To bot or not to bot.

[rcarmod]

I have not played long but I am already getting the impression that if you build efficiently the bots are not really necessary until much late. Although the first two bots are important because of the amount of structures you have to start off building. But, once those two bots are gone I think the only one you would really want until you get big and rich would be the drilling bot. Anyone else have different advice or a preferred strategy ?

[arreclain]

You want them again at about early mid game, around 75 colonists.

[Tanzia]

There is no one way to use the bots. You can make a bot army or never make one.

[tucho]

Bots perform basic task in a much more efficient way than the humans, moreover they do heavy tasks that have an impact on the humans morale (e.g. walk long distances ouside the base to carry resources, repair structures or whatever), so an automated base with some bots will be a more happy and healty base than other one without them...
You also are able to not build any robots and keep the morale of your colonists high in other ways like building more multi domes or bars, but the base will be a bit more inefficient because the basic tasks that the robots are able to perform are performed by the humans more slowly

[Quantum Optimist]

yeah the bots are good. only problem is that they take forever to build by your engineer because those rascals are always doing everything else but their jobs. Even when i have a building bot, it's mostly my freaking engineers going outside to go build this or that.

Meanwhile, my bot building machines stay empty most of the time even with all the materials filled. It's annoying! Also, the telescope who nobody watch like 90% of the time. I hate the engineers with a passion. And you can see them going about with moving stuff around when i have plenty of other peeps to do that.

I think this game is missing a big 'KICK THE ENGINEER WHERE THE SUN DONT SHINE' button. It would make my day!

[Targa]

Bots don't sleep, don't eat food, don't get injured and require medical supplies, don't require a dorm and a bed, don't use oxygen, and their movement speed is much faster than a human. They also free up humans to do jobs only humans can do, so you don't have biologists/engineers/workers carrying supplies when they have better things to do.

[Rigel]

Originally posted by PathOfPain:

yeah the bots are good. only problem is that they take forever to build by your engineer because those rascals are always doing everything else but their jobs. Even when i have a building bot, it's mostly my freaking engineers going outside to go build this or that.

Meanwhile, my bot building machines stay empty most of the time even with all the materials filled. It's annoying! Also, the telescope who nobody watch like 90% of the time. I hate the engineers with a passion. And you can see them going about with moving stuff around when i have plenty of other peeps to do that.

I think this game is missing a big 'KICK THE ENGINEER WHERE THE SUN DONT SHINE' button. It would make my day!

Sounds to me that you simply need more engineers.

Remember that time in the game goes much faster. If you played for 30 seconds, in the game a few hours have past (depending on game speed), so it's quite normal for the personel to take a break, get something to eat or whatever.

Keeping telescopes online is admittedly a pain in de neck. You need like 2 or 3 consoles and engineers per telescope to similate shifts. Build a dedicated, large control center just for the telescope consoles and prioritize it, then get a bunch of additional engineers whose only task it will be to man the consoles. Not very elegant solution, but it works. The telescopes will stay (mostly) online.

[Flexible Knot]

As you shift to an automated facility, you need to increase the % of engineers as well, and decrease the % of workers. 35% engineers and 25% workers is a good target. Biologists typically stay at 25% throughout.

Don't forget to place priority on all your structures you need to keep running. Your farms should always have a priority, you don't need biologists carrying around resources. Your robotics facility and/or control room can also have a priority flag to keep the engineers busy.

If you balance it correctly, you'll only need workers to man the processing plants and control room. Engineers will only work the factory, robotics facility, and control room. All maintenance, mining, and carrying are done by the robots, who are far more effective than people.

By 300 colonists, I generally aim for 150 robots.

[stillcrazy]

bots make your game easier, carrier to pick from bio dorm factory etc so your colonist can focus on machine on going here and there for picking item or store item, drilling bots can reduce the worker and contructing raduce the enginer. i make robot facility when i have 50 colonist... now i had 78 colonist and 85 bots... it can reduce your meal and medical because your colonist rare to going outside my vegi and meat sum around 600(5c) for trading and medical around 150 (25c)... never sell your good like plastic or stell

[Rigel]

I never prioritize anything except control centers to make sure guards and engineers stay on the job. And when I'm doing an express colony I prioritize the mines because it helps to boost production. Otherwise I only prioritize when there's an emergency or such. Generally it's best to let the AI choose what to do.

I realize prioritization gives people a sense of control but I think it usually does more bad than good.

[kingjames488]

I like the carrier bots, they're faster than humans, can go out in storms without dying, and wont sufficate if my airlocks get congested.

I also like driller bots, broken bones from mining are a pain. though by the time you can get driller bots it's usually past the point where a broken bone can doom your base so not as useful as they could be.

constructor bots... I don't see the point. the builder only needs to go out once for a sec to build something and you generally shouldn't expand too fast anyways. I generally only get a couple of these.

[martiño]

Our advice on bots is:
- Carriers: Make a ton of these, the liberate your skilled workers from carrying stuff around
- Constructors: Make just enough to make sure your engineers dont have to go outside to repair stuff
- Drillers: Make 3 per mine