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Keeping Weather and Caves Seperated


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Weather can now affect caves. Sure, caves were a cheap and easy method to escape the cold, but the way to fix this is not by adding weather to caves, mostly because we already have to deal with weather above ground and forcing us to also deal with it underground is a bit redundant and uncreative. We need a fresh challenge to worry about then we go underground for more adventures.

 

This is why I suggest that caves should take a different route of development that steers away from the weather system and create new and unique problems only found underground that can potentially make players want to deal with the weather over whatever is underground. This way, caves will not be a 'save haven' to hide in, and will create a new challenge that players will have to adapt to, giving the player a new experience compared to what that have already dealt with above ground.

 

So, what can we ad to caves to make surviving underground as much as a challenge as surviving on the surface without adding weather to caves? The weather system forces players to be active or they will either starve to death in winter or have all of their hard work burn up during the summer. Now, caves need something that can also threaten character health, food sources, and structures underground.

 

Here are some random ideas I came up on the top of my head to give you guys a basic idea of what I think caves should be working toward in development to, and maybe light a spark in one of your guy's heads. *these ideas are not meant to be taken as serious suggestions with much thought put into them.*

 

  • Wandering Boss like the Deerclops; this boss, like the Deerclops, will be a hazard to the player's base if it finds your base. Boss could be anything and there could be a unique one per cave level, like a giant rock armored spider-mole, a giant worm, or maybe a giant shadow fiend for the ruins.
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  • A rodent or goblinoid (maybe even a hybrid of the two!) that can harass your base by stealing/destroying things. Could also be a natural enemy of the rabbits. (pigs to merms)
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  • Shadow Leakage events. Events that spawn like lure plants (in discovered areas) and will continue to spread and threaten the player if the player does not go to the center of the cause and fix it. Leakage could cause a good(bad) number of things, I will let you guys get creative and give ideas of what it can do if you like this concept.
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  • Oppressive Darkness: sections of cave are shrouded in unnaturally thick darkness that reduces radius of light sources by 80%, greater sanity drain, and direct damage to player ignoring armor (like cold damage) if the player has no light around them. Charlie will also come to say 'hi' if you stay in darkness for to long, of course.
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  • Spider infestations: Spiders infesting Farms, Brushes, Trees, and Structures. Spawns a spider every time the player interacts with infected object. Need special equipment to remove them. 
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  • Geysers: random water spouts for short periods of time that lightly flood cave sections drowning crops and bushes if they are not protected. Players will have to create custom floors and walls to prevent geysers from bursting up around their plants and block incoming water from another geyser.
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  • Rubble from Earthquakes damaging structures. Players will need to build reinforcement pillars to prevent  rubble coming down in certain areas.

 

Bottom line is, weather does help solve the issue with caves being an easy get away from the weather, but it is also a very weak fix that creates more of an irritating problem that you have to deal with again, rather then creating a fun and new challenge. What do you all think? Should weather stay in caves or should weather be removed in place of something different? If so, what could be added to caves to make surviving in them a real challenge?

 

If not, then at least an option under map settings to turn cave weather off for those who do not want to deal with it when they are spelunking.

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I like the ideas of geysers and leakage events; both would present similar challenges to weather while fitting with the underground setting - they add a sense of danger and a need for constant maintenance to plug holes and such.  They could also take advantage of existing mechanics (wetness, Nightmare Phase) as a basis too. 

 

(full disclosure: I haven't played heavily in caves, so I'm thinking about a balance of immersion and challenge based on reading the wiki.)

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I definitely agree very strongly with the notion that just copy-pasting weather into caves is a weak way of addressing the issue.  I understand though that new monsters and other threats would probably double the time the devs would have to expend, and I guess what can you expect for $5?  But I would definitely like to eventually at some point see a different set of challenges for the cave environment, rather than them being 'overworld without light'.  Even it it took another DLC. 

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They could also take advantage of existing mechanics (wetness, Nightmare Phase) as a basis too.

That would makes sense, seeing that the ruins is directly beneath the caves so why not?

Also, maybe the wetness part of it is that some parts of the cave are flooded by rain waters, making travel difficult. Also, torches won't work while trudging through it.

Maybe they can add lava leaks that spew out of the ground at times, endangering flammable resources and structures.

Or even let Spider Queens roam about the dark recesses of the dank cave, waiting for a good meal of Wilson for lunch.

Or have the bosses like Deerclops hibernate there during other seasons or even the other bosses of the seasons, only to awaken by the smell of food to fill its massive stomach.

So, yeah. I agree they should do something like this instead of copy-pasting weather down there, cause in reality, that's not really how it works.

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Or have the bosses like Deerclops hibernate there during other seasons or even the other bosses of the seasons, only to awaken by the smell of food to fill its massive stomach.

I just had this great image of Deerclops sleeping while wearing a nightcap and clutching a teddy bear.  Shhhh!  Walk softly (no chopping mushtrees) or you'll wake him!

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I agree with the fact that there is no reason for the weather to affect caves.

In the real life, a cave is a chilly place all the year.

At least, if there is nothing new planned for the caves, weather effects should be removed because  there should really be a different challenge in caves, in addition to the lack of light.

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I think the weather is OK for the caves. But of course, very smoothed: need many hours to freeze \ overheat in caves. But not in ruins. In the ruins must be normal temperature all year round.

Yeah, that's what I wanted.  Caves should still experience weather, but a more tame version of it.

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I think the weather is OK for the caves. But of course, very smoothed: need many hours to freeze \ overheat in caves. But not in ruins. In the ruins must be normal temperature all year round.

Yea, this sounds perfect!

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Sure, weather is okay for caves, it makes caving a hard challenge now. But, the challenge is based on the same system you have to deal with above ground. Even if they smooth it out for caves, it will have the same feel as the surface when instead it should have a different and new feel to it. So, still a "no" even if they reduce the effects.

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I don't think that weather should be applied for caves: at first in real life caves are always warmer in winter and cooler in summer, of course here can be such thing as flood during spring, like a lot of water dripping around entrance of the cave, but only around entrance, the more further you get from it the less water is dripping down and after a few screens (2 or 3) there would be no water at all.

 

For those of you who desperately want that weather would affect the caves there's an idea: the more deeper you go down the hotter there will be (I think everyone knows that in the mines temperature is really high) so in the ruins it will be hotter than in a upper part of the caves, so you will need chilled amulet or something similar to cool yourself. Of course one should not be hard to obtain because of statues in ruins: you mine/hammer one and you get some gems or what are they dropping (actually I never been in ruins by myself, I know shame for me, but I couldn't manage to find thulecite sinkhole)

 

For those who still think that caves are not challenging enough (hurr durr, too easy): there's sum of things that are difficult in caves: constant sanity drop, earthquake, lack of food because there's no berry bushes growing in there except for some rare green squares with some trees, saplings and grass, buunymans who will hunt you down if you have any meat, depth worms, cave spiders, spiters, splu monkeys that will grab yer stuff like a baus, and so on and so forth. Of course some of those obstacles can be carried on like bunch of cave lobsters can be hired to take out depth worms, but there's not much to do with bunnyman

 

Of course i like the idea of liquid darkness that will gather around you while slowing you down and significantly decreasing light radius or sometimes even extinguishing a torch.

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Almost forgot about the monkeys in ruins -.- Took everything to keep those little jerks at bay, and the 'put lantern on ground to fight' tactic does not work for these guys. So facing them when you have to deal with weather will be a bit of a pain.

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Firstly I want to point out that exploring in caves is significantly more difficult already, and you already rely on overworld resources. That said you can sit at the entrance and wait out winter (no RoG).

 

Here's a potential solution for seasons in Caves:

 

Winter:

  • You can freeze in about half a day if you aren't wearing any insulation.
  • Any insulation at all (earmuffs will do) will prevent you from ever freezing.
  • Ice sheets form randomly (different places each winter). They are invisible until partially thawed.
  • Stepping on an ice sheet causes your character to slide until you either run into something or reach the other side.
  • Standing over an icesheet with a torch or lighting a fire nearby will melt ice over a several seconds.

Spring:

  • Flash floods can appear anywhere. In flooded places the character moves more slowly, berry bushes cannot be harvested, buildings won't function, food rots much faster, containers might lose their contents.
  • Overworld lights always flood for the duration of spring. (like where there's a hole in the ceiling)
  • Sometimes Bunnymen will randomly become Bunny Justicars and will wander the caves for several days in search of meat-eater blood. They will destroy your base and attack the player if you get close even if you don't have any meat.

Summer:

  • Cave Spiders and bats will leave their homes and wander the caves in search of food. 

Autumn/Fall: 

  • Radio-active Mutant Ninja-Pirate Beardlings!
  • Mechanical Dinosaurs!
  • Hostile Amazonian warrior queens!
  • Nazi Zombie Beefalo!
  • Goons in black SUVs!
  • OK, these ideas are starting to suck.
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Caves should not be a respite from heat or cold, it should be a different kind of hell that will give players living down there other problems to worry about, possibly making them want to deal with heat/cold instead of dealing with whatever is down in the caves, thus making the hot or cold air of summer and winter a respite from the dark depths of the underground.

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Lots of good ideas here ! Any of them is wayyy better than the current system.

 

As it stands, there is never a good reason to go down in caves except maybe in autumn or spring. It's just way too hard fighting the constant darkness, monsters and temperature at the same time. It heavily discourages you from going down there where as before it was a good motivation to escape some of the cold grasp of winter.

 

I think they should either change it or at least mitigate the effects of temperature while you're down there. As it stands, you just won't go in during either summer or winter

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Caves should not be a respite from heat or cold, it should be a different kind of hell that will give players living down there other problems to worry about, possibly making them want to deal with heat/cold instead of dealing with whatever is down in the caves, thus making the hot or cold air of summer and winter a respite from the dark depths of the underground.

 

There are already other problems down there, they are called darkness and sanity

 

Think about it this way: Winter has its own problems: the cold. The game is bugged right now and wetness is also an issue, but the devs decided to fix that since having two problems present is a bit much. Now why should the caves be that way? I am only advocating the removal of heat in the caves though, rain makes sense from a gameplay and logical standpoint

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Agreed, just please do away with the current copy-pasted weather system completely or implement a much tamer and realistic weather system in the caves with other more creative hazards. The constant sanity drain, darkness, huge wave of depth worms and nightmare cycles/fissures are tedious enough as it is.

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