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1. Underground pipes might enable efficient heating

Now In the past I used the argument that lying pipes would likely just feel like conduits mk 2. But take a look at this base:

(http://wstaw.org/m/2017/02/23/allwrongcolony_png_750x750_q85.jpg)

It looks all wrong (distances, concave huts) because it's a melee colony, and I raise war beasts too. It's almost winter now, but I realized that I may run out of firewood so I made my girls sleep in shared rooms.

Heat transfer is a major advantage of underground colonies and single building colonies (a.k.a. Rimworld Institute) If there were underground pipes available, I could heat efficiently. Even assuming that heaters were made more intelligent and had more granular power use (they have Low and High modes now), heating with heaters would require a lot of steel (flat map!), components and especially breakdown maintenance. You still need one heater per room and no two ways about it.

Campfires are inefficient for small rooms, like heaters/coolers they're One Size Fits All. And refueling them is a lot of work, definitely not worth it during a toxic fallout. By the way the is not tundra. Technically it was boreal forest.

2. Water system could distinguish biomes like arid shrubland, desert and rainforest. Plants in the dry biomes would have to be watered somehow.

Arguments against:

-1. There's no convincing way to represent floods without Z-levels (maps only have one layer)

By the way can someone help me find the most recent thread about encouraging open colonies ? The one shorter than 42 pages ?

I made a comment in the recent Windows thread about how adding a need/mood benefit for natural light would encourage more town-like layouts instead of the mega-warrens.  Is that what you're thinking of?

I'm personally super biased towards having a water system, but I'll try to be as neutral as I can be.

Feel free to add these to the original post for simplicity; if you desire.

New Arguments:
3. In favor - Water as a basic physiological need would add meaningful depth to the gameplay, without overcomplicating things too much. Water already exists as a tile, and rain is already an implemented weather pattern. Simple jobs like collecting water from a pond, or building rain barrels would fit into RimWorld just fine. Harsher biomes like the desserts would have more of an identity as a difficult biome to survive in.

-2. Against - Water would make certain biomes unsurvivable depending on the starting season and items. A lot of people don't like the idea of not being able to beat every biome from the get-go, with the right strategies.

Rebuttals:
1. Rebuttal - Conduits are already frustrating enough to keep track of, and the last thing anybody needs is to worry about a "Zzztt for pipes" event. If anything, I would recommend water radiators powered by electricity. But, we already have an electric heater, so that seems redundant.

-1. Rebuttal - While the idea of floods in RimWorld is interesting, it doesn't make sense to assume they are a necessary part of a water system.
Z-Levels do not have to precede a water system.

I build lots of bases like this, where rooms and buildings are spread out.  I just like the style and kind of helps with combat cause I use little to no turrets. Sometimes the layout will backfire on me though. Anyways, like you said heating and cooling these bases uses up a lot more resources. There are more items to break and repair.  I've been wanting pipes to be introduced into rimworld. I don't know if it was meant to discourage/penalize this kind of base building or if it's just something that hasn't been worked out yet.

I wish you could elaborate a little more on your ideas of the water system.  Unless you're only wanting to focus on watering plants.  I like the idea of interacting with water in rimworld, but I always felt a lot of work need to be done to add it in properly.

Irrigation pipes and water pumps!

-2. While a water system could be used to diversify biomes, there are workarounds like making rain, storm speed up plant growth. This would give a big boost to rainforest growing

Quote from: Hans Lemurson on February 23, 2017, 05:24:34 PM
Irrigation pipes and water pumps!

What about them ?

I think if you add water, go all in, or don't add it at all.

Where to get water?
Existing water tiles and rain barrels (as mentioned  by "O Negative"), but also from snow, and a new item to build; A water well.

Water wells could be dug in anywhere and have 2 phases of work.  First phase is "dig" where you place the well, and someone mans it to dig deeper and deeper.  Chance roll of when, or if, they hit water.  If they hit water, next phase is "collect" where you collect the water from the well.  If you don't hit water while digging, you can deconstruct the well and try somewhere else.  This can be an old-school bucket well, or a hand pump.  Maybe one of each with different efficiencies, and where the old school well uses stones, and the pump uses steel.  Different biomes get different results.  If you're in the desert, you gotta dig deep!

Water isn't clean
You would have to have water in 2 parts.  Dirty water, and clean water.  Dirty water can water plants, but if ingested, can have a chance to cause disease like a sickness, or parasites.  Using the cook stove, or campfire, you can add a bill to boil water which turns dirty water into clean water.  Colonists will only drink clean water if it's available, but if only dirty water is available, they'll drink that instead.  Forbid dirty water collections to keep them from drinking it if that's all you have.

Character stat
I'm not sure if a new bar should be added like the "food' bar, but perhaps add it as a mood called "thirsty".  If you're thirsty for too long, you get a health issue of dehydration.  Thirst could also come faster in hotter temperatures, and having plenty of water could help to stave off heatstroke a little longer.

Just my 2 cents...

Quote from: Dorian on February 23, 2017, 05:42:09 PM
Just my 2 cents...

Blah, blah, blah ! That's a bunch of useless details. Keep it out of this thread! Can you make a good argument for water system ? Your post doesn't have it. What does it add to the game ? How does it make it more interesting ? The game could have a detailed system of pimple popping. What makes water system more interesting ?

 Adding hydration to the game, as the previous poster mentioned, would make desert survival a sort of inverse challenge of icesheet survival. Right now deserts are largely about making hats, dusters and having AC units everywhere. The lack of available soil for growth is essentially the same issue with ice sheet survival.

Stillsuits, urine recycling, rain condensation collection, drilling to aquifer, channeling existing water sources, water purification of putrid surface water early game.

Also what about a desiccator that can use animal/human corpses to extract water from but would only give dehydrated meat with less calories?

Also hygeine would be an interesting mechanic as dirty pawns would be less likely to have positive social responses or fall into romance. It might add for a more interesting system than hats being useful for amping social numbers up - wouldn't make sense for the coms unit though.

Negatives i can see with this is it's one more thing to manage and if all other things are kept equal might make the early game much harder given you now have to find water or establish a source of extraction.

Another negative is that the entire game might have to be re-balanced to accommodate the time investment pawns spend maintaining and building the water system and engaging in their own hygiene, this might require other things pawns do to become easier and the balance of the game already feels pretty good.

One other issue is would feral animals need to hydrate and if so many would likely just aggregate near large bodies of water. Animals that are too far away from water on the map might either leave the map or linger and dehydrate at the edge of teh map if there is no water near which would seem a bit artificial

Quote from: Rafe009 on February 23, 2017, 06:57:53 PM
Stillsuits,

"Totally not dusters with appearance change"

Quoterain condensation collection

Rain ? In a desert ? And how would this be more interesting that another type of power generator ?

Quote
drilling to aquifer

Drilling is high tech in Rimworld, and you can't expect players to reach it quickly and survive. Deserts would be only available to people who migrate there from a more hospitable biome.

Quotechanneling existing water sources

How would you detemine which way water flows on a completely flat map ? Dwarf Fortress has vertical levels, water flows down or in absense of holes uses floodfill algorithm. Rimworld has no up or down, no high or low.

Quotewater purification of putrid surface water early game.

Mandatory facility to construct and forget about it other than breakdowns ? There are already things you can build close to water: moisture pumps. They give you a large amount of soil in ice sheet, and let you drill there.

Quote
Also what about a desiccator that can use animal/human corpses to extract water from but would only give dehydrated meat with less calories?

Biomes with many animals don't need it, hot deserts have very few animals. That would leave arid shrubland.

Quote
Also hygeine would be an interesting mechanic as dirty pawns would be less likely to have positive social responses or fall into romance. It might add for a more interesting system than hats being useful for amping social numbers up - wouldn't make sense for the coms unit though.

So duplicating the existing eating mechanic ? Colonists need to go to location X each day and spend a few minutes there ?

The negatives you listed could be overlooked if you had convincing arguments for water system. But good point about animals. They're now plants that move, possibly they are that way so as to not drain too many processor cycles. Adding a water need would ask more of their AI, and that could slow the game down.

I'm specifically interested in arguments that are not just listing things that would make Rimworld sound more detailed. In particular not making a parallel power system that's functionally identical. Anyone can list stuff. Look, I can do this too:
badger, aardvark, raccoon, magpie, rat, crow, cat

I'd actually like to make the point of animals aggregating around water holes/"rivers" a positive argument for adding a water system.

4. Animal behavior could be made more convincing by having animals with a depleted water need seek water tiles for hydration, much in the same way they already do with plants and other pawns on the map.
This would also help get newly spawned animals on the edges of the map to migrate to the center regions where water is more commonly spawned.
It would also supply a deeper sense of realism, as animals tend to behave this way to begin with.
-----
4. Rebuttal (1): Animals needing to drink water would cause potential performance loss, due to the increased number of constant calculations.

4. Counter-Rebuttal (1): While a fair point, for now, this can also be said for any added mechanic.
Alpha 17 is supposed to bring many bug-fixes, and I would like to see just how much performance is gained before using "further loss of performance" as an argument against any new possibilities.
-----
4. Rebuttal (2): How are animals in dry biomes supposed to get by?
They don't have access to the same technologies players will be using to acquire water.

4. Counter-Rebuttal (2): Animals native to dry biomes would have an inherently slower loss in their water need.
They've evolved and adapted to live in those environments, and it could always be made a point to add at least one small oasis when generating a map tile.

Desert animals can also get some water from the food they eat.  The kangaroo rat gets most of its water from carbohydrate metabolism.

I am not too much fan of adding hydration/hygiene for characters, I feel it is unnecessary as it just adds another bar next to food and sleep (There is a mod for hygiene already and I found it very uninteresting). Food could technically include drinks anyway. In short, it doesn't add any new interesting gameplay.

As for adding a whole water system with pipes and the likes, I really don't see the point. We got options for creating power and electric heaters already exist, so why add more that run on water instead? If you would add water then it would make sense to add toilets, showers, etc... But I don't think that would add anything fun to the game, just one more thing your colonists will run off to do.

However I am a big fan of the idea of plants requiring to be watered. Growing is totally overpowered at the moment, you only need a few growers to make massive amounts of cash and enough food to supply your entire colony. I think plants having a need to be watered which varies depending on temperature (warmer weather = needs more water) would be good, it could be used to restrict how many plants a single grower can manage to grow (and make high growing skill more valuable as they can water faster).

I would like to see something like a well/rain barrel where the growers have to go get water, then go over to the plants and water a few of them, get more water, repeat... Perhaps even make it so that wells can't be placed anywhere on the map or that certain locations on the map would give more water from a well than other. Or something like that so you have to take this into account as well, but that is not strictly necessary.

Some nice features I see from this,

• Would make growing less powerful
• Would make hot/dry biomes a lot harder
• Would make rain matter more, rainy day = your growers can do other things (Anyone else get happy in Stardew Valley when it would rain the next day?)
• Would make you have to consider your farm placement more, not just plant and forget all over the map
• Rain would give another advantage (except power usage) to growing outside compared to inside
• Adds more diversity to the biomes
• It's an interesting new mechanic that makes perfect sense and can be tuned for balance (set plants to dehydrate faster at higher difficulties)
• Can also balance individual plants this way. More profitable plants = higher water need
• Allows for the potential adding of new expensive research / buildings to automatically water your plants
• This can also add some interesting new game events (eg. Dry wind for a few days so more watering required or drought during which your wells run dry and you have to rely on rain water or no growing...)
• High growing skill would be even more valuable as they can water faster therefore maintain more plants
• Finally it fits in nicely with existing game mechanics (temperature, rain, heat wave)

There are probably some other nice things about this as well, but those are the ones I can come up with in a few minutes. As for downsides, I don't really see any as it adds an interesting new challenge to the game and helps reign in growing a bit since it is way too powerful at the moment.

An additional idea could be to add something like plant quality, which would directly affect yield when you harvest. Then if your plants lack water instead of dying straight off their quality would degrade. That way if you have to defend your base from an attack you may need to consider leaving your growers to water else it will affect your harvest yield (but not kill it completely).

Edit:
I would like to add I am not a fan of adding some sort of pipe system for plant watering, etc... But rather a building like a sunlamp that could water a radius around it (preferably small radius, very expensive and high power consumption, or not at all else growing just becomes OP again near endgame).

Edit 2:
I thought about wells only being placable in certain spots like geothermal is now, and I think this could be a good mechanic. That way as you start out your growers may have to haul water from further away. Then rather than automatic plant watering you could make research that would initially allow your colonists to move more water at a time, or to make some sort of storage container so that water can be moved closer to the growing spot by haulers. And finally at really high research and for very high costs even allow automatic transfer of water (but then we might get into piping unless some other elegant solution is made or perhaps a classic aqueduct?)

Either way, just an additional related idea I wanted to mention.

Water can be pumped from groundwater or lake/river, but if add water system, it should add sewage treatment plant as well, otherwise water system will be polluted, and cannot be used sooner

By the way, if water system added, there are many things needed, for example, shower head/bathtub, toilet, washing machine, etc. Because colonists care about many things(hungry, hot/cold, social, love, room's beauty, comfort, space, etc), no reason they don't care about personal cleanliness

Pros.

Water based power - hydro plants, water mills.
Sea travel, boats and fishing.

It would 'make sense'. Also it would add some genuine difficulty to desert biomes.

Growing system would be more developed.

Cons.

I would really hate pipes. I'd be only ok if you just needed to store water in a silo and then it can be magically accessed from water points in the colony. really don't want to have to build pipes like in prison architect.

Would make water/ food gameplay annoying. That said, if the penalty of no food went down and water placed as the top priority that could be interesting.

No toilets or sanitation please. Don't want to play the sims.



Overall I want water. But I would want it to be a basic system.

Quote from: b0rsuk on February 23, 2017, 06:42:31 PM

Quote from: Dorian on February 23, 2017, 05:42:09 PM
Just my 2 cents...

Blah, blah, blah ! That's a bunch of useless details. Keep it out of this thread! Can you make a good argument for water system ? Your post doesn't have it. What does it add to the game ? How does it make it more interesting ? The game could have a detailed system of pimple popping. What makes water system more interesting ?

Read between the lines!  It adds more challenge and realism, which makes the game more interesting.  You also have to adapt more to your environment in the same way as you would if there are many trees available for wood or not.  Why do we have to grow food, hunt animals and chop wood?  Same reasons.

I am pro water as a ressource and think it would add a lot of challenge and diversity to the biomes.

But I also think the logistics should be kept simple.

What about adding water without adding water?

Hear me out:

First, it feels like nearly every argument FOR water centers around
1) making growing harder
2) making deserts harder
Most of the rest have been argued against plenty already or only have minimal support.

Those two points do NOT require a water system....instead, they could use a much less invasive, much lower CPU load system:  Humidity or moisture.

Lets address point #2 first: 
What if each terrain square has a humidity/moisture rating on top of all the others...if you wanted to get more dynamic, you could add a dynamic humidity displayed alongside the current temperature (and likely affected by it).  Have the growing system reference humidity as well as temperature for plant growth...low temp or low humidity causes slower growth.  This means that rainforests are still amazing for growing, temp forests are pretty darned good.  Boreal forests and arid shrublands would have difficulties, but still totally doable without special systems.  Deserts and tundra would be really hard, and anything else impossible without specialized systems.  A "humidifier" and a potential tribal substitute (the passive cooler already references this) could humidify rooms to make indoor growing possible in dry biomes.

As for #1, the growing issue, Humidity would help, but I think people are looking for a bit more.  It seems it isn't a water issue at all...growing being "overpowered" is a work issue...the plant and forget mentality of growing means that to maximize your growers, you want fields so big that all your growers do day in and day out is plant and harvest.  Simple solution (that would require a good deal of balancing and testing) is to nerf the BASE grow time of plants and allow growers to "tend" crops, for some minor guaranteed boost, but an increasing boost as the growing skill rises...give it a "tend quality" and freely borrow from the medical system already in the game.  Now growers have to interact with a given plant, say, 5 times in the plant's lifespan instead of 2 (plant and harvest).  something like growing 6 should probably yield amounts equal to what you already get, since it does require some more pawn-hours of work, but with yield increasing after that, it will still encourage smaller fields (pawns that have to check plants will simply not be able to cover as large an area), but those fields will be more productive.

All in all:
humidity system instead of full-fledged "water system" since growing and deserts seem to be the only really truly convincing arguments for "water."  Also, growers tend plants to reduce growing time or increase yield - base growing time lengthened.

A humidity/moisture system would be far more CPU invasive than a simple hydration value similar to nutritional value, and a few new "workbenches."

For whatever reason, I can't help but feel that people don't want their people to need water because it wouldn't be as easy as food is. Deserts are used as an example primarily due to how ridiculously easy it is to survive in them. No water need, no problem.

I have zero problems with adding a "Thirst Bar" that goes along with the existing "Hunger Bar".  Water would in a way be another type of food, but one whose acquisition is rather different, and whose depletion is strongly affected by your environment.

It would also properly represent the challenge of hot climates, and if a crop-watering system were added, it would provide a way to offset the year-round growing season of Deserts.

As it is, Arid Scrubland is one of the easiest biomes to survive on.  It's a year-round bonanza of productivity, and you can feed half a dozen people on just wild-harvested Agave and Berries even without making use of the patches of fertile soil (which shouldn't even be there).  Add in the necessity for water, and now its scarcity becomes a rather limiting factor on the human habitability of the region.

Quote from: Limdood on February 24, 2017, 10:15:35 AM
....

All in all:
humidity system instead of full-fledged "water system" since growing and deserts seem to be the only really truly convincing arguments for "water."  Also, growers tend plants to reduce growing time or increase yield - base growing time lengthened.

I also agree that growing could be fixed by the system you propose or a similar system however I think the watering solution has a few advantages that I would like to point out.

First of all it's the tie in with rain and heat waves, it is true that you could tie the system you propose with humidity into that as well but what would that do? All that would happen then is that your crops would grow a bit faster and/or yield a bit more materials. That is great and all but it is not interactive at all.

On the other hand with a water based system rain would free up your growers, time is a very important resource in this game as you rarely have time to do all the tasks you want to do. As such freeing up growers to do other jobs (even if it is just hauling) would make rainy days a great thing. In the same way if balanced properly a heat wave could be devastating (unlike now as it has barely any effect on gameplay) because you either would have to sacrifice part of your harvest or designate more pawns to growing.

Water system also has the option of having more events as well (such as drought), which is also more interactive and adds a different type of challenge.

Another point is research, in another system where you just need your pawns to interact with the crops during the growth cycle what research could you have? Tools that you make once and then forget about? On the other hand with water depending on your implementation you could do a variety of things that makes the growing cycle more efficient (already mentioned in my last post). It would also mean that you have to handle some basic water logistics which adds another challenge.

All in all I think a water based system would be more interactive for the player and therefore more fun.

Because the competition has water in it (Oxygen Not Included) and it is awesome. Its time we see water in this game!

Quote from: O Negative on February 24, 2017, 11:10:59 AM
A humidity/moisture system would be far more CPU invasive than a simple hydration value similar to nutritional value, and a few new "workbenches."

For whatever reason, I can't help but feel that people don't want their people to need water because it wouldn't be as easy as food is. Deserts are used as an example primarily due to how ridiculously easy it is to survive in them. No water need, no problem.

the problem with a colonist water need is that the AI just doesn't handle needs very well.  If my miner is going to wake up, walk across the map, take 1 swing at the rock, come back for food, go back and swing, come back for water, walk, swing, walk, food, walk swing, walk, water, walk, swing, walk, bed - he's not going to get much done.  Am i exaggerating?  sure, but it is still quite a legitimate issue, and it ISN'T an issue with needs, its an issue with how game's scale and how needs are managed...which is mostly fine, or at least tolerable for now, but each new need added to pawns is going to exponentially increase pawn downtime.

Also, i don't see how a separate ambient value that is only referenced by plants and "humidifiers" would be more intensive than adding a water need to every single pawn on the map AND having it somehow impact growing plants too.

Quote from: Beider on February 24, 2017, 12:16:18 PM
I also agree that growing could be fixed by the system you propose or a similar system however I think the watering solution has a few advantages that I would like to point out.

First of all it's the tie in with rain and heat waves, it is true that you could tie the system you propose with humidity into that as well but what would that do? All that would happen then is that your crops would grow a bit faster and/or yield a bit more materials. That is great and all but it is not interactive at all.

On the other hand with a water based system rain would free up your growers, time is a very important resource in this game as you rarely have time to do all the tasks you want to do. As such freeing up growers to do other jobs (even if it is just hauling) would make rainy days a great thing. In the same way if balanced properly a heat wave could be devastating (unlike now as it has barely any effect on gameplay) because you either would have to sacrifice part of your harvest or designate more pawns to growing.

Water system also has the option of having more events as well (such as drought), which is also more interactive and adds a different type of challenge.

Another point is research, in another system where you just need your pawns to interact with the crops during the growth cycle what research could you have? Tools that you make once and then forget about? On the other hand with water depending on your implementation you could do a variety of things that makes the growing cycle more efficient (already mentioned in my last post). It would also mean that you have to handle some basic water logistics which adds another challenge.

All in all I think a water based system would be more interactive for the player and therefore more fun.

These are all good points.  I also think adding water considerations would deepen the game by providing another kind of survival pressure on the colony.

That said, everything above is about water availability in the environment and that's where I would stop at adding water.  I don't think adding a thirst bar or additional water need to the individual colonists would add to gameplay.  I think if there's food we can assume the colonists were able to get water, too.  At least, I'd be willing to make that assumption.

I don't particularly want to water crops, either, ala Stardew Valley/Harvest Moon.  However, I do think it would add a lot to game play if early crops were dependent on the rain to water crops and have them grow, with research available for wells and irrigation that would make those crops less susceptible to lack of rain and/or heat waves.  Crops planted in the two squares closest to water tiles could be self-irrigating, giving the presence of lakes a purpose and making oases vitally important on desert maps. 

I would not want to add piping, water storage, faucets, toilets or any of that kind of infrastructure to the game.  To me, these things don't seem like they would add much to the game because they feel too repetitive with existing systems.

Alright, I want to preface this by saying that Rimworld is by far my favorite game, and I've got over 1000 hours playing it in steam.  So, my suggestions come from the point of view of someone wanting to see an incredible game be even better.

To be honest, when I heard that the consensus was that Rimworld didn't need to model water I was shocked.  Rimworld is a survival game, based on meeting needs.  And the big three needs are food, water, and shelter. 

I don't think rimworld needs z-levels , although I wouldn't mind a simplification (say, 3 levels total, to represent flat ground, elevated areas and ditches) , but adding water would add the potential to add a great deal of interesting content and decision making to the game, especially now that we have the ability to move on the world map.  With the detailed biomes that Rimworld already has, it wouldn't be that hard either -- just calculate where the water table is (or if one even exists)  on any given map (for wells), how to collect rainfall, and whether any lakes and rivers existed.

Currently thirst is , I suppose, abstracted away in the hunger stat. This would make sense if thirst behaved like hunger, but it doesn't -- one can go hungry for much longer than one can go thirsty and still survive, for example, and how thirsty one gets depends more on external factors like temperature and work load than hunger does.  Currently people go nut pretty quick if they don't eat.  With water added, it would make sense for pawns to be able to go longer between meals, but not between drinking.  You would have biomes where water is easy to get and food is difficult, and vice versa. 

Water also has interesting interactions with food production, animal behaviour, defense, and electrical generation (IE, if we had rivers water wheels would be a first tech solution for tribals getting electricity).

In short, I think adding water would add a lot to the gameplay, while making RimWorld more in sync with the genre it represents.

Ken

Quote from: Jstank on February 24, 2017, 02:08:38 PM
Because the competition has water in it (Oxygen Not Included) and it is awesome. Its time we see water in this game!

Saying OnI is competition/akin to Rimworld is like saying a Mario platformer is akin to Ultima IV.  Outside of the survival theme they're world apart.

Crap .. there is always someone fast than me writing down what I wanted to write.

I am with Aerial in this.
I would like a Water/Irrigation System but without adding the extra Need-Bar for pawns.
Water as an Item I am unsure.

But to keep it in B0rsuks Format

pro (1) I want rivers.
pro (1) irrigation and draining of land to make it better for agriculture
pro (1) plants are even more dependent on a biome ( or hydroculture )
than before. ( rice for wet biomes, corn for lush biomes, potatoes for dry biomes )

pro (1) expensive flow model is not needed. the floor level is enough to make ditches represent water and everything else. Personally I find it strange, that there are nearly no impassable bodies of water .. even slowed over 50% of most lakes are walkable .. why ?
floods could be represented by water over floor level.
pro (1) low tech water collection in desert could be by extracting it from plants ( cacti, agave ) against later higher tech solutions like digging and drilling a well.
pro (1) the same goes for getting rid of water in wet biomes.
pro (1) for temperate and cold biomes there is also the matter of snowmelt.
pro (1) moisture levels for ground and air ( ground only local with player interaction ) and air global .. even the most sophisticated ac's can't do much against humid weather. further distincion between biomes, because of the different combinations of humidity and temperature ..
pro (1) personally I don't care about pipes .. I allready wish for different phases for power cables


con (-2) having moisture levels of the ground and air calculated could be a cpu drain.
con (-1) i can't see a way around pipes to fully use water with higher tier tech.

I agree with implementing water, matter of factly, I am shocked that Rimworld doesn't have it. I see all these simulators as Dwarf Fortress-clones, kind of how like games can be Diablo-clones. So when I began playing the game, was surprised my Pawn's don't need water to survive, and neither the rest of the animals.

I'm frankly shocked at the resistance to implementing it, because the way I see it, I just want more Rimworld, which is me really saying I want more Dwarf Fortress, in this nice, clean looking UI.

I want the Vanilla game to have shoewear already loll. Pawn's need shoes, Tynan. Everyone talking about 'hat's, on the Reddit. We need "Shoes", too.

EDIT: The one feature I would suggest to go along with everyone's ideas on Water as a resource, is that while I assume it would be a separate mechanic to satiate, when Cook's are preparing Meals, they should "include" Water (cup) in the production, by either buckets or pipes as some here have suggested. It would simplify the mechanic, but Water would also be consumed on its own as well.

Quote from: NagaPrince on February 24, 2017, 06:25:17 PMI'm frankly shocked at the resistance to implementing it, because the way I see it, I just want more Rimworld, which is me really saying I want more Dwarf Fortress, in this nice, clean looking UI.

The reason I resist water as a resource for pawns is that I can't see any interesting production chain or interaction for water.

For food there is a production chain, you have multiple choices on how to acquire it (growing, hunting, livestock, trading, butchering raiders). This creates opportunities for the player to make choices and prioritise depending on the current situation. In particular since cooked meals and meat have a short life when it is not frozen, while harvested vegetables have a long life this adds more choices if you don't have a freezer (like tribal start). In addition you have different levels of food (simple, fine and lavish) which adds more choices.

Now those of you who support adding water, can you think of an interesting system for water that would not be build and forget? For instance in dwarf fortress you built a well and you were done. Great job, you built a well wasn't that fun! Now you can watch your dwarves drop everything they do to run to the well once in a while, yay, the fun!

Rimworld is a game and not real life. I think rather than asking, "how can we model this closer to real life?", we should be asking, "is it fun?". If it's not fun, then don't add it.

Edit: For anyone who thinks water sounds like a lot of fun here is a mod that adds toilet need and hygiene to the game, I suggest you try it out and see if this is really what you want. To me it is mostly a build and forget thing, not to mention pawns have no sense of ownership so making private bathrooms just means some idiot will run in to poop/shower in the room of someone else while they are sleeping.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=836308268

Quote from: Beider on February 25, 2017, 04:25:37 AM
Now those of you who support adding water, can you think of an interesting system for water that would not be build and forget? For instance in dwarf fortress you built a well and you were done. Great job, you built a well wasn't that fun! Now you can watch your dwarves drop everything they do to run to the well once in a while, yay, the fun!

Rimworld is a game and not real life. I think rather than asking, "how can we model this closer to real life?", we should be asking, "is it fun?". If it's not fun, then don't add it.

Edit: For anyone who thinks water sounds like a lot of fun here is a mod that adds toilet need and hygiene to the game, I suggest you try it out and see if this is really what you want. To me it is mostly a build and forget thing, not to mention pawns have no sense of ownership so making private bathrooms just means some idiot will run in to poop/shower in the room of someone else while they are sleeping.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=836308268

Tynan is interested in game mechanics that are fun and interact with each other. So, I'll try to answer your question by following those guidelines.
While I prefer things to remain simple, I see all of the following to be rather reasonable additions.

Health
Much in the same way famine (lack of food) can be detrimental to the health of your colonists, dehydration adds more to maintaining colonist health, which is currently a trivial task.
It doesn't have to be mundane, and there are plenty of ways of making this more interesting.
I think you already understand this to be one of the main arguments.

Production/Foraging
Water can be collected from water tiles already in the game manually, or collected automatically by the water pump already in the game.
Rain barrels collect rain in a similar way wind turbines generate power based on the weather.
Certain plants (ie. Cacti) can be harvested for their water contents.
Dehydration of food (unappetizing) to prolong the shelf-life of food drastically, and rehydration of food with water as a resource.
*This is where the main "fun" problem solving is, if you ask me.

Storyteller/Events
While I don't think floods are a necessary addition, droughts/lack of rain in otherwise "wet" biomes could cause interesting issues for people.

Growing
As others have already stated, growing could be and should be way harder than it currently is.
I'd be content with the removal/rarity of blight events in exchange for a water/maintenance requirement.
I'm not sure I'm entirely fond of the idea of wild plants having a constantly calculated water need, though...

---

Please, don't perpetuate the idea that a water need will/must be accompanied by a completely mundane hygiene need.
A mod that only adds a water need/mechanic would be a much better example; confounding variables are never good.
Most RimWorld players agree: This isn't The Sims...

The hygiene argument is bad, because a water need doesn't inherently advocate for a hygeine need.
Please, leave it out of this discussion.

Couldn't someone make a mod that has a building like quarry, or the fishing peer mod produce buckets of water instead of fish or rocks. Then  water is required to make meals, so you can tie the water need to the food need?

Saying that the game doesn't handle needs well is kind of a misnomer. It is just another bar to keep track of. The thirst bar, you either have access to water or you don't.

Quote from: O Negative on February 25, 2017, 07:10:51 AM
Tynan is interested in game mechanics that are fun and interact with each other. So, I'll try to answer your question by following those guidelines.
While I prefer things to remain simple, I see all of the following to be rather reasonable additions.

Health
Much in the same way famine (lack of food) can be detrimental to the health of your colonists, dehydration adds more to maintaining colonist health, which is currently a trivial task.
It doesn't have to be mundane, and there are plenty of ways of making this more interesting.
I think you already understand this to be one of the main arguments.

Production/Foraging
Water can be collected from water tiles already in the game manually, or collected automatically by the water pump already in the game.
Rain barrels collect rain in a similar way wind turbines generate power based on the weather.
Certain plants (ie. Cacti) can be harvested for their water contents.
Dehydration of food (unappetizing) to prolong the shelf-life of food drastically, and rehydration of food with water as a resource.
*This is where the main "fun" problem solving is, if you ask me.

Storyteller/Events
While I don't think floods are a necessary addition, droughts/lack of rain in otherwise "wet" biomes could cause interesting issues for people.

Growing
As others have already stated, growing could be and should be way harder than it currently is.
I'd be content with the removal/rarity of blight events in exchange for a water/maintenance requirement.
I'm not sure I'm entirely fond of the idea of wild plants having a constantly calculated water need, though...

---

Please, don't perpetuate the idea that a water need will/must be accompanied by a completely mundane hygiene need.
A mod that only adds a water need/mechanic would be a much better example; confounding variables are never good.
Most RimWorld players agree: This isn't The Sims...

The hygiene argument is bad, because a water need doesn't inherently advocate for a hygeine need.
Please, leave it out of this discussion.

The thing with this is I see this simply ending in one of two extremes (kind of like food is at the moment). Either you will be struggling like crazy to get water since there isn't enough in your biome (desert) and often will just lose because you can't get enough water for your colonists. Or you simply build a well and forget about, never having to interact with the system in any meaningful way again.

I agree that the needs system of colonists could need an overhaul to make it more challenging, but I don't think adding a need for water will solve anything at the moment.

Quote from: Limdood on February 24, 2017, 03:06:16 PM
the problem with a colonist water need is that the AI just doesn't handle needs very well.  If my miner is going to wake up, walk across the map, take 1 swing at the rock, come back for food, go back and swing, come back for water, walk, swing, walk, food, walk swing, walk, water, walk, swing, walk, bed - he's not going to get much done.

And thirst is a much more serious need than hunger for humans. A rough estimate is that a human can survive 1 month without food but 3 days without water. So if colonists had thirst bars, they would need to deplete 10 times as fast to resemble reality. Rimworld colonists eat about twice per day.

"Oh, but they would carry canteens with them!"
- what about bedridden colonists and patients ? Have your busy doctor feed them water howManyTimes a day ? Currently incapacitated pawns can't even wipe themselves, how would they even reach for canteens ?
- what about prisoners ? Nutrient paste dispenser for water would be a must. Now imagine an event similar to solar flare, but for water.
- a canteen would need capacity larger than 1 drink. How would AI decide how often to refill it ? And if you make canteen large enough to hold, say, 2 days worth of drink, then drinking would become a meaningless activity. A colonist would stop several times per day to drink, and interesting interactions would only occur during disasters.

Another reason for water nobody mentioned yet is fire fighting.

Having Water pipes or buckets around would be a huge help.
It would also scale nicely with the biomes because the drier biomes have less fire hazards

I'll take water puddles over firefoam any day...

Just chiming in to say that a water system is one of the big features I feel the game is still missing.

an advanced research tech could be for those things you see at on tatooine in the first star wars movie in the moisture farms, some sort of electrical condenser capable of pulling water out of even low humidity air. Much less efficient than other systems like rain barrels, but could give you an option for desert living with water limitations, similar to hydroponics for biomes where food growing is tough.

 There are actually different terrain levels, we (the player) just can't interact with them. Take a look at lakes, marshes, etc. The game tracks elevation, and fills in terrain accordingly.

Not really sold on water needs being added in just to satisfy "muh survival realism" and I believe it'll just add extra micro that'll be more tedious than fun.

But I do propose this:
Have a water need. But have it be super easy to manage.
Early on, all you would need to worry about is designing your base with access to water sources like lakes, rivers, and etc. If those are not available. Rain catchers could be made. Pawns would be equipped with canteens which when filled, would last half the day. At the start of each day they'll drink from the water sources and refill their canteens like how meals work now. Very little interactivity with the player, which isn't really such a bad thing.

"But you might as well not add them at all."

Ah, but they're only like that at the start. Later on, certain events and other mechanics will have a great effect on them.

1. Toxic Fallouts can irriadiate water
Which can potentially make your pawns sick unless treated via the cooking table. And if irrigation is included then indoor greenhouses can also be affected. Meaning that bunkering down will not truly protect you from risk. Also it differentiates it a bit from manhunter packs.

2. No Rain + Sieges and Manhunters
With water being added as a need, your building location may sometimes choose between having an easy source of water via lake but be in the open or being inside a defendable mountain and relying solely on rain collectors. Since water would be easy peasy to handle, most would probably still choose the latter. And here's where rain (or lack thereof) comes in. There could be an event where rain would be unavailable for a month or two. Which would force players to expose their pawns to collect water from farther places and generally waste time on travel. Pair this up with manhunter packs or sieges and you have serious risks of pawns dying from dehydration.

Also the lack of rain would be the defining feature for deserts and dry biomes.

3. Corpses and diseases
Corpses being anywhere near water tiles can increase the chances of pawns getting sick when they drink from that body of water. With the amount of corpses increasing the chances, you must ensure the lake your getting water from is free from corpses. Tribal raids would be all the more dangerous. Alternatively, since enemy pawns would also need water, you can dump corpses on far-away water sources and poison any raiders attempting to drink from it. While regular raids won't be as affected, it can become a viable tactic when dealing with long-term dangers like Sieges and Manhunters.

Expanding on the poisoning part. There could be a tribal raid who's goal is to poison your water supply and then leaving. Then coming back a few weeks later and starting a raid when your colony is weakened.

4. Firefighting
Another firefighting method could be added which involves a bucket of water putting out large tiles of fire at a time. Now there's a chance for you to prevent your entire wooden colony from burning into the ground. No problem for colonies with access to large sources of water but for collector-depended colonies. It would be a massive drain on their water supply, at the cost of less fire destruction.

5. Winter and freezing temperatures
Frozen water sources would severely affect drinking time and cause mood debuffs from pawns drinking from it. Rain collectors would be filled with undrinkable snow instead. You'll be given the option to boil snow to get some water. During these times your cooks would have to work double-time to provide enough drinkable water to sustain the colony and prevent mood debuffs.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Those are just somethings I have at the top of my head. There's potentially more. But TL;DR

Water is a need that's easy to manage.
+ Can be tied in with diseases.
+ Can buff firefighting.
+ Can encourage having bases on the open.
+ No more "I'm surprised this game doesn't have water" posts.

+/- Greater danger of events like Toxic Fallout.

- Seems more work than it's worth.

The only way pipes will be useful and not a headache is by coupling the wires with them. In that way, we can even justify the zzzzzzt events as a leakage in the pipes. Even hygiene should only be result of the environmental cleanliness of the pawn like beauty or space moods right now. No need of adding toilets and showers and such.

Outside of flooding or crop water usage I think the rest of what's mentioned here is just going to make the game more fidly, not more fun.

Quote from: b0rsuk on February 25, 2017, 08:24:56 AM

Quote from: Limdood on February 24, 2017, 03:06:16 PM
the problem with a colonist water need is that the AI just doesn't handle needs very well.  If my miner is going to wake up, walk across the map, take 1 swing at the rock, come back for food, go back and swing, come back for water, walk, swing, walk, food, walk swing, walk, water, walk, swing, walk, bed - he's not going to get much done.

And thirst is a much more serious need than hunger for humans. A rough estimate is that a human can survive 1 month without food but 3 days without water. So if colonists had thirst bars, they would need to deplete 10 times as fast to resemble reality. Rimworld colonists eat about twice per day.

"Oh, but they would carry canteens with them!"
- what about bedridden colonists and patients ? Have your busy doctor feed them water howManyTimes a day ? Currently incapacitated pawns can't even wipe themselves, how would they even reach for canteens ?

Possible solution:  Vitals monitor also acts as an IV with saline solution.

Quote- what about prisoners ? Nutrient paste dispenser for water would be a must. Now imagine an event similar to solar flare, but for water.

Possible solution:   Bucket of potable water.  An event for water is called a drought.

Quote- a canteen would need capacity larger than 1 drink. How would AI decide how often to refill it ? And if you make canteen large enough to hold, say, 2 days worth of drink, then drinking would become a meaningless activity. A colonist would stop several times per day to drink, and interesting interactions would only occur during disasters.

Possible solution:  Just make the canteen carried and have it deplete over time in a pawn's inventory as applicable.  You don't really need the animation and stop action to drink.  People drink on the move all the time.  Just as if they're thirsty, have a movement penalty or something similar.

With alcohol and drugs, they could make a pawn thirstier for using them.

In reality, 99% of all human settlement occurred either on a river, on the coast, or both. Why?

Access to fresh water is critical for any settlement, of any size.

An actual "water mechanic" doesn't have to be that complicated; just add it to the food system. Simple meals take 5 water, Fine meals take 10, Lavish meals take 15. Or, do like the Vegetable Garden Mod does, and add actual goddamn recipes to the game. Different recipes require different ingredients, provide different amounts of meals, and provide various benefits.

If there is a body of fresh water on the map, within a certain radius of your settlement, your pawns automatically collect water as part of the Hauling skill. On the other hand, natural bodies of water can be polluted, by bodies or in general, leading to diseases (kinda like how food poisoning works in-game).

To avoid that, or if your colony lacks a body of water close by, you could build a well using X wood and X stone. This works the same as a natural source, but it can't be polluted.

Done.

@Boston

Problem with just that is that there's so little effect on gameplay outside of "being slightly more realistic" that you might as well ignore it.

"Slightly more realistic" is a bit of an insult. Every playthrough, I have to suspend disbelief in the idea that my people need food but not water... In a game where basic survival is a huge component.

Let's just get rid of the food system, since it only adds a bit of realism, right? It's not like your people are in a state of malnutrition enough for it to really matter during raids. Making colder biomes harder to survive in is whatever. It'll help with performance, too, because it'll be one less need to track :D

/Where's the sarcasm font, anyways? ;)

I did not mean to insult and I apologize for whatever tone I may have been using. But if water is gonna be added as a resource or need, I believe it should at least add a degree of challenge to the game. Building a well to quickly solve water issues seems like it would just undermine the purpose of it.

I do agree that should water be added, water can be contaminated and be a source of disease.

Quote from: O Negative on February 28, 2017, 01:23:16 AM
Strawman

Difference in opinion. I'm not really bothered by the lack of water as it'll just fulfill the same role of food. I mean The Sims is tagged as a "Life Simulation" game yet it doesn't even have a water need.

The food system is what drives the player to gather, farm, hunt, and generally interact with the environment. Without food, interaction would become optional. You might as well just wall yourself up into a 1 tile room under a mountain and say that you've beaten the game.

Biomes are there to provide new challenges that players can overcome and variety in maps. Realism mostly has got to do with it but it's probably not the sole reason.

These features are here with the intention of making this game fun and varied.
I'm not against adding water. But unless the whole point of the game is super-realistic survival, which I don't think it is, I believe it should at least bring something new to the table. One which food hasn't already covered. Go say "Water mechanics could X, and Y" instead of just pushing it "Because real-life has it."

Well that or maybe I'm just tired of the sole reliance on the realism argument.

Edit: There's bound to be someone to type up another extreme argument. So whoever's about to say "Eyebeams shooting out people's eyes are fun, why not add that?", stop right there. While it may be fun. It must also be sensible.

Also you can use /s if you can't find the font.

You didn't have a bad tone, I was only poking fun. I'll apologize for my vague tone and strawman, though.

Anywho,

-----
If/Then

"If water is gonna be added as a resource or need, I believe it should at least add a degree of challenge to the game. Building a well to quickly solve water issues seems like it would just undermine the purpose of it."

I agree. However, I don't understand why people come to the conclusion that a well is going to be the solution they're offered. There are plenty of other possible passive methods of collecting water, and they don't add tedium nor make water collection trivial. I've listed them before.
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The Sims

The Sims is no different for me, with respect to basic physiological needs. I just think they wanted to keep their UI clean by having an even number of needs ;)

I'm not a fan of the slippery slope arguments which often point towards RimWorld turning into The Sims if we add one more need.
"Then what? A hygiene need? Maybe a bladder need? Grrr!"
The Sims needs those mundane needs/tasks to keep the player occupied, because not much else is happening.
-----
Realism ≠ Good Idea

I agree 100%.
I've seen many arguments that rely solely on "This is how it happens in real life, so..." arguments, and their silly.
Game design should be, first and foremost, decided by what makes the game more fun/functional.
Realism only compliments gameplay.

I'm sorry if I ever came across as making that my main point.
-----
Biomes & Interaction

You're not wrong. There's no real way to argue that water couldn't offer a similar, yet unique, set of challenges and interactions.
Many have been listed in this thread already.
Unless, of course, you insist water collection will be made trivial & mundane :P

Water needs to be more than just a relabeled food need.  It should have DIFFERENT effects on the game than food does, and it should have it's OWN challenges that stay pertinent through different biomes or game stages.

In short, water affecting colonists has already been done...in the food need.  Water affecting OTHER systems in the game (most notably growing) COULD enhance the game, but only if its done in a meaningful way.

Heh. I'm gonna go ahead and throw in the towel on this one.

If I want a water mechanic enough, I can always continue to try to learn C# and make a mod of my own...

I thank you all for your valuable insight, though.

Some great thinking here but I believe it's gone the way of overthinking, as these things tend to do.

Let's try looking at it another way: water is noticeably absent from gameplay. Except  most all actions inherently revolve around water intensive activities. Farming, cooking, medical treatment, defensive strategy, etc. So we already accept that water is necessary for survival but is, thusfar, unaccounted. Highly stylized existence, the nature of this game.

Instead of devising ways to make a water mechanic complex to satisfy some false notion of being realistic and representative, we can instead devise ways to keep it truncated while still adding an increased level of complexity for mechanics already presented in the game. Namely agriculture and animal husbandry.

We don't need to plumb buildings, provide hygiene and count how many times a day someone must drink. That's a bit of an overkill and unnecessary. If there is some form of water we can accept, as we do currently, that pawns are handling those needs on their own. But farming and raising animals,  primary means of sustenance, can't always fend for themselves. If you build a watering hole, or there's a natural one where animals can fend for themselves, that works. If animals can, so can humans. It just needs to be a available, the details of how that physical need is satisfied aren't important--how it currently works.

Agriculture, on the other hand is an exception. Most forms of crops in this game are naturally water intensive--and pawns can also derive their own water needs from these crops.  So having irrigation could diversify crops and not only provide improved, or crucial, nutrition in formidable circumstances but also a means of income. Seed stocks could be either traditional or found from each biome--the latter would be more suitable for those not investing in irrigation but with reduced yields. Trade could be more interesting by buying seed that is more suitable to an irrigated landscape or selling rare seeds collected from harsh landscapes. Surely there's a market for it.

Otherwise, do we need to demand realism just for the sake of complexity to make it seem plausible? I don't believe so. Just setup a pump and an irrigation ditch next to your crops and consider them watered. That level of simplicity is consistent with this game.

Sunlamp is extremely cheap to build but has outlandish power usage: 1600W. I think this is to make up for the lack of water system. If there was a water system, indoor farming could have a rational and less arbitrary cost.

Outlandish?  It provides 100% light in a 100 tile area.  That's a lot.  You can fit 4 solar collectors in their radius.  If Solar Panels weren't forbidden from using artificial light, it would be ridiculously easy to create an over-unity power generator.  Sun Lamps give far too much light for their power cost.

Are you sure you need a resource to make something? I know in the Medieval mod you can make ice blocks out of an ice tile, and you don't need anything to make it.

Or maybe you can make a bucket out of a bench, and when you take it to the water gathering spot the bucket changes from a empty bucket to a full bucket, and when you use the bucket to make a meal or drink it, it turns back to a empty bucket.

What if you turned the food processor into a water storage unit.... The colonists would go and get the bucket and dump it into the hopper. The hopper will only accept water. Then the storage unit can be connected through pipes to the cook stove. The cook stove will use water the same way that items use power. Use a parallel but separate system. Intake pipes can later connect pumps to underground water sources later in the game when you research water pumps. Water pumps can be placed either by surface water sources or underground water sources. Underground water sources needs a water scanner to reveal. Water scanner works like ground penetration scanner except it is much cheaper to research and build. Add a resource on the map called Natural well to all maps. Natural wells work like Geothermal vents but can produce natural water when a well is built on it. In the desert this is necessary to survival, so pawns will have to transport water to the hopper from the well using buckets. Buckets would then need to be made from either steel or wood, or you would never have buckets in the desert or tundra. Later pawns can build a pump by the well to pump the water through pipes. Again, water pipes work identical to power lines except the resource transported IS water. Also, when it 'rains' the water storage unit will automatically start filling up by itself if it is unroofed. For ice maps, have melt ice snow to water bench. Use collection spot from medieval mod, to collect blocks, have blocks = water buckets, pour water into the storage unit. When it snows have water fill but at a reduced rate.


So therefore I think that having pipes and a requirement that the cook stove be hooked up to a constant water supply to use would make more sense if you could create a ground water resource to attach a pump to. I think that is the best solution if it was simple to do from early game. Neolithic cultures could make a well and aqua ducks or something. It does start to sound pretty complicated once you start to try and wrap your head around it.

And don't forget beer, beer = water because DF!

The entire point of the debate in this thread is that there's a difference between "Can" and "Should".

Quote from: Hans Lemurson on March 03, 2017, 04:15:58 PM
The entire point of the debate in this thread is that there's a difference between "Can" and "Should".

Well put.

Unmodded Rimworld deliberately keeps certain level of abstraction. You have neurotramine as a component for many drugs, where in reality you would probably need a few dozen of reagents and chemicals from different sources, with different deterioration rate, handling and storage requirements. You have components, but you could have screws, gears, wires, transistors, electronic boards, resistors, capacitors, lenses, magnets and more. You have medicine, but you could have bandages, syringes, scalpels, anaesthetics, disinfectants, antibiotics, thermometers, etc. Not everyone enjoys minute details of every aspect of colony simulation. Not everyone is a gun enthusiast, has chemical interest or likes to tinker with Rasberry Pi Zero.

Against whom are you making this point ?

I liked the suggestion of JStank and suggested to him to repost from another thread ( thirst need )

It is abstract enough to fit the rimworld setup and different enough from Hunger to make sense as a ressource.

Thanks spacedorf! I wish I knew how to mod stuff or I would try and work on it. I recently discovered the mars mod and it has similar systems to my suggestions. Water is possible!

So expanding on that idea (just thought of it) Lets say you wanted to have a juice dispenser, to have yummy juice drinks that provide a mood boost. Make a bench called a juicer, hook it up to your water storage tank. Have a bill adds berries and uses water out of the bench and wala you have berry juice + 5 mood boost! 

Yeah, I wish I had a head for modding too.

I know XML and C#, but I have no Art skills and no endurance for the work ..

QuoteI'm specifically interested in arguments that are not just listing things that would make Rimworld sound more detailed. In particular not making a parallel power system that's functionally identical. Anyone can list stuff.

Water is a huge requirement for life, and it's not all that common.  I think Rimworld is hollow without at least some mention of water.  In short, it just seems necessary.

Weather.  You can't have weather without water, and there is a LOT going on there.  Plants don't like humidity, they like water.  The suggestion of flooding requires moving water though, and that's a challenge.  Shrinking and growing puddles on the other hand is a done deal (poison ships for instance).

Would it "balance" the game to add water as a resource?  It would certainly stack the odds in the favor of life in some biomes and against life in others.

I think half of rimworld is watching survival and chores from an historians perspective.  We didn't zap cholera with chlorine and wastewater treatment until the turn of the 1800-1900s.  Add water and there are a lot more ways to lose a colonist as well as ways to keep one alive.  I'd say heck ya it adds balance.

Easy to Implement:

• Just change "Power conduit" to "Infrastructure"
• Start without irrigation or running water and research up to it.
• Frankly I think latrines or outhouses are key.

It would be great if water were used as a disaster incident. That's a very common thing in any world. Having a portion of your base, crops or equipment rendered useless from flooding would pretty amazing. Having the ability to control or channel the water an added bonus.

Water system could also cause more realistic animal distribution among biomes. Now it's not uncommon to see elephants in tundra. If animals had more distinctive water requirements and temperature requirements, animals that don't fit would naturally ragequit. Donkeys would thrive in arid shrubland.

But that would also be effected by the plants that the animals are able to eat.

I don't think there's a single gameplay argument against having a water system in the game.

The only thing keeping it out is the amount of work involved with such a thing, when there's already work that needs to be done in the game.

Quote from: Sola on March 09, 2017, 03:59:13 PM
I don't think there's a single gameplay argument against having a water system in the game.

The only thing keeping it out is the amount of work involved with such a thing, when there's already work that needs to be done in the game.

Don't confuse the discussion of one as a demand for one. Only but the greenest newbies make such demands. I think it's safe to say we're all comfortable with the demands of Alpha dev, but that doesn't prevent us from discussing additional ideas for later development. 

Quote from: Sola on March 09, 2017, 03:59:13 PM
I don't think there's a single gameplay argument against having a water system in the game.

Of course there is... haven't you read this thread?

A reminder, this thread is about water as a potential resource to be stored and/or provided to colonists, plants, animals or machines. Having boats or raids by water doesn't really need a water system, you can just reskin Transport Pods and make a requirement that they are placed near water.

People like me think simple hydration need is boring, because it's a copy/paste of food need. Most of needs are distinctive and the challenges they make are distinct. Clean your rooms once in a while, dispose of corpses, don't store ugly resources in work room if you can help it, install sculptures. Craft comfortable furniture, especially beds and dining chairs (okay, this one is a bit primitive, it could use more mechanics like comfortable clothing). Drugs, unlike comfort and beauty, can be bought for addicted colonists, can be grown. Actually drugs are very much like the food need, but you can't decide to stop eating. What I'm saying is that a new need shouldn't overlap too much with existing needs because it's not an interesting addition to the game.

I think currently coastlines and water tiles in general are currently wasted/underused. Some of the arguments made about human habitats being on the coastline have some merit, classically they provided ample food. I do agree, we don't "need" another need bar to manage. So, I'm going to come at this idea from a few angles, not because I am advocating for them, but because I see value in calling out missed opportunities to expand on existing gameplay elements, even if I personally don't think I'd like the idea.

Fishing, is one resource that would be dependent on water. The deeper the water, the larger the fish. The obvious bonus is an additional food source, but the risks are clear: you can't just fish from safety, you have to get to the water's edge; you can't really wall off coastline. Spear fishing, for instance, would make use of what I see as an underused weapon. You could add in certain dangers to water, to offset the "creation" of food.

I understand irrigation in some form used to be in Rimworld. (Before my time, I'm afraid, so I don't really have that knowledge to draw from.) My thought would be allowing players to channel new waterways for higher fertility, the risk involved would be overused waterways drying up, as well as brief droughts causing plant death. (At least one additional calculation per season, I would think, based on rainfall per region.) Water storage mediums could be used, such as wells and above ground storage tanks, to offset this danger.

Fires. Currently, we have firefoam (and to be fair, I never use them) but for a tribal? (They are clearly throwing clumps of dirt at the fire, trying to smother it.) I'd rather see wells providing buckets to be carried to fight fires, instead of just running into a raging inferno, putting it out with one pawn barehanded. I'm not exactly sure how this might affect firefighting, and I'm finding it difficult to imagine. Droughts would of course lead to higher fire risks, as the ability to fight fires would be lessened.

I don't necessarily think water needs a lot of "good" mechanics, but I do believe it needs to be more than just something that gets in the way of your base building.

Quote from: b0rsuk on March 10, 2017, 02:34:01 PM

People like me think simple hydration need is boring, because it's a copy/paste of food need.

Since you brought it up, in my mind water is essential and should be integral part of the game. You think it's boring and a waste of time yet you're ok with the need for mopping and cleaning as an engaging and efficient use of gameplay. That is so bassackward I can't even.