Steel rework

[Coldy]

The last few weeks i've been playing a lot of terrafirmacraft, my general view about the mod is that it has more content than vs(but most of the stuff that is in vs is just better) and it has addons that are better than vs mods in my view, anyway by playing tfc i noticed that steel in vs is boring, in tfc for you to make steel you make a blast furnace, quickly proccess it into pig iron, and then you work it twice to make steel, and to make 2 more tool tiers you can alloy it with some stuff to make colored steel, of wich you combine a whole ingot of it with a whole ingot of pig iron (so 1 colored steel is 2 iron) and then you can do that again to make a better colored steel, but in vs you simply make a furnace and put 16 iron ingots in for like 3 days, my point is in tfc you are doing active work, how much steel you get depends on how much time you put into it, but in vs the only thing you can do is wait, or at the most get olivine and titanium to make maintenance of the furnace cheaper, i'm not advocating for vs to just copy paste tfc's steel but i think it would be a lot more fun for steel to have a more active making proccess.
oh and also one more interesting thing is that after steel you can just ignore iron, in tfc, and just use steel to make alll iron recipes but more efficiently, like if you use iron to make rails you need 3 ingots for 32 rails, but with steel you get 64 rails per 3 ingots.

Edited August 26 by Coldy

[LadyWYT]

58 minutes ago, Coldy said:

but in vs you simply make a furnace and put 16 iron ingots in for like 3 days,

It's about a week to finish the steel smelting process, actually, which by standard time settings for a world translates to about one month.

1 hour ago, Coldy said:

but in vs the only thing you can do is wait, or at the most get olivine and titanium to make maintenance of the furnace cheaper

Or build more refractories and the necessary infrastructure to keep them all running at the same time.

1 hour ago, Coldy said:

i'm not advocating for vs to just copy paste tfc's steel but i think it would be a lot more fun for steel to have a more active making proccess.

I'm not against a potential rework, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't usually skeptical whenever someone says that a system is too simple and needs more for the player to do. In some cases it does turn out to be true; some gameplay loops are a little too simple and end up getting fleshed out a bit more to make them more challenging and interesting. However, making something more realistic or require more effort in the name of giving the player more to do doesn't necessarily translate to "more fun".

The steel process that Vintage Story has now is realistic enough to help immerse the player more in the world while providing a bit of a challenge to reach(at least the first time, not so much if you know what you're doing). Acquiring steel is also rather tedious, as you need to first refine the iron, and then spend a good chunk of time and resources babysitting the refractory until it finishes smelting. Thankfully, steel is also incredibly durable in VS, so it both feels worth the investment while you're using it, and you won't need to go through that process all that often. If you live in a climate zone that gets cold, winter is the best time for smelting since you're more limited in what you can do, and the tedium of the process can be mitigated by building additional refractories(refine more steel per batch).

Steel-making is a lengthy process, so I definitely wouldn't want the creation time to be significantly shortened in a rework. However, I'd also rather not see a rework make the process take even more direct effort than it already does, for the same finished result we have currently. The more time that the steel-making loop demands from the player is less time that the player has to do the other fun stuff the game has to offer. Likewise, forcing the player to spend a lot of time doing a very specific thing over and over again is a good way to make them start looking for ways to avoid doing that thing, as it becomes a tedious chore instead of something enjoyable to do.

In regards to how one could even accomplish a rework like this, I'm guessing it would probably involve some sort of Damascus steel-type method, with an extensive amount of time spend at a helve-hammer(potentially in addition to time babysitting a refractory as well). Personally, I prefer the system we already have, where it might be a bit tedious but I can refine a lot more material per firing, provided I built the infrastructure.

[Thorfinn]

I suspect there will be more to come with steel. Alloys would not surprise me in the slightest. But as I read the roadmap, I think a parallel goal of the game is to better automate the tedious parts of the game, which it sounds like TFC has in spades.

[Coldy]

6 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

I suspect there will be more to come with steel. Alloys would not surprise me in the slightest. But as I read the roadmap, I think a parallel goal of the game is to better automate the tedious parts of the game, which it sounds like TFC has in spades.

As i said a i dont want a copy paste of tfc steel, not evwn alloys, i jus want steel to stop beeing expansive because it takes loads of time to smelt and start beeing expansive because it is labour intensive 

[ifoz]

9 hours ago, Coldy said:

oh and also one more interesting thing is that after steel you can just ignore iron, in tfc, and just use steel to make alll iron recipes but more efficiently, like if you use iron to make rails you need 3 ingots for 32 rails, but with steel you get 64 rails per 3 ingots.

I like the way the game has you using "lesser" tool tiers even in the steel age because it can sometimes be more efficient dependant on situation.
It makes progression feel much less linear, which in my eyes is a very good thing.

I'll find myself sometimes even using bronze in the iron and steel ages, purely because it's cheap and I can cast it.

Edited August 26 by ifoz

[Thorfinn]

10 hours ago, Coldy said:

As i said a i dont want a copy paste of tfc steel, not evwn alloys, i jus want steel to stop beeing expansive because it takes loads of time to smelt and start beeing expansive because it is labour intensive 

Right. I just don't think that's what is on the roadmap. What else would he mean by

Quote

• More ways to mechanize work with mechanical power. There ought to be a way to mechanize or automate most repetitive tasks.

 

[LadyWYT]

12 hours ago, ifoz said:

I like the way the game has you using "lesser" tool tiers even in the steel age because it can sometimes be more efficient dependant on situation.
It makes progression feel much less linear, which in my eyes is a very good thing.

It's not even just the tool tiers, it applies to armor as well. Generally speaking, you'll want chain, brigandine, scale, or plate in order to have the most protection; lamellar armor if you're using bronze. However, if you're fighting at range, light armor like gambeson suddenly becomes much more appealing, as it still offers some protection without sending your ranged accuracy into the toilet. Likewise, if you're just doing basic chores around your base or wanting to travel quickly, wearing heavy armor isn't going to be as appealing since you don't need the protection; it'll weigh you down and increase your hunger rate without much benefit.

13 hours ago, ifoz said:

I'll find myself sometimes even using bronze in the iron and steel ages, purely because it's cheap and I can cast it.

I tend to use copper, bronze, or sometimes iron for the nails, since those are cheap materials and the durability doesn't matter for nails since they're just a crafting ingredient. Some tools I'll even still use flint/stone for, like hoes and axes for chopping firewood(not the trees themselves).