Anyone focuses on potatoes here?

[BanDHMO]

What is it like? What equipment do you use, which fields do you work, and what does harvesting look like in terms of tasks, time and effort?

I'm liking the idea, but the numbers scare me. It's a very cheap large-volume crop, giving something like 10 times as many liters as soybeans. Seems like transportation would be a killer, and you can't hire helpers to do it.

Also, seems like storage would be difficult in case the market doesn't have any good price, you would be forced to sell at whatever is being paid at the time of harvest.

[Rev Counter]

I've never done it large scale but you store potatoes in heaps which means you can put them anywhere and there is no storage limit :)

[BanDHMO]

Originally posted by SMcGgamer:

I've never done it large scale but you store potatoes in heaps which means you can put them anywhere and there is no storage limit :)

Doesn't that also mean it's a pain in the neck to then reload them onto a tipper for sale? Or do you use conveyor belts for that?

[Rev Counter]

Yep, conveyors can be very easy if you set them up right, there's a few YT vids on it :)

[Vaupell]

Originally posted by SMcGgamer:

I've never done it large scale but you store potatoes in heaps which means you can put them anywhere and there is no storage limit :)

Just like grain, corn, hay, silage and everything else now ;) Just stack things up at the egde of the fields, no point driving them to a silo :p

[durango39]

My experience with root crops in game is that there is not massive loss in prices when you start selling so just harvest the fields and load the trailers directly and then alternate the sale points after every trailer load tipped that way theres no messing around with piles or pallet boxs which do not have the real life effect

In real life boxs are for grading the sizes of the potatoes which is not needed to do in game so its a waste of time doing as there is no gain

Beets are normaly piled up in real life to help reduce the moisture content

[Nate]

Are they good for money? I've mostly been selling soybeans

[Alshain]

Originally posted by Nate:

Are they good for money? I've mostly been selling soybeans

I've found all crops are about equal just in different ways. It's best to be diverse.

There are several factors that Giants used to balance them.
1. Seed cost. Some crops use more seed than others.
2. Actual Sell Price. This is pretty obvious, some sell for higher prices.
3. Yield. Again pretty obvious, some crops produce more (usually the ones that sell for lower prices)
4. Biproduct. Wheat and Barley produce straw which can be gathered and sold as part of the crop.

So in the end there may be minute differences, but it's less important to try and find the best crop than it is to try and be diverse for when a particular crop has a great price at that moment.

In short, grow everything.

[BanDHMO]

Originally posted by Nate:

Are they good for money? I've mostly been selling soybeans

Check out this guide:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/447020/guides/?searchText=best+crop+for+profit&browsefilter=trend&browsesort=creationorder&requiredtags%5B%5D=-1#scrollTop=0

Potatoes are supposed to be great for money, as far profit/acre goes. But:

- They make a huge volume, so much more driving to sell
- They require specialized machinery, which covers less area than grain/beans machines and so it takes longer to work the same acreage

So in sum total, whether it's a good crop to focus on or not, I'm not sure. Hopefully somebody who focused on it can tell us what they think of their choice.

[BanDHMO]

Originally posted by Alshain:

Originally posted by Nate:

Are they good for money? I've mostly been selling soybeans

I've found all crops are about equal just in different ways. It's best to be diverse.

There are several factors that Giants used to balance them.
1. Seed cost. Some crops use more seed than others.
2. Actual Sell Price. This is pretty obvious, some sell for higher prices.
3. Yield. Again pretty obvious, some crops produce more (usually the ones that sell for lower prices)
4. Biproduct. Wheat and Barley produce straw which can be gathered and sold as part of the crop.

So in the end there may be minute differences, but it's less important to try and find the best crop than it is to try and be diverse for when a particular crop has a great price at that moment.

In short, grow everything.

Well, there's more to the balance than that, according to the guide I posted above. Some crops require less land, some require specialized machinery, some require more transportation. I guess your broader point is that there isn't one obviously "best" crop, which is true, and thankfully so. But it's still interesting to look into the differences.

You brought up an interesting point about diversity. Worth noting that potatoes are horrible for that. The equipment you need to keep on hand for them can only do potatoes. Similarly, corn and poplar also have very specific machines. I'm starting to think it might be a good idea to do Soy/Wheat/Barley/Canola for diversity, since they all use the exact same equipment.

[Alshain]

Originally posted by BanDHMO:

Originally posted by Alshain:

I've found all crops are about equal just in different ways. It's best to be diverse.

There are several factors that Giants used to balance them.
1. Seed cost. Some crops use more seed than others.
2. Actual Sell Price. This is pretty obvious, some sell for higher prices.
3. Yield. Again pretty obvious, some crops produce more (usually the ones that sell for lower prices)
4. Biproduct. Wheat and Barley produce straw which can be gathered and sold as part of the crop.

So in the end there may be minute differences, but it's less important to try and find the best crop than it is to try and be diverse for when a particular crop has a great price at that moment.

In short, grow everything.

Well, there's more to the balance than that, according to the guide I posted above. Some crops require less land, some require specialized machinery, some require more transportation. I guess your broader point is that there isn't one obviously "best" crop, which is true, and thankfully so. But it's still interesting to look into the differences.

You brought up an interesting point about diversity. Worth noting that potatoes are horrible for that. The equipment you need to keep on hand for them can only do potatoes. Similarly, corn and poplar also have very specific machines. I'm starting to think it might be a good idea to do Soy/Wheat/Barley/Canola for diversity, since they all use the exact same equipment.

First of all, his field size is only used to calculate his other numbers, that has no real bearing on how well they produce or how much land they require, he probably just didn't want to harvest 3 ha of beets and potatoes. He just uses that number to calculate Yield/ha.

I don't like the way he describes his pricing. The most accurate way would be to use mean pricing. The Commodity Prices mod will calculate that over time. He's use the maximum price for some crops and the arbitrary 'green' price for others, that is going to introduce bias. In fact the ones he uses the maximum price for are the ones that show up highest profit. I question those numbers (which by the way are not the same in different difficulty modes), but I'm not sure that he is entirely wrong, just a little off.

So I'm going to do a quick comparison of Canola (because it's easier, no biproduct) and Potatoes, and assume all his other numbers are accurate. Canola in my current hard mode game has a mean price of 694. (588 low, 814 high) Potatoes are 206 (167 low, 240 high)

Potatoes: 82,824/1000 * 206 = 17,061 - 4000 = 13,061 Profit/ha - seed cost
Canola: 11,583/1000 * 694 = 8038.602 - 698 = 7340 Profit/ha - seed cost

So yes, it does seem that Potatoes make a little more profit/ha, but not as much as his data showed, and while I think he was on Normal, I don't think using data from a Normal game would end up as big a difference as his data showed either.

Finally, two balance elements I didn't mention above are equipment cost and time. Obviously potatoes and beets take more manual time, the bigger yield takes more of your time without helpers, and also specialized expensive equipment is necessary.

In the end however, the biggest question comes when you ask... what happens when potatoes stop selling at a high price? The answer to that question is you don't make money. By growing a diverse crop you are ready for the best price whatever crop it might be.

Right now my hard mode game is in Farming Simulator Recession. Nothing is selling well and that has driven my bank acount into a rather large deficit (I bought some equipment just before it started sadly). But when even one crop comes back up in price I will be ready because I have nearly every crop ready to sell, it doesn't matter which crop it is. So I still reccomend diversity.

[Alshain]

Oh and going back up a little. I have seen a price in green for a crop that was lower than a price in white for the same crop at a different place at the same time. Those price colors seem to arbitrary and I caution anyone relying on them.

Early in games it is ok (and best) to just go with the crops you can diversify with minimal equipment as you suggest. Eventually you should branch out even more though as your wallet allows.

[BanDHMO]

Alshain, can you post the actual mean prices for all products?

I don't like his price methodology much either, but have nothing else to go by.

[Alshain]

Sure, here you go.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=816850807

That commodity prices mod on modhub. I love it!
Your prices may vary slightly.

[BanDHMO]

Originally posted by Alshain:

First of all, his field size is only used to calculate his other numbers, that has no real bearing on how well they produce or how much land they require

Right, I was trying to say something different: because potatoes require more work on the same acreage (due to smaller, slower equipment), while producing more per acre profit, you could view it as that crop requiring less land to turn your working time into money.

[Alshain]

Originally posted by BanDHMO:

Originally posted by Alshain:

First of all, his field size is only used to calculate his other numbers, that has no real bearing on how well they produce or how much land they require

Right, I was trying to say something different: because potatoes require more work on the same acreage (due to smaller, slower equipment), while producing more per acre profit, you could view it as that crop requiring less land to turn your working time into money.

Ah, I see. In my experience, it takes more working time with potatoes and beets. More driving back and forth between where ever you are dumping, re-loading into trailers, and if you dare making crates and stacking those (which I highly do not reccomend due to buggy collisions).