Needful things (simple additions to improve the game)

[TheKobold]

If mobs besides Npc’s start opening doors we will definitely need door locks.

[Aggregate]

Absolutely.
grumbles about character limits

[ShadowDragon8685]

NPCs are enough reason to want door locks. Especially car door locks.
And maybe shock systems rigged up to the battery.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Characters with Marksmanship above a certain low minimum - like, 2 or 3 or so - should be able to control the size of bursts they make even with a weapon which is on full auto. At low levels they should be able to choose 5, 10 or 20; at medium levels add 3, and at high levels (Marksmanship 8+ or so,) the player should be able to enter a number of rounds they intend to fire between 1 and 20.

This would also make the trigger happy drawback more meaningful, as players with that flaw would still have an incentive to use firearms that go up to full auto, and thus risk ripping off a long burst, rather than just deciding that the flaw is free points by only ever using a semiauto for normal use and pulling out something with a full auto only at the times when they intended to do so anyway.

Instead of prompting the player before each burst, I would say that how it would work is that firearms with full-auto mode should have:
“Full Auto - Rock and Roll” that fires as many as possible. This would just be “Full Auto” if the player’s Gun skill is insufficient to control their bursts.;
“Full Auto - Long Burst” for 10;
“Full Auto - Short Burst” for 5;
“Full Auto - Three-Round Burst” for 3, all of which are replaced with;
“Full Auto - Custom Burst” when the player’s marksmanship hits 8. When the player selects this fire mode, they can enter a number, and the fire mode then displays “Full Auto - X Round Burst” where X is the number of rounds the player entered. Until the player attempts to switch off that fire mode again, that’s how many they will fire. If the player is using a weapon that only has the FA mode and switches fire modes, they enter a new number - such as if that nasty Shock Brute shows up at close range, you’re probably gonna want to enter ‘20’ and rock and roll.

This might have an additional advantage over switching firing modes in that switching the selector might take a (small) amount of time, whereas this is a declaration of the player’s intent and takes no time whatever. But that would require, I think, implementing selector switch use taking time.

As an alternative implementation to the above, you could have “Custom Burst” available at all levels, or even make it the only autofire option, and the player’s marksmanship determines how well they conform to their intentions - a character with low Marksmanship might fire too many, or too few, rounds.

[proxiehunter]

And maybe a lock on the wheelbarrow I’m dragging so they don’t walk over top of it and take everything that’s in it while my character apparently watches unable to do anything without a moral penalty for killing an innocent.

[psyxypher]

Allow NPCs who are hostile or scared of you to be reasoned with. It doesn’t make much sense for someone to run away from you when you’ve done nothing to threaten them and remain scared of you until the end of time.

[Dante]

I would like to not have to run over every NPC who gets the wrong idea on how friendly I am. I think my other NPC followers would mistake it as homicidal and psychopathic rage, when really I don’t want them to shoot me out of fear.

On the topic of this idea, how about being able to subdue NPC’s with different gas or take-downs to reason with them, or simply blow out a kneecap so they can’t bother me anymore without looking psychotic?

Also what if future traits focus more on personality and things that can’t be changed later in the game? Some of them don’t make too much sense, since they’re regular mutations mixed with defining traits that create the character personally rather than genetically.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Aikido and some of the other martial arts should be good for nonlethal takedowns - aikido particularly. CDDA handles NPCs so very poorly, though.

I guess you could have a nonlethal takedown option and if you subdue an NPC, you have the option of looting them as you see fit and then kicking them away (robbing them but without murdering them, for a smaller ethics penalty,) or just reasoning with them and explaining you did not want hostilities with them, and letting them go which would raise both their trust and fear of you automatically - after all, you had them at your mercy and could have done anything you wanted to them. It may or may not be enough to not make them run away and/or resume hostilities, depending on who they are.

[kuros]

How about just adding more responses to “What should we do now?” when talking to an NPC, to give ideas to new players about the variety of things that can be done in the game. Some examples:

NPC checks your skills/recipes list, and says, “We could probably use an X.” Possible values include: makeshift welder, folding cart, long bow, etc.

NPC asks for better armor or weapons, again based on your skills to produce.

NPC suggests looking for locations likely to have certain items.

Stuff like that.

Also:

DVDs and players. The ability to build a functional TV set that you can watch entertainment/training videos on. Tutorial videos you can watch on a tablet.

[druidniam]

The ability to build a functional TV set that you can watch entertainment/training videos on. Tutorial videos you can watch on a tablet.

Thats capable via modding.

[psyxypher]

An Electric Combat Chainsaw. Because my rampages must be UPS fueled.

[Dante]

Clumsy should be reworked some so the character actually seems clumsy. Some suggestions would be having a chance to drop items when picked up, a higher chance to fail crafting recipes with a unique message, a chance to spill food when eating, and maybe tripping every so often when running.

The current perk could be renamed heavy Step, since the character has more heft in their step.

Also a perk idea, Encumbrance Trained(or another name that fits better).

It would allow the player to experience less penalties for being encumbered, and most Military professions would get it since realistically they would be trained to wear their gear like a second skin.

[NEANDERTHAL]

Rename the “Filthy” in filthy clothing to “contaminated” or something similar. As it stands, it creates the impression that clothing gets dirty like it does in real life, which it should not. Besides, it seems that “filthy” clothing is just clothing that a zombie has worn.

[NEANDERTHAL]

Also, unify the “activate” “wield” “wear” and “eat” functions into one “use” button. Have items that would normally just be “activated” be “wielded” and then “activated” (with the exception of objects above a certain weight/volume; these you would not pick up and hold while using.)
For example, to play a game on their rechargable game watch, the player would press the “Use” key and select the watch. This would automatically equip the watch, and then play the game, in one keystroke. Say the player then wants to disassemble the watch with a screwdriver. The player presses the “Use” key again, which automatically wields the screwdriver (since it cannot be worn, and is not edible) and then dissasebles the watch. The player is then left with a screwdriver in their hand and a pile of watch parts.
The reason for all this is that
A) it doesn’t make sense for the player to be doing things like picking locks and eating roasts all while holding an axe or pistol in their hands, and
B) unifying the keys makes the game less tedious while still keeping the majority of the complexity.
The only “downsides” is that the player will be unable to wield shirts and socks as weapons, but who does that, anyways? Also, the furnace power CBM presents a conflict, but if you don’t want to eat your wooden hammer, just turn off the CBM.

[NEANDERTHAL]

Also, mutations should change the number of bionic slots availible, “popping out” bionics that do not habe enough space, with a great deal of pain/bleeding. Maybe bionics would also have a chance to turn into itchy metal things or other malfunctioning bionics when mutating.

[druidniam]

Rename the “Filthy” in filthy clothing to “contaminated” or something similar. As it stands, it creates the impression that clothing gets dirty like it does in real life, which it should not. Besides, it seems that “filthy” clothing is just clothing that a zombie has worn.

Filthy Clothing + Detergent + Washboard = Clean Clothing
Contaminated Clothing would imply you’d have to use disinfectant or something caustic to turn it into clean clothing which isn’t what the point is. The Zombie virus doesn’t survive outside the host, but dirty clothing is more likely to cause a bite wound to become infected and fester. The Tag is perfectly accurate in both function and description.

[NEANDERTHAL]

Then regular, uninfected corpses should be wearing filthy clothing as well.

[druidniam]

The randon scientists, drug dealers, survivors, military group corpses you find? Those are called “recently deceased NPCs”. Remember, when you gen a character, you are literally at T+3 Days since the end of the world. The uninfected were survivors just like you that ran a foul, usually from kreks or mi-gos, which aren’t plague carriers anyway. They’re bi-products of the teleportation research that brought the mother slime that caused the zombie outbreak and the mycus to appear. Craters in game are presumed to actually be tactical nuked portals rather than global apocalypse (but there is that too).

Edit: should be noted, undead started appearing at T - 7 days if I remember the design doc.

[proxiehunter]

We really don’t need to be making either bionics or mutations worse at this point. Bionics has already been nerfed somewhere between enough and too far and beyond a few specific mutation lines mutation seems to largely already make your character worse not better because they can no longer use most of the clothing and armor items in the game.

[psyxypher]

Have Hydrogen Cells and Fusion Packs either be mixed together as one item or have their number of uses be expanded. Currently, Fusion Packs are only used in one item that isn’t exactly that good on account of being a 2 shot, limited ammo weapon that will kill you if you use it too close to yourself. The Fusion Blaster Rifle also does the job of the Fusion Gun much better because of being solely UPS powered.

Hydrogen Cells are used in one weapon (that I’ve never seen, so I assume it only spawns in the Necropolis Armory), and even then they’d be wasted on that weapon because you could instead use them with a CVD machine to make ultra-powerful cutting weapons.

Feels like a lot of wasted potential here. Surely the lore can be changed so more research was done with these kinds of weapons before the Cataclysm, right?