Varying Levels of Bleeding

[Wally-kun]

Seems reasonable. Currently the only kind of bleeding supported in game is a rather significant one, presumably because an artery has been struck. It does clog on its own, but letting it go that long risks some very serious damage to specific limbs, or even death, if it’s in the torso or head. It has to be immediately treated with a bandage or whatever is on hand, or else.

But you bleed more than just from cut arteries. Why not have much more lenient bleed tiers? Max tier is what you have in game right now, when a Cougar catches your jugular or something. Bottom tier does menial damage over time, like if you cut yourself on a window and you draw like, a few drops of blood over like 5 minutes. Maybe it should be more serious if you’re going to inflict damage over time like that, but you get the idea. You should be able to bleed a little bit over a long time, like how you can currently bleed a lot over a short period of time. Round out the medical systems a bit. Give bandages a real use instead of just a generic health addition.

There are really not very many ways to bleed in game and there are sure a ton of ways to do it IRL. I feel like this should be reflected.

[MrQwerty]

i think the biggest problem would be how would this bleeding level be determined - do certain events/mobs cause only one certain level of bleeding(wouldn’t be hard to implement) or is it some randomized chance checked every time that you get a bleeding(could be a bit messy to implement)? And how would it be shown on the “health bars”?
still, it would certainly make bandages more useful.

[kevin.granade]

Longer term I’d like to replace the current hp system with an extensive system of wounds, more variation in bleeding wounds would be a good place to start.

[Wally-kun]

There are a handful of creatures, mostly animals, that have an attack with an additional chance to inflict the “Bleed” effect, sort of like how zombie attacks have a chance to be “really deep.” (It’s either that or a special move with a chance, I can’t remember which.)

A new bleed system would be complicated and kind of time-consuming to make, so editing what’s in place may be best. My suggested change would be to nerf bleed damage, draw out its length to have similar numbers by the end of its duration, and to compound it with the “deep wound” effect that zombies current give. A LOT of stuff can bite you, and the lore says that the zombification process is not due to virus or any such thing. It thus seems silly to me that infections are exclusively from zombies. If it’s just a bacterial infection from a festering bite, why not apply that to the animals that can currently bleed you? I have to assume that the wolves and coyotes are biting you when they inflict bleed. Give both bleed and possible infection at the same time.

Also, the additive pain either needs to go away, or be significantly reduced. One of the biggest and most frustrating early game hurdles is that, quite simply, animals will kill you even more often than zombies. Like, if an animal runs you down and bleeds you, you are simply dead. The damage is too huge, you have no way to stop it, and the debilitating penalties caused by pain rapidly strips the player of any feasible possibility of escaping. The huge dodge chances of animals also plays a part in this (Fucking fuck krecks; I don’t care what dimension you came from, fuck your dodge chance), but a lot of it is how damning bleed effects are right now. There’s just too much pain and you are dead well before the animal actually kills you. That’s not fun.

Bullets and bad cuts would also give you the bleed effect. While not guaranteed to get infected like bite wounds, regular bleeds can become infections on top of the regular bleeding, further compounding the problem because it was ignored or neglected. Odds are, though, the worst of the damage will be done by the bleed itself. Infection on top of that would just be from bad luck.

[RadaRadaRada]

There are a handful of creatures, mostly animals, that have an attack with an additional chance to inflict the “Bleed” effect, sort of like how zombie attacks have a chance to be “really deep.” (It’s either that or a special move with a chance, I can’t remember which.)

Monsters which deal cut damage, deal bleeding effect on player. Zombie bite is special attack.

[Wally-kun]

Monsters which deal cut damage, deal bleeding effect on player. Zombie bite is special attack.

What I’m saying is that the bite attack should be apply to many things, and that is also has a chance to inflict bleeding. Bacteria love mouths, and more than dead things have them. The lore implies that the infection zombies deliver is not unique to the zombies or how they work; therefore, there’s no reason that only they should have them.

The tweaks to bleeding in general will also make starting the game much easier, and make animals less of beginner-killing machines and more like…y’know, animals. You get bit, it’ll probably get infected. Bullets should also cause bleed, but have minimal chance of infection. Bleed itself should have a chance to become infected if you completely ignore it, because the wound is open.

Making them more likely to run before you kill them would also probably help out their behavior as far as realism (sensible creatures run if they feel outmatched or threatened), but that’s a separate issue. So’s dodge.

Still fuck krecks though. And manhacks.