Messages

31

Bug reports / Re: [Edited] Collection of spelling/grammar/punctuation issues

« on: October 01, 2017, 11:26:18 PM »

Next bunch, these are related to food and food-preparation:

*When trying to dry outside the appropriate season, you get the following warning:
"The weather doesn't suite the task. It's too warm and humid at the moment!"
Should be suit.

*When smoking, at the part where it requires a heated room, the following message is given:
"You need to be in a heated room or a building, preferably a sauna."
Should be "in a heated room or building". Right now, it means that any heated room OR any building, heated or non-heated, is sufficient. Which is obviously not the case.

*When smoking/drying, at the part where it requires tying equipment, the following message is given:
"A rope, a cord and so on. You can make these by yourself also."
Looks a bit strange. Sentences usually don't end on also like that: either use 'as well' or put 'also' straight after can. First sentence isn't wrong, but 'or similar' would probably fit the message slightly better than 'and so on'. That's more a choice of style, though.

32

General Discussion / Re: What's Going On In Your Unreal World?

« on: October 01, 2017, 09:55:38 PM »

Just conquered a Njerp village (5x warrior, a peasant, two craftsmen, a maiden, a woman, a housewife and a child) and carried away my spoils on Conquest, Victory, Triumph, Honour, Glory and Pride, which are the two bulls and four cows those dead Njerpez certainly need no longer.

33

Stories / Poems of the Fallen

« on: October 01, 2017, 08:11:37 AM »

Will post these whenever I get inspiration. Some refer to actual characters/character deaths I've had, some are more general.

Frozen

The spirits of autumn sang gently on the rain
Easing my worries and easing my pain
But ache and exhaustion had settled bone-deep
So to autumn's sweet lullaby fell I asleep

As I slept under open sky did sweet autumn me forsake
For it was harsh winter spirits that drove me awake;
Icy spirits whistling on a cold windy night
left a thin blanket of snow on open mire wide

Shivering and confused stumbled I 'round in a daze
Unsure where I had been going, where from I came
Confused and shivering in this unfamiliar place
Could I barely remember my people and name

Lost and forsaken in cold winter's lands
Bare were my feet and bare were my hands
So as I shivered and stumbled through open mire vast
In my heart I knew this morning would be my last

34

Gameplay questions / Re: Few questions about trapping and a couple of misc questions

« on: September 30, 2017, 04:34:44 AM »

Nah, makes sense. So much of the game's early stages are about trying not to starve that it's pretty easy to get into a "Protect Mah Food At All Costs!11!1!"-mode.

You're welcome.

As to furs and foreign traders: it also depends a fair bit on the quality of the fur, whether or not it's a wintertime fur (not something currently visible from the name, except that winter- and summertime furs don't stack even if of the same quality and animal, but no way to tell at a glance which is which. If I remember correctly, though, winter furs will actually have winter in their name next release onwards) and what animal species.

That, and large portions of what the foreign traders sell is bloody expensive stuff.

Aye. If nothing else, they weigh a lot less than the furs, meaning you could reasonably take those with you on a longer trading trip to, say, Driik (Why Driik? 'cause Driik has a lot more iron goods for sale) to use those to pay for awesome weapons you actually *can* use. Or you could train those skills up. Probably best to do so in safe circumstances, though, at least until your skill is at a more reasonable level.

Safe circumstances, like, say, attempting to hit a trapped animal with blunt arrows fired by crossbow. Or whack at an unconscious/non-hostile trapped animal (so no bears/wolves/etc, at the utter least) if you don't mind probably damaging the fur somewhat. (You could always set up an array of berry-baited light lever traps and whack at black grouses. They only give leather/feathers anyway, not fur, and leather value sucks compared to fur. Plus black grouse leather sucks for armour and all that. You could make ropes, bandages and cords from it, but the pests are common enough that if you have a sizeable number of light lever traps, you end up with dozens and dozens of 'm anyway. (One of my characters currently is well into the four digits of black grouse feathers. Not sure exactly how many right now, I'm a few days away from my settlement, but iirc, it was something like 3500 or so. Considering one black grouse gives off about 20 feathers or so--and none if the carcass is in too bad a state--and the character is about 1.5 years in-game time...yeah, no shortage of black grouse at all.)

35

Gameplay questions / Re: Few questions about trapping and a couple of misc questions

« on: September 30, 2017, 01:25:01 AM »

Re: best way to protect livestock: I tend to build a wooden building without floors/ceiling. The door gets 'blocked' by a three-piece fence. Usually I build a slightly larger fence with a door around it as well. That way, I can enter the minor fenced enclosure with a new leashed animal, close the door behind me, deconstruct the fence directly in front of the building's door, open the door, unleash the animal when inside and get out without risking my other animals escaping all over the place. At most, they get a few steps outside the building where it's not too hard to chase them back in. Once everything is back in, close the door, reconstruct the fence in front of the door.

It's not entirely kill-proof, but limits possible kills by wild animals to those that can both open doors and climb over or destroy a fence. In other words, bears. Long as you keep a nice larger fence with bear traps or trap pits around your homestead, and another few traps surrounding the stable building (just be careful with traps and livestock when bringing new lifestock home. I've never tested it but wouldn't be surprised if a leashed animal is capable of stumbling into a trap if guided too close to it), the chances of a bear actually getting at your livestock is quite small.

As to what to do with surplus meat: trading. Dried/smoked meat will eventually spoil, even if kept in a cellar (though it takes a loooong time). I smoke during summer season and dry in winter, and generally make two* meat-selling trips a year: at the end of winter, I sell off all smoked meats I have left (which are anywhere from 6-12 months old by then), and at the end of summer, I sell off whatever dried meat is left (same).

*Two as in, I take the time to do so twice a year. Usually each "trip" consists of heading back and forth between my home and the closest settlement repeatedly. If there's a village entirely or almost entirely reachable over water, I may instead manage to take most of it with me at once by dumping it on the raft. (Due to limitations on how much you can take on a raft, both in weights and stacks, this works best if stuff stacks as much as possible. 2 bland smoked lynx cuts count as a stack. 471 tasty smoked elk cuts counts as one stack, too. For that reason, I tend to switch from eating oldest-first to from smallest-stack first during the latter half of a season, by which point I should pretty much be through most of the really old stuff anyway)

As for furs: look for foreign traders. At first, buy stuff you need/could use, especially stuff you either can't make yourself or won't easily find in settlements, including quality upgrades to stuff you already have. Once you pretty much have everything you *need*, look out for stuff that's easier to haul around to actual settlements/you can haul more of around at once. Valuables, arrows, anything reasonably valuable that weighs significantly less than the furs you're trading in for it. You can always look into grabbing a back-up weapon to have in case yours gets damaged, too--or extra tools to leave at places other than your home you nonetheless frequent a lot, to cut down on the number of items you have to haul around.

Make a nice stack of cords and bandages, too. You don't want your cuts to spoil because you didn't have enough cords around to smoke/dry it and had to make some first. Bandages never hurt to have. If you have multiple shelters around, especially in areas you take frequent hunting trips to, put a couple of bandages and some cords there too. Meats can't be smoked at a shelter, but they can be dried there. Dried cuts weigh a lot less than fresh ones, so in case of large or multiple kills, it's often easier to just leave them to dry there, put up a note when approx. they'll be done, and grab them at that time. (Consider felling a tree for the last stage of hideworking at such places too, especially if a fair while out from your main settlement, and dump either a stone on top or craft a club to leave there. The less you have to haul around on a daily basis, the better)

If you find you've got a couple of shelters you pay a lot of visits to, drop a few less-valuable larger furs there. Helps keeping you warm when sleeping, but also means you can immediately replace whatever cords or bandages you use rather than having to remember to replace them later. (Replacing the furs can simply be done by hanging around for a day or two to tan the kill's hide at the spot. You're not likely to be using masses of cords for anything other than preservation of fresh kills at such places anyway, so you should easily be able to replace what's used.)
If the shelter is near fish-able water, pick up a couple spare fishing rods in villages and leave them at such places. If there's absolutely no water near, not even puddles, consider putting a tub of water there. Again, the less to carry as standard item set, the better.

Always keep a couple of furs around the homestead to sleep on, to repair worn armor, craft more cords/bandages, etc.

Consider crafting a spare set of fur armor if you start going after more dangerous prey frequently, or if you deal with hostile humans a lot. Armor can degrade rather quickly in certain fights.

36

Gameplay questions / Re: Few questions about trapping and a couple of misc questions

« on: September 29, 2017, 08:11:33 PM »

Having a high tracking skill definitely helps a lot in seeing enough tracks to actually follow that fleeing animal, even through woodlands. If dealing with an animal that's been hanging around the same area for a while, do occasionally double-check if you're still following the recent, not several days old, tracks.

And be persistent. It can easily take traipsing after that stag for half a dozen overworld tiles before it gets even slightly fatigued. Make tactic use of hiding/not hiding. Don't be afraid to spook an animal to get it to flee and thus tire itself much faster, but at the same time, try not to needlessly spook it in areas where you're likely to loose track of its tracks either due to terrain visibility, track visibility on said terrain or due to presence of many, many other/older tracks.

And don't spook it if you know it'll cost you an opportunity to corral it against a shoreline, fence, closed treeline or the likes.

If you lose the tracks, head back to the last known track and double-check it didn't turn while you headed in a straight line. Look for tracks manually if none are visible. If you really can't find the next tracks, look a bit further out from the last track. Keep in mind whether it's likely to change direction slightly or a lot. Try to consider where it might have gone. Which brings me to my next point:

Almost as important, though, is getting used to various animals and their behaviour pattern. Know what animals can and can't get over fences. What animals are willing to go into the water to escape and which will be corralled nicely against the shoreline. What animals may be chased onto weak ice and drown themselves or at least tire themselves out a lot that way. Whether an animal is likely to head in the same direction for a long while or turn frequently, and whether they're more likely to change direction after hitting an obstacle or just try to get around it and then head for the same direction they were originally going in. Whether they're likely to keep trying to flee even if you've got them cornered, or if they may try to actually defend themselves. If they're group animals, whether they will try to mostly flee in the same direction and then regroup asap, or scatter in all directions and then regroup, have some scatter as others go aggressive and attack you or whether persistence will make it possible to drive one individual from its herd without having the rest nipping on your heels.

In other words, don't hunt a bear like it's a stag, or a forest reindeer like it's a wolf.

37

Bug reports / Couple of weight issues

« on: September 28, 2017, 12:09:30 AM »

Another "let's collect similar issues in one thread 'cause Sil ain't no board-spammer" thread, this time regarding weight issues.

Weight rounding on shown weight:
Displayed weight rounding* is a bit iffy and always rounds up, sometimes to the point of utter ridiculousness.

Example:
A pinch of heather flowers is, by my calculation, 0.025 lbs either exactly or so close to it that the difference is less than 0.0001--in other words, utterly negligible. (Did some testing with various amounts of heather pinches and the knowledge that even a minuscule amount over the full lbs causes the displayed weight to be rounded up to the next number.)

40 pinches of heather thus are exactly 1 lbs and the stack has a shown weight of 1lbs.

41 pinches of heather flowers, a weight of 1.025 lbs, is rounded to a displayed weight of 2 lbs.

*The game knows perfectly well the actual exact weight of an item or stack, as shown by various crafting and cooking options requiring set weights of items. The issue is, as far as I can tell, solely in the rounding displayed, not the actual behind-the-scenes weight calculation.

Small animal carcasses occasionally weigh less whole than in parts:
There's various factors in play that decide the exact weight of any particular animal, as well as the weight of however much you get off an animal. It does occasionally happen with small animals that the total parts gotten from a carcass (being fur+meat cuts+fat+feathers if any) weigh more together than the carcass did to start with. This is mostly a well-hidden thing due to the rounding issue described above.

Example:
Grisly willow carcass of "2"lbs//1.3lbs*

Rendered to:

No skin (mutilated beyond usage)
No feathers (due to no skinning possible)
2x  willow grouse cut
1x willow grouse fat
for a total weight of a fragment above 2 lbs. (In genuine, not fake-rounded, weight)

*Rounding issue. Going by "Carrying" field in upper right, 1.3 lbs. Rounding there too, but playing with heather flowers showed it has to be within 0.025 lbs of that amount, so let's go with a full 1.3 lbs.

Have witnessed the issue on above-mentioned 1.3 lbs willow grouse giving just over 2 lbs in parts and a small 0.6 lbs squirrel rendering to a little over 1.3 lbs in parts (which made me first look into this, as meat cuts are always 1 lbs exactly and I noticed the carcass weighed less than that), but suspect most of the smaller animals to occasionally have this issue.

Weight of skinned carcasses same as weight of "whole" carcasses:
Skinned carcasses don't have the weight of the skin removed from the carcass' total weight. If, as I suspect, the carcass' entire weight is used to calculate the number of cuts, skinned carcasses may systematically give slightly more cuts than they actually should.

Furthermore, it means that if someone for whatever reason opts to haul around both a skin and the skinned carcass it belonged to (as opposed to either skinning-and-butchering it in one go or moving it to wherever they aim to go before skinning and butchering--which are both probably significantly more common actions than skin-and-carry-the-carcass, but there *are* nonetheless various circumstances in which opting to skin-and-carry is a perfectly valid choice), they're hauling along more weight than ought to be the case. In some cases, it can well mean the difference between being over-encumbered or not.

Example:
Small stag carcass of "456"lbs (too heavy to carry, so it hardly mattered in this case, but the principle remains. As I can't carry, I can't determine the exact weight beyond "somewhere between 455-456.0 lbs")

Rendered to

Fine stag skin of "24"lbs//23.3lbs
Small stag carcass (skinned) of "456"lbs//455-456 lbs

Appears to occur with all non-fish animals.

38

Gameplay questions / Re: Bridge Building

« on: September 27, 2017, 01:22:28 AM »

Never tried it. I frequently settle on islands, but have other ways of dealing with the issue.

I tend to most often choose a not overly small sea island with at least one adjacent tile of water non-freezing (not all sea water freezes) and a path through non-freezing sea tiles and land tiles that allows me to reach mainland (and/or several islander villages...mainland preferred, though) in some way and preferably also allows for some paths towards one or two other medium-sized nearby islands.

Generally such paths aren't very efficient compared to the usual rowing or icewalking* routes--sometimes even very inefficient--not seldomly am I required to travel 4x the number of tiles the most efficient icewalk or row routes take, plus the constant zoom in to reach shore, pick up punt, walk to the point I can zoom out, do so, drop punt, hit the water again, rinse and repeat every time my route requires me to hop over a minor island--but suffice well enough that I *can* reach civilization when necessary and I tend to mostly plan matters so that I do not require many trips back-and-forth during weak ice, either by having various on-home-island time and labour-intensive tasks to work on during those periods or by spending most of that time either on nearby islands or mainland.

*that is, if there is a direct icewalk-to-mainland route available, which isn't too common. Most of the winter months, even those with strong ice, require a mixture of overland (or overice) and water travel. The further off-shore, the more likely that becomes. Unless one happens to live in one of the Island territories smackdab next to an island with one or more islander villages on it. One of my current characters is lucky enough to have both an over-ice and fully-overseas route from island to mainland (so no island-hopping needed) available during winter, but that's pretty rare. Neither of those routes are anywhere near a straight line to mainland, though, and both land me on mainland about half a day travel from the nearest settlement even though the summer oversea route to nearest settlement is barely half a day in *total*.

Occasionally I settle on very large sea islands, though as I strongly prefer to settle on islands without NPC villages, those are somewhat rare. In those cases, I can--after acquiring all the necessities for self-sufficiency--easily go months in-game without requiring contact with civilization: plenty of large animals, foreign traders and njerps are generated on those to keep me from lacking things to do. The same goes for picking those islands as with the medium-sized ones: ensuring an existing, even if non-efficient, route to civilization.

For freshwater islands, strategical placement of rapids works but it can be somewhat difficult to find an appropriately-sized island that connects through rapids to either the lakeshore or through a chain of other islands eventually leading to lakeshore. Usually easiest when at least one side of the island is bordered by a river rather than a lake, but even in some large lakes you may find fitting islands. Just takes a lot more looking around.

39

Bug reports / [Edited] Collection of spelling/grammar/punctuation issues

« on: September 26, 2017, 10:35:01 PM »

Making a single thread to collect the following typos and the likes that I've found, so as to not spam the board with several threads for minor text issues. Mark-up in citations (emphasis, italics, underscores, etc.) mine.

EDIT: Post 1 is the bunch of in-game encyclopedia article spelling/grammar/punctuation issues the thread originally was about. Post 2 onwards are random spelling issues as I come across them. I really don't fancy making a new thread for every missing space or comma.

All of the following refer to in-game encylopedia articles/item descriptions:

*Most valuables are found in the 'pedia by [material][type]: bronze ball pendant, silver ring, silver chain bracelet, etc. Both small and normal bronze brooches are listed merely as 'brooch', which covers both sizes. As the article explicitly references such brooches are made of bronze, perhaps 'bronze brooch' would be better?

*Arrow: "[...]There are no special types of arrows for regular bows and crossbows, so any arrow can be shot with any bow. In addition to regular arrows there are also broadhead arrows and blunt arrows." This is meant to say 'crossbows and regular bows use the same arrows: plain, blunt and broadhead'. Instead, it technically says 'Neither regular bows nor crossbows have any special kinds of arrows. Blunt and broadhead arrows do however exist'. Perhaps a better order and wording would be "In addition to regular arrows, there are also broadhead arrows and blunt arrows. Regular bows and crossbows use the same types of arrows, so any arrow can be shot with any bow."?

*Battleaxe: "Despite of their size [...]" should be either 'In spite of their size' or 'despite their size'. Utterly senseless, of course, but that's English for ya. Could also use a comma between 'edge' and 'resulting' a sentence-and-a-half earlier in the description.

*Bronze bracelet: "[...] worn by w omen of western cultures." (Stray space)

*Fur: "its' wearer" should be 'its wearer'.

*Leggings: "[...]When worn with pair of trousers leggings give extra protection and warmth." should be '[...]with a pair of trousers, leggings [...]' (missing article, missing comma) "Some leggings can be worn also instead of trousers." -- 'can also be worn' would be the more common word-order.

*Mace: "Most have metal heads, oftern [...]" should be 'often'. "[...] affixed to wooden shafts between 24 and 38 inches in length" should be 'shafts that are between [...]' or 'shafts of between [...]'.

*Mittens: "A gloves without separate fingers". Gloves is plural. "A pair of gloves", instead. Next sentence could use a comma after winter-time. Last sentence: "to protect the hands in a battle." ('In a battle' is not strictly wrong but somewhat implies metal mittens can only be used for a single battle. I doubt anyone would misunderstand it, though, and I wouldn't have mentioned it if that was the sole flaw of the description)

*Paddle: "Paddle is used to shove punt or raft ahead." Lacks any and all articles. "A paddle is used to shove a punt or raft ahead." instead. (Though, afaik, except in very shallow waters, a paddle doesn't shove, not like a sesta/pole. It propels.)

*Spectacle helm: "From the outside, spectacle helm [...]" - a spectacle helm.

*Veil: Latter half or so of the description probably fits better in a more general article on woman's clothing. Of the topically-relevant information, "[...] of wool or linen, sometimes nettle is used" could use 'although' before sometimes.

40

Suggestions / In-game encyclopedia: Search function wildcard.

« on: September 26, 2017, 09:44:08 PM »

Right now, if I search in the in-game encyclopedia and whatever I search for is not an exact full match for an article title, all I get is "sorry, but there's no information available about this topic." This includes cases where the search query is an exact part of an article title. E.g. searches for 'bronze', 'silver' give no results although articles named 'bronze bracelet', 'bronze ball pendant', 'silver ring' and 'silver chain bracelet' exist. As far as I can tell, no option to wildcard a search exists.

It would be nice if a wildcard function was introduced, so that if one knows part of the name of the article one is looking for, it can still be found. Perhaps along the lines of "sorry, but there's no information available about this exact topic. The following information does exist: |list of matched articles|". It would make the in-game encyclopedia more useful for other purposes than broad general information and examining the stuff in one's inventory.

41

Solved'n'fixed bug reports / Re: Computer Crash

« on: September 21, 2017, 05:21:34 AM »

[...]
Also I don't like to backup URW saves too much because it can be used to bypass the permanent death. Yes I see the irony its okay to be killed by a bear but not a windows bug lol.

Nah, makes perfect sense to me. One is something that is actually in-character and quite possibly influenced by your (character)'s choices. The other, well, isn't.

Kind of the same way I didn't like being killed by a Njerpez several characters back but accepted it without save-scumming myself back to life, whereas the time I got killed by robbers because I meant to Shift-X (switch which hand the weapon's in) and pressed Shift-Z dropping to sleep in the middle of combat I probably would've bypassed if I had had a back-up. Because no, Iza Kaumolainen didn't actually decide to sleep and thus get butchered, I just hadn't properly gotten used to my new keyboard. One's an immersive in-game thing, the other is not.

42

Suggestions / Re: [NPC dialogue] Asking about other folks in town.

« on: September 18, 2017, 07:24:13 PM »

Yeah, I had noticed the same. Not just distances for that matter: it systematically rounds up weights too. (I suspect we've all had cases where we try to craft cords or clothes and it turns out that nah, that "1lbs" hide and "2lbs" scraps of a fur cloak aren't actually sufficient to craft 5 cords. If the rounding up is particularly egregious, it occasionally isn't even enough for 4 cords.)

It helps a little, yeah, but feels a bit "gamey". I'd prefer an in-game solution that allows me to stay immersed in the roleyplaying. Still, it's useful enough to keep in mind.

43

Suggestions / Re: [NPC dialogue] Asking about other folks in town.

« on: September 18, 2017, 04:51:46 PM »

[...]

When it comes to directions to villages, it would help if villages had names.

Or if, at the utter least, the region's name was mentioned in the direction like it is for various other quests. Would eliminate at least *most* of the possibly-confused villages in the majority of cases.

44

Suggestions / [NPC dialogue] Asking about other folks in town.

« on: September 18, 2017, 06:04:02 AM »

Sometimes when you head into the civilized world, it's because you're looking for a specific NPC or specific kind of NPC. (E.g. you need healing and now are looking for a sage; you got a quest in the middle of Driik lands and you're trying to figure out *which* of the dozen villages 'a couple kilometers to the north-east' this Mielitty the Driikiläis craftsman actually lives in; hell, perhaps you're looking to hire a companion and you want one with specific skills.)

In those cases, it would be nice to be able to actually ask that tribesman that keeps crossing your path if the town has a sage/they know of anyone in town good at the skill you want your companion to have/they know [name of the person you're meant to give a message/etc to].*

*Considering how common some names are, this'd probably occasionally result in a false positive. "Oh, you're here to visit Old Man Ruuri? He doesn't get many visitors these days..." and it turns out that while yes, there is a Ruuri the Old driikiläis man living in this town, it's not the one you're looking for. That might actually be a good thing, though--after all, how is Random Townie supposed to know that you really mean Ruuri-the-Old-man-from-two-towns-away?

This could work in the same way as asking about locations does, in that sometimes you get a 'well, I wouldn't really know' kind of response (especially when it comes to skills; the towns are small enough that probably everyone at least knows whether or not they've got a sage and/or someone by a specific name).

Relatedly, it'd be nice that, when you've finished a quest and now are back in town looking for the quest-giver, you could ask other townspeople about the whereabouts of said NPC, at least similarly to how they act when you're first *looking* for that person. (So basically, the quests where there's no secrecy going on. Old man's punt, gathering branches for kindling, stones for rebuilding the sauna, etc.--stuff where the player most likely heard about the quest through the 'how's it going' option from someone else than the questgiver)

45

Solved'n'fixed bug reports / [Fixed - Persists in 3.40] Trapped small animal opens door on adjacent tile

« on: September 15, 2017, 08:54:54 PM »

So...I hear a trap triggering as I'm tanning a hide at my table, a lot of squeaking and then a door opening. Turns out a fleeing trapped squirrel on an adjacent tile was 'fleeing' in the direction of the door and opened it. Which...probably shouldn't happen.

I mean, I really can't see how a 20cm squirrel stuck on a trap over a meter away (a tile's 2m, it was diagonally-adjacent, with the door part of a western wall and the trap to the northwest of it...even assuming that, somehow, the trap was in the utter south-eastern corner of its tile, it'd still be half a tile diagonally to the door) can even reach that door, nevermind the impossibility of a ~20cm, ~1lbs squirrel opening a door of that size and weight. (Even assuming only half the lumber used in creating it actually becomes part of the door, that door would still be 80lbs...)