"The Alcohol and Drug Update" Idea, Blacking Out and Hangovers

[AwesomeAlan1]

I'm sure there's been some form of this suggestion in the past, I couldn't find any post discussing these exact ideas, so I'll make this thread for it. This post is primarily dedicated to alcohol, but I think it could be expanded to drugs as well which is why I put it in the title. I think an updated alcohol system could lead to some really funny scenarios for players, especially those that are roleplaying as alcoholics/those who become alcoholics. To counteract some of the effects I'll be going over, there could also be a lightweight and heavyweight trait that affects your alcohol tolerance, but I'll get into those later.

 

For starters, if you reach a certain threshold after drinking too much alcohol, your vision will get very blurry and you'll make a lot more noise when moving around. You also have a chance to drop any objects you're holding in your primary/secondary hand slots. There are also even harsher effects, such as the screen going dark, and you automatically enter a sort of "sleep" mode, similar to how you'd sleep regularly in game. Only this time, you wake up in a completely random location (somewhere nearby so it's not drastically unrealistic). You don't know how you got there, you were completely hammered, but you're here now and you need to deal with the consequences. You also get some debuffs from a hangover, making the situation even more dangerous. After all, drinking alcohol in the apocalypse to take some of the edge off is completely understandable. But getting completely wasted? Well, that's just not very safe. Don't you want to survive?!

 

I'd picture the process being something like this: You have an alcohol tolerance that you can drink up to and be fine, but once you go past that, you start to see the dangerous effects. Certain traits could also adjust the tolerance level, so you could see these affects with more or less alcohol. Lightweight trait drops the tolerance level to 50. Heavy Drinker trait raises the tolerance level to 150. Let's just say that the max tolerance for a player without traits altering it is an alcohol level variable of 100.

 

Alcohol Level at 110 - Slightly blurred vision.

 

Alcohol Level at 120 - More blurred vision, you make more noise while moving.

 

Alcohol Level at 130 - Vision is heavily blurred, you make even more noise while moving, and you have a chance to drop one of your primary/secondary held items.

 

Alcohol Level at 140 - Everything from the previous level, but you now randomly let out shouts, attracting zombies. Your screen starts to dim black, making it even harder to see.

 

Alcohol Level at 150 - When you reach this point, you pass out, entering "sleep" and waking up in a completely new location. Probably somewhere near where you passed out. There is also an 85% chance that any zombies within a very close range to you in the new area are removed, just so you aren't killed instantly when waking up. That 15% though... This is how you died.

 

For things like multiplayer, it's tricky, but I suppose the player could just "lose control" of their character for a brief period while the blacking out effect is occurring. From a multiplayer perspective, it would simply look like your friend is wandering off in a drunken state and you can't stop them as they themselves have no control over where they're going. This could also utilize the upcoming NPC code to just turn one of the players into a simulated NPC for a brief period, having them go off and do something on their own while the actual player has no control, since their screen is black and they've "passed out". Or, instead of any of that, just check to see if the player is visible by any other player currently. If they aren't, then the black out occurs and they're teleported elsewhere. Just a few ideas on how to make it work, I'm sure the developers can come up with something more streamlined.

 

This system could also be expanded further with things like drugs or medicine. Have very specific effects caused by taking something/too much of something. For example, the game has an unused sanity system that could be perfectly implemented into using too many drugs. Hallucinations start to appear if you take certain drugs, you hear noises that sound like zombies breaking in, etc.

Edited May 24, 2022 by AwesomeAlan1

[LLcraigJ]

Perhaps the level of tolerance could be factored off of fitness and strength levels, with any relevant traits added in. Whatever method, be it alcohol, drugs or even things like poisonous plants or animals, could be combined into an "intoxication" stat. The details of the stat I haven't put much thought into, but I don't believe it would be difficult to work into a balanced mechanic. 

 

Multiplayer presents similar issues to sleep when intoxication reaches the point of blacking out or losing control. I do like the idea of piggy backing the npc code though. 

[AwesomeAlan1]

11 hours ago, LLcraigJ said:

Perhaps the level of tolerance could be factored off of fitness and strength levels, with any relevant traits added in. Whatever method, be it alcohol, drugs or even things like poisonous plants or animals, could be combined into an "intoxication" stat. The details of the stat I haven't put much thought into, but I don't believe it would be difficult to work into a balanced mechanic. 

 

Multiplayer presents similar issues to sleep when intoxication reaches the point of blacking out or losing control. I do like the idea of piggy backing the npc code though. 

 

Oh yeah, intertwining the system with fitness and strength would make a lot of sense. The system has the possibility of being super in-depth and so I'd love to see the game go in this direction.

[LLcraigJ]

I imagined that fitness and strength would provide a base tolerance, then trait penalties/bonuses would be applied. Professions could possibly factor in as well. A burger flipper might be a young party goer or a veteran might be a drinker for various reasons. On another end of the spectrum, there could be traits that encourage players to abstain from getting intoxicated or avoid being around things like players that are drinking/drunk.

[The_Fish909]

I actually really like the idea. I'm still surprised something even related to a hangover isn't even in game yet.

[getstoopid]

Like this pretty much... would be fun to play I think.