Managing Obsolete Units?

Jerh9e1k5 · October 3, 2003, 19:18

Hi guys (and girls

). I recently started playing SMAC again and I've always had my production lists so cluttered! When I go into the unit editing thingy (forgot the name) I have to say that each unit is obsolete one at a time, is there any way to speed this up? How do you manage the long list? Thanks!

Mongoose · October 3, 2003, 22:24

No.

The Design Workshop is only marginally user friendly. There is no way to rearrange grouping, nor to perform an operation on multiple design slots simultaneously. The best advice I can offer is not to let it get too far ahead of you...keep at it every couple of turns.

The worst is when you get a new reactor. I always try to obsolete almost all my designs before acquiring a new reactor, then go back into the Workshop after doing so and design the 'new' units I want, upgrading or retiring the old ones I don't want and/or can afford to upgrade.

Jerh9e1k5 · October 4, 2003, 00:08

lol, well that's too bad, thanks for the reply!

Sarxis · October 4, 2003, 01:18

That's a good idea Mongoose. Never thought to obsolete them aforehand.

Lazerus · October 4, 2003, 05:48

The list of units that are actually useful in most games is rather short, its just that damn AI unit generator that gets your list cluttered so make sure to turn that off.

Former, Crawler, Chopper, Needlejet, AAA garrison, Trance garrison if you're raping planet and either a rover or drop unit. Not much else is needed except in special occasions, and when those arise just build the unit and obsolete it straight away.

Adalbertus · October 4, 2003, 12:15

Lazerus,

Usually you'll need both rover and drop unit (protecting your home and attacking). Then you'll need shells for nearly each of them and the beloved elite-drop-1-1-1-soon-to-be-a-13-6-1-unit. So, the list is not that short.
Plus, I start to like marine detachment even more, which provides me with some free useless AI designs.

Datajack Franit · October 4, 2003, 13:54

SMAC workshop was really bad implemented but I've seen worse in lots of games around- don't complain too much

Flubber · October 5, 2003, 16:09

I just turn off the auto-design feature -- The only units listed are ones that I design ( except for certain basic ones)

CEO Aaron · October 5, 2003, 17:21

Agreed, the only way to play is to have auto-design off and auto-prune on. That way there's only a design when you make one.

Mongoose · October 5, 2003, 19:50

Well, no. That isn't the ONLY way to play. Personally, I loathe auto-prune almost as much as auto design. Maintaining and employing obsolete designs is part of MY design, thank you. You can't upgrade to an obsolete design, you know.

Flubber · October 6, 2003, 11:58

Quote:

Originally posted by Mongoose
Well, no. That isn't the ONLY way to play. Personally, I loathe auto-prune almost as much as auto design. Maintaining and employing obsolete designs is part of MY design, thank you. You can't upgrade to an obsolete design, you know.

I agree. . . auto prune and autodesign are BOTH off. Most of my older designs get upgraded over time but some do not. I end up with relatively few designs compared to the long list of CRAP the computer would fill my workshop with . ..

Also wouldn't autoprune get rid of designs like fission crawlers?

Another reason I like to design my own units is that I will give them more distinctive names . . .. It makes upgrading simpler when you know you plan to upgrade to your own custom-named unit.

Jerh9e1k5 · October 8, 2003, 22:22

Thanks for the advice, I found the auto-prune feature and the turn off auto design. I like auto prune and I keep off auto designs so it keeps my list nice and tidy, I really couldn't stand that long list of cluttered units everywhere before you showed me these features. Thanks again!

johndmuller · October 11, 2003, 05:34

I don't think auto-prune is a big deal one way or the other, I believe all that it does is 'obsolete' designs it thinks are superceeded by something you have just designed. If you don't like it, you can unobsolete it whenever you want to and it will stay active unless you design another potential replacement. Sometimes it's too eager to obsolete things, but most of the time I agree, say, that I'd rather not see the impact rover (and possibly build one by mistake) after I design a chaos one. Either way you have to get involved, either by doing all the work yourself, or by keeping an eye on what the autopruner does and undoing it sometimes.

In any case, it doesn't do anything as bad as all the extraneous designs that the autodesigner will generate, or even the excessive upgrade designs that pop up when you get a reactor upgrade.

As I said in the other thread about the DW, I also think it is important to clear the slots, and not just to 'obsolete'; I think one should zap them all together by 'upgrading' obsolete designs that no longer have any units to some other design, thus totally freeing up the slot.

Commander Jace · October 14, 2003, 16:56

Yes even though you can have the comp make your units I always make my own because alot of time the Computer makes retarded underpowered EXPENSIVE units that are not needed. This is why the best strategy is custom units.

gwillybj · October 18, 2003, 01:37

Regarding Auto-Prune: The Preferences menu text is "Auto-prune obsolete units (recommended)."
This is what I have experienced: Auto-Prune retires already-obsoleted designs if you have none of that unit type remaining. It happens (behind-the-scenes) the next time you acquire any tech, whether that tech unlocks a unit component or not. It does not touch any active (non-obsolete) designs.

johndmuller · October 18, 2003, 04:54

Quote:

Originally posted by gwillybj
Regarding Auto-Prune: ... Auto-Prune retires already-obsoleted designs if you have none of that unit type remaining. ...

Is that for real? I can't say that I've ever noticed obsolete designs (with no units) disappearing of their own accord and I do try to keep an eye on the units in the DW (especially when I get close to a new reactor). I do try to get rid of them myself (by upgrading the upopulated design), and by no means am I compulsively keeping track of them, so it could be happening, but still I think I would have noticed, especially as there are some designs you can't or don't want to bother upgrading like when you stop using foils or perhaps NJ's. Also, I understand that there are problems with retiring the intrinsic designs in PBEMs, and I have occasionally obsoleted some of the basic ones, like regular formers or probes so that I wouldn't build them by mistake - wouldn't the game then retire them by this theory and thereby create some havoc among the other players? I know if half my probes disappeared all of a sudden I would not keep it to myself

.

gwillybj · October 20, 2003, 03:27

The pre-defined units (as listed in alpha.txt) are always a special case, thus they are not retired by the auto-pruning. But I have experienced the retirement of other unit definitions as I described.