Various questions from a new player

[Edico]

There shouldn't be any penalty for using stale fat or a mix of fat and bark. I can't remember if spoiled fat works. If you use the fat from the animal you can reduce penalties to 0. If you use bark, 99.9% of the time if you'll get at least a 1% penalty since the unused will be in your inventory.

Repairing clothing doesn't degrade quality, it will remain masterwork. You can use any fur to repair fur clothes, no penalty for quality either. However, if you use enough of one type of fur to repair the clothes, it can take on the properties of the fur type you used. For example, when I get masterwork fur clothes I like to use a little more than 1/2 for bandage/cords and then repair with bear fur. I then have masterwork bear fur clothes with additional pierce protection, even though the clothes won't say "bear fur."

[Ara D.]

On the subject of fat I carry bird and squirrel fat for traps. The animals do not seem to care weather you bait with .1lb piece of fat or a 1 lb cut. So I can carry multiple .1 fat piece for the same weight as 1 cut. Also I've not noticed any real difference between fresh stale and spoiled raw bait, you can't use cooked food.

[jonottawa]

There shouldn't be any penalty for using stale fat or a mix of fat and bark. I can't remember if spoiled fat works. If you use the fat from the animal you can reduce penalties to 0. If you use bark, 99.9% of the time if you'll get at least a 1% penalty since the unused will be in your inventory.

You seem to be implying that the weight penalty of the clean skin and of the tanning agent used in the tanning process is not counted when you apply tanning agent to a clean skin. Do you KNOW this to be true? I know that it shows no penalty at the END of the process, or DURING the process, as the hide is placed on the ground as soon as the process begins. But my understanding is that only the penalty at the beginning of a crafting process matters and it seems quite possible that the penalty is applied before the skin is dropped on the ground, depending on what order the steps of the crafting process are carried out by the game.

The same question applies to cooking. If I have 10 cuts and nothing else in my inventory and I roast them, is the penalty from the weight of the cuts applied against the cooking result?

These questions are rather autistic, but I'd rather learn to craft the optimal way and then not worry about it than continuously craft suboptimally. That's one of my tiny pet peeves is the seemingly random way in which items can either be nearby or must be in your inventory in order to craft something. If it were up to me, tools would always have to be in your inventory, as would any raw materials smaller than a slender trunk. Or just tools, and raw materials can always be nearby but not in your inventory. But, for instance, when you're drying meat, I believe the only thing that MUST be in your inventory is the tying equipment, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

[PALU]

There shouldn't be any penalty for using stale fat or a mix of fat and bark. I can't remember if spoiled fat works. If you use the fat from the animal you can reduce penalties to 0. If you use bark, 99.9% of the time if you'll get at least a 1% penalty since the unused will be in your inventory.

You seem to be implying that the weight penalty of the clean skin and of the tanning agent used in the tanning process is not counted when you apply tanning agent to a clean skin. Do you KNOW this to be true? I know that it shows no penalty at the END of the process, or DURING the process, as the hide is placed on the ground as soon as the process begins. But my understanding is that only the penalty at the beginning of a crafting process matters and it seems quite possible that the penalty is applied before the skin is dropped on the ground, depending on what order the steps of the crafting process are carried out by the game.

The same question applies to cooking. If I have 10 cuts and nothing else in my inventory and I roast them, is the penalty from the weight of the cuts applied against the cooking result?

These questions are rather autistic, but I'd rather learn to craft the optimal way and then not worry about it than continuously craft suboptimally. That's one of my tiny pet peeves is the seemingly random way in which items can either be nearby or must be in your inventory in order to craft something. If it were up to me, tools would always have to be in your inventory, as would any raw materials smaller than a slender trunk. Or just tools, and raw materials can always be nearby but not in your inventory. But, for instance, when you're drying meat, I believe the only thing that MUST be in your inventory is the tying equipment, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Whether encumbrance matter depends on how strenuous the task is. As far as I understand, light task take no penalty from encumbrance, while medium/heavy ones do.

[jonottawa]

Whether encumbrance matter depends on how strenuous the task is. As far as I understand, light task take no penalty from encumbrance, while medium/heavy ones do.

I can't bring myself to waste a bunch of tasty cuts or fine furs to test this theory, but it's the first I've heard of it and I hope it isn't true.

[Labtop 215]

Does using stale fat to tan a hide have any negative implications on the outcome? Does mixing bark and fat have any negative implications?

If I repair a masterwork piece of clothing, does it remain masterwork or is there a good chance that it loses its premium designation? If I have a pair of elk fur mittens, can I use any fur to repair them or will the game only allow me to use elk fur?

Not sure if the game will even let you use spoiled fat to tan with, but I haven't noticed any quality difference between using bark and fat to tan skins or hides.  However, I've been under the impression that using different fur to repair fur clothing can result in mixed values.  I have no confirmation on weather this is true, but I've seen the developer say this at one point.  Feel free to disregard this however as I don't have a link.

Also, the penalties tend to be difficult to pin down as well.  I havn't noticed any difference in results for crafting due to being encumbered.  The game will usually tell you if penalties are reducing your chances of success via a message like "Your attempt is determined to success poorly due to your encumbrance/fatigue/injuries/starvation.", if you don't see this message when your penalties are greater than 5%, then it most likely means that this particular action is not being penalized due to encumbrance/fatigue/injuries/starvation.

I mostly only see messages like these when fishing but I could be just tuning it out.  I can run some tests later on to see if encumbrance has any effect on crafting, but it doesn't seem too from my experience.

[Tom H]

I've tried using spoiled fat to tan. It's not acceptable.

[Edico]

There shouldn't be any penalty for using stale fat or a mix of fat and bark. I can't remember if spoiled fat works. If you use the fat from the animal you can reduce penalties to 0. If you use bark, 99.9% of the time if you'll get at least a 1% penalty since the unused will be in your inventory.

You seem to be implying that the weight penalty of the clean skin and of the tanning agent used in the tanning process is not counted when you apply tanning agent to a clean skin. Do you KNOW this to be true? I know that it shows no penalty at the END of the process, or DURING the process, as the hide is placed on the ground as soon as the process begins. But my understanding is that only the penalty at the beginning of a crafting process matters and it seems quite possible that the penalty is applied before the skin is dropped on the ground, depending on what order the steps of the crafting process are carried out by the game.

The same question applies to cooking. If I have 10 cuts and nothing else in my inventory and I roast them, is the penalty from the weight of the cuts applied against the cooking result?

These questions are rather autistic, but I'd rather learn to craft the optimal way and then not worry about it than continuously craft suboptimally. That's one of my tiny pet peeves is the seemingly random way in which items can either be nearby or must be in your inventory in order to craft something. If it were up to me, tools would always have to be in your inventory, as would any raw materials smaller than a slender trunk. Or just tools, and raw materials can always be nearby but not in your inventory. But, for instance, when you're drying meat, I believe the only thing that MUST be in your inventory is the tying equipment, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Whether encumbrance matter depends on how strenuous the task is. As far as I understand, light task take no penalty from encumbrance, while medium/heavy ones do.

Maybe in general this is true, but it's certainly not always true.  Fishing is not strenuous and you receive a message about encumbrance penalties when trying it

There shouldn't be any penalty for using stale fat or a mix of fat and bark. I can't remember if spoiled fat works. If you use the fat from the animal you can reduce penalties to 0. If you use bark, 99.9% of the time if you'll get at least a 1% penalty since the unused will be in your inventory.

You seem to be implying that the weight penalty of the clean skin and of the tanning agent used in the tanning process is not counted when you apply tanning agent to a clean skin. Do you KNOW this to be true? I know that it shows no penalty at the END of the process, or DURING the process, as the hide is placed on the ground as soon as the process begins. But my understanding is that only the penalty at the beginning of a crafting process matters and it seems quite possible that the penalty is applied before the skin is dropped on the ground, depending on what order the steps of the crafting process are carried out by the game.

The same question applies to cooking. If I have 10 cuts and nothing else in my inventory and I roast them, is the penalty from the weight of the cuts applied against the cooking result?

These questions are rather autistic, but I'd rather learn to craft the optimal way and then not worry about it than continuously craft suboptimally. That's one of my tiny pet peeves is the seemingly random way in which items can either be nearby or must be in your inventory in order to craft something. If it were up to me, tools would always have to be in your inventory, as would any raw materials smaller than a slender trunk. Or just tools, and raw materials can always be nearby but not in your inventory. But, for instance, when you're drying meat, I believe the only thing that MUST be in your inventory is the tying equipment, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Maybe the penalty is applied before the agents are combined, maybe after.  I truly don't know.  Unless you get the devs to give a specific response you won't know for sure.  I believe as you do only the penalty at the start would matter if it did, the question here is, is that calculated after the ingredients are "removed" from your inventory or before.  I play as though it's calculated after, as all i'll lose is the amount of time it takes me to drop excess items.

[jonottawa]

I have a question about whether you'd consider something an exploit or not. It's a tactic I used to complete a quest:

Spoiler: show

Do you consider it an exploit to kill humans (robbers, njerps, etc.) from a punt with a bow and arrow while they flail around in the water? If you want to see the specific example I'm referring to, it's in episode 120 of my YouTube series here: https://youtu.be/8qGHD7BKk0w?t=3264

[PALU]

It's up to you to decide what you think is an exploit, but I use that tactic when I can. I also try to get my opponent (whether human or animal) to tire themselves into the Breathless state before engaging them. UrW is unforgiving, and once a creature is injured its ability to both defend and attack quickly decreases, which means getting injured can quickly result in getting killed.

[JEB Davis]

I have a question about whether you'd consider something an exploit or not. It's a tactic I used to complete a quest:

Spoiler: show

Do you consider it an exploit to kill humans (robbers, njerps, etc.) from a punt with a bow and arrow while they flail around in the water? If you want to see the specific example I'm referring to, it's in episode 120 of my YouTube series here: https://youtu.be/8qGHD7BKk0w?t=3264

For me, it would depend...
1. If I lured the man into the water by taking advantage of an AI shortcoming for example, then it's an exploit.
2. If I wandered into the area and found the man already flailing in the water, cruel yes, exploit no.

[jonottawa]

The game doesn't seem to like it when you travel far from a skin being soaked for leather. Is this by design? Has anyone done this successfully?

Details: I put a bear skin out to soak on the morning of day 6 week 3 before winter season. It said the skin would be ready in 13 days.

I travelled far away to a cultural territory 2 territories over.

I returned in the early evening of day 4, last week before winter season (12.5 days later) to a rotten de-haired bear skin.

[PALU]

Sounds like a bug. I'd back up the save and file a bug report. The save would then be available if Sami wants to take a look at it. The log should confirm the timing of your actions, I think.

[Ara D.]

The game switches between days in the morning. It is not a rolling clock. For example if you kill an elk around noon and fox during the small hours even though morning is only a couple hours away once morning rolls around everything advances by a day and game would consider both kills to be the same freshness. I don't know if you may have lost a day due to the time when the hide finished.

[jonottawa]

Why is a hunting bow worth more than a long bow?

I get that not every item is going to be useful or optimal. But I don't get why I can offer a hunting bow from the njerp I just killed and this old man is happy to give me a masterwork long bow for it.