Easy there big time, your getting a little too excited.

My playthrough seems to be a little different then yours. Because it's not consistent with what you're saying. You cannot repair to 100%, at least for me, it only goes up to 99%... you cannot, at least for me, repair a 50% degraded component up to 80%... it's always 99%. If I go 5 SOL without repairing anything in a HAB, I'm either in the single digit % or the part is broken (mainly 3 fuses in all equipment, 3 wires in electric supplier, and at least one carbon filter / heater coil).

Yes, I posted before I got the PRT. Having the PRT does make it easier to circumnavigate the surrounding area, making it easier to get from one HAB to another. I have done this, but after repairing one HAB and moving and repairing another HAB, that is a single day gone. Time management is a big factor here (and I know of ONE person who stated they wanted more daytime versus real time ratio). There is also the factor of being engrossed in dealing with stuff (e.g. focusing on gathering food, fixing waypoints, putzing around just because (like mining with a pickaxe when it's available). And since this is beta, I'm guessing there will be more implementations of things for your character to do besides searching for supplies in order to survive. Maybe doing mining and researching, maybe discovering there was a past civilization on Mars... who knows. Either way, you can lose track of time.

Being around electronics in a harsh environment and sandstorms, I can guarantee you that components last longer than 5 to 6 days. Yes, I had to replace components after installing a new one a week later, but I've also had components last several months before needing replacement... especially with a quick PM with minimal invasive effort.

Congratulations on achieving 130+ hours... you are a true gamer among regular gamers XD

But I digress... each player is different, and you are not the baseline. If anything, maybe a difficulty level should be put into place, just like wanting no, little, or a lot of sandstorms (which sandstorms should increase degradation of components).

Anyways... thanks for reading and commenting, although, to me, a little too petulant.

I get that... but you might want to take into consideration that keeping habitats running will allow air and power to build up so it will be easier to fill charged packs or air tanks without sacrificing your main habitat.

I still think a slower degradation would be better, especially since the degrade rate is longer with solar panels then it is for components inside the equipment. Solar panels are out in the elements, like sand storms and such, while the components are inside the equipment and somewhat safe.

Though, don't get me wrong... I for one knows about sand getting into places it shouldn't be, and I'm not saying that inside equipment is safe. But I think that is should degrade over a longer time than solar panels would.

RNG is certainly a pain. RNG in some of my RPG Maker games is always difficult to handle. But I do find if you add more variables in the mix of the RNG, like you were saying, what SOL you're on gives positive results when calculating RNG, and possibly already having one engineering tool or the such. This way, it won't be just a straight d100 (example) parentage roll.

Also, it was actually SOL 12, not 20... my bad. But I did make sure that I marked down the day I finally got my excavation shovel, and that was on SOL 28.

I'm guessing there are only 3 habitats? I've found all the waypoints and habitats, I found the shovel pop tent on the kid corner of the map where I started from (e.g. I started upper left at Habitat Alpha and the pop tent was bottom right). So it was certainly a trip XD