my idea is simple:
1)allow players to switch control to an npc that has a high enough trust
2)in the event the player dies and you have an npc that trusts you enough you automatically switch to them
I think this is balanced from the perspective that you control your faction through the faction leader.
some more details:
-you can only switch voluntarily in talking range
-on death you switch to the closest valid npc
the second point means you switch to someone else in your party if your player dies and if your party gets killed off you then can then switch to someone back at base
I have no idea how this would be implemented but it seems interesting enough to be worth sharing.
technically speaking: if you die as one character, make a new character, (on the same world) and go to the same spot you died in the world, you will find not only the world as you changed as that character, but also your dead body and all your stuff.
In principle you are right however some practical differences.
-your quests reset
-you lose all are npc followers
-you pawn away from your base
-spawning in an already existing world doesnât make much sense from a roleplay stand point (what was your new character doing since the cataclysm)
-while switching to one of your npc makes sense from a roleplaying sense
no you dont lose any followers, they stay in the spot where you left them and will follow your new character as if they were the same person, yes your quests reset but there really isnt any quests in this game youâd want to complete more than once, you could consider that a downside of having died, without having to fully reset. you dont respawn away from your base if the starting point of your spawn is your base insert roll safe meme, but part of the challenge (and punishment) for dying would be getting back to your stuff, as many survival type games do when you die.
reviving yourself definitely doesnt make sense from a roleplay standpoint, whereas spawning as a new person you could argue you came across a lucky-yet-unlucky survivor who happened to die to the elements and was unlooted.
regardless, taking over one of your npcâs would make you a character apart from your character⌠you would have diffrent stats, the quest system wouldnt carry over (hey are you freinds with that guy i sent to look for that thing? i dont trust you enough to do it.) and youâd have to go find your dead body anyway. why not roleplay yourself âbecoming a new personâ and filling the shoes of your now dead character
you do have a fair point of the lucky-yet-unlucky survivor
my thinking was playing from the perspective of you control your faction through your the current leader (the person you play as)
- under this view swapping characters is just swapping leadership roles
- I was thinking the quest system would carry over since your faction is doing the quest for the questgivers benefit not the specific player you were playing as. So for the quest giver its a question of if they trust your faction enough not the individual character.
-you donât need to go find your dead body if your base is well stocked enough since you could just make do without the stuff you lost.
-this is a reasonable approach since evidently where you died was very dangerous
-lastly there is the whole if you are exploring in a group and your player dies you could carry on with the rest of your group without having to travel to where you died.
-just approaching your group is dangerous for them because as soon as they enter the reality bubble the fighting will resume without you having the ability to influence the outcome until you get close
edit: also just spawning in new characters endlessly means the is no true âgameoverâ. in the extreme case this could result in you being able to do things like die a dozen times exploring a dangerous location with no lasting consequence.
it does also still have the same downside as any long game of cataclysm does: enemies respawn, loot in buildings does not.
i mean i get what youâre going for, a similar idea would be state of decay 2 (or the not-as-oft played survivalist: invisible strain), where you can be whoever you want to be at any given point in time and everyone has their own stats and whatnot⌠but i feel that then defeats the purpose of having a player made custom character to begin with when you could just swap out to someone whoâs much better off.
⌠also npcâs in this game are still dumb as a box of rocks, and often get killed well before i do.
my understanding is that zombies (the main enemy) donât respawn, just move around and evolve
triffids and fungi do respawn in a sense though
your right in that it would kind of make the custom starting character irrelevant in the long run
the only 2 things that make another character better off is stats and equipment.
once you gain their trust you can âborrowâ their gear.
while better stats can be dealt with by restricting npc spawning to be within the restrictions you have when creating a new character
-since npc stats are randomly selected your starting character would be better by virtue of having the stats you desire.
-npcs in your scavaging group may die before you, but the ones back at base (farming, crafting or just standing around) are almost certainly surviving just fine.
thanks for letting me know I was unaware that post existed. In hindsight I probably should have looked up to see if someone came up with the idea first.
Yea Iâm not hostile to this concept, founding a settlement means you can establish some kind of continuity despite the fragility of a single survivor, and losing individual members of your faction would still be quite costly.
i do think itâd be a good idea for people who want it as well, and from the other thread there seems to be a couple people whoâd be willing to work on it, i was mostly giving alternatives in case it never happens (as a lot of suggestions seem to just end up suggestions, with nobody to pick it up and run with it.)