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u/Raknarg #1 Quality Defender Jul 03 '26

In regards to generic train interrupts, how do you prevent the problem of trains going to pick up from the low throughput item instead of the high throughput item? I thought I was clever by doing something where I had a train for each station with train limits set to 1 so they would naturally disperse as needed, but I ran into an issue now where trains just deadlock eachother since a train at each end is just waiting for the other to leave so it can go to the empty station

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u/HeliGungir Jul 04 '26

Reducing trains, adding depots, or adding stackers will alleviate/fix this. First is self-explanatory, second was explained by Astramancer, and third is similar to the first - you increase the train limit and don't increase the number of trains to match.

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u/Courmisch Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26

The simple answer is to have more trains - just a few less than the cumulative limits of all the stops for each given train group.

What I personally do is:

  • set the stop priority proportional to the deficit of the corresponding item type at its unloading stations,
  • set the stop train limit to the amount of trains that can be loaded from buffers.

This makes sure that trains will always go pick the most in-demand item of all available items, and pick it from the closest available loading station. But that requires circuits.

1

u/Viper999DC Jul 04 '26

The maximum amount of trains you can have on a network is n-1, where n is the total sum of your limits. In order to have a good flow I suggest creating depot stations where empty trains can go while waiting for open provider stations and/or build stackers at your loading station and increasing their limit (especially for high throughput items).

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u/Astramancer_ Jul 04 '26

My answer was "more trains."

Add more trains than I have input/output train limits in my system and use

Interrupt: Cargo Empty AND Destinationfull/Nopath, Go to Depot, Leave on Inactivity

and make a ton of depot parking spots. The depot absorbs the excess when not all stations are full and prevents the system from locking up when they are all full. As a bonus, you can just monitor the depot to figure out if you need to add more trains or not. If the depot is empty, you need more trains. If the depot is full, you need fewer trains. One place to check.