Alcohol, worker morale, and fatigue

[bk3000]

I decided to break this into 3 post as I decided my post was too long to consider replying to.

We all know hunger is coming and farming will become far less optional as a result. I'd like to see alcohol become far more semi-necessary as well. Traditionally alcohol has been used as a means to placate workers and therefore prevent uprisings as well.

I'd add a morale level which would be depleted by performing manual labor and replenished mainly by drinking alcohol, among other things (like having your own bed to sleep in, being well fed, etc). Higher morale makes for a more productive worker. When the moral level drops too low on a person, they refuse to perform any labor. They would still fight - as to do otherwise would jeopardize their own life.

Slaves - if we ever get to own them - may require more alcohol than your squad members. Well I guess the other option to keep them working is less kind, but historically accurate. "The beatings will continue, until morale improves."

Supposing squad mates get individual personalities eventually, that may affect moral as well. One person despises slavery, and will loose moral if you capture/sell slaves. Another person is a psychopath, and his moral rises when he kills people. Some members may dislike killing, and it might be better to equip them with nonlethal weapons to prevent low morale. Some people may enjoy physical labor, and their morale drops slowly while working as a result. Others may be lazy and require more alcohol to keep them working.

Besides restoring morale, alcoholic beverages probably should also reduce hunger a bit as they realistically can sustain you calorie wise (even if devoid of nutrition). I would not be a good option to replace food though, as you would have a serious penalty to all combat skills for a few (in game) hours after drinking it that stacks as squad members drink more and more. Sword fighting while drunk isn't something that one could highly recommend.

[bk3000]

You probably would start out being able to make basic (terrible) booze. But through research you may get better options for different recipes and better distilleries. Better booze means raises moral higher, as well as commanding a better price. Different recipes may require different ingredients so some may be better options for you than others(depending on what is locally available).

Food itself probably would provide similar gains to morale if you get a good recipe and the food is high quality(skilled cook). Buy different recipes, research to improve them. And of course hemp is in the game. Research better strains for obvious reasons... but maybe that's illegal in holy empire areas.

I could see you growing illegal crops as reason enough to attack you on sight. Might I also assume with "Illegal Narcotics" in game that we may eventually have a chance to grow and produce such goods? Obviously that would be risky. It wouldn't be the best idea to give your people either, with the high risk of addiction and all.

[bk3000]

I'd also like to see a fatigue stat. It would be increased by working, fighting, running, etc. Running would obviously increase it faster than jogging or walking(which would barely increase it). It would slowly lower while you people are standing around. It would lower much quicker when lying on a bed or sitting in a chair. Food would help. Alcohol would help a little. Some of those "illegal narcotics" would help a lot.

But short of getting hooked on the "illegal narcotics," bed usage should be the only measure that helps enough, and so letting your people sleep regularly would become a necessity. You could also let people lay down on the ground, but it won't be nearly as good. Maybe tents could provide a better option while on the move, with the downside of eating up valuable inventory space.

[Hatsune_Neko]

you know
stamina is basically a fatigue stat.
we dont want to many different stats when you can tie into the same one that's most like it. and has a lot of the same functions.

[philthymcnasty]

I forget, will the game have stamina?

Everyone works 24/7, no tiring. This is part of why the economy is screwed up, as you can accumulate millions of cats in trade goods in a few weeks if you constantly work.

Like i build a lot of beds, but i only use maybe 3 or 4, because right now, they are only good for healing severely wounded people.

So stamina would add thousands of hours of game play, because you would no longer be able to: run six days straight across the map, hyper train strength, walk around with heavy armor non-stop, work like a robot, or fight a Leviathan for three days straight with a rusty club to hyper train toughness , saber, and attack/defense.

So yeah, stamina should be a thing. I would love to have the barracks i build be used for stuff, and i would love to have the squad put their equipment in the boxes by the bed so that they can sleep better.

[Hatsune_Neko]

yea.
its supposed to in teh game sooner or later. so there would be no more running forever, you would tire and enemies could catch up to you if they have higher adjusted stamina then you.

It should be required that your people need sleep to recover from a hard day of work. they do now but with NPC's, you see some of them heading to a bed to sleep in for the night. we should have that option as well.

[LootedWhileAwake]

You could also let people lay down on the ground, but it won't be nearly as good.

People can get used to sleeping on the ground, suffer some pains and start to get used to it just like they lift heavy equipment for a extended amount of time and have to recover. There might even be a dependency upon sleep position factors as to what hurts such as sleeping on your arm like a pillow could cause the character to adjust or experience some pain in that arm for lack of blood flow causing trouble for the character to grip things for a certain amount of time.

[Zeal]

As long as this is seen as an alternative, and not a requirement, then i'd have no problem with it. But not everyone is an alcoholic, and it certainly should not give any penalties for simply not having it in your blood.. Unless you're already addicted or something...

You should be very well able to operate 100% without alcohol, and, to be honest, being drunk should give you penalties, which you didn't seem to mention anything about. Drinking may help that "stress bar" or w/e, but at the same time it would diminish your ability to actually work, or even fight. You are not going to fight well drunk. Not unless you're someone very special, and you most certainly are going to be less efficient in work. You cannot even begin to debate that.

Alcohol should be optional, and have it's own side-effects about how it works with your units, that can safely be completely ignored if you so choose.

In your talk about slaves though, if personalities are maintained, i could see workers wanting alcohol or w/e, but I'm mostly retaining my grief with designating your own player controlled units as alcoholics. Mine certainly are not. Don't force me to make them.

[Chinsei]

As long as this is seen as an alternative, and not a requirement, then i'd have no problem with it. But not everyone is an alcoholic, and it certainly should not give any penalties for simply not having it in your blood.. Unless you're already addicted or something...

You should be very well able to operate 100% without alcohol, and, to be honest, being drunk should give you penalties, which you didn't seem to mention anything about. Drinking may help that "stress bar" or w/e, but at the same time it would diminish your ability to actually work, or even fight. You are not going to fight well drunk. Not unless you're someone very special, and you most certainly are going to be less efficient in work. You cannot even begin to debate that.

Alcohol should be optional, and have it's own side-effects about how it works with your units, that can safely be completely ignored if you so choose.

In your talk about slaves though, if personalities are maintained, i could see workers wanting alcohol or w/e, but I'm mostly retaining my grief with designating your own player controlled units as alcoholics. Mine certainly are not. Don't force me to make them.

Agreed.

Some cultures in the real world completely oppose and outlaw the consumption of alcohol.

I think that stamina eating drinking an so on should be 'optional' after all they can become tedious and annoy some people..

i'm all for 'hard' but theres a fine line between making a game challenging an fun , an then making it just annoying.

theres also a issue with consumption in games an that its usually falls so fast that your spending more time eating then doing anything else in the game.

Eatings an annoyance in reality -.- an can be even more so in games.

of course if we have eating and drinking then it stands to reason we need digestion too :p -goes into Sims like chain of need-

Also

some people enjoy 'working' and there morale wouldn't fall simply because they were working. there are plenty of examples in the modern world of people who enjoy working more than anything else.

and history is full of people who made swords because it was their passion i doubt any part of their sword making would make them stop doing something they enjoy.

if we have people who dislike something there should be people who like it.

every positive should possess a negative.

[Zeal]

Also

some people enjoy 'working' and there morale wouldn't fall simply because they were working. there are plenty of examples in the modern world of people who enjoy working more than anything else.

and history is full of people who made swords because it was their passion i doubt any part of their sword making would make them stop doing something they enjoy.

if we have people who dislike something there should be people who like it.

every positive should possess a negative.

Yes, precisely.
I have a character that would alleviate stress by stabbing people in the face. She absolutely refuses to wear any backback above the smallest size, and that backpack never carries building material. She will not build, she will not mine, she will not farm, and she will not drink. She gets antsy standing around, and if she hasn't knocked something unconscious all day, it would drive her insane.

Other units may not want to fight at all, and enjoy working the fields, or even at the mine. I don't see why they would need to drink to alleviate stress/anxiety or w/e if they're doing something they enjoy doing...

But.. this goes back to my wish for the player to be able to designate personlities to their units.. If you could be allowed to do that, and each personality had tastes for what they liked and didn't then this whole discussion would be a bit more meaningful... unfortunately I don't think the personality perks are going to exist in player units Something like that is going to take a huge amount of work, though to be honest, i know a select few people who would be more than happy to help the devs with that (one of them being myself)... Too bad they don't take volunteer work.

[bk3000]

As long as this is seen as an alternative, and not a requirement, then i'd have no problem with it. But not everyone is an alcoholic, and it certainly should not give any penalties for simply not having it in your blood.. Unless you're already addicted or something...

I don't disagree. There should be more than one way to maintain morale. But alcohol has often been used historically to placate workers. Yes I know this isn't universal across all cultures, but it is pretty darn common. I could see having a faction that doesn't allow alcohol for that matter.

You should be very well able to operate 100% without alcohol, and, to be honest, being drunk should give you penalties, which you didn't seem to mention anything about. Drinking may help that "stress bar" or w/e, but at the same time it would diminish your ability to actually work, or even fight. You are not going to fight well drunk. Not unless you're someone very special, and you most certainly are going to be less efficient in work. You cannot even begin to debate that.

I DID put up the idea of serious combat penalties to fighting drunk and that the penalties stack the more the person had to drink. It was at the end of my first post. As for work, I don't disagree but generally I would see drinking as an end-of-day kinda thing. I think most work should stop once things get dark.

Suppose that a player had them drink while they are working, then yes they probably should suffer a work penalty too. The penalties probably would last 'X' hours depending on how much drinking occurred.

But.. this goes back to my wish for the player to be able to designate personalities to their units

I'm all about them having individual personalities, as I mentioned in this thread that those personalities could highly influence their individual morale levels. Like with a character that doesn't like killing, so you should probably give them a club to avoid morale penalties every time they have to fight.

Also that some people like work, while others are lazy. The lazy people when made to work would loose morale faster. They may be better utilized as guards than workers if you don't want to be hassled keeping up their morale. Those who love to work won't loose/maybe gain morale when working. Most would lie in between. They may also have preferred work - like someone who is enthusiastic about making weapons in particular.

I don't necessarily like the idea that WE would get to choose their personality. I think that should be sort of randomized and perhaps some hint of their personality in the hiring dialog and maybe more info after hiring them. If you want a particular kind of person, then look around and hire that sort of person.

Different personalities (that we can't choose) means that the player is responsible for finding the right role to fit each member - as any good leader should. At the same time the player would probably pass on potential recruits that don't fit what we want or need, and dismiss members that just don't work out.

I think that stamina eating drinking an so on should be 'optional' after all they can become tedious and annoy some people..

i'm all for 'hard' but theres a fine line between making a game challenging an fun , an then making it just annoying.

theres also a issue with consumption in games an that its usually falls so fast that your spending more time eating then doing anything else in the game.

Eatings an annoyance in reality -.- an can be even more so in games.

It is a fair point. I would prefer that eating/drinking/etc happen semi-automatically and take up very little time. Somewhere in the squad menu they could add a setting for food ration levels and drink provisions (with "none" as an option) It shouldn't require a lot of interaction on our part to manage something so tedious.

Provided they where not currently working or under move/fight/etc orders, the squad members would eat and drink while idle without having to be specifically told to do so (depending on the settings). They would just auto-loot it from a storage box/someone's backpack/etc and use it. Should you have a bar set up and stocked, they might just go there to do their eating/drinking.

Just so long as you make sure that production keeps up with demand (or that you are purchasing enough), things would run smoothly without turning into micromanagement hell (aka The Sims, Dwarf Fortress, etc). Fortunately Kenshi strikes a good balance between individual control and AI units that pretty much can manage well enough on their own.

[Zeal]

I DID put up the idea of serious combat penalties to fighting drunk and that the penalties stack the more the person had to drink. It was at the end of my first post. As for work, I don't disagree but generally I would see drinking as an end-of-day kinda thing. I think most work should stop once things get dark.

How did I miss that...? I must have been really eager to respond with what i was thinking about with all the other stuff s.s

I'm all about them having individual personalities, as I mentioned in this thread that those personalities could highly influence their individual morale levels. Like with a character that doesn't like killing, so you should probably give them a club to avoid morale penalties every time they have to fight.

Also that some people like work, while others are lazy. The lazy people when made to work would loose morale faster. They may be better utilized as guards than workers if you don't want to be hassled keeping up their morale. Those who love to work won't loose/maybe gain morale when working. Most would lie in between. They may also have preferred work - like someone who is enthusiastic about making weapons in particular.

I don't necessarily like the idea that WE would get to choose their personality. I think that should be sort of randomized and perhaps some hint of their personality in the hiring dialog and maybe more info after hiring them. If you want a particular kind of person, then look around and hire that sort of person.

Different personalities (that we can't choose) means that the player is responsible for finding the right role to fit each member - as any good leader should. At the same time the player would probably pass on potential recruits that don't fit what we want or need, and dismiss members that just don't work out.

I can understand that for the normal player this would be an interesting style of gameplay, but for myself, I would probably drop Kenshi altogether, or find a way to mod in a way that we CAN select it.. My units have a very defined nature and design pre-designed by myself. They're my "children" thrown into this world, and if they don't match up with the way I know them, it doesn't work for me.. It is pretty much the entire reason I like Kenshi so much, because no other game offers something like this. To be able to create my own units, tailored by myself. Without that, I could not play it. It would just become "another rts" for me.. I know this is a very strong attraction in myself, and not everyone, but I don't believe i'm the only one out there who considers their units more close to home.

But.. then again.. we seem to like that "toggle" button, making everything optional, so there is that.
Personally I think that each and every unit should have a "default" personality that is just there, and you can change like any other feature at the surgeon. Just like a default appearence. So you could choose if you wanted to stick "what you get", or go with something a bit more personalized.. But.. that is all straying from the topic of the thread...

[LootedWhileAwake]

They're my "children" thrown into this world, and if they don't match up with the way I know them, it doesn't work for me.. It is pretty much the entire reason I like Kenshi so much, because no other game offers something like this. To be able to create my own units, tailored by myself. Without that, I could not play it. It would just become "another rts" for me.. I know this is a very strong attraction in myself, and not everyone, but I don't believe i'm the only one out there who considers their units more close to home.

Sounds a lot like you want to edit stats to carry out a personalized scenario.

Personally I think that each and every unit should have a "default" personality that is just there, and you can change like any other feature at the surgeon. Just like a default appearance. So you could choose if you wanted to stick "what you get", or go with something a bit more personalized.

I also like the personalization of the characters but having unpredictability is the excitement in a game, the more stuff you don't know about what you think are in your interests, the better the game is. Kenshi just needs some realistic way(s) to find the random characters that you do want.

Worker morale could be enhanced by stimulants which should reduce fatigue like cocoa leaves, coffee, or certain plants, then there's drugs....

[Zeal]

They're my "children" thrown into this world, and if they don't match up with the way I know them, it doesn't work for me.. It is pretty much the entire reason I like Kenshi so much, because no other game offers something like this. To be able to create my own units, tailored by myself. Without that, I could not play it. It would just become "another rts" for me.. I know this is a very strong attraction in myself, and not everyone, but I don't believe i'm the only one out there who considers their units more close to home.

Sounds a lot like you want to edit stats to carry out a personalized scenario.

I "edit my stats" by having them survive and grow So no, that is not the case. I do have general stats in mind for a lot of them, but I find it enjoyable working up to those positions. It gives them "history", without deterring them from the individual i see in my mind. Incorporation, if you will.