Is there anyway to actually prioritize work?

[Emissary0fViolence]

Just had a colony fail because my grower is also a carpenter, and for some reason he just would not spend any time growing, despite the fact I already had another colonist handeling the construction, I could only get my grower to work on 1 tile at a time through prioritization (very annoying), and eventually my colonists all starve to death because i'm too ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ lazy to micromanage that much. Now in retrospect I realize I could have just assigned him to only growing, but i'm really hoping there's a better way I just don't know about, because that in itself is pretty damn inefficient (mod suggestions are also welcome).

[BlackSmokeDMax]

Make sure to set the work screen to manual mode. You'll know it's set right when you see numbers instead of check marks.

[Daffy]

Also remember that they do the work from left to right, so if you have several things set to lets say 2 they will do things that are listed first from the left of the work screen.

[kevinshow]

Seeing the "Manual" work screen might not be noticeable at first, but after you see that, you'll very likely use it more than the auto screen where everything is just checked or not checked.


See also this recent topic that will help explain work priorities

http://steamcommunity.com/app/294100/discussions/0/1484359403774786512/

[BlackSmokeDMax]

Once you get the standard work screen figured out and you want even further control, I completely recommend using Fluffy's Worktab mod:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=725219116

Using the advanced mode (ctrl click on some columns to expand them) can give you very fine control as it breaks them down into sub-jobs so you can *really* set what order they do things.

Plus instead of off, 1, 2, 3, 4 as in vanilla you have off and 1 through 9 (or any lower number if you don't want that many- can be set in mod options)

(The video shown on the mod page is quite old btw, current version doesn't have the same look as that older one)

[McFuzz]

Easiest way, without mods or manual priority setting, is just turn off their labours that you don't want them to use temporarily, or use the prioritize function a lot. It's more handson, but it gets you past the setup phase.

[Zalzany]

You don't really need the mod even with the mod I never go beyond 4 levels of priority its way to easy to just use the defualt system I put it all on 3, then one for their main job, 2 for important but not the most important jobs like my crafters I got do this some times with say smithing so they make clothes first, as to me I only do clothing orders when peoples stuff is tattered so its priority over a new shiny mace to replace my melee person club, or a new gun when I already got one that works.

To me 4 is basicly things I want them to do manually using priority like my back up doc is 4 they almost never run out of crap to do around base so having it on four means I can still right click on the doc and do surgury or heal the doc, or some minor thing if the doc is busy and i want to get there skill up to do surgury on the doc later. Because in my experince some day every one wh odoesn't die ends up with a hook hand, peg leg or better at some point installed...

[Milky Wilky]

[Sorry for necro-posting but I actually was looking for this info today]

I actually found this discussion trying to remember how to temporarily assign a specific task to a particular colonist. While having the colonist selected, right click the "thing" you want to interact with and click "Prioritize [whatever the task is]" and that colonist will immediately begin working on that task if they're able to (have correct / enough resources, etc). They will continue to do this task until they cannot do it anymore (task complete, out of resources, randomly get struck by lightning and instantly die, etc.) Though they will sometimes stop to eat and you usually have to assign the task like described above again. DO NOTE that their happiness tends to decrease REALLY fast doing this because they typically wont stop to eat until they're almost out of food and wont stop to do recreational things. Another option for multiple of the same task (constructing a series of power conduit or floors) is to just assign that colonist a task priority of 1 for a little while, though they will stop to fight / flee / eat / sleep.
edit. You can stop the prioritized task by selecting the colonist and pressing the hotkey "C" or just clicking stop prioritized task at the bottom of the screen

[Radiosity]

Or you could just install Achtung.