More awful AI behavior (please review)

[SirDuke]

I found another REALLY annoying ai problem!
This time I do hope it gets a fix fast!

In my gameplay, I have to BUY "Foodcubes" and "Ration Packs"
I don´t have the possibility to create them.
So I really, really REALLY want to spare them for long travels...
That´s why I put them into a separate chest.


So I´ve build this house with a kitchen and a food store.
This is where I keep my common food.
Rice and gohan and whatever else...

BUT

The AI has driven my recruits CONSTANTLY to take the first food availabe.

So I even build a house on the furthes point of the city.
Put the chest for foodcubes there and locked the door.
Then I´ve build a f*****g wall around it and locked the damn gate!

But still some time a few recruits GET IN THAT F*****G FORT KNOX
unlock everything and eat the foodcubes!

*** EDIT ***

Now I tried to trick them.
Build a house with roof access and a wall all around.
Put the chest on the roof.
So I could click it, but the AI couldn´t reach them.
Thought it will work now...

BUT;

Now I just wondered, why two of my recruits dropped unconsious.
Noticed, that they haven´t eaten for some days, although the kitchen is full of gohan and ricebowl.

This is driving me mad!
Please, stop that!

[Sol Lignum]

This reminds me of good old times when you delete all doors in a Sim house... ahem

The food priority has it's place, indeed, but is working weirdly. I'd suggest you to build a shopcounter, they doesn't seem to be eating from there. Why can't you craft foodcubes though? Some kind of self-limitation, or i've missed something?

Also i believe the affected savegame might help, if it's indeed a bug.

[TerrorofKenshi]

This reminds me of good old times when you delete all doors in a Sim house... ahem

The food priority has it's place, indeed, but is working weirdly. I'd suggest you to build a shopcounter, they doesn't seem to be eating from there. Why can't you craft foodcubes though? Some kind of self-limitation, or i've missed something?

Also i believe the affected savegame might help, if it's indeed a bug.

You can't make foodcubes? That's a new one. I thought that you couldn't make ration packs but foodcubes? I do feel like the game could use a "forbid" button like in Rimworld for example so that your peons won't go for a certain inventory. What i also wish the so see is better priorities of food like, only eat the foor with the least amount of nutrients first like dried meat for example.

[SirDuke]

Why can't you craft foodcubes though? Some kind of self-limitation, or i've missed something?

I can´t, cause I can´t grow veggies or wheat in "The Swamps"

The buggy AI happens to my turret guards.

Everyone else is going into the kitchen for food.
All other turret guards are walking into the kitchen, too.

But there are these two guards near my "bunker-house".
They NEVER walk into the kitchen.
They first broke my locks...
Now they´d starve if I don´t pay attention...



I could provide a savefile, if you whish...
But I dont know, which part of it might be important.
The whole folder for ONE save game is 196mb
That would take me a minimum of 30minutes uploading

[SirDuke]

I'd suggest you to build a shopcounter, they doesn't seem to be eating from there.

Thanks for that hint!
This is an acceptable workaround.
Changed the chest to a shopcounter, now my recruits do ignore it!

I can live with that, but still, I think that behaviour should be reworked.

Thanks!

[Sol Lignum]

(...)
The whole folder for ONE save game is 196mb
(...)

Jeebus Chrisp, alright, in that case it's better to make sure the file is actually needed, so don't upload anything unless a guy with a blue name asks you to

And you're welcome, glad the shopcounter idea has helped you

[bk3000]

I believe they're doing what they should be doing - prioritizing the highest NU food item. In turn that makes them ignore the lessor items you might have in the food production chain. This is more efficient you see.

And you have the answer to avoiding this which is putting the food in any non-food-specific container. The AI when looking for things will only look in containers intended to hold that specific thing. Likewise they won't find building materials you've placed in your shop counter.

Also note hydroponics can be used to grow things you otherwise cannot grow in that area.

[Ocram]

Unfortunately there's no such thing as food(/nu) priority. I suspect it's a constant loop trying to eat something after a threshold, and if item NU fits the missing hunger value, that's gonna be eat. You can see this in effect packing animals with foul raw meat and foodcubes, for example, they will first eat the foul meat.
For storages, what I'm sure is that they will path to the closest storage at the moment of surpassing that threshold. Example: food store full of goodies in a house, near the door; a chest close the the backwall of that house with bread in it, char is behind the house (opposite side of the door). You would expect a char to go to the food store, since the path is clearly shorter. He will instead go pick the bread, cause the chest on the backwall was closer to him (fucking up your early bread stock, btw xd)

Here's a homemade movie I rolled with friends to demonstrate:

screenshot_2.jpg (322.36 KiB) Viewed 2802 times

screenshot_4.jpg (323.23 KiB) Viewed 2802 times

screenshot_6.jpg (322.09 KiB) Viewed 2802 times

Obv. the foodstore he's passing by is full. And no, it's not staged xd
Certainly could use some tweaks to this (foul meat -> higher NU -> ingredients), but is also easy to solve yourself.
[EDIT] I think my priority example doesn't make any sense, probably would be better prioritizing non-ingriedients over ingredients.

[Sol Lignum]

Unfortunately there's no such thing as food(/nu) priority. I suspect it's a constant loop trying to eat something after a threshold, and if item. (...) You would expect a char to go to the food store, since the path is clearly shorter. He will instead go pick the bread, cause the chest on the backwall was closer to him (f***g up your early bread stock, btw xd)

I think at some point it was claimed somewhere in the patchnotes that characters should in fact prioritise food by nutrition, and then i distinctly remember observing my chars preferring bread over gohan or foodcube nontheless. Also, bread basket in my case is geometrically further than food store, so they just love bread, and it may not be related to distance anyhow.

But anyway, something is a little wrong there.

[SirDuke]

And you have the answer to avoiding this which is putting the food in any non-food-specific container. The AI when looking for things will only look in containers intended to hold that specific thing.

At least this point is not 100% correct, as the AI does ideed look into non specific containers.
I can tell you that no chest (neither the general or the metal chest) and not the Boxes worked.

Or is this a specific food container?

And what about starving, if they can´t find a path to a roof?
Is that correct behaviour, too?



**** EDIT ****
Sad but true, I just noticed, that the "shopcounter trick" does not work all the time.
My recruits just dropped unconscious by hunger again.