Ammo production: Am I missing something?

[Athoros]

So I just got the season pass a few days ago, and decided to dive into some of the new production mechanisms. I decided to go with the production of jet/munitions for caps/ammo. I started a farm with a bunch of brahmin to get a steady flow of fertilizer. Since there is no way to manufacture plastic or lead, I planned on purchasing those resources in shipments.
As of this morning, I'm all set up and ready to go. Got a bunch of brahmin, and enough caps to buy all the shipments I could possibly need. So I go and buy some plastic, make a bunch of jet. That works out wonderfully and I profit about $8k. Then I go to produce ammo. So I go and get a shipment of lead, and measure the output. 10 rounds per 2 lead. Hmm. Okay so my charisma is boosted to 11, I've got all of the trading related perks that I know of, and this is still resulting in a net loss for me. Also bear in mind that I'm not looking to profit off of the ammo, just make my own ammo for cheaper than I could buy it for. So a shipment of 25 lead costs me 240 caps, and results in a total of 120 rounds of 10mm ammunition. 120 rounds of 10mm ammo is worth 240 caps, sells for 120 caps. Am I missing something? Even when you factor in the fact that I get my fertilizer for free, there doesn't seem to be any point in doing this.
So I thought ok maybe it's just this type of ammo. I looked at the materials required for other ammo and it's the same story, no profit. I don't get it. And for those who may say "you should scavenge for lead" it seems to me that the whole idea behind making a manufacturing plant is that you could get into the mass production of items via shipments and production, not scavenging.
I'm not venting, I'm just wondering if there's something I'm overlooking here. I mean if it's going to cost me the same amount of money to produce ammo versus just going to buy it, why on earth would I set up a generator, a plant, conveyor belts, fertilizer production, etc. to mess with it?

[Bansheebutt]

It's not meant for profit, it's meant for use, either for your own, companions, or settlers.

[Athoros]

Originally posted by Outstanding:

It's not meant for profit, it's meant for use.

"Also bear in mind that I'm not looking to profit off of the ammo, just make my own ammo for cheaper than I could buy it for."

[Bansheebutt]

Originally posted by Jabberwock:

it's the same story, no profit. I don't get it.

But you're also paying a premium for the "convienience" of making it yourself. Certain ammo types are harder to get in large quanitites, and depending on your weapons you might have to shop across the country.

[Athoros]

Originally posted by Outstanding:

Originally posted by Jabberwock:

it's the same story, no profit. I don't get it.

But you're also paying a premium for the "convienience" of making it yourself. Certain ammo types are harder to get in large quanitites, and depending on your weapons you might have to shop across the country.

I don't see the convenience either. The largest quantity of lead that I know of anywhere is 25 lead, which results in a maximum of 120 rounds. With the single exception of maybe 2mm rounds it's by far less convenient than just travelling to multiple places to buy rounds. Especially when you factor in the time and resources it takes to set up everything you need to do this. Consider the fact that you can set up a max tier weapons shop that will have about 200 rounds ready to go, and you can have one of those in every one of your settlements. I don't see how it's convenient or balanced compared to that. Again I'm not just complaining. I was hoping someone would come along and say "oh hey you're forgetting to do x, which will increase the point in doing this". As it stands though, this seems pretty pointless. Far less convenient than just setting up my own shops and buying from them.

[Hobo Misanthropus]

Your main issue here is assuming that shipments are the only way of obtaining these resources in order to produce.

[Sui Kibba]

Originally posted by Hobo Misanthropus:

Your main issue here is assuming that shipments are the only way of obtaining these resources in order to produce.

Yea, I can think of at least 3 gym-type places in the game with barbells that contain a ton of lead. Not to mention all the pencils laying around in schools and offices....

[Hobo Misanthropus]

Originally posted by Atla Wolffriend:

Originally posted by Hobo Misanthropus:

Your main issue here is assuming that shipments are the only way of obtaining these resources in order to produce.

Yea, I can think of at least 3 gym-type places in the game with barbells that contain a ton of lead. Not to mention all the pencils laying around in schools and offices....

"Strong can carry more than Puny Humans" required for any salvage operation to Madden's Gym. lol.

[Athoros]

Okay so I appreciate the responses, but I feel as if you guys aren't following my train of thought completely. Bear with me here and see if you get what I'm saying. Basically, the manufacturing stuff is expensive. Just one ammo builder requires a lot of resources. But then you're going to need at the minimum a storage belt, a terminal, and a power supply that outputs 8 power. Okay, so that's pretty resource costly in and of itself. But the thing is, everything about it implies mass production, automation, and distribution (hence the belts and storage). So then we've got the new generator that outputs 100 power. I don't know about you guys, but I've never even needed close to 100 power. At my setup at the castle I've got maybe ten industrial water purifiers, a bunch of lights, and all sorts of decorations that require power, and I'm still barely pushing 60-70. So 100 power again implies that we're supposed to now be able to set up some big factory type settlement. With the requirement to scavenge as the main premise for this, it doesn't work.
Scavenging defeats the concept of automation, which is really heavily implied with this whole setup. As I pointed out earlier, it would be more of an automated system to just build an infrastructure using max level weapons shops. The current system with manufacturing is really micro-manage heavy, and I see no way to build a living, working manufacturing plant that actually exists for a reason. It would actually cost more money to upkeep that than it would produce or save. Not to mention that if you actually went balls to the wall and made a huge manufacturing plant, there would be no way you could simply scavenge for enough lead to keep something like that going.
If we're genuinely supposed to scavenge for the lead to make ammo, why go all out with the fusion reactor and the conveyor belts and the builders? Why not just add a NV style weapon reloading bench that you can assign a settler to? I just don't understand why anyone would be motivated to use this system, honestly. I was really excited about it, but the premise of it doesn't make much sense to me now that I understand it.

[AlexMBrennan]

The current system with manufacturing is really micro-manage heavy, and I see no way to build a living, working manufacturing plant that actually exists for a reason.

Are you saying that this is a surprise? How could things have been any other way given that it's implemented by moving physics objects around in the currently loaded cell?

Why not just add a NV style weapon reloading bench that you can assign a settler to?

Because Bethesda is trying to sell DLC with lots of settlement objects. A big and flashy but pointless assembly line can sell DLC, but a recipe for the crafting bench won't.

[Athoros]

Originally posted by AlexMBrennan:

The current system with manufacturing is really micro-manage heavy, and I see no way to build a living, working manufacturing plant that actually exists for a reason.

Are you saying that this is a surprise? How could things have been any other way given that it's implemented by moving physics objects around in the currently loaded cell?

By making it cost 1 less lead per batch, and allowing settlers to make "supply runs" similar to the way that vendors currently do. That would a.) make it worth the effort to produce ammo and b.) pretty much completely automate the process, meaning once you build it, it runs itself. It would continue to produce ammo and the settler would just take bottlecaps from the workbench. Not really sure what you're branching out into, because this is all about logistics and has nothing to do with physics, draw cells, etc. Physics is not the problem. You can put down 50 builders already without breaking the game, the problem is that there's no reason to put down 50. I'm not trying to be difficult, but I seriously don't understand what isn't being understood on this point.

[Dex]

Originally posted by Jabberwock:

Okay so I appreciate the responses, but I feel as if you guys aren't following my train of thought completely. Bear with me here and see if you get what I'm saying. Basically, the manufacturing stuff is expensive. Just one ammo builder requires a lot of resources. But then you're going to need at the minimum a storage belt, a terminal, and a power supply that outputs 8 power. Okay, so that's pretty resource costly in and of itself. But the thing is, everything about it implies mass production, automation, and distribution (hence the belts and storage). So then we've got the new generator that outputs 100 power. I don't know about you guys, but I've never even needed close to 100 power. At my setup at the castle I've got maybe ten industrial water purifiers, a bunch of lights, and all sorts of decorations that require power, and I'm still barely pushing 60-70. So 100 power again implies that we're supposed to now be able to set up some big factory type settlement. With the requirement to scavenge as the main premise for this, it doesn't work.
Scavenging defeats the concept of automation, which is really heavily implied with this whole setup. As I pointed out earlier, it would be more of an automated system to just build an infrastructure using max level weapons shops. The current system with manufacturing is really micro-manage heavy, and I see no way to build a living, working manufacturing plant that actually exists for a reason. It would actually cost more money to upkeep that than it would produce or save. Not to mention that if you actually went balls to the wall and made a huge manufacturing plant, there would be no way you could simply scavenge for enough lead to keep something like that going.
If we're genuinely supposed to scavenge for the lead to make ammo, why go all out with the fusion reactor and the conveyor belts and the builders? Why not just add a NV style weapon reloading bench that you can assign a settler to? I just don't understand why anyone would be motivated to use this system, honestly. I was really excited about it, but the premise of it doesn't make much sense to me now that I understand it.

They understand what you're saying, they're just ignoring the illogical aspects of the new system. It is pointless to make your own ammo. In scrounging for all that material to make ammo production cheap, you'd have found more than enough ammo that you'd ever need. It's a time/cap sink that means nothing. NV style would've been awesome, but i guess they wanted to change it up.

[Sentient_Toaster]

Not if it's a rare type like .44 (let alone .45-70, if you're in the mainland).

Bigger issue is that if you did create lots of ammunition, you'd tank your game performance because the objects don't stack properly.

[Athoros]

Originally posted by Dex:

Originally posted by Jabberwock:

Okay so I appreciate the responses, but I feel as if you guys aren't following my train of thought completely. Bear with me here and see if you get what I'm saying. Basically, the manufacturing stuff is expensive. Just one ammo builder requires a lot of resources. But then you're going to need at the minimum a storage belt, a terminal, and a power supply that outputs 8 power. Okay, so that's pretty resource costly in and of itself. But the thing is, everything about it implies mass production, automation, and distribution (hence the belts and storage). So then we've got the new generator that outputs 100 power. I don't know about you guys, but I've never even needed close to 100 power. At my setup at the castle I've got maybe ten industrial water purifiers, a bunch of lights, and all sorts of decorations that require power, and I'm still barely pushing 60-70. So 100 power again implies that we're supposed to now be able to set up some big factory type settlement. With the requirement to scavenge as the main premise for this, it doesn't work.
Scavenging defeats the concept of automation, which is really heavily implied with this whole setup. As I pointed out earlier, it would be more of an automated system to just build an infrastructure using max level weapons shops. The current system with manufacturing is really micro-manage heavy, and I see no way to build a living, working manufacturing plant that actually exists for a reason. It would actually cost more money to upkeep that than it would produce or save. Not to mention that if you actually went balls to the wall and made a huge manufacturing plant, there would be no way you could simply scavenge for enough lead to keep something like that going.
If we're genuinely supposed to scavenge for the lead to make ammo, why go all out with the fusion reactor and the conveyor belts and the builders? Why not just add a NV style weapon reloading bench that you can assign a settler to? I just don't understand why anyone would be motivated to use this system, honestly. I was really excited about it, but the premise of it doesn't make much sense to me now that I understand it.

They understand what you're saying, they're just ignoring the illogical aspects of the new system. It is pointless to make your own ammo. In scrounging for all that material to make ammo production cheap, you'd have found more than enough ammo that you'd ever need. It's a time/cap sink that means nothing. NV style would've been awesome, but i guess they wanted to change it up.

Jesus christ, thank you. It feels like everyone else here is clinging at anything to rationalize using the system. I'm much happier with just concluding that the new system is flawed, not using it, and moving on to the other things that I do enjoy with the game.

[Tavman (4)]

I did notice that it isn't balanced out properly monetary wise, however I did get the achievement with the help of scrapping lead lined armor pieces with Scrapper rank 3.

[Tavman (4)]

Originally posted by Jabberwock:

Originally posted by Dex:

They understand what you're saying, they're just ignoring the illogical aspects of the new system. It is pointless to make your own ammo. In scrounging for all that material to make ammo production cheap, you'd have found more than enough ammo that you'd ever need. It's a time/cap sink that means nothing. NV style would've been awesome, but i guess they wanted to change it up.

Jesus christ, thank you. It feels like everyone else here is clinging at anything to rationalize using the system. I'm much happier with just concluding that the new system is flawed, not using it, and moving on to the other things that I do enjoy with the game.

It is useful, however it all depends on how you get your resources. Also you are better off making rare ammunition than just 10mm which can easily be found anywhere especially with the Scrounger perk.