Male vs Female

[jak522]

• Maybe there could be slight advantages or disadvantages to the different characters you play?

Female Character

Pros 

• Faster run speed/higher agility
• less calories needed
• better at fine skills because of smaller hands
• can get into small places quickly, maybe crawl faster
• takes less fall damage
• More run bar

Cons

• Gets colder quicker (thinner skin and less body mass)
• Loses condition faster (see above)
• can't carry as much weight
• Higher chance of inaccuracy with rifle because of weight

Male Character

Pros

• Higher weight capacity
• Better at laborious skills like chopping trees and breaking down items
• Loses condition slower
• Gets colder slower
• better at fighting back against attacks
• better at using the rifle (those things are heavy)

Cons

• Slower
• More Calories needed to stay alive
• not as good at fine skills 
• takes more damage from falling (higher body mass = more force you hit the ground with)

I wouldn't want one character to be more OP than another: i just want to add a different experience for different characters and change it up a bit. I also think that if you have a survival knife, hair should be able to be used as a tinder, as well as being able to break down cloth into tinder.

EDIT: this topic has been left up for the discussions that have taken place on it, I don't feel this way anymore, and would appreciate it if people stopped commenting "that's a bad idea".

[EternityTide]

See my post on a similarly styled proposal.

[cekivi]

Welcome to the forums @jak522

While character differences at start are a common visitor to the forums (I'm a supporter of them personally) having those differences based solely on gender is contentious. There are certainly differences between men and women but having those differences dictate game play is not necessarily good design as it would more likely be based on stereotypes than characterization. For instance, the female character could be a Olympic biathlon champion and have no negative draw backs or could be an unemployed student with no survival skills. Both are very different characters and neither has anything to do with gender (you can sub male and have the same results).

So, yes to having more character at the start of a sandbox run. No to having gender based characterization to avoid stereotyping.

[Mikhail_Reign]

Assuming both characters are 'outdoorsy' I really don't see any differenc between man and woman, and don't really feel that there should be any difference in game. For example - that rifle is probably about 4kg loaded - male or female that's not a lot of weight.

[alone sniper]

Hi @jak522 !!
Welcome to TLD forum !!! 

 + 1 to your idea !!! 

[SierraNevada]

     While I like this idea, in it's current form, I don't think it would go over well for Hinterland. Some Feminists would absolutely tear Hinterland up for some sort of stereotyping issue (bear in mind, I'm not referring to the moderate feminist group, just the 'extremists'). It would be cool, on the other hand, to choose some sort of profession that your survivor had before SHTF. Maybe, having a certain profession would give you a slight boost in a certain skill?

[Bjern]

I think it would add to diversity of playable characters, and adding some kind of differences would be realistic if done right. It would have to be in harmony with science.

My comments below...

Female Character

Pros

Faster run speed/higher agility
less calories needed
better at fine skills because of smaller hands
can get into small places quickly, maybe crawl faster
takes less fall damage
More run bar

Cons

Gets colder quicker (thinner skin and less body mass)
Loses condition faster (see above)
can't carry as much weight
Higher chance of inaccuracy with rifle because of weight

~ Faster running speed and more run bar doesn't seem accurate. I don't think the community would be happy about the rifle inaccuracy part, if that is a thing.

 

Male Character

Pros

Higher weight capacity
Better at laborious skills like chopping trees and breaking down items
Loses condition slower
Gets colder slower
better at fighting back against attacks
better at using the rifle (those things are heavy)

Cons

Slower
More Calories needed to stay alive
not as good at fine skills 
takes more damage from falling (higher body mass = more force you hit the ground with)

~ Slower? Technically faster in general. Loving the calories difference!

[Don Honas]

Stereotyping genders is a really bad idea. The two genders overlap closer to 80 % when looking at most of the differences in a large population sample. But if you would add different body types with different advantages and disadvantages (technically classes). Slender character with the proposed "female" type and a burly character with the proposed "male" type... But then again why not have character classes instead e.g. librarian, police officer, baker etc.? Body types can be a sensitive subject to some (or all depending on how you view it).

[Patrick Carlson]

Just to add some info here -- we don't have any plans to separate the gameplay characteristics of the male and female avatars in Sandbox mode. We like that there is parity there.  

[Rolandtigerfish]

What about RNG buffs/debuff?

[Ohbal]

1 hour ago, Patrick Carlson said:

Just to add some info here -- we don't have any plans to separate the gameplay characteristics of the male and female avatars in Sandbox mode. We like that there is parity there.  

In sandbox mode uh? That extra clarification leads to think that we may find something different in Story Mode? *nudge* *nudge* *wink* *wink* Say no more!  

[cekivi]

6 minutes ago, Ohbal said:

In sandbox mode uh? That extra clarification leads to think that we may find something different in Story Mode? *nudge* *nudge* *wink* *wink* Say no more!  

I should hope a medical doctor would have a different skill set from a bush pilot

[Ohbal]

Oh c'mon, don't get so rational with me now!  I was trying to pull the rope and see if a spoiler was to be found in the end  

I'm completely puzzled about how the gameplay will change beyond sandbox mode, and really hyped to find out! 

[Bjern]

3 hours ago, Patrick Carlson said:

Just to add some info here -- we don't have any plans to separate the gameplay characteristics of the male and female avatars in Sandbox mode. We like that there is parity there.  

Thank you for informing us.

What about body types, ectomorph, mesomorph, and endomorph? Either of which you can be regardless of your gender. I'm naturally ectomorphic, and so I feel the cold more so than other body types, to use myself as an example. Not sure how difficult it would be to implement this into the game, but just curious about it. It would help with diversity of characters at least.