Those playing with default settings only get cans from loot. Those playing with the creative menu enabled have an unlimited supply. Set your preferred settings and play. The last thing I needed was to look for water to make a smoothie.
Suggestion: Dew Collectors (and maybe apiaries) should require empty jars as fuel.
- Thread starter gofantasy542
- Start date
Adam the Waster
Hunter
One time I made it to day 4 and didnt realized I was in creative
I think the OP meant that once the dew collector is buildable and you build a few then **water** is so plentiful that jars itself become a useless item at any % setting, even at 0% return. Why need jars at all when you have water solved, after all jars are just a means to an end of getting water.
theFlu
Hunter
Hmm, I partially missed that; does indeed seem to be the frame of the OP. "Please don't make jars become entirely obsolete even in late game" or so. So that you'd be happy finding them in loot even later.
I guess the disconnect is rather simple, TFP and Roland seem to consider any "Jar Return > 0" -setting to be wrong, in the same way "Zombies: off" is wrong. Milder, perhaps, but "obviously unintended"; no balance required.
I dunno, I'd like it to be balanced, or possible to balance, somehow. All the suggestions I've seen seem partial.
For the situation, we have sources and sinks, and their adjuments:
Sources:
1) Loot*
2) Dew Collector*
3) Crafting via crucible
4) Vendors
* Loot abundance can be adjusted, effecting both getting jars and crafting collectors; but the setting is too "wide" to consider a good adjustment here.
Sinks:
1) Drinks and foods (Adjustable 0-100)
2) Glue (deletes (I'm guessing?))
3) Vendor (you can sell them, but who would...)
Since there's practically just one adjustable, any "balance" can only be found with exactly one value of the setting. Since the balance was developed for "no return", that's where it should be atm.
The suggestion to add requirements for the Dew Collector could be an adjustable; it just wouldn't be sufficient alone, AND it would make the collector pointless.
We could also just give "Jar looting" its own abundance setting. 0-100. You get 2 at the start of a game, you'll be fine at zero. Buy a couple more from the trader and you're set. Downside is, Dew Collector jar generation becomes insanely obvious. But at least it isn't useless, and Riamus doesn't have to loot a single jar, ever.
We could come up with new sinks... a shooting range with jars, and an LBD mechanic to go with it. Win win.
(Joking of course...
)
Roland
Community Moderator
It's the timing that matters. WIth 100% jar return water is solved on day one when you spawn in with two forever jars in your pack. For 0% jar return, water isn't solved until after you build the dew collector. Feeding jars into the dew collector will change nothing about having a surplus of jars. 100%ers will get every jar they put into the collector back again plus they will continue to find more each day. It isn't actually a sink if you get it back...
I don't want water to be struggle for the whole game. I want it to be there for the early game but solved once the dew collectors are built. If I have to feed jars into the dew collector it will just extend water scarcity out even longer and make it more of a slog rather than a nice progression because every jar used is used up.
Not wrong-- just a different focus. People who want 100% jar return are obviously prioritizing the immersion factor. From an immersion/ simulation aspect, it is right to get the jar back and right to input them into the dew collector and apiary. People who want that degree of realism are willing to sacrifice the progression of water scarcity to water abundance. Probably most of these people don't even care to have a water/thirst progression and are happy to focus on other progressions in the game and not have to worry about thirst at all.
People who want 0% jar return are obviously prioritizing the progression of water scarcity to abundance and are willing to sacrifice realism for that gameplay. Probably most of these people don't really think about where the jars go or why the dew collector creates jars. They just think of it all as "units of water" to be used for drinking or crafting as needed and are fine with the abstract implementation.
The seeming solution for both is probably to make jars craftable at about the same time as the dew collector becomes available. 100%ers won't need to craft jars at all. They will have plenty to put into the dew collector and will get them all back to put in again and will continue to find more in loot daily. 0%ers will need to craft jars to put into the dew collectors which will probably be acceptable to everyone except Riamus...
The only problem is still that with dew collectors costing jars, they still won't have much (if any) advantage over simply filling the jars and boiling them at a campfire. Costing jars reduces the value of collectors and really won't solve jar overstock problems for 100%ers anyway.
So requiring jars to fill the collectors isn't even a sink for 100%ers, won't solve the problem of having 100s of jars on hand, but will make them feel more immersive to a group of people who won't even need to build them at all-- while ruining them for the 0%ers even if jars can be crafted by time the collectors can be built.
Seems selfish...
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theFlu
Hunter
Are we? Am I? Is the OP? Or is this thread an attempt to fix that disconnect? It's not "selfish", it's an attempt to improve the game.
How is that an improvement? It would introduce an infinite source at the moment where the game is intended to slightly alleviate the burden of gathering and/or enable crafting glue.
The problem isn't "there are no jars", the problem is "there are too many jars"; especially when you aren't eating them. So all that would accomplish is making the jars even More obsolete.
I agree that messing with the collector / apiary isn't a good solution; it's not addressing the fundamental issue. But it's one of the components people are thinking about, so it's just a low hanging fruit of a suggestion.
I disagree that the other end of the jar-deletion-setting should be automatically causing an overflow. We'd need a setting to reduce sources, or increase sinks .. something like doubling the cost of glue would feel really artificial, but it'd accomplish the thing. Dropping the amount in loot next to zero would work.
But the real problem is in the way the collector works... it was made to limit the rate of water collection; it sounds logical in that sense. But it breaks as soon as you add an infinite source next to it. Realistically it serves little purpose next to a lake. This can't really be fixed directly, it's a failure in the basic logic. So any attempts to make it make sense as a limiting step are relatively futile...
In an opposite vein, I don't really get why they added jar return from foods. It's not realistic, but losing those jars felt less bad - a decent candidate for a "self-adjusting" sink. If I have extra jars, I start making boiled meats instead of grilled. That bit of glass I'm eating gives me a few HP, horrible logic, I know.
But it felt better because I also had the option not to waste the jars, to not entirely break the logic of water survival. Other such things could perhaps be added. Take the lure-function out of stones and add it to jars, with about 99% chance of breaking on impact. Give or take 1%.
Riamus
Hunter
I think the only way to really make most people happy is to give one or more game options related to it. How many depends on what the options happen to be and what impact they have. I've mentioned it before and I saw someone mention it here as well, that having more than one loot abundance would be a benefit to the game. If one loot abundance is related to empty jars, a player could choose to have some jar return while setting it so you can't loot any empty jars (0%). They'll have to either craft them, buy them, or get them back from things they drink. If set to something like 20% return, that would keep availability of jars very low while still allowing some return. Even at 100%, you'd still not get such a large number of empty jars. And for anyone like me who doesn't like empty jars, setting it to 0% return and 0% loot abundance would solve that problem entirely, at least as long as they don't require empty jars for the dew collector or apiary.
That's just one game option that could be considered. You could have other options instead or in addition to that one that can also improve things for both sides of this issue. I think that focusing on possible game options would have far more chance of finding a solution that works for almost everyone versus finding ways to change jars for everyone.
That's just one game option that could be considered. You could have other options instead or in addition to that one that can also improve things for both sides of this issue. I think that focusing on possible game options would have far more chance of finding a solution that works for almost everyone versus finding ways to change jars for everyone.
Roland
Community Moderator
Those are separate issues. Are you willing to sacrifice progression in favor of immersion? Yes....whether you want to phrase it that way or not. Those two jars of water you get in the first moment you spawn is the end of any actual thirst survival gameplay if you have the setting at 100%. From there it is all abundance and your only gameplay is easily maintaining your blue bar above 70%. Since pressing the option button for 100% jar return is a choice, you are making that choice.
Now I have no problem with people who want 100% returnable jars and I'm glad TFP provided that option. But I don't agree that requiring jars to be fed into collectors is an improvement to the game. It would do nothing as a jar sink for 100%ers since every jar they put in would come back to them again anyway. It would destroy the usefulness of collectors for 0%ers. All it would do would make the collectors more immersive for people who can't accept the abstract truth that the jars are there and must watch themselves actively put the jars in to believe it. Knowing what it would do to the games of other players while having no impact other than "feeling right" about a station you don't even need is the epitome of selfishness.
Am I saying the OP's intent was to be selfish? No. I don't think they considered all the consequences when they first posted it and I do believe their intent was to improve the game.
It would be like a player, who never builds because that part of the game is super boring to them and they just fight out in the open or use existing structures, suggesting a more immersive change to limit players to carrying more realistic amounts of building blocks-- maybe 3 wooden blocks, or 2 cobblestone blocks, or 1 concrete and that once the 4x4 is crafted that vehicle can then carry about 5 times that amount. That makes a lot of sense realistically and for immersion and it would also destroy the gameplay of builders. And since the player who hates building never builds anyway, such a change would hardly register in his own playing. But, I guess he would feel good when after putting three wooden blocks in his inventory he couldn't add any more. That's not selfish to initially suggest but it is selfish to insist upon once he understands how it would harm the builders all to alleviate his own feelings about immersion.
theFlu
Hunter
I'm willing to choose the lesser of two evils. I'm advocating for the improvement of the one I prefer. You don't seem able to recognize that Any improvement could even be possible.
I agree with all of what you wrote, in principle. For the sake of argument, I'll take your one point of uncertainty away, and call the OP outright eevul for daring to suggest touching the Dew Collector. There. He's eevul.
Now, is it possible to come up with any improvement to the game progression system for those who choose the option of 100% Jar Return, or is the "yer doing it wrong!" simply too strong?
Roland
Community Moderator
Not so. I definitely think improvement is possible but not by means of requiring jars to fuel the dew collector. I'm happy to look elsewhere for improvement. I'll think on it.
Whatever. You're being flippant and funny and assigning intent and motives for the sake of that humor but I in no way actually think the OP is wrong or evil for making suggestions. I think his suggestion is wrong and won't improve anything but I'm open to alternatives and I hope the OP continues to post suggestions and ideas.
Not at all as long as it doesn't harm the default version of the game or if it does there is a way to make it optional. So far the suggestions I've read would be detrimental to the vanilla version of the game all for the sake of a little more immersion for a workstation that isn't even needed by those who want the change. But lets do iterate on the idea and see if there is a feasible way to either make the jar cost to collectors optional or come up with something different.
theFlu
Hunter
All right, thank you, seems like we're communicating now ..
- Jar Loot ratio: 0-100. (as in, just reduce the drop rate) Instead of breaking the jar while drinking, it's already broken in the cabinet. IF you like, throw some glass shards in there for comedic effect. Could even be directly bound to the current Jar Destruction -setting, or not.
- Vendor setting: Could be tied to the above, vendors just sell less drinks every reset. If need be "vendor basic supplies" could be created, like MRE's and carton packaged water that would not be expected to come in a jar.
- Distracting Jars (instead of stones); sounds like a joke, but when is water meant to be an issue? At the early days. When is the Distraction Throw most useful? At the early days. Stones are free, I'm tossing them around whenever, but it might be more interesting to have to choose whether to risk dying of zombie bite or dehydration.
- Shooting range; I called it LBD as a joke, but heck, could just give a 10-20% buff to gun damage for an hour per 5 jars shot. Might get some extras sunk
And, now I'll commit the original sin, and add a new one, maybe even:
- Dew Collector setting. Might be bound to some/all of the above, like a combined "water difficulty" setting akin to the difficulty level (setting plenty of things, not exactly specific in details in the description). Can we even craft a Dew Collector? Do you get the mystical coat of paint it requires out of a T5 chem factory, or out of a T2 pharmacy? Or from the trader?
Any more come to mind?
So far, in this thread, I've proposed vaguely to either reduce sources, and increase some sinks. More specifically:
- Jar Loot ratio: 0-100. (as in, just reduce the drop rate) Instead of breaking the jar while drinking, it's already broken in the cabinet. IF you like, throw some glass shards in there for comedic effect. Could even be directly bound to the current Jar Destruction -setting, or not.
- Vendor setting: Could be tied to the above, vendors just sell less drinks every reset. If need be "vendor basic supplies" could be created, like MRE's and carton packaged water that would not be expected to come in a jar.
- Distracting Jars (instead of stones); sounds like a joke, but when is water meant to be an issue? At the early days. When is the Distraction Throw most useful? At the early days. Stones are free, I'm tossing them around whenever, but it might be more interesting to have to choose whether to risk dying of zombie bite or dehydration.
- Shooting range; I called it LBD as a joke, but heck, could just give a 10-20% buff to gun damage for an hour per 5 jars shot. Might get some extras sunk
And, now I'll commit the original sin, and add a new one, maybe even:
- Dew Collector setting. Might be bound to some/all of the above, like a combined "water difficulty" setting akin to the difficulty level (setting plenty of things, not exactly specific in details in the description). Can we even craft a Dew Collector? Do you get the mystical coat of paint it requires out of a T5 chem factory, or out of a T2 pharmacy? Or from the trader?
Any more come to mind?
Roland
Community Moderator
This is good and for more than just jars. Magazine drop rate, food drop rate, weapon part drop rate, etc would all be good ways to tailor loot tables much better than simply the global % changes we have now.
Same as above.
This would be fine in addition to stones but not instead of stones. Maybe you could craft a jar with a single piece of meat to create a more powerful distractor that keeps them in the spot for long enough to then follow up with a pipe bomp or molotov.
sure.
You could also make jars an alternative to wrapping with paper to get rid of smell.
And here's my joke one:
Combine paper with a jar that allows you to write a "note in a bottle" which, when thrown into the ocean at the map edge, it will get sent directly to the developers as an in-game way to send feedback.
theFlu
Hunter
Heh, I had basically the same idea later, trying to sleep. Use jars for smell prevention. I took the throwing idea a bit further as well, make that thrown, breaking meat jar spawn in a "corpse" of meat. Somewhat like a rabbit corpse, but meat. Makes a loud noise And smells And takes a bit of time to eat.
Now, you want to keep stones and paper as they are; I get the desire, but that wouldn't actually give jars a use outside of RP. I might want to let paper wrapping leak a little, or something. Or if the jar version is made into that throwable corpse, then that might be enough.
Another was, Maybe make jars into a trap block, that causes a loud noise for both zeds and players to hear when stepped on (by either). Needs a new block for a Jar, but they're back, let's embrace them! Put them all over the base to bask in their magnificent glory!
From there, the "gun range" idea could just be made with placeable jars. Set one down, shoot it for a buff "Honed in".
Also, of course mollies need a jar too! (Not sure if they do now or not)
Heh... some might take that as a tacit acknowledgement that sending feedback is relatively pointless. I like it
kemomimi
Refugee
・Molotov cocktail ingredients (changes or additions to existing recipes)Any more come to mind?
・Super Molotov cocktail ingredients
・Ultra-Super Molotov cocktail ingredients
Adding new uses for bottles is a great idea. I also like the concept of using raw meat as bait.
gofantasy542
Refugee
It is pretty cool that my original post has brought so much discussion and interesting ideas. It's the first time I ever posted, so I was sure it wouldn't really get noticed, lol, so this is awesome. I know that I never intended the return rate to be 100% when I made the original suggestion, in fact, I play at 0% myself. That was what prompted me to make the suggestion, cause I was sitting there thinking, if every bottle breaks, what is the point of the return rate setting once the player had dew collectors. The argument that dew collectors were now a later game item that is meant to represent an end to the struggle for water, just like a fully set up farm ends the food struggle made sense to me as well. I guess I was just trying to find a way to make the empty jars valid even in later gameplay, especially since it was such a big thing to get them back ever since they were lost so long ago. These cool new ideas people are suggesting would definitely handle that very nicely!
Riamus
Hunter
I like many of the alternative suggestions to make jars less abundant if you want a higher return setting. As long as dew collectors and apiaries don't require jars, I'm fine with just about any option you guys can come up with. I want there to be an ability to ignore jars entirely and still be able to have enough water for drinking, cooking, and crafting. We have that now. If jars are required for the dew collectors, your only source of water is the greatly decreased chance of finding it in loot, which really isn't enough once you need to start making glue for stuff even if you drink only from a ditch and don't cook food that requires water. But any other options for jar sinks are okay with me, so long as it doesn't require you to use jars for some other thing that you really have to make. For example, if they added an empty jar requirement for making glue or something like that.
As far as jars becoming unnecessary in the late game, I don't really think that's a big deal. That's kind of how progression works. What you need in the beginning isn't what you necessary need at the end. There are a variety of things that you don't use all game, or that some people don't use at all. There isn't anything wrong with that. But if they want to add some use for late game that isn't absolutely required for those who don't want to use them, that's not a problem either.
As far as jars becoming unnecessary in the late game, I don't really think that's a big deal. That's kind of how progression works. What you need in the beginning isn't what you necessary need at the end. There are a variety of things that you don't use all game, or that some people don't use at all. There isn't anything wrong with that. But if they want to add some use for late game that isn't absolutely required for those who don't want to use them, that's not a problem either.
If the dew collector required jars, why even bother with it when you can take those same jars and fill them yourself immediately instead of waiting 1-2 days?
As much as the whole "dew collector is 3D printing jars" thing annoys me, I don't see a point in monkeying with it any further. Use empty jars until you have a collector or collectors up and running, then you don't need to worry about water as much (until you're making enough glue to hold a truckload of rockets together)
As much as the whole "dew collector is 3D printing jars" thing annoys me, I don't see a point in monkeying with it any further. Use empty jars until you have a collector or collectors up and running, then you don't need to worry about water as much (until you're making enough glue to hold a truckload of rockets together)
Kyoji
Survivor
That is the problem for a lot of people though if you watch YouTube videos or read reddit comments. They want the realism of not having jars produced from thin air - even at the expense of balance or introduce a convoluted way to fix it when the problem isnt even a real problem with the context of the game i.e. gas cans, pill bottles etc not refunding containers. Once they added jars to the collector they would whine about cans and pill bottles next.
It's not low hanging fruit as you are assuming it's a positive fix. It isn't.
Reduce jars in loot and make canned foods and beverages only findable in t1 loot containers. Here you would increase the need for hunting which impacts the new smell system and brings water scarcity back a bit by not having ready to drink beverages stockpiled from raiding a store.
Yes. It's because people wanted jars to return. Without it then it's fine. I like jars returning (not refunding) but I still understand why the problem exists. So I admit that my desire for jars to come back did mess with dew collectors.
I agree.
theFlu
Hunter
What? I was discussing the problem introduced by the "Jar Jar returns" -setting. I don't give a ■■■■ what youtube comments are saying about the realism of cans or jars, in this context.
"Low hanging fruit of a suggestion"; an easy to make suggestion, not a good one. One made just because it's the thing you're automatically thinking about.