Remove "Construction" skill, make constructions use different skills

[Coolthulhu]

Construction skill is, and has to be, underpowered:

• Results of construction are immobile, unlike mechanics equivalents
• Most of constructions are useless. Tables, chairs, lockers, bookcases etc.
• Walls as static defenses are generally pretty useless. And when they aren't, solid rock is more useful than anything the player can feasibly construct.

This means that construction has no chance of being naturally leveled through use. It's all about books and grind.

The designation of construction as a separate skill also doesn't make much sense:

• Wooden objects, including frames, foldable frames, use fabrication
• Metal objects, like plating, also use fabrication
• Moving objects (crossbow, speargun, motors) use mechanics
• Controlled ignition objects (fire weapons) generally use mechanics
• Digging holes uses survival
• Construction is not architecture, because it only allows simple constructions, not towers

It only really works as "masonry" - working rock and bricks isn't covered under fabrication or mechanics. But could easily be, especially considering that masonry is an incredibly minor aspect of the game.

Having construction projects use different skills would have the following benefits:

• High-level construction recipes could actually be used. Reading a construction book is a waste of time, but if it came for free with useful skills, someone might craft a wood stove, reinforced window or a well.
• Construction recipes would become available with recipes similar to them. Work wooden planks, learn fabrication, learn how to produce planks from logs. Play with welding tanks and pipes (car work, mostly), level mechanics, learn to craft wood stove.
• Early fabrication would have more uses. Fermenting vat can be a cool thing to have around if you have excess fruit and no way to preserve them (or want to bootstrap yeast production), so crafting it wouldn't be a waste of time - time you'd probably spend crafting spindles otherwise. You could also go around your house reinforcing windows instead of just crafting those spindles.
• Rock forge setup would be achievable without grinding construction. "Tool lock" is a gigantic flaw in mid-game fabrication, which makes it nearly impossible to level naturally, despite tons of autolearn recipes for it.

[baraba3]

i start almost every game with contruction 3/.charcoal kiln and smoker are well worth it and one can grind with sofas to lv 5 abd rock forge although its annyoing crafting blankets but forge can also be solution if heating elements and electroncics are not easily availble.

most of constructions are useless indeed but i think they have inteded decorative function which i sometimes use.

i agree with you that most of construction items are not really construction but usage of other skills and although it would be nonttheless be better for me to have other skills used instead of wasting points on construction i i dont feel construction skill now is that weak cause forge,kiln and smoker are very usefull things.

as for nautral progression if you are fortifying base you can increse it somewhat naturally though i think some additiona ways of reinforcing base /obtacles for zombies are needed as recipies for some lvls so you dont fall on making chairs or sofas instead.Construction should even more reward one who want permannet settlement and maybe it can be more combined with traps skills as requisite to form sinergy for some elaborate traps as traps skills are also defensive in principle.

[Soyweiser]

Yeah but the forge, kiln etc, could be moved to other skills. So yeah, I think we could do away with the construction skill, and change the books to apply to other skills.

And that you can easily grind your way up to certain skills is not a good reason to keep the whole skill, I would say.

So your base is established? Time to spend 1 real life hour to grind up your construction skill to level X. Not really that much fun. We should not remove constructions, so people can still can make what they want. But you don't need to grind first. As you get the construction abilities with other skills.

[Zilenan91]

As the start of most of my runs I like to barricade in somewhere in town, board up all the windows, reinforce all the boards, build a bed somewhere and then use it as a base until I can get a car running.

[Soyweiser]

Yeah, but if construction was removed, and it now used other skills, would that influence the playstyle? Would that make it harder? Easier? Less interesting?

[Zilenan91]

More interesting. By doing those construction tasks like boarding up windows and reinforcing the doors and building beds and building walls that zombies knocked down, I'd be gaining skills that I'd otherwise have to grind later.

[baraba3]

removing construction would make thing easier.i could spend points on other skills and train them when i contruct.i dont mind.i just want to point that skill is usefull althiugh not for everyone but for those who go for permanent bases.well thats expected from construction,.

[Labtop-215]

Not sure how I feel about this idea. I don't think of construction as underpowered, and certainly not because you can do the same thing with mechanics. The difference for me would be that buildings don't require maintenance ingame, are permanent and often more powerful (rock forge, smoking rack, and charcoal kiln being examples already cites, but also stuff like fermenting vats and wooden kegs. Also you can dig a well at the highest levels of construction, so essentially you can get water anywhere on the surface with some materials, tools, and time.) and only require the welder for a few things, whereas mechanics requires either a ton of duct tape or a welder and welding goggles to build things and vehicle additions tend to be less powerful than the construction varieties.

Seeing the construction skill go would also change my play-style drastically, because I prefer to build bases from scratch instead of fortifying existing ones. If other skills like fabrication take this over, then essentially building bases from scratch becomes too easy rather than challenging, because I would simply just power through the fabrication tree instead of jumping between the two.

If you want to remove a big chunk of the grind, make the structural constructions like walls, doors, windows, roofs, and stairways give way more experience than furniture, and extend the effective skill ranges of what building these objects can train your skill too. That way, building an actual building will train construction better than spamming and disassembling furniture.

[Coolthulhu]

rock forge

Without a charcoal kiln it's strictly weaker than electric forge. And once the electric forge is mounted on a vehicle, using it becomes very cheap - lower maintenance than hauling charcoal.

smoking rack

No vehicle equivalent, but it isn't more powerful than haulable charcoal smoker - a semi-common city item. Also requires charcoal.

fermenting vats

That's one thing that can't be replaced. The problem is, it requires 2 construction. Grinding construction is very unrewarding. Moving it to fabrication or cooking or whatever would make fermenting vats more useful and common. Possibly even actually worth crafting on non-alcmet characters.

wooden kegs

At the level it requires, it is vastly underpowered. Level 3 construction is not achievable naturally except for very tedious playstyles.

If other skills like fabrication take this over, then essentially building bases from scratch becomes too easy rather than challenging

It wouldn't become easier. Just less tedious. There is a major difference between those two. Deconstructing and reconstructing a bunch of furniture isn't hard. Neither is collecting nails. The problem is, it takes a lot of player time, tons of actions, while the reward is mostly just roleplaying.

[Labtop-215]

You don't use the construction skill much do you?

If you set up a base yourself, a log cabin for instance, it is pretty easy to get your construction skill up. Cutting down tree's, which you need to do to clear up an area on a forest tile, will build your skill up, as well as copping falling tree's into logs and then planks.

Rock charcoal kiln requires 40 rocks, so rock forge is NOT strickly weaker because aquiring a charcoal kiln is already along the path for a rock forge, which also requires 40 rocks and can create 6,000 charcoal, which is easy enough to haul on it's own since you can build the rock forge, smoking rack, and charcoal kiln all close to each other. Also, in order to get an electric forge, you need at the very least a soldering iron with a battery mod (or two soldering irons), and more importantly a wrench (which if I don't find a toolbox, often is the thing that stymies me for quite some time), which you may not always be able to get in the beginning of the game, for a rock forge, you only require rocks and construction skill, a stone shovel, and a stone hammer.

Also, doing tedious work is a choice. I just do the work I need to get a site prepared and my skill is up to where I need it to be before I know it.

If you use the skill to build a new building instead of fortifying an existing one, the skill goes up quickly without the need for grind. Unless you consider actually building a new building the game to be grind. To be fair, maybe it is, but then again, when was building a whole new building a piece of cake?

Just because you can't achieve something naturally, doesn't mean it can't be achieved naturally.

[Coolthulhu]

You don't use the construction skill much do you?

I don't because it's incredibly tedious to level and incredibly unrewarding too. Few times I tried a pure wilderness start I realized that everything it offers can be achieved better by raiding a city. Having to collect 80 rocks for forge and kiln doesn't help.

Just because you can't achieve something naturally, doesn't mean it can't be achieved naturally.

Doing a pointless, unrewarding, grindy activity is not achieving it naturally.

[Labtop-215]

Doing a pointless, unrewarding, grindy activity is not achieving it naturally.

Clear an area of tree's, and build a log cabin there. Not pointless, and your reward is that you have a custom built base where you can store your loot and equipment, deep withing the wilderness, away from city raids.

Cutting down a tree requires 0 construction. Chopping up tree trunks into logs requires 1 construction. Chopping up tree trunks into planks requires 2 construction. Log walls require 3 construction. Log roof's require 4 construction. Assuming you built a decent sized building, you should have enough construction to build a rock forge, and you will definitely have enough for charcoal kilns, fermenting vats, smoking racks, and the like. Also at construction level 5, you have the potential to be able to dig out a basement. Granted you need a pickaxe to do this at level 5, but it can be done at level 5. So you can build an underground bunker if you can get a pickaxe. And if I'm not mistaken, you can find a pickaxe in a mineshaft, so you don't have to make it from scratch.

Your essentially able to scope out an advantageous area instead of accepting whatever the world generator spits out at you. You don't have to stay at a noise lab, or near fungaliods, triffids, giant ants, giant bee's, blobs, ect...

Lastly, as somebody whom actually likes changing the terrain in the game, I enjoy the construction skill, and I think it's powerful enough, and different enough from the other skills to be a skill in it's own right.

You don't use construction because you think it's unrewarding. All that tells me is that your not really qualified to talk about it's removal since you haven't played with it enough.

If you feel it's that bad though, how about we talking about adding some functionality too it instead of removing it outright. What do you think construction needs to make it on par with mechanics or fabrication?

[Coolthulhu]

Not pointless, and your reward is that you have a custom built base where you can store your loot and equipment

"Custom built" is just roleplay. There is no advantage over just building a crate and dropping all the crap in it, then dropping 2 blankets on the dirt and sleeping on those. So there is no reward, making it pointless.

So you can build an underground bunker if you can get a pickaxe.

Or you can just clear a basement and get it much, much less tediously.

Your essentially able to scope out an advantageous area instead of accepting whatever the world generator spits out at you.

By the time you have anything serious there, you could have a mobile base.

You don't use construction because you think it's unrewarding. All that tells me is that your not really qualified to talk about it's removal since you haven't played with it enough.

But I did play with it enough. And I'm obviously more qualified to talk about its removal than you because I can actually tell its benefits and shortcomings, while you keep bringing up advantages that only apply to a very limited, grindy, suboptimal playstyle. All your arguments rely on assumption that a constructed base provides significant advantages over a captured one. But that assumption is wrong.

If you feel it's that bad though, how about we talking about adding some functionality too it instead of removing it outright.

The best way to fix it is to move construction to other skills. It sucks and upgrading it is polishing a turd. Removing construction skill is the best way to add functionality to constructions.

What do you think construction needs to make it on par with mechanics or fabrication?

Removal. Alternatively, totally reworking horde mechanics which would take tons of work and most likely never finish.

So, removal.

[Labtop-215]

Leaving blankets in the middle of the wilderness leaves you open to attack while you sleep. You also can't always capture a base.

You don't always start with the tools to build a mobile base, mainly, your limited by welders and batteries, and finding a vehicles that you can repair. With construction, you can do the same thing from scratch, and with little to no combat if you manage your surroundings very carefully. As somebody who plays characters with no combat skill to improve the challenge, that's important. With the settings I play on, it may be to late to once you in combat to flee it, so a relatively safe way to build a base instead of capturing one is a powerful benefit, and one that I don't think should be given to somebody who simply cuts a few sticks into pointy sticks, wooden needles, and spindles.

Your method requires either starting with a welder and batteries (alternatively an acetylene torch), a wrench, and a hacksaw (or alternatively a toolbox), or risking life and limb in combat to try and get those things from a city raid. Not everybody character can do that reliably early game.

So building a custom base that protects you from the outside world, has merit because it carries less risk. Again, just because YOU don't do it, doesn't mean it doesn't have merit. And I would hate to see that become too easy to do just because stuff was shifted over to fabrication.

I play characters with flaws. I use the multi-pool system. I don't cheese the game with fire. I don't regularly use vehicles because acquiring one has become unreliable and luck prone early game. Just because you don't appreciate my "sub optimal" play style doesn't mean you have the right to just up and remove it.

You think it sucks, and I strongly disagree. Saying something "sucks" because it's "grindy" is non-constructive at best because that on it's nebulous. Are you saying that building a custom building is not supposed to take some work to accomplish? It takes hours in-game, but that's because the effort it takes to actually build a structure needs to be represented in-game somehow. Could the building process it self be a little better streamlined? Maybe. But you don't accomplish that by removing the construction skill and putting it under fabrication.

My point is that you aren't even trying to make construction better at all and you arbitrarily want it gone because you don't use it. Removing the construction skill and putting the associated building's under fabrication doesn't change the "tedium" that you feel in this regard. It only changes the skill that it falls under.

Is your concern that you can't build the structure you intend too right away? In that case, either the difficulty of some buildings need to be changed, or the skill that building lower tier stuff can train you to needs to change. Or better yet, don't change it at all because some types of buildings are harder to build than others.

Edit: Also, being able to build an upstairs would be nice. The only reason we can't build towers is because we don't have z-levels completely flushed out yet. There seems to only be a few minor quirks, like downstairs don't have roof's above them, and z-level targeting crashes the game. I'm also not sure if moving between z-levels is perfect yet or not, but once it is, it would be logical to assume we can build a second story on top of our existing building if we wanted too. Which means we would be able to build towers and fire down from them at enemies! When building a tower for defense becomes a possibility, don't think that should just be based on fabrication alone.

[Coolthulhu]

Leaving blankets in the middle of the wilderness leaves you open to attack while you sleep.

Tent or improvised shelter is enough. Walls take more work than securing the area by clearing it and by the time you can construct them, you don't need them. Oh and construction leaves you open to attack while you craft. If it is so dangerous that you can't sleep near it, then it is so dangerous that you can't construct near it.

As somebody who plays characters with no combat skill to improve the challenge, that's important. With the settings I play on

Even in the very specific, limited settings you're using, construction is suboptimal and only your choice.

Your method requires either starting with a welder and batteries (alternatively an acetylene torch), a wrench, and a hacksaw (or alternatively a toolbox), or risking life and limb in combat to try and get those things from a city raid. Not everybody character can do that reliably early game.

No, it doesn't require anything. You don't need a mobile base, it's just that it does everything that construction does but better. If you don't need a mobile base, you don't need an immobile one either - at best just a stash, and that doesn't take tedious construction.

Again, just because YOU don't do it, doesn't mean it doesn't have merit.

Just because YOU do it, doesn't mean it has a merit.

Just because you don't appreciate my "sub optimal" play style doesn't mean you have the right to just up and remove it.

I'm not removing any playstyles. Unless that playstyle is "grind yet another skill for no benefit" - that playstyle I'd be happy to remove, for the benefit of everyone who doesn't want to do it, but would like to construct things.

Are you saying that building a custom building is not supposed to take some work to accomplish?

Character work, not player work. Grinding an extra skill just for the sake of having an extra skill adds nothing.

But you don't accomplish that by removing the construction skill and putting it under fabrication.

Wrong.

My point is that you aren't even trying to make construction better at all and you arbitrarily want it gone because you don't use it.

I do use it. I use it enough to tell that it sucks, that it makes the game worse, that it adds nothing except yet another wall (heh) preventing people from using features that could be mildly useful otherwise.

Removing the construction skill and putting the associated building's under fabrication doesn't change the "tedium" that you feel in this regard.

It does. It certainly does make it less tedious when you don't have to grind an extra skill to gain minuscule benefits of having a fermenting vat, a forge or a fireplace.

Also, being able to build an upstairs would be nice.

I refuse to seriously work on a badly designed mess without first clearing it up. I'm planning to add "planning menu" to construction, which would allow automated building with NPC help, but first easy to fix, but big issues have to go. Construction skill is one of them. Another is lack of ability to remove a wall without risking collapse.

[Labtop-215]

Being attacked while sleeping means the enemy moves right up to you even if you can "see" it because your unconscious. If you are construction something and an enemy comes along that you can't deal with, you see it from a distance. The tent or shelter kit will get ripped if you get attacked in the middle of the night while a wall will not, (unless it's attacked by a zombie brute or a zombie hulk.).

The main reason you can leave your items outside is because we don't emulate wear on them from them being outside constantly. Also, arguably the storage capacities of tents and crates probably shouldn't be 4000 volume, but because there's no emulation of wear and tear on items that are outside, there's currently no point to putting them in anything. Except to perhaps protect them from NPC's. But if that changes in the future (which I think it should), the construction would have more value.

Your argument, if I'm getting it right, is that building a structure in the game is "grindy" and "sub-optimal" because it is requires either reading or use to advance the skill. You include building a structure from scratch in the wilderness, as grind work because the way you play never specifically includes that as a possibility. Basically, because you capture buildings instead of building them from scratch, building a building shouldn't count towards legitimately gaining skill? That was just accomplished by "grind work" and isn't a legitimate thing to do in the game? If your position is different from this, please let me know how.

Anyways, by moving construction activities to fabrication, your creating a situation where a person can still "grind" up fabrication by repetitively cutting heavy sticks into various wooden objects, can then suddenly and with no difficulty, training, or experience, just build a house from scratch. You read up on the art of glassblowing and suddenly you can build a stone house. You read up on engineering and can suddenly smith a sword.

Those are serious balance issues that would be introduced by your proposed change. Oh, and it still wouldn't stop actual building itself from being tedious, it should just mean that at the end of it, I can inexplicably know how to create several tools and weapons without ever having even tried, like pots, wrenches, hacksaws, butchers knives... I don't see how fabrication and construction go hand in hand that tightly.

Would you apply this treatment to mechanics for instance? Would you simply say "Well mechanics is just creating things that move, building a death mobile from scratch is necessary. You only do that for game breaking reasons and raising mechanics involves repeatedly removing and replacing parts, or reading a mechanics books to grind skill. You don't even have to create a death mobile, you can just get lucky and find a working vehicle in a garage with fuel and power." No, you wont do that because you actually use that skill and because vehicles can be built to be quite overpowered.

I refuse to seriously work on a badly designed mess without first clearing it up. I'm planning to add "planning menu" to construction, which would allow automated building with NPC help, but first easy to fix, but big issues have to go. Construction skill is one of them. Another is lack of ability to remove a wall without risking collapse.

You can add a planning menu regardless of weather construction skill is an actual skill or not. Just because you refuse to work on something isn't a reason that that thing has to go. Somebody else can implement the planning menu if they want it. If nobody else want's to work on this "planning menu" then there wasn't much will to have it implement in the first place. Which is sad. Construction could use something along the lines of a planner to help streamline it.

Also this right here bothers me

"Custom built" is just roleplay. What? So you think roleplay isn't a legit playstyle? I don't think building a custom structure is just roleplay for the reasons I've outlined above, but since when is roleplay not a good reason to have something in the game? Does every mechanic in the game have to be gamey? Must we min-max everything? Isn't being able to roleplay in the game a good thing?

Edit: And being able to remove parts of a building, like a wall, without the building collapsing is something that should be unique to architecture and engineering. You need to know how the weight is distributed so that you can provide support for the building before you remove or move around that specific support.

[Coolthulhu]

The tent or shelter kit will get ripped if you get attacked in the middle of the night while a wall will not

Which happens so rarely that it may as well not happen at all. "But what if" is not a valid argument for forcing tedium on everyone.

The main reason you can leave your items outside is because we don't emulate wear on them from them being outside constantly.

Even if we did, it would be a stupid idea to build a shed just to store items. Because you simply do not need to do that in the game. And that "shed" would be just 2 walls and one roof between them.

Your argument, if I'm getting it right, is that building a structure in the game is "grindy" and "sub-optimal" because it is requires either reading or use to advance the skill.

It's grindy because it requires repeated use of a skill that is very bad, used only for an incredibly limited set of actions, getting it to high levels is a fuckload of tedium and totally not worth it as level 3 is where all the sane options end etc. etc.

Basically, because you capture buildings instead of building them from scratch, building a building shouldn't count towards legitimately gaining skill?

Level 1->2 is grindy because when you're doing it right, you're just making and un-making furniture. Level 2->3 is grindy because the quadratic XP costs are kicking in already, meaning there is a lot of useless stuff to do. Tedious, but totally trivial, like crafting spindles for fabrication. Any level above 4 is grindy because most of the results are useless, meaning you have to craft things that you don't need.

Anyways, by moving construction activities to fabrication, your creating a situation where a person can still "grind" up fabrication by repetitively cutting heavy sticks into various wooden objects, can then suddenly and with no difficulty, training, or experience, just build a house from scratch.

It's not like cutting trees into planks is any better practice for building log walls than making wooden wheels is. This problem always existed. It's not worth fussing about another instance of it when it means having to keep a horrible skill around.

Would you apply this treatment to mechanics for instance?

Sure: Mechanics is an useful skill that should exist in the game because it has a ton of good, useful recipes associated with it, because it has vehicle building tied to it and vehicle building is a big, important part of the game and because everyone wants it for its numerous benefits. There, applied.

You can add a planning menu regardless of weather construction skill is an actual skill or not.

Sure. I can add good mechanics to horrible crap and then take the responsibility for valid complaints that I'm adding features to a broken mess, rewarding players for wasting time, keeping useful options locked etc. But I'd rather unfuck the mess, then add features to a working thing.

Construction could use something along the lines of a planner to help streamline it.

It could use a lot of things. For example, not being tied to a grindy, useless skill.

Does every mechanic in the game have to be gamey?

If by "gamey", you mean "not horribly designed, not full of tedium", then yes.

Must we min-max everything?

Options should be viable. There should be no useless skills and options that only exist to confuse players who don't understand them yet.

Isn't being able to roleplay in the game a good thing?

If changing the requirement of building walls from "chop trees into planks" to "make wooden wheels" prevents you from roleplaying, then you weren't capable of roleplaying in the first place. Excusing horrible practices with roleplay is a bad thing.

[Soyweiser]

Options should be viable. There should be no useless skills and options that only exist to confuse players who don't understand them yet.

It is iirc why a developers always talk about 'meaningful' options.

Mechanics

My only issue is that it can be hard getting mechanics up to level 1. (And 1 -> 2 can also be slightly annoying if you lack some stuff, iirc you mostly level it by tearing stuff of vehicles).

Somebody else can implement the planning menu if they want it.

This will never happen. Don't use the 'a magical other dev will do it' as an argument. It is a way to common trap to run into.

[Labtop-215]

If by "gamey", you mean "not horribly designed, not full of tedium", then yes.

No, By gamey, I mean stuff you do in the game simply because you know that's better than the alternative. For instance, repeatedly repairing and then disassembling vehicles in order to raise mechanics (with duct tape no less). Repeatedly shooting a tiny creature from far away in order to raise marksmanship and archery. Luring enemies over a bush that has been lit on fire in order to kill them faster. Taking drugs like cocaine because you know they are stimulants and the addiction system is a joke, ect. Essentially you don't like construction because it's not nice to power-game it, and power-gaming it isn't worth the effort to you, and that means you want to change it so that it's easy to power-train construction with minimal effort. That isn't an answer to the problem either.

Would you apply this treatment to mechanics for instance?

Sure: Mechanics is an useful skill that should exist in the game because it has a ton of good, useful recipes associated with it, because it has vehicle building tied to it and vehicle building is a big, important part of the game and because everyone wants it for its numerous benefits. There, applied.

It's still the same, repair tons of junk vehicles with duct tape, disassemble them, and then add things to your own vehicle. But that tedium is supposedly justified by the awesome things it can give you. Because vehicles can generate game breaking amounts of power, to the point that being able to tap into that power allows unlimited forge, hotplate, and chemistry set crafting, you judge construction by this broken standard. So you want to make construction less distinct because it isn't awesome enough in your eyes to use. You wont try to make leveling construction through construction oriented activities more streamlined. You wont remove the craft x to reach the next skill level problem, you'll just make it easier. That isn't solving the problem. Why can't we make building something new a potentially big part of the game?

You could add more building options so that construction gives unique benefits, and isn't so "useless" in your eyes. Heck the whole "it's useless" argument you have is a semantics argument. What's "useless" to you isn't so useless to other people. If you want to make construction have better benefits, come up with some ideas that involve architecture. Also keep in mind that building a structure does take time. Is your problem with construction that you have to walk up beside each tile and build that part of the building? That sounds like something your building planning feature could fix. Being able to designate that you intend to construct a bunch of walls, gathering the materials close by, and then a "build this" option would be a good feature that takes the tedium out of building structures with the construction skill. You don't have to remove the construction skill to do this though.

This will never happen. Don't use the 'a magical other dev will do it' as an argument. It is a way to common trap to run into.

My point is that saying you'll take your ball and go home unless you get your way is not a way to argue. That's childish. If you don't want to implement a planning building features unless you get your way, then we don't need a planning building feature. We should be adding to the game to make it better and improving upon what is there. Heck, if you feel it's so bad, why not redesign the functionality of construction instead of removing it as a skill altogether?

Edit: For the above, I guess that was Soyweiser making an original comment but I thought was quoted from Coolthulu. Still most of that stands.

Sure. I can add good mechanics to horrible crap and then take the responsibility for valid complaints that I'm adding features to a broken mess, rewarding players for wasting time, keeping useful options locked etc. But I'd rather unfuck the mess, then add features to a working thing.

Your acting like construction doesn't actually model buildings being constructed. It does. The tangible benefit of the construction skill is that when you are done it provides a functional building. Sorry that doesn't sound awesome to you, but that's not a reason to move construction to just be under fabrication. The construction skill has the potential to be expanded to be a unique facet of the game, if you put that under fabrication, you ruin that potential because then you have to constantly balance the ability to build buildings with the ability to craft items. This also assume rather erroneously that people who can build rock was from stones if they have the tools and materials can also smith a hatchet or create a bullwhip, because supposedly that uses the exact same skill?

If changing the requirement of building walls from "chop trees into planks" to "make wooden wheels" prevents you from roleplaying, then you weren't capable of roleplaying in the first place. Excusing horrible practices with roleplay is a bad thing.

It breaks the flow of improving construction, and it trades one set of grind for another. Your degrading construction by making it less specialized so that you can game the system better. Also, I've already said building a log cabin in the woods from scratch is not grinding. Would you say that building a vehicle from scratch is not grinding there for we should move mechanics? Oh wait, no you wont!

[Soyweiser]

My point is that saying you'll take your ball and go home unless you get your way is not a way to argue. That's childish.

Yeah, I agree with that.

But you clearly don't want it removed right? Do you have a better outline for the construction issues mentioned above then? And time/energy to work on it? Yeah, this sounds a bit like keeping it hostile. But not changing stuff that is bloaty and not fun because there other potentials ways that it could be fixed (but nobody wants to do) is worse imho. How do we make it less grindy? (And perhaps slightly unfair, do you have any idea how feasible it would be to implement that?)

[Coolthulhu]

No, By gamey, I mean stuff you do in the game simply because you know that's better than the alternative. For instance, repeatedly repairing and then disassembling vehicles in order to raise mechanics (with duct tape no less). Repeatedly shooting a tiny creature from far away in order to raise marksmanship and archery. Luring enemies over a bush that has been lit on fire in order to kill them faster. Taking drugs like cocaine because you know they are stimulants and the addiction system is a joke, ect.

If that's how you define gamey-ness, then I'm a giant opponent of it and have done a lot of work to remove tons of gamey-ness from DDA.

Essentially you don't like construction because it's not nice to power-game it

The opposite: I don't like it because the only sane way to gain it is power-leveling it. And because power leveling it gives no rewards except roleplay.

It's still the same, repair tons of junk vehicles with duct tape, disassemble them, and then add things to your own vehicle.

There is a problem with early mechanics leveling, yes. But then there's a reward for it, unlike construction.

Because vehicles can generate game breaking amounts of power, to the point that being able to tap into that power allows unlimited forge, hotplate, and chemistry set crafting, you judge construction by this broken standard.

No, it's more about being able to stash things on the go instead of having to wear 2 duffels just to haul stuff. And going fast instead of having to walk all the way. Unlimited power is a small bonus here. It would still be a superior option if you couldn't connect the forge to the vehicle and needed to use up batteries. Because batteries are plentiful and the faster you go, the more of them you gain.

Heck, if you feel it's so bad, why not redesign the functionality of construction instead of removing it as a skill altogether?

Because no one has suggested anything better than removing construction. Because I don't expect anyone to suggest anything better. Because knowing the playerbase, the few players who are knowledgeable enough about game design to actually suggest something are either supporting the idea to remove construction skill or don't mind its removal at all (because they used it very rarely). Because the more I think about alternatives to removing construction, the more I notice that they're inferior to removing construction.

The construction skill has the potential to be expanded to be a unique facet of the game, if you put that under fabrication, you ruin that potential because then you have to constantly balance the ability to build buildings with the ability to craft items.

For years, construction didn't get any new additions that would balance it (ie. make it less horrible). Years. Potential? So far it looks like the potential it has is the potential to be fixed by removal. And don't use balance as an argument when you clearly don't know what you're talking about. It's not like you would care about balance anyway - you are defending something that goes against it right now.

Would you say that building a vehicle from scratch is not grinding there for we should move mechanics?

If vehicles were as useless as constructions, then building them would be a grind. Mechanics would still have a giant set of recipes to fall back to. Construction doesn't.

[Nanothaniel]

I'd like to see the durability of static buildings emphasized. If you can make a truly impenetrable fortress then construction would be worth it, even vehicles with military composite armor and heavy frames seem a bit flimsy for my liking. If I can make a hulk-proof cabin I think construction would be well worth it. Other constructs such as wells couldn't be replicated with a mobile fortress (funnels and water tanks are weather dependent). I'd also like to see morale bonuses for upscale furnishings, if fancy furniture could have an aura that improved your mood that'd provide additional incentive to craft in a building.

[Labtop-215]

A user on the forums by the name of Azrad suggested this: http://smf.cataclysmdda.com/index.php?topic=10429.msg235898#msg235898

Essentially find a way to make constructing a house similar to working on a vehicle. Obviously not exactly like working on a vehicle, but allowing users to design a house from a planning perspective, and then work on each part without from a menu instead of walking right up to the tile would at least streamline the construction process.

You could balance the skill gain by first granting small amounts of skill every few minutes (maybe 5?) instead of one chunk right at the end. Have structural changes be the tasks that give good skill instead of furniture. Stuff like walls, roof's, windows, doors, and the like should give way better experience and potentially train your skills by more than 1 level above their difficulty to making skill raising seamless, provided you can keep your focus up. In fact furniture should potentially not give construction skill gain, since furniture doesn't usually change how well supported structure is.

The different walls should provide differing degree's of protection from the various enemies you see in the game. With weaker walls being more susceptible to creature attacks than stronger ones.

For instance, the simplest wooden wall's made from either log or plank would provide good enough protection from most normal enemies, like non crippled zombies, infected and non infected wildlife, and the like. So as a measure zombies hitting these walls would have a 5% chance to damage the wall upon attacking it, where as stronger enemies like moose, and bears and their infected equivalent would have a 20% chance. Even stronger enemies like zombie brutes, hulks, Jabberwocks, and Tank Drones would instantly destroy that type of wall.

From there the next strongest walls could be brick, concrete and stone walls, with these walls being impervious to attacks from zombies, have only a 5% chance of being damaged by zombie moose and Zombears, a 20% chance of being damaged by a zombie brute, have a 50% chance of withstanding attacks from hulks (being damaged instead of destroyed), but would still be destroyed by Jabberwocks, Tank Drones and Chicken Walkers.

The 3rd strongest wall type would be re-enforced concrete walls, being able to shrug off attacks from zombies, infected wildlife, would only have a 1% chance of being damaged by zombie brutes, 5% chance of being damaged by zombie hulks, 20% chance of being damaged by Jabberwocks, and a 50% chance of being destroyed by Tank Drones and Chicken Walkers (either one or the other).

Strongest wall type would be metal walls, which would have to have to have their difficulty reworked a bit to justify being more durable perhaps requiring a construction of 8, but would be able shrug off attacks from anything besides Zombie Hulks (who have a 1% chance to damage the wall), Jabberwocks, Tank Drones, and Chicken Walkers (whom have a 20% chance to damage the wall).

The idea behind this would be to lay the groundwork for resisting zombie sieges, or perhaps at a later day, faction sieges. Essentially from here, you could link construction in with others skills like electronics to build a large radio transmitter, or combat to build punching bags, training dummies, and target ranges. You could link this skill to mechanics by building a powerful crane to help lift vehicles you need to work on. You could link construction with trapping, mechanics, and electronics or some variations on those to build trap mechanisms that could be worked into various buildings and the strange temple to make artifacts harder to get safely, or other places harder to explore. Spike traps triggered by an electronic sensor anyone? Pits that drop people to lower levels? Possibly to their death? It's kind of sad that we have death mobiles but no death forts.

Either way, has anybody thought about linking construction too other skills too?

You can get the power from vehicles if nobody wants to put in buildings that produce power I guess. Solar power panels make more sense on a building than a vehicle though I think, but whatever I just want to get these ideas out there.

Being able to build something that can be used to draw zombie hordes to a spot on the map where you want them, and thereby reduce or eliminate those zombies from places you don't want them could be a nice reward. Or perhaps being able to collect their loot, assuming you don't get killed by overwhelming numbers and your structure falling in on you. That would be something I would like working towards.

Even when you aren't deliberately getting a zombie horde to siege your base, the outside world shouldn't be safe constantly anyway. There should be the occasional chance that a monster or a few monsters should spawn on the edge of the map, depending on what type of map tile the edge is on. Like zombies or wildlife from fields, forests, swamps, rivers, ect, on the surface. The question would be how often is occasional and where would the monster come from? Monster pools? Thin air? My idea would be that once every so many hours ingame (randomly determined) a roll could happen to see if a hostile monster from the creature pool could spawn, with a small chance (like 4%) of it actually happening outside of a horde. The idea would be to spawn enough so that sleeping outside on a blanket would be a bad idea.

Also as a side note, it would be nice if clay bricks could be batch crafted, since getting enough clay bricks for one brick wall takes like 20 hours, and I'm sure you could craft a clay kiln big enough to hold multiple bricks at once...

For years, construction didn't get any new additions that would balance it (i.e. make it less horrible). Years. Potential? So far it looks like the potential it has is the potential to be fixed by removal.

Sure, tons of things have been added to the game and changed, nutrients, zombie hordes and zombie evolution, batch crafting, gun magazines, the aiming menu, the new tailoring/repair menu, vehicle mounted turrets and foldable parts, fabrication as skill. The priorities have been different, but that doesn't mean construction is "useless". It just needs to be fleshed out more. Again, it has the potential to impact the game for the better, if you make constructing structures more streamlined.

I would like to be able to help. The problem is that I can't code in Lua. I work quite a lot in real life and I don't get much time off.

Lastly, I wanted to address this

Sure. I can add good mechanics to horrible crap and then take the responsibility for valid complaints that I'm adding features to a broken mess, rewarding players for wasting time, keeping useful options locked etc. But I'd rather unfuck the mess, then add features to a working thing.

Making something less tedious by improving the interface used to interact with construction would make it less "broken". Adding more benefits would make it less "broken" because it would begin to compete with mechanics in usefulness. Like, you seem to have a very one-sided view on the matter. Most people of the people I see on the forums agree that in general grind is a problem with everything in the game. But you singularly want to remove construction skill and file everything under fabrication. Not all of the facets of construction transfer cleanly over to fabrication. Mainly the architectural component.

sigh And with that, I'm done for the night.

[Coolthulhu]

Just as I expected: a bunch of suggestions that would take a lot of work, depend on other features that aren't implemented and would take a lot of work to implement, no actual guarantee that most of that would be useful, and all the possibly-useful parts work just as good or better with construction not being a skill.

Just to save an error of a "feature".

it has the potential to impact the game for the better, if you make constructing structures more streamlined.

Oh I do want to make construction more streamlined. See PR's title.

Not all of the facets of construction transfer cleanly over to fabrication. Mainly the architectural component.

That's fine, because there is no architectural component.

[Nanothaniel]

Well, let's just take the simplest and possibly most relevant suggestion: More durable buildings. How is this so difficult to implement (I'd say it's quite easy to implement) or better served by replacing with another skill (the argument I'm more interested in hearing).`

I will remind you the basic premise of this topic was "give me a reason not to axe construction". You shouldn't get angry when we provide a few examples.`

[mugling]

I would agree with @Coolthulhu both that constructions are currently defacto useless and that it is unreasonable to expect a rewrite of large aspects of the game for the sole purpose of preserving the skill. This is especially true when the alternative, retaining them but requiring an alternative skill, is readily achievable.

The debate should include how to mesh them with the other skills, especially now we have the ability for specifying multiple requirements (eg. fabrication 3, mechanics 1).

A common way to break deadlock is to request implementations of the differing proposals, eg. a PR that drops the construction skill and a PR that start work on any alternative proposal. Code that actually exists has a higher precedence over comments that do not.

[Nanothaniel]

The only person maintaining the uselessness of the skill in this discussion is Coolthulhu. We still haven't had any serious argument concerning the prospect of high durability fortifications that could possibly give construction some retribution.

I'd like to propose a counter-argument, one I've used myself when developing skill systems for my own game: Is it reasonable to suppose that because one is skilled in mechanics that they should be skilled in architecture? In my own system the answer is yes, but that's also partially because my setting takes place in 219X rather than 204X. I'm not entirely opposed to getting rid of construction, but if it doesn't have a principled roleplaying justification then I am wholly opposed. I've entirely delineated skills in the past because they don't meet this criterion, but if you don't consider the principle of fidelity you're bound to lose more than a few players. I'll just lay down the standard of judgement I place upon myself when considering whether something should be independent or dependent upon some other attribute, "Is it reasonable to imagine that this character is proficient at this one thing while being inefficient at this other thing" (that I had previously considered combining, I mean my goal is to have as few categories as possible while still being able to highlight oddballs).

If you can provide an in-game reason that fabrication should be able to completely supplement construction I'll capitulate; as it stands I'm not seeing it.

[Eighth-of-Third]

The only person maintaining the uselessness of the skill in this discussion is Coolthulhu. We still haven't had any serious argument concerning the prospect of high durability fortifications that could possibly give construction some retribution.

Immobile high durability fortifications will still be useless because you can only feasibly build them in areas you've already cleared of zombies. If you try to build fortifications in an area with zombies, they'll attack you while you're building, you'll have to kill them to finish building, and then the zombies are dead and the fortifications are pointless. I'm pretty sure they're still not useful even if you turn Hordes on because IIRC Hordes will just spawn zombies inside your fortifications. Additionally, the best fortification would still be a basement.

[baraba3]

well i could concur about costuctions being gameplay useless when i think about it aside from charcoal kiln giving you lot of charcoal without micromangament.. i am playing on higher spawn lvls/without night vision which is prohibitive in ability to obtain supplies so factor of backup objects construction skill offfers has kick in.i rember that long time ago i played on normal difficutly i didnt bothered with construction but went for car immidiately as both car and resources for car parts were not hard to get..

if we go for replacemet i think most of wooden furniture shoudl be avaible on lvl1-2 fabrication,metal funiture like rack and locker mechanics 1-2, metal kiln on mechanics 3 ordinary on fabricaton 3.forge on fabrication 4 as backup immobile forge in case of lask of resources and car most of basic reinforcing,chopping woods,digging holes should use no skill whatsoever. willl think about others

[mugling]

The only person maintaining the uselessness of the skill in this discussion is Coolthulhu.

The idea has been floated on the forums and it was not unclear from my post that I agree with @Coolthulhu. If an implementation was submitted it could be further considered against any alternative options.

My point is that saying you'll take your ball and go home unless you get your way is not a way to argue.

@Coolthulhu has 1'579 commits (a track record of committing and maintaining code) whereas you have zero. You cannot argue that because someone doesn't want to work on your idea that they are at fault. Further ad hominem arguments may result in you losing the right to reply.

If you can provide an in-game reason that fabrication should be able to completely supplement construction I'll capitulate

You misunderstand how open source projects work. If an idea has broad support among the developers and an implementation is submitted it is likely to gain traction. You can submit a competing implementation if you wish or if unable to do so you may attempt to convince a developer of your view point. At no point however does that fact that you don't concede really affect the above.

[Zilenan91]

As I said earlier, removing the construction skill completely and replacing various constructions with levels of fabrication and mechanics is a fantastic idea because it cuts out the tedium of you having to level up your mechanics skill in order to build a decent car and craft certain items. I legitimately use constructions on every character because of how helpful they are so for my playstyle this would be extremely useful.

[Zireael07]

@Zilenan91 I fail to see how adding more stuff that uses mechanics

cuts the tedium of having to level your mechanics skill

[Coolthulhu]

I'm not entirely opposed to getting rid of construction, but if it doesn't have a principled roleplaying justification then I am wholly opposed.

Roleplaying justification is in the first post: Having some objects use a different skill just because they stand still is arbitrary and makes less sense than bundling them with the "materialworking" skill.

Chopping wood won't make you a better builder than wheelmaking would, building log walls won't make you better at welding metal walls than welding metal plating on vehicles would, repairing (let alone understanding the principle of) a combustion engine has more to do with wood stoves than building log walls and roofs.

I will remind you the basic premise of this topic was "give me a reason not to axe construction". You shouldn't get angry when we provide a few examples.

The reasons are all "but maybe in the future". Well, if someone goes and implements that, notices that it actually makes construction good, then you can make a PR about splitting off construction from fabrication. When it has a valid justification, something that isn't "my playstyle involves building a cabin so everyone else should work hard to build a cabin or not get one at all", then it could be split off back. Recently I removed more than a thousand of "maybe in the future" lines of code for NPCs. Those were 3 years old or so.

[patternsepia]

I'm against the removal. I feel like construction is underused because building an immobile car at your base is generally more efficient. The very fact that immobile cars are a thing is a sign that construction needs help, since players are resorting to this pseudo-construction.

Sometimes, i build an immobile car at a house near the edge of town. What I usually install in this "car" are solar panels, a purifier, a funnel, and two tanks, for clean and dirty water . Sometimes i add an engine and alternator. Later, i add a trunk with UPS-recharger, and maybe a welder. However, if there was a generator or solar panels to attach to the roof (or walls?) so i could hook them up to the wiring in the walls (which IRL have wiring in place already) and run the refrigerator, stove and lights (!), then i wouldn't need to build the immobile car (bar the welder, but maybe plug it into wall too). In other words, mechanics has preemptively taken the functionality from construction.

My suggestion, implementation-wise, is to let walls transmit electricity (or power) , have a (loud?) generator that runs on gas/diesel attachable to the house's wiring system, and let some furniture attach to the system (by building it adjacent to the wall). Alternatively (or additionally), let walls take one (or two?) solar panels as well. To integrate other skills, electronics could be used to add wiring and and lighting to walls, fabrication as a corequisite for smaller furniture (eg tables and chairs). In general, if it's mountable on a car, it should probably also be mountable on floor/wall. Additionally, having furniture do something (speeding up crafting/eating/moving things/reading or granting a small morale bonus being near it) instead of existing as a resource would greatly add to construction.

TL;DR Construction is underpowered because mechanics does what construction should be doing. To address the first three points:

• Being immobile is not the problem. Being unpowered is. So let houses get power.
• The only use for furniture now is slowing zombies down a bit. I'm okay with useless furniture being moved to corresponding skill, until it gains actual uses.
• Buff wall protection

[Coolthulhu]

My suggestion, implementation-wise, is to let walls transmit electricity (or power) , have a (loud?) generator that runs on gas/diesel attachable to the house's wiring system, and let some furniture attach to the system (by building it adjacent to the wall).

Won't happen. Technical reasons - map loading and reality bubble.

[Zireael07]

Furniture might get a use if it allowed storing more items than flat out floor and/or locking it from NPCs.

[illi-kun]

@Coolthulhu, your arguments sound reasonable, and I support your intention to make the game solid, so I think you have rights to do such changes (even if it's so unpopular). We always can revert any changes if further experience shows those changes are wrong. Of course, details of implementation should be discussed (how to rescale other skills for saved games when you drop construction skill? Just drop it? Add 50% of its exp to fabrication skill? etc).

[baraba3]

Furniture might get a use if it allowed storing more items than flat out floor and/or locking it from NPCs.

locker and bookcase have increased capacity(locker double i think 8000) and will hide items till npc get next to them.

[Soyweiser]

@baraba3 well, ill be damned. indeed. Most of the furniture has indeed more volume (I see values of 7000 - 8000). I didn;t know that. Apart from this, I have little to add to this whole discussion, apart from voicing my agreement with coolthulhu's arguments again. But that doesn't matter, as this isn't a democracy.

[Night-Pryanik]

To make construction more preferable for everyone, not only for sole survivors building cabins in the woods, we should do at least one of the things (preferably both): either remove grinding or make construction more rewarding. Lvl1 -> lvl2 has only few ways to up and is grindy? Then add some other ways which everyone will find use for (though I can't devise any at the moment). Building wood/log walls (as an example for mid-game usual construction work) is time-consuming, don't really stop hordes, but finding ingredients for brick or concrete walls is much more harder? Make wood/log walls more sturdier by adding the way to reinforce them or add some spikes to the walls so the monsters attacking the walls will take damage.

[Coolthulhu]

Building wood/log walls (as an example for mid-game usual construction work) is time-consuming, don't really stop hordes, but finding ingredients for brick or concrete walls is much more harder? Make wood/log walls more sturdier by adding the way to reinforce them or add some spikes to the walls so the monsters attacking the walls will take damage.

Log walls are the best thing construction has to offer when it comes to defense. They're at the point where they're still accessible to someone who might possibly construct them before they become completely obsolete. Said time would be better spent cheesing zombies to train combat skills on them, but our survivor might be waiting out broken legs or something. All the other walls, roofs, reinforcements etc. are in worse state than log walls.

For construction to actually be useful, it would need to offer welding-free metal walls by level 3. And even then it would only be mildly useful. Spiked walls wouldn't help unless they either were very resistant or dealt stupidly huge damage. Or were constructible at level so low it may as well be part of another skill. Preferably as a way of grinding said skill at low levels - that could actually make spike walls worth crafting.

The problem is, fortifying is simply not a valid tactic and won't be for a long while (if ever). Hordes prefer cities and weren't updated for months so this is unlikely to change any time soon. And even if they were highly hostile, you can just hide underground. This one may actually change if I get to 3D scentmaps, though.

[Zilenan91]

Honestly the problem with construction is just how the game works at a fundamental level. Items in houses don't respawn (as they should) so moving around in mobiles bases is far more rewarding because you get access to far more things. Construction is useful, but unless there was much of a point in staying in one location, it's not going to be as useful as building vehicles ever will. For now it's only something I use in the early game and then completely forget about.

It'll likely have far more importance once NPCs are fleshed out. You can order them to your base and defend it and create your own faction and keep it supplied. Until then everyone will be rolling with RVs.

[Night-Pryanik]

Items in houses don't respawn (as they should)

And why should they?

[Rivet-the-Zombie]

I think they mean 'not respawning (like it does now) is the way it should be'.

[Night-Pryanik]

I think they meant right the opposite, but let's hear @Zilenan91.

[Zilenan91]

Items should not be respawning in houses. That's why I put the phrase in parentheses.

[PogoMarimo]

Let's not lose sight of the design choices at play here: The question isn't whether the output of construction is useful (Both mechanically and/or for role-play). Indisputably many players enjoy using the construction skill for what it can do. The question is whether construction, as an individual skill, is INTERESTING enough, achieves a high potential of FANTASY for the player, and is uniquely INDEPENDENT of other skills (That is, it represents something other akills can't). In my opinion, I think the first two points are arguable either way but the third point is unquestionably not. There is often times little reason to distinguish what is fabrication or construction skill, and sometimes even mechanics can muddle the mix. With that said, I don't feel like there is proper reason to keep construction as an individual skill--Merge all existing recipes into some combination of Fabrication, Mechanics, Survival, and Cooking. After all, If you are capable of creating a log cabin house, you're probably more than qualified to craft a two-by-sword from scratch. I could list a dozen other examples but I don't think I need to. As a UI, keep the construction menu as is since it distinguishes between permanent and non-permanent constructions.

[PogoMarimo]

Also Coolthulu, could you elaborate why can vehicles exist with powered components but those same effects can't be replicated in stationary constructions? The reality bubble doesn't struggle with vehicles running a minifridge. I'm just curious is all.

[Coolthulhu]

why can vehicles exist with powered components but those same effects can't be replicated in stationary constructions?

Each vehicle is a single object that is always either loaded or not. And even when not loaded, operations can be performed on it, as its bounds are well known and all it takes to "find" a vehicle is a single pointer to one. Some of those operations shouldn't happen (violating this unenforced rule caused "rings" of gas and diesel on maps), but with proper care, a vehicle can work outside the bubble just fine.

For a map object multi-tile construction to work, it would have to be loaded in its entirety, use a coordinate system different from the in-bubble one, understand whether given sections of it are in bubble or not (active items cache needs changed items to be updated in special way if they are loaded), be able to cancel processing difficult cases (structures too big to process), store global state of the object, store per-tile state of the object and be quickly identifable in a way that allows saying "those two tiles (don't) belong to same multi-tile object" without loading the entire object.

Basically, replicating most of the vehicle functionality but with existing simple map objects that don't store much data by themselves.

Won't happen, unless a dedicated programmer decides to commit to it.

[ghost]

Eyyyy so when's that removal? Lookin' forward to it. I might actually build stuff!

[Coolthulhu]

Eyyyy so when's that removal?

Planned™

As established here, it is a good idea, but it needs some work - for example, figuring out the replacement skills, handling the code side without getting "invalid skill" on save load and the like.

It would be trivial to reintroduce the construction skill as a mod if anyone cared, but I don't think anyone really cares.