Looks like I subscribed to this in March, but for some reason it got removed from my modlist. But yeah, this mod is pretty much a "must-have" these days. Back in 1.2 wild-fires were maybe 1 or 2 a year, but their frequency (also the amount of Pyromaniac pawns the game throws at you) have increased as the expansion numbers have increased. 1,4. and 1.5 no different.

I like the idea of a slower fire spread (coz IMO the default is a bit too quick) but not sure if this mod does that so much as prevent fire spread? Also loving the idea of environmental re-balance (dry thunderstorms in the rain-forest is just silly)

Thanks for the details, bro/bra. Sounds like we are basically on the same page. Sucks that it can't be helped for now. Thanks for the mod work, btw.

@The Bard of Hearts I totally get ya man but lightning strikes aren't handled in the XML, trust me I looked all over the files for the exact thing you asked for. Lightning strikes are handled by the source code and I'm no code monkey so the next best thing was to make the thing that makes wildfires go out of control more controlled and that was the grass itself and the parts of the lightning strike that are handled in the XML (e.g number of strikes for weather events).

Grass in this game especially on temperate maps just burns away like it's made of petrol or something. So by reducing the conductivity of grass to spread fire, wildfires should end up as isolated events. A lightning strike may burn down a tree or two but it shouldn't spread beyond that because the grass won't allow it to jump from one vegetation area to the next.

Ideally if I could code I would have made a humidity modifier and only allow fire to spread when it was hot and dry for a very long time

Game on. I haven't been a code monkey in almost 20 years, so my knowledge is beyond out of date. Still, I wonder if it would be possible to ADD something to the xml on lightningstrikes that extinguishes any fire they start right after it happens, thus getting rid of it realistically. Just musings, it you could get rid of lightning fires, you would be among the gods of the modding world (in my humble opinion).

@The Bard of Hearts

The difference between vanilla and this is that this doesn't cause wildfires. Lighting strikes will set things on fire (could not change this in the xml code) but won't spread outside of their initial impact area. This means that the tree or square that gets hit will get scorched, with maybe the surrounding squares but fizzle out after this.

I'll consider adding some screenshots for clarity though :) thank you for your comment.

Is it possible to see an in-between of vanilla and how this currently works? Really my big issue is the fires starting from lightning strikes. I live in thunder valley and I can't remember the last out of control fire we ever experienced. Granted, technology is a thing but still...

Anyhow, I (personally) don't mind seeing wild fires in the game, just not after every thunderstorm. Even if its a different mod, I'd love to see something that fixes that problem alone.

Will do. It may take a while to see it truly in action and make a good comparison but I like the view from the mod screen so far.

Let me know if you like the balance or want to see things changed :D

Updated! What's new in 1.4?

> Tweaked fire spread for bushes down a smidgen more.
> The number of lightning strikes for thunderstorms, rainy or dry, have been reduced to 1/4th of normal. (flash storms unchanged)
> Reduced the frequency of flash storm events by storytellers by eight fold. (12.5% chance of ordinary rimworld experience)
> Additionally flash storms cannot happen twice in a year. Resets after 60 days (a full year) has passed.
> Rebalanced weather system for biomes. Rainy thunderstorms replace dry thunderstorms signficiantly more in wet biomes now for wetter thunderstorms. All the thunder, less fire.

I agree with you completely on the flash storms. (and dry thunderstorms). Anxious to see what you come up with. Thanks for your work, btw.

@The Bard of Hearts

I'll see what I can do this weekend :)

It should still work for 1.4 afaik. It's just an xpath patch so as long as they haven't changed the biomes mechanic it should work fine in any version. I'm working on a more extended version at the moment that changes the weather generation balance, too many freaking flash storms in vanilla imho.

update for 1.4 in the plans? hopefully? =D

nice, now grassland biomes won't become a roaring furnace with every thunder strike.

Lifesaver! A flash storm torched a bunch of trees in my jungle biome start, but I successfully cut some fire breaks and the burning grass didn't send the blaze out of control.

I dunno what it is but since getting back into the game after 2 years the game loves to throw dry lightning storms at me all the time and it burns every plant on my map. Thanks for this.

finally now my colony won't suffer from dry thunderstorm