So I play medics, healers, support in just about any game I play so when I saw medical was a part of this game I was overjoyed. Now that I have had a lot of time working with the systems I wanted to share a few thoughts. Medical Conditions I think that several of the current conditions are overtuned for the purposes of interesting play. A single affliction can almost immediately kill your character either from DoT damage to becoming so overheated you go through 500 points of food in a mater of a few seconds and starve to death. This coupled with the fact that most enemies put multiple effects on you simultaneously and you are just dead. In order for any 'stage based' system to work I feel we need to give the players a chance to actually deal with the stage and make decisions on how or when to treat something. The fact that there is a stage system is so freaking cool by the way. You actually have the opportunity for triage, something games almost never do. But then it is complete lost when just about everything kills you instantly. My suggestion is to lengthen and expand on the current condition system to provide symptoms and options rather than the current solution to just about any affliction... "Meh, I'll just die and walk the 30 feet back to my backpack." Camera shakes making it difficult to aim Seeing spots like super bright lens flares Temporary black screens indicating black outs Inversion of axis controls indicating confusion Medical Terminals I would also like to speak about the medical terminals we have in game and how the a fore mentioned affects them as well. When something kills you or has to be dealt with within a few moments how exactly are players supposed to make use of these facilities? The only time you ever get inflicted with the majority of these conditions is when you are -out- of your ship and in a POI somewhere. I actually built a tiny CV as a M.A.S.H. unit to place outside of POIs and I have never once had enough time to leave the POI to go to my ship to cure because I would be long since dead. About the only one that is useful is the one that cures radiation because of all the warp drives placed right next to walkways. Like I said above, if afflictions were less terminal in every case and offered instead game changing effects that suck and suck more as actual time goes by and the affliction get's worse you open up an entire world of new gameplay and player decisions. Can we leave Bob without treatment for just a little longer to finish the end of the POI? Can I make it with my hands shaking this bad that I can barely hit anything. Dave just blacked out again, we need to wait a few moments until he wakes up to move on, etc. etc. I love the medical in this game and would love to hear more ideas on how to make it more engaging and less instantly punishing. Thank you.
I can certainly get behind more visual effects indicating illness or injury. Of course, some of these are going to require additional animations for the character model as well. For Example: Broken Leg If you've ever broken a leg (or a foot, or toe) walking is extremely challenging, downright painful, and seldom in a straight line. Running should be disabled, and there should be a continual risk of Falling Down (which would require a new animation as well). Crawling would work, but would also require new animations. Seeing someone walking around on a broken leg, they should appear as if they're are trying to walk on a broken leg (more animations). Poisoned would also be a good case for some visual anomalies. "Bad Trip" has a nice visual to go with it, so adding visuals to afflictions certainly is possible. I also think, for things like Parasite infestations, an Incubation period, with no outward signs would make things more interesting. For instance: "Dear Diary; Today I fought off a strange alien creature. Although it got the jump on me, and managed to claw through part of my suit, I was able to kill the beast with a very fancy shotgun I found in a discarded barrel. --- Dear Diary; I've been having strange dreams, and have been constantly hungry the past two days. I wish there was a medic station here. I think I might need a full exam. --- Dear Diary; I thought I was loosing my mind. When I looked in the mirror, I'd have sworn I saw something moving under my skin - until this... this THING burrowed right out of me. I noticed more of these things around the wound that alien creature made when we fought. I think it infected me with some kind of parasite!" A couple of days pass here before the symptoms of parasitic infection really manifest. Nothing Day one, not even a status marker, but there is still an infection going on. Two days later, we're losing food more rapidly than normal, but still no status marker. Day 3, the status marker shows up, as we realize we're infected with Alien Parasites. Now things can start going downhill fast. More blatant conditions, like Radiation Burns, Dermal Burns, and Broken Bones should show up right away. Poison might also be a delayed-onset condition, where we don't realize we've been poisoned right away - 30 minutes later though, we're seeing spots, wandering around in circles, hit points are dropping, and we're going "Uh oh, I hope the clone chamber is working...." while frantically calling out "Medic!" Too Cold/Too Hot should have some impact on our movement, slowing us down, causing some random stumbling (would need some animations here), until we reach Hypothermia/Heat Stroke levels, at which time, moving should be very difficult and disoriented (left becomes right, right become left, up becomes down, down becomes up, and Jump turns into Fall Down (again, need new animations here). Massive systemic disorders - Organ Failure/Sepsis should be immobilizing. Maybe you can fumble out a med kit or an injection pen, but you might drop it. You need immediate care, and that means not just some new animations, but here's a good one: The ability for someone else to apply medical care (give an injection/use a medical kit) on you. Right-click from the hotbar while equipped would work here. Alternatively, the ability to move a disabled player (pull/carry/put onto a new gadget we don't have - the maglev stretcher*) and get you into/onto the proper medical device for treatment. The MagLev stretcher would make a great addition, especially in Multi Player modes. This tool, equipped via the hotbar, would allow a player to pick up and move an immobile player, allowing them to be evacuated from the field to medical facility for treatment. For transport, the stretcher could be hand-carried, floating along as if carried by more than one person, or, this would be somewhat tricky - set down by the carrying player on a vehicle, where it would be treated like a Passenger Seat.
