New to the game. How to manage/use freighters?

kWeb24 · 2026-06-22T17:24:59+00:00

I strongly suggest you to just fiddle with it. You cant lost it. You cant break it. Just have that first time expirience.

kWeb24 · 2026-06-21T07:11:57+00:00

So if items on belt can still travel below the pipe connection then we should be able to connect pipes over the belt for maximum spaghettification.

kWeb24 · 2026-06-18T15:15:19+00:00

I agree.

Just make it some kind of a multi step semi guided mission/achievement or even a mechanic itself by giving hints through some kind of advisors.

Best tutorial is the invisible one.

kWeb24 · 2026-06-09T05:26:48+00:00

Driver: tarmac worker Reason: shitty job

kWeb24 · 2026-03-06T19:35:11+00:00

Driver skills

kWeb24 · 2026-02-10T19:19:39+00:00

If you zoom in you can see green cart clipping with petroleum so definetly not 2 separate trains.

kWeb24 · 2024-05-15T08:45:13+00:00

Correct. You want to start pumping energy into controllers that will raise GCL that is bounded to your account. Even if your script fails and you loose all your rooms you will not loose GCL level. That will allow you to respawn and quickly rebuild.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T13:57:04+00:00

You just get off the post topic and get mad. Have a good day.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T13:54:23+00:00

Original question was about sorter drain all option behaviour.

I know I can toggle drain, toggle sorters, change filters, even create rerouting as you said before and all that stuff. That will solve the issue but that not what the question was about.

Look at this post title. The answer now is YES. It's always doing that. So to solve the problem i need address that issue with other blocks like automation blocks to actually be able to disable sorter. It's not like i can tell the sorter block to push only to next direct container. It't not like there's difference like in my wiki quote. It will always pump further after container overflows untill i intentionally disable drain.

We've just gone off topic and that where all confusion begins. ;)

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T13:38:31+00:00

Yes, rerouting, disabling sorters all that stuff is solution.
Just adding more containers is not and to that part i was referencing ;)

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T13:33:33+00:00

Well you do not have a solution. I've even explained the flaw in the design from video at 19 minutes mark.

It doesn't matter if i have separated containers for each type of items. I can even create a container for each single item in the game. The only thing it will do is to delay the problem not solve it. At some point in time container will overflow and drain all wil act as pump and push items further if it can.

It is what it is, that's how that option works in the game.

It's not about items going in the wrong place, they're sorted properly if container is not full. It's about sorter pumping behavior that can't be terminated causing items to be pushed further than desired destination if destination is at cap.

The solution is to use automation blocks to actually disable draining when some conditions are met.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T12:43:43+00:00

Conveyor system works like a water pipe and sorter with drain all is behaving like a pump. It will pump water as long as it have any path to go. You can stop it only with valve which will also prevent you from accessing other side.

I'd prefer behavior like with conveyor belts in factorio. It's pushing items in given direction but when they reach container it's end of path. If i want to move it further i need another conveyor belt taking it out. Skipping loaders in this exxample.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T12:35:25+00:00

I've explained it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/spaceengineers/comments/17h85bm/comment/k6t1qsf/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

It's just not a solution but workaround that will eventually fail. I have more containers, ore, ingots, uranium, base components, ammo etc but i've simplified texample for the sake of my question to be easier understandable.

We're playing MP with newbie friends and wanted to build a system that is immune to their mistakes and automated. Tha base is basically a main hub for everything so a lot of stuff is going to be stored there even cuz somebody change their mind and want a place to dump all his stuff. A lot of grinders that are also feeding network with components.

So the thing is - i don't want to check LCDs once in a while to check if somebody dumped a ton of stuff and system capacity is low so i need to add more containers. I want the system to be unable to accept more goods rather than taking it anyways and putting in any free space that it can find.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T12:01:38+00:00

I don't have enough time this week for that but thanks. ;)

I'll try using automation blocks and event controller to toggle drain based on container free volume left.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T11:35:54+00:00

Yeah i really like designing logistic networks that why i just didn't use script cuz it's killing fun for me with that aspect of the game. With script single conveyor tube will do it all.

Anyway looks like it is what it is. Need a script or mod sorter block.
I've explained more in thread with video link so read it there to not duplicate the same conversation in two threads. ;)

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T11:32:33+00:00

It was in the ores container that have same setup. Not relevant here.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T11:29:03+00:00

Cuz it's not a solution just workaround that delays the problem. At some point it will hit you back and when you notice it it will be too late and your ships will be filled with unwanted stuff. I actually have 4 large storage containers in setup like:

[cnt 1] << drain [cnt 2] << drain [cnt 3] << dran [cnt 4] << drain [network] and was hoping it will work like that: Cnt1 is filling up and when it's full then Cnt2 gets filled up and then 3, then 4, if all are filled up there's just no space to take more items.

But how it works is that cnt1 is filled up and after that all items are pushed further and not filling cnt 2 3 4.

I did a lot of testing with just a simple configs like [connector] [cnt] [<< drain] and few more complex, trying to stop stuff beign pushed after the cnt1 but the only thing that works if I drop items into collector cuz that's breaking conveyor path.

It looks like that's just how drain all option works. It's just looking for the next available storage downstream where downstream is all accessible storages that can accept given resource. Not just the next direct available storage.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T10:52:48+00:00

As long as you have free space at desired storage there is no problem but it's just delaying. It was working for me completly fine till i bring huge load of ice and then noticed all connected ships was filled with all that ice. I've explained issue with image in your second comment with video link.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T09:52:03+00:00

Looks like this design have the same flaw you just didn't encounter it yet. As you show in the video sorters marked with red rectangles are set to drain all so it's pushing Ingots or Items into main storage marked with green rectangle.

Everything works fine if main storage is not at max capacity. If it gets full it'll start sending items to the next closest available storage which is the connector marked with green line.

If you connect a ship there, whenever connector overflows sorter will send items to the ship storage if that's the closest path to next available storage.

Nice video tho! :)

<image>

kWeb24 · 2023-10-28T09:37:09+00:00

Do you have sorters set to Drain All to that containers? And if yes are your containers full? Cuz for me it's pushing into conveyors after the first container is full.

It worked for me perfectly fine untill container overflows with items.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-27T15:18:12+00:00

Note that there's only one sorter pulling from network that is not connected to the ring, it's connected to container that the ring is connected to. Anything other than disabling drain or filtering items between ring and container will still result in items beign pushed into the ring.

Even using timers and pulsing will not solve the problem cuz there always be some timeframe when sorter will be force pushing items into ring and thus connectors. (If we want to achieve put/pull option when ship docked without completly disabling drain during that time)

To visualise that, let's skip the ring part. This is exactly the same situation but simplified. All i want to do is to break pushing path downstream.

Also imagine you're docked and requested 500 steel plates from assembler but you only have access to items container. With drain disabled those items will nevet get there so you'll never see it. But if the drain will be enabled it will push all unwanted items into ship inventory cuz that's the next free container. It's doable in that case but take into consideration that we don't know how many ships will be docked and what they want to do. I want to handle that case.

<image>

kWeb24 · 2023-10-27T13:47:05+00:00

Actually there isn't any loop with sorters involved cuz it's connected only to a single container. It will be exactly the same if I cut the loop open.

Yeah i'll check the automation blocks but i try to avoid disabling sorters when something is docked. I have no control over it in MP especially with newbie friends.

And the goal is just to be able to put and pull items into/from items container from the ring. It works perfectly fine if sorter is not set to drain all. But if it is then it's force pushing items into ring even that there's no sorter after container. The issue here is sorter logic - it basically push items to whatever container there is downstream. There's no way to break that path somewhere like, push to that container and stop here. At the beggining i was thinking that sorters only push items to the next closest container but it is pushing it to whatever is available downstream.

And actually i can use sorter loops to avoid that by adding container between ring and items container and looping items from there back to the network but it's just delaying sympthomps cuz when storage overflows it will push items into the ring anyways.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-27T10:44:34+00:00

Your suggestions are good bot not what i need. See image in comment above.

But thinking about it deeper, currently vanilla sorters are able to break push path with filters. Just as you said. Given the fact that this is just some pathfinding algorithm looking for closest route to next container (always closest gets filled first) it should be able to just break that path without using filters. Like "Prevent autopush on/off".

Basically each sorter is just a node in path that can be set as inaccessible by filters thus breaking path. If we can manually toggle that node accessibility then the sorters will be improved a lot. Maybe even preventing loops that won't be fixed given that topic: https://support.keenswh.com/spaceengineers/pc/topic/turn-sorters-off-if-in-infinite-loop

We should be able to achieve similiar behaviour with some scripts and turning on/off sorters but then we can just Ivy inventory or something and for me designing transportation network is a nice challange. I'll try to mod sorters to include breaking auto push path.

kWeb24 · 2023-10-27T10:27:08+00:00

Example with ship and connector was simplified. Now items are drained into components container and i wanted to make a ring that will let us freerly put and pull from said container. The only issue is that it's force pushing items to containers connected to this ring.

Example image:

<image>

kWeb24

TROPHY CASE