Distribute production uneavenly between lines

[NX Valiant]

Hi! So I have a goods factory producing on Level 3. The output is delivered to two lines: a train line with very high capacity running to a big city (demand 389 goods) and a truck line with only two trucks on it running to a smaller city (demand 234 goods).
I want to prioritise good delivery to the train line, since it's much more profitable. But currently, the truck line gets more goods than it can transport and the train line doesn't get enough.

I would have thought that the game takes into account transport capacity on a line when distributing the goods from a factory, but that doesn't seem to be the case. How can I influence distribution?

[Martin]

In general the game sends more to further away cities, because they're worth more money. You need to increase your input in order to satisfy both outputs. Basically you need to 100% your furthest city, before you can even get close to 100% on your nearer one.

[Autocoach]

Yeah you would have a problem . In my experience consider the 'base' position is to attempt to pro-rata the output across the required demand . Therefore your best idea in the current situation is to make the truck stop in the 2nd city only cover some of the goods demand .

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1965903297

[Martin]

Yeh that'd work as well, reducing the demand from the further city.

[Gregorovitch]

Originally posted by NX Valiant:

I would have thought that the game takes into account transport capacity on a line when distributing the goods from a factory, but that doesn't seem to be the case. How can I influence distribution?

It does but only insofar as that capacity limits the number of goods that can be shipped to a customer.

The game is modelling a sellers market in this situation. The factory can sell to whomsoever it pleases, you profits and concerns are irrelevant to it, you are simply the for hire wagon guy. Just like IRL.

The answer from your point of view depends largely on your financial situation and your own goals in the game. But you will notice that the total demand for goods you are dealing with here is 623 which means this factory cannot fulfil it on it's own. The optimal solution therefore is to stop worrying about the split between these lines and start worrying about how to bring a second goods factory online after maxing out this one at 400, or even before.

[bsones]

Originally posted by Gregorovitch:

Originally posted by NX Valiant:

I would have thought that the game takes into account transport capacity on a line when distributing the goods from a factory, but that doesn't seem to be the case. How can I influence distribution?

It does but only insofar as that capacity limits the number of goods that can be shipped to a customer.

The game is modelling a sellers market in this situation. The factory can sell to whomsoever it pleases, you profits and concerns are irrelevant to it, you are simply the for hire wagon guy. Just like IRL.

This is a thematic explanation that makes sense until the factory starts allocating so much to the first line that the platform is always at capacity and production is being lost, while the second line is still getting just a tiny trickle of goods. Which is a thing that totally happens. The game really does need to account for factors other than demand, because the way that logistics allocation currently works leads to some nonsensical situations. At the very least, the algorithm should understand that it can't sell more goods than the network can transport.

[TheGreenFellow]

Originally posted by NX Valiant:

Hi! So I have a goods factory producing on Level 3. The output is delivered to two lines: a train line with very high capacity running to a big city (demand 389 goods) and a truck line with only two trucks on it running to a smaller city (demand 234 goods).
I want to prioritise good delivery to the train line, since it's much more profitable. But currently, the truck line gets more goods than it can transport and the train line doesn't get enough.

I would have thought that the game takes into account transport capacity on a line when distributing the goods from a factory, but that doesn't seem to be the case. How can I influence distribution?

The game logic for production is that with multiple sources of demand, production gets evenly distributed between them. A factory by default settings can only have 400 production maximum, and by having 2 destinations you are splitting that in half - each city is going to be sent about half of that. You can verify this yourself by selecting the factory ingame and looking at the destinations tab - it shows you directly where the produced goods have been allocated.

The phenomenon you are witnessing is because your truck route does not have enough rate capacity to deliver that part of this evenly split allocation. To be clear - the game does not look at your current routes' rate capacities (which are often in flux due to several variables) when determining destination allocation. Earlier on, when towns are small and demand amounts are most often much smaller than the split allocation amounts, this doesn't yet factor in - it's when cities grow to the point that total demand connected to that factory by your transportation network outstrips that factory's maximum production.

If you are wanting to focus your production on the big city which has a demand level already very close to the default production rate cap for a single factory, you will have to decide from some options:
- source the smaller city's demand from another production source (wherein your furthest point of progress in your game will be when you have no more production sources to add and thereby further grow your cities; having new industries spawn in with a set target industry level can help even this out if you want longer games, and you can enable that option when loading a current save - there is also a industry-per-km setting that may be worth looking into tweaking yourself)
- artificially handicap the coverage of your delivery points in each city to be about 200 (more trouble than it's worth imo, this is always changing because of how cities dynamically grow and change and overly complicates your transport network situation)
- use dev tools/a workshop mod to increase the maximum production cap of factories (fundamentally changes the shape of the 'transportation network puzzle' you are intended to solve and will naturally greatly lengthen the distance to your furthest point of progress)

[mrtree]

This would be one of my "wish list" items for the next version of TPF. I would like cargo to be contract-based. Basically, when a supplier sees that you have set up a route for its goods, it will prompt you to agree to a service amount (50, 100, 200, 400 loads per time interval for instance), and then it is up to you to get to that rate on your lines. If you don't meet that rate, then the loads start to pile up, which is a signal to you, and maybe you face financial penalties for not meeting your contract goals. That would make the financial gameplay more engaging, especially in the late game, as inefficiencies start to become costly.

Then shippers that grow could also request greater contract amounts, causing you to put more trains on the line or upgrade to higher capacity boxcars, etc.

But if you don't want to serve certain cargoes, you just don't say yes to the contract. As it is right now, if you're not careful with the line filters, you might set up a line to haul coal but then the stone quarry sees you can carry his stuff and starts dumping them in your station too, and then your coal trains start carrying more stone and the steel mill gets choked off so your steel trains run empty... Without discrete contracts, your transport company is treated kind of like a public utility that anybody can jump on and use.

I play with industry mods to add lots of cargo types, and it's rather cumbersome to use filters to keep control of who carries what.

[Vimpster]

Originally posted by mrtree:

This would be one of my "wish list" items for the next version of TPF. I would like cargo to be contract-based. Basically, when a supplier sees that you have set up a route for its goods, it will prompt you to agree to a service amount (50, 100, 200, 400 loads per time interval for instance), and then it is up to you to get to that rate on your lines. If you don't meet that rate, then the loads start to pile up, which is a signal to you, and maybe you face financial penalties for not meeting your contract goals. That would make the financial gameplay more engaging, especially in the late game, as inefficiencies start to become costly.

That is a pretty cool idea. I like the idea of having to agree to contracts and being penalised if you do not live up to the contract. I think that would both allow for the greater control over where stuff goes while also adding a degree of challenge and accountability to the game.

[TheGreenFellow]

I only just looked at the timestamps and realized this thread's from 2020 and was bumped to complain about the game logic.... derp. Well hopefully my explain can still help show that the 'nonsensical' isn't that nonsensical after all.

Some kind of contract system might be neat to try, but I think I do prefer a style more in the Railroad Tycoon 2 fashion.