I’m probably not in the “average group” of gamers in terms of what I consider fun… but anyway:
- I kinda like not being able to find a book/schematic I need for a long time. It forces me to have to just get by without it, which makes my game less “the same as the other game I played”. The current perk system at least allows me to perk into something I need to play the game (like make a forge). If I never find a book to complete a set… that’s just how that poor survivors life went. I do feel that at some point it might feel nice to be able to suddenly go to a trader and buy a book I need, like after they trust me or I have some something for them, so basically maybe a “after day 100” or “player at level 250” option, maybe just in the secret stash or I can get a “craft any book from the x series” book that costs like 100k. Enough to hurt buying it to get 1 book.
- I wish there were more “barriers to entry” for stuff like the current forges/workbenches/etc. I think the campfire does a good job of this because I can make a campfire, but I need special tools on it to craft certain foods. These tools aren’t hard to get (as it’s just a freaking campfire, but the cooking pot as a POI decor block and as an item as well as a workstation tool is a nice touch!), but I do wish that as you move “up” in technology the tools you need to do stuff are harder to come by (like the crucible in the forge) and less like the anvil (makes it faster). I would totally got for some tiered forges/workbenches to break things up more (like 3 different workbenches, one being electric for welding, etc to make the gyro and 4x4) Anyway, I bring this up as a way to give more looting/crafting options to work upwards towards. It feels weird for me to have all the workstations under intellect… might feel nice to have some basic ones under other trees that are limited in function or maybe have special tools for crafting specific items so if you perk into Brawler maybe you can craft a few special clubs or axe that no other workstation can make. Nothing "super amazing 1 shot mega kill", but just a nice weapon set you can make to round out your character. If you give that weapon to some other character, fine.You don’t have to have a big brain to put plywood on top of sawhorses to craft something. Maybe the a2x "new armor" sets would fit within this well.
- zed corpse looting: I did enjoy it, and it’s a little odd to have a zed drop and then be “invincible” for a short while then pop out of existence as the normal thing. The loot bag drop feels weird to me because it’s so damn big (did it come out of the zeds a$$? Is that where everyone kept their big yellow overnight bag safe from thieves? I hope not). Why not have zeds wear some backpacks or something and drop those(as the bag model) or if not, allow some limited harvesting from zeds (like nasty cloth, flesh, and maybe occasionally some junk items like jewelry or trinkets. Make the materials you get mostly good for low level crafting recipes but with a higher ingredient count (better to gather 10 cloth vs 50 nastily cloth (have to clean) from a zed to make bandages). Make the rare trinkets something just to sell or for rare/cosmetic crafting. Additionally: make “trophy” items harvestable (heads/arms,etc) that are mostly useless except for base decoration. Make it sort of fun to loot corpses again, but totally not necessary or very rewarding, resource wise. Maybe leave the 1000 hit points but if you say there and harvested the whole thing you might get 4-6 items in total.
or maybe add in the possibility of finding some zed specific loot ( guns, medical, etc) similar to finding the prized 'toilet pistol". I loot every toilet but I know other people never do. Its a fun mechanic to find a rare item drop, even if that item isn't a super weapon or high tier armor/etc.
- back to looting: yeah, it’s a little weird to find stone/medieval tools pre made in loot. It might feel better if the loot “items” weren’t so limited, meaning: why can’t I ever find/craft twine or rope? If there were a bit more “hardware store items” to loot that you could use to make a stone axe for example (instead of auto making rope from plant fibers) it might feel better. I do feel TFP is trying to limit the item count to keep recipe counts lower/manageable and for other reasons (game still in dev, most accessible/player fun for the most people) and I know some people see this as “unnecessary grind” but there might be a sweet spot to add a few more base items for crafting so the looting feels a bit better and certain items (like stone axes) could be taken of the loot tables .