Raft Construction -- Game Mechanics

[Ryvaken Tadrya]

I've got a few questions about how raft construction works, particularly for large or oddly shaped rafts.

Is the center of the raft a fixed point set at the beginning of the game or is it dynamically calculated? Do only foundations count or is it weighted by amount of constructed material?

Is there a maximum size to the raft? If the center is a fixed point, is there a maximum distance from the center the raft can extend? Is this distance rectangular, euclidean, or taxicab?

Is there a maximum height to the raft?

If the raft has holes or loops where a pool of water is surrounded by foundations, is this interior hole a potential target for the shark to attack the raft's foundations? Is there a minimum size for such a pool to be a target? Is it still a target if an anchor is built in it? Or a roof over it?

[The_Carp_King]

the size of the raft is unlimited, the only limit is performance.
the center of the raft is not fixed that i know of, once rafts get big the shark just seems to attack any foundation, next to water or not, this is probably not intended.
i believe the shark is supposed to be able to attack any foundation that is next to water on one of its four sides.

[Mr. Monochrome [Hood Certified]]

The shark is suppose to attack the outside and work it's way inward.. if you are experiencing the shark attacking an inner portion report it to the devs here:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/648800/discussions/0/1708438376920596572/

If you've built up armored foundation around the outside the shark won't attack the raft anymore.

[Ryvaken Tadrya]

The question (one of them) is what counts as "the outside." If I knock a hole in the center of my raft, say to have a fishing hole next to a grill, does that count as "the outside of the raft" that the shark can attack.

[Mr. Monochrome [Hood Certified]]

'The Outside' would be where your raft ends and the ocean begins. Or the edge where you could fall off into the water. A hole in the middle of the raft wouldn't be 'the outside'.

[Kerulon]

Hi all,

sorry for reviving this thread (and the wall of text ^^), but i couldn't find a newer one on that topic
and my problem also centers around the center of the raft...

After playing in early access, I've come back to Raft to check out the new stuff
(large islands, farm animals etc.) and started a fresh world/save.


Does anyone know the width of the debris field the game generates?

If i read the info i gathered correctly, a homogenous debris field is constantly spawned,
then drifts towards the raft with the wind (in this regard it's irrelevant, that technically
the raft it standing still and 'the world' moves around us ^^).

The most recent info on the generation of the debris field i could find stated,
that if you pointed your sail in the direction of the wind (eg by using the wind marker),
you can speed up the resource colletion (before i stopped playing, rumor was,
that the debris would stop spawning with a lowered/engaged sail ^^).
Hence, if you position your sail perpendicular to the wind, you catch nothing,
as you're constantly 'dodging' the debris sideways (i just tested it)! ^^
A debris field with infinite width would defeat the purpose here.

This also means, that if you have no sail, or your sail is raised/disengaged,
and the raft is just drifting with the wind, the front of your raft
(front==the line that's perpendicular to your speed vector ;))
should catch debris in a homogenous fashion over the whole length, right?
Max catchment when front@90degres to the wind, none when parallel...

Why do i want to know the width?

Originally posted by The_Carp_King:

the size of the raft is unlimited, the only limit is performance.
the center of the raft is not fixed that i know of, [...]

I suspect, that the debris field is centered around the starting tiles
and not around the 'center of mass'/constructional center of the enlarged raft!

Because: when i'm only drifting (sail raised) my 25tiles wide raft,
the left 8 tiles of my catchment netting (perpendicularly aligned to the wind ;))
won't catch any debris at all (and i dont see any debris on that side);
while debris on the right side are visible farther away than i can throw my catchment hook!

This would set the width of the debris field only to about 12 tiles to the side
of the starting 2x2 square!

I tested this over a long period of time, as to be sure, that the raft is traversing
newly spawned debris while drifting (==no sideways vector)...

If in fact, the debris are spawned with the orginial 2x2 raft in the center, i would have
to totally reconstruct my raft! I don't know the exact location of the starting tiles,
but as i still have my first simply water purifier placed there, i have at least a vague idea,
where they are...

Does anyone have a solution/workaround or any info/data/URL on this?

I'm only at about 25x20x2height of my 25x25x4stories high raft design,
but disassembly and loss of mats would be highly annoying!
If i have to center the raft around the starting tiles, i of course want to do it now,
before it's all build up and decked out... ^^
(sidenote: currently the raft is floating at/turned 90deg to it's original alignment
but that shouldn't make any difference for that issue (nets are aligned at max yield)).

2nd problem (shark chewing on inside foundations):
Is there a workaround/solution for this or do i still have to armor every foundation there is?

Originally posted by Mr. Monochrome Hood Certified:

The shark is suppose to attack the outside and work it's way inward..
if you are experiencing the shark attacking an inner portion report it to the devs here:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/648800/discussions/0/1708438376920596572/

The shark attacking the inside of a fully foundationed (no holes) raft has been around
since ages and i'm experiencing it at the moment also.
It has been reported years ago already; by numerous players...

It seems the devs are unwilling or unable to fix it, hence: just live with it. ^^
If there is a known workaround (reinstalling, changing configs, whatever),
please folks, enlighten me!

That being said; because of that issue, only the devs would know, if a hole within
the outer boundary of a raft would also count as outside.

But: Having tested a donaut-shaped raft last year, i experienced shark attacks on the
inner edge of the raft as often as on the outer edge,
Attacks on the inside foundations of a solid foundationed raft appear to be quite
less frequent than on the outside ones (-> armor your anchors holes ).

Originally posted by Mr. Monochrome Hood Certified:

If you've built up armored foundation around the outside the shark won't attack the raft anymore.

Thet's definitely false.
The FAQ states, that it just takes more attacks to destroy it; it doesn't make it invulnerable
(i remember some info about something like "doesn't chew up more than 20%/25%(?) per attack).

Regards and HTH, Kerulon

EDIT: typos

[Ryvaken Tadrya]

Originally posted by Kerulon:

Originally posted by Mr. Monochrome Hood Certified:

If you've built up armored foundation around the outside the shark won't attack the raft anymore.

Thet's definitely false.
The FAQ states, that it just takes more attacks to destroy it; it doesn't make it invulnerable
(i remember some info about something like "doesn't chew up more than 20%/25%(?) per attack).

That part, at least, is outdated. They changed it a few months back.

[Kerulon]

Originally posted by Ryvaken Tadrya:

Originally posted by Kerulon:

Thet's definitely false.
The FAQ states, that it just takes more attacks to destroy it; it doesn't make it invulnerable
(i remember some info about something like "doesn't chew up more than 20%/25%(?) per attack).

That part, at least, is outdated. They changed it a few months back.

Hmm, that's interesting... i'm *sure*, i saw the shark chew on and had to repair an armored foundation yesterday (fresh world/save from a few days ago, if that matters)...
Strange!

Regards, Kerulon

[Anonymous Helper]

There is a mod that recenters the 2x2 foundation center of your raft:

https://www.raftmodding.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=146

Unfortunately it's very old and there is no way to find out if it works other than trying it out. You'll also need RaftModLoader found here: https://www.raftmodding.com/modloader.php

Armored foundations are untargetable by the shark since Update 8:

https://steamcommunity.com/games/648800/announcements/detail/1710700164974534949

FOUNDATION ARMOR

Upgraded game modes, upgraded security. Bruce is annoying in late game, and isn't really a threat to those well equipped to fight him off - for this reason, we have decided to make foundation armor untargetable for the shark: so you will now be able to completely fortify your raft, and not have to worry about pesky shark attacks any longer. Enjoy!

[Kerulon]

Thanks for both of your replies, Ryvaken Tadrya and Anonymous Helper!

As i said in my earlier reply already, i'm *pretty* sure, Bruce chew on one of my
outer armored foundations yesterday, and i had to repair it (thus, no 'optical illusion' as in 'shark attacked a different, nonarmored tile')...

Also the fact, that the shark targets some inner foundations (totally covered by surrounding foundations). Is this still a common thing with the newest update?

Lastly, as you pointed me towards "a mod that recenters the 2x2 foundation center of your raft",
i've been reading the description of the mod, and indeed, according to that, the stream of debris is actually centered around the starting 2x2 raft and not calculated dynamically with the enlarged raft!

So i'll just bite the bullet and manually recenter my constrcution. It's almost finished in one axis, and it won't be a problem in the other (simple repostioning of nets).
I'll have to realign the raft by 90 degrees to match both sides of the debris field in the other dimension though! ^^

Also, according to my observations, the width of the debris field seems actually to be around 26 tiles wide for my game. Is this in any way changeable by a config setting or depending on my system performance or anything thelike?

My 25x25 design wasn't choosen to catch the whole width, but merely a coincidence and dictated by the fact that i'd have to have a realistic chance to sprint to fend off Bruce from almost every spot on my single player raft...
If armoring indeed makes it immune to Bruces attacks, then

Regards, Kerulon

EDIT: (as always), typos/formatting

[nasojjr]

Is this crazy concern for the center of the debris because you are trying to catch as much as humanly possible with your nets?? Just wondering because I realize when you are in a building frenzy, catching lots of debris speeds that along, but it doesn't take long before you won't need debris much anymore. My raft of only 115 days or so is only 12 wide and I already have way more materials than I need.

In regards to the shark, I have armored all of my foundation except for 3 inner squares I left unarmored merely in hopes to get some free hits on the shark now and again. However, the shark has not attacked any of those squares in over 50 game days.

[Kerulon]

You're right, nasojjr,

after you've decked out your raft, you don't need as much debris anymore... *g*

It's more of a perfectionist approach, as well as sheer curiosity.
Having only a width of about 25 tiles of debris, that seems a bit narrow, hence my question whether it's affected by the systems performance. ^^

But, as i'm still in full build mode, the only resource i have to junk atm is plastic! *g*

Regarding armoring; i'll go with my old approach, outside layer, then crucial inside spots (anchor wells etc), then the layer of nets (it's really creepy, when you fall through a hole in the circle of nets in the dark when you expect a net-tile to be there! ).

On a side note: Is it a known bug, that you somethimes fall through a fully visible and undamaged foundation tile? I just got 3 of them on my raft, hacked them up and replaced them, but after the third one i stumbled into, i choose to save and restart... no idea if it were only the 3 or if the restaring fixed it... strange...

Regards, Kerulon

[Beer_Run_Bob]

Another thought for covering the debris field is to have your raft travel in a 45 degree angle. The diagonal distance between the 2 corners covers a greater distance than just one of the right angled edges. My current raft floats at 45 degrees and is a 21 x 21 triangle. The 21 tiles on the 2 right angled edges are all nets and basically no debris gets missed once the debris field gets centered on me. So if you floated your 25 x 25 at a 45 degree angle you should easily pick everything up in the debris field.

[Kerulon]

Correct, Wolf61,

Pythagoras (a^2+b^2=c^2, right-angled triangles, and here as it's an isosceles triangle, it's sqrt(2) longer) ...

But that poses more work when anchoring next to islands, as i don't want to maneuver a side of the raft directly in front of the island and then have to have 30 rooftiles as cantilevers to board it... ^^

So i try to stay aligned parallel to the wind.

Regards, Kerulon

P.S. I got it manually about centered on the starting 2x2 tiles, so i'm good now on that issue...

[Ryvaken Tadrya]

Originally posted by nasojjr:

Is this crazy concern for the center of the debris because you are trying to catch as much as humanly possible with your nets??

If a piece of foundation is detatched from the raft, it is automatically destroyed.
If multiple foundations, like say a line, are cut away, they are all destroyed.

If the raft is cut in half, the half that is cut away is destroyed.

It's a good idea to know where the game defines as "the raft" that is NOT destroyed.

[hazardousgamingarcades]

Originally posted by Ryvaken Tadrya:

Originally posted by nasojjr:

Is this crazy concern for the center of the debris because you are trying to catch as much as humanly possible with your nets??

If a piece of foundation is detatched from the raft, it is automatically destroyed.
If multiple foundations, like say a line, are cut away, they are all destroyed.

If the raft is cut in half, the half that is cut away is destroyed.

It's a good idea to know where the game defines as "the raft" that is NOT destroyed.

Ok, everything you just said is wrong. If a foundation tile would be floating completely by itself then that tile is destroyed. But if it is attached to something else it will survive. A 5 tile line with the center removed would make two 2x1 rafts floating there. Could even make it: ramp, tile, tile, tile, ramp and then remove the middle tile. Would create two single foundation tiles floating.