Unstable build feedback thread

Started by Tynan, June 16, 2018, 11:10:34 PM

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ChJees

#2640
Internal attacks, hmm. Like a powder keg with a long fuse just waiting to explode.
Reminds me of the times when I had social fights at the most inopportune times before a raid leaving two guys heavily crippled. Or the times when I had colonists being stoned on smokeleaf making them useless in a fight. (Also brings me to forbid smokeleaf from being a social drug :P)

Something that truly would bring drama would be to have a would be colonist "sell out" your colony by sabotaging doors and turrets quietly before a raid. Or poisoning the food in the colony leaving all your colonists with food poisoning. A helluva drama that. Also spreading catty rumors making your colonists hate each other :P.

Edit: Also why not have a event where you get a trader event only for it be uncovered as being pirates when you send out a negotiator? Two choices, your negotiator or your stuff!

Namsan

I like to have useless trash pawns from random join events, because at least I can use them as disposable melee defenders.(Pacifist trash pawns are truly terrible, though)
Having melee warriors is much important in 1.0, so they can be useful.
And even if they died from combat, I won't feel remorse or regret because they are useless at other things. So it's good for my emotion, too. ;D
Hello

Madman666

#2642
Quote from: Tynan on July 14, 2018, 05:06:14 AM
It means many of the problems you face will come from inside your group, not outside, just as in stories. In truth I'd like to turn RW more in this direction, because as we've discussed here, external attacks are still far too big a part of the game. There average pawn in this game really should be worse than they are, and many more should be entirely useless (and I mean actually useless, not, "he can only research and art" useless).

Thats really sad, from where i stand. I like story aspect of RW, but in no way i want it to be its central aspect. I still want it to remain largely a colony manager sim, with a bit of strategy\tactics thrown in, not a nursery and disability center manager. I really hope pawns won't ever get even more useless than they are already (though that would be quite an achievement), without even counting constant bickering about sometimes absolutely illogical things.

As for useful feedback in short - most refugee quests, wanderer joins event and chased refugee raid types, really need a solid buff in what kind of pawns they generate. Quests and hugely inflated raids especially since its often not easy to accomplish and as a reward you get yet another liability, that can't haul, volatile and also insults everyone it sees to boot. Or it has a solid bucket of health issues and only good as grave filler.

I don't mean to offend, but i tend to call things exactly as they are. So if i call some mechanic "atrocious" or situation where out of 5 pawns you get 4 with severe health or psychological issues - ridiculous - its what i think about it, not a jab at you, or the game as a whole. I like some things about the game and i don't like others. And also tend to say why. In this example situation - its because such commonality of disabled people feels beyond artificial.

Oblitus

#2643
Quote from: Tynan on July 14, 2018, 05:06:14 AM
Simply calling something "ridicuous" is no better than "atrocious". This isn't usable feedback, it's just venting, which is prohibited here by rule 2. You're welcome to criticize but please say something meaningful, actionable, discussable.
It is unfun mechanics that angers people. You can prohibit telling about it as much as you want, it won't make people like it. In fact, it would only anger them more. If the knowledge that things you do anger people is not a meaningful feedback, I don't know what is. If you want it to be a story generator, that is as much of a feedback as you can ever get - the story is evaluated by emotion it causes. Prohibiting telling about your emotions makes no sense, except one case - you want only to allow positive feedback.

Quote from: Tynan on July 14, 2018, 05:06:14 AM
As for the point, handling flawed useless people is part of the game. RimWorld is not intended to be an RTS.
This game is advertised as "a sci-fi colony sim." Not an asylum for disabled people.

Madman666

I mean do you still not find it strange that sooo many people ask to see the stats on wanderers, chased refugees and quest refugees? Its because I am not nearly the only one, who doesn't want to face a double sized raids only to save a pacifist pyromaniac, that can't do dumb labor and refuses to fight fires (because obviously).

Namsan

I think tree sowing time change is not good.
It's terribly long, and even pawns with high Plants skill will take long.
Honestly, it only made living in biomes with almost no trees annoying.

I was also thinking, why pine trees can't grow in cold temperature at all?
I thought they can grow in places with cold temperature.(like Russia or Canada)
Hello

dogthinker

Quote from: Tynan on July 14, 2018, 05:14:38 AM
Quote from: dogthinker on July 14, 2018, 03:04:59 AM
2) Since the last update (build 1964) I've been getting an error in HistoryAutoRecorder on every tick. It's probably just an incompatible save version. I noticed the 'debug' graph doesn't populate.

If you update to latest and reload this should stop. A version with this bug was up for about 6 hours but was fixed 18 hours ago.

I deleted the files and reinstalled it again. Still, 1.0.1964 rev8, with the problem. The update probably just hasn't made it to the Steam servers in my region though, or something like that.

Other feedback:
All melee raids seem (far) too easy to defend against (3 melee in a doorway + 3 shotguns or machine pistols immediately behind them. The enemy have to come in one by one, so you can literally hold off scores of attacker, as you're effctively fighting a series of 6v1 fights.) The only real drawback to defending like this that it makes you extremely vulnerable to ranged fire. I think it was a bit better when these types of mono-battles were less common. Alternatively, if the melee pawn AI was a bit smarter about attacking other nearby doors/walls to get a flank on the defenders, when they're getting blocked by a crowd of their own people, that would probably tone down the effectiveness of this tactic a bit.

As you can see from my prior screenshot, my colony has almost no fixed defenses, but just five poorly equipped colonists have now beaten 5(!) raids in a couple of days - around 40 attackers (plus a mass jailbreak, plus plague.) This colony really ought to be dead, but it's actually only cost them one eye, one finger, and one noble squirrel (a monument will be raised!)

On the other topic of the moment - useless pawns. I'm gonna agree with Tynan on this one. I think my most memorable, emotional, playthroughs were the ones which carried some dead weight. The one where I landed with a senile grandma and grandpa as two of the three survivors. The one with the depressive alcoholic teenager that basically never left his room. The one where my colony went into a death spiral because I couldn't bring myself to butcher the herd of cats that self tamed, even though the colony was already on starvation rations.  :-\

I love this game  ;D

Oblitus

Quote from: dogthinker on July 14, 2018, 06:07:59 AM
On the other topic of the moment - useless pawns. I'm gonna agree with Tynan on this one. I think my most memorable, emotional, playthroughs were the ones which carried some dead weight. The one where I landed with a senile grandma and grandpa as two of the three survivors. The one with the depressive alcoholic teenager that basically never left his room. The one where my colony went into a death spiral because I couldn't bring myself to butcher the herd of cats that self tamed, even though the colony was already on starvation rations.  :-\

I love this game  ;D
And still the game is actively punishing you for doing anything sentimental. I was trying to play like this, and it always was painful. Now I am indifferently butchering joined yorkies, harvesting prisoners and exiling useless pawns before they kill the colony. Who cares, it's a rimworld, where everyone is expendable by design. I don't care for their stories, they are just functions. They work or they are utilized. I won't take a flawed pawn, they only make me weaker, and everything already wants me dead.

Madman666

#2648
While its nowhere near as extreme for me, i also never really bother with keeping uselessness. (only cats, because they're justice, i can only sell them, pretending to find them good owners). I can cope with some bad traits if the guy has burning passion for a skill i badly need (read mostly medicine). I can cope with scars and addiction, if i see the guy can't do crap, but for example has decent shooting with passions and can clean (warrior-janitors are always needed). Otherwise i just don't ever do refugee quests and chases, because it always end up trolling me by giving someone beyond redemption.

Some pawns should be useless or even downright harmful, i agree, its a part of the game. But some. Not most. As it stands most pawns i get from quests\chases\wanderers turn out to be a liability, not a helping hand for the colony. Best chance to get a decent guy is to recruit a raider. But instead of buffing pawn generation for quests and wanderers, to be on par with raider recruitment, we see reduced raider survival chance to force player to go after refugees to generate more drama (at least after a while it was changed to depend on difficulty and your population already present).

Oblitus

Quote from: Madman666 on July 14, 2018, 06:29:47 AM
While its nowhere near as extreme for me
Believe me, it is only a matter of time. When you understand that everything is ruled by Deus Angst Machina you can't care anymore.

Lizzi

One could argue that calling an entire playstyle "terrible" isn't very constructive or actionable either, tbh. Personally, I felt like a better way to address that topic would have been "I know that's not how I would play the game, but why do you guys save-scum?" That way, you don't shut down people who choose to play the way they want to, and we can maybe get some perspective behind why people choose to save scum.

But that's besides the point. Tynan, I get where you're coming from, being dead set on your particular vision for this game. You've poured 5 years and many hours of your time into developing this game so far. But I feel like many games have room to evolve and grow beyond the original scope that the creators envisioned. For example, in the earlier installments of Fire Emblem, permadeath was the only option to play with. Whenever you lost a unit in battle, they were gone forever. Any level-ups, skill points, etc that you spent on them would be gone in an instant. However, the newer games allow you to turn permadeath off, so your units come back to you even if they go down in battle. To be perfectly honest, I don't think I could have gotten into Awakening had there not been an option for a more casual playstyle. But by allowing me the choice, I was able to comfortably recommend it to my two friends (who were even more casual gamers than I was). Today, we're all loyal Fire Emblem fans, eagerly waiting for the newest games to come out.

It's clear that the original Fire Emblem games were also designed to be based around losing your units and making the best of it. But by allowing a more casual audience to enjoy the games alongside the more hardcore veterans, a game that was on the brink of outright cancellation has since received many new entries, including a wildly popular mobile game and some spinoffs.

Of course, I'm not just referring to the permadeath mechanic, but I'd also like to mention that different people have different expectations of what they'd like out of their game. Some come in wanting a good story to tell their friends. Some want just to defend their base to the best of their ability with a carefully selected group of pawns. Others still just simply want to build the most expansive base that the game would allow. I feel like it would benefit both sides of the coin (you and the players) if you took the time to listen to their concerns.

I appreciate the time and effort you've put into this game so far. I sincerely thank you for delivering an amazing product so far, but I feel like it still has the potential to grow.

dogthinker

Perhaps build a cycle into the game that rewards the colony's ability to sustain its weaker members, such that keeping them going becomes an end in itself.

Another meter, 'humanity'. Lose it for murdering, for witnessing death and harm. Regain it collectively as the colony performs compassionate acts. Tending wounded. Freeing prisoners. Talking to the infirm. Feeding small fuzzy animals. Or just wrap that into Mood directly somehow. The social chats are a step in that direction.

Jibbles

#2652
Quote from: dogthinker on July 14, 2018, 06:07:59 AM
On the other topic of the moment - useless pawns. I'm gonna agree with Tynan on this one. I think my most memorable, emotional, playthroughs were the ones which carried some dead weight. The one where I landed with a senile grandma and grandpa as two of the three survivors. The one with the depressive alcoholic teenager that basically never left his room. The one where my colony went into a death spiral because I couldn't bring myself to butcher the herd of cats that self tamed, even though the colony was already on starvation rations.  :-\

I've had some memorable moments with useless pawns too. A while back, I built a ship specifically for this old female with health problems similar to the picture posted earlier, except she was capable. The frequency of them is an issue to me tho, incapable of violence being a big one since IT IS common. If such pawns were rare, then I would most likely accept them, now I let them bleed out.  It's also a shame that anytime I see impressive stats, I instantly look at their age and health and sure enough something is ALWAYS there. Pawns leveling up faster in this update makes me care for them a little more.  I don't need the best pawns, but pawns incapable do cause annoyances since they can also be hard to keep track of. For example; Clicking on three different pawns to cut blighted plants but they can't since they're incapable. (happened in my last game) happens all the time with minor tasks when you micromanage.

Tynan

#2653
Well, my whole purpose in making this thread and going through the 177 pages of it is to listen to player's concerns.

At the same time, we should realize that different people have different preferences. RimWorld's design goal as a story generator may not be exactly what a given individual player personally prefers, but that's okay.

It may seem there's a really obvious change that would make the game better for you. So it seems "ridiculous" not to do it, from that perspective. But considering the  desires of all the players together, others may really have different preferences, and what seems straightforwardly good to you may seem "ridiculous" to them. This is why I ask people to say a bit more than declaring some part of the game "ridiculous" or "atrocious" without further information; if I can understand the expectation/perception/impulse that creates this response I can integrate it into all the other preferences and impulses and expectations flowing through the community and try to find a design path that maximizes benefit overall (but still won't please everyone).

I have always set a goal of trying to make the game flexible by opening it up to different play styles - this is why we have, for example, game modes varying from Peaceful to Extreme, biomes from sea ice to temperate forest, etc. So I'd love to do things that open up new play styles.

What I don't want to do is fall into the trap of trying to please everyone.

I also want to avoid is things that make the game more similar to other existing games. Specifically moving it towards being Civilization (e.g. conquer-the-world mechanics) or StarCraft (e.g. robot-like perfect slave units) are both directions I avoid because there are already great games in those fields. They're established genres and those play patterns are burned into the brains of millions of players, so people often make suggestions in that direction, but I think it's critical not to drift that way and lose the distinctiveness that's made RW successful.

RW is an unusual game. As a story generator, it's something designers talk about a lot but there's very few serious attempts at making such a game. Most which seem similar become builder games or fighting strategy games. This great weight of expectation does have an effect; it's something I try to compensate for very carefully.

QuoteAs it stands most pawns i get from quests\chases\wanderers turn out to be a liability, not a helping hand for the colony.

If this is objectively true something's bugged; I've run Monte Carlo sampled tests and the great majority of pawns are reasonably useful at a few tasks. I'm pretty sure what you wrote here isn't the consensus of players in general. Streamers I see tend to want to recruit about 50%-80%, but it varies.

Quote from: dogthinker on July 14, 2018, 06:55:32 AM
Perhaps build a cycle into the game that rewards the colony's ability to sustain its weaker members, such that keeping them going becomes an end in itself.

Another meter, 'humanity'. Lose it for murdering, for witnessing death and harm. Regain it collectively as the colony performs compassionate acts. Tending wounded. Freeing prisoners. Talking to the infirm. Feeding small fuzzy animals. Or just wrap that into Mood directly somehow. The social chats are a step in that direction.

This is the existing design; there's mood penaties for things like banishing or executing your own colonists, especially if they have relationships. We could push this aspect harder and design more around this, but it's just a matter of development time, really.

----

Anyway, let's please move on from the meta-discussion. This thread is for discussing play experiences with the 1.0 unstable build.
Tynan Sylvester - @TynanSylvester - Tynan's Blog

alfons100

The Social penalties for doing immoral actions should be made more severe, Tynan. Right now, killing someones friend, butchering them and *eating them* is all not as bad as being a little ugly. Even in a place like the Rimworld thats very illogical.

If doing all those 3 would cause atleast -40 in colony-relation, this would make having psychopathes also be a possible hazard of them being seen as an outcast, then the 'Human hat factory' money meta will become a little less preferable.