No Tools!! What will I do??

[maiden4meldin]

Okay, so we all know we need tools. And to make tools you need both wood and iron. Steel tools, add in coal. But what happens when you run out of tools, and you don't have any iron to make them? Your wood supplies are pretty low too. And your labourer forces are far far away from where you are mining?? What to do? What to do?


Well, this is something that actually happened to me. I had a mine, with tons of workers, and they were working as hard as they could. I ran out of iron. Even with fifteen workers in the mine, why would that happen? And why is my food not coming in higher? Well, folkses, I gotta say, it was entirely my fault. I did not use the Pathing Tool in my game. Had I used the pathing tool earlier, I never would have put 15 workers in that particular mine. That zone, didn't have nearly enough housing for that mine ever. At most it could handle five miners only. Which is what I typically put into my mines. Putting 15 workers totally worked against me. My workers were coming from very long distances. And my labourers were also pushed to the outer reaches of my map, further compounding the problem.

How I fixed it.
First off, I didn't use the pathing tool, big mistake. But I did shut down the nearest to the mines forestry node, giving me 10 workers, Foresters 4, Gatherers 4, Herbalist 1 and Hunting Cabin 1. So, those workers immediately became miners, and this helped me put the labourers much closer. If I had used the pathing tool. I still would have shut down that forestry Node, but I would have reduced the workers in the mine as well. There were a lot of iron sitting just outside the mine, but until iron hits the stockpiles it does not count in inventory. The other thing I did right away, was pause any building still needing wood or iron. And turned the builders into labourers as well.

Took about two months, to get tools on the rise again, as well as making a small surplus of tools. I was able to reduce the amount of miners for that mine, down to just two. I had another mine built where I could have better access to housing, and opened that mine up with ten workers. I also learned that the more the merrier for Labourer's because prior to this tool fiasco, I didn't know the miners only put the iron outside the mine, and required Labourer's to pick up the iron and place into the stockpiles. I restarted the forestry node right away, and I began using the Pathing tool .

Once I saw how awful all of my pathing was, I was in a wood/fuel crisis. Yep, right after solving the tools problem, I was out of wood, my foresters could not even hope to keep up despite having four working full time. So, luckily a trader came, took the hide coats I stole, and put in 500 firewood. Then I still had a lack of wood, and the crisis for fuel would crop up again. So, I put foresters inside my Market areas, on Plant Only, with just one worker. Every so often I would take 1/3 of the trees that forester was growing, and that boosted my wood by thousands. My firewood, began going up and up, and became a primary trade good. My new mine, was well attended now, as I built extra housing into that area for the labourers. And my problems and all crisis's avoided.

How did you fix a lack of tools, or lack of wood, or fuel??

[HiFive]

I was running very low on tools for a while on my previous map. Amazingly, the workers still collected ore and such. I read that they can still work, but not as efficiently. The blacksmiths couldn't turn out the tools fast enough, so for a long while only a few workers had tools. However, even the ones without tools were breaking up the rocks and collecting them.

[dixiechow]

Well, yes, this happens to me on occasion simply because I'm not paying attention. I play with mods so the first thing I do is reduce my tool making to iron ore. Then I check to see if my blacksmiths are getting their supplies efficiently. I don't want them running around gathering wood and iron or iron ore. If that's the case I build a small wood and metal vending cart next to him to supply him. HiFive is correct, the bannies will work without tools. They just work slower.

I remember one game quite awhile ago when I was forced to make stone tools for awhile. Messy, but at least I had tools. Then fortune smiled and along came a trader selling tools!

[maiden4meldin]

Originally posted by dixiechow:

Well, yes, this happens to me on occasion simply because I'm not paying attention. I play with mods so the first thing I do is reduce my tool making to iron ore. Then I check to see if my blacksmiths are getting their supplies efficiently. I don't want them running around gathering wood and iron or iron ore. If that's the case I build a small wood and metal vending cart next to him to supply him. HiFive is correct, the bannies will work without tools. They just work slower.

I remember one game quite awhile ago when I was forced to make stone tools for awhile. Messy, but at least I had tools. Then fortune smiled and along came a trader selling tools!

Ya for me on this occasion I was playing for the uneducated achievement. And I made it ten times harder, because I did not utilize the pathing tool. I had people in one market area, working in my first market area, with a forestry node between the two markets, Thats how bad it was. I wasn't making enough food either. Wood/Fuel was barely getting by lol. And no tools, was a death sentence for me. Even though they can work without tools, being uneducated and without tools was grim. Verrrrrrry very grim lol. Since completing the achievements, I haven't ever run out of anything since. lol. But I still utilize my pathing tool

[maiden4meldin]

Originally posted by HiFive:

I was running very low on tools for a while on my previous map. Amazingly, the workers still collected ore and such. I read that they can still work, but not as efficiently. The blacksmiths couldn't turn out the tools fast enough, so for a long while only a few workers had tools. However, even the ones without tools were breaking up the rocks and collecting them.

I was playing uneducated, and without tools, they were barely bringing down one log to stockpiles. Even my vendors were not carrying at half their capacity. It was very hard to climb out of that spiral. I was so close to finishing the achievement too, like fifty people away. So now we know, the uneducated without a tool, is very bad. roflol

[28rommel]

Keep an emergency reserve of tools in your Trading Posts. Don't ever trade them away, just leave them there for a sudden need. What I do is very slowly increase the number of tools in your Trading Post. If you have multiple Trading Posts, put a little in each one. The idea is to increase the quantity in your Trading Post slowly, like in 5 tool increments, and not sudden large quantities you want transferred there (otherwise, you will experience a tool shortage). Once you have 30 or 40 (the quantity depends on how large your population is), that should be sufficient.

[dixiechow]

Originally posted by maiden4meldin:

Originally posted by dixiechow:

Well, yes, this happens to me on occasion simply because I'm not paying attention. I play with mods so the first thing I do is reduce my tool making to iron ore. Then I check to see if my blacksmiths are getting their supplies efficiently. I don't want them running around gathering wood and iron or iron ore. If that's the case I build a small wood and metal vending cart next to him to supply him. HiFive is correct, the bannies will work without tools. They just work slower.

I remember one game quite awhile ago when I was forced to make stone tools for awhile. Messy, but at least I had tools. Then fortune smiled and along came a trader selling tools!

Ya for me on this occasion I was playing for the uneducated achievement. And I made it ten times harder, because I did not utilize the pathing tool. I had people in one market area, working in my first market area, with a forestry node between the two markets, Thats how bad it was. I wasn't making enough food either. Wood/Fuel was barely getting by lol. And no tools, was a death sentence for me. Even though they can work without tools, being uneducated and without tools was grim. Verrrrrrry very grim lol. Since completing the achievements, I haven't ever run out of anything since. lol. But I still utilize my pathing tool

Uneducated AND no tools....Arrrgggggg!!!!! I guess I was really lucky to have stone tools. lol

[maiden4meldin]

Originally posted by 28rommel:

Keep an emergency reserve of tools in your Trading Posts. Don't ever trade them away, just leave them there for a sudden need. What I do is very slowly increase the number of tools in your Trading Post. If you have multiple Trading Posts, put a little in each one. The idea is to increase the quantity in your Trading Post slowly, like in 5 tool increments, and not sudden large quantities you want transferred there (otherwise, you will experience a tool shortage). Once you have 30 or 40 (the quantity depends on how large your population is), that should be sufficient.

good tips. But this was a major mistake I made in my town setup. I didn't have the housing to support miners and labourers. And I didn't use my pathing tool, so I had workers coming from far away. Then to compound the problem, my achievement was the uneducated challenge. I had not ever played uneducated before, and was unprepared for the speed of the game. I was running a deficit in food, tools, clothes and fuel, throughout the entire game. It all came to a crash, and I got lucky twice with a Trading post. One that I did not have nearly enough resources to get built, but I built it anyway. It was a hard game to play.

I do not ordinarily have issues getting a huge surplus of tools, clothes, and firewood, and food. But this game was screwed from the beginning with bad pathing. So all my workers were walking a long distance to do their jobs.

[Sarsgamer]

I'm still playing vanilla, but I've become 100% reliant on trading posts for tools.

My last map, before i would have even needed a second blacksmith i was already trading for steel tools. My second trading post i set a trader to always bring steel tools (same trader i set to bring stone also), not that i needed them every time, but when i did i'd buy some, or buy from the general trader on occasion. Near the end of the game i sent iron to my trading posts cause it was clogging up some stock piles and I didn't need it.

[maiden4meldin]

Originally posted by sarsippius27:

I'm still playing vanilla, but I've become 100% reliant on trading posts for tools.

My last map, before i would have even needed a second blacksmith i was already trading for steel tools. My second trading post i set a trader to always bring steel tools (same trader i set to bring stone also), not that i needed them every time, but when i did i'd buy some, or buy from the general trader on occasion. Near the end of the game i sent iron to my trading posts cause it was clogging up some stock piles and I didn't need it.

Wow, you play a much more different game than I would! I could never be relying on trading posts for something like tools or clothing. To me, that is just too risky. I also would never trade away iron, or stone either, as these are not renewable resources, and very expensive to buy regularly. I will dump wool because my tailors can't keep up, but thats way into my late game. I tend to prefer to buy wool, and build both warmcoats and hide coats. I will however take away, all iron tools, and all hide coats from time to time and trade those away. In fact, my trading posts are for surplus goods and variety only. I build what I need, or with a slight deficit in foods. Then my food trading brings in around 28000 food per trade per three trading posts times twice a year average. To me being reliant upon the trading post for something like tools, would have me too stressed out if I don't get the right merchant on time lol. Even if all my trading posts were to get resources for a couple years, all that would happen is my collector barns would become empty, and my BarnFarms would be getting emptied as well. But to rely on the merchants for tools, nope. nope nope, not this chick, roflol.

[Sarsgamer]

Originally posted by maiden4meldin:

Originally posted by sarsippius27:

I'm still playing vanilla, but I've become 100% reliant on trading posts for tools.

My last map, before i would have even needed a second blacksmith i was already trading for steel tools. My second trading post i set a trader to always bring steel tools (same trader i set to bring stone also), not that i needed them every time, but when i did i'd buy some, or buy from the general trader on occasion. Near the end of the game i sent iron to my trading posts cause it was clogging up some stock piles and I didn't need it.

Wow, you play a much more different game than I would! I could never be relying on trading posts for something like tools or clothing. To me, that is just too risky. I also would never trade away iron, or stone either, as these are not renewable resources, and very expensive to buy regularly. I will dump wool because my tailors can't keep up, but thats way into my late game. I tend to prefer to buy wool, and build both warmcoats and hide coats. I will however take away, all iron tools, and all hide coats from time to time and trade those away. In fact, my trading posts are for surplus goods and variety only. I build what I need, or with a slight deficit in foods. Then my food trading brings in around 28000 food per trade per three trading posts times twice a year average. To me being reliant upon the trading post for something like tools, would have me too stressed out if I don't get the right merchant on time lol. Even if all my trading posts were to get resources for a couple years, all that would happen is my collector barns would become empty, and my BarnFarms would be getting emptied as well. But to rely on the merchants for tools, nope. nope nope, not this chick, roflol.

i'm avoiding building quarries or mines as they aren't efficient.

If i don't craft my own tools then iron on the map is more than enough. At least so far.

There are occasions I start worrying about steel tools, but with the one trading post i request steel tools from, they bring 2100 whenever they visit, and general traders, who typically have 200 at at time, it's enough.

Even at 1k adults they still only go through about 200 steel tools per year.

Tailoring - i make my own clothes since whatever you're hunting or gathering or building brings in enough to craft to clothes.

[Ready2produce]

Originally posted by HiFive:

I was running very low on tools for a while on my previous map. Amazingly, the workers still collected ore and such. I read that they can still work, but not as efficiently. The blacksmiths couldn't turn out the tools fast enough, so for a long while only a few workers had tools. However, even the ones without tools were breaking up the rocks and collecting them.

I had a similar experience with one of my prior games ... excruciating experience.

[Ready2produce]

Originally posted by 28rommel:

Keep an emergency reserve of tools in your Trading Posts. Don't ever trade them away, just leave them there for a sudden need. What I do is very slowly increase the number of tools in your Trading Post. If you have multiple Trading Posts, put a little in each one. The idea is to increase the quantity in your Trading Post slowly, like in 5 tool increments, and not sudden large quantities you want transferred there (otherwise, you will experience a tool shortage). Once you have 30 or 40 (the quantity depends on how large your population is), that should be sufficient.

Of course, if you have disaster enabled and you have one trading post, pray that that trading post doesn't get hit.