Unable to find a tunnel!

[Deocyn]

So I've had a prison going for a while in which dogs kept on sniffing out a tunnel crossing underneath a yard in the centre of my complex. I spent time moving the dog around marking the tunnels and had an idea of which cells they may be originating from. I did multiple searches of the cell block, the toilets individually, indivudal cells... unable to find anything. I also have done multiple shakedowns however the tunnel entrance could never be found.

So I started to assume maybe it was a bug where there were some tunnels left over that were not connected to anything, and stopped paying attention to the constant alerts of dogs sniffing out the tunnels in the yard as much. I still did the occassional search / shakedown just in case, but being constantly unable to find anything I assumed it was a bug or something.

A long time later, 8 prisoners suddenly escape! And it is a REALLY long tunnel, the exact tunnel the dogs sniffed out going under the yard trailing miles to the edge of the complex. Originating from the very cells that had been searched countless times as they were digging this tunnel to china.

How come I was unable to find these tunnels? Constant guard searches did nothing and I am wondering if there is something I'm missing here.

[jasonharris2]

guard only have a 25% of finding a tunnel

[Frazzledragøn the Trustworthy]

Let's correct this.
If you do "Search Cellblock" or "Search Cell" you have a 50% chance to uncover a tunnel, when searching the toilet.
If you click the toilet manually and "Search" it as a single entity, you'll uncover it with 100% chance.

However, the second part of what I said, I'm not completely sure on that at this point. It could be that you forgot those specific toilets, or they were being overlapped by a different command, or it has something to do with Staff Needs, should you be playing with those (I don't know if they have any effect, I don't use them)
Another possible explanation is a type of cooldown, meaning if you do a Search Cellblock and nothing is found, you can't do a new search immediately after and find something. This is just a hypothesis with no real backing.

An alternative method you can use it to put a toilet on the tunnel-detection-spot and dismantle it again.
It's a bit cheatsydoodle, but if nothing else works, that'll do.

[Valdar]

@Frazzle
If you click on the toilet, you get an option to search toilets, plural, not singular. This option searches the entire cellblock, and is not 100% effective in finding a tunnel. I'm not sure what the percentage is, but I have a save file with a known tunnel underneath that I've been testing lately, and the tunnel goes unnoticed in said search.

The reason I point out the subtlety of one cell toilet vs. the cell block search is that I could have sworn that we used to be able to search the one toilet without disrupting the cellblock, but maybe I dreamed it (I've dusted the game off after not playing for a couple of years). Can someone confirm or correct me on that point please?

Search cell doesn’t produce much better results if the prisoner is awake or out of his cell either. The guards will find his digging tool in this case and punish him accordingly, but tunnel still goes unnoticed.

Two sure fire ways of finding a tunnel:
As Frazzle said, have a worker dismantle toilet and it will pop every time in my experience. I don’t really think it’s cheaty. In RL, the inmate would probably loosen the toilet and move it to dig and move it back later anyway, so dismantling the toilet to see what’s underneath seems reasonable to me. Just imo.

The other foolproof way is to do a cell search after you are well into your sleep time regime. The prisoner will leave a dummy head in his bed while digging. The guards will find this every time and instantly reveal the tunnel, and the digger will pop up from the tunnel and usually give flight and/or fight.

BTW, my guard dogs couldn’t find a tunnel if they fell in it XD

[Frazzledragøn the Trustworthy]

But you CAN still search single toilets.
There is "Search", "Search Cell", "Search Cellblock" and "Search Toilets".
And, unless they changed something to the mechanics, the first of those four options should yield 100% accurate searches.

Also, the cheatsy way I am talking about is putting a toilet literally in the middle of nowhere, outdoors, where the dog patrol is, then dismantling it.

[Valdar]

Maybe I wasn't clear: I DO get those options when clicking on a toilet, but...

Search = Search Prisoner
Search Cell = Searches all objects in that cell
Search Cell Block = Searches all objects in that cell block
Search Toilets = Searches only toilets, but ALL TOILETS in that cell block

At least that is what mine is doing. I don't see how the mechanics would be any different unless we have different versions of the game.

I thought we were able to search a single toilet in the past (as well as an option to search all toilets in cell block). And I remember that as being 100% effective as well. But my memory is not what it used to be :)

But as I said, I have a save file that has a known tunnel started by prisoner X and neither a "Search Cell" nor a "Search Toilets" discovers it (unless I conduct it while he busy digging).

And yeah, I agree that putting a toilet on a suspected spot just to dismantle is a bit over the top.

[Deocyn]

I didn't know there were chance percentages involved, thanks for the information. I must have been unlucky or something because the 8 offending cells were definitely searched mutiple times in different ways.

You can actually search single toilets, at least you can in my version of the game. Its the same with any searchable object. Search = Search the selected object. I'm unsure as to why your version of the game would take that to mean searching the prisoner assigned to the cell.

I did actually think I had ordered a search of the specific toilet I thought was being tunneled under but perhaps something kooky happened. I am playing with staff needs so maybe that interfered. Or, probably more likely, I convinced myself I had searched individual toilets but hadn't!

Cheers guys.

[Frazzledragøn the Trustworthy]

Originally posted by Valdar:

Maybe I wasn't clear: I DO get those options when clicking on a toilet, but...

Search = Search Prisoner

I tested this, with cells that definitively had prisoners assigned to them. My toilets were being searched correctly, so I don't know what is going on with your game.

[Valdar]

Ah, my bad. I think i was half asleep when I typed that. I was thinking of "search" as object owner instead of the object itself. Anyway, I KNEW you used to be abe to search a single toilet lol. Thanks Frazzle and Ali.

And interesting, i retested the saved game i mentioned, and in this particular case, "Search" finds the tunnel every time, but "Search Toilets" never does. This could be a difference in the two functions, or it could just be that the randomness factor for each function is stored in the save game instead of picking a percentage weighted value on the fly.