Console

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The console is the built in interface for lua-commands. It works a bit like any command-line-interface or the java-script-console for your browser.

Basically you can fire here all commands, like from any other lua-program (= Modding). This means you have full access to all in-game-internals.

In other words: Factorio doesn't need any special cheats, it has a console, which allows you to cheat around any limition, if you know how.

How to open the console?

You open the console by default with the key '/' or '~'. This is the chat window in multiplayer. You need to type '/c' in front of your commands, otherwise it is just a chat message!

To change that key go into the keyboard control and change "Toggle Lua console" to a useful key.

Editing

The console has an inbuilt history. You can use the "cursor-up"-key to edit/repeat the previous commands.

The game ignores newlines when pasting "scriptlets" in the console. This means they can be written in a human readable form in an editor and copy/pasted into the console, making understanding and editing a bit easier.

On the other hand, if you want to type several commands in one line you just need to put ';' (semicolon) between the commands - see examples down below.

Useful commands (cheats)

The 0.12.x updated added a _ to a the majority of the methods and properties.

• Remove all enemies from the map

   /c local surface = game.local_player.surface
   for c in surface.get_chunks() do
       for key, entity in pairs(surface.find_entities_filtered({area={{c.x * 32, c.y * 32}, {c.x * 32 + 32, c.y * 32 + 32}}, force= "enemy"})) do
           entity.destroy()
       end
   end

• Use it as command-line-calculator (see above: you can repeat command with the "cursor up"-key!)

/c game.local_player.print(1234 * 5678)

• Check how far the biters have evolved

/c game.local_player.print(game.evolution_factor)

• Turn off night

/c game.always_day=true

• Zoom out to place blueprints, that are bigger than your screen.

/c game.local_player.zoom = 0.1

• Kill all biters on the "enemy" force

/c game.forces["enemy"].kill_all_units()

• Add 100 iron plates to your inventory

/c game.local_player.insert{name="iron-plate", count=100}

• Refill resources (refill oil, iron etc.)

While holding the cursor over a resource in-game

/c game.local_player.selected.amount=7500

• Add new resource patch

This creates a new 5x5 patch of resources, centered on the player character. For resources other than stone, just change "stone" to "iron-ore", "copper-ore", or "coal"

/c local surface = game.local_player.surface;
for y=-2,2 do
 for x=-2,2 do
  surface.create_entity({name="stone", amount=5000, position={game.local_player.position.x+x, game.local_player.position.y+y}})
 end
end

• Finish research

/c for name,technology in pairs(game.local_player.force.technologies) do technology.researched=technology.enabled end

• Mine faster

/c game.local_player.force.manual_mining_speed_modifier=1000

• Craft faster

/c game.local_player.force.manual_crafting_speed_modifier=1000

• Switching on peacfulmode

/c game.peaceful_mode = true
/c game.forces["enemy"].kill_all_units()

• Faster research

/c game.local_player.force.laboratory_speed_modifier = 1

1 is normal speed, 2 is double speed 3 is triple etc. I think it goes up to 100.

• Destroy rocks in sandbox-mode (you don't have a player here, so you can't destroy anything)

 /c for _,entity in pairs(game.local_player.surface.find_entities_filtered{
       area={{game.local_player.position.x-32, game.local_player.position.y-32},
           {game.local_player.position.x+32, game.local_player.position.y+32}},
           name="stone-rock"})
 do
   entity.destroy()
 end

you need to center the rock in your vision range

• Use print() instead of game.local_player.print()

/c print = function(text) game.local_player.print(text) end

• Generate a section of the world and explore it at the same time

/c game.local_player.force.chart(game.local_player.surface,{lefttop = {x = -1024, y = -1024}, rightbottom = {x = 1024, y = 1024}})

Simply change the bounding box to the size you want and it will generate the map and explore it in that area. Keep In mind that command is telling Factorio to generate 64*64 (4096) chunks so it's going to take a while before all the background entity generation (trees, resources, biters) are placed in the world.

• Check water level in a pipe

/c game.local_player.print(game.local_player.selected.get_liquid().amount)

• Enabling technologies

/c game.local_player.force.technologies['electric-energy-distribution-1'].researched=true
/c game.local_player.force.technologies['steel-processing'].researched=true

• Player color

/c game.local_player.color={g=50,b=200,r=200,a=.9}

• Where can I see how many Robots are in my network?

Count all active robots

/c game.local_player.print(game.local_player.force.get_entitycount("logistic-robot"))
/c game.local_player.print(game.local_player.force.get_entitycount("construction-robot"))

Count all active and inactive robots in the network, but misses the ones flying over gaps in coverage: This is no longer needed because the roboport will give accurate counts.

   /c robots = {};
   roboports = {};
   logistic = 0;
   construction = 0;
   recurse = function(r)
      id = r.position.x .. "," .. r.position.y;
      if (roboports[id] or r.force.name ~= game.player.force.name) then return end;
      roboports[id] = true;
      logistic = logistic + r.getinventory(1).getitemcount("logistic-robot");
      construction = construction + r.getinventory(1).getitemcount("construction-robot");
      ids = {};
      for _, robot in ipairs(game.findentitiesfiltered{area={{r.position.x-50, r.position.y-50}, {r.position.x+50, r.position.y+50}}, name="construction-robot"}) do;
         id = robot.position.x .. "," .. robot.position.y;
         if ((ids[id] or not robots[id]) and robot.force.name == game.player.force.name) then;
            construction = construction + 1;
            ids[id] = true;
            robots[id] = true;
         end;
      end;
      for _, robot in ipairs(game.findentitiesfiltered{area={{r.position.x-50, r.position.y-50}, {r.position.x+50, r.position.y+50}}, name="logistic-robot"}) do;
         id = robot.position.x .. "," .. robot.position.y;
         if ((ids[id] or not robots[id]) and robot.force.name == game.player.force.name) then;
            logistic = logistic + 1;
            ids[id] = true;
            robots[id] = true;
         end;
      end;
      for _, roboport in ipairs(game.findentitiesfiltered{area={{r.position.x-48.5, r.position.y-48.5}, {r.position.x+48.5, r.position.y+48.5}}, name="roboport"}) do;
         recurse(roboport);
      end;
   end;
   p = game.player.character.position;
   roboport = game.findentitiesfiltered{area={{p.x-48.5, p.y-48.5}, {p.x+48.5, p.y+48.5}}, name="roboport"}[1];
   if (roboport) then;
      recurse(roboport);
      game.player.print("Robots in network: Construction:" .. construction .. " Logistic:" .. logistic);
   else;
      game.player.print("Not in range of a roboport.");
   end

• Disable evolution, increases pollution evolution instead

/c game.mapsettings.enemy_evolution.time_factor = 0.000008 * 0
/c game.mapsettings.enemy_evolution.pollution_factor = 0.00003 * 2

• Custom Scenario: How to spawn a character at a certain point (instead of being in god-mode

/c game.local_player.character = game.local_player.surface.create_entity{name="player", position = {0,0}, force = game.forces.player}

More commands can be looked up in the modding-section.

See also

• Superspeedrun
• The Console: What is it and How do I use it?

Some interesting cheats or useful commands and tips.

• Totaly new player -> setting up a game:

# Preface all console commands with /c in .11.0+

# Set player to white
game.local_player.color = {g=1,b=1,r=1,a=.9}

# remove old player
game.remove_offline_player("username")

# Technology and Recipe unlocking
game.local_player.force.reset_technologies()
game.local_player.force.reset_recipes()
game.local_player.force.enable_all_technologies() # does not research them (see below)
game.local_player.force.enable_all_recipes()
game.local_player.force.research_all_technologies()
game.local_player.force.technologies["technology-name"].researched = true

# cheating
game.local_player.force.manual_mining_speed_modifier = 200
game.local_player.force.manual_crafting_speed_modifier = 200
game.speed = 2
game.freeze_day_time()
game.always_day = true
game.peaceful_mode = true
game.local_player.insert{name="item-name", count=1}