Science Packs priority : black or blue ?

[Jonathan]

So... first of all : I usually work mostly on my own, building my strategy, ignoring most mainstream strategies. So don't try to picture my base : it's a huge chaotic marvel. (And I love it ! <3)

Anyway : I played a full playthrough in 0.13, 0.14 and 0.16.
Now going for 1.0. (yay !)

But ever since black and blue sc.packs have been set to be "on the same tier", I've been wondering what do people generally do first ?

I have a tendency to "build for big" so both of them are a lot of work(to sustain 20-ish sc.centers). I can't imagine doing both at the same time.

But in 0.16, I did blue first and I remember thinking that the black one were a pain in the bottom.

But now, I just went for black first and bitters are beginning to be quite powerfull. Not having drones yet to repair is troublesome. And not having laser turrets for quick-and-easy new-base deployment is also quite troublesome.

Plus, I lost extra time building armor-piercing ammo factories and automated deliveries to all turrets around the map, mostly delivered by train... (where as I would have used a lot of lasers if I did blue first)


So.......... to me, it kind of feel like doing black first was not a good choice.


Looking for opinions on the subject.



Thanks !

[Fel]

They are not really on the same tier, black is a mostly optionnal type of science pack used for military technologies.

Basically, each tier of science starting from green will have military technologies as well where you add those black science packs.
They add new weapons, ammo or turrets or just give bonuses to damage or shooting speed for various things.

You don't want to neglect those military technologies too much but your main goal after automating green science packs is the blue science pack to continue your progression towards the rocket.


Don't worry about your gun turrets, those will eventually be a lot more potent than laser turrets and both of those work better as support for flamethrower turrets anyway.
Laser turrets used to be borderline OP but their base stats were severely weakened in 0.17 (lower base shooting speed and damage) so the good old "spam laser turrets and have a fool-proof defense" is not really applicable anymore.
Well, you could spam even more of them to compensate but the cost in power means that it requires a serious investment to work properly.

[Overeagerdragon]

Originally posted by Jonathan:

So... first of all : I usually work mostly on my own, building my strategy, ignoring most mainstream strategies. So don't try to picture my base : it's a huge chaotic marvel. (And I love it ! <3)

Anyway : I played a full playthrough in 0.13, 0.14 and 0.16.
Now going for 1.0. (yay !)

But ever since black and blue sc.packs have been set to be "on the same tier", I've been wondering what do people generally do first ?

I have a tendency to "build for big" so both of them are a lot of work(to sustain 20-ish sc.centers). I can't imagine doing both at the same time.

But in 0.16, I did blue first and I remember thinking that the black one were a pain in the bottom.

But now, I just went for black first and bitters are beginning to be quite powerfull. Not having drones yet to repair is troublesome. And not having laser turrets for quick-and-easy new-base deployment is also quite troublesome.

Plus, I lost extra time building armor-piercing ammo factories and automated deliveries to all turrets around the map, mostly delivered by train... (where as I would have used a lot of lasers if I did blue first)


So.......... to me, it kind of feel like doing black first was not a good choice.


Looking for opinions on the subject.



Thanks !

First of all; Love love love the pride you have for your own little mess of a factory (and I say that with the utmost respect as I'm looking at my own little mess of a factory, loving it just as much)

For me Black science is a must asap but I play with the full EVO modpack as well as some other enemy enhancing mods so biters eventually get elemental resistances. This foces me to make a balanced defensive line as lasers alone won't cut it (various biters would simply be immune to them). However: all but a few upgrade techs for firepower are locked behind that black science so even though I would want to diverse through blue science I'd still need black to up the potency of that variety.

So early game (when diversity isn't much of an issue) black has more value to me when it comes to military firepower and blue has more value for expansion. As such I research what I need most at that time...if I have plenty of building space I'll build blue...if I need to clear for building space I'll build black.

I'd say neither is a waste to start though. (unless you play on peaceful mode ofc)

[sinoplez]

Originally posted by Fel:

They are not really on the same tier, black is a mostly optionnal type of science pack used for military technologies.

Basically, each tier of science starting from green will have military technologies as well where you add those black science packs.
They add new weapons, ammo or turrets or just give bonuses to damage or shooting speed for various things.

Best answer possible, black is a parallel track not a lower/higher tiers.

As it is focused on military tech, which is mainly used for upgrading your firepower to match the evolution of the bitter. The priority between blue and black is up to you.

As a conclusion, I would say that black science is easier to setup and produce than blue one (no need for chemical and the supply chain is simple).

[Jhea]

depends on what you need.
if you are on a deathworld black is pretty much the way to go, to have a fighting chance (pun intended) to actually get the other sciences ;D

[knighttemplar1960]

It depends on your map but I usually open up blue science packs first and then before I research any thing in blue science I open up military science packs. If you don't have any oil nearby chances are you will need to research some military techs to reach some.

Once I have them both open I can choose and prioritize what tech I need next.

[Jonathan]

Originally posted by Fel:

Laser turrets used to be borderline OP but their base stats were severely weakened in 0.17 (lower base shooting speed and damage) so the good old "spam laser turrets and have a fool-proof defense" is not really applicable anymore.

Good to know... and scary... ! I was one of those who just over-use the lasers...




I play vanilla, but I set map generation so that all ores spawn just a little bit smaller and less often, but are much deeper.

So I need to explore/spread a lot. But each ore source are near-infinite. Relocating is not an issue.

This being said, just preping for "black Sc.Packs" forced me to build 4 outer bases to gather ores. By train.

And already, my defenses are getting damaged every time bitters attack. (despite walls and 2-3 layers of turrets)

I'm gonna research the gun upgrades while I setup for blue, which will help..... Maybe set some fire turrets...



But blue will require me to set even farther away outposts... without repair bots to fix my defenses.... This is going to be a long, painfull mess, lol. LOTS of going back and forth to build away, come back to repair, return to build..... huh

[Modran]

I set up black science early, but less than the others (e.g. 20-30/min black packs while all others are 60/min), with an additional buffer, so that I can squeeze in a black research every now and then.

Edit: corrected per second to per minute

[THE kilroy]

I say black first but not much. You CAN get away with 1 or 2 assemblers of black but you really gonna want lots of blue. I like to start with black as it doesnt require such a large jump from green, and then i go for the oil infrastructure into blues.

Factorio is really good at "suggesting" progression. Ex red uses basically just smelted goods cause any start you need smelting. Green uses inserters and belts cause by then those parts should be produced anyways. Black uses walls ap ammo and grenades, good means of defense and aggression. When in doubt just roll with what feels good

[Drizzt]

Edit: was writing this for a while so didn't see the post above till after i posted, so there is some repetition! (great minds thinking alike and all that ;-))

i almost always do black (really it's more grey....) before blue, since it doesn't require fluid processing and so feels like the natural progression for the base - i.e. red just needs a very simple setup for copper and gears - green is a little more complex, and requires a decent resource flow to work through all the tech, and then grey adds steel and stone bricks to the mix (as well as requiring a coal line), which progress the base setup (2 more smelters, more intermediate products) but don't add any new concepts yet - so i feel it solidifies the basic concepts and enforces a robust foundation to the base, while also requiring a supply of ammo, grenades and walls, all of which will be needed due to the pollution that the base will now be producing (also includes important damage and shooting speed upgrades) - and then at this scale i find i am in a much better position to start setting up blue (currently just about to attach the fluid processing for blue at the 22 hour mark of my Lazy B*stard playthrough :-))

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Modran:

I set up black science early, but less than the others (e.g. 20-30/s black packs while all others are 60/s), with an additional buffer, so that I can squeeze in a black research every now and then.

did you mean /s or /min? i assume you mean per minute - in which case i was going to add that i tend to work in similar way, but keeping everything equal to 1 or 2 per second (current playthrough started with 2/s and staying with that) - so since grey and blue give 2 per unit, i have 10 red, 12 green, 10 grey and 24 blue assemblers for my 2 science per second, which should get me through all blue science fairly quickly - and i remember when that was all the science! (except alien - but that didn't need research)

Edit: should note these numbers are slightly off because the advanced assembler only has a 0.75 efficiency so everything is a little slower - but is good enough for government work ;-)

anyway - enough waffling from me - need to go and drive my brand new tank :-)

[Fel]

If you are using assembling machine 1, 10 making red science packs only makes 1 per second since they have 0.5 speed multiplier and the base time is 5 seconds per cycle.
Since there are no assembling machines with a speed multiplier of 1 (0.5, 0.75 and 1.25 respectively) it is pretty hard to reach 2 per second with 10 machines unless you use speed modules.

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Fel:

If you are using assembling machine 1, 10 making red science packs only makes 1 per second since they have 0.5 speed multiplier and the base time is 5 seconds per cycle.
Since there are no assembling machines with a speed multiplier of 1 (0.5, 0.75 and 1.25 respectively) it is pretty hard to reach 2 per second with 10 machines unless you use speed modules.

yup - realized that so made an edit :-)
so i guess i'm at 1.5/s or something like that - i tend to work everything out based on pretending assembler 2 has an efficiency of 1, and so then i'm never short on resources since everything will be ticking over slightly slower - not ideal for real life, but fine for play time ;-)

[fractalgem]

As you need relatively few black packs to get some significant improvements to your infrastructure, and can obtain the parts to handcraft them, you could probably just handcraft a few hundred of them to snag some low hanging fruit while you keep puzzling out blue packs.

If you're starting to struggle at all with biters though, go for black.

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Jonathan:

But in 0.16, I did blue first and I remember thinking that the black one were a pain in the bottom

i should note, i'm fairly sure the recipes changed after 0.16 - coz grey used to need turrets and now needs walls instead, which massively reduces the iron and copper required (while adding a much smaller stone requirement, albeit smelted) - blue has also changed - i actually can't remember the old recipe (just looked it up - was the electric mining drill) - but a component has been replaced with just sulphur, again replacing a bunch of iron and copper and a slightly fiddly setup with just a quick petrol/water mix

so yeah - current recipes less annoying, but the obstacle as always is fluid processing and red circuits for blue science - and then we have 2 more levels - i can't even remember the recipes for those since i only played it all the way through once or twice and was a while ago now

but i'm gonna get this Lazy B*stard achievement this week - oh yes i am! :-)

[Premu]

In normally don't priorize either. I build a starter base for red and green science and research everything I can needing only those two science packs. In the meantime I use extra resources to build machines, belts, inserters, etc. which I'll need to build a factory including blue and grey science.

After everything for green and red is reseached, I'll improve my very basic defenses and build the new factory for all four science packs. I also prepare a proper mall. With that I'll get a pretty nice looking and well planned factory which will lasts until everything for blue and grey is researched, where I'll prepare again a new layout for all six science packs.

You need some planning in before, though, to know how much you need to build to set up your new factory quickly.