v233 Campfires go out if you walk away from them

This happened to me twice in the Cave behind the Camp Office.

First time:

- Had ~8 hours of time on the campfire, walked out to the lake and was turned back by a blizzard. When I got back to the cave the fire was going out despite me only be away for a very short time.

Second time:

- Had ~5 hours of time on the campfire, walked out to the T in the trail and sprained my ankle causing me to go back to the cave once again, fire had already gone out when I got there.

Recording here: http://www.twitch.tv/kraelman/b/661484291?t=35m21s

See here.

The fire burning time lowering to a couple of minutes is "by design". I think you guys might want to reconsider this however:

- In reality the fire would either burn faster (a little! not 100x faster!), but also granting more warmth because of the additional oxygene added (compensating a little for the increased cold from the wind). Or if the fire was to burn on smaller flame, it would emit less warmth, but burn even longer! So I would suggest, if the fire burns (a little) faster due to wind, it should grant more warmth. Or just letting the fire burn on smaller flame, emitting very little warmth instead of just granting 1 minute of burning time for each log added to the fire, but burning for longer duration. If there is wind not strong enough to put out the fire immediatly, just granting 1 minute of burning time for a whole fire log does not make any sense!

- If there is wind strong enough to just blow out your fire, you should be able to pick up the partly burned wood again e.g.: if you had 3 hrs and 27 mins left of burning time before the fire went out, let the player pick up "burnt wood" from the fire place worth 3 hrs and 27 mins of burning time.

- If there is wind strong enough to just blow out your fire, you should be able to pick up the partly burned wood again e.g.: if you had 3 hrs and 27 mins left of burning time before the fire went out, let the player pick up "burnt wood" from the fire place worth 3 hrs and 27 mins of burning time.

I second this!! It goes along well with the old want to be able to clear away burnt out campfires dirtying up the landscape. But yeah, I can't tell you how often I've ended up wasting logs whilst thawing corpses because of sudden gales of wind. It would be nice to be able to reclaim some of it, though I think perhaps at the cost of a little bit of burning time so it does't last quite as long as what it had at the time of going out as a tradeoff.

See here.

The fire burning time lowering to a couple of minutes is "by design".

But if the fire is sheltered from the elements like when you are inside a cave, the weather really shouldn't have much of an impact on the fire at all. If you are in a cave and have a fire in the back that will burn for 8 hours, it will not burn itself out in minutes no matter what the weather is outside.

I agree with your observations on how weather should affect a fire. If the weather makes the fire burn quicker it should also generate more heat and if a fire has been blown out by the wind you should be able to harvest some (partially burned) wood from it, depending on how much wood was on the fire at the time it blew out.

Replying to this post got me all fired up about tweaks to the fire mechanics. I'm going to just create a new post, because it captures way more than the issues in this thread.

However, to the ideas in this thread:

+1 to the idea to re-light non-burnt wood.

Picking up previously burnt wood is a bad idea, because it makes everything it touches filthy.

A fire won't warm you very much if there is lots of wind. It will burn faster though.

Adding more wood to a fire shouldn't make it burn longer, just hotter, so I hope the ability to make an 8 or a 12 hour fire goes away. Balance that with a longer lasting embers, which should replace the need to keep a fire actually burning continuously.

There needs to be a balance between fun and realism. While it may not be very realistic to make a fire last several hours by piling on a lot of wood at once, it is also not a lot of fun to have to constantly feed the fire when you're cooking/ melting/ boiling a lot. Especially because you can't add fuel while doing any of these tasks.

Side note: while it is not very realistic to create a long lasting fire with a tee pee style fire, if you build an upside down fire it will burn longer time instead of hotter when you use more fuel (but only with the initial fuel obviously, adding fuel later would have the same effect as with any other fire).

I think giving fir and cedar firewood different burning features might be interesting. Fir firewood could (more or less) remain as it is, granting a +20°C heat bonus and a long burning time per piece. Adding Cedar firewood to such a Fir-firewood-based campfire could, on the other hand, increase the heat bonus (e.g by +5°C/piece) but only slightly increase the fire's duration.

That's probably not entirely realistic, but it would imo add some depth to the gameplay. Right now, foraging cedar becomes quite irrelevant once you've maxed your fire starting skills.

I think if something like increasing the the warmth bonus of a fire when adding logs is implemented, it should decrease the added bonus with each log. So the first extra cedar log could add +5C, the second +4.5C the third +4C etc. I don't think 20 logs would give off 20 times as much heat as 1 log. This would also prevent the player from making a fire so hot you can stand naked next to it in -50C and still be cozy warm.

IMO cedar is not entirely irrelevant when your fire starting skill is high enough to get a 100% chance with fir. Unless this has changed (haven't played in a while) cedar has a longer burn time than fir weight for weight. 1kg of cedar burns for 2 hours while 1kg of fir burns for 1.5 hours. I usually carry 1 or 2 cedar logs with me for starting emergency fires.

IMO cedar is not entirely irrelevant when your fire starting skill is high enough to get a 100% chance with fir. Unless this has changed (haven't played in a while) cedar has a longer burn time than fir weight for weight. 1kg of cedar burns for 2 hours while 1kg of fir burns for 1.5 hours. I usually carry 1 or 2 cedar logs with me for starting emergency fires.

You're right about that, but the difference between fir and cedar firewood is really minor at the moment. Fir is heavier (less burning time/1kg firewood), but gives slightly more heat while cedar is lighter and gives less heat. But the whole difference is so minor that it's hardly more than personal taste which kind of firewood you prefer to use.

I would like the two kinds of firewood to be more different, it should somehow have more impact on your gameplay whether you forage fir or cedar. I don't know, I just like it when my decisions have some impact on my future gameplay and I would certainly love to have a way to increase the heat bonus from fires.

I think if something like increasing the the warmth bonus of a fire when adding logs is implemented, it should decrease the added bonus with each log. So the first extra cedar log could add +5C, the second +4.5C the third +4C etc.

Sounds fine to me, as long as the maximum (additional) heat bonus is big enough to survive blizzards at night while sleeping inside your bedroll (= about 20°C).