La Farming Agency is back in force under Farming Simulator 22 by republishing its most famous mod: MaizePlus.
This time, this mod over 200mb (only available on PC/MAC) brings together all the tools and scripts necessary to directly offer players the experience of completely revisited animal feed.
Likewise, aware of the degree of complexity of its mod, the Farming Agency team has revamped its user manual and now has a network of ambassadors able to answer questions from their community. The-Alien-Paul having got on well with the Univers-Simu team, we were chosen for this role concerning the French-speaking community. You will find below our guide MaizePlus as well as the link to the official manual in French.
In this section:
- What is MaizePlus?
- What is the second Animal Food Additions (AFA) mod for?
- Key Functionalities
- From grass to hay, up to 4 steps
- News about silage
- The CCM mobile mill
- A completely overhauled animal feed
- The central role of mixers
- Ingredients not available in harvest
- Animal feed summarized as a production chain
- Glossary of all icons
- Mods that will conflict with the MaizePlus
What is MaizePlus?
The primary objective of this mod is to allow you to improve the degree of realism in animal feeding within your solo or multiplayer games. In addition to extending the possibilities of silage (immature cereals, alfalfa, clover) beyond just grass and corn, it also retains the nutritional characteristics of each of them. Thus, the finished product resulting from the fermentation in the silos will not simply be a "generic" silage but indeed a specific silage linked to its origin.
The MaizePlus does not incorporate new cultures. However, Alfalfa and/or Clover hay or silage is available at the store in the form of bales in order to include them in the rations if necessary. Adding new cultures is only possible with specially modified and prepared maps. The Farming Agency is already actively preparing for the future with optimized maps that will be released under the name TerraLife.
What is the second mod for Animal Food Additions (AFA)?
Ce second mod allows you to benefit from the most realistic experience possible regarding ration recipes and their impact on animal health and production. It contains many ration recipes to meet specific needs (young cattle, dairy cattle, cattle, pigs). The Farming Agency strongly recommends always activating it with the MaizePlus.
Why did you make a second mod then instead of integrating it directly then? The answer is simple:
– The ability to customize recipes according to your wishes by modifying the XML files
Thus, it is easier to exchange this small 20 KB mod between players (for a multiplayer game) than a large 200 MB mod. Similarly, map creators will also be able to offer perfectly adapted ration recipes to the cultures present on their maps.
To put it simply, you can play without this addition but you will lose a lot of the interest of the MaizePlus regarding its realism and its variety of ration recipes for your animals.
For more details on theAFA, refer to the general manual.
Key Functionalities
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From grass to hay, up to 4 steps
In the basic game, to get hay, you only have to pass the tedder once over freshly cut grass. In reality, the process is not as fast because the moisture can take several days to evaporate, especially from very green stems.
With the MaizePlus, the mown grass (and later the clover or alfalfa) will go through 4 different states: fresh, conditioned, half-wilted, hay.
Mower conditioners
To optimize drying, mower manufacturers have invented the conditioner to allow faster harvesting while preserving nutrients. Thus, it is intended to break the stems in order to be able to dehydrate them more quickly.
For simplicity, the MaizePlus will automatically add the ability to activate conditioner in all mowers. Do not look for a configuration at the store, the activation or deactivation of the conditioner is done via a key recalled in the F1 menu of the game.
With conditioner on, grass clippings will be conditioned grass instead of fresh. This will save you a drying stage.
The multiple settings of the tedders
In order to allow all players to be able to use this mod. The MaizePlus automatically adds in all tedders the possibility to choose the target drying stage. Clearly, if you want to play as with the base game, you just have to adjust the tedder to get hay from the first pass. On the other hand, if you want more realism, you can configure the tedder in "half-wilted" mode to simulate, for example, particularly humid climatic conditions which prevent immediate drying. You can thus come back a few days later and this time switch the tedder to “hay” mode to finally obtain this final state of drying.
Note: you can also program the tedder to return to a previous drying stage, for example to simulate a heavy rain which would again add humidity.
Use and collection of grass
The grass can be pressed in any stage of drying and the bale must be wrapped to carry out the fermentation and give grass silage after 48H.
News about silage
You can now ensile and/or mow whole plants (also called immature cereals) such as wheat, barley or oats.
The MaizePlus introduces the use of specific bunker silos (available via the construction menu under silos) to obtain 6 different types of silage.
Also note that potatoes and beets can now also be stored in the silos (without having to compact them).
The CCM mobile mill
The mobile mill is available in the store under tools/miscellaneous and can be configured in two modes:
- Mill-CCM: To grind grain corn and make crushed corn which once fermented will make CCM
- Cereal mill: To make a mixture of crushed cereals (accepts wheat, barley and oats)
A completely overhauled animal feed
Animal feed is divided into several categories. They no longer consume only the first type of food (1st line); they now consume all 4 types at the same time (4 lines), in parallel.
- Each category (line) brings 25% of the needs (if you play without the Animal Food Additions add-on mod)
- Food requirement has been increased for all animals
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- 10x increase over FS19 with season mode for cows if you have the animal food additions (AFA) add-on mod enabled
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- Significant increase in milk, manure and slurry production to compensate
- Adjustable if necessary by the user via an XML file (using the AFA mod)
Now, the title of the 4 food lines of a barn will mention a category of food rather than the food itself. There are a total of 9 categories:
▪ Staple food
▪Raw fodder
▪Silage protein
▪Protein feed
▪Energy food
▪Moisturizing food
▪Enriched food
▪Food concentrate
▪Mineral supplement
The 4 feed lines of each barn will therefore draw from these 9 categories for a given type of animal.
You will have understood, either you make an RTM by following the recipes proposed in the mixer and you will fill the 4 lines equally, or you feed each line individually but using the right foods for each category.
Feeding cows
Sheep feed
Feeding pigs
Horse feed
Feeding the hens
Example of feed consumption and production with cows
Here is an example of the entry and exit proportions for a 10 and 100 cow barn with the MaizePlus mod and Animal Food Additions enabled. Take this into account in your games because it is on average 10x higher consumption than with the base game.
10 cows (28 months old) Holsteins | Manure | Food | Milk | Manure |
1 day = 1 month | 15 L | 50 L | 20 L | 10 L |
3 days = 1 month | 5 L | 16 L | 6 L | 3 L |
5 days = 1 month | 3 L | 10 L | 4 L | 2000 L |
100 cows (28 months old) Holsteins | Manure | Food | Milk | Manure |
1 day = 1 month | 150 L | 500 L | 200 L | 100 L |
5 days = 1 month | 30 L | 100 L | 40 L | 20 L |
10 days = 1 month | 15 L | 50 L | 20 L | 10 L |
The central role of mixers
MaizePlus will automatically add two additional options in the F1 menu to mixers.
- When you are on foot or in a vehicle near the mixer:
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- The U key for the display radius (in meters) around the mixer
- The Y key to activate or deactivate the extended display which will remind you of the possible ingredients for each category of the recipe
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- When you are in the tractor hitched to the mixer:
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- The Y button to choose the recipe
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Don't forget that some recipes are long and that it will sometimes be necessary to remove the minimap (several presses on the 9 key) to make room for the F1 menu
You have several ways to fill the blender depending on the ingredient:
- If the ingredient is liquid: position the mixer close to the IBC tank of the ingredient and press R to fill it.
- If the ingredient is solid: empty it above the mixer using a front loader or position it next to the mixer and use the R key when controlling the mixer.
- If the ingredient is a bundle: unload it above the mixer.
Ingredients not available in harvest
As the MaizePlus does not add new crops to the menu, most of the new ingredients will have to be purchased from the store or in bulk from the DEUKA partner brand's point-of-sale silos. You will therefore always find your ingredients either in the store (bag, pallet or big bag) or from a sales silo (via the construction menu).
Below is the table summarizing the supply lines that will be filled according to the use of what you have purchased. The term "line" here designates the category of food required by each type of animal. Line 1 was the highest and 4 the lowest.
Pig food from the base game has been adapted to fill lines 2 & 3!
Description | Use Case | Supply lines filled |
deuka beet pellets | Complement | Complement |
deuka mineral supplement | Complement | Complement |
deuka crushed cereal | Complement | Complement |
deuka sheep feed | Food | Lines 1 & 4 |
deuka horse feed | Food | 4 online |
hay pellets (horses) deuka | Food | 1 online |
concentrate feed (cows) deuka | Food | Lines 1 & 3 & 4 |
deuka poultry feed | Food | Lines 1 & 3 & 4 |
deuka pig feed | Food | Lines 1 & 4 |
You can also store ingredients in silos that you install on your farm, they are available in the construction menu under silos and extensions. The Deuka containers will allow you to buy the ingredients directly via the adjustable wrench to fill them (thus avoiding the need for transport).
Animal feed summarized as a production chain
Do you know TheFlogger's strong taste for charts and technical diagrams? He has designed a series of diagrams detailing all the possibilities of animal feeds both with the MaizePlus mod only but also with the AFA (Animal Food Addition) activated.
Glossary of all icons
Mods that will conflict with the MaizePlus
As of 17/09 here are the lists of mods identified that are not compatible with the MaizePlus
ModHub Manual Discharge (IfKo's version works fine though) | Twine Addon | Net Wrap Addon |
ProShot | Screenshot Fashion | Better Contracts |
See Bales | Slip Destroys Fields (version 1.0.0.1) | Towing Chain With Hook |