suggestion Some Ideas For Better/More Immersive Gameplay

[JujuBear]

Hey guys! New to the forums here and my first post (but not my first time playing The Long Dark)

I decided for my first that I want to share some of my thoughts about a few features that can be included in the game to further enhance immersion, experience and bring a little challenge to players. And some mentioned because it just makes a little but of sense.

STONES AS FIRE STARTERS
When I was new to TLD I thought " ok, survival game,
gotta start a fire, need some stones..." because matches were not the first thing in my mind when thinking about starting a fire in a survival game. A work-around the abundance and accessibility to stones would be giving it an average % of starting a fire that can increase by a small increment the higher your fire starting skill. To make things fair as well, the condition % of stones would greatly be reduced with each attempted use (like say, 20% each time) If I think about it stones are most handy to when hunting rabbits and hardly an option for wolf deterrents. Other than that, stones don't have much use. A feature like this could be a useful crutch for early Loper games especially when you're in the situation of not obtaining any matches much later if not all.

EVEN MORE CAMPFIRE COOKING FEATURES
The cooking system to me right now is playable and I have not much to comment on but it is the limit of how much food a campfire allows a player to cook I think can be further enchanced. How about an option to build a variety of spits? It gives you more to cook and an even more useful reason to hoard sticks/wood and of course, is optional. The spit could be reusable at least a few more times before salvaging it to put in newly made ones. Each cooking level produces a different quality of spit, made with an increasing amount of materials required with the highest having the best quality spit of course. So instead of making 3 campfires to cook six pieces of meat after a hunt for example, a campfire and an added spit could cook maybe around the same amount with less wood needed to maintain 3 campfires.

BETTER WILDLIFE A.I.
This is one of those topics that borderline into "it's just a game, it doesn't have to be realistic" and "the way these animals behave...it's not realistic" but I want to be open about what could make it more challenging or interesting. I'm specifically talking about how we can utilizing crouching and sneaking more in a hunting situation. The deer for example, could be updated with reaction animations that alert the player that it is hearing something approaching (similar to the hare). This would be useful since currently there are no visual cues that aid me to tell me that my prey is aware of me, the deer just makes a run for it and I have to go give chase. If we have visual cues and the appropriate reactions from wildlife then this could be a useful tool for the player on how to approach quarry. Wolves should have dens as the bears do and perhaps this is a place wolves can retreat to when they aren't prowling. There can be a rotation of wolves staying in the den and prowling giving the option for player to actively hunt for wolves for the more timid (but still aware) ones staying by dens. Of course to make it fair, a handful of wolves would be hanging by the den and still presents a risk of being overwhelmed to the player should they choose to go with it. Attacking a wolf by their dens could startle them and force them to run away especially in a successful atatck by the player for example and give them a window to harvest remains before the scrambled wolves come back -- this one is a stretch though (and a little unrealistic), but just an idea for more options to be in the position of having the pre-emptive advantage in actively hunting wolves instead of being constantly put in the risk of being the one attacked with every attempt to hunt one. Bears can their biggy, same selves for all I care, no comment here  XD.

CLOTHING CHANGE IN FIRST-PERSON VIEW
I read somewhere else in this forum that the character model in-game should have their clothes updated in real-time (just the hands and
sleeves will do) so that immersion isn't broken.

So there, these are just some of the ideas I have on top of my head, let me know what you guys think!

[n4rut0f4n]

Yes!! We should be able to use stones to make fires in a survival game!! This was my first thought as well! It also doesn't make sense that using matches takes so long and sometimes so many attempts to get a fire going since you basically have actual modern fire starting equipment.

Now this would change a lot for Interloper players in survival mode since matches are much harder to come by which is partly what makes this mode so challenging and fun. Having infinite stones sounds too easy, but since it takes much longer to start the fire, maybe it balances it out.

Also.. I'm not entirely sure, but I do think deer poke their head up and move their ears when they sense me crouching close by.

[JujuBear]

15 hours ago, n4rut0f4n said:

It also doesn't make sense that using matches takes so long and sometimes so many attempts to get a fire going since you basically have actual modern fire starting equipment

Perhaps it's not so much with the issue with matches per se, but the fact that you usually start with a low skill with fire starting which would naturally give you some trouble with starting fires until you hit the higher levels. But not being able to use stones to start one??? Jinkies!!!!! That's like Outdoor Survival 101.

15 hours ago, n4rut0f4n said:

Also.. I'm not entirely sure, but I do think deer poke their head up and move their ears when they sense me crouching close by.

Oh, if that's the case maybe I'm not paying much attention lol. Though I still think the reactions could come more naturally. I think their path finding could use some more work too.

[ManicManiac]

12 hours ago, JujuBear said:

STONES AS FIRE STARTERS

Rocks don't start fire though (granted very specific types containing specific minerals can)... if you are specifically talking about flint/steel, note that this combination includes steel (iron in other words)... just banging two pieces of flint together does not spark.  You'd have to be striking flint against an iron-containing rock (such as pyrites for one example) to make sparks fly.  So, like I mention before just picking up two random stones and banging them together won't do anything for starting a fire.

As for flint/steel we have the fire-strikers for that... while the ones in game are based on magnesium strikers, functionally it's the same.

[JujuBear]

@ManicManiac Thank you for pointing that information out, it's nice to learn something.

Granted, I'm now even more interested at the idea because it could still be an opportunity to introduce a new option of starting a fire without the reliance of tools that doesn't come from the environment itself. The idea was conceived out of the fact that I thought there should be an alternative way to be able to start a campfire without relying on matches or fire-strikers etc. since you're more likely to chance upon natural fire making materials rather than matches and fire-strikers out there. The player could then turn to his surroundings seeing it is survival game after all. Their location of source could be consistent such as coal for example, but the abundance of it randomized to keep the balance (less likely but not completely derived of it in harder difficulties)

[ManicManiac]

25 minutes ago, JujuBear said:

Granted, I'm now even more interested at the idea because it could still be an opportunity to introduce a new option of starting a fire without the reliance of tools that doesn't come from the environment itself.

One thing that I (and others) have suggested in our wish list threads in the past has been friction fire.  Many people get caught up on the "bow-drill," probably because it's more familiar... but I think the "hand-drill" would be better since it's simple (and the crafting recipe could conceivably be just a stick and a piece of cedar - because these are already in the game).   ***for the sake of balance... I have also recommended that this ability would be unlocked once the player's fire starting skill rose to a more advanced level... like Level 5  - this way we have the magnifying glass and friction fire to rely on if we live long enough to run out of matches.   ***

Also since I only mentioned in passing and not explicitly beforehand... we do currently have the magnifying glass we can use as a fire starter during clear sunny conditions.

Edited July 23, 2019 by ManicManiac

[JujuBear]

15 hours ago, ManicManiac said:

One thing that I (and others) have suggested in our wish list threads in the past has been friction fire.  Many people get caught up on the "bow-drill," probably because it's more familiar... but I think the "hand-drill" would be better since it's simple (and the crafting recipe could conceivably be just a stick and a piece of cedar - because these are already in the game).   ***for the sake of balance... I have also recommended that this ability would be unlocked once the player's fire starting skill rose to a more advanced level... like Level 5  - this way we have the magnifying glass and friction fire to rely on if we live long enough to run out of matches.   ***

Yes! This is what I'm talking about. This is a great suggestion, basically surviving with what Mother Nature provides. Non-natural tools are great and valuable, but survival tools and skills that are reliant on nature is even more valuable imo.

 

15 hours ago, ManicManiac said:

 we do currently have the magnifying glass we can use as a fire starter during clear sunny conditions.

Still not as natural as I would prefer, I'm really talking about just natural  tools. A valuable tool nonetheless 😆