Am I missing something about house heating

[Sculpur]

Hello,

One thing about the heat management in this game that has been bothering me is that you can never heat up houses as well as workplaces, at least as far as I can tell. With all relevant upgrades, the heat level of houses is always lower than that of workplaces at the same temperature. Add to that the fact that you can't install heaters in houses for some reason, and it is absolutely more healthy for people to stick to their workplace than to stay home. I play Endless mode, and on medium difficulty I noticed that after I replaced most workers with automatons, health in the city actually decreased because they get sick more easily at home. And on hard/extreme, I absolutely cannot deal with the cold homes, and only survive respectively to the second/first storms after which everyone is done.

Am I missing something, or is that the situation with housing in the game?

Thanks in advance for any input!

[General Idea]

Homes are not independently heated. Steam hubs or braziers are like sub-stations fed by the main generator. Placing them in the housing areas will heat the homes to the generator level and supercharge when activated. Heaters apply to workplaces as you mentioned.

[General Idea]

Originally posted by General Idea:

Homes are not independently heated. Steam hubs or braziers are like sub-stations fed by the main generator. Placing them in the housing areas will heat the homes to the generator level and supercharge when activated. Heaters apply to workplaces as you mentioned.

Edit: Extending the range of the generator will also heat any homes within the range selected, but is less fuel efficient than steam hubs or braziers. However, your graphics card may well start to struggle if you have too many steam hubs, depends on your graphics card and machine.

[Bobywan]

With house + insulation + level 4 gen, you wont have issue anymore.
Housing has 4 level of insulation which doesnt consume coal whereas workplace require heaters to achieve the same level of heat.

[Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia]

Pretty sure the Infirmary and House of Healing are the only buildings who can have a base heating level higher than a House and only with both insulation techs. Only in extreme conditions is it better to have people working than staying at home in terms of temperature related sickness.

[Sculpur]

Thanks for your replies everyone, I guess I must have been missing some house insulation upgrades in my previous runs... Or perhaps encountered some kind of a rare bug. I'll try again an keep a sharper eye on the tech.

[Mr. Moneybags]

you don't miss anything it's true that workplaces have higher temperatur than houses because there are no heater mayby that is how they motivate the workers for the 14 hour shift :)

[Sunvine2]

I just started playing the game and shut it off after an hour. I placed steam hubs to heat my tents and it didn't do a thing. Doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Who programs these games?

[Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia]

Originally posted by MirrorWax:

I just started playing the game and shut it off after an hour. I placed steam hubs to heat my tents and it didn't do a thing. Doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Who programs these games?

Overlapping heat zones don't work any better. It is called Balance. A steam hub with generator heat level 1 will make a tent fairly acceptable for a few days before the temperature drops to -40c or worse, certainly long enough to either build bunkhouses or research heat level 2 with the latter being the better choice on all but The Arks scenario where you have so few people you can probably afford to jump straight to bunkhouses skipping tents entirely.

[Alcator]

Originally posted by Khan Boyzitbig of Mercia:

Pretty sure the Infirmary and House of Healing are the only buildings who can have a base heating level higher than a House and only with both insulation techs. Only in extreme conditions is it better to have people working than staying at home in terms of temperature related sickness.

Nope, Level 3 primary resource buildings - Coal Mine, Wall Drill, Steamworks have base heat level 3, and can have a +3 heater inside, making them +6, as opposed to Houses, which can only have +4 at maximum upgrade level. Industrial Hothouses with full insulation are even better: +4 base warmth, with +3 heater.
With a +4 Generator heat (whether direct or via Steam Hubs), that makes those resource buildings +10, compared to +8 for Houses. With a +2 Overdrive, it's possible to get +12 in workplaces vs. +10 in houses. Industrial Hothouses can get to +11 with heaters and Level 4 heatzone and to +13 with overdrive.
Fully upgraded Coal Thumper is +2/+5 with heaters/+9 with heaters and Level 4 generator/+11 with overdrive; Gathering Posts likewise.

In Endurance mode, you get storms up to -120 (= -12 levels, with -2 = chilly), so Houses will be Very Cold (-4) without overdrive and Chilly (-2) with it, while workplaces can be -2 without overdrive and Warm (0) with overdrive.

[Sculpur]

Originally posted by Alcator:

Nope, Level 3 primary resource buildings - Coal Mine, Wall Drill, Steamworks have base heat level 3, and can have a +3 heater inside, making them +6, as opposed to Houses, which can only have +4 at maximum upgrade level. Industrial Hothouses with full insulation are even better: +4 base warmth, with +3 heater.
With a +4 Generator heat (whether direct or via Steam Hubs), that makes those resource buildings +10, compared to +8 for Houses. With a +2 Overdrive, it's possible to get +12 in workplaces vs. +10 in houses. Industrial Hothouses can get to +11 with heaters and Level 4 heatzone and to +13 with overdrive.
Fully upgraded Coal Thumper is +2/+5 with heaters/+9 with heaters and Level 4 generator/+11 with overdrive; Gathering Posts likewise.

In Endurance mode, you get storms up to -120 (= -12 levels, with -2 = chilly), so Houses will be Very Cold (-4) without overdrive and Chilly (-2) with it, while workplaces can be -2 without overdrive and Warm (0) with overdrive.

Ah, that's exactly my observation minus the precise numbers, thanks, I guess not a lot of people pay close attention to that. So I guess I just need to git gut at heat tactics :D.