I know that space science is unchanged on purpose, since it already has it's own base-game complications, however I feel like as an optional hard mode, it should perhaps be made to work as a hybrid of how it does now, combined with how it worked before Space Age.

The reason for this is because I feel like Space Science is actually way too easy now. Setting up a platform isn't particularly hard, and once you do it, you essentially get free space science in perpetuity forever, which I feel is too strong. Yellow and Purple science are WAY harder to actually produce, despite them being far more limited in terms of progression.

Space Platforms should instead create Inactivate Space Science Packs, which can be Activated in an assembling machine by combining them with satellite data from rocket launches.

This way, space science would have it's own complication by requiring a constant stream of rockets, which was an interesting idea in Vanilla that was abandoned for Space Age.

Since Rockets are quite a bit cheaper in Space Age, this should naturally balance against it's earlier-game availability, especially if the amount of satellite data is adjusted to reduce the total rocket launch requirements.

Yeah, with the whole setting overhaul I did a little bit ago, i could see myself optionally increasing the complexity of space science,

Now your idea has already been done by another mod, https://mods.factorio.com/mod/RocketScience which does something similar to what you say so if you specifically want the experience you asked for, well you're in luck because it already exists, (even for 2.1 btw)

Now that does mean I won't be adding difficulty exacly this way (I don't see much of a use in making somewhat complex changes that have already been made by other mods)

But I do have a somewhat simple way to have a rocket launch based space science recipe be harder by forcing more complex logistic,
and that's by making the rocket payload that generates data require some space items, that way you have to manage making an item on Nauvis that needs space material and you have to make consistent rockets to launch it.

At least that way, your space science platform might have a bit more of an interesting design, both having to send down materials and science and recieve/process space data.

I'll try to implement that idea soon-ish, so if you have any counter-ideas on how to make space science platforms design more interesting by changing how space science is made, don't hesitate to share them.

That sounds really good! I guess I just missed the "send stuff to space and get results" thing from pre-Space Age Factorio, but your idea is even better.

That Rocket Science mod seems really janky, unfortunately, especially since AFAIK 1.2 added proper support for non-DLC styled space rockets in Space Age alongside space platforms, and yet the Rocket Science uses weird janky space-platform requests to work.

I really love Challenging Pack Logistics, and it's cool to hear that you have ideas/plans for making space science more interesting.

Just to throw it out there, a couple of mods have re-added the uranium as an ingredient in the space science pack recipe that was originally planned (https://factorio.com/blog/post/fff-381):

https://mods.factorio.com/mod/SpaceScienceNeedUranium
https://mods.factorio.com/mod/radioactive-space-science

I can understand why the devs changed the recipe. But changing back would tie space science to Nauvis, and force constant rocket launches, which I think is a nice solution.

I'll try and release a mod version with the changes to make space science harder tomorrow (it'll be a setting off by default as unlike the changes to the other packs, this one makes space science substantially more expensive with the added rocket and data cost so it's not just a logistical challenge).

For now I have still have to tinker with the balancing, spritework, locale and the whole muluna compat situation to make sure everything is in order.

For the general numbers, I think i'm going to go with:
1 new item, the Asteroid Data Analyser made with 1 carbonic asteroid, 2 ice, 1 barrel and 1 advanced circuit to make 2 A.D.A. (some kind of very basic satellite)
and change the recipe of the space science pack to have it use 5 iron plates, 2 carbon, 2 ice, and 1 A.D.A. to make 10 packs (somewhat more expensive + the A.D.A. and rocket cost)
by default, you'll be able to launch 100 A.D.A. per rockets, (equivalent to 1K of space science packs without any productivity)

All of these changes make space science quite a bit more expensive, and force you to make better space platforms that can route the basic space ressources back to their planet and collect more asteroids (especially carbonic asteroids), so again, it encourages more complex and somewhat more unique space platform designs while also on the planet :
requiring you to keep producing rockets to send back the A.D.A.s
and be able to handle items from space to make the A.D.A.s in the first place (the A.D.A.s cannot be crafted in space for obvious reasons)

If y'all have any balancing arguments to make, go ahead, without having tested any of these potential changes, I'm ready to tweak the numbers

Now to talk about the whole uranium in space science packs thingy ...
firstly, I'm not a fan of the general concept, I don't feel like space science packs should be effectively locked to the nauvisian orbit and i don't really see what uranium would have to do with space science (except for like ... the kovarex research ?)
and secondly, as I said before "I don't see much of a use in making somewhat complex changes that have already been made by other mods"
So yeah, if you want uranium in your space sciences, you've got mods that do it already, so there is no use in me making my mod do the same.

Now it's not to criticise the whole idea of using uranium in space science, it's true that it forces you to play with uranium (uranium currently isn't an ingredient in any science) and it does make you have to launch rockets consistently, I just don't feel like what this change brings outweights what it takes away.

The reason for this is because I feel like Space Science is actually way too easy now. Setting up a platform isn't particularly hard, and once you do it, you essentially get free space science in perpetuity forever, which I feel is too strong. Yellow and Purple science are WAY harder to actually produce, despite them being far more limited in terms of progression.

Space Platforms should instead create Inactivate Space Science Packs, which can be Activated in an assembling machine by combining them with satellite data from rocket launches.

This way, space science would have it's own complication by requiring a constant stream of rockets, which was an interesting idea in Vanilla that was abandoned for Space Age.

Since Rockets are quite a bit cheaper in Space Age, this should naturally balance against it's earlier-game availability, especially if the amount of satellite data is adjusted to reduce the total rocket launch requirements.

@Sarge945
Otherwise, for you there's also this mod which does almost exactly that. By adding the satellite back as an ingredient for the science pack, requiring you to launch rockets in space.
And it offers multiple customization options ;)
https://mods.factorio.com/mod/BetterSpaceScience

@valent125, it's an really interesting idea to send ingredients down to the planet and then send them back up to space after they've been processed.
With the many “uranium 238” mods, “rocketscience” by S6X, this idea of your mod, and mine, I think the options available to players who want to spice up the space science pack are pretty well complete : )
Great job !

Yeah, I'm happy the balancing of science packs has had so much mods made around it (since science production is kinda the most important goal of the game)
And i'm sure we haven't seen the end of it

Writing this, I realise that I haven't checked the compatibility of my changes with any of what your space science altering mod brings to the game, so uhh, I might try and make a fix for that,

Considering I talk about your mods in this mod's mod portal page, it'd be especially bad if there were now direct incompatibilities ...

I think it should be fine. Or am I missing something ?

My science overhaul is in three seperate mods, so if someone prefer your version of space science pack, they can just play without this specific part of the overhaul.

You add this in the form of a setting right ?
So if someone prefer my version but also want the rest of your mod they can just uncheck this setting.

That's for compat between our two mods. For others I let you see ;)

You add this in the form of a setting right ?
So if someone prefer my version but also want the rest of your mod they can just uncheck this setting.

well yeah, by turning of the setting, both mods can work well together
but by turning it on, the game will launch, but with stange recipes, and one of our intermediate items won't do anything

So I have two options:

Be lasy and just remove the option when https://mods.factorio.com/mod/BetterSpaceScience is installed.

or

Leave the option and make it integrate my intermediate product into your satellite so instead of making the player choose between a complex satellite (with your mod) and a simple space material based satellite (without it)

The player can play around with options to either have,
- a complex satellite (with your mod and my option turned off)
- a simple space material based satellite (without your mod and with my option turned on)
- a complex space based material satellite (with both your mod, and my option turned on)

That way you can have the logistical challenge of my mod and the customisable manufacturing challenge of yours =)

Sounds great to me !
I’ve got a setting to change the satellite recipe, though I’m not sure if that might make it a bit more complicated for you to get both of ours together.

Let me know if there’s anything I can do (if needed), or if – given that I have several recipes – you’d prefer me to add your ingredient on my own side.
Or if you manage it all. Both suit me :)

Don't worry, I won't curse you with more work lol

I'm pretty sure if I can call on your recipe difficulty setting, the change i'm proposing shouldn't take that long to implement anyway

Thanks for implementing this, impressive work!

It even works correctly with the bzlead mod out of the box (bzlead replaces iron asteroids with lead asteroids, and this recipe is updated accordingly)