NewGRF: Disable closure for all (Open)TTD industries

[SirkoZ]

I went through the Actions on TTDPatch NewGRF specs. page and didn't find any that would allow me to disable closures for:
a) extractive/organic industries when they reach the lowest production (with either economy changes),
b) processing industries when they become bored (=randomly after 5 years of no service).

Of course I could have overlooked something...

A good use for this setting/NewGRF would be for playing such beautifully and carefully crafted scenarious as this one where industries are placed in industrial areas of towns. It would sure make the game more enjoyable if one didn't have to rush to connect them all in 5 years.

Perhaps another NewGRF would be to prevent new industries of being constructed, but I digress.

[Timitry]

Yes, i do also think that option is really needed, especially for playing scenarios or competitive games.
A grf, where you can set the options:

- Opening behaviour of primary industries [no new / normal]
- Opening behaviour of secondary industires [no new / normal]
- Closing behaviour of primary industries [Won't close / Will close]
- Closing behaviour of secondary industries [Won't close / Will close]

Or however you write that in english

While a NewGRF would be good, it would be even better to have those options in the game itself, so you have more possibilities when setting up a game / server without anyone needing to have the NewGRF.

This thread might better fit in the suggestions forum, though.

Greetings,
Tim

[SirkoZ]

I have opened the same theme topic here (in TTDPatch Graphics section) because this one didn't have any replies in the longest time.
However - OpenTTD developer frosch has replied there with some methods for achieving this goal which are either somewhat odd (IMO) or tricky.
Therefore I'm writing again here if a this_industry_never_closes_down property was implemented for at least newGRF if not a switch under "Configure Patches/Advanced settings" because as Timitry agreed it would be really useful to have such an option for beautifully made scenarious such as "Cindini".

EDIT: if any of the mods consider this topic redundant, please close it and redirect people to the one under TTDPatch Graphics discussion area.

[DaleStan]

- Closing behaviour of primary industries [Won't close / Will close]
- Closing behaviour of secondary industries [Won't close / Will close]

For the umpteenth time, that's completely pointless. An industry must do exactly what it is requested. And if a requested closure doesn't happen, that same industry is fully capable of turning off its acceptance of all cargos and refusing to produce anything.

[ostlandr]

I respectfully disagree. I feel that the game would be more enjoyable for me if the following were implemented:

1. Primary industries' production drops to zero if underserved, but they don't simply vanish. (The exception of course being PBI when a mine is played out.) It could possibly cost the player a sum of money to fund reopening the mine works or lumber camp if shut down.

2. Secondary industries "close" by having their production drop to zero, and refusing to accept or produce anything. To "wake up" a shut-down primary industry should cost money, but not as much as building one from scratch. If dormant for a period of time (2-5 years?) then the warning should pop up "Chundinghead Factory to be torn down" and if not rescued then it should disappear.

This would be beneficial in both solo and multiplayer on large maps, when it may take 10 or 20 years of game time to build any kind of a large network.

[DaleStan]

That's as may be. But when an industry responds to the question "How should your production change?" with "I should be removed from the map next month", OpenTTD must do exactly that. If OpenTTD ever does anything else, the industry can instead start answering the questions "What cargos do you accept?" and "How much of what cargos are you going to produce now?" with "None" and "Zero units".

Which has the exact same effect as actually removing it, except that the industry is still occupying space on the map.

[maquinista]

I Like the idea of a option to disable the closures.

[DaleStan]

So, you like the option of having industries that accept nothing, produce nothing, and otherwise do nothing except take up space on the map?

[SirXavius]

As hardheaded as DaleStan seems to be, i must agree that an industry ceasing to produce is the same in effect as ceasing to exist. The only way the option to stay on the board (when production and supply is zero) is helpful is if you can "revive" service -- which i was unsure if that was an option of yours with this .grf. If you can't revive it, please remove it. However, even if it can be revived, it should cost.

With that said, there have been plenty of scenarios i've created where i needed an industry in a certain location, only to have it close down early into playing the scenario. I would have loved to have kept that industry until i could get to it.

Which offers the question, what if the industry is a producer but not an "acceptor" such as oil wells? How do you propose handling those?

[richk67]

With that said, there have been plenty of scenarios i've created where i needed an industry in a certain location, only to have it close down early into playing the scenario. I would have loved to have kept that industry until i could get to it.

In this situation when I see a future opportunity I want to use later, I set up a simple lorry service to prevent the industry being idle.

Of course, some of the industry sets designed for 256x256 map players dont scale well to the larger OTTD maps vis production reduction rates.

I do think however that the question and answer Dalestan gave should be split:
"How should I change my production?" Answer: Reduce towards zero.
"Should I close the industry at zero production?" Answer: Yes/No.* *refer to disable closure switch.

Yes, this can give the situation that the industry may hit a zero production; however, if the industry is still there, then there should be a random chance that it would increase its production later.

[SirXavius]

In this situation when I see a future opportunity I want to use later, I set up a simple lorry service to prevent the industry being idle.

I'm playing with the nightlies and i've noticed that industries will threaten to shut down if they don't get supplied even if they have a station attached to them with a vehicle trying to pick up. This is why i'd like to see them revivable if they're going to be hanging around.

[SirkoZ]

Well - a simple closure allowed/disallowed switch/newGRF's Action property would end all these woes.

[SirXavius]

i LOVE that popcorn gif! The devs should use that!:P

[Timitry]

Well, it seems like it is not that trivial at all, but wouldn't it be possible to include the following:

If the switches for industry closures are set to "may close down", just keep the old behaviour (maybe fix that powerplants can shut down, while being on it ).

If one or both of the switches are set to "May not close down", do one of the following:

If asked "How much will you produce next month?", and it would say: "I will close down, the game should check for that switch being on / off, and if it's set to "Do not close down", it could either:

a) Stay at the lowest production level
b) Drop production to zero, and either increase production again if
1) The player wants to pick up the cargo with a vehicle (of course, he would get nothing in the first month, but the industry would know it should increase production and would do so in the next month.
2) Pay some money for the industry to be "revived"
(I'd say implement either 1) or 2), but both could be also an option)

For secondary industries - they don't produce anything anyway if they want to close down, so if it decides to close down, it should just check for the switch and then get the answer "No, you will NOT close down!"

Of course, i'm not a programmer and do not know how hard it would be to implement that, but i'd imagine it would be possible. I think this (together with another switch to disable opening of new industries, but let's deal with that later) is actually a feature that OTTD would benefit quite a lot from, since you could hold REAL competitions, where each player gets the same map, with the same amount of industries, and has to make the best of it! Or you can divide a map in 2 / 3 / 4 ... pieces, and set up each identically to have a competition.
If doing that now, you always have the problem, that some players might just have luck, that there will be a lot of industries opening in their game / piece of the map, while others are really unlucky.
Last but not least, it would be great for realistic scenarios, such as heightmaps, where you manually place all industries to reflect the real situation (more or less).

Anyone up for the challenge?

[frosch]

Good evening, I proudly present to you the "Manual Industries" Set.
It offers great game play and perfectly adapts to your personal playing style - no matter whether you prefer realistic-playing or power-play

How to play with it?
1) Copy the grf in your newgrf resp. data folder.
2) Start a new game using it
3) For best gameplay press Ctrl-Alt-C and turn on "Enable modifying production values" and "Magic bulldozer".
4) Enjoy full control over any aspect of economy.

The features:

• Works in all climates.
• Full control over in-game industry creation using the great "Build Industry" window:
  • No stupid automatic industry construction that spoils every future plans of your transport company.
  • No stupid costs for funding industries, when they won't belong to your company anyway.
  • No stupid restrictions like banks only appearing in towns with more than 1200 citizens or oil wells only available before 1950.
  • No stupid restrictions about the availability of certain industry types only for certain climates.
• Full control over industry destruction using the innovative "Bulldozer" tool:
  • No stupid automatic closing-down of industries which will shortly gain big profits when you connect them to your transport network.
  • No stupid industries in locations far more useful for nice junctions or stations.
• Full control over industy production using two nice little "increase"- and "decrease"-buttons from the industry window:
  • No silly random production changes, which are not related to any sane reasoning.

Unfortunatelly the grf cannot be combined with other newgrf industry sets
I guess to authors are too ignorant to understand the real needs of great gameplay.

[shiver]

Thank you Frosch. Industries closing themselves after 5 years was the one thing keeping me from playing OTTD. It's a pretty annoying feature which I don't remember from the original TT.

[SirkoZ]

shiver: In the original TT factories/mills don't close if economy is set to "Steady", in "Fluctuating" mode they close if you try to transport more than 50% of production.

frosch - as much as I appreciate your work on this newGRF - wouldn't it be much easier and also applicable for all industry-sets (if activated) - a simple newGRF Action property this_industry_can_close = 1 or 0 (or similar)?

[DaleStan]

What part of "There's already a callback for that" are you not understanding?

[Youri219]

Thank you Frosch. Industries closing themselves after 5 years was the one thing keeping me from playing OTTD. It's a pretty annoying feature which I don't remember from the original TT.

TTO did indeed not close industries when unserved for 5 years, but TTD did close them (with the exception of power plants).

[SirkoZ]

What part of "There's already a callback for that" are you not understanding?

DaleStan - I really appreciate your lacking, non-informative posts. I really do.

Back to business:
I want a simple Action property that will work with:
a) any industry/type,
b) any industry set (default + newGRF -> editing it of course),
c) work with default and smooth_economy (that means all industries stay, producing anything or nothing while being subject to economy changes),
d) will be a simple one-liner in nfo file, like for example the property not to close temperate terrain oil wells.

To summarise all points - to be a simple one-liner property that just works - with smooth_economy. There is absolutely nothing of the kind in the newGRF specs.