Totally new player questions

[That Fish Guy]

Is there a way to un-tether my camera from my mech/wads keys? I'd like to have it off and doing stuff while I blue print my base, I've found holding shift allows it to go do things, but I can't put down building plans while in this mode, and when I let off shift it snaps back to the mech.


Is there an alternative build menu style, like a rolling hotkey-bar system (ala satisfactory) I like the pre allocated bars, they make sense, but I don't like f4 and f7 being used when f2, f3, f5, f7 are all empty, I'd rather be able to use the number keys for what I want to build, and mouse wheel through the different building sets (or have it all freely designatable).

Is there a way to consistently figure out how much space is required between a belt and a feeding arm? I'm used to running my belts pretty close to/straight into buildings, is there a way to run an output into a storage unit without a feeding arm? Do feeding arms always need to be at least 1 unit away from the building they're supplying? Can a feeding arm pick up from multiple tracks if it's placed going over a different track?

Is there a way to rearrange tech tree/internal fusion order after you've set things in motion? Is there a way to "refresh" the fusion queue so that it sees items you've picked up since you assigned the task? Or is there a way to delete a redundant ingredient without removing the final product from the build queue (not needed if there's a way to rearrange the fusion queue without recreating it)

Is there a way to assign a "clear vegetation" area without right clicking on every tree (also free move the camera while mech is doing this)

How can belt greasers be automatically refilled? Can turrets be automatically refilled?

Is there a way to set a storage/factory to only keep X amount of resource?

Thanks for the assistance, sorry for the long post. I've tried to get into this game 5 or 6 times now, last night was my most successful, each of these foigles has been some part of the reason I stopped playing before, especially the screen locked to mech, 1-8/f1-f8 assigned hotkey menu, and the research/fusion build queue (though fusioning items is becoming less necessary this run now that the factory is starting to take shape).

Hopefully some of this is just new player lacking nuance, but I worry it might not be.

Edit: feel free to point me to a guide/other topic if there's a bunch of already answers to these questions already

[Mr.D]

To answer a couple of your questions; God mode in settings gives you a much better view when building, maximum range of sorters is 3 squares, you can clear and level land by building on it, no tree by tree required, slider at the bottom of storage UI will let you customise how much of the storage you want to use.

[GMJoe]

You can untether the camera from your mech by pressing "M." Be aware that this limits what you can do; if you want to build stuff or interact with most buildings' inventories, you need to be nearby.

There is a way to run a conveyor belt into and out of a storage without using a sorter: Build the storage on top of a splitter. Note that only storages can be built on splitters; with other building types, you're constrained to that building's input/output slots.

A sorter can pick up items only from the single belt or building it's connected to, not other belts it runs over. There's room for multiple adjacent sorters on most buildings, though, so it's not hard for a building to have multiple sorters to pick from different belts.

I'm not sure what you mean by "Is there a way to rearrange tech tree/internal fusion order after you've set things in motion," but if you meant "is there a way to change the order of my research queue," the answer is yes: You can right-click on an item in the queue to remove it from the queue. Items removed in this fashion keep their progress, so you can continue them from where you left off later.

What's a belt greaser? Do you mean a spray coater? If so, you can refill them using a conveyor belt.

You can set a storage to only keep a certain amount of a resource by selecting it and dragging its "Limit for Automation Input" slider.

As for your other questions, I either don't know the answers or don't understand the questions.

[GMJoe]

Oh, and be aware that building on land destroys the resources you would've gotten by cutting down the trees on that land, so you might want to avoid it if you believe trees to be precious.

[That Fish Guy]

Thanks a lot guys! I'll try to re-word the questions if they continue to nag. Brevity is my dump stat.

You've both done a fine job answering my questions, I'm sorry some weren't clear, you've also illuminated things I hadn't considered (storage on sorters, losing harvest when building over trees).

[pemmons1]

>You can set a storage to only keep a certain amount of a resource by selecting it and dragging its "Limit for Automation Input" slider.

If you have a logistics distributor set to give to Icarus or take from Icarus (the default), and Icarus is set to give away that item from inventory, the bots will over-ride the "limit for automation" if necessary to relieve Icarus of its excess inventory. This can be very handy.

[FrozenLegion]

Heya Fish Guy! I noticed many of these got answered already to a degree, but as brevity is also not my strong suit, I figured I'd add my own notes/clarifications too! Also feel free to add me and message me with other questions too! I needed alot of help when I started with youtube tutorials,etc.

1. Sorters (aka feeding arms): Most building (smelters, replicators, etc) have 2-3 spots on any side where inputs (feeding arms) can put items from belts into the machine. If you run a belt directly alongside a machine( as close as it can go) and put a feeding arm (or multuple) inserting into it, you are going to put the items in at a more rapid rate. Sorter arms can also pick from belts that are 2 and 3 spaces away and insert into a machine, albeit at a slower rate.

That said, feeding arms only pull and place from and onto one belt. They can cross over other belts but will not pick items up from the belts beneath the extra span. you need an arm on each belt you want materials from.

2) If by fusion order you mean your manual creation of items in your mecha as opposed to your factory, then great... as far as it auto-updating the build queue when you pick up materials, I don't believe that is a feature that is present. if manually building from base materials/ores, its quicker to just cancel it and restart the final product with the more 'advanced materials' anyway.

Not the most convenient and sucks for inventory clutter early early game, but mecha is designed to not be efficient or convenient to craft long term or large amount of sophisticated machines, preferring automation for such tasks.

Eventually once automation starts happening there is also tech that can fly out requested materials from certain hubs directly to your inventory which is amazing. Think auto delivery of like 600 conveyor belts from a storage site when making a resource supply line.



3) Clearing vegetation.. As has been said, place a building (smelter,etc) down in the midst of the trees, dismantle and repeat to clear an area. Don't stress too much about the loss of wood fuel early on,it becomes essentially useless rapidly.

You very quickly can utilize coal to make various other more efficient fuel sources for yourself and your power grid. Also, even before that you can set down a mining machine on a coal deposit and grab the coal out and put it in your mecha if needed too (not as efficient as say graphite,etc).

4) Turrets can be automatically refilled.

Here's the automation process: Mine copper ore with mining machine and belt ore to smelter to make copper bars. Insert copper bars into replicators and assign the replicator the recipe to pump out ammo boxes (I think its 4 bars for 1 box of ammo). Use feed arm to dump ammo onto a conveyor belt.

Place down a turret nearby and run the conveyor belt through and into the turret ( turret does not require a feeding arm (sorter) to be fed ammo). If it isnt automatically loading, try rotating the turret until a tunnel looking space on the bottom of the turret lines up with the belt then try feeding it again. That should keep your turrets loaded.

5) Limiting Storage - lol took me a while to figure this out when I started. There is a slider in the interface once you open the storage. Play with it a bit, but if there are spots that are highlighted red once you play around, that indicated that the storage will not fill the red rows, etc.


On closing, super excited you're a part of the dyson community! Excited to be a part of the learning process when ya have more questions! Please reach out even if ya need anything or if ya just wanna play!