Faithful Cartographer - How many locations?

[ProsPex]

I have documented 255 locations in a spreadsheet. Ten of those locations do NOT increment the "Locations Discovered" count in the Journal when you first find them (I've reported this as a bug). The Journal will display between 243 and 245 depending upon the number of Coastal Houses not destroyed (there can be up to two destroyed at Waterfront Cottages and the one at Log Sort may or may not be destroyed).

 

[ProsPex]

Here is a list of the locations which currently do NOT increment the "Locations Discovered" count in the Journal when you first discover the location:

Locations not incremented in Locations Discovered statistic
Coastal Highway	Cabin #7	at Rabbit Grove
Mountain Town	Milton House #10	Grey Mother's
Mountain Town	Post Office
Pleasant Valley	Crossroads House #1
Pleasant Valley	Crossroads House #2
Pleasant Valley	Crossroads House #3
Pleasant Valley	Draft Dodger’s Cabin
Ravine	Ravine
Carter Hydro Dam & Environs	Winding River
Old Island Connector	Crumbling Highway

I'm not sure if the "Ravine", "Winding River", and "Crumbling Highway" are true locations. Their names show up in the Daily Log as Locations Discovered, but there is no "New Location Discovered" message. In any event these three locations do not increment the overall locations discovered statistic.

[peteloud]

ProsPex

Since your previous posting I have returned to Coastal Highway to check for things I might have missed.  I have used my charcoal and brought up a few cabin icons and the trailer at the log sort.  Before this my map looked complete, with negligible black un-mapped areas, so I assumed that I had mapped everything.  Trying again, standing right in front of a cabin, some icons have appeared which were previously not there.  However I haven't added any new locations to my journal record of 241.

Then a Win 10 auto-update screwed up my computer for a while.  I am just about to continue my search for missing icons and locations

[ProsPex]

You may have missed a couple interior locations which you must enter in-order for them to increment the "Locations Discovered" counter. Here is how many locations found in each region / transition zone:

Region / Zone	#  Locations	# Icons	Doesn't Inc
Broken Railroad	9	3
Coastal Highway	41	5	1
Desolation Point	15	5
Forlorn Muskeg	12	6
Mountain Town	37	8	2
Mystery Lake	41	6
Pleasant Valley	38	7	4
Timberwolf Mountain	22	5
Hushed River Valley	26	1
Raven Falls Railway Line	3	2	1
Carter Hydro Dam	4	2	1
Old Island Connector	6	2	1
Cinder Hills Coal Mine	1	0
Totals	255	52	10
Doesn't increment counter	10
Total “Discovered Location” count	245

[ProsPex]

Don't forget to enter the random Prepper's Cache at both ML and PV, as well as discovering the random Abandoned Camp at FM. Maybe those are the 3 locations you are missing?

[peteloud]

 

ProsPex,

I am surprised by your number of icons in Coastal Highway.  Just counting cabins & trailers I have around 20.  You have been so thorough I think it unlikely that I have found more than you.  Perhaps we have a difference in what we regard as an icon.

 

I have entered the Prepper's Cache in ML and in PV, but it might be that it was in a different game rather than my current mapping exercise game.  I shall check.

 

The "... the random Abandoned Camp at FM ",  does not ring a bell with me, and I can't find it on my current FM map.  So that seems to be something I have missed.  

. . . . .    Damn it!  I have just checked the Fandom TLD website and realise that I have seen this camp, but I thought it insignificant and just passed by it.  That might have been in a different game to my current game.  Another thing to check.

 

This is why TLD is such a good game.  Everyone sets their own challenges.  Setting your own challenge gives you greater motivation than following a set script.

 

 

[ProsPex]

When I count Icons, I'm counting only the icons that are visible on the map when the map is zoomed out as stated in the Faithful Cartographer Achievement, not all those that are visible when zoomed in. Lately, I've been finding the Abandoned Camp in FM here....

 

west of the Low Blind

1 hour ago, peteloud said:

This is why TLD is such a good game.  Everyone sets their own challenges.  Setting your own challenge gives you greater motivation than following a set script

I agree. I've had a lot of fun exploring all the nooks and cranny's of the maps. I think I was the first to find all the cairns. It was my own self challenge and really gave me a good feeling for what is where :-)

[peteloud]

> "... to find all the cairns. "

Now that is a challenge.  I wish more had been done to push people to try that.  I wish that there was a list where you could tick off those cairns that you had found, and show those that you had still to find.  I also wish that there was some indication, when you find a cairn, that it is a new find, or a cairn that you found ages ago.  I suggested it ages ago but heard no more.  In my current game I have only found 79/165, less than half of them.

> " I'm counting only the icons that are visible on the map when the map is zoomed out as stated in the Faithful Cartographer "

Ahhh! that explain our differences.  I didn't know that there were criteria stated in Faithful Cartographer.  When I started playing TLD I didn't even notice that there was a mapping facility. Once I realised that there was, what I wanted to do was produce maps without big black empty spaces.  The Faithful Cartographer was something that I noticed quite late in my playing.

Hinterland have done a superb job regarding game psychology, at least as far as I, and I guess you, are concerned.  Teenage gun enthusiasts in USA might disagree.

[ProsPex]

19 hours ago, peteloud said:

I wish that there was a list where you could tick off those cairns that you had found, and show those that you had still to find

Now it's pretty straight forward to find them since Gecko has updated the maps found in his Travel Guide and displays the location of each Cairn by number on the maps.

[peteloud]

Prospex

I checked the link for Gecko's Travel Guide and saw that it links to a Steam webpage.  Even tho' I am with Steam I haven't bothered to look through their pages giving info. on TLD.  But you are tempting me.  There is so much there to read that I am delaying.

I followed your advice and went to check the Prepper's Caches in ML and PV. The PV cache was one I had already found, I found it again but it didn't increment my Journal Locations counter.  I had previously found two other Prepper Caches in ML, but that must have been in other games.  After a great deal of searching I found the cache in ML and my Journal Locations was incremented to 242.

 

I was side tracked by a charcoal map for ML that I found after a Google search, it was under Steam.  That map had what appeared to be a completely new location, "Lookout", above & left, north-west(?), of Clearcut.  I spent ages tramping every sqaure inch in that area, using a million bits of charcoal, but could not bring it up.

Next I shall look for an abandoned snow shelter in FM.  I found one in an earlier game, and another in HRV without realising their significance.

[UpUpAway95]

On 3/1/2019 at 4:59 AM, peteloud said:

I eventually solved my problem.  It was my mistake.   My missing location for the Faithful Cartographer achievement was the icon for the exit from Mystery Lake to Forlorn Muskeg.   My careless checking was confused by the multiple inclusions of "Leave Mystery Lake".

 

After a little more playing of this Voyager game I have not been able to increase the number of locations mapped that is noted in my journal above 241.

That's great!  I'm glad you were able to finally track it down so you didn't have to start over with it after all.  I've been reading your conversations about find more locations and the cairns.  You definitely have more fortitude than I.  I have absolutely no plans to try to find all of those.  When my Faithful Cartographer gets to Day 500 (and hopefully has all his skills to Level 5), he's a goner.  From then on I just plan to play the Challenges, Wintermute and survival on Interloper and Deadman and no worry about these long grindy achievements.  I'm no impatient teenager (I've been retired for a long while now), but I still don't like grinding away on a game for months just to get an achievement.  I think 30 in-game days is about as long as I want any of my survival runs to last.

[peteloud]

UpUpAway95,

I find Interloper too stressful.  It is a great challenge, but the main factor is the random element.  No matter how experienced you are, if you get poor clothes and no food etc. at the start, it is impossible to survive. 

I am a very old man, I retired decades ago.  I need a game which will not give me a heart attack.  I play at, or between, Voyager & Stalker.  I am embarrassed to admit that I did use Pilgrim for something or other, apart from using it as a demo for my little grand-daughters and mentally challenged friends .

[UpUpAway95]

1 minute ago, peteloud said:

UpUpAway95,

I find Interloper too stressful.  It is a great challenge, but the main factor is the random element.  No matter how experienced you are, if you get poor clothes and no food etc. at the start, it is impossible to survive. 

I am a very old man, I retired decades ago.  I need a game which will not give me a heart attack.  I play at, or between, Voyager & Stalker.  I am embarrassed to admit that I did use Pilgrim for something or other, apart from using it as a demo for my little grand-daughters and mentally challenged friends .

Don't be embarrassed.  I started out with too little confidence in myself... so my Faithful Cartographer is a pilgrim; and I'll be darned if I'm going to start another 500-day run over at a higher difficulty... so, FC is going to platinum this game even if I die of boredom doing it.  I don't find Interloper too stressful, just quick.  I start, go for a little bit and then die... and then I can start a new one (or take a break since I do like to game in short stretches anyways).  Eventually, I should learn enough (and get enough of a lucky RNG roll) to make the 30-day deadman challenge.

[ProsPex]

38 minutes ago, peteloud said:

map had what appeared to be a completely new location, "Lookout", above & left, north-west(?), of Clearcut.  I spent ages tramping every sqaure inch in that area, using a million bits of charcoal, but could not bring it up.

Lookout is not new. It's a little tricky to find. There's a single birch or maple sapling at the spot. When you do find it, it should pop a message on your screen... location discovered.

[ProsPex]

Here's a screenshot...

[peteloud]

" Lookout is not new. It's a little tricky to find. "

 

Damn it!    I found the birch sapling, and cut it, but didn't use my charcoal. 

I think such a tight limitation on  mapping such a location is unreasonable.  "Lookout" should not be a precise specific location.  There are a few rocky outcrops there with a good view of the surrounding area, anything on those outcrops would be a good lookout point.  Had it been something like a Prepper Cache I could understand a need for precision.

[peteloud]

2 hours ago, ProsPex said:

ProspPex,

". . . There's a single birch or maple sapling at the spot. . . "

I raced back to Clearcut from PV with 15 pieces of charcoal.  I found the stump of the birch sapling, stood astride it, drew a map, but there was no "Lookout".

I tried other places close by, and still no success.  All of the places were in the area where "Lookout" is written on the charcoal map that I found earlier today.

 

I do not understand your "Here's a screenshot . . ." message.  What do I do with that long string of characters?

 

I give up for today.

[ProsPex]

Don't know why the screenshot shows up as a long string of characters for you. I see it as a picture. Verified that I can also see a picture from my wife's laptop, too.

[NardoLoopa]

I can also see the screenshot.  And I know the location.  There is usually a maple there (as the screenshot shows).  No idea why it's named that -- I can't see much from standing there.  Maybe it's more a "LOOKOUT!!" and there's a random chance of a widowmaker falling on your head.

[peteloud]

15 hours ago, ProsPex said:

Here's a screenshot...

This is the message I got from you, ProsPex.   I don't know why others see it and I don't.  I'll see if it there on my laptop.  . . . No, it's the same on my laptop.  The map image that I included a little higher up this page shows normally.  I wonder what the problem is.

I think it was birch sapling that I cut down.  It is in a valley and with a poor view.  I would have thought that a lookout point would have been better on the top of the nearby rocky outcrops.  It is quite close to cairn 96.  I'll re-stock on charcoal and look for the stump of a maple sapling.

This is the map I found and was using to help me locate Lookout.  With this map is seemed as if it would be a very simple operation to find and map it.  The second map is my map.

[peteloud]

Hey, that's strange. 

I quoted the message that I received from you, with the string of characters instead of an image,  but after posting the message the image came up.  That's definitely a maple not my birch sapling.

[peteloud]

Success, well sort of.

I collected some charcoal from the camp office and went directly to the spot in your image.  Neither the maple sapling, nor its stump was there. I mapped the area. When I checked the map there was no change.   I mapped again a few times close by in that area.  Still no "Lookout" added to my map.  I checked my Journal and found that my locations had been incremented to 243. 

As I headed down the slope I passed a birch sapling stump not far away.  That was not the birch sapling that I referred to earlier.  Most of my earlier efforts had been concentrated in the valley to the left, west, of this valley where I found a birch sapling and cairn 96, although I did map this area too.

 

On getting back to the camp office I saved and exited in the hope that reloading TLD would correct the missing name, "Lookout" on the map.  It didn't.  But I am content to believe that the increment to locations was due to my finding 'Lookout" even if it doesn't show on the map.

Now to find an abandoned snow hole(s) in FM.

[ProsPex]

12 hours ago, NardoLoopa said:

Maybe it's more a "LOOKOUT!!" and there's a random chance of a widowmaker falling on your head

I think you must be right! 

[peteloud]

I have just spent the past several hours trying to find an abandoned snow shelter in FM, without success.  I searched the top left quarter, including Marsh Ridge, and found nothing.  (I use top left referring to the drawn map as I'm never sure which way is meant to be north).  I popped into Milton Basin to stock up on rose hips and food.  Then I returned to the red rail vans to search the lower right quarter.  At the start of that search I walked into a bear.  I survived, but damaged. Eventually I shot the bear with an arrow, and lost a few other arrows into the bargain.  I got to the hunters' blind finding nothing on the way there or back.  I then gave up to get back to the ML camp office to cure the bear and other hides.  So I am still stuck of 243 locations.

 

I had a great many sprains these past few days I am now running out of rose hips and pain-killers.

[ProsPex]

4 hours ago, peteloud said:

trying to find an abandoned snow shelter in FM

Go 

 

west of the low blind and climb the hill at the edge of the swamp

That's where I find it most often.