Note: I will be improving this guide over it's lifetime, such as reducing wordiness, including better images, or suggesting ways to make the most of this build. This build still works as of 0.148 (any changes from previous versions have been largely unrelated to the contents of this guide.)

Factory Town originally began with a fairly straightforward economy; the player could choose to supply items directly to a house or indirectly to a shop, and both methods would yield the same profit and increase in town happiness. Additionally, shops could supply any house within a horizontal radius, so a market at sea level could supply a house high up in the sky, as long as the house was relatively close laterally.

This was the case until Patch 0.108; now shops would only supply houses connected by path tiles or navigable scaffolds. Additionally, houses and shops produced much less happiness, and houses no longer consumed items instantly. This change brought the economy down to earth and made specialized local markets for each kind of shop preferable to centralized house hubs, with players bypassing shops altogether in many arguments. In an older guide I showcased a design which could still connect many houses to all 4 shops for compact a way to sell goods and generate a moderate amount of happiness.

The design, which never left its prototype phase, became outdated as of Patch 0.128, where the game mechanics were again tweaked; a) shops had a reduction in vertical access to houses, and b) houses not in direct contact with a navigable path to the shops bounding square were not recognized (additional changes to the interactions between these buildings respective inventories were also changed but did not effect the functionality of the design.) The old design could then only support about half of the original 52 houses.

There were some positive changes however; happiness was revitalized with houses able to generate significant amounts of it on their own, and more categories of goods could be consumed simultaneously, boosting the amount of coins earned over time. With this addressing one of players main concerns with 0.108, all that remained was finding a reasonable design for the ultimate house hub. You can see the final product below, once again in its full (creative mode) glory!



The design contains all 100 houses and all 5 shop types within range of each other in the smallest volume possible. Additionally, each of the shops can be relocated depending on the players needs, and the introduction of omni-pipes means one can supply each shop with every good (albeit overkill and redundant) for the absolute maximum possible income and a maximum happiness generation of 5000 (insert DBZ reference.)

Caution: this design is intended to be at the very least mid-game, and the scope of the construction is very demanding and requires careful planning. If you're trying to get the basic structure out of the way there are a few milestones I would recommend completing first:

• Play normally until you have Foresters and Bans unlocked
  
• Have at least 2 dedicated plank factories, and if you're feeling fancy, 2 brick factories with storage
  
• Play until you are able to build level 5 houses; building houses up to level 5 immediately will save you time and patience

Also, due to the scale of the structure, you need to be very sure that your build site is where you want your hub to be. On the upside, once the basic structure is complete, all houses and shops will be path-accessible from the ground, so delivery of items early game will still be logistically feasible.

For starters you will need to find or make a plot with a 19x19 footprint. You can center this design directly on your base if you wish, but this will make your base largely inaccessible without independent changes to the design; building well above your base is recommended in this case. If using a regular ground plot, this is what you should have:



First, go 4 blocks out on both axes of a quadrant and place a column of scaffolds 5 high. Surround this column with a ramp spiral consisting of wooden stairs/stone ramps and wooden/stone bridges as shown below. Important: make note of whether your helices are clockwise or counter-clockwise (write it down!) On the top ramps for both sides place one-way logic blocks; one upward, one downward. You should have a structure like the one below (rotating counter-clockwise):



Using the columns tool select the whole 3x3 scaffold and copy it to the same position in the remaining quadrants without rotating (you can even place a spare one elsewhere if you think you'll need it, but this isn't necessary):



At this point you should remove any grid you have laid out in the ground and replace it with some basic infrastructure connecting the ramps to shops on the ground beneath the structure. Deliveries made here will reach the first 2 layers of houses, which will be followed by the shop layer. Now place wooden/stone bridges in a pound (#) formation and a ring formation in and around your 4 pillars as shown below. Copy the outer scaffold arrangement as well:



Time to place some houses! Place 25 houses on this layer in the formation below (orientation doesn't really matter here and can be changed at any time.) Be sure to copy the new one-way block layout as shown:



If you're not using manual delivery skip this section
At this point you're ready to start supplying your houses with goods. While the one-way blocks help direct any traffic, it's important not to overload your delivery system. Any number of workers should be okay, but as a rule of thumb avoid using more than 4 wagons per good type per level, and no more than 8 wagons/caravans per level (Level 1 example: 4 bread wagons , 2 shirt wagons, 2 juice wagons.)

Before building any higher heed this instruction! The best way to continue building by using the copy/block tools. You can either use a copied pillar or copy the whole first level (if doing the latter, copy only the first 5 layers, i.e. not the houses or one way blocks.) If your ramps run counter-clockwise, then when copying your structure you need to rotate (press R) 3 times per level skipped; if your ramps run clockwise, you need to rotate your structure only once per level skipped. For copying the first level using the block tool and holding the control key to adjust the height once the bounds are set, you can copy the first 5 layers of your structure (again, just the pillars and the platform; no houses or one-way blocks) and place another level above the first (make sure your scaffolds line up.) Note: while unlikely, houses on the top level may prevent placement of this level. Simply remove the problem house (likely the center one), place the next level, and replace the missing house.

If you're building along from the start you probably only have the base level for 24 or so houses; if this is the case then start by placing the center houses of the second level first and work your way out. If you have the resources, you can even repeat the previous step (Rotate accordingly!) and add the third level, the shop level, and start placing down your shops (read ahead for tips on placement.) In any case, your finished second level should look like this:



Now it's time to place your shops! Odds are that by now you at least have 3 or 4 shops unlocked; while shop placement doesn't really matter late-game (considering you can pump all of your goods directly using omni-pipes), proper placement can prevent traffic jams if you're still using wagons/caravans. For now, try to avoid using one ramp for more than 1 shop. You can refer to the layout below for relatively efficient delivery (I recommend researching up to caravans if you haven't already done so.) Note: some of the houses below may prevent shop placement if at level 3+. Simply delete the house, place the shop, and then replace the house (you can use the copy function to build an upgraded house):



All that remains are the last 2 levels, which are fundamentally the same and can be built by following the previous steps; just make sure that for each level you rotate the appropriate number of times. The complete structure is shown below:

This is likely the most compact hub design for its versatility and total shop coverage. This is due to each layer connecting 20 houses in a tight ring while still having room for 5 additional houses and 4-8 fully navigable ramps. This can be compacted to 4 layers by placing 6 additional houses on the 1st, 2nd, and 4th layers and the remaining 7 on the shop layer with the 5 shops at the expense of the inner delivery capacity, however this is not recommended for obvious reasons.

Please keep in mind that this is mainly a compact design; other house layouts can be more effective for your needs, however this is likely the best option for long term one-stop coin generation.

One important mechanic making this design possible is the following: any string of paths connected to a shop will connect adjacent houses to said shop as long as they remain within the bounding cylinder, a change from pre-0.128, where paths would eventually reach an upper limit to their usable length. Because of this mechanic, while the 0.108 model could have been constructed like the improved 0.128+ model, the distance along a path to some houses would go beyond this limit, resulting in the taller design over the stouter one.

I hope many of you found this guide helpful and worth the read! If you have any constructive questions or comments feel free to share below. And please let me know if you find any improvements; I'll be sure to make the appropriate additions in your name :)

Also a quick thanks to Desim for informing me of the change in mechanics which led to this design.

Consider liking or adding to favorites if you found this helpful. :)

Also feel free to check out my guide on Logistics and Compute blocks.