Cantr II Discussion Forum

A polishing cloth needs olive oil, not any other oil? WTF? What is it with Cantr staff and overspecification?

Chris wrote:A polishing cloth needs olive oil, not any other oil? WTF? What is it with Cantr staff and overspecification?

Was it done to encourage trade of olives?

Friar Briar wrote:

Chris wrote:A polishing cloth needs olive oil, not any other oil? WTF? What is it with Cantr staff and overspecification?

Was it done to encourage trade of olives?

It was a two birds with one stone type of deal. The other repair tools were expensive (compared to just a plain cloth), olive oil needed more uses. There's no other oils in the game.

I do think we might need to reconsider the usefulness of these tools (considering their lacking popularity). I wonder if it's a documentation issue. Their profit (purely based on days of work) is real and very significant.

*Wiro wrote:

Friar Briar wrote:

Chris wrote:A polishing cloth needs olive oil, not any other oil? WTF? What is it with Cantr staff and overspecification?

Was it done to encourage trade of olives?

It was a two birds with one stone type of deal. The other repair tools were expensive (compared to just a plain cloth), olive oil needed more uses. There's no other oils in the game.

I do think we might need to reconsider the usefulness of these tools (considering their lacking popularity). I wonder if it's a documentation issue. Their profit (purely based on days of work) is real and very significant.

I agree with how valuable they are. But I also think that we should give it more time to take off. For one reason, people often are creatures of habit and will stick to tried and true methods.

If it is a documentation issue, then I would suggest putting in the wiki an example of how much time is saved to fully repair an item instead of just giving a percentage of speed increase. Something like: bone knife needs 1 day of repair; with polishing cloth, the bone knife will need 3 hours, or something like that. Give a realistic example, so it can be visualized.

I personally believe they are incredibly useful. My characters have all the materials to make whetstones, just need to find the kiln.

*Wiro wrote:

Friar Briar wrote:

Chris wrote:A polishing cloth needs olive oil, not any other oil? WTF? What is it with Cantr staff and overspecification?

Was it done to encourage trade of olives?

It was a two birds with one stone type of deal. The other repair tools were expensive (compared to just a plain cloth), olive oil needed more uses. There's no other oils in the game.

I do think we might need to reconsider the usefulness of these tools (considering their lacking popularity). I wonder if it's a documentation issue. Their profit (purely based on days of work) is real and very significant.

patchouli oil
camphor oil
bergamot oil
eucalyptus oil

If you're willing to think slightly less literally:
coconut oil (as used in soap)
nut oils (I imagine this is a significant reason nuts make good shae butter soap)
vegetable oils (because they seem to be assumed in cooking)

I don't mind that I can't have polishing cloths because none of my characters have ever seen olive oil, only one of them ever saw an olive (it was a small sample given by a sailing trader, long ago eaten for the role play), and none of them are sufficiently motivated by the idea of blindingly faster repairs to seek out this unheard of resource (they often do repairs for lack of other things to do anyway, what with no better way to spend their time when I'm too busy to think of something more creative, and establishing a new influx of rare resources has consistently shown to be more effort than it's worth to me), so this isn't a complaint and I don't care if it never changes. I just don't like blanket statements that are simply not true, like "this thing about the mechanics doesn't make sense to Cantrians" or "there are physically no other options available to developers on this matter".

Nut oil and coconut oil make far more sense than using essential oils. And if we could get oil from a more common source it could be made into a pastry ingredient without any reason to complain. Baked goods in this game would suddenly make SO much more sense.

Though with how common and easy to produce they are in game maybe they're already not much like essential oil anyway. (I've always thought it was really strange you could just "grow" these rare, overpoweringly scented and difficult to produce oils in large quantities in game instead of the plants themselves and then another process to wring the oils out....IRL it would take something like 5lbs of peppermint leaves to make an ounce of oil)

I've got a 4 oz bottle of patchouli oil with my soap supplies that cost me $40. A quick search shows bergamot oil can be even pricier... $7 for a half ounce?

I know it's silly expecting Cantr to be realistic but growing oils in gardens has always been a hard one to get over for me.


... And wow this kind of turned in to a weird tangent, sorry.

Just...Let us make nut oil and coconut oil with a cheese press please.

I'd forgotten about the herb oils. The problem in the end is one that will never be resolved. We see it in fuel (separate projects for wood, propane, coal) and we see it here with oils.

Also the assumption that soaps use oils is right: pumpkin seed oil, nut oil, coconut oil. It was done like that to avoid the "which oil to use" problem (originally they were planned to use olive oil). Implementing those oils as separate object is more or less useless because they would have only one use.

Greek, is it possible to see a comparison of how much alcohols versus apothecary mixtures are produced and consumed in-game, please?

Friar Briar wrote:Greek, is it possible to see a comparison of how much alcohols versus apothecary mixtures are produced and consumed in-game, please?

I'm pretty sure mead still beats out everything since honey is free.

Though herbs are free too so I might be wrong.

Marian wrote:

Friar Briar wrote:Greek, is it possible to see a comparison of how much alcohols versus apothecary mixtures are produced and consumed in-game, please?

I'm pretty sure mead still beats out everything since honey is free.

Though herbs are free too so I might be wrong.

I'm guessing that you are right about mead, but I'm just curious to see if apothecary mixtures are really as unpopular as I think they are. I've only seen them in three towns in my whole time IG, versus alcohol which was available even in the most primitive places.

I want to know if any helicopter engines exist in the game.

*Wiro wrote:

Friar Briar wrote:

Chris wrote:A polishing cloth needs olive oil, not any other oil? WTF? What is it with Cantr staff and overspecification?

Was it done to encourage trade of olives?

It was a two birds with one stone type of deal. The other repair tools were expensive (compared to just a plain cloth), olive oil needed more uses. There's no other oils in the game.

I do think we might need to reconsider the usefulness of these tools (considering their lacking popularity). I wonder if it's a documentation issue. Their profit (purely based on days of work) is real and very significant.

To extend this off-topic, why not make a version with regular oil: http://wiki.cantr.net/index.php/Oil
It's both more common and more plausible than any of the other oils.

^^^ Regular oil is pretty much machine oil. Would make polishing cloths that much more accessible for everyone in game.

Fractional distillation stacks in the game... possibly also # per island. I was shocked to find people building two in the same town for separate groups, or simply because the town leader fell asleep with the key. Those things are expensive.

How many days of work it takes to increase a skill level. I've been looking around for an exact answer for a while, but nothing's turning up. Maybe it's something to test out.