Stations trade distance

[wwf4668]

Hi,

since 7.x I'm a bit confused about the number of gates/sectors station traders will travel. It used to be max(manager skill, pilot skill) but now it always shows 10/10. But this seems not to be the value that is being used. On the right hand side of the linked screen shot below it shows 10/10 for the station, but the failed command of the trader shows 2/50000 (50000?????). Manager skill is 3* while pilot is below 1*. And why does it always show 10/10 for stations even with a crappy manager? Can anybody clear that up for me? Thanks a lot!

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ ... rbox=false

[Zloth2]

Strange. I found a trader on a station with a 5-star manager that had a failed order, and the failed order had a 5/50,000. The main area had 5/5, though.

The maximum should be 5, not 10. Are you using any mods?

[wwf4668]

Thanks for the answer. Yes that's strange. I do use mods, but nothing related to trade really.
From memory:
- stop destroying my boarding target
- SectorSatellites
-Anghelos Destoryers AI
-Legal Inventory Wares
-Reaction Force
-Satellite Services..
-Cheat Menu

... So nothing that should mess with station AI or settings.

[TheDeliveryMan]

-Cheat Menu

This mod is known to break saves beyond repair!

[Baconnaise]

Hi,

since 7.x I'm a bit confused about the number of gates/sectors station traders will travel. It used to be max(manager skill, pilot skill) but now it always shows 10/10. But this seems not to be the value that is being used. On the right hand side of the linked screen shot below it shows 10/10 for the station, but the failed command of the trader shows 2/50000 (50000?????). Manager skill is 3* while pilot is below 1*. And why does it always show 10/10 for stations even with a crappy manager? Can anybody clear that up for me? Thanks a lot!

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ ... rbox=false

The easiest way to drill down what is cause or reason you need to create a new save. You could start a new custom start save with all mods disabled. I would give yourself a ship and station or a ship with a max stat pilot and manager. You can also give yourself the PHQ boso and dal plus most of the research like teleport. This allows you to compare vanilla no mods to your modded one. You can then go one by one enable each mod and reload to zero in on any conflict if any.

-Cheat Menu

This mod is known to break saves beyond repair!

What exactly triggers the save corruption?

https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/fil ... 459602844/

I would assume the issue would be listed under known problems of the mod if it was such a common issue.

[TheDeliveryMan]

-Cheat Menu

This mod is known to break saves beyond repair!

What exactly triggers the save corruption?

https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/fil ... 459602844/

I would assume the issue would be listed under known problems of the mod if it was such a common issue.

As far as I know, just installing the mod, loading and saving a game already breaks it. For details aks on the Egosoft Discord.

[Nanook]

...

As far as I know, just installing the mod, loading and saving a game already breaks it. For details aks on the Egosoft Discord.

The OP's save is not broken. Those are just false readings due to unknown (to us) causes. I see this in my games, too. Failed orders seem to generate weird buy/sell distances. They go away when you delete the failed order and everything goes back to normal. If it's really a bother, submit a bug report to Tech Support.

[Baconnaise]

I will add that I loaded up an older save and I see a distance of 10 on this particular save. My traders get failed orders quite a bit. This save is modded (60ish mods). The rule of thumb has always been 5 sectors for 5 star managers/pilot whatever. TBH it doesn't really matter for my playstyle even if they do unlimited sectors or five. You can plop cheap trade stations. Global orders and fine-tuning how you want multiple traders to function is much more of a PITA in my case.

[wwf4668]

Thanks a lot for the feedback. I will try the suggestion with a new save and observe a bit.
Apart from that, I think the traders work as intended. Traders assigned to older stations with more experienced managers show a maximum range of 5 sectors (visible if they have the failed order). The 10/10 sectors shown for every station seems to be a display error and yes I would guess that it comes from the cheat menu. Unfortunately, I really need this mod to keep the Xenon alive. Once in a while i spawn a couple of Ks in their sectors to prevent them from being invaded and wiped out.

Thanks a lot again.

[Baconnaise]

The 10/10 sectors shown for every station seems to be a display error and yes I would guess that it comes from the cheat menu. Unfortunately, I really need this mod to keep the Xenon alive.

If I had to guess, that would be mine as well since that's the only mod you listed that we share. I wouldn't get rid of it either, as you can use it to move jump gates, alter faction ownership, and delete stations. I tend to customize factions or flat-out remove them, such as ToA and Timelines, as I find them useless to my playthroughs. It's a great swiss army knife for the game as we lack a console/dev console and a more robust custom start setup.

[Mookau]

-Cheat Menu

... So nothing that should mess with station AI or settings.

Decided to take a look at it out of curiousity, cheat menu is at fault here.

The responsible cheat menu code:

Code: Select all

	<replace sel="/aiscript/order/params/param[@name='maxbuy']">
		<param name="maxbuy" default="0" type="number" text="{1041, 10054}">
			<input_param name="startvalue" value="0"/>
			<input_param name="min" value="10"/>
			<input_param name="max" value="10"/>
			<input_param name="step" value="1"/>
		</param>
	</replace>
	<replace sel="/aiscript/order/params/param[@name='maxsell']">
		<param name="maxsell" default="0" type="number" text="{1041, 10057}">
			<input_param name="startvalue" value="0"/>
			<input_param name="min" value="10"/>
			<input_param name="max" value="10"/>
			<input_param name="step" value="1"/>
		</param>
	</replace>

As far as it permanently breaking saves - From my own modding experience, I can say that mods certainly have that potential.
For example you change the position of a turret on a ship via a mod, and then buy that ship in game, it will have the turret moved. However removing the mod will not change the turret position on that ship back. Newly built ships will have the correct position, but anything touched by the mod will remain broken.
Anything ephemeral a mod alters will eventually be 'fixed' by nature of it being replaced. But anything permanent (like a faction) may be irrevocably broken.

Cheat menu in particular touches on several base game scripts referencing individual line numbers - this means that it's not resilient to version changes, or even having other mods installed that touch on the same scripts. It also appears to insert its own scripts that mimic base game scripts with minor alterations, instead of patching the base script logic itself.

From what I've heard from other players, cheat menu can cause Xenon to supply all wares instead of their normal wares of ore/silicon/ecells, causing them to slowly come to an economic standstill and die off as they pick up wares they can't use. I have also heard that it can cause ships to stop moving entirely. Briefly looking into the mod files I can see that it touches on advanced trade routines (which have a default ware list of "all wares") as well as move-wait orders (with an awful lot of hard coded line changes).

So while I can't say with certainty that it breaks anything, I'd consider avoiding it when starting your next playthrough just to be safe.

Unfortunately, I really need this mod to keep the Xenon alive.

If cheat menu breaking the Xenon economy logic is true, it could actually explain why you're having trouble keeping them alive.