Shaman needs some rethinking

[Mortalbane]

I was very excited to unlock a new elder and start a new run. But this excitement quickly faded once i got to know the Shaman.

1. Diversity disappointment.
This is mostly personal, but still. I've just finished a run where i ranched chicken (mostly for feather), and my main food source was crops. So i wanted to hunt some animals, newly-unlocked boars and birds, but with Shaman i'm forced to the same exact playstyle - farms.
Considering how profitable bakeries are, and how easy crops are compared to animals, i think that most players will win their first run with farms and will want some diversity, which Shaman doesn't provide here.

2. Tents.
So you say that killing animals is bad and we cry every time? Then why do we live only in homes made out of animal skin? =) With all those wooden buildings that we construct later on.
They have increased road radius? Great, but do you expect us to use them insted of signposts? That radius could have been useful in some way, but we know that we need to plan our dwellings in a cross shape for the late-game buildings.

3. Growing plants give us Nature, so we want less Nature shrines. Wait, we want LESS NATURE SHRINES?!?! =)

4. Gaining research from totem poles is a nice idea, but how does building it next to animals help? Those rabbits whisper some secret knowledge to our pips, so the more rabbits around the better?

So, as you can see, the Shaman lady makes no sense for me. To the point where i'd start another Matus run. I think it's such a shame-an!

Imo to make her work she needs quite a remake. Here are some basic thoughts that came to me (after sitting with rabbits near a totem):
1. Hunting.
I don't think shamans should hate killing animals. They usually stick to the idea of balance - when you don't take more than you need, try to give back what you can, and respect the nature. You can kill a rabbit and eat it. But with respect.
On the other hand, herding and ranching doesn't suit shamans. They live in harmony with nature, and don't try to cultivate it if they can help it. So maybe Shaman would have no ranching buildings and no butchers, but her hunters would be get better yield. Maybe they could learn to harvest resources directly from animal tiles, like shearing sheep or picking some feathers.
The general idea is that Shaman makes the most of hunting, and it requires less setting up than ranching, but can never reach the ranching scales of productivity.

2. Tents.
If skinning is now okay and not scary any more, tents are fine. I actually like the idea of cutting the signposts completely, and expanding only via tents. They have less population capacity, which only promotes building more of them. Especially if less end-game buildlings will have +production for each tent within 1.

3. Trees.
I thought about it when i first saw the Thinker Tree research station. Maybe Shaman can pretend to be a Druid, and make some buildings tree-based? They could require seeds to place, and they will grow by themselves - but slowly. When you research the next tier, your building can begin self-upgrading. So, completely free, but takes some time.
Or maybe some buildings could be built only on forest terrain, like the Hippie Nature Shrine. And Shaman could create forest terrain from seeds. Unless it's already possible to create forest terrain - cuz i haven't unlocked all the game content, so idk.
Since this way Shaman's village would require much less wood, its production can be nerfed - no lumberjacks allowed, only picking sticks. Removing forest can be done by regular pips (but slower), or maybe by some special pips (more on that later).

4. Fire bad.
Nature doesn't like fire. Of course, taking away ALL fire-base building is too rough, but maybe Shaman will have no firepits to fight the cold, and insted would rely on furry friends to keep pips warm. By hugging them or making a pelt coat out of them.
And fire events could generate Fear as well.

5. Nature shrines.
I think Shaman should want MORE nature shrines. Nature shrines everywhere! Maybe they could give some additional bonuses other than producing Nature, so that you would want to build more of them. Like increasing nearby production of food/animals/water/crops/whatever. But they could also want both forest and animal terrain nearby, to make things trickier.
I don't think that growing plants should give Nature. Cuz then animals should give it too. And we need more nature shrines.

6. Science.
I like the idea of Thinker tree being self-growing and exclusive to Shaman.
Also i like the idea that nature shrines produce science. More nature shrines!

7. Medicine.
If additional downsides are needed to make Shaman more challenging, i'd target medicine. Maybe pips could squeeze more out of the medicinal herbs, but they should never reach the effectiveness of a doctor.

8. Bourgeoisie.
I didn't get to them as Shaman, but i believe they are untouched. And I'd like to see them replaced entirely, for example with Druids. forest-removing-and-creating druids, animal-tiles-creating druids, scientist druids, ritual-performing druids who replace actors and theaters, and so on.

9. No tilled soil.
Gotta use that fertile ground! But get a better plant yield overall.

Quite a lot of stuff! Again, i haven't unlocked all the game content yet, so maybe something similar is already there. Just sharing my thoughts based on what i saw.

[glitzerpaillette]

I like your ideas. I just started a shaman run and it feels kinda wrong
EDIT: Actually, the shaman plays fine, it just isn't consistent with everybody's ideas of what a shaman should be like. Maybe a different name?

[glitzerpaillette]

Then again, if killing animals is bad, why does the nature shine want raw meat?

[Catman]

A complete rework of the Shaman is probably not what I'd like to do, also because many people like the current iteration, so instead I'd like to in the future explore more elders.

The shaman is on purpose quite contradictory to create a very interesting gameplay challenge!

However, some suggestions are interesting and could be part of future patches (no plan as of now!)

[Veylox]

I think I like the shaman better so far. It's easier to make research and population boom early with her (well, up until 10 pips, then you hit a roadblock), you only miss out on BBQ which is by far the superior food option up until you get bread. Your run basically relies on having enough forageables to reach sustainable bread production before winter hits and then you go from 10 to infinite population. Research based on animals makes sense to me, it's clearly a faction based on animal spiritism

[Joman]

Is the gameplay with the shaman more difficult, than with the elder?

[Veylox]

Originally posted by Joman:

Is the gameplay with the shaman more difficult, than with the elder?

It was easier for me, but maybe because by the time I reached shaman I understood early game better. Shaman felt like you could rush population faster, and I think her research building is just better than every other one. Her starting map seems to be the most favorable too. You do get penalty for killing animals, and whether it's good or not will highly depend on what type of buildings you roll. You can sustain an entire colony with only big game hunting so passing up on that can be annoying, but you can also sustain an entire colony with bread IF you get the right bakery. One of them is overpowered, one of them is annoying to deal with (plus requires killing animals anyway), and it'a 50% chance to get one or the other.

I'd say shaman and elder are pretty close in difficulty, captain is when things really start to ramp up

[Joman]

Can I do fishing with the shaman? Or does it also give 5 fear?

[Jay Ren]

I was a little disapointed by how similar my Shaman run looked tech wise to the Elder, and that all the new things seemed to be animals that I would want to hunt less....

But honestly, that might just be a problem with the memory unlock order or RNG. The shaman itself seems pritty fun.

[Rithrin]

Ironically, my first Shaman run was on Harder and my entire food engine was fishing. I did luck out and get a 1.5x production tech for fish, then later on I picked the "Tree Lovers" perk for another +1 on most of my fisheries.

The nice thing is that the Fear hit doesn't appear to be affected by difficulty modifier, so it's not too difficult to plan around the Fear hit and it was actually pretty fun to manage.

Since you need only a small amount of actual raw meat to run a barbecue or campfire, you can just harvest either a bit at a time or one large push to stockpile a huge amount. Either way allows you some time to figure out where you'll get the Hope offset from.

As far as tents go, they really do replace signposts well. Especially if you pick up the +1 roads perk early on. Late game buildings prefer checkerboard (or did, prior to latest update) but that doesn't mean you have to place every dwelling that way the whole game.

That said, I do think if Shaman had some unique ability to add fertile soil to dirt tiles or cheap way of adding forest tiles or something similarly nature themed it would be a nice thematic addition.

[glitzerpaillette]

I think that the map plays a bigger role in the difficulty than the elder you chose, once you understand their peculiarities.

[Joman]

Jupp, just finished the game with the shaman.

[Taku]

The problem with Shaman is the name itself, not the concept.

[Skaliton]

Originally posted by OmegaJasam _ DGD _:

I was a little disapointed by how similar my Shaman run looked tech wise to the Elder, and that all the new things seemed to be animals that I would want to hunt less....

But honestly, that might just be a problem with the memory unlock order

I think this is the major one. If Shaman and Captain were switched it would certainly feel different

(The problem with that is Captain is by far the hardest elder to play as)