Bad Water : Addressing those defending it

[Dr. Savior]

I've read peoples opinions from both sides now and those defending the new update all say the same thing, more or less. Something along the line of "its not that bad once you know what to do, the tools are there to deal with it"


My issues:

*Aesthetically. It is ugly, plain and simple. Half the map is red death.

*Challenge added? Not really, I built a floodgate to filter it off the map, not badtides are just droughts with extra steps (manually raising/lowering floodgates)

*Reward for overcoming? Absolutely nothing. Extra work to be in the same spot I was already before the update

*I am no longer free to build and explore the map as I choose. I am railroaded into specific build patterns and forced even more into going to specific parts of the map. Why would an update LIMIT a players creativity?

*The barriers to stop the contamination (are pointless as I dont allow bad water into my waterways in the first place), they're bulky and ugly, especially for the folktails aesthetic. very tile is valuable space and I wont waste any on these useless objects.

*People saying "jUsT pLaY tHe oLd vErSiOn". No. This also should never be a justification. I like to be upto date and also there were a couple quality of life changes that I cant live without now and also new decorations.

*** TLDR ***
The bad water/tides are ugly, adds no challenge or reward, railroads build patterns and exploration, the "tools to deal with it" are entirely redundant.


But all this would not be a problem if there was an option not to play with bad water/tides when making a new world in the first place. Make the bad water source blocks not produce any bad water but allow the player to put a buiding over it to get extract to still make dynamite.

[stevej018]

turn it off if you dont like it

[👀nɐMelɐK]

I know, change is hard.
You can just turn off the bad tides in the options and handle the permanent ones as resource nodes.
Adjust, and make yer glass half full again, it's our main skill as humans.

[Dr. Savior]

Originally posted by stevej018:

turn it off if you dont like it

Wrong. The update can be redeemed but discourse must be had to find the best solution. Ignoring a hole in the hull of a ship, wont stop it from sinking.

[Dr. Savior]

Originally posted by 👀naMelaK:

I know, change is hard.
You can just turn off the bad tides in the options and handle the permanent ones as resource nodes.
Adjust, and make yer glass half full again, it's our main skill as humans.

I want that to be an actual option, no editing or custom difficulties required, just select "No bad water/tides. I am enjoying most aspects of the update I just think it needs to be reworked

[stevej018]

>Im angry about feature
turn feature off
>I dont want to turn feature off, I want to be angry about feature

[Chud]

Pretty amazing how salty people get if someone doesn't like the bad water addition. A toggle to turn it off isn't something unreasonable. How is that a problem for people?

[bison7474]

It's an interesting point: The presence of the badtide is forcing different build patterns. I would add to that that I kind of miss the ability to build in-land irrigation systems using dam walls. When I first started playing with the update these are my two biggest concerns as well.

Then I played it for a few hours - all that's happened is I've had to change my strategic approach. I'm still working on my map, but I'm now on a path to start terraforming and changing the course of the flows of water - toxic and nontoxic.

I've come to the realization that I can still accomplish my usual goals, but I'm having to rethink my strategies. Ultimately, I don't mind this. In my opinion, it keeps the game fresh. I suspect if all they'd given us was just playhouses and hammocks, folks would be running around decrying we're only getting aesthetic updates and "the game's gone stale".

I guess I understand an option to turn badtides on/off - for the longest time I only played folktails in the game because I didn't care for the kind of strategic build choices I had to make with ironteeth. Now, I love them both equally. I guess if you come to Timberborn just to build a "Beaver Utopia", then you should. I would argue you could still do that, but in order to achieve Nirvana, you need to terraform hell first :P

[Ramonkey]

Originally posted by Chud:

Pretty amazing how salty people get if someone doesn't like the bad water addition. A toggle to turn it off isn't something unreasonable. How is that a problem for people?

The problem is that the toggle is already there, but he is refusing to use it

[asswoopman]

I agree this was a poor choice to add this challenge to the game. It made the fun and unique drought mechanic into a menace. All they've done is made the early game harder - but they already had a mechanic for that; drought length. The problem with this game isn't early game difficulty, it's late game difficulty.

I am enjoying this game less now.

[Alcator]

Originally posted by Chud:

Pretty amazing how salty people get if someone doesn't like the bad water addition. A toggle to turn it off isn't something unreasonable. How is that a problem for people?

Badwater is an ingredient into recipes. If you remove it from the map completely, you are blocking Explosives, Dirt, and Agora (plus some faction specific stuff)

[EleventhStar]

Originally posted by Alcator:

Badwater is an ingredient into recipes. If you remove it from the map completely, you are blocking Explosives, Dirt, and Agora (plus some faction specific stuff)

that's solved easily enough by making disabled badwater sources still have badwater on them, just not flow outwards.

though it does present a different problem in that ideally turning badwater off means replacing it with regular water. but you get the general idea, just add some sort of non-flowing badwater source that's worse but cheaper than the endgame seal buildings.

[oidepp]

all i read is: you want a sandbox mode

every "challange" in the game is just "extra work to be in the same spot" you could be without it

it is a game - that´s all

and it's never been a "fun game" without threats and challenges - and the last ones, from house building to food production, are all much more complicated than they need to be. of course. that's how games are.

[hthought]

I don't think aesthetically the bad water itself is bad. However, i don't like the corruption to be sincere. It looks aesthetically unpleasant to me indeed. It's easy later in the game to shut off the badwater sources but the badtides do still bring badwater from the pure water source so that is not ideal. But ok, not a big issue.

The main problem for me is that the bad water does not really offer any new mechanics and doesn't really add much to the game itself in regards to expanding the colony. It's just a danger to it, which is fairly simple to bypass with floodgates.

I hope there will be some automation cause doing it manually is very annoying and i also hope there will be some other uses of the badwater or some other features that actually add extra playing time to the core game, cause after you make enough metal blocks the game is basically over.

[Fall2YrDoom]

It takes what 7 cycles to deal with bad water, after that you back to building the way you use to, why all the hate, bad water helps with energy when a drought comes..

[Weruat]

Badwater is just mediocre chore that doesnt improve the game and the game still lacks any meaningful or interesting progression. Its not a challenge or remotely interesting. Im probably done following this game, the updates keep floundering for me.