Production amplifier
Production amplification (dubbed slooping or overslooping) is a mechanic that allows select factory buildings to increase their output without increasing their input cost, at the cost of inserting Somersloops and a huge increase in power demand.
Obtaining
Somersloops required for production amplification can be found in set locations across the world. Only a limited amount of Somersloops is available, they are a non-renewable resource.
Usage
Amplification slots
Production amplification increases the amount of products produced by a given machine, or in other words reduces the cost to produce a given part. Buildings that are being amplified will produce a low droning noise and emit red and purple steam when active.
The following machines can have their production amplified:
Amplification slots | Buildings |
---|---|
1 | Smelter, Constructor |
2 | Assembler, Foundry, Refinery, Converter |
4 | Manufacturer, Blender, Particle Accelerator, Quantum Encoder |
Other buildings, such as Miners or the Packager cannot be amplified.
If a given building has multiple amplification slots, then filling only some of them will cause a partial amplification. For example, if there are 4 slots but only 1 has a Somersloop inserted, then the amplification only provides a 25% boost, not a 100% boost. This results in one production cycle's output being doubled, followed by three productions cycles without any boost.
Power usage
The power usage of an amplified building increases with the following formula:
This results in 4 times the power usage for a fully amplified machine.
The power increase with increased clock speed is multiplicative. This means that a fully amplified and 250% overclocked machine will consume 13.431× its base power usage.
Tips
- If unlocked early by finding Circuit Boards in Crash Site wreckage, amplification can be utilized in these early-game production lines. If the recipe is changed within a single machine, only 1 Somersloop is required:
- Alien Remains → Alien Protein → Biomass → Solid Biofuel for 8× the Solid Biofuel to use in Biomass Burners.
- Alien Remains → Alien Protein → Alien DNA Capsule for 4× the Alien DNA Capsules for AWESOME Sinks.
- Power Slug → Power Shard for 2× the Power Shards to use in overclocking.
- Project Assembly parts, to halve the cost of Space Elevator phases.
- Amplifying machines producing the final product results in the greatest material gains.
- If you don't intend to amplify all machines producing a given item, then spreading the Somersloops equally between them will lower the power demand without affecting the boost amount. However, keep the following tip in consideration:
- Combining overclocking and production amplification results in the greatest utilization of each Somersloop, as the amplification applies to increased clock speed. This means that the boost is effectively applied to 2.5 machines, not just 1 machine.
- However, this results in by far the highest power demand, for a 250% clock speed power usage is multiplied by 3.36 (see Clock speed § Remarkable clock speeds).
- The Quantum Encoder's power usage peaks at 2,000 MW by default. With a maximum overclock and amplification, it will average at 13,431 MW and peak at 26,862 MW.