[Poll] On Summer Smoldering

[GetNerfedOn]

Next up on my list of questions:

What do you guys think about Summer smoldering?

As always, feel free to answer and discuss in the comments!

[Captain_Rage]

It could definitely use some adjustment. It's simply tedious when a base catches on fire because you didn't get any sane warning or indication. I am all for having a mechanic like this, to combat the comfort that an oversized base brings, but when something starts burning half a screen away and you don't notice it because of unfortunate RNG everything just feels trite. I mean, it would be more fun have a fair chance to try to fireproof a base instead of simply running away from it, given how the current mechanics work. If the Thermal Measurer could give some sort of consistent heads-up it would already be something. RNG plays a too big part, even if you carry an Ice Staff with you.

[SonicDen220]

Voted on most options in question 1 because since I almost never play alone, it depends on where my teammates set up the base in the first place, but most commonly we set the base up in oasis. If we don't, then we use flingos (and occasionally with lureplants). I also try to always have an ice staff and a luxury fan in my inventory on the surface. We also typically go into caves or ruins during summer. If anything goes wrong, then we resort to rollbacks.

Probably the most frustrating part of wildfires is that they can start just a little bit out of your vision, so you won't even see the smoldering until it's too late and the fire just spreads everywhere. That's kinda why I prefer small bases instead of huge builds.

 

...And don't even get me started on fire spread in singleplayer DS. It's instant, and a single flingo can't put a large fire out - If something (even a seed that a bird left) just outside the flingo range gets set on fire, your entire base is a fire farm.

[Rinkusan]

I'm a fan of smoldering personally. It's a seasonal obstacle that rewards the careful base builders who're frugal with their structure placement and flingomatics and base maids who do the under-appreciated dirty work of organizing and managing base inventory. 

I'd very much like for either smoldering to be buffed or a new summer hazard to be introduced, preferably after the first summer so that there's a sense of progression.  

[QuartzBeam]

I hate it with the fire of a thousand suns. But then again, it also hates me with the fire of a thousand suns; literally. So I guess the feeling is mutual.

 

Honestly, I think it's one of the most annoying, anti-fun mechanics in the game. At first glance, it seems like a fair challenge, since building flingos is for summer is similar to building lightning rods for spring. Except flingos are far more expensive, have less than half the range and need to be refueled every 5 days (without being particularly efficient about fuel either). Granted, that's not much of an issue when you are starting out and need only 1 or 2 flingos to cover your base. But when you get to expanding your base and decorating, it is an absolute pain in the butt.

 

So if you are into mega (or even medium) basing, the game essentially forces you to stop doing this thing you like for 11 days per year and hide away in the caves or sail around aimlessly. The sandstorm is the closest thing to a global countermeasure you can have (since nothing can smolder when you are in the sandstorm, not even things outside the sandstorm), but the oasis tends to spawn at the edge of the world, far away from most useful biomes. And it also requires playing that hair-pulling RNG game known as Oasis Fishing.

 

I'm really really really hoping this next update gives us a global countermeasure against it, like the Dripple Pipes and Howling Conch from Don't Starve. Else, I'm gonna have to go back to disabling them when I reach the late game...

[Well-met]

Isn't this thread more about Summer and less about the mechanic itself?

you know things can smolder by non-summer fire right

[Pikapikap]

I hope it will bring more difficulties. If Klei uses a new design in qol, I will also accept it. I like the challenge.

[GetNerfedOn]

3 minutes ago, Well-met said:

Isn't this thread more about Summer and less about the mechanic itself?

you know things can smolder by non-summer fire right

now that i think about it, yeah, thanks for pointing it out

will clarify 

 

[QuartzBeam]

3 minutes ago, Well-met said:

Isn't this thread more about Summer and less about the mechanic itself?

you know things can smolder by non-summer fire right

Most of these options only apply to the summer-specific smoldering.

[ArubaroBeefalo]

The simply idea of removing it makes me fear the future of the game

It could be so destructive but that is what makes summer a dangerous season, without it is just winter 2.0

I dont want dst to be a low cost sims/raid boss cheesing simulator

 

Edit: i would like an ocarine of rain like sw ones used in rog

[KeshS]

The other option of dealing with smoldering is unloading the area where it starts to smolder. Very useful if you can't reach a certain area or you are afraid you won't have time to extinguish, like swamp reed trap.

[ShadowDuelist]

Even though its much more efficient through a glitch, causing rains is yet another way to prevent the summer's wildfires.

They recently patched one of the ways to glitch the moslings to stay in summer, but the devs stated they would think about adding a better way to cast rain other than glitching moslings or wasting telelocator staves, so that could come handy.

[Pikapikap]

22 minutes ago, ArubaroBeefalo said:

The simply idea of removing it makes me fear the future of the game

It could be so destructive but that is what makes summer a dangerous season, without it is just winter 2.0

I dont want dst to be a low cost sims/raid boss cheesing simulator

 

Edit: i would like an ocarine of rain like sw ones used in rog

Absolutely agree, what we need is a Hard mode dst. Not easy mode dst.

[ArubaroBeefalo]

10 minutes ago, Pikapikap said:

Absolutely agree, what we need is a Hard mode dst. Not easy mode dst.

There is alreasy an easy mode: world editing+99% of the workshop so making official changes to make it less punishing is just a bad idea. Im not saying to make summer harder but klei already added a lot of help to deal with: smoldering (in rog everything burns in one second), caves without hot and the oasis

[Wardin25]

I really dont mind smoldering, but I do think it should be easier to see, if youre in your base and a fire starts in your chest zone, it will be almost imposible to see the smoldering

[Scrimbles]

I've had the suggestion come up before that smoldering should be limited to a new "heat wave" event that happens every couple of days.

This would create a predictable sort of pattern that alerts the player when stuff could start smoldering, and would make the mechanic feel more engaging, and less random.

 

On the other hand, heat waves could force the player to camp base and limit other activities.

 

Regardless, this still doesnt solve the problem of caves being way too strong against summer, dunno why Klei changed it so that you cant overheat by ambient temperature down there. I guess it mskes logical sense, but it removes the threat of summer.

[ArubaroBeefalo]

5 minutes ago, Scrimbles said:

I've had the suggestion come up before that smoldering should be limited to a new "heat wave" event that happens every couple of days.

This would create a predictable sort of pattern that alerts the player when stuff could start smoldering, and would make the mechanic feel more engaging, and less random.

 

On the other hand, heat waves could force the player to camp base and limit other activities.

 

Regardless, this still doesnt solve the problem of caves being way too strong against summer, dunno why Klei changed it so that you cant overheat by ambient temperature down there. I guess it mskes logical sense, but it removes the threat of summer.

Ye but a lot of un experience players cant deal with worms and sanity. I guess klei decide to make us choose between fire or worms

I see it as a good trade off but ofc when you have some experience sanity isnt an issue and you realize that worms are easier than hounds

I kinda prefer this than having to carry more items to cave exploration like in rog

[BeeClops]

I spend the 11 smoldering days in caves in general, i think it's an ok mechanic, but every time i get invested into a megabase i end up regretting i didn't turn them off completely. It also makes having your game open to the public in summer suicidal.

Does anyone know exactly how the "less" setting affects it?

[ArubaroBeefalo]

52 minutes ago, BeeClops said:

I spend the 11 smoldering days in caves in general, i think it's an ok mechanic, but every time i get invested into a megabase i end up regretting i didn't turn them off completely. It also makes having your game open to the public in summer suicidal.

Does anyone know exactly how the "less" setting affects it?

this is from wiki so it could be wrong

so it seems to reduce the % of entities triggering fire

[Primalflower]

flingomatics/caving are for puny little men 

[Well-met]

Am I the only one stock piling moose fans and using them for fires

the AoE is really massive

[GetNerfedOn]

34 minutes ago, Well-met said:

Am I the only one stock piling moose fans and using them for fires

the AoE is really massive

i stockpile them for temperature because when fires happen in base i usually get to them when they're over and everything's charred already and a fan won't do much to help in any case

[Wardin25]

2 hours ago, Lbphero said:

flingomatics/caving are for puny little men 

ur the puny little man edgy rick

[DaZoul]

6 hours ago, ShadowDuelist said:

They recently patched one of the ways to glitch the moslings to stay in summer, but the devs stated they would think about adding a better way to cast rain other than glitching moslings or wasting telelocator staves, so that could come handy.

next update the mysterious energy gonna give us a seed to plant, which will grow into a flower but only if you feed it 9 mandrakes, 3 krampus sacks and 5 bone armors, from the flower a baby water beefalo will rise which you will have to protect from daily hound waves featuring 25 Shadow Hounds which have area damage, and after the water beefalo grows up it'll go in heat, which is a boss battle you'll have to face, the difficulty of which is around the level of Enraged Misery 9 Iridescent Gem Crab King, afterwards a new baby water beefalo will grow, then repeat until you can somewhat safely farm their horns for Dripple Pipes (they do one-hit you and delete your steam account so yeah)

[Yuuko]

I really hate summer smolder.  I think my first posts in this forum were long rants about how horrible of a design they were, how miserable they made playing the game, and how much I wanted them to be changed.

I don't complain about this anymore, but I still think its bad design.

I do oasis and cave bases, and usually have at least 1 flingo area near any camp outside of those which I can run to if fire hounds spawn.  I also leave some ice staves and luxury fans about, and carry one with me as I go about topside.  So far this works well enough that I can't complain about FIRE==BAD but I still think it could be more interactive.

I think a cool change would be to have the sandstorm that happens in the oasis cover the entire topside intermittently similar to storms.  Have it only be during these sandstorms that wildfires can start.  These sandstorms could be much worse than just wildfire threats too possibly bringing new monsters with them, making desert goggles more useful while also giving some downtime where the player only needs to worry about overheating.