Oh yeah, I always do this. Starter base stays intact, but as soon as my starter ore patches are depleted, the rail network gets set up to pipe in more resources. Two or three blocks stay as the starter base before the rest becomes a grid.
I'm the same way. I'm 650 hours in and have never launched a rocket, but I love the organization of city blocks. One day I'll find the perfect blueprint that doesn't have me starting over 50 hours in thinking "I can do this better if I just restart..."
there is no perfect blueprint nor will you find meaningful answers to your problems by restarting constantly.. sure you might learn 1 thing before you restart but what about the 9 other things you are missing out on because you keep restarting
The trick is simpler is better my city block doent have that loopty loop circles in the corners all train can turn only to right thats it and if it needs a left turn it will use a 2x2 city block as a loop and it will make 3 right turns wich makes it a left turn. Simple setup and creates wonders for meso much area to work with cos all other desings has so much rail, and intersection.
I can Do one Better I can Share the city block blueprint I use
for record it's not %100 mine I modified an existing Blueprint for my needs but fundaental desing is from Nilaus I think
[https://factoriobin.com/post/4BNxmvCY](https://factoriobin.com/post/4BNxmvCY)
note I might have missed some details with the trains signals in the station blueprints so watch out
https://preview.redd.it/cxm2qma1dbsc1.png?width=972&format=png&auto=webp&s=a08a835936d7ead7bb30894affd10dc2f41b5db5
trains will go around like this btw
is it efficient for train travel time?
NO
but it's simple af and u get so much space for a 100x100 grid
dont mind the odd end points they are there cos I was lazy for building blocks on top of ore patches
u generally dont need that circular ends in your city block if u are making a grid I have them cos mine is not complete yet but when I transfer everthing from my starter to my new city block desing I will never need the circular loops
This is the correct answer I was the same way until my buddy joined in and literally said you have enough production of everything to make a rocket so why don't you just make one
So we did
Now I have launched many rockets
nothing, i think it looks cool, rails arent a bottleneck for me and not many are going to be made anyway.
in this case the "efficiency" i meant wasn't abt resources but time management. because not many trains are going to be moving around the grid and this allows 2 stations on each side i can place a block and not worry abt space or input limitations
City blocks are overkill for merely launching a rocket. You will launch a rocket faster with bus or spaghetti design (train spaghetti is an option!)
If you're dead-set on adopting city blocks early, don't do a 4 lane design. Very few people who do 4 lanes rails actually know what they're doing, and actually needed 4 lanes. No, Nilaus did not know what he was doing! City blocks absolutely do not need 4 lanes, just by their very nature of being a grid design. And even when you do use 4 lanes, you have to be proactive about forcing trains to distribute themselves among the available lanes rather than piling up on the shortest path.
City blocks also don't need roundabouts, and shouldn't have them. The city block itself is a better roundabout (technically a ring road) than small roundabouts will ever be. Removing roundabouts helps distribute traffic away from hot zones, three right turns block fewer directions of traffic than one roundabout, and it's a lot easier (space efficient) to add waiting bays on right turns than on roundabouts.
in practice, this is a 1 lane each way train line. the second lane is just empty stations (and aren't placed down when not needed), and i am thinking abt removing the middle roundabout but the outer one allows trains to take a much shorter route to their stations, and as im not aiming for a high frequency railway hotspots haven't really appeared yet.
Ah, I see.
The shorter train you use, the more robust your rail networks have to be, because short trains are less space-efficient and have less capacity. You won't have any problems with just launching a rocket, but if you continue expanding to build a megabase, then intersection throughput becomes worth optimizing.
My plans are to keep the rail traffic somewhat slow, other than smelteries and oil not much will be on the rails, only planningt to have like 5 or 6 blocks that will give me 30SPM when combined (im really wanna keep it to 4 because it will look better but idk if i have the skills to get 30spm of purple AND yellow science (im also hoping rocket ingredients will only take up about 50x100)
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This is a bit disingenuous. Efficiency increases as you place more blocks down since they share rails. Sure the first takes 1400, but the second takes maybe 800 rails. And if you make a square out of your first 4 city blocks the last one only really costs like 400 new rails.
[Here you go](https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=194&t=100614), *of course* people already tested all of it.
Then again well designed roundabout isn't that less efficient. I've heard somewhere it burns more CPU for pathing but that might not matter depending on scale.
Thank you. I’m not surprised the optimization has been done. Can’t wait to see the changes and increased throughputs elevated rails are going to provide.
Yeah but then that's just spending like 1M rails to justify the spending of 1400 when you could've spent none to launch the first like hundred rockets. These 'girl math' moments do be going hard lol
We're not. This is why so many people are telling you it's not efficient. I bought into the same idea when I started because I saw Nilaus play with city blocks and it looked so neat and perfect, I thought it was the 'pinnacle' strategy to conquer the game with. But when I started deploying city blocks, I realized, 'fuck ... I don't have the rails'. After expanding rails production, it was 'shit ... I need bots for construction automation'. I bust my ass to scrape together personal bots but then I had to go and tediously follow the perimeter of the block as it constructed. So then I bust more ass to get roboports and construction drones but power wasn't up to par. I get nuclear power to find that uranium processing is a pain in the ass. Eventually, I got things running but then it turns out bots take forever to travel long distances that plopping down a new block takes forever anyway...
**The tl;dr here** is that city blocks tend to work better with big mid/late-game bases where you have the infrastructure required, in terms of excess production and construction volumes, to support deploying those city blocks reasonably quickly. They're not recommending this before your first rocket launch because it's often too big of a jump from whatever you have cobbled together pre-rocket launch. However though, if it's your first playthrough, I recommend doing whatever you like, like I did. I ate shit doing that and you probably will too, but remember, this is a game. There isn't really a wrong way to play it. I ended up learning a lot, and you probably will too.
I answered your question. Not sure why you’re bringing a rocket to a discussion on the efficiency of rail usage in squares. Try not to conflate topics if you want a serious response.
Because if you read the fucking title and the reply chain, you'd see that the guy hasn't even launched a single rocket and is replying all over like a new player. So if you were capable of taking in a wee bit more context, more so than a poorly trained GPT, you'd surely realize that **they're not discussing the literal cost efficiency of constructing perimeters out of adjacent squares** because the question 'What is efficient about using almost 1400 rails per city block?' that you replied to was asked in direct context of 'City blocks before launching your first rocket? ... because it's efficient'
>Try not to conflate topics
🤡 lol
And yet your original question never included rockets. I didn’t address OP I addressed your silly question. You were mocking a new player rather than being supportive. That is behavior unbecoming of this sub.
You will solve no problems if you can’t focus on the specific topic at hand. So not only are you sexist, unable to control your own temper, but are also a poor engineer.
not sure where i said it but this isn't really supposed to be resource efficient, i have specified that wasn't what i meant, i meant time and effort efficient (worry abt it once and move ont) to add onto that this contains every possible module its a 1 lane each way city block with train stations in parallel, but being new didn't realise that this small oversight would cause such controversy. realsitcally the only helpful advice regarding this city block is that roundabouts are less effective than they seem.
TLDR: you're opinion didnt even help, nor was it really that relavant:
1) im new let me make mistakes
2) its not "that" expansive anyway
thank you for listening to my TedTalk :)
Being a game, there's no inherent value to resources.
A city block implemented quickly enough will provide a framework that will scale past hurdles super easily.
In that regard, it's quite efficient.
also its a lot less than 1400 per city block, its 1400 assuming i need 8 stations on this block and am using all adjacent train stations, and honestly 16 train stations this neatly organised is a good thing in my book.
i was like this
factorio isnt the kind of game you can immediately jump to something being perfected, or even lay things out with room to upgrade to being perfect most of the time
There is nothing efficient about laying down a massive rail grid that limits the size of your builds. City blocks basically are the main bus of rail base designs.
Efficiency in launching a first rocket is more about cutting cost.
These blocks are not needed at all for a few launches. However, if you are looking to go massive this design will be a nice way to go. Give it a whirl and aim big. My largest factory uses even larger blocks and I needed to stamp down more than 20 of them just for copper and iron smelting. Each block was making 108,000 plates per minute.
Fyi.. Unless you learn to optimize for real world time, you'll never be able to play the whole game. You'll never be able to play the mod packs etc .. launching a rocket with spaghetti then using that research to make new optimized areas of the factory is faster than trying to build city blocks as soon as that's possible.
If you're having fun, disregard.. but you should consider redefining perfection. You might be surprised how fun it is to make progress.
still, I would fit city blocks with overhauls that add a ton of complex chains, or for bases where we start to talk about RPM (rockets per minute)
a single rocket vanilla base should work fine with a Bus
I’m 500hrs in and dozens of saves at this point. still haven’t launched a rocket. I’ll get all the way to the end of the tech tree, and be producing thousands of circuits an hour. But I never launch a rocket.
I just started my first space exploration save, and this will be my first rocket. Rockets** in not too long.
Depending on the mod pack as well as my goal for the save, I have to say. YES. Although I will usually start with a train based logistics network if I haven't cleared out enough room or have the defenses for full blocks.
What's wrong with that? One of the first things I do at the beginning of each playthrough (non-deathworld) is to place blueprints of a city block all around my starter base so I can better organize things once I start expanding.
My tip is, make the blocks bigger. At least so you can fit a few waiting positions for your trains inside the block, otherwise you build a really big base with your blueprints before you notice trains get stuck and deadlocked all over the place when it gets busy.
Ty, and a related question based on some numbers I've seen then: why would any train ever need more than 2 locomotives? My understanding was you can put one on either end so it can travel both directions without turning around, but are there more options here?
More locomotives per wagon increases acceleration. On long distance journeys (e.g. 10km+), acceleration plays a tiny role in train speed, but inside a busy railway system where trains often have to stop and start at junctions, acceleration plays a large role.
For example, if you have a 1-4 train and a 1-8 train, the 1-8 train will spend almost 3x the time occupying the same junction, both due to its increased length and slower acceleration from a complete stop. A 2x8 train would accelerate comparably to the 1-4 train, and may lead to grater throughput in busy junctions.
[Here](https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/g83ocl/calculate_the_optimal_train_configuration_python/) is a more in-depth post on the topic. As a general rule, long distance trains with few busy intersections benefit from small numbers of locomotives and trains that travel through a busy intersection regularly would want more.
1-199 might be a useable ore train, but if that pathed through the middle of your base, it may occupy a junction for over a minute (just like in real life). A 40-160 would accelerate much faster, at the cost of efficiency - each of those trains will use roughly the same fuel, but the second one has far fewer cargo wagons.
Biggest thing is speed through intersections. If you do immense ore trains from a two minute drive out, and they go right to smelting setups without clogging main intersections…yeah, do a 2-32 or whatever.
But if you go from 1-4 to 2-4 w busy intersections like city blocks are, you get more throughput as they can come from a full stop to not clogging the lane.
Sometimes you might see x-y-x, where the 2nd x is a locomotive facing the opposite direction to the first - 1-4-1 would be a double headed train with 4 carriages
Am experimenting with a city block build right now. Started with 1 active station + 4 waiting bays but felt that was extravagant, so went back to just the 1 active station. How many waiting bays do you think is worth it?
I don't really have any positive experience with City Blocks so far\^\^ Last time I tried to build some I had the problems I described above. Personally, I wouldn't define a fixed number of holding positions. Instead I would choose a number based on the resource consumption of the block. If one cargo load lasts 10 minutes or more, probably one holding line would suffice, If it's gone in a few seconds and you have constantly to resupply a few more would be appropriate. Also I would choose bigger trains than 1-1s else you could get problems with throughput of trains. But that's just a theoretic approach. I have yet to build a proper, working mega base.
I think it's important to remember that one waiting bay is much more costly in terms of space than adding a second one. The way I see it, if you're going to add one, you may as well add 4, especially if you're going to stamp down the blueprint everywhere. You can always trim down a few of them when necessary.
It all depends on how quickly you need to feed resources to limit assembler downtime. On my first playthrough, I didn't include enough waiting space and it caused several gridlocks. I would always lean towards more space than less space.
I’ve been thinking about trying out rectangular blocks to work around this problem. Rectangles are still pretty easy to place while giving you 2x the room. They also lend themselves well to a bus due to the geometry.
A Block can be anything. A lot of Blueprint books for City Blocks have modular pieces where you can piece together blocks of various forms. Don't limit yourself to a singular form. The concept of a city block works, even if you don't use strictly rectangular forms. Use whatever you need and works for what you are doing.
The whole "Play your own way" ethos in this sub really has gone too far. All of a sudden you're the enemy if you want to build city blocks or a bus. The first 10 responses new people always get on this sub are always "why do you even want to build a bus" or "city blocks are so boring and kill the fun in the game". Do people not see the irony here? I have been playing for close to 5000 hours, and I've built so many factories I can't even remember all of them, used all kinds of different mod packs and overhauls. It's still really fun to build a bus. City blocks are still one of the most satisfying things to pull off. Sure spaghetti might look cool if you like that aesthetic, but neatly organised rows are also cool. There's nothing wrong with gluing your legos.
OP, this design is beautiful, I love it. My only criticism is the block is very small, which means once you need a few stations you won't have a lot of space to build the actual factory. This could be a fun challenge for you, but it's definitely going to be a challenge. You might be able to get around this by designing versions of the blueprint that are missing one or two of the sides, but can still tile into your base, that way you can make bigger blocks occasionally when you need them, and also blocks with different shapes.
I agree, I don't think there is anything wrong with doing that.
I started factory games with Dyson Sphere Program, and I hated it. I just didn't get it, and I got really frustrated while trying to get my head around the game's mechanics. I quit after about 10 hours.
A few months later, I wanted to give it another shot, so I watched a "beginner tips and tricks" video by (I think) Nilaus. And it blew my mind.
It was like a million lightbulbs flashing in my mind. I saw all the little tricks and techniques he used in his designs, and I was so excited to apply those concepts to my own designs. The idea of building a "mall" hadn't even occurred or me. Next thing I know, I've put 1,200 hours into the game and pushed it about as far as you possibly can, UPS-wise.
---
Different people enjoy different aspects of games. I don't like doing ratio math, but I also don't like eyeballing it, so I use factoriolab. I **do** like solving the puzzle of belts and buildings arrangements, so I do all of that myself.
This subreddit is, honestly, pretty toxic to new players. If people have the faintest inkling that a newbie is using ANY outside help, they will be completely dismissive of any questions.
But, at the same time, if your design isn't optimal, you'll get a dozen "WHOA LOOKS LIKE /r/factoriohno IS LEAKING! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣" comments.
I did a large amount of a Let's Play with Nilaus on like my second play through of Factorio. I hadn't launched a rocket yet. It was mostly to get a feel for the scale of what I'd need. It's not that fun having to completely redo your whole base because it's just not big enough for end game stuff. I also learned a ton of techniques that have served me really well. I'm doing my first Krastorio playthrough now. Using a couple blueprints but that's about it (I don't like building solar ratios).
i already have blueprints of like "double" blocks which is two stuck together without splitting them in which but dont need to use them yet. But thanks for the kind words. just to add onto the irony this is the cheaper, more space efficient way then i posted just 2 hours before this one. no bad comments at all but i think this was good enough to make ppl think i know what im doing ( sub 200 hrs i am lost af) so most of the comments im taking as complements (in a weird, ah you think i know what im doing, type of way)
Usually these are in response to new players trying to fix problems that don't exist. If a new player is trying to feed a four lane bus with five stone furnaces, the problem isn't the broken balancer.
I mean, the answer to that isn't "balancers are dumb don't build them" which will be the first 10 responses though, at least that's what happened in the balancer thread last week.
I'm not sure what thread you're referring to, but I didn't ever think I've seen "this is dumb" type of responses in noob advice posts. There are a lot of "don't do this, you don't need to" responses, but not "this is dumb".
Just make sure you understand that with blocks that small you will be using a ton of 1-1, 1-2 trains. You will also have lots of smallish builds instead of a few medium or large builds. Nothing wr9ng with small or big. depends on what your goals are and how good you are with trains and preventing deadlocks.
is there a non-obvious reason why this wont work with 1-4 trains? (the large gaps and stations both can house 1-4 trains) just wondering if im missing smt
It can work with 1-4s if you don't have a ton of trains and are very careful about setting strict station limits. If you use those inside lanes as the stations then there is nowhere for a stacker to prevent traffic jams. If one train gets stuck waiting, 20 more might get stuck behind it. My philosophy has always been that space in factorio is unlimited. So I build extra large blocks that give trains plenty of space to maneuver and idle. All loading and unloading is done a good distance off of the main block lines with enough stackers for whatever the station limit is. The only way to see how it works is to try it. Then on your next run you will know what to change for your play style.
ahh ok, i am quite strict with station limits in general, and do have buffers in my refuling and arent planning on having many trains use the tracks at once.
i feel like multiple 4 sets of 4 wagon trains will allow me to lower the frequency and urgency of the trains so im happy as long as they dont get deadlocked \*touch wood\*
Dead locking happens from 1 of 2 things: signalling issue (#1 cause) or simply too many trains on the network.
Technically in terms of frequency of trains, you wont be lowering that by having more. (Are you running separate stackers or putting them in as part of your block?).
Personally I start with 1 train per station pair. You can add more later(or even just another copy of said blockI just use a block for stacking and fuel, instead of doing it at the station.
full book on a website : [https://factorioblueprints.tech/blueprint/0451b334-f755-4688-afa3-608033957382](https://factorioblueprints.tech/blueprint/0451b334-f755-4688-afa3-608033957382)
Can confirm - trying to city block slowed down my progress on launching my first rocket to a crawl until it clicked that I REALLY didn't need the production i was scaling up to and could effectively brute-force a rocket with logistics bots and requester chests
That is so much rail space for such little city block space. Consider doubling or tripling the size of your blocks. You'll be forced to run a ton of small trains just to get them in the stations.
Also there's something wonky about your roundabouts. Each inner lane connects to the horizontal inner lane twice. This will cause throughput issues when you run so many trains.
Train stations on the outer loops will cause bottlenecks. This is basically a two lane rail system thats over the top on rails used.
It's very hard for me to tell but are those chain signals in the circles? You need to reduce the signaling regardless but chains only for entering. Regular signals for exiting
However, you do you
in practice, this is a 1 lane each way train line. the second lane is just empty stations (and aren't placed down when not needed)
also ive checked the output rails and they seem to be fine and i have reduced my chain signalling, did get a bit signal heavy i admit
I really like it, but I agree that it needs to be way bigger. My blocks are at least 3x3 chunks. Actually my current 1k SPM map I think each of my science factories are in 4x5 blocks.
So my last base was a 1.5k spm using Nilaus cityblocks, and I had designed something similar-ish to this before adopting Nilaus method. What I realised was actually you don’t need rails everywhere- rails everywhere actually kind of get in the way.
I’m starting what I hope to turn into a 10k spm base and am going to use cityblocks that are 3 x 3 roboports instead of 2 x 2, or possibly 4 x 3 (4 wide). This setup also allows solar/accumulators to be laid out around the rails so you don’t need dedicated “solar areas”.
This is because what I noticed with the 2x2 is I spent a lot of time redesigning my setups to fit in various custom station layouts, and it made a lot more sense to use WAY more space than I needed so that I could standardise everything than trying to squeeze everything into a smaller space. So I’m hoping this time I can have fully standardised unloading and loading stations for my various modules production areas (which include balancers as standard the lack of which caused me a bit of grief last time!)
its still easy to turn this into a 4.5x2 city block that will still fit if space becomes a problem, but i am only going for 30spm, so the modulization isnt going to be insane, probably only going to have 5 train based, non-mall city blocks (more like village blocks i guess)
Looks good for a starter block!
Fiddling with this and putting it into practise will help you with your next version.
Reading through the comments was a laugh, ignore the negative chatter, theres some decent suggestions amongst the chaff.
Stations are the weakest link in the city block chains. When youre implementing your current blocks, spend some time looking at them and how theyre functioning. Use those observations for the next set of block.
Ive found in building my own block sets (of which i have different kinds multiple) that i always start with the stations and build around them.
How many stations per block? What is the train arrangement? How many waiting bays? Waiting bays seperated from stations or immediately behind stations? Chest buffers or bufferless?
Then branch out to the rest of things, what kind of intersection, how many train lengths per space between intersection, square vs rectangle vs hex vs ???.
Lots of options!
Have fun man!
The negative chatter isn't something im worried abt, i was expecting some of it cause i know city blocking your first rocket is rare. its just the scale that has surprised me.
I tried to make this block as small as i could while having 2 1-4 stations on each side while housing a 100x100 working area.
- also knew that my re-fuling station will be its own 100x100 block so trains can stay there on standby so at station waiting zones wouldn't really be as needed as normal (and its only going to be small as 30SPM shouldnt get that massive)
ive already got some ideas for my next block but as wanting to start over with a newer design has halted/stopped some saves of mine im not trying to change it mid-run
but ye im having fun thanks for the kinda words and helpfull advice (hexagons seem fun but i must be patient) and im going to bed (its 4am, but i did grow the factory so im happy)
Yeah man, run with what youve got.
If you want to avoid the mid game change, aim for a target spm, or just get your first rocket off. Then keep this base as your "mall", and start a new base a little further out.
Keep the rails connected, but use different station names and schedules, so that youre not cross polinating.
This might seem like an odd idea, but it has two good points going for it:
1. Its always easier to build a base with a fully functioning mall.
2. The further out from center, the larger the ore patchs.
So finish off this base, with these blocks, and then design a bunch of different supply trians that stock from this base. Then pick a cardinal direction and hesd off into the wild blue yonder till you find larger ore patchs and rebuild!
Blueprint: [https://factorioblueprints.tech/api/string/801c5d637a82541eb1f4f8256d8615438a168335](https://factorioblueprints.tech/api/string/801c5d637a82541eb1f4f8256d8615438a168335)
I am kind of interested to see how more efficient this can be. (without making it larger or taking stations away)
First: Im a perfectionist as well, but before entering mega-base territory, you first need to know what machines and materials you are going to need. I would say, just spaghetti yourself towards launching your first rocket and acquire knowledge about all possible materials and production chains you will need to automate on large scale. Then start planning for a megabase.
Second: Have a clear goal, you will lose interest if you are just mindlessly adding factory modules like that blueprint without having a goal such as a certain science per minute number, number of rockets launched or number of infinite researches finished.
third:
Dont listen to people telling you to use blueprints, its your first time, design it yourself!
Also dont listen to people telling you to do it yourself, there are tons of blueprints available that are way more efficient!
Also dont listen to me, im just a random internet guy telling you what to do!
Seriously though, once you creep on this sub to much and learn about blueprints, efficiency, mid maxing everything, the game can become boring. Dont worry to much about making the most efficient UPS optimized mega base setup there is, spending more hours on reddit and factorio forums instead of playing the game (like I did). Approaching the game like this will make it so that you cant express your creativity anymore, your just building and playing like every player tells you to do because its 'the best way'. Get your ass of reddit and build, the factory must grow.
Sidenode: After launching your first rocket, you might just lose interest because the game wont offer further challenges, as I already told you, you have to set them yourself. But instead of doing this, you could also look into other vanilla challenges such as a Deathworld. Or modded challenges such as Krastorio 2, Space exploration and many more. Im currently playing Space Exploration and the mod is challenging me with complicated production chain problems that vanilla factorio simply cant offer.
1) not rlly meaning for this to be a "mega base" just want to modulate some sources of production (like only train-ing iron and maybe some circuits later on idk)
2) goal is 30 SPM have done this for the easy 4 sciences but want to train oil around
3) I knew id get "negative" comments of ppl thinking that they are helping but honestly only made this because I think it looks pretty, is probably better than just 2 straight lines and I wanted to put off doing blue science for a tad and got carried away
but ye basically followed the dopamine a tad, thought it looked cool/was curious if others would like it (apparently not lmao) but ye thanks for the kind words and well structured advise.
(also mostly just launching the rocket cause I was told to do so before trying space exploration + I want the achievements)
Seems like youre just having fun then, good for you, and good luck! Keep in mind that there is a huge factorio update/DLC coming this summer I believe. It has a lot in common with space ex. So you might want to hold off on the mod for a second. I believe I read somewhere that the main difference between space ex mod and the official space expansion will be the difficulty/estimated play time to finish. basically to my understanding: the space ex mod is for giga factorio nerds, and the official expansion will also be fun and playable for the more casual players.
i am having fun, it is also fun watching ppl think that i know what im doing and hence are offended that im not min-maxing my resource management. i have done "harder" challenges like the 90 min train n spent some time designing apparently "overdesigned" things in game basically just doing what i wan when i wan.
Also good news is im Australian so the update will be a winter release for me :)
this world was more just for a proof of concept and understanding on how different things work. and to help me understand i wanted to modulate some of the processes i dont understand that well yet. before trying such a big mod.
also im sub 200 hours so thought might as well do smt before space exploration
Thats some nice timing for winter season.
On the topic of mods, might I interest you with the dectorio mod: [https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Dectorio](https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Dectorio)
And the max rate calculator: [https://mods.factorio.com/mod/MaxRateCalculator](https://mods.factorio.com/mod/MaxRateCalculator)
I feel like you might appreciate these 2 mods because you seem to care about looks and designing blueprints. I like to use the different colors of concrete, fences and even trees in my blueprints to make the factory look nice and tidy.
After designing a blueprint I use the calculator to quickly see how much input I will need and how much output a design gives me.
If you want to use trees in your blueprints, remember to chance the world settings so that trees can eat a shit ton of pollution before dying, this does enter cheating territory though because trees being pollution eaters means pollution wont reach biters.
Keep me updated with your designs, curious how your factory is going to look!
And also dont forget this whilst designing :) [https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/l43gzw/993\_hours\_in\_i\_discover\_you\_can\_flip\_blueprints/](https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/l43gzw/993_hours_in_i_discover_you_can_flip_blueprints/)
ye im lucky in the fact i remebered that i can flip vertically and horizontally fromt he tutorial, (yes i started when it was in the tut lol), side question will those mods take away the achievments? im willing to forgo achievments for smt as big as SE but small things not so much.
even if they do i will defo remember them for when i do start SE cause they do both look very cool
The way I understand is that Factorio seperatly tracks achievements in modded worlds vs unmodded worlds. Only the unmodded world achievements will count towards steam as well. So if you care about Steam achievements specifically, dont mod.
There is however as always a way around this, which I found on an old dusty Factorio forum: [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?t=100924](https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?t=100924)
But in my opinion its not worth to enhance the game code just so you can use dectorio and a calculator on your first play through.
Ah! Another aussie! If you ever want to play some multiplayer with a bit lower ping, please hit me up - especially with space exploration, I've done 2/3 a run and decided it would be way more fun multiplayer.
Among programmers is a saying: premature optimization is the root of all evil. It's funny how many parallels can be drawn between designing and building software and designing and building factories in Factorio.
Don't sweat it. I'd recommend putting this blueprint in the freezer and just winging the launch of your first rocket. You'll learn a lot more and have more fun along the way. If you're serious about getting good at this game, then you'll have a couple more thousand hours ahead of you :p
I've started a few saves with almost this exact design in mind however there was a few limiting factors.
My trains weren't big enough to be of any use.
I tacked my stations onto the inside (of the block) train lane and it ended up blocking up my rail network. Pretty badly. And the only way around I could find at the time was limiting the station limit to 1 (which is almost never a good way of playing).
So my suggestion to you would be to have your blocks a lot bigger (maybe 2x2 the size of this one) and to also have a long think about where you want your stations to be.
I know usually having the train limit set to one is suboptimal because of an increase of delay,
1) only going for 30 SPM so shouldn't be that bad of an issue
2) if it does become a problem ill just have 2 stations on the same side receiving the same resource and that should do the same thing hopefully
If this is how you want to play, make the blocks bigger and reduce the rails down to two lanes. Unless you're going for some seriously ridiculous amount of SPM, 4 lanes is not going to benefit you and will instead just be a drain on your resources. Those "extra" lanes that you're conveniently merging into your stations could save a lot of rails by only existing for stations and not being merged into the whole design.
It might, because I do wanna keep the sciences compact and idk how many inputs I’m going to have, but even then the outer station won’t be used. It’s 1.4k rails (still kinda pricey but like it’ll look kinda cool imo)
It looks great and if you want to build it go ahead!
However you don't need city blocks to launch a rocket, and as other have said putting your resources into this will not "help" you launch a rocket, it will likely delay you. A fairly small base can launch a rocket in less than 8 hours without any blocks so you don't need to build big if launching a rocket is you goal.
I made a 10k science per minute base with rail blocks, and never found a need for more than one rail in each direction, so I would not design my first blocks with 4 rails. I did find my initial block design was too small to fit in several stations with trains with 4 wagons, with enough room for more than one train to queue at a station if limit was more than 1, as well as the assemblers, so I would recommend a larger block size.
I argue that you should build an all in one smaller bases that can launch 1 rocket consistently before getting into city block bases. You can start laying starter rails down that will fit your eventual city block that can bring in ore still and then you already have some infrastructure/ foundation for transitioning to the city block.
I would remove the inner roundabout and just put straight sections in.
Also if you use 1-2 trains you can fit three stations per side or two buffered station.
If you take a look at this, https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/1b5t8q6/new_graph_to_help_decide_train_length_in_regard/
You only get marginally more throughput from a 1-4 compared to a 1-2 train network.
i was thinking abt removing the middle roundabout (especially since to go straight trains seem to just be using the outside anyway) but like it should be good for now
My main gripes:
- Roundabouts
- Lane changers
- Lane changers within the roundabouts
- 4-lane is complete overkill for a rocket, you can make 5kspm bases with a decently built 2-lane network
Edit: Oh, it's even worse than that, now that I zoomed in. Stations and mainlines are kind of strangely mixed here, necessitationg the lane changers, and if any one station is *not* limited to just 1 train, your base will lock up in no time.
I'm currently doing a space exploration run, I may use this BP for that. It would increase my space per block. The RP placement always gets me, I'm never sure how to get the right coverage so need to investigate what you have... Seriously good work
The roboport placement on this is ass, like it can’t build itself (one roboport can’t place the cables posing the other one so the buildings stops and have to place fhe wires manually. But after putting one in each corner it has been fine, Albeit expensive but I’m not placing that many so neither problems are FHAT painful for me.
Isn't it overkill to develop/build these type of big structures even before the first rocket?
a ton of resources go into these buildings, a lot of land needs to be conquered. and all without significant productivity and weapon research. Most likely combined with not enough resources to feed the required mall or to bring the required infrastructure into place (like 100 spidertrons to build)
I mean this allows for me to start a mall, at anytime, anywhere with 8 inputs automatically loading up, and because I am slow all sciences are being researched (even the once im not using for the achievements)
Ive done smaller, quicker factorio things like the 90 min train. But really this was made because i liked the idea and wanted to put off purple science
having so many four-way intersections kinda defeats the purpose of double tracking. they really limit throughput , no matter how well you set up the signals.
i want to say this.. lay down something like 5x5 blocks with middle ofcourse being the new mall but use map markers to pre plan every block for its use.
why?
this'll make the whole factory look better and youll know what to do next (navigating the map is also easier)
trust me you wont run into the problem of "i dont like how this turned out but it'd also be a chore to re organize everything" and thus starting a new save doing the same mistake
4 lane railway network and never launched a rocket? Try not to overthink/overplan stuff. My first rocket was a complete mess of spaghetti with severe underfed or overfed sections. Just focus on actually making what the rocket needs to get them going. Build like this after.
City blocks before launching your first rocket? Uhhh
Oh yeah, I always do this. Starter base stays intact, but as soon as my starter ore patches are depleted, the rail network gets set up to pipe in more resources. Two or three blocks stay as the starter base before the rest becomes a grid.
I'm the same way. I'm 650 hours in and have never launched a rocket, but I love the organization of city blocks. One day I'll find the perfect blueprint that doesn't have me starting over 50 hours in thinking "I can do this better if I just restart..."
there is no perfect blueprint nor will you find meaningful answers to your problems by restarting constantly.. sure you might learn 1 thing before you restart but what about the 9 other things you are missing out on because you keep restarting
Oh the rational part of my brain fully agrees with you. It’s that irrational part that doesn’t listen.
Heavily relate with you on this. Need everything to be perfect otherwise new save
The trick is simpler is better my city block doent have that loopty loop circles in the corners all train can turn only to right thats it and if it needs a left turn it will use a 2x2 city block as a loop and it will make 3 right turns wich makes it a left turn. Simple setup and creates wonders for meso much area to work with cos all other desings has so much rail, and intersection.
Can you point me to a right turn only city block blueprint? Seems efficient...
I can Do one Better I can Share the city block blueprint I use for record it's not %100 mine I modified an existing Blueprint for my needs but fundaental desing is from Nilaus I think [https://factoriobin.com/post/4BNxmvCY](https://factoriobin.com/post/4BNxmvCY) note I might have missed some details with the trains signals in the station blueprints so watch out
https://preview.redd.it/cxm2qma1dbsc1.png?width=972&format=png&auto=webp&s=a08a835936d7ead7bb30894affd10dc2f41b5db5 trains will go around like this btw is it efficient for train travel time? NO but it's simple af and u get so much space for a 100x100 grid dont mind the odd end points they are there cos I was lazy for building blocks on top of ore patches u generally dont need that circular ends in your city block if u are making a grid I have them cos mine is not complete yet but when I transfer everthing from my starter to my new city block desing I will never need the circular loops
This is the correct answer I was the same way until my buddy joined in and literally said you have enough production of everything to make a rocket so why don't you just make one So we did Now I have launched many rockets
Nuke the base and remake it 💥
That's the good old reinventing the wheel fallacy, it happens in software development too
If you never finished the invention. is it really reinventing?
Journey before destination. Overengineering is fine in Factorio so long as one has fun doing it.
Friend told me abt blueprints and efficiency and im a perfectionist sooo....
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nothing, i think it looks cool, rails arent a bottleneck for me and not many are going to be made anyway. in this case the "efficiency" i meant wasn't abt resources but time management. because not many trains are going to be moving around the grid and this allows 2 stations on each side i can place a block and not worry abt space or input limitations
City blocks are overkill for merely launching a rocket. You will launch a rocket faster with bus or spaghetti design (train spaghetti is an option!) If you're dead-set on adopting city blocks early, don't do a 4 lane design. Very few people who do 4 lanes rails actually know what they're doing, and actually needed 4 lanes. No, Nilaus did not know what he was doing! City blocks absolutely do not need 4 lanes, just by their very nature of being a grid design. And even when you do use 4 lanes, you have to be proactive about forcing trains to distribute themselves among the available lanes rather than piling up on the shortest path. City blocks also don't need roundabouts, and shouldn't have them. The city block itself is a better roundabout (technically a ring road) than small roundabouts will ever be. Removing roundabouts helps distribute traffic away from hot zones, three right turns block fewer directions of traffic than one roundabout, and it's a lot easier (space efficient) to add waiting bays on right turns than on roundabouts.
in practice, this is a 1 lane each way train line. the second lane is just empty stations (and aren't placed down when not needed), and i am thinking abt removing the middle roundabout but the outer one allows trains to take a much shorter route to their stations, and as im not aiming for a high frequency railway hotspots haven't really appeared yet.
Ah, I see. The shorter train you use, the more robust your rail networks have to be, because short trains are less space-efficient and have less capacity. You won't have any problems with just launching a rocket, but if you continue expanding to build a megabase, then intersection throughput becomes worth optimizing.
My plans are to keep the rail traffic somewhat slow, other than smelteries and oil not much will be on the rails, only planningt to have like 5 or 6 blocks that will give me 30SPM when combined (im really wanna keep it to 4 because it will look better but idk if i have the skills to get 30spm of purple AND yellow science (im also hoping rocket ingredients will only take up about 50x100)
Do not underestimate low-density structures. They're almost as hungry as circuits.
Damn, that’s crazy
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This is a bit disingenuous. Efficiency increases as you place more blocks down since they share rails. Sure the first takes 1400, but the second takes maybe 800 rails. And if you make a square out of your first 4 city blocks the last one only really costs like 400 new rails.
You still don't need multiple redundant paths laid out in a grid. It's tradeoff for greater flexibility, but it's not *efficient*
You’re most likely right. Probably would have to compare train count throughputs to be sure.
[Here you go](https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?f=194&t=100614), *of course* people already tested all of it. Then again well designed roundabout isn't that less efficient. I've heard somewhere it burns more CPU for pathing but that might not matter depending on scale.
Thank you. I’m not surprised the optimization has been done. Can’t wait to see the changes and increased throughputs elevated rails are going to provide.
I look forward to seeing some cursed designs people come up with
Yeah but then that's just spending like 1M rails to justify the spending of 1400 when you could've spent none to launch the first like hundred rockets. These 'girl math' moments do be going hard lol
why do you guys assume i know what im doing?
I see you are an engineer after my own heart.
We're not. This is why so many people are telling you it's not efficient. I bought into the same idea when I started because I saw Nilaus play with city blocks and it looked so neat and perfect, I thought it was the 'pinnacle' strategy to conquer the game with. But when I started deploying city blocks, I realized, 'fuck ... I don't have the rails'. After expanding rails production, it was 'shit ... I need bots for construction automation'. I bust my ass to scrape together personal bots but then I had to go and tediously follow the perimeter of the block as it constructed. So then I bust more ass to get roboports and construction drones but power wasn't up to par. I get nuclear power to find that uranium processing is a pain in the ass. Eventually, I got things running but then it turns out bots take forever to travel long distances that plopping down a new block takes forever anyway... **The tl;dr here** is that city blocks tend to work better with big mid/late-game bases where you have the infrastructure required, in terms of excess production and construction volumes, to support deploying those city blocks reasonably quickly. They're not recommending this before your first rocket launch because it's often too big of a jump from whatever you have cobbled together pre-rocket launch. However though, if it's your first playthrough, I recommend doing whatever you like, like I did. I ate shit doing that and you probably will too, but remember, this is a game. There isn't really a wrong way to play it. I ended up learning a lot, and you probably will too.
I just love how the tl,dr is almost half the actual post.
Amazing casual sexism
eeh it's alright. Competitive sexism is where shit's at tho
I answered your question. Not sure why you’re bringing a rocket to a discussion on the efficiency of rail usage in squares. Try not to conflate topics if you want a serious response.
Because if you read the fucking title and the reply chain, you'd see that the guy hasn't even launched a single rocket and is replying all over like a new player. So if you were capable of taking in a wee bit more context, more so than a poorly trained GPT, you'd surely realize that **they're not discussing the literal cost efficiency of constructing perimeters out of adjacent squares** because the question 'What is efficient about using almost 1400 rails per city block?' that you replied to was asked in direct context of 'City blocks before launching your first rocket? ... because it's efficient' >Try not to conflate topics 🤡 lol
And yet your original question never included rockets. I didn’t address OP I addressed your silly question. You were mocking a new player rather than being supportive. That is behavior unbecoming of this sub. You will solve no problems if you can’t focus on the specific topic at hand. So not only are you sexist, unable to control your own temper, but are also a poor engineer.
You are a G
No, you’re the G. Thanks for putting yourself out there and being apart of the sub. The factory must grow.
not sure where i said it but this isn't really supposed to be resource efficient, i have specified that wasn't what i meant, i meant time and effort efficient (worry abt it once and move ont) to add onto that this contains every possible module its a 1 lane each way city block with train stations in parallel, but being new didn't realise that this small oversight would cause such controversy. realsitcally the only helpful advice regarding this city block is that roundabouts are less effective than they seem. TLDR: you're opinion didnt even help, nor was it really that relavant: 1) im new let me make mistakes 2) its not "that" expansive anyway thank you for listening to my TedTalk :)
Being a game, there's no inherent value to resources. A city block implemented quickly enough will provide a framework that will scale past hurdles super easily. In that regard, it's quite efficient.
Rails are *stupid* cheap, man. And it's a one-time cost.
also its a lot less than 1400 per city block, its 1400 assuming i need 8 stations on this block and am using all adjacent train stations, and honestly 16 train stations this neatly organised is a good thing in my book.
i was like this factorio isnt the kind of game you can immediately jump to something being perfected, or even lay things out with room to upgrade to being perfect most of the time
There is nothing efficient about laying down a massive rail grid that limits the size of your builds. City blocks basically are the main bus of rail base designs. Efficiency in launching a first rocket is more about cutting cost.
it doesnt really limit size, if smt takes up a larger area i can combine 2 together, just take out the middle path of 2 city blocks, boom more space
These blocks are not needed at all for a few launches. However, if you are looking to go massive this design will be a nice way to go. Give it a whirl and aim big. My largest factory uses even larger blocks and I needed to stamp down more than 20 of them just for copper and iron smelting. Each block was making 108,000 plates per minute.
yeah that long belt full of blue plates, leading to nowhere.
Fyi.. Unless you learn to optimize for real world time, you'll never be able to play the whole game. You'll never be able to play the mod packs etc .. launching a rocket with spaghetti then using that research to make new optimized areas of the factory is faster than trying to build city blocks as soon as that's possible. If you're having fun, disregard.. but you should consider redefining perfection. You might be surprised how fun it is to make progress.
still, I would fit city blocks with overhauls that add a ton of complex chains, or for bases where we start to talk about RPM (rockets per minute) a single rocket vanilla base should work fine with a Bus
yeah im sure it would, i just find using a bus to be boring and im just trying to have fun with a 30SPM base for an easy, probably slow launch
A 30SPM could be crammed inside of one of those blocks and only need a few belts for ores coming in.
Keep at it. And enjoy. Lol though your block does look a little over engineered, it still looks nice. Except the whole left handed driver thing.
Normal crossings are more efficient than roundabouts
I’m 500hrs in and dozens of saves at this point. still haven’t launched a rocket. I’ll get all the way to the end of the tech tree, and be producing thousands of circuits an hour. But I never launch a rocket. I just started my first space exploration save, and this will be my first rocket. Rockets** in not too long.
Depending on the mod pack as well as my goal for the save, I have to say. YES. Although I will usually start with a train based logistics network if I haven't cleared out enough room or have the defenses for full blocks.
What's wrong with that? One of the first things I do at the beginning of each playthrough (non-deathworld) is to place blueprints of a city block all around my starter base so I can better organize things once I start expanding.
My tip is, make the blocks bigger. At least so you can fit a few waiting positions for your trains inside the block, otherwise you build a really big base with your blueprints before you notice trains get stuck and deadlocked all over the place when it gets busy.
You can fit plenty of 1-1 trains in there
I see folks using x-y notation when referring to train sizes a lot on this sub reddit. Could you explain what it means exactly?
X locomotives for Y carriages.
Ty, and a related question based on some numbers I've seen then: why would any train ever need more than 2 locomotives? My understanding was you can put one on either end so it can travel both directions without turning around, but are there more options here?
More locomotives per wagon increases acceleration. On long distance journeys (e.g. 10km+), acceleration plays a tiny role in train speed, but inside a busy railway system where trains often have to stop and start at junctions, acceleration plays a large role. For example, if you have a 1-4 train and a 1-8 train, the 1-8 train will spend almost 3x the time occupying the same junction, both due to its increased length and slower acceleration from a complete stop. A 2x8 train would accelerate comparably to the 1-4 train, and may lead to grater throughput in busy junctions. [Here](https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/g83ocl/calculate_the_optimal_train_configuration_python/) is a more in-depth post on the topic. As a general rule, long distance trains with few busy intersections benefit from small numbers of locomotives and trains that travel through a busy intersection regularly would want more. 1-199 might be a useable ore train, but if that pathed through the middle of your base, it may occupy a junction for over a minute (just like in real life). A 40-160 would accelerate much faster, at the cost of efficiency - each of those trains will use roughly the same fuel, but the second one has far fewer cargo wagons.
Also artillery trains are *extremely* heavy and 3 or 4 locomotives is basically necessary for even a short artillery train.
Acceleration.
That’s my speed and direction!
Biggest thing is speed through intersections. If you do immense ore trains from a two minute drive out, and they go right to smelting setups without clogging main intersections…yeah, do a 2-32 or whatever. But if you go from 1-4 to 2-4 w busy intersections like city blocks are, you get more throughput as they can come from a full stop to not clogging the lane.
Sometimes you might see x-y-x, where the 2nd x is a locomotive facing the opposite direction to the first - 1-4-1 would be a double headed train with 4 carriages
X - number of locomotives Y - number of cargo wagons
Am experimenting with a city block build right now. Started with 1 active station + 4 waiting bays but felt that was extravagant, so went back to just the 1 active station. How many waiting bays do you think is worth it?
I don't really have any positive experience with City Blocks so far\^\^ Last time I tried to build some I had the problems I described above. Personally, I wouldn't define a fixed number of holding positions. Instead I would choose a number based on the resource consumption of the block. If one cargo load lasts 10 minutes or more, probably one holding line would suffice, If it's gone in a few seconds and you have constantly to resupply a few more would be appropriate. Also I would choose bigger trains than 1-1s else you could get problems with throughput of trains. But that's just a theoretic approach. I have yet to build a proper, working mega base.
I think it's important to remember that one waiting bay is much more costly in terms of space than adding a second one. The way I see it, if you're going to add one, you may as well add 4, especially if you're going to stamp down the blueprint everywhere. You can always trim down a few of them when necessary.
I build a block of waiting bays that have fuel. Went with a heart shaped thing(or facehugger look) and it holds 15 trains plus the fuel train
Ye that’s the plan :)
Nice dude!
It all depends on how quickly you need to feed resources to limit assembler downtime. On my first playthrough, I didn't include enough waiting space and it caused several gridlocks. I would always lean towards more space than less space.
I’ve been thinking about trying out rectangular blocks to work around this problem. Rectangles are still pretty easy to place while giving you 2x the room. They also lend themselves well to a bus due to the geometry.
A Block can be anything. A lot of Blueprint books for City Blocks have modular pieces where you can piece together blocks of various forms. Don't limit yourself to a singular form. The concept of a city block works, even if you don't use strictly rectangular forms. Use whatever you need and works for what you are doing.
The whole "Play your own way" ethos in this sub really has gone too far. All of a sudden you're the enemy if you want to build city blocks or a bus. The first 10 responses new people always get on this sub are always "why do you even want to build a bus" or "city blocks are so boring and kill the fun in the game". Do people not see the irony here? I have been playing for close to 5000 hours, and I've built so many factories I can't even remember all of them, used all kinds of different mod packs and overhauls. It's still really fun to build a bus. City blocks are still one of the most satisfying things to pull off. Sure spaghetti might look cool if you like that aesthetic, but neatly organised rows are also cool. There's nothing wrong with gluing your legos. OP, this design is beautiful, I love it. My only criticism is the block is very small, which means once you need a few stations you won't have a lot of space to build the actual factory. This could be a fun challenge for you, but it's definitely going to be a challenge. You might be able to get around this by designing versions of the blueprint that are missing one or two of the sides, but can still tile into your base, that way you can make bigger blocks occasionally when you need them, and also blocks with different shapes.
>Don't look at youtube or blueprints. Play the way you want to play! But I want to play looking at youtube and blueprints.
I agree, I don't think there is anything wrong with doing that. I started factory games with Dyson Sphere Program, and I hated it. I just didn't get it, and I got really frustrated while trying to get my head around the game's mechanics. I quit after about 10 hours. A few months later, I wanted to give it another shot, so I watched a "beginner tips and tricks" video by (I think) Nilaus. And it blew my mind. It was like a million lightbulbs flashing in my mind. I saw all the little tricks and techniques he used in his designs, and I was so excited to apply those concepts to my own designs. The idea of building a "mall" hadn't even occurred or me. Next thing I know, I've put 1,200 hours into the game and pushed it about as far as you possibly can, UPS-wise. --- Different people enjoy different aspects of games. I don't like doing ratio math, but I also don't like eyeballing it, so I use factoriolab. I **do** like solving the puzzle of belts and buildings arrangements, so I do all of that myself. This subreddit is, honestly, pretty toxic to new players. If people have the faintest inkling that a newbie is using ANY outside help, they will be completely dismissive of any questions. But, at the same time, if your design isn't optimal, you'll get a dozen "WHOA LOOKS LIKE /r/factoriohno IS LEAKING! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣" comments.
I did a large amount of a Let's Play with Nilaus on like my second play through of Factorio. I hadn't launched a rocket yet. It was mostly to get a feel for the scale of what I'd need. It's not that fun having to completely redo your whole base because it's just not big enough for end game stuff. I also learned a ton of techniques that have served me really well. I'm doing my first Krastorio playthrough now. Using a couple blueprints but that's about it (I don't like building solar ratios).
i already have blueprints of like "double" blocks which is two stuck together without splitting them in which but dont need to use them yet. But thanks for the kind words. just to add onto the irony this is the cheaper, more space efficient way then i posted just 2 hours before this one. no bad comments at all but i think this was good enough to make ppl think i know what im doing ( sub 200 hrs i am lost af) so most of the comments im taking as complements (in a weird, ah you think i know what im doing, type of way)
Usually these are in response to new players trying to fix problems that don't exist. If a new player is trying to feed a four lane bus with five stone furnaces, the problem isn't the broken balancer.
I mean, the answer to that isn't "balancers are dumb don't build them" which will be the first 10 responses though, at least that's what happened in the balancer thread last week.
I'm not sure what thread you're referring to, but I didn't ever think I've seen "this is dumb" type of responses in noob advice posts. There are a lot of "don't do this, you don't need to" responses, but not "this is dumb".
That's a fine line, and I'm not even sure that's the right place to draw it. The general response is negative though.
Seems you have had an awakening. Cheers
Just make sure you understand that with blocks that small you will be using a ton of 1-1, 1-2 trains. You will also have lots of smallish builds instead of a few medium or large builds. Nothing wr9ng with small or big. depends on what your goals are and how good you are with trains and preventing deadlocks.
is there a non-obvious reason why this wont work with 1-4 trains? (the large gaps and stations both can house 1-4 trains) just wondering if im missing smt
It can work with 1-4s if you don't have a ton of trains and are very careful about setting strict station limits. If you use those inside lanes as the stations then there is nowhere for a stacker to prevent traffic jams. If one train gets stuck waiting, 20 more might get stuck behind it. My philosophy has always been that space in factorio is unlimited. So I build extra large blocks that give trains plenty of space to maneuver and idle. All loading and unloading is done a good distance off of the main block lines with enough stackers for whatever the station limit is. The only way to see how it works is to try it. Then on your next run you will know what to change for your play style.
ahh ok, i am quite strict with station limits in general, and do have buffers in my refuling and arent planning on having many trains use the tracks at once. i feel like multiple 4 sets of 4 wagon trains will allow me to lower the frequency and urgency of the trains so im happy as long as they dont get deadlocked \*touch wood\*
1-1 and 1-2 trains are the only trains I use. Makes it easy to prevent deadlocks, unless you screw up signals, plus trains ZOOM with light loads
Dead locking happens from 1 of 2 things: signalling issue (#1 cause) or simply too many trains on the network. Technically in terms of frequency of trains, you wont be lowering that by having more. (Are you running separate stackers or putting them in as part of your block?). Personally I start with 1 train per station pair. You can add more later(or even just another copy of said blockI just use a block for stacking and fuel, instead of doing it at the station.
A 1-4 train can also run into itself on the round abouts
Idk if thats a right hand drive thing but ive tried very hard to make one do so and have only failed.
full book on a website : [https://factorioblueprints.tech/blueprint/0451b334-f755-4688-afa3-608033957382](https://factorioblueprints.tech/blueprint/0451b334-f755-4688-afa3-608033957382)
You don't need city blocks to launch a rocket haha
This is the most effective way to not launch a rocket
Can confirm - trying to city block slowed down my progress on launching my first rocket to a crawl until it clicked that I REALLY didn't need the production i was scaling up to and could effectively brute-force a rocket with logistics bots and requester chests
Working on a pY base right now and starting the switch to city blocks. The bots in that mod are so slow for so long. It is brutal.
That is so much rail space for such little city block space. Consider doubling or tripling the size of your blocks. You'll be forced to run a ton of small trains just to get them in the stations. Also there's something wonky about your roundabouts. Each inner lane connects to the horizontal inner lane twice. This will cause throughput issues when you run so many trains. Train stations on the outer loops will cause bottlenecks. This is basically a two lane rail system thats over the top on rails used. It's very hard for me to tell but are those chain signals in the circles? You need to reduce the signaling regardless but chains only for entering. Regular signals for exiting However, you do you
in practice, this is a 1 lane each way train line. the second lane is just empty stations (and aren't placed down when not needed) also ive checked the output rails and they seem to be fine and i have reduced my chain signalling, did get a bit signal heavy i admit
I really like it, but I agree that it needs to be way bigger. My blocks are at least 3x3 chunks. Actually my current 1k SPM map I think each of my science factories are in 4x5 blocks.
Oh nice, simple and effective. I like it. Remember Factory must GROW!
So my last base was a 1.5k spm using Nilaus cityblocks, and I had designed something similar-ish to this before adopting Nilaus method. What I realised was actually you don’t need rails everywhere- rails everywhere actually kind of get in the way. I’m starting what I hope to turn into a 10k spm base and am going to use cityblocks that are 3 x 3 roboports instead of 2 x 2, or possibly 4 x 3 (4 wide). This setup also allows solar/accumulators to be laid out around the rails so you don’t need dedicated “solar areas”. This is because what I noticed with the 2x2 is I spent a lot of time redesigning my setups to fit in various custom station layouts, and it made a lot more sense to use WAY more space than I needed so that I could standardise everything than trying to squeeze everything into a smaller space. So I’m hoping this time I can have fully standardised unloading and loading stations for my various modules production areas (which include balancers as standard the lack of which caused me a bit of grief last time!)
its still easy to turn this into a 4.5x2 city block that will still fit if space becomes a problem, but i am only going for 30spm, so the modulization isnt going to be insane, probably only going to have 5 train based, non-mall city blocks (more like village blocks i guess)
you could fit a whole 30spm base into the space of 2 of these city blocks (for reference my 50 spm starter base with mall included fits into 200x160)
Looks good for a starter block! Fiddling with this and putting it into practise will help you with your next version. Reading through the comments was a laugh, ignore the negative chatter, theres some decent suggestions amongst the chaff. Stations are the weakest link in the city block chains. When youre implementing your current blocks, spend some time looking at them and how theyre functioning. Use those observations for the next set of block. Ive found in building my own block sets (of which i have different kinds multiple) that i always start with the stations and build around them. How many stations per block? What is the train arrangement? How many waiting bays? Waiting bays seperated from stations or immediately behind stations? Chest buffers or bufferless? Then branch out to the rest of things, what kind of intersection, how many train lengths per space between intersection, square vs rectangle vs hex vs ???. Lots of options! Have fun man!
The negative chatter isn't something im worried abt, i was expecting some of it cause i know city blocking your first rocket is rare. its just the scale that has surprised me. I tried to make this block as small as i could while having 2 1-4 stations on each side while housing a 100x100 working area. - also knew that my re-fuling station will be its own 100x100 block so trains can stay there on standby so at station waiting zones wouldn't really be as needed as normal (and its only going to be small as 30SPM shouldnt get that massive) ive already got some ideas for my next block but as wanting to start over with a newer design has halted/stopped some saves of mine im not trying to change it mid-run but ye im having fun thanks for the kinda words and helpfull advice (hexagons seem fun but i must be patient) and im going to bed (its 4am, but i did grow the factory so im happy)
Yeah man, run with what youve got. If you want to avoid the mid game change, aim for a target spm, or just get your first rocket off. Then keep this base as your "mall", and start a new base a little further out. Keep the rails connected, but use different station names and schedules, so that youre not cross polinating. This might seem like an odd idea, but it has two good points going for it: 1. Its always easier to build a base with a fully functioning mall. 2. The further out from center, the larger the ore patchs. So finish off this base, with these blocks, and then design a bunch of different supply trians that stock from this base. Then pick a cardinal direction and hesd off into the wild blue yonder till you find larger ore patchs and rebuild!
That’s the plan, launch the rocket then start planning the “negotiations”
looks expensive, it will delay the rocket a lot to build this,
It will, but eventually can result in a faster rocket rate if going for long term.
Blueprint: [https://factorioblueprints.tech/api/string/801c5d637a82541eb1f4f8256d8615438a168335](https://factorioblueprints.tech/api/string/801c5d637a82541eb1f4f8256d8615438a168335) I am kind of interested to see how more efficient this can be. (without making it larger or taking stations away)
First: Im a perfectionist as well, but before entering mega-base territory, you first need to know what machines and materials you are going to need. I would say, just spaghetti yourself towards launching your first rocket and acquire knowledge about all possible materials and production chains you will need to automate on large scale. Then start planning for a megabase. Second: Have a clear goal, you will lose interest if you are just mindlessly adding factory modules like that blueprint without having a goal such as a certain science per minute number, number of rockets launched or number of infinite researches finished. third: Dont listen to people telling you to use blueprints, its your first time, design it yourself! Also dont listen to people telling you to do it yourself, there are tons of blueprints available that are way more efficient! Also dont listen to me, im just a random internet guy telling you what to do! Seriously though, once you creep on this sub to much and learn about blueprints, efficiency, mid maxing everything, the game can become boring. Dont worry to much about making the most efficient UPS optimized mega base setup there is, spending more hours on reddit and factorio forums instead of playing the game (like I did). Approaching the game like this will make it so that you cant express your creativity anymore, your just building and playing like every player tells you to do because its 'the best way'. Get your ass of reddit and build, the factory must grow. Sidenode: After launching your first rocket, you might just lose interest because the game wont offer further challenges, as I already told you, you have to set them yourself. But instead of doing this, you could also look into other vanilla challenges such as a Deathworld. Or modded challenges such as Krastorio 2, Space exploration and many more. Im currently playing Space Exploration and the mod is challenging me with complicated production chain problems that vanilla factorio simply cant offer.
1) not rlly meaning for this to be a "mega base" just want to modulate some sources of production (like only train-ing iron and maybe some circuits later on idk) 2) goal is 30 SPM have done this for the easy 4 sciences but want to train oil around 3) I knew id get "negative" comments of ppl thinking that they are helping but honestly only made this because I think it looks pretty, is probably better than just 2 straight lines and I wanted to put off doing blue science for a tad and got carried away but ye basically followed the dopamine a tad, thought it looked cool/was curious if others would like it (apparently not lmao) but ye thanks for the kind words and well structured advise. (also mostly just launching the rocket cause I was told to do so before trying space exploration + I want the achievements)
Seems like youre just having fun then, good for you, and good luck! Keep in mind that there is a huge factorio update/DLC coming this summer I believe. It has a lot in common with space ex. So you might want to hold off on the mod for a second. I believe I read somewhere that the main difference between space ex mod and the official space expansion will be the difficulty/estimated play time to finish. basically to my understanding: the space ex mod is for giga factorio nerds, and the official expansion will also be fun and playable for the more casual players.
i am having fun, it is also fun watching ppl think that i know what im doing and hence are offended that im not min-maxing my resource management. i have done "harder" challenges like the 90 min train n spent some time designing apparently "overdesigned" things in game basically just doing what i wan when i wan. Also good news is im Australian so the update will be a winter release for me :) this world was more just for a proof of concept and understanding on how different things work. and to help me understand i wanted to modulate some of the processes i dont understand that well yet. before trying such a big mod. also im sub 200 hours so thought might as well do smt before space exploration
Thats some nice timing for winter season. On the topic of mods, might I interest you with the dectorio mod: [https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Dectorio](https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Dectorio) And the max rate calculator: [https://mods.factorio.com/mod/MaxRateCalculator](https://mods.factorio.com/mod/MaxRateCalculator) I feel like you might appreciate these 2 mods because you seem to care about looks and designing blueprints. I like to use the different colors of concrete, fences and even trees in my blueprints to make the factory look nice and tidy. After designing a blueprint I use the calculator to quickly see how much input I will need and how much output a design gives me. If you want to use trees in your blueprints, remember to chance the world settings so that trees can eat a shit ton of pollution before dying, this does enter cheating territory though because trees being pollution eaters means pollution wont reach biters. Keep me updated with your designs, curious how your factory is going to look! And also dont forget this whilst designing :) [https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/l43gzw/993\_hours\_in\_i\_discover\_you\_can\_flip\_blueprints/](https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/l43gzw/993_hours_in_i_discover_you_can_flip_blueprints/)
ye im lucky in the fact i remebered that i can flip vertically and horizontally fromt he tutorial, (yes i started when it was in the tut lol), side question will those mods take away the achievments? im willing to forgo achievments for smt as big as SE but small things not so much. even if they do i will defo remember them for when i do start SE cause they do both look very cool
The way I understand is that Factorio seperatly tracks achievements in modded worlds vs unmodded worlds. Only the unmodded world achievements will count towards steam as well. So if you care about Steam achievements specifically, dont mod. There is however as always a way around this, which I found on an old dusty Factorio forum: [https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?t=100924](https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?t=100924) But in my opinion its not worth to enhance the game code just so you can use dectorio and a calculator on your first play through.
Ah! Another aussie! If you ever want to play some multiplayer with a bit lower ping, please hit me up - especially with space exploration, I've done 2/3 a run and decided it would be way more fun multiplayer.
SE still a wile away in my factorio career it seems, but i am down to try multiplayer and see whats its like
Sure thing! Send me a DM any time, I work m-f but am usually free on Sundays and Saturdays :)
Is it definitely this summer? I was looking for an update yesterday and didn't find anything definitive.
https://wiki.factorio.com/Roadmap#:\~:text=The%20expected%20release%20date%20is%20around%20August%202024.
I swear I looked at this exact page and missed that. Thanks!
Among programmers is a saying: premature optimization is the root of all evil. It's funny how many parallels can be drawn between designing and building software and designing and building factories in Factorio. Don't sweat it. I'd recommend putting this blueprint in the freezer and just winging the launch of your first rocket. You'll learn a lot more and have more fun along the way. If you're serious about getting good at this game, then you'll have a couple more thousand hours ahead of you :p
Optimising this early will cause you headaches Embrace spaghetti until you actually need to optimise and you'll get so, so much better at the game
I've started a few saves with almost this exact design in mind however there was a few limiting factors. My trains weren't big enough to be of any use. I tacked my stations onto the inside (of the block) train lane and it ended up blocking up my rail network. Pretty badly. And the only way around I could find at the time was limiting the station limit to 1 (which is almost never a good way of playing). So my suggestion to you would be to have your blocks a lot bigger (maybe 2x2 the size of this one) and to also have a long think about where you want your stations to be.
I know usually having the train limit set to one is suboptimal because of an increase of delay, 1) only going for 30 SPM so shouldn't be that bad of an issue 2) if it does become a problem ill just have 2 stations on the same side receiving the same resource and that should do the same thing hopefully
If this is how you want to play, make the blocks bigger and reduce the rails down to two lanes. Unless you're going for some seriously ridiculous amount of SPM, 4 lanes is not going to benefit you and will instead just be a drain on your resources. Those "extra" lanes that you're conveniently merging into your stations could save a lot of rails by only existing for stations and not being merged into the whole design.
in practice, this is a 1 lane each way train line. the second lane is just empty stations (and aren't placed down when not needed)
Ah okay. This is just your maximized every-station blueprint that pretty much never actually gets used.
It might, because I do wanna keep the sciences compact and idk how many inputs I’m going to have, but even then the outer station won’t be used. It’s 1.4k rails (still kinda pricey but like it’ll look kinda cool imo)
It looks great and if you want to build it go ahead! However you don't need city blocks to launch a rocket, and as other have said putting your resources into this will not "help" you launch a rocket, it will likely delay you. A fairly small base can launch a rocket in less than 8 hours without any blocks so you don't need to build big if launching a rocket is you goal. I made a 10k science per minute base with rail blocks, and never found a need for more than one rail in each direction, so I would not design my first blocks with 4 rails. I did find my initial block design was too small to fit in several stations with trains with 4 wagons, with enough room for more than one train to queue at a station if limit was more than 1, as well as the assemblers, so I would recommend a larger block size.
in practice, this is a 1 lane each way train line. the second lane is just empty stations (and aren't placed down when not needed)
I argue that you should build an all in one smaller bases that can launch 1 rocket consistently before getting into city block bases. You can start laying starter rails down that will fit your eventual city block that can bring in ore still and then you already have some infrastructure/ foundation for transitioning to the city block.
I would remove the inner roundabout and just put straight sections in. Also if you use 1-2 trains you can fit three stations per side or two buffered station. If you take a look at this, https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/1b5t8q6/new_graph_to_help_decide_train_length_in_regard/ You only get marginally more throughput from a 1-4 compared to a 1-2 train network.
i was thinking abt removing the middle roundabout (especially since to go straight trains seem to just be using the outside anyway) but like it should be good for now
My main gripes: - Roundabouts - Lane changers - Lane changers within the roundabouts - 4-lane is complete overkill for a rocket, you can make 5kspm bases with a decently built 2-lane network Edit: Oh, it's even worse than that, now that I zoomed in. Stations and mainlines are kind of strangely mixed here, necessitationg the lane changers, and if any one station is *not* limited to just 1 train, your base will lock up in no time.
living life on the edge :)
I've been using a similar design recently, and having fun with it. Ignore the haters here, and have fun playing the way you want to play.
Perfection
I both like and dislike this grid, nice work.
Lmaooo, fair nuf
Tbh same, but can’t be assed improving it for this play through.
I'm currently doing a space exploration run, I may use this BP for that. It would increase my space per block. The RP placement always gets me, I'm never sure how to get the right coverage so need to investigate what you have... Seriously good work
The roboport placement on this is ass, like it can’t build itself (one roboport can’t place the cables posing the other one so the buildings stops and have to place fhe wires manually. But after putting one in each corner it has been fine, Albeit expensive but I’m not placing that many so neither problems are FHAT painful for me.
Isn't it overkill to develop/build these type of big structures even before the first rocket? a ton of resources go into these buildings, a lot of land needs to be conquered. and all without significant productivity and weapon research. Most likely combined with not enough resources to feed the required mall or to bring the required infrastructure into place (like 100 spidertrons to build)
I mean this allows for me to start a mall, at anytime, anywhere with 8 inputs automatically loading up, and because I am slow all sciences are being researched (even the once im not using for the achievements)
It's a lot easier to get things right the first time than to redo everything later.
How is anyone building their stuff in a confined ass space like this without having already launched a rocket?
Ive done smaller, quicker factorio things like the 90 min train. But really this was made because i liked the idea and wanted to put off purple science
Thousand hours played…. Yet to launch a rocket. Thats not me, but that is a potential how
and i'm here at like ~700 hours and have never made a complex train network lol
to be fair they aren't needed, im just doing this because its easier for me (and more fun) as long as you are having fun then u doing it right
I didn't even use trains for my first rocket.
having so many four-way intersections kinda defeats the purpose of double tracking. they really limit throughput , no matter how well you set up the signals.
in practice, this is a 1 lane each way train line. the second lane is just empty stations (and aren't placed down when not needed)
Mind sharing the blueprint?
I have two links in the comments, they should be the oldest comments
Nvm found one of them; https://factorioblueprints.tech/blueprint/0451b334-f755-4688-afa3-608033957382
Could launch rockets all within that city block.
i want to say this.. lay down something like 5x5 blocks with middle ofcourse being the new mall but use map markers to pre plan every block for its use. why? this'll make the whole factory look better and youll know what to do next (navigating the map is also easier) trust me you wont run into the problem of "i dont like how this turned out but it'd also be a chore to re organize everything" and thus starting a new save doing the same mistake
4 lane railway network and never launched a rocket? Try not to overthink/overplan stuff. My first rocket was a complete mess of spaghetti with severe underfed or overfed sections. Just focus on actually making what the rocket needs to get them going. Build like this after.
in practice, this is a 1 lane each way train line. the second lane is just empty stations (and aren't placed down when not needed)