More to do, More Realism...

[KD7BCH]

I really like the maintenance mechanics we currently have with gun cleaning and with blade sharpening.

Some will say I am a pedant, yeah look it up, and other will say I'm right on. I figure my opinion is no more or less valued than anybody else but what I see in the feedback both the overwhelming positive and those that would not recommend the game after having played it is what I've said many times before. That is that more realism helps the game and the more gamey choices are compromises that don't really help it.

I also realize The Long Dark has gone a long ways farther than almost any other game working to incorporate elements of realism into the game and fundamentally games are art and that art isn't all about accurately or completely reflecting the rational and literal.

I would like to see additional realism added to the game requiring. Some in the form of time sinks and some as just more things to do. I would also like to see some additional items added. I posted these requests loosely all over the forums over the last year and thought I'd take the time to actually run though the list and reasoning behind each request.

Mechanics to tweak...

Stamina runs down based on how much you carry and how much you run and how rested you are. Id like to see more stamina on the character. To the tune of about 50% more. Meaning fully rested, you could remain awake for about 24 hour before being exhausted instead of the 16 hours or less. However to balance this I think walking speed should be reduced just a bit but running speed keep as it is.

Liquids, right now they don't freeze once melted. However this would be not so in many of the locations in the game. As a trade-off liquids on your person would continue to not freeze up, but but if liquids on the ground indoors and out were to freeze they would need to be heated to become liquid again. I don't know if the cpu overhead to track each containers temperature is beyond the level of the simulation the game can handle but it would be a good time sink and add realism to make it necessary to re-liquify water. Another trade-off for getting water might be to allow us to do that at fishing holes where we have to chip away the ice in order to get to the liquid water to pull fish out anyway. This water would obviously still have to be boiled to make it safe however it would not need to be melted.

Liquid storage. We should have to collect and also have to choose to save our used open food cans in order to store liquids and to boil the water. The endless free water bottle system should be scrapped in favor of a system which accurately limits your leverage of your total water capacity in line with the actual amount of water you could store.

Items to add

There are several items I would add to the current experience.

First, I would bring back the ability to craft arrow heads at the crafting table without having to forge them. I'd make these larger and less accurate than superior arrow heads that could be crafted as that would be an acceptable tradeoff. By less accurate maybe increase the circular error probability by one foot at 20 feet in game distance over the circular error probability of forged arrow heads.

Second & Third, I would add craft-able spears, and a "Lakestone". Meaning you could find a suitable length piece of wood and either use a rock or blade and sharpen it without the crafting table similar to how you would use the whetstone only instead of a whetstone you would use a "sharpstone" to make the spear pointy. Give it a timesink value of an 60-90 minutes with the stone and 20-30 minutes with the blade to sharpen. During the wolf encounters allow the player to throw the spear with a really low probability of hitting the wolf, direct hits would impale the wolf and cause it to run off as if struck by a bullet or arrow, only slower. A much larger probability, would be the spear could land near the wolf with the AI either dodging it, or running off or charging the player. Also allow the player to hold onto it and use it defensively should they have no other better weapon.

Fourth, Firebow, matches expire, magnifying glass only works some of the time, and well this would be an advanced way to make fire and reusable.

Fifth, Curing racks, these would be build-able racks for drying and curing animal stuff for use after their curing time or until processing. This craftable could be a decent 6-12 hour timesink but offer the advantage of improving the curing times by 25%.

Sixth, Snowshoes, in order to increase walking speed of normal walking as well as reduce fatigue these would be a long term craft-able 30-40 hours. Of course Hinterland is probably already working on this.

Thanks for the game and opportunity to post ideas.

[Dirmagnos]

Tiredness should last longer, i agree, But it should recover exponentially during sleep, so that 1 hour powernaps wont be that effective, like at 0.3 of current rate in first hour and then increasing by 0.1 for each following.

Spear throw accuracy could depend on distance to target and then additional check made if it actually did any damage, it could just graze an animal, since it lacks speed/power of a rifle bullet or even an arrow.