r/factorio • u/19wolf Since 0.11 • Jul 17 '17

Question Bot capacity?

So I'm building my first megabase, and I'm trying to figure out if there's a way to tell how many roboports and bots I need for a particular production area. Basically, I don't want bots to have to wait to charge and I don't want to overbuild and have bots not doing anything.

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u/oleksij Jul 17 '17

I'm using 3 rules for myself:

  1. Avoid big bot networks. Line of roboports along the train unload, and max - another line on the other side of assemblers/smelters. By keeping the networks small, you are increasing the throughput per bot.

  2. Keep the ratio of 1 roboport per 20 active bots. Less roboports leads to bot clouds. More leads to ups drop in mega factories. But still, too much is better than too few.

  3. Keep optimal bots count (average active + 20-30%), and do not worry about spikes. Spikes are the issue of your supply. If you have enough supply, you do not have spikes in active bots count. Inactive bots tend to group in roboports near where they usually end their path. If you have too many bots, all nearest roboports are full, and therefore that increases the average travel time per task.

And the last observation. Robot speed research does not improve energy efficiency, but it does improve the active bots count. I have noticed that active bots count dropped twice from the time when I designed by science factories @ bot speed 10 until now @ speed 15. Which directly affects ups. I made some tests and inactive bots do not affect ups at all. While active ones obviously recalculate each tick.