Celestial Navigation (and clockwork)

[EmperorPingu]

This post is an accompaniment to a mod request I've made in another area of the forums. The rules per that section say that replies cannot be made unless discussing the actual construction and delivery of those mods, so regular comments about discussion and design and what have you (my guess) would not otherwise be permitted. The mod is about realistic navigation, and as such, although I am making a request for the mod to get made by someone super amazingly awesome, I am also going to put it forward as a suggestion for the game developer's consideration.

The post is primarily technical jargon and details, but you can find that post here:

This post is the tldr and place where I invite anyone to discuss the ideas I have made.

 

Celestial Navigation (and clockwork)

To have a highly realistic and immersive navigational experience woven into the fabric of Vintage Story.

Realistic Cosmic Behaviour
At present the cosmos in game does not behave as it would on Earth, but neither does it act in a way that an alien planet would or could given certain factors like axial tilt and seasons. In the mod I've requested that the cosmos be exactly what we see on Earth, but that was for simplicity - I don't mind a creative astro-texture, just as long as it is mathematically consistent to it's own rules - the research I did shows that it basically doesn't - I'm not faulting the devs, I'm just saying it needs some work.

Polar coordinates
Polar coordinates can be worked out by using the polar-equator distance, and using the starting climate to determine where the equator is. With polar coordinates, we can then model a more realistic navigational approach to where players are on a map. In such a way (along with a realistic cosmic behavoir), players can have localised cosmic phenomenon (like the Sun setting much later is someone lives further west on the map).

Time and Date inaccessible by default
So players have to use the tools of the game to determine these variables.

Placed objects are player oriented
So players can't cheat their way out of making a compass to find their direction by simply placing an unknapped flint knife on the ground.

Dynamic Sunflowers
Sunflowers follow the Sun (useful for finding cardinality).

Primitive compass
Simple compass that can be made by placing a magnetised nail in a bowl of water with a parchment strip to get a cardinal direction.

Compass
A customisable object that that lasts better than the primitive compass, is handheld and can be used to find areas of large magnetite deposits.

Plumb line quadrant
A basic tool for finding ones latitude. Not hugely accurate, can find where someone is on the north-south line with an accuracy of 1° (~nearest 1000 z block), can also be used to find how many metres above sea level someone is to the nearest 10 metres (blocks). Can only be used at night or at midday. Cannot be used on rafts or ships.

Mariner's quadrant
A more advanced version of the plumb line quadrant that is harder to maker but more accurate (to 0.1°) and perfect elevation accuracy. Can only be used at night or at midday. Can be used on rafts and ships.

Primitive gnomon
Lets you know if it's morning, evening, or midday, and what month it is (must be configured at three seperate times of day).

Sundial
Gives you accurate time and day and decently accurate latitude.

Calender
Tells you the date but only lasts for 1 year.

Watch
Customisable, tells you the time at the location in which you set it's time - can be used in "chronometre mode" which can tell you how far east or west you are from the location in which you set the watch (to 0.1° of accuracy). Can be made into a pocket watch or wrist watch, both of which are wearable.

Clock
Works like the watch but is more suited to being placed somewhere. Doesn't need to be wound up as often.

Grandfather clock
Build your own grandfather clock - cannot be used as a chronometre but it never runs out of charge.

Giant clock hands
Used along side a paintable giant clock gearbox so that if fed into by rotational power allows the player to make their own custom clocks and chiselable clockfaces (like clock towers and such).

Sextant
As accurate as the Mariner's quadrant on it's own but you really want to be using the sextant alongside the watch. If used alongside the watch (in the offhand) will instead give a very accurate reading to the nearest 0.001° of latitude. If used in "relative mode", the readout will instead tell you how far north or south you are from a latitude location you recorded with the sextant AND how far east or west you from the place you set your watch at - if used properly (both sextant and watch "set" in the same place), this can then tell you how far away you are from a specific location and what direction that location is relative to you. If the watch and sextant are used together, they can be used at any time of day or night.

Immersive map making
You have to make your own maps (that exist in game) that only fill in when you literally draw on them within the location - and it doesn't show you where you are either. You can assign each map a coordinate region though (written in it's description) using the watch and sextant. You can also draw on your own maps.

Clockmaker class update
Most of these items should be exclusive to the clockmaker, but because of how dope it all is, they should have some of their traits nerfed. The Mariner's quadrent, the sundial, the watched, the clocks, and the sextant, are practically exclusive (to make) by the clockmaker. In return, they lose the Precise, technical, and tinkerer traits.

 

[Facethief]

Maybe instead of making advanced tools clockmaker-only, which sucks for single player, allow all players to make the tools, but only a clockmaker or a specialist NPC (Toby Vintage?) can calibrate it, making it fully accurate.

Edit: maybe don’t let most players make clockwork timepieces? That seems fair, as most people couldn’t make something with parts that small.

Edited December 31, 2025 by Facethief
Adding to suggestion

[Tabbot95]

idk I think exclusive recipies are kind of bad in a lot of ways unless there's a workaround; I'm not sure if that's something to have in the form of "written recipe schematics" that are written down and can be used or put into a book 

 

[EmperorPingu]

32 minutes ago, Facethief said:

Maybe instead of making advanced tools clockmaker-only, which sucks for single player, allow all players to make the tools, but only a clockmaker or a specialist NPC (Toby Vintage?) can calibrate it, making it fully accurate.

Edit: maybe don’t let most players make clockwork timepieces? That seems fair, as most people couldn’t make something with parts that small.

 

9 minutes ago, Tabbot95 said:

idk I think exclusive recipies are kind of bad in a lot of ways unless there's a workaround; I'm not sure if that's something to have in the form of "written recipe schematics" that are written down and can be used or put into a book 

 

Hey, so a lot of these suggestions/features I designed to work in tandem with each other as part of a larger/broader navigational mechanic. This post is just a brutally summarised version of that massive post (which I linked at the top) - you're welcome to read it but a it's mostly more instructional as to how to make the mod itself (so if you do read it you may want to skip the first feature as the first one is pretty much just maths - tldr: pseudo-polar coordinates and realistic celestial movement simulation given the world is a 2d plain).

I hear you on the clockmaker class upgrades and I did consider that. The design is not so much that the use of the items are exclusive to the clockmaker - but rather that the actual making of the item and the intricate parts themselves are what is exclusive to the clockmaker. If you wanted to be able to make some of the more advanced items whilst choosing a different class in single player, there is always the option to turn exclusive class items off. Secondly, some of the items are craftable by non-clockmaker class with less accuracy than the more advanced counterparts - such as the primitive gnomon, and the plumb line quadrant. Both types of compass are also craftable in this design to non-clockmakers. I couldn't justify something that enabled even a primitive style of longitudinal deduction as that didn't happen until the advent of mobile time-keeping devices - namely the clock/chronometre.

Class exclusive recipes are something that play into a civilisation feel of things but it isn't for everyone. Personally, I still prefer my method (that the clockmaker can make the parts exclusively), but a total workaround I'm all for is for a new travelling merchant who sells some of the more advanced items (that would otherwise only be craftable by the clockmaker) - sort of like how the clothing merchant sells the needle and thread? This seems like a fair comprimise - perhaps a sea captain on a boat somewhere in the water just happens to sell navigational equipment? His name is Ahab - he has an eyepatch and a parrot named Percy.