Climbing spots inside caves + torches

[Kranium]

I probably just suck at this, but... why does it take a half dozen (minimum) tries to throw a torch up onto the ledge? You know, at those places inside a couple of transition caves, like the new one to get to BRM. If you have a torch, when you go to climb you drop it. Or you hafta put it out & away, then waste a match to light it up top again. Or you can throw it, but it seems to hit an invisible wall in midair 75% of the time. I mean it's only like 8 feet high, it shouldn't be like trying to swish a basket from half court. To make things worse, now there's a double climb when leaving BRM, and I just finished an infuriating sequence where it took a crapload of throws to get a torch up onto the ledge, climb up, now there's a 2nd climb from there, so I throw, it hits an invisible wall again but now it goes ALL THE WAY BACK TO THE VERY BOTTOM goddam it took me about 3 beers to pull it off

 

Honestly I just needed to vent, I should have a coffee & some food, been a long afternoon splitting firewood outside (which takes a lot of beer admittedly) and I thought I could relax now and play some long dark but NO WAY JOSE instead i get BRICKWALLED by the torch throwing enigma aarrrrggghhhhh

 

anyway i wish doing that was much simpler, thank you

Edited December 19, 2021 by Kranium
invisible wall between my keyboard & my brain

[Sito]

Nice rant

[UTC-10]

Not sure when it happened, probably with episode 4 update, I guess, but now when you have a torch, presumably a flare as well, or a lantern, when you climb (up or down) a rope, "you put the lit torch or lantern away (so it does get dark if in a dark area)" do the climb then presto "you bring it back out, still lit".  Surprised the heck out of me when I confirmed that actually happens at least with rope climbs.  I should check if it applies to non-rope climbs or maybe somebody has already checked that. 

I had my trials throwing torches up to the next level, like the climb to the next level in the cave link between Forlorn Muskeg and Bleak Inlet.  I found in that case that I had to go around to the side to throw it up to the next level and not stand at the base of the free climbing face.  

[Kranium]

UTC-10: Yes, throwing from the side works much better. However, in the new transition cave there's the added twist of a 2nd climb, with a ledge partway up, and the 2nd face is a lot trickier to throw over. If you miss, it goes back to the bottom of the 1st climb. At which point I throw myself into the void.

 

Oh, and you do drop your light when climbing in these spots. (never knew that about rope climbs though, probably because I never rope climb at night, it's usually first thing in the morning after a coffee, or towards dusk before I'm going to sleep anyway)

[Morrick]

A related small rant: why can't I drop/throw items off a cliff? This is a potentially useful mechanic when you have to climb down a cliff and you're encumbered (not because you're tired, but simply because you're exceeding carrying capacity). And you're encumbered because you've found resources and tools while going up and now you want to bring them down (typical example: the return trip after going to the summit in Timberwolf Mountain). I would be OK with the item losing some condition just to have this feature. 

[UTC-10]

Off hand I recall one rope climb set inside a cave and that was in Ash Canyon.  I might venture to guess that might have gotten the devs to incorporate putting a burning torch or lit lantern away since the ledge above was too high to throw a torch onto and, lacking a lantern, the rope climb forced players to use an irreplaceable match or burn another irreplaceable flare to relight a torch.  It was probably thought that it was not that big a deal even if not quite "realistic".   

 

Being able to drop things off cliffs (or pretty much anywhere) would be an enormously useful mechanic as it would mean the character could now "throw" any item  not just that he could throw it off a higher place to a lower place.  I suspect that expansion of "what can be thrown" - because anyone can "drop" an item on the ground - to be able to toss it over a cliff or off a bridge, etc. - was probably thought too problematic to deal with.   But I would not mind being able to do so.  

[Leeanda]

I've often wished I could throw a rope off the cliff at mountain town.🙂

[Kranium]

I mean, IRL I've lowered my pack down via rope then climbed down after. (I've done my share of scrambling)

[Strelok]

Same here. Was in a TWM cave where i had no problem throwing it down. But upwards its very very hard to do. In the cave from FM to BI if i remember correctly, it was easy to throw upwards because there was a sidespot where the bed is to throw it up with no problems. It seems to have to do with the acutal climbing path which is like a invisible wall.

[DiscoJonny]

6 hours ago, Kranium said:

I mean, IRL I've lowered my pack down via rope then climbed down after. (I've done my share of scrambling)

right???  there should be a mechanic whereby you take off your pack and hoist it up or down.  This would be a great feature to have the modding community look into.  
You should probably suggest that on the modding forum.