Idea for mental afflictions


sonics01

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This is just brainstorming attempt, numbers and contents in this posts are purely came from my imagination. So I welcome any other idea or suggestions. I tried to make this list as realistic & reasonable as possible and tried to related mental conditions with what we call "traumatic" events. I'm not a health provider neither a medical expert, but I talked with some people who were suffering PTSD. This should balance the late stage of survival mode and should give additional challenges to players. 

 

1) Claustrophobia 

In official terms, claustrophobia is the fear of confined spaces, and cabin fever is included in claustrophobia. In this game, cabin fever is criticized due to unrealistic triggering conditions, and it really looks silly at current status. So I tried to touch this one. 

Condition: First, we need to carefully define what would be the "confined place" in this game. I would suggest any types of cave, inside any vehicles, and any very small buildings within specific volume/size. If a character suffers any kind of damage and experienced below 50% health due to any reason inside the "confined place", or if the character is trapped inside the "confined place" for more than 3 days, then let the claustrophobia kicks in. Let it chance-based, but with a good chance.  

Symptom: Once claustrophobia kicks in, the player cannot get into such a "confined place".  Or, let the player can get in the "confined place", but cannot sleep or past time, and cannot concentrate on any activity due to anxiety. 

Heal: Stay and sleep outside of "confined place" for more than 48 hrs. 

 

2) Wolfphobia or Lupophobia

Fear of wolves!! The life-threatening experience related to the wolf negatively influences the character, with anxiety. 

Condition: If character health reached below 50% after a struggle with a wolf, then let the wolf phobia kicks in based on some chance. 

Symptoms: 

a) Aim hardness: character cannot correctly aims to wolf, any gun or arrow, experiencing good degree of hand-shaking. Let the aim stamina circle always begins with red if a character have wolf phobia and aiming a wolf. 

b) Hallucinations-wolf sound: character continuously hear the howling or grrr sound of wolf and wolf footstep noise even though there are no wolves around the character. 

c) Hallucinations-fake wolf: character sees wolf slowly following him or watching him from distance behind the hill or beside the wall, but fade away or walks away if the character watches more than 5 seconds. It is a fake imaginary wolf that only exists in the character's head, so it cannot be hurt or interact with other objects. 

d) Visions: (Only if when the degree of fear is serious: If the character's wolf phobia is not cured but experiences the condition to initiate wolf phobia once again) character suddenly experience the wolf jumps to him or her, even in the building or anyplace, without any precautions. But once the character engages the struggle, the wolf soon fade away. Yes, the wolf is a lie! 

Heal: Kills more than 50+ wolves without experiencing any struggle against a wolf. 

You can make bear phobia and moose phobia in a similar fashion. For the bear phobia, introduce a higher chance to kicks in than wolf phobia, and heal the condition of 20+ bear kills might be proper. For moose phobia, introduce a higher chance to kicks in than bear phobia, and let's introduce 10+ moose kills to heal.  

 

3) OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) 
Condition: If the character's health reached below 20% for any reason, introduce a very small chance of having OCD. Life-threatening experience makes the character to adhere to silly stupid behavior, something like superstition, which he ore she belives brings a bit of good luck and save his or her life. 

Symptoms: 

a) Adhere to 'lucky' object: The character must carry one specific item in the backpack and cannot remove the item for any condition until OCD is healed. 

b) Carry all countable objects in 3 numbers: The character must carry some types of items in number of multiple of 3. 3,6,9,12... number of bullets, rocks, coals, and etc. 

c) character need to repair something or clean the gun every 2 hours. 

d) character need to pick something every 30 minutes, anything is fine. 

These are just examples, there should be a better idea. 

Heal: No direct way to heal this. Just survive, but introduce the random time duration between 2 weeks ~ 6 weeks. But I welcome any other better idea. 

 

4) Attention Deficit Disorder or ADHD, or concentration disorder.

Condition: If the character's health reached below 20% for any reason, introduce a very small chance of having ADHD. Life-threatening experience makes the character falls in a continuous loop of negative emotion and continuous anxiety. As a result, he or she cannot concentrate to something at all. 

Symptoms: 

a) The character cannot read at all. 

b) Higher chance of failure of repair or mend or any activity which requires continuous attention more than 15 minutes, regardless of skill level. 

c) Aim penalty to guns and bows. 

d) Cannot sleep fully. Continuously wakes during sleep after a random time. Cannot go back to sleep for an hour. 

These are just examples, there should be a better idea. 

Heal: No direct way to heal this. Just survive, but introduce the random time duration between 2 weeks ~ 6 weeks. But I welcome any other better idea. 


5) Depression
Condition: If the character reached level 5 skill level for 6 or more skills, and if the character health is 100% for 5 days consecutive, and if the character experienced an average "feels like" temperature above 0 for 3 days consecutive, then introduce depression with a very small chance. The character gets bored with too easy and too comfortable surroundings. 

Symptoms: 
a) The character cannot read or stops reading very frequently. 

b) Cannot sleep fully. Continuously wakes during sleep after a random time. Cannot go back to sleep for an hour. 

c) Cannot eat fully. Eats very small calorie and stop eating. Then, refuse to it further at least for an hour. 

d) Heal bonus of sleep reduces.

Heal: Continuous hunting and fishing to relieve stress, the character need to kill N number of fish or animals within specific amount of time, every day until Depression is gone. And should spend 72 hr outside of "confined space"

 

There should be more idea. I also thought of OCD related to washing and hygiene, but there are no related mechanics in TLD so... 

 

Edited by sonics01
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You mentioned wolf sounds hallucinations. I think it might be cool that instead of just hearing sounds that aren't there that some sounds could actually be replaced. So for example instead of random growls our character would hear sounds that are similar to wolves when the wind is blowing in the trees.

I do have issue with the OCD/ADHD things though. As far as I know people don't just become those things. I also have other issues with other things.

However I do think it's an interesting topic to explore. I think in general I would like to have things be a little more subtle than what you suggest.

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On 6/29/2020 at 11:52 PM, odizzido said:

You mentioned wolf sounds hallucinations. I think it might be cool that instead of just hearing sounds that aren't there that some sounds could actually be replaced. So for example instead of random growls our character would hear sounds that are similar to wolves when the wind is blowing in the trees.

I do have issue with the OCD/ADHD things though. As far as I know people don't just become those things. I also have other issues with other things.

However I do think it's an interesting topic to explore. I think in general I would like to have things be a little more subtle than what you suggest.

Wouldn't it be cool? "I see dead wolves" And I'm sure such hallucination is very possible and reasonable outcome after such traumatic events. 

Regarding other mental conditions, you are probably right, and the exact reasons behind the beginning of OCD or ADHD is still not 100% clear. But in this case, I'm just suggesting as a brainstorm effort, try to make a reasonable cause of these in TLD world. I know these are not 100% correct. 

 

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I have another idea

6) Concussion + Forgetfulness 

Let's be honest people. Who use climbing rope when you need to go down the mountain or hill in TLD? Everyone in TLD just sit down and stick to the wall and literally become a mountain goat. Isn't it? Am I wrong? Honestly, who use climbing ropes when you come down from Mt. Timberwolf? I think devs know about such "mountain goat" players, but it seems that it is not an easy problem to solve. 

To prevent/balance such "mountain goat" exploiting meta, let's introduce concussion + forgetfulness in this game as a physical and mental affliction. Let's assume, that if players get injured their wrist or ankle in the mountain especially when the player attempt "mountain goat" when climbing down the steep terrain, they also received the head injury, which brings concussion based on random chance. Steeper the cliff/hill, more chance of concussion. And, let this concussion brings forgetfulness to players for some amount of time. This way, players need to take a huge risk when they attempt "mountain goating" from the top of the mountain or cliff. 

To prevent too widespread concussion and forgetfulness, I think it would be better to limit the region to induce a chance of such head trauma. Like, the famous "mountain goat" region in Mt. Timberwolf, and other steep cliffs where players are supposed to go down the hill/cliff using ropes. It would be better to leave the normal hill or very localized terrains with steepness out from concussion and forgetfulness. Because this can be annoying. 

All times in these posts are in-game time, not real-time. 

Symptom

A. Concussion

1) Bleeding from the head. 

- Same with other bleeding. Requires bandage to heal.

2) Loss of sense of balance/spatial orientation

- Stagger, and slight loss of control (The same effect when player condition almost reaches to 0 and about to die. )

- Blur around the screen.  

- This lasts for 5~15 minutes after head injury. There's no way to heal. Just sit down and get rest. 

3) Headache

- Randomly appears for the next 2~4 days after head injury/trauma.

- Reduce concentration = increase the chance of failure of craft, repair, read, and any activity requires concentration under the influence of headache. 

- Very annoying = slow healing rate during sleep and during normal. 

- Random wake up during sleep. 

- Requires painkiller or rosehip tea to remove symptoms. But headache will continuously reappear for the next 2~4 days in random fashion. 


B. Forgetfulness 
Now headache is over, but the player would still suffering from traumatic damage to his or her brain. For next random 2~6 weeks, the player suffers from forgetfulness.
- After the player finishes their meal and move, there's a small chance to drop one random item in the backpack, during any random moment of the first 2 minutes after they finished the meal. 
- After the player wakes up, there's a small chance to drop one random item in the backpack, during any moment of first 2 minutes after they wake up. 
You forget something? You better go back to your route to check~! 

 

I will add more if I can think more. 

Edited by sonics01
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  • 3 months later...

I really like the depression idea. I was thinking of something similar a couple months ago. I wanted a depression mechanic that was triggered/increased by the looting of dead bodies, constant animal attacks, and the lack of any type of social interaction. If you don't treat the depression over time it progresses and affects your stamina and requires more sleep (lethargy) then leads to apathy where the character won't always follow your commands. It would eventually become despair where the character won't eat and slowly loses health and has an ever increasing risk of just laying down and giving up. I couldn't think of a good way to treat the condition (except a Wilson from Cast Away type of totem to 'talk to', or a new med item). My thought wasn't to make light of the condition but to emphasize how a lack of social interaction would affect someone surviving alone for so long who is seeing constant reminders that everyone is dead. 

 

On a side note loss of sleep should totally have a hallucination effect where you hear and see things that aren't there. Maybe a flash of hazy slightly opaque black fur just at your peripherals. Ever stay up a couple days without sleep? The world gets trippy.  

 

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On 6/29/2020 at 9:44 PM, sonics01 said:

Symptom: Once claustrophobia kicks in, the player cannot get into such a "confined place".  Or, let the player can get in the "confined place", but cannot sleep or past time, and cannot concentrate on any activity due to anxiety. 

what you suggest is the same thing than cabin fever but less punishing. I dont think it is necessairy.

 

On 6/29/2020 at 9:44 PM, sonics01 said:

Heal: Kills more than 50+ wolves without experiencing any struggle against a wolf.

This would be extremely annoying. 50 wolves is like the number of wolves you kill in a 150-200 days run.

 

On 6/29/2020 at 9:44 PM, sonics01 said:

You can make bear phobia and moose phobia in a similar fashion. For the bear phobia, introduce a higher chance to kicks in than wolf phobia, and heal the condition of 20+ bear kills might be proper. For moose phobia, introduce a higher chance to kicks in than bear phobia, and let's introduce 10+ moose kills to heal

No thanks again. this would literally take liek 100 days to achieve if you look everywhere on the map. and i am not talking about moose. moose can take from 1 to 30 days to spawn in a region.

 

On 6/29/2020 at 9:44 PM, sonics01 said:

OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) 

No thanks again. I think  that it would be so annoying. having to clean a gun every two hours wich is exactly every 12 mins in real time. just a waste of resource and it has no use in survival. i dont know how it could be emplemented but it would be for shure annoying.

 

On 6/29/2020 at 9:44 PM, sonics01 said:

Depression
Condition: If the character reached level 5 skill level for 6 or more skills, and if the character health is 100% for 5 days consecutive, and if the character experienced an average "feels like" temperature above 0 for 3 days consecutive, then introduce depression with a very small chance. The character gets bored with too easy and too comfortable surroundings. 

Now I think that is a great idea however there are too much variables for the illness to happend and the treatment is too boring and long to achieve. what i would suggest is that in order to get the illness you have to be well fed for over than x days, and being most of the times in positive temperatures. the idea of looting for a long time dead body is also great. also the treatment should involve reading, mending and those  type of task instead of making you unable to read or do things.

 now I think that the problem with all the other illnesses you shown is that the way to get em is always decided by the health and i dont think it is the way to go.

For the wolf fear. i have an idea: with the new darkwalker event two new afflictions are introduced: Anxiety and fear. now when a wolf or a bear is tracking you you have the anxiety affliction. if it last more than x time you get the fear affliction. if you experience fear more than x time in x days you will get  the wolf fear. wich will give you first auditive halluciantions and if it continues you get visual hallicinations. To heal this affliction you would need to craft and wear a wolfskin coat for x time. And if you have a bear fear, you will have to craft and wear a bearskin coat. I would like the visual hallucinations (if you already have em since a lot of time) to stay longer. like the imaginary wolf would have the time to jump on you and then he will disapear. then you would slowly get up like when the bear attacks you but without any wounds (physical wounds at least) if you get attacked by your hallucinations (of any type) more than x time in a save the hallucinations may never disappear whatever you do.

 

On 7/1/2020 at 8:04 PM, sonics01 said:

Am I wrong?

No you are not wrong. but on another side, I wouldnt want this mechanic to disappear. In the long dark you choose how you play and if you choose to lead a more risky life it is your choice. the mountain goat method is risky and brings its lot of dangers and inconvenience. i died multiple time by "mountain goating" and it is fine beacause I chosen to do so. now I would want it to be more risky it is already enough.

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2 hours ago, oplli said:

what you suggest is the same thing than cabin fever but less punishing. I dont think it is necessairy.

 

 

2 hours ago, oplli said:

This would be extremely annoying. 50 wolves is like the number of wolves you kill in a 150-200 days run.

 

 

2 hours ago, oplli said:

No thanks again. I think  that it would be so annoying. having to clean a gun every two hours wich is exactly every 12 mins in real time. just a waste of resource and it has no use in survival. i dont know how it could be emplemented but it would be for shure annoying.

 

Glad to see some responses from my old posts. Yeah, you are probably right, all my writings in here are just brainstorming effort, I 100% agree that my numbers are not a proper one. I just throwed an wide example as a brainstorming attempt, not that I mean these numbers are correct.

Yeah, and I agree some part of my ideas are too harsh and would be too annoying, I knew that even during I was writing this post months ago. I just wish to initiate some discussion and other ideas and other brainstorming. Again, this is my silly brainstorming effort, but if a part or some parts of these ideas would make this game much better, and if devs gave some attention, that will be my happiness for me. I don't mind if these ideas are incorrect because I knew these contents are way wild and too punishing.  

Glad you see your responses. 

2 hours ago, oplli said:

Now I think that is a great idea however there are too much variables for the illness to happend and the treatment is too boring and long to achieve. what i would suggest is that in order to get the illness you have to be well fed for over than x days, and being most of the times in positive temperatures. the idea of looting for a long time dead body is also great. also the treatment should involve reading, mending and those  type of task instead of making you unable to read or do things.

 now I think that the problem with all the other illnesses you shown is that the way to get em is always decided by the health and i dont think it is the way to go.

For the wolf fear. i have an idea: with the new darkwalker event two new afflictions are introduced: Anxiety and fear. now when a wolf or a bear is tracking you you have the anxiety affliction. if it last more than x time you get the fear affliction. if you experience fear more than x time in x days you will get  the wolf fear. wich will give you first auditive halluciantions and if it continues you get visual hallicinations. To heal this affliction you would need to craft and wear a wolfskin coat for x time. And if you have a bear fear, you will have to craft and wear a bearskin coat. I would like the visual hallucinations (if you already have em since a lot of time) to stay longer. like the imaginary wolf would have the time to jump on you and then he will disapear. then you would slowly get up like when the bear attacks you but without any wounds (physical wounds at least) if you get attacked by your hallucinations (of any type) more than x time in a save the hallucinations may never disappear whatever you do.

Thanks for your input about depression, your idea looks better than me!

And I'm also really happy and glad about new event contents and I'm enjoying this, and yeah, glad they are testing the concept of anxiety and fear. And yeah, your idea about wolffear and bear/moose fear sounds good with anxiety and fear afflictions. Hope they fine tune these contents and implement these in survival mode. As a one of the people who suggested mental affliction in this forum, I will be happy if they include anxiety and fear into survival mode. Plus more contents and more maps.  

Edited by sonics01
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On 10/30/2020 at 10:30 AM, Deadbolt0804 said:

I really like the depression idea. I was thinking of something similar a couple months ago. I wanted a depression mechanic that was triggered/increased by the looting of dead bodies, constant animal attacks, and the lack of any type of social interaction. If you don't treat the depression over time it progresses and affects your stamina and requires more sleep (lethargy) then leads to apathy where the character won't always follow your commands. It would eventually become despair where the character won't eat and slowly loses health and has an ever increasing risk of just laying down and giving up. I couldn't think of a good way to treat the condition (except a Wilson from Cast Away type of totem to 'talk to', or a new med item). My thought wasn't to make light of the condition but to emphasize how a lack of social interaction would affect someone surviving alone for so long who is seeing constant reminders that everyone is dead. 

 

On a side note loss of sleep should totally have a hallucination effect where you hear and see things that aren't there. Maybe a flash of hazy slightly opaque black fur just at your peripherals. Ever stay up a couple days without sleep? The world gets trippy.  

 

Great points, especially about linking the depression mechanism with sleep and stamina. Plus, I really agree that the influence of being cut off and loneliness would be more or less negative towards a lone survivor, especially if the survivor entered "flourish" stage. Once harsh moment of initial struggle against the nature is gone, and after people well prepared, then people will think about other things than survival. That would be the moment when things like depression kicks in. 

Well said about hallucination and lack of sleep. I also wish to see such contents in the future. 

 

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  • 1 year later...
On 1/3/2021 at 3:12 PM, ManicManiac said:

I think that something like "psychological/mental health" type mechanics would take a lot of nuance to keep it from feeling like an arbitrary negative consequence rather than just a part of the human condition that it truly is...


 :coffee::fire:
I will refrain from discussing it further... but that's my opinion.

Edited by ManicManiac
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I have to say that wanting a bit more realism in the game has to have it's limits.  As far as I can see cabin fever is nothing but pointless according to the majority of comments I've read. So adding something as complicated as depression would be even less welcome.    

I just can't see it being necessary in the game and I think the devs would have an incredibly hard time working it in.  

I think there's enough of it in real life as it is and we don't need a constant reminder of it in something that brings us that bit of happiness and escapism.  

Sorry but that's what I think.

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