Surviving Mars

Surviving Mars

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NASA Education System Users Guide
By SkiRich
NASA Education System Guide
Mod located here -=> NASA Education System
As of this writing - v2.0 June 17th, 2018 Live now.
A smarter Education System
Curiosity Patch Compatible

Features
  • Idiots are transformed into Gurus** (Settable)
  • Automatic University Shift Controls
  • User controlled "Auto" mode
  • Re-Train already trained Colonists
  • Options to Not Train, To Train and To Re-Train BioRobots including Non-Specialists.
  • Speed Up Graduation in Universities and Sanatoriums
  • Dynamic Game Notification when a colonist graduates School, University or Sanatorium
  • Dynamic Game Notification on Idiot Trained To be a Guru
  • Unique Notification Icons
  • University and Sanatorium colonists graduate faster - Mod Config settable
  • Grade Schools prevent Idiots in all martianborn**
  • Persistent notifications on load game
  • Future proof new specialists.
**Colonists must go through and complete one of the teaching institutions to get their Idiot traits transformed.
   
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Features Explained
Idiots are transformed into Gurus**
Idiot traits are removed upon graduation and replaced with Guru traits. The Nuns are strict.
Grade Schools never graduate Idiots anymore.
Universities change Idiots to Gurus but only for non specialized visitors taking a class.
Sanatoriums change Idiots to Gurus regardless of what they are there to be cured for.
Idiots turned to Gurus displayed in Notifications.
Idiot notification holds the last 10 Idiot to Gurus so you can cycle through them.

Automatic University Shift Controls
With Mod Config installed you can now set the NASA Education System to automatically control shifts. Shifts will be shut down when no more specialists are needed.
You can set this for each shift individually.
If demand for a specialist is present, the shift will automatically turn on.
This feature is off by default allowing you to manually control all shifts.

User controlled "Auto" mode
With Mod Config installed you can now turn off assigning individual specializations when the university is in "Auto" specialization mode.
By default all specialists are trained in "Auto" mode.
See the section on User Controlled Auto mode for more information.

Re-Train already trained Colonists
The game normally does not allow you to re-train colonists. Once they get a specialty thats it. With this mod you can change that and have any colonist that has a specialty set to be re-trained.
See the section on Re-Train Colonists for a how-to.

Graduation Speed Control
You can speed up the rate of Graduation in Universities and Sanatoriums.
Grade schools are age based and are untouched, but no longer graduate Idiots.

Other Features
  • Dynamic Game Notification when a colonist graduates School, University or Sanatorium
  • Dynamic Game Notification on Idiot Trained To be a Guru
  • Unique Notification Icons
  • University and Sanatorium colonists graduate faster - Mod Config settable
  • Grade Schools prevent Idiots in all martianborn**
  • Persistent notifications on load game
  • Future proof new specialists.
**Colonists must go through and complete one of the teaching institutions to get their Idiot traits transformed.
Automatic Shift Controls
With Mod Config installed you can now set the NASA Education System to automatically control shifts.
Shifts will be shut down when no more specialists are needed.
You can set this for each shift individually.
If demand for a specialist is present, the shift will automatically turn on.
This feature is off by default allowing you to manually control all shifts.

When to Use It
If you set a shift for auto, you turn control of that shift in all Martian Universities over to NASA Education System (NES).
NES will check twice a day to see if there is any demand for specialists at 0100 and 1300 hours.
If there is no demand for any specialists at those times then that shift in all Martian Universities is shut down.
The shift will stay closed until there is a demand.
If you manually turn it on, it will get turned off again on the next check.
NES will then be checking twice a day at 0200 and 1400 hours to see if any specialists are needed in the colony.
If demand for specialists is present it will turn on the shift.
The shift will stay on until the demand for specialists is met, then on the next check it will turn off the shift.
If you manually turn on the shift, it will get turned off on the next check.
To manually control the shift again, turn off Automatic Shift Control for that shift.
What constitutes demand? If a specialist retires (turns senior), if specialist dies, if a specialist goes back to earth or if you build new buildings that require specialists.

What happens to all the people in the university when the shifts shut down? They leave and look for jobs as non-specialists, however, they maintain their college credits already earned.
So if they ever come back to the University when its open, or if they find a University or University shift that's available, they will take a much shorter time to graduate.

If a University Building is turned off, the shifts will still be shut down, however if a University building is turned off and the demand is needed it will be turned back on along with the shift.
If a University building is destroyed, demolished or being bulldozed, the NES will not touch it.
If all shifts are turned off, the University will shutdown and appear turned off. This is normal.

This is an all or nothing setting. If you choose to automate a shift then the shift in all Maritian Universities will be automated.
Automatic shift control is not turned on by default. You must set that.
Mod Config settings are saved with the save game and restored on game reload. New games start with this feature disabled.

Why Use this Feature
To understand why I built this you need to understand how specialists are educated at the university.
Read the section on Specialist Graduation Selection and then come back and read below.
Now that you understand how specialists are picked it makes sense to automate some shifts.
At the point you have all the specialists you need for your colony, the Martian University still educates colonists but now randomly assigns the specialty.
This results is you getting specialists you may not need.
By automating some of the shifts, you can slow the rate of making these non-essential specialists.
You may also want to automate all the shifts, so that you always have the maximum amount of specialists and maximum amount of non-specialists, for those non specialists jobs.
By keeping a handy quantity of non-specialists you can always guarantee you can educate someone for when a specialist retires.
There is a counter argument here. By not having any specialists ready to go once a one retires or dies, you need to educate one.
But this mod allows you to quickly do that.
This mod also allows you to retrain already trained specialists.

The choice is up to you to pick the proper combination for your style of gameplay.
I personally automate all the shifts except for one, which keeps a few specialists on reserve.
I automate first and second shift allowing for night school, which is slow since the colonists in that shift tend to go home and sleep during the night.
Perfect for me.

You can combine this style with the following feature, User controlled "Auto" mode.
User Controlled "Auto" Mode
User controlled "Auto" mode is a series of configuration settings allowing you to control which specialist type is assigned upon graduation.
These settings only work when the University is in "Auto" mode.
Read the section Specialist Graduation Selection
When the Martian University has no demand for any specialty in particular and shifts are enabled, the University randomly picks a specialty to assign a graduating colonist.
This results is an excess of specialists you may not need.
For instance, do you have automated farms, then you don't need botanists.
Do you have the extraction tech allowing you to operate extractors without workers? Then you don't need Geologists.
You can turn those specialties off and prevent the University from assigning those specialties upon graduation when the University is in "Auto" mode with zero demand.
You cant disable all the specialties, you will need at least one specialty enabled.
The "Auto" mode settings you de-select only prevents those specialties from graduating when there is no demand for a specialty and the University wants to assign it randomly.
For example, if you disable "Auto Random Botanist" it will not be on the random list to assign when there is zero demand in ALL specialties.
But if you build a farm or a working botanist dies or retires then you have demand and the university will train a colonists for that specialty regardless of this setting.
They are all on by default which is the games default.
Settings are saved with your save game and restored when game loaded. New games start with these setting on.
Here is a complex scenario you can setup:
- You have one University in the Engineering dome.
- University is set for "Auto" mode.
- You turned off all specialties except for engineer.
- You have one shift enabled in your Engineering dome University.
- You have Auto Shifts turned on except for that one shift you manually control.
That University in the Engineering dome University will graduate Engineers slowly on a regular basis.
Now a farm you have set to only employ Botanist needs one Botanist because one retired.
There is now demand.
Even though Botanist is not set for Allow, the demand overrides the Auto Mode and the University will train the next colonist as a Botanist.
Once demand is zero for all, the rules go back into effect and the Engineering Dome University only produces Engineers.

Whats the difference between me controlling "Auto" mode and just setting up the University to graduate Engineers only? Well you can do that, and these settings are ignored, but you can use these settings to say something like, "When In Auto Mode" give me Engineers and Scientists. Something you cannot do when setting the University to manually graduate one type of specialty.

You can combine the Auto Shift feature with User Controlled "Auto" mode control to fine tune how your University educates your colony.
These two features are most handy when you are mid-late game and playing long term.

If you don't change any of these feature in either Auto Shift Control or User defined Auto Mode then the NASA Education System graduates colonists like the default University system, explained in the discussions.

What if I have a specialty set in the University instead of "Auto" mode? Then this mod respects that choice and does not change that functionality regardless of this User Configuration Settings.

I hope you find these new features handy. If you do please vote up.
Re-Train already trained Colonists
This mod allows you to Re-Train colonists that are already trained and have a specialty.
Why do this? If you have an overabundance of one type of colonist and you don't need so many, you can select them and send them back to a Martian University for re-training.
Just make sure you have your Martian University set for specialties you want or need before sending the colonist there.

How To Re-Train a Colonist
Find a colonist you want to re-train.
You can use the built in Colony Overview screen, narrowed by filter to find all the types you want to change.
You can also just pick them from the GUI in any of the buildings, or right off the street. Just select a colonist.

Once selected you will see a new Icon in the Info Panel of the colonist.
The Icons mean the following:

This icon tells you that the colonist is currently attending a university. You cannot alter the colonists status, but you could move the colonist away from the University if you wanted, using the other button to relocate them.

This icon shows you a colonist that is already trained and has a specialty. If you click this icon the colonists specialties are removed and the colonist appears as a Non-Specialist. You can then at the same time re-assign them to a University. If you do not immediately re-assign them to a University they will seek out a University the moment their current job shift ends, or the moment their current job fires them and hires a better worker. If the colonist is idle, such as being at home or at a diner, then they will seek out a University at their next change in status. Remember they are a non-specialist now, so if they are in a job that can use a non-specialist then they might stay and never go to university.
Pro-Tip: This process can happen fairly quickly, such as if the colonist was an engineer at a job that only let engineers work, they get booted from that job almost instantly when you take their specialty away. It all depends on the colonists situation. If you don't want the colonist to auto assign to the nearest University then pause the game and click the icon. Pausing the game also allows you to change your mind if you clicked the icon. At any time and as long as the colonist has not started a class at a University, you can click the icon again and reset the colonists specialization. I have seen colonists actually visit a Martian University and have their status changed to Attending a Martian University, but because the class didnt start yet, I could reverse the choice. They then leave the University. The Icon will update when you can no longer reverse this.

Notice the missing Cap? This icon shows you a colonist that is either not trained at all, or you selected a colonist to be retrained. If you hover over the icon, the tooltip hint will tell you whether its just a plain non-educated colonist, or a colonist that is currently set to be re-trained. If set to be retrained, you have the opportunity now to cancel that by clicking it again, as long as the colonist has not joined a University and started a class.
If a colonist has never been trained, the icon says that and does nothing.

This icon is purposely greyed out. It tells you in the tooltip why if you hover over the icon. Some reasons why the icon is greyed out: The colonist is a Child, they cant be "Re-Trained" since they never got trained. The colonist could be out of the workforce(Retired Senior). Seniors cannot be re-trained unless they can work (You must have the Forever Young Tech to let them work and be re-trained).
Graduation Speed Control
You can modify graduation speed for all Sanatoriums and Universities.

Graduation speed is settable for University and Sanatorium, Normal, 2x, 3x, 4x - via Mod Config
Grade school graduation is based on age and is untouched, but no more Idiots upon graduation. A Child in the default game goes to grade school from age 0 to age 5. They are considered Youth at age 6 and can attend University, Sanatoriums, and work.
What child labor law? Never heard of it.
For a detailed explanation of how graduation rates work, see section on Colonists Graduation Time.
Mod Config is here -> Mod Config
Mod Config settings are saved with each save game and restored on game load.
New games get defaults.
Without Mod Config the default graduation rate is set to 2x for University and Sanatorium.
Notification Icons
Below are some screenshots of notification icons you will see throughout the game.
These are normally set to stay on screen requiring you to right click dismiss them.
You can set them to auto dismiss in the Mod Config options as well as set the Time they remain on screen.
Clicking on the graduation icons allows you to cycle through the last 10 colonists in that category.
Clicking on the shift closed notification cycles through all the Martian University's that have closed shifts (Up to 10 Universities).
Guru Colonist Options
This mod will change Idiots to Guru's once they graduate from Grade Schools, Martian University or Sanatoriums.
A Guru is a type of trait that causes the the Guru Colonist to spread any of the other traits they have with all colonists in their dome that have less than 3 traits.
The choice of the spread traits is random by design in the default game and the Guru will share any of their Positive, Negative and Other Traits.
Children in Grade schools should have few if any traits that can be spread. They get their traits upon graduating.
Getting an Idiot in grade school is very rare, martianborn babies dont get idiot traits at birth. If you create a biorobot and that biorobot is randomly created as a child then maybe. Most Idiots in grade schools come from refugee children, imported children, or from children with sanity breakdowns from disasters(most common but can be mitigated with comfort services).
You should already be using filters to move children to a "Child" dome with schools. That will take care of the Idiot kids.
Here are the only traits a Guru will not spread:
GuruTraitBlacklist:
  • Guru
  • Martianborn
  • Tourist
  • Clone
  • ChronicCondition
  • Founder
  • Android (BioRobot)
In version 2.1 of this mod you will get an option to limit adding Guru traits to just Universities, Universities and Sanatoriums, Just Sanatoriums or transform Idiots to Gurus in All Schools.
You can also turn this feature off and just remove Idiot traits.
All settings are saved with your save game for the save game.
All new games start with defaults to change Idiots to Gurus in All schools.
BioRobot Training Options
A New Feature in Version 2.1 of NASA Education System

BioRobots, also known as androids are born as adults and do not get a specialization.
However, prior to the Curiosity patch, BioRobots had a flaw. They sometimes got specialties and they sometimes got a flaw preventing them from ever being trained which resulted in some of your BioRobots permanently being non-specialists.

NASA Education System incorporates a fix that allows Non-Specialized BioRobots with training problems to get trained in a specialty, or re-trained if already trained.

As of the Curiosity patch all new BioRobots should be set as non-specialists and be allowed to get training. Old save games may still have old BioRobots that cannot be trained. With NASA Ed, you can now train them.

The option to train BioRobots is on by default in all new games.
However to prevent unexpected flooding of your Universities with BioRobots, training BioRobots is by default turned off in Save Games that have never had this feature before.
You get a warning when that happens.
You can then turn it back on if you wanted to train all your BioRobots in that save game.

Games that started out with BioRobots allowed to be trained will keep their settings throughout the game even in save games.
All settings in Mod Config are saved in your game/per game.

Why would I want to keep this setting off?
Its your choice now on how to use a BioRobot. Keep them non-specialized or train them.
Specialist Graduation Selection
How Specialist Graduate - Game Mechanics

What is "Auto" Mode?
Martian Universities have two modes, "Auto" and manually selected specialty.If you set the mode to a specialty then the University will only graduate that type of specialist.
"Auto" mode is not so auto. If there is a demand for any specialist in your colony the University shows that in the list of specialists.
It will go down that list and graduate the most needed specialist (the specialty with the most numbers on it) first, see the notes below.
Then when all the demand is met and all the specialties are zero it randomly selects a specialty from all the specialties and assigns that to the graduating colonist.
It takes nothing else into consideration.
So I developed this mod. See Features.

How the University Knows you need Specialists
Its a simple formula but not what most people think happens.
A colonist does not go through University with a particular specialization being trained.
Instead a colonist gets generic training points while in University (nothing important - similar to Liberal Arts degree). See Discussion on Graduation Time.
Then upon graduation a specialty is assigned to the graduate.
Just before the colonist gets a specialization the University asks the game AI what specialties are most needed.
The game goes to each building that can employ a specialty.
It counts the number of maximum work slots that are not disabled (shift or slot turned off = disabled).
A list of all specialties and maximum number of specialists the Colony can employ is returned.
The University then asks the game how many of each specialist is in the colony, excluding those that cannot work (typically children and seniors unless you have seniors can work tech) .
The difference between maximum can employ and current working specialists is the number of needed specialists per specialty.
I bet you didnt think this is how those numbers in the University get populated.
The specialty assigned to the graduate is always the one that is needed the most.

What happens when you need the same amount of specialists for multiple specialties?
The first specialty needing workers is selected.

What happens when I dont need any specialists?
A random specialty is selected from the list of all specialties.

Will all my colonists eventually get trained and specialized?
Yes, eventually.
Colonists Graduation Time
Default in Game Graduation Time Explained

I use "ticks" to represent time here since you can speed the gameplay artifically.
Disussions in realtime minutes is moot.
I assume everyone understands what constitutes a colonists' performance and what affects that like, morale, happiness, comfort, services, disasters, their traits, their flaws, etc.

1 Sol = 750,000 ticks, 3 workshifts @ 250,000 ticks per shift.

Each "Teaching Building" is based on evaluation time except Grade Schools.
A University evaluation time is 300 points. (Think college credits)
A Sanatorium evalution time is 200 points.
A Grade School has no evalution time, instead a Child stays in school until they are a Youth (Age 6).

A colonist earns training points toward their evalution in the University and Sanatorium.
The faster they earn those points the faster they graduate.
A Child earns training points while in school, the amount of points will dictate which traits they gain in life.
There is no benefit to graduating a child early. As a matter of fact, its a detriment since they will have less points. When a child graduates a Grade School, a formula takes the amount of grade school eval points they earned and generates a trait map and assigns neat sometimes rare traits. The less points the less traits or the less desirable the traits are.

Colonists earn credit for time spent in class known as Gain Points. (think of this as attendance roster)
Colonists earn eval points (think college credits) based on their performance plus the time (Gain Points) they spend in a school.
If they are not in school (ie: they are out of their shift and at home idle or elswhere) then they do not earn points.
A low performing colonist will take longer to graduate.
Closed shifts in schools will cause colonists to take longer to graduate as colonists will compete for the shift.
For the nerds:
gain points = gain_points + MulDivRound(unit.performance, gain_point, 100)
eval points = MulDivRound(gain_point, time, g_Consts.WorkingHours * const.HourDuration)

Below are some observed statistics for a colonist to graduate:

University Optimal Scenario:
Default Time for Graduation = 300 eval points needed.
Assume colonist at 200% performance.
University normally gives 20 gain points per 30,000 ticks while colonist is in their shift.
Evaluation Breakdown as follows:
One entire shift = 250,000 ticks, thats 8 times a colonist can earn points if they stay for the entire shift.
I call 30,000 ticks a trainingslot.
If they stay for 1 training slot of the shift that is 60 gain points.
Gain Points = 20+((200*20)/100) = 60
Eval Points = ((60 * 30000)/(8*30000)) = 7.5
The Eval Points (college credit) formula (see above) evaluates to 7.5.
Maximum eval points per shift/sol this colonist earns = 60. (if they stay)
At this rate (300 eval points needed) they graduate in 5 sols.
With Martian Adaptation and 200% performance its 40 gain points per trainingslot which when all is calculated results in graduating in 2.5 Sols.
Math makes my head hurt.

Real observation for a typical game in a University:
Most colonists are not near 200% performance (some are and some get more, trait dependant), and some colonists idle around and dont go to their shifts in school or dont go for the full 250,000 ticks.
In a test colony I use that has 750 colonists:
Observed average eval points earned for Martian Born with Adaptability Tech is 14 per training slot.
Observed average Non Martian Born = 5

So in practice, a Martian Born colonist with average performance that never misses their shift will take 3 Sols.
However they never stay for the entire shift resulting in between 5-8 Sols.
A non martian average performance colonist that never misses their shift will take 7.5 Sols.
However they never stay for the entire shift resulting in between 7.5 - 15 Sols.
Some go faster, some go slower. Performance of the colonists vary widely and so do their visitation habits.
Get a colonist thats a hypochondriac and they may miss part of their University shift sitting in the infirmary.

Sanatoriums Need 200 eval points to graduate. You can do the math.

Grade School - Completely based on Age, so it takes time.

Use this mod to speed up earning these points.
Suggested Additional Mods
Mod Config Reborn is highly recommended. It is a separate mod available on the workshop maintained by me.

Mod Config Reborn is here -> Mod Config Reborn
Mod Config settings are saved with each save game and restored on game load.
Kudos and Credits
ChoGGi once again is a great friend helping me with my baptism by Lua Code.
Thank you RDR99 for beta testing all my stuff.
Developers Notes
This mod does not introduce new buildings, instead it affects all in game Schools, Universities and Sanatoriums.
This mod should work with any School, University or Sanatorium that is modded or built by other modders as long as they do not change the Graduation Code.
This mod changes The GainPoints and OnTrainingCompleted classes. So if you mod a new building do not change that code or this mod may step on that or vis versa.

This mod watches for any new future specialist categories in case Haemimont adds them, so it should not break "Auto" mode functionality if things change. However I will need to add controls to manipulate them after any update.
New specialist will be playable, although not show up as controllable in the Mod Config options until I update that. Suffice it to say, this mod wont break things if new specialists are introduced.
My Other Mods
You may find some of these handy.

SkiRich's Mod Collection

11 Comments
Moyocoya 3 Feb, 2023 @ 10:24am 
OK, got it !
Thank you and sorry !
SkiRich  [author] 3 Feb, 2023 @ 10:06am 
You are looking at the wrong mod config menu. Poke around, there is a Mod Config Reborn Menu.
Moyocoya 2 Feb, 2023 @ 6:58pm 
Thank you for your answer. I must have missed something...
I have already DL mode config reborn and find nothing in ingame mod configuration about nasa education but on/off.
SkiRich  [author] 2 Feb, 2023 @ 6:50pm 
Just click on my Mods collection link above this section and find Mod Config.
Moyocoya 31 Jan, 2023 @ 11:35pm 
Hi,

"Mod Config is here -> Mod Config"

The link don't work anymore. I cannot change graduation speed.
Mardoin69 2 Nov, 2019 @ 1:34am 
Oops... can't edit in browser... ugh... to clarify... "before you actually load a save file" not the surviving mars game itself. sorry
Mardoin69 2 Nov, 2019 @ 1:33am 
@maiden4meldin mod config is accessed through the options tab in the main menu before you actually load the game.

@SkiRich..... But.... I have yet to get the dang mods installed/loaded properly (dealing with this new damm steam client) from workshop to where Nasa education system loads up into Mod options myself. Not sure if it's just a new problem for everyone or I'm just lucky like that cuz, Steams really been screwing up my game lately. Still fighting to get everything installed properly so i can start a new modded game.
maiden4meldin 7 Feb, 2019 @ 4:54pm 
do youknow if anyone has done a utube tutorial on this mod. It has a lot of functions. starting with modconfig reborn, and then into the game play itself. I am a visual learner, and don't tend to absorb information through reading, even though I have read this guide several times, I still am not able to access config reborn. A tutorial video would be awesome.
Jean le Chauve 19 Jun, 2018 @ 3:08am 
Great mod and very interresting user guide.
I will test it today.
A question for the school : there is a breakthrough, nocturnal adaptation, who gives +20 at night shift. So, in my LP, I tend to favorise the night shifts. Are 20 net production points more effective than the time lost?
SkiRich  [author] 18 Jun, 2018 @ 7:20am 
This one took almost as long to build as the Patriot Missile System. Once the beta test shakdown is over I'll update the workshop with v2.0