Monkey Motors

[Moggie]

Hi,
in this scenario I tried a strategy of piling up the necessary raw materials in Machined City and then transporting it to Auto City. However, I was not very succesful. What was my error? I did use custom consist trains...

[nedfumpkin]

Not successful in what way? More detail please.

[Moggie]

Not successful in what way? More detail please.

I wasn't seeing too many of the materials arriving to Machined City make it to the (edit: custom config) trains I had running from there to Auto city. Of course one of the problems is that there are many industries competing for the same resources and I don't know how to manage them efficiently. Maybe I should make custom config trains going to the industries right at the beginning so they'd be in full speed by the time I get access to Auto City...

[nedfumpkin]

In this case it may be wise to set up a rail yard in a neutral location where you stockpile cargo there and only supply the industries with what they need or can produce.

For custom consists, you have to set the minimum number of cars for it to work properly.

Micro-managing cargo is the key to TM.

[Blackhawk]

Another thing to be careful of is what your trains take with them as they leave the city. There are times I have a custom consist for what goes to City A and don't care what it takes away from City A. Other times I don't care what goes to City A as long as Cargo X isn't removed from City A. So I don't know if your trains' custom consist includes what they will leave with from Auto City but that might be something to check out as well.

I haven't played this scenario so I'm not sure what industries are all in Auto City or what the objectives are, but you could also try focusing on one industry at a time. Ex. If you have a brewery (grain/rice + aluminum = alcohol)) and a bottling plant (produce + aluminum = food) and you need food to be produced more than alcohol send only produce and aluminum into the town so there is no grain/rice for the brewery to produce it's alcohol and consequently it wouldn't need aluminum.

Alternatively in some scenarios where you can built your own industries sometimes it can be helpful to build your own industries somewhere to help out the supply chain. The placement varies depending on the map and the objectives but in one map I played I had Industry A and B in the same city and what Industry A produced, was demanded by industry B to produce the final product.

[danrrt]

I'm having serious problems with this map. My current attempt is at 1912 with rail lines connected through to Auto City. I have 27 years to run, which ought to be plenty to build and ship 30 automobiles, since the two plants should be producing 2 automobiles a year each. But there lies the problem, no matter how much materials I deliver to the auto plants, they won't build me any automobiles. :(

I must be missing something fundamental, but I have trains arriving at the plants (each plant is served by its own little station) roughly once a year and each train delivers 3 steel and 1 each of machinery, electronics, glass, textiles, rubber - i.e. enough materials to feed it for 3 years, in theory. And the ****** auto plants just sit there, producing nothing.

As an experiment, I let it run all the way to 1935 on the fastest speed and in all that time, with all the materials that were delivered, no automobiles were produced. It's as if there's something they need that isn't being supplied - but I don't know what it is. I'm supplying everything it says they need.

Any ideas?

[Blackhawk]

I thought I wrote a review or posted my strategy of this map. I can't find it so I guess I didn't. I think this is the map where you have to build through some river valleys to get to the auto plants on the other side?

If that's the case then I also had an issue in that the Northern Auto Plant wouldn't build for autos for me. So I shipped all the materials from the Northern Plant to the Southern/Eastern Plant and autos began to be produced at the Southern Plant, no idea why they wouldn't be produced at the Northern Plant. Another thing that seemed to work was to go into the editor. (Shift + E) bulldoze the plant that isn't working, and then place a new auto plant. If I remember correctly that also worked. (Remember to hit Shift + E again after placing the new auto plant to go back into the normal game mode rather than playing in the editor.)

And since I had so much money towards the end of the map, I kept bulldozing anything in Auto City or whatever that city was called between the auto plants. Otherwise I had retail stores and bakeries etc popping up and wanting the glass and textiles etc, which meant the tycoonians kept taking the goods from the plants into the city. (Alternatively you can also just set up a train or two hauling everything that got brought into the city back to the auto plant.)

EDIT:
You could also try increasing the station to a bigger station size and see if that has any effect. It probably won't but it's something else to try.

Alternatively you could try to focus on just one auto plant and see if that helps. (It sounds like you're trying to supply both plants?) I believe I only used the Southern Plant and then I'd have a train with all steel, another with mostly all textiles, etc. Supplying the auto plant with more than the bare minimum of carloads for the less used commodities. As Auto City will demand and take many of these goods away from the Auto Plant I oversupplied the Auto Plants. I don't have the saved game available right now to look at but otherwise I'd say how trains I actually had running from one side of the map to the other. It was probably around 7-10. Then after the Plant started producing I'd have them haul the autos back to Capital City??? or whatever city it needed to go to, and reroute the train to whatever cargo I needed next or was ready to be shipped to Auto City. And like I said above, I rerouted a couple of these trains to also just go between Auto City and the Auto Plant hauling anything the Tycoonians took to Auto City.

EDIT #2:
I think I also bought the Auto Plant and upgraded it so it would produce 4 a year rather than just 2.

Hopefully one of the ideas in here works.

[danrrt]

Okay, I tried a few things based on your suggestions. First I used the scenario editor to bulldoze and replace the auto plants. The result was that the north auto plant promptly built 4 lots of automobiles! Unfortunately, it then went back into idle mode and refused to build any more. Bulldozing and replacing it again didn't make it build more, either.

I tried bulldozing Auto City's buildings so that it doesn't lure away supplies from the auto plants, but it didn't seem to make any difference. I also set up a train running cargos back from Auto City to the auto plant, but since the auto plant won't actually use them, they end up going around and around in a circle.

I tried focussing on the one auto plant - bought it, upgraded it, and rearranged my trains to supply the materials in much larger quantities - and noticed something odd. The auto plant will stack up supplies of steel, textiles, rubber, machinery and glass, but NOT electronics. Also on the cargo map, there is no blue demand arrow on the plant for electronics, though there is for everything else. When trains deliver electronics, the plant seems to ignore them and they migrate away overland to the city. (Where the train promptly brings them back again...) I wonder if this is the source of the problem? The plant needs electronics to produce automobiles, but doesn't 'demand' them?

This has been a fun scenario, setting up all the various industries and feeding materials in, but not being able to make the final product is very frustrating!

Dan

[Blackhawk]

When I get home I'll see if I can find my saved game and take a look. If you want I'll take a look at your saved game. Just upload it as a zip or rar file.

If you think the electronics are being drawn away you could try building a few of the storage depots which are Rail yard structures that demand textiles and electronics.

EDIT:
I just tried using the storage depot and in 1912 they don't have the "blue demand" arrow appear either. Although I'm not sure if rail yard structures produce demand arrows.

EDIT #2:
I did another test and in 1950 the autoplant has the blue demand arrow demanding electronics.

[Blackhawk]

Oddly no arrow shows up, but when you click on electronics to see where the are produced and demanded, the auto plant shows up even though there is no arrow. So it must know it should be demanding them, but whether it is or not I don't know.

Edit:
In a different test on 1929 the auto plant didn't show up when I clicked on demand/supplied electronics cargo.

[danrrt]

Well, I figured putting a storage depot there probably wouldn't make any difference, but I plonked one down right next to the auto plant - and lo and behold, the auto plant immediately started pumping out 6 autos a year.

My guess is that the plant was trying to use electronics at such a low rate (0.1 a year) that the electronics were migrating out of range before the plant actually managed to use any of them. Having the depot there helped them stay nearby.

Finally scored a gold win with 30 automobiles successfully delivered with 6 years to spare, despite having the glass supply unexpectedly fail in the middle - the glass factory started demanding aluminium and machinery in 1920 and I didn't notice until automobile production stalled for lack of glass.

Thanks for the help and suggestions!

[Blackhawk]

Glad I could help and that you were finally able to finish the map.

I wonder why the auto plant doesn't create a strong enough demand to keep the electronics early on. After all a storage depot is only a 0.1 demand as well. And the auto plant also only demands 0.1 textiles and 0.1 glass early on as well, yet those cargoes still seemed to have some slight demand. The best way to probably avoid any issues with an auto plant until 1930 when 0.2 electronics are required and a strong demand is created, would be to just put the auto plant in a city so the houses that are demanding electronics will ideally keep the electronics in the area of the auto plant.

[aquarian_star]

Tried installing campaign files 1a-1c zip files only show movie files then instruction say to zipto right files. Not clear. there shold show names of the files. they don't show up in campaign screens. none.

please clarify!

[Blackhawk]

Ned would have to help you with getting the campaign files working. We'll see if he responds.

You can still play the scenario even if the campaign files don't work. You'll have to open the map in the editor. Then there's an option on I believe the first page of settings with a box to check next to "make campaign map" and un-check that, then save the scenario under a new name like Monkey Motors - Scenario, and then go play it like any other scenario.

[nedfumpkin]

Tried installing campaign files 1a-1c zip files only show movie files then instruction say to zipto right files. Not clear. there shold show names of the files. they don't show up in campaign screens. none.

please clarify!

Not all the campaign maps have been completed, and the maps won't show up in any list...you need to go into the campaign room to access them. Also make sure you get the 5th campaign....1.1

As soon as I am finished wth the fourth map, I am going to be re-zipping it all to make for an easier installing.