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Soil Compaction
Available from v2.0.0
Heavy equipment compacts the soil it drives over. Compacted soil binds nutrients and reduces how effectively crops can absorb them - neglect it long enough and your fields will underperform no matter how much fertilizer you apply.
Compaction is tracked per field on a 0–100% scale. It accumulates when heavy vehicles cross the field and decays naturally over time.
| Event | Effect |
|---|---|
| Heavy vehicle pass (≥ 8 t total) | +2% compaction - once per field per game day |
| Subsoiler cultivator pass | −15% compaction per pass |
| Natural weathering | −0.5% per game day |
Total mass means the tractor plus all attached implements. A 6 t tractor with a 3 t cultivator exceeds the threshold. A single small tractor typically does not.
The once-per-day limit prevents a single day of field work from stacking compaction indefinitely - the worst a single working day can add is 2%.
Compaction affects how efficiently your soil can deliver nutrients to crops.
| Compaction | Nutrient extraction penalty |
|---|---|
| 0% | None |
| 50% | ~10% penalty |
| 100% | 20% penalty (maximum) |
The penalty is applied to nutrient uptake at harvest - compacted soil does not prevent fertilizer from being absorbed, but it reduces how much a crop can extract over the season.
A field sitting at 60% compaction is applying roughly a 12% drag to every nutrient point your crops would otherwise benefit from. That translates directly into yield reduction at harvest.
Any cultivator marked as a subsoiler in FS25 (typically a deep ripper or chisel plow) reduces compaction by 15% per pass. Multiple passes in the same day each count. A heavily compacted field (80%) can be brought below the amber threshold in two passes.
To identify subsoilers in-game: the tooltip or equipment spec sheet typically lists "subsoil" or "subsoiler" in the description. In the mod's code, the check reads spec_cultivator.isSubsoiler from the vehicle's XML.
Even without active remediation, compaction drops by 0.5% per game day. A field at 40% compaction that you leave alone for a season (roughly 90 game days) will reach near-zero naturally. Not ideal for an active field, but useful to know for fields on rotation rest.
When compaction is above 0% and the setting is enabled, a Compaction row appears at the bottom of the live HUD overlay while standing in or near the field.
| HUD colour | Compaction level | Interpretation |
|---|---|---|
| 🟢 Green | < 20% | Low - no meaningful impact |
| 🟡 Amber | 20–60% | Moderate - consider scheduling a subsoiler pass |
| 🔴 Red | > 60% | High - yield impact is noticeable |
Select Compaction (layer 10) from the Active Map Layer setting in the Soil Settings panel → Map to see compaction levels across all your fields on the PDA map (ESC → Map). Dark orange/brown indicates high compaction; green indicates healthy soil.
Compaction is included in the per-field detail popup (click any row in the Farm Overview or Treatment Plan tabs of the PDA - ESC menu → Soil & Fertilizer).
| Setting | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Soil Compaction | On | Enable or disable the entire compaction system |
Disabling compaction stops all accumulation, decay, and penalty calculations. Existing compaction values in the save are preserved but have no effect while the setting is off. Turning it back on resumes immediately.
Compaction is stored as a #compaction attribute per field in soilData.xml. It is backward-compatible - saves from before v2.0 load cleanly with all fields initialised at 0% compaction.
Does standing still with a heavy vehicle compound compaction? No. The once-per-day throttle is per field, not per location. Parking a 50 t tractor on a field all day applies the same 2% as a single pass.
Do forage harvesters and combines count? Yes - if their total mass (vehicle + attached header) is 8 t or more, a pass triggers the compaction event.
Does compaction affect fertilizer absorption immediately? No - the penalty applies at the nutrient extraction calculation during the daily update cycle, not in real time. You will see the effect in the daily nutrient numbers, not frame-by-frame.
Can I disable compaction mid-save? Yes. The Soil Compaction toggle in settings takes effect immediately. Your saved compaction values are not deleted - they are simply ignored while the setting is off.