No hunger or thirst!

[zeppomarks]

I personally like the concept of hunger and thirst, but I have an idea to make it more manageable. I would say no food or water bars. Just have items tagged as "Rations" and give them a charge counter like the medical equipment. Every hour or so, a charge disappears depending on how many people you have in your faction. Also, I would say, only one person has to carry the bulk of the food. No matter how far a member of the faction roams, we can just assume that he brought enough food and drink with him. That way we don't have to worry about the inventories of dozens or hundreds of people. We'll just have to worry about one storehouse where all the food is. Also, I would assume that once you get to the point where you have property and a box to put stuff in, the rations can just go in that.

Also, I don't think people should starve if you run out of food. Maybe have some points disappear from their health bars every so often depending on their endurance and/or Warrior Spirit to show weakness. But, I think you should have a certain amount of time (a couple of days maybe) to replenish your stocks. If you don't do it in that time, people start leaving. Or maybe they leave when they get to a certain level of weakness. Either way, no one's loyalty is so blind that they would starve to death before leaving. And if they do leave, I think they should go straight to a bar (meaning no fighting anyone, so they don't get murdered). That way they can be rehired later. With this mechanic you get penalized for letting your people go hungry, but it's no so permanent as death.

In regards to NPC factions, I think that would be easy. Every town should have a warehouse with necessities and their people would pull from that. And when it comes to groups of baddies without an HQ, like hungry bandits or dust bandits, when a group spawns, one of them would spawn with some rations, that suffer the same charges every tick just like you do. And if they run out, they start getting weaker, like I was talking about earlier. But I don't know about that. Food and NPCs seems like it would be much more difficult to do than with the player faction, but like Booter said, I'm not a big fan of being affected by things that the NPCs don't have to deal with.

I think this would do well for everyone as a good middle ground. No micromanaging, but we get the realism of food and water being a factor. Granted, you have to make sure you always have a store of food, but I don't think that's any different than always making sure you have a store of building materials or medical supplies. It seems to me, that this game is not one of hack and slash, but one of survival, maintenance and realism. Just completely eliminating factors as important as food and water, seems like it would be a detriment to the spirit of the game. But all in all, I agree that if you needed to make sure every single member of your faction had food and water in their inventory, that would be a problem.

That's my take on it at least.

[Deathhood98]

Maybe just have a option in the menu to turn hunger and thirst on and off...

[wolfwood296]

since we will have slaves we could just make them do all the heavy lifting and just place a small amount of guards to oversee them.

and for micromanagement we could just use something like a schedule format that most other jobs use in real life.

[mehelsel]

Since I like really realistic games( that are still fun) how about I say this, after 1 day your men's stats start decreasing with no food or water, then after the second day, he passes out, and 2 days later he dies. It lets every ones opinion be included in the starvation system.

I like compromises

[CovReaper]

Realism is nice and all but too much in a game can stifle the enjoyment for some, if not most. Either having the option have it on/off at game creation is one solution, another is that people will function better with a full stomach than one without (well fed buff basically). Or have it so eating/drinking will recover permanently lost sections of stats (such as arms/legs/head/etc...) to the point of yellow at which point they have to rest to fully recover use of the body part(s). While realistically impossible it would provide a sizable use for food/water without putting a death timer on each individual in the game.

This way if you had a farming community in the wilderness you would have to risk being raided by bandits looking for food/water to heal or employ some guards. Also, if a village was repeatedly attacked by well fed bandits then you could either sell/give them food/water so they could heal and not die (I mean who wants to see their favorite trader get dead!?). This could also lead into group additions; say you find a wanderer who was badly injured by bandits/creatures/a bad fall and is too weak to defend himself. You'd have the choice of carrying him away (incurring the wrath of who/whatever was after him), giving him food/water and leaving, or giving him food/water and he joins you (in a pitifully weak state so he would have to be guarded).

[Kuze]

I have to disagree. These two things would make the game that much more immersive, and good. Now to combat your point about, dying with out enough granola bars. A group of people rolling around the desert for extended amounts of time would bring with them a way to carry their supplies (med-kits, water, food, etc...) hence pack mules, wagons or something of the sort. You could also program the game to disperse the water/food in said pack mule to your team within X range automatically as long as you have a medic (I used to be a medic in the army, and it was I who kept up with those things for my platoon). Also of course this would affect all of he AI as well. I don't know if anyone else came up with a similar idea but, that's my two cents on the subject. I would enjoy to talk about this further.

[CovReaper]

The entire game won't be in a desert. He already said he was going to add in different biomes. Immersiveness and realistic is great in a game like this but too much will choke it. All of a sudden you're going to be dealing more with food and water than building an outpost, expanding, and who knows whatelse. Additionally, you're going to have to use up valuable space for food/water and what trading you do will be increased b/c of lower traded goods per trip, which increases the overall number of trips, placing even more of a strain on the food/water supply. It would become a game about food and water than anything else (at least to me) if hunger/thirst is implemented to the point I'm assuming most want which is no food/water = dead people.

However, if the food/water was implemented in a manner similar to the population caps of rts style games where you would have to produce enough food/water to supply your people. I think that would work because you are forced to deal with it, otherwise there are consequences (longer research rates, longer build times/recovery times, some factions may see you more unfavorablely, etc...) but if you have good quality food the opposite happens (better research rates, build times, factions like you more, etc...).

[LostSaint6689]

I think hunger and thirst is a great idea... only if it's not hugely hindering to the gameplay. Like once vehicles are added or even something like a pack mule... it would be managable. As it is i never have backpacks on my dudes just because it makes them quite ineffective in combat and if they are carrying a lot they will get left behind. I'm sure im not alone when i say, i dont have time to spend hours walking to other cities in hopes to sell things... unless the AI does it for me.

I really hate the idea of weighing my already overburdned travelers with even more. Like i said give a me a truck in which i could transport food and water in and i would accept it. As it stands hunger and thirst just sounds like more annoying micromanaging where there is already a lot of. If food and water work like med kits where they are small, light and have many charges so they last some time, i would also accept that.

This doesn't affect me too much as it seeing how my village outpost is quite self suffucient and not even that damned Holy Empire can attack me and win... So if food and hunger became a thing i would be okay as i rarely take long ventures.

[islesofurth]

Heres my Idea:

2 indicators, 1 hunger, 1 thirst.

both bars have two colours (like health when healed).
1st colour represents how long you can go without eating or drinking.
2nd colour represents how far into starvation you have gone. This bar grows after the other has depleted and has negative effects on the character.

When either of a characters 1st colour bars are 80% or more full they are well fed and gain some bonus
When either of a characters 2nd colour bars are 80% or more full they are unable to fight and at 100% they die, posibly feinting first

There is already food related items and a pub, i think we could add a Resturant for "better quality" type foods or we could also get them at a Brothel as dessert brothels where known for its fruits and other fine foods.

Food and liquid should be kept seperate, they both have differant times you can go without them for, and both have differant effects on the body.


Food: A person can last a very long time without food but begins to eat themselvs. 1st colour bar takes 24 hours to deplete. 2nd colour bar takes 48 hours to fill

Water: A person can not go without liquid for very long, liquids are however found in most foods. 1st colour bar takes 12 hours to deplete. 2nd colour bar takes 24 hours to fill.


PS: I recomend a topic name change so more people post ideas

[Luqin]

Many things were said so i will just voice my opinion to push scales closer to my opinion.

1. Food and drink should be in game, for my squad and for cities (as a counter that goes down, and rises prizes of these goods)
2. IT mustnt be busy work.. full of clicking. I imagine one click icon called "camp" where everybody sits down and feeds themselfs as long as anybody in squad has food (no inventory shuffling)
3. Possibly automated in my town.. so workers just stand up when its time for breakfast and go themselfs into a mess hall (if there is one) and eat, drink, talk,.. themselfs.. without me controlling their food lvls.. without seeing as a guy starves to death while working on a corn field.
4.Food blocking inventary/causing trouble.. again one button called "refill food supplies" and food will be fun..

[Eiron]

Perhaps you could designate one character as the camp cook/mess officer, and whenever your party stops for the night, he could automatically go to each character dispensing their nutrient-rich muck ration (like how the medic command currently sends your medic around to everyone without the need for you to micromanage). This may have been mentioned before, but my low-level search-fu failed to turn it up.

[kuzjin]

comon. dat amazing think.
eat dog, eat rat... become canibal... drink blood...

[Dregen]

I'd be greatly disappointed if food, water, and cooking weren't added. This isn't WoW and isn't about mindless quests and random killing. It can be done in a way that doesn't require too much management. But, it needs to be there and something required for a journey and if you don't have enough food or water major problems could happen.

In a game this detailed and with so much attention to detail, this is something that needs implementation.

[kuzjin]

yea. we need water food and hookers !
vote for it !

[somefaaatguy]

I'm in agreement to implement the elements of hunger and thirst.

However, it definitely needs to be implemented in a way that it doesn't require too much micromanagement. Personally, I don't really think it would be too much trouble for each player to carry their own rations/water. It could be no different from owning a medkit. E.g., a pack of sandwiches/bag of jerky and water bottle that can be consumed three times.

Possibly, we can have a few pack mules or property stored with a bigger portion of the food/water, which others could 'refill' from.

The characters may automatically consume their food/water when it is below a certain value. A quick restock button at a bar/restaurant etc may restore all the rations carried at the cost of cats.

As for NPCS/Bandits etc, I like to see that, but it would be probably be far more difficult to implement. But it could be pretty interesting with bandits attacking camps and travelers for the purpose of getting food and towns with people starving.

[slayergbbg]

IMO I think there should be food and water gauges, but not in the traditional sense. This is a rts/rpg. I think there should be a food and water gauge for the group, not individually. But this is a game about survival. So I think it would be a insult to the hardcore players that are looking for a survival experience if this feature is not added.

Also on the topic of food and water if he or they decide to go on that path, farms and wells would be a good idea for reliable food and water sources. Along with regular hunting, it really shouldn't be a problem. Unless the go Oregon Trail and food spoils, which will add a even more in-depth experience.

[islesofurth]

I think there should be a food and water gauge for the group, not individually.

that just seems to buggy, if a player or group of 1 joined another group (as you do) then what would happen to the hunger or thirst for both groups?
But for this to even work the game design would need to be setup to identify everyone as as groups to begin with. Im not exactly sure how Chris has set to or how he can set it but if this comes into the game, im pretty sure it would be for each individual as thats actually alot easier to do.