Any tips for unloading ships?

[Eccentric Gentleman]

I recently started playing the Last Autumn and I find I can't seem to unload the incoming ships fast enough. Not in the sense that they won't bring supplies at a satisfying rate but I can't seem to stop them piling up on the docks.

I had a dock importing steel, I equiped it with a reloader and set the reloader to extended work hours and the dock to normal hours. All to make sure the docks wouldn't fill up and become clogged ensuring no time or workforce was wasted. And yet I still had docks filled to capacity, steel was still coming in faster then I could put it in storage and thus interupting the flow of matirals.

Incidentally the game insists I upgrade the docks to make transport even faster.

What am I doing wrong? How am I supposed to run the docks? How could I possibly run them better? Shouldn't the system I tried be enough to keep up?

[amordron]

You need to adjust worker amounts between the dock/reloader to match rates. You dont need to fully staff. Will let you find the ratios yourself.

But this is to allow the use of double shift at basic reloader you want double shift on the reloader at steam on both reloader and dock at advanced on dock. That should give a clue to the rations when not using double shift as a note.

Reloaders only work on ones piles not the dock as a whole so need one per pile.

upgraded docks are really all you need when done right for extreme. Will bring all the resources you need.


Extended work hours is crap don't use it take double shift.

Game doesn't insist on anything there is nothing that forces you to upgrade the docks.

[Tiasmoon]

Originally posted by Eccentric Gentleman:

I recently started playing the Last Autumn and I find I can't seem to unload the incoming ships fast enough. Not in the sense that they won't bring supplies at a satisfying rate but I can't seem to stop them piling up on the docks.

I had a dock importing steel, I equiped it with a reloader and set the reloader to extended work hours and the dock to normal hours. All to make sure the docks wouldn't fill up and become clogged ensuring no time or workforce was wasted. And yet I still had docks filled to capacity, steel was still coming in faster then I could put it in storage and thus interupting the flow of matirals.

Incidentally the game insists I upgrade the docks to make transport even faster.

What am I doing wrong? How am I supposed to run the docks? How could I possibly run them better? Shouldn't the system I tried be enough to keep up?

Docks provide a lot more resources then a single reloader (or gathering post) can keep up with. The game advises upgrading the docks for this reason, as it wont increase resource gain rate but gives you more piles to gather from. Meaning you can build more reloaders for that dock and be able to keep up with the dock.

However, if you arent using double shift on reloaders, then it is better to use gathering posts instead. The reason for this is simple: multiple gathering posts can gather from the same pile. Even tho their gathering rate is lower then that of a reloader, since you are using more then one their combined gather rate is much higher at the cost of using more men.

Plus, reloaders cost steam cores while gather posts dont. Advanced reloaders at advanced docks give far more resources, but to get to that point you need a lot of steamcores and research. Early on you are better off going with 2-3 gather posts (3 for steel, 2 for anything else) Once you get advanced reloader and advanced dock researched, you will want to switch to reloaders for steel. Before that point remember to save up on some logistics to request steamcores.

As amordron mentioned above: you can adjust the unload speed of the dock with the gathering rate of the reloader/gathering posts by lowering the amount of people that work at the dock.
If your reloader is collecting at a rate of 6/h and your dock is unloading at a rate of 12/h, then half the amount of people working at the dock to get 6/h and 5 workers you can use elsewhere.

Managing resource gain vs resources spend is important to get the most out of your workers. As such you want to pay a lot of attention to the gather rates at each resource production place.

Lastly, as a side note, if you need a different type of resource you can switch the docks produce. Make sure to do this during the night/after work hours so that only 1 hour each day (first hour of dock production) is wasted.

[Panfilo]

I tend to upgrade the docks as early as possible because having the resource pile up is less wasteful than having a gathering post/loading station stop due to hitting your storage cap. You can always make up lost time by building additional gathering posts or loading stations later when you get more workers. You can think of the piled up resources like free storage in that regard.

Each dock upgrade lets it accumulate an additional pile (so T2 dock 2 piles, T3 dock 3 piles). Unless you really need those workers elsewhere it isn't the end of the world if it builds up, as you generally want the dock to accumulate equal or faster to the gathering buildings.

And don't forget there's separate upgrades for gathering post harvest speed, loading station harvest speed, and dock accumulation speed. I've heard it's more efficient /cost effective to focus on upgrading the building tier before the flat % upgrade, since the 'jump' in increased resource collection is higher when you go up tiers. So if I would guess the ideal sequence would be docks to T3, gathering post harvest upgrade, loading station to tier 3,THEN the dock accumulation upgrade/loading station upgrade. This order ensures you're accumulating resources as fast as possible, you can always build additional gathering posts to ramp up your harvesting speed until you get T2 loading stations.

Also the higher the tier the more manpower efficient the building is so if you need to pull people to other tasks you're still generating/gathering a decent rate.