: say you wanna make 30 wires & 30 cables /min for personal use. so you make 1 fused wire assembler and 1 cable constructor. the assembler produces 90 wires/min, which you want to split 60/30 (60 for the cables and 30 to keep).

but if you try to do that by smart-splitting the 90 onto a prioritized Mk1 belt, you won't actually get the 60/30 split you want

[elfin nebula]

you overflow split for inter-factory connections and not intra

[hybrid star]

there's a thing that's confusing me a little, I have 3 blenders producing 600 fuel (overclocked). The fuel is going to 8 refineries (overclocked) that each consume 75 fuel. One of the refineries is not getting enough fuel, sometimes but one of the blenders is getting backed up because not enough fuel is going out. ConfusedFace.jpeg its a simple manifold so it shouldn't be flowing backwards anywhere

[vapid gorge]

if you've clocked the cable machines to use the right numbers sure it will

[vapid gorge]

is it looped?

[hybrid star]

3 blenders in a line going to 8 refineries in a straight line, well it goes around a corner

[vapid gorge]

but is the manifold looped onto itself?

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1142247093528961156/1142273544005357628/image_13.png

[hybrid star]

no its just a straight line

[vapid gorge]

loop it and flood it before turning on the last refinery

[magic island]

my example is a single fused wire assembler, splitting onto a single cable constructor. the point I'm making is that Smart-splitting onto a slow belt will not give the cable machine 60/min to use

you can get the desired amount other ways (ie, smart-splitting onto an equal-speed belt and letting it back up), I'm just talking about why that specific way doesn't always work

[magic island]

it doesn't really matter whether it's inter-factory or intra, smart splitting onto a slower belt is not guaranteed to fill that belt to capacity unless the input belt meets a certain threshold for continuous flow

[elfin nebula]

yeah and thats the case for inter connections

but not for intra

[vapid gorge]

I mean if you're just splitting it onto 2 lines and both lines feed machines that consume the right amount you'll be fine.

and if you set the line awya from cable manufacture the cable will consume the right amount of wire and the rest, 60, will overflow

[magic island]

if you're trying to send 30 wires into storage and 60 wires into the cable constructor, the cable constructor will never get enough with this method until the storage bin completely backs up

you would have to priority-split to the cable constructor with a belt that is the same speed as the input belt, not with an Mk1 belt

[vapid gorge]

do you not know how a smart splitter works? you can prioritize the cable

[magic island]

I encourage you to try it out for yourself if you're skeptical

1 fused wire assembler, smart-split onto an Mk1 belt leading to 1 cable constructor, with overflow going into a bin. see if the cable constructor ever hits 100% (it won't)

[vapid gorge]

that makes no sense. You're overfeeding the cable machine

if by 100% you mean the efficiency meter on the machine? well thats dumb because those things don't work very well and you should never trust them

[magic island]

it won't be off by just a little, it'll come out to around 75%

the cable constructor will not receive 60 wires/min with that setup, even though the belt is prioritized

[vapid gorge]

if you prioritize the wire to the cable machine in this scenario it'll get 90 per minute until it's buffer is full.

[magic island]

Mk1 belt

I am talking about why smart-splitting onto a slower belt will not necessarily fill that belt. that is the entire point I am making

[hybrid star]

does it matter if its the other way around like that

[vapid gorge]

ok it'll get 60 pm, exactly what it needs and the spin up time will mean it'll have enough of a buffer to keep going

[magic island]

it will not get 60/min

try it and see

[vapid gorge]

should be fine but I don't see where the loop is connected on the left?

[vapid gorge]

I have. I've done things like this before. I don't know why you don't think a smart splitter can put 60pm on a mk1 belt

[magic island]

it sometimes can and sometimes can't. it depends on the choppiness of the input belt

[snow dove]

uhm, no?

[vapid gorge]

noif the over flow is set choppiness doesn't matter

[magic island]

I feel like I'm trying to explain the Monty Hall problem over here

[hybrid star]

thats the other end of it, dont mind the right thats a different sent of refineries

[vapid gorge]

even if you're worried about bursts the spin up/spin down of the machine will level it out

[hybrid star]

where it goes over the right that's where the other screenshot is

[vapid gorge]

cool, flood it with one machine off, and when all refineries are full turn teh last one back on

[magic island]

The Fused Wire recipe makes 90 wires/min, but it does it in large batches. As a result, your wire belt (presumably an Mk2) alternates between being full and being empty. The belt will be full of wires 75% of the time, and empty the other 25% of the time.

When a full portion of the belt passes through the smart-splitter, the priority Mk1 belt will receive the intended 60 wires/min.

BUT when an empty portion of the belt passes through the splitter, the priority Mk1 belt will receive nothing for that span of time.

Therefore, even though you've set it to be prioritized by the smart-splitter, the output belt is still only going to get ~45/min. You need to upgrade that output belt to something faster than an Mk1 in order for it to actually get the amount you want.

tl;dr, smart splitting directly onto slower belts is not necessarily a consistent way to control item rates.

[hybrid star]

what's baffling after a few minutes now the refineries are at 100% which is cool but one of the blenders is still getting backed up which causes drama with the refineries up the chain delivering resin

maybe in 30 minutes it will have figured it out

[vapid gorge]

sometimes it needs a bit of time to balance out, but if you did the math right and some blenders are backing up and something is wrong then stare at the refineries, they'll eventually go yellow

[hybrid star]

Its not making sense so far, the math is pretty basic (3200) -(875) = 0

sorry 3*200

lol its actively worse, now I have 2 refineries turning off regularly

[hybrid star]

its ridiculous but putting pumps on the blender exits seems to have worked, they're at or getting to 100%. there is no elevation advantage but they are actually spitting out the fuel instead of hoarding it and spitting out some of it e:blenders not refineries

[normal gate]

From a build I'm doing. I like to have extra handy of belt items. Any tips on having it so I can have say, an extra storage unit of containers to keep everything constantly fed? Like would I need a 2nd container at each point to hold the excess to keep my belts moving?

[vapid gorge]

either it's not actually working properly and you are assuming it does or you were doing something super weird to begin with. If it is working than it would have just been 'time waiting for things to stabalise'

[hybrid star]

no, the pumps did it. Everything is at 100%. Its working the way the production planner said it would. Nothing weird. https://www.satisfactorytools.com/production 1800 plastic with the blenders and turning rubber into plastic and then some of the plastic into rubber again. Don't know why the pumps made it work, they shouldn't but they did

[prisma kraken]

it isn't that smart splitters won't output fully onto a slower belt, its that if you use them to filter specific items onto a slower belt (like off of a sushi belt), there may not be a space on the slower belt for the item, and in that case, the item you wanted to filter goes onto the overflow line

[magic island]

it has nothing to do with whether there are multiple items

[prisma kraken]

this actually happens pretty often in central storage when you forget to upgrade one of the lifts to match the bus speed

maybe if your pushing 780 mixed on a mk5 belt and trying to filter off 60/min of an item you'll see that, but i don't think you'll actually see that happen if you're trying to direct 60 of 320 items a certain way on a 480 belt, maybe if the burstiness on a fast belt causes >1second gaps, you'll see it

but that makes sense

[magic island]

if this helps to demonstrate:

it gets even more severe with a faster input belt, because you end up with bigger gaps inbetween the batches of wires, which makes bigger gaps on the output belt

this particular recipe setup makes it very obvious what's going on, but the basic concept is: if the output belt of a smart splitter is slower than the input belt, fluctuations in the input can produce gaps in the output belt.

put another way: just because there's enough items passing through to saturate the output belt, doesn't mean they're all actually making it ON to the output belt

(simple solution I mentioned earlier: start the output with a length of the faster belt speed, then throttle to the slower belt speed)

[elfin nebula]

so you made a workaround for a visual glitch, ok

[magic island]

it's not just visual

[elfin nebula]

it is

[magic island]

and it's not a glitch

in the first picture, the output is literally not getting 60 wires/min even though it's prioritized

which is not a glitch. gaps along the input belt result in gaps on the output belt

if you do not believe me, build it yourself.

[elfin nebula]

we use that for ages and its a visual glitch, not actual problem

works flawless for several hundred hours now

and the visual glitch is known in this case for long

[magic island]

what on earth makes you think it's only visual?

[elfin nebula]

because its known

and confirmed

[magic island]

there's literally less than 60 wires/min getting on the output belt, and the reason is straightforwardly obvious and not a glitch

the splitter can only put stuff on the belt if there is stuff passing through it

when there is nothing passing through the splitter, it cannot put things on the output belt

therefore the output belt gets very real gaps

[elfin nebula]

well, you forcibly built something nobody would ever build, so the testcase is already bad

[magic island]

it's a demonstration of a principle that still holds in other builds

[elfin nebula]

no? thats the thing

nobody would build that

[magic island]

nobody would ever put a belt with gaps through a splitter?

[elfin nebula]

not through an overflow splitter, yes

there is no case even needing that

you direct connect in intra factory environment. every form of splitting would be too large for larger scales

[magic island]

belts get gaps on them for all kinds of reasons. recipe batch sizes, manifolding, etc. it is normal and common for belts to get gaps on them

and if you put a belt with gaps through a smart splitter, the gaps may get passed on to the output even if you don't want that to happen.

the effect may be negligible depending on what you're doing, but if you wish to be mindful of efficiency then it's one more thing to factor in

[elfin nebula]

its not because you dont ever have this case in practise

its specificly made for the argument, not because it has any actual usecase

[magic island]

you literally told someone to try doing this lmao

[elfin nebula]

yeah, for a case where its impossible to happen

[magic island]

#math-and-meta message

I am sorry to break the bad news, but it is not guaranteed that the priority belt in your diagram is always going to get the full 120/min you want it to get

don't shoot the messenger

[elfin nebula]

so it works for several hundred hours now but doesnt, i see

flawless logic there i guess

also is used for years in the community and nobody saw problems?

[magic island]

it is not necessarily going to deal a massive blow to efficiency, or crash your factory, or w/e. okay, your factory continued working. factories with inefficiencies often keep on chugging!

but much in the same way you may get imperfect results by clocking to repeated decimals, you may also get imperfect results by trying to use smart-splitters the way you recommended. sorry!

[elfin nebula]

no chugging or anything, it works flawless

exactly the amount everything should have

and its built like this for years and nobody ever had a single poblem with it

an 8 to 10 overflow splitter getting variational input cycle and outputs flawless 60 per minute belt for 200 hours now. still all machines have the exact same amount of ingot

[magic island]

I dunno what you want here.

You can use this information to your advantage when using smart splitters to control item rates, or you can... get really mad at me, for some reason?

I'm not in charge of your factory, build however you want. More information about how the game works can help you build better, if you wish. Go in peace, idk

[elfin nebula]

what you say just is a lie, belts have visual glitches at connections. the belt will get 60 per minute

[magic island]

I am not lying about how much the output belt is getting. Why would I lie about this

[elfin nebula]

to not need to say you were wrong

you can stare at that for hours. the logic how splitters work will always but everything to any and always leads the instabilities/gaps to the overflow

[magic island]

Here is what I am saying:
There are situations in which a smart splitter is not able to fill a slow output belt to capacity (even if the input rate exceeds that capacity), depending on the gaps along the input belt

sometimes the gap issue is small enough to be mitigated by the built-in buffer that splitters have, but I used a specific case to demonstrate what's going on and why it can happen

and for some reason this makes you upset

[elfin nebula]

but thats wrong

when there was a gap it will priorize the any belt to fix that

it doesnt split in halves

[visual crescent]

i wouldnt do that becasue then youre restricted to the lower speed of mk1, what does it matter that there is gaps. the mk2 has more potential to bring more items quicker

[magic island]

it's not wrong. build the setup I showed you. 1 Fused Wire assembler, split onto a priority Mk1 belt. see how many wires/min you get. It will be less than 60

[magic island]

in this case it is to control the exact amount, so as to get a 60/30 split (ie, 30 wires to keep, 60 to turn into cables)

[elfin nebula]

im splitting 100 to 60 and 40
and the 60 is flawless for eternity

because thats how smart splitters internal logic work

[magic island]

why, it's almost like you're using a recipe that doesn't produce the same pattern of gaps as my example!

[visual crescent]

just change the speed of you contructor so it builds slower

[elfin nebula]

the gaps doesnt matter since the splitter closes them

[visual crescent]

pretty sure its 50/50

[elfin nebula]

its not

[magic island]

then build it. prove it. Split 90 Fused Wire 60/30. try it!

[visual crescent]

how would you control that @elfin nebula

?

[elfin nebula]

you see that here, it always pushes all gaps to the overflow belt and never to the prio belt

[magic island]

I'm not bringing up Fused Wire randomly, the effect is especially pronounced with that recipe due to the batch sizes

I am explaining an effect that SOMETIMES happens, depending on the rate and choppiness of the input belt. it also sometimes DOESN'T happen.

[elfin nebula]

and it always does that, because its supposed to do that

[magic island]

do it with Fused Wire

[elfin nebula]

i dont have fused wires anywhere because the recipe is one of the worst in existence and nobody ever uses it

[visual crescent]

so how do you control which output of the smart splitter recives 40% and which recives 60%?

[magic island]

we are not talking about whether Fused Wire is a good recipe. Fused Wire is simply an example of a recipe that can cause the effect I am talking about

you are the one arguing that the thing never happens. I am pointing out a situation where it can. whether to test is up to you, but don't whine to me about it

[elfin nebula]

you set it to any to an mk1 belt, so it tries to push everything there, but thats limited to 60, so you have any belt as overflow to get the 40 there

basic overflow splitter

thats why we have 60, 120, 270, 480

to make use of that

because with 270 added to the stuff, you can split everything

[visual crescent]

oh yeah i mean you just have it overflow, i understand. pretty smart actually

[elfin nebula]

its designed that way

also still missing the answer of who ever would not direct connect

its one of the basic things

and especially with wires, screws etc you always do that

[prisma kraken]

Bexy is right on this, if there's a gap of more than 1 second's worth of items, the mk1 output will have a gap

[elfin nebula]

but that never happens in practise

[prisma kraken]

well it was just demonstrated by Bexy

[magic island]

it can, depending on logistical and recipe choices

even if you think the logistic and recipe choices are dumb

[elfin nebula]

well, in a forced way with specifically overly longs belts nobody would ever build

[prisma kraken]

not the length of the belt, it could happen anywhere

[magic island]

I'm not here to talk about which recipes are good, I'm just demonstrating a particular quirk of belt logic that CAN situationally occur

and you're acting like I ate your firstborn. chill a bit, hey?

[elfin nebula]

it only can when you want it to happen

[prisma kraken]

in any event, its not common, and not really worth obsessing over

[magic island]

I made the belts long to make the situation more clear, the belt length actually has nothing to do with what's happening. the same thing would happen with short belts

[elfin nebula]

the belt length has major impact on that

[magic island]

it does not, haha

[prisma kraken]

really the tl;dr is that if you're rate shaping by using belt speed modulation, you need the belts to be full of items all the time

[magic island]

certain recipes (specifically, ones that produce in big batches) tend to cause gaps on belts, whether the belts are long or short. the length doesn't change the choppiness at all

[prisma kraken]

that's because their cycle time is long

[elfin nebula]

and that is the case when the belt is short enough.
a size 1 belt, so splitter placed directly at the assembler wouldnt have the problem

[prisma kraken]

dude, length of the belt has zero to do with it

[magic island]

a fused wire assembler will result in a belt that alternates between full and empty. that will be true whether you make the output belt short or long

[prisma kraken]

you have a machine bursting 20 items ever 10 seconds onto a mk5 belt, you're going to have greater than 1 second gap

it doesn't matter the length of the belt

you can avoid it by using an mk1 belt out of the producing machine, but that wouldn't work for something like fused wire

an mk2 belt probably would avoid it, but i'm too lazy to do the math, lol

[elfin nebula]

so, when belt length doesnt matter, im sure you like to explain this then

and we are still talking about something nobody would ever build

[magic island]

Got an Mk2 belt coming out of the assembler, or something higher?

[elfin nebula]

obviously mk2 for the 90

[magic island]

oh, I definitely completely believe you

[elfin nebula]

just with this length

[magic island]

see, the thing is, I can get the effect in your vid by splitting an Mk5 into two Mk1s, even if they're long.

but splitting an Mk2 into two Mk1s doesn't work, even if they're short

[prisma kraken]

changine the mk2 to mk3 and you'll have different results

[elfin nebula]

sure, speed or length

an mk2 is still slow enough so that the splitter works

[magic island]

the length is immaterial. you will get different results with different combinations of belt speeds, which is something I was already pointing out

[elfin nebula]

for mk3 it would need to be shorter and that not possible

[prisma kraken]

its not the length, its that the mk2 belt will have items spaced every 3/4's of a second which is less than the clock for an mk1

[elfin nebula]

the same belts, just longer mk2 has different result though

[prisma kraken]

there's probably also something involving the splitter's internal buffer as a variable, i'm not going to spend the brain power calculating and experimenting

if stuff doesn't pass on a belt for more than a second, there's going to be a gap on the mk1 belt, its that simple

[magic island]

gaps using a short Mk2 from the assembler

[elfin nebula]

have it the same. the gaps on the any belt depend on the legnth of the input belt

with shortest mk2 belt, there isnt any

[magic island]

one of the factors here: if you use an input belt that has a higher capacity than both outputs combined, the input will back up, and maintain a supply that CAN (maybe) last through the next gap

this is wholly unrelated to the length of that input belt. like most things in this game, it's entirely about rates, not distances

actually I might not have thought that through enough. I suppose no matter how much the input backs up, it'll get depleted at a rate of 120/min (capacity of both belts) and therefore still end up with a gap before the next batch comes through. I think the "buffer" can only be after the splitter, not before

brain tired apparently

[wind spade]

@trim flicker see #math-and-meta message for alt recipe choices

[frosty owl]

Is the overflow belt MK1 or 2?

[magic island]

in the picture it's an Mk1, but the same thing would happen with an Mk2 or higher

in this particular arrangement the overflow is never going to exceed 60, because the input alternates between 120 and 0, and the priority belt always eats 60 of that

in other situations the overflow belt speed could factor in

[gaunt shore]

how do i take 60 off of a 300 belt?

help me i am going insane, spent 30 min on this still can figure it out!

[dusk bison]

Use a splitter with a Mk1 belt?

[gaunt shore]

yes i can use all the recourses

[frosty owl]

Well, all in all I think you got it all figured out @magic island (I went through these observations too). The existence of such scenarios is one of the reasons why I advocate for bigger "overflow inventories" for smart and programmable splitters (currently 3). As it stands, the buffer is not enough to buffer for all situations leading to issues with "burst recipes" (recipes that output many items per cycle).

Personally, I encountered this when trying to split series of 60/min Iron Ingots off a MK5 belt with mixed content from Pure Ingot refineries (output for Iron: 13 every 12s)

[gaunt shore]

i am bumb

[frosty owl]

A smart splitter

(No pun intended)

[gaunt shore]

haha yes!

[magic island]

yeah, a bigger buffer in the smart splitter would allow it to bank up more items, before putting them onto the overflow belt as a last resort. would solve 99% of "gappy belt" scenarios

[frosty owl]

Can make it 100% if the buffer is big enough compared to production cycles

Anyway, the fix you mentioned can do the job too: high tier output first to act as buffer, then a low tier segment to choke it

[magic island]

on the topic of smart splitter feature wishlists, I'd love to have a two-tiered overflow option within a single splitter

eg: prioritize belt A
send to B if A is full
send to C if both B and A are full

can do it with two splitters atm, but it'd be nifty to do it with one

[snow dove]

that might be better for programmable splitters, might given more use to them

[fierce ruin]

i was saying this exact thing to one of my friends today too

i think this would help consolidate splitters

[broken quest]

you don't even need a smart splitter right, because 60 is less than half of the 300 in?

[hybrid star]

if that's what a full 60 belt looks like. the other lines are 750 in and whatever is left of 750 after the 60 out

apologies for the clipping, its a smart idea so I wanted to see it happening

[broken quest]

huh, default splitter being screwy as per usual

[hybrid star]

to be fair that's just me making a line super fast off an existing 750 belt just to see what happens, I could have made it prettier

[broken quest]

no but it makes sense why it happens

even if it doesn't look the best or work the best

which means either overflow smart splitter is the only way

[frosty owl]

Normal splitters don't (reliably) split evenly on different belt MKs

[lethal prism]

Tbh if you want 60/30 split just split 3 way and merge 2

Problem solved

[livid forge]

Priority merger too

[wind spade]

pretty much pointless

[snow dove]

please don’t start them again

[livid forge]

about as useless as priority splitter for all the same reasons

still a great thing to have, cause there are some good usecases for them where you dont want to "build it"

[wind spade]

priority splitters are useful for overflow into sink purposes
priority mergers are kinda pointless

[livid forge]

put 2 splitters in front of each other, and mergers on top. Feed from the splitters into the mergers with lifts, and take the top output into storage, and bottom output into the sink 😉

problem solved, so priority splitter is useless

[wind spade]

that's not a priority split

[livid forge]

it sends 90% to storage, and rest to sink if it fills up.

if you dont want to sink 10% of ur stuff, use 3 segments to bring it to 3%.

still too much? add a 4th to bring it down to 1%

[wind spade]

but you never reach 100%

[livid forge]

doesnt matter, you can very quickly get to 1%

[snow dove]

and that wouldn’t work in a sorting system

[wind spade]

I don't want 1%, I want 0%

and the argument is weird anyway
"move items by hand, conveyors are useless" is the same logic

[snow dove]

even if you have smart splitters minus the overflow function, that wouldn’t work in a sorting system

[livid forge]

btw i hope you realize im trolling you btw. I'd love a priority splitter, but you'd not have much better to say about priority merger

[wind spade]

we have priority splitter tho

and we don't need priority merger, hence the absence of it

[livid forge]

Storage, 2 inputs

Input 1: The factory
Input 2: Container

You dump your whole inventory into a container, that then gets sorted into other "input 2" containers.
From there, they're fed into Storage.

If there are items in the container, then halt the factory and feed items to storage from the container. If the container is empty, and the storage is not full, feed from factory.

Solve that without smart merger and without just sinking stuff. Cause if "just sink it" is a valid option for you
I don't want 1%, I want 0%
then this comment you made is also invalidated

[snow dove]

use a normal merger, takes the same amount of time to input the items

i have the same kind of system in my base, container connects to my sorting system

[livid forge]

Then you run the very real risk of backing up in the "input 2 containers" and will overflow, since every time you take from storage, and dump it back into the system, the input2 container will get more and more full

[wind spade]

a weird request to "stop factory"

factory should never stop, otherwise production time is wasted

there's no difference between "item from input 1" and "item from input 2", so just merge both, overflow to sink

[livid forge]

do you sink copper wires?

[wind spade]

I sink everything that has full storage

[livid forge]

so you have a copper wire factory with a sink

[wind spade]

I have a storage that overflows into sink

[livid forge]

its a yes/no question, do you sink wires?

[wind spade]

I have a storage that overflows into sink
doesn't this answer the question?

[livid forge]

ill take it as a yes.

Ok, i find that stupid. I produce higher grade stuff with those wires, and sink those instead, as its more points per resource used, and more points per energy used.
Also, i dont need a factory for everything. Factories for low grade stuff is also stupid to me.

I have one factory, that produces 3 items. Computers, High Speed connectors, and Heavy Modular Frames.

At one point or another, this factory use every single part that is lower tier than computer, so i can leach those parts from the middle, and put to storage. The inefficiency that would come as a result of this leaching is temporary, and as soon as the storage system is backed up, the factory would ramp back up to 100%, and sink excess computers connectors and heavy frames.

This is why i want the factory to only feed me with low grade stuff, if i actually need them

you see, how we have slightly different ways of playing, and slightly different opinions? neither one of us has a "correct" way. They're just different.

So in my usecase, a smart merger would be wonderful

[snow dove]

you’re the only person i’ve ever heard that plays like that

[wind spade]

I also produce higher grade items and sink those
but those are produced by a different factory which already works at 100% efficiency, so I can't really put more wire into it
I also don't want do make a setup to handle the wires to make higher grade items, as that setup won't be running at 100% efficiency

I don't really think it's stupid to aim for 100% efficiency

[livid forge]

as i said, mine also runs at 100%

[wind spade]

only if storage is full

which isn't 100%

[livid forge]

which it is 99% of the time

[wind spade]

then you can't really build anything since building things reduces efficiency of your factories

all of my factories produce either to storage or to sink. There's no other way.

(and those that produce to storage also overflow to sink)

[livid forge]

that efficiency drop is next to none.
You have a principle to keep it at 100% then. Its not about the efficiency, its about satisfying you, by seeing that bar never drop below 100%.

The drop my factory would endure by me taking out a few items for building, is next to none

i think it is FAR better to let that efficiency drop to around 90% for a short time, rather than wasting resources producing excess copper wires and sinking them

[main dirge]

Priority mergers would be amazingly useful for resource-limited builds

[wind spade]

"a few items" is very much understatement

even at the low end of building scale, you need several stacks of items, which can take hours to fill back

[livid forge]

the factory would take 4 hours to fill up everything, if everything is drained

i mean, everything...

so grabbing 10 stacks of just the low grade stuff would fill back up in 10-20 minutes

[wind spade]

I make enough stuff to never have the storage empty
I don't see the reason to make a lot just because I built the factory in a weird way and I need the storage to refill fast

also I don't want me taking items hurting production further down the line

[livid forge]

i have a dump inventory container, and a "grab and go" container, that has a good mix of everything i need to go build.

thats why i have that system to dump it back into storage

[wind spade]

I also have dump invetory container 🤷‍♂️

and "grab and go" container is my storage

(or my construction vehicle)

[livid forge]

either way.

At scale, i use less resources per ticket, and i use less power per ticket. And i have the same flexible storage as you, at the small cost of occationally going below 100%. I think this is a good tradeoff, you can disagree, but you're not "correct".

I also dont like several small factories. I also dont want entirely disconnected factories just built next to each other. If its in a building, its relevant to that building.

[wind spade]

I don't have the overflow sink as a main sink production, I have it as "if storage is full, I may as well sink excess"
if I want a lot of points, I build dedicated point factory

[livid forge]

im doing it your way for anything higher tier btw.

Factory, x number of inputs, 1 output. Feed to storage, overflow to sink

[wind spade]

either way, your things don't really need priority merger 🤷‍♂️

[livid forge]

then go back to the orignial challenge i posted 20 min ago, and solve it without a priority merger

[snow dove]

is it a container with mixed items or a singular item

[livid forge]

one container is mixed, the "dump" container.

Its then sorted though smart splitters into their dedicated storage. Each storage has a "input 2 container"

so every item of mine has 2 containers

one big, main storage. One small, the "stuff was manually dumped back into the system" container

[snow dove]

then a priority merger wouldn’t help

[wind spade]

three train stations, first one takes items from container, second one from factory, third one unloads to storage
if train fills in first station, it doesn't take anything from factory
solved

[livid forge]

ok so i need what, 3*30 train stations. Sorted, ill get to it

90 train stations should not take up too much space for a storage system

[wind spade]

can be single train with 30 platforms

and weird requests get weird answers 🤷‍♂️

[livid forge]

non-practical

then i may aswell use 4 splitters and 4 mergers on top.

[wind spade]

then do that and don't complain about missing thing that pretty much only you need 🤷‍♂️

[livid forge]

didnt know there had to be a majority demand for someone to wish for something

1m wide foundations too please
sloped half-foundations too please

am i not allowed to want these either?

[wind spade]

if you want something, this isn't the place to talk about it anyway

[brisk shore]

Satisfactory Questions

You can send Questions, Feedback, Suggestions, and Bug Reports
https://questions.satisfactorygame.com
<3 @wind spade

[livid forge]

#math-and-meta message let pitchfork this guy too then

[wind spade]

my point is that here we can discuss it in any way you want, but devs don't read here so if it's a request, then put it to QA site

otherwise you're only sharing it with people who can chip in and discuss it with you

[livid forge]

im not posting here to try to get it implemented

i saw a guy wishing for an improved smart splitter, so i replied "yes, i want that. I would also like a smart merger".

You started arguing that its "useless", and off we went from there.

[wind spade]

then you're posting it here and we can tell you it's useless 🤷‍♂️

[livid forge]

#screenshots message this is the solution i used in my first playthough roughly 2 years ago, and im probably gona build the same again. To the left, you see the output chest. A smart merger would solve that

[snow dove]

you’ve basically decided to do an unorthodox and uncommon play style, which the game devs don’t really support, and then advocated for adding an item that would be entirely useless for anyone else

[livid forge]

back then we had no blueprint oh thank god we have that now

[snow dove]

and you literally already have a solution for it

[livid forge]

what is that solution? i literally dont. Building that massive chunk of splitters and mergers is 1. not good for lag. 2. takes up alot of space

[main dirge]

Here's something I'm not sure how to do without a priority merger:
I need exactly 1777 (3*600- 23) quartz in one direction and exactly 1823 in the other - the alternative is to do an absolutely ludicrous amount of decimal machine speed management for my mixed instant scrap / default aluminium setup (it's actually sulfur limited but this example is easier - that has transport issues making the eact split even more important). There's no easy way of getting 23 with splitters - but with a priority merger, you could take the nearby iron/limestone node, set it to 37/m the priority merge that onto a mk1 belt with the 23 quartz as a secondary input

[snow dove]

what is that solution

-names the exact solution i’m referencing

[wind spade]

manifolds exist

[livid forge]

thats not a solution

it works, but its not good

[snow dove]

it’s not a solution

it works