The direction of hunting?

[Thelittleone]

I started playing Haven and Hearth a couple days ago with my brother and his friend. So far, I'm really enjoying myself for how simple the game is. My brother picked unarmed for his combat, and is taking care of all of the strength related task. His friend picked up melee and is taking care of many of the tasks like farming and crafting. I decided to pick up hunting and do alot of the foraging. I didn't understand how hunting worked at all, I just thought it'd be cool to play ranged and help out by bringing home hides, food and other valuables.

Now that we're progressing and I've learned how hunting works, I've seen alot of complaints on the forums about hunting. Whether it be about a nerf, or it be about how OP it is.

My first view on marksman looks like this: My marksman is at 25, my perception at 10, and my sling is Q5. I had to grind other tasks like making baskets and foraging to get my marksman to 20, which is alot of LP to grind out for a newbie. I've been searching high and low for perception food, but Plaice and Carrots have eluded me thus far. I'm currently working on leveling to get my survival up so I can make a better sling. At 20 I was able to kill my first boar, but do not be fooled. I took me forever, and it ran away three times before I killed it, so I only got partial LP from it. After that I learned to trap and kill foxes. Again, don't be fooled. It takes me forever and a half to kill them. At marksman 25 my Aim bar still takes a few minutes to fill (with a reasonable chance to miss) and I've never seen it completely full. Maybe I just have bad RNG but I have a hard time believing people who say, "I killed a bear with a Q5 Sling and 5 marksman!". Point being: it takes some effort to get marksman to a point where its useful, especially for a newbie.

I'm seeing nerfs, complaints and all sorts of stuff when it comes to the amount of animals, the amount of LP, and which animals can break through traps etc. To me, I haven't had a hard time finding animals. Yes, it is a little difficult to find animals that are near the water that I can trap sometimes, but that all ends up being RNG. I didn't get any kills with the old LP but 30,000 does sound like a little much to me. What I don't get is people complaining about hunters using traps. Only some animals can be trapped, and some are extremely difficult/dangerous to trap and even require multiple people. I understand that the game is considered "alpha" and continuing to grow and develop, my only question is: what is the developmental intention of hunters? Are they meant to use traps?

To me it only makes sense that hunters get to use traps because they lose aim if the animal begins to move, or if they have to move. (I'm sure at higher levels this is less of an issue but I feel that its a bad design if we are required to level marksman to 50-100 by supporting it by grinding another skill before we can actually use it.) I actually think it'd be a cool idea if eventually hunters could build actual traps as an item and use them on animals.

I understand many of the nerfs were to combat the fact that higher end users were abusing them, but I feel that they just as easily effect new users. I would hate to see more nerfs that indirectly make it more difficult for newbies. I'd also hate to see traps be nerfed because without them, hunting seems rather impossible to me. I guess, I'm curious to see what you guys think about the direction of hunting or where you'd like to see it go. I'd also like to hear if the devs has already said anything on hunting and what he said. (Maybe I can get a direct reply from them?)

(I understand I'm a newbie and haven't experienced much of the game so correct me if needed, but please be polite about it. I'm not looking to argue about anything.)

[LinkR]

I agree hunters should generally use traps. Which is why it is such a shame how useless they became as of late. Now it's just all about hucking rocks at em from the water then leaping at them like a wild rabid animal and slugging it between the eyes until it stays down.

By the way you mention your marksman is 25 but you sling is only 5Q. Unless the system was changed in world 4 (and I would like to be updated if I am wrong) You should only be raising your marksman to double your sling Q. Any higher and you are just wasting LP. This however changes with bows, but I won't go into that without anyone asking.

[Thelittleone]

I just learned about having to punch them when they run away, which would have made my first boar kill much faster but I still like the idea of using traps.

The sling/marksman issue, I wasn't aware of that at all. The way I read it off the wikia made me think it was limited by the marksmanship only. All the more reason for me to work towards my new sling then. Thank you!

[LinkR]

Yeah the punch thing was also a new thing for me thanks to that one recent post. Though i am hesitant to use it with the recent aggression.

PS. TLO rules. Wish Idra could get a better attitude to respect as much..

[Thelittleone]

Many things appear to be getting randomized, or at least from what I can tell since I haven't been playing long. coughplaicecough

Hehe, TLO. I didn't even know who he was for a while. I had been using the name for a while because I'm a 5'0" girl in real life. Lo and behold, I get into the Starcraft 2 beta and I look up some videos on youtube to learn strategies and found out that he was pretty big in SC2. I think I might have stolen his name right after a wipe.

[LinkR]

His name changes frequently. I think it has something to do with his current sponsorship or something. Heh I wouldn't worry about stealing anyone's name on there what with the account ID's. There can be an infinite amount of Thelittleone's.


Anyway to stay on subject: Things may seem hectically different, but that's what keeps us playing. Jorb's got logic to his madness. I just wish he didn't treat us quite so much like lab rats when it comes to his super secret updates, but hell.. maybe that's what keeps the game fun.

[Thelittleone]

I wonder if the game ever reaches "release" if Jorb will keep changing things up on us all stealth like.

Btw, to make a better sling I have to get higher quality string which I get through raising survival, right? I made a new one and my sling is now Q12 and I saw a big improvement but I know I have to keep improving it.

[LinkR]

The Q of the sling is based on the average of the items used to make it. And your survival softcaps it in some way. I am not sure what the math is for it though, but survival won't hinder you hugely when making them as long as its roughly close to that of the average Q of items used.

Sling damage is based PURELY on its Q, so yeah you will always want to improve it when possible, no matter what your current MM is at. Only worry about the double MM of the sling Q to up it's aim speed. (which won't go down in anyway from a super high Q sling overshadowing your MM skill)

[Gedrean]

The Q of the sling is based on the average of the items used to make it. And your survival softcaps it in some way. I am not sure what the math is for it though, but survival won't hinder you hugely when making them as long as its roughly close to that of the average Q of items used.

Sling damage is based PURELY on its Q, so yeah you will always want to improve it when possible, no matter what your current MM is at. Only worry about the double MM of the sling Q to up it's aim speed. (which won't go down in anyway from a super high Q sling overshadowing your MM skill)

Problem with that statement:

I have MM of 20, Survival of 21.
Built sling using the following:
Taproots & Nettles, Q's of: 26, 26, 26, 25, 24. 2x Leather Q10.
End result SHOULD BE, using an unweighted (everything equal) average, is 147 / 7 = 21. Should be Q21 sling. With a 20 MM and 21 Survival, there should be at most a softcap against my marksmanship, at least a Q20.

I got a Q17 sling.

Obviously the formula is different now, but there's no evidence of how.

If anyone else remembers their details on sling construction, lets hear it. Maybe we can come up with a unified sling q-formula.

[Kazerenai]

The Q of the sling is based on the average of the items used to make it. And your survival softcaps it in some way. I am not sure what the math is for it though, but survival won't hinder you hugely when making them as long as its roughly close to that of the average Q of items used.

Sling damage is based PURELY on its Q, so yeah you will always want to improve it when possible, no matter what your current MM is at. Only worry about the double MM of the sling Q to up it's aim speed. (which won't go down in anyway from a super high Q sling overshadowing your MM skill)

Problem with that statement:

I have MM of 20, Survival of 21.
Built sling using the following:
Taproots & Nettles, Q's of: 26, 26, 26, 25, 24. 2x Leather Q10.
End result SHOULD BE, using an unweighted (everything equal) average, is 147 / 7 = 21. Should be Q21 sling. With a 20 MM and 21 Survival, there should be at most a softcap against my marksmanship, at least a Q20.

I got a Q17 sling.

Obviously the formula is different now, but there's no evidence of how.

If anyone else remembers their details on sling construction, lets hear it. Maybe we can come up with a unified sling q-formula.

The formula is obvious. It took me 5 seconds to calculate it.
Here: ((average SlingQ)+(average LeatherQ))/2
Lets take yours: ((25,4)+(10))/2=17.7
Any questions?