Transport Drones (Continued)

A ground-based logistics system for Factorio 2.0. Transport drones haul items and fluids between depots connected by road networks - a flexible alternative to belts and trains for mid-to-late game logistics.

This is a full rewrite of Klonan's Transport Drones for Factorio 2.0, with major new features: quality scaling, priority routing, channel segregation, supply thresholds, load balancing, blueprint persistence, circuit network overhaul, bot integration, Factorissimo 3 cross-surface support, and more.

Graphics by Bubbles from the Factorio discord.

How it works

• Build roads to connect your production areas.
• Place depots on the road network: supply depots offer items, request depots collect them.
• Insert transport drones into depots. Drones autonomously pick up items from supply depots and deliver them to request depots.
• Fuel the network with fuel depots - drones consume fuel proportional to travel distance.
  

Depot types

Supply depot

Makes its inventory available to the road network. Other depots dispatch drones to collect from it.

• Quality scaling: 80 / 100 / 125 / 175 / 250 inventory slots.
• Optional logistics bot access (passive provider) with the Transport Logistics research.
• Supply threshold: reserves items below a set count, only offering excess to the network.
  

Request depot

Dispatches drones to collect a selected item from supply depots. The number of drones controls throughput - more drones means more concurrent deliveries.

• Quality scaling: 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 10 drone slots.
• Max storage cap, ignore capacity research, and full stack only toggles for fine-tuned control.
• Supports both items and fluids (connect pipes to the output side for fluids).
  

Buffer depot

Acts as both a request and supply depot. Ideal for collecting resources from distant outposts and redistributing them locally.

• Quality scaling: 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 10 drone slots.
• Optional logistics bot access (buffer chest).
  

Fuel depot

Delivers fuel to all depots on the road network. Fuel type is configurable (petroleum gas by default).

• Quality scaling: 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 10 drone slots.
  

Fluid depot

Makes fluid available to the road network. Connect it to pipes - request depots can request fluids just like items.

Active depot

A push-based supplier for mixed item output. Automatically offers whatever items it contains to the network without needing a recipe - ideal for assembler outputs with multiple products.

• Fluid mode toggle: switch between pushing items (from chest) and pushing fluids (from south pipe). The entity swaps to a furnace variant that auto-detects the piped fluid.
• Confirmation dialog warns before switching when contents would be lost.
• Can be disabled via startup setting.
  

Storage depot

A passive warehouse for the drone transport network. Accepts overflow from active depots and serves items back when requested.

• Prioritized over supply depots at equal score (preferred sink for excess items).
• Shows zero-count items in the road network GUI so you can see what was stored even when depleted.
• Can be disabled via startup setting.
  

Drone dispatcher

Holds transport drones and distributes them to other depots on the road network.

• Drone request slider: each depot can request a specific number of drones from the dispatcher.
• Priority-based distribution: higher-priority dispatchers distribute drones first.
• Return slots: locked inventory slots collect excess drones when a depot's slider is reduced. Drones are returned automatically.
• Central dispatch mode: the dispatcher sends its own drones to pick up items from supply/active depots and deliver them to request/buffer/storage depots. Configurable with a drone allocation slider (percentage of inventory available for central deliveries). Each depot has an "Allow central dispatch" toggle to opt in or out.
• Can be disabled via startup setting.
  

All depot settings - recipe, drones, priority, channel, threshold, and toggles - are configured in a single unified Transport Drones panel that opens when clicking any depot. Removing a depot returns its contents to the player's inventory.

Roads

• Road - Standard tile. Walking speed bonus: 1.5x.
• Fast Road - Upgraded tile. Walking speed bonus: 2.0x. Drones are ~33% faster on fast roads.
  

Any connected road tiles form a road network. Disconnected road areas are separate networks.

Diagonal crossing prevention (enabled by default) stops drones from connecting road networks diagonally through non-road corners.

Roads can also be placed on space platform foundations (Space Age).

Quality support

Depot quality scales inventory size:

• Supply inventory: 80 / 100 / 125 / 175 / 250 slots (Normal to Legendary)
• Drone slots: 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 10 (Normal to Legendary)
  

Drone quality scales performance:

• Speed bonus: +15% / +30% / +50% / +80% (Uncommon to Legendary)
• Fuel savings: 10% / 20% / 30% / 45% (Uncommon to Legendary)
  

Any quality drone can be used in any quality depot. Drones are stored in a separate drone inventory that supports logistics robot delivery for automated restocking. Higher-quality drones are dispatched first (legendary before epic, etc.).

Priority system

Every depot has a priority slider (0-100, default 50):

• Supply/fuel depots: higher priority = collected from first, even if farther away.
• Request/buffer depots: higher priority = claims scarce supply first.
  

Priority can be overridden via circuit network using signal [P].

Load balancing

Two runtime settings fine-tune supply selection:

• Load balance threshold (default: 20) - when greater than 0, supply depots with similar scores are treated as equivalent and one is chosen randomly, spreading load across nearby depots.
• Priority weight (default: 0) - replaces the absolute priority system with a weighted bias, making priority a soft preference that can be outweighed by distance.
  

Supply threshold

Supplier depots (supply, buffer, fluid, mining) can set a supply threshold - items below this count are reserved and not offered to the network. Only excess above the threshold is available for drones to collect.

• Set in the depot panel or via circuit writer using signal [T].
• Useful for keeping a minimum buffer in supply depots before serving requests.
  

Channel segregation

LTN-style bitmask channels let you run multiple independent logistics networks on the same physical roads.

• Default: -1 (all channels - everything interacts).
• Assign channels like 1, 2, 4, 8… to segregate traffic.
• Depots only interact when their channels share at least one bit (bitwise AND != 0).
• Fuel depots respect channels - they only fuel depots on matching channels.
• Overridable via circuit network using signal [C].
  

Circuit network integration

Three circuit entities, unlocked by the Transport Depot Circuits research:

Depot reader

Reads the contents of the attached depot as circuit signals. Works on all depot types (supply, request, buffer, fuel, fluid, active, storage, mining, dispatcher).

Three modes:

• Network total - total supply across the entire road network.
• Depot local - only the attached depot's contents.
• Network minus local - network total excluding the attached depot (prevents feedback loops).
  

Additional signals (configurable via toggles):

• [D] - drone count
• Active drone count
• Fuel level
• Used stacks / max stacks
• Max capacity ([M])
• Stack size
  

Depot writer

Controls the attached depot via circuit signals:

• Set Filter mode: force the depot's recipe via circuit signal. Supports Anything/Everything virtual signals. The highest-count item signal wins when multiple are present.
• Enable/disable condition: enable or disable a depot based on signal comparison (signal vs constant, or signal vs signal). Disabled depots show a visual status indicator.
• Override priority, channel, and supply threshold via signals [P], [C], [T].
• Override request count: if the signal matches the requested item with condition =, the depot uses that value as its target.
• Custom GUI with live signal value display (auto-refreshes every 0.5s).
  

Road network reader

Set one or more item signals in its slots - it continuously outputs the total supply of each item across the entire road network. Useful for enabling/disabling production based on network stock levels.

Compatible depots are highlighted when placing circuit entities.

Blueprint support

Blueprints fully preserve:

• Requested item recipe
• Per-quality drone counts (logistics request proxy created automatically)
• Priority, channel, storage limit, supply threshold, and all toggle settings
• Active depot fluid mode
  

Paste a blueprint and logistics bots will deliver the correct drones automatically.

Logistics bot integration

With the Tr