Mediolanum - Issues buying clay?

[Dinks]

I'm currently in Mediolanum. The only way to get pottery is to buy clay from a trade partner and make your own.

I have all possible exports set up and making me money, so I set a warehouse aside to allow me to stockpile some clay before I get into full pottery production.

However, there is an issue - the merchant will stop by and sell me only 2 units of clay, and then that's it. They are able to supply 25 units annually but will only ever sell me 2, and will not sell me any more.

If I delete the warehouse holding that clay, they will stop by and sell 2 more, and then promptly stop again.

Additionally, the clay is undetected by other warehouses - I have the 2 units of clay in a warehouse that is only "Accepting" clay. Another warehouse is set to "Getting" clay but will never actually go make the pickup.

Does anyone have any thoughts?

For what it's worth, I don't have any pottery facilities at all - I was hoping to get a stockpile going first of clay - so I don't know if there's some automated built in shutoff to stop me from buying a ton of resources I'm not actually using, but I don't believe that there would be.

[5M0k1N]

you checked your stockpile settings for clay? i mean make sure youre you dont have set some low limit. other that cant think of much :/

[toteman]

I've not tried that tactic myself, as I like to get my industries going as soon as possible and stockpile the finished article if necessary, not the raw material, so it's ready for immediate use. I'm scratching my head over this one. It may well be that the game mechanics prevent you from doing what you want here, but I couldn't say for sure.

[Dinks]

Originally posted by toteman:

I've not tried that tactic myself, as I like to get my industries going as soon as possible and stockpile the finished article if necessary, not the raw material, so it's ready for immediate use. I'm scratching my head over this one. It may well be that the game mechanics prevent you from doing what you want here, but I couldn't say for sure.

Yeah, I'm hoping it's some sort of thing where the game is realizing that I have no actual (current) use for the clay and is stopping me from importing it. I came upon this at the end of my play session last night so I haven't tried to build any pottery workshops to see what happens.

I do still think it's weird that warehouses set to "Getting Clay" are not attempting to get the 2 units of Clay from the neutral warehouse...

Hopefully I get this resolved, because getting 7k pop with just casas would be a pain.

[Dinks]

Originally posted by 5M0k1N:

you checked your stockpile settings for clay? i mean make sure youre you dont have set some low limit. other that cant think of much :/

As far as I can tell, the limitations only apply to exporting and consumption of goods - "Export Over X" limits exporting, and "Stockpiling" prevents internal consumption as well as exporting, but I am not sure if anything limits importing?

Maybe I will force it to "Stockpiling" and see if that does anything....

[5M0k1N]

oh yea i was mixing it with pharaoh i think where you can import up to a certain number. its odd that other warehouses are not getting it maybe thers a problem in the roads? cant think of much else. if you want upload the save file somewhere lol

[Dinks]

Originally posted by 5M0k1N:

oh yea i was mixing it with pharaoh i think where you can import up to a certain number. its odd that other warehouses are not getting it maybe thers a problem in the roads? cant think of much else. if you want upload the save file somewhere lol

So I had the chance to hop back on, and I've solved my problem.

There is indeed a hidden import limit that seems to be tied to your theoretical needs of that import.

As I had said, I was just trying to get some clay imported to build up a reserve for when I eventually got around to making pottery production - I had no pottery workshops set up at the time. With no pottery workshops, the traders were cutting me off at 2 units of clay.

Adding one pottery workshop to use up the clay resulted in the traders leaving a bit more - I think 4 units?

Adding 6 or 7 pottery workshops opened up the floodgate, and the trader was leaving as much clay as they could at one time, quickly hitting their annual limit in just 2 or 3 trips.

So I guess there is a hidden limiter - surprising, I would have expected this game to not hold your hand here, and force you to drown in a pile of clay as a result of my own planning.

[5M0k1N]

yea thats very odd indeed. i remember in one level i couldnt import enough clay to sustain pottery for all my population so what i did was importing clay and had it to stockpile so i could make huge reserves. cant remember if i had the workshops built though (but if they were they werent producing anything) but didnt have any issues with importing clay that way. anyway maybe something to do with the campaign too ? but no idea xd

[toteman]

Just a thought. You can build a load of workshops but you can also use your Trade Adviser to close down any industry temporarily that you don't have a pressing need for. I've usually done this if I've got plenty of a certain good, and I'm short of workers elsewhere. Have you tried shutting down the pottery industry to see if this affects the importation of clay?

[Dinks]

Originally posted by toteman:

Just a thought. You can build a load of workshops but you can also use your Trade Adviser to close down any industry temporarily that you don't have a pressing need for. I've usually done this if I've got plenty of a certain good, and I'm short of workers elsewhere. Have you tried shutting down the pottery industry to see if this affects the importation of clay?

That's an interesting thought but I never tried it. I DO think that even closed industries will still get loaded with raw materials, so I do imagine that would work.

[MoDan]

I think you need to build the pottery facilities to make the demand. I do not think you can import without a need.