So I’ve been trying to get an NPC to tell me why it’s lagging behind but no luck. I ended up using debug to check it to find out if anything’s wrong so a small suggestion:
A no skill-check “Are you okay?” that won’t tell you anything the survivor would keep to themselves for whatever reason (Bitten, sick, etc) but would tell you “Hey, I’m carrying way too much shit.” or “MY LEG IS GONE” or “That horde of zombies I was holding off while you were sewing your pants has left me nearly dead, can I have some morphine plox?”
A more complicated vision of that being the NPC deciding how much it’s willing to tell you without a speech check but yeah. A little “my legs are broken” kind of response would be nice.
Honestly, it just shouldn’t be difficult at all to guess in a very vague manner how injured a person is, even without asking. Like, I can understand if the usual five bars is too much information. But just having a “not badly injured/badly injured/broken” system for each limb upon looking at a person would be perfectly sensible.
Example:
Torso * -
R. Leg * *
L. Leg - -
etc.
Vague enough that you aren’t like a psychic. Specific enough so that a guy with four broken limbs is distinguishable from a guy in perfect health or a guy with half his face bitten off.
There’s a lot of ways to convey injury through examination without necessarily giving you a bar or giving away too much. “His left leg appears to be injured, and he is limping. His breathing is heavy and labored. There is dried blood on his left arm, and he is holding it tightly with his right hand.” etc.
Any of those would be great if they were shoved under the “Size up” option. I figure sizing up a potential opponent/ally would involve noticing if they can’t hold any weapons for lack of arms.
That’s true. But if you fail, you’re left wondering why that NPC is chugging along at one tile an hour when I’m pretty sure that if I looked across the street at a stranger I could tell he’s carrying too much, or if he’s got a broken leg, etc.
I suppose if you have to associate a skill with it, run a first-aid check. I’m just saying, we can tell when a zombie is “nearly dead” why can’t we tell if an NPC is?
As far as ‘size up’ is concerned, an appropriate place for that might be under the ‘look around’ command. Based, perhaps, on the existence of an appropriate entity at the cursor location.
Sort of like…
Look Around …and ‘mouse over’ the NPC…
“You see Bob" Look Closer
"He is a humanoid creature that is gazing at you with nervous trepidation. He seems to favor his right arm and there is a badly bandaged wound on his left. He walks with a heavy limp, probably from a broken ankle.”
…and maybe not on that level as of yet, but it might be pretty simple to scan the wounds on an entity and do a check to see if they are visible. Maybe, instead of scan on examine, a flag of some sort that is attached to the character object relating to the inflicting of certain wounds over a certain threshold.
Perhaps closer to ‘his left leg is scratched and his right arm is bleeding profusely.’