Feedback Request - Farming (Test Server)

[Xsyon]

Farming is ready for testing on the Test Server!

Here is a basic rundown of the system
- Farming skill added to the character's skill and action lists.
- Farming action opens a farming panel, with one action, plowing.
- Plowing prepares a tile of terrain for planting seeds.
- New crop plants can be found through foraging. (Currently you can forage anywhere and find random crop plants in order to facilitate testing).
- Extract seeds from plants. Right click for the menu. Extract one or extract all.
- Plant seeds on plowed terrain. Right click seeds to plant.

Plants have 6 gauges
Sun Level - Currently this is constant.
Water Level - Decreases every update. Increases through watering.
Weeds Level - Weeds have a chance of growing or increasing every update. Cleared by tending.
Pest Level - Pests have a chance of appearing or increasing every update. Cleared by tending.
Fertilizer Level - Decreases every update. Increased through adding fertilizer (currently guts).
Growth Level - Increases every update based sun, water, fertilizer and tending levels.

Right click a plant to perform the following actions
Water Plant- Requires a full water skin in your packs. Fills the water level of the plant.
Clear Weeds - Clears weeds from the plant.
Clear Pests - Clears pests from the plant.
Fertilize - Increases the fertilizer level of the plant. Requires animal guts in your packs.
Harvest - Available only when the plant is ready. Only the farmer (owner) can harvest the plant.
Destroy - Available only for the owner or for any tribe member if the plant is dead.

Tending your plants
- Immediately water your plant. You will need a full water skin in your packs.
- Plants update once every game day.
- Check your plant once per real day (or as you desire) to ensure the plant is well tended.
- Plants that lack water or tending will wilt and eventually die from neglect.
- Plants reaching maximum age will die. Days left in the plant's life cycle show in the plant's info display.
- Plants can be harvested when they reach 75% growth.
- Plants yield more produce as they continue to grow (up to 100%).

Well tended plants grow faster. The goal is to tend your plants well so that they can reach maximum growth (100%) before they reach maximum age.

Notes
- For testing purposes currently plants update quickly, once per game hour instead of game day. Plants can reach full maturity in roughly one real hour.
- With your Farming panel open all nearby plants will display their information.

Additional Changes
- Terraforming level up and level down commands added to better control leveling terrain.
-- Level Up brings all corners of a tile up to the highest point of the tile.
-- Level Down brings all corners of a tile down to the lowest point of the tile.
- Hunting and crafting quests properly require questor to personally hunt or craft the quest item.
- Trade totems show details for allied trade items when selected.
- Revenant respawn blocked by 100 meters reserved land around active totems..
- Blocked adding materials from cart slots directly to the craft panel (to prevent bugs).
- Upkeep bonuses display as buffs with tool tips.

Under consideration
- Tools required for all farming actions.
- Performing actions (water, tend, fertilize) on all nearby plants (range determined by skill).

Please post any bugs, problems or general feedback on the system. Thanks!

[Umbrella]

i downloaded the game today and when i try entering the world it freezzes on the loading screen, whats happening?

[MrDDT]

402Test server is messed up Xsyon, you load into it and it looks like the matrix.

[MrDDT]

Test was working fine for about 5mins. Looks like it crashed or you took it down.

[Xsyon]

The Test Server is restarting now. I had to make some minor changes.

[tomduril]

Wow - that matrix style looks soooo cool :D

[MrDDT]

Right clicking on a planted crop gives the "Plant" option. Using that plant option it will remove the plant, only works while standing on a clear farming tile.

Currently it says it's winter in game and it should be spring not sure if this is related or how it effects crops.

None of the old foraged items are good for anything. Are these going to be used at all later for like making potions or healing herbs or something?

While standing on a farming tile the resources window had a blank picture in it. I clicked it and it gave me something that was blank in my inventory. Unable to reproduce it. (It had to use foraging skill because it came out 99QL)

Few times I've planted and it didn't say fail, used the seed, said I planted it, but no crop was on the ground, and now I can't plant anything on that tile.

Unable to harvest at 75% (It was almost 100% and still not able to harvest).

Not sure how to change the sunlight, is this a seasonal thing?


I love the icons. I love farming so far. I wish this is what you would have done to forestry making it a true trade skill.

[Xsyon]

None of the old foraged items are good for anything. Are these going to be used at all later for like making potions or healing herbs or something?

They will be either used in cooking or healing. Eventually they will all be available as crops (once we can make models and textures for them).

[Xsyon]

The Test Server is back up with some minor fixes:

- The 'Plant' option should no longer appear on plants in the world. It should only appear on seeds in your pack.
- Season should display correctly on the client side.
- The blank resources that were available at times from plowed land tiles have been removed. (This was left over from the first implementation of farming earlier this year).
- 'Harvest' should be available at 75% growth and beyond.
- 'Destroy' should be available on plants you planted and any dead plants.

Notes:
Still trying to reproduce planting that appears to succeed but doesn't display a plant. Did this happen with a particular plant type? If this happens again, please post your location and plant type.

Sunlight is currently constant. It will be set up as seasonal and I want to set it up so that buildings (roofs) over crops can provide shade.

[MrDDT]

Ok lets see if we can break some more stuff!

The seeds were all of 1 type, but I was able to plant some of that type. I will check again.

[Trekkan]

I just got in and started to farm. Nice work! I'm really enjoying it so far. One thing that crosses my mind, if seasons/sun and whatnot play a part in the plants growth/life, what about rain? Shouldn't it add to the water levels of the plants as well? No idea if that's possible or not, but it'd be cool if it helped with watering. =)

Another suggestion would be to change the layout of the plant status a bit.

Something like

<---- Harvest Level---->
<Sun> <Weeds>
<Water> <Pests>
<Fertilizer>

This puts all of the positive things on the left, negative on the right and the overall level of the plant across the top of them all.

[MrDDT]

I really like the system of farming, I would have to see the effects it has on the end product. So far the only thing that effects the end product is your skill level.
The amount is based on % ready to harvest it looks like. Pests/Water/Weeds effects growth speed, and if they die off or not.
How is the QL going to effect cooking? We will see.

Few things, the amount of and chance to get plants/crops while foraging is very high compared to what you get farming. So that will need to be balanced.

Is there going to be a use for heart/lungs/eyes/brains like guts? Maybe cooking? If not in cooking can we remove them from the game or make them useful in farming at maybe a smaller % fertilizer? Guts does 25% per gut, maybe have other stuff do 1-5% or something?

Also I would like to see water level, pest level, weed level, fertilizer level all effect the end QL, along with the amount you get.

Tools used in farming would be good. Maybe a blade type for harvesting crops, and a shovel/rake/hoe or something for clearing weeds.

Also looks like extracting seeds uses foraging skill, it should use farming skill IMO, also no skill gains for it or stats gains.

Tribe leaders are not able to harvest other players crops. Other players are not able to harvest other crops. I'm of the opinion anyone should be able to harvest, but might just be in the minority here. I believe if you want to protect your crops you can place them in protected fenced areas.


Notes:
Still trying to reproduce planting that appears to succeed but doesn't display a plant. Did this happen with a particular plant type? If this happens again, please post your location and plant type.

Happened to me again, successfully planted plants and it would lock up the tile until the next hour (game day I think in effect) then I could try planting again. Some weird bug here, didn't happen every time but would happen a good bit.

I'm glad it uses INT because INT is sorta lacking in the uses of skills. I hope maybe one day faith based skills will come into play and use INT more also.
Long time you talked about faith based magic able to water crops and what not is this going to work and still in the plans? Also like Trekkan said, it would be nice if the rain effected water level of crops.

[thurgond]

Eating crops did not help hunger.

Yield seemed low as well - results of 1 to 4 with farming skill in the low 40's. Mostly one on unfertilized plots.

Love the graphics and the mechanics in general.

One thought about possible fertilizer is bone meal. E.g. mortar and pestle grinds spine bones into bone meal.

[tomduril]

Are guts not used for twine also ?
I would love for the game to put more items to use that are currently unusable.
And Thurgond is right - bone meal or "Hoof and Horn Meal Organic Fertilizer" are fertilizers.

So those feet of the animals could be made into fertilizer (farming skill - mortar and pestle)
http://www.organicgardeninfo.com/hoof-and-horn-meal.html

I am also voting for useing rake for weeding like MrDDT proposed.
I generally enjoyed the idea to use of spades (terraforming), axe(wood), knives (fire) - makes weaponcrafting a more versatile skill besides warfare/hunting. Please keep adding the use of tools/weapons (with eventually breaking the tool) for the actions.

Would it be possible to modify the time it takes to weed a plot based on the tool you use ? So that better tools would reduce the time it takes ? - like without tool (if possible) 10 sec - simple tool 6 sec - master/elite tool 1 sec ... something in that line.

Thank you for all the work you put into the game!!!

[RosenBlod]

Currently testing it, seems mighty fun.

My thoughts:
- Fertilizer: Imagine what will happen to the animal population if you need 20 guts to fully fertilize 1 plant (relative to fail rate). Clever use of more different fertilizers would be a good idea (like bonemeal and other animal parts as others suggested).

- Interface: I quickly understood how to use the gauges, I think purple is a color suited for a negative element, like pests (and brown for weeds), where green would fit better for the growth of a healthy plant. Someone here suggested the gauges be moved around, having the plant growth on top, positive (sun/water/fertilizer) on the left side and negatives (weeds/pests) on the right side, I think it's a good idea. I also agree with MrDDT that giving optimal care to a plant should affect it's quality.

- Rain: Rain does not water plants. It should.

- Tools: Hoes, Rakes, Gardening Scythes etc. are perfect tools to implement for Farming. If they affected speed (significantly) and/or quality (slightly), they would be in demand.

- Plowing: Currently, it can be difficult to line up plowings. It's possible to end up with a half-tile of nonplowed dirt between 2 plowed tiles that you can't plow because system says it is allready plowed (Screenshot: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cza7i0vi5qzofpj/Screenshot_20131024_11_56_47.png )

- Seeding: I met an instance where I can't plant on an empty plowed tile that had been harvested before (Screen shot: https://www.dropbox.com/s/vrg5jorusuuyjyj/Screenshot_20131024_12_17_50.png )

- Harvesting: Harvesting has a very low yield (1, rarely 2 each so far) compared to foraging (1-4). With significant failrate, you would not be able to replant and your efforts are wasted (coupled with fertilizers). It would be more worthwhile to just forage the crops for cooking instead of farming them. I sustect they will be fairly rare to forage, in which case anyone with significant fail rate would just remove the seeds from the game.

- Fail rates: I never failed watering a plant (when I meant to). Why would my character? I think the fail rates of even 25 skill is really stupid. I think it makes more sense that you would drown the plant, rather than failing to water it. Also, instead of failing fertilizing, it should affect the amount of fertilization rather than failing alltogether. Fail rates are fine for removing pests/weeds.

- Temperature & individual plant requirements: I had an idea that plants thrive in different climates. A skilled farmer might know how much sun/water/fertilizer a given plant might need (shown as a markers on the gauges at certain skill level). I don't know if temperature is static throughout the Xsyon map, or if it is cooler up in the mountains. If local weather conditions ever come into play, this may be an interesting factor.

[MrDDT]

Currently testing it, seems mighty fun.

My thoughts:
- Fertilizer: Imagine what will happen to the animal population if you need 20 guts to fully fertilize 1 plant (relative to fail rate). Clever use of more different fertilizers would be a good idea (like bonemeal and other animal parts as others suggested).

I would like to use the other parts, I see no need to make bone meal, however, I think it could be good to use up some of the parts that are not currently used.
The fail rate on guts is pretty high, but once you start getting 40+ skill which is less than 500 actions, its almost no fails. So you cut that 20 guts down to 4 per plant, and I predict that rarely are people going to put 4 guts per plant. They are likely only going to use 1 maybe 2. I see no reason to change this, it will give people good options (expensive but fast, or cheap and slower).



- Interface: I quickly understood how to use the gauges, I think purple is a color suited for a negative element, like pests (and brown for weeds), where green would fit better for the growth of a healthy plant. Someone here suggested the gauges be moved around, having the plant growth on top, positive (sun/water/fertilizer) on the left side and negatives (weeds/pests) on the right side, I think it's a good idea. I also agree with MrDDT that giving optimal care to a plant should affect it's quality.

I think a color change like this would be fine, key to me is optimal care should be what is wanted the most, which would at the end of the day be quality and quantity, which quality being more important than quantity. Early skill levels quantity is more important but later QL will or should be the most important.



- Plowing: Currently, it can be difficult to line up plowings. It's possible to end up with a half-tile of nonplowed dirt between 2 plowed tiles that you can't plow because system says it is allready plowed (Screenshot: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cza7i0vi5qzofpj/Screenshot_20131024_11_56_47.png )

I think it's currently fine how it is, it allows the option for 1/2 tiles, removing it would not allow people to make the 1/2 tiles (Like roads between farming plots) if you find you get a 1/2 tile of non-plowed land simply redo the land next to it and stand closer.




- Seeding: I met an instance where I can't plant on an empty plowed tile that had been harvested before (Screen shot: https://www.dropbox.com/s/vrg5jorusuuyjyj/Screenshot_20131024_12_17_50.png )

This is the same problem I was having every once in a while.



- Harvesting: Harvesting has a very low yield (1, rarely 2 each so far) compared to foraging (1-4). With significant failrate, you would not be able to replant and your efforts are wasted (coupled with fertilizers). It would be more worthwhile to just forage the crops for cooking instead of farming them. I sustect they will be fairly rare to forage, in which case anyone with significant fail rate would just remove the seeds from the game.

After talking to this person, I've found that they didn't know you were to get more at higher growth %, so they were harvesting as soon as the option game up. I do agree that foraging currently is much faster/better than farming.
Another note about foraging, I think that the QL of the items should be at 1/2 the skill level when foraged, to give farmers a better reason than to forage.

[Madam]

First I have to say good job on the graphics part of the farming. From the Icon of the new plants that you forage to the rows you plow to the plants that grow. The plants seem to be the appropriate size. except for the massive carrot.8) .The status bars for the plants are good.
I do agree there should be some alternative fertilizer Like bone meal, to use unusable parts of the animals like small animal heads and feet, but there may be an issue with animal respawn rate in some areas.
I also agree on gardening tools should be used like a hoe instead of a shovel.
Natural rain should effect the plant or planting next to water for irrigation. This could be a great start for decorative plants like flowers and bushes.
It will be interesting to see what bonuses the plants will give us. It should be substantial considering what it takes to take care of the plant from start to finish. I am hoping to see maybe a self heal or energy and how it will blend with Cooking.
But all in all good job so far. I enjoyed farming and tending my plants.

[Whorlok]

FARMING IDEAS
_____________
First Farming is a new komplex Dimension in XSYON...I love it!

-PLANT SUGARBEET (the white gold in Xsyon)
(Ground ingredient most cooking recipes)
http://s14.directupload.net/images/131025/wyocircy.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/2p4gl62k.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
and Endproduct SUGAR
http://s7.directupload.net/images/131025/3c7ra573.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

-FERTILIZER
From animal all over the world you found EXCRETIONS randomly and you can collect this
http://s7.directupload.net/images/131025/42tb2pml.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
or
from WOODCRAFTING
wood waste
http://s14.directupload.net/images/131025/ys38n279.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
this wood waste or all the FORAGING-PLANTS also you put in a WOODBARREL (created from WOODCRAFTER) and after 10 days its compost
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/v5n7jbva.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

FARMING IDEA
_________________

-SALTCRYSTAL Ground ingredients COOKING for most recipes and you can extract this to salt)
You found it in Granit mountains(collect GRANITSTONE and randomly you found)
http://s7.directupload.net/images/131025/po2xqwjy.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
and the extracted Crytal is then fine salt
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/rhuiyq7h.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

-PEPER (COOKING ground ingredients all recipes)
___________________________________
Pepperplant
http://s14.directupload.net/images/131025/t5beab62.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
PEPERCORN ist product from PEPERPLANT (harvest)
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/owiw5d4o.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
then extract PEPERCORN and you endproduct for cooking--->PEPER FINE
http://s7.directupload.net/images/131025/nrvyh6nm.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

FARMING IDEA
______________
For the Bavarian BEER! It give at endproduct by cooking a drink who boost all your stats for a time to UPPER LIMIT!..But after this time you have headache and have for short time then little lower stats..;)
-HOPS PLANT
http://s14.directupload.net/images/131025/ze32f29g.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
and by harvesting
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/iixqnzvo.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

-BARLEY PLANT (COOKING later and also ingredient for the ground nutrition-->BREAD)
__________________________________________________ ____________________
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/rio4kknt.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
and after harvesting
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/ixmf3r8t.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

-BEER (COOKING later and one of the best recipes in game)
_________________________________________________

you need from WOODCRAFTER a BARREL! Then you put in HOPS and BARLEY and WATER and SUGAR FINE!
After a timer from 20 days you become fine BEER in game!
THE LONGER YOU STORE IT THE HIGHER THE STATS..10 realdays..or 20 real days..or 30 real days
BREWING BEER TAKES PATIENCE! ..;) BUT THEN ITS THE HIGHEST COOKING RECIPES!

FARMING IDEA
_______________

-GARLIC PLANT (COOKING later and a ground recipes)
_____________________________________________
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/do4wdof8.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
and after harvesting endproduct
http://s7.directupload.net/images/131025/58rftbq9.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
THIS YOU CAN DIRECTLY "EAT" and you lost for 10 minutes aggro(short protection) against all animal and revenants (bad breath)
or you put it into any COOKING RECIPES as ingredient

-PEPPERMINT PLANT (COOKING later you can "EAT" it directly and animals and revenants are coming to this point for 10 minutes...GOOD BREATH)
__________________________________________________ ____________________________
(AND ITS FOR FUTURE SKIL TAMING ALSO INTERESTING IF THE ANIMAL ARE COMING TO THE TAMER)
http://s14.directupload.net/images/131025/rudyxrqw.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
and after harvesting the plant endproduct
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/u2bmchby.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

FARMING AND HEALING IDEA (play as a doctor)
_______________________________________

-CAMOMILE PLANT (COOKING later for a tea and as a dressing with CLOTH from TAILOR)
__________________________________________________ _________________________
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/r9gicuue.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
and after the harvesting endproduct
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/mvrt8a33.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

-CLOTH FIRST AID KIT (with Camomile and a cloth...heals 4 Life and each player can it use self all 3 seconds)
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/35im3dj8.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)

PLAY A HEALER or DOCTOR IN GAME
________________________________
-with first aid kits
and
-Skill COMBATSKILL SCALPEL (from WEAPONCRAFTER crafted weapons...no damage heals 6 Live)
__________________________________________________ _______________________
each heal 3 seconds with animation foraging on a player)
http://s1.directupload.net/images/131025/2ss98e8n.jpg (http://www.directupload.net)
and
-HEALSCISSOR (from TOOLCRAFTER... heals 2 Live)

TO PLAY A GOOD DOCTOR?
______________________
in the INVENTORY from toolcrafter HEALSCISSOR and in the RIGHT HAND your weapon SCALPEL(no Damage only healerweapon)
and in the inventory the CLOTH FIRST AID KIT
Summary you can heal 4+2 Live with FIRST AID KIT and HEALSCISSOR plus 6 to 15 with weaponskill SCALPEL (3 seconds execution time)

A DOCTOR have also a chance to bring back dead player with 1 life with:
before a dead player spawn back by his tribe.
In this time he have a chance with 10 FIRST AID KITS and 1 HEALSCISSOR and 1 SCALPEL WEAPON with a chance from 1 to 3 to bring it back with 1 Life! But after each try he lost this ingredients above
STATS NEEDED SCALPEL Inteligence and Spirit

[freshpots]

what i think should be added is a lawn mower so you dont have to pick so much grass but to make is not that easy make it so you have to make piles of grass and then have to hand pick it up and put it in bunches it would be 4 spots of grass at a time and it would be scaterd all over scatterd all over the place then go to each pile and pick them up or use a rake to put it all in 1 spot so you dont have to walk here and there that would be great yahh or nay let me know