The Eternal Flame.

[Aagje]

Carter Energy, in conjunction with Quickflame, is proud to bring you the InfiniTorch^TM! Now you too can have totally infinite flame that never dies!*

So, while messing about working on the Fire Master badge (ye gods what a pain), I discovered a neat little trick. I'm sure everyone else has already found this, but on the off-chance that they haven't, here it is. At level 5 Fire Starting skill, a stick gives you 11 minutes of burn time. A torch takes 10 minutes away from a fire. So... start a fire with a stick (you'll usually have 8 or 9 minutes of burn time left, depending on the ambient temperature), add sticks to get it to 20 or 30 or whatever, then take torches out. Voila! Free torches. Repeat as necessary.

This is clearly cheesy as hell, and probably considered an exploit. But not sure what the best way to "fix" it would be. Reducing stick burn time would suck, as would increasing the amount of burn time getting a torch takes. Maybe reduce the Fire Starting burn time bonus from 50% to 40%? Which would be sad, but would at least prevent this kind of silliness.

Incidentally, this is what ~200 torches look like, all burning at once: (Do not try this at home. Professional driver on a closed course. Your framerate may suffer... like, a lot.)

(* Some conditions may apply. Offer not valid in the Continental US. Side effects may include panic attacks, increased blood pressure, reduced body mass index, and spontaneous wolf attacks. Please ask your doctor if InfiniTorch^TM is right for you.)

[MarrowStone]

So technicallyits not infinite but limited to how many sticks you have in your inventory? Or did I miss a step?

Also, holy moly! How many frames were you getting when you took that screenshot? Did you by chance record the temperature? Haha, if all those torches added to the ambient temperature thatd be crazy warm.

    I wish theyd bring back brands to prevent people from being able to put out and reignight sticks they pull out of the fire. Brands made a lot more sense because they weren't able to be "stored" as torches.

[kurja]

I agree that pulling torches from a fire is silly. On the other hand it sort of balances out as there are no other means for transporting fire (carrying embers or such).

[Aagje]

9 hours ago, MarrowStone said:

So technically it's not infinite but limited to how many sticks you have in your inventory? Or did I miss a step?

Sorry, I forgot to add a reminder that torches can be harvested for a stick. It takes two in-game minutes per torch. But with a lit torch and two sticks, you can turn those two sticks into torches, recycle two, and you have a fresh(-ish) torch and two sticks left. Walk down the road a ways, rinse, repeat.

9 hours ago, MarrowStone said:

Also, holy moly! How many frames were you getting when you took that screenshot?

Very few, although I don't know how to get an exact number.

9 hours ago, MarrowStone said:

Did you by chance record the temperature? Haha, if all those torches added to the ambient temperature thatd be crazy warm.

I think it capped out at some point, although I don't recall exactly what at. 40°C, maybe? Still plenty warm.

[Fuarian]

21 hours ago, MarrowStone said:

So technicallyits not infinite but limited to how many sticks you have in your inventory? Or did I miss a step?

Also, holy moly! How many frames were you getting when you took that screenshot? Did you by chance record the temperature? Haha, if all those torches added to the ambient temperature thatd be crazy warm.

    I wish theyd bring back brands to prevent people from being able to put out and reignight sticks they pull out of the fire. Brands made a lot more sense because they weren't able to be "stored" as torches.

Yeah, idk why they removed brands. I liked brands! With torches you can't just unlight them and keep them as light sources forever. Doesn't make much sense,

[MarrowStone]

On 2/5/2018 at 5:19 PM, Fuarian said:

Yeah, idk why they removed brands. I liked brands! With torches you can't just unlight them and keep them as light sources forever. Doesn't make much sense,

The team reduced the duration of the fire torch to counter it, but since it only costs 10 minutes of fire time and a match to re-light them, its almost more efficient to make 2 or 3 "brand torches" than to make a full  one with fuel. (And simpler)

I also miss brandishing, (mainly for the voice acting and ability to keep the torch handy) maybe middle mouse click brandishes but they keep the throwing mechanic as well?

[Samsonguy920]

If something like this isn't possible until Lvl 5 fire starting, I wouldn't see it too much as an exploit. It's not exactly easy to level up, after all.