Calories, strength, and fitness.

[Cthulhu]

I've played zomboid for roughly 150 hours, I'm no veteran but I've raised this idea with other players and they've for the most part agreed with me, one of them recommending I post this for the devs and other players to see.

 

From I have seen, the calorie burn is abnormally high for day to day activity, and that when you're as strong or fit as you physically can be that it really has no significant affect. If you have strength and fitness maxed out you're not much more effective than the average person, and burn the same amount of calories keeping your stats there. I am also fairly certain that many people here agree that you need to take in an abnormally high amount of food to gain weight when you're working hard through the day, or that once you start gaining its almost impossible to lose it for some reason. So for my suggestion, I'd say base calorie burn on level of strength as an upkeep cost and daily exercise amount, To keep your strength at a 6 or 7, you'll need to work out daily and eat more calories than someone at a 5. Strength 10 should be akin to a strongman in overall physical strength, but come with a higher requirement for nutrition.

 

For example, at strength 5 you should need 2,200 calories daily to maintain strength and weight, and at strength 6 you need to have 2,800 calories a day to maintain the strength and keep your weight.

This requirement for strength upkeep would increase further towards bodybuilder like strength at 7-ish, where you'd require almost 4,000 calories a day just to maintain it and not lose a lot of weight. 

For reference, if my memory serves me correctly bodybuilders usually eat 3,600 to 3,800 calories a day - and on their cut days, when they are trying to lose weight to make their muscles bulge they'd eat roughly 1,600 in an attempt to lose weight, while still working out extensively to keep the muscles.

At 8, 9, and 10 it jumps to strongman levels of strength, and as such the obscene requirements for their food intake. I'd say out those at 8,000, 9,000, and 10,000 respectively. 

 

The bonuses for this different set of strengths would change significantly, strength 6 being more comparable to what is currently a 10. With each point after 6 being a further 20% (or 20 point) increase to block chance, melee damage, and knockdown modifier. Encumbrance goes up by 4 points a level, so from strength 5's 12 Encumbrance to strength 6 it goes up to 16, then 20, 24, etc.

Perhaps as a counterbalance, on top of the higher nutrition requirements you also damage weapons more often.

 

This suggested change would significantly shift the power balance in favor of the player but it also makes it more realistic according to real life eating and exercise routines. With this you can be a strongman who can down zombies with a single hit when his strength is at 10, but he'd need to eat such a significant amount of food that it'd be almost unsustainable in the long term without a lot of hard work and careful planning. The main drawback to being at this level of strength is the dietary requirement.

 

Fitness, I think, should also be reworked so at a 5 you are average but at 10 you are akin to a cross country legend. Maybe reduce fatigue gain and endurance loss by an additional 10% for every level, and increase endurance recovery rate by 5% or 10% as well. The main issue with getting your fitness high is that having a high strength could get in the way due to the excessive food requirement.

 

Overweight, Underweight, and Obese.

These are not really accurate as they are currently in the game.

A competition strongman is considered clinically obese, but is able to push a car alone with little trouble. Being heavy doesn't reduce your physical strength, but it does increase the amount of energy it takes to move - which is why the calorie requirement changes so significantly from 7 to 8. Maybe at 8 you get the overweight trait, but modified to make leveling fitness harder and without any penalty to strength.

Whereas obese would cut your fitness experience gain in half, without any penalty to strength as well.

 

Underweight is a different situation, it takes less energy to move and keep moving, so perhaps they get a bonus to their fitness gain but a penalty to their strength gain. Malnourished is a more extensive version as well, with a further bonus to fitness gain and further penalty to strength gain.

 

These changes would give players more of a good reason to get to those extremes in strength and fitness while also real life physical limitations, instead of how currently a lot of players stop at 9 in strength because getting higher is just too much work for too little reward. This would let players decide their best playstyle, whether that be cardio, brute force, or a mix between the two. They'd all have good bonuses, and there'd be good reason to want to be at strength 7 instead of 8, 9, or 10 in a way that fits with real life standards.

 

From what I've seen in the competitive scene of the three sports, being marathon runners, bodybuilders, and strongmen is that

Marathon runners cut any excess weight from themselves to aid in their longevity and with their endurance and determination they're able to run for hours without slowing or faltering.

 

Bodybuilders through a lot of Willpower, and determination are able to sculpt their bodies to statuesque proportions to literally flex on the rest of us with their sheer glory. It is mostly for show, but that doesn't lessen that they're still quite strong and put a lot of effort into their bodies.

 

And Strongmen are driven with the goal of being the strongest they possibly can be, being some of the most driven and steadfast people who will break every physical limit they can to become the strongest. They have been shown to lift several thousand pounds during their competitions of raw physical might.

 

I have immense respect for all of these athletes, as you can probably tell by this point.

 

I don't much expect these changes to occur, but I felt that I should at least try because for a realistic survival game it feels quite limiting during gameplay, to a degree that isn't seen in real life. Additionally, I am aware some people may be different, or that you may know someone who is different from what I have stated above but this is what I personally have seen, and I welcome any feedback on the matter. :)