Timber and Stone - a brief comparison

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Hey guys, I mentioned this other game (Timber and Stone) in an /r/stonehearth Reddit thread recently and someone replied saying I should post here.

I did a brief search through the forums here and didn’t see any mention of Timber and Stone (sorry if there is, this format is a little confusing) so here’s my $0.02. Btw disclaimer, I’m a fan of both games, I want both to succeed, although I suppose I’m confused over which game is aiming to do what in particular.

[+] Building:
In T&S you basically lay down the plan for what block you want placed where. For example, if I want a 10 x 10 floor of brick, I’ll first mark that area for digging, then after my characters have dug it out I’ll make a 10 x 10 selection for “brick”. That will prompt the characters to pick up available bricks from stockpiles and place them there. You can also “cancel” (erase) part of the selection, like for example you decide it should be 10 x 5 instead, simply by laying down a “cancel” selection over the section of the original plan you don’t want.

I see in Stonehearth there are pre-planned buildings (well, 4 of them in Alpha 8), but I watched my buddy play and trying to design your own building seemed a little confusing.

[+] Marking areas:
Talking about laying down selections and marking areas - e.g. for marking areas to dig out. I noticed in Stonehearth the default selection is a large 4 x 4 x 4 chunk, and it seems to “snap to grid”. Also, while dragging it wider (X or Y axis) is easy enough, dragging for vertical (Z axis) seemed impossible?

This is where I really like how T&S does it: When you go to mark an area, first you click to set the initial “anchor point”. After that first click, you then drag the selection area wider/longer (X and Y axis), before clicking a second time to confirm the size of your selection. Now, while you’re in between the 2 clicks, you can use the PageUp/PageDown keys to increase/decrease the selection area along the vertical (Z axis). This makes 3D area selection a breeze.

One click to anchor your first point - then drag your mouse around to adjust X and Y axis and press PageUp/PageDown to adjust Z axis, then finally click a second time to confirm the selection. Very straightforward, and no messy mousebutton hold-dragging. And if you rightclick/press Esc you can cancel out.

[+] Trading:
I love how easy it is to trade in Stonehearth - you simply get a popup at dawn when it happens. In T&S they have a specific character class dedicated for trading. That’s actually fun too, although kind of a pain since you need to have roads zoned to allow traders to enter the map. In the long run, I think I prefer how T&S does it, even though it seems way more rare than in Stonehearth. I mean, here it’s like too easy - the settlement isn’t even up and yet you can have trading.

I love the mini-quest delayed trades here in Stonehearth though. That’s a great idea. “If you build me X doors tomorrow, I’ll trade you a bunch of wheat. See ya in 24 hours!” Even better, Stonehearth actually lets you confirm/cancel the trade after the time is up, in case you changed your mind in the meantime. This is really good.

[+] Classes:
To each their own - I like Stonehearth’s classes UI better though, it seems more RPG-like and exciting to look at (“ooh, there are advanced classes after the basic Trapper!”). On the other hand, T&S classes don’t have item requirements so that feels more realistic. Why does not having a hammer prevent me from becoming a Stone mason, right? Just let the player change classes if that character has fulfilled the xp requirements. Not having the necessary tool should just prevent class-specific actions from being acted on. So for example you could switch a Worker to Miner, but since he doesn’t have a pickaxe he’ll dig at the same speed as other classes - the lack of a pickaxe shouldn’t be an obstacle to actually change to that class.

I haven’t covered a lot of stuff, obviously. I’m still a noob to Timber and Stone, and I only get to watch my friend play Stonehearth. Both games look like they have incredible potential but right now I’m more partial to T&S than Stonehearth. Of course, we’re still deep in development, so I’m sure whatever issues we have will be fixed sometime.

Looking forward to updates!

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Basically, I think most of the issues can be summed up as either “new to Stonehearth” or “still in alpha”. To go into more detail however…

[quote=“PaulJ, post:1, topic:10041, full:true”][+] Building:
In T&S you basically lay down the plan for what block you want placed where. For example, if I want a 10 x 10 floor of brick, I’ll first mark that area for digging, then after my characters have dug it out I’ll make a 10 x 10 selection for “brick”. That will prompt the characters to pick up available bricks from stockpiles and place them there. You can also “cancel” (erase) part of the selection, like for example you decide it should be 10 x 5 instead, simply by laying down a “cancel” selection over the section of the original plan you don’t want.

I see in Stonehearth there are pre-planned buildings (well, 4 of them in Alpha 8), but I watched my buddy play and trying to design your own building seemed a little confusing.[/quote]
Still a work in progress, but basically you build from the ground up, then add fancy bits. Floor, walls, roof, then doodads like windows & doors. Editing & deleting / deconstructing still needs improvement though.

[quote=“PaulJ, post:1, topic:10041, full:true”][+] Marking areas:
Talking about laying down selections and marking areas - e.g. for marking areas to dig out. I noticed in Stonehearth the default selection is a large 4 x 4 x 4 chunk, and it seems to “snap to grid”. Also, while dragging it wider (X or Y axis) is easy enough, dragging for vertical (Z axis) seemed impossible?[/quote]
For now, yes. Mining is still in its very early stages, but I expect we’ll see mining tools allowing more detailed digging to be done later. For Z-axis work, bear in mind that ATM you can literally trap your entire population in a hole they can’t get out of ATM, so… probably best it stays as is for the moment :laughing: .

[quote=“PaulJ, post:1, topic:10041, full:true”]This is where I really like how T&S does it: When you go to mark an area, first you click to set the initial “anchor point”. After that first click, you then drag the selection area wider/longer (X and Y axis), before clicking a second time to confirm the size of your selection. Now, while you’re in between the 2 clicks, you can use the PageUp/PageDown keys to increase/decrease the selection area along the vertical (Z axis). This makes 3D area selection a breeze.

One click to anchor your first point - then drag your mouse around to adjust X and Y axis and press PageUp/PageDown to adjust Z axis, then finally click a second time to confirm the selection. Very straightforward, and no messy mousebutton hold-dragging. And if you rightclick/press Esc you can cancel out.[/quote]
Not sure what the plans are for SH Z-axis mining is ATM to be honest, so… have to wait and see. Sounds interesting though :slight_smile: .

[quote=“PaulJ, post:1, topic:10041, full:true”][+] Trading:
I love how easy it is to trade in Stonehearth - you simply get a popup at dawn when it happens. In T&S they have a specific character class dedicated for trading. That’s actually fun too, although kind of a pain since you need to have roads zoned to allow traders to enter the map. In the long run, I think I prefer how T&S does it, even though it seems way more rare than in Stonehearth. I mean, here it’s like too easy - the settlement isn’t even up and yet you can have trading.[/quote]
I think the plan is to move in the T&S direction eventually, but it’s just low on the list of priorities. I’m not sure if you saw one of the Desktop Tuesday videos, but the devs have already been working on in-game money to use for more complex trading.

Yep, having a period in which to trade is always good.

[quote=“PaulJ, post:1, topic:10041, full:true”][+] Classes:
To each their own - I like Stonehearth’s classes UI better though, it seems more RPG-like and exciting to look at (“ooh, there are advanced classes after the basic Trapper!”). On the other hand, T&S classes don’t have item requirements so that feels more realistic. Why does not having a hammer prevent me from becoming a Stone mason, right? Just let the player change classes if that character has fulfilled the xp requirements. Not having the necessary tool should just prevent class-specific actions from being acted on. So for example you could switch a Worker to Miner, but since he doesn’t have a pickaxe he’ll dig at the same speed as other classes - the lack of a pickaxe shouldn’t be an obstacle to actually change to that class.[/quote]
Personally I’d prefer a DF- or Gnomoria-style class system, where I assign a name & jobs to a class, then assign the class to people (each job having its own skills to level up, so if your carpenter-mason only does carpentry his mason skills will suck), but I can understand where the devs are coming from with the SH model - simplicity.

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Personally i like both games! The one thing that stonehearth will be much better in is combat!

Unless T&S revamps the combat in a major way, it will never be that great! Right now both games send you waves of baddies to kill.

Come Alpha 9 Stonehearth will be heading to a much better system with the addition of goblin camps.

I also think the building tools in Stonehearth will be much better!

T&S has much more to offer at the moment but they are very slow at updating the game and will fall behind unless they make lots of changes quickly!

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i actually migrated from timber and stone to this game XD

timber and stone was ahead in fun levels to me when i was playing it solely because there combat system was slightly better (and aimable ballistas, gotta love those) …but i discovered stonehearth exists at the perfect time because it wasnt even that long before we got to combat alpha which will probably blow that out of the water lol

this game has wayyyy more potential, solely because of mod-ability capability
if you go on the timber and stone forum right now, theres 0 mods that are fun graphical change mods and like 2 mods that make the game more convenient and easier to play

Stonehearth on the other hand IS A MOD , the moment i learned how to mod it was like…this game can be anything i want it to be. you could literally just make a QB model of a Gundam and then give it custom animations and then make its scale huge and tadaaaaa, you have 2 giant gundams in the sky battle in your game for no reason whatsoever…all it takes is time and creativity and you can make anything

I feel like i am playing the 3d version of starbound ( that game had so many mods for it that i could be Megaman with a giant scythe riding a Night fury fighting One piece and Naruto characters with mech suits, and i did!!)
my starbound has over 100 mods in it, its not even the same game anymore

another thing i don’t like about timber and stone is that every chance it can get to completely wipe your town, it will take it…that game was made with killing you heavily in mind lol

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