Base building, strategies, tips, advice?

[Bucketsmith]

Right so, been playing coop with a mate, haven't played in ages.
Our tail section crashlanded in a pretty sweet spot, but it's also close to some cannibal huts. Those guys don't respawn, but there's a lot of patrol traffic.
It's on the cliff just a little south-east of the sinkhole.
Right next to a cave entrance via climbing rope, that's next to two big boulders.
On the bottom of the cliff, a little bit next to it, is a waterfall and a little pond with fish.
Go down all the way to the shore and up north and you hit the cockpit section.

Feels like a pretty good location, and we've used simple walls to wall off a section around the tail end towards the cliff, but there's a few problems.
Even though we're on the topside of the cliff, it's really hilly, so we're always visible to the mutants. Which is annoying because you can't just hide out the patrols and mind your own business.
It's also not helpful for building ♥♥♥♥, flat ground would be better.

Then comes one thing that irks me about this game; the cost of building feels completely off, to me.
Some projects take hundreds of logs, that you can't easily gather and transport at only 4-5 logs per tree and like what, 10 on a single sled?
Just for some walls or custom platforms that the mutants can destroy quite easily.
The massive grind, in any game, should be balanced vs the benefit you get out of the resulting product.

I've been looking at building a plateau on stilts, on top of the cliff or off the side of it in the air, to create a flat area that hopefully would stop the cannibals from spotting us and stops the mfrom trying to wreck our ♥♥♥♥ so quickly/easily.
But then the project would cost a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of logs.
And starting out with a small platform and building new ones next to it will look clunky as ♥♥♥♥, with how building is done atm.

Any ideas on how to make an effective, as small as possible and safe as possible base for 2 players, but with enough room to build plenty of storage ♥♥♥♥?

[JMTAotP]

I have a base in the same area of the map but probably not exactly where your base is.

1. Visibility - I don't honestly think this matters as if they couldn't see you personally they would still see the walls even if you were in a different location. Though I am not sure if the cannibals react to walls but I do know for a fact when I am inside my walls the cannibals still act as if they can see me even though there is no direct line of sight to me. I do not know if they can see through the walls or if it is the walls themself that give away my position but it is because of this that I do not think it matters. I think if you want to avoid cannibals alltogether then you need to build in a spot without any patrols or use the command to stop them from spawning.

2. Hill building - Use custom foundations instead of prebuilt cabins or custom flooring. This will level out the floor or structures you place on the foundation. You already mentioned you were thinking about doing this in your original post it and I have to say it really seems like the only way to keep structures level on hilly surfaces.

3. Cost of building - I agree when playing with few people it seems grindy. However if you have 8 people and 8 log sleds then that is 88 logs per trip. I think maybe they could scale the resouce requirements to the number of players in game to make it more equal in time spent gathering. Unfortunatly, as it is now, if you want to build faster you need more people working. You can also blow down groups of trees with dynamite instead of cutting down each tree which saves a lot of time especially if you have a lot of people to pick up all the logs and haul them back. Regrow was also added for this reason. If you find you are traveling to far during resource runs then regrow the trees and you can basically start all over and still have the base.

4. Cannibals destorying walls - Put defensive spikes infront of the walls in the direction cannibals come from. I have not had a wall destroyed since.

5. Safe base - If you want a safe base then just build in a spot that has little to no patrols. However you may find the game boring after you compete your base and no cannibals come to fight you there and you always have to walk somewhere to get in a fight. I personally like building in patrol areas because it is an endless supply of bones and they come to you so you do not have to transport bodies to a fire or build a new fire just to burn them in the location you traveled to.

[Syncourt]

If it's the area I'm thinking, you have landed next to timmys cave which is the one near the boulders? you can climb down that and head down the left tunnel to get the katana for a start.

The small native camp on top of the hill is a very popular spot for cannibal attacks, it has a lot of totems there that respawn. I like to make a combat camp there specifically for farming bones sometimes. Probably not a good spot to make your main base if you enjoy peace, there is a lot of activity there.

Build your walls out of rocks, theyre stronger and as far as I remember, can't be destroyed like wooden walls unless that has changed. Only your wooden gates will be vulnerable then, which you can use as a defensive choke point.

I'd recommend heading a but south of there, there is a village with tonnes of cloth spawns, nearby herbs, a pond next to one of the village huts for washing off blood and fishing, the cave entrance in one of the huts there has a really good booze stash, there's luggage spawn around the village campfire, deer spawns and red paint at one of the huts a way away from the centre of the camp, berry bushes nearby too. Everything you need really except for a pot. You still get good amount of action there but not as constant as the one you are at.

[AimsKey]

Safe base = Build over water or out on an island at sea. Another place is up in the mountain, snowy areas up high. Not the lower parts near warmer lands. There are about 3 islands around the map, at the moment they dont know how to cope with water, so they drown. xD

One day, they might teach the AI not to venture into deep water. lol

Dangerous base = build near a village or cannibal route. They have a few routes they use a lot! One is over by the cockpit, the shallow water there, they ALWAYS run across one side to the other.

But as JMTA says, u need an area with easy access to logs and all the other necessities. So building in the middle of the forest some where can be "easiest" in terms of building fast. Study the map and look for safe areas, it even marks some out at https://theforestmap.com

[Bucketsmith]

Thanks for the replies.

I'm pretty sure visibility matters. From what I gather from reading, they react to things like fire (from pretty far away) and being able to visibly see you. They don't always turn hostile, though.
The patrols, which go directly alongside our base, sees our walls and some of our build stuff, and depending on where they are, they can easily look into our base and see both our fire and ourselves. That's when they really come to investigate and sometimes charge our walls.

I think, by reading these replies, the location is fine.
We have the tail end spawn some items, there's suitcases right in front of the tail end on the cliff (which is the middle of our walled off section now), the cannibal huts themselves don't seem to spawn any cannibals, there's a tiny pond of water on the bottom of the cliff and there's fish in there, though we haven't walled that part off or made any sort of way to get down there.

I'm thinking of making a custom foundation platform that levels out roughly evenly with the cliff topside, hovering in the air, then building defensive walls along the cliff edge. Aside from the walls that will go on the platform, it should minimize the walls that we need to build on the hilly terrain.
The supply of bones is nice. We could experiment with traps!

The cost of building still sucks. It would be nicer if a cheap wall required not as much wood, and a strong sturdy wall would require grinding. That justifies the grinding, regardless of the amount of players. As in, even if you have a big group, building the cheap walls is still an option if you only care about concealment and want to have some quick walls up, I guess.

[Syncourt]

Originally posted by Bucketsmith:

I'm pretty sure visibility matters. From what I gather from reading, they react to things like fire (from pretty far away) and being able to visibly see you. They don't always turn hostile, though.
The patrols, which go directly alongside our base, sees our walls and some of our build stuff, and depending on where they are, they can easily look into our base and see both our fire and ourselves. That's when they really come to investigate and sometimes charge our walls.

the cannibal huts themselves don't seem to spawn any cannibals

Originally posted by SurvivalistGaming C.M.:

Q: How do enemies find player camps?

A: Enemies can be attracted to player camps by lit fires, particularly at night. Bright fires at night will generally draw enemies to investigate the area. Most player generated noises can attract enemies as well, chopping down trees, dropping large objects or throwing things can attract attention. Dead bodies can also attract nearby enemies. There are also parts of the map that enemies will tend to patrol more often, such as villages, cave entrances and beaches. Building your camp too close to these areas can dramatically affect the amount of encounters.

http://steamcommunity.com/app/242760/discussions/0/522728269274822084/

[Bucketsmith]

Originally posted by Syncourt:

-snip-

Thank you.
It doesn't quite clearly answer the question, though.
Is it the fire object itself, is it the light? And if it's the light, even walling it in won't do much since for some reason it will light up the outside of walls, as well.

[Syncourt]

Its the level of light provided by the fire according to the devs. You'll notice that the level of light can change depending on the type of fire and how many leaves are thrown on, up to a certain point. I don't believe that the light has to be seen. Going by my experiences and as you also noticed, it seems that you can't hide the light from them.

[JMTAotP]

Originally posted by Bucketsmith:

Thanks for the replies.

I'm pretty sure visibility matters. From what I gather from reading, they react to things like fire (from pretty far away) and being able to visibly see you. They don't always turn hostile, though.
The patrols, which go directly alongside our base, sees our walls and some of our build stuff, and depending on where they are, they can easily look into our base and see both our fire and ourselves. That's when they really come to investigate and sometimes charge our walls.

Sorry I may have not been clear enough and it seems you misunderstood me. I did not mean that there is no visibility. You are attempting to hide a base in a patrol area and that is what I am responding to, not visbility overall. I am saying I think in this situation they are going to see you pretty much no matter what you do to make it so your base is not visible hence why I don't think it matters (though I could be wrong as I am just going from my experience). As the cannibals cannot see over my walls and I can sit in the pitch black (crouched) and they still scream and charge as if they can see me. So they either see me through the walls, can smell me, or it is just simply my base that gives me away (I don't honestly know which). But my base could be in more of a danger zone than your base. Anyway, from my own experience, it don't matter how dark and hard to see my base is. Unless I build in a safe area without cannibal patrols the cannibals come and attack my base every night regardless of how visible my base or I am.

[Bucketsmith]

Okay, thanks!

[Defektiv]

I landed in the lower right of the map near the shore with the 4 islands. The cannibal cloth camp was really close. If you head North along that coast there is a "safe" path along the ridge that has cover. I run it often at night when I get caught out in the dark. As you go North you cross that first river and there is a plateau with a pond right on top. There isn't a ton of trees compared to the southern part of the map but there's enough logs, sticks and rocks that you only need to use the sled for short trips. Cannibals do patrol when I cut a lot of trees down but because they can only get up from the North and you get a wide open view that direction from that pond. There are multiple places you can jump on rocks to get up around the area and I keep my boat parked right in the inlet there which sits right at the bottom of the edge of the ridge. It's a pretty decent spot so far. I just have to travel for suitcases, electronics and anything not naturally from the island.

[Bucketsmith]

I had a session with 4 people, last evening.
I can't believe the difference that makes. In building ♥♥♥♥, in fighting off cannibals and heavy mutants.
Which is also what irks me with the game. Those are the things that kind of force you to play with a certain minimum amount of players, because there's no balanced/plausible solution for when you're playing solo or with just two people.

[Defektiv]

That's a big problem with trying to balance a game. Anytime a dev introduces a tool or advantage for the solo/singleplayer, people who play coop or multiplayer see it as an unfair advantage and cry about the game being too easy. It's rare you find a game with a scaleable ruleset that provides a fun and fair experience for both playstyles in the same client.

[Bucketsmith]

It's not that much of a problem. Make a progression in options for anything that can be build.
Heck, you could just have one of each type (one wall instead of different types) and have resources like logs, reinforced planks, stones as a more and more grindy progression that as a reward offers much more durability and protection.
It would still allow a coop party to dump down cheap walls if they want to focus on somethign else - accepting the consequence of having cheap walls, and it also allows solo or two man teams to go for more grinding to upgrade their ♥♥♥♥.

It's a simple design elemnt that devs need to make decisions on and to my opinion, most devs tend to take a route that ends up being more annoying than interesting. With games where there's base building.

Right now everything costs a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of resources, you can't haul much of it, there are serious consequences to grinding that many resources and in the end after all that work, it's not even really worth it because the cheap walls get destroyed too easily and the tough ones cost much much more.
Heck, it would be nice if we could upgrade things as well, or replace things with not as much a loss of materials.

The loss of materials, as it is now, is not the right way to balance the lack of durability (by age/weather/anything but direct damage). It just creates more frustration.

[Defektiv]

I'm not finding it too bad at all right now. Rock walls take a ton of rocks but they respawn in just a few seconds. It still feels like a lot less resources are needed to build here than in Ark.

[Bucketsmith]

I've never played Ark. I've seen enough footage to know I'm not interested in it, much like Subnautica. The art style of the hud, the same clunkyness in how you/things interact with one another. This game is not much different on the latter thing, imho. Though dropped resources have physics, which is nice. Put them in a sled, though, and it's this smooth thing on rails.