Despawn time

[Xcom]

I'm not sure if anyone else is bothered by this stuff but I did the experiments and might as well share it.

Item name
Start PC time
End PC time
Total time

Fiber droped directly from inventory on the ground:
gfx/terobjs/items/flaxfibre
Time: 21:02:53
Time: 01:13:13
Hours: 4 Min: 10 Sec: 20

Flax harvested and have the fiber spawn on the ground:
gfx/terobjs/items/flaxfibre
Time: 18:59:57
Time: 23:10:05
Hours: 4 Min: 10 Sec: 7

gfx/terobjs/items/board
Time: 01:15:00
Time: 09:24:21
Hours: 8 Min: 9 Sec: 20

gfx/terobjs/items/intestines
Time: 10:56:18
Time: 11:16:38
Hours: 0 Min: 20 Sec: 20

Cow meat:
gfx/terobjs/items/meat
Time: 11:55:11
Time: 12:05:54
Hours: 0 Min: 10 Sec: 42

Sheep meat:
gfx/terobjs/items/meat
Time: 12:06:38
Time: 12:17:16
Hours: 0 Min: 10 Sec: 38

Pig meat:
gfx/terobjs/items/meat
Time: 12:32:11
Time: 12:43:02
Hours: 0 Min: 10 Sec: 50

gfx/terobjs/items/linencloth
Time: 13:02:10
Time: 21:49:06
Hours: 8 Min: 46 Sec: 55

gfx/terobjs/items/straw
Time: 22:13:22
Time: 22:34:18
Hours: 0 Min: 20 Sec: 56

My short conclusion.

First thing to note is that it seems that items dropped on the ground by hand or spawned naturally take exactly the same amount of time to despawn so all experiments were valid when dropping them directly from the inventory. The 2 different fiber despawn times shows that.

Second thing to note is that different items in the inventory that have the same resname in the world (on the ground) take the exact same amount of time to despawn no matter the type they are in your inventory. The 3 different meats Cow, Sheep and Pig meat all have the same world resname and also share the despawn time.

Boards and blocks takes ages to despawn so I guess you can easily cut them up and get to them when needed within the huge time. Same with a few other items that I haven't tested but I would assume fall into the same time category seeds and pumpkins.

The linen also has a large despawn timer (8 hours) and I think leather falls in that same category. (leather not confirmed)

Fiber from hemp and flax takes 4 hours to despawn but on the other hand it takes only 20 min for straw to despawn. I must say that its a strange thing that fiber takes 4h but straw only takes 20 minutes. It makes mega fields of flax easier to farm now with the confirmed knowledge of its long delay. But It makes me think that the straw might have been a over site by Jorb when coding there despawn timer.

Intestines takes 20 min and meats of different kinds takes 10 min to despawn. I guess this means you really don't have much time to pick up the meat when butchering and having the mats drop on the ground. Also might be good to focus on picking up the meats before picking up the intests.

[ImAwesome]

Flax harvested and have the fiber spawn on the ground:
gfx/terobjs/items/flaxfibre
Time: 18:59:57
Time: 23:10:05
Hours: 4 Min: 10 Sec: 7

on a large field of flax I've seen those things go poof before harvesting a 2nd row...your 4 hours was serious luck, to me that says its all random

[DDDsDD999]

(Being nearby certain items affects how long they take to decay.)

[Xcom]

Flax harvested and have the fiber spawn on the ground:
gfx/terobjs/items/flaxfibre
Time: 18:59:57
Time: 23:10:05
Hours: 4 Min: 10 Sec: 7

on a large field of flax I've seen those things go poof before harvesting a 2nd row...your 4 hours was serious luck, to me that says its all random

All these experiments were done on a character afk next to them. So it might be as suggested above that loading and unloading chunks might affect the timer. My farmer friend said the same thing. He also experienced despawn timers that were irregular and made stuff despawn sooner then expected.

I can confirm that items do despawn after server restart. It might be that some part of the code can reset and remove all items found on the ground just as if the server would restart.

Smart thing would be to stick around till the fiber is picked up, but at least I will be less hasty in picking up the fibers from now on. Same when I deforest.

[ImAwesome]

Smart thing would be to stick around till the fiber is picked up, but at least I will be less hasty in picking up the fibers from now on. Same when I deforest.

even standing right beside a fiber on the ground, I've seen them go poof on larger fields before the 2nd row was finished...walking along harvesting(with a scythe for speed), dumping seeds(full industry so only 1 seed per) in a container when inventory was full, and still had fibers despawn before I finished the 2nd row.

I'm going to state again: the despawn times on items is random!

[jordancoles]

Some shit stays forever I've found. An example being things like wooden plates, and newsboy hats for some reason. A newsboy cap stayed in front of my cupboard for like 8 hours once lol

[DDDsDD999]

I'm going to state again: the despawn times on items is random!

No.

Edit: I've also had a wineflask stay inside my place for a week because the map never unloaded.

[Arcanist]

maybe being inside/outside/in a cave affects the despawn time too?

[borka]

@Arcanist
Afaik despawn times are the same.

It seems on very few occasions despawn times happen to be much shorter - i had the same Im Awesome wrote - Straw despawning in first row when harvesting wheat in second row - prolly a hickup of server timer...

[Xcom]

maybe being inside/outside/in a cave affects the despawn time too?

Most of the experiments were indoors but I did randomly experiment when I was inside a cave and outdoors to.

But I know by fact that despawn timers are fixed in a non-compleat random way. It can easly be observed if you harvest hay and take your time picking it up. Its always the hay that was picked first that starts despawning and then the one after that.

In that list there is also 3 different items with the near to exact despawn time. Items do have a fixed despawn timer but they can be affected by strange anomalies that causes them to despawn sooner then they are supposed to. I dono why fiber despawned sooner in those instanses that ImAwesome is talking about but there is proof evidence to show that despawn times are fixed if server doesn't hiccup and remove them.