I apologize if this has been discussed before, did a quick search and couldn’t find a related discussion.
Totally new to the game and found a shaving kit and hair trimmer. They both seem kinda worthless for the paltry morale boost they provide. Wouldn’t it be more worthwhile and realistic for them to provide long lasting morale bonuses that would encourage daily grooming? For example, trimming your hair could provide a morale boost for a few days and shaving provides a morale boost for about 12 hrs?
Anyways, I absolute love the work you guys are doing. Thanks!
Just adding to this, perhaps being ‘Clean Shaven’ or ‘Well Groomed’ could provide a small bonus to NPC diplomacy, though I’d be surprised if it didn’t already. Both could make them less explicitly useless short of RP.
No, seriously. I can understand how a good and clean hairstyle can give a small bonus to diplomacy/bartering and to morale, but I, as a wielder of a mighty beard (not all that mighty. Also, yes, i make this sound more epic as it is.) find it insulting to imply that a nice beard can’t also help with diplomacy and morale. I in fact would most likely have a very small morale malus if I would shave myself clean, because I like my beard!
I always thought the idea of it was that it was a small morale boost, but it was a very long lasting one. I might be mixing it up with something else, but I vaguely recall something giving a very small morale boost that lasted for days.
As a proud owner of a mighty beard myself I fully support your statement, but do tend to agree that shaving normally gives men a more “professional”, a more smooth “business-ready” look. Not on me personally, or maybe you, but there’s a reason why customer services and jobs that revolve around dealing with other people require you to shave and be as presentable as possible to their clients. For example, working in a bank requires you to shave, at least where I come from.
You can make this a game-y thing, where shaving equals trying to be presentable, and be valued by other humans more after access to basic hygiene-preserving tools has been lost in the post-apocalyptic world they’re living in. It shows an attempt to try and appeal to another person, which when contact with other humans is scarce can score you extra points in their book. “We’re all starving and freezing to death but this guy manages to look good even at times like these, surely he cares greatly about others’ comfort”.
That’s the way I’m looking at it, even if it doesn’t necessarily make sense from a realistic point of view.
You could easily describe it as grooming your facial hair as opposed to shaving it to stay neutral.
However, how do you handle people with no facial hair in the first place? Do they get the bonuses all the time?
[quote=“Kevin Granade, post:7, topic:13229”]You could easily describe it as grooming your facial hair as opposed to shaving it to stay neutral.
However, how do you handle people with no facial hair in the first place? Do they get the bonuses all the time?[/quote]
I guess you would have to abstract the bonus to something very generic like “well groomed”. Thus, it could apply to female characters to simply mean their hair has been recently cut, maybe tidied up into a bun, braid, ponytail, etc or otherwise secured. Eyebrows trimmed, legs shaved… I’m completely ignorant of women’s beauty care. Basically, using a grooming kit equates to the little personal care things that feel/look good but aren’t strictly necessary after the end of the world.
As for mutants…maybe some severe mutations simply prevent you from using the item. The price of choosing to become an un-human freak, I suppose.
Oh right, te discussion had kind of side-tracked into talking about beards and I was reponding to that. In general yea it’s better to just have a “well groomed” status available to everyone. Mutants have specific interaction penalties already, so no need to penalize them again.
