Storage Bin Default Setup

[Kilyle]

I make a couple new storage bins and get kinda thoughtless with the categories and suddenly my peeps get bored enough to tote active slime all the way from the cistern to the private chambers, filling my base with Slimelung.

Well, great.  Thanks ever so much, peeps.

Trying to manage storage bins is fiddly and frustrating.  And that's on top of the way that moving between storage bins keeps jumping the list around, so trying to change settings on multiple storage bins is an exercise in frustration all on its own.

I would very much like to be able to set the parameters more easily.  Thusly:

1. Copy a particular setting and easily paste it across other storage bins, without having to set the categories manually
2. Save a small variety of storage groups and easily set new bins to one of my saved settings (e.g. Minerals & Metals, Agriculture & Soil & Seeds, Underwater Only (ice & slime), Construction Zone (sandstone & copper/gold), etc.)
3. Set the default storage bin categories (e.g. new bins automatically accept minerals and metals)
4. Set some banned items that are never held in a storage chest, or are never held in a storage chest unless I hit the Unlock button that gives that particular chest the ability to store banned items (e.g. I never want them to gather Critter Eggs or Ice, and I want them to gather Slime only ever in very special nearby containers, not trek the slime across the base because an errant bin got labeled "put slime here")

Basically the only time I wind up figuring out that they've stored ice in the bins is when there's mysterious fresh water somewhere, and the only time I figure out that they've stored eggs in the bins is when I realize the eggs are missing from where I thought I'd put them, and the only time I figure out that they've stored slime in the bins is when everything is horrible and why didn't I notice earlier and maybe I should just rage quit and start a new world 

So it'd be nice to be able to tell them that no, I do not ever want you storing ice in bins except for that one special bin in my well, thank you.  Or the like.

P.S. Why does it even say that you can Sweep bottles of water if there's actually no storage container that holds them?  Being able to put them in the bottle emptier doesn't feel like a sweep option.  Would be nice to be able to say "sweep" for bottles of water and just point at a specific location for all bottles in the area to get consolidated into, because right now I'm still going "select, move, here; select, move, here; select, move, here" for dozens of bottles every time anyone makes a mess, and if I hit Sweep it just makes a "we have no place to sweep that to" alert on all the bottles, and it's frustrating and time-consuming and not fun.  And even if I have the bottle emptier set up, they seem to only bring one bottle at a time, not gather it all together and stick it next to the bottle emptier for easy access next time.

[meekay]

One of my frustrations is on larger maps I'd like to be able to set up a conveyor belt so that suited dupes working down in the oil biome will drop materials onto the conveyor and let the rail do the work of carrying it all the way up to the base. With the current priority system there's no way to enforce that -- you end up with well-meaning dupes carrying hot rocks up 50 flights of stairs themselves. Or bored dupes picking up materials out of their final destinations and carrying them back down to the start of the conveyor belt, ad infinitum. 

You run into similar issues with volcano tamers unless you seal off the steam chambers to prevent dupes from bypassing your cooling loop.

Being able to specify that a storage bin or refinement building is for automated use only would be a big help.

[Charletrom]

2 hours ago, meekay said:

One of my frustrations is on larger maps I'd like to be able to set up a conveyor belt so that suited dupes working down in the oil biome will drop materials onto the conveyor and let the rail do the work of carrying it all the way up to the base. With the current priority system there's no way to enforce that -- you end up with well-meaning dupes carrying hot rocks up 50 flights of stairs themselves. Or bored dupes picking up materials out of their final destinations and carrying them back down to the start of the conveyor belt, ad infinitum. 

You run into similar issues with volcano tamers unless you seal off the steam chambers to prevent dupes from bypassing your cooling loop.

Being able to specify that a storage bin or refinement building is for automated use only would be a big help.

Try the “No Manual Delivery” mod. IMO it should be vanilla.

[goboking]

29 minutes ago, meekay said:

One of my frustrations is on larger maps I'd like to be able to set up a conveyor belt so that suited dupes working down in the oil biome will drop materials onto the conveyor and let the rail do the work of carrying it all the way up to the base. With the current priority system there's no way to enforce that -- you end up with well-meaning dupes carrying hot rocks up 50 flights of stairs themselves. Or bored dupes picking up materials out of their final destinations and carrying them back down to the start of the conveyor belt, ad infinitum. 

 

If you've specialized your workforce, you can mitigate this to a degree via door permissions.  If the materials are dumped form the conveyor rail into Room A, don't allow the dupes working in the oil biome into Room A and don't allow the dupes working in Room A into the oil biome.