Should I tear down my starter factory?

[Falesz]

Hey all,
I'm not very experienced with the game, I played a bit a couple of months ago and just fired up the game again for 1.0. I haven't gone anywhere deep into the story or progression yet.
I'm also coming over to play this game with a heavy Factorio mindset, so I find getting used to the limitations of the extremely simplistic logistics a bit difficult for now.

I'm sitting on the beginning of Project Assembly Phase 2, a point in the game where my horribly inefficient starter base appears to start becoming impossible to scale up effectively due to the poor choices in layout and logistics design. However I feel like I have all the necessary, fundamental unlocks to build an actual, well planned out (for a complete beginner, at least) factory that processes all the iron and copper ore from the starter ore patches in a more efficient and scalable manner.

It's just that it feels like a huge leap into a world of slow, slow progress and tons of hassle during which time my factory produces nothing and no progress is made towards new unlocks. I just kinda don't want to do it.

I haven't looked up any beginners' guides or stuff like that to avoid spoilers and to generally get to experience the game for myself, but I feel like I could use some help on this decision.
Should I just tear down my entire starter factory and rebuild it from scratch with all the new unlocks helping me with planning and efficiency? Is this something that is expected of the player? Is this something that people do? If not, what other options are there to keep expanding and scaling up past Tiers 1 and 2?

[Tagger]

I never really do this, when I start up a new game.

I always kinda want to, but I hardly ever do it - at least not until way later. I tend to just start up next to it, making sure I have plenty room to expand (to all sides and upwards) and then slowly "phase out the old factory". Then when it's not really used anymore; I start removing it - or simply just cut it out of the loop.

You do you.
There is nothing wrong in any approach you take.
The main "fun factor" in this game, is kinda making your own problems and sorting them out as you see fit :)

[MainMan02]

Believe me, there is a lot to be gained by just keep building and learning. You will find that as you progress, a lot of things are inter-related. When I first started, I was told to keep going and learn before I restart. In 8.0 I went up to the last Tier and my builds looked a mess, but I learned a lot. There is no rush.

[Falesz]

Originally posted by MainMan02:

Believe me, there is a lot to be gained by just keep building and learning. You will find that as you progress, a lot of things are inter-related. When I first started, I was told to keep going and learn before I restart. In 8.0 I went up to the last Tier and my builds looked a mess, but I learned a lot. There is no rush.

Thats pretty hard to do when my reinforced plates arent made at some rate of reinforced plate / minute, but rather minute / reinforced plate :/
Sometimes I go exploring for what feels like a considerable amount of time or play on the computer in the main hub and by the time I get back there is like 30 reinforced plates stored. But there is just no room to scale up the production without turning the whole place into a literally untraversable mess of spagetthi.

But thanks for the answers :) I guess I'll just try to keep going with this a little bit longer and start building elsewhere and try to slowly transition.

[Gorby]

I usually wait until I get coal power up and running, i.e. at least 8 coal plants, and then start building a new/better base and tear down the starter base as soon as the new one is ready.

Go exploring for a couple hours before you start on that new base, that will build up your supply of reinforced plates and other hard-to-come-by early game items.

[JimmyTheSaint™]

I usually remove my starter base and refine it a couple times before completely removing it later when I get around to building a very large factory.

Once you can scale up concrete with a couple limestone nodes I like to place roughly 12x12 foundations as a place to start scaling up and fine tuning the early production nodes. I like to have all my raw ores/ingots coming in one side of the factory and all finished goods on the opposite side. Then use conveyer lifts to move production vertically from the most basic components to gradually more complex per vertical floor. This still gives the "starter" factory a small footprint, scalability and can keep things more tidy without all the spaghetti everywhere since most conveyer belts run from one side to the opposite without many turns.

[Urtho Rashkae]

your first base is gonna be all spaghetti on dirt, dont worry. as soon as you get foundations you will build a new setup.
when you get faster belts you might rebuild or just upgrade and add more spaghet. eventually you will tire of the spaghett and build your final build, but we all know youll rebuild another 3 times before you give up and start over.

thats when you build spaghetti on dirt, then foundation rebuild. but this time it will be pre-built to accept upgrades. but, you will still rebuild 2 more times before you either settle in for the big build, or restart again.

rebuilds and restarts are common, just dont lose your notes on maths.

[Mush]

once you have MK 3 belts, there is a lot to be gained by cleaning up the starter mess and improving your throughput.
you will soon need a LOT more of everything and having a clean, orderly factory really helps you make that jump if you do it right.

just make sure to stock up on everything so that you can rebuild without missing materials.

[Icchan^]

It's part of the game i think. I've torn down quite large systems because I've realized that they're not expandable, are not efficient enough or are not well positioned etc...

You learn by doing that.

[Dark Admiral]

Same as Gorby, once I get a decent Coal Generator setup running, I start rebuilding everything slowly but with a better approach. One thing I still haven't learned after almost 600 hours, is that you ALWAYS need more room, so build consequently and leave tons of room around each factory for expansion.

[Ccrack]

once you get steel, unlock the blueprint builder and make some modular pieces

find a nice open space or build a platform and stick down your modular stuff and reroute all the resources to it then tear down the old stuff

thats how i go about it atleast

[filipeg165]

I love that this game let's you do it however you want, and there is no "right way" to play. This gives us the freedom I like in games like this to build, demolish, rebuild and improve.

After you've tried improving your starter base a few times, I recommend looking for guides on Youtube to see how you can make them even better, or how well you did by yourself. After I looked up some guides, I followed one step by step, now for 1.0 I managed to progress MUCH further by myself with a MUCH nicer looking factory.

[Sinister]

100% up to you, I tend to leave my starting area then build new factories elsewhere. Though I usually do tear down my very first starting area and put down foundations and such.

[Anaztazioch]

Dont (softly)
Because every time you resarch alternate recepit, your setup is inefficient and your prone to rebuilt.
Every time you reach a new miner mk. your mining output grows to such incredible proportions you want to rebuild. Than remember you need phase 5 for mk6 belt for phase 4 mk3 overclocked miner. Another need to rebuild.

[Tregon]

Depends on you. I tend to rebuild good part of factory once I have blueprints to start using blueprint based manifolds that are easily expanded.

And clean up some mess from early factories. But that depends on how much you actually have things in your factory. Eventually it will be too big job to rebuild from scratch.