PC Can we discuss stack sizes?

hotpoon

hotpoon

New member
Generally, I'm fairly happy with stack sizes, but

- why don't dye's stack? I mean you can stack a bunch of pot plants, which are much bigger, but 1 dye takes up 1 slot.

- has the water stack size been reduced? I seem to recall it being 15, but now it is 10.  Why not give it the same stack size as murky water?

 
Because dyes are mods and installing a whole stack of mods is not supported.

If you consider boiled and murky water the exact same, go ahead and just drink the murky variant. If for some reason boiled water seems worth more to you, there's your answer.

 
Thanks for explaining why dyes don't stack. That makes sense.

I disagree about the water though. I don't see stack size in terms of what is worth more. I think where things don't have varying stats, it makes sense to stack them regardless of how useful they are in game.

 
hotpoon said:
I think where things don't have varying stats, it makes sense to stack them regardless of how useful they are in game.
Click to expand...
Well, the game doesn't use weight or inventory space as a way to limit carrying capacity, so it has to use item value (roughly speaking). There is absolutely nothing "realistic" about 7D2D's inventory system so we can just toss any concerns there out the window. They are using approximate item value (to the player, not necessarily monetary) as a proxy for carrying/stacking capacity. It's awkward and sometimes jarring (pun absolutely intended), but understandable IMO.

Now what they could do is add something to a perk that lets you craft gallon jugs of boiled water, similar to the bundles of wood or rock or gunpowder etc. They already do have the helmet purifier mod which would let you just drink the murky stuff.

 
Boidster said:
Well, the game doesn't use weight or inventory space as a way to limit carrying capacity, so it has to use item value (roughly speaking). There is absolutely nothing "realistic" about 7D2D's inventory system so we can just toss any concerns there out the window.
Click to expand...
There's nothing realistic about any inventory systems lol. Realistic = not very fun. See that small boulder you broke? Yeah you'd be carrying that back to base about 4 tiny fractions of it at a time back and forth for weeks lol.

 
Yeah, I don't think anyone wants realism when it comes to inventory. Well...there is probably some masochist out there that would love it, but I'm sure most of us wouldn't.

The way I see it is the more different types of items that get added to the game, the bigger the stack sizes need to become, or you're running back to base after each room you loot. 

To me, if the water stacks to 99, it doesn't take anything away from the gameplay. 

 
Jugginator said:
There's nothing realistic about any inventory systems lol.
Click to expand...
I dunno. AD&D was pretty realistic even going so far as to limit pointy things in backpacks (and it translated to the games). Setting aside the magic loopholes, players really seemed like they could only carry a reasonable amount of crap. Buying a cheap wagon and a mule was often an early goal.

I am not suggesting such a system for 7D2D - I think they way this game does it is fine and suits the gameplay well. But some games do have inventory systems that hew more closely to realistic human carrying capacity.

 
Gazz said:
If you consider boiled and murky water the exact same, go ahead and just drink the murky variant. If for some reason boiled water seems worth more to you, there's your answer.
Click to expand...
I personally rationalize (is that a thing in this game) that murky water doesn't have to be cared for to prevent contamination so you can carry more, but boiled water is precious and as such, care needs to be taken so you get a smaller stack :)

 
Gazz said:
Because dyes are mods and installing a whole stack of mods is not supported.

If you consider boiled and murky water the exact same, go ahead and just drink the murky variant. If for some reason boiled water seems worth more to you, there's your answer.
Click to expand...
Now that the food system is more fleshed out water is more of a crafting item (lIke murky water) than a consumable. Especially since it has a risk of dysentery. This doesn’t mean it needs to stack to 125 but it also isn’t equal to the teas and other drinks. 

 
and then there's bandages, and pills.. those were what initially tempted me to start modding stack sizes.

then all the dang stacks of water taking up rows of storage space, not to mention wanting to be able to cook more at one time.

Turned out that it matters very little with my playstyle, but is very nice for storage management. Play wise very early game is the only time I keep 'clean' water, so it may stack up to >10 a few times. I normally only bring 6 or 7 jars of drink when I head out, and as soon as possible that's not plain water. Past early game I just throw out clean water when looting but keep murky water & empty jars, if possible, but they're early sacrifices to make room for better loot. Simple reason being you generally wind up looting quite a bit more murky/empty-jars than clean water.

While I can sorta? kinda? (not really) follow the logic of 'clean' water stack sizes, never could quite come to grips with it still having a chance to make you sick. If we craft it we have to use a pot, so impression is that we boiled it right? So it should be 100% safe to drink, imo anyway.

 
FileMachete said:
and then there's bandages, and pills.. those were what initially tempted me to start modding stack sizes.

then all the dang stacks of water taking up rows of storage space, not to mention wanting to be able to cook more at one time.
...
Click to expand...
True. I had a stack mod on at one point. Think I'll go see if there's one for A19 out.  
I honestly think there's enough different items in this game to challenge our inventory management skills, so that small stacks are just an annoyance, not valued gameplay.  

 
I agree that inventory management get worse with every new alpha because every new alpha adds new items. Look only at this new alpha, 10 new candies, new weapons and weapon parts, new tools but same inventory space. Im not sure but I think with this update storage chest can hold less items now.

hotpoon said:
I notice old sham sandwiches also only stack to 10, so clearly the stacking is not based on value.
Click to expand...


On this point I disagree, now that we need more food old sham sandwich is the new currency :D

Take vitamins and enjoy all your sandwiches. Most people underestimate the value of old sham. 

 
There is an old program a former member made that I have been using for the last 2 or 3 years (at least) called Advanced Recipe Editor. It says recipe but I use it mostly for editing stack sizes. It is so old that it still has the grid where you use to have to place the items in certain slots to make something. I find it still works very well for me though.

It takes minute or less to set up and then it has a nice gui to look through to edit stacks or recipes and has a search filter if you are looking for something in particular. With the move to new forum it may have gotten cut but I can have a look later and see if it is still around.

 
Jugginator said:
There's nothing realistic about any inventory systems lol. Realistic = not very fun. See that small boulder you broke? Yeah you'd be carrying that back to base about 4 tiny fractions of it at a time back and forth for weeks lol.
Click to expand...
Of course there is. You can aim for realism while making all the gameplay compromises you need.

 
hotpoon said:
I don't see stack size in terms of what is worth more. I think where things don't have varying stats, it makes sense to stack them regardless of how useful they are in game.
Click to expand...
I suspect this is a workaround for how traders operate.   They'll only buy 3 stacks of an item and since water is easy to make in vast quantities and sells reasonably well they wanted to limit how much money you could make from it.  Selling 3x250 stacks of water to each trader would allow you to break the economy on day 2.

 
Forgotten Memes said:
I suspect this is a workaround for how traders operate.   They'll only buy 3 stacks of an item and since water is easy to make in vast quantities and sells reasonably well they wanted to limit how much money you could make from it.  Selling 3x250 stacks of water to each trader would allow you to break the economy on day 2.
Click to expand...
That is a very valid point Memes. I brought up the idea (not claiming it as original one) of stack sizes being _container_ dependent in the a19 dev thread a while back. Gotta say while I'm not getting my hopes up I was encouraged that there wasn't an immediate, "nope" response from any of the devs.

Not saying we'll get this of course, but seems possible that say player storage containers (& campfire etc) could stack clean water to 250, player backpack still only to 10 and Trader say 20 or whatever.

While there'd still be the transferring bit, container to backpack to campfire, a 'transfer-all' shift+dbl-click or something could ease that part.

 
FileMachete said:
Not saying we'll get this of course, but seems possible that say player storage containers (& campfire etc) could stack clean water to 250, player backpack still only to 10 and Trader say 20 or whatever.
Click to expand...
This would almost certainly be a nightmare to code, so I wouldn't expect it.

 
Forgotten Memes said:
This would almost certainly be a nightmare to code, so I wouldn't expect it.
Click to expand...
Not really... could be an XML entry for every exception.  Make player inventory the norm and allow containers or whatever an exception to stack sizes for specific items.  If you wanted to put in a LOT of exceptions then you might have a point.

 
There are simply some people who like inventory management and some who don't. That is what this all comes down to. TFP as a company want a degree of inventory management in their game so useful items like water, medicine, and food are going to have smaller stack sizes because that is the way they want to enforce some semblance of inventory management. They could go a lot more hardcore in this regard if they wanted to do so but they are happy with the pretty casual and abstract rules they have in place right now.

I doubt they will want to go even more casual on it. They resisted any backpack enlargement for years until they finally gave in when they redid the UI in Alpha 13. People have repeatedly asked Madmole directly to please increase stack sizes for consumables and he has said, no. He values inventory management at least to some degree.

Objectively, having inventory management in a game doesn't break the game or make it bad. It simply is going to be a feature of the game that some will prefer and others will dislike. Since TFP definitely wants at least some inventory management in the game then that means that most likely mods that increase backpack size and change stack limits higher will continue to be popular.....and necessary.

Same goes for people who want a more extreme inventory management ruleset than is offered.

 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top