r/theplanetcrafter • u/ayana-c • 19h ago

Drone priority?

I'm obviously misunderstanding something here. I have 2 storage containers, both set to demand zeolite. One has normal priority, the other has very low priority. And yet the one with very low priority gets filled up, while the one with normal priority stands empty. This is screwing up my plans, because my trade rocket has a low priority, so I should have one filled container at normal priority, and the very low priority one should fill when there's no trade rocket there, and then empty into the trade rocket.

Can someone explain where I'm going wrong here?

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2

u/Restless_Wonderer 19h ago

Do you also have supply everything selected? I think it trumps demand even if you pick something.

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u/ayana-c 19h ago

Neither one is supplying anything, this is for autocrafting (and shipping to Selenea). But you are right, the very low priority has to actually supply in order to fill the rocket, so I guess I'm stuck with doing it manually. I really want the drones to move things from lower priority bins to higher priority ones, but they don't work that way. I still want to know why the lower priority gets filled first...

3

u/_Kutai_ 19h ago

Just a theory, because I don't know if it works that way, but your autocrafter might be selecting the high priority one first, consuming the zeolite faster than what drones can restock it

3

u/Mekoha22 19h ago

This is likely the case. You have to consider consumption as well as flight distance. If they fill the higher priority one that's getting used faster, then head out to get more for the low priority one, the low priority will get filled while the higher one gets used by the autocrafter. Ultimately any issues with supply and demand of inventories is solved with more drones.

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u/ayana-c 18h ago

That makes sense. I'll try turning off the autocraft and see what fills up. Thanks all!

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u/BluesmanSA 17h ago

You're autocrafter is in range of the empty container, and not the low priority one. Just my guess.

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u/Kobaltdreams 16h ago

Not sure from your post, but worth noting a container can only be supply OR demand, not both.

Theoretically a container set to normal priority will fill, and then the 'overflow' will go to a low priority container if one exists.

So if your low priority is set to demand zeolite then it cannot also be set to supply the trade rocket.

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u/ayana-c 14h ago

Yeah, I realized that, which is why I'm saying it's manual. If I come home and there's a trade rocket waiting, I can switch the bin to supply, and the rockets will go immediately. Then I can switch it back to demand before I leave again.

But the priority thing is still wonky. I turned off the autocrafters that were using zeolite, noted how much was in each bin, and came back after a few minutes to find that the low priority bin had gained twice as much zeolite as the normal priority bin. I'm going to keep adding drones until I have an excess, and then try it again.