Mechanisms Fix, please!

[frannilea]

Hi guys!

Could you please fix the mechanisms? We used to know whether a mechanism was required to work on a building or not, and which mechanism. Now it's just weird. Cranes are now required for buildings that I wouldn't have thought required excavators and excavators are required for buildings that I would have thought required cranes, buildings have the box stating that it requires mechanisms, but no mechanism will work there. We're left to guess which mechanism is required for each building and it's definitely not intuitive, or even logical in some cases. It's just completely messed up!

This is a pain in the ***!! I keep having to try out all my COs to figure out which mechanism is meant to work for a building!! I never had to do that before this because excavators worked for all buildings that required mechanisms and dozers worked for all longer roads that had the mechanism box. Now we're left guessing what works for buildings that have a mechanism box, only to waste time finding out that nothing works for some buildings, even though there's a mechanism box.

Could you please fix this!! If you've removed a mechanism working for a building, please remove the box in the panel window too!! It's very annoying!!

Edit: Or at least give us a dialogue box somewhere, either in the main window or in the Construction Window telling us which mechanism is required so that we can choose the correct mechanism!!

[Zruty]

In my experience, most buildings go through 2 phases of construction:
Groundworks: needs gravel, asphalt and concrete, accepts excavators that may work unmanned.

Laying bricks / Pouring concrete / etc.: Needs some subset of (bricks, steel, concrete, boards, panels, mechanisms), accepts cranes and requires manpower (cranes are a multiplier).

Sometimes, rarely, some buildings have a phase that doesn't accept any machines (i.e. interior detail on housing, and tunneling on mines).

For ROADS, it's a bit different:
Gravel roads accept bulldozers or excavators.

Asphalt roads are built on top of gravel roads. After the gravel stage, they accept an asphalt paver, and after the paving is done they accept a roller (I think both are optional now, but they used to be required)

"Lighted" asphalt roads are built on top of asphalt roads. After the above stage, they accept road cranes.

I hope this clarifies things.

[Elessar_warrior]

Originally posted by frannilea:

at least give us a dialogue box somewhere, either in the main window or in the Construction Window telling us which mechanism is required so that we can choose the correct mechanism!!

I liked this idea, maybe something like the button that tell us what aflatbed can carry.

[Stele]

Groundworks require excavator, the rest crane or nothing, depending on building config. Did anything changed there?

[frannilea]

Originally posted by Zruty:

In my experience, most buildings go through 2 phases of construction:
Groundworks: needs gravel, asphalt and concrete, accepts excavators that may work unmanned.

Laying bricks / Pouring concrete / etc.: Needs some subset of (bricks, steel, concrete, boards, panels, mechanisms), accepts cranes and requires manpower (cranes are a multiplier).

Sometimes, rarely, some buildings have a phase that doesn't accept any machines (i.e. interior detail on housing, and tunneling on mines).

For ROADS, it's a bit different:
Gravel roads accept bulldozers or excavators.

Asphalt roads are built on top of gravel roads. After the gravel stage, they accept an asphalt paver, and after the paving is done they accept a roller (I think both are optional now, but they used to be required)

"Lighted" asphalt roads are built on top of asphalt roads. After the above stage, they accept road cranes.

I hope this clarifies things.

Well, thanks for the tips, lol! All this is extremely obvious to any beginner whose spent 10 minutes in hard mode, yes...

The problem isn't roads . The problem is that the game doesn't tell us which mechanism is used for which building, and those mechanisms aren't necessarily intuitive. For example, cranes for garbage waste collecting spots??? Really?? What would require a crane to build a flat bit of concrete with bins?

I'm an old player who has played this game right back when electricity was the most difficult part of the game - at the beginning of early access. I keep my buses separate to avoid paying for workers for roads. I release buses when the mechanism is at the job. Now I don't know which mechanisms to release because the game has changed them around and doesn't tell me. I have to guess, and as with the garbage, I often guess wrongly. It'd be nice if, instead of just saying "Mechanism" in the window for the site, the game actually told us WHICH mechanism. Then we wouldn't have to guess, and since it's a busy game so we're checking up on other things like citizen happiness in another city, then come back and wonder why our high priority build isn't being built!

[MrKrabs]

Let me try to drop it in a nutshell.

- There is a window at the site?
No = No mechanism.

Yes = if gravel, asphalt, concrete is required than you can use excavator.
Workers optional. Or even both.

If other material is required than crane.
Workers needed.


Basically you can say that for the first stage you can use excavators or workers or both,
and for the following stages you can use cranes but need workers.

Bulldozers are not required for buildings. Only for roads and footpath of they are not to short.
But once again.
Workers can do the job as well.

Me personally I always have a CO with small busses only.
I send workers to a site only if groundwork is done and materials are delivered.

At later stage of the game when I use my own workers I let them search automaticly.

I believe that there is no right or wrong how to do it.
There are many different ways to approach.

I find the constructing mechanism of the game is really sauce.
This is the creame of the game.

I hope that my explanation is somewhat understandable.
I kept it as short as possible.

[Titule]

I wish that in the window of the construction site, where the resources, workdays and phases are listed, wera also a list of mechanisms that are necessary or could increase the build.

E.g.
18 Workdays (9 with std asphalt paver) , 1t Asphalt
or
10 Workdays (2 with std crane)

(Numbers are not accurate)

"Std" stands for a poor (inferior) device and the number of days is lower if a better mechanism were used.

[Phoenix]

"Assign construction office" button in any construction opens a window which lists every resource and mechanism that can be used on a construction site. There's no "requirement" for any mechanisms except specific types of trucks to bring those resources. Everything else is optional and just for speeding up construction.

[ulzgoroth]

Originally posted by Phoenix:

"Assign construction office" button in any construction opens a window which lists every resource and mechanism that can be used on a construction site. There's no "requirement" for any mechanisms except specific types of trucks to bring those resources. Everything else is optional and just for speeding up construction.

I am quite confident that's not true. Try building some paved roads.

[Phoenix]

Originally posted by ulzgoroth:

Originally posted by Phoenix:

"Assign construction office" button in any construction opens a window which lists every resource and mechanism that can be used on a construction site. There's no "requirement" for any mechanisms except specific types of trucks to bring those resources. Everything else is optional and just for speeding up construction.

I am quite confident that's not true. Try building some paved roads.

Every construction has that button and it's exactly the same.

[Titule]

Some misunderstanding:
* For my proposal it doesn't really matter if there are necessary mechanisms or not.
* ulzgoroth did not say that button does not exist, but said that you need special mechanism to build a paved road. (That's how I understood it)

[whisper]

Well, you don't need a mechanism to build a paved road, workers can do it all.

[Phoenix]

Originally posted by Titule:

Some misunderstanding:
* For my proposal it doesn't really matter if there are necessary mechanisms or not.
* ulzgoroth did not say that button does not exist, but said that you need special mechanism to build a paved road. (That's how I understood it)

I was just answering OP's question, it wasn't meant to relate to your proposal. I agree, it would be more convenient if this info has been directly placed in the construction window itself.

[2+2=5]

I think you might have different kinds of mechanisms in different COs, and you assign them separately based on what mechanism is needed. I just assign all my construction offices at once. It's not the most efficient, but it's easy and works fine. I suggest assigning all construction offices at once to every project, so you never have to worry about what mechanism is in the construction office.

[whisper]

Originally posted by 2+2=5:

I think you might have different kinds of mechanisms in different COs, and you assign them separately based on what mechanism is needed. I just assign all my construction offices at once. It's not the most efficient, but it's easy and works fine. I suggest assigning all construction offices at once to every project, so you never have to worry about what mechanism is in the construction office.

I mostly do this but I keep my bus and crane COs separate from all the others because I don't want to be sending workers until the materials are all on site.

[Dan]

Originally posted by Phoenix:

"Assign construction office" button in any construction opens a window which lists every resource and mechanism that can be used on a construction site. There's no "requirement" for any mechanisms except specific types of trucks to bring those resources. Everything else is optional and just for speeding up construction.

Ah, well that's an easy one to miss for us newbies! I've pretty much exclusively just let COs auto-allocate to constructions.
I'd pretty much assumed this info wasn't in the game until now :-)