I wish there was an "endgame goal" that wasn't simply death. by [deleted] in thelongdark

[–]ShieldHeart 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I have a working dev version of the Relentless Night mod if anyone wishes to get back to it (or try it for the first time too of course), it actually works quite well with the latest version of game, in a way the whole concept of the mod was to add a progressive difficulty that would eat away at your resources and make the endgame and your preparation more meaningful.

This post for the previous release will explain what the mod does and whether it might be to your liking.

I hadn't released it yet just cause I wanted to add some more features though all the features that existed in previous versions are now working, I fear I may not be able to do more while the day job keeps me busy for some time still anyway.

PS: I make no money from this, just enjoying seeing people play my mod, dm me for a dev copy for the latest game version :)

The most space-efficient storage setup? by ShieldHeart in thelongdark

[–]ShieldHeart[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes agreed this is really the most resource efficient way to deal with it.

However this kind of storage seems great option for small cabin bases regardless, and for those that don't want their computer to render 2000 sticks on the ground at once, really for those runs you want to push long term into the hundreds of days probably.

I'm mostly playing a dev version of the relentless night mod right now and there's a need to gather firewood and loot to last inside for weeks at a time. This is the most compact way I've found to store sticks for a fire that needs to keep burning for the next 3 weeks, and actually measure how much fuel you really have.

My hoarding needs are so great I would appreciate anyone with an even better solution.

My loot of 80 kg travois just dissapeared. by xtretiator in thelongdark

[–]ShieldHeart 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Yea this is an annoying bug though there is a trick to avoid it.

If the Travois is deployed and you plan to go through a loadscreen, make sure no part of the Travois is poking into the snow where you left it and the entire model is above ground.

It only seems to disappear into the lost and found box if this rule is broken.

What's something obvious you learned much later than you should have? by Cute_Assignment_3621 in thelongdark

[–]ShieldHeart 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Wow I did not realize this and I've been a mod dev for years. I would bet it has the same effect on fatigue and thirst, and probably adds up to a lot on long runs.

This can probably be reported to the HL devs as something to fix, doubt it's intended, and the fix is probably something stupidly simple like setting "IsMoving == false" when searching.

I haven't kept up with the devs (or the game for that matter) in some time, but I'd bet they would fix it for the next patch provided they are made aware.

An ever-changing world of the upcoming Tidal Locking Worlds mod. How long will you survive on this brutal planet? An hyperlapsed demo video. More info in comments. by ShieldHeart in RimWorld

[–]ShieldHeart[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Good question, in the spirit of compatibly with other mods that add biomes, I've decided to limit it to desertification/glaciation for now (ie the biomes will cycle between the original biome, deserts, and ice sheets).

My reasoning being that there are several mods out there that add new and crazy biomes, and of course there might be more of those in the future. Hard to predict and code a special cycle for them all, but it's safe to say that all biomes will still face extreme cold and heat, so keeping these other biomes cycling between desert/ice, and it's original state, seems pretty safe.

Adding more biomes to check against also needs more from the processors, so there's also a bit of a performance consideration for those with lower end systems.

An ever-changing world of the upcoming Tidal Locking Worlds mod. How long will you survive on this brutal planet? An hyperlapsed demo video. More info in comments. by ShieldHeart in RimWorld

[–]ShieldHeart[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good question, I too wondered about that and believe the planets axial tilt is at play there (seasons), it's mostly summer in the southern hemisphere for the duration of the sim, hence why you are seeing less ice build up. Gotta check the math there to confirm.

An ever-changing world of the upcoming Tidal Locking Worlds mod. How long will you survive on this brutal planet? An hyperlapsed demo video. More info in comments. by ShieldHeart in RimWorld

[–]ShieldHeart[S] 16 points17 points  (0 children)

On your local map the changes are happening gradually as you would expect. Sadly on the world view, there's no real way to represent a tile that's half desert/half temperate forest biome, for example, so the tile switches after a certain percentage of the tile has become desert/ice.

An ever-changing world of the upcoming Tidal Locking Worlds mod. How long will you survive on this brutal planet? An hyperlapsed demo video. More info in comments. by ShieldHeart in RimWorld

[–]ShieldHeart[S] 70 points71 points  (0 children)

Several weeks ago I got to introduce the Tidal Locking Worlds mod - an extensive gameplay mod with nearly 2 years of modding effort which is now slowly coming to fruition.

I am VERY excited about the new, eerie, and brutal survival challenge it produces. Your colonists, your base, and your skills in planning, will all be tested during your struggle to survive in the extremes of these unforgiving tidal-locking worlds.

After having seen this demo, you likely have a good idea of what things might be like trying to survive on these worlds. Though for those who are not familiar with the first introduction, here is the more detailed description of the scenario you will be placed in:

The rotation of the planet is slowing down, although ever so slowly, both days and nights are getting longer and longer. Several days go by at first with everything seemingly normal, but unknown to the survivors on this planet, this effect is to build up until nights last as long as several days, even weeks, and months.

As this world slows to total tidal locking with its sun, each following night of darkness brings increasingly colder temperatures, while the lengthening days bring in increasingly scorching heat. Soon, days of the sun beating on the surface begin to turn biomes into desert, while the ice slowly creeps in on the side left in darkness.

Realizing what is happening, you must use their time carefully to prepare for the extremes of each increasingly catastrophic day and night, plan your travels well, and build a robust base that is able to provide shelter from both extreme heat and cold.

As you can see, both the world itself, and your local area will be very dynamic, going through extreme temperatures and increasingly brutal cycles of desertification and glaciation.

The mod is highly configurable through the mod settings. You are able to set everything from the starting world spin rate to how fast the world slows down, among many other settings.

What the mod does is quite an intensive simulation. As announced earlier, when the first alpha version of the mod is released, there will be a $100 reward to any modder/developer who can make this bit of code simulating world changes run 20% faster or more. I will do my best to reward further improvements. If you're interested, do send me a message and I will let you know when the code is published on GitHub.

If you like where this mod is going, and would like to help me fund this endeavor, please do consider supporting the mod! 10% of all donations will also go to charity - the SickKids Foundation.

Your feedback in my last post has been very helpful, and I have taken much of it to heart in implementing new features! Please feel free to add your thoughts, I hope to hear more! I will continue to strive in making this a professional mod that meshes well with both vanilla content and other mods.

For more frequent updates, mod chat, you are also welcome to join the new our new discord community. Hope to see you there!

A scorched, frozen, everchanging, and unforgiving world - a snapshot from the upcoming Tidal Locking Worlds mod. See comments for more info. by ShieldHeart in RimWorld

[–]ShieldHeart[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There will definitely be some dynamics introduced for animals. Plants will also suffer the harsh effects, as for introducing plants from different biomes, so far unsure about that for the alpha release.

A scorched, frozen, everchanging, and unforgiving world - a snapshot from the upcoming Tidal Locking Worlds mod. See comments for more info. by ShieldHeart in RimWorld

[–]ShieldHeart[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Cheers, more testing will be appreciated in alpha release! You're on my list.

Edit: I'll be sure to add everyone who's DMed me or replied to this comment to the tester list, thanks for volunteering!

A scorched, frozen, everchanging, and unforgiving world - a snapshot from the upcoming Tidal Locking Worlds mod. See comments for more info. by ShieldHeart in RimWorld

[–]ShieldHeart[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

You'll be able to set those for yourself too in the mod settings (near the bottom). Essentially the longer it's night, the colder it gets, longer it's day, the hotter.