The production nightmare - another question(s)

[jjdenver]

My god if we could only have a way to specify all production manually without the un-intelligent AI trying to get involved in this. Production soooooo annoying in this game. My goodness. Forget every other enhancement to this game and just get production to work in a reliable way and the game is improved drastically. We spend literally hundreds of hours trying to whip production into shape in games. Many games just "stop" because we go back and forth with the file with every player trying to get the resources to run correctly (complicated further by trade).

Anyway, I'm trying to manually set a convoy route. Using 5.0.0.10. When I select default I don't see the routes to the left but when I select computed I do see the routes. I want to change the routes. Must I do this from computed? I was always taught to make all production planning changes from "default" state. Hope this question makes sense. Thanks.

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[Joseignacio]

Good luck

[Centuur]

First: Italy: remove the defaults settings. It is always advisable to have as few default settings as possible.

Second: the CW. Difficult to see what you want to do. A default or override setting is better if you want to select a route for a resource. That's because if you recompute, the program will (and it's very annoying indeed) try to find a better solution.

Usually only a few default settings are necessary, since the program will do a reasonable job on itself. If things really are getting messy, I will simply remove all defaults and overrides, let the program recompute and after that it only takes a few changes to get things right.

[jjdenver]

Second: the CW. Difficult to see what you want to do. A default or override setting is better if you want to select a route for a resource. That's because if you recompute, the program will (and it's very annoying indeed) try to find a better solution.

Usually only a few default settings are necessary, since the program will do a reasonable job on itself. If things really are getting messy, I will simply remove all defaults and overrides, let the program recompute and after that it only takes a few changes to get things right.

Thank you for taking time to reply. Sorry if my question was confusing. The basic question is this. I want to manually set a route. However I think there is a bug in the game interface perhaps. Because when I select "computed" there are entries in the route area on left of screen. But when I select "default" the entries all disappear. So I don't see how to modify the route. That's the basic question. Is this intended UI functionality? or a bug?

[Centuur]

Try this (should work):

First default the resource to the factory where you want to put it, and press the recompute button. That should give you the route the resource takes according to the program.
After that, you should be able to route it through the sea zones you want.

If that doesn't work, I would like you to put a gamesave in here, so we can check if a bug has appeared.

[rkr1958]

Second: the CW. Difficult to see what you want to do. A default or override setting is better if you want to select a route for a resource. That's because if you recompute, the program will (and it's very annoying indeed) try to find a better solution.

Usually only a few default settings are necessary, since the program will do a reasonable job on itself. If things really are getting messy, I will simply remove all defaults and overrides, let the program recompute and after that it only takes a few changes to get things right.

Thank you for taking time to reply. Sorry if my question was confusing. The basic question is this. I want to manually set a route. However I think there is a bug in the game interface perhaps. Because when I select "computed" there are entries in the route area on left of screen. But when I select "default" the entries all disappear. So I don't see how to modify the route. That's the basic question. Is this intended UI functionality? or a bug?

My experience with MWIF production is that the ability to manually set a route hasn't worked for several version, several years, now. I've given up on that functionality as every time I manually fixed a route MWIF would change it back.

I've invested a LOT OF TIME in attempting to master MWIF production and have discerned the following guidelines that I follow to get MWIF production to do what I want, what I think it should do, 95% of the time. There's still the 5% where I just take care of things manually by editing the game file.

My MWIF Production Guidelines - Hypothesis.
(1) MWIF processes resources in the following order from high to low priority: (a) Trade, (b) Default/Override/Save Oil, (c) non specified.
(2) One cannot directly control the route that MWIF uses to convoy resources to factories.
(3) However; one can indirectly affect the routes by which resources are convoyed to factories by using default/override/save (i.e., priority b) and by specifying which RPs are assigned for trade (priority a).
For example, assume nothing is defaulted with enough CPs in the Bay of Biscay to get South American & African resources to UK factories and enough CPs in Faeroes Gap to get Canadian RPs to the UK. Often times MWIF will route the CAN RPs first through the Bay of Biscay, ignoring the Faeroes Gap, and prevent (block) routing of South American and African RPs due to the lack of CPs in the Bay of Biscay (with unused CPs in the Faeroes Gap). In that case what I do is to default the blocked RPs to UK factories which now have higher priority in MWIF for routing than the unspecified CAN RPs. MWIF will then route the previously blocked South American and African RPs through the Bay of Biscay and then when it gets around to the unspecified CAN RPs (priority c), having no other choice, will route those through the Faeroes Gap.
(4) Note often times after a save and reload, I have to "respecify" which RPs I wish to assign to the trade agreements. If I get things working and then after reload notice production is now down again the first suspect usually is the "reassignment" by MWIF of which RPs are assigned to trade.

Try this (should work):

First default the resource to the factory where you want to put it, and press the recompute button. That should give you the route the resource takes according to the program.
After that, you should be able to route it through the sea zones you want.

If that doesn't work, I would like you to put a gamesave in here, so we can check if a bug has appeared.

I would love to see this functionality working; i.e, that to manually set a convoy route and have MWIF honor that setting.

[jjdenver]

Thanks for all the helpful posts. Ronnie I tried your method and it worked out. I assume you mean you click "clear defaults" when you say non-specified resources. This is what I tried and sure enough the game then took the "default" resource and shipped it through the sz first.

[rkr1958]

Thanks for all the helpful posts. Ronnie I tried your method and it worked out. I assume you mean you click "clear defaults" when you say non-specified resources. This is what I tried and sure enough the game then took the "default" resource and shipped it through the sz first.

Yes, you are correct. non specified <--> "clear defaults" <--> never have set to default

[jjdenver]

Hi Ronnie, one problem with the method you describe seems to be that when BP's are being sent from CW to USSR the game tries to route them around Africa instead of using available route through Arctic Ocean. It's Storm weather and USSR holds Archangel with a valid rail line south to Moscow but still the game leaves those cp's un-used.

Also a related question - have you had luck trying to get BP's sent from somewhere else like India instead of from London?

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[rkr1958]

Hi Ronnie, one problem with the method you describe seems to be that when BP's are being sent from CW to USSR the game tries to route them around Africa instead of using available route through Arctic Ocean. It's Storm weather and USSR holds Archangel with a valid rail line south to Moscow but still the game leaves those cp's un-used.

Also a related question - have you had luck trying to get BP's sent from somewhere else like India instead of from London?

I generally handle these types of trades "off the books". I verify that I have "surplus" CPs in the sea areas necessary to transport these BPs. And then just add in the BPs during final production. Doing it off the books takes one file edit and maybe 5 minutes total (to verify & to make the edit). Much simpler, much faster and much less time and headache required that having to battle MWIF, often times unsuccessful, to get these trades done the want I want them done. Doing them "off the books" is just some much easier for me.

Technically, I guess when I do this I'm doing them "on the books" but outside of MWIF!