Abundant workers, absolutely nobody working

[Bunnies&Cherris]

In a village of 80(57 able to work) people, seeing 20 sitting around "Wandering - Unable to work" with NO explanation as to why is so frustrating. And then they randomly become builders and actually do something, meanwhile almost nothing is getting built or done. But set a tree to get chopped and all 20 are practically forming a riot to cut it down.

Even worse, I have all those people doing absolutely nothing, and yet they all refuse to work at a school I just built. If I add a worker slot to ANY other building someone instantly fills the role, but nothing I do fixes the school.
I can't even tell if any of this are bugs or if it's mechanics they didn't bother to teach us or even hint at cause screw it, why not. I'd love to learn if I'm doing something wrong, but I should be able to figure it out through the tools the game gives me.

[Don Cool]

Schools require educated people, wait till an immigrant comes along who is, usually happens fast. You might already have one occupying another job, I don´t know how to find these quickly, I just wait for one to arrive.

Labourers will chop trees and stone, they will move some items but not all, you should always have an area to harvest otherwise your labourers will do nothing at times.

They randomly become builders because the AI creates the builders needed for the tasks at hand and you should be glad it is so, otherwise you would have to set a number of builders who do nothing when nothing is being built. (when it comes to fences and walls this is somewhat broken but they will get built ... eventually).

[Bunnies&Cherris]

Originally posted by Don:

Schools require educated people, wait till an immigrant comes alone who is, usually happens fast. You might already have one occupying another job, I don´t know how to find these quickly, I just wait for one to arrive.

Labourers will chop trees and stone, they will move some items but not all, you should always have an area to harvest otherwise your labourers will do nothing at times.

They randomly become builders because the AI creates the builders needed for the tasks at hand and you should be glad it is so, otherwise you would have to set a number of builders who do nothing when nothing is being built. (when it comes to fences and walls this is somewhat broken but they will get built ... eventually).

Good to know, I'm for sure giving feedback on their forums about explicitly stating that mechanic about the school. I just removed everyone from their jobs and undid that and quickly got someone working at the school. Thank you!

It's frustrating seeing laborers not working, just wandering around, meanwhile I have multiple buildings needing built and road sections to build/upgrade. I don't see the point of giving me the option to allow more workers to work on for example a house if only one will ever come to supply and build it as a dozen or more others wander around uselessly.
I'd almost rather have a small crew of builders on standby doing nothing so once I place things it's not just one guy doing it who might stop at some point to become a laborer and wander around halfway through.

[Kalarian]

pause the game, unemploy everyone, then try to employ the school. If it doesn't work, you have no educated people (you have a random chance of starting with one, i get one about every other game).

[Matthew]

There are some actions which appear to have a max amount of total workers ever. Upgrading roads seems to be one of them. It always takes a long time no matter how many laborers and builders you have.

For dirt roads, sometimes a new tree will sprout or an old tree will not get selected for harvest. The road just stays in perma-build mode. If a dirt road isn't getting built, open up harvest menu and drag it over road to make sure there are no obstructions.

[Death Korps Commissar]

Originally posted by Cherri:

In a village of 80(57 able to work) people, seeing 20 sitting around "Wandering - Unable to work" with NO explanation as to why is so frustrating. And then they randomly become builders and actually do something, meanwhile almost nothing is getting built or done. But set a tree to get chopped and all 20 are practically forming a riot to cut it down.

Even worse, I have all those people doing absolutely nothing, and yet they all refuse to work at a school I just built. If I add a worker slot to ANY other building someone instantly fills the role, but nothing I do fixes the school.
I can't even tell if any of this are bugs or if it's mechanics they didn't bother to teach us or even hint at cause screw it, why not. I'd love to learn if I'm doing something wrong, but I should be able to figure it out through the tools the game gives me.

Unable to work for me usually means one of the requirements for the assigned job isnt met.
say brickmaker has no coal, carpenter has no logs etc. looking at the associated building will usually give a clue.
also, as has been said above, schools require and educated immigrant

[degasi]

It literally tells you in the info box of the school, that "some professions require educated workers".
If you read this line, you normaly check at least one villager. In a villagers info box is the trait "Education". It will probably say "None".
The next step is to check for a villager that has something different written there. Like "Basic".
It's really not that hard to figure that out. The game tells you.

[fullerfamily]

Originally posted by degasi:

It literally tells you in the info box of the school, that "some professions require educated workers".
If you read this line, you normaly check at least one villager. In a villagers info box is the trait "Education". It will probably say "None".
The next step is to check for a villager that has something different written there. Like "Basic".
It's really not that hard to figure that out. The game tells you.

That was harsh. Lots of FF player didn't know how to get the first educated worker. That is comes from firing migrants is not intuitive.

Originally posted by Don:

Schools require educated people, wait till an immigrant comes along who is, usually happens fast. You might already have one occupying another job, ...

Good answer, Don.

[Alleykat]

You don't have to fire everyone from their job to find an educated worker. When you look at the professions list (P) there is a magnifying glass next to each profession. The professions that have more then one person in them, you just need to click the magnifying glass however many times as people in that particular profession. As you click, a small window pops up which lists the persons stats - including their education. Fire them from their current job and hire them in the school if you find one that has "basic" eductation. For your various laborers, just keep clicking through with the magnifying class icon until you see each one and their stats. Hope that helps and possibly saves you some time and trouble with the hiring and firing process. Good Luck!

[Bunnies&Cherris]

Originally posted by degasi:

It literally tells you in the info box of the school, that "some professions require educated workers".
If you read this line, you normaly check at least one villager. In a villagers info box is the trait "Education". It will probably say "None".
The next step is to check for a villager that has something different written there. Like "Basic".
It's really not that hard to figure that out. The game tells you.

I saw that the game said some professions require education. I don't think it would be "Normal" or obvious to go check and read over every bit of villager info after reading that, that was your personal experience that you're... trying to call me out for not replicating? You're just an ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. There is always one of you on every thread.

[Bunnies&Cherris]

As a reply to everyone else, no I'm certain my dirt roads aren't getting blocked by trees, I've been told that's what is happening at least three times now. No, I'm talking about unemployed villagers, as in, laborers, not people who's job is impossible from lack of resources. Laborers who sit there doing nothing as they could become a builder and help build.
There isn't a good reason for this as far as I can tell, and if that's true- which nobody has been able to give a reason so I assume it is- it needs to change. It makes the game feel so much more slow and grindy, and requires even MORE micromanaging to get things done faster, as if this game didn't have enough.

[KO]

Unless you are playing on vanquisher and is pressed to setting up the economy and defenses really early, just take this as a natural oddity that adds flavor to the game :) Eventually that road will get built.

[Nefelia]

Originally posted by Cherri:

Originally posted by degasi:

It literally tells you in the info box of the school, that "some professions require educated workers".
If you read this line, you normaly check at least one villager. In a villagers info box is the trait "Education". It will probably say "None".
The next step is to check for a villager that has something different written there. Like "Basic".
It's really not that hard to figure that out. The game tells you.

I saw that the game said some professions require education. I don't think it would be "Normal" or obvious to go check and read over every bit of villager info after reading that, that was your personal experience that you're... trying to call me out for not replicating? You're just an ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. There is always one of you on every thread.

I just waited until an educated immigrant came along. Took a couple of years, but wasn't that big a deal.

For your construction/repair woes, you need to increase the amount of assigned builders from the initial four as your population grows. In the early game I tend to boost by builders to 6, and then switch to a rule of thumb of 5% of my population being builders from 120 pop onwards.

[Bunnies&Cherris]

Originally posted by KO:

Unless you are playing on vanquisher and is pressed to setting up the economy and defenses really early, just take this as a natural oddity that adds flavor to the game :) Eventually that road will get built.

Honestly even on the easiest difficulty settings for the raiders- I prefer to use the advanced options to get the mid to hard game settings for some things and the easy one for the raiders- I find it difficult to defend from them unless I rush. In all likelihood that's probably from needing to learn the game more or something similar but there is still the core issue that builders won't properly assign themselves.

I do like your outlook though, thank you for the reminder that I don't gotta take this seriously lol.

[Bunnies&Cherris]

Originally posted by Nefelia:

Originally posted by Cherri:

I saw that the game said some professions require education. I don't think it would be "Normal" or obvious to go check and read over every bit of villager info after reading that, that was your personal experience that you're... trying to call me out for not replicating? You're just an ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. There is always one of you on every thread.

I just waited until an educated immigrant came along. Took a couple of years, but wasn't that big a deal.

For your construction/repair woes, you need to increase the amount of assigned builders from the initial four as your population grows. In the early game I tend to boost by builders to 6, and then switch to a rule of thumb of 5% of my population being builders from 120 pop onwards.

I did, I usually set the builder cap to 12 right away honestly, but despite that, even with multiple road segments and buildings placed it never goes about 7-9.
Thank you though, I wish it was something silly I am doing and is really an easy fix- and it still might be, but after looking at other's gameplay it seems a lack of builders while nothing gets done, despite even three dozen plus laborers wandering around nearby is just how the game plays at the moment because the devs did a crappy job at how the AI allocates itself.
I mean the fact that a fire disrupts the game for up to an entire in-game year? Ouch. No thinking in that decision.