Beavers priorities on amenities avoiding campfires or rooftops more often?

[Enginerd]

Screenshot included that i took of the well being stats below.

Even early game it feels like the beavers dont use campfires and rooftops very much vs other things. Yes some are vicinity based so thats easy to cheese but things that require recreational time seem to have the same bias for all beavers?

For example, beavers tend to always get "topped off" at things like exercise or wet fur but they don't seem to ever go to a camp fire or rooftop in the same manner. What i mean is, even if their exercise plaza bar is still partially filled they seem to make going back a priority instead of going to a different activity even if its at 0, such as a campfire.

I tried to see if this was a capacity and/or nearby availability issue by spamming campfires and rooftops all over and it didnt make any difference.

My current thought is all beavers must have the exact same "amenity preferences" instead of a bit of randomization per beaver or preferring to "add" a new amenity to their well being instead of "topping off" one they already have. Its as if they only Path towards the lesser valuable things if the other things are topped off OR if the capacity at a different thing is filled.

I understand that there's only so many hours in a day but they dont seem to have any variability in their interests? absolutely all of them hit the big hitters, almost none hit the camp fires at times. Yes there are also different "decay rates" to those needs being met for each amenity but they should be looking to "add" another +1 or +2 instead of just insisting on topping off a +2 or +3 that will possibly last an extra day anyways.

Am i crazy in this train of thought and suggestion? I know overall we want them to get the most bang for their buck/time but i feel like if some "individual preference unless at >50%" for each beaver was added they might be more well rounded with all things? especially if the decay rates are adjusted such that as you add more and more amenities they could possibly actually hit a fair amount of things over a few days without just dramatically reducing total work hours.. and since we dont have shifts they all rush to the same things at the same times kinda.

The game might be balanced enough right now but eventually if people or the devs add more "active use" amenities they will always plateau at a certain well-being and always do the same things.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3345459379

[pb0827]

I'm with you, @Enginerd. I just noticed this for the first time today actually.

I had recently doubled the number of campfires to account for what I thought was too few, based on the wellness measurements. I didn't see an increase as I expected so I followed a few beavers around to see what they were doing for enjoyment. They do seem to prefer the higher valued options over the campfire and rooftops. over and over.

I'm not familiar enough with the beaver behavior to know what should be expected, but it does seem that the path distances and the amount of working hours contribute to the beavers using their time for jobs + food + water + sleep + as-much-enjoyment-as-possible to maybe not have time to hit all of the enrichment items in a given day.

It would be nice if the beaver would weigh its own enrichment needs over a predefined order. For example, if exercise is (more) full compared to other options, the beaver should favor the next-best option than exercising. This, along with a variable decay rate, could allow a beaver to be self-sufficient in maintaining the happiness value.

EDIT:
In regards to the decay rate, it'd be great to have the higher valued happiness items (exercise, mud pit) take a much longer time to "decay" than the baseline items (berries rooftops, campfires) simply because the beaver's enjoyment "lasts longer" for those more exciting enrichment. For example, we might enjoy sitting by a backyard fire pit more often because it's not a huge rush of excitement; whereas, going on a carousel ride would give us a rush that would satisfy our need for another carousel ride for a while.

[Wuik]

Hi,
That's works more and less like that since the beginning ...
They were used and usefull in the early game and at the end-game when working time put to twelve or less and if you have bots to make the jobs ^^
Anyways , something that i have found "weird" in the experimental actually was the few numbers of tails tatoo during a game....
i have asked the question exactly about that today ^^

[Wolfman]

I've never seen the math behind these things and I don't think the devs made that clear in the past or will give more details in the future (I would happy to be wrong here, though).

However, I've made similar observations and to rule out bugs or unexpected behavior, you should set working hours to 12 hours or less for one or two days. That can be tricky at early game, but for testing things it might help. In middle and late game, and with a bigger colony, you should go for 12 hours anyway.

Maybe there is a priority list, similar to berries which are not consumed anymore when other food is available. Campfire and rooftops would be then used when needs considered as more valuable are satisfied to a certain extent. But that's a guess, I'm not sure about that.

[Kavey]

As above, bear in mind working hours and distance to travel after work have a big effect on beavers using attractions - early game when they are worked hard they often don't have time for many attractions but this improves as you get bots, reduce working hours and therefore free time.

[Enginerd]

Originally posted by pb0827:

EDIT:
In regards to the decay rate, it'd be great to have the higher valued happiness items (exercise, mud pit) take a much longer time to "decay" than the baseline items (berries rooftops, campfires) simply because the beaver's enjoyment "lasts longer" for those more exciting enrichment. For example, we might enjoy sitting by a backyard fire pit more often because it's not a huge rush of excitement; whereas, going on a carousel ride would give us a rush that would satisfy our need for another carousel ride for a while.

My thought with high "value" amenities like a carousel or whatever we see in the future is like, you dont go to a themepark everyday.. you hold onto that thrill / vacation / treat yo self for more than a day and obviously ignoring actual real life constraints of humans anyways.. you wouldnt want to go do the same ride every day for life if you could, infact the enjoyment would degrade or be less effective over time

[Enginerd]

Originally posted by Wolfman:

..
However, I've made similar observations and to rule out bugs or unexpected behavior, you should set working hours to 12 hours or less for one or two days. That can be tricky at early game, but for testing things it might help. In middle and late game, and with a bigger colony, you should go for 12 hours anyway..

Originally posted by Kavey:

As above, bear in mind working hours and distance to travel after work have a big effect on beavers using attractions - early game when they are worked hard they often don't have time for many attractions but this improves as you get bots, reduce working hours and therefore free time.

Yeah, i definitely understand and agree with you both that there's a balance of work hours to leisure hours and that an unofficial "goal" is to have bots do most of the work so beavers can live free and simple lives.

Just seems odd to me that they will always bias the highest things even with a relatively high fill of that thing instead of "adding" new things. I feel like if they expanded on the idea of "variety" or even just randomization among beavers for preference it would give the devs and modders much more freedom to really expand on "amenities" or luxury goods that wont completely horde all the attention simply because they're "less valuable".

I fear if something like that isnt implemented they wont have much room ahead in future updates or expansions for adding more foods and activities. Things that are vicinity, like shrubs etc are fine because you can force those conditions with placement. But eventually EVERY new food or new activity will need to be higher and higher "value" so that your beavers actually use the new stuff you get to play with more instead of taking a more balanced approach to their well-being. Yes they should want to go to the highest things first but if theyre gonna go "top-up" a +3 while ignoring 3x +1s then whats the point of building the variety?

IMO High value things should at least decay much slower and a minimum threshold on that decay bar before they choose to return. perhaps to throw in some variability and keep beavers off of the same "cycles"; a way to implement a sense of "preference" is each time a beaver hits >85% on a well-being activity or food [anything that requires beaver time] that decay rate has a bit of randomization to it but never less than 1 day (and higher value things should have less chance to decay super fast). With that a beaver could eat a fancy meal and it lasts 2,3,4+days; day 1 they are totally fine and go back to a carrot or berries, 2-3 cravings start to kick in, day 4 they go back to the snack shack for a tasty sugary treat. BUT this time they have the treat it decays slower or faster.. giving a % chance to go do more different things instead of the same stuff cyclically.

Not arguing and i just thought it was odd behavior ive seen repeatedly and just wanted to pose the thought to the community and Devs to see if they can elaborate on how beaver preferences work and how that could be impacted in the future