Loot variety improvements and tweaks

BeerBeer · 2016-10-10T12:30:07.000Z

To quote myself:

Incidentally, none of the firearms found ever have any accessories, nor are they ever pre-accurized.

I realized that when we find items and loot, they, for example, always come completely empty of charges OR fully charged. Why not have a mixed (random) amount of charges left. Especially the electronics store devices could always/mostly be empty.
Guns are never modded. Never pre-accurized. No scopes, attachments or anything.
Melee weapons could also be very rarely found pre-sharpened/enhanced.
Looted clothes are never pre-reinforced let alone have like extra leather patches sewn into them.
When we find devices, they’re always turned off. It might be a nice touch to find some devices turned on, presumably forgotten that way.
No devices ever contain extra battery mods or UPS mods. Maybe have them appear very rarely?

Note that I haven’t played in a long time… Some of these might already exist. Let me know!

Random_dragon · 2016-10-10T17:48:53.000Z

Since lighters at least can spawn with random charges, and clothing (or items in general) can spawn with random damage, it should be possible to include random variations in charges for tools. Reinforced might be available as a damage integer to cite, but unsure.

BeerBeer · 2016-10-10T18:48:04.000Z

True… This is what DOES occur:

Lighters have various charges (except gasoline lighters?)
Guns can have a varying amount of ammo (although crash site guns never have magazines… bug?)
I think food containers are ALWAYS full? Is this true? Like, bottles of clean water or juice. Alcohol.
Chemistry stuff always comes in full containers: jugs of bleach… you name it.
Soap always comes with full 10 charges.
Duct tapes always have 100 charges, or more. Never like 245 or 181, or other OCD-hating numbers.

I mean, I guess I can understand that we can’t have partially filled cans of soda or beer or canned food…

This, the items always coming in full charges, could be a gameplay balance issue. If the charges are cut across the board, it would surely make the game a bit more difficult. But it could be compensated by increasing item drops.

Random_dragon · 2016-10-10T18:58:33.000Z

Yes, and I’m suggesting that we have the means to make those full containers, tools, and stacks of duct tape spawn with random quantities.

John_Candlebury · 2016-10-10T20:55:24.000Z

As far as I’m aware, current system wont entirely support it. If you added the property to gallon jugs of bleach and duct tape they would spawn depleted everywhere, even where this makes no sense, like in stores.

Sharklaser · 2016-10-11T07:38:48.000Z

John Candlebury:

As far as I’m aware, current system wont entirely support it. If you added the property to gallon jugs of bleach and duct tape they would spawn depleted everywhere, even where this makes no sense, like in stores.

Well, tie the generation of goods to the location. Stores would be flagged as PRISTINE_LOOT - while normal houses would not have a flag, generation algorithm already considers location so adding this should not be a challenge at all. Because stores already contain different spawn tables the PRISTINE_LOOT could be tied to those specific spawn tables only, so their sellable commodities would be pristine but other stuff in the back room wouldnt.

Zireael · 2016-10-12T18:07:02.000Z

John, how difficult would it be to extend whatever the cash cards and lighters do to have variable number of charges, to other items?

Pandromidal · 2016-10-12T19:37:46.000Z

Concerning randomized item charges. How would this make the game more fun to play?

[Rephrased for clarity]

BeerBeer · 2016-10-12T20:02:53.000Z

[quote=“Pandromidal, post:8, topic:12703”]Concerning randomized item charges. How would this make the game more fun to play?

[Rephrased for clarity][/quote]
Are you saying it wouldn’t?
Are you saying all items should come fully charged?
Is that more fun to you?
It’s not about fun as much as novelty and a grain of realism.

Pandromidal · 2016-10-12T20:32:52.000Z

[quote=“BeerBeer, post:9, topic:12703”][quote=“Pandromidal, post:8, topic:12703”]Concerning randomized item charges. How would this make the game more fun to play?

[Rephrased for clarity][/quote]
Are you saying it wouldn’t?
Are you saying all items should come fully charged?
Is that more fun to you?
It’s not about fun as much as novelty and a grain of realism.[/quote]

In general I think we should avoid changes that mess up item stacking.

BeerBeer · 2016-10-12T22:12:38.000Z

Oh. I guess there’s that. Decent point. Wouldn’t be a deal-breaker to me though.

John_Candlebury · 2016-10-12T22:28:07.000Z

Zireael:

John, how difficult would it be to extend whatever the cash cards and lighters do to have variable number of charges, to other items?

Honestly I wouldn’t know. I believe its already possible but would have the problem of spawning half drunk water bottles inside vending machines and other places

I’m a contributor because I moderate the spanish subforum, not for my coding abilities.

Coolthulhu · 2016-10-12T22:34:56.000Z

It could require reinventing some group related settings, but I think it would be relatively easy to have inherited charge multiplier on groups.
For example, rolling from 0 to 1 and applying it to all charges in a group, resulting in some groups dropping mostly used up items, such as half-empty bleach jugs and radios with 1/4 the charge.

BorkBorkGoesTheCode · 2016-10-13T07:25:26.000Z

Can ammo spawn with less or more than the stated “count”: number? I have been getting stacks of slightly random quantities of bullets recently.

BeerBeer · 2016-10-13T10:37:56.000Z

I guess one more downside would be that the player would have to perform more ‘unload’ operations if he desires to combine partially filled containers.

And if we acknowledge that, the next step would be to automate the chore of combining the contents.

And then we might as well again have full containers only, just less of them to keep the loot level same.

The player would end up with more empty containers and other packaging anyway.

So… Is this pointless realism after all? Even if it did have some novelty value? How long would it take a fresh player to ask for full containers again?

Is this mod-worthy?

I mean, I guess fresh players would be LONG immune to the partially filled containers, but to the more experienced of us, we might just see the change as an added chore.

Edit: Containers aside, the gear tweaks would still make things interesting. Would you keep an accurized .38 pistol over an unmodified slightly damaged 9mm pistol if you had 12 rounds for the .38 and 20 rounds for the 9mm? Would you change an undamaged MBR vest to a reinforced kevlar vest?

mugling · 2016-10-13T10:51:09.000Z

Pandromidal:

Concerning randomized item charges. How would this make the game more fun to play?

This sounds like a UI nightmare for no tangible benefit.

Chezzo · 2016-10-14T10:52:57.000Z

When I found a soldier zombie with cigarette pack(3) and lighter(2), it made me laugh, and that was fun.

That would make me want to eat brains too, soldier zombie. I get it.