Messages

16

General Discussion / Re: Thoughts on All Crops

« on: December 13, 2023, 12:52:12 PM »

The main thing that needs to change with Clayweed is that it needs to be an actual weed. While this was certainly eaten, I doubt it was planted (even now I can't seem to find Chenopodium album seeds in Finland, only for the closely related perennial Chenopodium bonus-henricus) but instead harvested away as pest in the fields. That you can use the leafs like you would use nettle or spinach is just a bonus.

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General Discussion / Re: You are from: Moron Heath

« on: December 07, 2023, 11:48:04 AM »

Lots of the meanings in these place names are pretty obscure. I wouldn't know that pännä means a moron, and the dictionary of the Institution of Domestic Languages (Kotus) tells me it means a pencil. I suppose Sami and Erkka got these meaning from some more specialist dictionary; for regional, historical or place name specific words.

That being said, Finland does have lots of funny and vulgar place names in reality too, there are for instance many hundreds of place names beginning with pasko or paska (meaning shit) and you occasionally see them in URW too. You can find a tool for searching Finnish place names there (search for word plus * to find words beginning with something, e.g. pännä*): https://nimisampo.fi/fi

18

Suggestions / Re: Add cooking with wooden bowls

« on: December 06, 2023, 09:22:46 PM »

Matti as Im updating BAC again do you have more details to share?

The weblink is in Finnish and though can translate Im finding it awkward to drill out the details.

Going by the instructions from there for the modern day traditional dish from Lemi: https://www.maajakotitalousnaiset.fi/reseptit/lemin-sara-etela-karjalasta

The tub is carved from birch or aspen, and is sized to the oven. It's then soaked in salted water for "weeks", which is said to help prevent cracking (reminds me of the salted water treatment given to kuksa, traditional wooden mug). After this it's treated with sheep tallow.

For the dish itself, salted mutton or lamb (1kg salt for 10kg meat, so were are talking properly salted for preservation) is rinsed in water to remove excess salt. A heat retaining over is fired up. Any cracks on the tub are patched up with combination of water and flour. The meat is placed on the tub and placed in the oven, with few pieces of alder separating the tub from the bottom of the oven (this both protects the tub and imparts taste, alder being traditional smoking wood in Finland, I guess just branches would be closest URW equivalent). It's cooked in the oven for hours (as many as 8), with meat flipped halfway through the cooking and potatoes turnips added sometime during the latter half of it. Apparently the tub can handle about 40-60 uses, more than I thought.

Note that this is a "dry" dish, even if the meat naturally releases liquid to the bottom of the tub. I suppose we can assume the tub can handle the in-game stew type dishes as those contain minimum water, but no idea how it would hold up with a soup.

@Plotinus I suppose one could take a stance that the iron pot shouldn't even exist in the game, it's a very complicated thing to hammer that kind of thing together from wrought iron. I'm not too sure it would be easier to take care of such pot in real life. Taking that kuksa as example, it's arguably easier to take care of than modern carbon steel cookware is (wood is somewhat hygienic material naturally, as it tends to absorb moisture from the surface and bacteria don't like being dehydrated).

19

Modding / Re: BAC Mod Weaving yardage.

« on: December 05, 2023, 11:30:04 AM »

There were no oil laps or candles either, burning wood chips were the sole light source.

Did the medieval Finns really not have oil lamps or fat lamps? Using the blubber of seals?

At least not as part of regular peoples' household lighting, which continued to use these thin pulled wood chips all the way to 19th century. Supposedly they burned at rather measured rate, so not as silly as it might sound.

The wood chip production is depicted here (for sake of basket weaving, but same thing): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbMziRumSfw

20

Modding / Re: BAC Mod Weaving yardage.

« on: December 04, 2023, 12:55:49 PM »

I hadn't thought of weaving as a summer for light issue. As a Canadian I've heard pioneer tales of indoor crafts by the firelight.

With how dark it has gotten on the character Calle in winter with no sun and no moon I could see that being an issue. Some times it was so dark in the game he couldn't put wood into his oven-place because "you can only push items to where you can see".

It does make quite a bit sense especially in the Finnish/in-game context. The fireplace depicted in the game in unvented, you'd get carbon monoxide poisoning if you stayed in the room in non-prone position. Even during winter it was only lit once a day in the morning and then continued to heat the house through the rest of the day via the retained heat. To my understanding North American pioneers by contrast tended to use open, vented fireplaces, which could be used to provide light.

There were no oil laps or candles either, burning wood chips were the sole light source.

21

Suggestions / Villages should keep their water sources free of ice during winter

« on: December 04, 2023, 12:27:51 PM »

It's not just matter of having to smash the ice yourself, I can almost never find the things during winter since they blend in with the snow.

22

Suggestions / Re: Add cooking with wooden bowls

« on: December 04, 2023, 11:46:00 AM »

No*, but I don't think it's supposed to be a ceramic pot. The game icon, it's price tag and especially the fact it's within the scope of metal items one can order from your local blacksmith suggest an iron pot.

On the other I'm not so sure on the importance of the oven's passive heating for cooking now. Another archaeologist said that when Finns switched to heat retaining fireplaces (sometime during the Viking age) there was switch to outdoor kitchens in kotas and similar.

*Apparently, iron age Finnish ceramic pots were fairly smallish generally, at about 1 litre (but up to 4), and were glazed with ferriferous clay or bog iron limonite.

23

Suggestions / Re: Add cooking with wooden bowls

« on: December 03, 2023, 04:13:50 PM »

That also sounds rather different than the traditional Finnish usage, which is closely tied to usage of heat retaining fireplaces for household heating.

In any case, I was listening some radio programmes on Finnish prehistory earlier, and it was said that if anything this was the main cooking method, with metal pots being small, low volume things for rich futurist hipsters of the day.

24

Modding / Re: BAC Mod Weaving yardage.

« on: December 03, 2023, 03:53:25 PM »

As for historical dye plants: people used all kinds of dyeherbs. Woad for blue, onion skins or dyers' chamomile (Anthemis tinctoria) for yellow, madder root for red. Note that this is a very, very short list. Most of these natural dyes require a mordant, or a metal salt, to make sure the colors chemically bond to the fabric. Some of the mordants used are pretty harmless — alum, for example, is used to mordant some colors, but too much of it will leave wool and other protein fibers with a weird sticky texture. Other mordants are shit you need chemical disposal facilities to get rid of.

As a contemporary fiber crafter, I use acid dyes, which bond to protein fibers effortlessly with the addition of citric acid or vinegar.

In specifically Finnish usage, blue, black, red and brown are attested in archaeological record (plus a few oddities like violet). Yellow and green are absent, possibly because they were seen as too plebeian for the archaeological sample (funeral clothing) rather than being actually absent. Madder, onions and possibly woad did not exist in Finland (woad may have in the in-game Islander territory, but was also likely an import item, generally seen as the fanciest dye). Reds and browns were made from tree bark (e.g. alder) being soaked in birch lye solution, which could be left to "ferment" for months to produce different shades.

25

Gameplay questions / Re: Best Ways to Acquire Masterwork Fur Armor?

« on: December 01, 2023, 11:35:41 AM »

Actually scratch that, masterwork fur does get +1 to edge and +1 tear (over fine, which itself is +1 warmth and +1 blunt), which makes it situationally more useful armour material over bear fur which instead a better pierce resistance. I'd say bear furs are still generally better as blunt attack is relatively rare and edge resistance is easier to stack than pierce.

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Solved'n'fixed bug reports / Re: [3.63] [3.62] Game freezes on exit if audio device has been unplugged

« on: November 29, 2023, 06:40:52 PM »

I wonder what's the difference then? Mobo? Mine's Asus TUF GAMING B660M-PLUS D4 with software handled by Asus' Armory Crate suite and I also have their DTS app installed (though that app is disabled with Bluetooth headset and monitor speakers). Bluetooth is USB dongle running on Window's 11's default software. And I guess the monitor is interfacing via my GPU which is 3070Ti with driver version 537.34.

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Solved'n'fixed bug reports / Re: [3.63] [3.62] Game freezes on exit if audio device has been unplugged

« on: November 28, 2023, 05:49:05 PM »

This still happens in 3.82. Possibly related to issues with switching audio device while the game is running, as all audio stops when this happens. I.e. if you disconnect or connect a Bluetooth headset or if your monitor goes to sleep while you were using the monitor's speakers (on certain monitors at least), the audio stops and then the game freezes when you try to close it. Using Windows 11.

28

Suggestions / Add cooking with wooden bowls

« on: November 28, 2023, 12:23:17 PM »

There has been traditional usage of wooden containers for cooking in Finland, and this could theoretically go back to URW's times. I.e. särä: https://areena.yle.fi/1-50799207

In practice it would involve wooden bowl or similar new speciality item that would be patched a bit with quick dough and then placed in fireplace (which represents traditional Finnish chimneyless ovenstove) with burned out fire and cooked for hours, akin to meat stew and porridge recipes. The container should suffer wear in the process and be good for only few usages.

As pot is rather large investment early on, this would allow some basic cooking to be done by starting characters.

29

Suggestions / Re: [3.82] Porridge can only be cooked in absurdly small portions

« on: November 28, 2023, 12:10:51 PM »

More of a suggestion, but I agree. I wouldn't bother with the flatbread and quick porridge though as they are laborious to make. Instead I'd buy a second pot to make more oven porridge, which also serves as case in point of the problem.

30

General Discussion / Re: Human combat system is really off---enemy are fighting like zombies

« on: November 27, 2023, 01:29:39 PM »

Strong edge (or tear, yes I mean you Mr. Wolf) attack to neck is usually 1 hit instant death for PC and NPCs if there is no significant armour there (I don't think I have seen many mail cowls on Njerps). There is this massege about almost tearing the body part off. Happens also with broadhead arrows (including to animals as large as reindeer and at least smaller bears), and it can happen even to otherwise unharmed and fresh mobs. Point attacks are in my experience less instantly lethal, which is why I tend to choose axes over spears (and often bring broadheads if I know I'm going to fight Njerps or robbers and need to make my shots count).

I have never, ever missed with attack on unconscious mob (yellow text on attack screen), and I suspect such attacks automatically roll extra damage dice as well. You sure the mob was actually unconscious?

In general the main trick to URW combat is exhaustion management. Your opponents run all the time in combat situations, while you can choose not to. If they are not running they are attacking every turn (while you can choose not to, in which case you most likely move backwards so that your opponent has to run bit more). Exhausted mobs will have penalty to their attacks, they drop down easy and when they become unconscious they are unlikely to recover in reasonable time. You can essentially consider it equivalent of damage that just heals quicker, in that sense even moving backwards (and not even making a counterstrike) is a damaging attack on your enemies, and it has 100% hit chance.