Colonist skill levels are not increasing the way that they should.

[Macdallan]

Some colonists do *NOT* raise their skills when using certain crafting tables. I checked over and over. I keep sending one particular colonist to do certain tasks and their skills don't move. They don't have any traits that would prevent those skills from going up, and they're low enough that they SHOULD be going up, but on certain crafting benches their skills just don't change. I read a few forum entries about it and some players say "No, this skill will go up, not that skill on that bench." but that's not what's happening, ZERO skills are changing even if the colonist spends a few hours over the course of a week or so doing that task.

So... what's wrong? Is it a bug? Am I missing something? Are there certain tasks on some of the crafting stations that just don't give you any skill points?

[whatamidoing]

Some don't give skill. What are you trying to do, stonecutting?

[Steelfleece]

Stonecutting, smelting, and certain other basic tasks produce no skill increase. Some mod-added benches and tasks also may not.

If you do wish these tasks to add skill experience, depending on the task, there's probably a mod for it.

[Macdallan]

Originally posted by whatamidoing:

Some don't give skill. What are you trying to do, stonecutting?

Originally posted by Steelfleece:

Stonecutting, smelting, and certain other basic tasks produce no skill increase. Some mod-added benches and tasks also may not.

If you do wish these tasks to add skill experience, depending on the task, there's probably a mod for it.

One of the forums I read said that stone cutting WILL increase skills but that it boosts mining, not crafting, but it doesn't. Maybe it was referring to a mod that was mentioned somewhere else in the thread?

Well, if stone cutting doesn't improve anything at all then that answers the question. Seems a bit odd because stone cutting takes skill, and so does smelting - but then again a lot of things in the game don't make any sense.

Thank you both.

[The Blind One]

I really think they should just split up 'crafting' into 3 different skills.

Machining = machining table, fabrication bench.
Tailoring = Tailoring, give a bonus to durability for quality and a tiny mood buff to make it worthwhile.
Crafting = Everything else. It's basically how handy a pawn is in working with their hands or primitive crafts. Then allow smelting and stoneworking to increase their crafting xp.

It's honestly weird how a pawn can learn to make power armor because he stiched a few pants together

[Macdallan]

Originally posted by The Blind One:

I really think they should just split up 'crafting' into 3 different skills.

Machining = machining table, fabrication bench.
Tailoring = Tailoring, give a bonus to durability for quality and a tiny mood buff to make it worthwhile.
Crafting = Everything else. It's basically how handy a pawn is in working with their hands or primitive crafts. Then allow smelting and stoneworking to increase their crafting xp.

It's honestly weird how a pawn can learn to make power armor because he stiched a few pants together :lunar2019crylaughingpig:

There probably should be some kind of benefit to doing those two tasks even if it's just a small increase of some kind to at least one skill (even if it's just 5% or 10% of what other crafting provides). I haven't played the game enough to say whether or not what you propose would work or is or is not a good idea but I feel like it should do something other than provide materials since you can spend a heck of a lot of time cutting stone.

[Astasia]

Originally posted by Macdallan:

One of the forums I read said that stone cutting WILL increase skills but that it boosts mining, not crafting, but it doesn't. Maybe it was referring to a mod that was mentioned somewhere else in the thread?

Stone cutting originally improved crafting very marginally, not enough to really level the skill meaningfully or fight skill decay, but a token amount that could long term maybe get a colonist up to level 3 from 1 over the course of a playthrough. Then it was briefly changed to raise construction instead. Then the exp was removed entirely. It never raised mining, it's possible there's a mod that does that but I've never heard of it.

People you have stonecutting you might not want to actually gain exp because you might want to keep their crafting/construction/art skills below level 3 so they don't get creativity inspirations. It's effectively like "dumb labor" and is a good task for say your combat colonists who don't really have any other job they would be good at, and you can get more shoot frenzy and go frenzy inspirations for them if you keep their other skills low.

The task does not use or benefit from the skill in any way, a skill 20 crafter cuts stone blocks just the same as a skill 0 crafter.

[Macdallan]

Originally posted by Astasia:

Originally posted by Macdallan:

One of the forums I read said that stone cutting WILL increase skills but that it boosts mining, not crafting, but it doesn't. Maybe it was referring to a mod that was mentioned somewhere else in the thread?

Stone cutting originally improved crafting very marginally, not enough to really level the skill meaningfully or fight skill decay, but a token amount that could long term maybe get a colonist up to level 3 from 1 over the course of a playthrough. Then it was briefly changed to raise construction instead. Then the exp was removed entirely. It never raised mining, it's possible there's a mod that does that but I've never heard of it.

People you have stonecutting you might not want to actually gain exp because you might want to keep their crafting/construction/art skills below level 3 so they don't get creativity inspirations. It's effectively like "dumb labor" and is a good task for say your combat colonists who don't really have any other job they would be good at, and you can get more shoot frenzy and go frenzy inspirations for them if you keep their other skills low.

The task does not use or benefit from the skill in any way, a skill 20 crafter cuts stone blocks just the same as a skill 0 crafter.

So it's just another poorly designed system. Gotcha.