Monster Wolves.. Help!

[KeldorKatarn]

Frankly I find the point "this is handholding" completely invalid. I don't want handholding, I like that I can explore and figure out stuff in TLD. I died a cpl of times due to not finding food, getting lost, staying outside in strong wind for too long and freezing to death. I didn't mind that one bit. Why? Because I could see it coming and it felt completely fair. I just messed up.

The wolf situation is VERY different. Often I don't see it coming, often I cannot avoid it because the wolf blocks the only way to where I need to go, sometimes I cannot run away because I'm overloaded with stuff I found that I cannot stash somewhere either because I'm too cold and NEED to get home.

Every mechanic in the game gives me a chance to succeed. Combat with a wolf (even experienced players in this forum write that eventually this will happen no matter how well you try to avoid it) is almost always a complete desaster. To new players it is basically "game over, you died". For a player that did very well in every other aspect of the game this insta-death feels wrong. it doesn't feel like the rest of the game, it doesn't feel fair, it feels completely arbitrary.

That has nothing to do with wanting to be "held by the hand". I don't mind if wildlife attacks me and becomes a challenge. But it should be a challenge that I can master, not something that kills me no matter what. And especially not something that I die to because the controls are crap (and sorry they are crap, I've played a cpl of games in my time and these are the worst and most unintuitive combat mechanics I've ever seen).

I worked in the industry and I have developed games myself, and I'm very much against the modern trend of handholding. That doesn't mean however that an aspect of a game should be this unfair and unbalanced against the rest of the game. If the player is supposed to avoid wolves at all costs, then give him a chance to find that out on the FIRST PLAYTHROUGH. There is no reason whatsoever to withhold information from the player. Currently the player can figure out EVERYTHING to survive on the first run, except how to stay alive against a wolf. That feels unfair to the player and pisses people off. And nobody will say "It's fine, I googled it 1 hour and finally found something that worked after I tried 10 more runs and finally didn't bleed to death". Seriously??

Frankly I don't understand why people who complain about the wolves get attacked right away on this forum. Sometimes with insults, sometimes people simply feel they need to argue that wolves are ok. Why? If several people state that the game is not ok as-is, then that's information. Why people feel the need to jump at them and try to convince them otherwise I don't get. If I don't like a movie I don't like a movie. I don't need anybody else telling me "oh no you got it all wrong, the movie was great". Sorry, no it wasn't to me. And nothing anybody can say will change that.

If I think the controls are crap, that's a reason for me not to play the game. If I think the wolves mechanic is frustrating and unfair, then that's my impression as a gamer. And I don't need anybody to tell me I didn't understand it. YES I DID understand it, I just don't like it, alright?

I think it's unblananced, awkward, frustrating and ruins the game experience. I don't mind dangers in a survival game, why would I? I just mind if those dangers become unfair. The wolves don't feel like a threat, they feel like a bug int he game. Whenever I see a wolf in this game now, it takes me out of the game immediately. And I don't WANT to play in Pilgrim. I like Animals being a danger. But I don't like them to be an insta-kill-crappy-mechanics-and-controls danger. There's tons of stealth games out there, they all have situations where when you mess up and get seen you end up in real trouble. But nearly always you can still survive having messed up, it just gets harder. When you mess up against a wolf you basically die 99 out of 100 times unless you've already done it 300 time and finally got a hang of these crappy controls.

And stealth games also explain the stealth mechanic to you and give you feedback on how much you are stealthed, how visible you are, how much you are in danger.

TLD doesn't give you ANY feedback until it is too late and it doesn't give you any fair chance once you're attacked.

Explaining how stuff works to a player and giving them a chance to learn before you throw them into the fire and then actually giving them a chance to succeed is not hand holding, it's called fair rules.

I state it again: In my opinion the wolves are broken and ruin the game. And I think that's valid feedback to developers. So I'd appreciate if people would just leave this standing as such instead of doing the typical fan-boy reaction "oh no, someone instulted a game I like". Thank you. I love this game, that's why I support it financially by bying pre-release. but that also gives me the right to openly state when I absolutely hate something about said game.

I don't mind dying in a game, but when I do I want to feel like I had a chance to survive and know what I did wrong. Against the wolves I just feel pissed off and feel like uninstalling. If you guys think that's a good thing.. fine. I'd rather see broken things improved and the game more successful.

[Bill Tarling]

You say that TLD is tough, old school, no hand holding. I get this. But then you mention plenty of save spots, so players can continue right away if they die. Ok, so no permadeath across the board. I get this too. Then, some players found it too hard, Pilgrim was added. Is Pilgrim hand holding? Which is it, is the game hard or isn't it hard?

Pilgrim is semi-handholding, not not in the normal sense... it's meant for players who mainly like to explore, or aren't regular gamers (where you're thrown into everything right from the beginning), and also gives other players a chance to become familiar [experimenting on their own] with the mechanics since the game isn't going to give you the usual "this is how you do it" type guidance. It also gives them a chance to explore and learn the area on their own before jumping into the more aggressive gameplay modes.

Also, you mention most players having bad gaming habits. Beating the game as soon as possible. But you also mention a lot of brand new players who immediately start with Stalker and play it regularly. Is this overcoming the game as fast as possible too?

Yes and no... the difference in most games is that there is and end point (even in most sandboxes), so that's what is set up for quicker completion compared to real early games [early example, showing my age, I had over 800 play hours before I decided to complete all the quests in Ultima III... now even my wife completes a lot of games in under a week]

Some of the players jumping right into Stalker mode do so because they're enjoying the challenge... and they're always experimenting with different approaches to the challenges. Sandbox really has no endgame, and every major update brings new things to work out (as well as mechanic and setting tweaks which change and often require a new approach or adjustment to the challenges)

Also, isn't continuing right away if you die also overcoming the game faster? I know you can't "beat" it, I'm simply equating "beating" it with overcoming the challenge.

Yes, it would be defeating the purpose of the sandbox if you could simply save before every battle, and then just reload if you lost... it takes away a lot of the urgency or risk if you know it's no big deal if you die because you can just continue exactly where you left off. With permadeath there's always that risk of "what if" danger going into fights.

Now the devs didn't leave the players out of saves completely... you can still enter buildings or sleep to save your position [though permadeath will wipe it out if you die, so the fear of risky gameplay is always present] -- but you can't simply play foolishly because there's no consequence to just running in to pick a fight rather than thinking your way around obstacles or bad situations.

And again, story mode will have a different save system because permadeath wouldn't be appropriate since there is a series of goals to progress through. Story Mode will have an end goal, sandbox mode doesn't have a finish line.

Also, concerning the game being easy or hard, is it that rather we're being presented with different experiences? Pilgrim a more thoughtful, slow, introspective experience than Stalker for example. Because if this is the case, it means that players who jump into Stalker don't miss on the game being easy, they miss on the game at its most thoughtful, slow and introspective.

Except the ones who start right on Stalker mode usually aren't looking for a peaceful stroll - in fact, they're looking for an immediate "you're in danger, and you better figure out what to do damn fast" type game experience.

The different modes simply give an option of which experience type the player wants to explore first (or on-going)... some want a calmer casual Pilgrim stroll, others prefer the normal gameplay level of Voyageur, and others want a "hit me with your best shot" challenge.

There are in between levels [you can never satisfy every player], but the three modes give a reasonable balance to meet whichever way a player prefers to approach the sandbox. Remember, story mode might be a different mode selection for them if modes for the story are available when the time comes.

You say that it's best to let the devs work towards their final vision first, and allow them to tune what needs tuning with all content in place. Is somebody working against this? Does this mean we should stop giving feedback until then? Because giving feedback is hard. Essentially telling the developer to his face, look, this that and the third sould be such and such because A, B and C is not easy. For me at least. And the response I've been getting, and pretty much everyone gets, is please give us your feedback.

There are the rare individuals who do make the "change this or else" type comments or posts, as well as users who post nothing but complaints because it's not being changed the way they wanted [and some of them have never even played the game], but those type of players are (thankfully) more of a rarity.

Feedback is almost always wanted by the Hinterland Team -- but Raph explained it best when he talked about not always taking the literal suggestion, but instead trying to understand what experience the player is facing, and then trying to adjust mechanics and settings to offer a balance based on the feedback [as opposed to "wolves are annoying, and slowing me down from where I want to go. I should be able to kill them fast, but they shouldn't be attacking me" - and yes that was a common early -- and then saying okay, we'll get rid of all the wolves]

I'll see if I can track down some of the interviews, but if you check some of the early links and podcast interviews, there's a lot of fascinating insight into the developper's mind and approach to building and growing The Long Dark. That's actually where Raph explained the 'understanding what the players really want from their feedback, rather from what they think is missing' beautifully

(I wish I had bookmarked the explanation, because it was insightful and very well explained)

Also, regarding maps, why are CH and PV locked for new players? Just a curiosity. Because, as I understand it, it can't be that they're considered harder. Is it to encourage exploration? Or preventing the new player to overcome the game and see what it has to offer too fast?

The second map (coastal highway) was immediately open for the first Early Access players because it was the first new map, and a completely different feel... Players had been given the exact location of the transition area, and the maps were opened to get a sense of how players found the two very different map approaches could be played. Some players started new games right on CH for a fast first view, others transitioned to it.

That gave the devs a good perspective of how the players progressed, or evolved their gameplay with the different types of areas. It also allowed they to experiment with huge balance shifts easier/harder due to all the extra loot spawns -- that, in turn, gave them insight of what future tuning would need to take priority when adding in more content, items, activities, etc. It gave them a frame of priority references to watch for.

With that information available, they made later versions more closed - requiring new players to progress from one map (ML) to the next (CH) to unlock it... while it would be easy enough to find [Google/Forum Posts] the transition points, it gave a good reason for new players to start on ML in order to learn the basics [in other words, ML worked well for early players as a learning ground, and so this gave new players something to work towards]. It gave the goal/rewards early players had before getting their new map too.

Likewise with PV... it's an entirely different feel [and when it was released, this time players had to first find it on their own]... By this time, those progressing through each stage of the map had mostly been playing each map quite a while. They could also see/understand the connection or transition between each of the areas.

Don't forget all the sandbox regions also form the main story mode regions, so they aren't simply randomly picked remote/town/sparse farm areas... there is a flow, with each area having their own survival approach variations. Once unlocked they may seem like different completely independent random sandbox scenarios, but there is a learning flow from each.

As a person which is following the forums and which, frankly, doesn't understand most things, I see people saying it's either too easy or too hard. Of course, the silent majority could, and probably does, play the game happily.

I imagine that's probably the toughest balance challenge for the devs... I can see it being tempting to say "okay we'll make this tougher/easier right away"

The curse is they've done such a great job of making a game that's already incredibly fun to play, that a lot of players kinda want the levels adjusted then finalized for the content they're playing at the time. We tend to forget Hinterland still has a ton of stuff they're going to be adding (which will change the game each time).

Raph is a master at coordinating a team and keeping a vision/focus on track (side note: another past video link I'll have to track down where he presented a seminar on Team Management). I don't know how he manages, but they seem to blend an incredible balance between new stuff, adjusting/fixing old stuff, and adding in pieces of user requested stuff.

The main thing is, everything added has to also fit the mechanics and feel of their planned story mode. This isn't their usual Triple-A studio team of 200+ programmers and designers, nor does it have the same budget... they're always keeping in mind timelines, selecting what gives the best gameplay value in exchange for the programming cost [time], and making sure there's enough time/budget resources to ensure a solid quality and final game product given all the limitations.

Some stuff might sound great, but might either simply be fluff enhancements [not enough gameplay value to include at this point if it also means they may have to cut out some more critical components], or (as I expect will happen more often) they are still noting feedback, wishlists, and ideas for possible inclusion in future sequels where they may fit better.

Feedback is never wasted, but as players we tend to think in terms of "this would be cool to see" [and othen say "it's east to add because other games have done it"], and not as "how much of the bigger picture can we give up to get this idea included? Is this addition worth possibly having to give up a new map/crafting/UI enhancement"... That's where we have to rely on the dev experience to make those decisions...

Luckily Hinterland does listen, and often manages to surprise us by implementing some requests (often in a way very different than we expected). Just because they haven't included something, doesn't mean they're not looking at ways they might be able to make it fit if time and budget allows -- but at the same time they also have to sort through feedback and wishlist requests which have no bearing in the game [e.g. requests for travelling and playing on different planets, or fixing a nuclear plant using a couple of car parts -- and yes, both those have been requested on various forums]

But to me, this doesn't even matter. What does matter to me is, simply, why? Why players for which the game is either too easy, either too hard, exist, still, with Pilgrim, with Voyageur, with Stalker, with saves, with constant rebalancing, with player feedback.

As mentioned above, that's exactly the balance Raph has discussed as the devs duty to find the right balance... to understand that when a user requests 'X', what they actually mean is they need more 'Y'... So far they've been pretty good at the balancing act.

Too good infact, which is why I think many times players expect all adjustments to be made immediately for their current version [because the game still feels so complete as-is even at this stage]... There's so much more ahead they'll be adding, so they have to budget their time and resources properly in order to tune each setting as new stuff is added.

The current version isn't the one to perfect -- it's all part of the next version leading to the final product. 8-)

[KeldorKatarn]

I don't think this is a matter of difficulty at all. I don't think most players feel wolves are too difficult, I think they feel they are unfair, not explained and bugged. I don't mind a difficult game mechanic as long as it is intuitive and explained to me and fair. Wolves right now aren't. I don't WANT to play on easy. I just want the difficult parts to be explained and fair. Right now they are frustrating and driving me away from the game which makes me a sad panda.

[octavian]

Thanks for the answer.

[Scyzara]

The wolf situation is VERY different. Often I don't see it coming, often I cannot avoid it because the wolf blocks the only way to where I need to go, sometimes I cannot run away because I'm overloaded with stuff I found that I cannot stash somewhere either because I'm too cold and NEED to get home.

Every mechanic in the game gives me a chance to succeed. Combat with a wolf (even experienced players in this forum write that eventually this will happen no matter how well you try to avoid it) is almost always a complete desaster.

I respect your opinion and understand that things probably seem to you as you claim them to be (because you're new to the game). Should you be interested in knowing how the issue is once you've figured out how to "deal with wolves" as an experienced player, read on. And please respect these statements as well, just like you want YOUR opinion to be respected by people who don't have trouble with wolves.

- Wolves almost NEVER block the ONLY way anywhere. You can always circumvent them. Sometimes you have to walk much longer distances for that, sometimes you have to cross a ridge or travel through some neighboring valleys. But there are hardly any situations in which a wolf blocks the only passage available.

- Hand-combat with a single wolf is nothing even close to a desaster if you're a well-dressed veteran. Fully equipped, killing a wolf will not drop your Condition below 75%. Maybe 60% if you want to kill it on the spot. You have to be fast at klicking your mouse buttons for that, nothing else. It neither requires a complicated strategy, nor "skill", nor extraordinary much timing. Everyone who doesn't suffer from arthritis in his/her forefinger can do it. You only need to click LMB as fast as possible until the bar is charged, then release the attack with RMB. Rinse repeat until the wolf runs away (or lies dead in front of you). No rocket science. Nothing you have to practice 300 times before you can do it properly. And nothing impossible to figure out yourself without reading a guide about it.

I completely respect that a lot of people nevertheless have problems to either understand or carry out this mini-game. Which is why I support to explain it to them via an ingame tutorial.

I've just started a new Stalker game (= I'm running around in total crap clothes) and even then hand-fighting a single wolf is in no way life-threatening for me (about 55-60% condition left). Plus, as I mentioned before, wolf-fights can be avoided 80% of the time by dropping a decoy. If handfights give you that severe problems, you might try not to hand-fight at all but drop decoys instead if a wolf notices you. The game doesn't explicitely tell you about the drop decoy option, that's why I would like to give you this advise.

Frankly I don't understand why people who complain about the wolves get attacked right away on this forum. Sometimes with insults, sometimes people simply feel they need to argue that wolves are ok. Why? If several people state that the game is not ok as-is, then that's information. Why people feel the need to jump at them and try to convince them otherwise I don't get.

Because people on the Forums usually want to share their own experiences and opinions which might be completely different from yours. You just have to accept that. If you write things like "you have to practice hand-fighting 300 times in order to survive a wolf attack", in most players' minds a big red button labelled with "LIE" is going to flash. Not because they want to bash you personally but because your assertion completely contradicts their own experiences.

You've e.g. written that you die 99% of the time when attacked by a wolf, yet you still claim to have understood the hand-fighting mechanics. As an experienced player - and I intend no offense at all - I simply have to tell you that one of these assertions cannot be true as they contradict themselves.

Either you HAVE completely understood the mechanics (in which case you shouldn't die at all due to less than three wolves in a row) or you haven't unterstood the hand-fighting system as good as you believe. (I assume you're neither suffering from arthritis nor always bleeding to death after a victorious fight because you haven't figured out how to use a bandage. I apologize if one of these possibilities applies to you.)

I haven't written down all this stuff because I want to disrespect you opinion or tell the Devs "fighting wolves is fine, no need for changes here" but because I want you to understand that things - from an experienced player's point of view - look completely different than from your perspective. Which is just the reason why people on the forums might try to give you advice and/or "convince" you that wolves aren't a big issue once you have learned how to A) avoid and B) fight them.

Your opinion is valid, but so is the opinion of players who don't have trouble with wolves at all. It's a good thing if the Devs get feedback from both sides as they need to consider both points of view. In fact they even have to consider hundreds of different experiences and opinions.

[KeldorKatarn]

I still do not agree. Telling me I only doN't like it because I'm a new player... well first of all I'm not. I know how this works now, I still don't like it. At all. And I also don't understand why people think "well if you're experienced you see it differently" is any sort of valid argument. If a new player gets pissed off by this he will never become experienced because he'll stop playing the game. It's that simple. Mechanics need to be understood by and be fair to new players. If they're not, they don't work. And yes wolves CAN block the only possible path because early in the game you don't have the time or resources that allow you to take the longer path. On that longer path you might freeze or starve to death, sometimes you HAVE TO take that one path or you die.

If some elitist people think everybody that doesn't like this just didn't give it enough of a try, well sorry I disagree. I did try it, I hate it, I don't want to hassle with it anymore and it ruins the game for me. That's my stand and I don't need to die or survive 50 more times to wolves or "give it another try" to figure this out.

[Scyzara]

If a new player gets pissed off by this he will never become experienced because he'll stop playing the game. It's that simple.

That's just the reason why I said in my first post that your opinion is completely viable. Obviously a certain percentage of new players (I have no idea about the numbers, it might be anything between 20 and 70%, I really don't know) that start to play TLD shares your feelings and quits playing because they can't cope with the wolves. That's important feedback for the Devs.

If some elitist people think everybody that doesn't like this just didn't give it enough of a try, well sorry I disagree. I did try it, I hate it, I don't want to hassle with it anymore and it ruins the game for me. That's my stand and I don't need to die or survive 50 more times to wolves or "give it another try" to figure this out.

This has nothing to do with being elitist. You're forgetting completely that not EVERY new player quits playing because he/she has incredible trouble with wolves. There wouldn't be anyone on the forums here if it were otherwise. I for one am not even convinced that wolf-quitters are in the majority.

Wolves seem to trouble a lot of new players, yes. But we simply don't know wheter this wolf-quit phenomenon concerns 20% of the new players (and all of them come to the steam and Hinterlands forums to complain) or 35% (and some of them don't complain but remain silent) or 70% (and most of them just quit and never show up on the forums).

Believe it or not, a certain percentage of new players (again, I cannot tell you any numbers unfortunately) are able to figure out how to avoid and fight wolves themselves. They don't mind learning it by dying a few times at all (and honestly, most people can probably figure out this mini-game by dying maybe 10 times, it's not that complicated).

Just because the learning process didn't work for you doesn't mean that noone has learned it. Or that everyone has disliked learning it that way. Where do you think the "experienced players" (most users on this forums) came from, fallen from the sky? They're just those guys and gals who didn't quit out of frustration but decided to pull through the learning process, nothing else. Most likely because they didn't hate the learning process all that much.

I'm repeating myself, but again: Your point is viable and valuable for the Devs, because there are certainly people who quit the game because of wolves. But the opinions and experiences of all those players who didn't quit because of wolves simply matter JUST AS WELL. Both positions exist, both feedbacks are valuable for the Devs. Period.

If you refuse to acknowledge that, I cannot do anything about it. Except to offer you the well-meant advise to put yourself out of the world's center. It's quite an unhealthy position for a sapient human.

[KeldorKatarn]

ADMIN NOTE: *** post deleted by Admin and user banned for abusive language ***

[Shadrach]

What a sweet guy

[June]

Try Hello Kitty Online maybe. Heard there are no wolves.

[Shadrach]

Hello Kitty Online can be pretty sweeeet

[June]

hahahaha

[TWM]

I try avoiding them, they seem to always come in 2, and I can barely get a hit in before they kill me. It's getting to the point I give up and just let the wolves kill me.

Yes, wolves pose a major threat in the beginning of a new sandbox run. Getting the better of them poses a steep learning curve. But that's kind of the point: they're supposed to form a major threat factor to keep you on your toes. You're supposed to be scared of them. I've seen video tutorials of guys deliberately picking a fight with a wolf mano-a-mano to save on ammo. That kind of thing subtracts from the experience imo.

That being said, wolves can be beat. Here's some tips.

1. Wolves can be slowed down by throwing a decoy on the ground. This will attract them to the bait instead of you. Use number 4 on your keyboard to throw a piece of food on the ground. (Tip: when you eat, don't eat all the last bits, but save some small morsels of cooked meat and keep them in your backpack for use as decoys)

2. Use your flare. Flares and torches will keep wolves at a distance. When the wolf is at throwing distance, throw the flare in it's direction.

3. Get a hunting knife as quick as possible. The hunting knife is the best melee weapon to deal with a wolf.

4. Sleep often. Try to keep your fatigue down, so that when you can't avoid being jumped by the wolf, you're fit. Being fatigued will make you less able to fight off the attack.

5. Hunting rifle, obviously. However, since the wolfs zig-zag now, be sure to throw a piece of meat on the ground as soon as you hear that dreaded growl and take a few steps away. This'll give you plenty of time to aim, since the wolf will now be drawn to the decoy. You can always pick up the decoy later.

6. I've read that after a couple of fights with a wolf, you get a bonus for experience. I don't know for sure if that's true, but I seem to be winning my wolf fights these days, so it sounds plausible.

7. Practice! Yes, I know, it's very frustrating to die, die and die again. And then again. And yet another time. It's a steep learning curve, and at first, I didn't know how to tap the mouse buttons and in what order. It was really frustrating. I still don't really understand what I'm doing right, but apparently I'm getting the hang of it. But it did teach me to avoid picking fights with wolves at all cost. I'd rather throw a kilogram of meat to a wolf than risk getting injured in a fight.

I hope this is helpful.

[Raphael van Lierop]

1) We're working on Wolves. Always. Working. On. Wolves.

2) We welcome all constructive criticism. We take it into account. But, keep in mind this doesn't mean you'll like the way we change things.

3) Not liking something in the game is never an excuse for being abusive to other people in the forums. That behaviour will get you banned every time.

Also -- for the record -- we don't appreciate passive-aggressive threats like "unban me or I'll remove all my YouTube content about your game".

Everyone else -- sorry for the abuse, and good job to the Moderators for being on the ball and removing the offensive poster.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

[andrewb]

ARGHH, I died from wolf attack on day 95ish! (voyager)

My own fault, nothing wrong with the mechanics, I got complacent and ended up fighting one after already being down to ~30%

Bugger, I'll wait for next patch and crank it up to the next difficulty level.

[Incariuz]

Wolves don't bother me one bit how they are (Stalker). So long as I'm careful and only traveling in good health, even if they get a hold of me I typically walk away with 30-50% health still. If a second wolf were to pounce, well I'm likely toast, but that's just how it goes. If I were to say do anything in regards to wolves, it would be more about the character we play. Have it where the more wolf fights you survive, the better you get at fighting them, so you can walk out of a fight with less damage. But even then that would need to be limited so they were still a threat in numbers. As I said though, they don't bother me as is.

[Snoman]

Wolves don't bother me one bit how they are (Stalker). So long as I'm careful and only traveling in good health, even if they get a hold of me I typically walk away with 30-50% health still. If a second wolf were to pounce, well I'm likely toast, but that's just how it goes. If I were to say do anything in regards to wolves, it would be more about the character we play. Have it where the more wolf fights you survive, the better you get at fighting them, so you can walk out of a fight with less damage. But even then that would need to be limited so they were still a threat in numbers. As I said though, they don't bother me as is.

I like the idea but they would need to be vary careful. I would hope you would get less then 1% chance per fight and no more then a total of 10%.

[Spottdrossel]

If a new player gets pissed off by this he will never become experienced because he'll stop playing the game. It's that simple.

That's just the reason why I said in my first post that your opinion is completely viable. Obviously a certain percentage of new players (I have no idea about the numbers, it might be anything between 20 and 70%, I really don't know) that start to play TLD shares your feelings and quits playing because they can't cope with the wolves. That's important feedback for the Devs.

Steam Charts (I know these statistics aren't complete, but I find it still better than pure guessing; I'll also assume the numbers are comparable across titles) states that on average 369.9 players played TLD at any given time in May 2015.

The peak was 814 players during that month.

Hinterland reported 250,000 copies sold some time ago (don't care to find the exact date right now).

That means at most around 0.3% of the sold copies were in use during the last month.

I'm no expert but it seems rather low for a title that's still in development and might indicate that people stop playing rather quickly after buying.

As comparison:

Garry's Mod (at totally different type of "game", I know) reported 3.5 million sold copies at the end of 2013 and Steam Charts shows over 52,000 players peak. That's around 1.5%

If some elitist people think everybody that doesn't like this just didn't give it enough of a try, well sorry I disagree. I did try it, I hate it, I don't want to hassle with it anymore and it ruins the game for me. That's my stand and I don't need to die or survive 50 more times to wolves or "give it another try" to figure this out.

This has nothing to do with being elitist. You're forgetting completely that not EVERY new player quits playing because he/she has incredible trouble with wolves. There wouldn't be anyone on the forums here if it were otherwise. I for one am not even convinced that wolf-quitters are in the majority.

Of course we have no numbers showing if, when and why someone stopped playing.

It's possible they just took a break or cannot play for some amount of time. We can't know.

However in a previous post in this thread you wrote

If a considerable percentage of players has problems to figure out the fighting (and presumably also the fight-avoiding) mechanics - which is obviously the case given the numerous steam and forum posts about wolves as well as the low percentage of players that survived for more than ten days - it's completely viable to give the Devs some feedback that the current fighting mechanics are not self-explanatory (and obviously difficult to understand for many players).

Steam achievements state that only 0.5% of all players managed to reach 100 days, which makes the people who actually manage to do it quite "elitist" in my books.

But however you want to call it, you are part of an extremely small group of people who can cope with the dangers - including wolves - in a way that allows them to achieve that.

I don't think that any other aspect of survival is discussed as controversial as wolves, so I guess they are the biggest factor in determining how long someone can survive, which in turn would mean that it is not easy, simply because most people can't do it.

(There's quite some guessing in this chain of thought. The percentage might also be low because the number of active players is low.)

I know sometimes it's difficult to understand how and why someone struggles with something that comes easily or even naturally to oneself.

However, telling others that it is easy once they understand it, is not constructive (as in not helping them in any way, because there is no "advice" or "action" they could derive from this) and seems quite condescending to me (as in "I understood it and it really is easy. Apparently just not for you.").

As a side note:

I have yet to understand why some people seem to want to tell others what they should find difficult and what not.

Why should I care if someone thinks that a certain aspect of any game is too hard or too easy?

[octavian]

I don't think that any other aspect of survival is discussed as controversial as wolves, so I guess they are the biggest factor in determining how long someone can survive, which in turn would mean that it is not easy, simply because most people can't do it.

Boredom and grinding too settles how long someone can survive. Players that don't have trouble with wolves say this, there's nothing to do. Hinterland makes wolves just right for everyone, players default to this problem. Wolves isn't what's keeping TLD back, in case anybody's confused.

[Snoman]

Most of us have been conditioned to rush in or risk it in games. The fact the every division and mistake can means unrecoverable death Is one of the parts I love most. Its a learning curve to stop and think, move slow with caution. Once I got that drilled in to my head. I have only had two unplanned encounters with wolfs. Not sure if its just in my head but the fights I did best in I had high quality knife. over 75%

[nicko]

ha I was down to no food - wolves where hunting me so i decided to hunt them. no choice no food I will die anyway. sadly I lasted all of 2seconds trying to fight them hand combat. no chance.

Also Is there a hotkey to bring up the man made torch?

I know these keys

1=flare

2=lantern

3=firearm

4=decoy

5= ?

do you guys have a game wiki? might be a good idea to start adding game details, hot keys and such as they come into development?

[TWM]

Also Is there a hotkey to bring up the man made torch?

It's the same hotkey as you use for your flares.

The problem is, if you have picked up some flares first, pressing '1' will whip out a flare, not a torch.

So either you must carry around torches only, or you'll have to drop all your flares, pick up your torches first, and then pick up your flares again (be advised I haven't actually tried that so I'm not sure this would actually work - although it ought to, given the way the rest of the mechanics work)

[snegec]

Most of us have been conditioned to rush in or risk it in games. The fact the every division and mistake can means unrecoverable death Is one of the parts I love most. Its a learning curve to stop and think, move slow with caution. Once I got that drilled in to my head. I have only had two unplanned encounters with wolfs. Not sure if its just in my head but the fights I did best in I had high quality knife. over 75%

A lot of people bought the game when it was still cheap or they bought it on Steam Sales discounts, checked the forums some, saw that the game has promise but kept away until it's done, so it'll be a full experience.

I've got 3-5 games like that on the shelf in my steam library atm.

So the low playability isn't a problem. I'm also sure that player count spikes after major content update.

This is my yesterday encounter while lugging 20 kg of bear meat from the slopes to the coastal town - No blood.... Even though I've wiped out the wolves like 4 times already (75days survived on Stalker), I'm having a tough time every week since the game throws wolves, bears or blizzards my way.

Oh yes, contrary to popular belief, the bear DOES path through the coastal town.

[nicko]

I just got killed by a wolf inside wtf. was just walking around finding resources and stuff/repair items when i could. here is a log of that short night. doesnt say much. all I can think is there are open doors.

Morning: Discovered Carter Hydro Dam.

Morning: Not Freezing

Afternoon: Started fire.

Evening: Drank Summit Soda.

Evening: Ate Energy Bar.

Evening: Drank 0.46 L potable water.

Evening: Went to sleep.

Twilight: Woke up after sleeping 6 hours

Twilight: Drank 0.42 L potable water.

Twilight: Ate Beef Jerky.

Twilight: Went to sleep.

Twilight: Woke up after sleeping 2 hours

Twilight: Drank 0.21 L potable water.

Twilight: Went to sleep.

Morning: Woke up after sleeping 2 hours

Morning: Wolf attack!

Morning: You died from loss of blood and shock from a wolf attack

[snegec]

Another victim of Fluffy. The not-so-domesticated wolf of the Dam