Why does winter not affect everywhere?

[Broccoli Clock]

I love the seasonal effects in this game, snow can be really nice the way it interacts. I love the idea of the nights drawing in with the snow gently falling, each voxel illuminated by a light source.

However in a 100 blocks or so away, there is a large fairly flat open area that. While it shows the colour change to mark seasonal differences, there is no snow. It's not even snowing, yet I go back to my base and has layers of snow building up.

What is the reason for this?

Is it something game engine related? For some reason certain 'chunks' don't render in the snow?
-- although other areas of the game are snow covered, so presumably not.

Is it lore/environmental? There is a hot water spring nearby, or there are deep caves containing whatever Eldritch-eque horror within them and they give off some latent heat, or at the most advanced is it governed by the mountains - is the weather system that complex?
-- the area that is unfrozen doesn't seem to match any specific PoI either underground or over.

 

This game does a great job of immersion, and part of that is its realistic mechanics. Yet I feel some of that immersion is lost when I find myself in a brown tinted field devoid of snow when I'm having to shovel the stuff, not far from here, just to get out of my door.

Deep Winter is fairly short, so it's not a huge deal but I'd love to have an explanation that would fit into the immersion/lore.

Thanks in advance.

Edited March 2, 2025 by ricp

[Thorfinn]

Precipitation rates vary greatly over a surprisingly short distance. And even in a region that is marked as "Almost All the Time", you can still go a month without precipitation. Just the random number generator.

[Broccoli Clock]

20 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

Precipitation rates vary greatly over a surprisingly short distance. And even in a region that is marked as "Almost All the Time", you can still go a month without precipitation. Just the random number generator.

Thanks for the reply.

Forgive me but just to clarify, whether an area gets frozen is based on precipitation? If so, I at least have some rational for this happening, although it's a fairly unsatisfying one, as precipitation wouldn't affect whether the ground would freeze, or at least it's not the main reason.

Still, it's a computer game, and I do thank you for the answer even if it's not the one I hoped for.

[Thorfinn]

5 hours ago, ricp said:

Forgive me but just to clarify, whether an area gets frozen is based on precipitation?

No, precipitation is just whether it gets snow. Your question was specifically about snow, wasn't it? Snow only builds up when it is both cold and "raining".

The algorithm that fast-forwards unloaded chunks has some issues. If you visited a block in winter, the lakes may be properly frozen, and if you revisit it the following fall, it may still be largely or completely iced over, though the snow should be gone.

I rarely play much past spring of the second year because at that point, I've accomplished everything i intend to accomplish, and I'd rather play the fun parts all over again rather than build a road to nowhere or move a mountain 4 blocks east because it obscures my view of something or other. I don't know all the issues of unloaded blocks, but I do know that frozen ground is one of them.

[Michael Gates]

The small-scale rectangles with no snow, or less snow, do appear to be related to precipitation. If you want to see something *really* silly, run a couple thousand blocks thataway in summer, head home, then go back thataway in winter. The game engine doesn't seem to know how to change the season instantly, so you arrive back and everything's still green, berries still on bushes, etc. and then it totally cranks on the Season-O-Matic for a day or so until it's properly December. Some of the effects are absolutely wild. Technically this is Wrong, but it's funny so they shouldn't fix it.

[Broccoli Clock]

On 3/3/2025 at 3:30 PM, Thorfinn said:

No, precipitation is just whether it gets snow. Your question was specifically about snow, wasn't it? Snow only builds up when it is both cold and "raining".

I can understand why you would assume that, and you've answered the question correctly regarding whether it snows or not.

This is my fault for not being more descriptive, It was not just snow but snow and being frozen, and I apologise for not being more accurate.

On 3/3/2025 at 8:32 PM, Michael Gates said:

The small-scale rectangles with no snow, or less snow, do appear to be related to precipitation. If you want to see something *really* silly, run a couple thousand blocks thataway in summer, head home, then go back thataway in winter. The game engine doesn't seem to know how to change the season instantly, so you arrive back and everything's still green, berries still on bushes, etc. and then it totally cranks on the Season-O-Matic for a day or so until it's properly December. Some of the effects are absolutely wild. Technically this is Wrong, but it's funny so they shouldn't fix it.

Yes, that's what I am referring to.

I guess we just need to accept "this is a computer game". I'm a coder, I understand the limitations, I still have ice blocks in the middle of the water in Summer, and warm wet areas that still have berries on the bushes in the middle of December.

I'm new to the game, and I imagine this has been raised as an issue before.

Edited March 5, 2025 by ricp