Talk:Under The Hood - Revision history

Arrow Quivershaft: Stupidity, in other words.

2008-10-24T02:14:04Z

Stupidity, in other words.

← Older revision		Revision as of 02:14, 24 October 2008
Line 110:		Line 110:

	:OK I tested TFTD, and actually it never seems to check if you are allocating a uselessly large number of Technicians. I checked for all ammo types requiring less than 400 Tech Hrs/unit. In every case it will allow you to allocate more Technicians than are required to produce the maximum of one unit per hour. So, the safeguard is missing because... there is no safeguard! We probably only ever noticed it in the egregious case of Gauss Cannon ammo. For Enemy Unknown, there is a safeguard, all manufacturing is capped to allocate no more engineers than the number required to produce one unit in an hour (tested all items under 250 Eng Hrs/unit). [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 18:09, 23 October 2008 (CDT)		:OK I tested TFTD, and actually it never seems to check if you are allocating a uselessly large number of Technicians. I checked for all ammo types requiring less than 400 Tech Hrs/unit. In every case it will allow you to allocate more Technicians than are required to produce the maximum of one unit per hour. So, the safeguard is missing because... there is no safeguard! We probably only ever noticed it in the egregious case of Gauss Cannon ammo. For Enemy Unknown, there is a safeguard, all manufacturing is capped to allocate no more engineers than the number required to produce one unit in an hour (tested all items under 250 Eng Hrs/unit). [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 18:09, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

			::Then what they probably did was removed the code that limited Engineers in UFO, not realizing that other areas of the code would need to be modified to allow faster production. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 21:14, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

Spike: /* Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual */ EU has safeguard, TFTD doesn't

2008-10-23T23:29:52Z

Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual: EU has safeguard, TFTD doesn't

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:29, 23 October 2008
Line 109:		Line 109:
	::Spike: I find it far more logical and easier to accept that that the safeguard had to be hand-coded for each item and the programmers at Microprose either didn't realize this or didn't care. Probably the former. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_Razor\| Hanlon's Razor] and all. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 08:34, 23 October 2008 (CDT)		::Spike: I find it far more logical and easier to accept that that the safeguard had to be hand-coded for each item and the programmers at Microprose either didn't realize this or didn't care. Probably the former. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_Razor\| Hanlon's Razor] and all. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 08:34, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

	:OK I tested TFTD, and actually it never seems to check if you are allocating a uselessly large number of Technicians. I checked for all ammo types requiring less than 400 Tech Hrs/unit. In every case it will allow you to allocate more Technicians than are required to produce the maximum of one unit per hour. So, the safeguard is missing because... there is no safeguard! We probably only ever noticed it in the egregious case of Gauss Cannon ammo. [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 18:09, 23 October 2008 (CDT)		:OK I tested TFTD, and actually it never seems to check if you are allocating a uselessly large number of Technicians. I checked for all ammo types requiring less than 400 Tech Hrs/unit. In every case it will allow you to allocate more Technicians than are required to produce the maximum of one unit per hour. So, the safeguard is missing because... there is no safeguard! We probably only ever noticed it in the egregious case of Gauss Cannon ammo. For Enemy Unknown, there is a safeguard, all manufacturing is capped to allocate no more engineers than the number required to produce one unit in an hour (tested all items under 250 Eng Hrs/unit). [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 18:09, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

Spike: /* Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual */ Never attribute, either to malice or stupidity, something that doesn't actually exist.

2008-10-23T23:09:36Z

Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual: Never attribute, either to malice or stupidity, something that doesn't actually exist.

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:09, 23 October 2008
Line 108:		Line 108:

	::Spike: I find it far more logical and easier to accept that that the safeguard had to be hand-coded for each item and the programmers at Microprose either didn't realize this or didn't care. Probably the former. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_Razor\| Hanlon's Razor] and all. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 08:34, 23 October 2008 (CDT)		::Spike: I find it far more logical and easier to accept that that the safeguard had to be hand-coded for each item and the programmers at Microprose either didn't realize this or didn't care. Probably the former. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_Razor\| Hanlon's Razor] and all. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 08:34, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

			:OK I tested TFTD, and actually it never seems to check if you are allocating a uselessly large number of Technicians. I checked for all ammo types requiring less than 400 Tech Hrs/unit. In every case it will allow you to allocate more Technicians than are required to produce the maximum of one unit per hour. So, the safeguard is missing because... there is no safeguard! We probably only ever noticed it in the egregious case of Gauss Cannon ammo. [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 18:09, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

Arrow Quivershaft: Never attribute to malice that which can be adequetely explained by stupidity.

2008-10-23T13:34:48Z

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequetely explained by stupidity.

← Older revision		Revision as of 13:34, 23 October 2008
Line 106:		Line 106:

	:AQ, it's strange that only the Gauss craft ammo production is bugged in this way. That suggests the programmers deliberately disabled an existing general safeguard, with the intention of adding a feature to increase the production rate of this ammo (a sorely needed feature), and then lost the plot? [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 04:01, 23 October 2008 (CDT)		:AQ, it's strange that only the Gauss craft ammo production is bugged in this way. That suggests the programmers deliberately disabled an existing general safeguard, with the intention of adding a feature to increase the production rate of this ammo (a sorely needed feature), and then lost the plot? [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 04:01, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

			::Spike: I find it far more logical and easier to accept that that the safeguard had to be hand-coded for each item and the programmers at Microprose either didn't realize this or didn't care. Probably the former. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_Razor\| Hanlon's Razor] and all. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 08:34, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

Spike: /* Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual */ response

2008-10-23T09:01:51Z

Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual: response

← Older revision		Revision as of 09:01, 23 October 2008
Line 101:		Line 101:

	:::The one-unit-an-hour thing is a limitation of the game engine. You can't produce more than 1 unit of a give item per hour; in fact, the game won't allows you to assign more engineers to an item than the number needed to produce the item as 1 per hour, if I recall correctly. Except for the Gauss weapon ammo in TFTD; you can still only produce one clip or shot per hour, but you can assign as many technicians as you want, potentially causing serious lost productivity. This would be one more oversight among the approximately 2,943,756 other oversights made when hacking TFTD together. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 01:59, 23 October 2008 (CDT)		:::The one-unit-an-hour thing is a limitation of the game engine. You can't produce more than 1 unit of a give item per hour; in fact, the game won't allows you to assign more engineers to an item than the number needed to produce the item as 1 per hour, if I recall correctly. Except for the Gauss weapon ammo in TFTD; you can still only produce one clip or shot per hour, but you can assign as many technicians as you want, potentially causing serious lost productivity. This would be one more oversight among the approximately 2,943,756 other oversights made when hacking TFTD together. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 01:59, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

			:NightChime, I feel your pain! In theory, selling produced units '''before''' "Manufacturing Complete", and using the money to increase the number of Units to Produce, should create a "never-ending" production run. This ought to have maximum efficiency. But does it? My gut feel was that this seemed to make things worse, that the rounding down went against me. I must stress there was no measurement at all, that is pure gut feel.
			:The other part of the question is: how inefficient is it to make just 1 Laser Cannon? Is maximally efficient Motion Scanner production more, or less, profitable than maximally inefficient Laser Cannon production? I may need to return to the labs, with a stopwatch and notebook in hand.

			:AQ, it's strange that only the Gauss craft ammo production is bugged in this way. That suggests the programmers deliberately disabled an existing general safeguard, with the intention of adding a feature to increase the production rate of this ammo (a sorely needed feature), and then lost the plot? [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 04:01, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

Arrow Quivershaft: Clarification on one-item-per-hour

2008-10-23T06:59:04Z

Clarification on one-item-per-hour

← Older revision		Revision as of 06:59, 23 October 2008
Line 99:		Line 99:

	::Spike, your, how shall I say, correction, resonates soundly with me. When I was running those tests the conclusions I made were done with quick, fuzzy, mental calculations, at best (and let's not mention the worst). Anyway, what you say sounds right, although also as you say it deserves proper testing to be known. I don't know about making more items than the number of hours it takes to produce them (considering how it's said that you can't "make more than one unit an hour"), but making one unit at a time definitely seems to stifle productivity. This is especially important for me exactly right now in the game, since I can either make one Laser Cannon at a time, or a few Motion Scanners. Even without running the tests that "prove" this theory, it makes sense to me that the scanners may be more productive. Especially if I use a tactic probably not foreign to you, manually going to the base BEFORE production ends, selling the products, and increasing the product line's length with the increased revenue. [[User:NightChime\|NightChime]] 00:39, 23 October 2008 (CDT)		::Spike, your, how shall I say, correction, resonates soundly with me. When I was running those tests the conclusions I made were done with quick, fuzzy, mental calculations, at best (and let's not mention the worst). Anyway, what you say sounds right, although also as you say it deserves proper testing to be known. I don't know about making more items than the number of hours it takes to produce them (considering how it's said that you can't "make more than one unit an hour"), but making one unit at a time definitely seems to stifle productivity. This is especially important for me exactly right now in the game, since I can either make one Laser Cannon at a time, or a few Motion Scanners. Even without running the tests that "prove" this theory, it makes sense to me that the scanners may be more productive. Especially if I use a tactic probably not foreign to you, manually going to the base BEFORE production ends, selling the products, and increasing the product line's length with the increased revenue. [[User:NightChime\|NightChime]] 00:39, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

			:::The one-unit-an-hour thing is a limitation of the game engine. You can't produce more than 1 unit of a give item per hour; in fact, the game won't allows you to assign more engineers to an item than the number needed to produce the item as 1 per hour, if I recall correctly. Except for the Gauss weapon ammo in TFTD; you can still only produce one clip or shot per hour, but you can assign as many technicians as you want, potentially causing serious lost productivity. This would be one more oversight among the approximately 2,943,756 other oversights made when hacking TFTD together. [[User:Arrow Quivershaft\|Arrow Quivershaft]] 01:59, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

NightChime: /* Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual */

2008-10-23T05:39:56Z

Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual

← Older revision		Revision as of 05:39, 23 October 2008
Line 97:		Line 97:

	: Funnily enough I was looking at this a week ago (manufacturing time estimates vs reality) and I got the impression that the game's estimate is often one '''less''' than the actual, i.e. it often takes an hour longer than the game tells you. This hits your efficiency very badly when you manufacture small runs, with the worst case being a run of one unit. I was basically manufacturing 1, 2, 3 ,4... 9 Gauss Cannons in a cycle (then selling my profit and going back to 1 again). The impression I got was that production per hour is rounded down, with the 'extra' unit (the rounding error) being produced in the final hour of manufacturing. So let's say (hypothetical case) you are manufacturing 7 cannons and it says it will take 6 hours. One new cannon will show up in your stores each hour, and then 2 new cannon will show up at the end of the last (sixth) hour. If you manufacture one cannon, it says it will take one hour (rounding down 1.16 hrs), but actually it takes 2 hrs (rounding up 1.16 hrs). These are made up examples but you get the principle. From this I'm inferring that the games tracks "number of units produced so far" as a decimal number, but obviously only deliveres complete integers of units into your Stores (and only at the top of the hour). I did not record the estimated vs actual times scrupulously, however, so someone should test this scrupulously to be sure. The tests should be done with things that take a decent time to manufacture, otherwise your results get skewed by the bug that you can't produce more than one object of the same type at the same base in the same hour. [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 09:02, 18 October 2008 (CDT)		: Funnily enough I was looking at this a week ago (manufacturing time estimates vs reality) and I got the impression that the game's estimate is often one '''less''' than the actual, i.e. it often takes an hour longer than the game tells you. This hits your efficiency very badly when you manufacture small runs, with the worst case being a run of one unit. I was basically manufacturing 1, 2, 3 ,4... 9 Gauss Cannons in a cycle (then selling my profit and going back to 1 again). The impression I got was that production per hour is rounded down, with the 'extra' unit (the rounding error) being produced in the final hour of manufacturing. So let's say (hypothetical case) you are manufacturing 7 cannons and it says it will take 6 hours. One new cannon will show up in your stores each hour, and then 2 new cannon will show up at the end of the last (sixth) hour. If you manufacture one cannon, it says it will take one hour (rounding down 1.16 hrs), but actually it takes 2 hrs (rounding up 1.16 hrs). These are made up examples but you get the principle. From this I'm inferring that the games tracks "number of units produced so far" as a decimal number, but obviously only deliveres complete integers of units into your Stores (and only at the top of the hour). I did not record the estimated vs actual times scrupulously, however, so someone should test this scrupulously to be sure. The tests should be done with things that take a decent time to manufacture, otherwise your results get skewed by the bug that you can't produce more than one object of the same type at the same base in the same hour. [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 09:02, 18 October 2008 (CDT)

			::Spike, your, how shall I say, correction, resonates soundly with me. When I was running those tests the conclusions I made were done with quick, fuzzy, mental calculations, at best (and let's not mention the worst). Anyway, what you say sounds right, although also as you say it deserves proper testing to be known. I don't know about making more items than the number of hours it takes to produce them (considering how it's said that you can't "make more than one unit an hour"), but making one unit at a time definitely seems to stifle productivity. This is especially important for me exactly right now in the game, since I can either make one Laser Cannon at a time, or a few Motion Scanners. Even without running the tests that "prove" this theory, it makes sense to me that the scanners may be more productive. Especially if I use a tactic probably not foreign to you, manually going to the base BEFORE production ends, selling the products, and increasing the product line's length with the increased revenue. [[User:NightChime\|NightChime]] 00:39, 23 October 2008 (CDT)

Spike: Manufacturing time estimates vs actual - changed title, added comment

2008-10-18T14:02:09Z

Manufacturing time estimates vs actual - changed title, added comment

← Older revision		Revision as of 14:02, 18 October 2008
Line 67:		Line 67:
	Ah, okay, thanks, it'd be nice to have an article on this, even just a 1-liner... Is there anything useful that one can make use of from knowing the spawn priority? --[[User:Ethereal Cereal\|Ethereal Cereal]] 20:21, 11 May 2006 (PDT)		Ah, okay, thanks, it'd be nice to have an article on this, even just a 1-liner... Is there anything useful that one can make use of from knowing the spawn priority? --[[User:Ethereal Cereal\|Ethereal Cereal]] 20:21, 11 May 2006 (PDT)

	== ~~Suggestion for article ( we CAN talk about other things, right? :wink:)~~ ==		== Manufacturing Time Estimates vs Actual ==

	One thing which doesn't seem to be covered in this wiki is how you only get a message concerning an event once the clock's hour counter advances (save for UFO detection, which also happens 30 minutes after the hour). Why? When do other events actually happen? Well, rather than seem like a lazy douche, I did a little testing to see for myself. Specifically... these ones:		One thing which doesn't seem to be covered in this wiki is how you only get a message concerning an event once the clock's hour counter advances (save for UFO detection, which also happens 30 minutes after the hour). Why? When do other events actually happen? Well, rather than seem like a lazy douche, I did a little testing to see for myself. Specifically... these ones:
Line 95:		Line 95:

	:: I think discussion about how the Geoscape deals with time may be relevant here Under The Hood, or of course better yet in the Geoscape section. -[[User:NightChime\|NightChime]] 23:25, 17 October 2008 (CDT)		:: I think discussion about how the Geoscape deals with time may be relevant here Under The Hood, or of course better yet in the Geoscape section. -[[User:NightChime\|NightChime]] 23:25, 17 October 2008 (CDT)

			: Funnily enough I was looking at this a week ago (manufacturing time estimates vs reality) and I got the impression that the game's estimate is often one '''less''' than the actual, i.e. it often takes an hour longer than the game tells you. This hits your efficiency very badly when you manufacture small runs, with the worst case being a run of one unit. I was basically manufacturing 1, 2, 3 ,4... 9 Gauss Cannons in a cycle (then selling my profit and going back to 1 again). The impression I got was that production per hour is rounded down, with the 'extra' unit (the rounding error) being produced in the final hour of manufacturing. So let's say (hypothetical case) you are manufacturing 7 cannons and it says it will take 6 hours. One new cannon will show up in your stores each hour, and then 2 new cannon will show up at the end of the last (sixth) hour. If you manufacture one cannon, it says it will take one hour (rounding down 1.16 hrs), but actually it takes 2 hrs (rounding up 1.16 hrs). These are made up examples but you get the principle. From this I'm inferring that the games tracks "number of units produced so far" as a decimal number, but obviously only deliveres complete integers of units into your Stores (and only at the top of the hour). I did not record the estimated vs actual times scrupulously, however, so someone should test this scrupulously to be sure. The tests should be done with things that take a decent time to manufacture, otherwise your results get skewed by the bug that you can't produce more than one object of the same type at the same base in the same hour. [[User:Spike\|Spike]] 09:02, 18 October 2008 (CDT)

NightChime: /* Suggestion for article ( we CAN talk about other things, right? :wink:) */

2008-10-18T04:25:56Z

Suggestion for article ( we CAN talk about other things, right? :wink:)

← Older revision		Revision as of 04:25, 18 October 2008
Line 93:		Line 93:

	: I know our host of inner game mechanic boffins had a good chat on the engineering hours somewhere on the wiki at one point, but I can't think of where. Two places I might recommend having a look is the [[Manufacturing Profitability]] page and its talk page. Come to think of it, the information on how manufacturing hours ought to go in the [[Manufacturing]] page at one point or another. -[[User:NKF\|NKF]] 21:20, 17 October 2008 (CDT)		: I know our host of inner game mechanic boffins had a good chat on the engineering hours somewhere on the wiki at one point, but I can't think of where. Two places I might recommend having a look is the [[Manufacturing Profitability]] page and its talk page. Come to think of it, the information on how manufacturing hours ought to go in the [[Manufacturing]] page at one point or another. -[[User:NKF\|NKF]] 21:20, 17 October 2008 (CDT)

			:: I think discussion about how the Geoscape deals with time may be relevant here Under The Hood, or of course better yet in the Geoscape section. -[[User:NightChime\|NightChime]] 23:25, 17 October 2008 (CDT)

NKF: /Yes, yes we can/

2008-10-18T02:20:32Z

Yes, yes we can

← Older revision		Revision as of 02:20, 18 October 2008
Line 91:		Line 91:

	--[[User:NightChime\|NightChime]] 18:56, 17 October 2008 (CDT)		--[[User:NightChime\|NightChime]] 18:56, 17 October 2008 (CDT)

			: I know our host of inner game mechanic boffins had a good chat on the engineering hours somewhere on the wiki at one point, but I can't think of where. Two places I might recommend having a look is the [[Manufacturing Profitability]] page and its talk page. Come to think of it, the information on how manufacturing hours ought to go in the [[Manufacturing]] page at one point or another. -[[User:NKF\|NKF]] 21:20, 17 October 2008 (CDT)