Light's Out Mode

[Quyzbuk]

It has always struck me as odd that despite being able to select this preset for world generation, it doesn't really have support in DST.

As it stands, without any mods, spawning into a Light's Out Survival or Endless world is going to be a largely one player affair in DST for a while. For those who don't know, this preset puts an already lit campfire, and a chest with just enough supplies to make another torch or two and a campfire into the world (in DST's case, at the portal) as you would find it in single player. You are completely on your own after that. If anyone else decides to join you, you either have to spawn some supplies for them (assuming you have the power to), or have them wait while you scrounge some to share with and get them going (assuming you didn't alter any other settings when you generated the world). Good luck if you're going into an unmodded Wilderness Light's Out server, you won't even have that. It makes getting started a bit more tedious than it needs to be to say the least.

 

Now it would be rather tricky to figure out a one-size-fits-all solution for this with the 3 different modes available without also altering the characters or needing a massive code rewrite, I'm under no delusions on that front, nor am I under the impression that this mode isn't a niche for the really hardcore survivors who like to push themselves. That being said, I think I have a band-aid that could serve as a temporary solution for now. 

- Instead of having the preset generate the supplies for the world, attach it to the player instead.

This would make Wilderness Light's Out possible without having to abuse the spawn light for finding initial supplies, and it would allow players to explore Survival / Endless versions without needing to alter resource spawns for the world or needing someone to babysit the portal to allow others to join them. Each fresh spawn would get their own starter supplies chest (campfire optional) and could proceed how they wish from there. There are a couple downsides to this - the first, if you really want to classify it as such, would be that if a lot of players joined, it could pollute the starting area with chests or add a lot of random chests throughout Wilderness worlds for those who tend to die a lot. The second being that this would probably affect the "Default Plus" starting setting as well for the very few who actually use that preset for non Light's Out worlds which is substantially more generous since it is intended to jumpstart you and your progress.

 

If for whatever reason that is not possible, here's an alternate idea:

- Pull the Maxwell lights directly from the Adventure Mode coding in single player and apply it into the Light's Out preset in DST

Attach it to the world spawns the Light's Out preset gives so that players have a bit more freedom to look for supplies so they can venture out into the rest of the darkened world. This would not be viable for Wilderness mode sadly, but for Survival / Endless it would be a great tool to help point players toward their first waypoint. Typically when I host in DST, I spawn 4 Maxwell lights around the portal and then about half a dozen more that lead to the nearest path and/or wormhole, spaced out as you would find them in Adventure Mode so that you don't have more than one lit at a time giving too much vision (which would obviously negate the point of Light's Out). This approach would require a bit of planning to work in without doing any manual spawning, but I think a useful solution without being overly generous could be found here.

 

One final idea would be:

- Designate the portal spawn as an area that can have tumbleweeds when Light's Out mode is selected OR

- Allow tumbleweeds to spawn for the first day or two around fresh player spawns

You could simply set the tumbleweeds to 'more' as well in worldgen, but this would make it so that you don't see tumbleweeds all over the world and keep them to targeted areas like they currently are in desert biomes. I listed these two separately for a couple reasons. The former would encourage portal bases - which as we all know are the most vulnerable to griefers, and the latter could mess with the number of tumbleweeds spawned in the world, which if I recall correctly, does have a max value and could make the desert biome see less of them. The latter however would make it viable for all three modes though since obviously there's no portal spawn for Wilderness and it could also be a nice thing for the really long-running worlds where accidents, intentional moving of grass / twigs, or any of the other things that could happen to these valuable supplies around the portal in Survival / Endless could make it a bit less fair for newcomers to get going.

 

What do you think? Hopefully one of these options seems like a path worth taking.

[Sheauwn]

Allowing a built-in adjustable preset inventory would be very useful in general. I think Klei should definitely add it.

[Faintly Macabre]

Seconding this. This mode is especially broken in a Wilderness game, since everyone will spawn in a random location and only the first player will get the goods. Anybody who comes in after better hope they're lucky enough to find at least two saplings and two grass tufts within the login grace light or they're likely dead. Lights Out definitely needs some revision. I'd go with the backpack setup from Adventure worlds, myself, if having chests lying around were a concern. It probably wouldn't be a bad idea to give players a little extra inventory space in this otherwise unforgiving mode, anyway.

[imsomony]

Quote

Instead of having the preset generate the supplies for the world, attach it to the player instead.

 

I like that option the best, it's simpler. Also, no need to spawn chests that clutter up the world, just have players start with items in their inventory.

 

On that note, here's a mod that you can use in the meantime. To give players the equivalent of what LO mode would supply:

• 9 Cut Grass (6 grass, plus material for a campfire)
• 5 Logs (3 logs, plus material for a campfire)
• 4 Flint (3 flint, plus material for an axe)
• 7 Twigs (6 twigs, plus material for an axe)
• 1 Gold Nugget

[Frosty_Mentos]

I think klei should add the adventure mode gens to world options in game game too, but with caves