What was the point of the water change?

[Riamus]

7 hours ago, Jost Amman said:

As long as you stay near the water source, that's exactly what I intended. It would work exactly like in A20.

 

But if you stock up with hundreds of murky water jars that you get from the nearby water source, and then travel to an area far away where there's no water source available (e.g.: in the desert), you risk finding yourself with hundreds of empty jars once you get there.

 

That's a good point I didn't think of... but they could introduce a better bottling recipe for mid-game, where liquids won't evaporate enymore if you use (e.g.) a "sealed jar".

 

It does. As long as you can't get far from water sources without risking drinks to evaporate, it will make lakes, ponds and rivers logistically significant again.

At least, until you setup a base with dew collectors.

 

But for all this to work, they need to make dew collectors more difficult to craft or its components more rare.

Right.  Maybe you meant something different when saying it would work perfectly.  As you said, it would work like in A20, which means it would not offer any sort of increased difficulty with water, which was their goal.  That's what I meant about disagreeing.  It wouldn't have done what they wanted it to do.  All it would really do is make water sources more immersive.  That isn't a bad thing by any means.  I just meant it wouldn't do what they were wanting to do.  Granted, as I said above, I don't really see any increase in difficulty getting water with the new system, so I don't think the new system actually does anything either but that's an entirely different conversation. 

 

Also, something that causes liquids to evaporate means that if you play on a map without water sources nearby, it will be just a non-stop go loot a couple bottles of murky water, boil it and drink it.  Repeat the next time you need a drink, ad nauseum.  Not all maps have much water and not necessarily anywhere near where you start and you don't have a map showing where it is, so trying to run around looking for it just wastes the water you do have.  Admittedly, water on tiles seems to be a lot better in A21, so perhaps that isn't such an issue as it would have been in A20.  But it's still a consideration.  I don't disagree about the immersive benefits, just that this doesn't help make water more challenging if you have any water nearby and just adds a headache challenge rather than actual challenge when trying to deal with water when you don't have a water source, as well as "working the system" by using your water immediately instead of holding it until you need it.

Edited September 25, 2023 by Riamus (see edit history)

[BFT2020]

At one point, I modded A20 and changed the recipe for boiling water to include cloth and coal (as an additional step to filter the water while boiling it).  Along with removing drinks from loot (including boiled water), I had to work harder to get drinkable water just from looting (traders stock was also adjusted not to refresh as often so you can't just keep buying drinks from them).  I might bring it back to A21.  It doesn't make water scarce, but it did force me to work harder and plan ahead more.

[Riamus]

58 minutes ago, meganoth said:

To sum it up: If you have no problem at all with getting water the first days, you probably are not a typical player. AND even you probably value a jar of water in loot more now than you did in A20.

I'm guessing you don't know this, but maybe you do... in A21, would you qualify as a typical player in terms of crafting?  It sounds like you craft a lot.  Do you know (or can you guess, if you don't know) how much the typical player actually crafts in A21, especially in early game?  Are they in need of all that duct tape?  I mean, yes, an archer will use a lot of glue for arrows, but for anyone else, are they really in need of anywhere near as much duct tape for crafting as you are using?  Maybe that is the norm.  I don't know.  I do know that many people craft a lot but I'm also sure many do not for one reason or another.  I'm just curious what would be considered normal for the typical player.  The reason I bring it up is that, as I mentioned before, if you do craft a lot, you're of course going to struggle more with water.  If you do not craft much, water isn't going to be a struggle at all.  And I have a hard time believing most players are crafting all their armor or other things that need duct tape in the first week when water scarcity is supposedly intended even though you are doing so.  So it makes me think that most people aren't going to have the difficulty with it that you describe.  I could be wrong, though.

 

As far as mid- or late-game, this was something I touched on earlier as well.  At least according to Roland, the idea behind the water changes besides just removing jars was that you have water scarcity in the first week or so and then overcome it.  So, if that's the goal, most duct tape use for crafting ends up being things in mid- to late-game and so wouldn't be an issue based on the intended goal.  You should have plenty of water coming in, whether through looting or dew collectors, to handle crafting by that point if you really are intended to overcome the intended scarcity.  If you don't, then that suggests it isn't balanced the way they intended (assuming Roland is correct about their goals).  But that's a different issue than whether or not water in the first week is an issue.

 

I'll certainly agree that if you are using bows and crafting arrows, you are going to have much more of a water challenge in the early game than someone who doesn't.  But as this is only one "class", it doesn't mean that things are working well just because it impacts that one group of people if it doesn't really impact others.  I'll also agree that if you craft a lot of stuff that needs duct tape in the early game, you're going to need more water and it could be a challenge to keep up.  But as I asked, is that what a typical player does?  Or is it a smaller group of players who do that much crafting instead of getting stuff from loot (or even from the trader)?  If it's only a smaller group who does this, then again, it doesn't mean things are working well just because it impacts that group and no one else.

 

I do get that a challenge for new players that doesn't impact veterans is a normal and acceptable challenge in a game.  And I would agree that at least for the first game or two for a new player, water may be a challenge.  But I don't go out of my way for water and still have more than enough without needing any dew collectors.  I don't min/max specifically.  Yes, I quest/loot a lot but that's just because it's what I enjoy doing in the early game.  Mining with a stone shovel isn't my idea of fun and building with limited resources so I can't build something really interesting isn't much fun for me either, so I quest and loot until I have better tools and more resources to make those activities more interesting and fun for me.  But I don't go out with an intent of getting water.  I just loot everything and bring it back and then I boil whatever murky water I find every so often.  I rarely even drink anything I find in loot.  Tea, coffee, etc. just ends up going into storage and never comes back out in my games.  And I don't normally craft those to save on water.  I normally only start "upgrading" my water when I can eventually make mineral water.  So I'm not min/maxing in that way either, and I'd consider that a "normal" thing for people to do to save on water rather than some kind of "exploit".  Yes, my way of playing is different from those who don't loot much.  But I still think, as explained previously, that water is easy enough to find with even looting one POI per day unless you loot certain ones that don't have much chance of having water (no toilets, or only one, no water coolers, etc.).  As a last note, I will agree that if you do get hit a lot and are using meds a lot (or the auto-heal perk), you're going to go through water very quickly and if you eat things that drain water like charred meat, you'll also go through water very quickly.  These will of course influence how much of a challenge water is for you and why a new player may struggle more than a more seasoned player who knows to avoid those things when possible.

Edited September 25, 2023 by Riamus (see edit history)

[Riamus]

58 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

Speculating, because for people like me and Roland, who play the game, instead of trying to "game tha game", it looks like rushing quests as quick as possible to get as many water filters, water and money you can, looks like "exploiting a mechanic" (airquotes needed).

I think this should be looked at in a more unbiased way.  Yes, you have min/max players who will rush quests for that reason.  Just like with every other min/max option you have in the game, there will be those who do it specifically for that reason.  But min/max players are usually a relatively low percentage of players, so they don't really matter so much.  If you hate what they do, it's usually easier to just not play the game with them than to expect the devs to adjust the game to prevent what they do as long as they aren't actually exploiting something enough for it to need fixed.

 

But beyond the min/max players, many people enjoy looting in games.  If they loot all the time because it's what they enjoy doing and not to "rush" anything, then it isn't exploitive in any way even if the end result is that they get more loot faster.  If you want to say that those who loot all day are exploiting the game to get more loot, you'd also have to say that people who mine all day are exploiting the game to get more mined resources.  I've never noticed anyone suggest that mining all day is an exploit.  It's the same thing, though.  A player who plays one part of the game more than another because it's what they enjoy isn't exploiting the game in any way.  Yes, you'll have different results than someone playing another part of the game or someone playing the whole game in a more balanced way.  That isn't exploitive or a bad thing.  If I only loot, I'm going to have a harder time coming up with iron and clay and such than if I mined all day.  If I only mine, I'm going to have a harder time getting armor and weapons and other looted stuff.  This is expected and normal and not a problem.  It's why you are intended to play the whole game so you can get everything you need.  As a player, you need to balance what you enjoy doing with what you need to do.  If I need a bunch of forged iron and I'm only looting and not mining, I'm going to have to accept that I will need to do a bit of mining to get the iron needed for making the forged iron even if maybe I don't like mining.  If I need magazines or something and I'm only mining, I'm going to have to accept that I will need to do a bit of looting (or questing or purchasing) to get what I need even if I maybe don't like looting or questing or using the trader.  This doesn't mean the game is bad.  It means you have to make the choice to actually play other parts of the game to get what you need.  Just because this is partly a sandbox game, that doesn't mean that is all the game is.  For a fully sandbox experience, you really have to use the creative menu.  Otherwise, you're going to have to actually play the game and that isn't a bad thing.  You can still focus mostly on what you enjoy and skip what you don't, but you'll need to do things you might not enjoy once in a while to fill in what you aren't getting when doing what you prefer to do.  That is pretty common in any game.

[Jost Amman]

1 hour ago, Riamus said:

I think this should be looked at in a more unbiased way.  Yes, you have min/max players who will rush quests for that reason.  Just like with every other min/max option you have in the game, there will be those who do it specifically for that reason.  But min/max players are usually a relatively low percentage of players, so they don't really matter so much.  If you hate what they do, it's usually easier to just not play the game with them than to expect the devs to adjust the game to prevent what they do as long as they aren't actually exploiting something enough for it to need fixed.

Maybe I didn't explain myself clearly. My comment was not targeted at min/maxers, or any other player category.

It was aimed at the game and the developers.

 

They're still in the process of developing the game, true, but they're having difficulty in easing players into their own vision without artificially forcing them.

 

For water, as an example, if they can't get most players (or at least the "average player") to care about water for at least a few days early game, then they've failed.

Their vision, as I understand it, wasn't to impose limits to mining, so your example there is out of context in respect of what I meant.

 

Anyway, my comment is to say that the current system is an interesting step in the direction of survival, but it's not connected well (yet) with the other elements in the game.

Traders ar still OP, and can be easily exploited (again, not blaming the players here).

Looting, still give too much of the important stuff too easily, so it can be easily exploited.

[Riamus]

25 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

Maybe I didn't explain myself clearly. My comment was not targeted at min/maxers, or any other player category.

It was aimed at the game and the developers.

 

They're still in the process of developing the game, true, but they're having difficulty in easing players into their own vision without artificially forcing them.

 

For water, as an example, if they can't get most players (or at least the "average player") to care about water for at least a few days early game, then they've failed.

Their vision, as I understand it, wasn't to impose limits to mining, so your example there is out of context in respect of what I meant.

 

Anyway, my comment is to say that the current system is an interesting step in the direction of survival, but it's not connected well (yet) with the other elements in the game.

Traders ar still OP, and can be easily exploited (again, not blaming the players here).

Looting, still give too much of the important stuff too easily, so it can be easily exploited.

The mining is still in context because you were talking about doing a lot of quests as being exploitive and yet that can simply be someone playing the part of the game they enjoy.  Suggesting that it's exploitive would kind of automatically mean you're talking about min/maxers as regular players aren't actually exploiting things and are just playing the game in general.  In the same way, someone who only mines isn't exploiting things either because they are just playing the part of the game that they enjoy even though they'll gain a ton of resources very quickly compared to those who play all parts of the game in a more balanced way.  It is the same thing and neither is exploitive.  You are intended to loot and the devs don't limit how much you can loot on purpose.  If you want to loot a lot, it isn't exploitive.

 

As to whether or not traders are OP (they are), it really isn't related to water scarcity.  Sure, you can buy drinks, and filters are from traders almost entirely, but there aren't enough drinks from traders alone (at least not normally) for it to really impact water scarcity in the early game and filters still require building dew collectors, which is what they wanted.  Looting (not talking about quest rewards as that's separate) isn't really a problem.  If you want to loot, there's no reason not to get stuff tied to your level.  Loot stage is based partly on your level and so your loot will generally be somewhere close to what you should be getting no matter how much you loot.  They should adjust things relating to harder biomes, but again, this is entirely separate from water scarcity.

 

And if you were to look at this in terms of a real survival game (or real world survival), what do you think you'd be doing if you had no resources, weapons, or armor?  You go scavenging for stuff.  And you'd keep scavenging until you have what you need.  You might stop to build some kind of defensive base area for the night, but you're going to regularly be out scavenging for stuff.  And you are going to find weapons, tools, armor and more by doing so.  Choosing to avoid looting or limiting it to a small amount is actually the opposite of what you should be doing.  That is just playing the game the way you want rather than as intended.  And there isn't anything wrong with that but there also isn't anything wrong with looting a lot either.  Yes, you will get upgraded in gear faster looting than if you craft in most cases.  That isn't an issue with looting.  That is an issue with crafting - magazines not dropping fast enough, for example.  But again, a separate issue from water scarcity.

Edited September 25, 2023 by Riamus (see edit history)

[Jost Amman]

6 minutes ago, Riamus said:

The mining is still in context because you were talking about doing a lot of quests as being exploitive and yet that can simply be someone playing the part of the game they enjoy.

No, because TFP don't want to make mining harder, they only want to make water harder, that's my point.

Hope it's more clear now.

[meganoth]

2 hours ago, Riamus said:

I'm guessing you don't know this, but maybe you do... in A21, would you qualify as a typical player in terms of crafting?  It sounds like you craft a lot.  Do you know (or can you guess, if you don't know) how much the typical player actually crafts in A21, especially in early game?  Are they in need of all that duct tape?  I mean, yes, an archer will use a lot of glue for arrows, but for anyone else, are they really in need of anywhere near as much duct tape for crafting as you are using?  Maybe that is the norm.  I don't know.  I do know that many people craft a lot but I'm also sure many do not for one reason or another.  I'm just curious what would be considered normal for the typical player.  The reason I bring it up is that, as I mentioned before, if you do craft a lot, you're of course going to struggle more with water.  If you do not craft much, water isn't going to be a struggle at all.  And I have a hard time believing most players are crafting all their armor or other things that need duct tape in the first week when water scarcity is supposedly intended even though you are doing so.  So it makes me think that most people aren't going to have the difficulty with it that you describe.  I could be wrong, though.

 

It was an exhaustive list of stuff you might want to craft in early game but also not far from what I craft usually. Naturally if I find a pipe machine gun I won't craft one. If not, I will. That list was what zztong asked for, i.e. what constitutes "all demands".

 

If a novice player is not going out at night (which would be sensible) he has all night for looking around the recipes he can craft and he will craft what seems useful. Also he surely isn't as efficient in looting as experienced players and won't have found as much stuff as zztong for example.

 

I don't think anyone would run around in plant fiber stuff after day 1 if he doesn't need to or didn't find any of the armor crafting recipes (at least I don't). Specifically because infection chance is much higher. An experienced player will find a few pieces of armor, but half will be of the wrong type. A novice will surely wear what he finds, but he won't find all armor pieces fast enough that he might not want to craft missing set pieces.

 

2 hours ago, Riamus said:

As far as mid- or late-game, this was something I touched on earlier as well.  At least according to Roland, the idea behind the water changes besides just removing jars was that you have water scarcity in the first week or so and then overcome it. 

 

This is the short form. The long form has the word "gradually" included. What I mean by that is that while you have solved the problem in midgame you still have to get water on a regular bases (from the dew collectors and/or loot) to satisfy your needs. Which means water keeps to have a value, even though it diminishes. There is no simple switch.

 

Compare this to your food production and you will see the similarities: Food is gradually solved as a problem when you build up your farm and eventually you will only harvest when it suits you or when you want a new stack of gumbo stew, but your farm is still useful and food ingredients and food have some small value.

Another similarity: When you build up your farm you have to invest ingredients into the seed production to grow your farm and that delays how soon you can use those ingredients in actually producing food.

When you build up your dew collectors you also invest 5 water in every dew collector and this sets you back compared to a player who just uses the water for drinking. So everyone who just plays without ever building dew collectors might have an easier time in early game actually, but you are probably not the target group for which TFP balances the water scarcity. Maybe it actually is a balancing problem that as a single player you can currently get along so well in the first days when you don't craft dew collectors(?).

 

Since you mention it again: As soon as TFP posted about the new changes and the reasons for it I have been consistent in writing that water should only be a problem in the first days. But I write a lot in the forum so I am not surprised if you get confused about all the stuff I'm claiming 😉

 

2 hours ago, Riamus said:

I'll certainly agree that if you are using bows and crafting arrows, you are going to have much more of a water challenge in the early game

 

Huh????? I don't think I ever crafted flaming or exploding arrows in early game and only those need duct tape AFAIK. Naturally I didn't include them in my list at all. You need to be able to get steel arrowheads from somewhere. Someone who can craft a useful amount of them in early game is certainly an expert player above my abilities. I couldn't (and in the case of flaming arrows wouldn't anyway). Where would I get all the gun powder from in early game when I don't have a chem station?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 25, 2023 by meganoth (see edit history)

[Riamus]

1 hour ago, Jost Amman said:

No, because TFP don't want to make mining harder, they only want to make water harder, that's my point.

Hope it's more clear now.

Yet you were talking about quests being exploitive, not water.  You did mention water but that was more of a side effect to you saying that rushing quests to get stuff is exploitive.  In the same way, rushing mining to get stuff would be the same idea.  If one is exploitive, then so is the other, regardless what they are trying to make more difficult because they are the same style of gameplay.

Edited September 25, 2023 by Riamus (see edit history)

[Riamus]

31 minutes ago, meganoth said:

 

It was an exhaustive list of stuff you might want to craft in early game but also not far from what I craft usually. Naturally if I find a pipe machine gun I won't craft one. If not, I will. That list was what zztong asked for, i.e. what constitutes "all demands".

 

If a novice player is not going out at night (which would be sensible) he has all night for looking around the recipes he can craft and he will craft what seems useful. Also he surely isn't as efficient in looting as experienced players and won't have found as much stuff as zztong for example.

 

I don't think anyone would run around in plant fiber stuff after day 1 if he doesn't need to or didn't find any of the armor crafting recipes (at least I don't). Specifically because infection chance is much higher. An experienced player will find a few pieces of armor, but half will be of the wrong type. A novice will surely wear what he finds, but he won't find all armor pieces fast enough that he might not want to craft missing set pieces.

 

 

This is the short form. The long form has the word "gradually" included. What I mean by that is that while you have solved the problem in midgame you still have to get water on a regular bases (from the dew collectors and/or loot) to satisfy your needs. Which means water keeps to have a value, even though it diminishes. There is no simple switch.

 

Compare this to your food production and you will see the similarities: Food is gradually solved as a problem when you build up your farm and eventually you will only harvest when it suits you or when you want a new stack of gumbo stew, but your farm is still useful and food ingredients and food have some small value.

Another similarity: When you build up your farm you have to invest ingredients into the seed production to grow your farm and that delays how soon you can use those ingredients in actually producing food.

When you build up your dew collectors you also invest 5 water in every dew collector and this sets you back compared to a player who just uses the water for drinking. So everyone who just plays without ever building dew collectors might have an easier time in early game actually, but you are probably not the target group for which TFP balances the water scarcity. Maybe it actually is a balancing problem that as a single player you can currently get along so well in the first days when you don't craft dew collectors(?).

 

Since you mention it again: As soon as TFP posted about the new changes and the reasons for it I have been consistent in writing that water should only be a problem in the first days. But I write a lot in the forum so I am not surprised if you get confused about all the stuff I'm claiming 😉

 

 

Huh????? I don't think I ever crafted flaming or exploding arrows in early game and only those need duct tape AFAIK. Naturally I didn't include them in my list at all. You need to be able to get steel arrowheads from somewhere. Someone who can craft a useful amount of them in early game is certainly an expert player above my abilities. I couldn't (and in the case of flaming arrows wouldn't anyway). Where would I get all the gun powder from in early game when I don't have a chem station?

I don't know... maybe I'm just too much of a gamer or something, but I don't do anything special in the game as far as looting.  I wear plant fiber pants because of the initial quest (no longer a shirt since it's not required now) until I find something else.  I don't craft armor or clothes, ever.  If I don't find something right away, I go without.  I'll even go without wearing heavy armor that I normally use until I get leveled up quite a bit to overcome stamina problems and that can mean even less armor being worn than I could wear if I was putting on everything I found.  Clothing is very easy to find as it's lying around everywhere in residential POI.  Armor is less easy but still not that difficult.  Again, though, if you aren't going to scavenge, you'll have more difficulty finding the stuff but you'll also have less chance of getting the magazines needed to craft stuff, so that kind of balances itself out in that you will have more difficulty for finding stuff and crafting stuff both if you aren't looting.  More looting means you find stuff, including magazines so you can craft, faster than if you aren't doing so.  Now, admittedly, a new player probably wouldn't play the game without wearing every armor piece they can find immediately and would likely be hit far more often than I am, so they will have more challenges there than I do.  But as far as getting clothing or armor, there isn't any change between a new player and how I play except potentially in how much they may choose or not choose to loot compared to me.  I don't loot in any unusual way.  I loot containers only and only rarely scrap stuff in POIs and usually that isn't until later in the game.  Most scrapping I do is with cars.  Anyone, even a new player, who loots all containers in a POI will be doing the same thing I do.  I don't even pick and choose unless I run out of space.  I'll take stuff I never use (like blood bags) and just drop that into my medical crate once I have one even though it's useless for me since I don't craft medical stuff other than sometimes antibiotics.  So I'd say I'm pretty casual and normal in how I loot and not doing anything that would vary from a new player in that regard.

 

About food... I think your description of how food evolves depends on how you farm.  For me, I don't farm until mid game.  I don't put points into LotL until I am far enough in that I don't need the perks for something else and I don't want to farm until I have at least one point in that.  So I'll cook only what I find and I don't usually go out of my way for vegetables except occasionally if I happen to be looting a farm and there's corn or potatoes handy.  If I don't have the vegetables, I'll stick to more basic food (meat is so overabundant that you never even have to think about it).  Once I do get a point in LotL, I never have a problem with farming.  Especially now that corn seed is lootable in the farm bags, you'll never really have issues with corn.  For everything else, I'll recraft whatever seeds to fill up my farm (usually not very large, such as 3x3 or 4x4 depending what I feel like) after harvesting and then cook the leftovers.  So it's never an issue of whether or not I have vegetables from farming or need them for crafting.  It just always works out.  Now, if you're farming right away without LotL and are losing a lot by crafting seeds because of that, you may have more difficulty with it until you have a better amount of seeds.  But I always end up with so many seeds that I could easily get by without recrafting seeds a lot of the time and just using what I already have for seeds but I don't bother and just recraft from harvested crops and then use the leftovers for cooking.  Once my farm is set up, I never use seeds I loot.  Now, if this was an 8 player game and I was the only one farming, maybe I'd need to spend more effort on it.  But that again just brings up the issue of number of players greatly changing the "difficulty" of the game, which I don't really think is a good thing.

 

About the arrows, it was my understanding from other posts (I don't use bows) that you needed glue and feathers to make arrows other than the stone arrows.  If that isn't the case, then I'm not sure why I've seen people saying they needed a lot of glue because they use bows.  If you thought I meant you yourself were using arrows, I didn't mean that.  I was just stating that someone who did would have more trouble and that what I was saying would not apply to such a person in the same way as they'd need more water than I would.

[Roland]

18 hours ago, Krougal said:

 I don't know how you had these magical jars from heaven in A20, for some reason my A20 memory is a bit foggy, maybe I was doing something wrong, but I can tell you A19 and earlier, I dug up plenty of sand to make glass jars by the hundreds. Hardly a non-issue or something non-trivial. I feel like I wasn't doing that in A20, probably because of the removal of ethanol, which was the main reason to make jars en masse. Re-usable containers are well re-usable, so you just don't need as many.

 

In A20 there were tons of empty jars, jars of water, jars of murky water, jars of tea and other drinks in various loot containers spread all over the map. Every time you drank a drink of any kind you would get an empty jar returned. That is how jars magically would build up in your inventory so quickly because you would find additional jars constantly and jars you already possessed never got used up ever so that personally, I never had to craft jars. I always had plenty.

 

Now it's just drinks you find. You drink it and it is gone. No snowball effect.

 

18 hours ago, Krougal said:

I didn't mangle anything, it simply isn't a struggle. The first day EVERYTHING is a struggle, because you have next to nothing. You need to start doing a little bit of everything, there are certain immediate priorities that are common to everyone no matter their playstyle or build. Basic survival of course being foremost of those.

 

You mangled the meaning of what I posted before your answer. I said that TFP did not intend there to be a long term struggle with water and that it was expected for players to solve their water survival issues during the early game. You then came back and said you were glad that TFP did not intend there to be any struggle at all because, in your opinion, there never is any struggle at all and TFP failed if they were trying to create a struggle so it was good that their goal wasn't trying to create a struggle for water. 

 

I didn't say what you thought I was saying so I clarified it. We just will have to agree to disagree that the new system does not create any more of a struggle than the old system did.

 

18 hours ago, Krougal said:

As to the rest, I'm done, you used to be fun to have discussions with but I feel like you'd rather argue over semantics on everything with everyone these days and it's starting to feel like talking to a lawyer. I wasn't talking about this particular change being a knee-jerk reaction. I was talking about how they have added and removed things over the years. I don't feel like they devote the time to tuning anything as they add and scrap systems wholesale. I didn't just show up here yesterday, I've been playing this game for many builds. 

 

Oops, sorry. I'm not trying to be unfun. There tends to be a lot of speculation about dev motivation that I happen to have an inside view about so it isn't really semantics I'm quibbling over rather than refuting a wildly speculative guess at why and how the devs updated the game the way they did with my actual witness of how it went down. I know for players it was A20 one day and then A21 the next day so changes can seem sudden but for internal staff it was A21 for close to a year before A21 released so nothing about it was sudden or untested by time you got your hands on it. The same goes for every other change. We played with the change from LBD to centralized skillpoints to shop for perks for months and months before A17 dropped. That wasn't some sudden whimsical change.  In fact, I can't think of a single change over the years that was enacted on the night before an update was released to the public. They were all played to death by internal staff well before the release.

 

So even though you've been around for years, if you actually feel like changes are made suddenly and without thought, playtesting, and planning then you aren't thinking it through from the perspective of the development team. Maybe if the dev cycle between each alpha was only a month or two you could claim not enough time spent on these changes but these dev cycles have lasted 1-1.5 years and most of the time the major gameplay changes we've seen were finished at least 6 months before release.

[Jost Amman]

24 minutes ago, Riamus said:

Yet you were talking about quests being exploitive, not water.

Yes, in my opinion quests (and quest rewards), as opposed to mining, are currently OP.

[Roland]

19 hours ago, zztong said:

I was trying to envision what long-term water scarcity goals might have been. Limiting duct tape is what I hear other players talk about, but I didn't know if that was TFP's goal. If you say there's not a long-term scarcity goal, then nobody is trying to limit duct tape, or at least not trying to use water to limit it.

 

I like to think I understood you, but I do seem to misunderstand people from time to time.

 

On the long term I don't think TFP wants to limit anything. I think that ideally they would like there to be a progression from scarcity to abundance with a period of time in there where you might have to make choices for how you use your resources because there isn't enough to do everything. That will, of course, be truer for those who play less efficiently than those who play more efficiently. I don't think TFP can or even wants to balance it into a one balance fits all-- especially since their design philosophy is to allow multiple paths to get what you want. This means that there probably will be very little to no preventative measures taken to limit people from rushing the progression if they so choose. Some people rush the progression and feel great fulfillment and fun. Others rush the progression and by so doing ruin the fun for themselves. I know, for myself, rushing the progression would ruin the fun so I make conscious choices to not rush.

 

19 hours ago, zztong said:

I think I see, but you tell me...

 

You craft Dew Collectors and are satisfied as you have built your base. Each day you harvest Potable Water.

Each Day I harvest some Murky Water from a water source. I craft Potable Water at a Camp Fire and am satisfied.

 

The comparison seems equal, but ultimately a matter of taste.

 

I don't see harvesting Murky Water from a water source as an equivalent of using the creative menu. I see it as an equivalent to harvesting clay.

 

You're viewing the equality after the dew collectors are built. I agree that once I have my farm of dew collectors and you have your stack of empty jars the effort and gameplay loop for getting water is very similar. You take your stack of jars to a source and fill them up and bring them back to boil. I collect my water from each collector and bring them back. You can more easily gather tons of more water but you still have to boil it while I am limited to the number of collectors I've built but they are already boiled so to speak.

 

That comparison is essentially equal but a matter of taste, yes. The part that I feel is better and more enjoyable is the process of building that collector farm. I feel like the process of gathering the resources and the money to purchase the filters and the progressive nature of crafting more and more collectors to the point where I feel I'm good for the rest of the game is akin to building a base with materials I harvested myself.

 

Reusable empty jars along with more to be found as you naturally scavenge feels like a free trip to the point where water is no longer an issue. That feels like just being gifted all the building materials for the base I'm going to build. 

 

Now, I know not everyone enjoys crafting the collector farms. I can understand if they dislike that gameplay loop, why they might wish for the old version. To them, I can only hope that mods make their fun great again. But for me, I throw away all the empty jars I get because then there is absolutely no need for dew collectors and I want to build my farm just as much as I want to establish my base and get my food farm going and my crafting stations and my vehicles.

 

It is also why I feel that there is currently too much murky water in loot. It used to be more scarce and you were definitely more dependent upon getting a dew collector farm established. But that is my brand of fun that not everyone is going to share.

 

19 hours ago, zztong said:

You're limiting yourself to 1 quest per day. That is the significant difference. You're earning Dukes at 1/2 to 1/3 my rate.

 

Do you stay in your base at night? If so, that's another difference. Once I've made a couple of padded armor pieces, I'll be out at night hunting, foraging, and maybe doing a quest to turn in when the trader opens. (The buried supplies quests are great at night in the early days.)

 

I'd love to know what you'd consider exploitive. I don't think I'm doing anything exploitive.

 

I'm assuming different spending priorities are at play here too. In the early game, I'll spend my Dukes on filters for Dew Collectors (Vanilla) or save them (Modded). I craft or loot everything I use. I'll have a bicycle from completing tier 1 quests around day 3 or 4.

 

So one of the big hang-ups I have with my own sense of immersion is time. I feel that there is just way too much that we can accomplish in a 24-hour period of time beyond what we could in real life. Everyone has their real life vs game life hang-ups and this one is mine. I don't complain or call for limiting factors to be added to the game to make it more even and honestly I wouldn't want it to mirror real life since that would just be boring. With a stone axe I would be hacking at the same tree for three weeks before it came down.  BUT....the amount of trees we can chop down with a stone axe or any axe for that matter is too unrealistic for me to bear and that is simply one of many many things. You guys should check out Nate Bargatze's bit about digging a hole...lol

 

In general, I try to do in a day's time what I feel is more realistic while still fun. I reduce loot to 50% at times and play 30 minute days at times and increase block hp all to slow me down in what I can accomplish in a typical day's timeframe. I do enjoy those settings but they have other drawbacks. So a lot of the time I play default but just pace myself on purpose-- because for whatever reason I am hyper-aware about what I feel is our exploitive ability to unnaturally accomplish so much so fast. I know we can unnaturally carry more than reality allows and crops grow unnaturally fast and this is a fantasy game about zombies-- which is why I don't ever press my view that even in natural play without even trying to rush the progression, we still have this super advantage that makes survival a lot easier than it would be. It's just simpler for me to make objectives for myself each day that I feel are realistic enough to still be fun as a game and then accomplish those objectives and definitely don't try to maximize every single drop of time to getting ahead as quickly as possible since that just goes against my grain.

 

Night time is interesting. If I stay in my base and organize stuff, spend my skill points, cook, craft,  and do a bit of construction I don't feel too bad that I would normally be sleeping at night. But if I go out adventuring completing quests and looting POIs then I do feel that I'm taking advantage of the game's limitation that we don't sleep and it feels wrong to me. One of the advantages of 30 minute days is that the nights are much shorter-- but then the downside is that you never get a really epic horde night either. So, again, I tend to play default most of the time and try not to be too active at night. Weird, I know and probably not good to develop limitations for everyone for the vanilla version just because I feel like we should all be sleeping anyway.

[zztong]

Well I'm certainly impressed with all the different play styles and preferences -- and that's just from ~4-5 of us. It's pretty hard to compare notes between us given some pretty significant choices we make. I probably can't do justice to every variation listed, but...

 

Limiting to 1 quest per day will certainly slow a player's ability to purchase filters for a Dew Collector compared to those who do more questing.

 

Limiting loot to 50% will make gathering water and the resources to make Dew Collectors take longer plus reduce the amount of Dukes you can earn from selling salvage.

 

Changing the day length to 30 minutes will certainly change the day counts we compare. One week at 60 minutes is 2 weeks at 30 minutes.

 

If you're regularly getting mauled by zombies, you'll spend more time healing and/or go through more food and water.

 

Staying at base during the night, and feeling compelled to return to base before night, takes time.

 

Then there are clear differences in goals. Folks are prioritizing things like mining and base building.

 

If I try to make a mental image of what that kind of play would be like, I can start to see how you have a significant water scarcity for many game days and that you don't get Dew Collector production settled into "water stability" (aka infinite water) -- defined by me as producing 10 jars of potable water per day -- until you get to a 2-3 week point in the game.

 

Efficient or Inefficient, exploit or not an exploit -- all opinion, so I'll leave those alone. I don't care to have my play labeled as "exploitive" because I don't think I'm cheating. I'm just playing. But I get that you're not necessarily calling that an insult so much as a comparative to your own ideal game.

 

Objectively speaking, we have different priorities because of our different choices. A comparison:

 

There's no way I'm building a base until I have water and food solved. Grass fiber clothes are fine until water and food are solved. Higher quality weapons and armor are conveniences, and they can wait until water and food are solved. Armor -- that's the one thing I'll work on other than water and food. I need about two pieces of armor to address the occasional hits from zombies.

 

So I guess it's no wonder why we kick around the water debate so much. We have wildly different preferences that completely skew what is optimal.

 

EDIT: Let me add that I like a mobile combatant play style, so run-and-gun, etc. I don't need a horde base to survive a horde. A horde base just lets me earn more experience. I'll use a horde base in the late game. This means I have no reason to mine and build anything significant until late game. I can leave my workstations and chests on an empty lot if I want -- though I usually take over something like a trailer.

Edited September 25, 2023 by zztong (see edit history)

[BFT2020]

3 hours ago, Riamus said:

About the arrows, it was my understanding from other posts (I don't use bows) that you needed glue and feathers to make arrows other than the stone arrows.  If that isn't the case, then I'm not sure why I've seen people saying they needed a lot of glue because they use bows.  If you thought I meant you yourself were using arrows, I didn't mean that.  I was just stating that someone who did would have more trouble and that what I was saying would not apply to such a person in the same way as they'd need more water than I would.

 

To put it nicely, we can tell that you don't use bows  😉

 

• Stone arrows require rock, wood, and feathers
• Iron arrows require iron heads, wood, and feathers
• Steel arrows require steel heads and plastic
• Flaming arrows require steel heads, plastics, gunpowder, cloth, and animal fat
• Exploding arrows require steel heads, plastics, gunpowder, and duct tape

 

So the water production is for glue to make into duct tape.  And the reason they need so much is they are mass producing exploding arrows so they can spam them on horde night.

14 minutes ago, zztong said:

So I guess it's no wonder why we kick around the water debate so much. We have wildly different preferences that completely skew what is optimal.

 

And that is why they (TFP) can't please everyone.  So the best they can do is set a goal or objective and make the game towards that objective.  If that doesn't work for the others, then mods come into play.

[zztong]

18 minutes ago, BFT2020 said:

And that is why they (TFP) can't please everyone.  So the best they can do is set a goal or objective and make the game towards that objective.  If that doesn't work for the others, then mods come into play.

 

Yes. I would suggest that the 4-5 of us chatting play a game together -- but we'd never agree on the settings and mods. It would have to be Vanilla/default.

Edited September 25, 2023 by zztong (see edit history)

[Roland]

52 minutes ago, zztong said:

Efficient or Inefficient, exploit or not an exploit -- all opinion, so I'll leave those alone. I don't care to have my play labeled as "exploitive" because I don't think I'm cheating. I'm just playing. But I get that you're not necessarily calling that an insult so much as a comparative to your own ideal game.

 Yes, I was only referring to it as feeling like an exploit within my own sensibilities and not proclaiming your playstyle cheating. My only judgement/side eye for other people's playstyles are for those who repeatedly do things that lead to them not having fun. If the way someone plays is fun then it is right and good then I'm happy for them and I am perfectly willing to self-limit and enforce my own rules for myself rather than try to get the game to be changed in order to enforce the way I like to play. 

 

I know that sometimes changes occur that bungle up someone's play style and I understand why that leads to anger. When that happens to me (and it has happened) I simply adjust my own rules and objectives to get to the fun again.

 

Sometimes I wonder about folks who demand the balance be changed to prevent something if they've thought it through that such changes enforced would step on many many toes and just because they don't have will power to self-enforce rules if the game doesn't force it--that doesn't mean the devs aren't doing their jobs if they decide to leave things on the open-ended side of the spectrum or leave it to modders to enforce some different ruleset.

Edited September 25, 2023 by Roland (see edit history)

[Riamus]

43 minutes ago, BFT2020 said:

 

To put it nicely, we can tell that you don't use bows  😉

 

• Stone arrows require rock, wood, and feathers
• Iron arrows require iron heads, wood, and feathers
• Steel arrows require steel heads and plastic
• Flaming arrows require steel heads, plastics, gunpowder, cloth, and animal fat
• Exploding arrows require steel heads, plastics, gunpowder, and duct tape

 

So the water production is for glue to make into duct tape.  And the reason they need so much is they are mass producing exploding arrows so they can spam them on horde night.

 

And that is why they (TFP) can't please everyone.  So the best they can do is set a goal or objective and make the game towards that objective.  If that doesn't work for the others, then mods come into play.

Thanks for clarifying.  So, that would mean that duct tape for bow users is at least mid game and more a fun convenience than a necessity of a play style.  Though I suppose you could call what you do only on horde night a play style.  Either way, that reduces water needs in general.  You need them only for exploding arrows and not for any other types of arrows, so you're only using them (most people, anyhow) on horde night and not the rest of the time, so there isn't need for as much duct tape as I had thought.  That supports that water shouldn't be an issue in early game even more in the current state except for a new player.  As I said, I don't worry about efficiency for much of anything.  At least other than headshots and that's partly for the fun of dismemberment over actual damage increases, though that's also nice.

[meganoth]

7 hours ago, Riamus said:

But as far as getting clothing or armor, there isn't any change between a new player and how I play except potentially in how much they may choose or not choose to loot compared to me.  I don't loot in any unusual way.

 

 

 

But what if they are actually crafting and the unusual way you do things is that you don't craft stuff when you have the opportunity? In a game that is called a something crafting something game.

 

Not sure why you have talked so much about looting when the real question is about "to craft or not to craft".

 

You said you simply wait for your armor to drop in loot however long that takes. What if they simply craft missing pieces when they have the time, i.e. at night ? With the potential advantage that they may survive a narrow fight without infection or death the next day. With the disadvantage that they might find exactly the same armor the next day. 

 

You know the saying "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" ? 😉

 

Edited September 26, 2023 by meganoth (see edit history)

[Roland]

16 minutes ago, meganoth said:

What if they simply craft missing pieces when they have the time, i.e. at night ?

When you should be sleeping?!? Cheese alert!!!

[Riamus]

41 minutes ago, meganoth said:

But what if they are actually crafting and the unusual way you do things is that you don't craft stuff when you have the opportunity? In a game that is called a something crafting something game.

 

Not sure why you have talked so much about looting when the real question is about "to craft or not to craft".

 

You said you simply wait for your armor to drop in loot however long that takes. What if they simply craft missing pieces when they have the time, i.e. at night ? With the potential advantage that they may survive a narrow fight without infection or death the next day. With the disadvantage that they might find exactly the same armor the next day. 

 

You know the saying "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" ? 😉

 

Which is why I asked if you knew how much crafting is typical for players.  I know some really want to craft but I really think many players don't care whether they craft or loot so long as they get what they need.  If crafting a lot of stuff is being done by most people, then yes, you'll use more duct tape and need more water.  If it's only done when necessary and people are more likely to loot for stuff, then they'd need less water.  And if they don't ever craft beyond food and drink and perhaps certain things like ammo or building blocks or things you can't find or buy, then they need even less.  As I said, I don't know what actually is typical for the average player.  Where this falls greatly determines what amount of water is needed for a typical player.  For early game, most duct tape costs are going to be either pipe weapons or armor, right?  How many people craft those?  Do more people craft those or not?  I know that I've never had issues getting basic armor within the first 2-3 days and never craft that or clothing in any game I've played.  Maybe I haven't gotten every piece in that time, but close enough.  If you don't craft armor, that saves quite a lot of duct tape.  Pipe weapons might be more likely to be crafted, though they aren't really that difficult to find usually.  And even if you do craft one, that's a single cost unless you're upgrading it constantly by crafting every upgrade level.

 

I just don't see crafting being an issue for water scarcity in early game for most players.  Some, yes.  Most?  Probably not.  But again, I'm guessing and was hoping you might know.  In mid game or later, crafting needs a crazy amount of duct tape now, so you it does affect your water needs a lot if you plan to craft much of anything.

Edited September 26, 2023 by Riamus (see edit history)

[Jost Amman]

3 hours ago, Riamus said:

As I said, I don't know what actually is typical for the average player. 

Riamus - "I usually fly around, I don't walk at all."

Meganoth - "But people walk, what if they need shoes?"

Riamus - "I don't know, do people frequently walk? ... Hmm... I really don't know."

[meganoth]

9 hours ago, Riamus said:

Which is why I asked if you knew how much crafting is typical for players.  I know some really want to craft but I really think many players don't care whether they craft or loot so long as they get what they need.  If crafting a lot of stuff is being done by most people, then yes, you'll use more duct tape and need more water.  If it's only done when necessary and people are more likely to loot for stuff, then they'd need less water.  And if they don't ever craft beyond food and drink and perhaps certain things like ammo or building blocks or things you can't find or buy, then they need even less.  As I said, I don't know what actually is typical for the average player.  Where this falls greatly determines what amount of water is needed for a typical player.  For early game, most duct tape costs are going to be either pipe weapons or armor, right?  How many people craft those?  Do more people craft those or not?  I know that I've never had issues getting basic armor within the first 2-3 days and never craft that or clothing in any game I've played.  Maybe I haven't gotten every piece in that time, but close enough.  If you don't craft armor, that saves quite a lot of duct tape.  Pipe weapons might be more likely to be crafted, though they aren't really that difficult to find usually.  And even if you do craft one, that's a single cost unless you're upgrading it constantly by crafting every upgrade level.

 

I just don't see crafting being an issue for water scarcity in early game for most players.  Some, yes.  Most?  Probably not.  But again, I'm guessing and was hoping you might know.  In mid game or later, crafting needs a crazy amount of duct tape now, so you it does affect your water needs a lot if you plan to craft much of anything.

 

Lets go away from the details and sum up generally what we know now (or in other words state the obvious): There are some players who have no problems at all with water in early game and there are some players who have, some even so much that they make an account here to protest, and some having  just problems of deciding what to craft or make into drinks or postpone. In effect this is now a balancing issue.

 

Depending on where you loot and how much you loot you find some average of water jars per day (maybe a not so obvious point: the gas station POIs you so often get offered in the first days are often not a good place to find water). And depending on how much you craft and how much you expend stamina you have some average of water jars you need. And as we have seen both sides of the equation can be wildly different per player. Also those provide a lot of opportunities for adjustment here if TFP uses telemetry to find out what the average player does.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 26, 2023 by meganoth (see edit history)

[Krougal]

@Roland Ok, maybe I was a bit cranky the other day, and you didn't deserve the personal attacks, but that aside:

 

I still stand by my point about magical jars from heaven; you don't start with them on day 1, so if the water struggle is only meant to be a short-term thing, then the jars are still irrelevant since it is going to take you a few days to accumulate them.

 

I'm also not calling for jars to be brought back, the other methods of getting water that I did mention don't really negate the "early water struggle" since you still need to boil water if you don't want dysentery and you still need to find a pot to do so. Better beverages are still worth making even if water is unlimited since carrying capacity is a thing and standing water might not always be convenient. I mean does water really need to be more a struggle than that? They could remove the helmet mod, which would mean even late game you at least need to still carry drinks and boil water.

 

[Roland]

1 hour ago, Krougal said:

@Roland Ok, maybe I was a bit cranky the other day, and you didn't deserve the personal attacks, but that aside:

 

I still stand by my point about magical jars from heaven; you don't start with them on day 1, so if the water struggle is only meant to be a short-term thing, then the jars are still irrelevant since it is going to take you a few days to accumulate them.

 

I'm also not calling for jars to be brought back, the other methods of getting water that I did mention don't really negate the "early water struggle" since you still need to boil water if you don't want dysentery and you still need to find a pot to do so. Better beverages are still worth making even if water is unlimited since carrying capacity is a thing and standing water might not always be convenient. I mean does water really need to be more a struggle than that? They could remove the helmet mod, which would mean even late game you at least need to still carry drinks and boil water.

 

 

No worries. I think there are a lot of good ideas that have been floated that restore the immersion of being able to gather water from water sources but still keep empty jars absent as items. I'm not opposed to tweaks to the current system. I'm also fine with the current system as it is and I'm perfectly okay with the fact that some people aren't going to like it. All of these ideas are great starters for new mods even if TFP decides not to change things.