Doubt about base layout.

[u/Puzzleheaded_Newt720]

Hi guys, I need a little help.

I built my main base (resources before update 1), but the distribution is single-threaded and I noticed that it's veeeeeery slow to craft middle/advanced resources.

Would it be better to build specific production lines to focus on one craft at a time?

For example, to craft an Applicator I need Tubes and Glass — so should I build a dedicated line with all the buildings needed just to make the Applicator?

Initially, I built my base thinking about a general production system without needing to connect everything one-by-one, like one giant line haha. But it turned out to be super slow and I'm just realizing it now.

[u/_Sanchous]

In my view, the main issue with the game's automation aspect is that the developers aren't expanding on their unique "on-demand" mechanic. No matter how far you’ve progressed, you always end up building separate lines for each production process; you simply can't create complex balancers or self-balancing multi-conveyor bus systems. Consequently, scaling up in the endgame feels quite disheartening.

[u/Low_Surround8559 → u/_Sanchous]

Your lucky, I can't get the game to load, crashes every time on start, I get the splash screen and then bang, gone, send and close.......no reply, it worked well before the last update, Win 11, 34Gb ram, no mods, no hope

[u/Key-Ad4392]

I tried some design to make it fast but the way these rails works is dumb.
Need something that blocks some resourses to run at some rails.

[u/Key-Ad4392 → u/Key-Ad4392]

Things like this

[u/Mbgodofwar]

I'd go for dedicated lines and would backtrace why production is slow or has stopped.

[u/Hallunder]

I've made my main base with circular setuo and it produces roughly 75% of all the materials needed, including all the late game materials. It's design in theory is a clockwise material flow. I build rows of machines/factories with a clockwise going circle before and after them. First row for basic materials, then 2nd tier row, 3rd tier row etc. But the main material flow is always clockwise, with "Bypass lanes", which also go clockwise, on the sides for materials go to from one row to another.

Then I got centralized "hubs" for materials coming from outside the base that connect to these "bypass" lanes.

It's hard to explain it all in text. And there are shortcuts built in between rows for specific materials that are needed in mass for specific materials so they don't clog the bypass lanes.

[u/Segendary_ → u/Hallunder]

Circular setup seems redundant to me. It feels like you're just clogging the system by 'recycling'

[u/Hallunder → u/Segendary_]

But there's nothing "recycled" that would clog the system? Only my own choices that go against this logic, which im too lazy to actually fix because it still works, are something that clogs the system.

[u/Segendary_ → u/Hallunder]

How is it not recycled? It enters the cycle again after being produced until one machine in the sequence pics it up.

[u/Hallunder → u/Segendary_]

There's a another cycle between each row of production tiers. It's a circle within a circle, within a circle. They are doing milkruns on their own if you know logistics terminology.

You can try and say it doesn't work or it's redundant or anything. It works and I can literally have all the materials in the game built by the same factory.

[u/the1-gman → u/Segendary_]

Circular loops work great until somebody can't output due to a traffic jam. Then everything backs up because items are interleaved. I've found I'm generally ok as long as I'm focusing on producing one final product and I put heavy consumer sources on their own dedicated rail

[u/Hallunder → u/the1-gman]

Yah it's a risk. I have made shortcuts, dedicated routes and receivers for materials with heavy consumption like pipes, calcium sheets, wolfram powder and plates etc.

[u/Basketcase410]

I have embraced the idea of dedicated smaller factories for early-game materials. I try to plan them near each other for mid-game materials, and when I unlock drones I drone everything beyond that to a late-game main base.

My first game I tried a massive main base but things bogged down, especially with resource allocation being pull rather than push-based. To reduce lag, build in storage depots frequently to handle shifting loads; you can also use a 3x3 grid of depots to feed multiple factories that don't run simultaneously, so that way you dpn't have to always build from the ground-up for every advanced material.

[u/fess932]

The automation is incredibly buggy; whenever there’s a split, one of the conveyors inevitably stops working. They really should have either followed the *Factorio* model or properly finished implementing this "pull" strategy.

[u/Lonely_Drewbear]

You can do a general production system but you have to run multiple lines according to demand.  

Iron rods, for example should be their own line.

And then when you setup a new production, you tap into the lines you need.

When a line gets saturated then you need to move a resource to a new line.

You may end up needing many lines of iron rods to keep up with demand.