Guards and Unknown Threats

[b0rsuk]

...and if no event can wipe out a colony on its own, why limit overlapping events ?! I haven't looked into the code, but it certainly feels like they're limited because events overlap so rarely.

The result of the policy of not upsetting players is a large and vocal faction of players who want permanent colonies, raising children, craftable bionics, personal shields, brain surgeries. In other words, building the nicest colony possible, with a side minigame of tower defense.

Have you noticed how harsh requirement for impressive rooms are ? You need silver floors or multiple statues to make it lil bit impressive. That's not a survival game, that's some kind of achievement from Sim City. The person who coded room stats (it wasn't Tynan) must have been from the 'permanent colonies' faction.

[keylocke]

plot twist.. i am one of those whom you'd call the permanent colonies faction.. dundunduuun!! 

but that topic is too off-topic for this post, so civil war averted. (to be continued)

edit : though i also agree that some of those impressiveness requirements are too imbalanced at the moment.

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anyways, back to topic.

@harold :

As attractive as the Great Unknown seems in raid situations, it'd be a massive hindrance when hunting, harvesting, or collecting pods.

i sorta agree that having FOW would make these more difficult, but not impossible.

for hunting, there were suggestions that it should be tasked as a bill tied to a crafting station (like a butcher table or like a crafting spot) so players can just set the animal types to be hunted and the hunters will automatically hunt those animal types. it also makes it easier to cancel hunting by suspending a bill instead of trying to cancel it one at a time.

edit : to elaborate how hunting would work as a bill :
-players set a hunting bill and chooses which animals would be hunted (maybe even set the maximum range for hunting)
-once a bill is setup, anyone with the hunting work enabled will walk around the hunting zone until they find an animal that fits the bill within their visual range.
-hunter then automatically tags that animal for hunting and begins hunting.
-this is how hunting works in real life. hunters don't just make for a beeline automatically knowing where their prey is. that just takes the joy out of "hunting".

as for cargo pods, they are often accompanied by notifications, so even with FOW, players would be aware of their locations.

unlike those suspenseful ancient rooms with cryptosleep chambers that are covered with FOW, there's no "surprise" factor to cargo pods. currently when a drop pod lands, players automatically know what item it is. it's like you get to cherry-pick "free-stuffs" with minimal effort. so it kinda cheapens the event into a non-event.

no more, "a cargo pod dropped somewhere.. i wonder what it is?"
-"not worth my effort, it's probably more warg meat"
-5 mins later, "i thought it was useless crap, but omygash! it's 20 gold pieces!! today is xmas!"

^that

surprises are fun coz it makes even the most mundane events able to inspire curiosity.

[skullywag]

The problem with all this is the Ai, when there was FOW (yes it existed in RW) the AI had the advantage and just knew where all your stuff was whereas you had no clue where they were, to reverse this would have meant MASSIVE AI code changes, the kind you just dont want undertake. So FOW was removed which levelled the playing field.

[keylocke]

i don't think that the AI knowing where you are is necessarily a disadvantage. i think it actually levels the playing field since the player is often smarter than the AI.

let's face it. rimworld AI for a normal raid tends to be just a straightforward dash towards your base, there's nothing complicated about that.

same thing with sappers, but they try to waste their time attacking obstacles blocking their way rather than going around it.

and as for sieges? they just stand around waiting for their mortars to get built while player snipes them one at a time.

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even with FOW or not, those raider AI doesn't really change that much. their only advantage is overwhelming numbers.

ambushes and outflanking the player is one of the few things the game could add for making raids more challenging without increasing the raiders. but AI ambushes and flanking are pointless without FOW.

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edit : the current notification system in rimworld can already tell the player the location and direction of the threat, it even tells the player the nature of the threat. so the players would no longer be confused when they are getting attacked, from where will the attack come from, and what kind of threat are they gonna face.

those information can already be known simply by reading the notification popups which provide the player all the necessary information they need to make rational choices.

[Harold3456]

FOV is something better used in a survival game. Rimworld is a colony management game. For better or worse, Rimworld has no mystery. There is no exploration except mining, and mining is as dull as it sounds. You might discover some steel, sometimes plasteel or small amount of components. Resources to build stuff with.

^This. I like the idea of a Rimworld-like game having FoV, but I don't think it would be a good fit in Rimworld itself. Most of the suspense in Rimworld is in the act of the raid/infestation/psychic ship appearing. As attractive as the Great Unknown seems in raid situations, it'd be a massive hindrance when hunting, harvesting, or collecting pods.

But it means that mystery only happens when the Storyteller rolls dice. Mystery could be a game system instead, supported by mechanics like FOV.

And there is less emergence here than in a system composed of FOV and stuff. Events are scheduled and rarely overlap. I raise an eyebrow if a manhunter pack comes with a psychic drone - I was a bit worried because Freckles was caught in the open and had to spend night in a remote soil farm. The result is that each event has a definite solution, and can be played by the book. When was the last time I had two sieges at once ? More than 2 alphas ago. Do you remember a trade caravan that ran into manhunter pack ? Me neither. A siege with a solar flare, is it even possible ? I don't believe it, solar flare is the time to make a campfire in the growing zone and for food in the fridge to spoil a little. And I play on Randy. On Cassie and Phoebe it's probably even more formulaic.

You don't get solar flares the same time as raids? Talk about lucky! Just in this last colony I've had (which, according to the stats, has gone on 22 hours) I've had solar flares happen twice at the worst possible time, and a "ZZZZT" happen a third!

In addition, I recently got the pleasure of witnessing a tribe of raiders run headlong into the mechanite pod that had been plaguing me. That was a fun fight to watch.

I don't disagree that mystery could be fun, I just don't think it's necessary for the fun of THIS game, and it'll hinder other areas of of it. The "man vs nature" survival elements could be beefed up a bit, but that can be done through vision debuffs at night, nocturnal predators , etc.

As for "mining is boring", in a related thread I proposed stuff that can be found in the mountains for this reason. But again, this game isn't explicitly about exploration, it's about surviving, and the small thrills gained by not knowing your map will be dwarfed by the frustration of having to patrol for hunt animals (I don't know if you've proposed pop-ups for this hunt problem yet, but using pop-ups to replace all the things lost from FoW would be pretty overwhelming).

PS: One compromise I would accept is FoW at night only. It would mimic the blindness normal humans have at night, and wouldn't be a massive hindrance to daily function because most colonists sleep (the only thing that it would really affect is raids, and the raid aspect of the game seems to be the one you've been focusing on anyway, so win-win).

[00petar00]

I actually think that FOV should be optional or up to Tynan to decide, veteran players like me would prefer having FOV.
Also it would be nice to have even if you are a casual player.

I feel that more events are needed first, not much of a point to add FOV now.. all the time i spent playing latest version is heaters/coolers/hydrophonics and doors breaking over and over.. It just gets annoying..

We need much more events, more unique threats in a situation where FOV would be much more enjoyable.

[Mufflamingo]

I actually think that FOV should be optional or up to Tynan to decide, veteran players like me would prefer having FOV.
Also it would be nice to have even if you are a casual player.

I feel that more events are needed first, not much of a point to add FOV now.. all the time i spent playing latest version is heaters/coolers/hydrophonics and doors breaking over and over.. It just gets annoying..

We need much more events, more unique threats in a situation where FOV would be much more enjoyable.

I agree. I think Fog of war should be implemented when the game reached its final form.

[Harold3456]

[quote author=keylocke link=topic=19755.msg217219#msg217219 date=1462438024
for hunting, there were suggestions that it should be tasked as a bill tied to a crafting station (like a butcher table or like a crafting spot) so players can just set the animal types to be hunted and the hunters will automatically hunt those animal types. it also makes it easier to cancel hunting by suspending a bill instead of trying to cancel it one at a time.

-hunter then automatically tags that animal for hunting and begins hunting.
-this is how hunting works in real life. hunters don't just make for a beeline automatically knowing where their prey is. that just takes the joy out of "hunting".

as for cargo pods, they are often accompanied by notifications, so even with FOW, players would be aware of their locations.


^that

surprises are fun coz it makes even the most mundane events able to inspire curiosity.
[/quote]

^this is actually a pretty good solution to a lot of my concerns about FoV. I'm still dubious about it, because it's a massive overhaul to a game I'm very happy with already, but it's good to see that attractive solutions to this issue exist.

[rexx1888]

The problem with all this is the Ai, when there was FOW (yes it existed in RW) the AI had the advantage and just knew where all your stuff was whereas you had no clue where they were, to reverse this would have meant MASSIVE AI code changes, the kind you just dont want undertake. So FOW was removed which levelled the playing field.

doing a bit of ai work on a project of my own, im curious why it would be such a massive undertaking to change RW's ai. Currently, they clearly need to see everything to select a target, but once they have a target they charge off etc etc. Seems to me, not having all the information just means the ai needs to have a process to acquire targets. An i know, for certain, with experience behind it,  that that isnt that hard to implement in c#. I designed half a dozen of those behaviours in half a day for a 2d top down game an my coder had them built in about 3 days worth of work. An most of that work was on architecture that had nothing to do with target acquisition.

My point is, i havent code dived RW that much, an im curious what is going on in the backend that would be so hard to pull out an rebuild for oppositional pawn behaviour? Does it have something to do with storytellers, do they assign targets atm?

**edit: to be 100% clear i am not remotely as experienced a designer as Tynan and my coder isnt either, thus why im so confused.

[Kegereneku]

Rexx1888, don't forget to account that now Raider are an hivemind avoiding the place where they died the last time (so as to avoid KILLBOX).
Behavior which require to know the layout of your base to do that, this isn't "realistic" but player and especially game-maker should know that gameplay goes before realism, even in the most incredible simulator (ex: flight simulator don't force you to look around the cockpit and push the buttons as those are only an nice-touch/approximation of how you would actually pilot a plane).

In any case, I think you'll find out that either you rework the normal AI to adapt to "Blind-player", or you program them to have a Fog of their own. Which is another reason FoW is "more complicated than it seem".
Keeping in mind that a few players imagine a different Rimworld with "permanent threat" (enemy base on map) and will suggest things that fit with their ideal.


ps : keylocke, if you wonder why I didn't answer you : I lost a river of text through a bug of the forum(lucky you), then decided that with the uninviting way you format your question, SPAM edit... a QUOTE WAR should to be avoided. It doesn't mean I won't (or didn't already) answers your points (as said, they come up all the time).

[rexx1888]

can you just shhhh, i wasnt asking you. unless you have something to tell me about the code itself i dont want to hear it

[Jonofwrath]

Brilliant. Gets my vote.

[Harold3456]

Currently, they clearly need to see everything to select a target, but once they have a target they charge off etc etc. Seems to me, not having all the information just means the ai needs to have a process to acquire targets. An i know, for certain, with experience behind it,  that that isnt that hard to implement in c#. I designed half a dozen of those behaviours in half a day for a 2d top down game an my coder had them built in about 3 days worth of work. An most of that work was on architecture that had nothing to do with target acquisition.

My point is, i havent code dived RW that much, an im curious what is going on in the backend that would be so hard to pull out an rebuild for oppositional pawn behaviour? Does it have something to do with storytellers, do they assign targets atm?

**edit: to be 100% clear i am not remotely as experienced a designer as Tynan and my coder isnt either, thus why im so confused.

It's even simpler than that, at least from my view. As the AI stands now, you can't shoot at an out of range enemy, or even task a colonist to shoot at an out of range enemy, so it's not like your colonists would ever interact with anything outside the fog (provided you make the fog match the range of your colonists' weapons, which makes logical sense).

[keylocke]

ps : keylocke, if you wonder why I didn't answer you : I lost a river of text through a bug of the forum(lucky you), then decided that with the uninviting way you format your question, SPAM edit... a QUOTE WAR should to be avoided. It doesn't mean I won't (or didn't already) answers your points (as said, they come up all the time).

lel. in your theoretical tirade that didn't actually get posted, i'm pretty sure that you believe that everything you said is absolutely 100% cannot be contested and that everyone who disagrees with you is absolutely wrong. amirite? 

i still don't get why you oppose FOW (it's already in the game). adding a toggleable global FOW option for people who wants it, ain't gonna ruin your game. haha.

it's more like you're arguing just to ensure nobody else enjoys their game in a way that you don't approve of it.

rimworld is not your game, and i sure as heck didn't buy this game from you.

[MAKAIROSI]

@keylocke

I would suggest that it's selected from the beginning of your colony, rather than being a toggle button. Like saying, easy mode, normal mode(how the game was intended to be played), hard mode (with an option for "harder" that includes FoW), everyone is happy.