cjc813

Literally any game ever, if played with lag, things won't work right. To say, "this mechanic is broken because it doesn't work on a laggy connection" is kinda silly. At that point, it's not a Bowtorn problem, it's a problem with your setup. That'd be like me saying, "omg, Anego, fix your worldgen" just because my potato of a laptop doesn't have enough memory to generate chunks faster than I run. The problem's not with the game, it's with my setup.

Do people really not know how to... move? Every time someone calls bowtorn "super accurate" or "snipers" I facepalm.

It's not that I think mortar is difficult, it's that, after spending hours getting other materials and machines set up, I look and there's one more step that I forgot about that is going to have to run in the background. I couldn't be arsed to go mine more chalk and then cook the shit. I've got a chest full of bauxite and quartz and maybe 30 cooked bricks that I haven't touched since. I decided to do other stuff for a while, because honestly, I was straight up not having a good time.

This is the way. Get a copper anvil and make shears asap. After that, you'll have more sticks than you can... well... shake a stick at. As an aside, it makes zero sense that you can't make sticks. But I guess it is what it is.

After playing a little bit more today, I kind of agree with the folks who say combat feels janky. I think it's a combination of factors. 1) weapon animations take quite a while, and 2) the mobs jitter all over the place, even the slow ones like drifters. This results in a lot of swinging and, during the swing animation, the mob will zag and you'll miss and have to adjust. It's not *awful,* but honestly, swinging and missing and swinging and missing while a drifter just derps about aimlessly feels kinda bad. I honestly think it's working as intended with shivers. They're obviously meant to dodge your attacks and run and ambush and stuff, and it makes them interesting to fight. But, with drifters and bowtorn at least, having them jitter and derp around while you swing at them doesn't feel great. I honestly think 3 things could be tweaked. First, make the mobs less erratic. The ai/pathfinding seems to just go in random directions and change directions for no apparent reason. They just feel weird and spastic and not really aggressive enough. Lotta times they just end up jittering in a corner while you try to connect. Second, I think melee animations could be a bit faster. Also make the second half of the animation cancelable, so you can switch to a ranged weapon if the most recent hit makes the mob run. Third, implement a collision-based system where if your weapon's hitbox connects at the right time, you've landed a hit. These changes, especially the first two, would probably make the combat feel more fluid and less janky without changing the overall mechanics.

That would at least give Malefactor something interesting to do in combat. I like that idea.

I honestly like the core combat, and wouldn't want to see something too much more complicated than the point and swing stuff we have now. What I *would* like to see, is a more diverse sandbox. a) More mobs, and better implementation of the existing mobs. I'd like to see the enemies attack together more often instead of trickling in one or two at a time. I think the skeleton of a solid mob sandbox is there, but most of the time you might see a couple drifters, kill them. Then go fight one bowtorn, and occasionally get attacked by a shiver. Think something like Doom 2016/Eternal... each mob has a role on the field, and the way you move and fight depends on what mobs are out there and where they are. b) More weapons. I'd like to see different weapon speeds and ranges. Slow warhammers, fast daggers, swords in the middle, stuff like that. Maybe even a battle axe that could cleave, something. Have weapon diversity and make them useful for certain situations. Hell, even just cosmetic differences would be cool. I'm tired of looking at the same reskinned Falx.

First time working toward steel today. The material processing required is absolutely ridiculous, tbh. And this is in a seed where I have *everything* (short of olivine and black coal) very close to my base. Plenty of trees, quartz, and bauxite, chalk, etc. I even have a huge supply of borax. I didn't have to hunt for a thing, and it's *still* an insufferable grind. From processing all the charcoal and flint, and processing the iron itself, and mining and pulverizing the quartz and bauxite... next I have to fire the bricks just to make the blocks to make the furnace to smelt the g-dang steel. (Which means next I'm going to have to make a scythe and gather a crap ton of grass...) Oh, and NEXT I have to also cook the lime and then mix it in a friggin' barrel to make mortar!? Saw that in the handbook and logged off for the night. Uncompromising survival, blah blah blah. Fine. This game isn't Minecraft, and that's why we're all here. Generally, we love the process and the satisfaction our effort gets us, but this crap is the opposite of fun. There's a line where the tedium required to do something *completely* kills the joy of the game, and @Tyron bloody well crossed it with steel making. Who the heck thought this would be fun? Seriously.

Overall, very creative. I quite like it. It has paladin vibes. I'd at least consider trying it out, unlike Malefactor, Tailor, or Clockmaker. RP folks could have a lot of fun with it, too, I think. I'd say definitely include at least tier 4. (And maybe bears? Just for funzies? Lore-wise, nobles hunting bears for sport makes sense.) Side note: Doesn't feel like it'd fit The Noble, but think it would also be neat to have a class that got better prices at the traders.

I don't even necessarily mind how they handle inclines, considering the alternative: spamming spacebar and placing/removing rope ladders. It's an upgrade in that way, imo.

I really like this idea! Rope ladders are nice, but a bit tedious. Some sort climbing system would actually be pretty neat.

I understand that we want to balance the increased speed with drawbacks, otherwise the elk would just fly through all environments and be too powerful. I'm not asking for that. However, there is *zero* reason that turning 180 degrees should take every bit of 4 seconds. I imagine this is to avoid trivializing rough terrain, but here's the thing: we could probably double the turn speed of an elk (2 second 180 degree turns are still *extremely* slow) and rough terrain would still slow you down plenty. You have to slow down to navigate trees and leaves, swim through or go around bodies of water, and slow down to avoid running off cliffs or into pits. All of these things will still require the player to be engaged and careful (and will punish carelessness) with a faster turn speed. As someone who loves this game, I still have to say this is honestly ridiculous and makes the elk extremely disappointing. Add to this the fact that first person view feels jerky and unpleasant, and riding the elk on anything other than an open field feels awful right now. I'm honestly not 100% sure I wouldn't rather just go on foot, even if it'll take longer. That's a problem. The elk should be a useful upgrade for long-range travel. EDIT: are there mods/config files that allow you to change the turn speed?

Yeah, I kept reading about that one, but when I tried it recently it didn't work. Must've been nice for early flax fibers.

All I'm saying is that any well designed block game would include such a feature.

Was getting harassed by a bear earlier, so naturally I made a raft so he'd board it and get stuck and I could take him out easily. I dropped it in front of him, but he ran right passed it and killed me anyway. This can't possibly be intended behavior? Haven't tested it on wolves or drifters yet. I'll check back with those results, but it looks like rafts might be bugged?

Girl, bye.

Bro, I just want ice to melt at a reasonable rate.

I think this is the crux of the issue, tbh. My gut response is, "don't wear plate." Which isn't really a very good response, to be honest, because (a) it's in the game, it should have a purpose, and (b) you put in the effort and should get value out of it. And I think you're right on that point, honestly. Vintage Story as a game is all about putting in effort and getting a satisfying payoff. That's kinda the whole point. We don't *like* pounding out 40 braziillion plates to make armor, but we do it assuming that it'll pay off and we'll get to have fun with it. And, honestly, it seems like that's not currently how the game works. With the way the mobs currently are, it makes more sense to wear chainmail than plate, and that makes plate kind of irrelevant. Chain is better. And I could be a douche and just be like, "hurr, just wear chain, dummy," but at the end of the day, it doesn't sound like the game provides a great experience for people who went through the trouble of making plate.

Gotta respectfully disagree with y'all here. Building just a hole and standing outside of it to stab them with spears? Yeah, that feels a bit cheap. And building a "boiler room" over a hot spring to cook mobs automatically? Yeah, that's pretty cheesy. But building arenas, forts, etc? That's not cheese, bro. That's just being creative and prepared. The sandbox has changed. Combat has changed. (IMO, for the better.) Ya gotta adapt. My "house" has an upper level with windows I can shoot out of, and I lit up the surrounding ground and cut all the grass so I could see 100% clearly for a whole area. That alone has covered all my bases. Surrounded by bowtorn? Head upstairs and get into a shoot out. Lots of drifters? Head down stairs and go to town. Get caught with my pants down by a nightmare shiver? Run inside to heal up and re-engage. I got my bases covered. I think of it as strategy, not cheese. It's a building game. Why wouldn't you use building to prepare for temporal storms? And dude, my first bowtorn storm was heee-larious! I'd pop into the window to snipe 'em one at a time. And all you'd hear is SCREAMSCREAMSCREAMSCREAMSCREAM, and then about a second later, after I'd darted out of sight, just THUNKTHUNKTHUNKTHUNKTHUNK. Got done, and the entire side wall of my base/house/fort was just RIDDLED with spikes. It was a blasty-blast. (As an aside, ya wanna know what *is* cheese? Spawning with 76 of your buddies and filling a lone enemy with spikes. The mobs are the cheesy ones! )

Real talk though, resin is the one time consuming feature of the game that I wish was just... not there. I sincerely think resin could just be removed completely and the game would just be better. Ohhh nooo... now I don't have to carry a freaking cooking pot to this ruin and cook some damn glue just to bring home a stupid decoration... my experience is ruined...

You're speaking my language. Absolutely. Dying to wolves because you're running through the forest and get blocked is no fun, and neither is not having sticks when you need them. So shears are a permanent part of my kit. And yes, I, too, have been inconvenienced by an entire forest and just burned it down. RIP frame rate.

Oh, 100%. It's my favorite way to cook and preserve and carry food. Salt? Never heard of it. Can confirm, though, that 5 pieces (even of red meat pie) isn't enough to get *to* and *through* a casual jaunt in the RA in full iron chain. Especially when you can't figure out where the giant gear is supposed to go and explore the whole thing at *least* twice.

Is he canonically the Thunder Warden? Is this written somewhere I've missed?

Fam, I'm playing on a $500 laptop with integrated graphics. Coming back from RA, I dropped from Low to Ultra Low just to make it home in a reasonable amount of real-world time. I'm also torn by the distance between story locations; much of chapter 2 I've spoiled and looked up already, but I still want to head to the other locations; so much of the narrative is told environmentally, and people tend not to share those environmental details when they're posting online. So I want the "Journey," and the experience, but I don't want to spend the next real-life week or two preparing for and working through the content. So I'm tempted to just fly there in creative... butttt... I want to *experience* the story, so I wanna elk-up and travel. But that takes a ton of time... and so on. It's a dilemma.

Massive spoilers, obv. Stop reading and go play if you haven't already experienced most of the story. But, having spoiled for myself (but not yet played) Chapter 2, I've been thinking a ton about the lore and how it might all fit together. I've got some rough hunches/theories that I wanna ramble about. I might not have the details 100% correct (esp. re: The Lens and the chapter 2 content), since I'm currently piecing together what I've Googled, and I don't currently have time to play chapter 2. (I'm debating just creative-mode-flying to the Lazaret, etc. But I kinda want to experience "The Journey," so...) I also don't have the time/energy for a more organized writeup, so this will be very speculative and rambly, but here we go. Let's talk first about Eldritch themes, which we know Vintage Story is inspired by. Just how deep the Lovecraftian roots of this game's story go isn't clear; is the story just borrowing thematically here and there or is it a whole-ass Eldritch story? Not yet clear, but my gut tells me that the cosmic horror elements of this narrative go a lot deeper than we currently see (which, itself, is very Eldritch). Couple things we can pull away from Tyron and Luke's Eldritch inspirations. One: to an extent, this story isn't going to make logical sense, and at certain points we're probably going to have to pull away from firm, logical theories, the kind of which we would craft around, say, a hard sci-fi story. This story is a good bit more mystical, I think, and perhaps even a bit timey-wimey (for any Whovians reading). The unease of Eldritch horror stems largely from things that are cosmic and beyond human comprehension. I think, ultimately, a lot of Vintage Story is going to have a "beyond mortal comprehension" vibe. Two: where are the gods of vintage story? (Dave!? lol, Dave the Elder God, imagine that! ) If Vintage Story is full-on Eldritch, then malevolent, cosmic entities are at play. Not much is said about it/them in the current lore, but my gut tells me that at least one is there. (And he's underground.) Couple times where gods are mentioned: when you're talking to the trader, asking about drifters (or maybe just the monsters of VS in general), he says that these creatures are cursed by God/gods for their hubris, essentially. So, at the very least, deities are believed-in in the VS world, and there's this association with evil and the underground. (More about drifters in a minute.) Second is in the story of "The Morning," which is a whole other narrative ball of wax. I want to do a whole post about Bearfirth at some point. But, essentially, she digs deep underground and what does she find? Seems to be a g-dang elder god, with whom she makes a pact: power, in exchange for her loyalty. https://www.vintagestory.at/stories/storyexcerpt-themorning.html/ Now, this story could be a myth written by humanity emerging from the wake of its rotten apocalypse, so it might not all be historically accurate, so to speak, but it is very interesting, no? The suggestion that there is a deity beneath the earth willing to bestow a powerful madness on anyone devoted to him? We see something also interesting in Blind Bat Rickhart; He finds *something* down there that's metal, and it seems to peer into his soul. Again, how much of this is myth/folklore of a re-emerging humanity, and how much is *true* isn't clear. But again, there's another suggestion that there's something evil deep beneath the earth. Talking about the underground, we also can't ignore The Rot and the quarantine efforts lead by Jonas. Which also ties in, I think, somehow, to the appearance of monsters underground. During the accounts of The Rot, I don't *think* drifters are mentioned; at least, they aren't mentioned often. The people underground were more worried about starving than anything. But *now?* After the use of the machine? The underground is just chock full of abominations. And the deeper you go (i.e. closer to the god?), the more horrifying they get. Coincidence? [Potential inconsistency: Bearfirth flees underground to *escape* from the monsters. Not sure what to make of this.] We can also talk about the monsters in detail, but I want to chew on it a bit more first, look closely at the models of the new mobs, and probably play Chapter 2, before I say more. I will say this, though, especially about drifters -- I don't think they're organic. They seem almost like they're made of metal (and maybe cloth/flax?), almost as though they're mechanical material come to life. (Are we dealing with a medieval, metal, mechanical time god and his abominations?) Let's talk for a second about rot and rust, too. What happens to metal when left to the ravages of time? What happens to *flesh*? See!? I think The Rot was/is more of a temporal curse than it was a biological plague, where living things grew necrotic and began to, well... rot. And I think "rust" is a sort of analogue. In both cases, time is affecting the bodies of these creatures in an *unnaturally fast* way. (Though, the bodies of the monsters seem, themselves, unnatural, so there are differences, too.) But, I think there's something there. I also think this ties into the prima materia somehow. This material seems to relate to autonomy, energy, and time. It's used in the automatons, in temporal gears, in power generation, and in the "Salvation" machine. It also seems to relate to your immortality and respawning as a seraph. Narratively, it could just just be "essentially magic," or it may end up being more well defined. I guess we'll have to see. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prima_materia Lastly, what about the Lens? The Lens seems to be how Jonas got a lot of his inspiration/ideas. Did he make it? Find it? This might be revealed in parts of Chapter 2 I haven't played yet, as I know it's... YOU KNOW WHERE, but... I haven't been able to Google much about it. For the sake of time, I'll stop there. Though I will mention Blind Bat Rickhart as well as that one Jonas journal/letter again, and simply say: In the narrative, scrying through time/reality is an established theme. Here again, something is going on, and I think all these things are related. TYING IT ALL TOGETHER. TL;DR. ETC. Long post short: I think Jonas somehow brought about the apocalypse in Vintage Story by dabbling in cosmic matters he couldn't understand/control/predict. I think he was smart from birth, but his real progress started when he got ahold of the Lens, and that's when all the cosmic/Eldritch shit started happening. I think he drew the attention of a malevolent deity (a deity somehow related to metal, rust, and time), and that deity is ultimately responsible for *everything.* I think the deity noticed Jonas and our world, and creeped his way in. I think the deity looks back when the lens is used. I think it caused the rot, and influenced Jonas's plan to move humanity underground. I think it influenced "The Project," corrupted Jonas's automatons, and influenced humanity toward the big, cataclysmic event. (Jonas notes how everyone seems super fervent about the Salvation machine/project, and it *scares* him.) I think the machine was/is a way for this god to ultimately influence/control our world somehow, I think the machine still exists underground, and I think that's what caused (or at least made worse) temporal disturbances, monsters, and so on. I think *that* is the sense in which this elder god is underground; he's somehow tied to the machine itself, and... I think he's still there, and I think *he* is the threat that Tobias is so afraid of. But hey... that's *just* a theory... a gam... anyway. Gotta go to work now.