About radbolt infinite loop modification

[SamLogan]

Hello,

Next patch, now in the beta branch, will change the radbot infinite loop. To recall, we're talking about this :

Author : https://forums.kleientertainment.com/forums/topic/127994-infinite-radbolts/

 

Now, when two radbolts meets, you obtain some nuclear waste :

Rads disapear really quickly.

 

Klei modify this because they think it's overpowered, but it's not my though as I use this system during thousand cycles. For me why it's not overpowered :

- It cost a lot of energy (1920 Watts for this example)

- It produce a lot of heat, espacially in vacuum. 5K DTU/sec seems to be low, but overtime it's a lot of heat. I've obtain magma by melting my generator.

- I use it mainly to refull my radbolt rocket, and in this use, I agree it's too much powerfull.

- About plants mutations, when you see the Cyclotron Crop Mutator, it can appear overpowered, but it gives interests to this system that really need some. Mutation is a fun concept, but in game, it's too long and hard to setup for the gain. I much prefer add some plants instead of wait hundred of cycle to have the good crops.

The problem is we have only 3 main source of radioactivity : shine bug, wheezewort and light on the surface. We have also secondary source as satellite (one) and uranium biome but it's not enough to be reliable. About the research reactor, it's too hard to setup to do it just to have radioactivity source.

 

My proposition :

- Radbolt generator cost 1200 Watts. As well make full for the rocket will cost more than produce LOX/LH.

- Generate 12 000 DTU / sec.

- Radbolt explosion generate less radiations and produce a lot of nuclear waste.

 

As food preservation and vacuum, if you keep this modification, personnaly I will come back to my shine bug ranch that cost nothing :

 

[sakura_sk]

3 hours ago, SamLogan said:

My proposition :

- Radbolt generator cost 1200 Watts.

You will have to consider early game a little bit for that proposition... If powering a radbolt generator is above 1000w, that means no research until refining enough metals to make a grid and having enough coal to run 2 coal generators non stop. 

I think the radbolt collider (radbolts colliding) was nerfed mainly because of farming (mutations) and radbolt engine. I don't know yet if it actually needed that nerf (I only built that in sandbox while testing other things) but it is too early to say for sure if I would want it back or changed.

[babba]

This version sounds very classy, did they upgrade it

A former neighbour of mine always used to run around yelling "Cretin, cretin !" at everyone, I really miss him.

[Electroely]

5 hours ago, SamLogan said:

Klei modify this because they think it's overpowered, but it's not my though as I use this system during thousand cycles.

I don't think "overpowered" is the issue... I think it's just that it allowed you to forego radiation sources entirely, so you didn't need to interact with other parts of radiation. Also, the 1980W wasn't a consistent consumption - if you had the generators normally sitting in 0rads/cycle you could have a more power efficient radbolt source than regular wheezewort or shine bug setups since you would only power them when you need radbolts rather than all the time to build up/avoid losing them.

5 hours ago, SamLogan said:

My proposition :

- Radbolt generator cost 1200 Watts. As well make full for the rocket will cost more than produce LOX/LH.

- Generate 12 000 DTU / sec.

- Radbolt explosion generate less radiations and produce a lot of nuclear waste.

I don't see why radbolt producers need to be nerfed so severely. 1.2kW would be awful for a machine that needs to be constantly powered. I think they're fine as-is - we just need more ways to supply ambient radiation (especially to plants) and more radbolt consumers.

[sakura_sk]

47 minutes ago, Electroely said:

I think it's just that it allowed you to forego radiation sources entirely, so you didn't need to interact with other parts of radiation.

Or... they changed radbolt collision because they cleared the limiter of 50 in radbolt generators. You can shoot radbolts of 500 now  

Hmmm... Does that change germ generation I wonder... No it doesn't.... Just the usual 500 germs that degrade. Pity 

[SamLogan]

1 hour ago, sakura_sk said:

You will have to consider early game a little bit for that proposition... If powering a radbolt generator is above 1000w, that means no research until refining enough metals to make a grid and having enough coal to run 2 coal generators non stop.

No needs radbolts infinite loop for atomic research, only 2 wheezeworts are enough.

1 hour ago, babba said:

This version sounds very classy, did they upgrade it

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=928348692

Play in French and your life will change. :P

By the way, thanks to Kelda which doing a huge work with the translation.

[sakura_sk]

3 minutes ago, SamLogan said:

No needs radbolts infinite loop for atomic research, only 2 wheezeworts are enough.

No, I mean powering only one generator to do research. If as you suggested a radbolt generator consumed 1200w you would need refined metals and 2 constantly working coal generators (or other way to provide constant 1200w early game anyway)

[SamLogan]

Ok I see. ^^

[Tiru]

I used this method constantly for my radbolt rockets and loved it despite knowing it was probably an exploit (it's beta, so having fun with exploits is part of the game). I'd put a dozen generators directly on heavy watt wire and automation to wait to launch all at the same time and once they hit 50 radbolts they would go infinite after one launch and fill up as many rockets as I had lined up. It would drop to 1 FPS with all the radbolts flying around and if you left them running they'd all melt and explode but it worked!

I'm fine with this going away but think that they need to put a radbolt battery into the game instead as well as a better way to transport radbolts. 4800 radbolts to fill the rocket isn't really a realistic option w/o using an infinite radbolt system. I tried gathering shine bugs in one room but they all died off for some reason and the wrecked ship isn't in the classic start asteroids. That leaves just the research reactor for high output radiation. They need to have something that can store the radbolts or if the intention is to use the research reactor then provide a better way of getting the radbolts to the rocket since placing a reactor a few tiles next to each radbolt engine isn't really practical given the dropoff.

I'd also like to see the radbolt generators not create heat. If you're trying to power a payload launcher or a radbolt engine you'll have the generators in vacuum and without the infinite radbolts they would have to stay on and they melt pretty fast. I make them out of obsidian but I'm still rebuilding them after every few uses. I don't want another setup like the regolith farming C-miners of the base game that needed that drop of liquid and piping to cool everything down. I'd rather those CPU cycles go to something else than a space cooling loop. Again though, if the reactor could store radiation and dupes could transport it up to the rocket or the atomic collider then issue solved. Something like the gas bottler system.

[ghkbrew]

I doubt anyone is surprised to learn, I don't like the radbolt collider nerf.  I think it had enough downsides (power requirement, complexity) to not be too overpowered.

My main complaint is just that we're left with one less crazy contraption to build, in a game whose whole point (for me at least) is building crazy contraptions.

It's not like there aren't other sources of infinite radiation (namely nuclear waste, and shine bugs).  But frankly those other options, are just tedious and generally less fun to setup.

[KonfigSys]

I do not think that the radbolt collider needed the nerf. I tested it, I did not like the amount of energy it consumes even with the pauses. 

tested for atomic research:

2 wheezeworts for atomic research, it worked great;

space radiation without any other sources of r/a, it worked well 

 

tested for mutation:

the crashed satellite is great with shinebugs and/or wheezeworts

nuclear reactor is fine for massive mutant seed production

 

tested to run mutated farm:

shinebug farms were ok and a better choice than the collider

 

so it was a matter of taste rather than a straight forward OP.

 

[Sasza22]

Well the new slider allowing to wait until 500 radbolt units are stored helps a lot in transporting them. Before you had a 50 tile range now you can travel 10 times the distance. This means you can deliver reasonable amount of radbolts from the bottom of your base to space when needed. Main reason for infinite loops was the inability to transport the radbolts.

On 5/21/2021 at 9:12 PM, Tiru said:

4800 radbolts to fill the rocket isn't really a realistic option w/o using an infinite radbolt system. I tried gathering shine bugs in one room but they all died off for some reason and the wrecked ship isn't in the classic start asteroids. That leaves just the research reactor for high output radiation.

I feel like it was the original intention to use the reactor to power the engine.

[gabberworld]

if talk about research then there is some sort weird issue about rockets and collecting the research points, you not lose rocket fuel if you not travel far away from base. this is first time when i actually try rockets in dlc

[Parusoid]

On 5/21/2021 at 11:52 AM, SamLogan said:

will change the radbot infinite loop

source that it will change?

[sakura_sk]

2 hours ago, Parusoid said:

source that it will change?

Latest testing branch update 464793 changes and improvements part: "Radbolt tuning changes to prevent obvious feedback loops. Some radiation is emitted in the form of fallout on impacts."

Also, the fact that radbolt collision doesn't work in testing branch anymore (making an infinite reactor) 

[n_t_p]

obvious exploit gets obvious patch

Just play in debug mode. It's right there

[NewWorldDan]

On 5/21/2021 at 2:12 PM, Tiru said:

4800 radbolts to fill the rocket isn't really a realistic option w/o using an infinite radbolt system.

Build a rocket chimney.  Use radiant piping to condense the fallout gasses along one side of it so all the radioactive contaminants condense into nuclear waste that lands on top of a radbolt generator.  Pump the surplus waste to space (leave about 600kg in the tile) or use it as a radiation source for plants.  The radbolt generator will generate thousands of bolts over the course of a couple of cycles while the radioactive contaminants decay.  480w and it's a self replenishing system.  Especially since the generators can store an apparently infinite number of bolts (mine was over 35000 before I accidently froze my waste and then melted the damn thing).  I'll take a screenshot later when I'm at home.

[NewWorldDan]

Here it is - 9518 radbolts per cycle.  Boom.  Decays by 50% per cycle.  Radiant pipes along the top and side.  Really just need them along the one side.

 

[Swoop5994]

the same patch that removed the obvious infinite loop is great of course in the same patch they added the nuclear fallout and the heat generation if im not mistaken I do hope they dont nerf it anymore since the diamond press need 500 for 10kilos and the rocket need alot too. Having heat is just a really nice side effect to build something with it since without heat it's just pretty useless for power gen or melting some high temp stuff...

we'l see