How to Build Circles in Satisfactory
Epic Steam EA EX Intermediate Circle
This guide shows you how to create circles in Satisfactory, whether in vanilla, with the Satisfactory Calculator, or by using the Micro Manage Mod.
Praaug 29371 2020-09-26
How to Build Circular Foundations.
In this little guide, I show you how to build circular foundations. There are basically three different ways to achieve this.
The "Vanilla" way if you don't want to install mods, or upload your save to a third party site.
The "Micro Manage" way if you want to build smaller circles in-game, or using the
"Satisfactory-Calculator". This is most useful for larger circles as it correctly places the foundations regardless of the radius of the circle.
Video guides associated:
How to do circles the "Vanilla" way.
How to build circles using the Micro Manage and Satisfactory-Calculator.
Creating Circles in Vanilla
To build a circular platform using only in-game items, start by dropping an item to the ground. I normally use Wire.
Then switch to your foundation that you want to build and rotate it to the correct orientation.
You now need to stand on top of the wire and look straight down, jump and place the foundation directly beneath you.
At this point: Don't move anymore. Only rotate your body and build out a cross as far out as you want your circle to be.
Next, you need to dismantle the foundation you are standing on, as well as the four directly touching it, so that you are left with only the outer foundations. You now aim the foundation to the ground and use the scroll wheel to rotate it. In the case of the 2 foundation radius, I use increments of two.
Now again: Look straight down, jump and place the foundation and the four arms.
Repeat this process until the circle is complete. Once done you just need to fill in the holes:
Pros:
- You can build it without any third party mods or sites
- Easy for small circles
Cons:
- If you move, you have to redo the entire circle since you are not aligned anymore
- Only relatively big increments possible, which limit the radius of the circle
- Relatively hard to align the hight of two circles or curves, since they have a different center point
Creating Circles Using The Micro Manage Mod
This part will use the Mod "Micro Manage". To learn how to install mods, check our guide on installing mods.
The first thing you have to do is unlock the Micro Manage Tool. You can find the research in Hub Tier 1:
You need 100 Concrete, 50 Iron Plates, and 250 Screws for the research as well as 20 Iron Rods, 10 Iron Plates, and 5 Quartz Crystal at the workbench to build the tool.
After you equip the Microscope you get a little clipboard on the left side, that shows you the controls of the mod:
Now to begin with the actual circuit build.
Start out with a cross, then select the middle foundation with the `Crtl + left mouse button`. Then turning the platform with `Ctrl + J` for steps to the left or `Ctrl + L` for steps to the right.
With a 5x5 platform, I recommend 4 steps per turning cycle.
You now need to repeat that process until you are done with the circle.
If you are having trouble placing the last platforms, you can just dismantle the entire middle circle
Once done, you can then just build out the missing foundations
To finish up the build, just fill in the missing foundations.
Pros:
- Very intuitive to use
- Very fast
- Very easy to do multiple circuits/curves at the same height
Cons:
- Limited to specific increments which limit the radius of the circle.
- Requires the Micro Manage Mod
Creating Circles With The Satisfactory-Calculator
Start out with the middle foundation and then save your game.
Now go the interactive map part of the satisfactory-calculator website.
This Website can do so much more than just build circles, that it really needs its own guide.
Now open your save file by clicking on the button in the top left corner, or drag + drop your savefile in there.
The default location of the saves is:
`c:\Users\<userName>\AppData\Local\FactoryGame\Saved\SaveGames\<GUID>\`
You can just paste the following path in your browser and go into the id folder:
`%LocalAppData%\FactoryGame\Saved\SaveGames`
I usually sort this folder by "Date Modified descending". That way my most recent save is at the top of the list
The map will load and you can move around by clicking and holding your left mouse button. Right-click on the foundation that should be the middle of your circle and select "Spawn around 'Foundation 8m x 4m'".
This will open up a new Window:
You can select which form or Animal you want to spawn around that location. In the case of a circular build, we will use the "Plan Circle" option.
With the bottom option, you can select if items from your inventory and storage container should be consumed when building.
After clicking on "OK" you can specify the circle parameters. In this case, I used the standard six platform radius and 360° angle.
This will generate a perfect circle with the least platforms used to cover the area. We will clean up the middle platform in-game later.
To get this back into the game, you need to click on the small download button in the top left corner and move the file to the same save file folder as your normal save. The website will append a "- CALCULATOR" to the name of the savefile so that you know which file to load in-game. Go back into Satisfactory and Load the save. Don't use "Continue" since this will load the latest save you did in-game.
You should now see the platform at the correct location and the items missing from your storage if you selected "yes" for that option:
The only thing left to do now is cleaning up the middle part. For that, just delete the one or two most inner rings and place the foundations from the center platform.
Depending on how you want to use this build you can also replace all the round foundations except the outer ring. This way you can align your machines parallel. If you want to align your machines or storage also circular then you should leave more rows available.
For example, I arranged my "Mall" and main storage in a circular way, so I have everything right where I need it:
Pros:
- very clean outer rings
- the build itself is relatively fast
- no size limit (every radius between 3 and 256 foundations is possible)
Cons:
- Needs to upload and download to external site
Special thanks goes to Prauug for writing this guide and creating a video for the topic. Do check out his twitch channel. He normally streams in German but does speak English, so why not drop by and say hello, failing that he's just published his first video on youtube where I hope we'll see more great guides from him soon.
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