Dumb Labor experience

[Songleaves]

And having worked on a farms (granted it was doing biochemical analysis, but yes I would stand alongside the farm laborers as I had to grab 100 lb samples of potatoes to conduct analyses on), I would very much beg to differ.  There's a reason some folk are said to have "green thumbs" and others not.

Unfortunately too many people IRL think dumb labor jobs are just that, and there's no room to improve while working them.  I'd bet very few if any have done 'dumb labor' for enough years to know that's a common delusion rooted in classism.

I have over a decade of experience with farming, forestry, and horticulture. I was being diplomatic by saying "in my experience", but in reality I am entirely convinced that anyone who done planting, harvesting and tree cutting long enough IRL will find that planting has the lowest skillcap of the three. Now I'm not calling planting "dumb labor", I'm just stating that I find it odd how Rimworld prioritizes it above the other two when I feel like there isn't really a question concerning which has a higher skill development potential.

[charkesd]

ok but its not like 1000x the amount of time

like it would be for a charge rifle...

[Chibiabos]

I have over a decade of experience with farming, forestry, and horticulture. I was being diplomatic by saying "in my experience", but in reality I am entirely convinced that anyone who done planting, harvesting and tree cutting long enough IRL will find that planting has the lowest skillcap of the three. Now I'm not calling planting "dumb labor", I'm just stating that I find it odd how Rimworld prioritizes it above the other two when I feel like there isn't really a question concerning which has a higher skill development potential.

I'm pretty damned sure if I stuck you next to someone who has been doing planting professionally for 30 years, there's no way in hell you'd come close to competing, and not merely for speed but for getting the correct depth and getting the soil to the correct compaction, as well as watering and maintaining the plant correctly.

Your arrogant nose-down at labor jobs is just that -- arrogance.  Unfortunately its popular and too many people associate 'everyone believes this' to translate to 'this is true.'  It isn't.

[Songleaves]

I'm pretty damned sure if I stuck you next to someone who has been doing planting professionally for 30 years, there's no way in hell you'd come close to competing, and not merely for speed but for getting the correct depth and getting the soil to the correct compaction, as well as watering and maintaining the plant correctly.

Your arrogant nose-down at labor jobs is just that -- arrogance.  Unfortunately its popular and too many people associate 'everyone believes this' to translate to 'this is true.'  It isn't.

I meant that I have over a decade experience in each of those individually, which I feel puts me in a good position to compare them. You don't get faster at this type of labor after doing it for 30 years, any benefits of skill are lost due to advances in age. Like, I was going faster and better than my dad on our farm when I was still in highschool, despite the fact that he had been doing that type of work since his childhood. Getting the right depth/soil compaction is not nearly as fine-tuned and difficult as I believe you think it is. As far as maintaining the plant goes, yeah that is the most difficult part. Properly pruning and controlling nutrient inputs is by far more difficult than planting.

As far as arrogance towards labor jobs goes, it seems like you've learned well how to project very simplistic characterizations onto those with whom you disagree. What a pity.

[Chibiabos]

As far as arrogance towards labor jobs goes, it seems like you've learned well how to project very simplistic characterizations onto those with whom you disagree. What a pity.

I don't merely disagree, I've readily observed the opposite.

I've worked in lawn crews alongside other folk.  One guy in particular was a pretty strong physically, but had no clue or focus on the work and what he did do was fairly fast, but often inefficient so it wound up taking him longer, and he made serious gaffes.  He insisted he knew what he was doing with weed killing chemicals, for instance, and while he did indeed kill the weeds where had sprayed, he also killed the nearby customer's expensively-maintained sod and even worsened it by having walked through the ground he had sprayed and straight out into the grass -- this was evidenced when we responded to the customer having called the following week, we went out there and sure enough, there were shoeprint-shaped burn marks in the grass from this guy whom assured us he knew what the heck he was doing.

I've worked on farms and in landscaping jobs, and anyone who believes they've learned all there is to know and there's no more to learn in that business or any business is not someone whom is self-honest nor reliable.  I've seen that over and over in a variety of professions, from business managers (yes, I've worked in business management) to computer repair technicians to, yes, people working on a farm, working in landscaping and yes, I've worked as a janitor and seen similar inefficient work that makes a lot of mistakes in janitorial too leaving a lot of things routinely missed for cleaning.

There is never a cap to improving your ability in terms of efficiency or quality in any job.  The moment you feel you have, the reality is you've probably just burned out and are too bored to care or bother (generally comes from a sense of 'this work is beneath me') to figure out improvements to completing the task.

My real strengths in any job are my skill of observation and my passion for thinking things through thoroughly and looking for ways things could be improved.  It lead me to save an aerospace factory of some 500 employees from my pathetic little entry-level technical writing job -- without my accomplishing a few tasks, some of which were well outside my job description, the factory would have lost its Boeing business, and Boeing was 70% of their business -- the remaining 30% would not have sufficed to pay the bills to keep the factory going.  With another employer, a high-volume, high-speed and high-stress e-commerce warehouse, as a bottom-rung general labor grunt, I made lots of improvements to various processes that produced significant man-hour savings per unit quantities shipped, I also discovered several serious inventory defects (as in what they thought they had wasn't actually what they had) because I gave a closer eye on things than most.  One product in particular wound up being a $2 million mistake overlooked by every single person that had handled that item before me -- the logistical software which tied in with customer orders so the ordering system was affected too thought we had $2 million in $500-retail-apiece power tools proved to factually be (as in what we physically had received and stowed in the warehouse) a $20 hand tool that we didn't even carry (was not available for purchase on our ordering website) due to a UPC mismatch.

I know they had engineers, managers and other technical professionals whom had a decade or more experience there, but the longer I was there, the more I realized they (particularly the floor managers and higher level supervisors) didn't actually care about anything except speed, cutting corners and bonuses which several openly admitted to fudging reports to improve.

I -- again just a lowest-paid general laborer -- also discovered a more serious problem at the warehouse in hazmat handling; specifically we were readily receiving hazardous materials we had no capacity of dealing with.  Working with the warehouse safety manager, based on my reports and observations that brought this to light, it was discovered the General Manager had known about this for some time but refused to do anything.  Given the size and volume of the warehouse, it was inevitable and yes, we had hazmat spills we had no capacity to clean up because we were not equipped and no one was trained to handle those particular materials as required by OSHA.  Resulting from this, I -- the lowest-paid general laborer -- got the General Manager fired -- the highest-paid guy in the warehouse.

However commonly shared, bullshit claims don't impress me, and when my experience or observations contradict what someone says, I know better than to look the other way or chalk it off.  I've had too wide a variety of jobs to qualify as well-experienced in any, but I am very experienced at observation, noticing problems, seeking and receiving my problem reports are valid and getting significant changes done, even axing the head manager if that's what it takes.  I've waaaaay more than earned my pay at a lot of places I've worked, but still get treated like garbage ... that factory I saved?  Two months later the owner of that factory laid me off and axed my position because he believed I had no value.  I had worked closely with several higher-ups at that factory, including the Vice President of Marketting and the Vice President of Accounting and they, as well as my own boss (the Quality Assurance Manager) were all extremely peeved with the owner for axing me as I had provided all of them with a lot of useful help, work and putting my power of observation and critical thinking to improving things for them (not just saving everyone's job by patching things up with their biggest customer they were on the verge of losing).

I know how common arrogance is, its so ubiquitous that its essentially cultural.  I know no one operating on unhealthy levels of arrogance is aware of this, and none of my calling it out will likely ever have much of an effect.  I hope describing some of my experiences and things I have accomplished put some context into what I say for you, however, and maybe someday you'll rethink your assumptions.  There's always more effective, higher quality or more efficient ways to do any task.  Anyone who believes they can't learn any more in their job needs to find another job, it does not mean that job has a 'level cap' for experience.

[Thane]

Someone want to lock this thread?

We have two people arguing who, by and large, agree with each other and we have an obvious Troll.

OP is good, but this discussion has gone down a rabbit hole to China.

[carbon]

In the interest of trying to steer back to the original topic...

My sense of things is that adding skill-based progression to 'dumb labor' tasks would primarily add empty complexity; something you have to worry about as a player, but doesn't improve the gameplay in any meaningful sense.

I might be in favor of certain craftable 'tool' items that make certain tasks easier (e.g. long handled broom for cleaning), perhaps taking up the gun slot, but that would probably be a rather complex and time consuming update for the game.

[Chibiabos]

In the interest of trying to steer back to the original topic...

My sense of things is that adding skill-based progression to 'dumb labor' tasks would primarily add empty complexity; something you have to worry about as a player, but doesn't improve the gameplay in any meaningful sense.

I might be in favor of certain craftable 'tool' items that make certain tasks easier (e.g. long handled broom for cleaning), perhaps taking up the gun slot, but that would probably be a rather complex and time consuming update for the game.

I would argue its currently adding complexity because its not consistent with other tasks, which do gain experience and improve over time.  To me, consistency is the heart of simplicity -- the more variety of stuff tends to behave the same, the more easily you can handle them.  If the concern is computer memory, all the 'dumb labor' skills show a value (experience level 3) so I presume they all consume the same amount of memory as skills that improve anyway.

[b0rsuk]

For anyone with half a brain, the more you do any job, the better you get at it -- the more you can do with less effort put into it.  So sorry this concept seems to offend you.

Experience is one part of it. The other is physical fitness.

I have Bad Back and my condition got a lot worse last year. I finally started doing core muscle exercises daily, it typically takes me 35 minutes on days without pushups and squats. Not only I regained my ability to walk, but last winter clearing snow felt like fun. I did it all in one go, no rests, and I had an appetite for more.

So maybe we could have Physical Fitness for colonists ? Hauling, cleaning, stonecutting, growing, constructing, mining, LONG WALKS, hauling would improve it, maybe smithing too. Tailoring, art, research, machining, repairing, cooking, social, training, healing wouldn't.

[crazyarms]

I think the "dumb labor" tasks are more of a catch all at this point rather than things dependent on skill.
Imo, unskilled would be better than saying dumb. And to clarify, unskilled does not mean easily mastered.
While working in a factory (wood manufacturing) as a laborer, it was easy to conceive that "anyone" can stack and move lumber. This is (mostly) true (barring any physical capabilities) but... experience makes a big difference.

To the relevance of rimworld, I think, it would be strange to have a skill for unskilled labor (what would you even call it? physical task experience?). It would be nice if cleaning and hauling would level up individually (as I don't think experience should be shared between the two).

As far as coding goes, it might honestly be rather cumbersome unless you defined cleaning as a skill and hauling as a skill, although i can't say for certain...   

[Chibiabos]

"Unskilled labor" is a dishonest misnomer in my experience.  Unfortunately we are having a seemingly increasing disdain toward physical labor in our culture.  :/  Picking up garbage along public areas is now considered a punishment for criminals. :/

[Jonofwrath]

+1
Pretty much any task you do you'll get better at over time.