Grass geckos gots to go!

[Clwnbaby]

So here's some constructive feedback after now played A LOT with the gecko mechanic.

THEYS GOTS TO GO!  Of all the resource variants the geckos are the worst.  Not that they bad idea or I don't like them personally or anything but they are TERRIBLE for long lasting servers.  Strictly Unprofessional Public has had a lot of 1000+ day servers lately and we are constantly running into the same problem around 500 days-ish, there is no more grass in the world. 

Many players still keep the old mindset of plant it and forget it when creating resource farms and this causes MANY problems because they ignore disease and more importantly geckos.  There are a lot who want the geckos but given enough time most of the geckos die off.  And when the geckos die off they are not replaced with a new grass plant so the longer servers go the less and less grass we end up with.  This really sucks on long lasting public servers as well because it makes it harder for players who join so late in a world's age and they spawn in with NOTHING, no hope of finding grass.  Then it becomes the rest of the players on the server responsibility to provide every new spawner with a simple, and what should be a plentiful resource, such as grass.

I like the idea of the resource variants and twiggy trees and petrified forests are working out GREAT but the geckos are ending up hurting worlds rather than helping or making them fun and evolving.  Just my input, hope it helps!

[Ecu]

3 minutes ago, Clwnbaby said:

THEYS GOTS TO GO!  Of all the resource variants the geckos are the worst.  Not that they bad idea or I don't like them personally or anything but they are TERRIBLE for long lasting servers.  Strictly Unprofessional Public has had a lot of 1000+ day servers lately and we are constantly running into the same problem around 500 days-ish, there is no more grass in the world. 

It is my viewpoint that long running endless servers are not really the intended experience and are more of an extra option you use at your own risk.  In such a case, I would recommend the server implementing a server-side mod to solve the issues they are having.

To support my claim that long running endless servers are not the intended experience, you can check out https://my.jacklul.com/dstservers/statistics, where you will see that survival servers are the most common server type.  In addition to this, Klei's official servers only support survival mode.  Given where the game comes from (Don't Starve) and how Klei really didn't want to create multiplayer at all, for the longest time, it is pretty obvious that the feeling they want for the game is essentially Don't Starve with friends.  The eternal mode gameplay just doesn't fit with this.

Given this information, it is quite unrealistic to expect them to balance such game mode separately from the survival mode and the disease mechanic is meant to shake up resources in survival mode (intentionally built as such).  In survival mode, reducing overall resources is a game mechanic meant to slowly push you towards losing, if you don't play well.

The issue really isn't that grass geckos need to go, but that eternal mode itself.

[Clwnbaby]

yeah dude long lasting endless servers IS the intended experience.  Just cause some stat shows that people don't play for a long time doesn't mean thats not the intention.  The game wasn't meant to be played the same first 20 days over and over.  That reflects more on the experience level of the players not the intended experience.  Veteran players do play long lasting servers and want long lasting servers as well as mechanics that facilitate that experience.  The disease mechanic is meant to shake up the survival experience but not shorten it.  Its an obstacle you must overcome and because there are now MORE people managing resources and farms, the plant it and forget mechanic is TOO EASY in a multiplayer setting.  So a new obstacle was created where you now have to ACTIVELY manage your resources so its not so easy to just sit back and relax and create a stale playing environment.

7 minutes ago, Ecu said:

Don't Starve with friends.  The eternal mode gameplay just doesn't fit with this.

WTF are you talking about!  Don't Starve with friends would be and IS that.  If you don't get that or dont see that then apparently you never played Don't Starve.

[Ecu]

10 minutes ago, Clwnbaby said:

yeah dude long lasting endless servers IS the intended experience.  Just cause some stat shows that people don't play for a long time doesn't mean thats not the intention.  The game wasn't meant to be played the same first 20 days over and over.  That reflects more on the experience level of the players not the intended experience.  Veteran players do play long lasting servers and want long lasting servers as well as mechanics that facilitate that experience.  The disease mechanic is meant to shake up the survival experience but not shorten it.  Its an obstacle you must overcome and because there are now MORE people managing resources and farms, the plant it and forget mechanic is TOO EASY in a multiplayer setting.  So a new obstacle was created where you now have to ACTIVELY manage your resources so its not so easy to just sit back and relax and create a stale playing environment.

WTF are you talking about!  Don't Starve with friends would be and IS that.  If you don't get that or dont see that then apparently you never played Don't Starve.

I'm sorry, but you're incorrect.  If long running endless servers were the intended experience, why is not a single official server set as endless mode?  The majority of servers are set as survival servers, including every single Klei official server.  In addition to this, the majority of servers are in August, which gives the impression that of the servers that are currently active, many are in hibernation, waiting to start a new world.  So regarding the intended experience, there is no evidence to support that endless mode is it.

The disease mechanic specifically reduces the amount of overall resources, if you transplant resources.  As such, how can you actually claim that it isn't meant to shorten the survival experience?  Sure, it may not directly shorten it, as there are alternative methods to get said resource.  However, by reducing the transplantable resources, it can definitely cause survival issues that can lead to death and as such shorten the survival experience.

Regarding the last point.  You misunderstand (or I wasn't clear enough).  Sure, eternal mode can indeed be with friends, however, eternal mode servers tend to be more like MMO's with limited users at a time.  This is different when compared to survival mode servers where you generally do a run with the same people (for the most part) until the run is over and the world restarts (or you leave early and it has restarted by the time you've returned).

These are two quite different play styles of the game.  One plays more like roguelike games and the other more like sandbox games.  The intended experience definitely seems to be more roguelike and as such the balance of the game should be focused on that experience.  I feel that if you're desiring balance for a mode that isn't the intended experience, you should utilize mods to do so.  After all, mods are an integrated part of the game as well.

[Clwnbaby]

YEah dude you need to learn the game you're playing then tell me the intended experience.  Stop bouncing back and forth from all my threads.  Judging by your responses you don't know the game you're playing, and once you do know it you can come talk to me about it.  This is a thread for some constructive feed back to Klei, you know the people who made the game, and not a soapbox for YOU to tell ME how to play a game that would appear you clearly don't understand yet.

Also in response to "Why are all the Klei servers survival?"  Hmmmm I dunno maybe cause they are catering to their player base and over the course of the beta they learned that survival servers are less taxing to thier servers and thats what the majority of people play.  It would appear you weren't around for that part of the beta but Klei used to have endless and wilderness servers.  You know what happened to them?  They would go thousands of days and be nothing but beefalo everywhere with every base griefed, every tree chopped, all grass and twigs burned.  Maybe they realized there is no point in allocating cpu resources to servers that no one plays on and have no internal reset mechanic and that its much easier to provide their customers with something quick and easy to learn on and graduate up to the intended experience on their own. 

[Ecu]

17 minutes ago, Clwnbaby said:

YEah dude you need to learn the game you're playing then tell me the intended experience.  Stop bouncing back and forth from all my threads.  Judging by your responses you don't know the game you're playing, and once you do know it you can come talk to me about it.

I actually know the game quite well.  I've also provided you with evidence for my viewpoint on the game.  Said evidence is factual data which clearly shows exactly what I've presupposed.

18 minutes ago, Clwnbaby said:

This is a thread for some constructive feed back to Klei, you know the people who made the game, and not a soapbox for YOU to tell ME how to play a game that would appear you clearly don't understand yet.

Have I directed how you should play the game?  I don't recall doing so.  I merely stated evidence to the intended experience of the game.  If you choose to play the game in an alternative fashion, that is your choice.  However, suggesting balance changes that affect the intended experience to support a play style that is alternative, I have to disagree with.  For such balance changes, mods are a much better solution.

21 minutes ago, Clwnbaby said:

Also in response to "Why are all the Klei servers survival?"  Hmmmm I dunno maybe cause they are catering to their player base and over the course of the beta they learned that survival servers are less taxing to thier servers and thats what the majority of people play.  It would appear you weren't around for that part of the beta but Klei used to have endless and wilderness servers.  You know what happened to them?  They would go thousands of days and be nothing but beefalo everywhere with every base griefed, every tree chopped, all grass and twigs burned.  Maybe they realized there is no point in allocating cpu resources to servers that no one plays on and have no internal reset mechanic and that its much easier to provide their customers with something quick and easy to learn on and graduate up to the intended experience on their own. 

So in otherwards, survival ends up being a better experience for players and Klei chose to support that play style officially over the others.  Sounds about right.  This means that the current official experience is survival mode.  Which means the design of the game should also focus on said experience to better showcase the game in an official capacity.

[Clwnbaby]

dude its late im tired.  Im not gonna explain how video game design works to you now or even later when ive slept.  Your "factual" evidence is based on skewed data from a newer player base.  In short if someone makes a game and no one can beat it right off the bat doesn't mean the intention of the game is for it to unbeatable it just means the players cant beat it yet.  You clearly don't know the game and are not as familiar with it as you think because if you were you'd know long term survival IS THE GAME.  Im DONE im tired, im going to sleep.  I don't got time to explain this to you like a 5 year old child all day long. 

Also you COMPLETELY disregarded the end of my statement which was Klei is providing the player base with a launch point and YOU THE PLAYER graduate UP to the intended play experience.  But of course you ignored that cause you think the game should be the first 20 days over and over. 

[Ecu]

12 minutes ago, Clwnbaby said:

dude its late im tired.  Im not gonna explain how video game design works to you now or even later when ive slept.  Your "factual" evidence is based on skewed data from a newer player base.  In short if someone makes a game and no one can beat it right off the bat doesn't mean the intention of the game is for it to unbeatable it just means the players cant beat it yet.  You clearly don't know the game and are not as familiar with it as you think because if you were you'd know long term survival IS THE GAME.  Im DONE im tired, im going to sleep.  I don't got time to explain this to you like a 5 year old child all day long. 

Also you COMPLETELY disregarded the end of my statement which was Klei is providing the player base with a launch point and YOU THE PLAYER graduate UP to the intended play experience.  But of course you ignored that cause you think the game should be the first 20 days over and over. 

I'm sorry you disagree with me, but I'm not incorrect.  The intended experience of a game should be the experience the game developers themselves officially support.  If you are indeed correct and Klei intends people to play eternal mode or long running public survival servers like that, then the game should be balanced as such and the official servers should also be representing that experience.  This is not the case.  As such, one can only assume that the experience desired is the one presented by the official servers.

I also do not understand why you choose to continue to lash out at me simply for disagreeing with you.  I've never once said the experience should be 20 days, yet you continue to use such mocking language.  This is really uncalled for and does not lend well to your stance.

[spiderdian]

Tbh, the World Regrowth mechanics should be the solution in play. Out of all the stuff in game, Regrowth only takes care of what is renewable, and that kind of doesn't make sense for me. 

Summer burst can and WILL manage to destroy a good part of the world vegetation, mainly due to newcomers/newbies that just keep wandering around with no Ice/Feather in hands. They destroy trees, flowers and such, but also Grass(overall) and Saplings.

Why can't Grass respawn at savanna tiles after some are removed from the surroundings, like....it would be so much more logical than MushTrees poping out of nothing, It's a freaking grass floored biome.

I know this might not be the point of the thread, as came all these experience talk(Btw, If a feature is present in-game, then it IS intended to have a full experience. Looking at you Night Only), but I wanted to let this come out.

IMO, Grass Geckos' mechanics should stick, I like then, despite being unlucky enough to have only seem this happen twice, what must be revised is the way around.

[JohnWatson]

@ClwnbabyIf you want an endless style of play, then modify your World Gen options to disable diseases, maximize world regrowth, and disable wildfires. There, problem solved.

Veteran players that go for thousands of hours will actually  NOT benefit from making the game easier and making everything renewable. There's challange in surviving for as long as you can when the world is actively trying to kill you and reduce your resources. If I have resources just being spoonfed to me, then where's the fun in that?

[GLERMZ]

22 minutes ago, JohnWatson said:

@ClwnbabyIf you want an endless style of play, then modify your World Gen options to disable diseases, maximize world regrowth, and disable wildfires. There, problem solved.

Veteran players that go for thousands of hours will actually  NOT benefit from making the game easier and making everything renewable. There's challange in surviving for as long as you can when the world is actively trying to kill you and reduce your resources. If I have resources just being spoonfed to me, then where's the fun in that?

See that is where you are wrong. Because you can simple avoid all disease and geckos spawning by making small tiles of plantation instead of big ones. But by doing that, which is beyond easy to do, you can't do the nice stuff designs and decorations that 99% of the players do in the long runs

I keep saying, i would love the game to have more challenges in the end run, but this stuff is not the way to go.

Best Regards,

Glermz

edit: I forgot to say that i don't want geckos to go, i'm even more against on how disease works and that fact that is not curable, and will probably not be in a way that it will make designs worth doing it.
Still people refute with "Game is survival not designing" when this is not a hard feature at all to counter, or a problem at all for the 20-100 days players. And for the long runners, who know the game, like i said its easily countered but it destroys most of their goals and fun

[TitanCat]

Well it is after all still in development and every suggestion are welcome here

But it is kinda true that don't starve was never meant to be played endlessly

I've never personally reached past 200 day, not that i got killed or something

But mostly because I got bored easily, and ended up playing a new game 

Live Die Repeat, every game is different, but you will learn something new 

Learn to use the geckos the right way

or at least wait for another month when they released an easier cure for disease

[JohnWatson]

@Glhrmzz Get creative, I guess, you could still make it look pretty. I don't quite get why making small plantations over big ones counters diseases, though, I'd like to be told why.

In my opinion, though, I think diseases should be reworked so that it actually fulfills its purpose to reduce the player's ability to produce grass. Maybe have diseases be unavoidable, with no way to counter them, such that all transplanted plants will inevitably be diseased. I'm not sure if that's a good change, but that certainly solves the problem of being unable to design your base around plantation properly. Because you don't need to worry about designing around plantation if all your plantation is dead.

[GLERMZ]

38 minutes ago, TitanCat said:

Well it is after all still in development and every suggestion are welcome here

But it is kinda true that don't starve was never meant to be played endlessly

I've never personally reached past 200 day, not that i got killed or something

But mostly because I got bored easily, and ended up playing a new game 

Live Die Repeat, every game is different, but you will learn something new 

Learn to use the geckos the right way

or at least wait for another month when they released an easier cure for disease

I'm gladly proud that a lot of people changed the thought of "after 200 days gets boring"
And you can't say it's true that that's the way to play it, because i can tell you that there is also a lot of people who find it booring restarting it every time. And it's not because its challenging

[Ecu]

7 minutes ago, Glhrmzz said:

I'm gladly proud that a lot of people changed the thought of "after 200 days gets boring"
And you can't say it's true that that's the way to play it, because i can tell you that there is also a lot of people who find it booring restarting it every time. And it's not because its challenging

I think the issue between your camp and my camp is that we come at this game from different directions.  You seem to enjoy the more sandbox style play where the focus is on base designing and endgame resource production, whereas I enjoy the game for the roguelike elements.  It isn't a bad thing for us to enjoy the game the way we like to play it.

However, when it comes to the official game's design, it should be designed for the experience that Klei wants to represent and said experience supported officially.  Given the current experience Klei is supporting, the design and balance of the official game should be focused around those first 100-200 days.  This would better hone the experience such that the majority of players can experience the intended experience on the official servers.

Currently, the official server experience is rather fun, however, it is not all that challenging.  It also suffers from at least half the items in the game almost never getting used.  There are a whole lot of design flaws with the current game, I won't argue otherwise.

If it is Klei's intention to support the style of play that you desire, there should be official servers for it and game balance done to improve said experience.  Until I see such a direction being taken by Klei, however, I have to comment on suggestions as if this is not the intended experience.  Which generally means that I tend to suggest modding to those seeking such an experience as customizing one's experience is kind of the purpose of modding.

[TheKingDedede]

Keep the Grass Geckos and implement an option to disable them for players who don't want them. Simple as that. No, I don't think, "THEYS GOTS TO GO!" That would just be silly. Either give people the option to turn them off or mod them out. There's no point in taking them away from players who like and want them.

[TitanCat]

26 minutes ago, Glhrmzz said:

I'm gladly proud that a lot of people changed the thought of "after 200 days gets boring"
And you can't say it's true that that's the way to play it, because i can tell you that there is also a lot of people who find it booring restarting it every time. And it's not because its challenging

Well i guess you may be right, thanks to the world setting button and mods, we each could modify the game to satisfy each of our playstyle

[GLERMZ]

15 minutes ago, Ecu said:

However, when it comes to the official game's design, it should be designed for the experience that Klei wants to represent and said experience supported officially.  Given the current experience Klei is supporting, the design and balance of the official game should be focused around those first 100-200 days.  This would better hone the experience such that the majority of players can experience the intended experience on the official servers.

If it is Klei's intention to support the style of play that you desire, there should be official servers for it and game balance done to improve said experience.  Until I see such a direction being taken by Klei, however, I have to comment on suggestions as if this is not the intended experience.  Which generally means that I tend to suggest modding to those seeking such an experience as customizing one's experience is kind of the purpose of modding.

How do you know what they are going for ? And if you come again with server stats, please don't bother As long as you keep a theory on what Klei wants or not you can't say this or that. (Short or Long term games, we will never know as long as they don't tell us)
Also just because i love sandbox doesn't mean i don't like the rogue style. What I'm discussing is that the rogue-style you defending is not so rogue at all Even Babarians had nice things, not all was death and decay

Best Regards

[GLERMZ]

8 minutes ago, TitanCat said:

Well i guess you may be right, thanks to the world setting button and mods, we each could modify the game to satisfy each of our playstyle

Exacly. The point is in most Threads here people defending changes that will rekt one part or the other, instead of solutions that fit both ealry and end game and the survival aspect of the game.

Thats what i rarely see in this forum, there fore i decide to counter part both sides from now on, so people can finally starting focusing on solutions more than there own preferences. Because again, i'm against on what the OP is requesting, but at the same time what its behind his suggestion is not wrong and it is a problem.

Best Regards,

Glermz

[Ecu]

3 minutes ago, Glhrmzz said:

How do you know what they are going for ? And if you come again with server stats, please don't bother As long as you keep a theory on what Klei wants or not you can't say this or that.

I don't know what they specifically have in mind, as I cannot read minds.  However, simply due to only survival servers being officially supported and it being common knowledge that said servers average 100-150 days, it is really the closest we have to an officially supported experience.

Unless they actively begin to really change the direction, I can also only assume focusing on said timeframe what suggestions should really be shooting for.  Why?  Well, primarily because said timeframe is the experience the majority of players will experience.  It is also the timeframe new players will be most likely to experience.  If the officially supported experience is poor, it won't encourage as many people to get their friends to play.  At the end of the day, this is the better design decision.

9 minutes ago, Glhrmzz said:

Also just because i love sandbox doesn't mean i don't like the rogue style. What I'm discussing is that the rogue-style you defending is not so rogue at all Even Babarians had nice things, not all was death and decay

Fully agree here.  While the experience I enjoy is more roguelike focused when compared to the experience you enjoy, it is still poor in terms of overall difficulty.  That doesn't mean I want to support focusing on sandbox features rather than improving the roguelike ones, however.

12 minutes ago, Glhrmzz said:

Thats what i rarely see in this forum, there fore i decide to counter part both sides from now on, so people can finally starting focusing on solutions more than there own preferences. Because again, i'm against on what the OP is requesting, but at the same time what its behind his suggestion is not wrong and it is a problem.

While it is true that my preferences align well with what I see as the intended experience, it doesn't mean I'm focusing on it because it's my preference.  If Klei was to switch their focus and start heavily focusing on a more sandbox style play with the official servers supporting that, I would likely either use mods to achieve the experience I desire or quit playing.

When designing content, I tackle it based on the environment I'm working with and trying to determine what is best for said environment.

[SuperPsiPower]

5 hours ago, Ecu said:

It is my viewpoint that long running endless servers are not really the intended experience

Regardless of whether or not it is the intended experience, it's still a bad system. Single player's main point was to survive indefinitely. Just because they're not quite the same game does not mean that things should be implemented that should be our downfall in the long run. 

Clwnbaby plays on a dedicated server like me because Hosted worlds are terrible as they depend on the quality of PC and amongst other things. We cannot change the settings as they are because changing the settings isn't the solution to the problem.

The entire point of an endless server is to keep playing. Grass geckos contradict that game mode.

[Ecu]

2 minutes ago, SuperPsiPower said:

Regardless of whether or not it is the intended experience, it's still a bad system. Single player's main point was to survive indefinitely. Just because they're not quite the same game does not mean that things should be implemented that should be our downfall in the long run. 

This isn't Don't Starve, and due to the way multiplayer falls out during play, the experiences ends up different when compared to it.  Mind you, this primarily applies to public survival servers.

5 minutes ago, SuperPsiPower said:

Clwnbaby plays on a dedicated server like me because Hosted worlds are terrible as they depend on the quality of PC and amongst other things. We cannot change the settings as they are because changing the settings isn't the solution to the problem.

You could reasonably host a private server with a whitelist, which would alleviate the issues that a public long running server has for the most part.  As to the changing of settings, it is totally a reasonable solution to ask users to change their own settings to play the game in a way that is not in line with the experience they present.

8 minutes ago, SuperPsiPower said:

The entire point of an endless server is to keep playing. Grass geckos contradict that game mode.

The game isn't really balanced around endless mode, however.  It is just an extra option for those that really want it.  If Klei chose to focus on said direction, then I'll gladly reevaluate my position.  Until then, I can only use what we have current as the basis for my critique.

[Clwnbaby]

OKay this is not a thread about the "intended" game experience.  That being said all of you who think long term play is not the point here are clear examples you're wrong:  RESOURCE VARIENTS!!!! the very thing this thread IS about. 

Twiggy trees, petrified forests and YES grass geckos are Klei's way of providing LONG TERM players with a world that changes and evolves OVER TIME.  The most notable is the petrified forests.  They provide all the mineral resources that are not renewable after all the rocks are gone.  That way LONG TERM servers dont run out of rock flint and nitre and newer players who join in a server's old age can still find these materials long after every rock has been mined.  Birds dropping flint grass and twigs is another solution Klei implemented for LONG LASTING servers because these things become harder to find the longer servers go.

The point of this thread is to point out to Klei that grass geckos, of all the resource varients and changes like disease, in fact negatively impact servers on a whole short term getting worse and worse into the long term.  Im not complaining I can't handle geckos, Im saying that servers on a whole suffer too greatly from the current gecko mechanic and worlds are depleted of grass through a natural means rather than an artificial one such as grief.  Yes I know there are simple in game solutions to this and yes I know them all, but a huge chunk of players either don't or don't care and that takes a serious toll on servers over the long run.  Its been very clear to me that Klei is indeed creating a LONG TERM style of play so my feedback is "hey, this mechanic you adopted is working negatively as a whole in the long run."

[Trenix]

I don't think grass geckos should go, just saplings, grass turfs, all those things need to be part of the regrowth mechanic. As for variants, I don't get why the game picks one over the other. For example, a new world and you get grass geckos instead of grass turfs. Why can't we get both simultaneously? I mean we do, but far from each other across the map, makes no sense. This could help a bit with certain issues such as these.

[Ecu]

8 hours ago, Clwnbaby said:

The point of this thread is to point out to Klei that grass geckos, of all the resource varients and changes like disease, in fact negatively impact servers on a whole short term getting worse and worse into the long term.  Im not complaining I can't handle geckos, Im saying that servers on a whole suffer too greatly from the current gecko mechanic and worlds are depleted of grass through a natural means rather than an artificial one such as grief.  Yes I know there are simple in game solutions to this and yes I know them all, but a huge chunk of players either don't or don't care and that takes a serious toll on servers over the long run.  Its been very clear to me that Klei is indeed creating a LONG TERM style of play so my feedback is "hey, this mechanic you adopted is working negatively as a whole in the long run."

I would agree with you, except that every indication shows that the result you have experienced from grass geckos (and disease in general), is the exact result that seems to be intended by the mechanic.  It does specifically reduce  the amount of transplantable resources over time.  The issue is that when such a server world is public and long running, due to human behavior, this isn't able to be effectively controlled.  In a private and long running server world, the users can work together to keep resources available for a very long time, as they will not be affected by random people damaging the ecosystem through a lack of knowledge or intentional sabotage.  In public and short running server worlds, the disease mechanic only triggers a few times, not having time to cause the amount of resource reduction that is does over the length of time long running server worlds.

This is why I presented the argument that the experience that you wish to play is not the expected/intended experience.  It is also why I suggested mods (and others suggested setting changes) to solve the issues you are having.  You experience is not the average experience and it really isn't a common experience all together.  In addition, the mechanic itself is working as it should (from everything I can tell), it is just that your environment is unique.  Given a unique environment such as that, why is it unreasonable to fix it via modding?

3 hours ago, Trenix said:

I don't think grass geckos should go, just saplings, grass turfs, all those things need to be part of the regrowth mechanic. As for variants, I don't get why the game picks one over the other. For example, a new world and you get grass geckos instead of grass turfs. Why can't we get both simultaneously? I mean we do, but far from each other across the map, makes no sense. This could help a bit with certain issues such as these.

The reason everything doesn't grow back is that is intentionally designed this way.  They specifically altered endless mode to have birds drop things like grass tufts so that in such servers, they could be replenished.  They did not do this to survival mode (as far as I'm aware).  This shows that the mechanics are working exactly as they were intended to work.  It is only in a highly specific situation, such as presented by @Clwnbaby that it becomes an issue.