MrStevenWolfe

So, I had just set up an AMAZING fort at the Isolated House in Muldraugh. Relatively skilled character (lvl 4 3/4 Carpenter, solid melee skills, just started a farm.)
 
I wanted to add on to the preexisting structure, make it a five-story-fort-of-win.
 
"Time to start working over the pre-existing roof with the sledge-SHIT"
 
Falls through roof, leg shatters upon impact with the bed right below me. Now I'm stuck inside my bed, ala Johnny Depp in "A Nightmare on Elm Street".
 
Then I realized I didn't have my sledge.
 
Or any bleach...

Bicycle-powered generators exist IRL. They tend to have an output dependant on how long you charge them.
 
These would be good if you set up lights around your fort, and it would be cool if using them improved your character's "Sprint" ability.

Hmm, if we had wrecked cars + wrecked homes + litter....
 
Wouldn't it be great to open a window into a home you're trying to loot, only to find that the front half is missing thanks to a car crashing through the wall and parking in the living room? That would be pretty crazy!

Hmm, if we had wrecked cars + wrecked homes + litter....
 
Wouldn't it be great to open a window into a home you're trying to loot, only to find that the front half is missing thanks to a car crashing through the wall and parking in the living room? That would be pretty crazy!

Bicycle-powered generators exist IRL. They tend to have an output dependant on how long you charge them.
 
These would be good if you set up lights around your fort, and it would be cool if using them improved your character's "Sprint" ability.

This would be very unique!
 
And it could add some cool character creation perks too, to tie in with the madness stuff!
 
Such as:
 
Thousand-Yard Stare (+8) Character permanently has Trauma
 
Iron Will (-3) More resistant to Trauma, Sanity Loss, and Sir Crazy
 
Just some ideas

I hope that when animals are implemented, that zombies go after THEM as well as humans! that would be intensely close to the Brooks/Romero writing!
 
Wouldn't this just be nuts: Sauntering through the city, and the only reason your street is relatively clear is because four of five walkers have cornered a deer in an alley.
 
Cue the nature nuts dieing trying to save the deer

That's what electronics skill or something similar is for.    Most people can't build a three story house either.    Or perform surgery.    Or fix a car.    if the rules support their use they can add all kinds of skills.   Or a perk that allows explosive handling.

I've been playing a while now, and it might just be me, but I found that the only way to get zombies away from some place is to distract em, but that would be to you by screaming at them.
 
 
Now, my idea was, that there would be firecrackers, or however you call them, its this bunch of small firework sticks bunched together and then lit and then they'd all go and explode but not in a big explosion but small sparks that would all go "click click click" and such. Back to the topic,
I thought it would be cool if that was another way to distract zombies away from a place instead of screaming.
Imagine youre low on food, and theres that store. One problem, a group of 20 - 50 zombies is standing all around it.
I thought you could then go to someplace safe, light and quickly throw a firecracker to another place like 50 meters away from that store, then all the cracking would distract the zombies and make them move there while you can quickly sneak inside the building get the food and get out safely.
 
Okay so here others ideas:
Traps:
Barbed Wire trap:
Requires: Wood plank x4, Barbed wire x2.
A small patch of barbed wire laid down on the ground.
Zombies and npcs walking over it will slow down heavily and get scratches every second, perfect for slowing down hordes and gaining time and injuring to killing uncareful survivors poor enough to run over it. Group members will ignore this trap and find other ways to walk around it / even take no damage walking over it at all. Can be removed with gloves shall they ever be implemented.
 
Spike hole trap:
Requires: Shovel (duh), nails x20.
Can only be placed on grass and dirt.
A small hole covered with leaves, when someone runs into it (s)he will fall into a medium deep pit full of nails and most likely result dead. 1 time use only.
 
Bear trap:
Ideal for animals and humans alike, will severly injure a humans leg and kill an animal, can be used to hold off some zombies as theyll feast upon whatever poor thing ran into it. He...hehheeehehehehahahhahahaha.....
 
 
Distraction:
Bottle
A bottle of whisky or just a normal bottle, can be thrown up to 25 meters, any zombie 10-20 meters near it will hear the glass shatter and shamble / jog / run to that position.
 
More ideas to come!
 
 
 
We had this in the old game so might as well now. Pour fourth all of your ideas about traps, home made bombs, distractions for zombies, etc. here so that we can keep track of all of them without having the suggestions forum overrun with them! 
 
-Rathlord

little things, like allow a group to all sit around a table or fire while waiting for morning, eating, or healing  from a broken leg and just talk. and yes, read a book while sitting down, taking a rest break and any other reason we have for sitting down in real life.
 
lol, why else would we sit down?

I think it would be nice to be able to sit in ours chairs... sit to read a book... or maybe just sit to rest a little. I think its unlikely to read a whole book without sitting in a chair.

Whenever I find a gun in a  "strange" spot, I quickly remind myself, "Oh, right! .... Kentucky..." If anything there should be more guns in even stranger spots than teachers desks...because.....Kentucky

I think the problem is that you're forgetting that you're in Kentucky. Or, more generally, you're in the American south. In Kentucky the school board can give teachers permission to carry a firearm in the classroom. You just have to own it legally, obviously, and go through a safety course or something like that. Law enforcement doesn't even get involved in the decision. So, what you found perfectly fits the area the game is set in.

Yep, allowing you to pry open windows with crowbars would be a welcome, and logical, addition. The trade-off would be their carry weight, and you could have course make it so that it makes a fair bit of noise as well.
 
(I'd still like to see an option to "clear" any broken glass as well)

Yeah, butter knives are no good for prying, they bend too easily. A flathead screwdriver works. But for the sake of elegance I'd be content with having to use a crowbar. Crowbars should be useful.

I'm absolutely certain this has been suggested at some point in the past, but the recently added lethality of smashed windows brings it new relevance. Add 'pry window' action to windows with a crowbar in inventory? Possibly not an instant success, but at least vastly increased odds over trying to force them open by hand.

or ever coming back on at all?
 
What if a storm had a random % chance of knocking out the power permanently?
 
It would also be cool (not very realistic) that every time the power died it was because of an issue somewhere in the game world. Powerlines knocked down due to the storm, a transformer blew because of a lightning strike, etc. A player who has found certain manuals or books could repair the damage and get the power back on.
 
Something similar for the water?

I'm leaning for thunderstorms making the lights flicker. As in lightning flashes, thunder rumbles, and lights blinking in and out before stabilizing.

Depression IRL makes it difficult to want to do or accomplish anything, even getting out of bed is difficult. Some people self harm, others have suicidal thoughts.
 
Possible things depression could cause:
 
 
Slows skill progression, a lack of motivation to bother learning causes your character to gain less xp per actions performed.
 
Giving up on tasks part way through. Your character may just abruptly decide to not finish the magazine he or she was reading. Perhaps even finding the food they are preparing worthless and dumping it out mid prep.
 
Sleeping lasts longer, so does resting. Why bother getting out of bed when there is nothing to get up for?
 
Your character moves more slowly, moping about.
 
The deeper someone gets in to depression the harder it is to get out. Each stage of depression the game should half the amount of happiness gained from anything except anti-depression pills.
 
Self harm, a character may begin to pick and scratch at their own skin, pull out hair, or cutting. Random scratches and, assuming depression gets bad enough, a deep cut to the arm accompanied with bleeding could give interesting obstacles and legitimate concerns for becoming depressed. The deep cut would indicate a suicide attempt that would give consequence for being depressed and still remain within a players control rather than an insta death.
 
And as per mentioned in my first post, If you make it all the way to the severely depressed stage and you have a gun, an end it all option could appear which would still give you control over the situation, but be expressive of how depressed your character truly has become. Perhaps if more things are implemented to make depression suck an end it all option would even seem viable.
 
If all my suggestions were implemented; at severely depressed you'd be hurting yourself regularly, randomly giving up on tasks, moving slower, can never get rid of tired moodle, when you do sleep you sleep nearly entire days, can't learn new skills, and the happiness you'd get from any given item would be moot, so without anti-depressants you'd be stuck this way. End it all doesn't seem like a terrible option suddenly.

I feel like this has to have come through here before but if so allow me to re-mention it.
 
If you make it to the severely depressed moodle, and are holding a weapon, if you right click yourself you should get the option, "End it all."
 
Just would be a funny little easter egg for people since it wouldn't be commonly seen.

Link? I tried to find an existing thread - I'd be glad to start commenting there instead.
 
 
 
I think the idea is to improve PvP balance. Maybe there should be a "minimum trait" option for Sandbox - positive allowing survivors with more positive traits, negative allowing survivors with more negative traits.

I have no flaws
 
Except maybe pride lol

If I understand it correctly, the Panic system is intended to simulate the effects of the fight-or-flight response on the survivor: tunnel vision, degredation of fine motor control (wild swings with close-combat weapons, poor aiming with firearms, impaired stealth when moving), stress, suppression of drowsiness, acceleration of fatigue buildup, burst of strength, slowed digestion of food, faster clotting of blood, &c. (Not all of these are implemented, and I don't know if all of these will be implemented, but they make sense physically.)
 
Based on this, I'd like to suggest a spectrum of traits akin to the Weak/Feeble/Stout/Strong set: Intrepid, Steady, Nervous, and Jumpy.
 
 
I imagine these traits making the character suffer the negative effects of panic less (or more), but this could be replaced by or combined with making the character panic slower and calm down faster (or vice-versa). Regardless of the details, an Intrepid character would be able to function much better in a terrifying situation than normal, and a Jumpy character would function much more poorly.

I just watched Last Level Press's "Passing Pineview Forest" video, and one of the things Mr. Black commented on was that the character seemed to be walking faster towards the end of the run, when he might reasonably be expected to be more scared. I realized, when I was commenting on the video, that that seems like a really Zomboidish thing: fear makes you breathe harder and makes your pulse race, but it also makes you step just a little (or, as the panic rises, maybe quite a bit) more lively when you're trying to walk or sneak about.
 
Walking faster based on your Panic moodles would also have a lot of appropriate knock-on effects: you would get fatigued faster and recover from fatigue more slowly, you would be less stealthy sneaking or walking when you were scared, and you would probably be a little less likely to actually get caught by the zombies that are chasing you even without full-on running. Running I wouldn't have affected by fear (it's called 'sprinting' in the skill menu, after all), but walking I would make quicker.

Just some ideas for moodles regarding your sanity that may fit in to the environment.
 
Stir Crazy: You haven't left your house in awhile and boredom is setting in.
 
  What it does - Character begins to hear banging on windows and doors that may not be real. Deeper stages could cause the character to get jump scare noises randomly, despite no zombies being present. The agitated and panicked moodles could begin showing up randomly as well. Severe conditions of being stir crazy could result in the character beginning to engage in self harm, with random scratches and such appearing on arms.
 
  How to activate - Any time your character becomes bored it adds points in to becoming stir crazy. Reading, eating, other things that relieve boredom relieve stir crazy. Stir crazy grows more quickly the longer you stay in one area. Areas will be defined as currently loaded tiles. Leaving an area will be defined as loading new tiles.
 
  How to relieve - Just enter load unloaded tile space, the more severe your stir crazy is the more tiles you need to load to relieve it.
 
 
Trauma: You've seen some things, and those things are sticking with you.
 
  What it does - Character wakes up part way through a nights sleep due to nightmares. Causes random panic and exertion, as you re-experience past traumas via flashbacks (assumed, not witnessed by player). Severe trauma may cause your character to hesitate before firing or swinging a weapon, those split seconds mean everything when a zombie is coming at you. 
 
  How to activate - Witness another player die. Killing another player yourself will compound this. Become harmed by a zombie but survive. Become harmed by another but survive. Live through a serious injury. Have a house catch on fire while you're inside it.
 
  How to relieve - Very difficult. Drugs could be used to ease the symptoms but only time would heal trauma.
 
 
Literally losing your mind: I have no mouth yet I must scream
 
  What it does - Think Eternal Darkness style stuff. I hate to just rip off another game but it's a cool system. You begin seeing your limbs fall off, you start crying blood, shadowy figures begin following you around, and I'm sure many other crazy things that people can think of.
 
  How to activate it - Being alone, utterly alone in the zombie apocalypse for just too long. There could be a moodle that helps indicate you're working your way towards this (loneliness moodle). Jump scares could also add to this insanity meter.
 
  How to relieve - Well when sneak is added you could peak around corners to prevent jump scares. When NPCs are added, being around them will prevent loneliness (and of course real players on servers). Once it's starting to set in the best way to relieve it is to kill zombies. Just go on a killing spree and you'll work that insanity out, that's how life works, right?
 
 
 
There you go! Just a few ideas that were kicking around my head. I am really enjoying the community on here since I've joined and I hope to keep posting more things as I think of them.