Overview
This Guide details the methods I used to optimise the functions of the Industries DLC for City Skylines
Introduction
Quite a few people have asserted that the Industries DLC is ‘buggy’, and for quite a while I was inclined to agree. However, after spending several days experimenting with lots of set-ups, and then playing them out on <Fast-Forward>, I figured out how it actually works as opposed to how I expected it to work, and it doesn’t appear to be bug-ridden after all.
Having said that (and I’m speaking with my programmer’s hat on here), I consider the Industries DLC to be poorly implemented and very poorly documented – none of it is exactly ‘intuitive’, and frankly, I’d be embarrassed to release what in truth looks like a rush-released hatchet job that’s just been bolted on to CS rather than seamlessly integrated into it. Still, I guess we have to remember that Colossal Order are primarily in the business of making money, not high-grade code.
Important!A key thing to bear in mind with Industries, is the distribution of trucks throughout the supply chain … different buildings often have radically different numbers of trucks at their disposal. And if any point in your supply chain – be it extractor > raw storage > processor > intermediate warehouse > factory > final warehouse – runs out of available trucks, then that point becomes a ‘point of failure’ – an instant block to the smooth flow of materials throughout the entire chain.
The answer to that is to make sure the distances trucks have to travel from Point A to Point B, is proportional to the number of trucks that will ever be available in the first place – at Point A. It’s all about getting the ‘spacing’ between points in the Supply Chain in the ‘sweet spot’ – optimised such that no point gets too out-of-step with its neighbours within the chain
In my view, the best Guide on Steam for the Industries DLC, is Industries: Balancing the Production Chain. This Guide just summarises some of my own impressions …
Using Forestry as an example …
Even the basic functions of the Forestry Industry aren’t exactly intuitive. For example – in my world, basic logic would suggest that …
Forests produce logs for the Saw Mill
The Saw Mill produces sawdust, that’s pelletised by the Pellet Plant
Then the Pellet Plant produces Paper
But nope, that’s not how things work in City Skylines at all. What happens there is …
Forests produce not just logs, but sawdust too, both of which are used by the Saw Mill and Pellet Plant. Who would’ve guessed that sawdust could be so easily gathered from the forest floor, or just as easily converted to Planed Timber, or that logs could be readily pelletised …?
All of that’s because – under the hood of the Industries DLC – Forests don’t produce logs. or sawdust, or wood chips, at all. They just produce one resource – let’s call it ‘wood’ – and whether you create storage for logs, or storage for sawdust, or storage for woodchips, doesn’t matter in that respect – it’s all ‘wood’ as far as the code is concerned. The REAL reason to use different types of storage, is that each type has different numbers of trucks available (and that can be very important – see my note in the Introduction), along with differing maintenance costs and Worker requirements.
Similarly, you’ll never see a flatbed truck carrying sawdust – either in sacks, or loose, period. Instead, you’ll see logging trucks delivering logs … to Sawdust Storage! (that’s not only lazy work on Colossal Order’s part, it’s also downright confusing to players encountering the Industries DLC for the first time).
Anyway – bizarre logic aside – the goal is to ensure that all your Resource requirements (logs / sawdust / chips) are met by local industry, so that no Imports are required …
It’s essential to use the Outside Connections button to monitor Import / Export figures. The button will highlight in dark green which Buildings and Vehicles are Importing / Exporting.
The ideal balance is that your Processors and Vehicles are Exporting processed materials (Planed Timber / Paper), and your Resources are grey (in other words, not Exporting, because all their materials are going to your Processors).
Obviously, it’s OK if some of your Resources are Exporting (dark green) … that just indicates you’re producing more raw materials than local Industry requires.
Step [1]
This is the single most important factor to bear in mind when setting up an Industry …
The effects of changes to an Industry Area – such as adding new Resources (plantations) or Processors (Saw Mill / Pellet Plant) – take a LOT longer to manifest in terms of ingame time than you might expect …
The best way to see if a change has the desired effect is to implement it, then run the game on Fast-Forward for quite a while – all the while monitoring the status of Imports and Exports via the Outside Connections button. The intended effect may take some time to fully manifest, let alone settle down and stabilise.
You can run the game at a six-fold increase in speed by setting the Game Speed to ‘3’, then also use the SpeedSlider mod, set to 200%.
If the intended effect indeed emerges in the fullness of time, then go ahead – reload your Savegame – and implement the change … but (of course), when playing at Normal speed, expect to wait quite a while before the intended effect kicks in.
Step [2]
Note: This section’s information has not been confirmed, it’s just based on my recall … see Comments at the end of this page for more details.
Beyond Level 1 Industry, Resources (Plantations) won’t deliver directly to your Processors (Saw Mill / Pellet Plant) .. they will only deliver to a Storage Facility (Log Yard / Sawdust Storage).
If no Storage Facilities are built, then all your resources will be Exported, and your Processors will rely on Imports.
Step [3]
Build Storage Facilities and set them to BALANCED
That will result in a brief burst of Importing until your Storage Facilities reach the 65-75% range, after which your local Resources will take over and keep them topped up.
Step [4]
If your Processor (Saw Mill / Pellet Plant) is begging for Resources, and importing them – even though it’s surrounded with them (Plantations) – then the most likely cause is that all the trucks in your Storage facility are tied up with exporting.
Two options to fix:
… set some of your Resources to OFF, to lower production, then once BALANCE has been achieved, trucks will return and start delivering to your Processors – this will involve waiting!
… build another BALANCED Storage Facility to provide more trucks (though that may trigger another round of Importing – until BALANCE has been achieved).
Additional Notes
If your Resources (Plantations) aren’t Exporting, then most of their trucks will be idle, with only one truck being used from time-to-time to deliver to your Storage Facilities. Lots of idle trucks is normal in that situation, and not a cause for concern. Having said that however, it would be better to utilise any surplus trucks to get the Supply Chain kick-started – by placing your Storage Facilities some distance from your plantations, so that trucks have a somewhat longer journey, such that more of them are employed
Add as many Barracks as you can afford, as they improve the efficiency of your Industry by 5% increments, up to a maximum of 200%. Then – once you’ve built your Barracks, and they’ve been fully populated with Workers – turn them off! … because of a bug in the code, your Forest will still get the efficiency gains, but by turning Barracks off you’ll avoid incurring any Maintenance Costs (after all, there’s no point in paying Maintenance Costs if you can get the same benefit for free anyway)
It’s very easy to misjudge how many Resources you need – you could have too many, or not enough – and that’s where the Imports / Exports colour-coding in Outside Connections is very handy. The sweet spot is when all your Resources are grey (that’s just my opinion though).
Once everything has stabilised, your Processors and Vehicles will be dark green on Exports, and grey on Imports; and your Resources will all be grey (no Exports).
Even so, you will still see evidence in Outside Connections of ‘Imported Forestry Products’ …
… they are for Generic Industries (those from prior to the Industries DLC). Because they aren’t coded to accept goods from the Industry DLC, they will continue to Import all their requirements.
… to see what their actual figures are, use the mod Enhanced Outside Connections View – it adds a more detailed summary of Import / Export activity to the Outside Connections button than the vanilla game alone.
… so then, the residual Imports figure relates to trucks from outside the map delivering to Generic Industries, PLUS ‘dummy’ trucks traversing the map from one side to the other carrying goods.
… you can get rid of the dummy trucks with the mod Advanced Outside Connections – that will reduce your ‘Imported Forestry Products’ figure somewhat.
… you can’t get the figure down to ‘0’ though, the lowest it will go is ‘1’ (that will be due to the rounding up of decimal values, and – even then – to get it down to ‘1’, you’d have to remove all your Generic Industries).
So bear in mind that – if you have Generic Industries on the map – there’ll always be a bit of Importing going on, even though your local Industry could (theoretically) meet their needs.