Is this normal? Lack of spaceship/caravan traders

[TheMeInTeam]

Requesting caravans got hammered down in A17.  The main issue is that you need to get relations high to even make it sustainable.  Once you do, you still have to overcome that 700 silver cost + get what you want.  If you've a rich economy you can do that, but you're still only going to pick up 200-300 net silver since they only carry around 1k, so transferring wealth between caravan types is impractical.

Outside of sea ice, the combination of deep drilling + manufacturing stuff that exotic traders will buy can cover what you'd need.  On sea ice you're likely running human leather export for bulk goods to build a sustainable food income, then eventually a systematic way to attain wealth (both likely hydroponic).

[SpaceDorf]

Thanks, I will try the second base

Thank you, I can't stop laughing. 

[BugPowderDust]

Thanks, I will try the second base

Thank you, I can't stop laughing. 

Please enlighten me, oh wise one.

[TheMeInTeam]

Thanks, I will try the second base

Thank you, I can't stop laughing. 

Please enlighten me, oh wise one.

You can try searching alternative meanings for that phrase.  It's NSFW, not really bad but probably not something you want logged as looking up.

[BugPowderDust]

 

[mebe]

Just clearing some of the stuff about trade beacons:

To sell they don't need to be outside or unroofed stuff just magically teleports from your stockpile to the ship.

To buy you don't need anything other than a trade beacon and console, the things you buy seem to land at the closest unroofed area to your beacon. You can leave an unroofed patch in your stockpile to force where goods land but it never seems worthwhile to me (if it's unroofed you'll want to delete the zone there so you just end up with a smaller zone within range of your beacon)

[Vlad0mi3r]

One of the issues you were talking about is not having the skill level to grow Healroot. If you can spare a colonist to buff their growing skill this is one method that I have found to work.

First make sure you have your colonist you want buffed to be the only one set to growing/plant cutting. Lay out a reasonable grow area at least 4x8 and let them start sowing the potatoes. Leave them to it and come back and check for when they have finished. Once those potatoes are in the ground change the crop to rice or whatever. They will now go back and change the crops over building up their growing skills. Keep this up and especially someone with 1 or 2 passion in growing they will hit level 8 relatively quickly. Especially as they will be taking care of the other crops/trees you are planting and harvesting as well.

Hope this helps.

[BugPowderDust]

Just clearing some of the stuff about trade beacons:

To sell they don't need to be outside or unroofed stuff just magically teleports from your stockpile to the ship.

To buy you don't need anything other than a trade beacon and console, the things you buy seem to land at the closest unroofed area to your beacon. You can leave an unroofed patch in your stockpile to force where goods land but it never seems worthwhile to me (if it's unroofed you'll want to delete the zone there so you just end up with a smaller zone within range of your beacon)

Thanks for explaining that, much appreciated. I now have a similar setup

One of the issues you were talking about is not having the skill level to grow Healroot. If you can spare a colonist to buff their growing skill this is one method that I have found to work.

First make sure you have your colonist you want buffed to be the only one set to growing/plant cutting. Lay out a reasonable grow area at least 4x8 and let them start sowing the potatoes. Leave them to it and come back and check for when they have finished. Once those potatoes are in the ground change the crop to rice or whatever. They will now go back and change the crops over building up their growing skills. Keep this up and especially someone with 1 or 2 passion in growing they will hit level 8 relatively quickly. Especially as they will be taking care of the other crops/trees you are planting and harvesting as well.

Hope this helps.

Great, thanks- I am now critical with my meds and my best grower has just turned lvl7. I will try the above as we're now in winter, but I have an indoors patch of rich soil + sun lamp + heater.

I've learned that too many tribals in the gameworld means you don't get any good weapons/armour, and thus are stuck with making your own, and the knock-on to resources this causes!

[Snafu_RW]

FWIW arms manufacturing is no longer cost-effective in A17; better go with clothing/drugs (if personally caravanning), or even mass raw textiles/plants (if summoning caravans)

The OTB confusion has been addressed above, but remember that the 'pile radius will leave 1 unroofed 5 tile cross-shaped area in the centre if outside & bounded by walls (or simply 4 pillars); build a held-open door in the very centre to cover those last few tiles. An OTB itself won't count as an unstackable area: goods/wares will be dropped on top of it as necessary

Vanilla prosthetics' availability is still random (& v expensive); however they're occasionally available from pirate as well as exotic traders. Likewise bulk goods traders will buy artworks & (IIRC) furniture (expensive armchairs, eg human leather, alpaca wool etc can sell for quite a bit & are fairly self-sustainable), but only worth selling to ships due to caravan CC & available cash, so don't over-build them - however they don't deteriorate if unroofed, so.. a firepopper-protected random map area with an OTB may be a thought for mass storage (& a diversion for pirate looters)

Don't forget that decent meds require crafting 3, medicine 6; neutroamine (which you can't manufacture without mods) & 3x cloth. Herbal meds are reasonable; most effective method (fastest delivery of product) is growing them in hydroponics, followed by rich soil with only your best growers planting/cutting those areas for max yield. Put other growers on harvesting/planting spuds/rice etc to increase their skill


You can't (even with SetupCamp) build a base directly adjacent to an existing base (or its ruins); there has to be 1 blank hex between the two. However, it may well be a good idea to think about the advantages (& disadvantages) of having 2 bases next to each other:

• You have easy & quick access to a whole new site map, with its associated resources/growtime adjustments etc etc. SetupCamp allows you to define how large this area should be (in every case: you can't define 1 area size for 'your' camp(s) & another for raids AFAIK)
  
• You will have to deal with (# of sites)x the frequency of raids
  
• You will have to put up with damage from raids, even if the site is unoccupied. If both sites are occupied you may have simultaneous raids, and/or be underdefended for <site(s)>
  
• You can easily migrate from one site to another to avoid certain events (toxic fallout etc)
  
• Putting both sites on a major road will significantly reduce travel time between them even during winter
  
• I can't remember if colony wealth is global or local; if global, attack intensity may scale up for both sites
  
• You may experience (significant) lag if running >1 site, depending upon PC specs, occupational numbers of combined colonies etc etc - basically the workload of the engine & CPU

Hope this helps!

[Yoshida Keiji]

The biggest problem with multiple colonies is that sometimes, traders will enter unoccupied bases. And those occupied receive no traders. The game doesn't have a "central bank" yet. Ludeon doesn't recommend more than one for performance reasons, which hints that they don't seem to be looking into issues concerning multiple colonies. So if you run more than one colony, you will need to split your valuables evenly and then take what you need to the other.

With one tile away from each other its still possible to defend a non-occupied colony from raids, the only problem is that sometimes, you may end up arriving at the same border where enemies might be preparing the assault. Teleporting solves this so long as your unoccupied base is close to a border, and you just need to re-zone until getting the closest side.

[Wanderer_joins]

You will have to deal with (# of sites)x the frequency of raids

I'm not sure about this one, and it's a major difference in terms of game balance. In A16 the number of threats was clearly global, i had up to 5 colonies with a comparable number of threats vs a single colony. In A17, i didn't bother settling more than 2 colonies because of this game balance, but i'd say the storyteller still has a single timeline to send big threats to all the targets.

[BugPowderDust]

Thanks Snafu and the others, really helpful replies here.

I managed to get my growers to 8 using the tips earlier in this thread, and grew a large amount of healroot in rich soil under a sun lamp indoors. Now my medicine issue has gone, I am struggling for components- fortunately, I have found a seam of plasteel that I am selling for a tidy amount, so I can keep up with component demand- for now.

[sadpickle]

Thanks Snafu and the others, really helpful replies here.

I managed to get my growers to 8 using the tips earlier in this thread, and grew a large amount of healroot in rich soil under a sun lamp indoors. Now my medicine issue has gone, I am struggling for components- fortunately, I have found a seam of plasteel that I am selling for a tidy amount, so I can keep up with component demand- for now.

I wouldn't sell the plasteel directly. It might seem tempting as a means of quick funds for little work, but plasteel has many uses (and don't get me started on mods that use it, then you're dying for more all the time). Stone statues are my favorite export, since I am usually knee-deep in blocks (gotta process those chunks) and simply don't need that many walls.

If you really want to sell the plasteel, consider making weapons out of it. You should get a much better return on anything normal quality or above, I think. Might want to get out a calculator to be sure. I'm not sure what gives you the best return, I am sure that information is around or someone here knows.

[BugPowderDust]

Thanks Snafu and the others, really helpful replies here.

I managed to get my growers to 8 using the tips earlier in this thread, and grew a large amount of healroot in rich soil under a sun lamp indoors. Now my medicine issue has gone, I am struggling for components- fortunately, I have found a seam of plasteel that I am selling for a tidy amount, so I can keep up with component demand- for now.

I wouldn't sell the plasteel directly. It might seem tempting as a means of quick funds for little work, but plasteel has many uses (and don't get me started on mods that use it, then you're dying for more all the time). Stone statues are my favorite export, since I am usually knee-deep in blocks (gotta process those chunks) and simply don't need that many walls.

If you really want to sell the plasteel, consider making weapons out of it. You should get a much better return on anything normal quality or above, I think. Might want to get out a calculator to be sure. I'm not sure what gives you the best return, I am sure that information is around or someone here knows.

Interesting, I'll look into that. I have some good crafters, so that could work really well- thanks!

[Snafu_RW]

As of A17 at least, weps trading gets - (yes minus) 80% value debuff, so for value you may well be better off trading raw mats..

Hanging on to plasteel stocks may be useful for certain mods that allow you to create bionics, but in vanilla once you have enough power armour etc there's little you can do with it: you may as well trade it away IMO.. or build turrets/outside autodoors from the excess