What is the reason for the default three day season?

[ricardo]

So I made it to winter, and I have no warm clothes. To get a string for my bow, I have to go to a far away village and will most certainly freeze to death on the way. Was I supposed to get that far in just nine days? I don't even have a bow yet because I need linen thread. I have furs from the rabbits I killed, was I supposed to do something with that?

So the seasons days are adjustable. Why? What are the consequences of making the season longer? Does the xp scale down? I'm really struggling to understand the ethos of this game. At this point, many of the design decisions I've seen make no sense at all to me.

[Goldi_Toplitz]

Each year has four seasons, each season has three days. So, if you keep this in mind each day in the game is equal to a month. You can and likely want to play over more than one generation. That is why time passes a little faster.

Don't let yourself get stressed out by this: you have enough time for everything and the game rewards you for taking that time. A torch can be your life-saver in winter.

Season length is adjustable because this was a big community wish. However, the game is balanced for the three days. All other settings can bring new difficulties of their own. Remember, for example, that crops grow per season, so you will only have one harvest, no matter if you play with three or thirty days.

[Gamer Mickey]

Because the devs want to let people play the game however they see fit. Some people like longer seasons. I myself have it set to 5 days so I can get more done before winter arrives.

[Dutchgamer1982]

the reason things in the game are ajustable is basicly cause the developer made cheating as hard as hummanly possible, to save him the headache of providing support to players whoes games are corrupted due to this cheating.
-in exchange many (but not all) of the commonly cheated options, were added to the menu as settings.

the "goal" of the game is to get a wife, knock her up, wait 18yo and than proceed as this heir.
with 3 seasons of pregnacy, and some time flirting before any girl want to be your wife, this easely can take 20 ingame years, or 20x12 = 240 ingame days
-each ingame day takes about 30 minutes of real life time.
so thats already 120 hours of gameplay just to complete the main objective.
**if you set that slider to 30 days.. that becomes 1200 hours.. a bit to rich to many.
so the logic of picking 3 days was to keep the hours needed to "finish" the game managable.

as for what it will do :
a longer season will give you more time to get things done.
-things like completing the quests or seeding or harvesting seasonal produce.
-upkeep of villagers, and exp gained is on a per day base, so a longer season will mean villagers will age slower being better trained for their age
-the reverse is, there is only 1 harvest a year, so feeding a population on longer season lenght, means you get less harvest per day on average, and you likely want larger warehouses to stock up for the longer seasons.
**so it is a personal preferance.. where on this trade in you like things.

for hunting : you do not need a bow, or spear, most tools can be used to hit annimals in melee (axes are the best in it, just being slighly less in damage than a dedicated club)
you don't HAVE to kill with range.

**surviving your first winter, is a big thing.. and it is very common to freeze to death, or barely survive it (and it will strongly motivate you to fix things)
-if you not like that experience, you can set cold damage off in the games menu.
but yes, if played well.. :
your first 9 days should be about aquiring clothing to not be cold in winter.
**this can be done by grabbing sticks & stones, crafting them into knifes, selling these knifes in bulk and use that money to buy clothing.
**this can be done by exploring, there are broken weapons and hunting camps (these camps can have bandits starting in year 2.. so not yet a problem in your first year) sometimes these have clothing items... thats a way to obtain clothing too
**failing both these, you can hold a torch in your hand.. this will keep you warm (press F, need to have torches in inventory) torches will burn out eventually, so you need to craft more.. that needs straw (can be obtained from reeds growing at shores) and sticks.
**or you can just stay stationairy near a lit fire.
(tier 2 and 3 houses will have one inside... but you can build one in the wild too)
**having stocked up some broadleaf plantain for winter is wise too (each broadleaf plantain heals 2 health, but they don't grow in winter.) this can heal you up early game when you sustain some cold damage.

[Goldi_Toplitz]

Customising game settings is something often added to games of this genre. Most of what was added was something that could be useful for players and that could help with bugs at the time as well.

Sure, it's better to have a proper option than having to rely on something that might break your saves or, if you download a third party software, could come with a whole lot of baggage you really don't want on your system. However, the custom options weren't a "reaction to people cheating", they were a reaction to people playing the game and a result of our exchanges about it. ;)

[Lailantie]

Just to add... in the beginning we still need to figure out things and make mistakes, that's normal. You are not supposed to be able to craft a bow and winter clothes in your first winter. But, and here's the secret, you can buy fur boots and some hood at one of the seamstresses. And stone knives can buy them, won't take too long to craft. Others walk around with a torch in winter, but that's not my style :)

[zantariz]

Originally posted by Dutchgamer1982:

the reason things in the game are ajustable is basicly cause the developer made cheating as hard as hummanly possible, to save him the headache of providing support to players whoes games are corrupted due to this cheating.
-in exchange many (but not all) of the commonly cheated options, were added to the menu as settings.

Please don't refer to these things as "cheating". The game so far has been a single player game, so it's not a competition with other players, and therefore, "cheating" doesn't really play a role here. Even when Co-Op mode is available, it's still not "cheating" as every involved player will be working from the same set of parameters.

As a single player (or even Co-Op) game there is no need or risk or downside to allowing players to customize their game experience... other than the player may find that they don't ultimately like their settings, but those can now be changed within your existing game without having to start over... so no danger there. It's all upside. Default is a 3 day season, somebody posted they like 5, I like 8. We can all be happy.

[zantariz]

Originally posted by ricardo:

So I made it to winter, and I have no warm clothes. To get a string for my bow, I have to go to a far away village and will most certainly freeze to death on the way. Was I supposed to get that far in just nine days? I don't even have a bow yet because I need linen thread. I have furs from the rabbits I killed, was I supposed to do something with that?

So the seasons days are adjustable. Why? What are the consequences of making the season longer? Does the xp scale down? I'm really struggling to understand the ethos of this game. At this point, many of the design decisions I've seen make no sense at all to me.

Since you play with the game default 3 days season, the winter is only 3 days. Until you have the funds to purchase or the means to craft your own warm clothes, stick around the house / campfire. In the other seasons, go out exploring and you'll find camps or abandoned caches where you might happen to find a variety of items. Also, you don't need a bow to hunt (although it's the best option), you can start out hunting with throwing rocks for rabbits and small game, spears for boar, even your stone axe can do some nice damage when combat is up close. You might want to avoid wolves, wisents, and bears until you have a bow. Bows are expensive, so craft your own... just buy the thread you need to do so.

The downside to playing a longer season is mainly that the children in your village will take longer to mature. Is that good / bad? I suppose it depends on how much and how often you play. I play a lot, but my season is 8 days. My son is still only age 4... so it's going to be awhile before I can assign apprenticeships. I could change my season length to speed that up, but I find that I still need the long season to do everything I need / want to do. I think I'm up to 80 villagers.. and they are starting to eat me out of hearth and home. I need to grow a lot of crops (well my farmers do) and that takes time. Even with a donkey to ride, it still takes me a full 2 days to complete all the quests for each season.. mainly when there is a night hunt. I like to build at least a couple new buildings each season, that takes a day or more depending on travel and distance to resources.

[Dutchgamer1982]

Originally posted by zantariz:

Originally posted by ricardo:

So I made it to winter, and I have no warm clothes. To get a string for my bow, I have to go to a far away village and will most certainly freeze to death on the way. Was I supposed to get that far in just nine days? I don't even have a bow yet because I need linen thread. I have furs from the rabbits I killed, was I supposed to do something with that?

So the seasons days are adjustable. Why? What are the consequences of making the season longer? Does the xp scale down? I'm really struggling to understand the ethos of this game. At this point, many of the design decisions I've seen make no sense at all to me.

Since you play with the game default 3 days season, the winter is only 3 days. Until you have the funds to purchase or the means to craft your own warm clothes, stick around the house / campfire. In the other seasons, go out exploring and you'll find camps or abandoned caches where you might happen to find a variety of items. Also, you don't need a bow to hunt (although it's the best option), you can start out hunting with throwing rocks for rabbits and small game, spears for boar, even your stone axe can do some nice damage when combat is up close. You might want to avoid wolves, wisents, and bears until you have a bow. Bows are expensive, so craft your own... just buy the thread you need to do so.

The downside to playing a longer season is mainly that the children in your village will take longer to mature. Is that good / bad? I suppose it depends on how much and how often you play. I play a lot, but my season is 8 days. My son is still only age 4... so it's going to be awhile before I can assign apprenticeships. I could change my season length to speed that up, but I find that I still need the long season to do everything I need / want to do. I think I'm up to 80 villagers.. and they are starting to eat me out of hearth and home. I need to grow a lot of crops (well my farmers do) and that takes time. Even with a donkey to ride, it still takes me a full 2 days to complete all the quests for each season.. mainly when there is a night hunt. I like to build at least a couple new buildings each season, that takes a day or more depending on travel and distance to resources.

I on the other hand play with 30 day seasons. and 200% building limit.
I am in the spring of my 4th year and I have 115 villagers.
2 of those are newborns 0 year old, one of those my sob no other children as of yet.
85/115 I have trained to have lvl 10 in all skills. I want to hire 7 more villagers next summer.
*leveling farming skill is however very hard due the long seasons and I have given up on farming.
-instead I used 10herbal huts to gather a lot of mushrooms in autumn in let that rot. now I use barns to have villagers turn rot into manure to level their farmimg skill.
**gathering is another hard skill to level for villagers, fishing is best but I cannot get enough rods fir it due only 1 flax harvest per 120 days.

when I have my desired 120 villagers all with level 10 skills in all 6 professions.. I likely cut season lenght down to 1 day.. to speed up aging of my heir.

supplying for this large village is very easy. I have perfectly balanced food, wood and water needs.
but I do tend to spend 20-25 days a season just standing idle... doing nothing..

[zantariz]

Originally posted by Dutchgamer1982:

I on the other hand play with 30 day seasons. and 200% building limit.

My first game was set to a 30 days season.... ouch. I liked it at first, but ultimately, it was way too long for me... especially once I realized the affect it would have on raising new generations and.. as you mentioned... the availability of flax and other goods.

[Dutchgamer1982]

Originally posted by zantariz:

Originally posted by Dutchgamer1982:

I on the other hand play with 30 day seasons. and 200% building limit.

My first game was set to a 30 days season.... ouch. I liked it at first, but ultimately, it was way too long for me... especially once I realized the affect it would have on raising new generations and.. as you mentioned... the availability of flax and other goods.

Luckely one can alter it later.. I plan to do 30 days now.. so I get a young all lvl 10 in all skills population.. and than lower it to 1 day for fast aging past the pregnacy years..

[kyew]

The debate over season length is irrelevant. If you put it at thirty days a season, you can still change the season after three days when you rest. I set all my saves at thirty days, and if I get tired of exploring/hunting/mining/etc. I just advance the season. In effect, my seasons are anywhere from three to thirty days, at my discretion.

I will say though that if you set it at the minimum, it's a bit more challenging. I find it difficult to do quests, farm, and get all my building done with only three days.

[Dutchgamer1982]

Originally posted by kyew:

The debate over season length is irrelevant. If you put it at thirty days a season, you can still change the season after three days when you rest. I set all my saves at thirty days, and if I get tired of exploring/hunting/mining/etc. I just advance the season. In effect, my seasons are anywhere from three to thirty days, at my discretion.

I will say though that if you set it at the minimum, it's a bit more challenging. I find it difficult to do quests, farm, and get all my building done with only three days.

in fact the minimum is ONE (yes 1) day;)

[kyew]

Originally posted by Dutchgamer1982:

Originally posted by kyew:

The debate over season length is irrelevant. If you put it at thirty days a season, you can still change the season after three days when you rest. I set all my saves at thirty days, and if I get tired of exploring/hunting/mining/etc. I just advance the season. In effect, my seasons are anywhere from three to thirty days, at my discretion.

I will say though that if you set it at the minimum, it's a bit more challenging. I find it difficult to do quests, farm, and get all my building done with only three days.

in fact the minimum is ONE (yes 1) day;)

It wasn't the last time I played.

[Dutchgamer1982]

Originally posted by kyew:

Originally posted by Dutchgamer1982:

in fact the minimum is ONE (yes 1) day;)

It wasn't the last time I played.

it is now:)

doing 4 day, spring, summer, autumn, and 1 day winter, is in fact a trick one can do;)

[kyew]

Originally posted by Dutchgamer1982:

Originally posted by kyew:

It wasn't the last time I played.

it is now:)

It isn't relevant to my post.