Matrix Games Forums

Woah woah woah....am I misunderstanding how the system works totally?

My understanding was the logistics capacity was just that..a capacity. The ability to deliver X amount of stuff given demand? But looks as if that's not it at all? It's actually capacity wasted that goes down roads where nothing needs to be supplied??

Correct. Every time a road branches, it evenly splits truck points over both branches. So a lvl 1 farm connected to your main supply road will siphon off thousands of truck points until you place a traffic sign. And with enough points on the main line even the 95% sign wastes hundreds of truck points on that branch.

Right, meaning you can either micro-manage the traffic lights OR build a ton of truckstops if you have the fuel. Really is no other way to deal with it.

I wholeheartedly agree that it does not make sense. Having finished two games already, and about to win my first extreme game on a large world, the one point of failure for this game, in my eyes, is the logistics systems. By turn 50, I spend 1 to 2 minutes visually checking my supply network and then 3 to 5 minutes fixing traffic signals.

This is necessary because of 2 factors: AI roads (the ones you conquer or the civilians build) and oil shortages. The latter is more extreme, as AI roads are a one and done deal. If you run out of oil or workers, your whole supply network falls apart and you have to spend 5 - 10 minutes cutting off things you can live without in order to get more oil and get supply underway again.

The fact that by turn 100 it takes a good 10 to 15 seconds to load the supply preview for next turns tells me that this is not programmed properly. As a software designer myself, I could implement a demand system in half a dozen way with minimal impact on performance, even counting all the minors AND majors - yes, even if minors used supply the same way majors do. It is not that hard and has been done countless times before.

There is no excuse. It is not logical and it is not efficient or fun. I support the idea of traffic signals, but only to prioritize which road to send supplies on, in a demand based system.

As an example: If you have 5000 demand NE, 5000 NW, and 3000 S, but only 10 000 capacity; you can prioritize NE and NW, and leave the south to eat dirt for dinner. I do not support the current system and feel that it should be at the very top of the list of things to amend. Before the steam release.

Also, the forum needs an upgrade, this is horrible.

Otherwise, love the game even with the logistics system the way it is.

There's some skill in logistics, in the forward planning and construction of roads to ensure you're getting the most out of your LIS. The Traffic Light system allows you to adjust where necessary, but I can't really see a situation where excessive turn-by-turn adjustment of 70+ traffic lights would ever be necessary where you couldn't just increase the amount of trucks you have to meet increasing demand. Certainly, if there's a very messy set of roads inherited from an AI then you might have to set the Traffic Lights at the start, but why would you need to adjust all of them every turn? Or even ten of them every five turns?

It doesn't make any sense, I'd quite like to see some screenshots of this situation to help me understand it better.

I totally agree with the issue of how long the logistics preview takes. Hopefully something can be done there.

ORIGINAL: KingHalford

There's some skill in logistics, in the forward planning and construction of roads to ensure you're getting the most out of your LIS. The Traffic Light system allows you to adjust where necessary, but I can't really see a situation where excessive turn-by-turn adjustment of 70+ traffic lights would ever be necessary where you couldn't just increase the amount of trucks you have to meet increasing demand. Certainly, if there's a very messy set of roads inherited from an AI then you might have to set the Traffic Lights at the start, but why would you need to adjust all of them every turn? Or even ten of them every five turns?

It doesn't make any sense, I'd quite like to see some screenshots of this situation to help me understand it better.

People have already posted screenshots that illustrate this issue. Out of curiosity, have you won a game yet, or conquered a big major? I ask because you reply here and talk like someone who has never run into this, when so far this has been ubiquitous for, it seems, everyone arguing against this system.

Yes and yes but I claim no expertise.

The earlier screenshot showed a handful of traffic light connections, and all of them set to 100% block. Instead of that I'd recommend one of the less severe settings, and figuring out how many are being used so that you're not having to change them every turn.

I completely agree that system was not designed so that the player had to adjust it turn by turn, and it's clear that the tools are designed to prevent the need for that happening so not sure why it is then that people are demanding that it's changed so early into the game's release.

And no I have never run into this. There are aspects of micromanagement in this game that can get annoying but traffic lights is not one of them. Early in the game, there's some micro necessary there but it's certainly no more chore than anything else, and later when you're up against a major you should have developed your logistics system to the point you can handle it. If the AI took you by surprise then you're going to have to struggle a bit, as happened in my last game! And then, you'll do whatever you can to win right? And I still highly doubt that there's any situation where 70+ traffic light connections need constantly adjusting on a turn by turn basis but happy to be proved wrong.

I think people are over-exaggerating the issue a bit. Fighting with logistics can be an uphill battle that takes 20 to 30 minutes, but once it is set properly, it will endure for a while. The main issues arise when AI zones your roads/railroads, or you run out of oil. Conquering major AI roads can be a pain initially, but like I said before, it is a one and done deal however annoying it is.

I'd show you some screen shots of a truly terrifying road network, but the forum is clunky and won't let me.

I feel like beyond the heated arguments on this topic, the core thing we have in agreement is that we appreciate and welcome the supply system; having LIS (can we get that renamed please?) and sending it around to supply zones and units, or the SHQ, I personally feel is what is going to put Shadow Empire on the throne of 4x games. The thing we do not like is the way the LIS are sent down roads.

When your farm eats 2000 LIS, of which it uses only 10%, while your infantry starves, and your tanks sit in enemy territory with no fuel, the first thing to blame is the traffic signals and the design choice to split evenly. In a way, I agree with this, and I also agree that forward planning, and setting up traffic signals in advance, solves this issue but introduces unnecessary micro-management, and again, traffic signals are to blame.

I think that is generally what people mean by 'give us better tools or make it demand based'.

ORIGINAL: WeaverofBrokenThreads

I think people are over-exaggerating the issue a bit. Fighting with logistics can be an uphill battle that takes 20 to 30 minutes, but once it is set properly, it will endure for a while. The main issues arise when AI zones your roads/railroads, or you run out of oil. Conquering major AI roads can be a pain initially, but like I said before, it is a one and done deal however annoying it is.

I'd show you some screen shots of a truly terrifying road network, but the forum is clunky and won't let me.

I feel like beyond the heated arguments on this topic, the core thing we have in agreement is that we appreciate and welcome the supply system; having LIS (can we get that renamed please?) and sending it around to supply zones and units, or the SHQ, I personally feel is what is going to put Shadow Empire on the throne of 4x games. The thing we do not like is the way the LIS are sent down roads.

When your farm eats 2000 LIS, of which it uses only 10%, while your infantry starves, and your tanks sit in enemy territory with no fuel, the first thing to blame is the traffic signals and the design choice to split evenly. In a way, I agree with this, and I also agree that forward planning, and setting up traffic signals in advance, solves this issue but introduces unnecessary micro-management, and again, traffic signals are to blame.

I think that is generally what people mean by 'give us better tools or make it demand based'.

I think that's a very fair summary.

ORIGINAL: WeaverofBrokenThreads

I think people are over-exaggerating the issue a bit. Fighting with logistics can be an uphill battle that takes 20 to 30 minutes, but once it is set properly, it will endure for a while. The main issues arise when AI zones your roads/railroads, or you run out of oil. Conquering major AI roads can be a pain initially, but like I said before, it is a one and done deal however annoying it is.

I'd show you some screen shots of a truly terrifying road network, but the forum is clunky and won't let me.

I feel like beyond the heated arguments on this topic, the core thing we have in agreement is that we appreciate and welcome the supply system; having LIS (can we get that renamed please?) and sending it around to supply zones and units, or the SHQ, I personally feel is what is going to put Shadow Empire on the throne of 4x games. The thing we do not like is the way the LIS are sent down roads.

When your farm eats 2000 LIS, of which it uses only 10%, while your infantry starves, and your tanks sit in enemy territory with no fuel, the first thing to blame is the traffic signals and the design choice to split evenly. In a way, I agree with this, and I also agree that forward planning, and setting up traffic signals in advance, solves this issue but introduces unnecessary micro-management, and again, traffic signals are to blame.

I think that is generally what people mean by 'give us better tools or make it demand based'.

Yh, it requires some streamlining. But I am glad of a complex logistics system frankly, over something very simplified. The core ideas are great.

ORIGINAL: WeaverofBrokenThreads
I wholeheartedly agree that it does not make sense.

Purely on your first sentence (haven't played on huge maps into 100s of turns yet so I cannot say on the rest) I disagree.

It does make sense.
Logistics isn't transport. It's also not transport capacity. It's the organization of transport. In my mind I picture it as a bunch of people checking and calculating where stuff should go. It's an organisational cost. So every road that your minions need to check does cost organisation effort points. And your minions are rather silly and hand-check every road, even those short ones, with a certain organisation budget if not stopped.

Now, I get that it's tied to Truck Stops and can get ignored by Traffic Signs which both indicate real world objects instead of organisational complexity, but that's just flavor.

To me it definitely does make sense. It's probably counter-intuitive for a certain percentage of people (high or low idk), but I can totally see it making sense.

So, again, just purely on that I disagree. It's very possible that you're right it gets unwieldy on bigger maps and later stages (and more difficult settings).

Yes, it is abstracted. They are being told "service these roads with any requests", and the more roads, the more coordination is required. So it can be said to make a kind of sense. That said, it is true that the dispatchers are in fact going to be told "take these rifles to this point" rather than "make sure anyone on this road gets them". So it also doesn't make sense, and if you look at Gary Grisby's games, there is a certain amount of total trucks and rail power, and the question is how much of what is needed can get to where it is needed based on that and the actual demand, including all of the calculations for terrain, off-roading, etc.. HOWEVER, the fact is that this system gives you more to do and so if you find logistic fun it adds to the game, even if it is not the best modelling. That's why I like it for a change.

Honestly, if a tweak is to be made, I'd make the supply centers work a bit better (further range). The way other games work is that the transport mostly takes the stuff to local stockpiles (HQs of various levels usually) and they are then in charge of distributing them. Since I don't think OHQs serve this function in this game, supply centers could fill in... just a thought, and that may not make much difference. As it is, I never build supply centers, but in reality that is how logistics works.

Yes it definitely adds to the game for me so far (and that may hold true later on)!

ORIGINAL: WeaverofBrokenThreads

... having LIS (can we get that renamed please?)....

Noooooooo! [:@]

LIS has become iconic. [&o]

Nobody knows exactly what it stands for; nobody knows how to do it perfectly; best of all, it will be the major discussion topic forever!!! [:D][:D][:D]

LIS, hallowed be its name, is absolutely 100% transport capacity. It says so in the description. You don't give 'AP' to organization of transport. Your SHQ does that. Even though the game refers to it as exactly that - capacity - it is not. LIS, may it bless this waterless, mutant-ridden world with its sweet, sweet logistical nectar, is your regime brute-forcing the problem. It is sending trucks and magically teleporting resources out of your SHQ and into assets and units that need them.

May the LIS be with you and protect you from the surviving AI.

I've had a think about this issue some more and wrestled a bit with the proposal to make it demand based.

My conclusion now is more firmly against the idea than before. I gave it a fair shout, but here's my reasoning:

If the game automatically determines where the demand is needed, what is there for the player to do with logistics beyond building roads/rail and truck/railway stations? The game will essentially automate the entire process and remove the need for the player having to interact with it. There's a very strong argument in game design that states that if something is automated there's a good chance it shouldn't be in the game, or it should be hidden from the players sight completely.

I think to drastically overhaul one of this game's most interesting features and demote it to being a mostly automated system with little interaction from the player to "fix" the issue of a few players feeling compelled to constantly micromanage the Traffic Lights would be a massive mistake. I don't mean to sound like a dick saying that, I'm sure that there are occasions where it's just necessary to have to spend some time each turn fiddling with the Traffic Management but until I see some evidence that this is any more time consuming than the rest of the micromanagement in this game, then I'm fundamentally opposed to that particular solution.

This has thrown up an interesting discussion though, and it might have highlighted a flaw in the game design because if a game rewards constant micromanagement of this kind, then people are going to do it, and then they'll complain the game is bad or "a mess". I gave the earlier example of taking Director Relation penalties for changing BP allocation to Organisations as a superb way of preventing the player exploiting and micromanaging the allocation sliders turn-by-turn.

Perhaps some similar system to limit Traffic management allocation to discourage such constant fiddling would be better? In which case, how's about a small BP penalty for changing the Traffic Lights?


Perhaps someone who's also had a think about the ramifications of such a change and came to a different conclusion can explain their side of the argument better than I explained it to myself.

Supply isn't a binary thing regime-wide. It's not 'either you have it' or 'you don't have it'. Making it demand based only reduces the micromanagement requirement, and potentially reduces the performance impact.

A demand based system would operate the same way as it does now. You'd have to build truck stops and supply bases to extend the capacity and AP. AP is the real limit to how much supply you can send. It does not remove the grander strategic approach; whether you want to send supply to the east front or the west front, or whatever have you.

The innovation with SE's logistics system isn't the capacity; it is in two parts: How it is handled to procure and distribute resources via SHQ interaction and AP. I cannot stress AP enough. For that reason, in my opinion, the satisfying part about logistics is the roads you build, the types of roads, the supply bases and truck stops.

To further illustrate the point that there is no downside: A demand-based system is the equivalent of perfect micro control of traffic stops. It is no different. Just done automatically. You still have the ability to block supplies down one of these main supply routes, which in a demand based system would be 'prioritizing' a different branch.

EDIT: I re-read your post and realized we were saying the same thing. In that case, I don't know what to tell you. I guess I can only reiterate that 'perfect micro or automated leads to the same result, but one is annoying and the other is not as exciting'? I imagine that even if you like the way it works now and will probably work forever, after a week or so, it won't be exciting anymore.

I believe the issue is the over-micromanagement of the system, not the system itself. What do you think to my suggestion to discourage people from constant fiddling by making Traffic Management cost them in some way?