Hallucinations that can hurt you

TheGrifter · 2014-01-26T01:51:58.000Z

Okay, so you’re out of that awful temple, and you’ve got the artifact, some dead eyed idol. And suddenly the floor of reality drops out, and you’re in hallucination mode. All sorts of things fading in and out…

Only they’re real. Now, there’s some bit of coding that prevents hallucinations from harming people, but it could be removed for maximum fun.

FunsizeNinja123 · 2014-01-26T02:56:08.000Z

Meh, would like a warning if you use/have it.

Inadequate · 2014-01-26T03:35:49.000Z

This is a pretty stupid idea that goes against the entire point of hallucinations. If they can hurt you, then they’re just another monster. What’s the point?

FunsizeNinja123 · 2014-01-26T03:40:52.000Z

No one else can see them.

TheGrifter · 2014-01-26T03:43:17.000Z

Perhaps there’s a 1 in 300 chance of spawning a real one per hallucinated monster. Something to change it up. Keep them on their toes.

Inadequate · 2014-01-26T03:50:59.000Z

Considering how regular monsters already exist, this doesn’t seem like a large enough change mechanically to be worth bothering with.

ClaytonRISING · 2014-01-26T05:57:14.000Z

Inadequate:

This is a pretty stupid idea that goes against the entire point of hallucinations. If they can hurt you, then they’re just another monster. What’s the point?

I concur.

EkarusRyndren · 2014-01-26T08:10:22.000Z

Clayton:

[quote=“Inadequate, post:3, topic:4865”]This is a pretty stupid idea that goes against the entire point of hallucinations. If they can hurt you, then they’re just another monster. What’s the point?

I concur.[/quote]

Except that there’s a small problem with hallucinations as is, There’s no doubt in your goddamn mind at all that you’re hallucinating and not at any risk what so ever. It might be worthwhile to make it so once in a blue moon a real monster spawns so that that whole “It’s not real, there’s no reason to panic” goes away.

Straume21 · 2014-01-26T08:50:52.000Z

I think it’d be a cool idea. Realistically, in a hallucinatory situation, the person experiencing the hallucinations is unsure of the reality of their hallucinations to a certain degree, and when the player is entirely confident that every monster they see is fake, it takes away the validity of the hallucination as a realistic event. There isn’t a “scared” trait that decreases stats, so all of the mistakes that come along with fear in real life are nerfed when you have an outside player controlling the subject in-game. The realism of the character’s fear is meaningless because it doesn’t affect gameplay, so I think adding a twinge of doubt in the player’s mind as to the reality of their character’s hallucinations would make the whole situation of hallucinating more realistic.
And I think the question we have to ask here is whether or not this is at least in part a Matrix-like world where events in your character’s mind affect your character’s self. I mean, we already have dreams that produce mutations. Maybe the character could hallucinate damage done to them by the hallucinations too, and then have all of the damage done by the monsters wiped when the character stops hallucinating (or not, if the game really is like the matrix).

EkarusRyndren · 2014-01-26T08:57:47.000Z

[quote=“Straume21, post:9, topic:4865”]I think it’d be a cool idea. Realistically, in a hallucinatory situation, the person experiencing the hallucinations is unsure of the reality of their hallucinations to a certain degree, and when the player is entirely confident that every monster they see is fake, it takes away the validity of the hallucination as a realistic event. There isn’t a “scared” trait that decreases stats, so all of the mistakes that come along with fear in real life are nerfed when you have an outside player controlling the subject in-game. The realism of the character’s fear is meaningless because it doesn’t affect gameplay, so I think adding a twinge of doubt in the player’s mind as to the reality of their character’s hallucinations would make the whole situation of hallucinating more realistic.
And I think the question we have to ask here is whether or not this is at least in part a Matrix-like world where events in your character’s mind affect your character’s self. I mean, we already have dreams that produce mutations. Maybe the character could hallucinate damage done to them by the hallucinations too, and then have all of the damage done by the monsters wiped when the character stops hallucinating (or not, if the game really is like the matrix).[/quote]

I like this idea. The question is how do we go about implementing “fake” damage. XD

deadmerits · 2014-01-26T09:02:25.000Z

The last couple times I hallucinated I actually took real damage. I attributed this to the fact that I didn’t know the hallucinated monster wasn’t real and injured myself trying to defend myself form the imaginary enemy. Maybe something like that with a text to explain what was happening.

The Athletic Zombie attacks. You attempt to defend yourself from the imagined horror but end up scratching and tearing at your own skin in your confusion.

Straume21 · 2014-01-26T09:11:34.000Z

[quote=“deadmerits, post:11, topic:4865”]The last couple times I hallucinated I actually took real damage. I attributed this to the fact that I didn’t know the hallucinated monster wasn’t real and injured myself trying to defend myself form the imaginary enemy. Maybe something like that with a text to explain what was happening.

The Athletic Zombie attacks. You attempt to defend yourself from the imagined horror but end up scratching and tearing at your own skin in your confusion.[/quote]

That’s actually a really good idea. I don’t like how absent of negative effects hallucinating is in the game. At the very least, it should have some stat loss during the hallucination, but your idea is a really good one and fits pretty well into the whole idea of hallucinating in general.

infectedmochi · 2014-01-26T11:17:45.000Z

Since the character can’t diffrentiate between reality and imagination when halluciating, I think a penalty to Perception would be reasonable. As for fake damage, I really the idea of having fake damage, I think the game could go even further and fake detrimental statuses that come with fake damage too, like Pain and move speed lost or stat reducition.

John_Candlebury · 2014-01-26T11:25:27.000Z

I remember the glitch that made hallucinatory monsters real if you saved while they were active. Suddenly Amigara horrors in your bathroom, fun times.

But yeah having hallucinatory damage that returned to the actual values when you return to normal would be nice, perhaps some phantom pain too.

Inadequate · 2014-01-26T12:59:16.000Z

At this point it stops being about hallucinatory monsters and just loops around to actual invincible monsters you have to avoid. Why even make them hallucinations at that point? If that’s what you want you can make a separate suggestion for that, but why even try to legitimize them as hallucinations?

Datanazush · 2014-01-26T14:23:22.000Z

Inadequate:

At this point it stops being about hallucinatory monsters and just loops around to actual invincible monsters you have to avoid. Why even make them hallucinations at that point? If that’s what you want you can make a separate suggestion for that, but why even try to legitimize them as hallucinations?

I haven’t played the experimentals recently, but have they been made invincible? Because last time I checked, you could disperse them with a strong glance, I’d hardly call them hallucinations.

Inadequate · 2014-01-26T14:29:36.000Z

I meant the more recent proposals made in this thread. If you have ‘fake’ damage and ‘fake’ stat effects corresponding to the damage, eventually it becomes less about hallucinations and more about straight-up dragging you into a weird dimension where monsters appear out of nowhere, but you can’t hit them because then you end up hurting yourself. At that point they loop from being weird and unsettling to just regular overpowered monsters. If invincible monsters you can’t damage and can only dodge for a while before they disappear is a thing you want you can make another suggestion thread for it, but don’t try to shoehorn it into the hallucination mechanic.

KA101 · 2014-01-26T15:25:43.000Z

Two problems I’m seeing here.

a) No clear way for the player to know “you are now leaving the previous game-reality”. At least with the Tome Of Eternal Darkness they had to affirmatively read it–still not ideal, but a clear interaction event. Sticking people with this for just grabbing something seems way too harsh. (How else are you going to interact with it? no item-examine whilst it’s on the ground, IIRC.)

Making folks afraid to touch things for fear that they’ll get permanently Screwed–I’ve not seen anything in either of these threads about ways to cure the problem–discourages experimentation. Bad Thing, IMO. If dropping the idol or the Tome lets the penalty-state time out, then I might think about it.

b) Hallucinations are fake and should stay that way. When one’s weapon stuck in them, we considered that a bug. Likewise there’ve been times when hallucinatory critters did do real damage. Bug also. Pretty confident we cured the problem where hallucinations could interact with terrain. There’s a long tradition of “hallucinations can’t affect reality” in Cata.

I’d rather not have to check bug reports for whether or not someone entered this penalty-state, especially when people might not know how or why they did so.

Cultist tip 116 seems relevant here.

John_Candlebury · 2014-01-26T15:34:42.000Z

Yeah once you think it twice, hallucinations doing phantom pain and damage is not a good idea. I guess that if we want to make more dangerous we should make them contex based aka (you hallucinate zombies mostly in cities, bugs in the wilderness, ants in actual ant infested locales sewer monsters while underground, etc) so that its harder to tell if they are real or not.

EkarusRyndren · 2014-01-26T22:32:45.000Z

Inadequate:

At this point it stops being about hallucinatory monsters and just loops around to actual invincible monsters you have to avoid. Why even make them hallucinations at that point? If that’s what you want you can make a separate suggestion for that, but why even try to legitimize them as hallucinations?

When did they become invincible? Hallucinations disappear after any damage is done to them (hell I’m not sure but they disappear even if you miss?) “Why even try to legitimize them as hallucinations” because as it stands the second you start hallucinating it becomes very, very, very obvious that there is no danger whatsoever from the creatures spawned as hallucinations. Which defeats the point.