Maybe... diversify the repair mechanic?


Dirmagnos

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The way how tools like knives work has been topic of various debates for some time, so theres a few thoughts i came up with lately on this subject.

At this point its mainly concerns with knives and hatchets, altho other tools may be affected as well.

Currently all tools have simply durability and portion of it is expended every time tool is used, regardless of how menial of a task it is. And at the same time complex tasks, like butchering a corpse of bear, have fairly minuscule impact on the same tools. Also there is no such thing as tool effectiveness, based on its durability. Plus, currently, with enough sharpening stones, they can be kept in perfect condition indefinitely(at least in theory).

So, my idea is to add sharpness stat in addition to durability. Degree of sharpness would affect how effective tool is in performing its tasks, mostly speed. And various taks would affect sharpness to far greater degree - cutting a few leather stripes when making stuff should be nothing compared to gutting a deer, task that should have considerably higher impact on tool sharpness.

Whetstone. Currently its rather meh, its not particularly effective and it has just 20 uses from full durability. Rather weird approach. I think that whetstone should last longer and maybe be a bit rarer. Specifically, as whetstone is worn down it would take more and more time to sharpen an item(percentual penalty, based on both amount of sharpness restored and condition of the stone) and its condition lower border would be 20%, it wont go any lower, but sharpening anything with it would take a long time. 

Player can only restore sharpness of the item by using whetstone. However, based on amount of sharpness needing restoration and condition of the whetstone it may "cost" a condition point to sharpen an item. Duller the blade and more used up whetstone = greater chance to ruin blade, a bit.

Chance for losing a condition point would be based on dullness of the blade. With gutting corpses that can easily cost player 30-40% of sharpness(depending on factors like frozen state for example, or cutting meat compared to cutting hide), it could be a real problem. Chance for losing a condition point would be 30% of missing sharpness, eg knife with 60% base sharpness, when sharpened, would have 13%(40*0.3) chance to lose a point of condition upon being sharpened.

In addition to that condition of whetstone would play a role. More worn up the stone, greater the chance of fking up. Id say increase chance of failure by 1% for each 5% condition missing on whetstone(rounded up). So, knife with base sharpness of 60% sharpened by whetstone with condition of 73% would have 19%((40*0.3)+6) chance to fail while sharpened and lose a condition point instead. Half of that value, rounded up, would contribute to critical failure, eg 10% chance, or losing 3 points instead of 1.

While 19% may not look a lot, need for constant sharpening after major tasks, may make it a notable issue.

And Maintenance skill on top of that. Each level of skill decrease failure chance by 10% of current value. So at lvl 5 chance of failure of 19% would be downgraded to 10%. At lvl4 player has 25% chance to ignore sharpening failure and not lose condition point. At lvl2 time for sharpening tools is decreased by 25%. At lvl3 player gain ability of regrounding whetstones, adding flat 20% bonus to it condition(and appropriate effectiveness), however, each reground decreases minimal durability by 10%(so after 2 regrounds it can go as low as 0 durability and be destroyed). Can only be used when stone reaches lowest possible durability to prevent stacking. At lvl5 decrease sharpness loss from performing tasks by 40%. So far no idea for lvl1.

Thoughts ?

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Good idea :winky:

Sharpness does make a lot more sense than condition for knives. I've had my hunting knife for years. It's in great shape. You still can't cut anything if the blade's dull though...

Two additional points:

  • Do you see using a dull knife as something that may trigger a critical failure on the task and cutting the player? Dull knives are an awesome way to cut yourself.
  • Can this perhaps make it worthwhile to use an axe while harvesting a frozen carcass? I don't know about you but my knives don't cut through frozen steak that well :big_smile:
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I have a knife in my toolbox that hails from soviet era, its at least 30 years old and has seen a fair amount of use. Its still extremely sharp due to regular sharpening when needed. At the same time it has lost like 2/3 of its blade width. It may not look as great as originally, but its quite capable to perform on pretty much same level as day it was bought. The fact that it has been sharpened possible thousands of times has extremely little impact on its performance.

Im not really fond of idea is critical task failures based on sharpness. It may be a thing, but i dont really see how to implement it properly, at least now. While dull blade would make performing cutting tasks considerably harder/longer, even if it slips it would have lower chance to cut player, since its dull(and player mostly wear thick clothes). Id rather see self-harm chance to be based on tiredness, giving a progressive chance as player becomes more tired, with significant jump if player tiredness bar is completely empty.

I do believe that harvesting frozen carcasses should be far more efficient with hatchet. Its far more logical to hack them, rather than attempt to cut frozen meat. Altho id say that saw would probably the most efficient - meat is solid enough to be sawn thru without getting stuck and its density is low enough to offer very little resistance. Plus saw is far better choice to deal with bones than either knife or hatchet(presuming that when gutting you miscalculated and instead of a joint managed to cut thru meat to bone), allowing faster cutting in case of inevitable mistakes or in general more convenient(just saw thru frozen carcass as it lies there, instead of attempting to turn it to get a better angle for hacking or cutting; or simply cutting off pieces of convenient size).

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  • 2 months later...
  • 2 months later...

So apart from Interloper mode, the toolboxes have pretty much been made redundant now that rifles, hatchets and knives are no longer repaired using the toolbox but instead using the cleaning kit or the whetstone.

However, in reality keeping a rifle clean or a blade sharp doesn't actually repair the tool, it just keeps it functioning properly.

So why not add a mechanic where the sharper the blade is, the more efficient it performs and the cleaner the rifle is, the better the aim; whereas repairing the overall condition of the tool requires a piece of fir and some scrap metail again.

Thus, tools like these would come with two sets of stats: one for efficient functionality (sharpness, cleanliness) and one for the overall condition of the weapon.

This way: foraging for toolboxes and scrap metal will become a significant part of survival again, and all those metal frames across different sets of maps might become an actual much needed resource. Now they're just sitting there (okay, maybe if you play for 1000 days you might run out of hatchets and whetstones one might switch to a hacksaw for harvesting deer; but how many players actually make these long stretches?)

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I've came to realize that I had made several wrong gameplay assumptions during my time at TLD. Like I thought you couldn't cure in open caves. Another one was the false assumption that a 100% knife would give better harvest times than a 50% one... I've been playing as if this was the case, so I'm pretty much in favour of this suggestion. Makes all the sense in the world!

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Yup, I like this idea a whole lot.

Extend it to hacksaws too. It doesn't make a lot of sense that scrap metal fixes the saw blade. I'd rather see the frame need to be maintained with repairs and saw blades either sharpened on a whetstone or be a separate, expendable item (like ammo).

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