Ranking the first three planets

[sweet lemonade]

From best to worst, in my opinion so far, Gleba > Fulgora > Vulcanus. Vulcanus is just totally not unique and feels more like a replacement to Nauvis than an actual new planet. Gleba and Fulgora are like Factorio 2 and 3, really excellently designed and fun to figure out. Overall, WUBE did an outstanding job with the expansion

[Sathreyn]

I feel like they make a neat progression - Vulcanus changes things a little bit but the core principles work the same as the base game, it just teaches you to change how you approach gathering the base materials. Then you go on to Fulgora and Gleba, which significantly change the entire progression of a factory - I'd feel Fulgora is the more natural first stop, then Gleba, but I think they work really well together. In terms of preference I'd personally rank it Gleba > Vulcanus > Fulgora, but I think they're all really good as gameplay challenges. Overall, I am in agreement - WUBE did an outstanding job with the expansion.

[daddy devito]

for me personally gleba is the worst if only because i despise having to defend my base against the massive stompers and volcanus is my favorite because everything that planet does is actually useful and good for the rest of my worlds

[BKo]

To me they're equal except Gleba which is a total mess of contradictory progression and bad design, and it only becomes "okay" once you completely finish with it. Just change a few of the things about it and it'd be quite good. People say there's no real "point" to it but it does have one thing the other planets don't: it's potentially infinite and with no need for expansion. On other planets you will eventually run out of scrap or calcite, but as far as I know my Gleba base could last forever (except potentially for enemy behavior, the enemy behavior being one of the worst parts about it).

[malogoss]

Originally posted by sweet lemonade:

From best to worst, in my opinion so far, Gleba > Fulgora > Vulcanus. (...)

Personally, same ranking. Gleba is so unique. Fulgora is good, but I thought the reverse production would be more of a puzzle. Still fun, just thought I'd need to think harder. Vulcanus is average on all levels. No real difficulty there, except maybe the worms if you have no idea how to deal with them.

Can I mention Nauvis is so much better than it used to be? I mean, it's the same planet it was, but the new map generator makes things a lot more interesting.

[Entropy]

Originally posted by malogoss:

Originally posted by sweet lemonade:

From best to worst, in my opinion so far, Gleba > Fulgora > Vulcanus. (...)

Personally, same ranking. Gleba is so unique. Fulgora is good, but I thought the reverse production would be more of a puzzle. Still fun, just thought I'd need to think harder. Vulcanus is average on all levels. No real difficulty there, except maybe the worms if you have no idea how to deal with them.

Can I mention Nauvis is so much better than it used to be? I mean, it's the same planet it was, but the new map generator makes things a lot more interesting.

Navius is better because you have elevated rails and where you can easily setup your megabase :D

[malogoss]

Originally posted by Chastity Belt Enjoyer:

Navius is better because you have elevated rails and where you can easily setup your megabase :D

No.
Train traffic too low at this point to justify elevated rails for me. I only used them before I got cliff explosives, to pass over cliffs. And I'm far from a megabase yet.

Nauvis is just a lot better. How it looks, the sounds, the map itself.

[Freeman]

Originally posted by BKo:

To me they're equal except Gleba which is a total mess of contradictory progression and bad design, and it only becomes "okay" once you completely finish with it. Just change a few of the things about it and it'd be quite good. People say there's no real "point" to it but it does have one thing the other planets don't: it's potentially infinite and with no need for expansion. On other planets you will eventually run out of scrap or calcite, but as far as I know my Gleba base could last forever (except potentially for enemy behavior, the enemy behavior being one of the worst parts about it).

To be fair the main reason to go to the planets is science anyway, everything else seems optional as I havent found a need on Volcanus to do anything else. I hope that changes as I explore the other planets, its my first run and I dont even know what happens beyond the 3 dlc planets, working on the assumption the base game was just to launch a rocket and it ends there, so assuming you complete these 3 planets and then leave the solar system ending the game there. Would be cool if I'm wrong though and looking forward to finding out if there any hidden suprises in store other than researching until everything is complete

[Nico]

Hmmm ... I thought that Nauvis was the first planet, os how come Nauvis is not part of the first 3 planets?

[BossmanSlim]

It depends on what you from the planets:

Support of Navuis and progressing the game: Vulcanus > Fulgora > Gleba
Interesting to play by changing up gameplay: Gleba > Fulgora > Vulcanus

[sweet lemonade]

Originally posted by Nico:

Hmmm ... I thought that Nauvis was the first planet, os how come Nauvis is not part of the first 3 planets?

I guess "first three planets you can travel to from Nauvis" or "first three new Space Age planets" would be more appropriate. Oh well.

[sweet lemonade]

Originally posted by BossmanSlim:

It depends on what you from the planets:

Support of Navuis and progressing the game: Vulcanus > Fulgora > Gleba
Interesting to play by changing up gameplay: Gleba > Fulgora > Vulcanus

Vulcanus has ridiculously good rewards almost to the point of being unbalanced, with the two buildings essentially doubling or more every metal resource.
But from my point of view, the buffs the planets provide don't really matter. It's a single player logistics puzzle sandbox game. If I wanted +50% production on all my iron I could just cheat in another mine and smelting stack with no consequences. The reward serves as bait to get you involved with the mechanics and enjoying the game.

[Hurkyl]

Originally posted by sweet lemonade:

Originally posted by BossmanSlim:

It depends on what you from the planets:

Support of Navuis and progressing the game: Vulcanus > Fulgora > Gleba
Interesting to play by changing up gameplay: Gleba > Fulgora > Vulcanus

Vulcanus has ridiculously good rewards almost to the point of being unbalanced, with the two buildings essentially doubling or more every metal resource.
But from my point of view, the buffs the planets provide don't really matter. It's a single player logistics puzzle sandbox game. If I wanted +50% production on all my iron I could just cheat in another mine and smelting stack with no consequences. The reward serves as bait to get you involved with the mechanics and enjoying the game.

Identifying the tools to make your factory more productive, working towards accessing those tools, and setting up the infrastructure needed to use them, and then designs applying those tools to maximum effect... that is single player logistics puzzle.

(even if you prefer to cheat through that aspect of the puzzle while enjoying other aspects or prefer designs not using the new tools)

For example, using the foundries requires you to:

• Space travel to Vulcanis
  
• Set up Vulcanis-specific production chains
  
• Build a Foundry making factory
  
• Clear the Vulcanis obstacles to actually using the factory
  
• Set up the interplanetary logistics to ship Foundries to Nauvis and other planets
  
• Actually use Foundries in Nauvis (and other) production chains
  
• Remember you need calcite and set up a harvesting and shipping chain for that too

[Nonotorious]

Well you can get calcite from asteroids once you get advanced asteroid processing but that locked behind gleba.
Personally i would rank them as:
Nauvis = novice
Vulcanus = beginner
Fulgora/Gleba = intermediate

It's very easy to make a rocket on fulgora and recyclers and electromag machines are great but unlocking calcite and copper from asteroids is also extremely handy.

[Freeman]

Originally posted by Hurkyl:

Originally posted by sweet lemonade:

Vulcanus has ridiculously good rewards almost to the point of being unbalanced, with the two buildings essentially doubling or more every metal resource.
But from my point of view, the buffs the planets provide don't really matter. It's a single player logistics puzzle sandbox game. If I wanted +50% production on all my iron I could just cheat in another mine and smelting stack with no consequences. The reward serves as bait to get you involved with the mechanics and enjoying the game.

Identifying the tools to make your factory more productive, working towards accessing those tools, and setting up the infrastructure needed to use them, and then designs applying those tools to maximum effect... that is single player logistics puzzle.

(even if you prefer to cheat through that aspect of the puzzle while enjoying other aspects or prefer designs not using the new tools)

For example, using the foundries requires you to:

• Space travel to Vulcanis
  
• Set up Vulcanis-specific production chains
  
• Build a Foundry making factory
  
• Clear the Vulcanis obstacles to actually using the factory
  
• Set up the interplanetary logistics to ship Foundries to Nauvis and other planets
  
• Actually use Foundries in Nauvis (and other) production chains
  
• Remember you need calcite and set up a harvesting and shipping chain for that too

To be fair though, aside from needing a Foundry to produce Vulcanis science, the rest of what you listed is entirely optional. In a way its a shame they dont have more of an integral use on other planets, but by the time most people leave Nauvis they have a perfectly fine infrastructure running and there is no need to do all that as everything is already set up and running. I guess that's more for people who like to max optimise everything, which admittedly will make up a large number of people that play the game

[MangoMan]

Gleba > Vulcanus > Fulgora

Gleba is complex and interesting and is like a new Nauvis

Vulcanus is a bit easy and simplified and so a little boring but not completely boring. it has _some_ of the complexity of Nauvis or Gleba but not all.

Fulgora... I don't have anything good to say about Fulgora. Fulgora is EXTREMELY boring to the point of feeling unfinished. There are no enemies and basically infinite resources including infinite power. There is no reason to explore since there is 10s of millions of scrap right from the start and you are overflowing with blue circuits and low density right from the get-go without even trying. Building a rocket is incredibly easy so you are never stranded there. The only sort-of challenge is how to deal with the overflowing resources, but other than that there is almost no effort required there. Even the recipes are boring, doing nothing interesting except leading from one thing to the next. Make A so you can make B so you can make C so you can make D so you can make E so you can make science packs, the end.

IMO Fulgora is just unfinished as it currently is. There is so little going on there in comparison to the other places; it's actually a shame. I'm not sure how to fix it but some changes could be: have more than one kind of scrap; have less concentrated piles of scrap; have recipes that you have to learn that progress your ability to pull things from scrap. And there definitely needs to be some kind of enemy threat. Tesla weapons should be a huge help to fend of whatever danger is on the planet. I think the lack of enemies is a definite sign that they did not finish this planet.