Soil healing mechanics??

[Daynen Drakeson]

from what I hear, mulchtube is supposed to be the more "reliable" soil healer as opposed to giant's grass. So far, my experience has been the opposite. So I'm testing.

I've got a patch of tubes and a patch of grass growing adjacent to each other for about three game years now and while I can visibly see the soil under the grass improving and track the ratio of sand/clay/silt/loam, the mulchtube has just kind of sat there. Is there some hidden mechanic? does mulchtube need fertilizer to work? Does it not work outside the desert? I'm on the trading post scenario on concordia and I bought the mulchtube recipe to plant it but so far it's been a waste.

I also planted two isolated 3x3 patches of tubes and set one to not harvest to see if that made a difference. So far: nothing from either one. both started on 9 tiles of 70%(sand.) No change in three years. Still 70% soil quality.

Anyone have any comparative testing?

[Bjørn]

Originally posted by Jaggid Edje:

Alright, so crystals have a soil change rating of 15%, and they change every soil type straight to sand. Giant grass and Mulchtubes both change via a progression of Sand->Clay->Silt->Loam, and a significantly slower percent.

So if you're after returning our sandy soil to loam, you'll need to grow mulchtubes or giant's grass for a very long time. Plant your energy crystals on Clay for the fastest restoration.

Thanks for the observations

[Daynen Drakeson]

I'm not following how planting crystals on clay speeds up the restoration. Crystals DEGRADE the soil to sand, yet they do grow fastest on loam. Planting crystals on clay is just going to slow the initial crystal growth, increasing the time it takes to plant the grass/tubes to start restoring it. Unless I have COMPLETELY misread the entire description of crystals both here and in-game?

Either way, for the moment I'm just going to conclude that for whatever reason, mulchtubes don't restore soil outside the desert biome. Unless someone has found out how to make them work, giant's grass remains the way to go.

[Elgar]

Originally posted by Daynen Drakeson:

Either way, for the moment I'm just going to conclude that for whatever reason, mulchtubes don't restore soil outside the desert biome. Unless someone has found out how to make them work, giant's grass remains the way to go.

Mmm... That would be great if JensErik or one of devs could confirm if it's intended or if it's a bug in the current version.

[Jaggid Edje]

It would be rather odd for mulchtubes to only work on one map, if Giant Grass and crystals work on both. There's no separate code for mulchtubes, they use the same game parameters, just with different variable definitions.

[Kedryn]

Originally posted by Jaggid Edje:

It would be rather odd for mulchtubes to only work on one map, if Giant Grass and crystals work on both. There's no separate code for mulchtubes, they use the same game parameters, just with different variable definitions.

Mulchtube definitely works in Sobrius for me. I've been trying them both out, and I think the Giant's Grass helps neighbouring tiles, but the mulchtube seems to be faster, and works on tiles the grass doesn't fit in.

[Daynen Drakeson]

The radius of soil healing was also something I wondered about. Early on in my gametime I tried planting alternating rows of grass and crystals to see if they would simply balance each other out but I didn't pay close enough attention to the results at the time. If Giant's grass can restore the soil OUTSIDE its own field and mulchtube can't, then the argument is settled in my mind because I can just plant some grass every few squares to upgrade all my soil while the crystals drink it up.

Symbiotic relationships, HOOOOOOOOO!

[Jaggid Edje]

Giant's grass definitely hits the soil next to it, just saw that in my last game. But it appears to only be like a tile or two, It is also VERY slow compared to how quickly crystals destroy the soil, so just planting them side-by-side will not be enough.

[Daynen Drakeson]

Have you tried surrounding a crystal with grass? Make a 3x3 square of grass with the center square as a crystal. Might even be tileable. Seems like a lot of room to grow crystals, but if it can keep the soil out of sand range it might be good enough.

[Bjørn]

I'm also using mulchtube and giant's grass on Sobrius, and I see improvement half way through the year for both. They're both former max size crystal fields next to each other, going from loam and some silt to sand in one year.

I'm taking screenshots of the soil status screens with regular intervals to compare later They're both a bouquet of all soil types now, so it's very confusing...

[Daynen Drakeson]

Yeah there's apparently some randomness so each square will heal at different rates, but maybe I was just finding a bug. Early access is SO MUCH FUN, amirite?

[Kedryn]

Further testing... the mulchtube takes sooo much more labour. It takes one tile, so there are four harvests for every one grass harvest, but requires no replanting like the grass does.

I think for large areas, I'll stick with grass.

Also, I've noticed "infertile" areas spreading while I do this.

[Bjørn]

Originally posted by Bjørn:

I'm taking screenshots of the soil status screens with regular intervals to compare later They're both a bouquet of all soil types now, so it's very confusing...

Thought I'd follow up on this. Both mulchtube and giant grass turned the soil back from sand to loam in a single year. I kept them both set to planting and harvesting throughout the year, although I'm not sure that matters for restoration, but logically it should.

So like Kedryn mentions above, maintaining the mulchtube fields requires quite a lot of work, so I'll go for the giant grass in the future, if available.