Factorio Forums

TL;DR

Detach Steam Turbine from nuclear production into separate research that is a prerequisite.

What?

What I suggest is to allow players to build steam turbines earlier in the game by making them a separate research option with lesser requirements than for nuclear production research they reside in now.

Why?

Steam turbine, while being used mainly in nuclear setups, also have a lot of uses in ordinary powerplants as well. It has double the power for aprox. triple the cost and also allows for higher steam temperature, similar to how Assembling Machine 2 costs double for additional 50% crafting speed and allows for fluid handling.
Allowing access for steam turbines earlier will give players the option to make their powerplants more powerful on the same footprint (or make them more compact while retaining their power production), and also make transition into nuclear energy feel smoother.

I don't see the value for vanilla. Until you unlock nuclear, you can't create steam hotter than what the boilers do, and it doesn't matter whether they're being fed into a steam engine or a turbine, they'll still produce the same amount of power per unit of steam consumed.

I do actually see one niche potential reason for this in 2.0. On Vulcanus, the acid steam recipe produces extra hot steam that would be best used by a turbine, and it has nothing to do with nuclear. And getting into space only requires uranium processing tech, not nuclear power, so theoretically you could get to Vulcanus without steam turbines and waste quite a bit of that energy. But it is a very specific situation, I don’t think it would happen often enough to justify the change. And using turbines for boiler steam is a total waste, new players shouldn’t be encouraged to do it.

CyberCider wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 11, 2024 9:01 pm

I do actually see one niche potential reason for this in 2.0. On Vulcanus, the acid steam recipe produces extra hot steam that would be best used by a turbine, and it has nothing to do with nuclear. And getting into space only requires uranium processing tech, not nuclear power, so theoretically you could get to Vulcanus without steam turbines and waste quite a bit of that energy. But it is a very specific situation, I don’t think it would happen often enough to justify the change. And using turbines for boiler steam is a total waste, new players shouldn’t be encouraged to do it.

True, though to be fair, once you've unlocked uranium processing, nuclear tech isn't that far away.

I could see splitting into three, starting with steam turbine research. Get that, start making the turbines while researching heat. Get that, start making heat exchangers and heat pipes while researching nuclear power. Once that research is complete make a reactor or two and you have what you need to set up your first power station. Rather than one big lump of research followed but a whole big bunch of production, it just breaks it down into smaller more manageable chunks, the way that railway research is split into railway (trains), automated railway (train stops), and rail signals.

Amarula wrote: ↑

Wed Mar 13, 2024 12:45 pm

I could see splitting into three, starting with steam turbine research. Get that, start making the turbines while researching heat. Get that, start making heat exchangers and heat pipes while researching nuclear power. Once that research is complete make a reactor or two and you have what you need to set up your first power station. Rather than one big lump of research followed but a whole big bunch of production, it just breaks it down into smaller more manageable chunks, the way that railway research is split into railway (trains), automated railway (train stops), and rail signals.

I'd actually have to disagree with the logic here.

In the case of trains, each piece is usable without the later pieces. Just tracks can be used manually. Tracks with stops can be used for single train automation (or multi with some creativity and train limits with more stops than are needed). Then rail signals of course improves it to the full extent.

Steam turbines (with 1 exception), heat exchangers, and nuclear reactors, on the other hand, are unusable if any one of the other three components is missing.

The one exception to this, as mentioned before, are the turbines if you choose to go to Volcanus first, but even then you are only 1 research away from nuclear reactors, anyway (as uranium processing is required to go to other planets). It makes no sense to separate out turbines and put them before uranium processing as you won't be able to effectively use them until after, and placing them between uranium processing and nuclear reactors just needlessly delays nuclear reactors.

True you need all three pieces to be really useful, so it could be argued that they should stay combined, unless they lead to separate uses like flying robot frames. I am starting a new vanilla world, and I have just started nuclear research. It struck me that it would be kind of nice to be able to start on the production side while waiting for the research to be done that's all.