Pumping station

[Dirmagnos]

From what ive seen on forum there have been plenty of those idea around, so il give it a shot as well.

3x3 box, 13 indicators, 12 intakes/outtakes for pipes(3 on each side).

12 indicators are shape of a triangle and show direction of the flow(pointing towards outtake means liquid goes out, and vice versa), with color for medium(like blue for water). Each indicator is located directly adjacent to outlet it monitors. 13th indicator in the center shows status of station, eg green means that everything is ok, yellow shows that there are so issues(like one of the pipes goes nowhere) and red means something bad has happened(like internal tank is full and liquid has nowhere to go). Alternatively it could be just 8 connections in total, would probably be easier, but serve same purpose.

Selecting construction shows player new menu, where he can change flow direction for each outlet(because right now if i try to make multi-pipe connection, then its a mess, with 3-4 pipes connected nothing moves anywhere for no good reason, with max pressure prior to intersection and no pressure past it, forcing to make a maze of pipes with million intersection, even tho they all may move same liquid, often even in same direction), amount that is allowed to pass and sort out liquids as well for each pipe, if preference is selected(instead of placing bunch of liquid filters for every possible scenario).

480W, 5000l capacity(so it can store certain amount of liquid without expelling it, but if its full, then nothing goes nowhere until tank is emptied of it content).

Essentially whole setup is like combo of regular liquid pump, liquid valve and liquid filter for multiple connections.

Same could be done for gasses and even transformer would be nice addition, operating on similar principles(round indicator means free flow in both directions, triangular only in one, and square no movement, with indicator either brightness or color change showing how close it is to it max capacity).

[sadovsf]

Actually you can manage this already by using for example bridges on connections. They are prefered place for liquid / gas to go and routing seems to be done in a way everything in pipes is each game tick trying to move to some input so you can use this to direct liquids even in cases where you need to rejoin some loop in which you store reserves etc... Plus you can do stuff like mechanical filters and much more

Check out this for example:

Or this which is more related to what you request:

 

[Dirmagnos]

6 hours ago, sadovsf said:

Actually you can manage this already by using for example bridges on connections. They are prefered place for liquid / gas to go and routing seems to be done in a way everything in pipes is each game tick trying to move to some input so you can use this to direct liquids even in cases where you need to rejoin some loop in which you store reserves etc... Plus you can do stuff like mechanical filters and much more

Interesting, but id prefer not to use exploits(there are 2 many already), like game mechanic that 'magically' prioritize bridges as far as flow goes. Granted, pressure mechanic in the game is rather iffy, but it doesnt mean that i should abuse the **** out of it.

[sadovsf]

Actually i would not call this a exploit. It is simply a way how pipes are working. And it will probably not change because you always want to provide supply to building before you will proceed with flow otherwise you wold end up with having to first fill whole pipe system before providing something to someone

[BlueLance]

27 minutes ago, Dirmagnos said:

Interesting, but id prefer not to use exploits(there are 2 many already), like game mechanic that 'magically' prioritize bridges as far as flow goes. Granted, pressure mechanic in the game is rather iffy, but it doesnt mean that i should abuse the **** out of it.

The first one using a mechanical filter to me is an exploit but it is very grey zoned, the second one on the other hand is not, Bridges as well as buildings and valves were intended to be priority for fluids and gasses, If this was not intended then you would use the bridge as the overflow instead.

But as said buildings take priority and you can see this if you have multiple devices in a line, the first will take the fluids until it is full, e.g filter or generator, and once its reserve is filled the next device will get the packets.

But for your system it can also be achieved either by natural seperation of fluids, or filters, or mechanical filters, and automation (In conjunction with either kind of filters)

The only problem with what you are after that I am aware is that it seems the coding in the game only allows for one input and 1 output of liquids and gas. Unless the devs change this it seems there will only be at most 1 input for liquids, and 1 input for gasses. and 1 output for liquids and 1 output for gasses. This was mentioned in a threads a couple of months ago by someone who knows the coding pretty well for the game IIRC 

[Dirmagnos]

Kinda yeah, on one hand game is heavily trying to emulate real life physics(well, compared to most other games). On the other, game engine is not particularly well suited to deal with those challenges. Like same liquids, that acts more like a jello, with water having viscosity far higher of what it should. Or the fact that connecting multiple pipes drives game nuts. Or water having pretty much unlimited energy absorption values, allowing to keep constructions like polymer press to run 24/7 if slightly submerged(just add a few drops and all that excessive heat energy disappears into the void).