An immersive way to maximise hydraulic farms.

Started by Taramafor, March 29, 2018, 03:17:28 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

Taramafor

So I been seeing some designs where the colonists have to crawl over some of those hydraulic farms to get to other ones that are in the same range of the lamps. Frankly it's immersive breaking and I for one think there should be a mood penalty for having to "crawl over to do extra work" or something (idea for a mod maybe?).

This then mean there still needs to be an immersive way to set up the farms. You can't really do it with one sun lamp, or even 2. But you can do it with 4. It might be a bit of power, sure, but you can always make the maps bigger to place more power buildings. I don't even need to do that and had more power then I knew what to do with once I had one such farm set up.

So the design is as follows. 4 sun lamps just about touching each others range. Basically you're forming a sort of square. The next step is to put a hydraulic farm on each NEAR corner of each sun lamps range. That's at the top and bottom corners.

After that on the left two sun lamps you can fill up the left side of them and with the right side of the sun lamps you can fill up the right side. I like to make sure the hydraulic farms don't touch the corners of the sun lamps but there should be enough of them in the middle as well. I still get a good number of farms out of this but I also had outdoor farms so I'm not sure how much food per colonist I got out of that. I had it all on rice, which is the fastest growing food. Even if it wasn't enough farms I could always make another square of sun lamps and have another "indoor farm" set up. Which should give enough food for what you need. I had about 15 colonists.

As for power it's roughly two solar panels or wind turbines per sun lamp. When it comes to solar panels I like to keep them a space away from anything else, which includes each other. This also makes sure nothing gets in the way if I need to repair one or lay down a power line or switch. A good base should have solar panels/wind turbines spread out across the map or in specialised "power farms" anyway. With a few battery storage areas here and there. Components can be an issue early game but with so much food on a desert biome I easily traded for them and got up component workshops set up. No fighting or looting needed. So this can be a good way to get them for pacifist players, or otherwise players that like "build up first".

The difficulty can lie in snow biomes or even ice sheets. The only tactic I can think of for this one is to make sure you got a lot of steel, components and food before starting in such an area. Drop podding in can help a lot. Make sure you also got the needed material of whatever the walls are going to be and you're good to go. In most other biomes you can just grow things outside but that's not happening here. Get the walls placed, the suns lamps set up and the farms along the sides of the walls with the power set up too. As long as you got the steel and components when you arrived it should be set up quite quickly. The other issue is also heat, so make sure you also have enough for that too. Steel might be easier to come by but you need a LOT of it here. 3000 should cover everything, I think. As for components I'd aim for 200. To play it safe I'd actually go for 5000 steel and 300 components to also cover other production buildings. If weight is an issue drop pods are good at ferrying over supplies in the blink of an eye (plus you can bunny hop to where you want to get too).

I'd put up an image but I don't have one yet. I had to move my colony. I'll post one as soon as I get a "square farm" set up. It's both immersive and efficient. Also might be a place to quickly set up sand bags if the enemy break into it.

dkmoo

it's a cool design but AFAIK the pawns will still climb over a row to get to the next row instead of walking around in any nicely laid out paths you may have set up for them so you won't be able to get rid of that aspect of immersion-breakingness.


Bozobub

Thanks, belgord!

sick puppy

anything that makes normal sea ice/ice sheet /extreme desert impossible gets a big no from me, so since you already admitted that it will cause a lot of trouble there, my verdict is: no thanks

Taramafor

#4
Quote from: dkmoo on March 29, 2018, 03:38:37 PM
the pawns will still climb over a row to get to the next row

That's what I'm saying. They don't do that with me setup. There's TWO ros in the middle of the design. With the sides lined up against the walls. There's also another line at the very top and very bottom that isn't touching the other farms.

I actually can't really remember the exact design. I know there was no "crawling over" needed though. I know how to make it but I need to do that again to get a "mental picture". I'll either have an image up tomorrow or the day after, provided my colonists don't all die off. I'd be working on it right now but am tied up somewhat.

Dashthechinchilla

#5
Define immersion breaking. I like the skylights mod because it is more like a greenhouse to me. I am a gardner, and the only time I would use a grow light is seedlings in my own house. The sun works much better.

If you are fine with mods, skylights could help you arrange the hydroponics in a more natural way.

Taramafor

#6
Quote from: Dashthechinchilla on March 29, 2018, 10:20:53 PM
Define immersion breaking.

Anything that feels like "extra work" for the pawns when simply spacing things out more will keep things "immersive". For example, not cramming in a farm in every single spot in a single sun lamp as that requires so much crawling over which, let's be honest, would cause a mood penalty to anyone in real life. Let alone in the game. Or otherwise drain more hunger and tiredness then normal. I actually farmed a bit in real life and even "in the most efficient way" is enough of a chore as it is.

In any event I got that farm set up and I actually improved on the design with two more sun lamps.

First image.

https://imgur.com/a/Ef3Cy

As you can see the middle spaces are lacking to say the least. I could "cram in farms touching each other" but even if I did there would still be a space here and there out of the light. I thought on it for a bit and came up with another solution.

Second farm

https://imgur.com/a/YqJ2r

I managed to get two rows set up in the middle here. I'm fine with that since you can still get to one side if not the other on each row in the middle without crawling over. I didn't quite get it all done fully in this case because a lot of bad things happened due to forgetting to place joy structures and not keeping on top of early food. But the farm is done even if the floor and walls weren't sorted out. Even managed to set up some sandbags to show how to dig into the area. With rice production (maybe some with potatoes) this should be enough for a good number of colonists. It might be a good idea to have one farm on just rice production with another set to things like cotton, healroot and potatoes. I doubt more then two farms of this type dedicated to food will be needed to feed your colonists.

'Fraid I can't show the power production. I didn't get a chance to set that up this time. But basically 12 solar panels/wind turbines, give or take depending on how much power you already have on hand. Components aren't that hard to come by once you start trading for them and are even less of a concern once you stock up and make sure you always take them from the old colony. Truth be told I've had to worry more about steel. Cotten, heal root and extra rice (or corn if growing outside as well) sells nicely to buy the needed steel if you can't find enough and have yet to get drills and scanners set up.

Edit: Just checked the range of the top and middle lamps. I actually need to bring the top two sun lamps down one space in the second image. Was rushing somewhat due to so much rampaging.