What was the point of the water change?

[Riamus]

2 minutes ago, AtomicUs5000 said:

Back on topic of the water changes specifically though, I do wish things were more of a mix. Like I've said before, I want the struggle of having to deal with carrying water in a little container at first, but then I want to earn that reward of the more convenient dew collectors. Part of the reason why people argue their likes and dislikes in such a black and white manner might be because quite often when these changes come about, the changes themselves are black and white. When LBD switched to LBP, this change was black and white and many of the opinions were black and white. Some of us had thoughts that a hybrid system would be best but it was difficult to be heard as a shade of gray in between all that black and white. I'm finding it to be the same regarding this water change even though its significance is so small compared to that of a skill system.

True.  Those against it will argue a lot about it and both those who really like it and those who are more in the middle both tend to respond to the complaints in a way that suggests they entirely like the change.  You do tend to lose the idea that a middle ground is actually better to most players.

[warmer]

21 hours ago, Survior said:

It is currently since you seem to be unable to answer the question, where is the learn by doing mechanic that you are saying exists currently?

well, what do you choose to level into?

What you expect to be doing! lol

Its not exactly LBD, its a hybrid idea. You level into what you intend to do as a character, and that influences the magazine drops. Effectively you influence your progression by leveling into attribute/skills based on play style, ala doing.

[pottervogel]

On 6/26/2023 at 6:37 PM, Survior said:

It is currently since you seem to be unable to answer the question, where is the learn by doing mechanic that you are saying exists currently?

In my borderless naivity i would assume its gathering xp to skill your attributes / perks. Welll - it's a game. It can not simulate everything, but try to find a balance between immersion, practical solutions, player wishes and own visions. Often they do a really good job, sometimes they fail. Over time some trials get ironed, and almost every possible wish inspires someone to mod it into the game.

[Lukesaber]

Hello.

 

I've been enjoying 7 Days to Die for quite a while - bought it on Steam about a year ago - and have enjoyed the game thoroughly.

Excited for the A21 release, as the launch of the game has a note saying everyone's working hard on it - I opted to install the beta and give it a go.

 

I love the changes made to the play style with the advent of skill books - the zombies are a bit harder too, and that's a good thing.

 

What troubles me (and others I glean, from the numerous posts about it) is that the thirst system in this game is completely nerfed.

I get that the game needed to be a bit more challenging, but honestly - what is the point of playing a game for fun when it is no longer fun to play?

 

Running around constantly neutered by thirst is a pain in the ass.
why not make the glass jars harder to make? why not give a different avenue - like only two buckets of water can be carried (try and carry three in real life, you'll understand) and only two jars of boiled water can be produced?

now i am forced to run to a lake or river with at least two goldenrod teas to prevent shatting myself to death.

 

Who knows - maybe I'm completely off the deep end here - but what survivalist HAS NO ACCESS TO WATER CARRYING EQUIPMENT?

Forgive me. I don't mean to be rude... but we as a species have been making pots out of mud for thousands of years.

 

This is pretty game breaking in my eyes and ... honestly, there are other games out there with replayability that *don't* make me question if its worth spending my time to play them.

 

Did i mention that glue requires water?

Yeah! so.. its a choice between no stamina (and soon death), dysentery and being locked distance-wise to a body of water - and making a bottle of glue.

 

Hoping this hits home and the devs get to work on another option that will retain their fans

 

I've no use grinding for no joy... does anyone else here?

 

Cheers to all

 

Lukesaber

Edited June 28, 2023 by Lukesaber (see edit history)

[meganoth]

1 hour ago, Lukesaber said:

Hello.

 

I've been enjoying 7 Days to Die for quite a while - bought it on Steam about a year ago - and have enjoyed the game thoroughly.

Excited for the A21 release, as the launch of the game has a note saying everyone's working hard on it - I opted to install the beta and give it a go.

 

I love the changes made to the play style with the advent of skill books - the zombies are a bit harder too, and that's a good thing.

 

What troubles me (and others I glean, from the numerous posts about it) is that the thirst system in this game is completely nerfed.

I get that the game needed to be a bit more challenging, but honestly - what is the point of playing a game for fun when it is no longer fun to play?

 

Running around constantly neutered by thirst is a pain in the ass.
why not make the glass jars harder to make? why not give a different avenue - like only two buckets of water can be carried (try and carry three in real life, you'll understand) and only two jars of boiled water can be produced?

now i am forced to run to a lake or river with at least two goldenrod teas to prevent shatting myself to death.

 

Who knows - maybe I'm completely off the deep end here - but what survivalist HAS NO ACCESS TO WATER CARRYING EQUIPMENT?

Forgive me. I don't mean to be rude... but we as a species have been making pots out of mud for thousands of years.

 

This is pretty game breaking in my eyes and ... honestly, there are other games out there with replayability that *don't* make me question if its worth spending my time to play them.

 

Did i mention that glue requires water?

Yeah! so.. its a choice between no stamina (and soon death), dysentery and being locked distance-wise to a body of water - and making a bottle of glue.

 

Hoping this hits home and the devs get to work on another option that will retain their fans

 

I've no use grinding for no joy... does anyone else here?

 

Cheers to all

 

Lukesaber

 

I get the impression you didn't notice that there are dew collectors now in the game.

 

If you didn't know: You should be able to build dew collectors very early in the game, but you need to buy filters to build them at the trader. Each dew collector you have will give you 3 water a day. And with enough money you can build as many collectors as you want or need.

 

I would guess that a normal single player will want 2-3 of them, more if he plans to use explosive arrows.

 

[Scyris]

On 6/23/2023 at 4:26 PM, warmer said:

I love the fact that I dont have to deal with jars or empty cans anymore. that was just a pain in the butt to inventory manage. 

 

This, frees up inventory slots for other things. As single player I find 8 dew collectors able to produe enough water i can drink, make food and make glue with it. I do have one suggestion: Allow us to upgrade dew collectors with materials so they have more storage slots and faster production, maybe 3 levels? and each level has a new model with extra parts to it? Maybe, add it in between workstation tiers? Once you learn it you can then upgrade it. Or since they are easly pickupable with a land claim block, or hell you can even pickaxe them to pick them back up (they have very low hp), just have it require the tier below dew collector as part of the recipe to upgrade it.

13 minutes ago, meganoth said:

 

I get the impression you didn't notice that there are dew collectors now in the game.

 

If you didn't know: You should be able to build dew collectors very early in the game, but you need to buy filters to build them at the trader. Each dew collector you have will give you 3 water a day. And with enough money you can build as many collectors as you want or need.

 

I would guess that a normal single player will want 2-3 of them, more if he plans to use explosive arrows.

 

 

2-3 is not enough, maybe just for drinking and some food crafting, even with 8 of them I still run out of water making food and glue, mind you I probably make more than I actually need right away. If you do a few clear quests on day 1 you can easly have a dew collector up on day 1, I usually do. I usually have 8 of them up by day 7 or 8, basically 1 a day, I mean at low character levels the traders don't really stock much else worth buying. I've adapted to the a21 changes pretty quickly myself. I got more than enough water for food and drink, its mostly having spare for glue that is the issue, or my current game I have more than enough water i've actually ran out of bones so bones are actually being my delay for making glue.

 

If I did have one gripe, its that I feel we need to have a chicken coop or something, as getting eggs are a major issue. I'm on day 10 i've looted every single birds nest i've seen and I have a total of 16 eggs, i've never used a single one in crafting yet. Could make it where you have to "reload" it with corn after each harvest. Darkness falls does this, the first loot after making one is free, after that you have to feed it 1 animal feed each time you loot it which is made from diff crops at a 1 to 1 ratio. Generally it is lootable every 60 minutes of real time.

 

Most of my food has basically been grilled meat and whatever i've found in loot. I do have 10 meat stews on me, but haven't really *needed* to use those yet. Meat isin't a problem I have like 2-3 stacks of it on day 10, its the eggs that is severaly limiting bacon n eggs crafting.

Edited June 28, 2023 by Scyris (see edit history)

[meganoth]

51 minutes ago, Scyris said:

 

This, frees up inventory slots for other things. As single player I find 8 dew collectors able to produe enough water i can drink, make food and make glue with it. I do have one suggestion: Allow us to upgrade dew collectors with materials so they have more storage slots and faster production, maybe 3 levels? and each level has a new model with extra parts to it? Maybe, add it in between workstation tiers? Once you learn it you can then upgrade it. Or since they are easly pickupable with a land claim block, or hell you can even pickaxe them to pick them back up (they have very low hp), just have it require the tier below dew collector as part of the recipe to upgrade it.

 

2-3 is not enough, maybe just for drinking and some food crafting, even with 8 of them I still run out of water making food and glue, mind you I probably make more than I actually need right away. If you do a few clear quests on day 1 you can easly have a dew collector up on day 1, I usually do. I usually have 8 of them up by day 7 or 8, basically 1 a day, I mean at low character levels the traders don't really stock much else worth buying. I've adapted to the a21 changes pretty quickly myself. I got more than enough water for food and drink, its mostly having spare for glue that is the issue, or my current game I have more than enough water i've actually ran out of bones so bones are actually being my delay for making glue.

 

If I did have one gripe, its that I feel we need to have a chicken coop or something, as getting eggs are a major issue. I'm on day 10 i've looted every single birds nest i've seen and I have a total of 16 eggs, i've never used a single one in crafting yet. Could make it where you have to "reload" it with corn after each harvest. Darkness falls does this, the first loot after making one is free, after that you have to feed it 1 animal feed each time you loot it which is made from diff crops at a 1 to 1 ratio. Generally it is lootable every 60 minutes of real time.

 

Most of my food has basically been grilled meat and whatever i've found in loot. I do have 10 meat stews on me, but haven't really *needed* to use those yet. Meat isin't a problem I have like 2-3 stacks of it on day 10, its the eggs that is severaly limiting bacon n eggs crafting.

 

I actually found more eggs in my SP game than I could use in my blueberry and pumkin pies at the moment, but I haven't been very methodical in my farming, and well, luck plays a big part in this as well. I avoid Bacon & Eggs though as it wastes too many eggs for only low food value.

 

 

 

Edited June 28, 2023 by meganoth (see edit history)

[warmer]

32 minutes ago, Scyris said:

 

This, frees up inventory slots for other things. As single player I find 8 dew collectors able to produe enough water i can drink, make food and make glue with it. I do have one suggestion: Allow us to upgrade dew collectors with materials so they have more storage slots and faster production, maybe 3 levels? and each level has a new model with extra parts to it? Maybe, add it in between workstation tiers? Once you learn it you can then upgrade it..

That would be pretty cool. We should at least have an electrified version that could be used like an air conditioner which literally works by drawing moisture out of the air.

 

bump that up 2x production rate.

Edited June 28, 2023 by warmer (see edit history)

[8_Hussars]

  

16 minutes ago, Scyris said:

This, frees up inventory slots for other things. As single player I find 8 dew collectors able to produe enough water i can drink, make food and make glue with it. I do have one suggestion: Allow us to upgrade dew collectors with materials so they have more storage slots and faster production, maybe 3 levels? and each level has a new model with extra parts to it? Maybe, add it in between workstation tiers? Once you learn it you can then upgrade it. Or since they are easly pickupable with a land claim block, or hell you can even pickaxe them to pick them back up (they have very low hp), just have it require the tier below dew collector as part of the recipe to upgrade it.

2-3 is not enough, maybe just for drinking and some food crafting, even with 8 of them I still run out of water making food and glue, mind you I probably make more than I actually need right away. If you do a few clear quests on day 1 you can easly have a dew collector up on day 1, I usually do. I usually have 8 of them up by day 7 or 8, basically 1 a day, I mean at low character levels the traders don't really stock much else worth buying. I've adapted to the a21 changes pretty quickly myself. I got more than enough water for food and drink, its mostly having spare for glue that is the issue, or my current game I have more than enough water i've actually ran out of bones so bones are actually being my delay for making glue.

Currently on Day 28 SP, and am surviving with 2 Dew collectors.  Glue and duct tape (and murky water) are looted a bit more often, and the former two are available at the traders as well.  Have crafted a fair amount of items, food, and duct tape but never really been short even with just two collectors.

I am of the opinion that all 7d2d water should be tainted due to the environment and the basic dew collector should provide murky water.  (return glue recipe to murky water)

I like the idea of enhanced or improved dew collectors.  Much like the tools in the forge, being able to add a bucket (or something) for extra collection storage, and/or an advanced filter (or the water filter mod) or a distillation system (or something) for faster operation and conversion of the dew collector output to normal water.  I also wouldn't mind to have to stock the collector with activated coal or replace the filter at a fixed interval, but maybe that's just too much busy work.

[mrflippy]

1 hour ago, 8_Hussars said:

I am of the opinion that all 7d2d water should be tainted due to the environment and the basic dew collector should provide murky water.  (return glue recipe to murky water)

I actually really like glue not being murky water now. The recipes are more streamlined now, and you don't have to worry about keeping murky water around to craft some things but not others. (Or, things like glue should be able to be made from any type of water.)

[Lukesaber]

On 6/23/2023 at 3:08 PM, OccamsShavingCream said:

 

If this is the case, why aren't those jars we always have on hand available when we're next to a lake or pond?

 

I'm not trying to be argumentative here, but this is inconsistent, and one of the biggest strengths of this game has been that over each iteration the simulation of the world has gotten deeper and more and more internally consistent. This however feels like a step backwards.

This.
 

 

On 6/25/2023 at 2:03 AM, Skaarphy said:

That is at least something. Doesn't take away the nonsense of not being able to scoop up some water and carry it home (with some sort of container, maybe? Like a jar or some such?) but still. That's good to know. 

 

True. Buying a pot was the first thing I did, and it was no problem at all. They're dirt cheap, and apparently every trader has them now. But as for wasted loot, I don't see the issue here. Just like with plenty of other stuff which you eventually don't want anymore there's always the option of not taking it with you. 

And personally, I find the challenge of overcoming the chance for dysentery (as with my 3 water stages example) much more interesting than the challenge of getting hold of a cooking pot. 

Especially since once you have one getting drinkable water doesn't seem to much of a problem anymore. You just have to be very specific about how you go about it and before the first week is over having water for all kinds of puposes stops being an issue, and will remain so for the entire rest of the game.

Not sure if this is really the result TFPs were hoping for. Maybe, who knows. To me it just seems kind of meh.    

 

Sure, ok - i'm certainly not going to stand in the way of progress and developing a game that everyone enjoys is a hard task to complete.

 

Loot is luck when you are starting out, the challenge and success is what gives players (and myself) the dopamine burst we're looking for.

Try looking for an axe or a wrench by looting without any water and minecraft starts to look pretty farking good.

 

My point is that they've taken realism and reasonability and tossed them out the window.

Want to get drivers to slow down? use square wheels!

want your kids to shut up? ... you can see where i'm going.

 

pretty heavy handed tactic and while everyone can do their best to see the dev's vision, the apples are on the table and they've begun to rot.

 

i should be able to carry a unit of water from a body of water and do something to it - that's the part that sucks.

you wanna make it challenging - make THAT step harder... dont cut off fingers and call it "a challenge to players"

 

two cents i guess...

 

hoping the devs read their forums and continue their creative development on this one

 

Lukesaber

[AllTheGoodNamesAreInUse]

7 hours ago, Lukesaber said:

i should be able to carry a unit of water from a body of water and do something to it - that's the part that sucks.

you wanna make it challenging - make THAT step harder... dont cut off fingers and call it "a challenge to players"

 

This. It's like if they decided that wood is too plentiful in the game, and their solution to that problem was to remove axes.

 

EDIT: Oh crap, I probably shouldn't say stuff like that. They might take that as a suggestion.

Edited June 29, 2023 by AllTheGoodNamesAreInUse (see edit history)

[Survior]

I agree, too much wood, wood should all be rotten, alpha22 should be the wood nerf!

Spoiler: alpha23 is the rock nerf because "you know the thing" is making everything bad.

 

[AtomicUs5000]

4 minutes ago, Survior said:

I agree, too much wood, wood should all be rotten, alpha22 should be the wood nerf!

Spoiler: alpha23 is the rock nerf because "you know the thing" is making everything bad.

That's ok because we'll have learn by dying.

[AllTheGoodNamesAreInUse]

"Learn by dying" sounds better than the whole magazine mess. Dying is something I can do rapidly, and often!

[Riamus]

3 hours ago, AllTheGoodNamesAreInUse said:

"Learn by dying" sounds better than the whole magazine mess. Dying is something I can do rapidly, and often!

Reminds me of Planescape: Torment.  You start the game already dead. 

[Renathras]

On 6/23/2023 at 5:06 PM, Roland said:

Because that would obviously break the water survival gameplay of the early game so infinite collection of water from bodies of water is limited to just drinking. If you want a bottle of murky water to go into your inventory every time you press E while standing in water then you may as well just open the creative menu and give yourself all the water you want. It would amount to the same thing.

I feel like this completely negates your prior point.

By this token, why not make you auto-consume the Honey from the tree stump then and there?

Oh, because it's about limiting water survival, not about realism? It's about forcing people to do content they dislike instead of the game being a sandbox that lets players play how they want? It's about nerfing things, no matter how irrational and illogical it is to do so, instead of just letting people have fun in a video game?

I genuinely don't mean to be antagonistic, but this statement I quoted negates every argument in favor of removing glass jars. It says the change was not to make inventory easier (seriously, glass jars stacking to 125 was HARDLY the cause of anyone's inventory woes when we have so many other random things - take a wrench to a vehicle and you just filled half to two-thirds of your inventory!), it was not because of some logic of "you have tons of free jars on you", or to reduce server backend item management or free one or two item registries up so you could add 2 new items in their place (and the very idea that would be an issue in the first place in a game in the year 2023 is just absurd).

All this proves is that the change was specifically to make gameplay dealing with water more annoying, and that making it more annoying was such an imperative to the programmers they broke half the rest of the game in their Quixotic quest to nerf water availability.

I feel like the solution would have just to make it harder to boil water, like requiring a beaker or distiller. That would have achieved all the things that this change has forced, but actually be logical (a distiller generating heat makes more sense than a dew collector generating heat, too) without breaking other crafting and other aspects of the game.

Heck, you can still get the helmet water filter or the book that lets you drink murky water, so getting your hands on either still negates the entire change system.

.

Sorry, Roland, but I don't think these changes are defensible.

[Doctor3D]

I don't understand how this does anything for the 'survival' part of needing water. There are magical vending machines every 200-300 meters that have plenty of fluids. You can drink straight out of the water source and there's many ways to prevent, treat any sickness. I haven't needed or used a dew collector, myself. It's definitely not good for immersion to be near a lake and not be able to dip a glass bottle in it to collect the water, or not capable of melting snow. It doesn't feel like you're 'surviving' when you can just pop in some dukes in a vending machine and get anything you want to drink. 

 

I'm not a fan of the way the water is, but I can live with it. It's definitely a downgrade to me though. It feels backwards. It feels even less like survival when you can't even do the most basic thing of bending down into a water source and collect it. 

 

In my perception, making it take way longer to create glass jars and making them more rare could have slowed things down enough. I'm not even slowed down by water at all as it is now - there's still water everywhere. 

[theFlu]

27 minutes ago, Renathras said:

seriously, glass jars stacking to 125 was HARDLY the cause of anyone's inventory woes

To be completely honest, I do enjoy the short-circuit going on in my brain every time I drink:

*Chug clug clug* ... "did I have jars already, or do I need to drop this one ... oh right! great!"

 

It wasn't a big deal, but it was a pointless extra thought that went thru my head. Now it's fading and I ain't going to miss it when it's gone.

 

For everything else accomplished here, yeah, no. Having issues finding H2O standing next to a lake is not going to make sense. If you want to make glue harder, make the campfire recipe locked under workstations, and the chem station recipe locked further down the same line. And double the costs for all I care... just don't break basic logic, please.

[Renathras]

30 minutes ago, Doctor3D said:

I don't understand how this does anything for the 'survival' part of needing water. There are magical vending machines every 200-300 meters that have plenty of fluids. You can drink straight out of the water source and there's many ways to prevent, treat any sickness. I haven't needed or used a dew collector, myself. It's definitely not good for immersion to be near a lake and not be able to dip a glass bottle in it to collect the water, or not capable of melting snow. It doesn't feel like you're 'surviving' when you can just pop in some dukes in a vending machine and get anything you want to drink. 

 

I'm not a fan of the way the water is, but I can live with it. It's definitely a downgrade to me though. It feels backwards. It feels even less like survival when you can't even do the most basic thing of bending down into a water source and collect it. 

 

In my perception, making it take way longer to create glass jars and making them more rare could have slowed things down enough. I'm not even slowed down by water at all as it is now - there's still water everywhere. 

I think this is the biggest frustration to me.

I remember at some point jars being low drop rates. Playing with friends, we'd have to manage jars early on because we had relatively few (and they were still consumed in cooking). At some point, the jar drop rate was boosted, as well as things that contained jars/gave you jars when consumed.

Now, the dew collector/water change seems to have been made to make this actually something you have to manage...

...EXCEPT there are Traders and Quests in the game now, and you get TONS of Murky Water by just looting. If you aren't getting any, a Tier 1 quest gives you enough Dukes to buy 2-5 drinks from a Trader/Vending Machine, and those restock every few days. Every Trader also has a Vending Machine. The average Vending Machine I've found has around 10-15 drinks in it for 120 (Water) up to 600 (Bootstrap, Smoothies), meaning every Tier 1 quest I do (can do 2-4 in a day) can get me AT LEAST one drink, and at most 5, and the Vending Machines and Traders restock often enough that they never run out.

"Ah, ha, but the nerf was only intended for multiplayer!", you might counter.

Well, first off, that's just wrong. Second off...there are more Vending Machines in the world. Find yourself a POI with a working Vending Machine to turn into a base. Now you have water for life without even making a dew collector, even if other players are emptying out the Trader inventory and Trader Vending Machines. And Vending Machines aren't exactly rare.

Between Vending Machines and Traders, the change to water was completely irrelevant.

All it's done is make it where you HAVE to quest to be guaranteed water - either through getting Dukes to buy the filter, or getting Dukes to hit up the Vending Machines - and that's it. It hasn't actually made water survival more difficult, it's just forced people out of crafting/basebuilding playstyles and forcing them to quest. For people who already did a lot of questing before, literally nothing has changed for them.

Which might be why so many posters who prefer questing and running POIs are saying they don't see the big deal. Because, for them, nothing really has changed.

[Roland]

1 hour ago, Renathras said:

I feel like this completely negates your prior point.

 

I'm not sure what prior point you're talking about since you responded to me almost a week later and I can't remember. Sorry you feel that I self-negated myself?

 

1 hour ago, Renathras said:

By this token, why not make you auto-consume the Honey from the tree stump then and there?

 

Uh...because the stump is destroyed when you get the single jar of honey and the lake isn't? I guess if the stump was unbreakable with infinite reserves of honey inside then the devs would let you auto-consume the honey rather than taking infinite jars of it away or I guess they could allow you to gather a jar of murky water from the lake at the moment that it is completely destroyed by doing so. I think the way it is makes more sense.

 

1 hour ago, Renathras said:

Oh, because it's about limiting water survival, not about realism? It's about forcing people to do content they dislike instead of the game being a sandbox that lets players play how they want? It's about nerfing things, no matter how irrational and illogical it is to do so, instead of just letting people have fun in a video game?

 

It's about changing water survival from having no gameplay presence to having a gameplay presence. Whether you feel that the gameplay TFP designed is fun or not is your very own valid opinion. There are plenty of people having fun and plenty of people not having fun with the same changes. The game is becoming an actual full-fledged game that will involve limitations and rules that weren't there before. It has some sandbox elements just like it has elements of several other genres. It is not a dedicated sandbox game although you can make it so by enabling the creative menu and godmode. Just because you can't understand the rationality and the logic of the changes doesn't mean they are irrational and illogical. Just because you aren't having fun doesn't mean they aren't fun.

 

I've loaded in overhaul mods that I played for about an hour before uninstalling because I wasn't having fun. Does that mean the mod author made their changes to the game in order to prevent people from having fun with 7 Days to Die? Did they mod it on purpose to make the game worse? Obviously not. I just didn't like the changes, myself. I didn't go to that mod author's thread and rant about how stupid their changes were and ask why they would do such irrational and illogical modifications to make the game unfun for everyone. That would just be rude to do to someone who obviously put a lot of thought and effort into the mod. Instead, I simply realized that the changes weren't for me but that they probably were fun for other people and I looked elsewhere. If that mod author did happen to ask for my feedback I would have given the reasons I didn't find it fun and leave it at that. I certainly wouldn't demand that he change his mod to suit me.

 

1 hour ago, Renathras said:

I genuinely don't mean to be antagonistic, but this statement I quoted negates every argument in favor of removing glass jars. It says the change was not to make inventory easier (seriously, glass jars stacking to 125 was HARDLY the cause of anyone's inventory woes when we have so many other random things - take a wrench to a vehicle and you just filled half to two-thirds of your inventory!), it was not because of some logic of "you have tons of free jars on you", or to reduce server backend item management or free one or two item registries up so you could add 2 new items in their place (and the very idea that would be an issue in the first place in a game in the year 2023 is just absurd).

All this proves is that the change was specifically to make gameplay dealing with water more annoying, and that making it more annoying was such an imperative to the programmers they broke half the rest of the game in their Quixotic quest to nerf water availability.

 

Your problem is that you are looking for the one ring to rule all reasons why the change was made. There isn't just one reason. There are lots of reasons and I've spelled them all out ad nauseum plus I don't think they would change your mind if I did it again

. The fact that you think that the change was specifically made to make gameplay more annoying shows your incredible inability to think beyond your own personal mindset. It may be that you find the changes annoying but that was not the goal and it is pretty naive that you think that it is. Every change the devs make are the purpose of improving the fun factor of the game. You can agree or disagree that they succeeded but to say that they set out to do things intentionally to make the game less fun is incredibly shortsighted.

 

1 hour ago, Renathras said:

I feel like the solution would have just to make it harder to boil water, like requiring a beaker or distiller. That would have achieved all the things that this change has forced, but actually be logical (a distiller generating heat makes more sense than a dew collector generating heat, too) without breaking other crafting and other aspects of the game.

 

Talk is cheap. What you have here is an elevator pitch of an idea. So test it out and prove that it would have achieved all the things this change set out to do. Either mod your game or self-restrict yourself however you need to to simulate your design. After all, that is exactly what the devs are doing. They designed a change and implemented and tested it for months and now are having the player base test it and they are making adjustments as they go. So test your own idea and if turns out really good then see if you can get it made into a mod.

 

1 hour ago, Renathras said:

Heck, you can still get the helmet water filter or the book that lets you drink murky water, so getting your hands on either still negates the entire change system.

 

A chance for a helmet water filter is not the same as guaranteed infinite water bottle gathering from a lake. I felt disappointed both times I found the helmet water filter and simply sold them for money since I wanted to play the water survival gameplay because I think it's fun. Since you find it annoying I'm surprised you aren't overjoyed to have the helmet water filter mod. That gives you exactly what you want which is probably why the devs left it in. That way people who want infinite water early on can have it and those who don't will have some games where it is forced since they don't find the mod or chosen since they can just sell it if they want.

 

I don't know about any book that lets you drink murky water.

Edited June 29, 2023 by Roland (see edit history)

[Firecrow]

Easy solution that preserves what they are trying to do.

Set water back the way it was.

Leave jars consumable on use, as they are now.

Add them as a recipe that requires a forge, sand and clay to make.

Preserves early survivability difficulty until you can get a forge set up. Frankly after that point it isn't hard to get enough water to survive from scounging.

 

This way, the people who want to make use of the trader can still do so.

The people who want to ignore the trader and just forge their own way can do so.

Stockpiling water was never addressed by this change so that is a non-issue.

It does, however, allow people to alleviate the bottleneck of murky water for glue and other uses.

Also put in a recipe for crafting filters with a recipe like a bucket, charcoal, sand and stones(gravel). Hell I can make one right now with A ziplock bag, charcoal, sand and gravel.

As it is right now you HAVE to use the trader for Dew collectors and I'd wager a fair number of people don't want to have to rely on traders.

[Renathras]

1 minute ago, Roland said:

 

Talk is cheap. What you have here is an elevator pitch of an idea. So test it out and prove that it would have achieved all the things this change set out to do. Either mod your game or self-restrict yourself however you need to to simulate your design.

I'm not a modder. I've only ever played the vanilla game. Can you teach me to make a mod to do this so we can test it out? That sounds like a lot more work for you, but I suppose we can do that if you want to.

As for the gameplay:

As I said in another thread: That'd be an argument if it wasn't ridiculously easy to get water by questing. Run a Tier 1 quest. Get 600 Dukes. Go to the Trader you just turned the quest into. Buy 5 waters. Now you're good on drinks for 2-4 in-game days, and it only took you 1/3rd or so of a day to run that quest. What's that, the Trader doesn't have any drinks? Well, today's your lucky day! Right outside their door (or sometimes in the same room) is a vending machine that ALSO sells drinks at the same low, low prices. They also restock every 3-4 days (Traders and Vending Machines), making this a permanent source of fluid.

In one game, I haven't bothered to build a base. Just done quests and bought all the food and drink I needed. I literally have had LESS water issues on that map than any of the maps I've tried base building. I can do 2-4 tier 1 quests in a day, which is enough for me to buy all the water and teas I need, no dew collector required. It's gotten me thinking most of the people saying the change is no big deal are also people that quest and run POIs all the time, and so to them, literally nothing has changed from the way they played before, so to them, it IS no big deal because nothing changed.

When I say more annoying, it's because we went from having two viable ways to secure water (questing or gathering) to having one-ish (questing/POI running). A single Tier 1 quest will give you enough water for at least a day. A day of Tier 1s (4, maybe more if you rush it) will give you enough water to last a week. And the Vending Machine at the Trader will have enough fluid to give it to you. And if it doesn't, the Trader will. And if they somehow don't, there are other Vending Machines nearby, and all of these things restock every couple says.

Where's the "difficulty" here?

The difficulty didn't change at all. If anything, it's super easy too have all the water you need just by running a Tier 1 quest every other day. The only thing that changed is it's more onerous to get water if you don't like questing, and/or it's not possible to have sustainable water unless you have a yucca and berry farm in the snow biome. It made one playstyle less viable while not changing another playstyle, and so didn't make water management any more difficult, it just made one way that could be used non-viable while having no change to water management of another playstyle which was already easy to begin with.

[Roland]

5 minutes ago, Renathras said:

I'm not a modder. I've only ever played the vanilla game. Can you teach me to make a mod to do this so we can test it out? That sounds like a lot more work for you, but I suppose we can do that if you want to.

 

There are plenty of tutorials for making xml-based modlets. It's super easy. I'm not a programmer and I was able to figure it out in an afternoon and create some basic changes for myself. You can also force the change in a vanilla game by the way you choose to play in order to simulate the change. Lots of people stopped using empty jars while still playing A20 to try simulating A21 at least partially. You don't me.

 

See? Zero work for me.

 

8 minutes ago, Renathras said:

As for the gameplay:

As I said in another thread: That'd be an argument if it wasn't ridiculously easy to get water by questing. Run a Tier 1 quest. Get 600 Dukes. Go to the Trader you just turned the quest into. Buy 5 waters. Now you're good on drinks for 2-4 in-game days, and it only took you 1/3rd or so of a day to run that quest. What's that, the Trader doesn't have any drinks? Well, today's your lucky day! Right outside their door (or sometimes in the same room) is a vending machine that ALSO sells drinks at the same low, low prices. They also restock every 3-4 days (Traders and Vending Machines), making this a permanent source of fluid.

In one game, I haven't bothered to build a base. Just done quests and bought all the food and drink I needed. I literally have had LESS water issues on that map than any of the maps I've tried base building. I can do 2-4 tier 1 quests in a day, which is enough for me to buy all the water and teas I need, no dew collector required. It's gotten me thinking most of the people saying the change is no big deal are also people that quest and run POIs all the time, and so to them, literally nothing has changed from the way they played before, so to them, it IS no big deal because nothing changed.

When I say more annoying, it's because we went from having two viable ways to secure water (questing or gathering) to having one-ish (questing/POI running). A single Tier 1 quest will give you enough water for at least a day. A day of Tier 1s (4, maybe more if you rush it) will give you enough water to last a week. And the Vending Machine at the Trader will have enough fluid to give it to you. And if it doesn't, the Trader will. And if they somehow don't, there are other Vending Machines nearby, and all of these things restock every couple says.

Where's the "difficulty" here?

The difficulty didn't change at all. If anything, it's super easy too have all the water you need just by running a Tier 1 quest every other day. The only thing that changed is it's more onerous to get water if you don't like questing, and/or it's not possible to have sustainable water unless you have a yucca and berry farm in the snow biome. It made one playstyle less viable while not changing another playstyle, and so didn't make water management any more difficult, it just made one way that could be used non-viable while having no change to water management of another playstyle which was already easy to begin with.

 

You are choosing to play the game a certain way that makes water survival easier. There are other ways to play that bring more of a water survival challenge. It's a choice and part of the sandbox element of playing 7 Days to Die. You can spam quests and ignore your base and have plenty of water or you can focus first on your base and do a couple of jobs a week and have a more challenging water survival experience. Not everyone can or wants to do 2-4 tier one quests per day. 

 

As for murky water loot amounts and vending machine availability I agree that more balancing is needed. Murky water used to be rarer in loot than it is now. I suspect they increased it in anticipation of larger teams of players playing and they may decide to make adjustments there. I think everyone agrees that the Duke economy is still a work in progress. I would expect the prices on drinks to eventually increase by quite a bit. Then again, there is also a wide range between players on how efficient they are at making money. Someone who can rake in the Dukes to always purchase their drinks easily will find the changes less impactful while others who are less savvy at trading won't be buying drinks so often.

 

All things said-- I agree that the feature still needs tuning. I disagree that the gameplay loop, itself, is annoying since I have witnessed many reports of people immensely enjoying it. I acknowledge that many people also don't enjoy it. All I can say is that TFP is aware.

 

 

[Doctor3D]

I think still allowing the character to harvest the bodies of water 'somehow' - would at least be a comfortable middle ground.  Maybe water pumps you can put on the water blocks?

 

That's the same system (workstation collecting water) At least then, it wouldn't seem like the water is mostly just useless data on the map.  I mean you can of course drink it with your hands but that's about all it is good for now. The lakes of water on the map don't have much utility beyond scooping and drinking it dirty with your hands.  

 

The dew collector could be an easier item to build and start with - but slower. Then water pump would be more of an end game item. 

 

Still not perfect - I'd just rather have the water jars and dip them in the pools of water like the most basic of human concepts, but I'd be less disappointed if it at  least tiered out the water collection in different ways through workstations like pumps to take advantage of actual bodies of water just sitting there. 

 

Either way, I can live with the change as it is. Don't like it at all - but it's not a game-breaker.