[X3TC.Guide] Using Commodity Logistics Software to Automate your TL Storage Solution.
Posted: Wed, 20. Jul 11, 08:50
This is my first guide so any suggestions / corrections would be greatly appreciated, I would really like to hear from new players who have used this guide to know how useful it has been for you and what changes I may need to make.
I will be assuming throughout this guide that people have the full Bonus Pack installed. (quite frankly I never played this game without it lol)
This guide covers a nice wide area about Commodity Logistics, so it is definitely a good read for anybody starting out using CLS!!
Let's get started shall we?
Using Commodity Logistics Software to automate your TL storage solution
I will start off by saying that this can be used for ANY ware, but is most useful when you have a personal weapons factory/complex, or if you want to store a ton of wares for certain plot missions that shall remain un-named .
By the end of this guide you will have a storage TL that automatically stores any ware you want it to as soon as it becomes available where it is docked, even setting the limit for each ware you want to store!
You will also be able to, using this same process, control whether or not you are selling or buying certain wares by controlling the stock levels, full or empty.
List of things you will need:
1) Your own Equipment Dock (or basically anywhere you own and can dock a TL, but we shall stick with an equipment dock for this tutorial)
2) A TL for Storage. (Ideally a Mammoth for it's high cargo space)
Required Software:
Commodity Logistics Software MK2
Navigation Command Software MK1
Pilot with "Cargo Messenger(Level 4)" Rank or above
3) A few TS's to bring the wares to your Equipment Dock.
Software neccessary will depend on whether you are using Commercial Agents (CAG's) to buy wares or Internal Logistics (CLS1's) to transport wares from your own factories.
Pilot Ranks neccessary will depend on how many wares you are transporting, but I always use the highest rank here for the most flexibility.
Required Software (CAG):
Trade Command Software MK1 & MK2
Fight Command Software MK1 & MK2 (optional but recommended)
Jumpdrive (optional but highly recommended)
Required Software (CLS1):
Commodity Logistics Software MK1
Navigation Command Software MK1
Fight Command Software MK1 & MK2 (optional but recommended for escaping)
Jumpdrive (optional but recommended)
4) If you are producing wares, a few more TS's to sell your excess stock.
These will be CAG's so just use the same software as mentioned previously.
It is recommended that you max these guy's shields or they will most likely die to pirates/xenon/kha'ak (or a combo of all 3!! O_O) More shielding gives them more chance to escape.
5) A few trained CAG pilots. for a guide on how to quickly train these guys and to transfer them to different ships, please click this: http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=277232
The Method - Part 1, Setting up your TL/Equipment Dock
First of all, you want to build your equipment dock somewhere it will be useful.
This is roughly a 50mill Cr investment and should not be taken lightly!!! If you are storing weapons/shields etc you want this near to the shipyard you use most often.
Next you dock your TL at the Equipment Dock and transfer a CAG pilot over to it; don't forget, this one needs to be Cargo Messenger (Level 4) or higher.
Then you bring up the command console/Orders for the equipment dock, (click it in your property menu[R]) select any slot 1 - 10, then select Dock Ware Manager.
Here you can add any ware to be listed at your Equipment Dock that you want; you don't have to store them in the TL if you don't want to either .
Go ahead and add your wares now.
We are now going to set up your TL to automatically load wares as soon as any stock appears in the Equipment Dock.
To do this, open up the command console on the TL and select the following:
-Trade
-Start External Commodity Logistics
In this screen there are a lot of options, we need to modify only two of these so don't panic!
Before we continue click Restore Defaults at the bottom then click yes, so we are working with a clean slate.
Now let's continue:
-Waypoints
-Add Station
Select your equipment dock in the sector where you put it.
-Load
Or Unload if you are reversing the process, keeping in mind unloading will be slightly different with regards to the next step.
Now we are presented with all the wares that the dock trades in, you will need to repeat this process for each ware that you want the TL to store, for now just start at the top of your list.
After you have selected your ware:
-Manual input up to
Select the maximum number you wish it to store, or just hit maximum cargospace on the previous screen if you're not bothered.
This step is different for unloading, the "up to" would then refer to the EQ dock NOT the TL!!
Now we are returned to the Waypoints screen; to add another ware click the previous ware on the list in front of you, then click:
-Add Waypoint
This way you can add another ware without having to select the station over again.
Once you have finished adding all the wares go back to the main External Logistics screen where you shall now select Supply Conditions.
We only need to modify two things here, that is the top two options:
-minimum transfer amount on collection / delivery
Set these both to 0%, this will make the TL act like a sponge and just suck up (or spit out) wares as soon as it sees them (or there is space in the EQD).
Now we go back to the External Logistics main screen and click:
-Start External Commodity Logistics (at the top).
Congratulations! Your TL is now all set up and will now automatically store any of the wares you selected as soon as they appear in the equipment dock!
The Method - Part 2, Setting up your CAG / CLS1
We will start with CAG's, I will explain both how to set them up to Sell excess wares or purchase the wares you want.
Please remember to set your prices at the correct levels, even if you aren't open to the public, the CAG's don't sell below your price limit, or buy above it.
First of all select your TS with the correct software upgrades that you wish to use and bring up it's command console[C].
The first thing we need to do before anything else is set it's homebase to the Equipment Dock.
After doing this we then go through the list of settings:
-Trade
-Start Commercial Representation
Once again, lots of options in here; first things first, Restore Defaults and after going into each menu press ESC once to go back up a level.
-Ware lists
Here you want to set up which wares you want your CAG to deal with, you can either set it up as a blacklist (the default) which means, "trade any wares except these ones" or a trade list which means, "trade these wares only". Select whichever best suits your needs.
Next on the list is:
-Exceptions
Most of this is pretty self explanatory, again we have a blacklist and trade list, these apply to the sectors / stations and allow you to manipulate where your CAG will be trading. Useful for making sure they stay clear of stupid sectors like LooMankStrat's Legacy ^^;
Next we have:
-Trade Duties
You will be seeing a lot of this screen in future, get to grips with it early on!
We want the following settings for our CAG if selling excess wares
-Salesman
-Sell Products - CAG will sell wares down to this level, set it to 0% and he will sell sell sell! set it to 100% and you've basically broken him.
-Sell Products Freighter Cargo Bay - Set this to 101% to disable it, it's redundant after you've set "Sell Products" correctly and often causes clashes.
-Sell Intermediate Products - set this to the same as "Sell Products" I can't tell which one is used for docks and I haven't bothered testing it sorry lol.
And for Purchasing required wares:
-Shopper
-Purchase Resources - CAG will buy wares up to this level, set it to 100% to buy buy buy! set it to 0% and you've broken him again.
-Purchase Intermediate Resources - Again duno which one the dock uses, set this to 100%
-Purchase stations credit balance - CAG's only use funds available in their homebase, this option sets a limit of funds below which CAG's will not use to buy things, do with this as you see fit.
Go back up one and next on the list we have:
-Station Settings
Here you can set the trade range of your agent, useful if you want it to stick to a certain part of the universe. This overrides anything set in the homebase and allows you to have different agents with different jump ranges working in the same station.
-Jump Drive Settings
Here you can set your CAG's Jumpdrive settings, these will override what's in use in the command console. Most useful when you save your settings and load them to another agent whom you want to do the same job.
That's CAG's over with now we're moving onto CLS1.
CAG's are used generally to trade with NPC stations but CLS1's are designed to work within your own empire, in a nutshell making sure points A B and C gets what they need from points X Y and Z and not vice versa.
(e.g. Crystals from 3 Crystal fab complexes in Ore Belt to 1 Solar Power Plant complex in Akeela's beacon, OR, Energy cells from SPP in Akeela's to Crystal Fabs in Ore Belt, NOT both)
(e.g. #2: All races food products from one complex delivered to weapons production complex which uses all of them)
First of all select the TS with the correct upgrades that you wish to use and bring up it's command console, then select it's homebase at your factory/complex you wish to keep your equipment dock supplied.
After that select:
-Trade
-Start Internal Commodity Logistics
Big list of stuff to tinker with again, by now it should be getting easier right?
-Home Base Products
These are the wares you want it to supply to the Dock.
-Suppliers and Consumers
In this case, the homebase is the Supplier and is automatically listed for you, select the Equipment Dock as the Consumer, you can select 10 suppliers and 20 consumers with a top rank CLS1, but keep in mind, they will treat each one equally due to the next item on the list.
-Supply Conditions
These ones are going to get a little bit confusing, but stick with it we're almost there now
-Minimum Storage Space filled - For the Supplier, the CLS1 will not take wares below this % marker. e.g. if set to 10% and if your supplier can store 100 items and has 10 left, the CLS1 will not touch them.
For the Consumer, this % marker is reversed, so the same as before but on the consumer's side if it has 90/100 in stock the CLS1 does not serve it.
Do not worry if you are confused, it's taken me months to get this right in my head lol! If you are still wondering, set it to 0% or 100% and see which one gets it to move. (When doing this, restart the script by selecting Start Internal Commodity Logistics in the main script menu)
-Freighter Cargo Bay - 101% again to disable, can cause clashes and you should have set your Minimum and maximum storage space at good levels to avoid needing this.
-Fly to Supplier Only - If checked yes, the CLS1 will visit SUPPLIERS in order of which has the most stock, helps to keep stock levels evened out in multiple suppliers. Remember, CLS1 always flies to consumers in order of need.
Okay now let's go back up a level to the next setting; last one!:
-Jumpdrive Settings
Same as before set as you require.
We are now finished! you should now have 3 or 4 things!
An equipment Dock with all the wares you want added to it.
A TL docked at it sucking down wares that you want to store.
A CAG set up to either purchase wares for your EQ dock or to sell excess wares delivered from your complexes.
And maybe a CLS1 set up to deliver wares from your complex/complexes to your equipment dock for storage/sale.
Thank you for reading, I hope this was informative for you!
Earl Harewood.
I will be assuming throughout this guide that people have the full Bonus Pack installed. (quite frankly I never played this game without it lol)
This guide covers a nice wide area about Commodity Logistics, so it is definitely a good read for anybody starting out using CLS!!
Let's get started shall we?
Using Commodity Logistics Software to automate your TL storage solution
I will start off by saying that this can be used for ANY ware, but is most useful when you have a personal weapons factory/complex, or if you want to store a ton of wares for certain plot missions that shall remain un-named .
By the end of this guide you will have a storage TL that automatically stores any ware you want it to as soon as it becomes available where it is docked, even setting the limit for each ware you want to store!
You will also be able to, using this same process, control whether or not you are selling or buying certain wares by controlling the stock levels, full or empty.
List of things you will need:
1) Your own Equipment Dock (or basically anywhere you own and can dock a TL, but we shall stick with an equipment dock for this tutorial)
2) A TL for Storage. (Ideally a Mammoth for it's high cargo space)
Required Software:
Commodity Logistics Software MK2
Navigation Command Software MK1
Pilot with "Cargo Messenger(Level 4)" Rank or above
3) A few TS's to bring the wares to your Equipment Dock.
Software neccessary will depend on whether you are using Commercial Agents (CAG's) to buy wares or Internal Logistics (CLS1's) to transport wares from your own factories.
Pilot Ranks neccessary will depend on how many wares you are transporting, but I always use the highest rank here for the most flexibility.
Required Software (CAG):
Trade Command Software MK1 & MK2
Fight Command Software MK1 & MK2 (optional but recommended)
Jumpdrive (optional but highly recommended)
Required Software (CLS1):
Commodity Logistics Software MK1
Navigation Command Software MK1
Fight Command Software MK1 & MK2 (optional but recommended for escaping)
Jumpdrive (optional but recommended)
4) If you are producing wares, a few more TS's to sell your excess stock.
These will be CAG's so just use the same software as mentioned previously.
It is recommended that you max these guy's shields or they will most likely die to pirates/xenon/kha'ak (or a combo of all 3!! O_O) More shielding gives them more chance to escape.
5) A few trained CAG pilots. for a guide on how to quickly train these guys and to transfer them to different ships, please click this: http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=277232
The Method - Part 1, Setting up your TL/Equipment Dock
First of all, you want to build your equipment dock somewhere it will be useful.
This is roughly a 50mill Cr investment and should not be taken lightly!!! If you are storing weapons/shields etc you want this near to the shipyard you use most often.
Next you dock your TL at the Equipment Dock and transfer a CAG pilot over to it; don't forget, this one needs to be Cargo Messenger (Level 4) or higher.
Then you bring up the command console/Orders for the equipment dock, (click it in your property menu[R]) select any slot 1 - 10, then select Dock Ware Manager.
Here you can add any ware to be listed at your Equipment Dock that you want; you don't have to store them in the TL if you don't want to either .
Go ahead and add your wares now.
We are now going to set up your TL to automatically load wares as soon as any stock appears in the Equipment Dock.
To do this, open up the command console on the TL and select the following:
-Trade
-Start External Commodity Logistics
In this screen there are a lot of options, we need to modify only two of these so don't panic!
Before we continue click Restore Defaults at the bottom then click yes, so we are working with a clean slate.
Now let's continue:
-Waypoints
-Add Station
Select your equipment dock in the sector where you put it.
-Load
Or Unload if you are reversing the process, keeping in mind unloading will be slightly different with regards to the next step.
Now we are presented with all the wares that the dock trades in, you will need to repeat this process for each ware that you want the TL to store, for now just start at the top of your list.
After you have selected your ware:
-Manual input up to
Select the maximum number you wish it to store, or just hit maximum cargospace on the previous screen if you're not bothered.
This step is different for unloading, the "up to" would then refer to the EQ dock NOT the TL!!
Now we are returned to the Waypoints screen; to add another ware click the previous ware on the list in front of you, then click:
-Add Waypoint
This way you can add another ware without having to select the station over again.
Once you have finished adding all the wares go back to the main External Logistics screen where you shall now select Supply Conditions.
We only need to modify two things here, that is the top two options:
-minimum transfer amount on collection / delivery
Set these both to 0%, this will make the TL act like a sponge and just suck up (or spit out) wares as soon as it sees them (or there is space in the EQD).
Now we go back to the External Logistics main screen and click:
-Start External Commodity Logistics (at the top).
Congratulations! Your TL is now all set up and will now automatically store any of the wares you selected as soon as they appear in the equipment dock!
The Method - Part 2, Setting up your CAG / CLS1
We will start with CAG's, I will explain both how to set them up to Sell excess wares or purchase the wares you want.
Please remember to set your prices at the correct levels, even if you aren't open to the public, the CAG's don't sell below your price limit, or buy above it.
First of all select your TS with the correct software upgrades that you wish to use and bring up it's command console[C].
The first thing we need to do before anything else is set it's homebase to the Equipment Dock.
After doing this we then go through the list of settings:
-Trade
-Start Commercial Representation
Once again, lots of options in here; first things first, Restore Defaults and after going into each menu press ESC once to go back up a level.
-Ware lists
Here you want to set up which wares you want your CAG to deal with, you can either set it up as a blacklist (the default) which means, "trade any wares except these ones" or a trade list which means, "trade these wares only". Select whichever best suits your needs.
Next on the list is:
-Exceptions
Most of this is pretty self explanatory, again we have a blacklist and trade list, these apply to the sectors / stations and allow you to manipulate where your CAG will be trading. Useful for making sure they stay clear of stupid sectors like LooMankStrat's Legacy ^^;
Next we have:
-Trade Duties
You will be seeing a lot of this screen in future, get to grips with it early on!
We want the following settings for our CAG if selling excess wares
-Salesman
-Sell Products - CAG will sell wares down to this level, set it to 0% and he will sell sell sell! set it to 100% and you've basically broken him.
-Sell Products Freighter Cargo Bay - Set this to 101% to disable it, it's redundant after you've set "Sell Products" correctly and often causes clashes.
-Sell Intermediate Products - set this to the same as "Sell Products" I can't tell which one is used for docks and I haven't bothered testing it sorry lol.
And for Purchasing required wares:
-Shopper
-Purchase Resources - CAG will buy wares up to this level, set it to 100% to buy buy buy! set it to 0% and you've broken him again.
-Purchase Intermediate Resources - Again duno which one the dock uses, set this to 100%
-Purchase stations credit balance - CAG's only use funds available in their homebase, this option sets a limit of funds below which CAG's will not use to buy things, do with this as you see fit.
Go back up one and next on the list we have:
-Station Settings
Here you can set the trade range of your agent, useful if you want it to stick to a certain part of the universe. This overrides anything set in the homebase and allows you to have different agents with different jump ranges working in the same station.
-Jump Drive Settings
Here you can set your CAG's Jumpdrive settings, these will override what's in use in the command console. Most useful when you save your settings and load them to another agent whom you want to do the same job.
That's CAG's over with now we're moving onto CLS1.
CAG's are used generally to trade with NPC stations but CLS1's are designed to work within your own empire, in a nutshell making sure points A B and C gets what they need from points X Y and Z and not vice versa.
(e.g. Crystals from 3 Crystal fab complexes in Ore Belt to 1 Solar Power Plant complex in Akeela's beacon, OR, Energy cells from SPP in Akeela's to Crystal Fabs in Ore Belt, NOT both)
(e.g. #2: All races food products from one complex delivered to weapons production complex which uses all of them)
First of all select the TS with the correct upgrades that you wish to use and bring up it's command console, then select it's homebase at your factory/complex you wish to keep your equipment dock supplied.
After that select:
-Trade
-Start Internal Commodity Logistics
Big list of stuff to tinker with again, by now it should be getting easier right?
-Home Base Products
These are the wares you want it to supply to the Dock.
-Suppliers and Consumers
In this case, the homebase is the Supplier and is automatically listed for you, select the Equipment Dock as the Consumer, you can select 10 suppliers and 20 consumers with a top rank CLS1, but keep in mind, they will treat each one equally due to the next item on the list.
-Supply Conditions
These ones are going to get a little bit confusing, but stick with it we're almost there now
-Minimum Storage Space filled - For the Supplier, the CLS1 will not take wares below this % marker. e.g. if set to 10% and if your supplier can store 100 items and has 10 left, the CLS1 will not touch them.
For the Consumer, this % marker is reversed, so the same as before but on the consumer's side if it has 90/100 in stock the CLS1 does not serve it.
Do not worry if you are confused, it's taken me months to get this right in my head lol! If you are still wondering, set it to 0% or 100% and see which one gets it to move. (When doing this, restart the script by selecting Start Internal Commodity Logistics in the main script menu)
-Freighter Cargo Bay - 101% again to disable, can cause clashes and you should have set your Minimum and maximum storage space at good levels to avoid needing this.
-Fly to Supplier Only - If checked yes, the CLS1 will visit SUPPLIERS in order of which has the most stock, helps to keep stock levels evened out in multiple suppliers. Remember, CLS1 always flies to consumers in order of need.
Okay now let's go back up a level to the next setting; last one!:
-Jumpdrive Settings
Same as before set as you require.
We are now finished! you should now have 3 or 4 things!
An equipment Dock with all the wares you want added to it.
A TL docked at it sucking down wares that you want to store.
A CAG set up to either purchase wares for your EQ dock or to sell excess wares delivered from your complexes.
And maybe a CLS1 set up to deliver wares from your complex/complexes to your equipment dock for storage/sale.
Thank you for reading, I hope this was informative for you!
Earl Harewood.