Wildfires, What are they good for?

[Starlogy]

17 hours ago, ALCRD said:

As annoying as the Volcano is in Dry Season (Shipwrecked) at least you get a warning to react accordingly before entire area around you ends up in flames.

Fires are simply a random middle finger to the player. At least a quote cue would be nice where characters notice something starting to smolder nearby and say something like "I smell something burning" that would be enough.

Honestly, this alone would make wildfires much more manageable. Warnings are a very fair tool to give to the player. You get warned for hounds. You get warned for bosses. You should get warned for a wildfire starting. Plus more quotes are always fun.

[Brago-sama]

10 minutes ago, Starlogy said:

You should get warned for a wildfire starting. Plus more quotes are always fun.

"It wasnt me this time i swear!" -Willow

[willell]

Fire is a negative influence in this game.

For example, in a combat system, fire attacks are only used in a few cases.

Relative freezing is more useful.

This is also the reason why Willow's ability is not nice in this game.The system of the game is rejecting the negative effects of the flame.Fire will be out of control, it will be destroyed, and it will only play a positive role in handling food.

The conventional short-range operation of the role makes it difficult to restrain the destructive power of fire in time.

So I think it is beneficial to change the fire system.

 

[goatt]

From the evolution of the game, Summer's wildfire made a lot of sense for DS survival game and it also makes sense for the survival aspect of the game.

But a lot of players nowadays are really casual and spoiled. Inconvenient challenges usually become unpopular.

So I think wildfire is still good for the sake of the game, but it's not good for the majority of the current player base.

[Yuuko]

46 minutes ago, goatt said:

From the evolution of the game, Summer's wildfire made a lot of sense for DS survival game and it also makes sense for the survival aspect of the game.

But a lot of players nowadays are really casual and spoiled. Inconvenient challenges usually become unpopular.

So I think wildfire is still good for the sake of the game, but it's not good for the majority of the current player base.

I don't think "spoiled" or "casual" are the right words.

For the shock value of lighting something on fire next to a new player who has no clue what's going on it might be exciting, but after literal years of playing, thousands of hours in game its uninteresting, unchallenging, and could be deleted with zero negative effect on the game whatsoever.

Its old, bland, and monotonous.  Its bad design is evident at this point because there are so many more interesting systems in the game and yet, wildfire is just what it is.  If we put it on a chart of "things you do" and "things done to you," and "things you interact with" and "things you do not interact with" wildfire would be in the corner of things done to you that you do not interact with.  Literally the worst thing to have in a game.

Should they delete it?  rework it?  I don't care.  At this point its been in the game so long, and we've received many ways to completely side step it (also with zero interaction, oasis / caves / tall trees / etc) that it really doesn't matter.  It can stay, sure - new players can maybe enjoy the shock value once or twice before googling "how to make sure this never happens again" where they will quickly find a satisfactory answer to completely sidestep the system.

[Mike23Ua]

1 hour ago, goatt said:

From the evolution of the game, Summer's wildfire made a lot of sense for DS survival game and it also makes sense for the survival aspect of the game.

But a lot of players nowadays are really casual and spoiled. Inconvenient challenges usually become unpopular.

So I think wildfire is still good for the sake of the game, but it's not good for the majority of the current player base.

From my experience it was great for single player DS, but it doesn’t translate well into DST- With that Said… there’s a lot of things that Do not Translate well into DST, and what I mean by that is what worked in a single player game- Becomes Chaotic in Multiplayer.

a Single Player can avoid wildfires by doing several different things, but if a single clueless player in the entire group doesn’t know “the rules” then Welp, your base just went up in a blazing inferno.. they’re to blame, they’re stupid & inexperienced let’s vote to kick- This does NOT make the game fun for them, in fact it stims Toxicity into the games player base, sure maybe in a group of very Very close friends avoiding challenges together may be exciting, but most the times.. I personally just “lock” my worlds with a Password & play through the entire season of Summer Alone before unlocking my world for players to rejoin.

Why?? Because Summer is great for trolls who KNOWS the Chaos it can bring, and also great for the players lacking game knowledge to accidentally troll.

Dont believe me? Fine.. did you know that an Unappeased Ant-Lion will go from only trying to hit you with 2 ground craters up to 7 in a row? No.. well it can- And unless you go appease or fight this thing in Summer, players who don’t know why the ground is breaking just caused what appears to be an earthquake right in your base that destroyed everything.

This is both players who are new to the game and don’t know any better, AND the ones who have played for forever and use the seasons very destructive nature, for things like weapons of intentional mass destruction.

Unfortunately, a lot of features in the game (not just summer or wildfires) share this same multiplayer Unfriendly approach, such as a single player being able to Rush Post CC content onto everyone else. Or playing Russian Roulette with Twins of Terror Phase 2.. or something as simple as having to throw your backpack on the ground to equip armor, none of it translates well into a game where your expected to cooperate and work together with strangers.

I feel like we’re about to see the dawning of a new era for DST, don’t ask me what I mean by that.. I just mean when a Dev highlights that there’s a lot of old mechanics they’d like to go back over & rework- clearly some big changes are being conjured up.

If Wildfires absolutely have to go (due strictly to the game being multiplayer..) then I hope some more interesting but less destructive content is added to Summer as a Season.. 

[Gotheran]

It can be frustrating on its own to have something you put time and effort into burn down out of your control, but with multiplayer factored in, even if no one is actively trying to troll or what have you, you're just opening the net wider and wider for the mechanic to cause serious harm to the world in general, losing dozens or hundreds of berry bushes, grass tufts, saplings, mushroom spawns, pig houses, spider nests, merm houses, and other difficult or outright non-renewable items because you had 4-5 people wandering around the world not aware of smouldering items just off screen. I still tend to look at this game through a single player lens because I have yet to see a server that doesn't have at least a seconds worth of delay for one, but also I don't usually join random servers for most games.

I also generally try to think about survival games in terms of how likely heat death is, as in when do renewable resources peter out and stop being enough to keep going, or if renewability is nearly non-existent how far can you take the supplies you do have. The Long Dark has alot of non-renewable resources, eventually you'd break every gun in the game given enough time, and its true most players will stop playing before that happens its fun to try and figure out how far you could go even if you would never play that long. Certainly the loss of some of the items that won't be renewable won't end your longevity with Don't Starve. Where it disappoints with Don't Starve is that DS has a big focus on resource renewability and being self sufficient, where The Long Dark is far more leaning into entropy and the idea that your supplies will eventually run out one way or the other.

[Mike23Ua]

To be fair, the berry bushes, saplings, etc your so concerned about not respawning actually DO Respawn if you play the game on Endless Mode, but if your playing in the appropriately named Survival Mode I think those resources are intentionally supposed to eventually burn out, otherwise they’d renew just like Endless Mode.

And since a previous March QoL update where if you started your 10,000+ day world in Survival Mode you can now at any time exit your world and change that mode to Endless-

I personally don’t see a problem with Wildfires & OTHER Destructive features being added to the game.

Its meant to bring a definitive “end” to your worlds resources at some point on the mode titled “Survival” but on “Endless” it shouldn’t matter what happens to your world and everything should respawn overtime.

[Ornge]

Wildfires are certainly an annoying mechanic on paper, but in practice stuff starts smoldering right next to the player and then you put it out. That's it. Very rarely have I ever lost anything due to wildfires in either singleplayer or dst (mostly singleplayer because fire is very mean there). It's one of those mechanics that sound super scary because the thought of something burning down your entire base in an instant makes you feel helpless. But in actuality, wildfires are not as common or as threatening as they seem.

8 hours ago, Starlogy said:

 You should get warned for a wildfire starting. 

Smoldering is the warning and it works fine

[Captain_Rage]

14 hours ago, _zwb said:

Above average trees requires SAILING and actually engage with OCEAN content. Ugh, nope thank you. Let's say I did get one seed, then I need 20 days and multiple visits to the waterlogged to get the materials I need. I'm not wasting my time on this :/

Plus this tree only protects a small area, this kinda limits my build and for some reason my pc struggles whenever I see a avove average tree, idk why but it makes the game literally unplayable.

My base might be "boring" but I don't care at all. I built it and I love it.

Did you mean: Volcano from Don't Starve Shipwrecked

Sailing and obtaining the first giant nut is great fun! Afterwards you are rewarded with stellar fire protection indefinitely. You can even be liberal where you place it. Default worlds have these streaks of water all over between the biomes. Once you get the hang of traversing the ocean it does not require a whole lot of resources or time. I can do it consistently in random games and I am not even a good player. All you need is a boat and an oar. Once you find driftwood and craft a better oar you will have it in no time.

If you are standing and actively watching the tree grow for 20 days you have a very unique way of playing the game indeed.

16 hours ago, Baark0 said:

Wildfires are most comparable to disease, both being a mechanic that incentivizes not interacting with it as the best way to deal with it (wildfires by hiding in the caves/oasis, disease by using gekkos/twiggy trees). 

You are gimping yourself. Stay on the surface and keep an Ice Staff at hand. It is really that simple to last through a summer without anything burning down.

 

Summer has its perks. The days are very long which make resource gathering and exploration easier. It is by far my preferred season for gathering resources on the surface. This is offset by a theoretical minimal risk of said resources catching fire if you linger for too long in the same place. This barely ever happens, coming from a player who spends most of the time of the summer in the game above ground or at sea. An Ice Staff is more than enough mitigate any risks of wildfire.

Obtaining a giant nut is not a time sink. Try it on a public server. Get enough food, cut stone and grass for the winch, build a boat, craft and oar, then simply row around until you find driftwood to craft a better oar which is more than enough for finding Pearl's Island within 4 days. Meanwhile you will have an empty bottle and can get the nut immediately once you obtain the blueprint for the winch. It is only one empty bottle.

You vastly overestimate the difficulty of getting out on the ocean in the early game.

[goatt]

3 hours ago, Shosuko said:

I don't think "spoiled" or "casual" are the right words.

For the shock value of lighting something on fire next to a new player who has no clue what's going on it might be exciting, but after literal years of playing, thousands of hours in game its uninteresting, unchallenging, and could be deleted with zero negative effect on the game whatsoever.

Its old, bland, and monotonous.  Its bad design is evident at this point because there are so many more interesting systems in the game and yet, wildfire is just what it is.  If we put it on a chart of "things you do" and "things done to you," and "things you interact with" and "things you do not interact with" wildfire would be in the corner of things done to you that you do not interact with.  Literally the worst thing to have in a game.

For a new player who hasn't experienced harsh summer and who hasn't figure out how to deal with wildfire, this is legit challenge.

It only becomes old and bland to someone who already figured it out long ago. Then wildfire becomes an inconvenience rather than a challenge.

Game does offer various way to deal with wildfire in late game, all of which has a price to pay.

Despite seen also as a base building game, DST is a survival game first. DST offer base building aspect by providing late game strategies such as ocean trees, oasis and plausible cave base. Game even offers an option to turn it off.

From survival point, wildfire is extremely easy to deal with. For multiplayer, it is a trouble if the owner or a veteran isn't present. But that's consistent with the survival aspect, that is, if someone doesn't know how to deal with wildfire, he will burn the base by accident.

To me it is a little tedious. But it wasn't tedious when I first started to play the game. I'm basically saying the same thing as you. The difference is I still value it being challenging to new players, as I was once new. I think new players deserve to experience the frustration and struggle.

For veteran like you and me, you can just turn the setting off.

"casual" and "spoiled" aren't right, i agree.

 

[ALCRD]

1 hour ago, Ornge said:

but in practice stuff starts smoldering right next to the player

Cow caca.

If this is how it supposed to work then it doesn't most of the time.

Many times i encountered situations where things burst in flame out of my field of vision. Where smoldering could not be seen. Cause it was off the edge of the screen. Resulting often to me returning to burned crap in that area.

Happens even when i wasn't moving and standing near crockpot cooking or crafting something then random bush or tree outside of my base range just started smoldering where the smoldering wasn't visible or audible (i was fully zoomed out)

and i only noticed when a bright light and fire noise came from the edge of my screen.

The area loaded around the player is bigger than what players field of vison covers. And guess what smoldering happens within the loaded area without taking into account player's vison. Which is just cow caca squared.

So unless you use mods that let you zoom out much more than game allows. THIS IS A PROBLEM.

I wish people would stop saying "smoldering happens on screen just put it out"

Cause no it does not most of the time. This is 100% disingenuous.

If it did happen reliably next to me as some of you claim it does i would have no problem with leaving wildfires on..

[_zwb]

3 hours ago, Captain_Rage said:

Sailing and obtaining the first giant nut is great fun! Afterwards you are rewarded with stellar fire protection indefinitely. You can even be liberal where you place it. Default worlds have these streaks of water all over between the biomes. Once you get the hang of traversing the ocean it does not require a whole lot of resources or time. I can do it consistently in random games and I am not even a good player. All you need is a boat and an oar. Once you find driftwood and craft a better oar you will have it in no time.

If you are standing and actively watching the tree grow for 20 days you have a very unique way of playing the game indeed.

You are gimping yourself. Stay on the surface and keep an Ice Staff at hand. It is really that simple to last through a summer without anything burning down.

 

Summer has its perks. The days are very long which make resource gathering and exploration easier. It is by far my preferred season for gathering resources on the surface. This is offset by a theoretical minimal risk of said resources catching fire if you linger for too long in the same place. This barely ever happens, coming from a player who spends most of the time of the summer in the game above ground or at sea. An Ice Staff is more than enough mitigate any risks of wildfire.

Obtaining a giant nut is not a time sink. Try it on a public server. Get enough food, cut stone and grass for the winch, build a boat, craft and oar, then simply row around until you find driftwood to craft a better oar which is more than enough for finding Pearl's Island within 4 days. Meanwhile you will have an empty bottle and can get the nut immediately once you obtain the blueprint for the winch. It is only one empty bottle.

You vastly overestimate the difficulty of getting out on the ocean in the early game.

I play shipwrecked a lot and I have to say, DST sailing is much worse than SW sailing. The ocean is so empty, you only get a few waterlogged biome in a world and there's no direct hint towards their locations.

This is boring. I'd rather go to the caves and explore every single biome, at least caves isn't just sea stacks, sea stacks and more sea stacks. And I actually get to interact with the game, not just aimlessly looking for a tree that butchers my frame rate.

[ALCRD]

20 minutes ago, _zwb said:

I play shipwrecked a lot and I have to say, DST sailing is much worse than SW sailing. The ocean is so empty, you only get a few waterlogged biome in a world and there's no direct hint towards their locations.

For real the more i play Shipwrecked the more i'm like "man i wish this or that was added / implemented in DST too"

[Gotheran]

I'm not fond of SW myself, I find sailing in both games largely unrewarding, but as far as how the sailing feels I do prefer DST's system a bit more, mostly because when combat does occur its not the weird janky system SW uses where you have to constantly inch closer to your target while doing the whole sailing animation that cancels your attacks, short of using bombs which i recall being hard to make due to gunpowder requirement, nitre being limited and rotten eggs being non-existent, its far easier to make eggs in DST and nitre is at least partially renewable. One thing SW sailing has over DST is the spy glass, makes it easier to find stuff in the massive swaths of nothing on the sea, which would trivialize the finding of waterlogged biomes but wouldn't make using above average trees any less of a grind.

[Mike23Ua]

20 minutes ago, ALCRD said:

For real the more i play Shipwrecked the more i'm like "man i wish this or that was added / implemented in DST too"

This is what I’ve been trying to say since 2019 when boats were first added to DST.. but I was meet with harsh backlash from the community with phrases like: “It doesn’t fit the atmosphere of DST” “I’d rather have New content then something I’ve already played before” or- “Just download & use mods that add them.”

I think what those players were really trying to say is that they did not like the gameplay mechanics of Shipwrecked or Hamlet & want them as far away from ruining DST for them as possible.

This is a completely unfair way of thinking though.. because IF Klei were to put shipwrecked and hamlet themed content into DST I would want it to be placed out at sea requiring boat travel to occupy all that very empty ocean space.. 

And for the players who want nothing to do with SW/Ham they can just live indefinitely on the Main Land & like most the “Ocean Content” Ignore it as completely optional.

Shipwrecked & Hamlet, biomes, mobs, resources & weather patterns (unique to their islands) would really go a massive distance in bringing the ocean to life.

Things like Pigskin would become infinitely renewable if Hamlet areas spawned the Vampire Bats instead of Hound Waves.

Overall adding SW/Ham content into DST would Help the game more than it would in hurting it.

And ironically enough- SW/Ham craftables and resources would give us even more ways to deal with Summer & Wildfires back on the Main Land.

I strongly feel like Summer needs an entire Overhaul, it is just far too destructive in a game where Klei expects you to work together with complete strangers in Multiplayer.. so much so that I just “lock” my worlds & play the entire season of summer alone, before letting players rejoin in Autumn.

[Gotheran]

4 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

Overall adding SW/Ham content into DST would Help the game more than it would in hurting it.

As long as Poison stays out of it I'm willing to try most things

[ALCRD]

5 minutes ago, Gotheran said:

As long as Poison stays out of it I'm willing to try most things

While getting poisoned yourself was a bit annoying i love how you could use the poison against other enemies by either letting them eat poisonous food or slash them with a poison spear. Which reduced their movement speed making kiting even easier.

Poison spear is awesome.

[_zwb]

45 minutes ago, ALCRD said:

For real the more i play Shipwrecked the more i'm like "man i wish this or that was added / implemented in DST too"

Sadly they can't do that because they made Shipwrecked in collaboration with Capybara Games, so klei can't add shipwrecked to dst for legal reasons. (Fun fact, in the base game's source code, shipwrecked is referred as "CAPY DLC", in the file dlcsupport.lua)

[ALCRD]

8 minutes ago, _zwb said:

Sadly they can't do that because they made Shipwrecked in collaboration with Capybara Games, so klei can't add shipwrecked to dst for legal reasons. (Fun fact, in the base game's source code, shipwrecked is referred as "CAPY DLC", in the file dlcsupport.lua)

They don't have to copy paste the entire SW exactly (That's what Island Adventure is for)

I meant that some of the SW mechanics or items / gear that functions in similar manner and some more biomes and sea life based on SW ones (based as in for example like the Waterlogged is heavily based on Mangrove) that would by really great to make embarking on a Ocean adventure more fun.

[_zwb]

37 minutes ago, Gotheran said:

short of using bombs which i recall being hard to make due to gunpowder requirement, nitre being limited and rotten eggs being non-existent, its far easier to make eggs in DST

Not true. You can make your game Hamlet compatible and buy coconades from pig shopkeepers for 20 oincs each. Do you know how easy it is to farm oincs? Just get some cacti and some bee boxes boom infinite money (trade stingers for 3 oincs each).

 

Also eggs. You can massively farm monster meat by building ape pods and dragoon dens together(with wall dividing them), you can afk and the monkeys will kill the dragoons for you. Easy monster meat and dragoon heart.

[Hornete]

14 minutes ago, ALCRD said:

While getting poisoned yourself was a bit annoying i love how you could use the poison against other enemies by either letting them eat poisonous food or slash them with a poison spear. Which reduced their movement speed making kiting even easier.

Poison spear is awesome.

Poison is an awesome mechanic. I can't believe people dislike it. Sure it sucks getting poisoned yourself but like you said the benefits of using it to your advantage made it really great to use.

As a reminder for what point does on enemies it:

• Slows their movement speed
• Slows their attack speed
• AND Reduces the damage they deal!

I wish they'd take notes from the benefits/buffs of poison. Been pushing for years for them to make it so Walter's slowdown rounds also slow a mobs attack speed.

17 minutes ago, _zwb said:

Sadly they can't do that because they made Shipwrecked in collaboration with Capybara Games, so klei can't add shipwrecked to dst for legal reasons. (Fun fact, in the base game's source code, shipwrecked is referred as "CAPY DLC", in the file dlcsupport.lua)

Klei is the publisher of SW, and so likely have full ownership over it, it would be quite strange for a publisher to not even have full ownership over the DLC they're selling! I'm no lawyer but even that would strike off as weird to me. Plus, they've already used parts of Shipwrecked in Hamlet and DST! Sailing mechanic and many other mechanics/items were reused in Hamlet, and a lot of crockpot dishes + Wobsters + animations were used in the development of DST's ocean.

[_zwb]

1 minute ago, Hornete said:

Poison is an awesome mechanic. I can't believe people dislike it. Sure it sucks getting poisoned yourself but like you said the benefits of using it to your advantage made it really great to use.

As a reminder for what point does on enemies it:

• Slows their movement speed
• Slows their attack speed
• AND Reduces the damage they deal!

I wish they'd take notes from the benefits/buffs of poison. Been pushing for years for them to make it so Walter's slowdown rounds also slow a mobs attack speed.

Klei is the publisher of SW, and so likely have full ownership over it, it would be quite strange for a publisher to not even have full ownership over the DLC they're selling! I'm no lawyer but even that would strike off as weird to me. Plus, they've already used parts of Shipwrecked in Hamlet and DST! Sailing mechanic and many other mechanics/items were reused in Hamlet, and a lot of crockpot dishes + Wobsters + animations were used in the development of DST's ocean.

They don't own the boat assets I think

[-Variant]

8 minutes ago, Hornete said:

Poison is an awesome mechanic.

I need more Poison lovers here. Poison was always one of my favorite mechanics.

[Yuuko]

I prefer the DST boats to what SW had.  They were basically water shoes, way too simple.  The boats we have in DST give us different cool ways to interact with them !  Those could use some small improvements, but largely the problem is vision and speed.  Seeing only the screen your in just isn't good enough with their lack of maneuverability.  We need the spyglass so we can scout as we travel to make our slower movements more efficient.  We also need better turning / breaking so once we do pick up speed we're able to properly handle it.

Besides that, the main thing I wouldn't want from SW is the surplus basic resources - grass and twigs are fine.  Things that SW did that we need?  Beaches, waves, different vegetation based on the area (all we have are berries and carrots for the whole map lol,) more diverse biomes, islands (really at this point DST needs island generation in some way.)