Quality Engineering
Quality is engineered, not gambled.
In vanilla, quality modules give you a chance per craft, and reaching Legendary means grinding items through recyclers until the RNG cooperates. This mod does it differently: build the chain properly and each step reliably raises the quality tier. No gambling, no upcycling.
Heavily inspired by Reworked Quality by TheInsaneOne2932.
Recycling behavior is provided by Normal Recycling by protocol_1903.
The rules
- Maximum +1 quality tier per production step. You can never jump from Normal → Rare or Rare → Legendary in a single machine. Every tier must be earned in sequence.
- Once your quality chance reaches 100 %, the outcome is deterministic — it is no longer luck.
- Recycling reverts quality to normal. Any quality item that goes through a recycler comes out as normal quality. Upcycling loops are gone.
- Mining drills cannot accept quality modules. Quality comes from the production chain, not from the mine.
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Early- and mid-game helpers exist for the few chains that have no other entry point (raw ore, etc.):
- Ore Washing – chemical-plant recipes that produce washed ores.
- Purification Furnace – a dedicated electric furnace for high-cost purification recipes.
- Fluid Purification – for recipes with only fluid inputs we can utilize calcite, runs in Electromagnetic Plants.
Rebalanced modules
The quality bonuses look generous on paper. In practice they are a power/pollution struggle.
| Module | Speed | Energy | Quality |
|---|---|---|---|
| Speed 1 | +20 % | +50 % | −15 % |
| Speed 2 | +30 % | +60 % | −20 % |
| Speed 3 | +50 % | +70 % | −40 % |
| Quality 1 | −20 % | +100 % | +20 % |
| Quality 2 | −30 % | +200 % | +30 % |
| Quality 3 | −50 % | +400 % | +50 % |
A single Quality module 3 halves the machine’s speed and multiplies its power draw by 5×. Quality is no longer obtained by dumping huge quantities into a recycler and waiting for the RNG. It is obtained by building a deliberate, slow, power-hungry chain and letting each step raise the tier by one.
Quality science is actually profitable
Higher-tier science packs already give extra research value in vanilla, but almost nobody bothers because the RNG grind costs more time than the bonus is worth. With reliable quality the economics change: producing higher-quality science becomes genuinely profitable.
Recommended companion mods
These mods fill important gaps so the quality system works cleanly across the whole game:
- EM Holmium Charging – solid-state holmium chain that preserves quality (vanilla holmium goes through a fluid and loses it).
- Quality Farming – lets quality matter on Gleba’s agricultural side.
- Captive Spawner Nutrients – quality-aware nutrients / captive biter spawner chain without introducing extra buildings.
- Downgrade Port – controlled way to step quality back down when you need to.
- Quality Upkeep – makes negative quality effects (for example from speed modules) actually matter. When a machine is processing uncommon iron plates into uncommon gears, some of the output can drop back to normal quality instead of staying uncommon.
- Customizable Quality Names – rename quality tiers to whatever fits your game.
Recommended play style
Now that quality is reliable instead of pure RNG, it is only fair that the enemies can have quality too. Quality machine-gun turrets, laser turrets and the rest of your defences become actually necessary rather than optional. For that reason we strongly recommend pairing this mod with Entrenched Enemies (or a similar quality-biter experience) so the threat scales with the tools you now have.
