Can't build ships.

[ceselb (OP)]

I have a big problem.  This is my second game.  I keep having problems with designing ships.  Takes forever to get them to show up in the shipyard after designing them.  First two times it took well over a year.  This time I did two at once and it's now been over 2 years and they still don't show up.

Wiki or forum doesn't specify what you actually need to do to save your design.  I lock the design and also press save under the "DAC / Rank / Information".  I don't know if that is needed, but the first times I kept going back every 30 days to check and I fiddled with a lot of things, so I don't know.  Those two were what finally made it appear.  But not this time.

The wiki/forum thread needs updating too.  Either to state that it takes a long time or what to actually do to get the design finalized.

When I registered here I got an email saying this: "Before you can login and start using the forum, your request will be reviewed and approved.   When this happens, you will receive another email from this address. "
I haven't gotten such an email yet but I can still post here it seems.  So either it doesn't need to be reviewed anymore or the mail simply isn't going out.  Either way, something needs to be fixed.

[Erik L]

Your shipyards need to have sufficient capacity for the designs to show.

As for the second email, I have a choice; Approve, or Approve and Send Email. I usually approve without the email.

[ceselb (OP)]

The two variants, grav and geo ships that I designed are 1150 ton each.  All yards are above 5000 tons.  Those were finalized 2. 5 years ago now.  The third ship is 30000 tons, but I have one yard of that size.  That's over a year ago now as well.

Look here, the refit list is empty:


EDIT: For some reason I can't get the image to post, or even show up in preview.  Maybe the bbcode implementation is broken or something? Direct link.

EDIT2: Something is really screwy, forum just ate that link.  *Sighs. * Oh well, I'll just post it without any bbcode fluff, just paste it in and have a look.   ceselb. myftp. org/shipyard. png

EDIT3: Apparently the forum puts an extra space after each period for every edit, making my post look very odd indeed.  Fixed, but I won't fiddle more with this now.

[Ziusudra]

(The forum stuff is spam prevention.)

The shipyards can only refit to or construct an assigned class or eligible additional classes.

In the Shipyard Complex Activity section choose Retool for Selected Class and choose the 30k ton class.

[ceselb (OP)]

Please see the link to the image I posted.  That list is empty.  (Unless you mean something else than 'Economy -> Manage shipyards'.  I don't have anything called Shipyard Complex Activity).

[Thiosk]

Ok i'm not ENTIRELY sure what the issue is, but we'll go with this:

Your shipyards have no class asigned.  Instead of looking down in the refit section, where its blank, look up top:

Task type: no activity.

Set it to: retool shipard for selected class, select the class.  It will instantly retool because its the first design, and then you'll instantly be able to begin construction down below.


A yard can be retooled, for a nontrivial cost and time.


note:  "the shipyard complex activity" section is in that window you linked.  
The top third is the list of yards.  middle is "shipyard complex activity".  bottom is "create shipyard task"

The wiki could stand a substantial rewrite.  But I for one am working on my graduate thesis, and don't have time to do anything  .  However, once thats done, i may have time to get in there and do it-- as you figure stuff out, consider it as well!   

[Ziusudra]

I've drawn a red box around the control where you choose Retool. Once Retool is selected a list of classes small enough for that shipyard will appear just to the right of that.

[ceselb (OP)]

The one on the last third, 'task type -> refit to' is functionally identical I belive.  It's the one I used in my first game when I managed to build two different designs.

Anyway, that list is also empty.  ceselb. myftp. org/shipyard2. png

[Ziusudra]

The one on the last third, 'task type -> refit to' is functionally identical I belive.  It's the one I used in my first game when I managed to build two different designs.

No, "Refit to" changes an existing, already built ship to a different class. "Retool" changes the shipyard.

Is the class marked as obsolete on the F5 Class Design window? Are there any Design Errors listed on the Design View tab of the same window?

[Erik L]

EDIT3: Apparently the forum puts an extra space after each period for every edit, making my post look very odd indeed.  Fixed, but I won't fiddle more with this now.

That's a spam prevention measure. Once you hit 10 posts your urls won't be munged.

[ceselb (OP)]

No, "Refit to" changes an existing, already built ship to a different class.  "Retool" changes the shipyard.

Well, that's odd in that case.  But no, that is empty as per my image.

Is the class marked as obsolete on the F5 Class Design window?

No, it's not.  Besides, that would involve me having put that checkmark there myself, right? I'm not that stupid.

Are there any Design Errors listed on the Design View tab of the same window?

There were none when I built it.  Can't see now, since I locked the design thinking that was the problem.  Are you saying it doesn't need to be locked to show up in the shipyard then?

[Thiosk]

it locks automatically when you tool the shipyard for the first time.

[Ziusudra]

As far as I know there are only three reasons a class won't show up in the Retool list: marked obsolete, too big for the yard, or a military class on a commercial yard.

Your Shipyard #2 is commercial, is the class? The last line of the summary on the Class Design window should read: "This design is classed as a Commercial Vessel for maintenance purposes".

The class does not need to be locked (which is kind of counter intuitive.) I don't think design errors make a difference, I asked that as a shot in the dark.

Have you tried the Retool for either of your other designs on the other shipyards?

[ceselb (OP)]

Ofcourse the one I had selected was a commercial.  I hadn't seen those.  I thought they were invisible or something like the ships they produce for the civilian companies.
Great, spent 5 years upgrading the wrong yard.  Now it'll take another 5 years to upgrade the right one to 30k tons.
I wonder what happened last game then as I did a non-whatever start and only built normal military yards.  A whole lot of trouble then too.

[Thiosk]

This game is a puzzle at first.  Theres so many little things.  The first several games were a waste for me, too, but now i'm having a wonderful game that is playing just the way i want it to.  Stick with it!  And we're here to sort out the crazy.