Game gets easier as you go. Counter-balances?

[stray_cur]

The addition of feats and skills amplifies the game's main issue - that it gets easier to survive as you go, from day 1 on.  I've been waiting a long while for an update which addresses this issue, but now this,,, just stuff that makes it worse.  What's the deal?  

Yes, there are the "challenges"; isolated mini games that push you towards an arbitrary goal, and the upcoming story mode, which will be neat, but still only a few hours of gameplay.  Why not build some natural 'push' into the sandbox?  Perhaps a lower wildlife respawn rate could help.  I'm not sure what else,,, but it would certainly be a move in the right direction to be able to turn off the skills and feats.

Is this not obvious, or am I missing something?

[cekivi]

Welcome to the forums @stray_cur!

Yes, power creep is something that a lot of long time posters have brought up. Since the early alphas, resources have become more plentiful, wolves less threatening, and - once the maps are learned - the weather is less threatening. Part of the problem is trying to balance three difficulty levels across five maps. Since you don't know where someone will start all the areas have to be viable starting locations. Due to the varied playstyles some people want easier and some harder. Hopefully, once the areas are finalized and all the desired mechanics are implemented then the game can get re-balanced to something that is challenging again for those who like challenge.

For the time being, we can only really give out feedback.

[Pillock]

Depletion of wildlife in areas you've been harvesting or hunting for a prolonged period would help a lot, as you said.

Also, I think degradation of buildings and fixed beds so that you have to move out into the world after a while.

Both these things would add later-game challenge without affecting the chances of 'getting going' at the beginning of the game.

[ShawnB]

Easy long term gameplay is Definately the biggest issue with this game in my opinion. While mechanics need to be introduced to make late game more difficult, more mechanics need to be introduced to make late game less predictable too.

Sandbox events decribed in my other post here is one mechanic that could spice things up. I'm sure there are many other ideas out there.

I am also drafting up a post to discuss this and some shortfalls of the latest update.

[sarudak]

@cekivi It's not just power creep. Power creep has been a bit of an issue, however power creep is easy to fix and rebalance. The other issue is much harder to address basically the player power increases but the game difficulty stays static. This means that the beginning of the game both in each individual game and in a players experience are really hard but then the game gets progressively easier until survival is trivial. The skills and feats mechanics exacerbate this issue while nothing was done to compensate for it. The first few days of a game are a struggle but once you find rifle, hatchet, knife, and decent clothes the game becomes much easier, once you get the bow and all the fur clothes the game becomes trivial. From a player experience perspective knowing the maps makes a huge huge difference, I can loot most of a map within a few days meaning that for me the difficult part of a game passes quickly.

[cekivi]

@sarudak: I still think it's mostly power creep. In the earliest updates (I started playing in Halloween 2014) a can opener was an amazing, miraculous find. You could open cans without smashing them! Now, can openers are nearly superfluous. Scrap metal used to be the key limiting factor for whether you could reach 100 days since it was needed to repair everything. Deciding between your can opener or keeping your rifle repaired was a hard decision. Now, the limiting factor is your patience. 

I can still see your argument and I agree that it's a problem as well. Once I've got my animal skin clothes and a good knife the weather and wolves aren't much of a problem any more. I was just pointing out that in ye olden days just getting a knife was amazing and keeping it repaired was a constant struggle.

Now the game has evolved beyond that. In some ways better; in others worse. Now you need specialized tools to repair things and we have new maps and challenges. All of this is great! However, regaining condition is still problematic as is wolf behaviour and resource abundance. There's always room for improvement

Personally, I would reduce the condition regained from resting (wounds become more problematic), reduce the number of wolves but make them more deadly, keep the amount of food, cloth, etc. but greatly reduce the number of tools and, lastly, make whetstones and gun cleaning kits repairable. Whether this will ever happen though...

[sarudak]

I think a lot of the power creep has come from people wanting indefinite survival (or effectively indefinite 300+ days) to be possible. I would like it to be possible but then that means there has to be enough resources on the map for that. I think gating resources behind skill development, books, long term labor projects (ie spend 80 hours of work digging through this rubble to access some hidden cache of supplies) or some other method would allow resources to feel more constrained throughout the game and would lend a continued sense of progress. Currently the game feels a little flat after 20+ days. You keep scavenging but your heart isn't really anything because you don't really need anything you're getting.

[cekivi]

Very fair criticism. That's the main reason I've been playing mostly the challenges recently. If you're not achievement hunting (and my last attempt to do so bugged out ) there's not much to do aside from loot and explore once the necessities have been found/crafted. That's not necessarily a bad thing. The Long Dark has some beautiful music and scenery. I've been tempted to start a Pilgrim game for a while now just so I can wander around and listen to the game's music

How would you address the mid game plateau @sarudak?

[sarudak]

Well I mean there's obviously a lot of tuning that could be done to slow the players advancement like making condition recovery much slower forcing the player to be more cautious. The goal is a game where the player constantly has something that they need to survive about to run out on the horizon but there's always something they can do to work toward acquiring more of that something. Ideally you will also move from superior resources (gun, matches, knife, axe) to inferior resources (bow, magnifying glass, player forged tools) so that activities take more time (since time is a resource) or impose additional restrictions (like only being able to start fires outside during sunny days). This is because you want to counter the fact that moving into mid game theres much less to scavenge so the player suddenly has a lot of time available.

Something else that could help a lot is gating. We already have a bit with tools being required for harvesting wood or frozen carcasses. Add more gating and make it more hard gates. For example, put more goods in the safes but remove the mini-game and not allow the player to open them until they find a book on safes and then spend several hours of time to crack each safe. Another example would be allow players to search through piles of rubble for resources but require say 20 hours of work to do so. For outside areas these resources would be very expensive to access because of clothing level and would require gathering large amounts of wood to heat the player while doing so. Canned goods could be soft gated so that unless you find a can opener you would only use them as a food of last resort. In addition to lost food add a risk of injury to opening cans unless you have the proper tool. Late game equipment like fur clothes and makeshift tools could be gated behind skill advancement or book perks.

The mid-game needs continued pressure on the player and also things to do. Things to do will tend to resolve to time sinks like we have with fur clothes crafting or travel to location specific resources (travel to the summit and bring down lots of goods, travel to desolation point to use the forge). I think we need more of these kinds of activities to spice up the mid game. 

tl; dr; A lot of the balancing needs to be tightened up considerably to prevent super abundance early and keep the pressure on. More gating keeps the pressure on and more time-sinks and location based activities give the player interesting objective to try to plan around into the mid and late game.

[cekivi]

I like some of these ideas but not all. Gates are fine. You're right that we already have a few and they do slow down a player's speed and progression. However, I wouldn't want to add hard gates to the game for the simple reason that players may find it frustrating. Especially if it's a book/tool/item that they just cannot find because it is on another map/behind an object/not obvious. For your two examples they're both soft gates. You can harvest a frozen carcass with your hands provided you build a fire first to thaw it out. You can't harvest limbs but you can still harvest sticks, branches and crates to get wood. Both alternatives are less efficient but are still options.

Reduced animal spawns would be an excellent mid game pressure on players. The option to completely hunt/fish out an area should also be a risk although I don't know how that could be communicated to a player... That way, wasteful resource management would result in barren maps quite quickly. I don't like location specific resources but I do like location specific bonuses. That way you feel good if you go to get the bonus but you aren't penalized for not doing so.

[sarudak]

Hard and soft gating is a continuum. I agree there shouldn't be any absolute hard gating on things that are necessary for survival however hardish gates are ok on things that make your life easier. My most interesting games of long dark have involved missing one of the tools for at least a whole map (like hatchet or rifle).

I don't understand what you mean about resource vs bonus. All resources are bonuses unless they are absolutely required for survival. Are you against the forge? Because I think that's one of the best additions to the game. Doing a supply run to desolation point to bring back a bunch of knives and hatchets was great fun.

[cekivi]

I'm not against the forge as a concept. I am against it for how it currently works. For instance, if you could make "simple" arrow heads and "improvised" knives at a work bench and forged knives, hatchets and arrow heads on the Riken than that's fine. You can make do with what's in your area but if you go to Desolation Point you have the option to make something superior and more durable.

However, as it currently is, I can find more than enough knives/hatchets to last until I want to start a new game (around 100 days) so forging anything isn't necessary and the restriction on arrow crafting means I just don't use the bow because I have no arrows. Plus I can usually make enough snares, catch enough fish and find enough rifle rounds that I don't need the bow. So, for me, the forge is not useful at best and at worst limits gameplay by restricting the arrows I can make to those I can scavenge. It feels arbitrary as opposed to a cool reward or bonus.

For instance, when arrow heads were craftable at a work bench I once made a dozen for target practice and learning how to shoot. In my latest saves I can't do that so I am punished by either not being able to use the bow or having to trek all the way to Desolation Point which is my least favourite map.

In my view, bonuses should either be a better version of something you already have or a more plentiful form of something you already have. Therefore you're not restricted in how you play but are still rewarded if you choose to undertake the challenge of getting the bonus. I generally dislike any game elements that limit choice.

[sarudak]

Hm... I'm going to have to disagree pretty strongly with you. 

59 minutes ago, cekivi said:

Therefore you're not restricted in how you play but are still rewarded if you choose to undertake the challenge of getting the bonus. I generally dislike any game elements that limit choice.

I think this is the biggest issue here. Games are all about limiting choice. After all what is the purpose of cold other than limiting the choice of how long you can stay or work outside? Hunger limits your choices dramatically. The magnifying glass limits your choices of when you can use it. Games are composed of aesthetic elements and mechanical elements. Mechanical elements are completely about constraining your choices so as to make a compelling game experience.

I agree that the forge is largely pointless because even for a long playthrough (100 days easy) you are not going to run out of scavanged knives, hatchets, and even arrowheads. 

Let me ask you this. Did you dislike it that the distress pistol was limited to having to reach the summit? Did you think it was unfair that is was limiting your choice?

[cekivi]

Not at all. The distress pistol, while nice, is essentially an improved flare. Especially post update when flares can no longer be dropped. So, while you have the choice to climb Timberwolf Mountain to get the flare pistol you can still use torches, brands and flares for the same mechanical effect albeit with the possibility of failure versus the flare pistol's guaranteed success.

And I don't think mechanics, as you describe them, limit player choice. I can still choose to stay outside while freezing and even when hypothermic. It's a bad choice but you can do it. The consequence of that choice is condition loss and probable death but you're not forced inside when you're cold. It's a factor of the world and you get to choose how you interact with the cold. Good mechanics always give choice or - at the very least - the illusion of it.

[stray_cur]

Thanks for the welcome @cekivi  "Power creep", that's the term! (I don't really understand @sarudak's clarification of the term's usage though).  I'm glad the issue has been identified by many, from early on, as you say,, but that makes it even more concerning that the devs see it as such low priority that they'll sooner make it blatantly worse (feats, skills) than better.  

And 'gating', another useful term and idea. Thanks for that @sarudak. True, some useful / necessary things to further survival which can only be gotten after a while of 'progress' would be good.  The safe / locker idea seems pretty straightforward and compelling.  And the other examples look good and well thought out too.

And I like @ShawnB's idea of bringing those now strangely isolated one-off challenges they've made right into the sandbox -- organic and naturally integrated as possible, and optional where appropriate.

Degrading structures, ala @Pillock -- maybe,, would certainly stress me out, not sure if in a good way or not.  

Still, the simplest tweak (soonest hotfix) seems to me to be a modified animal respawn.. but there may be ramifications beyond my foresight -- as I assume the devs must have heard it suggested more than once.

[sarudak]

@cekivi The same can be said of everything you get from the forge. It's not required but a nice to have. You can still use the gun as a weapon, you can find hatchets and knives. You can even find arrows and recycle them for the heads. The only time you might be forced to use the forge is if you want to play for a very very long time. I honestly think that the only reason people complain about the forge is that arrowheads used to be forge anywhere but that got taken away. Players complain when things get taken away or their power is diminished, when developers respond to that you get power creep. It makes sense because the player's job is to figure out how to get more powerful and the game mechanics are there to restrict and guide the ways they can do so. But when players bring the same mindset into the metagame they just ask the developers for more power.

@stray_cur I wasn't clarifying the usage of the term power creep. He was exactly on point with his assessment of it. I was saying that there's another in my mind bigger issue which is the fact that the player character grows in power over time (more tools, better clothes, stockpiled food and water, and now skills and feats) but the world does not get any harder to deal with. The effect of this is that the hardest point in the game is the very first day and it just gets easier after that.

[Nasdaq401]

I think part of the problem is the highest difficulty setting is just way too easy.  There are just way too many man made food items that spawn and the cold is non existent once you get crafted clothing.  I believe it just needs a higher difficulty.  Colder weather, less food spawning, make things rare not as abundant. After not even a week in game I never experience that feeling of excitement when finding something i need.  It definitely shouldn't be like that on the hardest setting in a survival game like this, that's one of the best parts of a survival game. I find myself starting new games almost every time I pick up the game now. 

[cekivi]

@sarudak: Like I said, I don't have a problem with the forge in concept - just how it's currently implemented

The forge is a very cool idea especially if there was an alternative to the hatchet/knife that you could make a shoddy improvised version of versus the trek to make a forged version. Combine that with rare knives and hatchets and you have a winning recipe for challenging gameplay.

@Nasdaq401: "Difficulty" is a hard thing to gauge. For instance food decays so it doesn't really matter how much we start with after x days there will eventually be none left. Or, fix the decay rates of canned goods so they last a really long time and make them rare. Just making them rare or decay quickly doesn't address the issue. For me, sparse animal populations, rare tools, slower regaining of condition, and the risk of over hunting/over fishing an area would all make the difficulty just right in my opinion  

[Nasdaq401]

Yeah having rarer items would make it a lot better.  I just miss that feeling of finding things that you really need.  There's just too much of everything right now.  I like the idea of the canned/man made foods lasting longer but spawning MUCH less 

[sarudak]

@cekivi I still don't understand. We already have scavenged hatchets and knives. We can already work around not having a hatchet or knife with some difficulty. Finally we can make the trek to go forge a bunch of tools. Why would we need an additional improvised tool version? It's just unnecessary and detracts greatly from the appeal of the forge.

[Boston123]

2 hours ago, sarudak said:

@cekivi I still don't understand. We already have scavenged hatchets and knives. We can already work around not having a hatchet or knife with some difficulty. Finally we can make the trek to go forge a bunch of tools. Why would we need an additional improvised tool version? It's just unnecessary and detracts greatly from the appeal of the forge.

What "appeal" of the forge? 

[cekivi]

3 hours ago, sarudak said:

@cekivi I still don't understand. We already have scavenged hatchets and knives. We can already work around not having a hatchet or knife with some difficulty. Finally we can make the trek to go forge a bunch of tools. Why would we need an additional improvised tool version? It's just unnecessary and detracts greatly from the appeal of the forge.

You've hit the nail on the head: there is no need (at all) for the forge right now. If there was only one knife per map (as an extreme example) and your only option was an improvised butter knife than a forged knife becomes much more appealing. As it is, there is no purpose for the forge.

[cekivi]

Actually, it seems we're not the only people to realise this...

 

[sarudak]

There is appeal to the forge as an idea. I like the idea of having to go somewhere to replenish some form of necessary supplies/equipment. In reality though tools are so plentiful that the forge is simply not really needed. I wish it were.

[continuity]

I think the solution is fairly simple, Take a leaf out of don't starve's book.  Start the game in summer (relatively speaking) then progress into winter, meaning it gets colder and the weather is worse more often.  You could also slowly ramp up the predator behavior, working toward packs actively hunting you... there are options to make sure the difficultly keeps up as you gear up.