Originally posted by Erenussocrates:

I've laid down the proliferation for the coal based framework itself, I have mark 3 proliferation, and the main highway is fed excess mark 1 and 2 proliferators as well, which ensures that there will be some degree of proliferation in the flow even if production of mark 3 falters.

You want to avoid that since proliferation will default to the lowest proliferated input, so getting mark 2 stuff in will waste your mark 3. Plus you want to proliferate your mark 3 stuff with mark 3 for the extra charges.

Easiest way would be north/south running belts with the mark 3 paint. With the idea of putting sized production blocks in alignment.

For example, blocks of circuit board factories where all the proliferators line up, then connect it via a north/south running belt. Then it is an easy adding splitters to the existing lines at the north/south points to allow for a new block

Once you get the hang of it, the spraying process is pretty simple. Find your ingredients, put sprayers on the line, feed the sprayers.

Fidget spinner logi bots are your friend. Build one or 2 stations that collect a pile of sprayer, then use the mini bots to distribute them in boxes across the planet. Oh, and be sure to max out the power setting on the logi stations. It's needed to keep up with stacked high speed belts.

Sprayers get obliterated by power shortages. They take pennies of power to run, but if power runs low then they start missing sprays. Missing any spray at all will destroy the bonus. if a thing is fully sprayed it won't waste any more sprays, but getting a 2 star will waste a ton of sprays to get it back up to 3 star.

In general, don't bother spraying factory outputs. A single unit of contamination, from any planet, any place, at any time, will ruin every single factory that depends on those items. You will have to spray everything all over again. Spray at the factory input. It lets you choose exactly which recipes get full spray, and ensures no waste outside of it. It also minimizes large scale damage from missed sprays. If something goes wrong, the problem stays constrained to that one factory piece. It won't spread throughout the galaxy.

The one exception is I spray all fuel cells the instant they're produced. That way if any planet has a power shortage, it doesn't damage the sprays on the fuel. Lost fuel sprays are a death spiral which would make the power shortage even worse.

PS. The first place to use sprayers, is on the sprayer production line! Hit everything with blue spray, all the way to blue spray. It's a great way to get familiar with the spraying process, and it saves a ton of coal at the same time.

I just use either dedicated ILS or free slot on topmost or bottom most ILS then run belt vertically through whole production line, granted it doesn't always allow to run through whole planet and might need 2nd belt depending on how fast production goes.

And as Bobucles said, don't mix proliferators nor spray outputs, it will really mess things up. Spraying ILS outputs right before they get used is the best way to ensure everything is proliferated properly.

Having production organized in neat rows helps a lot.

I don't get what you mean by don't mix spray marks though, the spray coater doesn't take in different kinds of proliferators and it waits until the current mark is completely emptied out in the tank, if there is a different kind waiting next in the line?

Originally posted by Erenussocrates:

I don't get what you mean by don't mix spray marks though, ...

Whatever you are doing here:

I've laid down the proliferation for the coal based framework itself, I have mark 3 proliferation, and the main highway is fed excess mark 1 and 2 proliferators as well, which ensures that there will be some degree of proliferation in the flow even if production of mark 3 falters.

...isn't going to be helpful. Simply make and distribute enough mark 3 pro-- do not distribute lower marks of pro.

Yes but you still haven't explained the point that I'm actually confused about

Originally posted by Erenussocrates:

Yes but you still haven't explained the point that I'm actually confused about

The "...if there is a different kind waiting next in the line?"

Don't. Do not mix different kinds of pro anywhere, because having some spray coaters get pro 3 and others pro 2 or 1 will not work.

Maybe try it and figure it out? Sprayers aren't that tricky. The items go through the bottom line (forward or back, both ways work), the spray fuel goes 1 elevation above into a slot at the top. Belts can go through and feed multiple sprayers at a time.

I'd love to see a few end-of-game saved games from our expert players, which give a good representation of their own preferred practices. How they handle proliferation would be helpful to observe. Whatever we do, it must be contemplated and planned starting early in the game to avoid adding spaghetti to spaghetti.

My approach for the home planet is a circular distribution belt around one of the poles with twenty spokes radiating out from it at longitudes evenly divisible by 18. These longitudes accommodate straight lines however far towards the equator you need them to go. Pre-build them to whatever extent necessary to ensure that the space remains unobstructed. Those radiating belts along which proliferator is made or imported carry it towards the polar hub, and the others carry it away from it. Those belts not currently needed can also go towards the pole so that they remain empty. Of course, the distance between these spokes at high latitudes is small, but still useful for low-quantity production. Approaching the equator, you might be surprised by how far apart they are. Sooner or later, the vast majority of these belts will be used.

Most of my production on other planets is built near the equator, and I try to minimize the number of ILS slots that must provide proliferator. This means a few rather long north-south belts with proliferator, and as many production lines along it as possible. The result might not be pretty, but I think that it is efficient if the production lines are in a logical sequence so that outputs become inputs nearby.

Proliferation is very simple if all your logistics are built around logistic stations.
all my logistic stations import sprayer mk3, it then is output from the station which immediatelly sprays all other outputs that come from the logistic station.

Assuming you have a centralised megafactory that builds mk3 sprayed proliferator, which then is the single point of export of that proliferator, all your empire's logistic stations that import sprayer should have the top tier one, simplifying logistics.

Its time consuming to blueprint first instance of every such station, but it pays later down the line.

in the image you can see how a logistic station is used to produce a single specific item, all the required materials are proliferated before they are fed to assemblers.
https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3408362970

I have most things blueprinted using logistic stations, so if i am low on <a thing X>, i just plop the X thing producing blueprint anywhere in the cluster and it just works.

The hardest part is then to just monitor if you have enough proliferator being made in your proliferator megafactory.

Most of my logistic station based factories are designed in such a way that they fit vertically on the equator zone while also fitting horizontally on the more polar zones.

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3408364656

Lots of resources are in abundance late game but early mid can be tight or you want more throughput so i just use it on the important stuff i know is tight until later. However i would at least advise spraying science for the extra Hashs. Mk2 is fine till later on when you can get a lot of what you need for Mk3 as it is expensive. This is my approach.

Originally posted by Ragnaman:

Proliferation is very simple if all your logistics are built around logistic stations.
all my logistic stations import sprayer mk3, it then is output from the station which immediatelly sprays all other outputs that come from the logistic station.

Assuming you have a centralised megafactory that builds mk3 sprayed proliferator, which then is the single point of export of that proliferator, all your empire's logistic stations that import sprayer should have the top tier one, simplifying logistics.

Its time consuming to blueprint first instance of every such station, but it pays later down the line.

in the image you can see how a logistic station is used to produce a single specific item, all the required materials are proliferated before they are fed to assemblers.
https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3408362970

I have most things blueprinted using logistic stations, so if i am low on <a thing X>, i just plop the X thing producing blueprint anywhere in the cluster and it just works.

The hardest part is then to just monitor if you have enough proliferator being made in your proliferator megafactory.

Most of my logistic station based factories are designed in such a way that they fit vertically on the equator zone while also fitting horizontally on the more polar zones.

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3408364656

So what I'm seeing is, you are plopping down a separate planetary logistics tower just focused on providing the inputs for a single production item, repeated for every single craftable item, is that so? Just one of those towers are really expensive. But wouldn't that become quite expensive and maybe even slower depending on circumstances?

Originally posted by Erenussocrates:

So what I'm seeing is, you are plopping down a separate planetary logistics tower just focused on providing the inputs for a single production item, repeated for every single craftable item, is that so? Just one of those towers are really expensive. But wouldn't that become quite expensive and maybe even slower depending on circumstances?

20 steel, 40 titanium ingots, 40 processors, 20 particle containers per PLS according to the wiki.
Depending on the starting seed (fire ice or not) I could see the 20 particle containers as a bit expensive early-mid game. (processors you chew through at 2 per purple matrix, so that's only 20 purple matrixes worth of them per PLS)
But I'd have to check, but I think later game I always carry around either 50 or 100 PLSes in Icarus' inventory.
Switching to a bunch of PLS/ILSes as factory input instead of belt spaghetti should be viable from home planet + nearby titanium planet conquered onward.
Some people even go to using all ILSes for those cases (extra 20 particle containers and 40 titanium alloy according to the wiki)

A single tower to feed an entire planet? Yeah, that's fine. It's way better than wasting 1/5 of a dozen towers to feed each line. The mini logi does get stressed trying to cross the emtire planet, though. 2 supply towers, each at the poles, should be rock solid.

Unfortunately there are no alarm systems to deal with proliferator towers running low on material. There is only flow sensors or online sensors. You'll just have to get a feel for what is good or bad, I guess.

Originally posted by Erenussocrates:

Yes but you still haven't explained the point that I'm actually confused about

If you have different tiers of proliferation on ingredients being used in the same recipe then the machine conuming them will use the lowest proliferation level of all the ingredients.

Example: proliferator mk2 on one ingredient and proliferator mk1 on the other will make the machine using them see both as having proliferator mk1.

All that means is you're wasting resources because you're not getting the benefit of using mk2