Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (Full Version)

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Rumpelstiltskin -> Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/14/2017 7:21:14 PM)

I followed Timotheus' guide to start my first game of DW:U (meaning I control everything manually), and eventually realized that my new colonies were hardly growing at all, despite receiving suitable shipments of strategic and luxury resources years earlier.

I realized I probably needed my passenger ships to have hyperdrives and more passenger compartments to allow my newer distant colonies to grow faster. I manually upgraded my passenger ship design to an appropriate Mk2 variant, saved it, then selected all of my private passenger ships in the Ships and Bases menu and ordered them to retrofit to the new design.

Normally, when I do this with bases or other types of private ships, they'll either begin retrofitting immediately, or (as with freighters) they'll queue the retrofit and do it once they've accomplished their current tasks.

The passenger ships did nothing at all. They didn't add anything to their queue, but instead continued to list "Transport Migrants" as their only current task. I tried selecting them individually and ordering them with right-click, but because they're private ships, all I can do is give them away as gifts.

I Googled around a bit, didn't discover much, then decided to wait to see if they'd eventually retrofit. An entire war occurred based on two mutual defense pacts, I subjugated another empire, and much later I finally remembered to check up on my passenger ships.

None of them had retrofit. Two new passenger ships using the updated design had been built by the AI, but the original 12 were still transporting migrants.

At this point, I may resort to scrapping them or giving them away in order to force the private sector to build more, but I'd really like to know what's going on.



Shogouki -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/14/2017 11:08:53 PM)

Are your passenger ships set to automatically retrofit in the design screen?



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/15/2017 1:47:06 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Shogouki

Are your passenger ships set to automatically retrofit in the design screen?


I've finished that game (ended up scrapping the obsolete ones after all, worked great), so I loaded up an old save from just after that first war and subjugation I mentioned.

Yes, they are set to automatically retrofit, both the original design and the upgraded design. I can't change that in the drop-down, even when manually upgrading the design. I can select manual retrofit when beginning a totally new private ship design from scratch, though.

My freighters are also set to automatically retrofit, and they still immediately accepted and queued my command to retrofit, much earlier in that game.

I take it from your question you think that having it set on automatic will prevent manual upgrade? I suppose you're probably right, although it's odd because just now I went to the game options, turned on ship design and building automation, made sure both designs were set to automatic retrofit, waited a while... and the passenger ships still hadn't retrofit. I think the Automation Options are for state ships only, but I wanted to be thorough.

In the future, I'll be very careful to set everything to manual from the first designs at the beginning of the game, although the behavior is inconsistent because, as I've said, I was able to manually order the freighters to retrofit, and they obeyed.



Bingeling -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/15/2017 5:36:12 AM)

My memory is hazy, but pay attention to the two upgrade and retrofit settings in the design and design list. I believe one of them should say whether the AI should retrofit away from it (automatic upgrade?) and the other is about what happens if you tell a fleet to retrofit (if off the ship won't retrofit in this case).

Even if both are set "correctly" the AI is always free to decide when or if to retrofit. The AI buy, retrofit and retire civilian ships as it see fit. Maybe, deep in the AI methods, the civilian ship AI is poor, does not have much valuable work, and can't afford to retrofit, or something. Or it could be a bug...



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/15/2017 12:16:45 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Bingeling

My memory is hazy, but pay attention to the two upgrade and retrofit settings in the design and design list. I believe one of them should say whether the AI should retrofit away from it (automatic upgrade?) and the other is about what happens if you tell a fleet to retrofit (if off the ship won't retrofit in this case).

Even if both are set "correctly" the AI is always free to decide when or if to retrofit. The AI buy, retrofit and retire civilian ships as it see fit. Maybe, deep in the AI methods, the civilian ship AI is poor, does not have much valuable work, and can't afford to retrofit, or something. Or it could be a bug...


I think it might be a bit buggy, yeah, perhaps something to do with the "Transport Migrants" action specifically.

I don't mind the AI having control over the private sector, but when I've got two or three colonies in different star systems and an entire role category of non-FTL private sector ships refuse to upgrade either at my manual command or on their own (and additionally are crawling through deep space on thrusters only), that's a huge problem. Scrapping worked wonders! It cost the private sector a bit more, but then I didn't have to wait for the passenger ships to chug back to a starbase.

It seems to me that the AI keeps SOME old-design private sector ships. I still have some freighters using obsolete designs, for example. This might be for flavor and/or cost savings, and I hope that the the non-FTL guys are sticking to a single system....



USSAmerica -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/15/2017 1:33:24 PM)

If your initial Passenger Ship designs didn't have FLT drives, it's very possible that they were on their way to another star system with their migrants on board. They may never have been able to arrive at a shipyard to upgrade for the remainder of your game. Take a look at your old save and see where they are located and where they are heading.



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/15/2017 6:10:20 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: USSAmerica

If your initial Passenger Ship designs didn't have FLT drives, it's very possible that they were on their way to another star system with their migrants on board. They may never have been able to arrive at a shipyard to upgrade for the remainder of your game. Take a look at your old save and see where they are located and where they are heading.


I checked that yesterday, and indeed, many of them were unfortunately in deep space, no doubt doomed by my inexperience to remain useless for the rest of the game. However, some (presumably recently created) were still in my home system, and they exhibited the same refusal to accept a queued retrofit command.

Passenger ships aren't covered in detail in Timotheus' guide, but the "we're missing a critical private design" pop-up appeared early on and suggested it was vital I create a passenger ship design; still being very new to the game, I created it before having FTL tech and without paying close attention to the Design pane automation settings.

I'm much more experienced now compared to when I began, since I've finished that entire game, although I rushed through it and ignored some finer details. Today I've mostly just been reading the Galactopedia or, when it lacks detail, using a search engine to fill in the gaps.

Thank you all for the advice. I've been playing 4X since the days of MoO/2, SMAC, the early Civs, and all that jazz, plus many (so, so many) that didn't quite live up to the MoO legacy. A few were pretty good (GalCivII for example), but Distant Worlds is the first space 4X to release this century that feels worthy of the MoO mantle in its way, despite some of its flaws. It's been on my Steam wishlist for years now, and I'm very glad I decided to get it (from GOG, since their sale brought it back to my attention).

It's a shame the DW community is so dispersed, but you can only play even great games for but so long before your attention moves elsewhere. That being said, every now and then when the topic of comparing 4X games comes up on some Steam or Internet forum, occasionally DW is mentioned, and always as being superior to the more recent/flashier games like Stellaris and Endless Space 2.



Retreat1970 -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/15/2017 7:35:43 PM)

I don't think I have ever worried about passenger ships ever. That part of the game is out of my control so I never worry about it. I haven't played in so long maybe I'm wrong.



OzoneGrif_slith -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/15/2017 7:42:06 PM)

Passenger ships are free population and money, they are pretty important.
It's not really out of your control since you can trigger immigration with low taxes, high development, and ruins.
It's actually the most peaceful way to steal other Empire's population.



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/15/2017 8:03:04 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Retreat1970

I don't think I have ever worried about passenger ships ever. That part of the game is out of my control so I never worry about it. I haven't played in so long maybe I'm wrong.


Well, the problem for me was that my colonies were growing very slowly (at least in my opinion), even once they had received their initial resource dump from freighters and traders and were in the green on happiness with 0% tax. I'm talking like 6-8% growth on 40-50m pop, which to me signaled that there must some problem I wasn't aware of, since it would take the rest of the game to get to a tiny fraction of my homeworld's income and research potential that way.

Large-capacity FTL passenger ships to bring excess pop from my developed worlds seemed like the right answer to me, although I don't imagine migration is factored directly into the actual growth % displayed on the colony info panel.

I noticed later that my smaller new colonies were sporting much higher growth rates than they had been a handful of years earlier. I'm not sure if there's a hidden "newness" penalty that wears off over time on top of the other factors, if luxury/strategic resources increase growth slowly over a period of time (rather than shortly after being delivered), or what.

While we're here, can I stack colony modules to deliver double the initial population, and is there anything else I should do to grow new colonies quickly? I already know I can't drop off colonists on worlds I've already colonized, because while one of my colony ships was on its way to colonize a neutral minor civilization (with a fleet of mine jumping in ahead of it for safety's sake), they decided to join me on their own anyway when my advance fleet arrived in the system. I never canceled the actual colonization command, and shortly after, the colony ship tried to colonize there, and I received a message informing me that I can't double-colonize established colonies.



Shogouki -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 12:23:50 AM)

I believe you can stack more than one colony module and increase the number of colonists that they carry. I can't be certain though and unfortunately I'm away from my PC and unable to test this for you.

I think part of the reason that your colonies don't initially grow quickly is that it takes time for the necessary resources and colonists immigrating to get there. As soon as I found a colony I assign a smuggling mission for all resources there as I believe they are needed to increase your colonies development level. And the higher the development level the more desirable the colony, I think at least.

Having a station with recreation and medical facilities (might?) also help.

Oh and low tax rates.



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 1:50:45 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Shogouki

I believe you can stack more than one colony module and increase the number of colonists that they carry. I can't be certain though and unfortunately I'm away from my PC and unable to test this for you.


That's all right, it's something I can easily test myself when I have time.


quote:

ORIGINAL: Shogouki

I think part of the reason that your colonies don't initially grow quickly is that it takes time for the necessary resources and colonists immigrating to get there. As soon as I found a colony I assign a smuggling mission for all resources there as I believe they are needed to increase your colonies development level. And the higher the development level the more desirable the colony, I think at least.

Having a station with recreation and medical facilities (might?) also help.

Oh and low tax rates.


That's an excellent point, although I remembered reading something about not building too many starports (causes private ships to aimlessly transfer stuff that doesn't really need transferring, or something), so I tried to avoid building too many ports. I suppose I could have built non-port stations and probably should in the future.

As for smuggling missions, I tended to have only 50-100k cash on hand and was leery about setting "all" smuggling missions, but I set them anyway on a couple of my later colonies to get them started. I know DW has the odd, if basically logical, trait of giving the state money when civilians upgrade private ships and bases, but I was as frugal with private designs as I was with my state designs and didn't have any extraordinary racial income or government bonuses, so I never had the hundreds of thousands/millions that some people mention having in their games.



Shogouki -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 7:38:05 AM)

Yeah you definitely don't want to build lots of space ports. I try and build a space port over each regional capital but no more. I tend to play very defensively so I build a defence station over every colony which also includes recreation and medical facilities.

I also strive to be an economic powerhouse however even before I can accomplish that I've never had money problems with assigning smuggling missions to each of my new colonies.



Hattori Hanzo -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 7:40:21 AM)

The smuggling resources that the pirates bring to your colonies are always payed by the private sector.

I am absolutely sure of the above statement.

About passenger ships not upgrading you can try to temporary change the ship design to automate and see if the AI design itself a new model of passenger ship and finally upgrade the obsolete ones to the new model.



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 10:35:32 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Hattori Hanzo

The smuggling resources that the pirates bring to your colonies are always payed by the private sector.

I am absolutely sure of the above statement.


Oh? Well heck, sign me up.


quote:

ORIGINAL: Hattori Hanzo

About passenger ships not upgrading you can try to temporary change the ship design to automate and see if the AI design itself a new model of passenger ship and finally upgrade the obsolete ones to the new model.


I did do that (building and design automation checkbox ticked/dropdown selected in game options, designs and retrofitting set to auto), but it didn't seem to make any difference. However, I only waited around but so long to see what would happen, since it was just a test on an old save and I was trying various things.



Aeson -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 5:32:33 PM)

quote:

Oh? Well heck, sign me up.

Be aware that smuggling missions drain money from your private sector into pirate factions' coffers. Rich pirates are strong pirates, and strong pirates are a problem. Furthermore, there has been at least one incident where a player bankrupted their empire's private sector through a too-liberal use of smuggling missions. A bankrupt private sector is a problem; it will not build new ships, upgrade old ones, or replace losses, and it may also scrap existing vessels to try to make ends meet.



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 6:23:35 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Aeson

Be aware that smuggling missions drain money from your private sector into pirate factions' coffers. Rich pirates are strong pirates, and strong pirates are a problem. Furthermore, there has been at least one incident where a player bankrupted their empire's private sector through a too-liberal use of smuggling missions. A bankrupt private sector is a problem; it will not build new ships, upgrade old ones, or replace losses, and it may also scrap existing vessels to try to make ends meet.


That's really cool, actually.

That reminds me: After thinking it over, I can't quite follow the economic logic of the private sector paying the state for private ships and mining bases and their retrofits. The mining stations are built and owned by the private sector, which means that the resources are rightfully theirs—yet the resources are given away to the state. They have to pay the state for the mining station, and then relinquish all the yield!

That would make sense in a nationalized economy, but then again, in a nationalized economy mineral-harvesting operations wouldn't have to pay the state for the mining station, either. The state would provide the station for them.

Of course it's all abstracted, and the state provides services, facilities, and governance, but it's quite odd.

I guess the real question is: What happens when the state pays credits for its ships? Do those credits vanish from the game, or are they paid to the private sector?



Hattori Hanzo -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 6:25:20 PM)

my smuggling recipe for new colonies is to let them to receive about 30k of resources from smuggling pirates. then I cancel the smuggling mission.

never bankrupted my private sector with the above procedure.

it help greatly the new colonies growth.



Hattori Hanzo -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 6:39:22 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Rumpelstiltskin
The mining stations are built and owned by the private sector, which means that the resources are rightfully theirs—yet the resources are given away to the state. They have to pay the state for the mining station, and then relinquish all the yield!


the mining stations are owned by the private sector yes, but are built by the state through his building ships.



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/16/2017 6:49:27 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Hattori Hanzo

the mining stations are owned by the private sector yes, but are built by the state through his building ships.


Yeah, but those construction ships were built entirely with resources harvested by private sector, so we're right back at square one.



RogerBacon -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/17/2017 1:28:34 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Rumpelstiltskin


quote:

ORIGINAL: Hattori Hanzo

the mining stations are owned by the private sector yes, but are built by the state through his building ships.


Yeah, but those construction ships were built entirely with resources harvested by private sector, so we're right back at square one.


I also have never lik3ed the idea that the private sector pays the state for ships. Maybe they should pay something along the lines of a tax but paying for the whole ship has always bothered me. Its too easy to exploit. Many people run at 0% tax rate for years, relying only on ship construction.



Bingeling -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/17/2017 7:54:43 AM)

The game is easy to exploit. The privates paying the state for ships is what the game is balanced around, so if that is modified the effect on the AI would have to be checked.

From my point of view, it would be nice if DW2 is less exploitable, but it won't really matter for me. I do not sell useless tech for cash, I have never used 0 tax much, and I do not run retrofit shenanigans on the civilians to get their cash. And removing all kinds of potential exploits could turn away a lot of players too.

But I can always dream of a new game where there are real trade-offs of all kinds. Where it is not easy to just add "more fuel cells" to cure range issues, and not so easy to see through AI mechanisms to get rid of enemies during war.

0% tax has been changed over time, but I hope it will be replace through a different kind of mechanic to boost new colonies by spending some effort. 0% tax on the single colony should not work, but by upping the tax on the main colony you ought to be able to somehow fund the boost of another one.



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/17/2017 6:30:17 PM)

Personally, I have no problem with expecting the player to show a bit of restraint and not abuse the gameplay systems too much. Oftentimes, it's absolutely necessary in order to support mechanics that allow for a lot of player freedom; with that freedom comes the potential to exploit it.

I realize though that other people whose playstyles involve utilizing every advantage they possibly can to its fullest sometimes have psychological issues with this, since an advantage that doesn't involve a cheat code or the developer console is basically just sitting there and calling to them.

It's been said before, but SOME advantage from a low/nonexistent tax rate does make sense. If the colony's government and people have more financial resources at their disposal, then they're able to procure more and do more. In essence, setting a 0% tax is like subsidizing the fledgling colony.



Shark7 -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/17/2017 8:04:49 PM)

The passenger ships may not be retrofitting due to having a lot of missions queued as well.

If you have a resettle policy, or if you have a lot of Resort Bases, the ships may have a long queue of 'Pick up people, deposit them here' missions to clear out before they can go in for a retrofit. Since I have both of those scenarios active in my current game, the passenger ships take forever to retrofit.

That is the one thing I can think of that might explain it. Upgrade your construction ship designs, and you will be able to see it as well. The construction ships will finish whatever was in their build queues at the time you made the design change before actually going into port to retrofit. I'm betting the passenger ships have a similar logic when it comes to missions and retrofitting.

Also, I'm like Bingeling when it comes to the civilian ships. I do make changes to them, but I may only upgrade them twice during an entire game. And only when I get new reactors, engines, etc that actually make them better ships. So if mine never get around to retrofitting because they are too busy doing what I need them to do, it doesn't really bother me.



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/18/2017 12:49:42 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Shark7

The passenger ships may not be retrofitting due to having a lot of missions queued as well.

If you have a resettle policy, or if you have a lot of Resort Bases, the ships may have a long queue of 'Pick up people, deposit them here' missions to clear out before they can go in for a retrofit. Since I have both of those scenarios active in my current game, the passenger ships take forever to retrofit.


They didn't even have a queue; or if they did, then they weren't displaying one properly. Normally, when I queue a retrofit for other types of civilian ships, a (1) appears to the right of their current task to indicate that there's 1 task in the queue. The passenger ships had no queue displayed, and even if they had, if the retrofit had queued properly then the queue readout surely would have incremented by +1. Instead, there was absolutely no feedback whatsoever.

It's just very strange all around. Even those of you who clearly have a lot of experience with the game don't seem to be sure what's going on.

I'd post the save file on Google Drive, but I'm not allowed to post links yet, so that's out.



Bingeling -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/18/2017 7:39:32 AM)

I am quite sure that the AI never queues missions. That is a tool for the player. The AI should always complete its missions, sit for a moment with no mission, then get a new one (that moment may be very short). The main shortcoming with this is that it can give some rather silly effects. Like military ships on 1/3 fuel heading in to refuel a station that is under attack and such. And never diverting a ship to refuel on a long trek.

The best way to have lost ships is to have them on a mission to go across the galaxy without a jump drive. If under a serious fuel shortage, they will try to head to that tempting independent for fuel (that is sure to be swarming with pirates if they even can get there in the time frame of a game).



Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/18/2017 8:14:57 AM)

I've never seen a civilian ship with a queue either unless I'm the one who gave the order which created the queue, but I obviously haven't been playing DW for very long, so it's hard to be sure about anything until I've got a few more games under my belt.



Hattori Hanzo -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/18/2017 1:29:56 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Rumpelstiltskin

I'd post the save file on Google Drive, but I'm not allowed to post links yet, so that's out.


when you will be allowed, please post the link of your save file: I will take a look trying to find a possible explanation to the passenger ship upgrade issue.




Rumpelstiltskin -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/19/2017 12:11:00 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Hattori Hanzo


when you will be allowed, please post the link of your save file: I will take a look trying to find a possible explanation to the passenger ship upgrade issue.




I will. It's not so much that I need help at this point, it's that it's a mystery that must be solved!



OzoneGrif_slith -> RE: Why won't my private passenger ships retrofit? (12/19/2017 6:10:11 PM)

quote:

I've never seen a civilian ship with a queue

I actually had many civilian ships with queued missions in my last game. It was late game and I never upgraded the cargo space, and the civilian ships were not many enough to support the whole logistic.

When I seen "2 queued missions" on my civilian ships, I suddenly understood why so many constructions were at a crawl!



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