New Jobs in old priority system. It doesn't work.

[Lacost]

I'm asking here for help and want to give a little bit of feedback regarding the current situation with jobs and the old priority system.

 

Feedback:

Spoiler

I think that Klei dropped the ball by going back to the old priority system. Even though there was some backlash from the community it was the right call to overhaul the priority system. The combination of the new jobs and the old system just feels like a lame compromise that isn't favorable for either sides. Either old job system and old priority system or new job system and new priority system. A mix between the two doesn't seem to work.

 

 

My issue is that jobs are completely trivialized because your Dupes don't favour tasks that are related to their jobs. The only way to get an artist to create art is to give high priority numbers to the artwork. However, since an artist will not paint non-stop you will want him to do other tasks too like sweeping and delivering. If you allow this, your paintings always have to have higher priority than your secondary "idle" tasks for your artist. If not, then the artist will happily ignore every piece of art to sweep that one item at the end of the map whereas the gofers were perfectly capable of doing it by themselves (and more efficient).

One other issue is related to stations. To force a cook to cook or a scientist to research, you have to set high priorities on those stations. Unfortunately, that also means that supply to those stations gets the same priority. As a result, miners from the edge of the map will run back to pick up 600 kcal of Meallice to deliver it to the Musher. In return I can't give a lower priority to the Musher because the cook will then completely ignore it. On the other hand my Miners should also sweep and deliver in times were no mining is needed. The only solution to this seems intense micromanagment where I, per hand, have to assign "idle-tasks" as soon as a Dupe gets idle.

 

 

This whole issue trivializes many jobs for me and I'm back to the old system where every Dupe is doing every task again, with the exception of cooks, scientists and artists. The only reason why I assign Dupes to jobs is to farm those extra attributes (permanent +2 strenght for gofers etc.) and unlock new traits. As soon as a Dupe masters a job it gets reassigned to master another job. This is not at all what the Jobs-System should do.

 

Help:

How do you manage your colony jobs and priorities?

I recently lost a Dupe to suffocation thanks to the extremely poor tracking and building AI, coupled with some glitching through walls. The overall slower walking speed of the occupational upgrade made the risk of death by digging and building even more dangerous. The issue was, that my Dupes simply ignored the job tasks that were given to them. I tinkered a lot with the priority system but I never seem to get it right. Miners deliver to farms, gofers are digging and builders are delivering foods to the cooking station. And of course, the slowest Dupe in my colony from the other side of the map decided to deliver the life-saving building material to the rescue ladder ... only to decide to get hungry halfway through and drop the material. -.-

My problem is that i can't figure out how to best assign idle-tasks which for me are sweeping and delivering and secondary job tasks. (Secondary job tasks = mining and delivering for builders so they can build stuff on their own and don't have to wait for the other 2 Dupes.)

 

Another issue is that stations require very high priorities, otherwise the specialized Dupes will ignore them. This also means that supply-jobs also get that high priority. Is there a way to only tell the Dupe on the station to resupply that station? (Only the cook sweeps food for his own cooking station)

 

Thanks for your help!

 

 

[figaroess]

This isn't really a solution to the problem, but just a work around I've been using: door permissions. For example, your miner could be denied access to the kitchen (just keep the food outside the kitchen), and a strategic door on the way to the mining site could prevent your cook from wandering too far. Only farmers allowed in the greenhouses, and only mechanics in the power plants. I then set things like the stove and the farms, etc. to priority 7, and let them do their thing. It requires a bit of set up, which can be annoying to tweak until perfect, but ends up needing much less micromanagement as time passes. 

I agree that the job prioritization doesn't quite seem to be working as intended, but I would guess there will be small adjustments as time passes. 

[Roxanne4018]

Okay so the update, besides the whole priority drama, has as a goal to make the game more challenging and it works. It personally took me a little time to get used to it and get back to efficiency but it is possible and you could do it by playing and figuring things out.

FYI I had no dupes dying (except for starvation and a run a tried to do with only researchers) since the update and would ALWAYS loose dupes before.

Here's a couple of tips\ reminder

• Door management : what are your miners doing in your farms anyways?
• Have one dupe master Art student and only have him allowed to do art. Then switch him jobs. ( if creativity is 4 and higher they will produce masterpiece
• Don't have dupes only doing their jobs(which is what you seem to be doing), but don't have all dupes doing everything either.
• Don't set every task to 9 that way emergency get fixed.
• Only 1 dupe at a time is allowed to do research. (ideally switch them so that they all master lab assistant and get +2 learning)
• Also have all dupes to master gofer to get +2 atletics
• Rotate hats, don't go straight for the higher tier jobs to help manage your stress.
• Focus on food quality ( I saw that not meeting your dupes food quality requirement could go up to -450%/cycle) 
• Get creative

[Kasuha]

Duplicants keep any mastery they learned before and they don't have to do tasks of their current occupation to gain mastery in it.

Besides a few miners you may want early on to dig abyssalite, just pull your duplicants through the masteries level by level and let them accumulate skills and stat points. It's a bit slower than before but still fast enough. Don't sweat it.

 

The system may change, but now it's pretty much exactly as it was before, except skill/stat leveling is slightly held back by occupations. There's a major issue with duplicants doing their assigned jobs only - a duplicant sticking to particular task types will spend more time traveling than a duplicant that does all tasks that are within close reach.

The priority system was made even flatter than before. For example, digging, building and delivery at the same priority level are the same priority. That means a duplicant will finish any digs, deliveries and builds nearby before going somewhere else. I am confident it was done to reduce amount of duplicant running around.

I made an experiment recently, made a miner, a gofer and an architect and arranged them like this:

They all did both digs and the build right next to them before they moved over to help others. And surprisingly they did the three things (actually four as the build also requires a delivery) in seemingly random order, even the architect and miner had no preference between building and digging.

[Steelflame]

As Roxanne said, the same tricks we used pre-Occupational update work now, only we now have further tools to specialize dupes.

My personal strategy is this.

 

1.  Research dupe.  This guy is the only one who touches research, and I specificly reroll till I get him at the start.  He needs to have +8 learning, and none of my "Must not touch" traits (Flatulent, Loud Sleeper, and Narcoleptic, and the obvious most not have Yokel).  Any other stats are a bonus for the most part.  Starting with +8 learning means that when he has the research assistant job, he has 10 learning, or effectively +400% research speed and +100 skill growth.  This guy can do 100% of your research by cycle 60 assuming your base doesn't have critical problems show up, and can let you power rush to the specific desired researches that you must have ASAP, and once he hops off of research he'll rapidly grow any other skill to be a great filler for your base as a general purpose or specialized dupe.

2.  General purpose dupes.  These guys are your dupes of old pretty much, the general builders, diggers, and movers of the base.   The main stat to look for is high Athletics and Strength, and the general "do not touch" traits not existing on them.   You will cycle these guys through all 3 basic job types (Digging, building, and Gofer), as well as grounds keeper.   Don't upgrade them if you can't handle the extra stress from having a higher than T2 job until you are ready for it.

3.  Specialized farmers.  Start specificly aiming for them after you are looking to transition to Bristle Blossoms as your primary food source.  Higher is better, if only because it increases the seed gains, which lets you swap off of meal wood quicker too.  Make sure that they CAN do operate jobs (because the fertilizer machine for greenhouses is an operate task, not a farming task).  Same "must not have no touch traits" rule as in other positions.  You may give them operate job experience if they have mastered their farming experience and you want them to skill up a bit, just remember to keep where they can go restricted via doors so that they stay close to their farms.

4.  Specialized cook.  A single cook can keep up with your base's general food needs until you get fairly large, so long as you are on Bristle Blossoms+, even if not actively cooking 100% of the time.   Make sure your food bins are kept in a CO2 storage room (You can put them directly below the cook pretty much, so long as there is no horizontal or below access to the room, and it will stay good unless you have gas pressure issues in the base, at which point you have bigger problems to worry about).   Assuming you are properly managing job tier and keep people eating food they like, Stress is mostly a non-factor in the current update so long as you make a passing attempt at keeping Decor decent.  Paintings above beds in the barracks, good bathroom buff, good food.   Don't even need to worry about making a Mess Hall, so all you gotta do is make sure food bins are scattered around the base in CO2 pits.