[1.0] RimWorld is being sucked dry of its flavour

[TheMeInTeam]

If you do think I made a mistake, give a concrete example of what it is. Here you're just saying I'm thinking these foolish internal thoughts (pure assumption) and the only evidence seems to be that the melee system doesn't have a ton of complex internal variation like toxic attacks or bleed attacks - which is a feature that  I don't ever recall even being discussed here. It's not like it used to have this and I removed it.

I'm PRETTY sure there are bleed attacks right now, given the amount of "clean blood x5" that tends to show up when someone takes a nice neck shot or a knife to the lung .

Unless I've been lucky this still seems to bypass the "kill on down" check when used vs raiders too, though it's kind of hard to make it happen since they can get incapped by pain or take one too many hits to something that isn't survivable to lose.

You actually did add something to it recently too - the blunt stun procs, in addition to the dodge rate introduced in the late betas.  Sand in eye is new too, though kind of egregious in terms of delay.  Blunt stun in particular could get pretty crazy with more likelihood.

Door micro is still with us btw, but needs to force raiders to attempt cover now to buy enough time to avoid return fire.  Might be enough, effective DPS down from it makes alternatives more attractive when possible.  It might be time to dust off that filtering contraption I was using early B18 to bait a couple raiders into an area and close door behind --> force melee.

[Ser Kitteh]

I honestly don't understand the argument "you want this game to be more mainstream for the Fortnite " despite the fact 1.0's many QoL improvements and removal of unnecessary stuff (less qualities) makes the game better in many ways. There's a reason why the most popular mods for RW are QoL ones. Streamlining is a dirty word because people use it wrong. What people should be saying is "simplying mechanics may in turn reduce depth and make for a shallow experience" instead of complaining how it's a lot easier to compare stats.

If anything, OP is right on the nose on RW losing its flavour in regards to lack of apparel stats and generic renaming (gravel is gravel, and pekoe should be called pekoe tea so everyone wins). No one's asking RW to be Dark Souls-level of vague in terms of mechanics, we just want things to be clearer.

Anyway RW is not a true sci-fi/western unless Tynan adds in saloon doors and repeaters. Without this, RW is doomed to fail because it's not Firefy enough.

Jokes aside, while there are somethings I do dislike with 1.0, the improvements far outweigh the negatives. Hurray for the return of 3 shot bursts!

[Syrchalis]

I actually think the game gained a lot of flavor by quests being more relevant, faction relations mattering more (ally help yay), legendary items actually being LEGENDARY (and rare), rivers being useful and many other things. It just isn't the same kind of flavor it might have had, but it's not worse.

[Mehni]

If you do think I made a mistake, give a concrete example of what it is.

It's hard to pinpoint a single example when my issue is "the direction RimWorld has taken since I started playing", but mine is this: Allowing players to produce medicine and the feature creep as a result of it. We're discussing a trend here, so this example starts in A13 or A14. The only medicine players could produce at the time was herbal. Industrial medicine was sold only by traders, and glitterworld medicine was exceedingly rare. Then the ability to refine herbal medicine into industrial medicine was introduced, along with neutroamine. The alpha after that nerfed the medical potency of all types of medicine and 1.0 even introduces a per-medicine cap on max tend quality.

It's giving with one hand ("yay, we can make medicine!") and taking with the other ("medicine is now less effective"). In the end it's a zero-sum equation except with more steps. Is the game a richer experience? No, I don't think so. It's still mostly the same system, just with an increased tech level now. Adhering less to the "Western" part that was a big part of RimWorld.

Another example would be how visitors/friendlies/whatnot now give you a message of goodwill loss. That's not part of a lawless western frontier; that's a civilised society. The most recent change is that factions now politely wait outside your map if a rival faction happens to be visiting you. That's not "Guns at High Noon, Shootout on the Prairie", that's "Coquettish Pride And Prejudice or 'How to behave in modern society and dine on cucumber sandwiches'". I'll add that THOSE are the kind of dynamics that make for a world that feels alive. They're naturally occurring chance events that make for far greater storytelling than any hamfisted elements Cassandra has in her cheap book of tricks.

On the surface, none of those are *bad* changes. They're very sensible and balanced changes. But they do suck the soul out of the game.

[5thHorseman]

On the surface, none of those are *bad* changes. They're very sensible and balanced changes. But they do suck the soul out of the game.

And I think that right there's the problem. You want less sense and less balance to preserve what you thought Rimworld was based on your playing of an unfinished version. As the game became more and more complete, it lost some of the things that didn't work for gameplay reasons (or were placeholders that shouldn't have been there in the first place) that you mistakenly thought were essential for the flavor of the game.

[Serenity]

Pawns don't take off their coats when they come inside, either. 

Maybe they should. At least with heavy clothing. Automatic or manual dressers are possible. There are mods for it. And people wouldn't have to use them if they think it's a waste of time.

[Ser Kitteh]

The issue with the equipping of clothes of course, has the same problems with meals: RW isn't designed with them in mind.

Compare this to early Sims game where you have generic meals where Sims cook on a stove and be done with it. It was later with Sims 3 you can make specific food types which then integrate nicely with a new system of aspirations, goals and wants. Sure you could change everyone in the assignment bar but it's just not the same.

[ReZpawner]

I think this is more a general problem with all games. In the beginning, they are incomplete and quirky, and this gives them a special unique feel.

I too feel that "streamlining" a game really does remove pretty much all uniqueness of a game though. A completely balanced game without quirks isn't very fun. It's pretictable, and standardised. I don't think however, that this has happened to Rimworld. What's happened to Rimworld is just change.

We should keep in mind that the game one begins making is seldom what the final product is. It's the same with Rimworld as pretty much any other game. As time progresses, and small changes are being made*, you'll always move away from your original design - for good and for bad. Things like the "scary" mechanic that some of us remember from the early days is no longer here, tonnes of items have been altered or removed - and even more have been added. This is change, and change to most people isn't a good thing. This is the downside of being an early tester. Things that you liked will be changed. Things you hated will be changed too, but we don't tend to remember these. If we weren't early testers, we would have no idea about either of these things, and we wouldn't miss them what so ever.

I would ask of those who feel nostalgic about the early days - go back there. Find an old version and give it a spin. I think most of you will find that the new version IS better, and that the perception of it is skewed because of time and experience. Playing 0.0.250 does have a certain "oooh this is fun, I remember this" type feel, but it does get old rather quickly.

Currently, I personally feel that the balancing is way off concerning the hostiles - tribals and raiders are too easy, mechanoids are too hard, and anyone arriving by droppods can go get fucked; That said, balancing IS being worked on, and hopefully the 1.0 release is still a while away, giving Ty & Funky-Bunch enough time to polish it before it's released.

I mention that because that's what is currently ruining my own feel of the game. I too have fond memories of the huge colonies I made back in A14, 15, and 16. Colonies I have not been able to recreate ever since, because the mechanics of the game changed. But I'm also aware of the nostalgia behind them, and how that affects my current perception of the game.
I would absolutely love to join in with you guys in the angry dome (why isn't this a thing? come on, set up an angry dome sub forum for rants), but I recently loaded up some older versions, and while the current one is imbalanced as fuck in its current state, the older ones, while remembered fondly, are nowhere as good as we remember them as.

* Unless the design is set in stone, which usually results in a piece of shit game anyways.

TL;DR: Nostalgia is a bitch, and  you should probably re-play some older versions to get some perspective.

[Modo44]

While 1.0 has a lot of good changes and larSyn's artwork is absolutely fabulous, feels much less fun with the game artificially adjusted to have more chances to make you suffer for either not microing something like kitchen cleaning, or for using turrets instead of your squishy everwhining colonists.

Game balance is the excuse given. But really, it is all about forcing a specific type of game progression to happen. Ever. Single. Time. Thank fuck for mods, because I could not stand that for more than the first couple playthroughs.

[Franklin]

Pawns don't take off their coats when they come inside, either. 

Maybe they should. At least with heavy clothing. Automatic or manual dressers are possible. There are mods for it. And people wouldn't have to use them if they think it's a waste of time.

Yeah, an automatic dress down/suit up system to support combat vs. casual vs. labour routines in a given pawn's life would be a better system than just saying eff it, armour doesn't impact stats anymore. Sure, it solves the gripe of having to micro-manage armour pre/post combat, but that's part of the sacrifice you make with wanting the best combat armour and for your pawns to work well, too.

[TheMeInTeam]

The amount of IRL micro time each raid is indeed the main downside to armor impacting work speed.  You need to do some pretty heavy zoning/careful shelf placement to make the in-game time decent, but because of how the game's clothing assignment switching works this still takes a lot of IRL time to do quickly in terms of game-time, and you can't afford to dally.

As for moving in armor, I'm not sure how heavy it's supposed to be in game, but if you haven't tried it you'd be surprised how much difference even 20 pounds of weight makes IRL.  Back when I actually had some athleticism, I could run 2 miles in ~11:20.  First time attempting it with that on, I couldn't even complete 2 miles w/o stopping to walk.  You do acclimate, but not to the point where it's like you're not wearing it (don't think I ever broke 12:00 wearing it).  Wearing enough flak to stop bullets is probably considerably heavier than that.

Maybe this is something that could make power armor more appealing than the flak stuff to a greater extent?  The implication given it's "power" armor is that it offers some assistance for movement that would otherwise not be there.

[Razzoriel]

The amount of IRL micro time each raid is indeed the main downside to armor impacting work speed.  You need to do some pretty heavy zoning/careful shelf placement to make the in-game time decent, but because of how the game's clothing assignment switching works this still takes a lot of IRL time to do quickly in terms of game-time, and you can't afford to dally.

As for moving in armor, I'm not sure how heavy it's supposed to be in game, but if you haven't tried it you'd be surprised how much difference even 20 pounds of weight makes IRL.  Back when I actually had some athleticism, I could run 2 miles in ~11:20.  First time attempting it with that on, I couldn't even complete 2 miles w/o stopping to walk.  You do acclimate, but not to the point where it's like you're not wearing it (don't think I ever broke 12:00 wearing it).  Wearing enough flak to stop bullets is probably considerably heavier than that.

Maybe this is something that could make power armor more appealing than the flak stuff to a greater extent?  The implication given it's "power" armor is that it offers some assistance for movement that would otherwise not be there.

You know what, raids are too micro-intensive. Pawns should just equip themselves and shoot and fight automatically, no user input needed.

Tell you what, base building is too micro intensive too. We should just expect pawns to automaticallt build, hunt, cook and craft what we want.

Actually, why cant we just win the game by default? Theres just too much microing in generating input for the game to respond to our commands. We should just command to win and win...

[Madman666]

You know what, raids are too micro-intensive. Pawns should just equip themselves and shoot and fight automatically, no user input needed.

Tell you what, base building is too micro intensive too. We should just expect pawns to automaticallt build, hunt, cook and craft what we want.

Actually, why cant we just win the game by default? Theres just too much microing in generating input for the game to respond to our commands. We should just command to win and win...

Comparing having to micromanage clothing change each time a raid spawns and fighting in general? Good move. Not to mention that some raids are just cheesy as hell and drop on your head, punishing you instantly for... err. What for exactly? And if you don't happen to enjoy armor reducing speed and work efficiency on you colonists and took it off - its even worse, since now it takes forever to equip one. You get hosed the instant drop pods open up. So you either risk a sudden death from a raid and go without armor, or you ll have to live with constant slowdown and loss of efficiency. What else to call it if not a fun change?

[Razzoriel]

You know what, raids are too micro-intensive. Pawns should just equip themselves and shoot and fight automatically, no user input needed.

Tell you what, base building is too micro intensive too. We should just expect pawns to automaticallt build, hunt, cook and craft what we want.

Actually, why cant we just win the game by default? Theres just too much microing in generating input for the game to respond to our commands. We should just command to win and win...

Comparing having to micromanage clothing change each time a raid spawns and fighting in general? Good move. Not to mention that some raids are just cheesy as hell and drop on your head, punishing you instantly for... err. What for exactly? And if you don't happen to enjoy armor reducing speed and work efficiency on you colonists and took it off - its even worse, since now it takes forever to equip one. You get hosed the instant drop pods open up. So you either risk a sudden death from a raid and go without armor, or you ll have to live with constant slowdown and loss of efficiency. What else to call it if not a fun change?

If you dont want to make your colonists be prepared and risk them getting mowed by drop pod raids, then equip them with enough armor to not be naked. Isnt flak armor unrestrictive? Get everyone but one or two brawlers flak armor if you dont want to micro. Simple. Micro should bring advantages to the player interested in making changes on their defenses on the go. If you dont want to micro, then dont blame a bad roll on the storyteller sending three raids on a row. Sometimes these are just too brutal; no amount of micro could save your colony.

[Madman666]

Flak armor is unrestrictive indeed. But do try to survive a scyther in it. Those like to drop pod on you and shank you to pieces literally. With how many raids now don't give a crap about your defenses and walls wearing plates or power armor is more or less a must late game. And a colony of 30 people or maybe more - some people like to play big maps with big cities. Now imagine having to micro that.

And even if you're prepared for that tediousness, you d have to have armor stands all over your base, so that no drop pod raids can cut you off of your armory. And a good measure of luck so that no one pulverizes your pawns, while they are leisurely pull their pants off to stick some armor on for an hour.