maximizing manual resource gathering

[BRASCH]

What is optimum combination of damage/tool quality to maximize manual resource gathering? 

 

So the wiki says: Melee Damage is a measure of how much damage you deal when attacking with your fists or any tool or weapon. Higher damage allows you to kill creatures and other players as well as harvest resources in fewer hits. It can also increase the amount of materials harvested from a spawned resource, and improve the chances of receiving any rare materials. It does not affect damage from ranged weapons such as bows, thrown spears, and guns.  

Putting a point into Melee Damage increases your damage modifier by 5% points. 

 

I am at 225% melee damage and I'm using a journeyman metal hatchet, and I'm not getting more wood than before.  I'm actually getting less because the trees are falling over in one hit and I'm only getting one harvest from it. Here is a quick field test on three trees per hatchet type:  

 

Journeyman metal - 15,14,10   

Primitive metal - 15,26,16 

Primitive Stone - 8,11,9 

 

This obviously isn't enough of a field test to make any kind of real decision, but I've found that the primitive metal is the best for my melee damage output. It may be helpful to know how the increased harvest yield is calculated in the code, but I'm on xbox so...  I mean does it work like the fortitude increase affects heat/cold resist, or is it a higher roll chance, or what; you know? 

 

[Danouk]

You could see a big difference before but since the nerf patch that effected the Dinos our manual gathering is a hit and miss as far as I am concern.

[MrDynamicMan]

I believe trees have a static resource pool that cannot be exceeded. Idk though. Honestly if you want to gather quickly tame a mammoth.

[BRASCH]

11 hours ago, MrDynamicMan said:

I believe trees have a static resource pool that cannot be exceeded. Idk though. Honestly if you want to gather quickly tame a mammoth.

i have a mammoth, i just wondered if anyone knew.  I thought that it was weird that using better quality gear, whose purpose is to gather resources, was not as good as a lower quality one.  So, what's the point?  maybe it works better if you don't have points into melee damage??

[MrDynamicMan]

7 hours ago, BRASCH said:

i have a mammoth, i just wondered if anyone knew.  I thought that it was weird that using better quality gear, whose purpose is to gather resources, was not as good as a lower quality one.  So, what's the point?  maybe it works better if you don't have points into melee damage??

Its trange. Id say do about 10-15 test per tool, and come back. That shoudl avergae out the results.

[BRASCH]

3 hours ago, MrDynamicMan said:

Its trange. Id say do about 10-15 test per tool, and come back. That shoudl avergae out the results.

Tbh, I'm not that troubled over it. I really just wondered if anyone else had worked it out. The primitive is definitely working better for me. And though that seams counterintuitive, if the developers are good with it, it doesn't bother me. Its a small thing. It's just wierd.

If you are doing more damage, you are clearing the spawned resource in less hits, which is why you should be getting more yield from each swing; but their equation has a point of negative returns or something.

And the minimum you should use to get statistical data is 30.

[DmpTrkDrvr]

Don't count trees count units /time I think you'll find if you set a timer for 2 minutes then chop down trees with each axe you'll find over the 2 minutes you'll wipe out about 15% more trees with a journeyman axe than a stone axe.. This on turn can actually results in a difference of about 50-75 more wood over the same TIME as a standard stone axe... also you'll get more wood with less thatch.. 

[BRASCH]

56 minutes ago, DmpTrkDrvr said:

Don't count trees count units /time I think you'll find if you set a timer for 2 minutes then chop down trees... 

to be clear, i'm not talking about the stone ax at all.  I only put that in there because i had one (from a raptor loot, or whatever) and figured id check it out.  the metal ax definitely gathers more efficiently than stone.  the issue is that the higher quality metal ax is not out producing the primitive metal ax.

it is true, it could be calculated on time but you'd still find the issue to be true.  the problem is that you still gather as little as 2 wood per strike and you are only getting one strike per tree. so, the time to swing your ax twice on one tree is obviously less than the time it take you to move to the next tree, right? well, when you are getting a single roll of, say, 2-30 per tree with the purple metal ax (assuming that the purple metal ax does actually increase the output; which if it doesn't, why is it even in the game), it can't compete with 2 rolls of, say, 2-25 with the primitive metal ax.  not to mention that you clear out a larger patches of trees with way less to show for it, meaning you have to travel further and need more trees for the same amount of wood.

maybe the higher quality axes do out produce the primitive axes when your melee damage is low enough to gather twice per tree.  which means that the added resource yield from increasing melee damage is only effective up to a point.  at this point this is all just food for thought; maybe something that could be balanced out in the beta or whatever. or just leave it broken with the knowledge that in the big picture no one will stop playing this game because they have to through out useless engrams, right?

[Proud]

What's the difference in damage on the axes themselves?

[DmpTrkDrvr]

2 hours ago, BRASCH said:

to be clear, i'm not talking about the stone ax at all.  I only put that in there because i had one (from a raptor loot, or whatever) and figured id check it out.  the metal ax definitely gathers more efficiently than stone.  the issue is that the higher quality metal ax is not out producing the primitive metal ax.

it is true, it could be calculated on time but you'd still find the issue to be true.  the problem is that you still gather as little as 2 wood per strike and you are only getting one strike per tree. so, the time to swing your ax twice on one tree is obviously less than the time it take you to move to the next tree, right? well, when you are getting a single roll of, say, 2-30 per tree with the purple metal ax (assuming that the purple metal ax does actually increase the output; which if it doesn't, why is it even in the game), it can't compete with 2 rolls of, say, 2-25 with the primitive metal ax.  not to mention that you clear out a larger patches of trees with way less to show for it, meaning you have to travel further and need more trees for the same amount of wood.

maybe the higher quality axes do out produce the primitive axes when your melee damage is low enough to gather twice per tree.  which means that the added resource yield from increasing melee damage is only effective up to a point.  at this point this is all just food for thought; maybe something that could be balanced out in the beta or whatever. or just leave it broken with the knowledge that in the big picture no one will stop playing this game because they have to through out useless engrams, right?

You're overthinking it.  I've never gotten 2 wood.

  With my 154% mastercraft axe and my 125 melee I average 15- 27 wood pee large tree.. with a primitive metal 100% I average 9-14 wood.  In 2 minutes I chopped down 54 trees got 496 wood with MC hatchet.   Let trees respawn chopped same trees with primitive  hatchet took 38 seconds longer 21 more hits got 374 wood..   That's the best I can do for you.    That's about as scientific as I get.. it should be noted I got more thatch from the primitive  than the MC hatchet as the thatch is the secondary rss for a hatchet the better the tool the more intended rss you get.