Wildlife eating meat left sitting out / all carcasses ravagable

[rakshasa]

I have some suggestions around food and hunting. Searched around the wishlist and couldn't find pre-existing threads (though I'm sure these have probably been brought up before):

1. Meat left outdoors attracts wildlife in the same way as when carried by the player—wolves treat all left-out meat as bait and will steal it.

2. All meat left outside disappears eventually, in the same way as fresh carcasses.

3. Carcasses from hunted animals have a chance to attract wolves, who will come eat it as if they had taken it down themselves, leaving a ravaged carcass.

4. Ruined food acts like other items and disappears when placed in a container.

These suggestions would significantly alter long-term food supplies (you'd need to store meat in outdoor containers to take advantage of slowed condition loss, and this would effectively end cooking ruined food). Hunting would be a greater challenge, as you'd need to find your kill faster to get all the meat.

This would make it a greater challenge to stay in one place indefinitely, and add tension to hunting due to the time pressure of getting to your kill before the wolves do.

Thoughts / feedback?

[Moll]

resonable

[Willy Pete]

1. Mostly agree. If implemented there should be a way to conceal it, either via burial in the snow or something that either reduces or outright eliminates wolves or bears coming to steal food. Canines are known to bury their food for exactly this reason. Alternatively, having X number of meat stored outside makes wolves/bears change their pathing to an area around where the meat is stored.

2. Disagree. This would probably be too much of a pain to implement and doesn't really make sense in the first place. No other item disappears on its own (carcasses aren't items) and meat rotting totally to nothing would take an incredibly long time, especially in sub zero environments where microbes wouldn't be able to properly break it down. The only real reason carcasses despawn is to help declutter the world and increase performance.

3. Agree. I swear I recall the devs talking about this exact thing somewhere a while back. Something about carcass stealing.

4. Does it not? I swear I left some low condition venison in a container on one of my first playthroughs and it disappeared. In any case, rotten meat is still useful as a decoy while something like a ruined sewing kit isn't. Makes sense for the kit to disappear, but you can still get use out of ruined meat.

[MarrowStone]

22 hours ago, Willy Pete said:

2. Disagree. This would probably be too much of a pain to implement and doesn't really make sense in the first place. No other item disappears on its own (carcasses aren't items) and meat rotting totally to nothing would take an incredibly long time, especially in sub zero environments where microbes wouldn't be able to properly break it down. The only real reason carcasses despawn is to help declutter the world and increase performance.

I think the purpose of #2 was to simulate animals stealing the meat after a few days, but I agree, it's made redundant by point #1 where it's already being stolen by predators. If someone could store it on some cliff/tree the animals wont get to, that should be totally fine since I'm assuming there'd be some risk involved getting up there anyways, encouraging interesting decisions. Also meat stored in a closed off porch (pleasant valley farmstead) shouldn't disappear. 

This would go well with lootable bear-proof containers for storing meat. Or maybe some way to hang a container out of a tree. Currently, I store my meat in car trunks since it's still outdoors, mostly bear proof, and I think laying it in the snow doesn't have enough consequences in the current state of the game. Animals should be attracted to meat and steal it.

[ManicManiac]

I think some of these ideas have merit, but I'm still good with the game as is.  Some of these ideas, while interesting, are potentially serious game changers and I'm not sure that's a positive.

[Moll]

Every update is game changer, so dont bother.

But i see no problem with that.

1. Dropped meat can be found by wolfs, it can dissapear then, why not. Lets give players way to store food in craftable containers, like underground food stashes digged in snow.

2. I was never fan of ability to eat ruined food. When its ruined its no longer food. But i would rather disable possibility to eat it and limite use for bait only.

3. If all items with 0 % condition will be automatically  removed from  game session, it will help the game too. The less items the better for game. Food can dissapear, cloth and boot will be automatically harvested into crafting material, tools break beyond repair, but unlike cloth, they require manual harvesting. Fireamrs will stop work, but unlike tools they can be "saved" from 0 % condition. I would remove possibility to harvest a rifle. Especially when you cannot harvest a revolver.

 

Tbh, i am not very fan of tool or firemars harvesting. They should be excluded from this mechanic.

 

Edited September 29, 2019 by Moll

[ManicManiac]

2 hours ago, Moll said:

Every update is game changer, so dont bother.

That seems oddly combative considering OP asked us for thoughts and feedback.
 

@Moll, concerning your points:
1. This idea seems predicated on the team implementing craft-able containers... which while it's a good idea isn't likely at this point.

2. I've said this many times before.  If there is something we are capable of in the game that we don't like... we can just choose not to do that.  I see no need to limit other players just because some of us "don't like" something.  I feel this game is all about player choice... so I say we let people play the way they want to.  If Hinterland saw it as an issue they would have changed it.  Until then, I'd say it falls under creative game play.  I see no need to change the game if all we have to do is excursive player choice.  If we don't like something...we can chose not to do it.

3. You're stating an opinion, but you are framing it as an objective fact (which is not the case, it's just your preference).  You can exercise player choice here too... you can get rid of most ruined items by putting them in a container.  If we object to "ruined" items in the game... we can get rid of them or just not use them (in the case of food for example).  Again there is no need to change a game when all we have to do is take responsibility for the way we play.  If we don't like it, we can choose not to do it.  I see no reason to take the choice away from other players.
 

2 hours ago, Moll said:

Tbh, i am not very fan of tool or firemars harvesting. They should be excluded from this mechanic.

You can just chose not to do this too... again I don't see a need to change the game if you can just choose no to do it if you don't like it.
 

Player Choice  

Edited September 30, 2019 by ManicManiac

[rakshasa]

Yeah, the purpose of #2 was to simulate the fact that when you're away, animals are coming to steal all the meat you left out. And combined with #4, meant to do away with the ruined food exploit. This could also be handled with an update to how lvl 5 cooking works—for example, cooking meat merely doubles its existing condition, and level 5 provides something like 95% protection against food poisoning / parasites instead of 100%.

I actually wasn't intending this to be paired with any sort of ability to "stash" your food outside—it would add value to existing outdoor containers, and you can still store your food indoors, it'll just spoil faster. The whole idea behind this suite of suggestions is to reduce large meat stockpiles.

I am looking at this from a late-game perspective though. It could be that these suggestions just make the early-game more punishing and don't have much impact on late-game food supply. Balance across all the different difficulties is hard.

As for the argument "If you don't like it, just don't do it", I get it, and I am definitely a fan of self-imposed goals and challenges, but not everyone is, and personally I have enough to keep in my head in a typical TLD run without having to also keep mental track of the goals, rules or conditions I've set for myself.

Changes to the game rules also communicate something about Hinterland's intentions about the experience. Obviously these are my suggestions and I'm not the devs, but I believe Raph has said that it shouldn't be possible to survive indefinitely, and right now it certainly is. I'm trying to think of ways that move us closer to a game where you can't survive forever.

[ManicManiac]

@rakshasa
Actually I was responding to Moll with my previous post.  I wasn't referring specifically to yours with that one.  Moll just seemed to be a little combative, so I thought I would address those counter points directly.

I did see what you were getting at though with your original post, and most of those ideas have been proposed here before.  Some of them even by me in my previous wish lists, however I came to realize it's also important to allow folks to play how they want to instead of taking away options from other players.

I've always liked the idea of predators stealing food left outside.  It would certainly be a game changer though, since most foods keep better when "stored" outside.  Considering Hinterland would most likely need to add some method to mitigate it tells me that it's not likely for now.


As for your follow up:

2 hours ago, rakshasa said:

I am definitely a fan of self-imposed goals and challenges, but not everyone is

Which is why I think it's important to leave room for player choice.   This is why I talk about being able to simply chose not to do things we don't like, instead of taking things away from other players.

You also mention about not wanting to be able to survive "indefinitely."  I'd say you can't really do that anyway... not even now.  Granted, at least one very creative and skilled player lasted for 10 in-game years on interloper, but I am willing to bet that it isn't the norm (far from it, based on what I've seen).  Every run ends in death of one kind or another.  Whether due to our bad decisions or mismanagement of resources, or we just gave up (deleting the save being sort of tantamount to suicide ).

 

2 hours ago, rakshasa said:

I am looking at this from a late-game perspective though.

I personally don't think there is a late game problem (I've mentioned this in other threads before).  I do think there might some issues with late game "expectations."  Which to me is not the same thing... [my post in a previous Milton Mailbag Dispatch were I talk about this]

 

2 hours ago, rakshasa said:

meant to do away with the ruined food exploit.

I don't think there is any "ruined food exploit," it falls in line with things that systems allow you to do... the perk with cooking 5 seems to make it clear that it's part of how the systems have been intended to function.  That's why I can't agree with you calling it an exploit.  I say if Hinterland saw it as an issue they would have addressed it and changed it.  Until such time, again we can just chose to not do those things if we don't want to... but there's nothing wrong with other players choosing to do those things.  I just don't think it's necessarily the right answer to take those options away from folks. 

Again, my apologies for the confusion about my earlier post, it was really intended to address Moll and Moll's specific counter points.
 

Edited September 30, 2019 by ManicManiac

[Lonelyloper]

I think level 5 cooking is a bit overpowered as it is, so I personally think some changes would be great. I really like the idea of meat being taken by predators when it's left outside on the floor. I know this game isn't supposed to be hyper realistic, but it's always seemed silly to me that that doesn't happen.

I appreciate what @ManicManiac says about making the choice not to take advantage of the level 5 cooking mechanic, but I know that myself, if it comes down to my character dying or not,  I'm gonna just cook that ruined meat lol. So myself, I just play the game taking advantage of level 5 cooking, even though I think it does take away from the experience somewhat.

Maybe the only way to keep everyone happy is to make more custom options. But then if the devs start making too many large game mechanics customisable, it could turn out that one day we'll all be playing very different versions of the long dark from one another. And I don't really like the idea of that tbh.

Sooooo basically, I think this is my slightly long winded way on saying, even though it's not perfect, I'm mostly in favour of keeping the cooking mechanic the way it is. But I wouldn't mind if wolves stole my food

[ManicManiac]

I don't know...

I'm just saying I'm fine with the game the way it is... I say people should be able to play how they want to (especially since it's a single player game)... and I think it's better to accept the game for what it is.  If the Hinterland team wants to make changes, then I'm fine with it... it's their game, it's the experience they want to craft, and it's the story they want to tell.  Personally I'm grateful that I've had this wonder game to play for the last 5 years. 

I wish... we, as a community, would focus more on things we'd like to see come into the game, rather than complain about things we can do that we just don't like.  As I've said many times already, we can just choose whether or not we do those things.

*As I said before I've always been interested in the idea of predators getting at your food if you leave it out laying on the ground, but I also feel like that would also mean that the Hinterland would need to implement some way to mitigate that (the easiest I can think of would be to let us move small empty containers around - I'd love to be able to move one of those small plastic containers or maybe a backpack to nearby where I live to store food outside.  I think that could be great).
 

Edited October 3, 2019 by ManicManiac

[MuTT7]

Meat has never disappeared for me on interloper they will not come for the meat unless they are stalking you already.

MEAT should NOT disappear.

Saying that I have now found it to be bugged, was cooking the dear on the ice near the coastal house in CH an 3 wolves were taking it in turns (as they do) to come for me an then run from the fire. So dropped the cooked meat an gut, 5 mins later it was gone. So tell me how does a wolf eat it when it never even gets close to it? Wolves are also responding visually to picking up a single bit of cooked meat as if its given you a scent marker, but you need 3 bits in your inventory before a marker appears. This is making survival mode very difficult atm you carnt carry any game to eat.

Oh an one more thing watched a wolf chase a dear from one side of the ice in CH to the other or at least a 1000 yards right on its heals but could not catch it, I always use wolves to kill dear then they get a stone in the face because I'm the alpha predator around here mate. Dose not work if dear can out run them now.

[K63]

I really like the original post! In fact I entered the forum to suggest the very same thing. One member expressed the opinion that this forum thread exists precisely for ideas like this. Again, I am in total agreement! Trying to guess at the difficulties of implementing the idea is beyond my pay grade.

This is by far my favorite game and I will play as is and enjoy it, but if improvements can be made to increase realism, I am all for it!