Stop changing materials on me...

[FistfulOfZen]

Klei,

If I want to change building materials. I will change building materials. I don't know whose idea it was to automatically change materials based on what's the highest amount of inventory (WITHOUT informing the player), but it's incredibly annoying, and is absolutely my least favorite feature. Get this, I might be saving it for special use, and don't want to waste it on water pipes that are going to be hidden by walls and doors anyway. Stop it.

Thanks!

PS - loving the new update, though not perfect, I enjoy the food plant rebalance, though it may be a hair too simplified. The new diseases are interesting, though I do wish there were more ways to deal with immunity loss within the game, like inoculations and/or vitamins.

EDIT: Maybe antibiotics?

[Coolthulhu]

There are at least three instances where the game tries to be smarter than the player:

• Automatically changing materials when current ones run out
• Preventing assigning plants when there are no accessible seeds (except with "copy settings")
• Preventing designating buildings for which there are no resources right now

In all of those cases, the effect is useless and annoying. The resources don't seem to be hard-assigned to individual building designations, meaning there is no excuse for it to work like this.

It does not prevent over-assigning either - sometimes the resource does run dry despite this annoying mechanism, meaning that it is both annoying and inefficient.

[Kasuha]

6 minutes ago, Coolthulhu said:

The resources don't seem to be hard-assigned to individual building designations

They are reserved by amount to them, however. Wherever you see amount of a resource, it's reduced by amount already dedicated to planned buildings and production.

[brummbar7]

The building-prevention due to resource thing I don't mind.  I do like knowing if I've hit the limit of available resources.  This allows me to prioritize.  If it just allowed me to assign buildings even with insufficient materials, I could easily put myself in a deep material deficit, and the dupes might choose to build stuff first that I would not have wanted built if I'd known I was going to be out of material.  I think this issue would be better solved by a planning mode (priority 0?), which does not assign materials.  Many people have suggested this.

The material switching is maddening though, and definitely one of the worst ideas in the game. 

[Michi01]

1 hour ago, Coolthulhu said:

Automatically changing materials when current ones run out

I think we generally should still be able to put up blueprints for structures even if we run out of materials. It should just tell us that the material ran out and that we should assign a low priority to it. It can be really annoying sometimes, for example while building an abyssalite wall around the base and running out as it's almost done and not being allowed to finish planning it/not even noticing it and making dupes waste their time on putting up sandstone walls.

[Mjello]

Aye thumbs up for removing the auto change thingie. Especially annoying when you don't even notice it until after filling the thing with liquid

[Darkarma]

1 hour ago, Michi01 said:

I think we generally should still be able to put up blueprints for structures even if we run out of materials. It should just tell us that the material ran out and that we should assign a low priority to it. It can be really annoying sometimes, for example while building an abyssalite wall around the base and running out as it's almost done and not being allowed to finish planning it/not even noticing it and making dupes waste their time on putting up sandstone walls.

Yes this. I would like the ability to predesign my entire base regardless of supplies and the option to choice what is prioritized and what is left for later (zoning anyone?), a priority zero at least would be good for sections I don't yet have resources for, but allows me to plan out ahead. Instead I find myself forgetting what my initial good ideas are as the hours stretch on an no way to design for it.

Also, like the priority tool, there should be a material tool that allows us to change the material of what has yet to be built. or upgrade already existing items.

[Thiosk]

IF the items in question at least were colored, as in the colors mod, then it would be livable as I could at least FIND what i had to deconstruct because I'd notice the weirdly snaking abyssallite pipe that now runs a gajillion tiles to the middle of nowhere.

[Sevio]

And on the same subject, have each save remember between reloads what material the player wanted to use for each building.

[Peachiz]

I <3 this post x1000.  OP is right on all points.

It usually doesn't bother me, except in cases of abyssalite, wolframite, and (now) gold amalgam.  It wouldn't even be so bad if you could see where these materials went (with, say, an overlay), but, as it is, if you really want to find them, you have to  go tile by tile D=

[chaos0720]

19 hours ago, Stinktooth said:

I <3 this post x1000.  OP is right on all points.

It usually doesn't bother me, except in cases of abyssalite, wolframite, and (now) gold amalgam.  It wouldn't even be so bad if you could see where these materials went (with, say, an overlay), but, as it is, if you really want to find them, you have to  go tile by tile D=

Somebody made a mod that works for showing what stuff was made out of. It's on the forums here somewhere and it's easy as hell to install.

[Michi01]

This is the mod that Chaos is referring to: