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[Maximus]

I finally got a bookkeeper in my current fortress, and had my metalsmiths start melting some scrap objects.  I last tried out melting objects several versions ago, where just about everything could be turned back into 1 metal bar.

Now it seems like melting objects only produces a bar sporadically.  I got nothing back from melting a steel shield, steel boot, copper dagger, iron leggings, or silver hammer, and got only 10 bars back from melting 13 suits of bronze plate mail.

I hope this isn't intended behavior, or else melting is pretty boned now.

[Pacho]

It has always been that way.  You only get a fraction of the metal back.  Each smelter keeps track of the fractions and keeps adding to the number until it has enough to give you a bar.  Meaning that if an item gives you 1.5 bars of metal the .5 is not lost after it gives you one bar, it will wait until you give it .5 more so it can give you a whole bar.

I don't know how clear that is =|  However, it has always been like this.

[bbb]

...what's really weird is that they said they can't find things to melt...

yet i can still see stuff in stock screen set to be melt (haven't checked if they are still "unowned" though)

wonder if they are in bins/what not..

... they are... of course... narrow/small/large stuff left behind by goblins/etc..

----
wonder if they are in bins or what... some of the stuff were definitely melted

[ December 20, 2006: Message edited by: bbb ]

[Maximus]

Awww, nuts.  When I first tested it, it looked like it was 1 bar from 1 item, except for certain items that produced 0 bars.  But now it's clearly not even that.

Got something against recycling, Toady?  

I did much more careful testing this time.  I melted 13 suits of bronze plate and 64 gold goblets.  The suits reduced to 9 bronze bars and the goblets to 12 gold bars.  However, at times I melted 10 goblets before I got another bar, and at other times, only 2.  So the game doesn't keep track of fractional metal bars produced.  It looks like it uses a % chance of a bar being produced, based on the melted item's [MATERIAL_SIZE].

Goblets appear to have a material size of 2, and plate mail has a size of 9.  Based on the above tests, the chance of producing a metal bar from an item is (material_size * 8%), possibly higher (material_size * 10%)?  This produces some pretty cruddy recovery ratios, though, maybe 25% - 30%.

I'm wondering if Toady has some plans to change materials use to match materials size at some point (so a Jet ring won't consume a  300-weight Jet boulder).  I expect that'd require stack-merging to be implemented first.

[Pacho]

quote:Originally posted by Maximus:
<STRONG>So the game doesn't keep track of fractional metal bars produced.  It looks like it uses a % chance of a bar being produced, based on the melted item's [MATERIAL_SIZE].
</STRONG>

I'm fairly certain that it was Toady himself who said that it does keep track of the metal.  Lemme see if I can do a search to get the post.

EDIT:  Blah, I couldn't find it.  I only found the post by Aquillion, but I hardly think that proves anything.  I'm fairly certain reading a post by Toady saying so, but I have horrible memory.  =|

Maybe Toady can clarify this.

[ December 21, 2006: Message edited by: Pacho ]

[Toady One]

Yeah, it works in fractions.  There are no random calls within the procedure.  A goblet should produce 20% of a bar.  Each smelter stores the fractions separately by material.

[darknight]

Even if the recovery percentage sucks, its still a big plus to me, since most of the stuff being melted is being donated by invaders. That means its that much less metal that _I_ have to dig for. Works for me!   let the goblins mine the stuff, and then nicely leave it for me to use.

I am already reusing their weapons. Most of the weapons in the traps just inside the front door were dropped by previous invaders. So I have goblin weapons being used to kill goblin invaders. I smile every time a goblin gets impaled by one of their own swords!

[Areyar]

On another tangent:

I designated all narrow iron items to be molten down, but they have now been placed inside bins, which removes the dump/forbid/melt tags.

It seems this is not just a GUI thing, because my smelter has cancelled the repeating 'melt object' order now that all visible objects are molten.

This seems a bug to me.

Are items inside bins invisible to search routines?

[Draco18s]

quote:Originally posted by Areyar:
<STRONG>Are items inside bins invisible to search routines?</STRONG>

Go into the bin, hit enter on the item.  It may be still marked for melting (this is how you'd check), if it isn't, hit M and return to the bin contents and repeat.

[Awayfarer]

quote:Originally posted by Maximus:
[QB]
I did much more careful testing this time.  I melted 13 suits of bronze plate and 64 gold goblets.  The suits reduced to 9 bronze bars and the goblets to 12 gold bars.  However, at times I melted 10 goblets before I got another bar, and at other times, only 2.  So the game doesn't keep track of fractional metal bars produced.  It looks like it uses a % chance of a bar being produced, based on the melted item's [MATERIAL_SIZE]. [QB]

Do you have more than one smelter? IIRC each smelter keeps track of their own partial bars.

[Nesoo]

You, uh... might want to check the date on the post you're responding to...

[Awayfarer]

D'oh!

[Jay]

quote:Originally posted by Awayfarer:
<STRONG>D'oh!</STRONG>

No, you were fine.  It was Areyar that necro'd big-time.

[Areyar]

ah sorry. the risks of searching for and jacking a thread that looks related.

and I checked, some was marked [m] other stuff wasn't, probably some old stuff put in bins before I started the last (cancelled) melt order. The marked stuff from the latest ambush.

[Pickerel]

This leaves me with a question.  Does the smelter keep track of items when creating them as well?

Example: a goblet is size 2, so produces 20% of a bar, and is kept track of in the smelter.  Now lets say I want to take a gold bar and make a goblet.  Does it only use up 20% of that bar, keeping the other 80% 'stored' in the smelter for later item production?  And were I to then designate another goblet, would it make one without consuming another gold bar, instead using 20% more of the original?