Difficulty decreases with more days survived?

[Evgeny]

Just curious. The more days you survived, the more adapted you become. You find weapons, craft tools, clothes, etc. So it should be easier to survive further. In reality it would be so: you survived first few days, then it should be easier. So, the question is: does the game offer any new challenges as survival day count increases? Or environment is the same on the first day, and on day 100?

[Ruruwawa]

The mid game is pretty easy atm.  The big challenge comes for very long term play (well past day 100) when your manufactured stuff is used up, decays or wears out.  How do you kill animals after every weapon in the world wears out?   How do you harvest meat and hides after every tool wears out?  How do you start fires after the last match is gone?  It's still possible, but surviving becomes more challenging as your options narrow.

[Evgeny]

Ok, I understand, thanks.

So you go from rifle to bow, because you can't craft bullets, but can craft arrows.

[Scyzara]

The game's parameters themselves (e.g. wildlife scarcity and behavior, outdoor temperatures, etc.) don't change over time. However, your subjective perception of the game's difficulty will of course decrease over time. Simply because it's easier to deal with the threats of the environment if you have the right equipment (and can thus e.g. kill wolves with a rifle/bow or are able to stay outdoors for longer periods of time due to fur clothes). Oh, and there's one exception: Cabin fever. In Voyageur, you can't get it prior to day 50, in Stalker not prior to day 25.

@Ruruwawa is right about the (re)increase of the difficulty level under endgame conditions in principle, but the thing is 99,99% of the players will never play a game long enough to reach this phase of the game any more because it takes thousands of days to run out of all resources unter the current game's conditions. If you want to experience the endgame phase nevertheless, I can very much recommend @mellow_swe's Birthday Suit Challenge . 

 

[Ruruwawa]

5 hours ago, Evgeny said:

Ok, I understand, thanks.

So you go from rifle to bow, because you can't craft bullets, but can craft arrows.

Bows and arrows wear out and run out eventually too.  Saplings don't respawn.   But @scyazara is right, most games never reach this stage.

[vonflare]

you eventually have to switch to just using rabbit traps for food. once all those wear out, and you have no more gut to make more, it's time to die. but this is well past the 2000 day mark.

[Evgeny]

4 hours ago, Ruruwawa said:

Saplings don't respawn.

But wolves do, right? That's just not fair! 

2 hours ago, vonflare said:

once all those wear out, and you have no more gut to make more, it's time to die.

Post-apocalypse world is sad place. 

[cekivi]

Not that sad though. There are some very interesting things planned for the future in the sandbox roadmap

[Wasteland Watcher]

On May 4, 2016 at 2:53 AM, vonflare said:

you eventually have to switch to just using rabbit traps for food. once all those wear out, and you have no more gut to make more, it's time to die. but this is well past the 2000 day mark.

You can pull guts out by hand, as well as meat & the pelt as long as the carcass isn't frozen.

As long as the weather is decent enough to allow you to harvest rabbits without freezing you, you can last indefinitely eating rabbit.

[cekivi]

Note that you can also thaw carcasses by building a fire near them. I've done this a few times with deer.