About working hides...

[Tom H]

I guess I'm hoping someone has the perfect method of tanning hides. I'm at 82% in hide-working and every time I clean a Superior skin I cross my fingers. I've actually given up trying to tan them, resorting to curing them until I can improve my craft.

So, my first question is, how do you set your guy up to work skins? I get a fire going in the fireplace and strip off armor, weapons, etc, to lower my burden, and try to never work unless fresh and vigorous. That's my rule for simply CLEANING a superior hide!  Someone said that it doesn't matter whether you're tired or not, just the amount of burden you're bearing. Can that be confirmed? Is there a best way?

Questions on mechanics- Why will my guy reach out to an adjacent square for a tool but not for a water bag or tub? Hefting a 21lb bag of water adds to burden!
                                      If I pass out while felling a tree, it's partially felled. Is the same true if I fall out while working a hide?
                                      Does putting my uncleaned hides in a cellar slow their deterioration? I do this when I'm already weary, etc, to avoid ruining the hide. But, is that actually
                                      built into the game? Likewise with the meat from kills. Is waiting in a cellar to dry/smoke them a viable plan? How long will it keep meat fresh, if so?
                                      Are any of the four steps immune to degrading a hide as you work it? I mean, is there a step in which I can't possibly screw it up, like soaking a skin to
                                      cure it?

For the record, I had a superior cured bird skin that I tried to proceed with, as a test. The very next step degraded that one, at 82%. I'm not ready yet!

[PALU]

I routinely drop everything when performing tasks to remove the encumbrance penalty (or reduce it in winter), and generally wait until the fatigue has dropped before starting (I don't care about fatigue for carcasses that are harmed, as they can never yield superior skins).

There is little logic as to when you have to carry something and when it can be used from the ground (or at least I fail to see the logic, apart from it being coded in various ways).

If you can pass out due to fatigue during a task you can continue the task later, with it partially done. Even if you're ready to drop (and has already dropped several times) when starting the final stage on an elk hide, you're going to finish it and THEN drop immediately (having lost two nutrition levels during the work, and probably losing one or two more during the exhausted sleep).

I do not know for certain that putting hides in a cellar slows deterioration, but I assume the logic is the same as for food, where it definitely does. Putting food in a cellar does not increase the shelf life by an amount, but reduces the likelihood of it deteriorating when the game checks for deterioration, but in practice the effect is quite significant. I'd say the shelf life is about doubled in a cellar.

None of the "real" hide working stages are immune to deterioration. I rarely cure skin, so I can't speak for that stage.

It should be noted that a 100% skill does not mean perfect, only that it's as good as it gets. You're still not going to get superior results from even half of your attempts when starting with an undamaged carcass and working under optimal conditions. I'd say you may get to something like 25% superior skin/hide when skinning resulted in a superior skin.

[Tom H]

Palu- Thanks for the input. The info about harmed skins was something I never thought about. I'll start paying more attention to hide condition, just to try to get a more accurate gauge of what my skills make possible and what's already stacked against me. heh

I've wondered if the hide value stays the same as when you began a step when fatigue mounts greatly. For instance, the final step of beating it into pliability? Large elk and bear hides typically take me about eight hours straight to soften it and I'm always beyond 100% fatigue. Does my chance for maintaining hide quality get reduced by my growing fatigue?

When butchering, does knife quality affect the number of cuts? Today, with a Masterwork Knife, I hit my highest yet, 369 elk cuts.

Anyway, thanks for your replies to my many queries. I see that you do the same on the Steam forums, too, for others. Are you just a player or are you a mod? You always seem to be around...hehe.

[PALU]

The success rolls are made when a task starts, so fatigue gained during it doesn't count (although I'm not completely sure about batch jobs, such as e.g. drying 19 cuts in one order: they can sure end up having different qualities [and it's a poor example as well, as drying is an "easy" task that's not affected by encumbrance or fatigue]). There are two rolls (it was changed from a single one not too long ago): one for the quality and one for the duration of the task.

I believe the knife quality affects the number of cuts, at least of the knife is unsuitable, such as a rough stone knife.

I'm a player, and neither moderator nor modder (at least not to any extent), and I'm not active on the Steam forum (I chose other platforms whenever there's a chance to do so, due to their horrible policy of allowing you to have a license to play the game you bought, but not own it, and reserve the right to steal the right at any time just because they feel like it, without even providing a justification).