Auto-wrangle option missing?

[Kiel814]

This is probably not a bug, just me being silly...

Why do my critter drop offs do not have the auto-wrangle option?

I was looking at a ranching tutorial and noticed it on the video, but there is no such option in my game?

Is it related to the DLC? I only have the base game. Is it a mod? Everyone seems to give it for granted, yet I can't find it.

[Nase]

Those videos are probably referencing the old Critter Drop Off that doubled as a pick-up (hence the auto-wrangle option). One of the most recent updates split the functionality into two buildings, so auto-wrangle is no longer relevant. You'll simply need to build the Critter Pick-Up (similar looking building, but blue and pointing up), and IIRC it will just auto-wrangle once critters exceed the maximum amount set.

[Kiel814]

Oh I see! This is even better. If I'm not mistaken this will make puft ranching trivial. No need for that crazy amount of automation I was watching.

Thanks!

[Sotanaht]

How do you automate it now?

So I have 2 rooms.  One is a Breeding room, the other is Overflow.  I want to wrangle critters from Overflow back to Breeding when critters in the Breeding room die of old age.  I do not want to wrangle critters in the Overflow room under any circumstance UNLESS there is a free slot in the breeding room.

Under the current system, if I use just a Pickup sign and a drop off sign, Dupes will ONLY wrangle creatures out of the overflow room if there are more than <Pickup Sign> number in the room already.  That's not what I want.  I want them to take critters from overflow REGARDLESS of how many there are in the room, but only when there is a space in the breeding room. 

 

The best I've been able to find is to put a Critter Sensor in the breeding room and then hook it up to the Overflow Room's pickup sign, sending a green signal if below the desired target and setting the Overflow pickup to 0.  However this does still cause over-wrangling, as my dupes will continuously wrangle critters in Overflow until one of the non-ranchers shows up to carry the 1 critter I actually need over to Breeding.

For specifics, Overflow here is actually a shearing room for dreckos.  I have 8 (max allowable) in the breeding room with their plants and dual atmosphere, and then any eggs get sent via conveyer to the Overflow room where they are sheared until they starve to death.  The whole pickup/drop off thing is to replace the ones that die of old age.

[Im_not_Included]

8 hours ago, Sotanaht said:

How do you automate it now?

So I have 2 rooms.  One is a Breeding room, the other is Overflow.  I want to wrangle critters from Overflow back to Breeding when critters in the Breeding room die of old age.  I do not want to wrangle critters in the Overflow room under any circumstance UNLESS there is a free slot in the breeding room.

Under the current system, if I use just a Pickup sign and a drop off sign, Dupes will ONLY wrangle creatures out of the overflow room if there are more than <Pickup Sign> number in the room already.  That's not what I want.  I want them to take critters from overflow REGARDLESS of how many there are in the room, but only when there is a space in the breeding room. 

 

The best I've been able to find is to put a Critter Sensor in the breeding room and then hook it up to the Overflow Room's pickup sign, sending a green signal if below the desired target and setting the Overflow pickup to 0.  However this does still cause over-wrangling, as my dupes will continuously wrangle critters in Overflow until one of the non-ranchers shows up to carry the 1 critter I actually need over to Breeding.

For specifics, Overflow here is actually a shearing room for dreckos.  I have 8 (max allowable) in the breeding room with their plants and dual atmosphere, and then any eggs get sent via conveyer to the Overflow room where they are sheared until they starve to death.  The whole pickup/drop off thing is to replace the ones that die of old age.

you could add an automation of a dupe sensor, and a series of gates- only allow a green signal for x amount of time after it senses a dupe AND the breeding room needs a friend. you'd have to monitor it to get the timing right, but you just need the pick up to activate long enough for the wrangle action, and that speed depends on your dupes skill level. 

[blakemw]

9 hours ago, Sotanaht said:

So I have 2 rooms.  One is a Breeding room, the other is Overflow.  I want to wrangle critters from Overflow back to Breeding when critters in the Breeding room die of old age.  I do not want to wrangle critters in the Overflow room under any circumstance UNLESS there is a free slot in the breeding room.

I don't think there is or has ever been a trivial and clean solution for "wrangle on a need basis", that is the game doesn't provide a way to count or detect critters that are already wrangled, hence over-wrangling can always be an issue, even though it's minimized by priority schemes (ensuring delivering the critter is higher priority than wrangling).

The clean (though not trivial) solution is using purely mechanical critter droppers (sometimes called "pez dispensers" in the community), which only allow a critter to go in one direction (e.g. closing a door on the critter to drop it, and having it fall through a locked door). Either storing a freshly hatched critter to be dropped when needed, or using automation that opens a door when a critter is needed, allowing a critter to enter an intermediate chamber. Then have a pair of critter sensors in that room that hold the door open unless there is exactly 1 critter (e.g. over 0, below 2 AND gated together), once there is one critter trapped in the room, the the dropper door opens and then shuts on the critter once it leaves the sensor room, dropping the critter.

For example here's one I quickly threw together in sandbox which will remove one critter from the "Overflow" ranch (left) and drop it into the "Breeder" ranch (right) in order to maintain a population of 8 critters. Door placement is with care to make it impossible for Dreckos to get stuck in a locked door as even if they manage to get inside it, they'll get dropped out to the floor when it closes.

(It can be made more compact but I spread it out a bit to hopefully make it clearer)

Video of how it works, with the door being open until there "randomly happens" to be 1 critter inside, only then does the dropper door open.

 

Mechanical critter relocation can be a little tricky to understand, and involves a few arcane game mechanics (some other critter ejectors involve exploiting how critters interact with liquid), but they are reliable and well understood.

The Dropoffs and Pickups provide a generic and relatively easy to use solution for ranching, but if you want high precision behaviour you're better off not using them at all in favor of mechanical critter relocation which tends to be faster and more reliable and not require any dupe labor. Incidentally this is often the case where the building that does the thing, does the thing in the a convenient way, but not the most efficient way, such as Oil Refinery and Desalinator.