Travel time passage

Would you agree to some kind of travel weariness regardless if the day-night cycle syncs up, with regard to fatigue of stats from things like hunger and cold, and maybe lack of sleep?

 

That sounds very fair.

 

It's a great idea. But feasible as in: can it be done? And if so: can it be done within the budget?

 

It could be done in theory. If it can be done within budget, it depends on either whether they have to develop special resources they wouldn't have to otherwise. The way it would work is the server would keep track of each player's time, and NPCs would just act according to a specific schedule and appear as they do to the player according to the time in the player's schedule, rather than maintaining the NPC routines on server time. The logic for syncing players together would be something they'd need to figure out, but that wouldn't be the resource-intensive part.

 

Possibly.. but there are a number of things you just have to assume in games. Such as travel time including the odd bathroom break or when does your avatar stop to take a bath? That daily mundane stuff happens (if at all) by assumption most of the time. You really have to have a good answer for "how does this improve gameplay"? If it does then I'm all for it.. but if it's all stick and no carrot then it might not be all that popular. (I'd probably like it though).

 

Well, by making travel take a toll, it

* Makes travel more of a big deal; adds more of a sense of immersion, living, and exploration in a real world.
* Encourages players to stick to regions more and build regional communities.
* Creates a genuine need for certain crafters like rations procurers.
* Creates a barrier to players from doing "PK flash mobs" so to speak, and other types of PKing behavior.
* Encourages role-playing more than the carrot approach would alone, while if done at a good, measured pace -- and doesn't build the fatigue too fast -- it would give enough leeway by not be overly burdensome and tedious.
* Encourages thinking of the game intelligently, with preparation, rather than mindlessly.
* Creates more gaming situations, like having to defend a camp from ambush, or being able to ambush another camp.
* Gives the world more detail.

I really don't like the comparison to bathroom breaks, which others have brought up too to try to portray hunger as a kind of useless realism... If you're talking about something like food, you're talking about something that substantially matters to the the game world and the people in it -- considering it as an alternative reality -- and which requires preparation and decisions on the part of the player. Think of it as an "Oregon Trail" aspect to the game. You wouldn't just be fighting and crafting and talking to people, but you'd be a living member of the world, trying to make your way through it like everyone else. You're not just an avatar in a VR chat room -- you're a character in a world with certain needs.

During travelling, bathroom breaks would be done at any second and take less than a minute. They don't require preparation or purchase of anything at shops. They don't slow travel down much at all, and don't require you to set up camp. A lot of people in Medieval era wouldn't have bathed very often and it wouldn't have made a difference to most people if someone bathed every day or not. So that wouldn't even be done realistically with a stick unless there's something specific to wash off.

I just don't think lack of bathroom breaks changes anything substantially about the game world like lack of hunger would. Although it would certainly be cool to see things like baths as an optional thing in the game, from a role-playing and story perspective. I think it would be a tough argument to require them in any way.

Lack of sleep having an effect might just give the player a motivation to eat at camp more often, rather than just eating on the trail out of the ration pack. They'd then have to defend the camp from potential ambush.

I definitely think that in addition to the stick approach and everything I described that I think it opens up, there should also be a carrot to these aspects of the game. You might need food to address hunger, but certain food would be better than others and give you buffs.

 

I like the idea of rest or hunger going down faster on the top map.
Another thing that might make the top map more interesting is if we can buy a wagon or something, just to speed up travel and help rest from not going down as fast.
You might could even throw in some oregon trail gameplay. Like something on your wagon breaking and needing new parts.
http://tinyurl.com/k4udhlv

 

I was just trying to think of something mundane and every day. lol it was the first thing that came to mind. Hunger really is a different beast as it pertains to survival.. unlike say.. combing your hair or clipping your nails.

 

Yea, I know; you've defended the concept of survivalist role-playing before. I was saying others here have brought up the comparison before and I find it way off.

 

Running into things like blizzards, rainstorms, sandstorms, and other weather events while traveling could add to the game I think And having to walk through deserts while feeling the heat. I remember in Ultima V, you lost hp in the desert and saw mirages of oases. The way I'd imagine that to work is building a thirst penalty and requiring water, but only whenever you're walking through any particularly arid, desert regions, and not in other areas of of the game world.

Plus you'd have the choice to either buy rations or live off the land and hunt.

You'll be able to buy horses sometime in game development, I'm sure, even though it won't be in the first chapter. Would be interesting if your horse needed to be shod to deal with caltrops.

 

The thing I'd worry about is players feeling like they have to frequently micromanage this stuff. It could be fun so long as most don't find it tedious.

I do have flashbacks to U7.5.. if you didn't have your furry boots, tacky looking hat and some kind of fur cloak you could end up taking cold damage in the frozen north until you find some place warm or you die. I have rather enjoyed the survival mods for Skyrim but that I think also has a big deal to do with my more casual play style. So long as I'm having fun I don't mind taking my time and making sure I'm properly prepared to get from point A to point B.. but does the average player have the patience?

 

A lot of these things were implemented poorly in U7 and SI, so I'd rather not people use them as models to judge Although I enjoyed the idea, at least, of them being in the games while I played them.

Like hunger, freezing was done in a way that was invisible to the player -- you had to go to your stat window to see the effects. That's one of the reasons I'm pitching hard for the stat capping system, because it makes things very visible. You also couldn't put fur lining under your armor; you had to replace your armor. I hope we have clothing layering in the game. You couldn't make your own fur by shooting down animals and skinning them. Since that was an important tradeskill in UO, I'm sure we'll have it here. You couldn't build fires. You had to take care of your whole party like they were babies. Ugh.

I'm like you, I don't mind a game that has high requirements and takes patience.. But I think these features can be built for less patient players, too.

 

I only bring up SI to point out that Ultima did have things like this in it. I wouldn't use it as a target to live up to. I would like to see extreme environments have some kind of affect I know.. maybe it doesn't need to be deadly but some kind of debuff if you're unprepared.

Wandering around in the desert wearing full plate generally is not a good idea.. unless you plan to use yourself as a cooking surface to fry things on. Or similarly full plate in a frozen wasteland with high winds.. plate armor may be good protection in a battle but it's also a good conductor of heat and in those situations it will either freeze or bake you.

 

Yea, trying to think of some things in oregon trail that could work
1. Buy a wagon for fast travel and more storage - can only be seen on the top map
2. You can set your speed of travel - real fast makes the trip faster but things can break easier
3. Wagon parts can break so best to keep a supply on hand.
4. Weather can effect your travel speed and could make you or npc's with you ill
5. For food you can always stop and go hunting but food is needed.
6. Ox/horses can die so better to have at least 3 or 4 pulling your wagon.
7. Of course you might be attacked by npc's or creatures on the way
8. NPC's need rides from town to town and they tend to get sick or something during travel - meaning you need certain kinds of medicine to heal them.
9. Ford/Float your wagon or take a ferry.
10. Things happen along the way that you can stop for

Of course your skills could come into play like hunting, wagon repair, taming, healing, etc.

 

Could be the same type of fatigue debuff I'm suggesting for other things -- which would become deadly if long enough, but that would be a long time gamewise, and most players aren't going to wait that long for it to be deadly, so it wouldn't be an impediment to gameplay.

How would plate compare to chainmail? Isn't chain heavier than plate?

 

No chain's a fair bit lighter and.. it breathes and is more flexible. It's a lot more forgiving in the heat that a full breastplate.. Since chain isn't a solid piece of steel there isn't as much to conduct heat into or away from the body.. it should dissipate any heat faster also since there's more surface area compared to weight. Some of this assumes the chain is exposed though.. there's not a lot you can wear over plate but you can easily wear leather (or even plate) over chain.. suddenly it doesn't breath so much. but the main concern is conducting heat.

I've heard stories of guys wearing plate while using it to fry an egg before. So I can only imagine the potential for baking someone in the desert. You could mitigate the effect for both heat and cold I suspect with the right under armor.. furs or insolater for cold and something to catch and hold sweat to keep you cooler for the heat. But also.. you generally wouldn't wear your armor 24/7 like you go in a game.

 

Which brings up an interesting point... you could have players adapted to fighting and surviving in certain areas in the game, and they could use help from other players if they needed to travel. Those living in snowy climates could rely more on furs for protection, those in desert climates could wear armor like the Seljuks and Byzantines did.

I've seen a lot of Near Eastern armor with chain coifs that covered the face, or ventilation on the lower part of the helmet. Was this a practical feature adapted to the climate or simply stylistic?



And a breakdown of the armor here, with a lamellar corset over a tunic:



And a full suit of Saracen armor:

 

By contrast, for cold weather, I'm sure you could look at Viking armor for examples.

 

It's actually pretty practical. If you put on a great helm or other full face helm on a hot day you quickly realize the important of ventilation. I didn't usually wear a helm but when I did shows we had a game we did called "shoot a knight".. bows and rubber tipped arrows.. which we were all targets at some point. I'd wear a great helm for that.. toasty warm let me tell ya.

But in these cases the chain lets you breath while still providing some protection.. plus it's not at hot as you can see it lets a lot of air in. Not great against impact or piercing weapons but it's good slash protection. Of course being flexible is also a plus as it won't restrict your head movement any.

 

Yea party travel sounds great, maybe even with a wagon train.
What all that means vs going solo I'm not sure.