Nerf berry bush needed ?


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I actually catch rabbits more or less exclusivly with traps, yet, I always have a chest filled with morsels. the issue with rabbits is not that they are easy to catch with or without traps...

Truthfully I can't say I've ever done a comparison, but another user was kind enough to perform some research. Here's their post quoted from another thread:

Don't forget that you need to spend time gathering resources, placing traps and checking them after some time. No-trap hunting is more efficient because you can do it just passing through and obtaining 1 morsel will take 2-3 seconds instead of minutes.

I checked both options. I spent half of a day gathering supplies and placing 5 traps, and when I returned i got 5 morsel at the end of the day. Then I spent another day and half checking traps and reusing them. Summary - 2,5 days for 25 morsel. And I did some other stuff, but not a lot anyway.

The second option gave me 26 morsel in one day. And I can do all that I want, having enough food for 2-3 days concentrating on my tasks.

So there are some other factors to consider. But going back to your suggestion...

...the issue is just that they respawn way too fast. same for the bushes, there is no need to prevent people from making berry farms if they want to, just make the berry respawn slower, not every 5 days, but every 8 or 10 days.

Same goes for the farm issue, if it can get abused with too much poop, just make the beefalo poop less.

I think we agree about respawns for bunnies and berries. That's an interesting suggestion about the fertilizing issue. It's true, maybe the problem isn't with the ability to fertilize crops so they grow faster, rather the issue may be with the amount of manure dropped by beefalo. Huh. You may be right about, by reducing the "poop rate" (new term) that would still give players the option to fertilize crops for faster growth without making it over-powered.

all these issues can be dealt with just by some number juggling, there is no need to spend time on coding mechanics that rebalance parts of a game that isnt even finished yet. Not to mention that tweaking numbers of game mechanics that are already implemented usually is much less likely to cause new bugs compared to whole new game mechanics, so thats even more time the devs can spend on development progression.

I like to think that some of my ideas are easy to implement, while others are harder. The DEVs can decide when and what to implement at their own pace. And maybe even undo a quick nerf when a better "counter" is coded later on.

I am not saying that the suggestions made in this thread are bad, imo, they are just not needed and a, sorry for the harsh words, waste of time right now, since I am very sure that the development team has a ton of stuff on their to do list already.

Well time is what you make of it. I have lots of free time right now, so I like to muse. :)

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well, I guess we can agree on most parts then. again, your ideas arn't bad, and it sure would enrich the game if animals were able to steal your food from bushes and fields, nothing to discuss here, I just think that this is something we can have later on, while now, tweaking numbers is enough :)

about the poop ration :D besides the possible abuse, the poop just gets a bit annoying aswell, I usually have my basecamp near a beefy herd and they literally poop all over the place, so a bit less of that is not only a way of balancing, but also would make me feel a lot more home in my basecamp.

about the trap comment though... Kasiornis seems to be a bit bias in favor of active hunting.

trapping is done at night, not during the day (at least if you know what you are doing, and it seems Kasiornis does not), in the camps light circle, and I get 20-25 morsel in one night, not in 2.5 days, plus, running after rabbits, circling around their holes, and also the time needed to see what hole is most likely the home of what rabbit most likely takes more than 2 seconds.

But honestly, I pretty much think that the question of "To trap, or not to trap" will be something generations of don't starve players will be bashing their heads about. Let the hunters hunt, and the trappers trap :)

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This is true Bogpad and it's something I have to remind myself of when I'm in alphas/betas. The game isn't complete yet and all the content isn't there yet. So it's possible that by the time everything gets implemented the berries will be needed as they are, sort of a lifeline in the early stages. I also fall into the active hunting rather than trap category.

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about the poop ration :D besides the possible abuse, the poop just gets a bit annoying aswell, I usually have my basecamp near a beefy herd and they literally poop all over the place, so a bit less of that is not only a way of balancing, but also would make me feel a lot more home in my basecamp.

Less manure sounds like a good idea. Also, maybe they could reduce the proximity connected with manure's "buzzing fly" sound effect. It feels like you can hear it far too easily, even when it's not nearby.

about the trap comment though... Kasiornis seems to be a bit bias in favor of active hunting.

trapping is done at night, not during the day (at least if you know what you are doing, and it seems Kasiornis does not), in the camps light circle, and I get 20-25 morsel in one night, not in 2.5 days, plus, running after rabbits, circling around their holes, and also the time needed to see what hole is most likely the home of what rabbit most likely takes more than 2 seconds.

Hmmm. You may be right. I admit that my knowledge on trap hunting is limited, as I switched to active hunting after only a few days. Also, I hunted only during the day because I was under the assumption that all the bunnies would be gone during the night. Of course I recently spotted a post where someone mentioned rabbits pop their heads out of their holes at night and I suppose a trap placed over such a rabbit hole would catch it. Of course traps do still need to be maintained to offset the somewhat hands-free aspect of food gathering they permit.

As for 2 seconds... maybe he was thinking about the easiest situation. If you stumble across a rabbit outside its hole and you're already coming from a direction opposite from it, then yes, you could just keep walking to cut it off from its hole and then head straight towards the rabbit for the kill in 2-3 seconds. But that's a best case scenario. Usually you bump into a rabbit and its in some way between you and its hole and you need to skirt around it before going in for the kill. In those cases it's more like 5-8 seconds. And then there's also the issue of missing the strike (~1-in-5 chance) or coming across multiple bunnies/holes and failing to guess which rabbit will escape to which hole.

Then again for me it's reached the stage where food isn't an issue, so I kill bunnies more in passing than hunting terms. I'll be running off to, say, build pig houses on a swamp island and come across an easy kill rabbit (the 2-second variety), so I think "Why not" and whack it. I usually don't even bother picking up the meat morsel unless I'm actually short on food, so my main island is litered with meat around rabbit holes.

I think once Kevin introduces rotting... then that will at least curb this sort of behaviour from me. :)

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No, I don't agree. Berries give very little food. If you have enough time to harvest that many berry bushes, you have time to build a log suit and spear. Of these two options, hunting beefalo is FAR more effective. Beefalo meat gives much much more health and satiation than berries. Even rabbit hunting is more effective, and morsels more filling, than berries.

Farm plots are also more effective than berries. Something like an eggplant gives almost full satiation. Again, one eggplant > 10 berries. It also grows in the same time as a bush, or even faster if you have a high research farm plot. Yes, sometimes a seed will grow something weak like a carrot, but if you have 2-3 plots, that's as effective as 15 berry bushes.

Berries are cute and fun. That's all.

Edited by jres80
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the power of the berries lies in amassing them around your camp. if you have 30+ berry bushes at your camp, you get so many berries that you hardly will be able to use them all before the next respawn. that makes them so powerfull.

farmplots need you to gather seeds and manure, both easy tasks, yet, still a restriction, while berry bushes work completely without your doing.

Also keep in mind that beefalos may give a lot of meat, yet they are not respawning, and so a finite source of food, berries are infinite.

I admit that one berry indeed is weak, but 3 berries together with a morsel used in a crock pot give you a very high bonus food item that is incredibly easy and fast to obtain, in addition with no risk for your life at all, unlike hunting beefalos, sure, it is not that hard to do, but still, it is something that can kill you, berry bushes and rabbits can't, even in the worst case scenario! (though I admit that I once was nearly killed by a rabbit, because it lured a werepig right in my direction, thank god the pig kept chasing the rabbit while it ran past me close enough to touch it!)

But you are also right, it is not a simple berry problem, food in general is too easy to get when you settled in the game. The problem is, if you make it harder t get food, the first days will be an increadibly and unfun struggle, while as is, if you are a few days in the game(let's say 20), food is too easy to get.

It will be a really hard thing for the devs to sort that problem out.

@ mobius: the idea of a pig house in a tentacle swamp is actually genius, I have to try that!

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Think rabbit hunting is easy now? try this... put a berry or carrot on the ground near some rabbits. Let the rabbit come to the food and start the "nibbling" animation. Now run up and slaughter it as the rabbit will not run while they are eating.As an added bonus you get the food back too. Morsels for days.

For easy daily meat build 2-3 pig houses near your camp and kill them every mourning for a free meal.

I still say the option to dig up and replant things doesn't fit with the feel of the game, everything else is temporary. You constantly need to build traps, torches, fires, etc. I refuse to dig up stuff and place it all near my base. I enjoy making expeditions and picking a single resource to go after. bring an axe, a bedroll, and a stack of meat and head to the "forest island" to make a day of wood collection.

TL;DR

-Agree bunny spawning needs a nerf.

-Get rid of the shovel's effect on the berry bush.

Edited by PrincessJane
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About the not nerfing becose of the game not beeing finished: How are we supose to give inout to anything in that casa? We cant suggest this and that or comment on theese and thoose becose maybe when the game is finished it will be different in a way and the suggestions wont matter or be under or over powered.

We have to give crituiqe to the game as it is becose thats all we got.

About berry bushes: I agree with Jane, sortov. I like to be able to remove anything I want to clean up my living space. So maybe use the shovel to destroy grass, saplings and bushes. But not move them.

Also, Kevin mentioned something about there beeing no downside to having large collections of these things. So something could already be on the way to nerf things up :)

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Well the gobble only takes berries on the ground right? Then it doesn't really count :)

sadly, I think kevins hint was indeed aiming for the gobbler, I doubt there is any more on the list for that right now.

the plus side is, now that the gobbler is there, it is possible to make him a threat, maybe not for your life, but for the berries. let him be able to eat berries from the bushes, not only the ones from the ground, or let bushes drop the berries once they are "ripe", so if you don't tend your bushes in time, there will Sooner or later be a gobbler eating all your foodz.

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Berry bushes are definitely too good, it totally eclipses the other food sources. I feel like it should take a combination of different sources in order to survive, 2 or 3 different sources to be comfortable.

I can see two different ways to tackle the problem, either making their growth periods longer or making the plant unmovable. I think it would be more fitting if they weren't movable anyway, foraging berries in a survival situation makes more sense to me than farming them.

As it is the game sorely lacked challenge for me and the biggest reason is the berry bushes. Day 70 on my first playthrough and survival has been an afterthought since around 15 days in. That said I'm loving the game and am totally happy with my purchase.

Berry farm:http://i.imgur.com/aHtTt.jpg

Edited by hailoyu
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