Mineral transport

[Barkhorn (OP)]

I finally have a good game going, with my first extra solar colonies up and running, and I've got a problem.  I can't figure out a good way to transport minerals through jump gates.  Mass drivers can't do it, there's no way to tell civilian shipping lines to do it, and I'm not sure how to set up my freighters to automatically carry minerals from the mining colonies to my factories.  I've been just keeping careful track of all the minerals I'm mining and manually sending a freighter to pick them up, but there must be a better way.  I can't imagine managing an empire as large as the ones described in the fiction section of the forum.

In a related question, there doesn't seem to be a good way to automate fuel harvesters either.  If I use the "When fuel tanks full, unload fuel at colony" conditional order, they just go and unload at the nearest colony, which is practically guaranteed to be an auto mine, not some place I want lots of fuel.

[Nathan_]

Cycle orders is the answer to both questions. Have your fleet where you want the minerals/fuel to be delivered to, order it to go pick up the cargo and return it, order it to refuel, and lastly click cycle orders. this re-adds completed orders to the orders list at the bottom.

[Barkhorn (OP)]

But cycling orders will waste fuel because the mines don't work fast enough to stockpile enough to fill a freighter in the time it takes to make one round trip.  It's especially problematic for the fuel harvesters because they work so painfully slow.

[Erik L]

But cycling orders will waste fuel because the mines don't work fast enough to stockpile enough to fill a freighter in the time it takes to make one round trip.  It's especially problematic for the fuel harvesters because they work so painfully slow.

Instead of "Load All Minerals" use the "Load xx Minerals" Then the ship will wait for the amount specified. But I also believe that is per mineral.

[Barkhorn (OP)]

So basically I need 1 freighter per mineral type?

Really this should be something you can contract out to the civilians.  They should ship minerals based on supply and demand, but instead of you making taxes off it, it would cost you money.

And is there any solution for the fuel harvester problem?

[Erik L]

Not necessarily. If you mine 200 duranium per month, and 150 vendarite per month, set those as your limits, and stack the orders.

Load 200 Duranium
Load 150 Vendarite
Move to Earth
Unload all minerals
Refuel (useful in all cycle type orders)
Move to mining planet

[Barkhorn (OP)]

Alright, I guess if I want to not have the cargo bay almost empty each trip I'll just have to have them wait longer.  Or make smaller freighters.

[Erik L]

Small freighters. That way you have a constant supply coming in, rather than a burst.

One thing I do is make a depot colony near a JP. All minerals mined in that system get tossed to that colony via mass driver. Then it's just one stop.

[Barkhorn (OP)]

Now, is there a way to do a similar thing, but for fuel harvesters?  I've been trying to harvest fuel from gas giants in my colonial systems so I can have fuel there and not have to ship it in from Earth.  But as I said the conditional order for unload fuel just dumps the stuff on the nearest colony, which is often some dumb auto mine.

[NihilRex]

Not really.  I just wait for the "Harvesters over 90%" message and do it by hand.

[Barkhorn (OP)]

Oh so I at least get an event in the event log for that?  I thought I had to just babysit the things.  That's not so bad I guess.

[Nathan_]

But cycling orders will waste fuel because the mines don't work fast enough to stockpile enough to fill a freighter in the time it takes to make one round trip.  It's especially problematic for the fuel harvesters because they work so painfully slow.

You can manage fuel usage vs amount of stuff delivered by slowing down your freighters and tankers while they are enroute.