I understand that this was already posted before, but I feel it should get more attention. When I start a game I like to be able to choose my starting team and right now the only way to do so is by endlessly rerolling my villagers stats. It take time to get to the same result, I believe that a point system would be best, like every villagers start with 1 in each stats but have like 8 or 9 points that can be allocated.
For the traits, maybe make it random or if we choose one, we have to add a negative one.
For example, project zomboid is doing this and it make for excellent character customization without making your character over-powered.
Thanks for the feedback! We talk about every time we touch the embark screen, and each time, we decide not to do it because we donât want you to feel like you have to optimize like this for each of 7 people whenever you start, or have a sub-optimal time. We may revisit as we touch the # of hearthlings or tweak the value of the stats
I understand what you mean, @sdee, but those first 7 hearthlings are the only ones that we can precisely plan what jobs to give them. I always go for the most important 7 jobs for my new settlement and get quite specific in what stats/skills I will work with.
For me, my future carpenter/potter and knight always get the best possible stats out of the usually available 13 points, 6-6-1 and 1-6-6. Then I go for two 6 mind hearthlings for other crafters and two 6 body hearthling for a trapper and a farmer. For my future cleric I want 6 spirit of course.
It has been a while, but back in April I would sometimes get a hearthling with 16 to 18 points. I sure miss those.
That raises an interesting thought â what if the immigrants, who necessarily have random stat attributions, have a higher average and maximum possible stat cap? So if 13 is the standard for embarking hearthlings, a migrant hearthling might have an average of 14 stat points (being biased towards one or two stats, rather than getting a lot of 5/5/5 hearthlings) but a maximum cap of, say, 16.
Personally, I like the variety of re-rolling stats, even though I also have my âoptimalâ starting load-out and I usually re-roll a bunch of times to get something I like the look of.
Ahhh⌠reroll. Canât live with them, canât live without them. Itâs a time honored tradition dating back to the time of 20-sided die. But seriously, itâs the simplest mechanic a game can have to pick-your-own-challenges as well as game balance.
Back in the gold box AD&D day, people reroll all day to get that 18/00 strength on a fighter. Players choose their desired level of challenges and narrative based on the party mixes they start with. You want a group of demi-god, stat-wise? Sure thing, just be prepared to stare at the start screen all day. You want to work with a bunch of average Joes so that you can feel a strongrr sense of achievement? Thatâs easy, just grab the first batch of recruits without reroll.
Finally, there is an element of realism. You canât be sure if the next guy joining your team is going to be a miracle worker or a complete deuce. Without stat and trait somewhat randomized, Stonehearth is going to be a different game, not necessarily better or worse, just different.
I am not asking for to be able to choose every villagers, including immigrant. I just think we should be allowed to choose the stats of the starting villagers. That wouldnât necessarily go against your second paragraph, by that I mean if you want to have a strong sense of achievement, dont tweek the stat, just press start, if you want to go with the demi-god bunch, just tweek the stats. That way you at least have a good start if you wish and the rest is up to the game to decide, you could still get an unwanter vimmigrant with poor stats.
Unfortunately, the simple fact is that the ability to reroll mean that we can optimise each villager if we wish. It just make it harder to do so. If we donât reroll to get the stats we want we will have a sub-optimal time, that is just a fact since we need the best villager for each job to really perform. We arent obligated to, but if we really want to play our way, or the best way, we kinda have to.
It also help with one of the feature you are trying to implement, that is create a real personality for our villagers. By allowing us to choose not only the appearance of our villagers, but also their stats, you make it possible for us to create real characters. For exemple, I always reroll to get a good footman with a good trait, then I make him look like a character I know. Last game I made a miniature Mister T as a footman (mohawk and everything) so he could smack some fools.
Finally, it also help to identify the first batch of villager from the immigrant, my Mister T always stood out from the rest since I made him like I wanted and named him differently.
Maybe instead of having points allocated to the hearthlings themselves you could have a set pool of points that you can allocate for everyone like some RPGs, but just for your initial settlers, with new people having random stats. Everyone starts with 1-1-1 of course so you would need 35 points to max one stat out for each of your 7 hearthlings, Maybe something like 50 or 60 points total to be allocated. You could use that to make a couple of hearthlings super powerful but the rest of your settlers would be terrible, so youâd have to balance things out a bit.
I also Kindof like the idea of allocating traits as well. Perhaps with a negative trait being randomly assigned for any positive one. Maybe the whole idea of all of this is a bit too micro-manage-y but all i know is I spend quite a bit of time rerolling at the beginning so that I have starting jobs with at least a 4 or 5 in the stats I want for it.
Also, traits should perhaps have a minimum set requirement to be eligible on a hearthling. A 1 body hearthling that dreams of being a knight isnât exactly ideal, especially since thereâs no way to grow the stat you want except for temporary buffs.
Iâve seen so many Hearthlings that have a trait for a particular [or particular type of] job, and yet have a 1 for the relevant stat. Iâd be so happy if these had a minimum stat requirement, even if it was very low, if thatâs possible in the game.
I tend to ave the philosophy here, that where there are (beings like) humans, you canât fully control them. Because of that, I find the current workings where two things, the traits and stats, were random (thus linked), and the other things being costumisable.a good compromise between customisation and hearthlings having their own lives.
If there is one thing that is random, you can just roll until you get the right values in that variable, and adjust the rest to be exactly what you want. If you have two things which are random, then you canât âbuildâ the hearthling.
From that perspective, I also donât mind people with low body stats wanting to become a knight. It is unideal emergent gameplay, but hey, that happens sometimes.
Having said that, it is not a hard-pressing matter for me. I wonât be disappointed when this is not how it will be in the end game. It is just more of a, âoh I think it works well this wayâ.
I like it they way it is. It is like real life. Managers with a low mind attribute, workers pushing it to the limit everyday because of a low body attribute and psychologists or spiritual people not capable of making others belief in them in cause of low spirit.
So i dont really see the point in building a hearthling. Just do the best out of what you get or reroll 100 times.
But on the other handâŚshow me the button how i can reroll my own kids.
Why not have both options for people, but for me I would like this since I want to make myself and my friends when playing. Makes me more invested in the game personally.
If anyone is familiar with Gurps they have an advantage/disadvantage system which I think could be implemented decently well, where everything has a trade off that can affect gameplay overall.
I sure miss those.