Firestarters

[Melerna]

I think it would be groovy to have more fire starting options as you progress through the game. At present, firestarters can take quite some time to light anything, and torches are very fast! I feel that having something in-between these two could contribute to the overall feel of the game. It would also give players more options for firestarting while traveling. I've fallen in many a hole before making a lantern, extinguished my torch in a waterfall on the way down, and then fumbled around in the dark with a firestarter. I like the idea of being able to prepare a bit better prior to the development of lanterns (they are so powerful), while still keeping the challenge! Also, having more historical stuff in the game is just incredibly cool.

If they could be placed in ground storage, they could be quite lovely to look at, and could also be useful for environmental storytelling in ruins and other structures.

Some ideas:

Fire Striker: It's basically flint and steel, but it does not need to be made with flint and steel. It had a variety of other types of stone and metals it could be used with, apparently! I think a good way it could be used would be by having us create the metal hoop on the forge, and then having us have to carry another stone with us to use it, main hand/offhand. Apparently some extremely cool people used their axes to start fires? That also sounds like it could be fun to have in game! Maybe by having a viable stone in your offhand?

Fire Piston: It's an ancient tool that has seen continued use throughout history. The earliest known ones were used in Madagascar and Southeast Asia, though they were also used much later by folks in Italy. It could have tiers, as it can be made from a variety of materials, such as bone, wood, and bamboo. Some of them are really very beautiful, and some are very simple.

 

Spoiler

A Falx-Engineered Lighter: There's so much amazing technology in the game, I can't imagine someone wouldn't have invented a lighter of some sort. There are so many wildly inventive lighter designs I've seen in antique shops and online, the sky really is the limit with these. I could see a Clockmaker being able to find ruined ones, and sometimes find flawless ones in ruins. I'm not sure if it would make decent sense because I'm not quite as clever as all of you are, but I reckon there could be a way of further refining fats to use as fuel, or barring a new fuel source, have them simply become unusable once they run out. It could make for some fun moments, if you find it in a ruin when you need light, just before a temporal storm hits. You found some unlit torches and quickly light one, placing it in a sconce nearby while you try to hold out in some dark hole in the ground you've managed to find yourself in at the worst possible time. I dunno, but I just think it sounds neat!

I think that both of the first ideas could necessitate a tinderbox, but since at present we're already using grass placed on the ground essentially as tinder, I don't see a problem with keeping the trend going. If you ever wanted to add tinderboxes as decorations or storage though, that could be neat! While browsing around online I learned about chuckmucks and those look so pretty, I could see them being added as a belt or shoulder item at some point in the game.

Anyway, sorry for rambling! I hope ya'll have a great day! 

[MKMoose]

23 minutes ago, Melerna said:

It's basically flint and steel, but it does not need to be made with flint and steel. It had a variety of other types of stone and metals it could be used with, apparently!

Instead of flint, primarily quartz and chert could be used, and many other hard, non-porous rocks are viable as well - that much would be fairly trivial to implement, though flint is already easily accessible either way.

Instead of steel (or iron, though it's less effective), you'd seemingly need pyrite or marcasite, if we want to keep it relatively grounded - iron minerals which are not currently in the game. Making them reasonably accessible in the early game without greatly devaluing other sources of iron may not be exactly straightforward. Many nonstandard options could be feasible, though they inch into the territory of alchemy and not simple firestarters.

 

While I broadly really like the idea, it will not serve much purpose besides vanity as long as lit torches can be carried conveniently and indefinitely. None of this is really a justification not to implement more proper firestarters, but the game may need to change in a couple places to accommodate them properly and give them a distinct role.