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1

Suggestions / A few ideas after playing quite a lot:

« on: May 10, 2020, 05:35:21 PM »

Hello folks.  I have a few suggestions that I think would be nice.  Keep in mind, everything herein is my opinion, and I'm welcome to criticism as long as it's constructive.  At the end of the day, developers develop at their own discretion.  If all of these suggestions never make it into the game in any form, I won't be upset or any worse for wear.  Cheers.

• More modular modding support

I get it, this is so generalized that it's probably been suggested before in various ways, but the skinny of it is this:  A lot of mods struggle to accomplish what they are going for because a lot of the game is locked behind C (Or C++) and the build process.  Every item and every use and attribute of that item should, more or less, be plaintext.  Some examples would be things like more types of trees, more types of animals, tools, etc.

• "Vehicles"

I'm not suggesting the addition of a pearl-white Volvo 240 but a nice travois or "Purilaat" would be nice.  I think something like this should have a weight limit of maybe 1 tree, you could load an animal on here and bring it back to your camp.  It would be unwieldy, so you couldn't put it on a punt or raft.  It also fits within the time frame of the game, I'd say.

• A "[CRUTCH]" tag

You've just lost the use of one of your legs (or both!) and this slows you down or stops you from using your legs completely.  Having weapons or tools with a [CRUTCH] tag allows you to walk as long as they are equipped.  Maybe even an efficiency on the tag, for example a "[CRUTCH] = 10" for a completely efficient crutch tool, such as a staff, or "[CRUTCH] = 6" for something like a spear or Javelin.  Maybe a staff is "[CRUTCH] = 9" and a separate tool can be made, an actual crutch, which has "[CRUTCH] = 10".  Less efficient crutches make it harder to stand if your wound is too severe and incur a speed penalty.

Not having any wounds at all and having a "[CRUTCH]" weapon equipped could make it so weight burdens carry a lesser % penalty or exertion is lowered.  These exist in real life, hiking poles for example.  People who walk with spears generally do use it as a crutch even if the amount of weight they put on it is insignificant.  I challenge you to try and scale even a small incline while holding a pole in both hands, as if you're ready to attack or something.  It's much more difficult and less intuitive than using it as an improvised hiking pole.

• Smoke

Smoke!  I can use my sauna as a smokehouse, which kind of defeats the purpose.  You wouldn't want to stand in a smokehouse, and fish wouldn't get preserved in a sauna.  My idea is, just a simple 'smoke' tile that fills up and dissipates whenever there is no roof above the tile.  My idea is that it would be an animal or NPC of some sort, pathfinding towards the exit.  If it doesn't have the ability to open doors, it would just 'walk around' in the area.  I think the challenging bit would be to make them work with food.  You'd probably have to make it so smoked food just requires the 'smoke tile' to pass over it, or maybe the smoke 'npc' goes over to raw food and 'eats' it, leaving behind smoked food of the type it ate.

• Cultural Traits

One thing that currently exists is that certain cultures get a minor boost to a few skills.  The biggest boon to picking certain cultures is their starting weapons and skills.  I think it'd be interesting if they also had some specific traits, like maybe the Seal-Tribe gets a 10-15% skill bonus to skinning seals, or Reemiläiset take a 30% less penalty when using awkward tools for house building.  Initial customization might be fun to get a better idea of who your character is, especially if you do a full random character.  This idea can be expanded to certain negatives too.

• Long term projects

In Dwarf Fortress, people have accomplished 'everything'.  As an open ended game, you have to keep yourself entertained by coming up with 'megaprojects'.  Things like a huge farm field, or a cabin so large you could house an entire village under its one roof.  It would be nice if things like this could exist in the current game.  Maybe a shrine made of 10 bear skulls, or a way to create your own 'village' that attracts settlers (and thieves!) and 'retire' once certain conditions are met.  As there is no endgame, it wouldn't hurt to give major optional goals and objectives.  Things that would take between 2-3 winters.


Anyway, thanks for reading my suggestions.  Happy trapping, and remember where you left your raft .

2

Stories / Lika's Story

« on: May 08, 2020, 10:25:12 AM »

Hello friends.  I've recently started playing this game again, after putting it down for a few years.  I think I've become enraptured with the folklore and even the developers themselves I've developed a keen interest in.  There is something very fascinating about the eccentricity of them, as well as the lifestyle of those you control within the game.

Anyway, I will preface this story by saying I am not a writer, nor an artist of the traditional variety at least.  You'll have to forgive me as I intend to supplement this story with some (crude) traditional drawings and proverbial speech of my own.

Lika is an escaped slave, most of you know of course this means they have very little to begin with.  My interpretation is that they were forced to build for their captors, thus their high skills in that region.



Hungry and alone, far into the west he went with only a stone knife to get him by.

And they will be starting far in the east, near the Njerpeziläis.


The Story:

Many years ago, a great event sparked great divide.  The Kaumolaiset engaged in a skirmish with the Njerpeziläis and it lit off an unending cultural war.  The Reemiläinen were therefore targeted for reasons of being similar enough to their Kaumolaiset neighbors.  It's disputed among elders why the reasons for this hatred is on-going, but the general consensus is that revenge outlives the trees and therefore, we will never see an end even when we cannot remember the beginning.

Lika's parents are but a distant memory, and his original name is long forgotten.  Only in his dreams does he experience his heritage, as the spirits whisper to him throughout the nights he is most hungry.  He can now speak two languages and understands his enemy is not so different from himself.  Grueling winters of building and working against his will has hardened his physical body, but more so his spirit.  Those in red have given Lika a new thought on revenge and future prosperity, and that in the end, everyone is reclaimed by nature.

One early midwinter Lika was involved in maintaining an outward camp, watched over by but one lowly Njerpeziläis warrior.  Seeing his opportunity to escape, he pushed the man over and ran as fast as he could, the sound of swearing and swaying chainmail behind him almost as loud as his heartbeats.  With arrows flying past him and the spirits of his ancestors pushing him forward, he managed to lose his captor in the trees and escaped without harm.

The gentle thicket swayed around him quietly, the distant noise of curse and footsteps long subsided.  Freedom.  It was at this moment, Lika knew what he must do.  Head west, to the Driikiläiset.  The traders.  He remembers them as the most difficult for his captors to attack.

Hungry and alone he will go, for many days.

To be continued...