carbonpencil

Duck season

Maybe they were dark matter scientists?

The vertical cave entrance sounds cool. Imagine dropping in a flare only for the light disappear down the hole and then choosing to abseil down.

Actually the Wendigo sounds about right. I never knew about that lore. I recently saw an interesting documentary about Beau Dick - Maker of Monsters and that's about all the Northern Canadian lore I know. It's fascinating how such art can rationalize monsters to reflect morals.

Nice. How about this? The Dark Walker represents an alien creature like the Predator, visiting planets to hunt the strongest survivors of an extinction level event. It glows green from radiation and is set upon any species unwilling to live sustainably on their planet. It uses poisonous fog to remind survivors of the pollution that has been inflicted upon the world. Maybe as a species we can only move on from this place to the next. Happy Halloween.

Orange Evening

Quiet Crumbling Gyre

Bereavement Overseas

Hushed Desolation

I can change the polarity of the field by using a negative sign in Universal Sandbox but the process of reversing the magnetic poles is a big unknown to science let alone game simulation. It's known that for objects in space, things tend to flip somewhat regularly when spinning about an intermediate axis (see Dzhanibekov Effect). It's not known how or if this flipping about a secondary axis would occur when it comes to planets and their complex fluid like magneto dynamics. It is true though that the Earth's magnetic field strength changes and even flips over at intervals in the order of millions of years according to the observed geological record. But no one knows how long the process itself takes or why exactly the field strength is currently weakening while the north pole is accelerating towards Russia. Some theories even suggest that the Sun can produce CMEs (solar particle tsunami) that can cause earthquakes, mega lightning and massive electrical grid destruction. Methuselah definitely knows something (just Google the meaning of his name) but I think he might also be a religious militant. He's probably right about Will and what he did to Hobbs. I really like how The Long Dark had adapted solar storms and aurora phenomena into the story.

You know I just wanted to make room for a scenario where the power was being used in some fantastic way that steers towards one of my favorite works of fiction. It's just a wish. The inhabitants may have been surprised but for a forward thinking mega corporation, planning it would be about business continuity by diversifying their assets. It's the kind of thing a large multinational Internet company might need to do in order to maintain their services. Amazon, Google and Facebook already use remote data centers that span acres, run 24/7, backup all their data, and consume enough energy to worry about utilizing the thermodynamic advantage that colder snowy environments bring. They may even be prepared for end of the world scenarios in some way (mabye even stocked up on MRE and reserves of generator fuel). If they were forward thinking enough to use AI to help humanity in the event of an unforseen catastrophe (think of Terminator's Skynet), then that AI would need to be working overtime in such conditions. Who knows what AI's may predict about the future. Maybe the AI's will decide to use 5G against us all and break the magnetosphere (just be skeptical). Even though the hydro dam is old it still seems to be decades ahead of the wooden (non concrete) buildings around. Even with their industry demands a hydro power station seemed to be more than enough and adds room to additional lore. The story of Carter Hydro is just like those forward thinking companies that leave legacies behind when things go wrong. I heard about this being done for large data centres awhile ago. Here's an example in Sweden where a town of 100,000+ and two Hydro-power plants hosts a data centre for Facebook. Facebook boasts green data centre in Lulea Sweden about

Anyone play Universe Sandbox? I had an idea to try an get a Long Dark version of Earth by adjusting the properties of the Sun and Earth. I started my solar system simulation in 2012 and began by reducing the Sun's mass by 1% and the Earth's atmosphere by 20% over a year (as well as lowering the magnetic field strength by 90%). In just five years my simulated Earth was 5 degrees C colder. It didn't seem like much but from the look of it about 90% of all the land was covered in snow.

It's very speculative and the island could well be larger since the penitentiary might also be on the island. So maybe the remoteness, defensive terrain, proximity to exploitable prison labor, untapped energy resources (hydro power and glowing ore?) and subterranean possibilities would make a great location of some secret end of the world bunker.

In July 2012 Earth actually had a near miss of a CME event (like the Carrington event; see https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/23jul_superstorm ). I think that's been adapted in this game when they mention the event's of the First Flash. I watch SuspiciousObservers on YouTube but I don't all believe it.

I agree.

How much power was the old Carter Hydro Energy Dam supposed to produce and why was it built? It seems like it sends most of it's power to the mainland and very little to the inhabitants of the island. I guess that each turbine was designed to produce 100 Mw and that there are two turbines at the dam. If the average demand per US/European/Canadian home is 2 Kw then there may have been enough power to supply 100,000 homes. But the island seems to have only a couple of hundred homes. Could the power station have been constructed to prepare for the great collapse (Or the first flash)? Why else would that area need so much power? I am hoping for a story tie in that could introduce some kind of end of the world subterranean computer center where something like William Gibon's Neuromancer could live (Or begin? Maybe if Carter Hydro Energy was part of Tessier Ashpool's infrastructure portfolio). But that would be a dream.

Hi @ManicManiac . I have been reading some of your TLD tips. They're good. Have a nice Winter.

Lock down these days has given me a kind of cabin fever. I guess that's why I chose to pick up TLD early July 2020. After putting in 50 hr of gaming I'd have to say that it's surprisingly good. I found it uniquely atmospheric and challenging. Maybe it's a coincident of timing but I've recently been asked to help design an Off Road Trailer as well. I guess it's all a part of my rekindled interest (and appreciation of) in the outdoors and survivalism. Not to mention the work of doctors and rescue workers in remote areas.

Thanks. How about if the abilty to save game is disabled if the character is exhausted. Serves you right if you don't let the character sleep when they get so tired. That way they might enter a dream without even initiating sleep. The goal then becomes to meditate back to a conscious awakening or push on to test their limits (in the dream) and then risk a random negative condition when awakening. And maybe with some Shamanic preparation you might stay in the dream for a long time. Sorry for too much Inceptioning there but I feel that as a player you don't get a good sense of the limits of endurance until it's too late in the game. A dream could be a way to let players know what they should and shouldn't worry about.

Finally you're warm and safe. You close your eyes for a few vital hours of sleep. Then you wake up in some dreamscape but you can't tell the difference until it's too late. If the dream wolf kills you while you sleep you wake up exhausted.

I'm going through Ep3 Capable Survivor as well. I've rescued all four and just need to do one more food run before the storm (only about 2000 calories left). On my first rescue with Gwen(Gale?) I encountered two TW packs of three each (six wolves in total) on the way back. With my revolver I killed three and havested 500g of meat from one of them (Astrid was hungry enough to try wolf steak once). The first encounter was pre dawn by the river so I quickly placed the survivor, lit a flare and dropped it close by and aimed my revolver. I dropped the first wolf and the rest fled. By the second encounter the sun was up and visibility was great so I could use my rifle. Took out two wolves in my best encounter yet. I've found that TW packs would usually continue to spawn shortly after picking up each survivor. They probably would just wait in the area around the survivor. But this didn't happen on the last trip. On my way to the final survivor I was fortunate to come across a 9kg deer walking around on my path. Shot the deer and havested 8kg which was quickly cooked up while nursing the survivor (Logan?) back to health. With the surviors' infite fire cooking the meats was pretty easy and my scent went to zero. With the extra weight I decided to try an alternative route back to base. Even though I sprained my wrist while carrying the survivor, I didn't encounter any wolves on the way back. Maybe they were checking out the deer carcass.

Maybe it could be used as a temporary flame thrower? Or something to microwave during an Aurora.