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Messages - Shadowdweller

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1
Guides and tutorials / Re: A guide for the aspiring hunter
« on: January 03, 2024, 11:01:14 AM »
Crossbow - Crap (One shot wonder)
Uhh...no.  Crossbows perform consistently better than bows at hunting; except for at very high bow skill %s and some edge cases.  They have a combination of high damage and high accuracy at long range in exchange for a low rate of fire.  For hunting, where you can only sneak up close enough to hit your prey at long range and you only have time for one or maybe two ranged attacks accuracy and damage are most the important traits.  Crossbows perform well even at low skill levels - like 20-40%.  Typically only a single successful shot is enough to slow a target down enough to make it simple to chase down on foot.  They can hit at noticeably longer ranges than javelins.

The low rate of fire makes them less desirable to use against wolf packs, njerpez, or robber groups (though they're still serviceable).  Where there are ranged threats that can fire back potentially several times during the reload delay; or multiple dangerous foes that can charge you quickly even if you manage to down one.

2
It is very difficult to start a char with a good flail skill.  But the skill DOES in fact have a use: Preserving hide quality as you finish stuff off in melee.  Killing stuff with blunt weapons results in better fur quality when skinned; at least if the weapon is powerful enough and you're skilled enough not to need a hundred blows to bring something down.  And flails can be quite damaging.  (Unlike other weapons, threshing can help train the skill, although painfully slowly).  It's often easier to train and outfit a character with a good club or mace though.  Most cultures start with a decent club skill.

3
General Discussion / Re: How to avoid boredom
« on: September 26, 2021, 07:25:55 AM »
Boredom has always been my greatest foe in urw. What works for me (temporarily): Come up with in-game goals and work toward them.  Build a mansion with a herd of cattle. Go on a hunting or fishing trip somewhere else - build a summer kota or cabin there. Hunt seals in the ocean; or build a spare home near rapids. Visit the archipelago. Surviving the through winter is a decent (non-combat) challenge. Albeit a slow-paced one.

4
General Discussion / Re: Hunting gripe
« on: August 28, 2021, 04:32:18 AM »
A running target is harder to hit than one that is stationary or moving slowly, and I believe that applies to ranged attacks, and it's obviously a lot easier to achieve that while the target is (mostly) unaware of you.
I believe the accuracy penalty against running targets ONLY applies to ranged attacks. One other benefit of stealth though is that the target is less likely to notice or be spooked by a missed shot.

5
General Discussion / Re: Hunting gripe
« on: August 27, 2021, 11:05:30 AM »
Stealth makes a massive difference to your first shot. URW compares the success level of you shot versus the success level of the targets dodge, almost always reducing the damage by a considerable amount. If the target can't see you, there is no dodge. Always try to hide before taking a shot, if you can. You can unhide to chase.
Hmm.  You know, while I will readily admit that it's been....years...I was rather under the impression that dodge did not apply to ranged attacks.  (Which is one of the things that makes thrown weapons so effective in Njerpez/Robber fights).  Something that could be readily tested I would imagine, if the damage difference is, as you say, considerable.

6
Stories / Re: The Oath [Vegetarian/Pacifist challenge]
« on: August 27, 2021, 10:52:23 AM »
How big is that lake? These days, I tend to plant my seeds along the border of a lake/river because it's less work to clear the area, but I only plant in every other row because I want there to be some spaces for bear pipes to grow.

Another thing I like to do if I'm making a big farm and want to plant a whole tile, I pick a tile that is already mostly open (like a lichenous pine forest). You can only plant about a third of it before you hit the tile item limit so I make crop circles or rather big triangular designs. But it's not stupid to start in a woodland like you did, you'll have plenty of logs for a big cabin when you're done.
Lake is maybe about 30 tiles.  Having an easy cabin is nice and all, but I'm worried about getting as much farmland planted as possible atm.  As well as having time to make trade goods for necessities.  Thinking maybe I should have gone for a hill or maybe grove instead.  Usually easy enough to plant near a bordering forest so you have plenty of lumber; not to mention that there's often enough trees around anyway.

7
Stories / Re: The Oath [Vegetarian/Pacifist challenge]
« on: August 27, 2021, 08:46:53 AM »
https://imgur.com/a/YXGjPno

Weary and in pain, the Kinslayer abandoned the pyres of his family.  He would not touch the bloody implements that had killed is family.  In his pockets, nothing save a stone knife he had knapped out of idle boredom on a snow-choked eve.  It had not touched blood.  It was still winter, nothing edible yet grew.  And the family stores of food, or at least that which his oath would permit, had burned with the cabin.  Knowing that without food and shelter he would not survive long, the Kinslayer quickly traversed the short mile to the nearest village.    Perhaps his visage had changed with his spirit, but the townsfolk paid him little head, offering neither recognition nor censure.  "Perhaps they are too busy averting their eyes from the blood," he thought.  He spoke to some, they seemed friendly enough; though distant.  "Do they know?  Can they tell?" he mused.  First he sought at the town sage.  The Kinslayer's need was writ upon his skin, they exchanged few words.  "I should no doubt was my wounds more thoroughly when I have a chance."  But he shivered at the thought of freezing water on his skin, already cold and pale from his trek through the snow.  He warmed himself a moment at a hearth, then proceeded to check the storehouses to see what might be gained here from trade.  It was clear the townsfolk were preparing for the spring.  Boxes of seed, grain, beans were ready for planting.  The smell of ember-roasted turnips made him feel the empty void in the pit of his stomach.  He noticed spools of nettle and linen thread.  And a well-made broad knife sitting unclaimed.  He wondered if the villagers would mind him borrowing it, as long as it remained unclaimed, if he did not remove it from the storehouse.  In the end, he could not withstand the villagers' cold gazes for long.

So the Kinslayer ventured into the woods to find his own shelter where he might make items for trade.  He settled a scant distance from town, along the shores of a large lake.  At first he tried removing alder bark, to weave into ropes.  But this proved taxing.  He tried making staves, perhaps to construct javelins - but the blade of his stone knife was uneven and resulted in splintery specimens that were uncomfortable even to hold.  He lacked even a crude stone axe, with which to chop fallen trees into blocks for conveniences like wooden bowls.  So in the end, he spent several uncomfortable, hungry nights as he slowly wove a couple of birch-bark ropes.  Though his wounds had slowly started to heal, his body was starting to become weak from hunger.  The Kinslayer returned to town the next morning, hoping to trade.  Offering all he had made, he bartered for a skein of linen thread and a number of roasted turnips.  The turnips were gone within two meals, leaving him no stronger than before.  Turnips would not sustain him.  "I will need grain, then.  I could make waybread from flour; and I will need to plant soon if I am ever to carve out enough farmland to keep myself from starving during the winter."  The rope, though crudely made, was still valued by the villagers.  Once having at last built a stone axe, the Kinslayer would quickly learn that his feeble attempts at making wooden bowls or javelins were valued little.  He calculated that to pay for even a sack of grain, he would need at least seven or eight birch-bark ropes.  But he could see little other hope if he were to keep his oath.  So for the next week, the Kinslayer set about peeling birch-bark, then returning to town to borrow that knife for rope-making.  And at last he could trade for food...for at least a short time.  Slowly and surely after much baking, his strength started to return.

On one fateful bartering trip, the Kinslayer learned that a wounded hunter had taken refuge in village, having been mauled by a bear.  The man asked the Kinslayer to retrieve his handaxe, a treasure gift from the man's now deceased father.  Sheepishly, without meeting the man's eyes, the Kinslayer agreed.  It was not recollection that disturbed the Kinslayer; not fear nor painful memory of his own violent, recalcitrant father.  It was not the pain of his wounds, nor the guilt for his part in the deaths of his family.  It was shame.  For upon hearing the tale, the Kinslayer knew he would not be returning the handaxe.  He would be taking it for himself, fearing for his survival without.  For days he searched, at last finding the wounded hunter's campsite just as the snows started to melt.  "With this," he thought, "I can clear land for farming at my camp."  But as he slowly cleared and burned, preparing a small plot for farming he thought about just how large of a farm he would need to survive the winter.  And his lifeline, his grain bag, was running empty.

Note: Sooooo, I guess being a pacifist doesn't actually make for a very exciting story.  Or perhaps I just don't know how to dramatize high-stress trading  :-\  I've never actually played a vegetarian character before.  Hunting and trapping are amongst my favorite things about unreal world.  And I was initially worried that the character would end up being bogged down into endless crafting sessions of low-value bartering items or endless berry gathering.  It still may end up being that way, but the initial game was actually surprisingly fun to play.  Because, vegetarianism makes starvation a constant problem in the early game; and requires constant work to fill one's stomach at least with waybread.  I was at 30% starvation by the time I was able to afford grain.  I think the food thing is going to be a struggle for the whole game.  Anyway, building my farm in a woodland as the pictures should show - which is probably an incredibly stupid thing to do.  I think I'm going to need an enormous farm if I'm going to feed myself in winter.

8
Gameplay questions / Re: Aren't dogs die of cold?
« on: August 26, 2021, 03:31:05 AM »
Chasing a squirrel? j/k

9
Stories / Re: The Oath [Vegetarian challenge]
« on: August 25, 2021, 10:59:11 AM »
Thought I'd try out a vegetarian / pacifist character.  The ground rules I set for myself:
First character stats accepted no matter what they are - custom build.  Hurt, Helpless, and Alone scenario; starting in spring to give the character time for the planting of crops.  No game courses.

No eating meat of any kind.  No hunting, no fishing, no trapping - thus no furs or skinning.  No violence of any kind unless an animal or foe is trying to kill me.  Or kill my animals.  Even then - only enough to drive it off.  I kinda reserve the right to trade for furs so I don't freeze to death in the winter  :-[

10
Stories / The Oath [Vegetarian/Pacifist challenge]
« on: August 25, 2021, 10:50:28 AM »
The youth gazed in mute disbelief at the charred and mutilated bodies, laid out as if in rest by the blackened ruin.  Six of them.  Even the youngest sister, three years old.  Serene and unwounded but dead nonetheless.  Bad air?  How could this happen?  The youth stared at his wounds, his bloodstained clothes...his hands, his bloodstained hands, and tried to remember.  Dreams.  Nightmares.  A drunken father, a battered mother.  Terrible words.  An argument - demands to leave the cabin, to seek fortune elsewhere.  Away from everything and everyone they knew?  Defiance.  A son's fists raised in defense.  Knives drawn, then worse.  Brother fighting against father.  Sister against brother.  Then blood. So much blood.  And flame.

Six bundles of sticks gathered and laid out like beds.  The smoke stinging his eyes brought relief; for at last he could cry.  Let their spirits join the air, the forest, the waters.

Crying still, he tried to wash away the bloodstains from his hands, his clothing; but to no avail.  "I did this," he thought.  He would have thrown away or burned his tattered clothing, but some semblance of survival instinct stayed his hands.  Around the ruined homestead, the snows of winter still gripped the land; though the buds of new leaves had started to grow.  He would not survive, naked and foodless in the snow.  "No more.  No more blood.  No more hands raised in violence, save perhaps in the direst need of self-defense or defense of my animals.  No more will I draw blood nor eat the flesh of human nor beast nor fowl nor fish.  And if I starve, let it be the spirits' judgment upon me."

And he wondered when at last he left, "Could the sweat of my brow ever wash away the blood?"

11
Not bugs / Re: 3.70b No wandering Njerpezit raiders
« on: August 24, 2021, 12:58:51 PM »
I'm not big on combat with most characters....but I very much like the sense of danger they present.  Or used to present.  Haven't seen any Njerpez or Robbers yet in 3.70b3 either.

12
Bug reports / Re: [3.70b3]Stuck Beavers (Pathfinding?)
« on: August 24, 2021, 12:54:28 PM »
Guess it's not the double-slope thing.  Just had one stuck in a place without a double-slope.  Stayed there 1+ months without moving or dying.  Running around it did not result in it moving or becoming unstuck.

13
General Discussion / Re: Hunting gripe
« on: August 24, 2021, 12:34:38 AM »
Yeah, high stealth usually only allows you to get a couple steps closer to your prey. And while this makes a bit of difference as far as reducing range penalties or lining up a clear shot, the difference is subtle enough to be hardly noticeable if you're not pretty familiar with the game already.

14
Bug reports / Re: [3.70b3]Stuck Beavers (Pathfinding?)
« on: August 23, 2021, 06:28:20 AM »
There was a general discussion forum post that I myself made some two days ago that involved a massacre and waddling...

15
Bug reports / [3.70b3]Stuck Beavers (Pathfinding?)
« on: August 23, 2021, 02:20:47 AM »
Have had three instances now of beavers seemingly unable to move while a couple steps away from safety and water now.  Beavers were not wounded or visibly fatigued to the point of immobility.  I THINK what's going on is that the beaver pathfinding script is trying to make them move down a double-slope but not accepting alternatives.

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