Melting vs Boiling Snow

[Vagos]

If I'm not mistaking melting 1l of snow takes 20 minutes and boiling 1l of water takes 10 minutes.

This should be the opposite at least? Melting is easy, boiling for purification requires much more time and resources.

Comments?

[Scyzara]

I agree.

It's really quite odd that getting snow from - 20°C (or whatever temperature it has when you collect it) to 0°C takes twice as much time (and thus energy) than getting it from 0 to 100°C. Just saying.

Thinking about it, I believe that it's probably a relict from the pre-alpha or very early alpha versions when the game was totally different regarding its possible survival time and difficulty level.

The purification tablets are probably a relict from this time (of actual struggle for one more hour of survival) as well. In a game environment where the best players survive less than ten days, saving half an hour of boiling time is presumably pretty relevant and can probably save your life. Nowadays saving a few minutes really doesn't matter any more.

But back to topic.. I don't see any benefits to keep the time for melting vs boiling this way around any more. It might have made the game slightly more difficult a whole long time ago, but these days are gone anyway. Noone is so desperate any more to ever drink unboiled water.

[Boss Llama]

I thought about this one and concluded that the reason for the snow-melt taking longer is that it isn't simply a matter of grabbing a liter of snow, melting it, then boiling it. Snow Water Equivalency (SWE) is the term used to refer to how much water, by volume, is contained in a given volume of snow. People might be familiar with it from a meteorologist comparing a given snowfall amount to a given (much smaller) rainfall amount.

Typically, the SWE for the fresh top layers of snow is anywhere from 5% to 20%, with lower temperatures resulting in lower percentages. This means that to get one liter of water, you need to melt anywhere from 5 to 20 liters of fresh snow. That likely entails a number of trips outside to collect snow, doing it in stages (I haven't seen many 20 liter pots lying around), which all would take some extra time. While it did seem weird to me too at first glance, on reflection I accepted that it may be a reasonable summation due to the other tasks involved in the process.

Some basic reading on it, if you're interested.

[selfless]

It takes more energy to transform ice into water than it does to warm that same water from 0 to 80 degrees C. Compound that with the fact liquid water also transfers energy through convection while solid water can only receive heat through contact or radiation and you can start to justify melting taking longer than heating. Further consider the insulating properties of air filled snow and it seems even more likely.

But thermodynamics is a whole lot more complicated than is ever modeled in this or any other game. Not sure how far anyone really wants to take it...

[Vagos]

If you take under consideration the time needed to gather the correct volume of snow to get 1l of water then it might explain the longer time to melt/convert the snow in water.

Thanks Llama

[dctrjons]

No, because it requires a fire to collect snow...which doesn't make sense. I'm O K with the current system but it is kind of backwards.

Going off straight heat requirements it really pretty close to 1:1 (4:5 ratio with zero C snow) since you could argue the snow is likely below zero and the player is uber-accurate at pulling the water off as soon as it start boiling. Since boiling will just lose water (albeit pretty slowly since actually gassing boiling temp water takes a lot of energy.)

But going too literal with the process begs the idea of melting snow without fire...sorta. In a heated shelter you could argue that snow would melt on it's own even if the fire died...but then this would require shelters that have varying heat a new and tricky mechanic to balance logically and with mass approval. One I think the game needs since I think wood gathering should be on par with food gathering as "missions" to keep the game interesting for longer plays.

[Eachna]

One I think the game needs since I think wood gathering should be on par with food gathering as "missions" to keep the game interesting for longer plays.

I'm not sure what you mean here? We already have to gather wood (by picking up sticks and branches and chopping firewood). Or do you mean it needs to be as complicated as hunting?

[Greenbacks]

I'm not sure what you mean here? We already have to gather wood (by picking up sticks and branches and chopping firewood). Or do you mean it needs to be as complicated as hunting?

I think he just wants to collect snow.

[Eachna]

I think he just wants to collect snow.

Oh...hmm...that might be neat. Although we'd need containers.

[selfless]

We could craft snowballs. Then we don't need a container. Unless we go indoors or near a fire...

[elloco999]

I say: try it for real and see how long it takes to melt enough snow to get 1L of water. You may be surprised at how long it takes!

I do think it would be cool if you could collect snow, place it in a 0+C room and melt it that way without having to put it on a fire. But it would probably not add much to the game so I'm fine with the current method.