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Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 1:52 am
by FoldedDice
I’m all for more interesting tweaks, but the benefit to gameplay as it is should not be understated. In my current playthrough involving this mod and Tedious Travel I recently embarked on a whole little side adventure in a random town I was passing through, since it seemed unwise to keep on walking through a snowstorm. It was a nice little bit of immersion that would never have happened without these extra additions.

On the suggestion side of things, before that I decided to try an Argonian and I died faster than the time it took to escape Privateer’s Hold and walk to Gothway Garden, especially since the RNG did not see fit to grace me with any sort of footwear. I’m not sure this should be changed directly as an underdressed ectotherm should absolutely not be able to survive outside in the winter, but perhaps there could be a way to change the game’s starting season? As an optional difficulty setting preferably, since I’ve found starting in the winter to be a fun challenge now that I’ve chosen to undertake it with a more survivable character.

Or, as an alternative to that, perhaps a toggle (also optional!) that would force new characters to always start with a pair of shoes? I’m all for the increased difficulty and the sense of working my way up from nothing, but giving players options to tune that to their own preference certainly couldn’t hurt.

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 2:45 am
by alphaTECH
Ralzar wrote: Sat Feb 08, 2020 11:23 pm While discussing my mod with someone I got asked if there was any benefits to the mod. Which kind of caught me off guard at the time, because I consider the benefit to be more realism/immersion and increased challange.

That said, having thought about what positive effects the mod could have, I thought of the following:

Preferred Climate
Each race has a type of climate that they enjoy. While in that climate and NOT too warm or cold, they get some kind of minor buff?
Nords in mountains, Redguards in subtropical, khajiit in desert etc.

Does that sound like a good idea?
Absolutely. I was going to say the same thing a little while back but the post came off as being asshole-ish so I scrapped it. As much as I love the immersion it brings to the game, C&C really only makes DF more difficult to play.

Also, the post above mentions how difficult it is to survive certain weather and race combinations when you're just starting out, so it'd be good if the mod eased new players in, gave them a chance to get some stuff together, maybe having 25% effect at level 1, 50% at level 2, 75% at level 3, then finally the full 100% effect at level 4 and onwards.

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 3:59 am
by FoldedDice
Helegad wrote: Sun Feb 09, 2020 2:45 am Also, the post above mentions how difficult it is to survive certain weather and race combinations when you're just starting out, so it'd be good if the mod eased new players in, gave them a chance to get some stuff together, maybe having 25% effect at level 1, 50% at level 2, 75% at level 3, then finally the full 100% effect at level 4 and onwards.
A grace period is a nice idea, but I think again only as an optional tweak and not a core feature. Let people start the game off in a desperate situation if that’s how they want to play.

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 7:22 am
by L57
Each race has a type of climate that they enjoy. While in that climate and NOT too warm or cold, they get some kind of minor buff?
Nords in mountains, Redguards in subtropical, khajiit in desert etc.
You rarely have any use of such buffs, because there are almost no hostile encounters outside the dungeons in vanilla game. I think it's ok to add minor buffs as an optional feature for those who use Wilderness enemies mods and such, but not in the core mod, as others already said.

To me, current balance looks perfect. I don't get why good weather should make you stronger or faster. :) It seems natural to expect that default non-buffed and non-debuffed attributes already indicate what abilities your character has in comfortable conditions all other equal.

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 2:33 pm
by Dubiousintent
To me, the main problem for starting characters in PH with this mod is the relative lack of appropriate winter clothing. Given the "shipwrecked" scenario, that is to be expected. The reasonable solution would be to be to have more "winter" appropriate clothing in the loot piles. (There are already complaints enough about them.) When you get your "Starting Equipment" mod up and running, I expect that to either be partially implemented in this mod or recommended for use with it.

Don't see a need to "buff" when in a racially appropriate climate. Debuffing away from one's "normal" climate should only last for a period of time (roughly a month) as one gets "acclimated". Endo/ecto-therms will have more limits in that regard, as a physical limitation to those body types. It's only when a quest plotline forces them to go to places they would normally avoid that it becomes a major issue.

Would be interesting to see a "cast on self" "warmth/cooling" spell. But the magic system needs to get fixed first.

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:08 pm
by Ralzar
Dubiousintent wrote: Sun Feb 09, 2020 2:33 pm Would be interesting to see a "cast on self" "warmth/cooling" spell. But the magic system needs to get fixed first.
This is something that SHOULD work but I doubt it actually does. Climate&Cloaks uses your characters Resistance to Frost/Fire to give you protection against Cold/Heat. I have not tested it with spells, but it appeared to not work with potions, but at the time I started wondering if those potions worked at all.
What does work is any Frost/Fire resistance gained from class and Race abilities.

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:10 pm
by Ralzar
As for problems with starting, I am thinking of adding a feature for "Soft Start" where temperature effects are lessened until you reach level 2. This will not be default though.

That said, starting with Climate & Cloaks works better if you also have Realistic Loot, because I made those loot tables and I made sure to add a lot more clothes ;)

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:12 pm
by L57
Ralzar wrote: Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:10 pm That said, starting with Climate & Cloaks works better if you also have Realistic Loot, because I made those loot tables and I made sure to add a lot more clothes ;)
This. I have wondered why people complain about rough start, but now I remembered that I use Realistic Loot :)

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Sun Feb 09, 2020 10:17 pm
by Ralzar
So, next feature I'm working on: Text Box.

At the moment, I have the ability to set a key (defined by mod setting) to make a text box pop up.
Note: I have not been able to couple this with the Status textbox. And if you bind it to the same key as Status, you just get the mods textbox and not the status boxes.

So, the next part is making a heap of conditinals to produce a few lines of text that describe your current situation and possibly ends with a tip as to what you should do.

I am thinking the result will end up giving a text like this:

"The cold spring night of the mountains is no place for a Redguard like you.
You are dressed very warm, but the metal armor you wear cools you down.
You should seek an inn or make camp until morning."

Re: [MOD] Climates & Cloaks

Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2020 12:07 am
by FoldedDice
Ralzar wrote: Sun Feb 09, 2020 4:10 pm As for problems with starting, I am thinking of adding a feature for "Soft Start" where temperature effects are lessened until you reach level 2. This will not be default though.

That said, starting with Climate & Cloaks works better if you also have Realistic Loot, because I made those loot tables and I made sure to add a lot more clothes ;)
I actually do also have that installed. The default loot drops are just nonsense, so it's certainly an essential tweak. My Argonian also didn't generate with a weapon that he could use with proficiency, so I had to bypass nearly all of the fights and only managed to grab a few loot piles, which did not happen to provide what I needed. It was a truly catastrophic convergence of just about everything that could have gone wrong, so take that with an appropriately large grain of salt.

Aside from that one experience I'm quite pleased with the way the difficulty is currently tuned, so I don't think I will be enabling any easier settings unless I decide to attempt a playthrough that would be completely non-viable at the harder settings. For the most part I'd say it's fine how it is, but of course more options are always welcome.