teamster woes...

[vancomycin]

hi,this is my 1st post and i would like to start off by saying that this is the most addictive game i ever played...

ok,i  was curious about the function of the teamsters and hence i locked on to view some of them. then i found that they sometimes took a year or more to find things to move. i think the problem lies in the fact that they move from farm to farm looking for goods. as a result,i had many farms and factories with surplus output store with no one to move them

maybe i'm wrong but it would be nice if someone can answer the following questions:

1.  how does food get distributed? by teamster? or by the marketplace? or directly?

2.  is it normal for teamsters to be ineffective?

3.  does building all farms in one area helps reduce     the confusion?

4.  how come there's no vehicles? i think even the poorest countries IRL has trucks to transport goods?

5. is this game mod-able? maybe can create vehicles?

thanks!  

[Kekkonen]

1. Tropicans get their food either directly from the farms (fishing wharves, ranches) or from a marketplace; I assume they use whichever is closer (although they might be more inclined to use the marketplace, since it has a wider variety of foods). Food is taken to the marketplace by teamsters.

2. No, it's not. If your teamsters are ineffective, you either have too few of them, or their offices are badly located. It's generally best to have the teamster offices fairly close to the places where they fetch stuff from, so they can get their carts full almost immediately after they show up for work.

3. I don't think it matters much, if you have enough teamsters.

4. I think it was a programming decision. Adding trucks etc. would have complicated pathfinding etc. further.

5. No idea.

By the way, it sounds like you need more teamsters; generally, if you've got a serious stack of goods in your output cues all over the place, it's a pretty good sign that you have too few teamsters. The single teamster office you start with isn't anywhere near enough once your economy gets going.

Build at least one teamster office which is relatively close to your farms, mines, or logging camps (and see to it that those teamsters have affordable housing within a reasonable distance). Then build another close to your factories. This way, the teamsters from the farm offices will carry stuff to your marketplaces and factories, and the teamsters from the factory offices will carry them to the docks. If your dock is a long way from your factories, you might also consider building another dock.

[Sleeping_Dragon]

1) Teamsters only take food from a farm to either a marketplace or a dock; however, Individuals can also go directly to the farm to pick up grocieries

2) Yeah.. sorta.. but for the most part they do ok.  Once you get the feel for it you will learn where and when to place additional teamster offices, this will cut down on the backlogs.

3) Depends.  If you only have 1 office  it's good to have all the farms nearby.  It's also best if your office is near your 'outputs', in this case farms, that way they don't waste as much time walking to the job site.

4) Apparently it was a design desission; I know it was talked about.  To tell the truth I'm not sure if it would have brought enough to the game from a gameplay standpoint (IMHO)

5) No clue

[Sleeping_Dragon]

Hey Kekkonen

  Looks like you beat me to the post will I was typing  

[vancomycin]

thank you all!
i shall strive for better building placement from now on...but still quite unhappy about the time compression (take years to move stuff...)  

[paomanz]

Yeah!

Time Compression!!!

[Protista]

The tips about optimal teamster office placement are very true, and if you can, build at least one additional teamster office.  Make sure the income is reasonable.  Roads along the route from your farm, mine or industry will also help.  As to the time compression, make sure you have downloaded and installed patch version 1.02. This really helps with the time compression, and has made this already excellent program much more enjoyable and rewarding to experience!

[Coconut Kid]

..., i  was curious about the function of the teamsters and hence i locked on to view some of them. then i found that they sometimes took a year or more to find things to move. i think the problem lies in the fact that they move from farm to farm looking for goods. as a result, i had many farms and factories with surplus output store with no one to move them.
... if someone can answer the following questions:
1.  how does food get distributed? by teamster? or by the marketplace? or directly?
2.  is it normal for teamsters to be ineffective?
3.  does building all farms in one area helps reduce the confusion?
4.  how come there's no vehicles? i think even the poorest countries IRL has trucks to transport goods?
5. is this game mod-able? maybe can create vehicles?

Long ago and far away. It's hard to know what version may have been involved. In any case, here are the answers based on current knowledge.

1.} Food may be obtained at the farms where it is produced or at buildings (Market, etc.) to which it is moved by the Farmers or the Teamsters.
2.} Teamsters are not ineffective if their Offices are well placed. They do NOT search for goods to move; they leave their Office building with a workorder for a single pickup point.
3.} There is actually no confusion. Roads may help more than clustering Farms, although the location of suitable land may naturally lead to clusters of Farms.
4.} It's a game more than a simulation of RL. It has a limitation on coding that precludes the highly complex problem of land vehicles; especially about having to use roads or go across country. There are vehicles: freighters, gunboats, airplanes, fishing & other small boats. The Teamster's "handtruck" is a minimal code substitute for a burro.
5.} The game can be modded within narrow parameters. It can not be modded to add trucks for the Teamsters.

Time Compression I don't understand what the problem is, or how the later versions changed it. Certainly the players didn't wish to play a 50 year game that would take 50 years to play. Did they wish for the "teletransport" system that so many other games use to pander to impatient players?