Ocean content buffs

[Masked Koopa]

Here are my takes, but I wanna know what you guys reckon as well, since the closer the community is to agreement, the better a shot we have at Klei listening.

To make a long point short, a LOT of the ocean content introduced during return of them is incredibly underpowered. A lot of this seems to have been a result of community concerns at the time, but I think most if not all of these concerns were an overreaction, as we can see the results of the balance today - a bunch of content that's essentially worthless due to providing worse rewards than the land-based alternative.
 

Salt Crystals:

• De-spoiling now works on crock pot food.
• 1 salt crystal will now fully restore the freshness of 5 items.

This should make salt crystals a viable way to keep your food fresh for long periods of time, and serve as both an early game alternative to the Polar Bearger Bin, and a late-game complement to it.

Cookie Cutter Cap:

• Now has 25 thorns damage, similar to the Brightshade Armour's 10.
• Now has 75% armour value.

The cap is currently a much more out-of-the-way version of the football helmet while also being entirely inferior to it. Thorns damage would make it much more unique, and make it an interesting complement to body armour. While the increase in armour value may (technically) make it worse as a complememt to body armour in terms of durability, it'd make it at least usable when used as the only form of protection.

Cookie Cutter Shell:

• Can now be hammered for broken shell bits.

Cookie cutter shells have a few uses as ingredients for lures, but broken shell bits are quite nice for shell bumpers, and another source of them wouldn't hurt. Plus, you really only need so many lures, especially if you are skilled at ocean fishing and don't lose them frequently.

Broken Shell:

• Now stacks to 40

I know it's not technically ocean-exclusive but it relates to the above, and the stack limitation on this item is absurd, making no sense balance-wise or in terms of logic.

Cookie Cutter:

• Cookie Cutter Shell drop rate 50%->100%

The cap already costs 4 shells, and having to kill ~8 Cookie Cutters for a single hat just seems silly, especially given the damage they can do to your boat.

Ocean Debris:

For reference, the original loot table:

My reccomended table:

• Much more frequently spawning.
• Spawn in clusters of 2-5.
• If they spawn more in shallow ocean, change this to make them spawn everywhere (not well documented as to whether this is the case).

This aims to remedy the following:

1. The ocean is currently a 'resource drain', in the sense that boating requires resources that cannot be easily found on the ocean. Adding a source gold and flint would greatly lower the materials the player needs to collect before setting sail.
2. In addition, basic resources like grass and twigs are nigh absent on the ocean. Making Ocean Debris more akin to tumbleweeds would definitely remedy this. Grass especially has a lot of uses for boat structures like sails and anchors, so it has been bumped up above kelp.
3. Bull Kelp Stalks are currently essentially nonrenewable due to the absurd rarity, while Sea Weeds and Anenemies are entirely nonrenewable. Sea Weeds are much less 'spammable' than Kelp or Anenemy traps, so giving them the low rarity feels a little more sensible.
4. The fishing gear has also been put into one category instead of being needlessly split between two tiers of rarity.

Rockjaw :

• Now drops 5-15 rocks.
• Now drops 2-3 Barnacles

Rockjaws clearly have a jaw made of rock, and sea stacks are not the most reliable source of rocks due to the tendency for the rocks to fall in the water, and their nonrenewable nature. Rockjaws are also not particularly rewarding to kill in their current state, so a boost to their drops would be very much welcome.

Skittersquid:

• Groups are now about twice as large
• Will now prioritise jumping on your boat to eat meat off the floor over chasing fish
• HP 170 -> 100
• Monster meat drop chance 100% -> 50%
• Increased spawn chance if the player is in darkness

Skittersquids are currently more of a funny critter than a viable source of light bulbs, which seems a shame since it'd be a nice alternative to going down to caves to make your first lantern, as well as a way to refill while boating. The change to chase meat is to allow the player to lure them in if the player wants to go fishing.

Seedshell:

• Stack size: 20->40
• Damage: 23.8 -> 68

These things suck. Any balance concerns Klei or the community might have had were unwarranted, they are so awful, good god. This honestly probably won't even make them worth the effort, so if ya'll have any additional ideas, by all means pitch them.

Barnacle Nigiri:

• Healing: 40->60

This item is currently pierogi with an inferior spoilage timer, and much more specific ingredients. Absolutely ridiculous. It should heal AT LEAST as much as Wobster Bisuque, making it a mass-produceable very high HP food.

Barnacle Pita:

• Sanity: 5->33

Butter muffin but with meat's eating animation time and barnacles instead of butterfly wings, one of the most basic and easy to obtain ingredients in the entire game. This will make it a superfood for all 3 stats, and a great sanity top-up for if a player kills a Rockjaw, or happens to come across some Sea Weeds on the ocean.

Barnacle Linguine:

• Sanity: 20 -> 50

Would now be Jelly salad, but with a much better hunger value. Less barnacle-efficient than pita, but saves on filler.

Stuffed Fish heads:

• Hunger: 75 ->150
• Health: 20->40

These things have a spoilage time of three days, and most of you probably forgot they exist, or that they require barnacles. Being twice as good is like the bare minimum.
Sunken Chest:

For reference, the current loot table:

My suggestion:

Note that this is meant to be a general suggestion to cover the following:

1. Putting in a bunch of Malbatross feathers is incredibly dumb, especially now that the items no longer require blueprints. If Malbatross isn't dropping enough feathers, increase his drops.
2. Putting basic boat items like sails and an anchor makes no sense whatsoever. You have to help pearl to even make the pinch n' winch in the first place, so you're probably already going to have a boat with most if not all of these by the time you have treasure
3. Less random junk that doesn't even feel like treasure and serves no function. Stuff like moonglass, moonrock, cookie cutter shells, salt crystals and dead fish have no place in a treasure chest. If these absolutely must be loot in underwater objects, add them to ocean debris, this is meant to be a treasure box.
4. We already get plenty of lures and such from pearl. Once again, not something that belongs in a treasure box.
5. A way to get more empty bottles would be much appreciated.

Fish Food:

• Now always creates a new school of fish, similar to Wickerbottom's fish book.
• Now obtain 5 per bottle instead of 1.
• Increases the odds of Malbatross spawning when hooking a Deep Sea Bass

 Most of you probably didn't even know this item exists. It has been totally and utterly outclassed by the Angler's Survival guide, despite the latter being much easier to obtain, free (assuming a decent sanity source or being used on lunar island), and infinite use.

Gnarwail:

• Now spawn in pods of 2-5.
• Have herd behaviour but not mentality (won't defend each other when attacked, but will stick together)

Much too uncommon in number for the horn to be even remotely consistenly obtainable for the strident trident, and it'd generally be nice to see them more often, they are funny fellows.

Strident Trident:

• Land damage: 27.2 -> 68
• Water damage: 68 -> 102
• Spell damage: 85 -> 150
• Right click can now be used on land (or on a boat) to summon rain.

Needlessly underpowered item, its only current use is in farming fish, but the Moon Quay Cannons can do the same thing while also killing the fish, making this item only useful for Wurt players willing to switch to Wickerbottom.

Spectackler Box :

• Fishing items will now be automatically put in here instead of the inventory. (Excludes things like seeds, figs, twigs, etc)
• Equipping an ocean fishing rod will automatically open this
• Now has a storage slot dedicated to an ocean fishing rod, visually puts the rod next to it.

Ocean fishing is currently way too annoying in terms of inventory management. This item alleviates the issue slightly, but it should honestly just solve it. Ocean fishing is never going to be competitive with other food sources, so it should at the very least be easy on the inventory and seamless. This would let you avoid lures and bobbers in your inventory, as well as let you hold all fishing items in a single slot when not in use.

Ocean fishing :

• Now gives small amounts of santity for hooking, reeling, etc.

Sanity is currently quite hard to come by, and fishing is currently a not-so-useful activity. This would handily address both issues, and make sense for such a relaxing activity.

[DownloadADuck]

All these suggestions are really good, but I do think that there should be some changes to seaweeds. They are very late game to farm and are also pretty annoying and rng based to farm aswell

[chirsg]

Spoiler

Spoiler

24 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

• De-spoiling now works on crock pot food.

As good as it would be, no. I'm not of the uncompromising lot, but this crosses a line.

24 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

• Now has 25 thorns damage, similar to the Brightshade Armour's 10.
• Now has 75% armour value.

Yes

25 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

• Can now be hammered for broken shell bits.

 

yes

25 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

• Now stacks to 40

 

Yes. Why isnt' this a thing already?

26 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

• HP 170 -> 100

Skitter squids shouldn't be nerfed. They never have really caused that many problems and they guarantee a light bulb. As much as people say that it helps newer players if some things were given to them as a head start, we shouldn't straight out be nerfing things in the game.

28 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

 

Seedshell:

• Stack size: 20->40
• Damage: 23.8 -> 68

These things suck. Any balance concerns Klei or the community might have had were unwarranted, they are so awful, good god. This honestly probably won't even make them worth the effort, so if ya'll have any additional ideas, by all means pitch them.

Barnacle Nigiri:

• Healing: 40->60

This item is currently pierogi with an inferior spoilage timer, and much more specific ingredients. Absolutely ridiculous. It should heal AT LEAST as much as Wobster Bisuque, making it a mass-produceable very high HP food.

Barnacle Pita:

• Sanity: 5->33

Butter muffin but with meat's eating animation time and barnacles instead of butterfly wings, one of the most basic and easy to obtain ingredients in the entire game. This will make it a superfood for all 3 stats, and a great sanity top-up for if a player kills a Rockjaw, or happens to come across some Sea Weeds on the ocean.

Barnacle Linguine:

• Sanity: 20 -> 50

Would now be Jelly salad, but with a much better hunger value. Less barnacle-efficient than pita, but saves on filler.

Stuffed Fish heads:

• Hunger: 75 ->150
• Health: 20->40

These things have a spoilage time of three days, and most of you probably forgot they exist, or that they require barnacles. Being twice as good is like the bare minimum.

yeah ok, why not.

29 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

Sunken Chest:

problem isn't the loot table. It's the frequency of how much they appear from a bottle spawn. I'm of the opinion they should always spawn from bottles. 

30 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

 

Gnarwail:

• Now spawn in pods of 2-5.
• Have herd behaviour but not mentality (won't defend each other when attacked, but will stick together)

Much too uncommon in number for the horn to be even remotely consistenly obtainable for the strident trident, and it'd generally be nice to see them more often, they are funny fellows.

I like it

31 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

 

• Land damage: 27.2 -> 68
• Water damage: 68 -> 102
• Spell damage: 85 -> 150
• Right click can now be used on land (or on a boat) to summon rain.

Needlessly underpowered item, its only current use is in farming fish, but the Moon Quay Cannons can do the same thing while also killing the fish, making this item only useful for Wurt players willing to switch to Wickerbottom.

i think water damage is too powerful. 

32 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

 

• Fishing items will now be automatically put in here instead of the inventory. (Excludes things like seeds, figs, twigs, etc)
• Equipping an ocean fishing rod will automatically open this
• Now has a storage slot dedicated to an ocean fishing rod, visually puts the rod next to it.

Good intention, but troublesome. tackle boxes drop to the floor when opened. 

33 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

 

Ocean fishing :

• Now gives small amounts of santity for hooking, reeling, etc.

Sanity is currently quite hard to come by, and fishing is currently a not-so-useful activity. This would handily address both issues, and make sense for such a relaxing activity.

 

yes, why not

 

 

 

Some I agree, some I disagree

[Cassielu]

You forgot the most important one.

Accursed Trinket: Delete

Pirate Raid: Greatly greatly geatly greatly reduce frequency and randomness... or Delete

[Masked Koopa]

3 hours ago, chirsg said:

Some I agree, some I disagree

In regard to the Skittersquids, the intent was to raise the overall light bulb count by doubling the number of squids but halving their HP and monster meat. I wanted to suggest them dropping 2 bulbs, but I figured that'd make less sense.

As for salt crystals I really don't think it'd be very unbalanced, I think it just sounds kind of dramatic.

As for the trident, where do you reckon you'd put the damage at?

2 hours ago, Cassielu said:

You forgot the most important one.

Accursed Trinket: Delete

Pirate Raid: Greatly greatly geatly greatly reduce frequency and randomness... or Delete

I was trying to focus on ROT ocean content mostly because I think Waterlogged and Moon Quay are not balanced in the same way.

 

3 hours ago, DownloadADuck said:

All these suggestions are really good, but I do think that there should be some changes to seaweeds. They are very late game to farm and are also pretty annoying and rng based to farm aswell

My focus was moreso on their loot (barnacle foods, seedshells) before the weeds themselves, as I think it is good if they have items worth getting before it is decided how easy they should be to farm.

[chirsg]

4 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

As for the trident, where do you reckon you'd put the damage at?

2 hours ago, Cassielu said:

Under 100. 100 damage threshold is pretty huge. Even the base damage, while it should be more than 50, I don't know if it should be a dark sword.
As much powercreep as the darksword is experiencing against it, it should still be the dark sword. 

6 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

In regard to the Skittersquids, the intent was to raise the overall light bulb count by doubling the number of squids but halving their HP and monster meat. I wanted to suggest them dropping 2 bulbs, but I figured that'd make less sense.

Even if the schools doubled, They should at least be stronger than 2 hits from a dark sword. I don't think they should be at 100hp.

I'm not trying to poo poo on your line of suggestions. There are overwhelming more good parts than bad. Your heart and mind are in the right place. You've just put in a LOT of ideas. 

[NoodlemanNed]

5 hours ago, Masked Koopa said:

Now drops 5-15 rocks.

i think it would be better if these guys dropped flint instead, you already mentioned how sea stacks give you an abundant amount (even the monkey portal gives them). flint is also currently non existent on the ocean besides the non renewable boulders on lunar island, and having a reliable way to craft basic tools seems reasonable. I did see that you put flint in the ocean debris loot table, but for such a basic material i think it makes sense for there to be a somewhat abundant source of it.

overall very cool suggestions

 

3 hours ago, Cassielu said:

Accursed Trinket: Delete

i think this is the only issue with pirates currently. they can be pretty tough to deal with currently but it still can be managed with some basic prep. my issue is that being equipped to fight pirates still leaves you with a "punishment" that is neither difficult nor engaging. having the passive options against pirates is good, but punishing players for standing their ground seems like a really dumb idea for designing enemies that you cant escape from.

[arubaro]

7 hours ago, Masked Koopa said:

Sunken Chest

they also should get rid of the 4 chests per world limit

is not multiplayer friendly and s*cks hard, i had 2 chests filled with message in bottles waiting to be opened when i decided to go into a "sunken chest hunting season".

would be funnier to raise that limit so players can go and gather all the chests instead of going to 4 just to see they need to go back and pick a new one that spawned in an area already visited making the process way more cumbersome 

[_zwb]

1 hour ago, arubaro said:

they also should get rid of the 4 chests per world limit

There's no limit to how many chests that can spawn. Only 4 chests can show their map icon, making a illusion of spawning limit.

8 hours ago, Masked Koopa said:

Strident Trident:

• Land damage: 27.2 -> 68
• Water damage: 68 -> 102
• Spell damage: 85 -> 150
• Right click can now be used on land (or on a boat) to summon rain.

Needlessly underpowered item, its only current use is in farming fish, but the Moon Quay Cannons can do the same thing while also killing the fish, making this item only useful for Wurt players willing to switch to Wickerbottom.

This buff is kinda OP considering Wickerbottom can mass farm those, feels like cutlass supreme from SW, which is a dark sword without sanity drain. At least it gives players incentive to actually fight crab king I guess.

[finn from human]

13 minutes ago, _zwb said:

There's no limit to how many chests that can spawn. Only 4 chests can show their map icon, making a illusion of spawning limit.

Are you sure about this? I checked in a test world and after reading 22 bottles, of which about 10 of those made the "Ding!" sound and opened my map to indicate I had found a treasure, there were still only 4 treasures in the world.

[_zwb]

13 minutes ago, finn from human said:

Are you sure about this?

After a bit more digging, yes, that is true. Did you just count how many map icons are there? That wouldn't work

[Ardcrumb]

6 hours ago, Cassielu said:

You forgot the most important one.

Accursed Trinket: Delete

Pirate Raid: Greatly greatly geatly greatly reduce frequency and randomness... or Delete

I'm not accepting wonkey slander on this thread 

[Masked Koopa]

1 hour ago, _zwb said:

There's no limit to how many chests that can spawn. Only 4 chests can show their map icon, making a illusion of spawning limit.

This buff is kinda OP considering Wickerbottom can mass farm those, feels like cutlass supreme from SW, which is a dark sword without sanity drain. At least it gives players incentive to actually fight crab king I guess.

The thing is, DST already has a pesudo cutlass supreme in the form of the glass cutter, a dark sword with only 25 less uses, as well as the brightshade sword, which has 200(!) uses, twice that of a darksword. I think chrisg may have a point about the water damage being too high, but dealing the same damage as the darksword really isn't a big deal. Sure it has more uses, but the darksword's big claim to fame over the glass cutter is its ability to be crafted on the go by carrying living logs and nightmare fuel. The Strident trident would just be an upgrade to the glass cutter, but with more expensive ingredients.

[_zwb]

4 minutes ago, Masked Koopa said:

the darksword's big claim to fame over the glass cutter is its ability to be crafted on the go by carrying living logs and nightmare fuel. The Strident trident would just be an upgrade to the glass cutter, but with more expensive ingredients.

True, I should've taken the non stackable ingredients into account

[arubaro]

4 hours ago, _zwb said:

There's no limit to how many chests that can spawn. Only 4 chests can show their map icon, making a illusion of spawning limit.

even weirder

when i have 4 chests marked in the map and i read bottle with a new chest it points to an old one, does it means that a new one spawned in another place but the game doesn't tell you? because i never saw any sunken chest that wasnt marked in the map 

[_zwb]

3 minutes ago, arubaro said:

does it means that a new one spawned in another place but the game doesn't tell you?

Yes It'll keep doing this until there are less than 4 treasures in the world

[Tal_]

5 hours ago, Masked Koopa said:

The thing is, DST already has a pesudo cutlass supreme in the form of the glass cutter, a dark sword with only 25 less uses, as well as the brightshade sword, which has 200(!) uses, twice that of a darksword. I think chrisg may have a point about the water damage being too high, but dealing the same damage as the darksword really isn't a big deal. Sure it has more uses, but the darksword's big claim to fame over the glass cutter is its ability to be crafted on the go by carrying living logs and nightmare fuel. The Strident trident would just be an upgrade to the glass cutter, but with more expensive ingredients.

I agree. You can get a darksword in the first few days playing, whereas to unlock this you need to find and kill CK. Also, unlike the darksword, this only acts as a dark sword when on the ocean, on land it is next to useless.

[_zwb]

I made a mod implementing some of those buffs

[Hornete]

4 hours ago, _zwb said:

Yes It'll keep doing this until there are less than 4 treasures in the world

 

5 hours ago, arubaro said:

even weirder

when i have 4 chests marked in the map and i read bottle with a new chest it points to an old one, does it means that a new one spawned in another place but the game doesn't tell you? because i never saw any sunken chest that wasnt marked in the map 

As some others have mentioned, this is indeed not the case, there is very much a hard cap of 4 treasure spawns per world. Any further reads of a bottle will simply redirect to one of those existing treasures until space is freed up for a new spawn.

[_zwb]

2 minutes ago, Hornete said:

Any further reads of a bottle will simply redirect to one of those existing treasures until space is freed up for a new spawn.

Could you show me where the redirection code is?

[Hornete]

1 minute ago, _zwb said:

Could you show me where the redirection code is?

`components/messagebottlemanager.lua:190-224`

Feel free to inquire further if you still don't understand. 

[BalkanCockroach]

9 hours ago, Ardcrumb said:

I'm not accepting wonkey slander on this thread 

They don't know that the Wonkey skill tree will be the most cracked OP thing ever.

[Captain_Rage]

Salt Crystals and Barnacles are silly easy to get once you have Docks up an going. The current stats are fine.

[arubaro]

3 hours ago, Hornete said:

 

As some others have mentioned, this is indeed not the case, there is very much a hard cap of 4 treasure spawns per world. Any further reads of a bottle will simply redirect to one of those existing treasures until space is freed up for a new spawn.

i dont understand the design philosophy behind this

[Masked Koopa]

3 hours ago, Captain_Rage said:

Salt Crystals and Barnacles are silly easy to get once you have Docks up an going. The current stats are fine.

If you're at the point where you are setting up docks, chances are you don't need help with raw ingredients - you almost certainly have things like stonefruit and bull kelp available. As for barnacles, seaweeds deal a lot of damage, and sea stacks can only be found in deep ocean, meaning you will A: need boats to harvest them and B: need to walk out quite far to even harvest them. And that's after relocating the sea weeds in the first place.