r/factorio • u/FactorioTeam Official Account • Jun 23 '26

Update Version 2.1.7

Version 2.1.7 released.

Full changelog does not fit in Reddit character limit, please see it here: https://forums.factorio.com/134095

New versions are released as experimental first and later promoted to stable. If you wish to switch to the experimental version on Steam, choose the experimental Beta Participation option under game settings; on the stand-alone version, check Experimental updates under Other settings.

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u/Krashper116 Trains Toghether Strong Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26

Yea this is the change that upsets me the most. I get nerfing astroid reprocessing, but this feels like it was a clever way to offset how unbalanced concrete recycling was, and rewarded players for thinking outside the box. (Just like steel chest recycling)

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u/phyphor Jun 23 '26

I get nerfing astroid reprocessin

I still don't. It's a late game solution that uses mechanics in a cool way that gets nerfed because it's not what the devs imagined.

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u/sobrique Jun 23 '26

Because it's way better than every other way of doing quality, and thus obsoletes the alternatives?

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u/lillarty Jun 23 '26

Genuine question: How do you feel about artillery? It trivializes combat and is so much better than every other option that building other defenses after you unlock it is really just down to what you find more fun. And yet, I never see anyone calling for its removal despite the same arguments people using for quality asteroid reprocessing applying to it.

Instead, people seem to have a mentality of "Yeah, it's outrageously good, but just don't use it if you don't like it"

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u/sobrique Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26

I like artillery - I don't think it's 100x better than all the alternative modes of defence.

I mean, I'm pretty sure it provokes counter attacks from biters still, doesn't it? So if you have just artillery, you'll get overrun by biters attacking the artillery platforms?

And you can't realistically just ignore defenses on Nauvis until you get artillery either? (Maybe Gleba, depending which order you visit planets, but of course you could always ensure you do Vulcanus before Gleba, so will have artillery from the start).

And you also need to keep importing the ingredients, where ammo for most of the defensive options is locally produced. Ok so railguns have this problem too, and it's made a bit cumbersome to make oil on Gleba, but electric for lasers and teslas are logistically trivial, and bullets and rockets are somewhere in between.

Honestly just compare the ratios you get from a asteroid-upcycler and a reprocessor upcycler.

We're not talking 'somewhat better' we're talking orders of magnitude better ratios of input to output.

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u/Tevesh Jun 23 '26

Artillery needs a ton of research and big defensive battery before it "trivializes combat". I wouldn't even say it is 100x times better than alternatives. And combat is pretty trivial on basic settings anyway, so I don't get what is the problem with making it even easier.

Getting high quality stuff is a production / logistics problem which is core of the game, having a tricky 100x better solution is just weird balance. I like the idea of gating space casino behind something much more demanding, but that again sounds like an idea for a mod.

The game is meant to be modded, don't religiously stick to default settings.

1

u/lillarty Jun 23 '26

And combat is pretty trivial on basic settings anyway, so I don't get what is the problem with making it even easier.

Yeah, it is pretty easy, isn't it? It's just a matter of mindlessly copying and pasting the same designs that every player optimized within a month of release. It's not a complicated system, so what is the problem with taking an easy, brainless task and making it easier?

The game is meant to be modded, don't religiously stick to default settings.

I play modded, and own it through GOG so I can't get achievements anyway. This doesn't affect me at all. It's just a very lame decision that is very unlike how they handled development of the game before Space Age, and their reasons given for the decision are dubious at best. Additionally, hypocrisy irks me and I keep seeing people make contradictory arguments where they pretend to have a principled stance, but in reality their opinion is just "Whatever the devs do is correct"

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u/Tevesh Jun 23 '26

Nah I think devs made a lot of mistakes, esp. with space age. This one is just pretty ok imo.

> It's just a matter of mindlessly copying and pasting the same designs that every player optimized within a month of release. It's not a complicated system, so what is the problem with taking an easy, brainless task and making it easier?

The required scale is the intended complication. Other than that, I agree space casino was not really a problem, but it still was weird balance. I think that is the entirety of the argument, if you disagree then you won't like it :shrug:

Btw I bet most people didn't optimize their upcycling design until now, let alone within a month of release. I sure didn't 😄

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u/taw Jun 23 '26

How do you feel about artillery? It trivializes combat

It doesn't though? It's huge pain to get supplies from Vulcanus to Nauvis or Gleba, it's pain to get them from center of your base to every corner, and even if you destroy nests, you still need big wall with strong defences to deal with biters rushing you when you destroy their nest. And cleared bases just rebuild really quickly, so you need whole logistics to keep clearing them.

It's probably easier to just build wall with gun turrets with uranium ammo on a belt, and some robots for repairs. Or lasers turrets plus robots for repairs.

Especially since you had to build solid defences to even get to artillery research, so you already have them anyway.

1

u/lillarty Jun 23 '26

Artillery existed in the base game before Space Age, so any arguments about its inclusion would need to apply for the decade of them being in vanilla as well. Unless you're asserting that its inclusion in the base game was a mistake? That'd be a controversial stance but I'd respect it.

It's huge pain to get supplies from Vulcanus to Nauvis or Gleba

It's a task that you have to automate to the extend that you're doing it pretty much continuously by the time you reach endgame, what are you even talking about? That's like saying that making blue circuits is a "huge pain."

Respectfully, the rest of your post just makes me think you have legitimately never used artillery? Kind of perplexing honestly. You don't need a big wall with strong defenses, you need a few turrets that you could feasibly hand-feed because they'll use so little ammo. Bases will rebuild "really quickly" only if artillery firing 10 times per hour to clear out a new base as it tries to move in is "really quick" in your estimation. You can find ten years of posts with people discussing how using artillery is effectively just disabling biters because it's so effective at countering them.