Skilled Survivor Achievement

[peteloud]

". . . I found the easiest way to maintain a clip of two mends per day . . . "

 

TLD is meant to be an experience in survival in harsh conditions, not a game about sewing.

 

[UpUpAway95]

5 hours ago, peteloud said:

". . . I found the easiest way to maintain a clip of two mends per day . . . "

 

TLD is meant to be an experience in survival in harsh conditions, not a game about sewing.

 

As I've indicated, I have other save files for that.  This achievement (Skilled Survivor) is ultimately about cooking about 500 things, catching about 500 fish, killing X number of animals with the rifle and then killing so many more with the bow, and then doing about 300 to 350 mends on your clothing.  It's a ridiculously grindy achievement that has very little to do with surviving in harsh conditions.  You can rag on me all you like for finding a way to do this achievement without having to start it over numerous times in numerous different, harder file saves because of repeated permadeaths; but perhaps your time would be better spent petitioning the devs to get rid of these grindy achievements and replace them with more ones like the 24-hour Interloper survival one... i.e. ones that are specific to a certain difficulty level and/or challenge mode.  The same holds true for the 500-day one.  The devs could easily change it so that it applies to a specific difficulty level.  Right now, it applies to all survival difficulties, which includes custom and includes all settings available to every person playing on custom.

Edited March 7, 2019 by UpUpAway95

[hozz1235]

I don't agree this is "grindy", in fact it's an achievement you will get through normal play (if you live long enough).

[UpUpAway95]

37 minutes ago, hozz1235 said:

I don't agree this is "grindy", in fact it's an achievement you will get through normal play (if you live long enough).

Pretty much every achievement out there can be obtained through normal play as long as the player is willing to devote hundreds of hours of their life into playing the game.  It is grindy because, if the player is playing the game to maximum efficiency, then it will take them all that much longer before they need to mend clothing the number of times that the game requires to earn the achievement.  Similarly, if one is just killing animals when they absolutely need the meat, then it will take them all that much longer to shoot the requisite 50 animals to earn the achievement.  Ditto on catching 500 fish (the number needed to get that to Level 5).   My pilgrim's ability to survive much longer than 500 days is not in doubt.  He'll survive, but I would rather kill him off on Day 500 and have more time to play on challenges and in Wintermute, etc.  Additionally, I don't want to invest 473 days in a file trying to get a 500-day achievement, only to die and have to start such a long and time consuming achievement over again... that's why I opted to do it on an easy difficulty.  For those who think that game achievements need to be inordinately difficult to be achievements, may I remind you that Minecraft hands out an achievement for opening your inventory... along with numerous others than can be obtained within the first few minutes of starting the tutorial and has considerable achievements that can be done on Peaceful difficulty.

Edited March 7, 2019 by UpUpAway95

[UpUpAway95]

I'm now done with this achievement and this particular save file.  He jumped from TWM on Day 500 of his achievement acquiring ordeal.  May he RIP.

Here's the data as I recorded it.  It may help others trying to get this achievement to have an idea how many times they have to repeat some of these actions.

It took a total of 322 mends, with having researched all the Sewing Primers I found.  It took exactly 200 mends to go from Level 4 to Level 5.

It took exactly 50 rifle hits to get to Level 5 (after researching at least 2 Frontier Shooting Guides and 2 Advanced Guns, Guns, Guns).  I did find more of the shooting guides, but was not allowed to research them after researching the Advanced Guns.

My journal showed 61 bow hits, but I believe it reached level 5 around the 50-hit mark.  I researched every "Stay on Target" I found.

I caught a total of 508 fish.  A few were caught after I leveled up, so I believe the total needed there (after researching all the Angler magazines) is 500.

Since the other skills reached Level 5 long before I became concerned about getting this achievement before Day 500, I have no idea how many repeats it took to get to level 5.

I can't remember for certain now (and the file is deleted), but I'm fairly sure I did not have the Book Learning feat active for this file.

With my achievement hunting days over, I'm moving on to more exciting playthroughs.

Edited March 8, 2019 by UpUpAway95

[atomic]

I have 53 rifle hits and I am sure I read some books to increase the skill, still I am far away from level 5. Could it be that the quality of the hit matters too? I mean I'm not a very good shooter, so maybe one shot kill hit gives more advantage than just a hit where the animal is able to run away?

I needed far less bow hits to reach 5, because I fabricated a lot arrows and bows. Damn I am really bad at bow

Can't wait to confirm that 322x mending to reach 5. Just need 12x more, but I'll wait until my clothes are a bit more "used".

 

[UpUpAway95]

4 hours ago, atomic said:

I have 53 rifle hits and I am sure I read some books to increase the skill, still I am far away from level 5. Could it be that the quality of the hit matters too? I mean I'm not a very good shooter, so maybe one shot kill hit gives more advantage than just a hit where the animal is able to run away?

I needed far less bow hits to reach 5, because I fabricated a lot arrows and bows. Damn I am really bad at bow

Can't wait to confirm that 322x mending to reach 5. Just need 12x more, but I'll wait until my clothes are a bit more "used".

 

 

It's certainly possible that critical hits count for more than hits that would just cause the animal to bleed out after running for a ways.  I was playing on Pilgrim, so I didn't have to worry about being attacked by anything and, with the rifle, I could aim while crouched.  Basically, my technique was to watch how the deer in area path'd, then work my way to a position where one would eventually come towards me and where I could stay behind some cover, I would then carefully aim as they got close and I was basically able to ensure a head shot every time... or else I simply wouldn't pull the trigger.  If the rifle started to sway, I would just lower it and raise again so it would be steady when I fired.  I also did some practicing on other save files.

I had a lot more total misses with the bow (ETA:  than the rifle - hitting only about 70 to 75%) since I couldn't draw the bow while crouched.  However, essentially all the hits were critical since what I hunted with the bow were rabbits -- and they always die if you hit them at all.  I did forge about 60 arrowheads and made arrows (which goes towards the skill) and reduces the number of hits you need.  I also shot a few wolves, but only as they were feeding on deer kills.

Mending was the issue since I wanted to get the achievement before Day 500.  I had been so good about not mending until the condition was at the point where it would just get to 100% that I was way behind on what I would need to get the achievement "on time."  That's when I took the advice here and began mending every time the condition dropped below 100%.  Since I had scrapped all the clothes I wasn't wearing, cloth was not ever an issue... even when I resorted to mending my bedroll almost every night (which takes 2x cloth).  Had I not changed strategy, I'd probably still not have reached Mending Level 5 by Day 1000 of the run.

Edited March 9, 2019 by UpUpAway95

[piddy3825]

4 hours ago, UpUpAway95 said:

 

I caught a total of 508 fish.  A few were caught after I leveled up, so I believe the total needed there (after researching all the Angler magazines) is 500.

 

just curious... was it 500 fish or 500 kilos of fish?

 

[piddy3825]

3 hours ago, atomic said:

I have 53 rifle hits and I am sure I read some books to increase the skill, still I am far away from level 5. Could it be that the quality of the hit matters too? I mean I'm not a very good shooter, so maybe one shot kill hit gives more advantage than just a hit where the animal is able to run away?

I needed far less bow hits to reach 5, because I fabricated a lot arrows and bows. Damn I am really bad at bow

Can't wait to confirm that 322x mending to reach 5. Just need 12x more, but I'll wait until my clothes are a bit more "used".

 

since you have achieved level 5 with the bow, are you at least now able to improve on you hit percentage since you can crouch and shoot now?  I crouch down and the deer practically walk right up to you.  Hard to miss with a bow at point blank range while crouching?

[UpUpAway95]

13 minutes ago, piddy3825 said:

since you have achieved level 5 with the bow, are you at least now able to improve on you hit percentage since you can crouch and shoot now?  I crouch down and the deer practically walk right up to you.  Hard to miss with a bow at point blank range while crouching?

Sorry, you're right... The journal shows the title as "Fish Caught (KG)"; so it would have been 508 kg of fish that I had caught when the level changed from 4 to 5.

[piddy3825]

18 hours ago, UpUpAway95 said:

Sorry, you're right... The journal shows the title as "Fish Caught (KG)"; so it would have been 508 kg of fish that I had caught when the level changed from 4 to 5.

I wasn't trying to belabor the point.  I am slowly closing in on hitting this goal myself so I was just trying to gauge how long it may yet still take.  Fortunately, it seems my average sizes are improving over 1kg per fish but even at that slightly higher weight(s) I am catching, still gonna take a fair bit of time to complete.  Appreciate your contribution to the discussion!

[atomic]

20 hours ago, piddy3825 said:

since you have achieved level 5 with the bow, are you at least now able to improve on you hit percentage since you can crouch and shoot now?  I crouch down and the deer practically walk right up to you.  Hard to miss with a bow at point blank range while crouching?

Yes, I'm better now than the stats show. Didn't knew about the way to approach game, didn't know about crouching. These are the stats of my first survivor who made it past 50 days in Pilgrim (it's long ago). He's the first one who tried his hand at hunting.

This topic inspired me to try to reach Archery to 5 without shooting an arrow or reading a book. So I called up the suvivor who did my Pacifist and Silent Hunter achivments from retirement and he already started to look for saplings, scrap metal and crow feathers. I really wonder if it's possible and how many arrows and bows will be necessary to achive this level

I'll also try to collect as much ammo as possible and go on a hunting voyage from 1 to 5 once the archery achievement is done.

[piddy3825]

3 hours ago, atomic said:

This topic inspired me to try to reach Archery to 5 without shooting an arrow or reading a book. So I called up the suvivor who did my Pacifist and Silent Hunter achivments from retirement and he already started to look for saplings, scrap metal and crow feathers. I really wonder if it's possible and how many arrows and bows will be necessary to achive this level

Sounds like a nearly impossible task, imho, but now I'm curious if it could be achieved merely thru crafting.  Time consuming for sure, but an interesting self imposed quest considering how many bows and arrows you'd probably will have to craft.  Your certainly going to be covering every square inch of map in your hunt for resources.  If you travel light and you systematically clear region, I bet you can have the entire island harvested within  75 in game days.  Looking forward to hearing about your progress!

 

[UpUpAway95]

16 hours ago, piddy3825 said:

I wasn't trying to belabor the point.  I am slowly closing in on hitting this goal myself so I was just trying to gauge how long it may yet still take.  Fortunately, it seems my average sizes are improving over 1kg per fish but even at that slightly higher weight(s) I am catching, still gonna take a fair bit of time to complete.  Appreciate your contribution to the discussion!

Fish are quite a bit heavier at Coastal Highway, so fishing there means you'll have to catch fewer fish overall.

[hozz1235]

On 3/9/2019 at 7:07 PM, piddy3825 said:

Sounds like a nearly impossible task, imho, but now I'm curious if it could be achieved merely thru crafting.  Time consuming for sure, but an interesting self imposed quest considering how many bows and arrows you'd probably will have to craft.  Your certainly going to be covering every square inch of map in your hunt for resources.  If you travel light and you systematically clear region, I bet you can have the entire island harvested within  75 in game days.  Looking forward to hearing about your progress!

 

I suppose if the custom settings are right, this may be achievable.

[atomic]

On 10.3.2019 at 3:07 AM, piddy3825 said:

Sounds like a nearly impossible task, imho, but now I'm curious if it could be achieved merely thru crafting.  Time consuming for sure, but an interesting self imposed quest considering how many bows and arrows you'd probably will have to craft.  Your certainly going to be covering every square inch of map in your hunt for resources.  If you travel light and you systematically clear region, I bet you can have the entire island harvested within  75 in game days.  Looking forward to hearing about your progress!

 

I went through 3 regions now (Birch/Maple):

ML: 13/6

FM: 12/6

BR:6/2

I'm quite optimistic, because I was so bad at the bow, just about 35 hits. Next destination CH.

[piddy3825]

On 3/10/2019 at 5:34 AM, UpUpAway95 said:

Fish are quite a bit heavier at Coastal Highway, so fishing there means you'll have to catch fewer fish overall.

I've been pulling in some 5.5 kilo fish!  boo yah!!  anyways, just hit level 5 in game.  i musta crafted a lot of hooks and read all the books 'cause I leveled up just shy of 460 total kilos caught.  

[Doc Feral]

My current Stalker game has 130-something days and level 5 in fire, cooking, harvesting, archery. Leveled up to 5 (77 shots/ 70 hits) in archery with my first ever instant kill of a bear.

Fishing 2 (54kgs), rifle 3 (never fired a shot, just read books), sewing 3 (80 repairs)

[UpUpAway95]

8 hours ago, piddy3825 said:

I've been pulling in some 5.5 kilo fish!  boo yah!!  anyways, just hit level 5 in game.  i musta crafted a lot of hooks and read all the books 'cause I leveled up just shy of 460 total kilos caught.  

I never thought to check whether crafting hooks contributed to leveling fishing the same way crafting arrowheads levels archery.  I didn't craft very many until I had to start using them to get the sewing achievement... and by then I already had Level 5 fishing..  I did read every Angler I found, but it's always possible I missed finding one.

[atomic]

On 11.3.2019 at 10:57 PM, atomic said:

 (Birch/Maple):

ML: 13/6

FM: 12/6

BR:6/2

Rav: 3/-

CH: 19/5

 

 

[piddy3825]

On 3/15/2019 at 3:11 PM, atomic said:

Rav: 3/-

CH: 19/5

 

 

I take it you've harvested all the Birch and Maple saplings that you can find?  What's the next step here?  feathers and arrowheads?  Looking forward to seeing the next phase in your process!  BTW, I hope you have been taking advantage and harvesting all the dead deer for their guts and collecting all those feathers.  I think you're gonna need close to 500 feathers!  wow

[atomic]

Yes, that's what I did. I wanted to on go to DP, but realised the point about the feathers. So after getting all saplings to Camp Office I decided to start crafting some bows. I've made two of the 13 possible at this point and can confirm now that this action is not counting to level your archery skill.

So next step was to produce arrow shafts. I was able to produce 159 shafts - still no progress on the archery skill.

After that I went on a harvesting mission to the Dam where it took me at least a week to harvest about 100 units scrap metal. Now I am about to leave Camp Office and visit the forge in FM.

The problem is, that I have only found 81 feathers until now... That's only enough for 27 arrows.

It's day 63 of my mission. After forging in FM I will have to go on and concentrate on collecting feathers

 

 

Edited March 17, 2019 by atomic

[piddy3825]

5 hours ago, atomic said:

It's day 63 of my mission. After forging in FM I will have to go on and concentrate on collecting feathers

you may not want to harvest every item from the deer carcass's that you find.  That way you'll continue to get some feathers without having to hunt something.   I was surprised that you dont get any points for bow and arrow shaft crafting.  I guess those points are only granted with arrow crafting.   now really curious as to how far up the skill set you progress when you craft 159 arrows.  that's approximately 240 hours of in game arrow crafting.  Not to mention how long it took you to fabricate all those arrow shafts! 

[atomic]

Good tip, haven't tried that before because I think I've read somewhere that the carcasses dissapears after 3 days or so.

After a week of hardcore forging in FM, I went back to Camp Office and took a walk around the lake to visit the 4 corpses there. I was also able to run one of the deer into the wolf who was wandering there. Gave me 9 kg meat, which I really start to need now as my cover of manmade recources becomes thinner and thinner. I haven't used neither the bow nor the shotgun yet. I left hide and guts to see how long the carcass will stay. After harvesting I had additional 4 feathers. My new total is 102. I guess I will go back to MT now, where this survivor started to get the pacifist and silent hunter achievements. I know I ran 4 deer into a wolf near Orca Gas Station, I hope I gathered the feathers then. My plan is to go back from there climbing down the ropes to FM and back to ML again.

[atomic]

So, I came back from MT where I was rushing game into wolfs a bit nearby the farm there.

Back in Camp Office I started to craft arrows. It took me 15 arrows to level archery from 1 to 2 and another 25 arrows to get from 2 to 3. Now I have made 50 arrows in total, I guess I need further 30 to get to level 4. However, i have no feathers anymore. It's day 85 of my survivor's mission. I think we both need a break. Once I'm ready to search the world for further feathers I will reactivate him. 😀