On the subject of survival

Today I want to write a little bit about the survival system.

The system is handled by a certain amount of character states (most of them independant from each other) respectively several little state machines or state sequenences to make it more understandable (the states are not really sequential though).


There are some very basic state sequences:

Eat nothing for days => starve => stats heavily decreased => die of starvation
No sleep/rest for days => exhaustion => stats heavily decreased => fall over somewhen
Drink nothing for days => stats heavily decreased => die of thirst


There are also some less obvious state sequences:

Sleep outside in bad weather => probably get sick => stats decreased => no treatment => dead
Walk far with one pair of boots => boots destroyed => boo-boo on feet => stats decreased
Eat poisonous plants => diarrhea => no treatment => dead
etc. etc.


Of course there are ways to prevent suffering and death.
You can break almost any sequence at any point by an action that sets back the particular sequence (unless you are dead sick or already crapping your pants for the third time). The thing is, the further you go into a sequence, the harder it might be to get into the initial state again.

There are also survival skills which might help you. Like medical treatment, basic repair, tracking etc.
We will cover the skill system another time though.

Until next time!