Locations used multiple times

I don't know why, but it somehow bothers me, that some interiors are used multiple times. For example Lake Cabin A. There are three cabins that are exactly alike, with the same layout and the same chances for loot spawn. I get that it's easier to program it that way, but still.

Isn't there a way, that you can program cabins or locations like Metal containers or Lockers, where you have a % chance of finding a certain item in there.

Maybe the same would be possible for cabins as a whole? That you get chances of finding in there a bed, a shelf, a desk, a chair, whatever, and they can be placed randomly in the room, and then having a % chance of spawning some item on those "containers"?

That way, every place would look completely different and offer different items each playthrough. Of course, this would only be needed for the smaller places, not the safehouses, that are designed on purpose, like the dam, camp office, trapper's homestead. Let me know what you think.

If I found three small cabins in a row, all the same size and identical on the outside, I'd expect them to be identical inside. Even if their doors were facing in different directions.

Not the removable contents, of course. Just the "fixed" furniture.

Andruin

And you would also expect to find a "Quality Winter Coat" in all three, neatly folded on the table, a can of Pork & Beans on the shelf in the same spot and an old newspaper next to the chair that is standing right beside the entry door?

I don't mind that they have the same furniture in them. I mind that they used the exact identical item spawn. It is the same location, with three different entry points and rerolled loot.

But the spawning chances are the same in every cabin with the same layout, here's an example for LakeCabinA.

These numbers are by no means exact, but they are approximately right:

• 75% for a plastic container, sitting on the tall shelf (Container has about these item spawning chances, I assume it's sampling with replacement, I would have to test to be sure: 50% food item, 25% clothing item, 10% material, 10% tool, 5% first aid)
  65% for a newsprint roll next to the chair
  65% for pork and beans on the small shelf
  35% for Quality Winter Coat neatly folded on the table
  35% for cardboard matches in the box below the tall shelf
  35% for accelerant in the box below the tall shelf
  35% for Tinder Plugs in the box below the tall shelf

The reason for me posting this is: Assume you find a village and that village has 12 houses. I don't want there to be 5x house A, 3x house B, and then houses C, D and E. I want there to be as many different houses as possible. So that I care about searching these locations, since they have a chance of spawning something useful, since loot spawns will be random.

Now, obviously the developers are using containers that draw from a pool of loot which is again consisting of pools of item categories. I would simply add another superordinate category system, which would be "Furniture". Then add items from different pools onto the furniture. That way, you would have loot that is a lot more random in the cabins. Then every cabin would have a chance of spawning that rare item you're looking for. Say, rifle ammo. Or some scrap metal. Whereas now, if I have plenty of tinder and some decent clothing, I don't even bother checking out the lake cabins, since they have such a low chance of giving me anything I need, like bandages, antiseptics or scrap metal.

And since it is alpha, I'd suggest restructuring the interiors even further, by designing the interiors in a way that furniture elements have a chance of spawning randomly and in different locations. Say your cabin has room for 6 "slots", in each slot you have a chance of spawning a furniture item. You have 2 "big furniture slots" and 4 "small furniture slots".

Now in the big item slot, you have spawning chances of bed 80% and table 80%, meaning that you can have 2 tables in there, 2 beds or with a 1/25 chance one spot will be unoccupied.

Then on the bed you could have a small chance of drawing something from the clothing loot table, and below the bed there's a small chance to spawn a metal container.

Same for the "small furniture slots", I would suggest that in that category there would be shelves (small and big), the bench, the armchair et cetera.

The small shelf could have 3 slots of spawning something, say 1 food item, 1 random pool item at a low rate and 1 container at a very low rate.

It would in my opinion make gameplay a lot more interesting, since locations that are supposedly random will really become somewhat random.

In a nutshell:

Now we have % chances for specific items or a container and % chances for items in containers.

My suggestion is to have % chances for item pools or containers and % chances for items in containers.

If possible I would like to have % chances for furniture items which have % chances for item pools or containers and % chances for items in containers.

I agree Trandor, I've had similar experiences. However I would guess it's something they're working on already, and are probably just doing this simple 'cottage A' 'cottage B' in the meantime because there are other pressing things people are demanding, like being able to use your hatchet or knife to defend yourself.

I totes pick up what you're laying down though, it's pretty absurd to find the same newspaper and the same can of beans in two, let alone three, cabins in a row. But for now I guess it works.

@ark1of712: I guess you are right, or I at least hope you are right. But since I cannot be sure of it, I had to make a post about it. Maybe one of the devs could reply and enlighten us all.

And you would also expect to find a "Quality Winter Coat" in all three, neatly folded on the table, a can of Pork & Beans on the shelf in the same spot and an old newspaper next to the chair that is standing right beside the entry door?

I don't mind that they have the same furniture in them. I mind that they used the exact identical item spawn. It is the same location, with three different entry points and rerolled loot.

I think you misunderstood me. What you wrote is what I meant by:

Not the removable contents, of course. Just the "fixed" furniture.

Andruin

I don't know why, but it somehow bothers me, that some interiors are used multiple times. For example Lake Cabin A. There are three cabins that are exactly alike, with the same layout and the same chances for loot spawn. I get that it's easier to program it that way, but still.

While I agree with you on the loot spawn, I do not agree on exactly alike cabins. Yes, there are three identical cabins, BUT:

I don't see any problem with that, in fact it is logical and realistic. E.g. hotels also rooms with exactly the same furniture layout (as do the camps IRL).

If you are a owner or a camp and you need to build a few cabins, you'll employ builders to do this for you. Before starting to build they will need a plan for every cabin, so they would know how many materials and time it will cost, thus how many money you'll have to pay them for work. To make a plan for a cabin you'll need an engineer, every unique plan will cost you money. In your interests as an employer is to reduce costs. To do that you can use cheaper materials or reduce variety of cabin layouts (less engineering costs). This explains why do they look the same from the outside.

Now furniture layout: why would you (as the owner) need different layouts for cabins that are structurally exactly the same. You just come up with one optimal (from your point of view) layout and apply it to them. As I mentioned: hotels, camps, hospitals they all have few different types of rooms, BUT, dozens of rooms.

Summarizing: I don't see the need to move the furniture around, but certainly there should be more loot spawn points.

While I agree with you on the loot spawn, I do not agree on exactly alike cabins. Yes, there are three identical cabins, BUT:

I don't see any problem with that, in fact it is logical and realistic. E.g. hotels also rooms with exactly the same furniture layout (as do the camps IRL).

...

Summarizing: I don't see the need to move the furniture around, but certainly there should be more loot spawn points.

Well, @Trandor did write:

I don't mind that they have the same furniture in them. I mind that they used the exact identical item spawn. It is the same location, with three different entry points and rerolled loot.

But the spawning chances are the same in every cabin with the same layout

And I agree that while it makes sense that the outside of the cabins are the same and they have (for the most part) the same furniture and layout, the cabins would not necessarily contain the exact same containers in the exact same locations. Where cabin A might have a plastic container on the top shelf of the cabinet on the right, in cabin B it may be on the table or in another cabinet or on a different shelve. And in cabin C it may have broken so it's not there at all, having been thrown in the trash years ago.

So, yeah there could be a bit more diversity. In the furniture as well. Even if all the cabins were furnished the exact same way when they were build, in the intervening years things might have been broken and replaced with different items.

I think you misunderstood me. What you wrote is what I meant by:

Not the removable contents, of course. Just the "fixed" furniture.

Probably glossed over that part, sorry about that.

While I agree with you on the loot spawn, I do not agree on exactly alike cabins. Yes, there are three identical cabins, BUT:I don't see any problem with that, in fact it is logical and realistic. E.g. hotels also rooms with exactly the same furniture layout (as do the camps IRL).

Summarizing: I don't see the need to move the furniture around, but certainly there should be more loot spawn points.

Yes, of course hotels use the same design, but they do not use the same room. Imagine you had keys like in Matrix Reloaded, and you build 3 cabin exteriors, that all lead to the same room (probably where the architect is located). That is where the core of the problem is located. You would not rent the same room to 3 different couples at the same time, since it would be impossible.

I care about loot randomization, it bothers me that the same locations was used three times. If they had used the same layout for the hut and used a different loot spawn, well okay then. But they didn't. They used the same location.

If you enable debug mode, you can see that when you enter 3 of the huts, all the map locations are the same:

So the map of the lake cabins looks like this:

(Lake Cabin C is the Lone Cabin north of the Unnamed Pond, in case you're wondering)

I don't mind if they use the model of cabin A, add different loot spawns and call it cabin G. Again, the problem would be fundamentally the same, since each location will keep on spawning identical loot. But at least there will not be a village where in every house you enter, you will find a can of pork & beans on the shelf, which was my main point of concern.

But I'd much rather have lower chances of spawning particular items, but more loot spawns and make all those items that could spawn part of loot tables, so it's random what you find.

The physics engine should not be a problem here, since dropping stuff on shelves or beds or tables seems to work just fine.

Well I did say that there should be more loot spawn points, which means more diversity.

While I agree with you on the loot spawn [...] but certainly there should be more loot spawn points.

Well not exactly. More not randomly generated loot is simply more loot, not necessarily more diversity. But I think that's beside the point, as long as we both agree that something has to be done about this situation.