Worse than Hypothermia?

[Braeirden]

Longish time player, first time poster.

Been playing for about a year and recently started fresh in Timber ( Stalker all the way ). Best zone by far, beautiful, scary and totally unforgiving. I am just curious at to others real banes to survival, obviously death aside. Is there anything worse than hypothermia? This damn thing has been the cause of my demise more times than anything else in fledgling games ( first few days/weeks ). I find it to be the real game changer and throws all plans right out the window, and doesn't close the shutters while burning my curtains.

 

 

[cekivi]

Infection without antibiotics and bleeding without bandages are the only two I can think of that are worse. Both will kill you in short order if you can't get them under control. However, I've yet to be felled by either. You're right that hypothermia is far more common.

[Fuarian]

Falling off of high ledges can kill you instantly.

[LucidFugue]

Yeah, I find that in every situation in which you contract hypothermia, you were already in such a desperate state that you absolutely won't have the resources to recover from it. Almost nothing is worth throwing away the amount of condition you will lose to freeze damage before you contract hypothermia (I think it's about 30% or so?). So I don't know if it's the hypothermia that kills you per-se, but I've only ever worked through it once, when I overextended to get to the Farmstead in PV. That had food and supplies such that I could stay indoors and above zero for the full duration without any struggle. I still probably would have been better to either make camp at another shelter, or not head out in bad conditions if possible.

 

[NotThatGuy]

Quote

I find that in every situation in which you contract hypothermia, you were already in such a desperate state that you absolutely won't have the resources to recover from it.

Yep, I'd say that's the key: by the time you're hypothermic, you're already staring death in the face. Unless you're very lucky, the chances are good that you won't survive.

 

[cekivi]

17 hours ago, NotThatGuy said:

Yep, I'd say that's the key: by the time you're hypothermic, you're already staring death in the face. Unless you're very lucky, the chances are good that you won't survive.

 

Huh. So far I've found hypothermia to be mainly an annoyance. I usually get it by deliberately pushing my luck hunting or scavenging near my base camp. So far, I've always been able to make it back inside and warm up before my condition gets too low. I've been hypothermic three times so far (I think) in my current playthrough. Still going

[LucidFugue]

8 hours ago, cekivi said:

I usually get it by deliberately pushing my luck hunting or scavenging near my base camp.

Interesting. I'm probably playing a bit more risk averse, because I will leave a carcass overnight (or even leave a blood trail and go searching for the carcass later) rather than risk losing 10%+ condition to freezing. I guess when you have the clothing to retain positive temperatures indoors, and sufficient food supplies, hypothermia really isn't anything to worry too much about. It just feels like a costly condition to get over, and so I'm avoiding it.

I might experiment a bit more sometime. Best way to learn how to deal with it is by suffering through it.

[Braeirden]

Hey Guys

Interesting responses, a little bit learned for sure. For me it really is an early game issue as i'm now bout 29 days in on Timber and have not left the zone since waking up here and could only see it happening again if/when I decide to leave the zone and lack direction and preparation. I think it's by far a larger risk in this zone and any future zones with minimal fully encased cover like the buildings with separate zoning, as being able to heat properly for 24 hours in the early days in Timber was impossible. I kept getting my hypothermia down to say 10 or twelve hours and then had to rush out in unfavourable conditions to get more wood putting the counter back up to 24hrs. After a day or two of this I couldn't take it anymore and threw myself off a ledge.

LucidFugue, I think those points are bang on the money too.

Cheers for indulging my curiosity.