Fitness and stuff

Game Talk The Drawing Board
1

Hey…
I have an idea about stats (str, dex, int, perc) - they should be altered by other ingame ways than mutations. What I have in mind is that if you regularly exercise, you get stronger, if you practice your brain, you get smarter (or at least think faster), and such… My idea is that stats could have same % like skills, which could raise up with exercises and activities, or go down, through stat rust and other things (like bad habits). Basically you could become stronger/faster/smarter/more perceptive than on start, or, you could become a retarded couch potato, depending on what you do. However, stat gain and rust should be way slower than other skills (with few exceptions), since they’re already too fast. That would make that one extra point hard earned, and wouldn’t mess with game balance too much.
Some ideas:

Strenght - melee, chopping wood, mining (if it gets implemented), exercising - either with calisthenics (could fit in that “wait for how long” console), or with exercise machines, dumbbells (could make an interesting weapon)

Dexterity - sprinting (if it gets implemented), throwing, exercising with tools above

Intelligence - practiced by crafting, speech, hacking, logic training gizmos like Rubic’s cube, chess etc

Perc - shooting, throwing

It’s just a basic construct (straight out of my head, my Int is somewhat low now), so there’s lot more space for ideas…

Gets me to something - there are lots of ways how to hazard with your health in Cata. Drugs, especially. So far there’s no long term penalty for using drugs, other than cravings, withdrawals and occasional heart attacks. If substance abuse would hit stats in long term, then it would balance using drugs a bit. I know few guys who wasted themselves on drugs, and it does have effect on the body, that’s for sure. Loss of weight, strenght, less perceptive, brain weakens both physically and intellectually, and other symptoms.

But, there are also performance drugs - anabolics, growth hormone and such. They could give you strenght and dex bonus in long term, and help you gain these stats faster, while having an effect on intellect and perception (not that it’s scientifically approved that 'roids cause dementia or something, just for the sake of gameplay)

It’s all just a basic idea, if you find it OK, feel free to add your own idea.

2

I Like that, gives more reason to waiting as right now i use everysecond doing something like finding food or crafting my ultimate base surrounded by flamethrower turrets xD

3

Recently had the same idea and used the search function.
I think this would be good for the game but to have it softcapped.

We could use the starting stats as Base Stats and add a “Dynamic” bonus or penality based on actions.
The farther this value goes the harder it is to move and the faster it regresses.
Each increase or decrease should be based on a monthly use value, so even if you go beyond you will only get one increase/decrease.
It would make progress require a certain playstyle rather than a grind.
Health could also be used in this upkeep requirement, making it easier to maintain when healthy and easier to lose when not.

Then each additional change would require more time to reach, like +1 would only take one month of consistently reaching the the requirement, +2 take two months and so on…This way you would need 15 months to reach your +5 plateau.
However if you started to neglect yourself it would only need one month to reduce from +5 to +4, but would need two months
of neglect to go from -1 to -2

This would make a difference for long term survivors and naturally increase your stats while maintaining a realistic level…
a 8 str char would have a very hard time to reach 15 str, but a 13 str char would reach 15 rather easily.

Tying it to common actions and limiting the actual possible growth discourages grinding.
Why grind something you can achieve simply by playing?

4

OK idea for a mod, but it would only worsen the problem the game already has, making it quite unfit for the core game.
A mod like Stats Through Skills.

The only simple way I see of making this work well would be assuming that the survivor starts out in the top form and then loses (rather than gaining) stats that are trained the least (going by ratios of training, not volume). Which is probably not what anyone here wants.
Starts are already tough, so starting out with untrained stats (and balancing game against trained ones) would only cause problems.
Endgame is already easy and adding extra stats there would only worsen the gap between fresh and old survivors.

5

seems to me that something along the lines of this would be FAR more balanced than stats-through-skills mod. Not all skill training would do much if anything, rather it would only be specific actions which would actually make sense to increase staid stat.

6

I find it strange that my character who has 8/8/8/8 stats can sit in a car and read for a week and have 18/21/15/12 stats when i’m done.

7

I find it strange that my character who has 8/8/8/8 stats can sit in a car and read for a week and have 18/21/15/12 stats when i’m done.[/quote]
Yeah it would seem to me like a more specific method of leveling stats, that can be (more easily?) soft capped, appropriately would be a plus.
Edit.
Just thought of something. I can’t think of anything (<.< ha, wording) that would level up perception. Somehow I instantly thought about hiding creatures. Would be cool if all the appropriate animals (deer, predators, etc…) had a “hide” skill or such that they could activate when holding still. They would remain unseen by others, until they decided to “break cover” and move, or until the one trying to spot them passes a perception attribute check. (similar to minefields) and maybe add a bonus to perception the longer the seeker is still. Just ideas to be tossed around.

8

Disarming traps? Playing music? Perception is all of your senses, not just sight–right? Making really long distance/difficult shots or attacking unseen creatures (Could blindfold self to practice)

9

true. Getting good martial arts should help perception too. Maybe add a “sixth sense” perk that lets you sense the location of enemies 1 block away, even if blinded.

10

Probably not. Seeing as that’s what antenna do.

11

:frowning: oh.