what is the point of category limits?

[CathyM]

Hi, all-
I know this is a dumb question, but I don't quite understand what the limits section is about - why wouldn't I just set ALL my limits to 1000000?? Which I basically do and don't see any side effects. Is there an advantage to having lower limits on categories? All it seems to do is make the worker stop working...

Thanks for being patient with a novice!

[brads3]

several reasons. u forget this worker doesn't just stop working.he becomes a laboerer.this can be very handy to have,depends what you are trying to get done. more laborers can clear land for construction faster.

        also if the limit is high,the workplace can use up materials. if your wood cutter is trying to hit the max,you will run out of logs. if all your food is going to make ale,you can have a food shortrage. if all your logs are being cut into lumber,what will you build houses with? if all the iron ore is being used to make tools,opps none to make iron to build with.

     at the start, i increase, textiles since i have Necora's trapping, and herbs. after that ,much depends on my start and what i plan to do. with my mod order,i can not let my wood cutter hit the limit. since i need these logs for building,i usually manually slows him down. thatch is under the firewood limit. if you hit the firewood limit,construction projects slow down. after i have more workers, i begin to increase my clothing.usually this is my trade good for seeds.

       plus if the bannies are short of materials, the alert beep goes off. the higher the limits,the more this beep will go off for each flag.

[Nilla]

I agree with Brad. Especially at the beginning of a game, it's a good and easy way to use the limit to have enough firewood and tools without running out of the raw material that can be used elsewhere. But for me, the main reason to slowly increase the limits as the game goes and not set them high from the start is the last thing Brad talks about; all these warnings that you're short of something are annoying when you don't really have a shortage. You can turn these "bings" off but I like to have these reminders when they really mean that I'm slowly running out of tools or something else.

But.....

With game-changing mods, with many new products and production chains, it no longer makes sense to use these limits to turn production sites on and off. Often several products are in the same category and you want to continue to produce bricks, even when you have a lot of glass and so on. In such a game it makes sense to set the limits high, not to 999999, I don't want all these warnings but high enough not to reach the limit.

[theonlywanderer]

If you set your limits to unattainable goals, your Bannies will never stop working.

One thing not mentioned, though I've yet to find a definitive answer too, is that Bannies need time off to get the baby making done.   If they are constantly working, they won't have time and your growth rate suffers.  I read this a long time ago somewhere and could be inaccurate, but it sounds logical.

I'm pretty sure happiness and health are also affected by working non stop.  So, you are better off being reasonable with your limits so that your Bannies have some down time.

[Vimes]

Maybe I found another reason as well, as to why you need to be cautious about having unlimited categories.

Not played the game much and I'm using the RKEC full mod. I hadn't bothered with specialised barns and then realised at around 250 population that glancing at the food production, more than the consumption, was not enough. My barns had become clogged with items produced with that mod that were not food items slowly over time. The result was my food production at the time of crisis was still up but its storage was measure in fractions, it clicked when I saw the warning for low food and then a screen full of knives and forks.
Since that incident I've started to use specialised storage and also try and figure out the limits on certain production items that would otherwise just clog up the food storage barns.
Whilst buffers could be needed for certain events that can occur (?) too much isn't a good thing. I don't see a point on wearing out tools quickly either.
Perhaps my thoughts might change over time, this is the first time that I have played the game.

[Nilla]

I´m pretty sure, @theonlywanderer that your theories belong in the category "Banished myths". All Bannis stop working from time to time to do other important things like idling, eat something, warm up when they are cold, fill their houses with supply and I suppose making babies even if it´s not shown. If they have a lot to do or nothing doesn´t matter. It´s right that people who have nothing to do idle, what else can they do but they don´t make children when they idle, they simply stand at an attractive spot chatting with others or just "dreaming away".

If they have work or not has nothing to do with happiness and health, not even in the"sharps" mods from @Tom Sawyer and @Discrepancy. Maybe you´ve read something that mixes things up because if people are unhappy or have poor health they work less, instead they idle or go to the herbalist (even if you have no herbalist) but this has nothing to do with the production limits or occupation of your Bannis.

@Vimes, I think you have identified the most important, difficult and interesting aspect of Banished; logistic and location. Sometimes setting limits may prevent you from filling the barns with stuff that only take space away from things you need, like tools but sometimes it doesn´t. Like the example of brick and glass in my last post. Low limits may also increase this problem: if you have set a low limit for clothing and the tailor stops producing, it may very well happen that your barns in sheep pasture areas will bill full of wool and have no room for food or your forest barns are full of leather. But these are the things that make Banished such an interesting game, you can play it for years and still learn to optimize your gameplay. There´s no "right" way to do something, everything depends on the circumstances.

[Vimes]

@Nilla I agree, perhaps more so with mods like RKEC, as they add many more commodities to the game.
Balance is essential, even tho you can have specialised barns and storage piles.
Without labouring the point I did like LIF when it was possible to easily padlock items in your storage to be locked or not so that the villagers would have no access or full.
The challenge can be somewhat helped with the RKEC mod by using the specialised barn storages and granneries, which just accept food items.

All good fun, most of the time. Lol

[CathyM]

Thanks, all, for the answers! I see that I have a lot to learn about this game, especially logistics. I am running into some of the problems you mentioned, and now I understand a bit more about why. (Sorry this reply was late; I wasn't able to get to this site for a while, due to other stuff).