Regarding repairs from an old survival vet

[Doc Hussey]

Since pretty much every thread regarding the change has devolved into a pissing match, how about honest feedback?

The repair system was a broken mess prior to todays patch. Whichever side of the aisle you were on, you can't argue that. It was too simplistic to the point that it didn't need to be in the game at all, which bred this whole division in the first place. Either you thought it was the greatest thing since sliced bread because "hur dur, make wood tool, repair scarlet pick!" or you hated that mindset because it didn't make any sense or you just hated the idea of durability to begin with.

Regardless, this is a game that is listed, per the store page, as as a survival game. Don't believe me? Look at the store page yourself. "Trapped deep underground will your survival skills be up to the task?" Survival tends to mean that there will be resource scarcity in some aspects. Without resource scarcity, there is really no "survival" to the game. Tool degradation is just one of many ways that a game can provide resource scarcity in an otherwise unlimited world.

I am firmly on the side of repair and degrade. It makes you consider the uses of an item vs how hard it is to obtain or repair. Even Minecraft, the oft cited "best game of all time" uses a degradation system to make players explore further and collect materials.

Pretty much every thread I've read since the update has boiled down into a couple main complaints:

1. It costs too much to fix my (tool/armor)- Good point, this is the first iteration and I actually agree that the repair costs are a bit too high. Industry standard is roughly half materials to fix an item. Item takes 20 bars to make, make it 10 to repair it from completely broken and scale it back as it wears. Half broke? 5 bars. Got duplicates or item you don't want? Scrap it down to half materials too. That's pretty fair, would you agree?
   
2. I'm afraid to mine or fight because I don't have the materials to fix my (tool/armor)- Fair thought, but how are you using the item? Are you taking that scarlet pick and going ham in the clay biome? Wouldn't a copper or tin pick one-shot those walls just as handily? Or using wood to bash out dirt? If you've got a big truck and a small car, okay? Which are you going to drive to work every day? The 12 MPG truck or the 40 MPG car?
   
3. I'm running out of (resource) to reapir my (tool/armor)- You can scrap crap now. You know how you get a bunch of copper gear from slimes and maggots? Free copper baby. Tin? Same deal, kill stuff, get drops, scrap drops. In fact, you don't need to hunt for ores if you really don't want to. Kill stuff. Or mine for ores. Or get the shop keepers and buy ores. You've got more freedom and ways to get resources than you did yesterday, believe it or not.
   
   But that's just my 2 cents. I think the change is welcome, even after starting a new char and world. It's a bit overkill right now, but with time comes balance. I can't wait to see what people think if they decide to actually allow you to starve to death.

[DJDiceZ]

I'd rather have this than an obnoxious durability management system, but it's true that a wood pickaxe shouldn't be enough to repair max tier equipement.

[CarrotKnight]

I think repair is needed, but not as easy as it is rn

[Hammer O'Malley]

I have played all the aforementioned craft style games. This repair mechanics is fine. Minecrafts is too burdensome.

[Palandus]

Minecraft allows for tool repair you know. There are three ways it allows it:

1. Place two of the same tool in the crafting grid and get a new tool of an average of the two tools + 5%. You will lose enchantments though.

2. Place a tool and a resource used in its crafting, on an anvil, at iron tier or higher. So an iron pickaxe, can be repaired with an iron bar. This won't lose the enchantment but you do need sufficient levels.

3. Place a tool and the same tool on an anvil and fully repair it. Keep the enchantment but costs levels.

[Palandus]

As for fixing this, that would be quite simple:

Only allow tin or better items to be salvaged into scrap parts for doing repairs. That way it is costly to acquire a large amount of them.

[LVL 99 Slime]

Hmm, I have to agree with the problem somewhat. Right now, Repairing is just taking up two slots of my inventory and only acts as a slight hassle with no real meaning behind it.
I feel like the devs want to encourage players to build sub-bases all over the map, but the repair function just doesn't have enough depth to it to push players beyond carrying a repair bench and materials.

Personally, I would either:
- Break materials into parts classification to match a certain tier of item. This way the cost would match the actual item. Just link them up to the tier of anvil/workbench you need. Copper bars or Copper spare parts to repair copper equipment (copper parts just get eaten first if you have them), tin for tin, iron for iron, ancient parts for legendaries, with maybe a few items sprinkled in that just have to be crafted again and act like consumables. (powerful boss items maybe)

- Add multiple material slots, like a chest almost, that a repair bench pulls from to perform repairs, each repair costing more the closer your item was to breaking. That way you'd have to carry 3 or 4 materials with you to repair all your gear. Like repairing a pick takes so many ore bars and some wood. While the best stuff needs ancient parts or something of that nature. Maybe even add new 'part' items you need to make first to craft items to add a huge amount of depth if you want to practically force players into making sub-bases for repair. Though i think that last part is way to much, but maybe modded or hardcore players might like it as an optional toggle..

- Simplify repairing to consume simple repair kits that take resources that are underutilized in the game. Stuff players naturally just gather tons of to add purpose, or just simply remove it on all but a few items that are considered consumable like wood picks and armor, or even a few items crafted at the boss alters to add interest.

Anyway i rambled enough.

[stretch]

Am I the only one who wants item decay gone? You all want to modify the repair system. Repairing is a curse in every game I have ever encountered it. It's a tax. Get rid of it. Make the equipment harder to craft and have no wear. It's a stupid and totally unnecessary mechanic and needs to be gone entirely and not just reworked.

It is not needed. It achieves nothing at all in any game. It's a joke. It adds nothing to any game. Never has and never will.

[mike]

I think it's a placeholder for now. I agree that's it's kind of...like, pointless, if you can repair everything with scraps from wooden tools. I think it could be something like: no scraps from wooden tools. And it would be okay.

[BuddyGuy]

I disagree with your opinion.

[Astasia]

Silverbird eredeti hozzászólása:

trekwiz eredeti hozzászólása:

I hope it stays; the mechanic you're asking for is absolutely obnoxious in Minecraft and similar games. Tool durability where it isn't easily dealt with is not an even slightly fun mechanic.

Almost all games in this genre have 'non-easily dealt with' tool durability, so having a game that leaves that out makes it feel like it's missing something. (minecraft, terraria, starbound, cryofall). The only exception is stardew valley, which doesn't have tool durability at all; if durability isn't intended to be a barrier in this game, then just remove it and be like stardew valley where durability doesn't exist.

Terraria and Starbound don't have durability systems. Starbound has limited duration pickaxes and drills, but those are bonus items that you can't craft and aren't the main tool used for digging, and none of the other equipment has durability. Terraria has nothing like that. CryoFall is a MMO that's trying to create an economy, and I wouldn't consider Minecraft to be in the same genre.

I don't really have a problem with the system used in Core Keeper, but I could see them maybe eventually requiring an enclosed room to make tables like the repair station function.

[Solarmax]

As doom devs once said - "You control the button you press"

If you don't like it, simply don't use it. When weapon breaks, discard it in the bin and create a new one.

[DonnieTheDoom]

This a silly thing to complain about. That's for sure. If any change would be made it should be made so you have you have to at least use the core resource for repairing along with X = scrap depending on the item . Bar of iron plus 5 scrap to repair say an iron pick.

Again though, this is such a ridiculous thing to complain about. I've never once thought "wow , I sure wish it'd take me LONGER and this mechanic was more tedious". I value my time a lot, so I really can't vouch for some unnecessary bs being added or extra work. For 11 dollars I've got 30 hours so far, and tons more to come because I'm not done doing what I want.

If you think it's too easy just don't repair I mean how silly. Instead of repairing , just make a new tool every time, that was it's More or whatever? That's literally what asking for right?

[DonnieTheDoom]

Solarmax eredeti hozzászólása:

As doom devs once said - "You control the button you press"

If you don't like it, simply don't use it. When weapon breaks, discard it in the bin and create a new one.

Someone smart. Nice

[Strilter]

First off lets not forget the game is indeed up to the developer, Without knowing their personal core game philosophy it is a bit arrogant to suggest changing any of the systems. If they want a difficult gameplay loop that requires in depth thought about each individual system so be it they could make it a pain. If they want a chill vibe where once you complete X specific mechanics become trivial or have less value, so be it. I personally like more in depth/thought to be required around mechanics throughout entire games and find when even beginning mechanics become trivial it detracts from overall game play. That said if they wanted to make it more difficult they could do the following which is kind of a moderate approach rather than making it ridiculous. (Don't forget you can always make another map to farm for those rare mats and items, but that level of grind should never become a requirement unless it is truly an epic piece of equipment.)

How to balance this. (if it is indeed an issue) If you wanted a more difficult mode/gameplay loop.

1.) have different tiers of repair benches

2.) don't drop the station when its destroyed (requiring the setup to craft a new one, and have the same apply to the workstations. So you would indeed need to setup entire crafting setups in other biomes not just carry 1 thing around.

3.) different "tiers" of repair materials obviously wood/wood tin for tin ect. For the Anchient/op tier of weapons and the pick have mats you can find throughout the world or require double the cost of mats (they are just too good right now which leaves almost no room for expanding the game without altering the stats (mainly talking about the pickaxe)

As it stands now there is next to no reason to mine lower tier mats once you get past them to the next. Yet you continue to get an influx of them from POIs and mobs. There needs to be some reason to have/use them later in the game.

[Nakos]

It's a survival game, those tend to have durability.

But most survival games have either respawning, or functionally infinite resources (Conan Exiles and Starbound come to mind).

Durability needs to be balanced against resource use (short term), resource availability (long term), and whether or not the mechanic is fun.

Personally, I think it's a bit too easy at the moment. But I also don't like the idea of making it dependent on non-renewable resources either.