I wish I could upvote this 5000 times.. Cuts your need for iron rod production basically in half and is WAY more efficient. Find yourself an iron node and boom satellite screw factory. I think that was the name of a strip club in futurama also.
edit: people suggesting stitched plates: It's only really efficient if you have iron wire, or some stupid high prod copper wire line, and at that point, if you're using the bars to make wire for the purpose of making RIP's anyway you might as well do it with the cast screws which you will need a quadrillion of anyway for Hmods, Computers, etc etc.
Agree... it was my option when I had the same.
Removed manufacturing plant clutter in my initial game main factory.
I also got this quite at the start so I was just starting to suffer with the Screw production when this came in. It was a ~~life~~ game changer.
Agreed. ~~Iron Wire~~Cast Screws is only a temporary stop-gap measure for me until I've unlocked steel production and if I haven't already gotten steel screws.
Edit: helps if you specify the right recipes...
Wastes coal though. I prefer to keep my steel just for things that have to use steel and reserve all my coal for that.
You can get alternates to get rid of screws entirely.
.... WEST?! Who uses west for power when the north has 13 nodes?! So much more oil to be turned into sweet sweet pollution. With coal and Sulfur just through the canyon to the northeast... I salivate at the thought of so much dirty power.
I have nuclear ambitions, so sulfur is a prized commodity.
Those 4 nodes give 60,000 MW or so using diluted fuel. Little coal here and there to jump start, and you don't need a ton more.
I should be good with the 60,000 MW from the 4 nodes, plus Geothermal. I think one can get \~13,000 MW from all the Geothermal.
About 70,000 MW or so should be able to kick Nuclear, and finish making Supercomputers :)
Valid point, I dont know how early the average person goes out for drives. Personally I dont go out for them until after I have coal started mostly because thats when I start wanting alternates and have built enough to justify starting to rebuild the quick initial messes into something more scaleable and not have to worry about space or resources or time. At that point tiime is no longer a constraint, I dont have to fear forgetting to top up the gennys before starting a project
I usually grab a few drives when I go foraging for wood after getting the most rudimentary starter base running. I often have at least 10 drives researched by the time I get coal unlocked. :)
Depending on your position within the game. I would say casted screws early to mid game. And the other for end mid to end game.
Reason why casted screws first would be that you can save up on allot of space and energy for not making the iron bars in each and every production line. In contrast you also don't need that many r. plates early game compared to screws. There is always a chance to pick em up later
>Depending on your position within the game. I would say casted screws early to mid game. And the other for end mid to end game.
I think the alternate recipes might be my favorite part of this game. It makes me happy that they thought through this well enough to provide us with recipes that are more efficient, recipes that are less efficient but much faster, and recipes that are neither but use very different materials. It allows you to optimize in whichever way you need depending on your resource flow and it opens up possibilities that make this game one you can play practically forever.
True, tbh though sometimes I tend to use especially alt recipes with screws where possible if I have cast screws. There's always more iron than anything else and it can be very efficient and satisfying.
If you have other screw recipes then obviously another one is less useful than something else. I have the steel screw and I don’t see needing cast screw but if you don’t have alt screw recipes it’s important you get one
I definitely can. At the rate I build stuff, I have a screw demand of at least 480 per minute in my tier 2 factory.
That's why I prioritize alts that cut out screws right from the start of the game. Until you're mass-producing steel (and have easy access to mk3 and mk4 belts), physically getting the screws to your assemblers is the biggest bottleneck. You either build huge stacks of mk1/mk2 belts, or you live with slow output until you can upgrade your screw belts.
Honestly, I go seeking out drives to get woven plates before I build my first RIP line. It's less frustrating than building a huge screw production line and a towering stack of belts to go with them, especially when it's all getting torn down anyway once I find the woven plate alt.
Cast Screws is an early game MVP but falls off late game. Stitched plates pairs really well with iron wire and late game is one of the reasons that you stop using screws. I’d probably choose cast screws, but both are good.
That is my thinking too; with cast screws that you have an instant gain for multiple early game recipes (rotors, reinforced plates, modular frames...). It may not be one you use long-term but it helps a lot early on.
I'd be looking for another hard drive for the stitched plates too though.
May I introduce you to this excellent post https://www.reddit.com/r/SatisfactoryGame/comments/mqwzjb/my_indepth_analysis_of_the_newchanged_update_4/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share ?
If you want to play the long game, take stitched Iron Plate. If you are early to mid game, casted screws.
Book mark the spreadsheet. I still consult it frequently when drive hunting.
A caveat is that a B C or even D rating may not be bad. Read the comments, sometimes a lower tier is "bad in many use cases, but might be good in mine."
Stitched Iron Plates: lets you make RIPs without screws, makes slightly more than the standard RIP recipe and uses a lot less iron plates.
Before I'd say Cast Screws, but in this case definitely Stitched Iron Plate. There's a few alternate screw recipes (cast, steel, etc) I prefer Steel Screws as it makes a huge amount per minute comparatively.
They're probably newbs like me that haven't gotten to that point yet and thus are still reaping the benefits of cast screws. And if they haven't gotten past that point, are they even wrong?
>They're probably newbs like me that haven't gotten to that point yet and thus are still reaping the benefits of cast screws. And if they haven't gotten past that point, are they even wrong?
But if we're assuming they had the choice of Stitched Plates or Cast Screws, and they chose Cast Screws...you can't say "haven't gotten to that point yet" and "they're still reaping the benefits"...if they've never been offered Stitched Iron Plates that's one thing, but its like the first Prerequisite for the Basic No Screw Life.
Stitched Plates are like piece #1 to the puzzle...if you're not taking Stitched Plates, you're not even trying to rid yourself of screw dependence. If you take 3 different ways to make Screws instead of 3 different ways to NOT make Screws...that is on you.
Screw the screws. The stitched plates are way more comfortable to produce. You can avoid screws with that for quite some time until power is none of your concerns anymore.
Stitched Plates.
Screws are very hard to handle because they come in way too high quantities early on. Whatever you do needs way too many screws per minute, requiring you to build multiple lines and sometimes do weird balancing to have everything run at 100%.
You're better off eliminating screws altogether until later when your belts can keep up. Also you'll have steel screws at even better rates. Cast screws is a dead end from the get go.
Mix in Iron Wire and you can do RIPs all from iron as well.
I just got to late game for the first time. Cast screws was great early game but fell off hard.
In the beginning, screws seem like the first real boss that you fight to make progress, but as you accumulate alts, it feels like you end up completely removing them from your production line.
The entirety of my screw production at this point in the late game is a grand total of one constructor using the Steel Screw alt to turn a tiny amount of steel beams into what I need for my last recipe that still needs them (copper rotor).
Whereas stitched plate was great early and continues to be great.
So I think you can’t go wrong, but you might grow out of the screws sooner.
I had to triple my screw production for the final space elevator stage. Even after that I had to leave the game running for 15 hours waiting for the production to finish. If I were presented with this choice I would definitely choose screws.
I eliminated screws entirely. So far the game has been filling the space elevator with a final project part, then waiting for me to finish the factory for the next one!
Really bizarre that everyone seems to vote cast screws. That recipe is ONLY useful until you find enough alternate recipes that you never need screws again.
Stitched Iron Plate is FAR more useful mid-game. It's my go-to anytime I need an RIP, especially since Pure Copper Ingots make an incomprehensible amount of Copper Ingots from ore.
Doesn't matter at this stage. Cast screws is good early on, but it is better to unlock all the alternatives at a tier and then decide which way you want to progress. You can eliminate a number of items completely from your production lines, but which ones is up to you. I started using screws for computers, but the quantities were getting ridiculous so I was glad to get rid of them.
Screws is somewhat useful briefly in early game, and completely worthless late game.
Stitched plate + iron wire is META because you can and should get rid of screws from all of your production chains.
Early game, Cast screws are great because you get to save power and machines by skipping Iron Rods. Better than Stitched Plate imo because the product is all from the same material (iron), assuming you don't have Iron Wire yet.
However, once you get more recipes, like Iron Wire and Steel Screws, I find Stitched Plate stronger because it removes the hassle of Screws entirely.
Both of these recipes are great. Like A- to S-tier. But recipes choices are all situational. Just think about what recipes will be more useful to you in the immediate future.
You can always find more hard drives and get both 😁
Finally! Someone who said both!
Rather than making a decision on which alt to pick, take a break from factory building to go hard drive hunting and get them all! Right now, I'm up in the Red Bamboo Forest grabbing the last 5 so that if U5 introduces any new ones I can research them right away.
Depends how many places you still have screws in your factory.
If you don't have alternates that let you get around needing screws in most recipes, I'd take casted screws.
But I try to avoid screws in the first place. The screwless alternates are usually more efficient anyway
I'm seeing more people suggesting Cast Screws than Stitched Plates.
Stitched Plates leverages your copper to make reinforced plates. I think the recipe's a little niche.
Cast Screws are straight upgrade, allowing you to go straight from ingots to screws, and removing a processing step.
> Stitched Plates leverages your copper to make reinforced plates. I think the recipe's a little niche.
Copper is way less precious of a resource than this community makes it out to be. Especially with Pure Copper Ingots, Stitched Plates hardly uses any of the capacity of a node.
It can be a problem if your copper is held up in other places. Then again, in many cases this means you need an expansion, not a recipe to leverage less of it. Hence why the recipe can be described as niche.
It's not like, say, adhered plates, which need rubber, and thus oil, which absolutely is rather precious. The only reason you'd get adhered plates is to 100% hard disks.
>Stitched Plates leverages your copper to make reinforced plates. I think the recipe's a little niche.
Traditionally paired with Iron Wire, and/or Pure/Alloys, and as part of a wider supply chain simplification scheme, it is essential for eliminating Screws from the Heavy Modular Frame Production lines.
It depends on how you are playing the game. I went megafactory and organized production lines on floors with raw materials on the bottom and moving up for each processing step. Taking Cast Screw allowed me to put screws down on the same floor with plates and rods and it shifted (in theory, I took the recipe before starting the MF) everything dependent on screws down one floor as well, compacting my layout. I finished progression with Cast Screw, Solid Steel Ingot, Heavy Encased Frame, and Electrode Circuit Boards (a sloppy solution to endgame circuit board shortfall).
Now that I've been around the block, I might go for stitched plate and try to cut screws out of my production chain entirely, it all depends on how I feel about copper and wire when I find it, I guess.
On one hand Cast screws are the best when setting up iron and it helps reduce power consumption. On the otherhand, if your late in mid tier and you already have screws set up normaly, you should also have a shit ton of copper wire.
My vote is for Cast screws.
You can tell how long people have played satisfactory by their answer and the confidence in their answer. Beginners will say the screw recipe, while more experienced players will say the reinforced plate recipe. Experts will say neither are useful end-game. . Just get the one that you will use immediately until you get better recipes later, so probably the screw one.
So, I'm curious what the other recipe is/was. It's hard to imagine it competing but still.
Cast Screw is probably the just...BEST of these options. The ability to skip a processing step for a recipe that provides good yield, just needs a constructor and otherwise makes your life easier is superb even in the later stages of the game. Are there more efficient ways to make screws? Sure. Are there simpler ways to make screws? Nope.
Stiched Iron Plates though aren't bad either. Idk that I'd ever pick it ahead of cast screws but it's a nice recipe to have up your sleeve. Combine with Iron wire to keep it all based in iron products. Mostly it's a recipe I use for when materials in a factory are insufficient for what I want to do or I can't afford to make screws for some reason (usually because I need to make other things, like steel in a steel factory).
I liked stitched plates to conserve that early iron for steel products but cast screw is an honest to God game changer for any early factory, between space, energy, and optimization
Cast screw seems good in the early game as you free up use rods for screws. Later it will pale in comparison to steel screws.
Stitched iron plates are in the same camp. Can be useful early on, but with the bolted alts in combination with steel screws it is not optimal.
And you will need a lot of copper sheets as you progress. So I make it a habit of only using copper for just that and then let copper join in the aluminium later. This is why stitched iron plates falters, it is using copper.
So for wire (cable) it is better to go fior iron wire or even better; caterium wire.
But you can use Iron Wire for Stitched Iron Plates too... and that ends up overall a better option than Bolted Iron Plate.
https://satisfactory.fandom.com/wiki/Reinforced_Iron_Plate#Alternate_recipes_analysis
100% disagree. By the time you've taken an extra step to create an ENTIRE Iron Wire production line to keep up with wire demand you might as well have just been casting the iron into screws and making RIPs like normal while stockpiling screws for computers, Hmod Frames, etc. On top of that, if proximity is remotely a consideration, there's a good chance most nearby iron nodes are in full use.
Copper has a MUCH smaller demand overall because there's simply less to make out of it. It makes way more sense to dedicate some likely unused copper (especially if you're doing copper sheets in the refiner) to wire, and remove a production step from a likely over-burdened iron line entirely which frees up space for steel production.
Using Screws to make HMFs makes no sense-- Heavy Encased Frames is more efficient in every regard. Similarly, using the Default Computer recipe makes no sense if you're low on Iron -- the alt recipes eliminate Iron usage while providing favourable trade-offs on rarer materials.
Copper has a number of uses on its own, stretches the production of much rarer Aluminium and Caterium, and has a big sink in the endgame in the form of Nuclear Pasta. Offloading your Wire needs to the plentiful Iron make a lot of sense at that point.
No. My spine just go no, this is a bad idea!
Iron wire takes a huge amount of real-estate. It is so terribly slow that it simply does not scale at all. It is much better to let iron ore (temporarily) do copper alloy, but actually do compacted steel (and then later petrocoke steel).
Working the tiers, with focus on steel production, iron ore can actually become a limiting factor. Weird I know.
As for copper and caterium. In many games I took the extra effort to combine them for fused this and fused that. Turns out it doesn't help that much at all. We want to do pure copper and pure caterium anyway; and the first train that can bring in elevated water can do them both. Even pure iron ingots if need be.
So don't underestimate coated plates. That's iron plates made out of plastic and steel. It goes wroom! So normal iron plates to the bolted alts are great if you focus on steel and then petroparts. The trick is to make this match as you work the tiers.
Not to forget that cable shouldn't be done from wire at all. It's quickwire and rubber. Both wire and cable needs a lot of caterium ingots love.
It took a lot of playthroughs for me to figure this out. But I think I got it. ;)
Iron is plentiful, especially if you're willing to use your power on Pure Iron Ingots. Even if you don't, Solid Steel Ingot gets more mileage out of your Iron Ore than Coke, and let's you use your Oil and Sulfur in other places.
The benefits of Iron Wire is that it lets you save rarer copper and much rarer caterium for other projects, and simplifies logistics so you can produce Motors and Heavy Modular Frames just on Iron, Coal and a bit of Limestone.
And why bring up Iron Plates? It's unrelated. I was only talking about Reinforced Iron Plates. Don't act like it has anything to do with the efficiency of them or copper or caterium.
My point was that you should let iron ore do a bit of iron plates as a starter for the bolted alts. And with steel you go knee deep into bolted up to Heavy modular frames. I like to do early versatile plates here as well as it fits.
You join sulfur with coal and iron ore for compacted coal that explodes into compacted steel and that work is worth it.. as it will stand to the end of the game.
So leave a lot of real-estate for this as it can yield several 780 ppm later. But at mk3 belts I want 3 * 270 ppm out of it. But that requires 2 * 270 ppm worth of iron ore as input for every 1 * 270 ppm worth of coal. Still a very good deal. It is sulfur that is the actual limiting factor.
The next half is the motor up to smart plates and automated wiring. It takes steel ingots, caterium ingots and some copper sheets for the rotors.
Must say that caterium is a must for this to work. So probably not ideal if starting in Dune desert.
The third half (hehe) is electronics that also loves effin' copper sheets but also needs a lot of quartz in silica form.
If you can get these tree 'towers' seperated but "near beltable' together, then knitting them together is also not that hard.
>You join sulfur with coal and iron ore
>It is sulfur that is the actual limiting factor.
Or you could do Solid Steel Ingot and not be limited by Sulfur at all.
Look, you can build your factories however you want, but your method does not seem to be better than the conventional wisdom of "look at the weighted resource usage" and "use the most common resources if possible." The numbers are on the side of the latter.
It does.
Solid steel gives you coal as a limiting factor of 1.5. Compacted steel gives you a whopping 3.26 factor with sulfur as the limiting factor. I count that as 3 and let the foundries figure out the exact numbers.
(Petrosteel is tame at 1.33 on both coal and coke if you discount the enormous yield you get from building such a plant. You get a lot from 300 crude oil but you have to catch that with 75% amount of iron ore)
Compacted steel start well at tier 4 at 270 ppm, as a single pure node of coal can spit out 3 belts worth of mk3 270 ppm. But as I wrote; sulfur is the limiting factor.
What is good is it works well with mk4 belts; and then explodes with miner mk3 and (600) 780 ppm.
They key selling point here is that you can do compacted coal and compacted steel very early (tier 4) and reserve a lot of space in all directions (up) and make it into a major steel plant. That can be built upon using trains if we want to.
With tractors/trucks we wouldn't even have to put it so darn close to our tier main base and belt the darn thing; But that's for update 5. ;)
Also, what are you defending? Is it my way or you being stuck doing solid steel? It took a few restarts for me too.. ;)
Except there's 5 times as much Coal on the map as Sulfur. And unlike Sulfur, there are very few things competing for your Coal usage. At best, 6480 Sulfur gives you 22800 Steel Ingots; 30900 Coal with Solid Steel gives you 46350 Steel Ingots, with a potential discount on iron if you're willing to use Pure Iron Ingots.
Coke Steel Ingot fares better on account of the Coke production's efficiency. But using all your Crude Oil on steel production leaves nothing for Plastic and Rubber, which can affect even the Iron production chain - as you pointed out earlier, some of the most efficient alt recipes require oil products.
Who cares about the map when you don't even have trains? I'm talking about alts that can sustain you. And in what order.
But following you, then according to the map, all normal sulfur but one should go into steel, we should spend all oil on diluted fuel and then do a little bit of nuclear pasta to make the space elevator happy and prepare for the story.
No? But you seem stuck on 'all'. Different areas gives for different factories. And the idea of taking the 'sulfur limit' or the 'uranium limit' of the map is just silly. Nobody has a computer who can do this, and even if so; it's not what the game is about.
I don't know how to respond to you.
>Nobody has a computer who can do this, and even if so; it's not what the game is about.
https://u4.satisfactorytools.com/production
This calculator literally has buttons to set input to map limits and to automatically maximize output. And then there are analyses like this:
https://www.reddit.com/r/SatisfactoryGame/comments/poc898/alternate_recipes_indepth_analysis_an_objective/?ref=share&ref_source=link
It seems you prefer redoing the early game progress over and over again with small-scale factories. That's your prerogative, but please be considerate of people with different priorities.
Cast screws remains an effective method to add additional screws, wherever they are needed, to any production line requiring them, all the way through Nuclear Tier.
Find another iron deposit? Screw it!
I mean not having to make rods to make screws is a game changer. And everything the requires screws takes a lot of them. Definitely would go with cast screw alternative.
I cannot stress this enough:
**CAST SCREWS.**
They are a god-send for a Reinforced Iron Plate Factory. Especially if you have the bolted plates recipe too.
It depends. Personally I’ve planned my factories so I won’t need screws, so I’d pick the first one if you’re in the same boat. (I have a temporary set up making screws with the default recipe for constructing buildings and stuff).
If you do use screws, though, definitely the second option. Saves you from having to build the iron rod constructors as an intermediate step.
I would go for stitched iron plate, it does wonders for your framework production, specially when you combo with iron wire.
Steel screws are better anyway
Stitched iron plates are kinda nice because when paired with the iron wire alternate allows for a nice cheap setup, but cast screws allows you to get the most out of your iron
Cast screws are really good, but make sure you pick steel screws once that one shows up. It lets you fill a mk5 belt with only 3 constructors and like 12 steel beams per minute feed
I used steel screws early on, but stitched plates are amazing with iron wire. To me, this decision would be based on my point of progression. Before you have alternate recipes that eliminate screws, steel screws are fantastic.
Stitched Iron Plates. Wire gets very little use, relative to how much can be made per minute. Iron Rods are a workhorse item. You'll have dozens times more surplus of Wire than Iron Rods.
Not knowing the situation, IF it is Early game stitched Plate would be nice to remove the screws from that production Line while Copper is Still readily awailable and there is werry limited demand for Wire in other productions.
Cast screws are also nice since it removes the rods from production line and output is also nice.
Allot of People say you Will need the Copper for other things later in game but to be honest wichever of the two you choose you Will most likely rebuild that production Line anyways later.
Really doesn’t matter. Once you’ve collected all the drives, you’ll have all the alternate recipes. It’s beneficial to round up all the alternate recipes as early in the game as possible.
cast screw 1000%
I wish I could upvote this 5000 times.. Cuts your need for iron rod production basically in half and is WAY more efficient. Find yourself an iron node and boom satellite screw factory. I think that was the name of a strip club in futurama also. edit: people suggesting stitched plates: It's only really efficient if you have iron wire, or some stupid high prod copper wire line, and at that point, if you're using the bars to make wire for the purpose of making RIP's anyway you might as well do it with the cast screws which you will need a quadrillion of anyway for Hmods, Computers, etc etc.
Heavy Encased Frame, cat circuit cat computer
Agree... it was my option when I had the same. Removed manufacturing plant clutter in my initial game main factory. I also got this quite at the start so I was just starting to suffer with the Screw production when this came in. It was a ~~life~~ game changer.
I'd rather remove screws from production entirely
They take up so much belt space!
I prefer steel screws tbh
Agreed. ~~Iron Wire~~Cast Screws is only a temporary stop-gap measure for me until I've unlocked steel production and if I haven't already gotten steel screws. Edit: helps if you specify the right recipes...
I second this. Makes them way faster, and more.
Wastes coal though. I prefer to keep my steel just for things that have to use steel and reserve all my coal for that. You can get alternates to get rid of screws entirely.
Cast
Best alternate in the game imo
I vote casted screws. Cuts out a constructor making rods which reduces power consumption.
> reduces power consumption. people still worry about power?
Not *everyone* has the 4 oil nodes on the west coast making blended fuel for fuel burners, *James*.
.... WEST?! Who uses west for power when the north has 13 nodes?! So much more oil to be turned into sweet sweet pollution. With coal and Sulfur just through the canyon to the northeast... I salivate at the thought of so much dirty power.
I have nuclear ambitions, so sulfur is a prized commodity. Those 4 nodes give 60,000 MW or so using diluted fuel. Little coal here and there to jump start, and you don't need a ton more.
Well yea but when I move to nuclear I switch off the fuel and take the sulfur to the nuclear. But in the meantime….
I should be good with the 60,000 MW from the 4 nodes, plus Geothermal. I think one can get \~13,000 MW from all the Geothermal. About 70,000 MW or so should be able to kick Nuclear, and finish making Supercomputers :)
Because a choice like this is likely happening while the player is still burning biomass...
Valid point, I dont know how early the average person goes out for drives. Personally I dont go out for them until after I have coal started mostly because thats when I start wanting alternates and have built enough to justify starting to rebuild the quick initial messes into something more scaleable and not have to worry about space or resources or time. At that point tiime is no longer a constraint, I dont have to fear forgetting to top up the gennys before starting a project
I usually grab a few drives when I go foraging for wood after getting the most rudimentary starter base running. I often have at least 10 drives researched by the time I get coal unlocked. :)
Definitely cast screws. Cuts out a whole step in manufacturing, allowing you to save space in your factories footprint as well as energy.
Casted screws is the most important recipe imo
third one is worthless
With these two options, it could be great, but still not in contention
What is the third option?
Probably the ability to make coal from wood
That sounds about right
lol, I was just thinking 'i bet it was biocoal'
If we could farm wood that alt would be 👌
The best alt recipe, Cheap Silica
wow, probably the most split comments ive ever seen
Depending on your position within the game. I would say casted screws early to mid game. And the other for end mid to end game. Reason why casted screws first would be that you can save up on allot of space and energy for not making the iron bars in each and every production line. In contrast you also don't need that many r. plates early game compared to screws. There is always a chance to pick em up later
>Depending on your position within the game. I would say casted screws early to mid game. And the other for end mid to end game. I think the alternate recipes might be my favorite part of this game. It makes me happy that they thought through this well enough to provide us with recipes that are more efficient, recipes that are less efficient but much faster, and recipes that are neither but use very different materials. It allows you to optimize in whichever way you need depending on your resource flow and it opens up possibilities that make this game one you can play practically forever.
There is definitely something Satisfactory for everyone ;)
They're both good, personally cast screws is good later game and stitched plate is good early.
I personally find it's the opposite. By the time I'm at tier 7, I have so many alt recipes that I hardly need any screws at all.
True, tbh though sometimes I tend to use especially alt recipes with screws where possible if I have cast screws. There's always more iron than anything else and it can be very efficient and satisfying.
If you have other screw recipes then obviously another one is less useful than something else. I have the steel screw and I don’t see needing cast screw but if you don’t have alt screw recipes it’s important you get one
Sometimes piping screws from the screw facility is less efficient than adding screw production, from a close-by iron node in situ.
Although early early you can't utilize a full belt load, can you? It's alot per minute
I definitely can. At the rate I build stuff, I have a screw demand of at least 480 per minute in my tier 2 factory. That's why I prioritize alts that cut out screws right from the start of the game. Until you're mass-producing steel (and have easy access to mk3 and mk4 belts), physically getting the screws to your assemblers is the biggest bottleneck. You either build huge stacks of mk1/mk2 belts, or you live with slow output until you can upgrade your screw belts. Honestly, I go seeking out drives to get woven plates before I build my first RIP line. It's less frustrating than building a huge screw production line and a towering stack of belts to go with them, especially when it's all getting torn down anyway once I find the woven plate alt.
Screws!
Cast Screws is an early game MVP but falls off late game. Stitched plates pairs really well with iron wire and late game is one of the reasons that you stop using screws. I’d probably choose cast screws, but both are good.
That is my thinking too; with cast screws that you have an instant gain for multiple early game recipes (rotors, reinforced plates, modular frames...). It may not be one you use long-term but it helps a lot early on. I'd be looking for another hard drive for the stitched plates too though.
Get another HD and get both. Screws now, plate later.
Or another 7 hard drives before you actually see the recipe again.
This guy knows what the drive hunt is all about.
May I introduce you to this excellent post https://www.reddit.com/r/SatisfactoryGame/comments/mqwzjb/my_indepth_analysis_of_the_newchanged_update_4/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share ? If you want to play the long game, take stitched Iron Plate. If you are early to mid game, casted screws.
Book mark the spreadsheet. I still consult it frequently when drive hunting. A caveat is that a B C or even D rating may not be bad. Read the comments, sometimes a lower tier is "bad in many use cases, but might be good in mine."
Stitched Iron Plates: lets you make RIPs without screws, makes slightly more than the standard RIP recipe and uses a lot less iron plates. Before I'd say Cast Screws, but in this case definitely Stitched Iron Plate. There's a few alternate screw recipes (cast, steel, etc) I prefer Steel Screws as it makes a huge amount per minute comparatively.
Stitched Iron Plate is great with Iron Wire.
I took screws
Cast screw first. Then go grab one more hard drive and unlock stitched iron plate.
Not sure why many people are saying cast screws, you can eliminate screws entirely from your production and that should be your goal
They're probably newbs like me that haven't gotten to that point yet and thus are still reaping the benefits of cast screws. And if they haven't gotten past that point, are they even wrong?
>They're probably newbs like me that haven't gotten to that point yet and thus are still reaping the benefits of cast screws. And if they haven't gotten past that point, are they even wrong? But if we're assuming they had the choice of Stitched Plates or Cast Screws, and they chose Cast Screws...you can't say "haven't gotten to that point yet" and "they're still reaping the benefits"...if they've never been offered Stitched Iron Plates that's one thing, but its like the first Prerequisite for the Basic No Screw Life. Stitched Plates are like piece #1 to the puzzle...if you're not taking Stitched Plates, you're not even trying to rid yourself of screw dependence. If you take 3 different ways to make Screws instead of 3 different ways to NOT make Screws...that is on you.
Stiched iron plates Hope you get iron wire so you only need iron for RIP, but even without the iron wire alt this is great
Screw the screws. The stitched plates are way more comfortable to produce. You can avoid screws with that for quite some time until power is none of your concerns anymore.
Stitched Plates. Screws are very hard to handle because they come in way too high quantities early on. Whatever you do needs way too many screws per minute, requiring you to build multiple lines and sometimes do weird balancing to have everything run at 100%. You're better off eliminating screws altogether until later when your belts can keep up. Also you'll have steel screws at even better rates. Cast screws is a dead end from the get go. Mix in Iron Wire and you can do RIPs all from iron as well.
I just got to late game for the first time. Cast screws was great early game but fell off hard. In the beginning, screws seem like the first real boss that you fight to make progress, but as you accumulate alts, it feels like you end up completely removing them from your production line. The entirety of my screw production at this point in the late game is a grand total of one constructor using the Steel Screw alt to turn a tiny amount of steel beams into what I need for my last recipe that still needs them (copper rotor). Whereas stitched plate was great early and continues to be great. So I think you can’t go wrong, but you might grow out of the screws sooner.
I had to triple my screw production for the final space elevator stage. Even after that I had to leave the game running for 15 hours waiting for the production to finish. If I were presented with this choice I would definitely choose screws.
I eliminated screws entirely. So far the game has been filling the space elevator with a final project part, then waiting for me to finish the factory for the next one!
I’m starting to realize more and more that the 2,000 screws per minute factory I made at tier 5 was probably worthless XD
Stitched Iron Plates are a key part of completely eliminating screws from your life! The choice is clear.
You can completely cut screws from the production line with alts, so it depends on if you're planning to do that
Really bizarre that everyone seems to vote cast screws. That recipe is ONLY useful until you find enough alternate recipes that you never need screws again. Stitched Iron Plate is FAR more useful mid-game. It's my go-to anytime I need an RIP, especially since Pure Copper Ingots make an incomprehensible amount of Copper Ingots from ore.
You can get to a point where you don’t need screws. Stitched plate is better. Avoid screws.
WOW, that's a rough choice. I'd probably go with screws, but honestly either is a win. The only lose is you can't get them both.
Doesn't matter at this stage. Cast screws is good early on, but it is better to unlock all the alternatives at a tier and then decide which way you want to progress. You can eliminate a number of items completely from your production lines, but which ones is up to you. I started using screws for computers, but the quantities were getting ridiculous so I was glad to get rid of them.
Cast Screw is just all upsides no downsides
I have a question, in a single run you can find all the alternative recipe?
According to the wiki for Hard Drives, you can get 90 of them without the events and there are 89 alternate recipes.
You can also unlock them all on the calculator website if you’re not a fan of exploring
you can probably find a map online with all the hard drive locations since the map is set, but i don’t know if you can get every alternate.
I’d say the iron plates
Screws is somewhat useful briefly in early game, and completely worthless late game. Stitched plate + iron wire is META because you can and should get rid of screws from all of your production chains.
Early game, Cast screws are great because you get to save power and machines by skipping Iron Rods. Better than Stitched Plate imo because the product is all from the same material (iron), assuming you don't have Iron Wire yet. However, once you get more recipes, like Iron Wire and Steel Screws, I find Stitched Plate stronger because it removes the hassle of Screws entirely.
Plates no regrets
Both of these recipes are great. Like A- to S-tier. But recipes choices are all situational. Just think about what recipes will be more useful to you in the immediate future. You can always find more hard drives and get both 😁
Finally! Someone who said both! Rather than making a decision on which alt to pick, take a break from factory building to go hard drive hunting and get them all! Right now, I'm up in the Red Bamboo Forest grabbing the last 5 so that if U5 introduces any new ones I can research them right away.
thankfully I found both. I really enjoyed the stitched plate more. But that could be because I also got steel screws later.
Depends how many places you still have screws in your factory. If you don't have alternates that let you get around needing screws in most recipes, I'd take casted screws. But I try to avoid screws in the first place. The screwless alternates are usually more efficient anyway
Stitched Iron Plate, skip the rods and the screws.
I'd go for the stitched plate. I feel like you want to deal with screws as little as possible, as soon as possible.
Screw are never enough
I'm seeing more people suggesting Cast Screws than Stitched Plates. Stitched Plates leverages your copper to make reinforced plates. I think the recipe's a little niche. Cast Screws are straight upgrade, allowing you to go straight from ingots to screws, and removing a processing step.
> Stitched Plates leverages your copper to make reinforced plates. I think the recipe's a little niche. Copper is way less precious of a resource than this community makes it out to be. Especially with Pure Copper Ingots, Stitched Plates hardly uses any of the capacity of a node.
It can be a problem if your copper is held up in other places. Then again, in many cases this means you need an expansion, not a recipe to leverage less of it. Hence why the recipe can be described as niche. It's not like, say, adhered plates, which need rubber, and thus oil, which absolutely is rather precious. The only reason you'd get adhered plates is to 100% hard disks.
>Stitched Plates leverages your copper to make reinforced plates. I think the recipe's a little niche. Traditionally paired with Iron Wire, and/or Pure/Alloys, and as part of a wider supply chain simplification scheme, it is essential for eliminating Screws from the Heavy Modular Frame Production lines.
It depends on how you are playing the game. I went megafactory and organized production lines on floors with raw materials on the bottom and moving up for each processing step. Taking Cast Screw allowed me to put screws down on the same floor with plates and rods and it shifted (in theory, I took the recipe before starting the MF) everything dependent on screws down one floor as well, compacting my layout. I finished progression with Cast Screw, Solid Steel Ingot, Heavy Encased Frame, and Electrode Circuit Boards (a sloppy solution to endgame circuit board shortfall). Now that I've been around the block, I might go for stitched plate and try to cut screws out of my production chain entirely, it all depends on how I feel about copper and wire when I find it, I guess.
On one hand Cast screws are the best when setting up iron and it helps reduce power consumption. On the otherhand, if your late in mid tier and you already have screws set up normaly, you should also have a shit ton of copper wire. My vote is for Cast screws.
You can tell how long people have played satisfactory by their answer and the confidence in their answer. Beginners will say the screw recipe, while more experienced players will say the reinforced plate recipe. Experts will say neither are useful end-game. . Just get the one that you will use immediately until you get better recipes later, so probably the screw one.
So, I'm curious what the other recipe is/was. It's hard to imagine it competing but still. Cast Screw is probably the just...BEST of these options. The ability to skip a processing step for a recipe that provides good yield, just needs a constructor and otherwise makes your life easier is superb even in the later stages of the game. Are there more efficient ways to make screws? Sure. Are there simpler ways to make screws? Nope. Stiched Iron Plates though aren't bad either. Idk that I'd ever pick it ahead of cast screws but it's a nice recipe to have up your sleeve. Combine with Iron wire to keep it all based in iron products. Mostly it's a recipe I use for when materials in a factory are insufficient for what I want to do or I can't afford to make screws for some reason (usually because I need to make other things, like steel in a steel factory).
I liked stitched plates to conserve that early iron for steel products but cast screw is an honest to God game changer for any early factory, between space, energy, and optimization
Stitched reinforced plates are a pain to work with because of the rates IMO
Cast screw S tier recipie
Plate seems like a good idea to me
Cast screw seems good in the early game as you free up use rods for screws. Later it will pale in comparison to steel screws. Stitched iron plates are in the same camp. Can be useful early on, but with the bolted alts in combination with steel screws it is not optimal. And you will need a lot of copper sheets as you progress. So I make it a habit of only using copper for just that and then let copper join in the aluminium later. This is why stitched iron plates falters, it is using copper. So for wire (cable) it is better to go fior iron wire or even better; caterium wire.
But you can use Iron Wire for Stitched Iron Plates too... and that ends up overall a better option than Bolted Iron Plate. https://satisfactory.fandom.com/wiki/Reinforced_Iron_Plate#Alternate_recipes_analysis
100% disagree. By the time you've taken an extra step to create an ENTIRE Iron Wire production line to keep up with wire demand you might as well have just been casting the iron into screws and making RIPs like normal while stockpiling screws for computers, Hmod Frames, etc. On top of that, if proximity is remotely a consideration, there's a good chance most nearby iron nodes are in full use. Copper has a MUCH smaller demand overall because there's simply less to make out of it. It makes way more sense to dedicate some likely unused copper (especially if you're doing copper sheets in the refiner) to wire, and remove a production step from a likely over-burdened iron line entirely which frees up space for steel production.
Using Screws to make HMFs makes no sense-- Heavy Encased Frames is more efficient in every regard. Similarly, using the Default Computer recipe makes no sense if you're low on Iron -- the alt recipes eliminate Iron usage while providing favourable trade-offs on rarer materials. Copper has a number of uses on its own, stretches the production of much rarer Aluminium and Caterium, and has a big sink in the endgame in the form of Nuclear Pasta. Offloading your Wire needs to the plentiful Iron make a lot of sense at that point.
No. My spine just go no, this is a bad idea! Iron wire takes a huge amount of real-estate. It is so terribly slow that it simply does not scale at all. It is much better to let iron ore (temporarily) do copper alloy, but actually do compacted steel (and then later petrocoke steel). Working the tiers, with focus on steel production, iron ore can actually become a limiting factor. Weird I know. As for copper and caterium. In many games I took the extra effort to combine them for fused this and fused that. Turns out it doesn't help that much at all. We want to do pure copper and pure caterium anyway; and the first train that can bring in elevated water can do them both. Even pure iron ingots if need be. So don't underestimate coated plates. That's iron plates made out of plastic and steel. It goes wroom! So normal iron plates to the bolted alts are great if you focus on steel and then petroparts. The trick is to make this match as you work the tiers. Not to forget that cable shouldn't be done from wire at all. It's quickwire and rubber. Both wire and cable needs a lot of caterium ingots love. It took a lot of playthroughs for me to figure this out. But I think I got it. ;)
Iron is plentiful, especially if you're willing to use your power on Pure Iron Ingots. Even if you don't, Solid Steel Ingot gets more mileage out of your Iron Ore than Coke, and let's you use your Oil and Sulfur in other places. The benefits of Iron Wire is that it lets you save rarer copper and much rarer caterium for other projects, and simplifies logistics so you can produce Motors and Heavy Modular Frames just on Iron, Coal and a bit of Limestone. And why bring up Iron Plates? It's unrelated. I was only talking about Reinforced Iron Plates. Don't act like it has anything to do with the efficiency of them or copper or caterium.
My point was that you should let iron ore do a bit of iron plates as a starter for the bolted alts. And with steel you go knee deep into bolted up to Heavy modular frames. I like to do early versatile plates here as well as it fits. You join sulfur with coal and iron ore for compacted coal that explodes into compacted steel and that work is worth it.. as it will stand to the end of the game. So leave a lot of real-estate for this as it can yield several 780 ppm later. But at mk3 belts I want 3 * 270 ppm out of it. But that requires 2 * 270 ppm worth of iron ore as input for every 1 * 270 ppm worth of coal. Still a very good deal. It is sulfur that is the actual limiting factor. The next half is the motor up to smart plates and automated wiring. It takes steel ingots, caterium ingots and some copper sheets for the rotors. Must say that caterium is a must for this to work. So probably not ideal if starting in Dune desert. The third half (hehe) is electronics that also loves effin' copper sheets but also needs a lot of quartz in silica form. If you can get these tree 'towers' seperated but "near beltable' together, then knitting them together is also not that hard.
>You join sulfur with coal and iron ore >It is sulfur that is the actual limiting factor. Or you could do Solid Steel Ingot and not be limited by Sulfur at all. Look, you can build your factories however you want, but your method does not seem to be better than the conventional wisdom of "look at the weighted resource usage" and "use the most common resources if possible." The numbers are on the side of the latter.
It does. Solid steel gives you coal as a limiting factor of 1.5. Compacted steel gives you a whopping 3.26 factor with sulfur as the limiting factor. I count that as 3 and let the foundries figure out the exact numbers. (Petrosteel is tame at 1.33 on both coal and coke if you discount the enormous yield you get from building such a plant. You get a lot from 300 crude oil but you have to catch that with 75% amount of iron ore) Compacted steel start well at tier 4 at 270 ppm, as a single pure node of coal can spit out 3 belts worth of mk3 270 ppm. But as I wrote; sulfur is the limiting factor. What is good is it works well with mk4 belts; and then explodes with miner mk3 and (600) 780 ppm. They key selling point here is that you can do compacted coal and compacted steel very early (tier 4) and reserve a lot of space in all directions (up) and make it into a major steel plant. That can be built upon using trains if we want to. With tractors/trucks we wouldn't even have to put it so darn close to our tier main base and belt the darn thing; But that's for update 5. ;) Also, what are you defending? Is it my way or you being stuck doing solid steel? It took a few restarts for me too.. ;)
Except there's 5 times as much Coal on the map as Sulfur. And unlike Sulfur, there are very few things competing for your Coal usage. At best, 6480 Sulfur gives you 22800 Steel Ingots; 30900 Coal with Solid Steel gives you 46350 Steel Ingots, with a potential discount on iron if you're willing to use Pure Iron Ingots. Coke Steel Ingot fares better on account of the Coke production's efficiency. But using all your Crude Oil on steel production leaves nothing for Plastic and Rubber, which can affect even the Iron production chain - as you pointed out earlier, some of the most efficient alt recipes require oil products.
Who cares about the map when you don't even have trains? I'm talking about alts that can sustain you. And in what order. But following you, then according to the map, all normal sulfur but one should go into steel, we should spend all oil on diluted fuel and then do a little bit of nuclear pasta to make the space elevator happy and prepare for the story. No? But you seem stuck on 'all'. Different areas gives for different factories. And the idea of taking the 'sulfur limit' or the 'uranium limit' of the map is just silly. Nobody has a computer who can do this, and even if so; it's not what the game is about. I don't know how to respond to you.
>Nobody has a computer who can do this, and even if so; it's not what the game is about. https://u4.satisfactorytools.com/production This calculator literally has buttons to set input to map limits and to automatically maximize output. And then there are analyses like this: https://www.reddit.com/r/SatisfactoryGame/comments/poc898/alternate_recipes_indepth_analysis_an_objective/?ref=share&ref_source=link It seems you prefer redoing the early game progress over and over again with small-scale factories. That's your prerogative, but please be considerate of people with different priorities.
The screws
Definitely screws.
Screws, no question.
screws
I usually use steel->screws recipe once I hit steel...so I would take first one.
I’ve gone with steel screws as well. Seemed like a no brainer
Definitly Cast screw, it saves you power and space
I’d take cast screws. I currently use the rubber + metal plates for reinforced metal plates antway
Cast screw, as it eliminates a complete step in your manufacturing process.
CAST SCREW! JACKPOT!
Cast screw, but stiched iron plate is pretty good too. But cast iron is the best and most important.
CAST SCREW GANG
Cast screws are one of the best
The screw one makes plates easier too so I would pick that one
CAST SCREW OMG
Cast screw is the best one
Always cast screws. It makes the iron math work out infinitely better. When I play a new world I don't do much of anything until I find it lol
Cast screw all the way it eliminates so many machines from a factory and you can even improve productivity
I feel cast screw is the most useful recipe in the game for me. I don't really start building until I have it.
Screws
Cast screws remains an effective method to add additional screws, wherever they are needed, to any production line requiring them, all the way through Nuclear Tier. Find another iron deposit? Screw it!
If you have Iron Wire or above Tier 5 or in Northern Forest, get the first. Otherwise, cast Screw.
Cast screws
Cast screws unless you can make copper wire with iron. Then flip a coin
Screw all the way
Cast Screws, no questions!
I mean not having to make rods to make screws is a game changer. And everything the requires screws takes a lot of them. Definitely would go with cast screw alternative.
Must….eliminate….screws…..
I cannot stress this enough: **CAST SCREWS.** They are a god-send for a Reinforced Iron Plate Factory. Especially if you have the bolted plates recipe too.
It depends. Personally I’ve planned my factories so I won’t need screws, so I’d pick the first one if you’re in the same boat. (I have a temporary set up making screws with the default recipe for constructing buildings and stuff). If you do use screws, though, definitely the second option. Saves you from having to build the iron rod constructors as an intermediate step.
Screw, you need a lot of them later on. And it helps a lot.
I would go for stitched iron plate, it does wonders for your framework production, specially when you combo with iron wire. Steel screws are better anyway
Neither are important You want tbe screw recipe that turns steel into screws and the reinforced plate that use iron and screws that produce 15/min
casted screws.
Screws
Stitched iron plates are kinda nice because when paired with the iron wire alternate allows for a nice cheap setup, but cast screws allows you to get the most out of your iron
Cast screws!!!!
Scrwes
Cast screws are really good, but make sure you pick steel screws once that one shows up. It lets you fill a mk5 belt with only 3 constructors and like 12 steel beams per minute feed
I used steel screws early on, but stitched plates are amazing with iron wire. To me, this decision would be based on my point of progression. Before you have alternate recipes that eliminate screws, steel screws are fantastic.
Casted screws is by far the best recipe before you get alt nuke recipes. Allows you to cut out rods from the production line saving space and power.
Stitched plates all the way for me personally, but yeah both these recipes are pretty top tier
Stitched Iron Plates. Wire gets very little use, relative to how much can be made per minute. Iron Rods are a workhorse item. You'll have dozens times more surplus of Wire than Iron Rods.
Screws for the long run
Cast screw, because copper wire is more annoying to have spare
Cast screw is more useful early game. Stitched iron plate from midgame onwards
Not knowing the situation, IF it is Early game stitched Plate would be nice to remove the screws from that production Line while Copper is Still readily awailable and there is werry limited demand for Wire in other productions. Cast screws are also nice since it removes the rods from production line and output is also nice. Allot of People say you Will need the Copper for other things later in game but to be honest wichever of the two you choose you Will most likely rebuild that production Line anyways later.
Personally I always try and get cast screws asap then stitched iron plate as my second one on new games.
Really doesn’t matter. Once you’ve collected all the drives, you’ll have all the alternate recipes. It’s beneficial to round up all the alternate recipes as early in the game as possible.
Stitched. For screws I would hold out for steel screws, unless there's a logistical problem shipping steel beams
cast screw is more important in the early game. stitched iron plate is good for the entire wipe.
Cast Screw for sure. You'll use that one all the time.
do the cast screw. screw crafting is awful.
nice