You think you want longer seasons, but you don't.

[Iron Zerg]

I've seen this feedback come up a lot. People want longer seasons so they can "do more". But they're not seeing the forest for the trees. You want time to pass. You want the years to go. This game is about building a dynasty over the course of decades, not days.

I'm over 20 hours into my game, and I'm just entering year 4. Think about how many hours, and how much dead time would be built into the game if seasons were 5, 10, or even 30 days (as had been suggested). I just progress into a small, 12 building hamlet. Things are starting to come together and fall into place to make it a real village. And a lot of that progress is tied to the seasons progressing. Growing crops. Doing quests. Getting married. Recruiting villagers. For it to all happen, seasons have to pass. Years have to go by.

If you slow time to a crawl, you slow the pace of the game down to the point of misery.

Look at things like farming. You can plant wheat once a year in the Fall, and harvest in the Summer. Right now, if I plant in the fall, it takes me about 4 to 5 hours for Summer to come around so I can harvest. That can be a long wait, especially after you start recruiting more villagers to do more of the work for you.

Or take some of the quests...come back next season. That's another 4 to 5 hours before I can pick up that quest chain again. Do people really want to wait 20 hours to take the next step in a quest?

That doesn't even begin to talk about your dynasty. When you have your first kid, your wife is raising him for 2 years before she'll go back to work. Right now, that's about 10 hours. Do you really want to NOT have your wife working for 20 to 40 or more hours of game play? And of course, you don't get to actually play as your next of kin until they're at least 18. That's 18 years in game...how are you going to experience a dynasty if it takes thousands of hours to get there?

Early on, the days go by fast because there is a lot to do. But guess what? There's no rush to do it. You don't need to build Rome in a day. Plan your seasons, plan your years. If you need to do a lot of questing, plant crops that require less attention and can sit for a couple seasons. Or focus one year on stockpiling some gold, so the next year you can focus on getting more buildings up. And sure, farm plots are essentially "free" to build, but that doesn't mean you need to run plantations of hundreds of crop plots in year one or two.

But regardless, there is no wrong answer because the game is meant to go on for decades and decades and decades. It just requires a broader perspective on what time actually means in this game.

[Hawky]

Just got to my second Spring and while I was scared of 3-day season before I bought the game, it really is enough.

[Rimmsi]

well said and I do totally agree!

no idea why so many players is crying for longer seasons...

[cleaner]

Originally posted by Hawky:

Just got to my second Spring and while I was scared of 3-day season before I bought the game, it really is enough.

When you get to the third one, you will be making posts for shorter seasons :)

[Blaze1961]

I still think giving players an option to set the season length is a good idea as long as it dynamically changes the game mechanics to match. that being said I at first thought 3 days was way to short but the longer I play the less I feel that way. I am starting to see how it can effect late game play.

I would say if anything maybe a longer day cycle would be better. (long day short night)

[Fortus Victus]

Yeah, you can practically see sparks flying out of peoples ears they are so pre-programed for instant gratification. WHAT?! I WON'T HAVE LONDON COMPLETE BY WINTER 1?!

Its nuts...I mean, waiting 216 days from the birth of my Heir till the next 'Generation' of dynasty actually seems abit long to me. Even with side quests and further content to be added I like the incentive to have some plan going into Spring to manage crops, or that I over built with logs in the Fall and have to spend the Winter hacking wood just to keep up with firewood...won't do that next year.

[Luke S]

I agree that the Days/Seasons are fine, I have a village running itself and I often find myself questioning what else is there to do now?

I am waiting on crops growing, mining for a bit of cash, hunting to pass time, all of which I do not really need to do

[authenticus]

Solution to this would be adding difficulties, higher the difficulty, longer the seasons. In addition, to adding steam rewards, for surviving said difficulties for the achievement junkies.

[Face]

the time aspect is not a problem, same as you i have 23 hours, my only issues is that certain things take more time then they should, IE: when you run out of wood or something glitches and the wife gets up set, her mood drops rapidly fairly quickly.

for example i had the latest patch and it broke my house showing in the management tab, rendering her homeless, she was at 79% mood, by the time i realised what happened and managed to get a new house built, she was at 19%, this occured in a single day.

personally this and a few other things need to be balanced better.

especially ecconomy costs, right now the time you have to the time you need for things is painfully hard to get the money you need for stuff.

also tool durability is rubbish, needs a new system of perhaps removing the tool breaking entirley for iron tools, but have it that it looses effectiveness over time for use, IE: iron axe needs to be sharpend after chopping 50 trees or something. Cause having tools straight up BREAK and needing to be remade is entirely rubbish and outdated in terms of survival game mechanics these days, mind you wood tools and stone tools doing this should be able to be repaired at half cost to full craft cost.

although this is early access and fairly early build, im really hoping for that cart to haul alot more stuff then im currently able to cause 35kg of weight allocation sux, even with the +5 from that perk.

[Mortiis]

Please please do not extand the duration of seasons; 3 days per season is perfectly enough. People are complaining because they have like 1 or 2 villagers, so they have to do everything on their own (note to them - you dont have to do everything in a single lifetime!!). I have 7 villagers and I have plenty of time. If you increase the length of seasons the game will lose the "dynasty" feature, because advancing to the next generation will take ages!!! Currently a day lasts 24 minutes (real time), so for my character to die at age of 60 (he's currently 23) it would take 177 hours (real time). Considering I can play for 3 hours a day (Im a working adult with family), it would take me 2 MONTHS to advance to next generation!!!!

[Luke S]

Originally posted by Face of Insanity:

the time aspect is not a problem, same as you i have 23 hours, my only issues is that certain things take more time then they should, IE: when you run out of wood or something glitches and the wife gets up set, her mood drops rapidly fairly quickly.

for example i had the latest patch and it broke my house showing in the management tab, rendering her homeless, she was at 79% mood, by the time i realised what happened and managed to get a new house built, she was at 19%, this occured in a single day.

personally this and a few other things need to be balanced better.

especially ecconomy costs, right now the time you have to the time you need for things is painfully hard to get the money you need for stuff.

also tool durability is rubbish, needs a new system of perhaps removing the tool breaking entirley for iron tools, but have it that it looses effectiveness over time for use, IE: iron axe needs to be sharpend after chopping 50 trees or something. Cause having tools straight up BREAK and needing to be remade is entirely rubbish and outdated in terms of survival game mechanics these days, mind you wood tools and stone tools doing this should be able to be repaired at half cost to full craft cost.

although this is early access and fairly early build, im really hoping for that cart to haul alot more stuff then im currently able to cause 35kg of weight allocation sux, even with the +5 from that perk.

Iron Arrows are a good money maker, Build a smithy outside the mine and sell those for massive income.

Once you have the tech that is.

They weigh almost nothing and the only issue I find is that the storekeepers cannot afford them all, you can get around 3-6k a ingame day.

[Carpe Diem]

Originally posted by Face of Insanity:

the time aspect is not a problem, same as you i have 23 hours, my only issues is that certain things take more time then they should, IE: when you run out of wood or something glitches and the wife gets up set, her mood drops rapidly fairly quickly.

for example i had the latest patch and it broke my house showing in the management tab, rendering her homeless, she was at 79% mood, by the time i realised what happened and managed to get a new house built, she was at 19%, this occured in a single day.

personally this and a few other things need to be balanced better.

especially ecconomy costs, right now the time you have to the time you need for things is painfully hard to get the money you need for stuff.

also tool durability is rubbish, needs a new system of perhaps removing the tool breaking entirley for iron tools, but have it that it looses effectiveness over time for use, IE: iron axe needs to be sharpend after chopping 50 trees or something. Cause having tools straight up BREAK and needing to be remade is entirely rubbish and outdated in terms of survival game mechanics these days, mind you wood tools and stone tools doing this should be able to be repaired at half cost to full craft cost.

although this is early access and fairly early build, im really hoping for that cart to haul alot more stuff then im currently able to cause 35kg of weight allocation sux, even with the +5 from that perk.

the first part is a bug so not really fair to use as a measure, otherwise 1 day is a month so yeah staying 1 month without heat would suck, right now the game is still raw but ideally your woodcutter wouldn't allow that to happen.

I agree that iron tools should degrade in quality instead of durability and need iron to bring it up to brand new again.
I feel like its ok with wood and stone since you won't be using them forever.

there is mount in the road map so maybe you will be able to put a bag on it to carry stuff for you, a cart seems possible but far into the future right now

[WuTidi]

I would like longer Seasons/Days only with (Rest/Sleep/Sit) possibility to let time run.
The way it is now is for me a good compromise.

[[ Col ] Chamberlain]

In every Game are some Things , whitch the half Player are fine with it and the other want to Change something. To finde the right Balance, is some of the hardest Thing for the Dev Team.

I think , the best Way is like in LIFYO or Subsistence, where you can set how long the Days and or the Season are going.

So dont cry pls dont change it, its enogh so is fine or change it, its to short. I think, the Dev Team knowing about this Conflikt for the Players and they will do something.

For me , the Days are going too fast, What can you handle on one Day? Farm some Wood Logs, maybe go to an other Village and make a small Quest or go for Hunting and than the Day is gone .

[Tzemaru]

one important point is missing.
the children need a long time to grow up and to be able to go to work.
because every family (apparently) can have 2 children, there are 2 more mouths to feed per family.
the children can't go to work at the age of 6 years and are waiting for them to be able to send them to work.

if i imagine to have to wait even longer....

besides, every child increases the reputation to get new residents

[Ayphion]

Totally agree with this post, well said!