Pips do this:
In honor of the series, and because we have probably really figured it out by now, and because there is still confusion, here is Everything You Need to Know About Pip Planting.
Thanksfor the discoveries and shares along the way@Coolthulhu, @abud, @snoozer, @shuuny,@Lurve,@Gurgel, @Promethien, @OxCD, @bzgzd, @suxkar, @vascoegertklei, @mathmanican@Tobruk@Ketmol and many people I missed.
1. Planting rules.
Pips will consider planting a seed in a tile under these conditions:
- The tile has no more than 2 other plants in a square 6 left, 6 down, 5 right, 5 up from the tile.
- It is either a "natural tile" of less than 150 hardness, a farm tile or a hydroponic farm.
- The pip can navigate to the seed and the tile, and there must beno buildings obstructing the plant's location.
- The atmosphericpressure is greater than 100g.
- The atmospheric temperature is around ±50C to ±100C of the requirements of the plant.
If you can't figure out why your pip isn't planting, it is always rule #1.
Details:
Spoiler
Rule 1:
The range is from the TILE to the PLANT.
- Here, "plant" means the 1 to 3 tile height that the plants occupies.
- For decorative plants and sleet wheat, it means the 1 tile height that they occupy.
- Most plants including trees are 2 tiles high and branches do not count.
- Thimble Reeds and Pincha Pepperplants are 3 tiles high.
- Decorative and domestic plants count. Because this checks only at the time of planting, and it is a large area, planting order matters.
- Buried seeds do not count, but if a living plant is later entombed in e.g. falling sand, it will count.
Rule 2:
Essentially, all natural tiles except for obsidian, abyssalite and diamond are eligible. They are happy to plant right into "natural" steel tiles. If they plant in a farm tile or hydroponic farm, the plant will be domesticated.
Rule 3:
They can plant hangingplants. Trees need the 1x2 trunk zone, they do not need the branches area to be free. There is probably a maximum pathing range, but about 25 tiles distance still works. After that it might be too slow so you will want to move the seeds closer.
Rule 4:
Any gas or liquid seems to work as long as the mass is more than 100g above the tile.
Rule 5:
The temperature of the tile doesn't matter, just the atmosphere. A couple of examples
Sleet Wheat: -155C to +85C
Bristle Blossom: -55C to 125C
2. Optimal Horizontal Spacing
The 3x3. Highest density pattern. This 15 tile span has 9 plants, or 60% density.
Start out as shown, then remove each ladder starting from the right, waiting for the plant to take its place.
The 1x1. This 15 tile span has 8 plants: 53% density. At long distances these two will be about even, but the 3x3 is nicer for placing buildings anyway.
The Tree One. (UK spelling: The 3-1) Place a 2 space gap every third tree.
This pattern allows for maximum branch density. The 4 middleladders must be left there until all trees mature. This will ensure that the outer trees grow 4 branches on their exclusive spots, and the middle will be available for the middle tree to fill in. These spots are the outside 4.
If you mess it up, you can still prune (dig) the middle branches out and they will respawn until you get maximum density.
3. Vertical Spacing
For maximum density for normal plants go top to bottom to achieve a plant every 5th tile.
For hanging plants go from bottom to top, every 6th tile.
Spoiler
4. How to make "natural" tiles
As always, there are better and worse ways.
The better way.
Yup. You really just deconstruct a door. It needs all 7 tiles surrounding it. It also works when rotated and deconstructed from the right.
The other ways usually involves using vole puke or cooking algae or fertilizer into dirt.
For algae, you can construct/deconstruct storage bins to drop1-10kg of algae into each location.
The Glass Forge.
Now with high efficiency thanks to @abud. Place 5kg algae per tile and set the valve to 2084 (25kg glass / 12).
Original recommendation in the spoiler.
Spoiler
Try 10kg of algae with this. Thanks to @Gurgelfor the numbers. Use your best insulated pipes.
\
If you insulate it, and even if you don't probably, it will continue to cook the neighboring tiles. Here I cooked 5 tiles with the three outputs after some time.
The Tuner/Tepidizer.
You can cook it from belowwith an aquatuner or tricked tepidizer.
Spoiler
shuuny also discusses the vole method in this post.
The Tricked Space Heater.
Cook it from all over.
Spoiler
Be sure to isolate the room. It takes a while. Use low pressure hydrogen (50g). Drop your wires and pipes beforehand.
To make space heaters work above their temperature use either of these circuits:
Metal Refinery and Conveyers.
Spoiler
See this post by OxCD. Very straightforward!
5. But why won't they plant!
Spoiler
It's always rule #1. Here are some examples of problems and how to identify them by applying rule #1.
Spoiler
5-6 plants are below the intended room. Replant from top to bottom:
A third decorative plant on the bottom left:
The trees below are barely in range: trees count from either of their two tiles (some plants are 3 or 1):
Planting inefficiently from bottom to top. Left: the three height plants are in a 6 tile range from above.
Right: the minimum distance for this:
A rare rule #4 issue:
Thanks for reading! Please share if you have found any exceptions or better methods.
