Drug Overdose

[vancopower]

I was wondering if we could treat multiple infections with only 2 pills. Why? because it is more realistic, if you suffer from multiple  illnesses increasing the amount of antibiotics it is not the way, to get better faster in fact you can overdose and make it worse. So maybe the mechanic should be re balanced somehow, how does your body know if you are taking pills for the wolf bite infection or the parasites in the first place. My suggestion is to make it like this: all the bites, parasites food poisoning once they hit the final stage they should be treated by taking just 2 pills a day for all of them in order to stop the negative effect on your condition, however  the hours that survivor needs to rest should increase to multiple days. So for example the parasites will take 1 day, food poisoning 2 day and wolf bite infection 3 days to cure. Also if you stop taking antibiotics for one day the effect should reverse and you will get worse again. This will make more sense, and it comes with new strategy you can melee wolves get tons of bites and leave them then treat them all at once by staying home eating well and resting, and save you antiseptics for emergencies. This mechanic will be better I think and easier to grasp for new players. 

I just tested it got myself 2 wolf bites and they both require 2 pills each to cure. I think that this is wrong if anyone has better idea I would love to read about it.

[RighteousFury]

I agree, though I don't think the devs want to add a bacterial evolution mechanic... Jokes aside, this is true and should be rebalanced, along with food poisoning.

[hauteecolerider]

13 hours ago, vancopower said:

I was wondering if we could treat multiple infections with only 2 pills. Why? because it is more realistic, if you suffer from multiple  illnesses increasing the amount of antibiotics it is not the way, to get better faster in fact you can overdose and make it worse. So maybe the mechanic should be re balanced somehow, how does your body know if you are taking pills for the wolf bite infection or the parasites in the first place. My suggestion is to make it like this: all the bites, parasites food poisoning once they hit the final stage they should be treated by taking just 2 pills a day for all of them in order to stop the negative effect on your condition, however  the hours that survivor needs to rest should increase to multiple days. So for example the parasites will take 1 day, food poisoning 2 day and wolf bite infection 3 days to cure. Also if you stop taking antibiotics for one day the effect should reverse and you will get worse again. This will make more sense, and it comes with new strategy you can melee wolves get tons of bites and leave them then treat them all at once by staying home eating well and resting, and save you antiseptics for emergencies. This mechanic will be better I think and easier to grasp for new players. 

I just tested it got myself 2 wolf bites and they both require 2 pills each to cure. I think that this is wrong if anyone has better idea I would love to read about it.

Wolf bite (and bear bite) infections are bacterial. Parasites are more like protozoans/worms. Different things. Technically antibiotics work only on bacteria, not viruses, protozoans or worms. While there are a few exceptions (metronidazole comes to mind), there is no one panacea or cure-all for every ill that comes to mankind. That said, this is a game, and designating different pills for different infections may be going too far into the minutiae, though I'm still holding out for birch bark tea for parasites and conserving antibiotics for wolf and bear bites (and food poisoning).

That said, it has always irked me about the game that I have to take one pill of painkiller for each sprain! Why doesn't a single pill treat all of the concurrent sprains?? Why can't one antibiotic pill clear up multiple wolf bites?? IRL, medicine is pretty nonspecific (except for nanomedicine, which is still in experimental stages in the US) and pretty much blankets the whole body (which is why we suffer side effects). 

So I'm with you, vancopower, on requiring multiple treatments for multiple infections, sprains, et al!

[Wastelander]

Quote

That said, it has always irked me about the game that I have to take one pill of painkiller for each sprain! Why doesn't a single pill treat all of the concurrent sprains?? Why can't one antibiotic pill clear up multiple wolf bites?? IRL, medicine is pretty nonspecific (except for nanomedicine, which is still in experimental stages in the US) and pretty much blankets the whole body (which is why we suffer side effects). 

This. Also, painkillers have some pretty weird side effects as well, some of which may very well be detrimental to that whole survival-thing, like thinning your blood or making you all dizzy and stuff. I'd probably not use the painkillers when I'm in the middle of Icebox, Canada and maybe just bear with it once I've got at least a wall and a door between me and the next wolf.

[hauteecolerider]

11 minutes ago, Wastelander said:

This. Also, painkillers have some pretty weird side effects as well, some of which may very well be detrimental to that whole survival-thing, like thinning your blood or making you all dizzy and stuff. I'd probably not use the painkillers when I'm in the middle of Icebox, Canada and maybe just bear with it once I've got at least a wall and a door between me and the next wolf.

Yup. BTW, there are two basically different kinds of painkillers - narcotics and NSAIDs (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug). Each has different side effects. 

Narcotics, besides messing up your head, can screw with your sense of balance and coordination, and cause your blood pressure, heart rate and respiratory rate to plummet. Not good. That's what makes you all dizzy and stuff.

NSAID's affect your platelets (i.e. reduce blood clotting, aka blood thinning), raise your blood pressure and increase your chances of heart attack. Oh, and let's not forget stomach ulcers, liver failure and kidney failure . . .

Either way, you're screwed . . . But only if you use them frequently or too much at once. Sparingly, and in the case of narcotics, only while you're in a relatively safe situation (i.e. inside Trapper's Cabin with plenty of food, water and firewood), you're likely to gain more of a benefit.

I would like to see a little bit more of a tradeoff in using these drugs, like we have with the emergency stim. 

[Wastelander]

Just now, hauteecolerider said:

Yup. BTW, there are two basically different kinds of painkillers - narcotics and NSAIDs (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug). Each has different side effects. 

Narcotics, besides messing up your head, can screw with your sense of balance and coordination, and cause your blood pressure, heart rate and respiratory rate to plummet. Not good. That's what makes you all dizzy and stuff.

NSAID's affect your platelets (i.e. reduce blood clotting, aka blood thinning), raise your blood pressure and increase your chances of heart attack. Oh, and let's not forget stomach ulcers, liver failure and kidney failure . . .

Either way, you're screwed . . . But only if you use them frequently or too much at once. Sparingly, and in the case of narcotics, only while you're in a relatively safe situation (i.e. inside Trapper's Cabin with plenty of food, water and firewood), you're likely to gain more of a benefit.

I would like to see a little bit more of a tradeoff in using these drugs, like we have with the emergency stim. 

You seem to know a lot about this stuff. Would it be okay if I PMed you every now and then if I have questions regarding the subject matter that aren't directly related to TLD?

[hauteecolerider]

Sure, I don't mind! I just answered your question in another post, but I've practiced veterinary medicine for 19 years before leaving the profession a few years ago.

So my academic and professional areas of expertise cover biology, ecology (as it pertains to parasitic lifecycles and bacterial/viral transmission), pharmacology, physiology, genetics, surgery, internal medicine, reproductive science (NSFW!), animal behavior and husbandry, to start with. 

[Wastelander]

That's quite impressive actually!

[RighteousFury]

1 hour ago, hauteecolerider said:

Sure, I don't mind! I just answered your question in another post, but I've practiced veterinary medicine for 19 years before leaving the profession a few years ago.

So my academic and professional areas of expertise cover biology, ecology (as it pertains to parasitic lifecycles and bacterial/viral transmission), pharmacology, physiology, genetics, surgery, internal medicine, reproductive science (NSFW!), animal behavior and husbandry, to start with. 

I take my recent post back in that case. Your a trained professional, whereas I am a freshman in high school who thinks he is an engineer...

[hauteecolerider]

4 minutes ago, RighteousFury said:

I take my recent post back in that case. Your a trained professional, whereas I am a freshman in high school who thinks he is an engineer...

Hey, we all started somewhere!

Even though it was a loooong time ago for me, I remember being a freshman in high school. I thought I was a veterinarian, too. Just from reading every book written by James Herriot. Boy, did I find out how wrong I was just eight years later . . .

Though James Herriot did not write anything wrong. But he wrote about veterinary medicine 75 years ago, and things have changed a lot since then.

Come to think of it, I'm sure it's changed a lot since I left practice just six years ago . . . 

[vancopower]

YO YO YO! People focus pls. None of you posted about what you think of the new mechanic should be like: Any suggestions? I thought about this even more so, and here is what I come up with:  Instead of multiple infections we should have stages for example:

wolf bite stage 1:  Still can be treated with antiseptic but it goes away in 24 hours, the effect is regain condition slower when you rest.

wolf bite stage 2:  Can't be treated with antiseptic anymore, but can be treated with mushroom tea, antibiotics and it will be gone in 2 days. the effect is small condition loss.

wolf bite stage 3:  Can only be treated with antibiotics. and you need to rest for 4 days.  the effect is major condition loss.

 

The sickness should progress and regress depending on how you treat it, for example if you stop taking medications in stage 2 it should revert to stage 3 the next day again.

[Wastelander]

I agree on a progression of sickness, yeah. +1 for that!

[Wasteland Watcher]

To be completely honest, I only like things added that make things in this game more realistic. 

In any game I seek out, realism takes a much higher priority than "game balance."

 Which in this day and age limits me to one or two games

 So I guess what I'm trying to say is that I hope they do add the effects that this post is about, but that they do it after researching what happens in real life and then finding a way to incorporate it into The Long Dark

 

[hauteecolerider]

@vancopower

+1 on your wolf bite progression and this should add further realism along with the 1-2 pill(s) treats all relevant existing conditions (i.e. 2 painkillers covers all sprains, 2 antibiotics covers all bites).

[vancopower]

1 hour ago, Wasteland Watcher said:

To be completely honest, I only like things added that make things in this game more realistic. 

In any game I seek out, realism takes a much higher priority than "game balance."

 Which in this day and age limits me to one or two games

 So I guess what I'm trying to say is that I hope they do add the effects that this post is about, but that they do it after researching what happens in real life and then finding a way to incorporate it into The Long Dark

 

Well the devs are not myth-busters but at least they can base it on common sense, TLD is still a game after all but yea sure I also hate to play survival where there are no basic needs at least like hunger, thirst ... For example Fallout 4 until they added the survival update it was unappealing to me, and it still bothers me that weapons do not degrade. And that's why I love TLD so much, I never miss the destruction element the kill score of other games I'm all about creation. My only wish is that Hinterland continues this road and soon we will have new items to make, to survive for example eating raw charcoal can purify your stomach. This can be used to counter food poisoning ... A big thank you to all for being so supportive.  

[Wasteland Watcher]

1 minute ago, vancopower said:

Well the devs are not myth-busters but at least they can base it on common sense, TLD is still a game after all but yea sure I also hate to play survival where there are no basic needs at least like hunger, thirst ... For example Fallout 4 until they added the survival update it was unappealing to me, and it still bothers me that weapons do not degrade. And that's why I love TLD so much, I never miss the destruction element the kill score of other games I'm all about creation. My only wish is that Hinterland continues this road and soon we will have new items to make, to survive for example eating raw charcoal can purify your stomach. This can be used to counter food poisoning ... A big thank you to all for being so supportive.  

It sounds very much like you and I like the same kinds of games   But, I guess that's why we're here in The Long Dark forums  

Fallout 3 was good when mods that make it a survival game are used (very good actually!), but even with a "fixed" Survival Mode I find The Long Dark MUCH more enjoyable than Fallout 4 (my biggest disappointment of 2015). 
Fallout 4 is like vegetable pizza -- it's got vegies on it but that doesn't make it healthy and it's also a disappointing "junk food."
(If you're gonna have junk food, go all out, or don't do it at all  )
The Long Dark is the real deal, like a great steak dinner with all the trimmings!

Hope that your Common Sense Meds gets implemented in a future update 

[RighteousFury]

11 hours ago, Wasteland Watcher said:

It sounds very much like you and I like the same kinds of games   But, I guess that's why we're here in The Long Dark forums  

Fallout 3 was good when mods that make it a survival game are used (very good actually!), but even with a "fixed" Survival Mode I find The Long Dark MUCH more enjoyable than Fallout 4 (my biggest disappointment of 2015). 
Fallout 4 is like vegetable pizza -- it's got vegies on it but that doesn't make it healthy and it's also a disappointing "junk food."
(If you're gonna have junk food, go all out, or don't do it at all  )
The Long Dark is the real deal, like a great steak dinner with all the trimmings!

Hope that your Common Sense Meds gets implemented in a future update 

I'm confused why you guys are trying to take a story drive open world shooter and shit on it because it doesn't have a hunger and thirst mechanic. I may not be the best person to ask for an unbiased opinion with anything related to fallout, but to me it is the same thing as saying The Long Dark is a disappointment (I know it's not though) because it doesn't have a wide variety of weapons and there corresponding ammunition types.

[hauteecolerider]

4 hours ago, RighteousFury said:

I'm confused why you guys are trying to take a story drive open world shooter and shit on it because it doesn't have a hunger and thirst mechanic. I may not be the best person to ask for an unbiased opinion with anything related to fallout, but to me it is the same thing as saying The Long Dark is a disappointment (I know it's not though) because it doesn't have a wide variety of weapons and there corresponding ammunition types.

I think what @vancopower and @Wasteland Watcher are saying is that they favor the survival experience more than the shooting/swordplay/combat style of choice experience. For them TLD is a dream come true. Though I've never played Fallout, I'm familiar with the type of game (I play Elder Scrolls IV and V, aka Oblivion and Skyrim). They are role-playing games first, though I imagine Fallout can be played as an FPS. However, for role-players, immersion is important, and immersion for such players often includes realistic needs and tradeoffs. In fact, I see complaints about these games being OP all the time, simply because you can run/shoot/kill/maim/jump/activity of choice without consequence. You don't need to sleep, eat, drink or heck, you don't need no stinking fire to stay warm in the frozen wastes of northern Skyrim!

I'm with them because I much prefer playing Oblivion and Skyrim with survival mods that adds needs and consequences for ignoring said needs. It makes the games more immersive for me. And I came to TLD as a role player. I find it nearly perfectly fits my playing style as it is. And that's saying a lot. A lot.

[vancopower]

Just now, RighteousFury said:

I'm confused why you guys are trying to take a story drive open world shooter and shit on it because it doesn't have a hunger and thirst mechanic. I may not be the best person to ask for an unbiased opinion with anything related to fallout, but to me it is the same thing as saying The Long Dark is a disappointment (I know it's not though) because it doesn't have a wide variety of weapons and there corresponding ammunition types.

 Well it is like this I didn't exactly did what you described in here however I suppose I can elaborate little further. I'm playing open world shooters for more than 10 years and killing and scoring doesn't appeal to me anymore. Picture it like this you have a girlfriend for 10 years and no matter what color her hair is or how much weight she looses she is still the same person and whether you admit it or not the second some hot babe gives you the looks you imagine yourself being with her. Thankfully we don't have to be so faithful to a piece of software because that will be fanatic so there you have it I love my new hot girlfriend very much You can date my old one if you like I don't mind Sall' GOOD

[RighteousFury]

2 hours ago, vancopower said:

 Well it is like this I didn't exactly did what you described in here however I suppose I can elaborate little further. I'm playing open world shooters for more than 10 years and killing and scoring doesn't appeal to me anymore. Picture it like this you have a girlfriend for 10 years and no matter what color her hair is or how much weight she looses she is still the same person and whether you admit it or not the second some hot babe gives you the looks you imagine yourself being with her. Thankfully we don't have to be so faithful to a piece of software because that will be fanatic so there you have it I love my new hot girlfriend very much You can date my old one if you like I don't mind Sall' GOOD

I must have taken it the wrong way then, thank you for clarifying!

Oh, and as a nerdy coder who listens to Marilyn Manson all day, I don't think I'll be picking up a girlfriend anytime soon. ; )

[Wasteland Watcher]

@RighteousFuryIn short I'm burnt out on straight up first person shooters because I've been playing them since 1996. When I'm in the rare mood for them I tend to go back to original Quake.

I love Fallout 3 because it is a RPG that can also be sort of a FPS, but it is a RPG first and foremost.  There are plenty of ways to complete quests without killing. 

Adding mods that add "wellness needs" make it an ideal post-apolcalyptic RPG and Survival Game  

Original Fallout (and FO2) is an outstanding RPG even though it's not first person. 

When I bought FO4 I was expecting another great first-person RPG but it turned out to be simply an open-world first person shooter game. Todd Howard's team took a great RPG franchise and in FO4 stubbornly and unrepentantly turned it into a straight up shooting game where over 90% of missions require you to kill to complete the goal.  If you read interviews with him, he specifically states that his goal was to make it "more action oriented."

That's why it disappointed me so badly. Makes me regret pre-ordering that dumb PIP-boy edition. I plan not to buy any products made by   Bethesda Softworks ever again. 

Anyhow I think I better get off this soapbox now.  All it does is stir up anger for anyone listening/reading.  Myself included. 

I'm just happy that The Long Dark is the great game that it is.  I hope it's focus never changes! 

[Wasteland Watcher]

10 minutes ago, RighteousFury said:

I must have taken it the wrong way then, thank you for clarifying!

Oh, and as a nerdy coder who listens to Marilyn Manson all day, I don't think I'll be picking up a girlfriend anytime soon. ; )

 There are a lot of women in Japan who dig dudes fitting that profile. You'd probably be surprised

 

[RighteousFury]

22 minutes ago, Wasteland Watcher said:

 There are a lot of women in Japan who dig dudes fitting that profile. You'd probably be surprised

 

WELL ALRIGHTY THEN (gigidy gigidy)! As a freshman in high school, I don't think I'm going to Japan anytime soon. Neither will I be learning it.

[Wasteland Watcher]

1 hour ago, RighteousFury said:

WELL ALRIGHTY THEN (gigidy gigidy)! As a freshman in high school, I don't think I'm going to Japan anytime soon. Neither will I be learning it.

I didn't get here until I was 25. I'm glad I did though. Better late than never

 

[cekivi]

1 hour ago, Wasteland Watcher said:

That's why it disappointed me so badly. Makes me regret pre-ordering that dumb PIP-boy edition. I plan not to buy any products made by   Bethesda Softworks ever again.

To go way off topic what made me regret pre-ordering was ME3. The ending was just... so disappointing and Bioware's EA puppeted husk of Bioware's response to the controversy just made it worse. To give credit where it's due when Fallout 3 had it's ending criticized at least Bethesda released a DLC to allow you to keep playing and not die in a very... well stupid manner. 

On topic, some tweaking to First Aid would be nice. I don't know if needing a detailed treatment regimen is necessary. What I proposed on another forum was just having different degrees of injury. The more severe, the more time and medicine required to heal.