Too many Njerps?

[Bert Preast]

I am based in the south west, between Driik and Sartola lands.  I am doing the Big Elk part of the Advanced Adventures course, sallying out daily from my cabin to hunt a big elk.  In 2 weeks of this, I have found and killed 4 elk and 6 Njerps.

I would be fine with this if I was anywhere near Njerp lands, but it seems excessive considering how remote I am from them. 

I feel it's a major game balancing issue - I am a combat orientated character so for me the Njerps are easy kills and make me rich.  If I were not combat orientated then each Njerp would be a deadly peril.  I have also tried playing hermit type characters in the far north and a surplus of wandering Njerps made those runs either too easy or too hard as well. 

My suggestion is that around Njerp lands yes it should be crawling with Njerps, but in the far west and north they should be extremely rare.  That way players who want easy kills or constant terror can settle near the Njerps, and those who would prefer not to slaughter more men than Genghis Khan in a play-through can settle in somewhat more peaceful lands.

[Dungeon Smash]

Personally i was just doing the Njerp hunting quest from the Advanced Adventures, and actually found them quite tough to find.  I had to travel far to the east before spotting a single one.  Perhaps this is simply an example of the "Random Number Generator" acting unfavorable?

[Bert Preast]

I think the RNG should be weighted to location.  As I mentioned, I have had the same surplus of Njerps in a lot of games in the west and north. 

When I play in the west I am usually doing what I think they call "power gaming", using a character with good stats and hoarding the loot.  It goes great, but only because I am well set to take down the wandering Njerps that make up far too much of the local game.  If you can kill Njerps, things are very easy - but if you can't kill Njerps they are a huge problem.  In the west and as far as you can get from Njerp lands, I don't think they should be such a concern.

When I play in the north, I am looking for a hermit lifestyle, as far from a village as I can get.  And again, what I do get is Njerps, and lots of them. 

Maybe if you have good combat skills, the game spawns more Njerps?   

[Fenris_Wolf]

I tend to find the amount of them ruins the balance as well. You don't even need to be combat oriented, a solid active hunter build will can dispatch a lone njerp without difficulty (and often before they can even react) and make ridiculous profit in trades from selling off their weapons. My current game is a Owl Tribe hunter dead center of Driik territory, and in less then 2 months I had enough for complete fine knife set, and all masterwork axes, with MW spear and bow.

Frequently I run into multiple warriors on the same day (sometimes as many as 3). A few days ago (real days, not game) i spotted 2 at once in the bog, kill them then spotted 2 more as soon as i went back to world map. Killed the 3rd and went back to the village to rest before the 4th, and saw a 5th warrior on my way. All within maybe a 8 tiles radius and a few in-game hours. This could be explained away as a raiding party on the village, but since they're lone warriors and not moving as a group they're just easy pickings.

IMO other areas of the map except njerp lands or no-man's they should spawn a lot less, and more likely as a raiding party since they'd be in hostile lands. Common robbers should be more frequent then njerps. They're much harder to farm. Lower rewards due to worse gear and because they're a group much more of a risk to engage.

[Bert Preast]

Yes, when I said "combat orientated" I didn't mean I was rocking a battlesword and full mail - just furs, spear and some javelins as I do active hunting.  Half my hunts turn into "stalk the Njerp", I give him a couple of javelins and if he survives that then chase him until he's breathless then finish the job.  A couple of times a particularly handy Njerp has left me a bit sliced up, but mostly they are easy riches.  It's a bit like living in a slum populated by largely inept muggers, where you end up stealing their watch.

On the other hand my hermit type characters are built around trapping, fishing and farming.  A Njerp becomes a holy terror, and even in the remotest spots they are the most numerous thing I see aside from trees!  It would be great if they were absent or at least very rare in the parts of the map where you would not expect to find them.

As Fenris says above, away from the Njerp areas robbers and wanderers should be more common.  I like the frequency of robbers and wanderers, that seems about right. 

[StefanPravda]

I have read somewhere that it might be related to spirits? When you are a nasty little boy njerpez wonder around trying to get your arse?

[Bert Preast]

Very little is known about the spirits, it is true...  But my Finn seems to be in good standing with them, he sacrifices after each kill (maximum once daily, of course), and recently met the forest spirit who was happy with him.  Still wading through Njerps though!

[Fenris_Wolf]

If anything, I suspect the opposite might be true. Good standing with the spirits causing the forests to reveal more Njerps on the map, who were probably already spawned regardless of standing.
All of my games "appear" to be in the spirits good books with lots of unity with the forests messages, and all run into a high warrior count.

[Sami]

I am based in the south west, between Driik and Sartola lands.  I am doing the Big Elk part of the Advanced Adventures course, sallying out daily from my cabin to hunt a big elk.  In 2 weeks of this, I have found and killed 4 elk and 6 Njerps.
..
I would be fine with this if I was anywhere near Njerp lands, but it seems excessive considering how remote I am from them. 
..
My suggestion is that around Njerp lands yes it should be crawling with Njerps, but in the far west and north they should be extremely rare.

There’s some weighing already used to Njerpez appearance at different cultural areas, but it maybe it only takes into account setting up their war camps. However, we always need lots of examples and lots of discussion when it comes to something too much <>  too little kind of adjustments.
One character doesn’t tell that much at all. Even if Njerpez are extremely rare at some areas, or made even more rare, there’s somebody among thousands of players whose one character encounters them, and it may then arise an assumption that Njerpez are once again too numerous.
And then there’s always somebody who never meets them, even at their densely populated areas.
But I’ll check the code, and see if there’s something immediate to take action on, and in the future I can also check out savegames which feel far too abundant of Njerpez.

[StefanPravda]

Maybe you can add a Njerpez counter for debugging? Related to areas, etc. Each time you save the game, the Njerpez numbers will be saved somewhere so you can check them.

[Sami]

Maybe you can add a Njerpez counter for debugging? Related to areas, etc. Each time you save the game, the Njerpez numbers will be saved somewhere so you can check them.

I can check these things from savegames. No need for extra work.

[Tom H]

I would suppose it has much to do with how much/how far one travels. When you're a relative homesteader, you'll be moving around less and the Njerp you'd see will  have found you, not the reverse. I've only ever had ONE Njerp show up at a homesteading.

Otoh, when you travel widely, you'll be invading their tramping grounds, even when it's not Njerp territory. The greater your travel, the greater the frequency of an encounter, I would expect. If the frequency of encounters that troubles you is actually at your homestead, that would be both interesting and something I've not heard from anyone before.

[JP_Finn]

What I feel, note, feel; more you target creature X, more the RNG favors spawning creature X.

My newest character, created in 3.62, targeted hares and black grouse. Got a lot of them. Then came across an elk. Killed 14 of them in roughly 9 in game months. Don’t see many hares spawning now.
Took few ingame months to see first Njerpez, killed him. Since then total Njerp kill count is 33+6(by dog). Many times when going to check traps, see 2-4 Njerpez warriors on my run. Process hides, do other trap section/area, see 0-4 Njerpez. For 4 trapping “zones”: that seems to get me 5 Njerpez per week.
I might do a side save* and stop targeting the spotted Njerpez; just to see if their spawn rate slows down, or if they build a war camp.

*if I rename save folder to something else, is it playable and/or can it corrupt the original character?

[PALU]

You can backup your save by copying the save folder (while UrW isn't running a game: escaping out to the OS and copying an active save isn't advisable). This can be used for "what if" testing, such as: I definitely think attacking that bear naked equipped with only a knife is a stupid idea, but I want to find out if it's possible, as well as an actual backup if the save gets corrupted (it's rare, but that doesn't help when it happens).
Just copying the character folder after each session and then delete all but the last one when they're too many should allow you to recover from crashes with at most one session lost. I don't think you can play from the backup folder directly, as I think the folder name has to match the character name, but you can rename the copy back to the original and then continue.

[JP_Finn]

That’d be a IRL management nightmare: play character “Bob” as Njerpez murderer, save game to Bob-murderer. Take previous save and play that as “Bob” contact avoider/hermit. Save that to Bob-hermit. Remember to switch the play style, depending on which folder was last loaded.

I feel like I might need to ask Sami to rename a save game, to run it as test for Njerpez behavior. But I do not want to bug the Elks after swamping whole Suggestions board

I might need to start yet another character, and run him aggressively for 4-5months, then have chance of heart. Then compare the Njerpez spawn rate to the current Njerpez-bane. 37 kills and 6 “fatalities” by the dog. Swidden to middle of Center Month. I wonder if getting 50 Njerpez in 1st year without actively looking for Njerpez is doable. Actually, that’s only 7 more in next 2.5-3 months. [sisukas isänmaan puolustaja]