Workers should immediately stop mining gold and mine stone if told to do so

[Pizza90]

Sorry for the title, I couldn't find a better way to explain it. So let me try here. After years of MG playing MG I just realized that workers mining gold, if told to start mining stone (or vice versa) they don't immediately follow your order. At first I thought it was a bug but then after more observation I realized that it will eventually do it. I think this is counter-intuitive and a bit annoying, especially if you are in a frantic part of the game.

--What happens now--
1 worker is mining gold
2 you tell it to mine stone
3 worker keeps mining gold until he reached his maximum load
4 transport it to the base
5 starts mining stone

--What should happen-- (which is what happens when a worker harvest wood and you tell it to start mining)
1 worker is mining gold
2 you tell it to mine stone
3 worker stops mining gold
4 transport it to the base whatever amount it has harvested
5 starts mining stone

[andy_5995]

My perception of that is that it's more of a bug than a feature request. One shouldn't have to wait until a load is complete before you reassign a worker.

[Pizza90]

Oops I think you are right  ;D I just thought maybe it was an intended thing since nobody reported it before (afaik). Can someone move this to the bug section?

[andy_5995]

It's fine where it's at until it's reviewed by titi. I was just expressing my opinion about it, not saying you posted in the wrong forum xD

[andy_5995]

I realized that a worker will immediately stop mining gold if he's told to move to an empty location. So the quickest way to get a worker to stop mining gold and start mining stone is to select the workers, right click an area near the stone, then right click the stone. That's not as intuitive as it should be, but workable (no pun intended).

Some additional info...

I saw this bit about "HarvestEmergencyReturnCommandType" in types/command_type.cpp (last line)

CommandTypeFactory::CommandTypeFactory(){
        registerClass<StopCommandType>("stop");
        registerClass<MoveCommandType>("move");
        registerClass<AttackCommandType>("attack");
        registerClass<AttackStoppedCommandType>("attack_stopped");
        registerClass<BuildCommandType>("build");
        registerClass<HarvestCommandType>("harvest");
        registerClass<RepairCommandType>("repair");
        registerClass<ProduceCommandType>("produce");
        registerClass<UpgradeCommandType>("upgrade");
        registerClass<MorphCommandType>("morph");
        registerClass<SwitchTeamCommandType>("switch_team");
        registerClass<HarvestEmergencyReturnCommandType>("harvest_return");
}

I searched a bit and found that the "harvest_return" command is the only command that is never used in any xml data files. I experimented a little but couldn't get it to show up on a worker menu.

[jammyjamjamman]

Although I agree this is probably a bug, I really like the fact that workers don't immediately abandon mining gold/ stone in favour of the stone/ gold. The reason is because when you send workers to get wood instead, your stored resources is no longer a multiple of 5 and calculating how much stuff you can afford becomes a pain  :O . (Also messes with my OCD.)