Bay 12 Games Forum

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Advanced search  

Author Topic: Seed Hauling Bug  (Read 3179 times)

Corthane

  • Escaped Lunatic
    • View Profile
Seed Hauling Bug
« on: February 10, 2013, 09:52:09 am »

I understand that there is a bug with the new hauling system that causes dwarves to take partially filled containers and use them to pick up new stuff. I first noticed when I got a lot of job cancellations due to no seeds being available, because someone decided to pick up the bag which contains all the seeds. As a bag holds up to 100 seeds, two bags are constantly on the move to pick up new seeds, which means their contents can rarely ever be accessed. The instant someone puts down the bag, someone else picks it up to pick up new seeds. At first this was manageable, but as my fortress has grown, so has its need for plump helmets. My stock of seeds has been rising, while the number of grown foods have dwindled to the point where I might face serious problems in the near future.

I have tried making two stockpiles, forbidding barrels in one and linking the other to pick up from the non-barrels stockpile. This does nothing to solve the problem with seeds however, since bags doesn't count as barrels. As of right now only a few seeds get planted, seriously harming my farming.

I believe this bug is already well-known and reported, I just couldn't find any solutions concerning the seeds. Is there any way I can fix this, i.e. make the contents of the seed bags accessible?
Logged

Oaktree

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Seed Hauling Bug
« Reply #1 on: February 10, 2013, 11:31:08 am »

My sort of workaround is having a group of 1x1 no-barrel stockpiles near my farm plots.  Since they will hold one bag each I have enough stockpiles to assign 2-3 to each kind of seed I am planting.  The goal is to always have one bag not being used to collect seeds when a farmer wants a seed in order to plant it.
Logged
Armorer McUrist cancels forge steel mailshirt, interrupted by minecart

Dangerous Beans

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Seed Hauling Bug
« Reply #2 on: February 10, 2013, 08:19:37 pm »

As Oaktree said separate seed stockpiles near the farms that don't allow barrels.
Also have the stills/mills near the seed stockpiles, so the dwarves aren't hauling the bags across the fortress.
I also have a few dedicated farmer/food processor dwarves and do brewing/milling in batches, so i am either producing seeds or planting them, thus reducing the demand for the bags. with that approach i don't get too many job cancellation messages, and they usually sort themselves out.

Edit: I have also noticed the spam is worse if you have farm plots set to grow the same plant every season. If you are planting plump helmets while processing the last crop then you have a greater chance that two dwarves want the same bag. so a field with "plump helmets x4" is going to produce more job cancellations than a field with "a) sweetpods, b) cavewheat, c) pigtail, d) plumphelmet."
« Last Edit: February 10, 2013, 08:25:16 pm by Dangerous Beans »
Logged

Lich180

  • Bay Watcher
  • Avatar by PlutoniumApe, "Urist McGuyFieri"
    • View Profile
Re: Seed Hauling Bug
« Reply #3 on: February 10, 2013, 09:01:04 pm »

This idea is taken from someone else here on bay12, don't remember who.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

That is how I set up my farm plots and seed stockpiles. The vertical stockpile lines are set to only accept seeds, no barrels, while the horizontal ones are set to accept only the plants coming from those farm plots, no barrels.

What usually happens is the farmer pulls the plant out, either leaves it on the farm plot or moves it to the stockpile, then someone else comes along and sucks all the harvested plants up at once.

No other stockpile is set to accept seeds, and the ones in the stills and farmers workshops are usually picked up in bags and deposited in the appropriate pile.

Very few cancellation orders, and this way you also cut down on planting and harvesting time.
Logged

krenshala

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Seed Hauling Bug
« Reply #4 on: February 10, 2013, 10:38:33 pm »

I create two seed stockpiles next to the farm plot.  The larger accepts barrels, but only takes from the smaller seed stockpile.  The smaller seed stockpile does not accept barrels and takes from anywhere.  What ends up happening is dwarves grab a bag from the small pile if one is present, and uses that to go around collecting seeds and returning it. If no bags are present in the smaller pile then dwarves just bring the seeds individually and drop them off.  About every other dwarf will grab a barrel from the big pile, walk over to the small stockpile and collect all the seeds or seed bags then return the barrel to the big pile.  When a farm wants to plant, he will grab the seeds he needs from the larger stockpile with no issues since any seed pickup jobs will be using bags from the smaller pile.

This also works for collecting used but unbroken bolts/arrows.
Logged
Quote from: Haspen
Quote from: phoenixuk
Zepave Dawnhogs the Butterfly of Vales the Marsh Titan ... was taken out by a single novice axedwarf and his pet war kitten. Long Live Domas Etasastesh Adilloram, slayer of the snow butterfly!
Doesn't quite have the ring of heroics to it...
Mother: "...and after the evil snow butterfly was defeated, Domas and his kitten lived happily ever after!"
Kids: "Yaaaay!"

Patchy

  • Bay Watcher
  • Mukyu
    • View Profile
Re: Seed Hauling Bug
« Reply #5 on: February 11, 2013, 12:12:41 am »

I've stopped using seed stockpiles period here. At least till Toady manages to work out some of the kinks with the hauling update and seeds. I keep my food processing areas close to the farms. The workshops process the plants, and leave the seeds in the workshops. They do still try to bag every stupid seed much to my chagrin, but at least they don't spend as much time moving bags around. The only type of seeds that makes it out of the farm/food processing area are the plump helmets since they are edible raw, and the seeds often times end up in the dining hall.
Logged

MasterShizzle

  • Bay Watcher
  • Constantly in a fey mood
    • View Profile
Re: Seed Hauling Bug
« Reply #6 on: February 11, 2013, 11:39:15 am »

Go to d_init.txt and change [STORE_DIST_ITEM_DECREASE] to 15 or so and change [STORE_DIST_SEED_COMBINE] to 0. Dump and claim a bunch of empty bags right next to your still. Your dwarves SHOULD grab filled seed bags to get seeds only if there's not an empty bag available within 15 steps. You should end up with a lot more bags with just a couple seeds each.
Logged
Boss is throwing a tantrum!
MasterShizzle cancels Play Dwarf Fortress: interrupted by Boss

Minecraft's fine, your computer just sucks.