A few new traits/trait edits?

Game Talk The Drawing Board
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Parkour master edit - Make its so you can move through some objects that are normally impassable (Trees, car walls (climbing over them), display cases, etc) Like in the normal one you can move over stuff more quickly, make these normally impassable objects take the amount of time that it takes to move over stuff without parkour master.

Pacifist - Negative trait, Makes you feel bad about killing most things, leaves corpses barely damaged.

Anti-cyborg - Negative trait, Makes you unable to install CBMs on yourself.

Precise - Positive trait, Zombies take less hits to kill and are less likely to revive afterwards (Maybe a bit OP?)

Clumsy - Positive or Negative trait? Zombies are less likely to revive after your clumsy beating. Zombies take more hits. Occasionally drop random items from your inventory while walking around.

Sharp hearing - Positive trait, Instead of showing question marks for noises. Shows what is making the noise and exactly where it is. or replaces noises made by something that could be a threat with exclamation marks.

Unstable Genetics - Negative trait, more chance of getting a mutation from moving around areas like sewers or toxic waste dumps. Will randomly mutate while walking around. (Disables robust genetics to avoid exploitation)

So what do you think of these?

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[quote=“Samscale1, post:1, topic:1867”]Parkour master edit - Make its so you can move through some objects that are normally impassable (Trees, car walls (climbing over them), display cases, etc) Like in the normal one you can move over stuff more quickly, make these normally impassable objects take the amount of time that it takes to move over stuff without parkour master.

Pacifist - Negative trait, Makes you feel bad about killing most things, leaves corpses barely damaged.

Anti-cyborg - Negative trait, Makes you unable to install CBMs on yourself.

Precise - Positive trait, Zombies take less hits to kill and are less likely to revive afterwards (Maybe a bit OP?)

Clumsy - Positive or Negative trait? Zombies are less likely to revive after your clumsy beating. Zombies take more hits. Occasionally drop random items from your inventory while walking around.

Sharp hearing - Positive trait, Instead of showing question marks for noises. Shows what is making the noise and exactly where it is. or replaces noises made by something that could be a threat with exclamation marks.

Unstable Genetics - Negative trait, more chance of getting a mutation from moving around areas like sewers or toxic waste dumps. Will randomly mutate while walking around. (Disables robust genetics to avoid exploitation)

So what do you think of these?[/quote]

Pacifist - Would you feel bad about killing zombies and other abominations? Or mostly just ‘innocent’ creatures like other humans, animals, and stuff like that?

Anti-cyborg - Better name for this would be ‘Technophobe’

Precise - Sounds OP.

Clumsy- Sounds like a pain in the ass. Better be a big point cash out for taking it if implemented.

Sharp Hearing - Sounds like something not a lot of people would take imo. Would be a nice 1 point trait, but I’d just put the loose point into an attribute or something like night vision or anything else really

Unstable Genetics - There’s already a trait like this that can be gained from mutations.

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Anti-cyborg - Better name for this would be 'Technophobe'

Nice Idea

Unstable Genetics - There's already a trait like this that can be gained from mutations.

So? Why not have it available from the beginning.

Pacifist - Would you feel bad about killing zombies and other abominations? Or mostly just 'innocent' creatures like other humans, animals, and stuff like that?

Occasionally, not all of the time. Special zombies probably not. Randomly on normal zombies like if your character randomly recognised someone from before the apocalypse. Always for child zombies. Never from zombie dogs. Always from killing NPCs and more often than not on killing wild life. (Would probably pay out 4 or 5 points if taken)

4

Perhaps pacifist should be King Hearted - you can’t bring yourself to harm non-hostile NPCs?

Sensitive Immune System: The chance for being harmed from installing CBMs is increased. It’s possible to receive pain or injury even if you successfully install one!
Bad Temper: Failing something you attempt, especially convincing others, leaves you with a hit to your focus.
Depressive: You dwell on the negative. Bad thoughts linger longer.
Will To Live: When you are lethally injured there is a slight possibility that you will remain alive through sheer grit and wake up some time later. (perhaps successfully surviving reduces one of your stats by 1?)

5

I think that, to be accurate, a “Pacifist” trait would have to discourage any and all forms of attacking. Pacifism implies a dislike of violence itself, and the trait is more interesting when the penalty is applied broadly.

Also, traits that just give you a morale bonus/penalty in some circumstance or other are really dull and hard to notice in play.

Anti-cyborg - I don’t like how skewed the effects of this are; it’s a simple benefit early on, when you can’t install CBMs, but CBMs are really good so it’s really bad over the long term. You’re also sacrificing a huge amount of content, probably for some boring passive bonus like +4 dex or whatever. If bionics aren’t meant to be something everyone wants, then alternatives should probably be at least a little bit interesting, given how interesting bionics are.

Precise - A trait that just lets you do more damage (I think?) simply does not fit in with the others, whether it’s good or bad.

Clumsy - I don’t like traits that have a bunch of vaguely-correlated effects, some good, some bad. Randomly dropping items is a terrible no-good rotten idea.

Sharp Hearing - Letting you know exactly what made a sound, and where, is way too good. A trait that just makes it easier to hear things would be fine (these basically already exist, but as bionics and mutations only).

Unstable Genetics - It doesn’t really make sense for a character to start play with a trait that gives you random mutations and… no mutations. But starting with mutations is a bad idea, because it leads to startscumming. And it doesn’t make a lot of sense. And even if you don’t start with mutations, you could just take it easy for a day or so and restart if you don’t get what you want.

Xommers:

Sensitive Immune System: You already want to install CBMs in a safe place where neither pain nor injuries matter. This would probably be free points.

Bad Temper: It would probably make more sense as a morale penalty, not a direct penalty to focus? Also, morale (and focus, same thing) penalties are dull.

Depressive: I don’t like morale traits.

Will to Live: I don’t really like the idea. The bonus is too erratic; you either get nothing, or you get the only thing that matters. There’s already a decent adrenaline trait that gives you a last-gasp chance of survival without being quite so all-or-nothing.

6

I think for pacifist, it should give a slight moral loss while holding a weapon, but if you go to fight a zombie, for example, when you get next to the zombie, it should say something like “You do not have the courage to provoke violence, even against the undead.” Or something like that, and you don’t actualy attack. As for depressive, not only should it have a moral loss, but maybe make you do things slower, move slower, and with low enough moral make you kill yourself un-intentionaly? I don’t really know, as I know very little about depression. Probably shouldn’t work with the optimist trait as well…

7

I had a cool Idea for a Negative Trait

Cursed: It would make it so your character always has some weird negative effects from artifacts like blinding light, random transportation,
mob spawns on them, etc… I think this would be so cool to pair with schizophrenia to make the game seem like a much more horror filled game

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Lets not drag religion in this now.

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afraid of dark - while in complete darkness , you get severe moral penalty , have reduced dexterity by 1 or 2 and maybe have panic attacks when something appears in line of sight.

I’ve had an idea for this one for a long time , but i couldn’t find a good name.

also arachnophobe - your intelligence is reduced by 1 or 2 as long as any spider is in sight.

this one would be good if NPC’s get an upgrade.

very social - if you don’t talk , or see any NPC’s for long periods of time , at first you get mood penalty , then reduced intelligence and maybe even become insane.

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I’m not really talking about religion I just want to see some more crazy things from the world of cataclysm.

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Lets not drag religion in this now.
Nor will we drag in Fallout, and Jinxed. :-D
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I thought up a few more. The names could probably be edited, but these might be useful. Rather than downright annoying

Vampiristic: Can drink blood from corpses. (adds a new feature in which blood can be harvested into blood bags, or bottles or found in hospitals)

Strong stomach: Reduces the chance of receiving food poisoning from eating rotten food or tainted food.

Pyromaniac: Can set fire to small trees and brush and other wooden objects without having to use kindling like logs or 2x4’s (This one is just for fun)

Hunter: Corpses weigh less or corpses of wild animal corpses are never destroyed.

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Pyrophobic : You take huge hits to dexterity every time you’re near fire (5 squares away). +1 point

Heavy footed/Two Left Feet : You make more noise walking around than a normal person. +2 points

Gentleman : Gain +1 to Intelligence and Perception when wearing ‘gentlemanly attire’ -1 point
(Gentlemanly attire ; Blazer, suit, top hat, monocle, weilding a cane, dress shoes)

Cold blooded : Body temperature fluctuates much more than normal. You get very cold or very hot easily. +3 points

Allergies : You sneeze every few minutes when outdoors, and moreso in forests. (Sneezes cause noise) + 1 point

Terminal : You have a terminal illness. In ten days, unless you can find a cure (A special syringe in a lab and/or hospitals that only spawns if you have this trait) you will die. +4 points

Flammable: You’re made out of sawdust and tissue paper. Flames hurt you twice as much. +1 point

Flame resistant :You’ve played around with fire before. You can handle yourself around flames. Fire only does half damage to you. (Cancels out Flammable) -2 points

Aches : Thanks to past injuries, your joints ache. You’ll randomly experience low amounts of pain and impairment in that area of the body. +3

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These need a bit more details, but otherwise aren’t bad.

That could cause problems when cooking, as wood’s hella more common than batteries. I’d ask for 2 points at least.

“Loud Step”? Decent idea and pairs well with Light Step. I like it, though I wouldn’t take it personally.

[quote=“Tee, post:13, topic:1867”]Gentleman : Gain +1 to Intelligence and Perception when wearing ‘gentlemanly attire’ -1 point
(Gentlemanly attire ; Blazer, suit, top hat, monocle, weilding a cane, dress shoes)[/quote]
We’ve had this idea before. It’s nifty, but encounters problems around the fact masculine-coded dress clothes are much better-suited for survival (less encumbering, more storage) than feminine-coded. Apart from that, yeah, it’s an idea.

There already is a “Cold Blooded” mutation–speed loss when air temp below 65F. “Thermal Imbalance”?

Involuntary noise is tricky–coughing when ill is currently as loud as a flashbang grenade. Might the allergies give a chance to expel Fungal spores before they infect?

This seems very much a RNG-dependent trait. Either you get lucky and find both the building & lifesaving item (so the trait no longer affects you)…or you don’t (Dead). Extra bonus for finally clearing the Lab only to find that no syringe spawned. Oppose. :frowning:

[quote=“Tee, post:13, topic:1867”]Flammable: You’re made out of sawdust and tissue paper. Flames hurt you twice as much. +1 point

Flame resistant :You’ve played around with fire before. You can handle yourself around flames. Fire only does half damage to you. (Cancels out Flammable) -2 points[/quote]
I like the idea. Are these supposed to be available via mutation?

Would this ask the player to pick an achy area, as with Martial Arts?

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I suppose many of these could be mutations. As for the Terminal one, it would sort of be luck of the draw. Thats kind of the point. Hospitals would have a 100% chance of spawning the cure, labs a 75% chance.
Allergies I think would work pretty well with fungal spores. Youre much less likely to get infected, but the sounds of sneezes draw the fungal zeds in.
I never thought of the ache trait being a specifc area, but I think it’d work better that way.

16

I guess Hunter could mean no failed butchering.

My suggestion is:
Light Sleeper - You never find it difficult to fall asleep (although you might still wake from hunger/thirst/cold/noises).
The opposite of Heavy Sleeper.

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[quote=“Zireael, post:16, topic:1867”]I guess Hunter could mean no failed butchering.

My suggestion is:
Light Sleeper - You never find it difficult to fall asleep (although you might still wake from hunger/thirst/cold/noises).
The opposite of Heavy Sleeper.[/quote]

Insomniac.

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Serial Killer: You have strange urges. You have to kill an NPC every week, or else you will begin to suffer hallucinations and morale drain.
Black-out: You tend to forget large parts of your experiences if you drink a lot. If you get drunk, then you will “black out” and wake up in a randomly selected place on the map. You may gain or lose certain items.
Attuned: You always did know when something was deeply wrong with the area around you, but you couldn’t say why or what was specifically wrong with it. However, after the Cataclysm, this skill has come in handy. When an artifact or an extradimensional creature is nearby, a message will occasionally pop up saying "Something’s not right in this area."
Beserker: When you get angry, everyone wants to get the hell out of your way. If you take extreme amounts of pain, you will enter “rage mode” where your melee attacks are doubled in damage and you will not take further damage. However, this rage mode doesn’t last long.

19

I guess I should chime in with my thoughts as well.

Watched (+2)
Description: Everywhere you go, you simply can’t shake off the feeling that someone or something is watching you.
Effect: This is a milder version of, “Otherworldly attention”. From the start, the player increments the counter that goes into determining the spawn rate of otherworldly entities. The counter is capped at a reasonably low value, though; less than one would achieve with an artifact with the same effect. An artifact that causes this effect overrides the effect of watched and will allow the counter to continue to count up from its current value to however high it’s normally allowed to go. If the artifact is dropped, the value drops down to the maximum of Watched gradually, as normal.

Strong Back (-3)
Description: You can carry loads that would crush others. You can carry 35% more weight.
Effect: As Description. 1.35(Weight Capacity)=New Weight Capacity

Sadist (-2)
Description: You take pleasure in causing harm and pain to others.
Effect: Every attack that does damage has a chance (50%?) to raise morale by a certain value (2? 4?).

Non-swimmer (+1)
Description: You never learned to swim! Whenever you enter deep water, you sink like a stone to the bottom.
Effect: Player cannot swim, even if he has mutations that assist in swimming. Swimming skill is ignored and the player sinks as if he were carrying too much equipment.

Inconspicuous (-2)
Description: You are very easy to miss. It is more difficult for creatures to detect you. Machines are unaffected.
Effect: Non-machine creature sight radius is treated as 5(10? Might be too much) less for purposes of detecting the player. Machines, such as bots, manhacks and turrets, are unaffected.
Why: With static spawns the original doesn’t seem to be very helpful since you can always just sleep somewhere where there aren’t zombies and animals can’t or won’t break windows or doors.