Marathon Survivor Mode - In it for the long haul

[vultures]

Quakes. Really, earthquakes. There are lava pits there already, right? Make 'em work for you; the epicenter is near, so it’s getting more intense on weekly basis.
Acid BURNS. You know what hell is like? Fire and Lightning, Ice and Rock all at the same time. It’s havoc that can bring serious destruction to the sector it struck badly.
Portals. If you invite guests, expect to see more of them. For every easy kill (of the latter) in a timespan, that isn’t followed by a kill of near/equal encounter rating to match the player’s abilities, another portal is open in the vicinity. Also, opening 'em near places of interest can hurt player’s ambitions even further.
Hordes. Have roaming hordes of Zs, really.

[Wanderer]

Quakes. Really, earthquakes. There are lava pits there already, right? Make 'em work for you; the epicenter is near, so it’s getting more intense on weekly basis.

Perhaps there’s a source to the quakes, a really weird artifact?

Acid BURNS. You know what hell is like? Fire and Lightning, Ice and Rock all at the same time. It’s havoc that can bring serious destruction to the sector it struck badly.

I agree, but definitively if we are having god-erasing acid rain, this have to be HUGELY warned, or else is very, VERY unfair. Not FUN unfair, but MAD RAGE unfair.

Perhaps the old mode of Journey to The East, where you must push to the east, or risk fighting against the giant mob of neverending zombies… and in this case, disasters?

Portals. If you invite guests, expect to see more of them. For every easy kill (of the latter) in a timespan, that isn’t followed by a kill of near/equal encounter rating to match the player’s abilities, another portal is open in the vicinity. Also, opening 'em near places of interest can hurt player’s ambitions even further.

In other words, or hard fights against guests, or - wait, this will eventually lead to a mass invasion .-.

The theme of full guest invasion haven’t been fleshed yet, so we could have some sort of guest intelligence guiding attacks against the player? So, if you don’t do much against them, fine. If you do, they start to send more prepared and planned attacks/actions?

[KA101]

[quote=“vultures, post:21, topic:1484”]Quakes. Really, earthquakes. There are lava pits there already, right? Make 'em work for you; the epicenter is near, so it’s getting more intense on weekly basis.

Perhaps there’s a source to the quakes, a really weird artifact?[/quote]

There are artifacts that can cause localized J-Hammering. Amp that up a little and it could suffice.

[quote="vultures, post:21, topic:1484"][i]Acid BURNS[/i]. You know what hell is like? Fire and Lightning, Ice and Rock all at the same time. It's havoc that can bring serious destruction to the sector it struck badly.[/quote]

I agree, but definitively if we are having god-erasing acid rain, this have to be HUGELY warned, or else is very, VERY unfair. Not FUN unfair, but MAD RAGE unfair.

Perhaps the old mode of Journey to The East, where you must push to the east, or risk fighting against the giant mob of neverending zombies… and in this case, disasters?

Uh, someone might want to use Construction? A mode that requires nomadic living could be neat-o, but shouldn’t have to be part of the 365-day mode. Three options from the Special menu: 365-Day Year, West* Or Die, Both, [and everything else].

*In New England, going to the East requires that you hit the Atlantic at some point.

[quote="vultures, post:21, topic:1484"][i]Portals[/i]. If you invite guests, expect to see more of them. For every easy kill (of the latter) in a timespan, that isn't followed by a kill of near/equal encounter rating to match the player's abilities, another portal is open in the vicinity. Also, opening 'em near places of interest can hurt player's ambitions even further.[/quote]

In other words, or hard fights against guests, or - wait, this will eventually lead to a mass invasion .-.

The theme of full guest invasion haven’t been fleshed yet, so we could have some sort of guest intelligence guiding attacks against the player? So, if you don’t do much against them, fine. If you do, they start to send more prepared and planned attacks/actions?

I’m not sure I understand the original idea here. If I’m reading it correctly, the player is required to seek out and defeat an “appropriate” (whatever that means) challenge every time xe kills a “less-than-appropriate” (again, that’s not clearly defined), or another Netherworld portal opens. If that’s the idea…seems wide open to argument over what constitutes an “appropriate” challenge, and as Wanderer suggests, will eventually be a kill-screen. I think a mode where the idea is to play for a really long time really doesn’t need a kill-screen.

[DWC]

For a long term game…

I’d say make the game easier, or somewhat less hostile at the start of the game. Start it off right after the cataclysm, no giant bees, fungaloids, triffids or anything else not established before the milk spoils in the refrigerator, then the world should get progressively worse as time wears on. Maybe even have more friendly NPCs, soldiers or something even, when they are working correctly. It should be fun to see everything collapse and fail and have the cataclysm unfold over a course of time at first.

With a long term game, there should be some difficulty scaling, perhaps leading to the survivor’s inexorable demise.

[Flare]

I’d like to see larger cities. MUCH larger cities. Cities that aren’t small villages. Cities that takes days to get out of on foot.

Did you steal the title from Nord Invasion?

[Mate]

[quote=“Flare, post:25, topic:1484”]I’d like to see larger cities. MUCH larger cities. Cities that aren’t small villages. Cities that takes days to get out of on foot.

Did you steal the title from Nord Invasion?[/quote]
That, and bigger forests, highways, etc.

[iceball3]

[quote=“Máté, post:26, topic:1484”][quote=“Flare, post:25, topic:1484”]I’d like to see larger cities. MUCH larger cities. Cities that aren’t small villages. Cities that takes days to get out of on foot.

Did you steal the title from Nord Invasion?[/quote]
That, and bigger forests, highways, etc.[/quote]The benefit of wider highways also.

When the engine makes it reasonable, maybe even planes and the like for regional travel?

[Mate]

I don’t think it’s reasonable to assume your character could fly, but abandoned airports, train yards, ports and industrial districts would be cool.

[vache]

Single engine planes like a crop duster or something would be easy for a single person to fly. Maybe require a high driving skill and a high mechanics skill to get one in working operation first?

[Mate]

With a chance of crashing.

[vultures]

There are artifacts that can cause localized J-Hammering. Amp that up a little and it could suffice.

Well, there must be some way to handle obstacles since (sorry coders) NPCs don’t hamper character’s ambitions in 0.5. It’s only a mild curve to the world, one that will suffice as a statement (e.g. “See this? Keep up building your hesitation skill and see what happens”).

Uh, someone might want to use Construction? A mode that requires nomadic living could be neat-o, but shouldn't have to be part of the 365-day mode. Three options from the Special menu: 365-Day Year, West* Or Die, Both, [and everything else].

*In New England, going to the East requires that you hit the Atlantic at some point.

I’m really not a fan of the whole New England intrigue, mainly 'cause it’s just a landscape rather than ecosystem. And it brings up the whole Middle Earth tale; it’s just you and a scenery you’ve been stuck in. There is no way in the world that the western issue is more adaptable than anything else only to justify it with line-coded continental climate.
I’ve seen some point in Wanderer’s words; one could find itself in midst of raging fires, acid “lakes” and such. But mapping points of interest and using them for picking up with the pace of a hazardous world should be one of the main things if the player is up to the Marathon challenge, the way I saw it.

I'm not sure I understand the original idea here. If I'm reading it correctly, the player is required to seek out and defeat an "appropriate" (whatever that means) challenge every time xe kills a "less-than-appropriate" (again, that's not clearly defined), or another Netherworld portal opens. If that's the idea...seems wide open to argument over what constitutes an "appropriate" challenge, and as Wanderer suggests, will eventually be a kill-screen. I think a mode where the idea is to play for a really long time really doesn't need a kill-screen.

The only original thing about it is that of portals spawning near each other. Dangers connected with them should be somewhat balanced. But if you defy game’s balancing simply on avoidance/hit and run basis, the game should pick it up - better than ignore it.
The Challenge Rating is what you get when the game assumes you’ve found and used that power armor, aided your cause with CBMs and you’re already making zombie butter with a mounted machine gun. Essentially it’s dynamic - but every instance of dynamic spawning playing CataDDA static mode from the start brought this up and it’s been somewhat fair.
Essentially, there was a slight influence of nature’s forces, or forces that be if you will, in my reasoning. If you waste a woodland creature (say, a wolf, or a fox) there’s ought to be a dozen of predators that want to check it out at some point. Now if you don’t clear out them as well the area would become more challenging, not much else.

[Iosyn]

No time dilation? So milk won’t spoil on day one?

Nah, I kid. It does sound like a very nice feature, hope you guys can get it stuck in. Looks like construction would be a bit unwieldy, but in all honesty I’ve never really seen the purpose of building your own buildings (except additions, defences, fences etc) when there are already abandoned ones that are mostly in decent, safe places.