Add Lighters for Fire Starting?

[cekivi]

Right now there are four ways to start a fire: wooden matches, paper matches, fire striker, and the magnifying glass. They all have pros and cons to use. I think it would be neat to find disposable lighters (especially on corpses or in cars). The bonus would be a +10% fire lighting bonus (better than wooden matches) but the downside is they would run out fairly quickly (perhaps 20 uses so 5% condition loss per lighting attempt). Lighters would be another easy way to add some character elements to what we interact with in game (e.g. this corpse was a smoker) while providing a limited use bonus for starting fires so you don't need to carry around accelerant.

[vancopower]

3 hours ago, cekivi said:

Right now there are four ways to start a fire: wooden matches, paper matches, fire striker, and the magnifying glass. They all have pros and cons to use. I think it would be neat to find disposable lighters (especially on corpses or in cars). The bonus would be a +10% fire lighting bonus (better than wooden matches) but the downside is they would run out fairly quickly (perhaps 20 uses so 5% condition loss per lighting attempt). Lighters would be another easy way to add some character elements to what we interact with in game (e.g. this corpse was a smoker) while providing a limited use bonus for starting fires so you don't need to carry around accelerant.

Lighters are also more common than matches, how about a zippo lighter which will be rare find that you can fill (increase condition with accelerant).

[Dirmagnos]

Additional use for accelerant would be nice. Right now it becomes useless fairly fast.

[Fuarian]

How about butane lighters or bic lighters. They are as common as matches but will have limited uses. They will run out of fuel fast and can usually spawn with a little amount of fuel in them. You can find them in cars, corpses, gas station and other areas. You can also use them as accelerant. 

I just find it strange how there aren't any around. Especially in CH. I go to a deppaneur (corner store in Canada) and they pretty much always have tiny Bic Lighters.

 

I think it's a good idea.

[Scyzara]

I'm rather indifferent to lighters in general, but I'd definitely love to see the elusive "flint" item either a)implemented or b)removed or c)replaced with a lighter from the fire lighting options eventually. Always bugs me a little to still see flint on the list even though it doesn't exist.^^

Oh, and I really believe that the lighting boni of the different fire starting tools need some work. Especially lighting a fire with a burning torch or flare should give you a considerable lighting bonus. Atm using a firestriker gives you a +15% bonus, but a burning torch/flare has no bonus effect at all which is a bit odd.

I would rather suggest to rework the bonus system a little and set wood matches as standart (no bonus), keep cardboard matches at -5% as currently, set the magnifying lens to -20% (few people use it before they reach skill 100 anyway and some chance to fail would imho benefit both gameplay and realism), the firestriker could imho remain at +15% and using a burning torch or flare should add a +25% lighting bonus.

[Hatchet]

You may also light fires with a lit torch or a flare, give it a try if you haven't already!
Edit: I see, 

Scyzara

already mentioned it.

Lighters would be nice but i think they should only take up 2% durability per attempt to light a fire. The downside of it would be that it would have a -10% chance because in my experience it's easier to light a fire with a match than it would be when using a lighter.
Also, you wouldn't be able to refill them, atleast most of them but to spice it up a little bit there would also be lighters that you may refill with accellerant, they would be much more rare than the normal lighters, about as rare as a firestriker and they would degrade with 1% durability for every 2 uses (the sparker stone would wear out) and a full (refillable) lighter would last for 50 attempts (much like the regular disposable lighter) so you would be able to refill it 4 times before it goes bust, that's 200 fires compared to 50 fires, if you manage to find one at 100% durability which would be as rare as winning the lottery.

[vancopower]

14 hours ago, Scyzara said:

I'm rather indifferent to lighters in general, but I'd definitely love to see the elusive "flint" item either a)implemented or b)removed or c)replaced with a lighter from the fire lighting options eventually. Always bugs me a little to still see flint on the list even though it doesn't exist.^^

Oh, and I really believe that the lighting boni of the different fire starting tools need some work. Especially lighting a fire with a burning torch or flare should give you a considerable lighting bonus. Atm using a firestriker gives you a +15% bonus, but a burning torch/flare has no bonus effect at all which is a bit odd.

I would rather suggest to rework the bonus system a little and set wood matches as standart (no bonus), keep cardboard matches at -5% as currently, set the magnifying lens to -20% (few people use it before they reach skill 100 anyway and some chance to fail would imho benefit both gameplay and realism), the firestriker could imho remain at +15% and using a burning torch or flare should add a +25% lighting bonus.

Also they should add these bonuses, to when trying to light up a torch because as it is now all you have to do is make your first fire than grab a torch and all those bonuses count for nothing if the largest bonus is from lighting fire with a torch, if however before lighting a torch you are again presented with the option of chance to light is depending on a fire-starter you  will think twice before abusing this.

[Dirmagnos]

Using torch having bonus is only plausible if youre trying to light up something big, like bonfire. Dont think that lighting small campfire would benefit from it in any way.

Firestriker should have penalty of -20(since its not as easy as using matches), but last a lot longer.

Regular disposable lighters last far longer than 50 attempts. Im a smoker and i can use one for 2-3 months, smoking 5-7 smokes a day.

[cekivi]

14 hours ago, Dirmagnos said:

Using torch having bonus is only plausible if youre trying to light up something big, like bonfire. Dont think that lighting small campfire would benefit from it in any way.

Firestriker should have penalty of -20(since its not as easy as using matches), but last a lot longer.

Regular disposable lighters last far longer than 50 attempts. Im a smoker and i can use one for 2-3 months, smoking 5-7 smokes a day.

I agree. Firestrickers should last a very long time but of all the fire starting methods they should really be the worst/require the most skill. Do you know how hard it it to catch a spark on a piece of tinder and actually have it catch? Most commercial firestrikers come built into a piece of magnesium so you have a way to amplify the spark and actually get the tinder to light. The striker in the game does not seem to include this.

And, yeah, I was thinking of regular Bic lighters. Sure, they should last a long time but seeing how quickly everything else degrades/runs out of fuel I thought 20 attempts would be balanced with what is already in the game.

[elloco999]

Disposable lighters are filled with butane in liquid form. The butane is pressurized in the lighter and when you press the button it vaporizes and escapes as a gas through the valve, where the spark of the flint lights it. In cold temperatures however, butane doesn't vaporize and the lighter becomes useless. It is possible to use a butane lighter in cold weather but you need to keep it warm (or warm it up prior to use).

So not exactly a very useful item. A petrol lighter, like a zippo, would be far more useful. It will work in cold weather.

However, I do wonder if TLD would benefit from lighters. IMHO there are already too many matches in the game. When I first started playing TLD you had to really spread your matches in order to make a long run. I really tried to make every fire count by cooking as much meat as possible and boiling as much water as possible with each fire. Now there are so many matches and you generally also find a couple of fire starters that you can light a fire every day and still kill yourself out of boredom before you run out. So do we really need to add lighters?

The only reason I could think off to add lighters would be diversity. So remove half the matches and replace them with lighters that will start the same amount of fires.

That leads us to the discussion of the amount of fires a lighter should start. Yes, in real live a lighter can start many many fires. But if each lighter can start a lot of fires and you find lighters on every other corpse, in every other car, in the gas station and in many houses, you can light several fires a day and never run out of ways to start a fire. I don't think this would be good for the gameplay. And if you make lighters that can only light a dozen or so fires that won't be realistic as everybody knows lighters last a long time.

So there are five options if you ask me:

1. Add lots lighters that last a long time, may be realistic but not much fun.
2. Add a few lighters that last a long time, less realistic but a little more fun.
3. Add lots of lighters that degrade fast, even less realistic and about as fun as option 2.
4. Add a few lighters that degrade fast, still less realistic but the best fun gamplay wise.
5. Don't add lighters, not very realistic but certainly as fun as any of the options above.

Conclusion: lighters don't add to the gameplay. So why go through all the trouble of adding lighters and trying to balance them if you can have just as much fun without them?

Just to be clear: I'm not against adding lighters, but if they're added the other ways of starting fires should be balanced accordingly (i.e. less matches). And since balanced lighters will not be to anybody's liking (either very rare but long lasting or common and short lasting) I think it might be better to skip them altogether.

[cekivi]

I'd be fine with less matches and your option #2

Also, since you usually keep lighters in your pocket or somewhere else close to your body having them work is usually not a problem. That being said finding a zippo and being able to fuel it with lighter fluid (maybe make it almost as rare as the magnifying glass?) may be the best solution overall.

 

 

[Wasteland Watcher]

elloco's option 2 is best.

But I was under the impression that people in Canada are smart and have given up cigarettes. Hence, no lighters

[Dirmagnos]

Less matches and option #2. Plus zippos that can be fueled with accelerant and kerosene, that would be indestructible but would require flints to be replaced every now and then, that could be salvaged from empty disposable lighters and once youre out of them youre out of them. Even with flint knaping im not sure that player would be able to do such fine work to be able to craft ones required for zippos.

Also, on a related note, id like to have an ability to stack matches above those 20/24 stacks. I dont really see the point of durability of creating a boatton of stacks. It clutters inventory without any particular need for it.

[vancopower]

I vote  for the zippo which can be refueled with accelerator, that will be a cool mechanic as for common lighters they could be present in the game but just for aesthetics , they should be not pick-able just lying on the ground since they will not work  as  Elloco999 pointed out. There you have it realistic and fun altogether. it's a win win

[Tbone555]

i really like this idea, i was about to suggest it myself a few days ago, but never got around to it

but +1 to lighters!