6+ months of agonizing "realism" nerfs have ruined this game

I wouldn’t have a single complaint with this game at all if the devs made more of this shit optional. The reason you rarely hear me griping about nutrition and faulty parts is because I’m free to turn them off before I start up a game. Having filthy clothes and lifting equipment Jsoned or made optional would be a decent attempt at compromise.

I concur.

My feelings exactly.

I recently played a game (meaning i reach mid game+ / played for 200 days or more) after an 8 month period.
One (not the only one) reason i haven’t played that much recently is all these realism mechanics.
They usually sound fine and good (weapon durability etc.), but tend to be grindy and add nothing really important.

To be sure, i have not contributed very much to cata, but i’ve been around for 2,5 years now. Nerfs are easy to do and required from time to time (EV needed many nerfs to stop being a non-brainer). But overdoing it is really bad for the game and needs care.

IMO, what cata needs are the hard-to-do stuff, that people (especially new devs) would hate to do (since they are complicated to achieve). Older devs do some of these, but their time is limited and not nearly enough usually. Off the top of my head:

  • Fixing/rebalancing the food/nutrition system in order to not be either “just cooked meat” or “always grinding for food” or “scurvy/calcium deficiency” - but still to not require spending half a day looking for food (even if it is realistic for an apocalypse)

  • NPC ability to do things independently (could abstract this and not have them do it in real time) without nagging the player for a glass of water

  • NPC-bases reworked

  • NPC questlines expanded & NPC faction wars

  • Z-level interactions & expansion (still requires fixing the LOS system and noone but Coolthulhu has touched them, correct?)

  • Non-flat map, other biomes, climbing onto trees and cliffs (needs the z-levels fixed first and is a ton of work on its own)

  • More water stuff. Swimming expanded, buildings, boats, NPC riverboat pirates!

  • Reworked map generation. JSONise it as much as possible and make it easy to work with.

In general, we do not need too many nerfs and we do not need to many new monsters, or items, or recipes, or materials. But we need more interesting world!
In short, i would like cata to focus on expanding the world (eg. there was a Railroad PR for a loong time, was half ready but never completed :cry: ) and the people within it.

But as i said, i am not the one doing the work, which is the most important thing in an Open-Source project. So my words are not backed with work. Still if devs agree, there could be some sort of roadmap and guidelines for new contributors.

As a design path, i would like small-scale mechanics that do not have overwhelming effects - but interact in interesting ways with each other (and are mostly unsusceptible to player influence - thus not grindy)

Anyway, just my 0.02Euros, hope it is of use to someone.

EDIT
For the record, i got to say that i actually do like the magazines system, specifically.

Hi there fella CataDDA-tors, long time no see. :slight_smile:

Most sincerely, I grabbed my last experimental just before the “yummy” clothes nerf kicked in, and I’ve just downloaded the latest nightly to check it and say hello to everyone. Kinda busy with work and all, I still own every single Cata build I’ve downloaded and I’m looking forward to dive in tonight’s one, too.

I haven’t been idle all the way 'till tonight, and I’ve gotta say there are a lot of folks challenging the idea zombie clothes are all but useless. The initial game phase, the moment you’re honing your skills and gathering equipment and supplies, heavily relies upon making use of whatever pieces of clothing you can salvage. I don’t feel the need to point out, though it is implied, that newcomers may find this particular modification exceptionally heavy to embrace.

Never have I insisted on devs’ decisions and never should I, so all I’ll leave is a thoroughly thought-of suggestion. Find a sufficient mechanism, that’s all I need to say. Think about game design, whereas getting rid of items earned on your adventuring path shouldn’t hamper character progression. If an item is bad, offer a shorter path to salvaging whatever scraps might be useful - or just plainly destroy it and clear the path forth. Don’t introduce mechanics that feel unnatural to a casual gamer, make use of the player base instead. It should prove enough for every future feature-test you’ve got in your plans.

I’ve made this short just so I could go and play latest CataDDA. Stay sound, I love ya all.

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I have always, repeatedly, advocated the idea that realism needs to ADD to gameplay, not detract from it. Despite the OP’s use of Dwarf Fortress as an example, I enjoy the realism features of DF a lot more than I enjoyed most of the “realistic” additions to this game.

I was present for the foundation of magazines. I agree that having made a way to disable them was a smart idea, but personally they add to the gameplay dynamics far more than catching scurvy or not wearing clothes that are ALREADY too tattered to wear.

And then there were features like the sewing change to a long action. This is sensible in THEORY, but in practice it balances sewing by adding player hassle and excessive thread consumption, and when it was first added the chance of item damage was royally fucked in the ass, and this making repairs MORE unrealistic than they used to be.

I was also the one that added shields, and the mechanics behind them. Some of the foundation is annoying, like being unable to hold a jerrycan if you’re wearing a briefcase. I would’ve been fine with adding shields to medieval mod as purely passive armor, but Kevin and Coolthulhu insisted otherwise. Perhaps I shoud’ve added lesser penalties like attack roll debuffs or something in between “can wield this” and “nope, fuck you” but what I added ALREADY tested the limits of my abilities.

Also? Filthy clothes, their mere existence isn’t the problem. It’s the fact that they do NOT have the intended effect of balancing zombie clothes, and they are purely a morale effect. Dwarf Fortress makes body filth affect odds of getting infection from injuries. Filthy clothes having that effect would be perfectly logical.

Instead you have an effect that does jack shit to prevent players from using flithy clothes, is a pain in the ass to clean up, and is FAR LESS effective a balancing element than the pre-exisitng feature of zombie clothes spawning with random damage. That deters players from wearing kill drops lest it get torn to pieces. A small hit to morale, in a game where 90% of the things you can do will affect morale, is a literally useless feature.

I also want to point out the amusing coincidence that the drama between Kevin and I hit its peak, and I was booted from the project, a bit over 6 months ago. :V

There is a roadmap/design doc.

http://smf.cataclysmdda.com/index.php?topic=5559.0

It seems as though attention is not really being paid to it thought. If you look back through the suggestions forums, you’ll also notice that things that were shot down in say, 2014 as tedious and un-fun are now in game. Here’s a few examples:

[quote=“i2amroy, post:2, topic:4869”]Cleaning firearms occasionally? Yes.

Cleaning other things? Possible, but slim

Cleaning clothes? Probably not. The reward for adding it in is probably not worth the amount of hassle it would cause in-game.[/quote]

A few examples. I’m pretty sure I could find more if I wanted to.

[quote=“Coolthulhu, post:2, topic:12504”]I agree about the filthiness and boom cranes.
Filthiness (its current form) kinda creeped up and I wasn’t there to veto it. It was fine when it was a strict trait with no way around it, but turned into a major annoyance. I’m pushing for removal, but it isn’t working too well…
Boom cranes are partly my fault. I OK’d them hoping they’ll work, but they turned out to be bad.[/quote]

For some reason, the concept of only one of the more active devs getting why this crap makes for a bad game bodes poorly to me.

I don’t think anyone could find fault with doing things this way. The devs would be free to introduce whatever they please, “good” or “bad”, and the rest of us would be free to like or dislike it without it making the game suck.

C’mon RD, everyone knows jerrycans are a twohanded job!

No idea what Rivet’s opinion on these game design fuckups are, but she at least is generally as sensible as Coolthulhu about game design, moreso than Kevin.

No idea what Rivet’s opinion on these game design fuckups are, but she at least is generally as sensible as Coolthulhu about game design, moreso than Kevin.[/quote]

I dunno, I took the “I wasn’t there to veto it” thing to mean that Cata is always on the precipice of tumbling into a bog of wretched, horribly unfun design choices, and that this brave knight is the one person who stops the un-fun from consuming everything on a fairly regular basis.

But maybe I’m just reading into that a bit much.

Right. And while I would’ve have been able to outright veto the idiocy, having a (relatively) sane voice to suggest better applications of design ideas, and point out obvious fuckups, would’ve maybe make the game’s descent into shit a bit less rapid. :V

Where is the option to disable dirty clothes? I don’t see it in options.

Playing on 5451

[quote=“Commie, post:16, topic:12504”]Where is the option to disable dirty clothes? I don’t see it in options.

Playing on 5451[/quote]

You thought that dirty clothes should have an option to disable it? Congradulations, you have more sense than whoever PR’d that feature.

Oh I thought someone said there was.

Well I didn’t play the game for a long ass time and I just DL’d it, patched the Arcana mod, glance at the forums, and see this.

What’s this ‘dirty clothes’ thing exactly? What ig do I need to do now?

Basically, clothing dropped by zombies gives a completely useless morale penalty, that can easily be ignored. Or you could craft your own gear, which everyone does anyway because tattered random clothing is already solidly balanced against being relied upon.

Or you could wash the clothing with rare and elusive soap. Nevermind the fact that you can “launder” dirty clothes simply by cutting them up for nice, magically clean rags and leather.

Filthy clothing: pointless realism that isn’t actually realistic.

Oh, so if it’s not dropped by zombos I’m ok?

Do I have to worry about clothes I make (edit; or find not on a zombie, but like in a store/LMOE shelter) getting ‘dirty?’

As far as I know, only zombie-dropped clothes can be filthy.

And then there’s the thing of ‘newcomers’ vs. ‘longtime players’.

What do the newcomers think of these controversial changes that have been introduced? I mean specifically the ones so fresh that they weren’t around to experience the change.

Cool beans.

I have no idea what kind of drama is going on/did go on here, but thanks for all the work you did do or are doing. I really enjoy the game and your arcane mod specifically.

[quote=“BeerBeer, post:22, topic:12504”]And then there’s the thing of ‘newcomers’ vs. ‘longtime players’.

What do the newcomers think of these controversial changes that have been introduced? I mean specifically the ones so fresh that they weren’t around to experience the change.[/quote]

Based on what’s in this thread, keep in mind last version I played was the Cooper release…

I never wore zombie clothes, which is likely why after coming back to CDDA i didn’t notice this specific controversial change. Frankly putting on zombie clothes seems disgusting. I don’t know if that’s a ‘fun’ change or not but yeah, the lowest tier of savaging behavior should have some penalty. Yeah it should be toggleable.

I like the magazine change. Yes, it’s clunky, so are guns, actually. So is reloading and keeping track of magazines. I personally think this is a good change all around as it makes revolvers/lever actions get a huge advantage for long excursions as you arn’t worrying about juggling and reloading 8 magazines.

Generally all my cars end up as gigantic 4 engine 8 gas tank 16 wheeled killdozers so a nerf to one kind of engine is sort of irrelevant, if it even happened.

I ran into a ‘hell castle’ and died. Was fun. Found a funky temple that collapsed on itself after some… supernatural thing in the basement threw a fit due to my presence. That was fun. LMOE’s arn’t god-tier anymore due to noise and shit working through z-levels. I like it. Think I saw some new monsters too.

Something changed with encumbrance cause im encumbered to all hell. Seems ok though as I am just used to wearing an absurd amount of layers w/o problems.

Other then that game seems good. Still a bit sad portals and ‘hellmouths’ (I think) don’t seem to do anything.

Feel free to bring up other features I might not know about for critique and I’ll let you know what I think. I’m not at endgame currently but should be there soon.

Sorry if this post causes drama. Ya’ll are adults though and I don’t know anyone so it’s impossible for any of this to be a ‘personal attack’ so don’t take it that way. It’s all just what I think~

Signed up on the forums to say that I seem to be one of the few people to actually like the Magazine system. To my knowledge, things like extended magazines weren’t actually in existence before magazines were introduced, which allows more utility to guns overall. MP5 extended magazines as an example, they have about 66% more bullets in an extended magazine than a regular one which lets the MP5 scale much better later on in the game. Heck your ammo doesn’t even cost volume anymore, you can just find/make pouches to store your magazines in.

I also don’t get why people say magazines are tedious. It’s very very easy to find magazines for most guns, super rare Rivtech and other ones aside. People also seem to underestimate just how good guns are in current experimentals. With Stamina being so punishing (can’t melee hordes to death anymore which is a good thing) and ammo being common guns are actually useful and not just cool trinkets you find in towns.

Also filthiness is dumb please remove it. It taking 40 units of clean water to clean one piece of clothing is ridiculous.

I didn’t mind it either. I helped work on some of the research for magazines for assorted guns, especially ones I added.

Oh I also like the change to books and memorizing shit w/o actually doing it.

Before this it felt like every character I had was walking around with eidetic memory or something.