Automating Distribution?
Jayson
distribution from say, a mine to a light factory. So that every update
iron that is produced at the mine is distributed to the light
factory. But for some reason, it does not seem to work the way I am
doing it. How does distribution and deliver work, and how can I tell
how much commodity is sitting around at a factory or a warehouse?
~~J
Gemini
I'm not sure how you're trying to accomplish this, but the method for
automating distribution is to set your producing sectors to distribute
to a warehouse or harbor - they both have a bonus when auto-distributing
(reduced mobility cost).
Lets say your m is in sector 1,1 and your lcm is in 2,3 and a warehouse
is in 3,2.
You would:
distr 1,1 3,2
distr 2,3 3,2
This sets both you j and your l sector to use the w in 3,2 as a
distribution center.
The next key is to use threshold. Auto distribution only works when the
threshold for a commodity is greater than 0. That means, the only way to
get the mine to distribute iron to the warehouse is to sets its iron
threshold to 1. The reason for this is that a threshold of 0 means don't
distribute. Setting it to 1 means it will import/export iron to/from the
warehouse in an attempt to keep 1 iron in the sector. Since you m will
produce iron, it keeps one and moves all the rest to the warehouse.
Next, using the same concept, we need to tell the lcm factory to bring
in needed iron for production. So again, we use the threshold command in
our j sector setting it to an appropriate level - lets say its early and
our p.e. is low and we have no uws yet, so we set the iron threshold to
610 - since lets say we have an avail of 610 in the sector, and there's
only 1 commodity, then we use 1 avail per iron used - actual lcms used
is based on p.e. Use the production command to see all this info.
thresh i 1,1 1
thresh i 2,3 610
So, at each update, the m in 1,1 will distribute all but 1 of its iron
to the warehouse. Then, the warehouse will move enough iron into lcm
factory sector to bring it to 600.
to check how many commodities are in a sector, use the commodity command:
comm 1,1 might yield
COMMODITIES deliver-- distribute
sect sgpidbolhr sgpidbolhr sh gun pet iron dust bar oil lcm hcm rad
1,1 m .......... ...0...... 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0
1 sector
Deliver can be another session - that's a whole 'nother animal. :D
Let me know if there are any other questions, or if you need anything
clarified.
Also, you might be wondering why we don't just distribute to the lcm
factory, and if you're curious, we can discuss that - but I think the
info pages should give you all the info you need. But I agree that
sometimes all the information isn't helpful, if you're not sure of the
general concept.
Info pages to peruse:
info distribute
info Distribution
info level
info threshold
info commodity
info production
Scott C. Zielinski
Gemini
]G[
tracy johnson
| \| |/ _ \ \ /\ / / | || __/ _ \ '_ ` _ \
| |\ | __/\ V V / | || || __/ | | | | |
|_| \_|\___| \_/\_/ |___|\__\___|_| |_| |_|
.
The MAT.erial command now sorts! You can now sort by
any of the items presented. Below is from the updated
HELP command:
.
[EDEN : 99/255]: HELP MAT
MATERIEL (Land or Sea)
Gives you a list of your materiel on all your islands.
(Explosives, Planes, ect...)
MAT[eriel] [NOTOTALS]
[A(rtillery)]
[E(xplosives)]
[F(ighters)]
[B(ombers)]
[S(ectors)]
[P(ower)]
[AS(cending)]
Specifying a materiel type will sort the islands by that materiel.
Ascending reverses the sort order.
.
EXAMPLE:
.
[EDEN : 99/255]: MAT F AS
FLEET[1] Materiel Report Sorted by Fighters (Ascending)
Date: 45470.00
Num. Sect Art Explos Fightr Bomber Power TL Island Name
---- ---- ---- ------- ------ ------ ------- --
------------------------
9. 27 243 26973 445 196 149796 99 FLEET 9
8. 62 558 61938 999 501 351876 99 FLEET 8
10. 27 234 26973 999 151 195746 99 FLEET 10
7. 48 359 47952 1508 278 320254 99 FLEET 7
2. 292 453 66483 4975 269 706916 99 FLEET 2
4. 270 415 57487 8379 3293 1632224 99 FLEET 4
6. 339 439 75717 12434 2138 1844384 99 FLEET 6
1. 598 1698 231068 21975 26342 8012936 99 EDEN
3. 321 2655 294705 28313 6408 4835060 99 FLEET 3
5. 577 994 132081 29242 7345 4707062 99 FLEET 5
--------- ---- ------- ------ ------ ----------
2561 8048 1021377 109269 46921 22756254
---- ------- ------ ------ ----------
Navy 60 6800 0 0 29900
--------- ---- ------- ------ ------ ----------
Totals 8108 1028177 109269 46921 22786154
Martin Neitzel
Scott's explanation was already excellent, here are some assorted
remarks from my side:
- When I began, I had trouble to make "distribution" work, too.
My error was that the level "0" means "don't do any levelling
at all". To push out (allmost) all iron out of your mines,
you have to adjust the the level to "1":
threshold i * ?des=m 1
- You can use a single warehouse (or harbour) as your only
distribution point for an entire island of size 40 or 50
and you don't have to take care about mobility or building
roads. The distribution hub doesn't even have to be in
the middle of the island, you could put it pretty much
anywhere.
I usually use one realm per island and a command such as
distr #4 7,9
is all which is needed when the warehouse is at 7,9.
Then you just use lots of "threshold" commands to define
your target levels for the various sectors to push or pull
goods. You do NOT set any thresholds at for the warehouse
sector. (Another mistake I made as a beginner.)
- If you want to stop any further automatic distribution in
a sector for some good, set the target level to "0".
- You can ignore the "deliver" mechanism completely and just
rely on "distribution" for an entire island.
You can use direct deliveries later on for additional
finetuning, though. (I like to push "any civilians
beyond 800" into a neighbouring harbour to be able
to staff my cargo ships, for example).
- Timing: First all "push out" distributions are done,
in a second pass all "pull ins". Production of goods
happens after that. This order is quite nice. In
particular, you don't need to worry about any "top to
bottom / left to right" ordering between producing and
consuming sectors.
However, all this just happens during the update moment.
A "threshold" doesn't have an immediate effect (such
as "move/explore/nav").
Deliveries _do_ happen during a top-to-bottom/left-to-right
scan of all sectors. This means that a "deliver" chain
mine --(iron)-> j --(lcm)-> park
gets productive more quickly if these sectors are sited
"along the standard coordinate scan".
- Command groups:
distribute / threshold / level work together.
deliver / route work together.
com/prod are helpful to see where levels need still
some adjustment.
- I use distribution levels to fill my islands with
civs, too. I usually don't use "move" commands.
Martin Neitzel
Jayson
>
> Lets say your m is in sector 1,1 and your lcm is in 2,3 and a warehouse
> is in 3,2.
>
> You would:
>
> distr 1,1 3,2
> distr 2,3 3,2
>
> This sets both you j and your l sector to use the w in 3,2 as a
> distribution center.
>
> in needed iron for production. So again, we use the threshold command in
> our j sector setting it to an appropriate level - lets say its early and
> our p.e. is low and we have no uws yet, so we set the iron threshold to
> 610 - since lets say we have an avail of 610 in the sector, and there's
> only 1 commodity, then we use 1 avail per iron used - actual lcms used
> is based on p.e. Use the production command to see all this info.
>
> thresh i 1,1 1
> thresh i 2,3 610
>
Great explaination Gemini, Thanks. My problem was that I had not set a
threshold. The other problem is that I was trying to distribute
directly from the mine to the lcm, and from and lcm directly to a
library. So the correct way would have been to set the distribution of
the mine, lcm and library to a warehouse, and then set the thresholds
for each to be the amount I want to be in that sector each turn. For
the mines 1, and for the producing sectors, the max that they can
produce. I will have to do some more reading about p.e and uws and all
that. My head was starting to hurt right around then. UN-compensated
Workers? and p.e.? Feel free to elaborate if you get a moment.
Thanks again,
~~J
Jayson
>
> - When I began, I had trouble to make "distribution" work, too.
> My error was that the level "0" means "don't do any levelling
> at all". To push out (allmost) all iron out of your mines,
> you have to adjust the the level to "1":
> threshold i * ?des=m 1
Very useful tips. So in order to push out civs the same way, you would
have to set each sector to have the warehouse as a distribution point,
and then also set the thresholds of civs for the capital, or what ever other
sector you want, to 800 or so?
~~J
Gemini
correct - as I think was mentioned before - using the realm command is
very useful for this. Check the info pages for realm. In the very
begining, you could use the * - meaning every sector you own.
So, you could:
distr * 3,2 (make all sectors you own distribute to 3,2)
thresh civ * 800 (set the threshold of civs in all sectors you own to 800)
Using realms you could:
distr # 3,2 (make all sectors in the default realm deliver to sector 3,2)
thresh civ # 800 (set the threshold of covs for all sectors in the
default realm to 800)
Territories become useful as well once you get a couple of expansion
island conquered - but their concept is a little strange and I consider
it a more advanced topic.
Selectors really help, like Martin noted:
threshold i * ?des=m 1 (set the threshold of iron in all owned sectors
that have been designated m to 1)
check out info syntax and info selector - once I discovered conditional
selectors, the way to play the game completely changed - and it made it
so much easier.
The idea behind centralizing distribution is to remove the shear volume
of micromanagement that would otherwise be present.
You can set your mine to distribute to the lcm and then from there to
the library, but, here's why that starts to break down. The lcm factory
will produce lots of lcm, likely over 500 even to start. But, your
library will probably only need < 100 for the first couple of updates -
if the lcm is distributing to the library, how do you get its lcms to a
harbor for ships or a park for happiness or tech center, etc.
By utilizing central warehousing, all of you lcm can then be divvied up
with all the other sectors that need it - and you don't have to worry
about who's producing what for whom - just how much.
Scott C. Zielinski
Gemini
Garry Moorer
The nation command will tell you the exact number of civs (and uws)
you can keep in a sector before the update, without the sector being
overpopulated.
For example, in 60 etu games these days, it usually is 769. I don't
distribute civs but if you set the threshold above that amount of
people and don't move the extra, you are "truncating" people and
therefore losing money since you will have less people, and less tax
income. I'd only dist my civs if I knew I would be gone for a few
days.
On Sep 27, 11:58 pm, Gemini <sco...@websagacity.com> wrote:
> Jayson wrote: