B18 – Strange prioritization and path finding

[corestandeven]

If the moderators think this is a bug I'm happy for you to move this to the bug part of the forum.  In summary my cook is traveling further to pick ingredients outside when that same ingredient is nearer in the freezer I've created.

In my new B18 colony i have my kitchen and built a freezer next door. I've done this in all my A17 and A16 colonies for food production efficiency and I'm sure is a common tactic of players. Im growing one crop currently in my colony, potatoes. My grower is harvesting the crops, and slowly my hauler is moving some potatoes to my freezer. I have about half the produce in the freezer, and half still sitting outside waiting to be hauled. Although my cook (who is cooking simple meals) is nearer to the frozen potatoes she leaves the main building, walks past the freezer, to go all the way to the potatoes outside, and brings them back to cook, then repeat. The distance to the freezer from the kitchen is about 10 game blocks, and the distance to the growing field is about 40.

I can only assume something has been changed in B18 so that cooks go for produce that has a shorter lifespan (as the stuff outside will expire before the freezer) and that is now a higher determining factor than the distance? It didn't happen in A17 or A16 as cooks went the shortest distance for ingredients.

I have mods installed but none are about adding or changing path finding. Equally no mods i have add new crops, ingredients or meals or change cooking in any way. I have a airlock system for the freezer (steel doors) but both doors are unblocked. There are no items blocking the freezer, as pawns go in there to pick the meals or meat to butcher.

The only workaround is to limit the distance that the cook collects ingredients for, but this is not ideal as I want her to go outside IF there is no food in the freezer.

Anyone notice this in B18?

[Canute]

This isn't a B18 thing that happen before too.
He think that the other thing from the other end of the map will suit better to these meal he is creating the the potato he allways use from the freezer.
It is because the cook don't work closest first.
The recipe say "Use A or B or C ..." So when A is at range even when it is at the end of the map and C would be next to the kitchen he still take A.


Thats why you got the resource search range at the bills.
Just adjust this that your cook only so far that is your freezer included.
This is more efficient anyway so hauler can carry a whole stack, while the cook might just carry the amout he need for his recipe and leave the remainings.

[Zookes]

If your haulers are moving items into the freezer, that may be part of the problem. Pawns seem to "claim" the stack they're interacting with, preventing anyone else from using it even if they're just hauling more of the same item to the stockpile there or taking only one of many. I've noticed this with stacks of medicine in hospitals: I typically keep a single-grid stockpile of medicine around the beds for swifter healing in emergencies, but if more than one doctor is operating and grabbing medicine at one time, one of them - if they both try to "claim" the stack in the same moment - will instead run clear across the map to another stockpile to take what they need. Sometimes, neither one will acknowledge the medicine there because somebody in the drug lab 100 tiles away decided to haul their newly minted meds to the hospital. This also has a huge CPU hit, often causing significant lag spikes when you have more than even 8 pawns accessing the same stockpile and items.

I really *really* wish the pawns had less derpy AI when hauling and interacting with things.

[Canute]

And this behavior isn't new to B18 too.
But these locking of the stack is needed for the current hauling/taking system.
Sure this system might be improved but thats part of a further release.