"Scarcity" vs "Resource Management"

[Boston123]

As I have played TLD, and viewed these forums, I have come to notice something that I still cannot really understand: Why "survival games" tend to focus on the scarcity of items as related to survival, instead of focusing on a much-more realistic level of resource management.

For example, look at EVERY item of loot in-game: we have to scavenge house to house, to find a couple of scraps of clothing, some cloth, a comparatively-small amount of food, etc. Why is this the case, when realistically a region like "Coastal Townsite" should have enough resources (food, cloth, firewood) to last for several months at least?

Think about it this way: how would the game be different if there were a realistic level of resources, and you didn't have to constantly move to search for unrealistically-low returns? If each house in the Coastal Townsite had a months-worth of food stocked up, along with plenty of dried firewood, the game wouldn't be easier per se, just focused long-term instead of the current short-term. Yes, you might have a glut of resources available NOW, but if you don't plan ahead and work to maintain that level of resources, you will run out.

Think about that, along with the animal population: as winter goes on, the animals will become leaner, and move deeper into the woods to search for food. Predators will take out the weaker, "dumber" members of the deer population, and rabbits will move into burrows and such. Therefore, over time, deer and rabbit become much less "available", and the individuals you do "get" are leaner, with fewer available resources. Wolves become leaner and meaner over time, due to hunger, until their population drops due to lack of food.

What does the above mean? You hunt early, or you might not hunt at all

So, coupled with the above starting-high-level-of-resources, means you actually have to plan ahead in order to survive long-term. You have plenty of canned food NOW, so you should go out and hunt/forage in order to have at least some food when the canned food runs out. You have plenty of dried firewood NOW, so you might want to gather some more while you have a surplus, so you have some when your current supply runs out. You have access to a surplus of blankets and cloth NOW, so you might want to make some spare clothing (http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showth ... p?t=119924 , for ideas) while you have enough food and firewood to not have to devote all you waking time and energy into gathering more

I am sure you get the idea. Instead of rushing around, hurriedly gathering food, fuel, materials so we don't die right away, why not start off with a glut (a realistic glut, that is) of materiel? Sure, the "beginning" of the game might be easy, but that is only if you sit back on your laurels and relax. When you run out of this materiel, unless you wisely spent time gathering more, you will be screwed, just as much as you would be in the "normal" game. Plus, with animals becoming scarcer and leaner over time, you can't just go shoot a deer and sleep for a week.

This would prompt the development of foresight, as well as reward planning ahead.

TL:DR real-life survival focuses on "resource management", not on artificial scarcity. I feel the game would be...."better" if it was the same way.

Discuss

[Willbonney]

The Story of the game hasn't yet been released for the most part. If the area was evacuated, as it seems since there would be a lot more dead around than there are if the alternative were true, then people would take with them most of the important possessions. What is left is what got left behind I suppose, stuff that didn't matter to those who evacuated. Which looking in some of the houses in Coastal Highway seem to suggest that. Drawers left open, cabinets ripped off hinges, it's all in disarray.

The beginning of every game starts pretty much the same. You're the sole survivor of a plane crash and the surrounding area is deserted of living people. The only critique I would make of this is we never see the crash sites, and a lot of useful items can usually be scavenged from a crashed plane. Med Kit, flares, a knife or two, usually some fire logs, and often 5-10L of drinkable water. There is usually a bit of cargo as well, because every small plane up that way I've ever been in also served as a courier of mail and packages.

[Seshins]

I guess one way you could argue the event happened over time, society collapsed (not overnight obivously) but fairly quickly and you are all that remains....or something similar. However, you cant then explain why the player had a working aircraft when supoosedly the "event" had knocked out all working electronic/machinery (radios, cars etc).

its an Alpha sandbox, at the moment development isnt too heavy in regards to pulling it all together like story mode will, but just a way to add features and balance things out. I have no doubt Story mode will be very fun when it releases.

IN SAYING ALL THAT - i do like the original post. I would quite like that kind of pre-planning, where the fruits of planning will only emerge down the track. I kind of do that at the moment, i have something like 15kgs of canned/processed food which will only be used when i have zero snares, rifle rounds, fishing line or any ability to hunt meat.

[Bishounen]

I guess one way you could argue the event happened over time, society collapsed (not overnight obivously) but fairly quickly and you are all that remains....or something similar. However, you cant then explain why the player had a working aircraft when supoosedly the "event" had knocked out all working electronic/machinery (radios, cars etc).

its an Alpha sandbox, at the moment development isnt too heavy in regards to pulling it all together like story mode will, but just a way to add features and balance things out. I have no doubt Story mode will be very fun when it releases.

IN SAYING ALL THAT - i do like the original post. I would quite like that kind of pre-planning, where the fruits of planning will only emerge down the track. I kind of do that at the moment, i have something like 15kgs of canned/processed food which will only be used when i have zero snares, rifle rounds, fishing line or any ability to hunt meat.

I think this is kind of the idea, and also why we don't see the crashed plane.

Essentially, the "event" happened MONTHS before the start of the game, back in summertime. THAT is when you crashed WAY OUT in the northern Canadian wilderness, and you have been spending the intervening months hiking slowly south. This is why you don't have proper winter gear or much in the way of supplies. You started out in the summer, when you didn't need a heavy coat, and while walking back what few survival supplies you had have already been used up.

Now you have finally reached the northern outposts of civilization, only to discover it in ruins, the people either evacuated or dead, most of the resources stripped from the area and Mother Nature encroaching back onto the ruins, reclaiming what was once hers.

This explains pretty much everything you find in the sandbox mode. Scarce resources, random frozen corpses, burned buildings, ransacked supplies, etc. It's the only way the "story" works.

[TLDFAN]

I guess one way you could argue the event happened over time, society collapsed (not overnight obivously) but fairly quickly and you are all that remains....or something similar. However, you cant then explain why the player had a working aircraft when supoosedly the "event" had knocked out all working electronic/machinery (radios, cars etc).

its an Alpha sandbox, at the moment development isnt too heavy in regards to pulling it all together like story mode will, but just a way to add features and balance things out. I have no doubt Story mode will be very fun when it releases.

IN SAYING ALL THAT - i do like the original post. I would quite like that kind of pre-planning, where the fruits of planning will only emerge down the track. I kind of do that at the moment, i have something like 15kgs of canned/processed food which will only be used when i have zero snares, rifle rounds, fishing line or any ability to hunt meat.

I think this is kind of the idea, and also why we don't see the crashed plane.

Essentially, the "event" happened MONTHS before the start of the game, back in summertime. THAT is when you crashed WAY OUT in the northern Canadian wilderness, and you have been spending the intervening months hiking slowly south. This is why you don't have proper winter gear or much in the way of supplies. You started out in the summer, when you didn't need a heavy coat, and while walking back what few survival supplies you had have already been used up.

Now you have finally reached the northern outposts of civilization, only to discover it in ruins, the people either evacuated or dead, most of the resources stripped from the area and Mother Nature encroaching back onto the ruins, reclaiming what was once hers.

This explains pretty much everything you find in the sandbox mode. Scarce resources, random frozen corpses, burned buildings, ransacked supplies, etc. It's the only way the "story" works.

Wow just wow, that is a brilliant backstory! I love the explanation of how you got where you are.