Using rattlesnakes to train dodge

[Sterlin]

In playing the latest build (0.8-1517-g222b5cc)
I had just started up a new world and went out of my garage to hunt and found a rattlesnake, I started hitting it for awhile with a pocketknife and eventually it took out my legs and only did damage to my legs, which leveled up my dodge skill infinitely.

My pain is at 1935 and my skills are at 0, My legs are completely damaged yet im still alive with my dodge skill at 6.

[kevin.granade]

Mental note:
Make rattlesnake poison potentially deadly.
Let small monsters hit above the legs if legs are taken out entirely.
a) possible a straight override
b) possibly give player the “downed” status permanently if legs are at 0 HP
b.1) Reversed with crutches.

[i2amroy]

I’ve got some basic plans written up for some body part improvements already; namely:

1. Add a new level of hurt; “destroyed/mangled/some other name”. This can happen if a part goes enough into the negative health range.
2. Splints will fix broken parts. The only thing that can fix destroyed ones is the hospital machine (which gives it a bit of value again).
3. Monsters will still hit broken parts, but they can’t hit destroyed ones.
4. Once a part becomes broken you lose functionality in that limb (i.e. you can’t walk on it, use it to fire weapons, etc.).

Some other possible expansions:

1. Allow the player to select right/left handed on character creation. Mostly just flavor but you get penalties if your main arm is broken.
2. Crafting/skill/speed penalties if you try to do something with broken limbs.
3. Possible things that can allow you to get beyond some penalties (crutches?, wheelchair?)

[EkarusRyndren]

3) Possible things that can allow you to get beyond some penalties (crutches?, wheelchair?)

BIONIC LIMBS. HUZZA.

[i2amroy]

[quote=“i2amroy, post:3, topic:3535”]3) Possible things that can allow you to get beyond some penalties (crutches?, wheelchair?)

BIONIC LIMBS. HUZZA.[/quote]
I could see giving yourself a robot limb making it so that the limb has natural armor at the cost of not regenerating health naturally (though maybe you would have a “fix limb” option when you activate it, which would draw upon your mechanics skill to see if you could fix things).

[KA101]

Hmm. That would also imply needing to fix augs such as Alloy Plating, at least. Bionic maintenance could be tedious after a while.

Just checking, Kevin: by “potentially deadly” you mean your numbered list, or is that a percentage chance of instakill?

[kevin.granade]

More like a real rattlesnake bite, low (probably no) chance of death with a single bite, but if you stick around a get bitten several times you’re in trouble.
And not instakill regardless, venom takes a while to get things done with such a large disparity in body size. Also potential for antivenom, but um… unlikely you have it on you.

[KA101]

Was presuming rattlesnake venom worked in similar fashion to spider venom: not a joke, but survivable.

Having a delayed instakill would be a first for Cata, sinkholes notwithstanding. Was one of the things I liked.

[kevin.granade]

It’s a freaking rattlesnake >_<
What’s the justification for making it NOT lethal? Also it’s not an agressive creature. If it is in game that should be fixed. If you get bitten multiple times by a rattlesnake you were asking for trouble.
For example, “training dodge skill with a Rattlesnake.” That’s a Darwinization well deserved if I ever heard of one.

[KA101]

OK, so summarizing the IRC discussion: rattlesnakes shouldn’t be aggressive, any sort of boot should prevent their bites, and you’ll likely survive a one bite at a time. You’d need multiple bites to run a serious risk of death, and antivenom and Blood Filter would be solutions.

Black Widows, though currently the nastiest venom in the game, are apparently fictionalized (Blob, presumably) and not subject to comparison, unlike real rattlesnakes which are to be made realistic.

:-/

[EkarusRyndren]

[quote=“KA101, post:10, topic:3535”]OK, so summarizing the IRC discussion: rattlesnakes shouldn’t be aggressive, any sort of boot should prevent their bites, and you’ll likely survive a one bite at a time. You’d need multiple bites to run a serious risk of death, and antivenom and Blood Filter would be solutions.

Black Widows, though currently the nastiest venom in the game, are apparently fictionalized (Blob, presumably) and not subject to comparison, unlike real rattlesnakes which are to be made realistic.

:-/[/quote]

Well someone correct me if I’m wrong on this but the assorted spiders in the game are of the “giant” variety, implying the venom is tailored towards larger critters.

[i2amroy]

Black Widows, though currently the nastiest venom in the game, are apparently fictionalized (Blob, presumably) and not subject to comparison, unlike real rattlesnakes which are to be made realistic.

I’d like to point out that black widow venom is some 15x stronger then rattlesnake venom (dry weight based), with a LD50 dosage in the 1.39 mg/kg area. Even if giant black widows produced the exact same venom, their very size makes them highly lethal.

Average widow bite venom: .19 mg
Average black widow size: ~.00023 m^3
Average giant black widow size (1/2 average human size): .0375 m^3
Expansion factor: ~163
Average giant widow bite venom: 31 mg
LD50 threshold (kg/bit): 22.3

Since the average person in the US is about 81 kg, that makes the LD50 threshold for them at about 4 successive bites before 50 percent of characters would eventually die. This is a bit high for gameplay IMO so they can afford to be slightly less lethal.

[Zireael]

[quote=“i2amroy, post:3, topic:3535”]I’ve got some basic plans written up for some body part improvements already; namely:

1. Add a new level of hurt; “destroyed/mangled/some other name”. This can happen if a part goes enough into the negative health range.
2. Splints will fix broken parts. The only thing that can fix destroyed ones is the hospital machine (which gives it a bit of value again).
3. Monsters will still hit broken parts, but they can’t hit destroyed ones.
4. Once a part becomes broken you lose functionality in that limb (i.e. you can’t walk on it, use it to fire weapons, etc.).

Some other possible expansions:

1. Allow the player to select right/left handed on character creation. Mostly just flavor but you get penalties if your main arm is broken.
2. Crafting/skill/speed penalties if you try to do something with broken limbs.
3. Possible things that can allow you to get beyond some penalties (crutches?, wheelchair?)[/quote]

I like these ideas!

[timtek]

I love that right or left handed idea but I think it should be a random roll at creation time and also include a low chance to be ambidextrous.

[i2amroy]

I love that right or left handed idea but I think it should be a random roll at creation time and also include a low chance to be ambidextrous.

I’d rather have it be character controlled and then have a 1 point “ambidextrous” trait that players could select. There are some RP’ing players out there who would like to be able to select handedness after all.

[John_Candlebury]

Actually using a rattlesnake to train dodge sounds like some awesome insane training from hell

I propose making rattlesnake attacks having an extra difficulty to dodge at the advantage of every dodge you do pull out has a double exp gain so all those 6 level dodge characters have a (risky) way to continue to train dodge

[GlyphGryph]

[quote=“KA101, post:8, topic:3535”]Was presuming rattlesnake venom worked in similar fashion to spider venom: not a joke, but survivable.

Having a delayed instakill would be a first for Cata, sinkholes notwithstanding. Was one of the things I liked.[/quote]

Nonsense. Fungal infection, infected bite wounds, we’ve had several delayed kill status effects in the game for a while. Blood filter and royal jelly would both still probably purge your body of the poison. It really isn’t different from the sort of thing we already have.

[Rivet]

In-game, rattlesnakes are non-aggressive until you get right up on them.

I guess I kind of dropped the ball on their venom, since I just used the BADVENOM trait instead of making a new type.

[KA101]

OK. BADVENOM is Black Widow, so they ought to be deadly enough.

As for fungal and infection: those are eventually lethal and escapable with hours of game warning. (That said, good luck installing Blood Filter or obtaining Royal Jelly with them going.)

Rattler venom, as I understood it, would be much quicker. “Delayed instakill”, as I understand it, is “have the fix on you NOW or die” territory; 10 turns or so max. Sinkholes qualify because if you don’t have the gear, you’re stuck in there for good.

[prytoclasm]

Not really efficient, tbh. Just play along and you will train ‘dodge’ on the run.

Current char skills after roughly one ‘year’ playtime:

Melee: 14
Bashing Weapons: 14
Dodging: 12
Cutting Weapons: 10

Additional, Dodge is overrated.