Replace home mechanic's welder with acetylene torch

[Inglonias]

Summary

Balance "Gave the Home Mechanic profession an acetylene torch instead of a welder"

Purpose of change

With the new requirement of welding rods for using welders, the home mechanic start suddenly becomes far less useful. My understanding was that this profession is for those who want to do at least a little bit of vehicle work from the very beginning.

Describe the solution

I gave the home mechanic an acetylene torch instead of a welder

Describe alternatives you've considered

Giving them welding rods. I was discouraged from doing so by Erk, so it's their fault.

Testing

The game doesn't crash on startup, and the home mechanic has welding rods.

Additional context

[I-am-Erk]

I think it's already a bit surprising that a person would flee the apocalypse carrying their trusty welder. Should they really also be lugging around welding rods? What's the story this is meant to tell?

[Alex-Folts]

I think it's already a bit surprising that a person would flee the apocalypse carrying their trusty welder. Should they really also be lugging around welding rods? What's the story this is meant to tell?

In current realities welder without rods nearly useless, as far as i remember there is still several recipes which do not require consumables for welder, but in the future all of them most likely will be patched.

As alternative we could give him acetylene torch, which is useful even without rods.

Giving them more or less welding rods. I'm flexible on the number here. I just chose 250 since it felt ok to me.

250 should be fine, its like 2/3 of a pack, pack considered as 35-40 rods and each rod last for 10 charges, so 350-400 charges in 1kg package.

[I-am-Erk]

I am far more in favour of changing this to an acetylene torch, I can also see that being the sort of thing a person might grab for looting and stuff whereas a whole welding rig seems a bit excessive.

To pre-emptively address the associated concern, I'd also be fine with a lot more acetylene fuel being added to loot locations.

[Alex-Folts]

To pre-emptively address the associated concern, I'd also be fine with a lot more acetylene fuel being added to loot locations.

I have some ideas about it, i'll describe it in a new issue.

[Shodan14]

Maybe the welding cart should have a chance to contain some?

[Alex-Folts]

Maybe the welding cart should have a chance to contain some?

Actually yes, i did add consumables to all loot entries which had welder or torch, but havent check welding rig. Good thought.

[Inglonias]

I think it's already a bit surprising that a person would flee the apocalypse carrying their trusty welder. Should they really also be lugging around welding rods? What's the story this is meant to tell?

From a realism standpoint I understand the concerns. From a gameplay perspective, I believe the idea behind this start was to give the player a good chance of being able to fix up a given car on day one so that it can move, but still be pretty beat up. If we still want to allow that playstyle, we will need to stretch credulity just a tad here and give the player welding rods.

I'm not against making the requested change from an arc welder to an acetylene torch. I just wanted to know if you were aware of the gameplay intent behind this profession, and whether or not that information changes what you want done. Essentially, this is me asking "Are you sure?" before I go ahead and make the change you're asking for.

[I-am-Erk]

I don't think 'make it easy to fix cars on day 1' is inherently a good argument for a profession, and I think there are actually some (very minor) balance issues to starting with an electric welder that are nicely offset by changing it to an acetylene torch.

I am not opposed out-of-hand to the idea of starting with some welding rods, but I think the addition needs to pass a logical sense test, not just a 'gameplay use' argument.

[Photoloss]

I think the addition needs to pass a logical sense test, not just a 'gameplay use' argument.

Sounds like it should be limited to specific scenarios then. The combat mechanic for example might be carrying welding rods for field repairs. Or a "prepper" or "sheltered" type character might have stashed some away out of personal preference only to discover that food and water are more pressing concerns. A subgroup of "Missed" or "Lab Staff" would be amusing where you were on an actual welding job as everything went downhill.

All of these speak for a "professional mechanic" (with corresponding point cost) rather than the home tinkerer though. If anything the typical motorhead would more than likely leave larger tools behind in a rush to make it out with their dearly beloved barely-drivable truck/oldtimer. Which is just as likely to be sprawled out in their driveway in a thousand pieces ;)

[Inglonias]

For the time being the mechanic now gets an acetylene torch with a full sized welding tank. I considered giving them two tanks, but that seems even less believable than having everything for welding from the get-go.

[PatrikLundell]

The testing section still mentions welding rods. I assume it's just a result of not having updated that section, rather than not having tested the changes, though.

[Inglonias]

The testing section still mentions welding rods. I assume it's just a result of not having updated that section, rather than not having tested the changes, though.

Correct. I did test with the torch and it seems to work as expected

[kevingranade]

This profession either needs to be held to a toolkit that would be a believable daily carry for a mechanic or get killed off.
If you want to start with car building resources make a custom profession or debug in your tools, "just happening to have a full tank of acetylene on you" is beyond the breaking point of credulity, and it's definitely not the kind of resources you get with a normal game start.