Just an idea, have lights that use electricity maybe even electric fences to keep out those pesky goblins especially for late game. you could have a generator that runs off of coal and water that powers the village. the Hearthling workers could transport water in buckets until you make a pump and some pipes and this could have a class with it called the Electrician. I know this is a long way off but I think it’d be neat to have
The concepts of tech and science have been a long running debate here on the forums!
While I of course would love these sorts of classes, I don’t believe Radiant is planning to go that route…they seem to be aiming for the fantasy/medieval route for the most part.
The one exception to this is the Engineer class with steam power and gunpowder, but that’s also been a serious debate as to how “advanced” this tech ultimately will be in the game.
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I’m kinda ‘meh’ on Electricity for SH.
For me, it doesn’t seem to fit in the world setting (as Atralane said, a Fantasy&Medieval setting)
Magic seems like a more appropriate source of energy for SH for me, and if we get Electricity and such, Mages and Geomancers and such might look kinda pointless…(if you have Electricity you might rather have guns than magic spells)
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Hey there @TheLostHearthling ,
Just to throw in my two cents...
If you haven’t heard, which actually might be the case since I actually haven’t seen anyone talk about it here on the forums, but there are plans to include, not electricity, but mechanical power.
Mechanical power, which involves the use of, in Stonehearth’s case, wooden struts and gears, water wheels, windmills, cranks, etc. If you’ve ever played Minecraft along with a modification called “Better Than Wolves,” it’s essentially just that.
But yeah, if electricity never becomes a planned feature, then you’ll still get at least some form of power.
-Surly
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I too I’m not super hot for electricity, that’s too advanced science for the depicted age. NOW, we could imagine a fourth kingdom where magic is like breathing and hearthlings could imbue some magic into their crafts to add some effects. They would “catch” some natural elements from nature (while mining, harvesting, etc) that would become ingredients. From there you can imagine whatever like offensive and defensive powers, magic lights, animated objects by natural spirits, etc…
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I agree Electricity doesn’t fit the age…
I’m not saying we should have major electric focus just a touch if coal generators are too much then have cells that lose charge and make the player have to re-craft them when they’re dead. and the lights could be a gas the illuminates when it reacts with electricity. there has been evidence of electricity being use in Ancient Egypt how do you think they light their tombs? (Sorry for history lesson)
Not so much pointless, but a completely different route the player can take. I think most of us were looking at it like an equal branch of fields to explore in the game. After all, Tom said magic’s intended to be powerful, but rare and dangerous. Three to five rifleman could end up equaling one mage in terms of damage output, but that sort of potential could have some serious drawbacks (like cost to produce, danger to self/others, etc.)
As far as electricity goes, I think it’s likely to be mod territory. If it’s explored seriously and intricately enough, mechanical (and steam?) energy sounds extremely fun and innovative. Of course, if such a mod was to come around, I’d be interested in checking it out at the very least.
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isn’t that what the mechanical mod basically does? i never really checked it out…
Well, if Tom said so, i suppose i’m okay with it(and i actually like that idea)
And i’ll write that in as a idea and note for my mod!
I’m pretty sure Mechanical and Steam energy has a good chance on getting in SH (there’s suppose to be a Mechanic or something class right?)
And it kinda matches the theme of the world for me; it’s kinda limited but is efficient.
in contrast; if you have electricity, you’ll have a loooot of things you can do
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Sorry, I meant a mod about electricity. I’m still holding out for the mechanical components in the vanilla version, since Tom’s hinted at it.
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With electricity I didn’t mean guns I meant just little things that assist you like a logistic system for your storage that sends items that a crafter needs and elevators so your Hearthlings can quickly go deep into the mines. Magic on the other hand could be a combat feature adding powerful weapons and spells to disorientate the enemy making them turn on each other. To balance electricity you can have breakdowns on the machines while magic the only balancing i can see is if the Hearthling kills himself sometimes or make extremely expensive.
well for those things electricity wouldnt necessarily be needed, just a bit of power that simple steam machines could provide…
just thought i would toss that out there…
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Even steam is not really necessary for machines, we can imagine systems fueled by water or even by human force. And this would be much more interesting at the visual level than cold machines doing the work…
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The problem is that having to rely on human force means less available settlers ultimately, since someone ends up having to be stuck on each device. And considering steam power was already something hinted at with the Engineer, why not embrace the usefulness that comes from it? Likewise, go all out with wind, water, geothermal, magic, etc., to make lots of choices for energy input in the settlement.
Maybe it’s just me, but working machinery is very aesthetically pleasing–it also livens up the settlement and makes it more exciting and fun to watch (and this goes for advanced magic devices, too).
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But that’s a good source for choices, will you promote quickly to some complex jobs or keep some workers for that machine you need soon? And you would have to organize and defend well your troops if you want things to work properly because then a unique missing heartling could cut off your production for example…
And indeed, steam machines are cool too with steam plumes and all but if TR goes this way, it should be a very advanced feature, kind of the ultimate stage from the engineer tree, way after naturally driven stuff.
Keeping with the medieval feel of the game, it was common to use animals harnessed to a large sprocket to power simple machines when water wheels or wind wasn’t suitable. They used everything from goats to oxen and horses depending on the scale of the machine
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I was thinking quite hard at the aspect of energy back when I’ve started with Zulser. I think it’s possible to have fitting electricity in the game, but it requires a few bits to work:
- It needs to be “ridiculous” to some extent, not real. Think of steampunk or dieselpunk.
- Although some of the concepts can be modern, the design should be very early electricity age. I think anything up to 1910, maybe 1930.
- Energy shouldn’t be directly be generated from plants, but rather ridiculous generators. The first I had intended for Zulser was a sheep on a treadmill. Occasionally you would need a new sheep because it was exhausted, but it was “free”-ish. Keep the sort of light hearted spirit of Stonehearth up by having seemingly useless things just work.
- Energy needs to be optional. It should be convenient and maybe add some new game features, but it should not be required and it should not ease gameplay for those who use it. At the same time, it should not be overly difficult. Using electricity should be a design choice, not a gameplay one.
Generation is easy (sheep on a treadmill, two sheep one plastic rod, hydroelectric dam, windmill, turbine coupled with steam boilers), transportation too (cables on the ground, overhead wires with wooden poles), but the real difficulty is finding proper appliances. I wanted to do something in the direction of defence because it was right around the goblin release. However, there are ideas that just don’t work out:
- Electric fence: Could work, but doesn’t quite fit into the whole theme. Too modern, too little gimmick opportunities.
- Forcefields: Way too modern and way too difficult to implement.
- Alarm sensors: Now that’s something that could work. Motion detectors or something. But wiring those up would be pretty wasteful, so probably some sort of battery system would need to be added, too.
- Turrets: Partial. On one hand, they’re way too modern, having them mounted by units would be more sensible. Maybe they require an operator, electricity and ammunition to run?
- Robots/Drones: Not sure as fighters. They’ve been mentioned in stockpile sorting/management, which could work fine as some sort of roomba implementation maybe. Could work for other tasks too, such as farming, maybe digging too.
- Mining: Not related to defence per se, but this could be something to think about. Automated minecarts, maybe conveyors too.
I think in the end, finding things that could be powered by some sort of machinery in general is way more difficult than anything. Whatever machine you find, you could probably get it with electricity too. I’m not sure if things like ovens or the furnace require coal to heat right now as example, but that’s something that could be replaced by electricity as example.
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I know when I asked about a bicycle for transportation it was considered to advanced. I think any powered items will probably end up being magical in nature.
I’ve been thinking about the animal power a lot though and it would be useful for things like a simple water pump to fill irrigation canals (bonus; potter makes clay pipe) or a winch system for getting mine carts moving. There are other things they were commonly used for, like grinding wheels for blacksmiths and stonemills for grinding grains but that wouldn’t do much beyond speed things up a little
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Anything up to 1910/30 is modern age. ST depict a time similar to what Europe was between let’s say the 12th to 15th century. Electricity would be pure magic, steam power would be the devil’s expression (heat and steam? ->Hell!).
Now, SH could be declined into ages, old age would be what we have, middle age could see steam and modern age would have even electricity. BUT no idea what TR really want to depict.
A big mix could also be possible even if it would be totally inconsistent (if we stopped fighting with swords there is a reason). SO ok having all the cool stuff like swords + guns + lazers would be fun but imho separating ages via mods is the way to go to offer a larger gaming experiences without creating a nonsensical monster.
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