Keeping deconstructed items local

[pat]

I know this will be fixed in 0.17, but since we're not there yet...

If I want to move a large production setup ten sectors to the south, I blueprint the whole thing, deconstruct it and put the blueprint where I want it. Great in theory, but the idiot bots take the items all over the universe. I'm really baffled by the logic. Sometimes they take them ridiculous distances away. I've tried putting a storage chest nearby and added a few of each of the items to be deconstructed, but that doesn't make any difference.

Removing surrounding roboports to isolate it isn't a realistic option. Is there anything I can do to coerce the bots to store the items nearby?

[Gluth]

I would like to keep my personal items/bots away from things I construct/deconstruct in my base. They often run to deconstruct fill inventory with unwanted things and then cry that there is no room in inventory and I'm pushed to manually remove things as they come from those helpful bots.

[pat]

From doing some experimenting, I think the bots decide where to put it based on where they are when called. So if you try to deconstruct something in California and Maine robots answer the call, they choose the nearest storage chest to their roboport in Maine.

Therefore, a solution would be to first call enough robots to fill the nearest roboports first. Then do the decostruction.

[Name Lips]

They also want to make complete stacks. They're trying to avoid making 2 belts in this chest, 5 in that chest, which is extremely inefficient for space management... they find the nearest incomplete stack of the item they're carrying and try to complete it.

[pat]

My solution, which took forever, was to save the game, deconstruct part of the area, and see where the robots brought the goods. Restore the save, go to that chest, eliminate any space, deconstruct again. Lather, rinse, repeat. It took about a dozen tries, but I finally got the buggers to save everything nearby. The final process was SO fast that I have to wonder if I might have actually saved time doing it this way.

[impetus_maximus]

bots are not smart. it's best to keep them isolated in sections. one giant bot network never works smoothy in my opinion.

i wish the devs would more control of instructions for bots. give us the option to construct/deconstruct and have our personal robo ports do everything, or have them ignore for the land robo-ports to handle it. same for robo-ports, and other players personal robo-ports.