This is useful info for me. I've only started two games in Satisfactory, the first was two updates ago and started in the first location, and the second was started and abandoned shortly before Update 5 in the second location which just never grabbed me, might have to try out these dunes.
I'm also thinking of modding out the hostile wildlife, Satisfactory is one of my go-to podcast games and without audio most sessions involve repeatedly having the piss scared out of my by those big lizardy lion things slamming into me from behind while I'm smelling the flowers. Can you recommend any other QoL mods?
For QoL mods, you might consider:
Passive Mode-no enemies or poison gasses
PermaDay-no night time. You can always see!
No Fall Damage
Additional 300 Slots Inventory
Fast Forward-just waiting for things to craft for the space elevator? speed up time
Structural Solutions-gives you a bunch of new walls and foundations to play with.
More Decorations-if you are into that. gives a ton of things to place around
Full Health Regeneration - regenerates health over time
If you want to get a little cheaty or play in creative mode there's always these:
Progressive Trains and Drones - get them earlier in the game. Also, drones don't require the insane end-of-game recipe for batteries, which makes them kind of useless. Unfortunately, they still can't carry much.
OR
DI Transportation - Improved trains and drones with a new battery recipe for drones, and drones can carry about 4X as much. Can't unlock until tier 6, but at least you'd get some use out of them.
Advanced Logistics - An earlier unlock of smart splitters that allows you to determine how many items go which directions (for instance, you could send 3 items to the middle conveyor and one item to the left conveyor)
Just Fly (lets you fly)
Refined Power - Adds things like solar power and wind turbines. But it also adds a ridiculous Dyson Sphere.
Faster Manual Crafting (speeds up the crafting bench)
Storage Teleporter (use this to teleport items from one area of your factory to another. I use it some playthroughs to create a warehouse without having to run conveyors there for everything.)
Fluid Sink and More (gives you a pipe end that dumps excess water, or any other fluid. It makes aluminum and nuclear processing easier. You might want to play at least once without it to get the intended challenge. Also gives you a water drill so that you can drill for water anywhere. That's a huge cheat because running pipes around and having to contend with gravity is a big part of the fluids update. Again, that one might be better just for a relaxing second playthrough)
Craftable Slugs (yep, you'll be able to overclock basically everything--you'll need a lot more power though)
Geothermal MK0 (an energy cheat. gives you a 10000 megawatt geothermal power plant. Again, that completely changes the game and may be better for a second playthrough, but if you are playing with craftable slugs, you might want to consider it)
Infinite Storage Container
Item Spawner (this is the creative mod)
Magic Splitter-Takes stuff off a conveyor belt and distributes it to any machine that needs it. I used it on one playthrough to play without conveyors at all. Wasn't as much fun, to be honest, but a lot of people use it, so I thought I would mention it.