What's the point of T3 Mass Fabricators? T2 clearly better.

[Goldy3]

T3 Power gives +2500 Power, T3 Mass Fabs takes away -3500 Power. With this in mind you'd need at least 2 T3 Power for every 1 T3 Mass Fab.

2 (T3 Power) x 2500 (Power Gained) = 5000

5000 (Power Gained) - 3500 (Power Lost) = 1500 (Power Adjacency will make this number higher)

Total Gains for investment towards more mass: +12 Mass (T3 Mass Fabx1) + 1500 Power (T3 Powerx2)
Total Gains for surrounding T3 Mass Fab with Mass Storage: +18 Mass (T3 Mass Fabx1) -3500 (T3 Mass Fabx1)


However, when surrounding a T3 Power with T2 Mass Fabs.

Adjacency bonus: T2 Fabs + T3 Power = 121 Power Lost

Can fit 4 T2 Mass Fabs on 4 sides of T3 Power > 4x4 = 16

16 x 121 = 1936 (Power Lost)

2500 (T3 Power) - 1936 = 564 (Power Gained)

Total Gains for investment towards more mass: +16 (T2 Mass Fabx16) + 564 (T3 Powerx1)
Only 67% Less power than T3 Powerx2 with T3 Mass Fabx1
Only 2 less than T3 Mass Fab with Mass storage surround
Faster to build than building 2 T3 Power and a T3 Mass Fab
Costs 1600 Mass and 64000 Power (saving 1400 mass and 1000 Power than building a T3 Mass Fab) to surround(x16 T2 Mass Fab)a T3 Power with T2 Mass Fab.

and I'm sure there is more benefits..


So what's the benefit to making T3 Mass Fabs? Over T2 Mass Fabs?

[Aulex]

unit cap, more health

[errorblankfield]

There really aren't any benefits (really unit cap Aulex?).

If people know what they are doing, they build T2s.

Now if the mass extractor was a 2x2, then I could see it being worthwhile. I think some tweaking would still need to be done, but that means the power cost goes down (double adjacency) and you can toss 4 mass storage (with 1 overlapping) for a 25% bonus.

Not going to whip up numbers to prove this or anything. Everyone knows it sucks. It's just really hard to balance right (which is code for we aren't changing it cause reasons). (Though in all honesty, if we could just make them at least equal to the T2, that would be a start. Or heck, make them T2 clones, but non-volatile so the choice is cheap and risky, or expensive but stable.)

[FunkOff]

Also with adjacency you can reduce the power usage on T3 fabricators down as much as 75%. It would probably be wisest to compare 4 T3 pgens + 5 T3 fabs for this purpose. In that adjacency configuration, one fab gets -75% power use and the others get -37.5% power use, so the total is 9625 power used with 10000 power gained, thus that configuration nets you +375 power and +80 mass, which is quite significant. Total mass cost = 27960

Compare that with 80 T2 mass fabs, for which adjacency to more than 1 T3 pgen is difficult. 80 * 100 = 8000 mass cost, which with adjacency to 1 T3 pgen for each T3 mass fab, required 9750 power, so 4 T3 pgens + 80 T2 mass fabs will cost 21680 to produce +80 mass and + 250 power.

Well shit... even in that case T2 fabs are better.

I guess it comes down to simplicity + ease of construction.

[errorblankfield]

Well shit... even in that case T2 fabs are better.

I guess it comes down to simplicity + ease of construction.

LQTM

[Aulex]

There really aren't any benefits (really unit cap Aulex?).

If people know what they are doing, they build T2s.

Now if the mass extractor was a 2x2, then I could see it being worthwhile. I think some tweaking would still need to be done, but that means the power cost goes down (double adjacency) and you can toss 4 mass storage (with 1 overlapping) for a 25% bonus.

Not going to whip up numbers to prove this or anything. Everyone knows it sucks. It's just really hard to balance right (which is code for we aren't changing it cause reasons). (Though in all honesty, if we could just make them at least equal to the T2, that would be a start. Or heck, make them T2 clones, but non-volatile so the choice is cheap and risky, or expensive but stable.)

imagine setons where unit cap is an issue, i'm not saying t3 mass fab is good i'm just saying that is one of its benefits, compare 10 vs 120, big difference

[errorblankfield]

In a very (very, very, very,....) rare case, maybe.

But if I'm about to cap out, I look at a million other things first. Namely engies (which I stopped using in mass at engy mod) and old units.

But yea... it's technically an upside. A tiny one, but .

[Sulo]

I've already checked all possible versions of adjacency on both T2 and T3 fabricators and T2 are clearly more efficient.

They have couple drawbacks however:
- T3 have lot more HP
- T3 Mass Fab grid with mass storages wont blow as hard as T2 one
- less micro to turn it off and on if you dont have any mods
- you need less buildpower to build T2 grid of the same efficiency as T3 but it takes more space and thus if its big enough engies will get stuck in it while building, also they have to move from one fab to another all the time, with T3 they just build it without pauses effectily meaning T3 grids can be built faster and will take up less space (so also less shields, AA, SMDs, TMDs...)

and mentioned before unit cap and most of all - LAG.


If you only need small boost to your mass production then get T2s but if you want big farms you will want to go for T3, also if you build RAS sACUs at the same time it will take care of power requirements of those T3 fabs without building T3 PGens, and lets be honest, you WILL have leftover power from your sACU spam in late game...

[errorblankfield]

Buildings add to lag?

That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Their affects should be marginal. The game doesn't need to know a lot about such buildings (compared to a unit or a factory). I suppose some pulse/move in circles but still... marginal stuff.

[E8400-CV]

Paragon:
1 building, 5000 health, no adjacency needed
costs 250,200 mass, 7,506,000 energy

Yields 10,000 mass / second, 1,000,000 energy.



On Setons with 13 T3 mexes each and RAS, that's not even 2:45 to build it if you kill all other production and have the power.