Apparel deterioration way too harsh on stats

[Negocromn]

So, one of the things that is bothering me the most in RW right now is the nonstop and ever increasing apparel micro, that mostly happens because your items lose absurd amounts of stats every day and every fight.

As it is right now, an 80% item is already so much worse than its original form that you're usually better off wearing a brand new one from inferior materials or couple lower quality levels. I don't really know the numbers and how it works exactly, but I tested a couple items and the stats lost/hit points lost ratio seems to be 75%. Flat. Which means you won't have to worry about changing apparel just when it gets really worn out or specially shredded in a fight, instead, you'll have to worry about it everyday, and the bigger the colony grows and the more people you try arm with decent equipment, the worse it gets.

I think having tiers of stat degradation per level of % durability would be the best, so from 100% to 50% durability you lose X% stats, from 50% to 20% 2X% stats, from 20% to 0% 5X% stats. Or something along the lines of that, ofc.

So, to put it short, I think deterioration is a fundamental part of the game, having to replace items really adds to the gameplay. But, it shouldn't be such a major chore nor punish the player that invests in apparel, it would be much more sensible if you only had to care about replacing actual low durability items.

Am I the only one that has a problem with this?










ps how do I use spoilers here x.x

[Kegereneku]

This is true,
When Deterioration was added and Traders items revised we ended up with a lot of micromanagements and less money to buy efficients weapons.
It was unneeded before as everything was undestructible, but now a way to "repair" items would be greatly appreciated.

Also, although it reduce micro-management, I think the current outfit-system could be improved a little to allow quick-change of equipments between "normal" and "combat".

I also wouldn't mind a storage system other than 1 items per square.

[TLHeart]

I have no problem with the current degradation of the clothing. a 20% drop in durability equals a drop in quality. Pawns don't care so long as the clothing does not become frayed.  Very easy to set up a tailors bench to stay ahead of your colonist needs, and set up a storage area for only the quality cloths produced... Then adjust the sliders on the apparel wear to match what you want them to wear.  The only micro management I have to do, is making sure the tailors store of quality stays full... the do until counts all items of the type, not just the quality ones.

The tailors bench should be able to mend and repair clothing, but NOT back to full quality. A patch repair is always less durable than the original clothing.

[Murdo]

I don't recall what the dev blog said on the matter, if anything, but I always assumed the ultimate goal was to have the % value of clothes be repairable (mending, patches etc.), with multiple repairs ultimately lowering the basic quality level of the item (Good -> Normal, etc.).  That just seems to make the most sense. But it all comes down to game balance.

[Rahjital]

Yes, I have noticed this. The current system is quite forgiving with normal apparel made of cloth, but legendary hyperweave clothing seems to wear down at similar rate which is simply not right. Quality and material should both have a noticeable effect on how quickly it deteriorates, with perhaps legendary clothing having little to no wear (how can there be any legends about it if it doesn't last a year? )

[UrbanBourbon]

It's a damn shame about the high-quality devilstrand or hyperweave items. They're so expensive and fragile. They are definitely not worth wearing, as there are far more economic options. The 50% limit for what counts as 'frayed' or 'worn-out' is too high as well, IMO.

I think hyperweave and devilstrand should not wear out in normal use at all. And even if you catch a bullet with them, they should take damage only slightly. And make them both immune to fire. Repair option would be nice, too, but it should be expensive material-wise, and time-consuming, perhaps so that at 50% condition it'd be the same if you'd craft a new shirt. Of course if the damaged item was a legendary item, then you'd probably want to repair it rather than risk producing a less-than-legendary item. Might also be fun if clothes kept a record of the damaged location and the received damage/projectile type, much like pawn bodies:

"Left sleeve - Great Bow (Toxio Turtlepuncher, The Talisman Tribe)"
"Torso - Shotgun (Jackie Jackson, The Mercenary Group)"
"Torso - Pistol (Nellie Newbieshooter, Colonist)"
"Torso - Bite mark (Squirrel)"
"Right sleeve - Burn mark (Lightning)"

Might be great if one could assign an owner to a piece of clothing, much like you can assign a bed to someone. Colonists need wardrobes in their quarters, where to store their clothes. Prisoner wardrobes might be handy, too. I think clothes take too much space and we need a controlled way to store multiple clothing items in one square. That same mechanic could be used to store guns, which would enable proper weapon racks and armories. 5 pieces of clothing/weapons per one tile, maybe?

[Negocromn]

My only problem with introducing repairing, as most suggested so far, is that with the current degradation + outfits/stockpile mechanics it will have everything to become an even greater hassle, with the possibility of even more forced microing.
I mean, I too think it's a much needed mechanic, but if it ends up being implemented as an obligatory always running mending industry, then it doesn't really help improve gameplay much.

[isistoy]

I particularly agree to the idea for complex synthread, devilstrand and hyperweave clothes of excellent->masterwork qualities. Apart from that, all the necessary crafting is, imho, enough to cover even big colonies needs and you have already the ability to slowly upgrade all colonists to excellent leather/cloth stuffs regularly revisiting then to check if they wear something worth changing, making them drop the thing and recheck the stockpiles.

[Woyzeck]

StatDefs, Stats_Apparel, look for this bit:

<curve>
          <points>
            <li>
              <loc>(0,0.25)</loc>
            </li>
            <li>
              <loc>(1,1)</loc>
            </li>
          </points>
        </curve>

Those are what determine the curves for stat degradation. I thin in general both degradation and quality bonuses are too strong (for both weapons and apparel). I would prefer it if quality ad its greatest impact on an item's max hit points instead - high quality objects IRL generally being much longer lasting and lower quality ones often considered such specifically because they aren't made to last (the "buy cheap, buy twice" principle).

[Tynan]

I'll rebalance it a bit, thanks.

[Boboid]

I was just having a look through the numbers, quality already has a significant impact on degradation rate and only pawn death causes a significant decrease in durability, firefights represent perhaps 2 days of degradation for most apparel qualities.

It takes a significant amount of time for a standard piece of apparel ( 100 hitpoints, not armor ) to lose enough durability to have lost stats equivalent to 1 quality level, and it's non-linear as each quality level significant reduces degradation rate.

We're talking like 25+ days even for Good shirts to resemble Normal shirts.

Admittedly material doesn't have an impact on degradation rate but.. I mean with the exception of Hyperweave every apparel material can be generated significantly more quickly than it's lost in terms of clothing replacement. Especially Devilstrand and Cloth, each colonist represents a tiny amount of cloth/strand lost per day in degradation but a huge increase in proportionate crop yield.


Unless your tailors are 3 thumbed, 1 handed, blind men who've never seen a needle before and you're buying overpriced hyperweave I don't see how you're struggling with clothing degradation or "micromanagement" as a result.

The outfit system pretty much does away with micromanagement entirely - if used correctly the most you'll ever have to do is increase your standards as time goes on which is hardly a blip on the radar in terms of interface time.


I'm very confused by the responses in this thread :/

[Rahjital]

quality already has a significant impact on degradation rate

I just tested this by locking three colonists in cells where they had to work on plasteel longswords to keep themselves occupied, and found out quality doesn't matter at all. Legendary clothing wears down just as quickly as awful does. The deterioration stat only seems to govern how quickly it degrades when you leave it lying outside and not when colonists wear it.

That's why there's a problem. The system works really well for normal clothing, but once you deck out your colonists in legendary devilstrand clothes, you'll have a hard time getting a replacement set before the first becomes frayed. It's even worse with non-craftable items like power armour or personal shields, I think those shouldn't wear down at all outside combat.

[Kegereneku]

In my mind the deterioration was only for unprotected object left outside in the mud, or damage occurred in unusual situation.

'Repair job' would be sparse and reserved for definite items/clothes/weapons, not an all around "repair everything under 50%" bill)

[Boboid]

The deterioration stat only seems to govern how quickly it degrades when you leave it lying outside and not when colonists wear it.

Was a bit dubious about the way you tested this so I tested it myself.

Edit: See later posts.
You're just flat out wrong I'm afraid.

Deterioration rate does affect the rate at which apparel loses durability while worn. Test it yourself using dev-mode and Shoddy vs Legendary equipment, Shoddy deteriorates 3.75x faster than Legendary so it's a pretty easy test.


I entirely disagree that it's difficult to replace devilstrand clothing as quickly as it deteriorates.
With regards to power armor and the like they at least have higher hitpoints so the deterioration proportionately less significant.

[Rahjital]

That's the way I tested it. I used dev mode, gave six colonists pants, t-shirts and dusters (three got awful quality, three got legendary), then I locked each of them in identical cells to make sure the test conditions would be as similar as possible and that they would spend time outside too (in case it had an effect) and let the game run in 3x time acceleration. In the end, all clothing was similarly worn.

I suppose the only way to truly know is to fire ILSpy and look at the code directly...

And yeah, normal devilstrand clothing is not hard to replace. I think legendary devilstrand is a different matter, though.


Edit: Found it!

Code Select Expand

public float wearPerDay = 0.2f;

In other words, apparel wear is a hardcoded constant and does not take quality (or anything else at all) into account.