Trader - My personal vision

[Laika Ivanova]

Hello! I've decided to write a bit about what I personally hope the Trader will be, or more importantly; what he will have to offer. Some people here know my personal stance on the game, especially the last few years updates and what I criticised about them, but for the ones that don't, here a brief summary:

 

Personally, I heavily dislike the approach of adding finite, non renewable content to the game. Things like crampons not being repairable initially, now flasks not being repairable. In a game that allows me to stay alive indefinitely I don't think items should be able to be effectively run out or be gone one day. It will inevitably lead to a barren wasteland where only...cloth and pelts exist and that is just off putting to me. Most of the things in the game are either renewable, or can be repaired with materials that are, again, renewable. It has been like this for years when it comes to most, if not all content that we got. 

 

The recent addition and clarification of Hinterland that the flasks can be damaged whilst not being repairable is intentional by design worries me. Being able to effectively loose the flask forever without being able to repair doesn't fit the game. Unless...the Trader! Perhaps, things like these items will be able to be bought from the Trader to create another option of renewability for these kind of items. Same with Frontier Cooking ingredients. 

 

I am aware that there have been past statements from Hinterland that the game isn't meant to be played forever on one save. But for over a decade they designed the game to effectively function like this so I hope that they keep this in mind when it comes to the last few updates the game is going to receive.

[artmunki]

After the release of Frontier Comforts, cooking ingredients quickly joined coffee/herbal tea at the top of my personal list for stuff I expect the eventual trader to offer, as all of those items are in limited supply and easy to use up. Flasks would certainly make some sense now too, as would safety boots and canisters for the mask, tho obviously there are game balance reasons why they might be kept in limited supply. We might also see some basic medical supplies, some of the materials for gunsmithing (like gunpowder or dusting sulphur/stump remover), and of course whatever materials are required for the darkroom and camera once they're added.

Basically I expect the trader to stock anything manufactured that's kinda definitively finite in supply, but not super high-value (no guns, top quality clothing, most tools). And I wouldn't be at all surprised to find a few items for base customisation too, whatever that ends up being like. Add in maybe some other minor packaged food items, some low-level clothing if you really want it, and possibly one or two unique items (or crafting recipes - that would be really cool) only available from the trader.

I kinda expect the trader to be a little unreliable in what will be available at any given time too, so you might have to come back a few times if there's something particular you're looking for, and obviously they'll probably be in the mountain pass region, so it's not gonna be the most convenient place to visit. Maybe they'll even travel around the island to different shop locations or something (the shops in CH, MT & PV?), so you'll have to almost hunt them down. That seems much less likely tho. Y'know, unless the shopkeep is Methuselah. 😜

I broadly see the trader as being a mechanism for ongoing maintenance once development of the game is finished - we wont be getting new updates, regions and loot refreshes anymore, so the trader will allow continued access to stuff that you'll eventually run out of if you're playing long-term games. We might even get occasional tie-in items from other Hinterland games from time to time, just as a wee novelty, tho they'd probably just be like cosmetic stuff for your base or whatever. Maybe cute hats.

[MarrowStone]

Amazing ideas, all of them!

When it comes to finite vs renewable, I think items for maintaining things should be renewable while the items themselves finite. So a scarcity of some item would only be due to a player's carelessness and lack of maitenence and not because they exhausted the supply of things to repair it! (TLDR Infinite rifles? No. Infinite repair kits? Yes. Cooking ingredients? Yes.) 

A possible solution to this could be like adding the frostbite mechanic to some of the more game changing items, but not to an extreme degree. Something can only be "good as new" so many times after all, but that doesnt stop ot from becoming an heirloom. 

Speaking of heirlooms, thatd be a cool mechanic! A favorite tool of yours could also recieve minor buffs for simply becoming an extension of your character, encouraging careful maitenence even more. So while it probably has a knock on durability or effectiveness from repeated repair, some other unique trait could keep you from wanting to part with it. 

[Dan_]

I have a sneaking suspicion the Trader is gonna be connected to the end of the third tale, and thus you would only able to make contact using the radio. Perhaps this person was an acquaintance of Rudiger/Foreman/Security Chief. Keeping the crew working deep inside the mountain would demand a constant supply chain, so the Trader makes sense Tales' lore wise. 

I would also expect to not make visual contact with the them, as that befits TLD's style the most in my opinion. Agree with Art's take on the selection the trader might carry, consumables like food and medicine (including Vit C tablets, maybe?) should be staples for all difficulty modes, perhaps lead and gunpowder for the difficulty modes that have firearms enabled. High end tools and weapons should not be available through this mechanic IMO.

I would also love it the selection to be randomized to simulate supply constraints to some extent and that randomization reflects on the price of items. 

There is so much that can be done with this mechanic to keep the game interesting for years to come, this will finally liberate the hoarder in me to use up my cooking ingredients more. 😁

Edited December 17, 2023 by Dan_

[artmunki]

9 hours ago, MarrowStone said:

When it comes to finite vs renewable, I think items for maintaining things should be renewable while the items themselves finite. So a scarcity of some item would only be due to a player's carelessness and lack of maitenence and not because they exhausted the supply of things to repair it! (TLDR Infinite rifles? No. Infinite repair kits? Yes. Cooking ingredients? Yes.)

Much more succinct way of putting it, aye. Almost everything useful in the game loses condition when you use it - if you just use it until it's done, maybe the trader will have some, but if it's repairable, you better get fixin'! Of course, beachcombing for scrap metal combined with the milling machines kinda make a lot of the most important tools more or less infinitely repairable already, but gun cleaning kits and whetstones still seem like pretty reasonable things the trader might stock. Tool kits too, maybe. I really only added low-level clothing to my list because traders in games always have crap clothing, right? 

12 minutes ago, Dan_ said:

I have a sneaking suspicion the Trader is gonna be connected to the end of the third tale, and thus you would only able to make contact using the radio...

I would also expect to not make visual contact with the them, as that befits TLD's style the most in my opinion.

Dammit, radio! Of course! Since the trader was first announced I've been wondering how you'd contact them, as it just seems so out of sorts with the survival game to have another actual person on the island after all this time - kinda made the trader the part of the DLC I was looking forward to the least tbh. The only way I could see that making any sort of sense would be if the trader is Methuselah, but even that seemed a huge reach. Best I'd come up with is that maybe you'd leave a note of what you need in some kinda order-cache spot, but a radio makes so much more sense. Ooh! Or maybe it's an online catalogue, and you can only place an order during an aurora, and then you just have to come back and check until your order arrives RNG-weeks later. Would that be too cheesy?

[Enigmaecho]

On 12/15/2023 at 5:13 AM, Laika Ivanova said:

Hello! I've decided to write a bit about what I personally hope the Trader will be, or more importantly; what he will have to offer. Some people here know my personal stance on the game, especially the last few years updates and what I criticised about them, but for the ones that don't, here a brief summary:

 

Personally, I heavily dislike the approach of adding finite, non renewable content to the game. Things like crampons not being repairable initially, now flasks not being repairable. In a game that allows me to stay alive indefinitely I don't think items should be able to be effectively run out or be gone one day. It will inevitably lead to a barren wasteland where only...cloth and pelts exist and that is just off putting to me. Most of the things in the game are either renewable, or can be repaired with materials that are, again, renewable. It has been like this for years when it comes to most, if not all content that we got. 

 

The recent addition and clarification of Hinterland that the flasks can be damaged whilst not being repairable is intentional by design worries me. Being able to effectively loose the flask forever without being able to repair doesn't fit the game. Unless...the Trader! Perhaps, things like these items will be able to be bought from the Trader to create another option of renewability for these kind of items. Same with Frontier Cooking ingredients. 

 

I am aware that there have been past statements from Hinterland that the game isn't meant to be played forever on one save. But for over a decade they designed the game to effectively function like this so I hope that they keep this in mind when it comes to the last few updates the game is going to receive.

It may initially seem to be a dire situation that the flask is not repairable but consider that at the very least there are 6 of them in a run and at most 14 if there’s one in every region(I’ve found 2 of the same flask in dif regions) and they only take damage from attacks and falls and not every time just a chance.

I’m a bit bummed we can’t fix it but that’s more because I’m a lazy bones than being bothered I have to play a little more cautious when I have my precious with me lol 

finally I am a bit torn at times being an early access and also an infinite run player but always trying to view from the perspective of new players and casuals and from HL’s pov as well “I still chuckle about going back and forth with Raph about the tales save wipe and our convo ending with “you’re supposed to die” as it is now even pre tales pre beach combing the game was survivable into the thousands of days I think the record is over 10k so losing items post tales shouldn’t really affect it but it would be nice if the trader has some items like the flask firestrikers, recipe ingredients or other consumables

Personally I would love it if instead they were an information dealer of sorts, a First Nations or another indigenous community member who brings a few new items and blueprints and skill lines to us I’ve long wanted flint for fires and a flintknapping skill line to make tools eventually, trade off being no bench required to make knife/hatchet, arrowheads, but it breaks really fast and can’t repair because for flintknapping making the knife sharp again means chipping a lot more material away, could have a chance of fail and ruining the item at lower skills but then let the shards still be used as strikers and require tinder for all fires started with flint regardless of fire proficiency level, an expansion of primitive traps and a skill line for trapping too, build a better snow shelter perhaps, more of the same items we have a bunch of will diminish the impact a bit I think so them having ingredients and other rarer consumables is the safest assumption 

Edited December 17, 2023 by Enigmaecho

[Dan_]

2 hours ago, artmunki said:

Dammit, radio! Of course! Since the trader was first announced I've been wondering how you'd contact them, as it just seems so out of sorts with the survival game to have another actual person on the island after all this time - kinda made the trader the part of the DLC I was looking forward to the least tbh. 

I'm fully expecting the trader to be an external character which might remain nameless and unbound to Story mode. It makes perfect sense to me that the trader would not be meeting the player in person, at least not intentionally. Picture this: he/she's used to dealing with Rudiger and probably other unsavory types (Mathis? Forest Talkers? Breyerhouse goons?), you would minimize any chances of you getting shot and left for dead in this such a godforsaken place, like GBI. 

Buried Echoes Spoiler:

Spoiler

Maybe you need to be close to the transmitter in the future region, as per the security chief's notes.

I'm thinking you would need to get in range to a specific transmitter and wait for a transmission, then negotiate the terms right in place, ( perhaps the trader has a loot set which is slightly random every time, maybe you request for medical supplies or gunsmithing materials, etc ). A new tales quest/task would then be enabled with the location of your payment. Once you deposit the agreed price ( whatever that is ) you have to wait for another tranmission with the location of the supply cache containing your items/they are already waiting in a set location the trader left for you. 

The Tales design and roadmap are very deliberate in having the radio as a centerpiece, I'm pretty sure we're speculating here but the design and features are already being worked on or already set. If you think about the roadmap they haven't strayed from the original content scope, even though they made it clear they could reverse course on features at any given moment. I think the radio is a safe bet to be related to the trader mechanic.

Edited December 17, 2023 by Dan_

[artmunki]

1 hour ago, Dan_ said:

I'm thinking you would need to get in range to a specific transmitter and wait for a transmission, then negotiate the terms right in place, ( perhaps the trader has a loot set which is slightly random every time, maybe you request for medical supplies or gunsmithing materials, etc ). A new tales quest/task would then be enabled with the location of your payment. Once you deposit the agreed price ( whatever that is ) you have to wait for another tranmission with the location of the supply cache containing your items/they are already waiting in a set location the trader left for you.

I remember a specialised trader in one of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games, where you could request one of a narrow selection of loosely described higher-end gear, and after a wait he'd deliver something pretty good that fitted what you asked for, but you wouldn't know exactly what he'd have for you until you got it (well, maybe he always brought the same sniper rifle or whatever, I'm not sure - there was more than enough gear to be found elsewhere in that game that I rarely bothered with his wares). Could be they'll go a similar way, with a Long Dark twist - you make a general request for the sort of stuff you need (your suggested medical/gunsmithing/etc.), pay your fee (hides? coal? crafted goods? will gold become a rare spawn-able in some caves?), then good ol' RNG determines exactly what you actually get back from a short topical list. And it'll always be what you asked for, but rarely what you actually hoped for, or much of what you need. 

[conanjaguar]

On 12/17/2023 at 3:09 PM, artmunki said:

And it'll always be what you asked for, but rarely what you actually hoped for, or much of what you need. 

“I always get a bunch of stupid matches or a flare or soda or something like that.”

”What is it you want?”

“Rifle bullets.”

[artmunki]

19 minutes ago, conanjaguar said:

“I always get a bunch of stupid matches or a flare or soda or something like that.”

”What is it you want?”

“Rifle bullets.”

Hehe. I don't expect it to be quite that bad, but .... yeah. 

[ManicManiac]

All speculation aside.  I feel like Hinterland has more than earned "the benefit of the doubt" (so to speak)... so I think it's probably better to just wait and see how Hinterland has actually chose to implement the Trader.  

Regardless of how the trader will manifest, how it will work, or what will be up for "trade"... I will remind folks that we do always have the choice to just not use the trader if we don't want too.

On 12/4/2023 at 2:28 PM, ManicManiac said:

I think that creating expectation based on assumption, is often how folks end up giving themselves a lot of disappointment.

####
other notes:

On 12/17/2023 at 9:42 AM, Enigmaecho said:

It may initially seem to be a dire situation that the flask is not repairable

Folks could also just take care of their flask and take precautions not to take falls or get into struggles.  Could also keep it in a safe place until we actually want to use it, rather than just lugging it around everywhere whether or not it's empty or full.  I think it's easy enough to just take care of our gear rather than wanting everything to be "repairable."
 

On 12/15/2023 at 4:13 AM, Laika Ivanova said:

Personally, I heavily dislike the approach of adding finite, non renewable content to the game. Things like crampons not being repairable initially

Personally, I preferred when things like crampons weren't repairable... it made it much more important to conserve and use them wisely.  After they were made repairable (to my mind) they became trivial.  Long story short... I hope the flask stays unrepairable.  Also, I think that finite resources make the gameplay experience richer... since again, it asks the player to really have to manage and use what recourses they find wisely.

Edited December 19, 2023 by ManicManiac

[Leeanda]

The flask doesn't need to be repaired, there's more than one on each run..   yes they're fragile, I've had one break without dropping it before  ,but how are we supposed to repair it anyway? We don't have glass or rubber to fix it...  I can't see htl adding more things in the game just for repairing it..

I'm with Ralphs decision on this I'm afraid.

[xanna]

So happy to find I'm not the only person who calls the survivor Mack!

[AdamvR]

Resources, apart from sunlight are finite.
This game does good reminding us of this.
Even if we have an entire society's hoard to search, loot, and burn through ... which I personally think is more than generous.

On the trader I agree with those who expect it not to be an NPC, but rather a box through which you leave your price and get your reward at times.
The radio is a good idea, but I'd prefer leaving a note, or "online ordering" during aurorae, as @artmunki said. I also loved the thought, to place a "rough" order, and get something, but not sure in advance, what it would be.

Even hearing a live voice through the radio would be a bit odd to me in the quiet apocalypse.
I do not think we are meant to escape GBI... This is end of the road, we are only prolonging it.

Edited December 24, 2023 by AdamvR

[artmunki]

Don't really see why this thread has been moved to the wishlist section. We're just speculating about what we think the trader might be like, not making requests for what we'd like to find when we get there. I for one am perfectly happy with whatever Hinterland chooses to give us, but it's fun to guess before we see what's in store.

[AdamvR]

On 12/19/2023 at 5:51 PM, Leeanda said:

Ralphs

-L

it’s Raphael

[Leeanda]

1 hour ago, AdamvR said:

-L

it’s Raphael

That was a typo,shouldn't have been an l in it...    

I hope he doesn't mind my calling him raph though,but as he's never said I don't know..