Miscellaneous Nitpicks

[That1GameGuy]

Here are some mostly minor things that I'd like to see changed that I didn't think would suffice as it's own post individually:

- Making any armor set that isn't steel or iron feels like a waste. Making armor is such an expensive undertaking that in my first world I ended up waiting until steel to even bother. I think maybe being able to sell or upgrade armor would be a good change.

- Trees don't lose their leaves during the winter.

- Meat feels like too strong of a food source compared to the others. Some a lot of non-meat foods fill you up a pitiful amount compared to the effort needed to make them.

- Naturally generated fruit trees don't start vernalized

- Either beehive kilns need to be accessible earlier, or there needs to be a mid game kiln. I feel like I shouldn't have to wait until the iron age just to color my clay.

- Elk taming NEEDS to be shortened. In a year, I can raid the Resonance Archives and buy a fully tamed elk AND walk away with a bag full of loot. With every other mechanic in this game, doing things yourself is always the "main" way, with trading being a back-up. Here, It feels reversed.

- Alcohols and distilled spirits feel more like a gimmick than an actual food. They fill so little and punish you with the drunk effect.

[Fyrol]

Honestly that's a really good list of nitpicks, though I can't say much on the elks since I still haven't managed to interact with them. I didn't even realise the tree leaf thing until seeing it here. Will say with the alcohol though I think it is absolutely being saved for some sort of alchemy/status effect system. Either being drunk will have some positives, or be used like a base for potions ala Witcher.

To throw my own into the pool, I would say:
- Spears not scaling with damage tiers.
- Bows/arrows not making how they interact with defence tiers clear.
- The controls to deposit liquids. Why is it always in 1/10ths, and not 1L increments. 
- There not being alternatives for bauxite, and olivine. They handled it way better with lime, since you need to look for one of multiple stones, instead of needing to look for one that isn't prospectable, and the other might as well be. (only spawning in one kind of stone)

[LadyWYT]

2 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

- Making any armor set that isn't steel or iron feels like a waste. Making armor is such an expensive undertaking that in my first world I ended up waiting until steel to even bother. I think maybe being able to sell or upgrade armor would be a good change.

Have to disagree here. I think the copper/bronze lamellar is decent for its tier, provided the player isn't rushing anything. However, I think the armor sets for copper/bronze are more meant to be optional. Metal armor is quite a resource investment, especially without a helve hammer to work the plates needed for most metal armors. If copper/bronze armors were a hard requirement for the early game, I honestly don't see a lot of players being thrilled about needing to sink in that level of time and resources for something that could reasonably be skipped(at the cost of going without protection for a little longer).

2 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

Meat feels like too strong of a food source compared to the others. Some a lot of non-meat foods fill you up a pitiful amount compared to the effort needed to make them.

Meat is a calorie dense food source though, in reality. A hamburger tends to keep one energized for much longer than a salad. From a gameplay standpoint, vegetables, grain, and fruit can all be easily farmed with little risk or upfront cost. Meat, however, needs to be hunted(which is risky) or acquired via livestock(requires a lot of upfront investment) or fishing(low risk but requires time). Meat also spoils relatively quickly, so it needs to either be eaten or preserved soon after acquisition or else it rots.

 

2 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

Naturally generated fruit trees don't start vernalized

This is a change I would like to see, since it would be nice to be able to work with wild fruit trees the first year. However, I could also understand why the devs maybe wouldn't opt for that route, since fruit trees have rather large yields and the wild ones can be rather large.

 

2 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

Either beehive kilns need to be accessible earlier, or there needs to be a mid game kiln. I feel like I shouldn't have to wait until the iron age just to color my clay.

I wouldn't mind earlier clay colors, however...the easier option, I think, might be to just have traders buy pit-fired pottery. That way the player can cycle out their plain pottery for prettier once they get a beehive kiln up and running(or otherwise trade for/find prettier pottery), but still get something for the plain pottery rather than just throw it out.

 

2 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

Elk taming NEEDS to be shortened. In a year, I can raid the Resonance Archives and buy a fully tamed elk AND walk away with a bag full of loot. With every other mechanic in this game, doing things yourself is always the "main" way, with trading being a back-up. Here, It feels reversed.

Disagree here. It should take some significant time investment to get a fully tamed creature from a wild one. I think the intention behind the design here is mainly to give Homo Sapiens player access to a mount(which they're not otherwise going to have), as well as acting as a proof-of-concept for future creature taming and mount options.

That is to say, I think it would be better to keep the taming difficulty, and have more creature options as mounts instead. That way the player doesn't need to rely exclusively on finding elk to tame, if they wish to tame their own. Horses, cows, camels, elephants, even bears would give more options as well as flesh out the world more. 

2 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

Alcohols and distilled spirits feel more like a gimmick than an actual food. They fill so little and punish you with the drunk effect.

Kind of, but I'm not sure there will be much change here until a status effect system. At the very least, I'd like to see a longer delay before the drunk effect settles in, as well as perhaps a requirement for the player to have more than one mild drink within a sitting. 

Until then though, the SlowTox mod does a great job of lending more use to alcohol.

2 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

Trees don't lose their leaves during the winter.

It would be interesting if appropriate trees lost their leaves in the winter, and I wouldn't be surprised if the devs manage to figure out how to implement it some day. My main concern with this kind of thing though is performance.

 

2 hours ago, Fyrol said:

Spears not scaling with damage tiers.

Not sure if you're referring to 1.21 spears or 1.22 spears, but spears are getting some significant changes in 1.22. 

 

2 hours ago, Fyrol said:

The controls to deposit liquids. Why is it always in 1/10ths, and not 1L increments. 

I think this is specific to bowls, and not containers in general. I do agree that this area could use a little polish though.

 

2 hours ago, Fyrol said:

There not being alternatives for bauxite, and olivine. They handled it way better with lime, since you need to look for one of multiple stones, instead of needing to look for one that isn't prospectable, and the other might as well be. (only spawning in one kind of stone)

That may or may not change sometime in the future. To widen the bottleneck for steelworking though, an alternative for borax would need to be added to the list as well, since it's a critical ingredient for iron anvils and stone coffins.

[Fyrol]

12 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

Not sure if you're referring to 1.21 spears or 1.22 spears, but spears are getting some significant changes in 1.22.

So I'll just say I haven't personally downloaded the update, I did check a couple of videos however. That being said, all the spears stats I could see in videos showed an attack tier of 0. I just want to use pole-arms vs drifters //media.invisioncic.com/r268468/emoticons/sleep.png
 

13 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

I think this is specific to bowls, and not containers in general. I do agree that this area could use a little polish though.

Double checked it myself, and it also applies to jugs. Kinda makes it feel like liquid wasn't meant to be moved outside a bucket
 

13 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

That may or may not change sometime in the future. To widen the bottleneck for steelworking though, an alternative for borax would need to be added to the list as well, since it's a critical ingredient for iron anvils and stone coffins.

So my problem with the bottlenecks for steel is that you can't locate them very easily, along with having more specific requirements. The reason I didn't mention titanium and borax is that each of them can be prospected for, and spawn in multiple types of rocks. It gives enough control to the player I think that you at least aren't completely on a wild goose chase, while bauxite I think is the lead example for "a specific thing I need to find where I run forward until I hope I see it."

 

13 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

16 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

- Making any armor set that isn't steel or iron feels like a waste. Making armor is such an expensive undertaking that in my first world I ended up waiting until steel to even bother. I think maybe being able to sell or upgrade armor would be a good change.

Have to disagree here. I think the copper/bronze lamellar is decent for its tier, provided the player isn't rushing anything. However, I think the armor sets for copper/bronze are more meant to be optional. Metal armor is quite a resource investment, especially without a helve hammer to work the plates needed for most metal armors. If copper/bronze armors were a hard requirement for the early game, I honestly don't see a lot of players being thrilled about needing to sink in that level of time and resources for something that could reasonably be skipped(at the cost of going without protection for a little longer).

I know it's what the other guy said, but I have a 3rd cent. The greater issue with armour is that there isn't any reason to use it outside of story dungeons or very deep caving. The boss of the archives is attack tier 3, which means you need at least iron to fully defend against it, and I haven't touched the 2nd chapter stuff yet but I'm sure it's not easier. Which means outside of surface drifters, which you don't need more than leather, or temporal storms, which you can hide inside, or fight for some okay rewards at best, the story dungeons are the only content that really needs armour, which kinda lead you towards iron. 

I saw something in the patch notes about smaller dungeons, and if they add more kinds of damage, (I saw in an Oscillascape interview that the devs were in the talks about a bone breaking/lasting injury system) I'm sure there will be more of a reason to use weaker armour.
 

 

Also LayWYT, do you have any nitpicks? You should throw them onto the pile

[LadyWYT]

24 minutes ago, Fyrol said:

So I'll just say I haven't personally downloaded the update, I did check a couple of videos however. That being said, all the spears stats I could see in videos showed an attack tier of 0. I just want to use pole-arms vs drifters //media.invisioncic.com/r268468/emoticons/sleep.png

Interesting. The polearms should still function just fine against drifters and other targets though, since monsters and wildlife don't have armor stats. Against players though it's a lot more of an issue, since players can use shields and other armor to counter attacks. I'm guessing that's also why spears are listed as tier 0 attacks; it's to allow those heavy ranged shots to be effectively mitigated. Bowtorn are designed around similar logic, if I'm not mistaken, in that their ranged shots qualify as tier 0 attacks, meaning that players can mitigate high level bowtorn shots with lower quality equipment(which is rather useful).

Basically, when fighting NPCs, all you really need to worry about in terms of which weapon to use is the raw damage numbers.

28 minutes ago, Fyrol said:

I saw something in the patch notes about smaller dungeons, and if they add more kinds of damage, (I saw in an Oscillascape interview that the devs were in the talks about a bone breaking/lasting injury system) I'm sure there will be more of a reason to use weaker armour.

The procedural dungeons is what I would more expect here, in terms of more reasons to make and wear armor. But even then, I think early armor will still suffer for the reasons I already laid out earlier: it breaks quite easily and isn't that protective, and thus doesn't really justify the effort needed to acquire it. Just my opinion here, but I think the early game should be focused more on just surviving, with the combat and other things becoming a focus in the later portions of the game when the player starts thriving, and thus has more options.

An injury system would most likely be part of the status effect system that's supposed to be getting added, though it will probably be 1.23 or later before it arrives.

32 minutes ago, Fyrol said:

Also LayWYT, do you have any nitpicks? You should throw them onto the pile

Not really.  I've already thrown a few out there, and otherwise most of my nitpicks are just things that are obviously rough edges of gameplay or otherwise things that are on the roadmap but not yet implemented. Thus it doesn't really feel productive to harp on most of them, in many cases. At least some of them I report over on the bug tracker, if it's something that seems to be unintended game behavior or grammatical error. 

The only real nitpick that comes to mind otherwise is related to the first boss fight, in that it would have been much better to have broken glass or iron bars lining the arena alcoves to prevent the player from getting catapulted to safety, rather than the invisible walls that currently exist now. 

[Fyrol]

3 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

Interesting. The polearms should still function just fine against drifters and other targets though, since monsters and wildlife don't have armor stats. Against players though it's a lot more of an issue, since players can use shields and other armor to counter attacks. I'm guessing that's also why spears are listed as tier 0 attacks; it's to allow those heavy ranged shots to be effectively mitigated. Bowtorn are designed around similar logic, if I'm not mistaken, in that their ranged shots qualify as tier 0 attacks, meaning that players can mitigate high level bowtorn shots with lower quality equipment(which is rather useful).

Basically, when fighting NPCs, all you really need to worry about in terms of which weapon to use is the raw damage numbers.

So this got me to go test it for myself, and yeah enemies have no defence tiers to them. I always assumed, especially with the lore of the game, the falx is was a specially designed weapon to fight the rust. I figured the attack tiers were to show what tier it could break the defences of. In that case, I think attack tiers should be done away with until there is some sort of combat update. Would make early armour better vs bears, and not be as obtuse. For reference, a pickaxe has a higher attack tier than any spear. So if the whole reason spears are tier 0 is for shields, then it seems to get in the way more than anything.

Can't say much for the PVP/NPC side though, since I usually play solo or in very small co-op groups.
 

3 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

The procedural dungeons is what I would more expect here, in terms of more reasons to make and wear armor. But even then, I think early armor will still suffer for the reasons I already laid out earlier: it breaks quite easily and isn't that protective, and thus doesn't really justify the effort needed to acquire it. Just my opinion here, but I think the early game should be focused more on just surviving, with the combat and other things becoming a focus in the later portions of the game when the player starts thriving, and thus has more options.

An injury system would most likely be part of the status effect system that's supposed to be getting added, though it will probably be 1.23 or later before it arrives.

I mean why can't early dungeons be more focused on helping with survival? I imagine a lot of "dungeons" are actually more intact remnants of otherwise normal building, so their treasure will probably be related to more survival things. I imagine there could be more rare seed (like cabbage) or more unique seed (like soy), plus probably some more unique pieces of equipment like stuff/parts of a boiler or condenser, maybe a helve hammer, or maybe the game can add some earlier tier Jonas tech. Basically anything that would help out with survival, that might otherwise be more laborious to create. Plus I'm sure with more and more side systems being created, there will be more side-stuff to make, and thus to find. Stuff like maybe alchemy equipment, meat hooks, or even some worn down clothes that provide some much better warmth/cooling(if that gets added).

Either way this might be getting a little out of nitpick, and more into wishes...

3 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

Not really.  I've already thrown a few out there, and otherwise most of my nitpicks are just things that are obviously rough edges of gameplay or otherwise things that are on the roadmap but not yet implemented. Thus it doesn't really feel productive to harp on most of them, in many cases. At least some of them I report over on the bug tracker, if it's something that seems to be unintended game behavior or grammatical error. 

The only real nitpick that comes to mind otherwise is related to the first boss fight, in that it would have been much better to have broken glass or iron bars lining the arena alcoves to prevent the player from getting catapulted to safety, rather than the invisible walls that currently exist now. 

To be fair, having a more diegetic reason to be trapped would be cool. Though I think something more rust like would fit more, like some gears or rusty spikes or something
 

[LadyWYT]

35 minutes ago, Fyrol said:

I mean why can't early dungeons be more focused on helping with survival? I imagine a lot of "dungeons" are actually more intact remnants of otherwise normal building, so their treasure will probably be related to more survival things. I imagine there could be more rare seed (like cabbage) or more unique seed (like soy), plus probably some more unique pieces of equipment like stuff/parts of a boiler or condenser, maybe a helve hammer, or maybe the game can add some earlier tier Jonas tech. Basically anything that would help out with survival, that might otherwise be more laborious to create. Plus I'm sure with more and more side systems being created, there will be more side-stuff to make, and thus to find. Stuff like maybe alchemy equipment, meat hooks, or even some worn down clothes that provide some much better warmth/cooling(if that gets added).

I look at it from the opposite angle; dungeon loot shouldn't be geared toward survival so much, but rather it should be rare stuff that's hard to acquire in the wild, expensive to trade for, or otherwise something that can't be obtained through crafting or trading. Stuff like gemstones, decorative clutter, larger amounts of rusty gears, gold and silver ingots, Jonas parts, etc. Perhaps the occasional bit of iron or steel as well. The main idea though is that the player will need to do the initial survival footwork themselves in the early game, since it is, well, a survival game in many ways.

I suppose it's also where I draw a line between "surviving" and "thriving". Like I said, copper armor breaks too easily and doesn't mitigate enough damage to warrant the effort that it takes to craft. It's a similar case for bronze. Sure, the player could invest a lot of time and energy up front to craft a set so they can conquer an easy dungeon for some loot, however...if the enemies inside are weak enough to be countered by simple copper, it would probably be more resource efficient to craft bear armor and charge in with a copper falx and a few spears. Still, the player would likely be much better off if they sank the same amount of effort into planting flax fields or acquiring ore. It also doesn't seem like the player is meant to be able to rely purely on combat to progress either, so I doubt the loot for a "tier 1 dungeon" would be much better than a few pieces of bronze tier tech, at the very best.

Basically, dungeon loot ought to be stuff that's more useful after the player has already established themselves in the world, and not something they worry about cracking open while still working toward bronze.

[Zane Mordien]

19 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

 

22 hours ago, That1GameGuy said:

Trees don't lose their leaves during the winter.

It would be interesting if appropriate trees lost their leaves in the winter, and I wouldn't be surprised if the devs manage to figure out how to implement it some day. My main concern with this kind of thing though is performance.

I feel like they will definately do this one day. I think snow accumulating and water freezing has to be harder than just having the trees change graphics to not having leaves. It is probably just not a priority yet.

[Vexxvididu]

My biggest single pet peeve is lake ice NEVER melting unless you frequent the area....  it lingers far too long.  It needs a catchup mechanic or something.

I agree that elk taming should be difficult just because we don't want them to be too easy to get.  Better to make the player do the Archives first.

I agree alcohol is more of a gimmick than anything practical.  I've previously suggested adding uses for Aqua Vitae.  It needs to be a component in more stuff!

I am not a fan of beehive kilns as is....  to me they take up too much resources to produce, and are mostly only useful if you need to fire A LOT of clay stuff.  Many have suggested there needs to be a cheaper version and I agree.

I agree that ideally most trees would lose leaves in winter but also echo what LadyWYT said about performance.  Having to simulate all those updates in big forests is a potential problem.

EDIT TO ADD:  I forgot another big pet peeve.... plants in greenhouses shouldn't get covered with snow and sway with the wind.

Edited February 20 by Vexxvididu

[Fyrol]

1 hour ago, LadyWYT said:

I look at it from the opposite angle; dungeon loot shouldn't be geared toward survival so much, but rather it should be rare stuff that's hard to acquire in the wild, expensive to trade for, or otherwise something that can't be obtained through crafting or trading. Stuff like gemstones, decorative clutter, larger amounts of rusty gears, gold and silver ingots, Jonas parts, etc. Perhaps the occasional bit of iron or steel as well. The main idea though is that the player will need to do the initial survival footwork themselves in the early game, since it is, well, a survival game in many ways.

I suppose it's also where I draw a line between "surviving" and "thriving". Like I said, copper armor breaks too easily and doesn't mitigate enough damage to warrant the effort that it takes to craft. It's a similar case for bronze. Sure, the player could invest a lot of time and energy up front to craft a set so they can conquer an easy dungeon for some loot, however...if the enemies inside are weak enough to be countered by simple copper, it would probably be more resource efficient to craft bear armor and charge in with a copper falx and a few spears. Still, the player would likely be much better off if they sank the same amount of effort into planting flax fields or acquiring ore. It also doesn't seem like the player is meant to be able to rely purely on combat to progress either, so I doubt the loot for a "tier 1 dungeon" would be much better than a few pieces of bronze tier tech, at the very best.

Basically, dungeon loot ought to be stuff that's more useful after the player has already established themselves in the world, and not something they worry about cracking open while still working toward bronze.

I get this angle, however I think it applies to much more of a mid-late game kinda thing. I was thinking of our current ruins structures, think some of the bigger ones such as the church looking thing, but instead more rusted and thus preserved in a way. The top is covered, along with more walls, and an intact basement. To get to the basement, you need to kill the "owner" of the area, and make it like a weaker bell, or some more unique monster. Something that needs some armour, but not such that you need something stronger, and short enough that it makes the armour's low durability workable. This could be a good way to let players who can barely survive, eek out a larger corner. Plus I'm sure as more and more variants are added for things, and more specific uses (Lets say spelt beer would give a defence boost, and rye beer an attack boost or something, just to have a reason to find the other, barred growing conditions), not having to travel as far would be nice. Not to mention all the random sort of crafting stations that are no doubt going to be added.

I think as the game is expanded upon, each individual tech/metal tier will become far more fleshed out. Looking at it now, bronze and steel are so similar to copper and iron in terms of overall tech, that I think when there's even more to copper tech, and what of that is needed to process things for the bronze age, the more a copper-age specific dungeon makes sense.

1 hour ago, Zane Mordien said:

I feel like they will definately do this one day. I think snow accumulating and water freezing has to be harder than just having the trees change graphics to not having leaves. It is probably just not a priority yet.

Thinking about it, doesn't the game already have some of these is place? Have leaf blocks change their texture to that of their twiggy version, sans the leaves. Make a less twiggy version, then use that for the full leaf blocks. Then you cover them in snow the same what crops are, just don't let it accumulate on the blocks themselves. As LadyWYT pointed out performance, either a texture change would hopefully not be taxing enough to stutter low end machines, or you could just start doing it as chunks are being loaded, kinda like walking a bit away and then seeing a snowfall.

1 hour ago, Vexxvididu said:

I agree alcohol is more of a gimmick than anything practical.  I've previously suggested adding uses for Aqua Vitae.  It needs to be a component in more stuff!

I couldn't find what you suggested in your post history, what did you suggest for aqua vitae? I can't think of anything barred potions, but I do tend to have fantasy on the brain...

1 hour ago, Vexxvididu said:

I am not a fan of beehive kilns as is....  to me they take up too much resources to produce, and are mostly only useful if you need to fire A LOT of clay stuff.  Many have suggested there needs to be a cheaper version and I agree.

The whole needing to fire a lot of things quickly got me thinking, what if there was a 1x1 or 2x2 internal beehive kiln, maybe with bronze doors or something. Have the trade-off be a smaller space, along with only being able to put 1-2 doors on to limit the colours you could get. Then you can use iron to maybe allow 3 even on the smaller one? Give more player choice to how they make their kiln, especially because I would say most players rarely want to make a 3x3 area of clay stuff all 1 colour, so making smaller kilns overall would be nice. Fireclay bricks I would say are cheap enough of a resource to not need a cheaper variant.

[Zane Mordien]

6 minutes ago, Fyrol said:

Thinking about it, doesn't the game already have some of these is place? Have leaf blocks change their texture to that of their twiggy version, sans the leaves. Make a less twiggy version, then use that for the full leaf blocks. Then you cover them in snow the same what crops are, just don't let it accumulate on the blocks themselves. As LadyWYT pointed out performance, either a texture change would hopefully not be taxing enough to stutter low end machines, or you could just start doing it as chunks are being loaded, kinda like walking a bit away and then seeing a snowfall.

I can't imagine it could be that much of a performance issue. The game Wurm did this long long ago and it was a precursor sort of to Minecraft. 

[Zane Mordien]

There are still too many bears. I don't mean the one bear by itself. I mean the 2-3 that spawn on top of each other. 

[LadyWYT]

1 hour ago, Fyrol said:

I was thinking of our current ruins structures, think some of the bigger ones such as the church looking thing, but instead more rusted and thus preserved in a way. The top is covered, along with more walls, and an intact basement. To get to the basement, you need to kill the "owner" of the area, and make it like a weaker bell, or some more unique monster. Something that needs some armour, but not such that you need something stronger, and short enough that it makes the armour's low durability workable. This could be a good way to let players who can barely survive, eek out a larger corner.

Possibly, though I would argue that if the player is really struggling to survive in the early-mid game, dungeon crawling probably shouldn't be something they focus on as they'll likely struggle a lot more with that than the more mundane methods. I'd also be concerned about the loot for such dungeons being a little too strong as well. Yes, it might be stuff that really helps a struggling player in the earlier portions of the game, if they can manage to clear it. However, I do think it opens the door to being a convenient way for more experienced players to skip a lot of early gameplay loops with relatively little effort, which I'm not sure is ideal. It'd be the kind of thing that probably feels fun if you're experienced, a little unfair if inexperienced/underskilled, or otherwise makes the conventional progression methods feel pointless due to time/resource cost.

 

1 hour ago, Fyrol said:

I think as the game is expanded upon, each individual tech/metal tier will become far more fleshed out. Looking at it now, bronze and steel are so similar to copper and iron in terms of overall tech, that I think when there's even more to copper tech, and what of that is needed to process things for the bronze age, the more a copper-age specific dungeon makes sense.

Maybe, though I wouldn't really call copper, bronze, and steel all that similar when it comes to tech. Copper requires little effort to work, since it can be cast and does not require a bellows at the forge. Bronze requires a bellows to forge, it seems, but it's flexible enough to be cast. Steel...is a whole different beast, requiring several different refinement processes with the end product being highly durable as well as high damage/high efficiency for tools and weapons.

 

1 hour ago, Fyrol said:

texture change would hopefully not be taxing enough to stutter low end machines

At the very least, it could potentially be a toggle in the settings. However, I do think it's the kind of feature that everyone will be wanting to play with, so best to make sure it runs on lower end machines too, and not just the high end. Especially with what's going on with computer parts these days.

 

1 hour ago, Fyrol said:

The whole needing to fire a lot of things quickly got me thinking, what if there was a 1x1 or 2x2 internal beehive kiln, maybe with bronze doors or something. Have the trade-off be a smaller space, along with only being able to put 1-2 doors on to limit the colours you could get. Then you can use iron to maybe allow 3 even on the smaller one? Give more player choice to how they make their kiln, especially because I would say most players rarely want to make a 3x3 area of clay stuff all 1 colour, so making smaller kilns overall would be nice. Fireclay bricks I would say are cheap enough of a resource to not need a cheaper variant.

I like the idea. I tend to rush a beehive kiln anyway, since I both like colored pottery and generally need to fire a lot of bricks as well. It's also a lot cheaper to keep a beehive kiln running than it is to keep pit kilns fueled. Not that sticks are hard to acquire, but pit kilns love to eat through sticks. 

Though I would say that beehive kilns are becoming a more attractive choice, perhaps, with the addition of the clay tiles.

[Fyrol]

8 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Possibly, though I would argue that if the player is really struggling to survive in the early-mid game, dungeon crawling probably shouldn't be something they focus on as they'll likely struggle a lot more with that than the more mundane methods. I'd also be concerned about the loot for such dungeons being a little too strong as well. Yes, it might be stuff that really helps a struggling player in the earlier portions of the game, if they can manage to clear it. However, I do think it opens the door to being a convenient way for more experienced players to skip a lot of early gameplay loops with relatively little effort, which I'm not sure is ideal. It'd be the kind of thing that probably feels fun if you're experienced, a little unfair if inexperienced/underskilled, or otherwise makes the conventional progression methods feel pointless due to time/resource cost.

I absolutely agree with the progression skip stuff. It's a massive problem with a lot of minecraft structures, and I would hate for Vintage Story to take a more negative aspect from it. That being said, I do think you could be choosy with what you give the player. Think like a single barrel being in a dungeon, especially a tiny one for copper tier players. A single barrel skips progression, can allow for some skips (leather I think being the strongest), however a single barrel, especially without buckets is even longer, and more wasteful. I'm sure as more systems come into the game, there will be more items like this. Kinda like how current cracked vessels can give copper tools. Can skip progression, but more-so used to give a small advantage.

I also think that dungeons are less for the struggling player, and more for unique things, or things that are otherwise harder to find. Especially since copper is really the only metal that is really easy to find, it could also be a way to get maps to mark certain ore locations. So if you're unlucky, or just struggling with the prospecting system, you could try looting instead. More ways to get through the same progression path I think makes playthroughs unique, but as you said it can be easy to have items that allow you to skip way too much.

13 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Maybe, though I wouldn't really call copper, bronze, and steel all that similar when it comes to tech. Copper requires little effort to work, since it can be cast and does not require a bellows at the forge. Bronze requires a bellows to forge, it seems, but it's flexible enough to be cast. Steel...is a whole different beast, requiring several different refinement processes with the end product being highly durable as well as high damage/high efficiency for tools and weapons.

I meant more in the sense of what kinda stuff can only be made from that metal and beyond. Like copper opens up a ton of stuff, with saws for planks, nails for chests, fruit presses, and just so much more. After looking at what specifically other tiers of metal unlock, I would honestly extent the complaint to iron too, though the tool quality is a big enough jump that you could argue that's the main advantage. Bronze only really unlocks helve hammers, and padlocks if you want to count that. Iron beehive kiln, and that's kinda it. Steel has some backpack upgrades with chromium, but that's about it. So what I mean is, as more stuff is added that's gated by metals, you could throw them into dungeons. Like if you're struggling for bronze, you could find a helve hammer head. You still need to get fat and sap, but it'll give you a bonus before you're supposed to have it, while not being broken.

[EnbyKaiju]

All the talk of metal uses does have me curious about what other things could be possible through the use of copper & bronze. The devs just updated it so copper roofs are cheaper to make, and we still have use for chutes up until the late game (though it would be nice if we had more uses for the soldering iron), but it has me curious about uses of things like bronze throughout antiquity. As both @LadyWYT & @Fyrol bring up some interesting points with all this.

Maybe once players move into and out of the bronze age then bronze becomes more of an ornamental function rather than a mechanical one? I doubt the devs are going to let us move into giant bronze mirrors that we can use to death-ray drifters, but maybe bronze mirrors themselves could make an appearance? Or bronze cookware? Maybe let the players cast bronze items using wax or sand casting methods like bells, statues or jewellery that can be displayed or sold to traders?

As of now once a metal moves out of functional usage it gets relegated to lantern status pretty much except for some special use cases, so I'm very interested to see how the devs play with that down the line. They definitely don't seem to like the idea of things just becoming useless once you move up the tech tree.

What other uses can folks think of for other metal types that don't get the love outside of a couple of mechanical uses? Thinking of things like silver & gold, moly, brass...etc? I bet if we dug through some historical records we could find something fun.

You know what mineral I'd love to have introduced because I think it has been ignored despite being historically pretty consistent? Jade. I want it as a stone to carve, as something to shape for jewellery, and as a building material.

 

[LadyWYT]

10 hours ago, EnbyKaiju said:

I doubt the devs are going to let us move into giant bronze mirrors that we can use to death-ray drifters, but maybe bronze mirrors themselves could make an appearance?

I dunno...get a few big reflector plates and attach them to some sort of Jonas beacon, and then the player has a floodlight they can use to light up areas. Expensive to build, requires temporal gears to power, but perhaps it covers several chunks of territory at once. 

 

10 hours ago, EnbyKaiju said:

You know what mineral I'd love to have introduced because I think it has been ignored despite being historically pretty consistent? Jade. I want it as a stone to carve, as something to shape for jewellery, and as a building material.

Same. More gemstones in general, really, but there ought to be something to do with them first aside from just collecting and trading. Socketing them into weapons, armor, and jewelry would be nice.

 

10 hours ago, EnbyKaiju said:

As of now once a metal moves out of functional usage it gets relegated to lantern status pretty much except for some special use cases, so I'm very interested to see how the devs play with that down the line. They definitely don't seem to like the idea of things just becoming useless once you move up the tech tree.

What other uses can folks think of for other metal types that don't get the love outside of a couple of mechanical uses? Thinking of things like silver & gold, moly, brass...etc? I bet if we dug through some historical records we could find something fun.

I think having some kind of metal leaf option for chiseling, instead of needing solid blocks, would be a great use, and likely encourage more players to use metal textures in their designs. As it is, one block of metal, I think, requires 5 plates to craft, which is going to be 10 ingots per block. Certainly a statement when using expensive blocks, but it does discourages players from using even the cheaper metals.

[Vexxvididu]

15 hours ago, Fyrol said:

I couldn't find what you suggested in your post history, what did you suggest for aqua vitae? I can't think of anything barred potions, but I do tend to have fantasy on the brain...

Use as a solvent in all sorts of chemicals.... potions would be one thing.  Could also make it a component in magical lubricants for advanced machines and stuff like that.  I never went into that much detail in prior posts, but have suggested vaguely such ideas.

As for beehive kilns, My main frustration with them is that by the time i have iron, I've MOSTLY fired what I'd need to fire.  ...other than just refractory bricks.  I think a scaled down version available with lesser materials would be cool.

[Fyrol]

4 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

Same. More gemstones in general, really, but there ought to be something to do with them first aside from just collecting and trading. Socketing them into weapons, armor, and jewelry would be nice.

14 hours ago, EnbyKaiju said:

Maybe once players move into and out of the bronze age then bronze becomes more of an ornamental function rather than a mechanical one? I doubt the devs are going to let us move into giant bronze mirrors that we can use to death-ray drifters, but maybe bronze mirrors themselves could make an appearance? Or bronze cookware? Maybe let the players cast bronze items using wax or sand casting methods like bells, statues or jewellery that can be displayed or sold to traders?

As of now once a metal moves out of functional usage it gets relegated to lantern status pretty much except for some special use cases, so I'm very interested to see how the devs play with that down the line. They definitely don't seem to like the idea of things just becoming useless once you move up the tech tree.

What other uses can folks think of for other metal types that don't get the love outside of a couple of mechanical uses? Thinking of things like silver & gold, moly, brass...etc? I bet if we dug through some historical records we could find something fun.

You know what mineral I'd love to have introduced because I think it has been ignored despite being historically pretty consistent? Jade. I want it as a stone to carve, as something to shape for jewellery, and as a building material.

Something I'm pretty sure will pop up down the line is some form of magic. With how the world is falvoured, I always thought it would show up as some sort of alchemy, kinda like what they were doing in the resonance archive. However with no status effect system, and a lot of other more pressing mechanics to polish/add/expand on, I see that coming a lot later. Having gemstones and other "lesser" materials used in lets say enchanted jewellery, or alchemical items. I can only really think of more modern tech using stuff like copper, gold, and solder, but from my understanding the devs want to stop at the steam-age. Maybe Jonas tech will be used as a substitute for it?. I just agree that I hope they have some sort of use, even if I litter my base with chimes or something.
 

1 hour ago, Vexxvididu said:

Use as a solvent in all sorts of chemicals.... potions would be one thing.  Could also make it a component in magical lubricants for advanced machines and stuff like that.  I never went into that much detail in prior posts, but have suggested vaguely such ideas.

I wonder if something like that won't be the basis of the next update, or whenever they add status effects. Might explain why they pushed it back.

[LadyWYT]

26 minutes ago, Fyrol said:

Something I'm pretty sure will pop up down the line is some form of magic. With how the world is falvoured, I always thought it would show up as some sort of alchemy, kinda like what they were doing in the resonance archive.

I doubt it. Vintage Story is rather grounded in realistic natural processes, with a little eldritch horror in the background for flavor. Having some kind of "magic" system would just be jarring with the tone of the game. Alchemy was on the roadmap at one point, but was later renamed to herbalism, which is another reason I don't really expect anything too fanciful.

What I do expect to see is more whimsical steampunk gadgets in the form of Jonas tech. That is, stuff that's obviously not entirely realistic, but more grounded in naturalistic process and "science".

[Zane Mordien]

57 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Having some kind of "magic" system would just be jarring with the tone of the game.

To me there is already magic in the game, but its more Lord of the Rings magic vs D&D magic. Although translocators are pretty D&D magical since they flat out magically transport you somewhere else. Everything else is the vague alchemy/magic of the temporal technology. Transforming humans into serphs and hurling them through time is also very magical.

If they keep heading down the path of explaining how it all happened while you work with the imortral (more magic) guy from chapter 2, it seems like we will be learning more of that "magic", but I don't think we will be throwing fireballs or anything.  

[Fyrol]

5 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

I doubt it. Vintage Story is rather grounded in realistic natural processes, with a little eldritch horror in the background for flavor. Having some kind of "magic" system would just be jarring with the tone of the game. Alchemy was on the roadmap at one point, but was later renamed to herbalism, which is another reason I don't really expect anything too fanciful.

4 hours ago, Zane Mordien said:

To me there is already magic in the game, but its more Lord of the Rings magic vs D&D magic. Although translocators are pretty D&D magical since they flat out magically transport you somewhere else. Everything else is the vague alchemy/magic of the temporal technology. Transforming humans into serphs and hurling them through time is also very magical.

If they keep heading down the path of explaining how it all happened while you work with the imortral (more magic) guy from chapter 2, it seems like we will be learning more of that "magic", but I don't think we will be throwing fireballs or anything.  

I think I wasn't clear on what I meant by magic. I mean in the sense of having a new resource, something like the glowing blue stuff in chapter 1, that can be turned into equipment that can do things for you. I would highly doubt that they'd go through the effort of making so many clothing and apparel slots, especially stuff like broaches, that would have nothing to do with gameplay. The Jonas tech stuff is already in the game, with some stuff that makes no sense. (I'm mostly thinking of the night-vision goggles) Zane Mordien mentioned some lore reasons, but I think in just what you see there's enough precedent for more subtle magics.

Already magic rifts open up, along with temporal storms, that allow monsters to crawl over to our world, and some drop a glowing blue gear. So yeah a staff of fireball would probably not work, but some I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream esque tech that shoots a stream of flame seems like something endgame that you can put together after like 40 steps. Even with something like alchemy being renamed to herbalism, I see that as less being then moving away from magic, and more allowing it in homo sapiens mode. 

[Zane Mordien]

14 minutes ago, Fyrol said:

I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream esque tech

Nice. Definately the eldritch horror vibe to that statement.

[The Lerf]

I wish that the bronze age lasted a fair bit longer. It feels like a half-step to Iron, despite having 3 different bronze alloys in the game. Though I don't actually have any ideas on how to fix that... unless you make the saw unable to be forged out of copper, moving the 'planks upgrade' part of the game locked behind bronze, which would delay players not rushing progression... but game design/balance is hard.
I feel like this also plays into OP's nitpick about lower tier armors straight up being pointless investments, because you're at the copper/bronze age for such a comparatively short amount of time, and you're encountering enemies that invalidate those armor tiers pretty often (bears, temporal storms, and caving). I don't see the amount of metal needed to be bad, per se... but maybe lower tier armors, if they aren't going to be nearly as good, don't need an equivalent amount of ingots to making iron/steel armors. Making lamellar armor more accessible with less ingots needed might make it more worthwhile. The opportunity cost is way to great with current amounts, as lamellar chest armor takes 19 whole ingots at a point in the game where you're still blowing through tools every other outing, have a potentially limited amount of alloy material, and need to invest in a bronze anvil. The biggest bottleneck to progression at that stage is finding iron, not combat endurance... so perhaps making iron more easily found via caving? Encouraging locust hives to spawn near iron? Is this a fun change though? I'm not sure.

We've also got what, 40+ varieties of mushrooms now, and after the agricultural revolution they kind of fall off. Less satiation than other vegetables, yet harder to find is a confusing combo, especially in the early game when foraging really matters. 

I also kind of wish that there were more variants of ruins and they were more lucrative for decor-type finds. Super rarely I'll find a decorative object in a ruin that I didn't even know was in the game, like a damaged locust or something neat that doesn't need glue to grab. I want more of that, more "Oh neat, nice find!" moments in ruins that aren't about like, cabbage seeds or a blackguard cuirass. 

 

[LadyWYT]

45 minutes ago, The Lerf said:

I wish that the bronze age lasted a fair bit longer. It feels like a half-step to Iron, despite having 3 different bronze alloys in the game.

After tinkering around a little more with 1.22, I'm thinking that bronze will be lasting a little longer than previous versions. Or rather, that investing in some basic bronze armor and tools feels like a more attractive option, since iron takes a little more work to get going. Iron can be worked without bellows, however, it doesn't stay hot enough to be workable beyond a handful of swings before needing to be reheated. 

I don't think it's necessary to go smithing bronze chain or invest in a full set of bronze armor, but players may find themselves opting for some bronze lamellar to make spelunking and combat a little less risky. Flax will probably be saved for windmills rather than gambeson, and buying gambeson from a trader may or may not be an option. What the player chooses to do also depends on their preferred playstyle, but I do think there's going to be a few more options to consider in 1.22 rather than a clearcut meta strategy.

[MKMoose]

3 hours ago, The Lerf said:

I wish that the bronze age lasted a fair bit longer. It feels like a half-step to Iron, despite having 3 different bronze alloys in the game. Though I don't actually have any ideas on how to fix that... unless you make the saw unable to be forged out of copper, moving the 'planks upgrade' part of the game locked behind bronze, which would delay players not rushing progression... but game design/balance is hard.

I feel like if the Bronze Age is short, then the Copper Age is a mere moment, because many people will only craft the bare minimum set of three copper tools and then beeline for bronze. One thing that is especially difficult to balance here is the contrast between new and experienced players. Some struggle to find their first copper deposits, and some will easily get to steel before the first winter ends. Any way to extend the early game would likely end up in a similar fashion - a large obstacle for the beginner, but at most an inconvenience for the veteran.

I don't think it's worth it to delay or extend progression for the sake of it. Iron is already non-critical, because it's possible to do nearly everything in the game with bronze tools with no issues - the durability is unimpressive but absolutely sufficient for the average player not engaging in some massive projects, and there are very few features which are actually gated behind iron. The main problem here is that even if the player were forced to wait for some long processes or slog through a tedious grind to get to iron, it will still almost always be technically optimal to get the better tools before engaging in the activities which aren't critical to progression, even if the improvement isn't too significant in practice.

If the goal is to extend the Bronze Age, then the best way to do it might be to just continue adding various features that don't benefit significantly from having better tools (some of which might be only unlocked at bronze, like the helve or the crate trap). Or generally develop the more primitive parts of the game's progression to be more self-sufficient with more unique unlocks that don't have clear endgame upgrades, so that they're not just stepping stones to iron and steel. Sure, most of it would be optional and many players would skip it, but beyond a couple critical unlocks it seems intentional that going through the material progression isn't strictly required for everything else.

As for examples of those optional mechanics - herbalism, mushroom farming and improved animal domestication are on the roadmap, and so are woodworking (ideally including wood and bone carving) as well as weaving, which could be pretty big undertakings but would likely serve well to extend the early game without putting pressure onto the player to advance quickly through the progression.

 

2 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

After tinkering around a little more with 1.22, I'm thinking that bronze will be lasting a little longer than previous versions. Or rather, that investing in some basic bronze armor and tools feels like a more attractive option, since iron takes a little more work to get going. Iron can be worked without bellows, however, it doesn't stay hot enough to be workable beyond a handful of swings before needing to be reheated. 

It turns out that earlier I was testing on a world with a lower time speed, so I initially though the difference in cooling rate is lower. It's a bit annoying, frankly, to have to switch back and forth, though I don't think it's too bad. The iron blooms also seem to cool down faster than ingots for seemingly no reason. Though I don't think that this has much influence on making bronze armor. In this specific case, making iron armor more annoying to obtain just makes it more annoying to obtain, but bronze armor is still weak and expensive, and gambeson still exists.

Edited February 23 by MKMoose