Wood weapons are not used, longer paced game, levels gained too fast

[Plymouth]

Pretty much.

In real life, wooden weapons, like clubs and such, are very lethal. Getting a wooden club upside the head will kill you. Wooden spears and arrows are easy to make.

Really, there shouldn't be a difference between weapons made of different materials. Arrows and spears made from stone will penetrate just as deep as projectiles made of steel. The skill of the user should determine effectiveness, not material.

The Aztecs successfully fought off steel-and-gun-wielding Spaniards using stone weapons, after all.

There is a world of difference between a wooden, stone and steel mace. The harder the material, the denser it is, the more grevious will be the wound.

Aztecs had the numbers advantage, as well as territory knowledge and great supply lines, while spaniards were at disadvantage except for loud, ineffective gunpowder weapons to scare the natives untill they got used to them. Spaniards were severely outnumbered, and moreover did not expect such a severe resistance.

[Elixiar]

/quote]

They're really not.

However I agree with you that there should be a more gradual climb to advanced weapons. Not in crafting though, just in attaining good quality weapons.


PS. My board skills are awful, I'm aware I've messed the quote up somehow :p.

[wbonxx]

Apologies for delving so off-topic. I support lengthening the starting game, but feel that should mostly be done by fleshing out the starting game with more content (adding ways of preserving food without refrigeration, for example), rather than slowing down the rate at which the current content is encountered. Although I do support removing the starting guns because I feel they are overpowered and make early encounters a breeze, after which you gain better access to weapons which leads to a snowballing effect that ultimately ends in combat never being challenging or satisfying.

Agree. In regard to including the pistol.... I short bow would make the work. Or actually it would be better to have nothing at all and let the player craft from wood what ever he wants at the beginning. Refrigerating isn't really necessary. Over the winter is fine and plants products last long enough. Maybe the possibility to cook undeteriorable meals like survival meals or dry meat?

I opened the topic just because  looks to me like a 20% of the game is missing for not apparent reason, a 20% that could be actually fun to play. I'm talking about the real survival first hours, where you have no food, you sleep on the ground. Cook with camp fire and try to survival beats attacks ... raids could be delayed.

[Lonely Rogue]

Apologies for delving so off-topic. I support lengthening the starting game, but feel that should mostly be done by fleshing out the starting game with more content (adding ways of preserving food without refrigeration, for example), rather than slowing down the rate at which the current content is encountered. Although I do support removing the starting guns because I feel they are overpowered and make early encounters a breeze, after which you gain better access to weapons which leads to a snowballing effect that ultimately ends in combat never being challenging or satisfying.

Try opening the ruins from the start of the game. You haven't lived until you've killed two centipedes and three scythers with nothing but a rifle and a pistol. Oh, and superior tactics vs. the AI. 

[hector212121]

Apologies for delving so off-topic. I support lengthening the starting game, but feel that should mostly be done by fleshing out the starting game with more content (adding ways of preserving food without refrigeration, for example), rather than slowing down the rate at which the current content is encountered. Although I do support removing the starting guns because I feel they are overpowered and make early encounters a breeze, after which you gain better access to weapons which leads to a snowballing effect that ultimately ends in combat never being challenging or satisfying.

Try opening the ruins from the start of the game. You haven't lived until you've killed two centipedes and three scythers with nothing but a rifle and a pistol. Oh, and superior tactics vs. the AI. 

Bah, I could do that by punching a wall mostly open, building a corridor, then filling said corridor with wood deadfalls before shooting the wall down.

[ro.othorick]

Unfortunately, for the time being, the status quo is enforced by two things:

1) Whatever you have, within the first season, pirates will most likely show up with gunpowder weapons at a minimum. Stunting the player early would be rather punishing. And having the pirates show up with only melee implements raid after raid then later show up with gunpowder or energy weapons without explanation would do no favors for suspension of disbelief, something that's already a bit strained in the game as it is.

2) Fists are OP. A stand-up fight with a decent melee skill and a decent melee weapon against someone with a gun (and therefore brawling bare-handed) will almost invariably go to the guy with the shiv... who is now usually too wounded to repeat the feat. Not much of an issue for the raiders, who almost invariably have numbers on you, but for the same reason, that means relying on melee is a non-starter for you.

Before we can even think about this, combat needs a close re-examining in multiple places.

[Wex]

Starting with melee would put your colonist on the queue for the doctor. IF you have one. And if you have the medicine; it's the beginning of the game after all, and a shiv infection could very well spell doom for your pawn.

[ro.othorick]

Starting with melee would put your colonist on the queue for the doctor. IF you have one. And if you have the medicine; it's the beginning of the game after all, and a shiv infection could very well spell doom for your pawn.

FWIW, bruises really don't need meds, and you can usually get away with not treating them at all; even in the earliest game, "brawler-sniping" a dangerous gunman is a valid and effective tactic if you have a shield or other means to get your brawler to him.

What makes fists dangerous is how easily those bruises incapacitate. Yeah, your dude's gonna get up because it'll heal away quickly just from him laying there, but that's only if the guy he tried to beat down doesn't decide to haul him off.

[Boston]

Starting with melee would put your colonist on the queue for the doctor. IF you have one. And if you have the medicine; it's the beginning of the game after all, and a shiv infection could very well spell doom for your pawn.

Yeah, and? That is realistic.

Contrary to what movies tell you, unless there is a significant disparity between combatants skill or equipment, in hand-to-hand combat both combatants usually get severely wounded.

[skullywag]

seems to me that the starting equipment should be in xml and therefore easily moddable.

[Wex]

Yeah, and? That is realistic.

Yea, and its'not fun to fail to start the game.

[ro.othorick]

Yeah, and? That is realistic.

Contrary to what movies tell you, unless there is a significant disparity between combatants skill or equipment, in hand-to-hand combat both combatants usually get severely wounded.

The same is true of a gunfight. And that very concept is anathema to the premise of the game and already pointedly averted.