My ally is complaining that he’s suffering from Radiation sickness (hey, turns out, so am I!). I grabbed some Prussian Blue tablets, ate one, and then tried to Examine NPC -> Use Item On -> Prussian Blue, but it isn’t on the list.
I seem to be able to use bandages, medical gauze, hemostatic powder, and disinfectant, but no other drugs.
I seem to recall that NPCs are not smart enough to use items in their inventory that would solve these problems.
I feel like I should be able to use any drugs on my Allies. I dunno if they can even get colds, but I could see wanting to suppress their coughing, etc. I could even see getting a mood boost from sharing recreational drugs with them.
Ya but applying a bandage or disinfectant to a wound is different then applying a tablet into their throat, I mean they aren’t cats, well most of them aren’t.
If I can’t figure out how to do it under 5 minutes, it’s poor game design.
If I can’t tell that it’s going to work without potentially wasting a rare resource, it’s poor game design.
F*#$ your realism.
Edit: To be clear, that was a commentary on my disagreement of the general design philosophy of C:DDA, not an insult directed at any person in particular.
Sounds like a you problem.
Why don’t you just mod your own game to make npcs more willing to take pills if you’re gonna gripe so much about their “design” philosophy, it is open source anyways. Or just spawn another Prussian blue if you waste one on your distorted vision of realism of expecting someone to let you shove random pills down their throat…
It’s not really a ‘you’ problem if it involves the UI/process. You’re pointing out an issue with the game, and feedback is part of the purpose of the forum, I think.
I mean, I wouldn’t have hurled any profanity . . . but you’re not wrong in saying ‘if it takes more than 5 minutes’ to figure out something like giving your buddy medication, yeah, that’s not optimal.
Yeah, I realized a handful of seconds after I posted the profanity that it could have been taken as an insult, rather than an expression of my frustration, which was how I intended it to come out. Long enough that someone might have read it already, so editing it out felt like a cop-out.
Tone is forever an issue with online text-based forums.
Had I been more rational, I might have said something eloquent about how there are a variety of choices made in CDDA for “the sake of realism” which fail basic game design theory.
I was an amateur game designer decades ago, and read a fair few books on the subject. I’m sure the principles of game design have evolved since then, but the rules I studied back then still seem to apply in my mind.
I forget who wrote it, but one of the critical reads during that period for me was, “If it isn’t fun to do, don’t make players do it.” Trying to figure out how to make a process work falls into that category for me.
I just dealt with radiation on an NPC a short while back, and I can’t say I ever suffered the problem of not being able to figure out what to do. But then, I knew what to do beforehand, thanks to my experiments in shoving my NPCs full of mutagen.
Is unfortunately a thing that will probably always be around in a game as detailed and complex as C:DDA.
I suppose an “offer food/drink/medication” option could be added to the NPC interact menu, though.
Nothing wrong with realism. Your request is actually for more realism lol
What you really want is intuitive design. Which is rather complicated. A dev has to be able to ask his/herself the question and then figure out the ways in which it will function that is the most probable path to commit to this action.
I do this all the time here and the reason why is because I don’t code. So when you see my long drawn out threads with frame work. You then get a better picture of the idea. Not being sarcastic here when I suggest to you. Build a better framework for it and chances are the devs will put it on the list of things to do. Better the framework. More intuitive. All the better.
On that note. I think it works well enough with one exception. If the toon has an ailment. The correction in inventory. This should perhaps be an “if” have items in inventory = use corrective + wait X turns for result before another attempt.
I think that the quest for realism gets in the way of streamlining the user interface, not just in this game, but as a general trend in any game design. A lot of people will talk about wanting to add realism, but, as you say, without due consideration to implementation and clean presentation of information. We all know that the NPC system was thrown together quickly, and I am glad we have it rather than nothing at all. Now that it is in place, we can talk about how to streamline what’s there.
Your thoughts about frameworks have given me another idea, but I’ll make it a separate post.
