Farmer Effectiveness

[Zarquan]

I have a high level farmer in my base.  Doubling growth speed is a great buff and I want her to work on that over anything else.  I can get her to make plant food at high priority, but I can't get her to prioritize using it on the plants over harvesting, which leads to her running around doing things I want the lower level farmers to do.  Any ideas?

It looks to me that one farmer can fertilize 15 plants.

[Domelo]

I can't even get my farmers to tune up all the crops in a room :/.

I think your highest farmer should be the one harversting, since he has the highest farming speed + seed drop chance. In my base every farmer has it's own room, the best one tends to the best crops.

I can't see any benefits on your scenario, isn't the buff the same regardless of who's applying it?

[goboking]

So let me see if I have this straight: your high ranking farmer is doing other jobs because your low ranking farmers are doing his/hers?  The solution is simple; banish your low ranking farmers to toil in the mines and your high ranking farmer will be free to tend his/her crops all day long.

[Zarquan]

But I need more farmers.  I've resumed my accept everyone challenge with fatalistic and miserable now that I think I've gotten a good hold on the occupation update (I lose if anyone dies).  I'm going to want every plant I can get upgraded if I want to get past 90 dupes...

[FutureJohny]

Use door permissions, allowing each farmer to only go where he/she belongs.

[Siromatik]

Was going to say something like @FutureJohny, this way each farmers stand in the room and the farm station assigned and stop running everywhere else (considerate you're deserving the room with the need of fertiliser or at at least a storage locker with some!)

[Zarquan]

The issue is that they need access to the plants, but they are harvesting.  If they can't get to the plants, they can't apply the plant food.  But if they can, they prioritize harvesting.  I have plenty of farm hands who are highly qualified with a high farming skill, but its the farmers who do the harvesting.  When they are harvesting, they aren't applying the Farmer's Touch, which means my dupes end up with less food in the colony. 

[Saturnus]

I've come to the conclusion that Farmer and Power stations are n00b traps. They work well in a really small set up with maybe 3-4 dupes and small farms and low overall power demands. In larger set ups they're not worth the space, material and dupe workload cost of having them. 

[Oozinator]

3 minutes ago, Saturnus said:

 In larger set ups they're not worth the space, material and dupe workload cost of having them. 

"larger" base or farm? I have one farmer and one farm/greenhouse and he is a "good boy" ^^

[Saturnus]

20 minutes ago, Oozinator said:

"larger" base or farm? I have one farmer and one farm/greenhouse and he is a "good boy" ^^

That's pretty much what I mean with a small set up.

[clickrush]

1 hour ago, Saturnus said:

That's pretty much what I mean with a small set up.

I agree on the powerplant situation. But a 96 tile greenhouse is fairly large given its kcal output Also note that if you want to scale up your farms just put doors in between them to maintain the room boni, it isn't really a big of a deal. Fertilizer is extremely easy to get and is normally produced in excess. Farmers who tend for the plants scale naturally with your base. The more dupes you have the more farmers you can have.

The issue with greenhouses is from my experience not the theoretical efficiency. It is the fact that assigned farmers straight up don't seem to actually use the farming station for all the crops as mentioned in previous threads.

But in theory you convert fertilizer and duplicant time into water and space. Both of which is very welcome given that duplicants usually don't have much to do past the midgame and fertilizer is plentiful

[Coolthulhu]

I noticed that farmers are stupid enough to buff plants that are overheated and aren't growing right now.

[Zarquan]

5 hours ago, Saturnus said:

I've come to the conclusion that Farmer and Power stations are n00b traps. They work well in a really small set up with maybe 3-4 dupes and small farms and low overall power demands. In larger set ups they're not worth the space, material and dupe workload cost of having them. 

I certainly wouldn't call farming stations "noob traps."  The plant boosts are definitely worth it.  Every time a farmer buffs a brissle blossom, it directly saves 20 kg of water off the cost of growing the plant at the cost of 5 kg of fertilizer (I believe.  That's what it looks like anyway).  That means that even if you are using a fertilizer synthesizer, you are saving around 13.25 kg water (accounting for the cost of making the fertilizer from polluted water).  It is actually better than that because the natural gas generator puts out water too.  This also allows smaller farms early game, meaning you can get off of mealwood faster, which allows you to conserve dirt.  I got off mealwood at around cycle 30.  I would probably still be on mealwood if I wasn't buffing my plants.  It increases the total number of dupes possible in your colony.  If you use electrolyzers for O2 and you feed your dupes grissle berries, then each dupe consumes (without farmers) 127.6 kg water.  Each of my farmers buff around 15 plants (maybe more, that's just when I counted) each day, so they save the colony 198.8 kg water/cycle.  If you use morbs for oxygen, then it is even better, because each dupe takes 60 kg water/cycle and each farmer still saves 198.8 kg water/cycle.  If you were already making the fertilizer as part of your power system, which is common, or from outhouse's polluted dirt, which is also common, then the amount the farmers save is 300 kg/cycle.

I should point out that I misread the calorie count on frost buns.  Frost buns are the most efficient food waterwise, at 50 kg/cycle per dupe. 

In short, they pay for themselves.  Farmers are free water.  Definitely not a noob trap now that farmers are willing to fertilize more than 1 plant at a time (thanks Klei!).

Also, eating raw food is gross, always cook your food.

3 hours ago, clickrush said:

I agree on the powerplant situation. But a 96 tile greenhouse is fairly large given its kcal output Also note that if you want to scale up your farms just put doors in between them to maintain the room boni, it isn't really a big of a deal. Fertilizer is extremely easy to get and is normally produced in excess. Farmers who tend for the plants scale naturally with your base. The more dupes you have the more farmers you can have.

The issue with greenhouses is from my experience not the theoretical efficiency. It is the fact that assigned farmers straight up don't seem to actually use the farming station for all the crops as mentioned in previous threads.

But in theory you convert fertilizer and duplicant time into water and space. Both of which is very welcome given that duplicants usually don't have much to do past the midgame and fertilizer is plentiful

I also agree that powerplants are in no way worth it.  Refined metal is non-renewable unless you sell your duplicants' souls to the devil to call upon his demonic powers (looking at you @R9MX4).

I think large greenhouses are essentially pointless.  Each greenhouse of mine is minimized in space and built for 32 plants.  The room size is 78.  Many of the plants do not get boosted.  Of course, this sentence is wrong if there is a benefit for a plant just being in the greenhouse.  I believe the only benefit is that the plants can be tended.

Keep in mind that making plant food is an operate task, so you have to let your farmers do operate tasks.  It shouldn't be this way but it is.  I'm set up so that my farmers are the only ones allowed to farm and it is all priority 9 so they prioritize it over everything else.  I have plenty of dupes that can respond in an emergency to real priority 9.

1 hour ago, Coolthulhu said:

I noticed that farmers are stupid enough to buff plants that are overheated and aren't growing right now.

The AI could be smarter about it, I certainly agree.  I recommend digging up overheated plants until you fix the farm.

[Saturnus]

12 minutes ago, Zarquan said:

Each of my farmers buff around 15 plants ...

 

If I put the farm station at P9 and lock the farmers inside the base, with all the fertilizer in the world available they do 2 or 3 tops. They'll stand around doing nothing most of the time but farming is one thing they refuse to do.

In my last game I could have gotten off mealwood by cycle 22 but instead I wanted more dupes in. It's not like I'll run out dirt. By cycle 72 I had 16 dupes on bristle blossoms only. Never made a single farm station.

[Zarquan]

22 minutes ago, Saturnus said:

If I put the farm station at P9 and lock the farmers inside the base, with all the fertilizer in the world available they do 2 or 3 tops. They'll stand around doing nothing most of the time but farming is one thing the refuse to do.

In my last game I could have gotten off mealwood by cycle 22 but instead I wanted more dupes in. It's not like I'll run out dirt. By cycle 72 I had 16 dupes on bristle blossoms only. Never made a single farm station.

My colony begs to differ.  My farmer boosts around 15 plants per cycle as long as there is enough fertilizer.   My farm looks like this (it's morning, so the dupes haven't arrived at work yet.)

@Saturnus Have you tested it recently?  When it first came out, they would only apply plant food to one plant at a time.  Now, they will apply plant food to as many plants as they can.  There was also apparently a bug where only one farming station would work at a time, but they fixed it.

[Saturnus]

25 minutes ago, Zarquan said:

 

@Saturnus Have you tested it recently?

Yes. I just did just test actually but I already use my fertilizer for sleet wheat to make berry sludge so it would be unsustainable in the long run. And I certainly don't want my farmers spending even more time in my -22C sleet wheat farm than they already do. They just barely escape constantly getting hypothermia by wearing sweaters as it is. 

[Zarquan]

10 minutes ago, Saturnus said:

Yes. I just did just test actually but I already use my fertilizer for sleet wheat to make berry sludge so it would be unsustainable in the long run. And I certainly don't want my farmers spending even more time in my -22C sleet wheat farm than they already do. They just bare escape constantly getting hypothermia by wearing sweaters as it is. 

I don't think the sleet wheat needs to be that cold.  Sleetwheat will grow at 0 C and you can feed it water at 2 C without too much difficulty.  If you feel it does need to be that cold, I would recommend exosuits.  Actually, I would recommend exosuits anyway and flood the farm with CO2 so my stupid dupes won't hang out there.  In fact, I'm going to put all my farmers in exosuits in the late game so they spend more time farming.

Farming stations are even better on sleet wheat because it effectively costs 4 less kg of fertilizer.  Every time your farmers boost a sleet wheat, that is 4 less kg of fertilizer that you have to spend on it to get it to grow because the one use of plant food reduces the growth time of the plant by one cycle, so you only lose 1 kg of fertilizer per plant food.  And you gain so much in reducing the amount of water you spend.  Fertilizer synthesizers are better than ever!  Water spent on fertilizer gives you more water back in reduced plant costs.  This conversation has convinced me to remove the hatches from my latrines and use compost piles more for free fertilizer.

[Saturnus]

That is still assuming the farmers do any tune ups. My farmers still doesn't beyond 2 or maximum 3. And since the tune up only lasts one cycle that's a lot of wasted farmers if I have to multiply that up.

[Zarquan]

1 hour ago, Saturnus said:

That is still assuming the farmers do any tune ups. My farmers still doesn't beyond 2 or maximum 3. And since the tune up only lasts one cycle that's a lot of wasted farmers if I have to multiply that up.

Of course.  If they don't do tuneups, then they aren't working properly.  I actually barred my farmers from doing anything but operate and farm and deliver.  I set all the priorities on the farms to 9 so that they wouldn't be distracted.  They aren't even allowed to enter each other's greenhouses to do things like harvest.  I strictly control what they can and can not do. 

I believe my two farmers do between 31 and 35 tuneups per cycle (I actually counted one cycle and it was 33).  That means that on average they fertilize 16 each, which is great.  They wandered off a couple times and I didn't stop them.  I think the secret with sleetwheat is to not let them get the fertilizer.  Then they won't try to fertilize the plants and will leave that to the couriers and whoever else isn't busy.  I should also put their mess tables and bathrooms closer to their farms.

In short, on farmers, only allow them to build, operate, and farm.  Only let them in to their own greenhouses.  Don't let them deliver fertilizer to the sleetwheat, only plant food. 

[zzKratoszz]

Here is the bug report. 

 

[Zarquan]

 

15 minutes ago, zzKratoszz said:

Here is the bug report. 

 

I've seen that glitch.  That glitch made me sad.  I even commented on that bug report and emoted sadness.  But they fixed it and now I'm emoting happiness !  I think the hotfix repaired that glitch. 

I think the issue @Saturnus is having is with priorities.  The dupes run off and do other things rather than tend their crops.  I recently posted a suggestion that they change the categories associated with the farming station.  Specifically, using the station should go under Farm and not Operate and delivering the plant food should go under Farm and not Supply.  That way, you could have your master farmers on Farm only and not worry about them wandering off.  I had to mess around with a lot of priorities and door controls all over my base to get my farmers working properly, which should be completely unnecessary for such a simple task.  I even set the farms to all priority 9 so that they would never stop working on them, which is OK because only the farmers do the farm work.

I've decided that I am happy with my setup.  Though more efficient farmers might get 20-23 plants per cycle, the 16-17 they get is fine with me.

Another nice thing is that my farms don't need paintings.  Brissle Blossoms and lights have positive decor and my farms have an average decor of around 80, meaning their fatalism isn't stressing them too much.

[PhailRaptor]

Watching this discussion unfold, I can only say that the Fertilizer Maker is going to be next on deck for a massive nerf once the Farming Station issues are ironed out.  On one hand, yeah, we finally have a use for the colossal amount of "waste" Fertilizer they are producing in everyone's NatGas/FertSynth power loops.  On the other hand, with these kinds of water savings....

[Oozinator]

For me the farmer job and greenhouse mechanics works fine.
One thing, while i had one farmer, "farmers touch" was rare, but after changing jobs. Nikola was farmer before. Now he is electrical engineer and he is always doing the "plant food"(Lindsay rare) to plant apply stuff (as an ex-farmer).. Lindsay (farmer) works at the farming machine, producing mass of plantfood. Every plant in the greenhouse has farmers touch.

[Zarquan]

10 hours ago, Oozinator said:

For me the farmer job and greenhouse mechanics works fine.
One thing, while i had one farmer, "farmers touch" was rare, but after changing jobs. Nikola was farmer before. Now he is electrical engineer and he is always doing the "plant food"(Lindsay rare) to plant apply stuff (as an ex-farmer).. Lindsay (farmer) works at the farming machine, producing mass of plantfood. Every plant in the greenhouse has farmers touch.

That is weird...

How many plants do the two of them boost per cycle?  More or less than 33?  Because now you are using two dupes, meaning that it would be best to compare the performance of your system to the performance of 2 farmers working rather than 1.

[Oozinator]

40 minutes ago, Zarquan said:

More or less than 33? 

Less then. Around 20 bristles, enough for 8 dupes. I use maelwood and mushrooms only in the "grown wild version" and there is plenty of...
One or two plants are not boosted per cycle, but when i use the wrenchtool in the jobsection, they stop it completely. No plantfood produced, or plants booosted. When i give manual orders, it works. Farmstation prio 8, hydrotiles 7.