Health System Improvements

[Necrofallen]

Hello! In short; I had gone through a decent amount of effort to write a pretty detailed post about this, my computer crashed. I still have all the calculations and such, but yeah, pretty annoyed about that. I may not write as detailed this time, sorries!

I'm a HUGE fan of this game. I have lost hours among hours, meticulously ordering a bunch of hopeless nobodies in hope that they'll one day escape the retched world they now live on. During that time, I can't say I haven't come up with a few ideas for improvements. As you may be able to tell by the title, this one is about my idea for health.

Introduction:

Basically, I loved dwarf fortress for many reasons. One of the most clear reasons was the health system; There was something oddly entertaining about chopping of various facial features and beating your foe to death with them, or raging as a spear gets driven through your heart and you know your end draws close.

However silly it was, it was what overall overcame the lack of graphics or grammatical perfection. It even made up for the two year breaks before updates were released.

And do not get me wrong, I love the current Health System. Especially in regards to the specifics (ie. Tibia rather than lower leg) But I still have some ideas for improvement. I hope you'll consider these.

My suggestion:

Though the current system is fantastic, it is still based off of one single factor; Health points. There are no seperate factors to it's functionality, the result of an injury, or the damage that is dealt. Just simple numbers. I understand perfectly well that that's all it CAN come down to, numbers, but come on - look at the stats system. What's that doing there when the body is so simple?

One of the most *irritating* things in this game is the instantaneous deaths or the fact that a bullet can tear off your entire arm and god forbid the universally generic "Torso". The points, as I shall call them, currently represent the structural integrity of the part they are bound too - Does that really make sense?

I propose that instead of referring to the integrity of the part, it refers to the capability, or the function of the part. For example, when your heart has been battered and bruised to the point that resembles nothing more than a squashed tomato it is not "Gone" or "Severed" and nor are your arms or legs. (except in the case of certain weaponry) I more so complain of the fact that when the points are drained from any external part you either die in the case of the head or torso, or they are cut off. A bullet that does 50 damage (over the health of the humerus) should not simply blow your arm clean off; However it will irreparably shatter anything from your shoulder to your elbow, and maybe even below - you'll be unable to use it, but it's still there.

It is not the lack of flesh inside the torso that causes death realistically (infact, less flesh would I dare say be more beneficial in regards to surviving longer when your death is inevitable) it's ALWAYS blood loss, or the damage of a vital organ. The "torso" in it's generic form is nothing more than muscle and tissue.

But..What's the point? Whether an arm is shattered or an arm is cut off has no difference - they both do exactly the same thing. - The point is realism.

I'm unsure whether the current system is rendered "complete" or whether it is simply a placeholder for when more is added to the game, for example if thirst was added then kidneys would have more of a function. But, from what I can tell (I have not gone into this, forgive me if I'm incorrect) damaging the liver does close to nothing - as is the same for kidneys or lungs. (Aside from at 1.5 bleeding modifier..) The stomach and brain are the only things I have observed to have an actual effect. The stomach having an effect on metabolism (Note that a bruised stomach causes much less metabolic issues than a bruised lung or even kidney) and the brain having an effect on just about everything - as it should. I wonder whether the organs do nothing because their effect would be too resource consuming to add or the effects are simply too minimal to make a huge impact.

I do not believe I have seen a single game where all the "vital" organs actually have a serious effect.

Below I've created a few different formulas..

Formula:

By the way, I'm not at all saying THIS is what should be added. I'm saying that SOMETHING should be added.

As I was complaining about limbs being severed completely by bullets earlier, I thought I'd make a proper (albeit horrid) formula for severing limbs..Remember, this is acting as though health points refer to both ability and integrity, not one or the other.

First of all, the simpler one. z = (x * 2) + y
Z being the end product (percentage), x being the amount of health points below zero the limb is, and y being the base chance (10%).

So, for example, if a limb is at 100% functionality, then there's a 10% of it being severed. As is the same for 1.

But the lower you go beyond zero, the higher the chance gets. For example, if the part was at -30% health, there would be a 25% chance of it being severed. At -50%, there'd be a 35%.  At 90%, there'd be a 55%. I don't like this formula, its unrealistic and minimalistic. Use it as an example of being lazy.

The one I prefer; (x / y) -  = z

X being the total damage dealt to the limb (in percentage) Y being the amount of damage dealt using cutting weapons, s being size & z being the total chance. As a note; Size = # - 20.

So, for example, the torso has a size of 100.00. Meaning it has an 80% reduction. The two methods are the chance has to be OVER 80% to be severed, or -80% to whatever z is. I use the latter below
When at say, 42% health(58% damage) with 27% of this damage being dealt by a knife, there would be but 3% chance of it being cut in half (rounded down) I couldn't, and nor could any of my math-genius friends think of a way to incorporate realistic weapon damage so that a butter knife doesn't have the same chance of cutting it in half as a light saber does. If you can think of a formula, kudos.


The livers functionality;

Well, in real life, the liver is in charge of producing essential vitamins & enzymes aswell as cleaning the blood. It also assists in the metabolic process & preventing exertion (From physical activity)

Although it's certainly vital for long-term livelihood, really, if it ceased functioning in the midst of combat you wouldn't keel over and die. (Though death would occur fairly quickly if the bleeding wasn't stopped)

As over-used hormones, dead blood cells and other toxins like cholesterol build up throughout your body, your body would simply start degrading in efficiency.

I would suggest treating liver damage like you do an illness; With progressive symptoms and "Stages". I have no idea how to use C#/C+ or whatever Rimworld uses, or else I would do this myself, but here's what I imagine it'd look like; <at<event trigger><Movement speed - <liverdamage></Movement Speed><Pain + <liverdamage></Pain><Blood Pumping - <liverdamage></Blood Pumping></event trigger>

So basically, if the liver is at 30/100 health, then reduce movement speed by 0.70cl/s, increase pain by 0.70 and reduce blood pumping efficiency by 0.70 at every event trigger. (Maybe reduce/increase the amount depending on difficulty level, as it'd already occur less frequently on Phoebe Friendly)
NOTE: Seriously, limbs are pretty resilient to blunt damage. Only severe damage can cause hemorrhage and inflammation. Maybe only let it damage a limb if the weapon does over 20 damage, and reduce the damage by 50% or something..


The KIDNEYZ

The kidneys, I would say, should act the same way as the liver functions. It's not because I can't think of anything that the two do differently, it's just that most of the functions they don't both serve aren't implemented and I don't expect them to ever be implemented (except maybe bladder?)

The LUNGZ
When a lung is shot or pierced..It's a very very bad thing. Yes, you can live with a single lung (with severe debilitation) but it's rather rare that you meet someone who has actually survived a wound that requires them to live with only one lung. (Excluding cancer)

I unfortunately have too little knowledge to even make a guess at how coding it would be, but (again with the no-to-instant-death) as the amount of oxygen you're receiving lowers, your blood pressure will severely drop - sometimes resulting in death within one to twenty four hours. I'd personally suggest that there be a two-hour in-game time limit until any sort of lung puncture (no matter the damage done) causes incapacitation (through lowering all the stats, much like brain damage - until conciousness is lowered to zero) but that time is decreased by the amount of damage done. If the lung is only at 50% health, reduce the time by 50%. If it's only at 75%, reduce by 25%. Whether or not this is too "complex" or "bothersome" to code in, perhaps for each additional two hours that go by without the wound being sutured, some brain damage occurs. (25% of the damage done to the lung. So if the lung has 30 health, and its now at ten, then add 6 damage to the brain per two hours. This damage does not repair itself once the lung has been repaired.

The STOMACHZz

I'm not quite sure what metabolism is at this stage. I believe that if they have reduced effectiveness in metabolism, it means they consume nutrition faster and require more food - This should not be the case. I would say that, while a stomach is damaged, they are unable to consume as much food as they were able before - if the stomach is at but 50% of it's health, then they may only consume 50% of their meal, meaning they must have another meal in a 50% shorter time (not because they consume food faster, but because they cant consume as much food)
Not that theres really any difference..

The heartzies:

You can actually live for a suprisingly long time without a functioning heart. You do indeed have three major circulatory systems within your body; Your cardio system, which supplies oxygen to your heart, your primary circulation system, and your lymphodic system. Your cardio and lymphodic systems are aided by the heart, but can function using various Smooth Muscles. The oxygenated blood thats already inside of your body can still supply the nearby cells, even without a pulse. It takes around 5 to 20 minutes for the cells, specifically in the brain, to begin dying.

Even if they are doomed to die, as there is no system (without mods) currently in the game to replace a heart (unless you have one spare, for whatever reason) it does NOT mean that you need to instantly kill them; Unconsciousness would occur in as little as 2 minutes with 0% efficiency, and as stated above, can take up to 20 minutes for total death to occur. As with the lungs, I would suggest dealing damage to the brain. If the heart is at 1/30 health points, then deal 29 damage to the brain every in-game half an hour. They are not useless if you manage to revive them before their brain completely dies, they can be used for organ harvesting. Mm mm mm.

The brain, as I see it, is fairly accurate...

The SPLEEN
How could I forget about the spleen! My word, if a gunshot pierced your spleen, you would bleed a heck-of-a-lot faster than you currently do in-game. It basically holds a moderate amount of red blood cells in the case of blood loss; Meaning all that was held inside the spleen, is now gone. Please, do increase the bleed rate SIGNIFICANTLY for this if not for other organs too. It's alternate functions I don't find necessary to be put in.


Other noteworthy things;
Pain really should not keep someone unconscious for eternity (or, until they naturally heal some of their damage) but there should be x amount of time before they wake up; Followed by x amount of time until they pass out again. Hopefully there is a way to make pain slowly degrade also.
I do however understand why it is not like that at the current time; The idea is that they're removed from battle. Hopefully the timer is set high enough that the gunfight should end before they wake up, and if it hasn't, they will have probably died of blood loss even if they didn't stand up and make their previous assaulter aim for them again.

(I will edit this and add more as I think of it.I also sincerely hope that other people have better systems than the ones I have come up for. This isn't a thread for just my suggestion and peoples opinion on whether it's good or bad, but for other people to post their suggestions.)

Again, the current system is amazing, and I'd still continue to love and enjoy every part of the game as I play it, but aren't all early-access games about receiving input from their players?

[kingtyris]

First, let me admit that I didn't read the whole post, but rather scanned it. So if I misrepresent or misunderstand anything you've written, please let me know.

It seems to me that you're beef with the health system is that it isn't realistic enough? While I agree that there are finer details that could be made more realistic, on the whole I think the health system as it is now strikes a good balance between realism and good game play.

[inman30]

I agree king. I like the simplicity of the health system but it could be refined. I believe that they're going to add changes to the health system in alpha 9 so don't worry... And may i remind you this is just alpha 8/9 so really they're going to add a lot more to the game.

[Necrofallen]

First, let me admit that I didn't read the whole post, but rather scanned it. So if I misrepresent or misunderstand anything you've written, please let me know.

It seems to me that you're beef with the health system is that it isn't realistic enough? While I agree that there are finer details that could be made more realistic, on the whole I think the health system as it is now strikes a good balance between realism and good game play.

The realism would indeed be nice, but I'm more posting solutions that are alternate to instant-death. For example, if you read the "Liver functionality" paragraph(s) you'll see that when it is shot, death is progressive rather than instantaneous. Same for every other organ, except of course the brain. The other suggestion is to counter the fact that things are considered "gone" or "shot off" when their points reach zero. If you're happy with a bow & arrow tearing off your colonist's legs just because it has enough arrows in it, or you're perfectly happy with none of the organs doing anything at all (except the brain) then this is not the thread for you.

Given that its a game requiring a certain amount of imagination, I always just assumed that the arrows hit a blood vessel and the arm had to be amputated. Part of the fun is filling in your own details.

Why leave it to imagination when it takes so little effort to make it reality?

So what your saying is.... rouge like is too brutal for your tastes?

I'm not sure what your getting at with more "realistic" but no instant deaths?

If he wants to tie "instant" deaths to difficulty level I guess that would be cool but no instant deaths is in no way "realistic".
A shotgun in the face IS gonna be instant death... you really want your lil dudes to get entire head transplants? (which by the way would be hilarious and how cool would an android head replacement be)

Just a suggestion but could you highlight some of the important parts of your post? Cuzz... yea... that's a long one

Hehe, sorry - Not one for TL;DR's, I'll go ahead and do that now.

Well, obviously a shotgun blast to the head would be instant death (The brain is the only organ I believe that, when damaged, SHOULD be instantaneous death (as mentioned in the original post) unless only bruised - They usually manage to starve, freeze, or make a target of themselves as the system currently stands - No modifications would be needed to assure their death (and utter uselessness)

What I'm arguing against is that if something doesn't kill you in real life - why should it kill you here? Vice versa too - if a single damaged lung often kills you in real life, why shouldn't it here? I personally think the game could be more immersive and enjoyable if shots to the liver weren't as powerful as shots to the head. (I mean, whose heard of !!Livershot!!? {Unless you count worms})

[kingtyris]

Given that its a game requiring a certain amount of imagination, I always just assumed that the arrows hit a blood vessel and the arm had to be amputated. Part of the fun is filling in your own details.

[200Down]

So what your saying is.... rouge like is too brutal for your tastes?

I'm not sure what your getting at with more "realistic" but no instant deaths?

If he wants to tie "instant" deaths to difficulty level I guess that would be cool but no instant deaths is in no way "realistic".
A shotgun in the face IS gonna be instant death... you really want your lil dudes to get entire head transplants? (which by the way would be hilarious and how cool would an android head replacement be)

Just a suggestion but could you highlight some of the important parts of your post? Cuzz... yea... that's a long one

Hey thanks for the highlights!
Ok disregard all the crap I said before. I def didn't read enough of it

I think I got it this time hahaha. Just a more in depth and advanced anatomical/biological system which should react more according to real life? I guess I could get on board but there may be a point where too much is just too much. Not sure where you'd limit it?

[Necrofallen]

So what your saying is.... rouge like is too brutal for your tastes?

I'm not sure what your getting at with more "realistic" but no instant deaths?

If he wants to tie "instant" deaths to difficulty level I guess that would be cool but no instant deaths is in no way "realistic".
A shotgun in the face IS gonna be instant death... you really want your lil dudes to get entire head transplants? (which by the way would be hilarious and how cool would an android head replacement be)

Just a suggestion but could you highlight some of the important parts of your post? Cuzz... yea... that's a long one

Hey thanks for the highlights!
Ok disregard all the crap I said before. I def didn't read enough of it

I think I got it this time hahaha. Just a more in depth and advanced anatomical/biological system which should react more according to real life? I guess I could get on board but there may be a point where too much is just too much. Not sure where you'd limit it?

W-What? You want a limit on realism? Very odd. The ONLY limit for the realism of health is the developers capability, and lag. I'd say what I mentioned above is still decently accurate to how the body would function after having (x) damaged, while still adapting the results to make the game playable and fun. MAYBE the oxygen-deprivation-equals-brain-damage thing is a little overboard, but lungs are just too unimportant at the moment.

[200Down]

What I'm getting at is how much do you really want simulated? It could become overbearing amounts of medical bs that the player just doesn't care or need to know. And just like you said "lag" I don't really think it's in the cards because the code already needs plenty of optimization. Basically there needs to be a reasonable "limit" on what you want simulated on each and every living being. Because EACH and every injury and EACH and every stat takes processing and too much at once coupled with inefficient code creates those nasty old lag spikes with so much going on. Hell it may very well need a ground up re-wright the way it is because  it already chokes quite often on my quite "beefy" system. And we both know that won't happen.

Short version is. If you ask for everything you'll simply get nothing. So I'm asking, what would be the most important things for you to have in the med area if you had to choose just a few?

Hell man I'm with you on wanting it more fleshed out and perfectly simulated but I'm also aware that will never happen 

Also noticed your fairly new to the forums so you may be new to the game to and the people behind developing it. Well see here's the thing, there are really no "people". It's pretty much a "person". So there's limits in time and everything there to be aware of 

[Darth Fool]

If your liver is shot, you are going to die from internal bleeding, not the failure to remove toxins.  Same for a knife to the kidneys.  Damage to internal organs will often be fatal because of how much blood flows through them and not their lack of functioning.  If you survive by a miracle or rapid surgery, you may then suffer the ill effects of a damaged organ.  You don't often hear of people shot in the liver because people don't aim for your liver.  They aim for your head.  Or maybe your torso.  Maybe with the proliferation of cowboy hats they aim for your hand.  But liver... never.  Doesn't mean that people who are shot in the liver don't die very fast.

[Necrofallen]

What I'm getting at is how much do you really want simulated? It could become overbearing amounts of medical bs that the player just doesn't care or need to know. And just like you said "lag" I don't really think it's in the cards because the code already needs plenty of optimization. Basically there needs to be a reasonable "limit" on what you want simulated on each and every living being. Because EACH and every injury and EACH and every stat takes processing and too much at once coupled with inefficient code creates those nasty old lag spikes with so much going on. Hell it may very well need a ground up re-wright the way it is because  it already chokes quite often on my quite "beefy" system. And we both know that won't happen.

Short version is. If you ask for everything you'll simply get nothing. So I'm asking, what would be the most important things for you to have in the med area if you had to choose just a few?

Hell man I'm with you on wanting it more fleshed out and perfectly simulated but I'm also aware that will never happen 

Also noticed your fairly new to the forums so you may be new to the game to and the people behind developing it. Well see here's the thing, there are really no "people". It's pretty much a "person". So there's limits in time and everything there to be aware of 

Well, as (yet again) I mentioned in the original post, I did say that there are ALOT more factors, results, etc in real life than what I am suggesting - All I'm asking is for 10-30 more lines of code per organ; Which really, isn't that much to process, but it is (as stated) still the factor that prevented me from making more realistic and in-depth suggestions.

Let's take the liver for example; Upon an injury of but 12 damage (the standard damage of a glock) there would be but three things (that I know of) that need to be calculated; Blood loss rate, current health, and the "whole body blood loss" That remains exactly the same in my suggestion; Only one line of code must be added to the event trigger, along the way of: if(liverdamage == true); apply.liverdamageeffects.src
Which is, yes, still more to process; But it's not a *constant* and continual code that is processed throughout the entire time of play; It's only IF blahblah happens then initiate blahblah. It is the same with every other organ, excluding the lungs and heart which have but one more factor calculate, and that is a timer. A backround timer consumes very very little processing power - and as the game currently stands, I can run it on my laptop (albeit not at 3x speed) which is perhaps four years old and cost no more than $300 (AKA, the cheapest laptop I could find) So really, the limits have already been placed prior to you stating this; It's more a question of what limits YOU think need to be added, as you're the one pointing out there needs to be one.

Unless you were asking if I had ideas for future alpha builds and whether or not more would need to be added to the health system then, in which case I respond with; Baby steps. Present build first, future build later.

If your liver is shot, you are going to die from internal bleeding, not the failure to remove toxins.  Same for a knife to the kidneys.  Damage to internal organs will often be fatal because of how much blood flows through them and not their lack of functioning.  If you survive by a miracle or rapid surgery, you may then suffer the ill effects of a damaged organ.  You don't often hear of people shot in the liver because people don't aim for your liver.  They aim for your head.  Or maybe your torso.  Maybe with the proliferation of cowboy hats they aim for your hand.  But liver... never.  Doesn't mean that people who are shot in the liver don't die very fast.

Yes, but I'm talking about modifications to the current system - If you look, I mention somewhere that the bleeding rate for internal organs is only 1.5x what it would be for most other injuries - And most my suggestions, aside a special few, are based on what currently is rather than presuming that the health system was as I have suggested it. Be that as it may, unless they had multiple puncture wounds, they would most likely die of infection sooner than blood loss (again, very unrealistic) yet REALISTICALLY, if the internal bleeding was somehow stopped, the effects of injury I have mentioned above are approximately what would be suffered due to, and most likely the lethal cause of, the injury. Unless, of course, an infection occurs which requires surgery.

Furthermore, as there is no current system for aiming (Each limb has a defined percentage for being hit - the torso, of course, being the largest with a ridiculous 67% or something) and again referring to what I said in the previous paragraph about basing my suggestions of what currently is, rather than what I'd like, there is no presumption that someone is aiming for the head rather than the liver. Obviously as this game develops, the health system will evolve alongside it, in which case both the system I am suggesting AND the current system would need an extensive re-work.

On another note, as someone who enjoyed studying the human body; There is but one single major artery inside the liver. If any other part of the liver were to be pierced, it would be no more than a few minor arteries, and most of the damage would be done to capillaries. (Apologies if this is incorrect, but I believe that a couple of organs do have a blood barrier surrounding them, much like the brain (except much less) to soften it's damage when it comes in contact with the membrane surrounding it - So the bleeding would still be lethal, obviously, but would not result in death nearly as quickly as you suggested. Infact, the body would probably be able to seal off most of the bleeding before you succumbed to blood deprivation, though the damage would most likely require extensive surgery nevertheless)

If I recall correctly, prior to the discovery of antibiotics, most wounds from muskets that did not kill you immediately were fatal precisely because of infections.

However, as so famously quoted from a speech in the UN, "bullets are made to kill, not wound" and as of such certain restrictions were placed for certain calibers and such; Most bullets are designed to do no more than pierce through the body - which is still usually lethal, but allows for easier surgery and prevention of death, aswell as for avoiding permanent debilitation. I'd more-so fear the fragments of earlier bullets than the dirt or even the cloth of the wound;

Take a splinter embedded in your skin, for example. It is /extremely/ advised you remove it as quickly and cleanly as possible, but that is no more than a provisionary as your body is quite capable of ejecting it (most of the time and providing it hasn't been embedded deeper than the muscles to the tendons or even bone) providing of course it doesn't harbor particularly harmful bacteria, which is rare except in the case of rotting or often-dampened wood.

Now, continuing on - I'm presuming these colonists aren't complete idiots (Which pathing wise, they are, despite the use of 'regions' they still see something on the other side of a mountain more appealing despite the fact that in actuality it's 60 tiles further away than the closest source) and tend to their own wounds in a most basic manner; Washing it with whatever they can find, not poking at it, maybe even licking it, so on so forth.

Therefor, the point is that so long as the wound is safely sealed & the bullet is free of contaminants, then the function loss of the organ would be the killer. (Funny, the liver is the thing that decomposes, or more-so discards rather, iron from the hemoglobin. It'd be fun to study whether or not it'd actually have an effect if there was literally a shard of iron wedged inside of it, I extremely doubt it would, but very interesting)

In addition, the infection itself is the SOURCE of death but not the DIRECT killer, it's still function loss. As the surrounding tissue rots (to feed and act as breeding grounds for the bacteria) the major danger is the blockage of a major artery, 'separation' of the bacteria (where it travels down the blood stream, often stopping in another organ and therefor spreading) and overall, function loss of the affected organ.

(I'm not certain on this system in which it does this, but as far as I'm aware muscles, if pierced, often contract {not in response to the splinter, but in every day life} and push the splinter out {or in..} in conjunction with the bodies immune system{which'll respond as a result of the foreign bacteria}, and for shallow foreign bodies, skin shedding) 

TL;DR - I'm not quite sure whether you'd be for or against the suggestions - but as far as I can tell, you're simply adding onto it as I asked at the end of the post. If you are against it, however, would you please admit that instantaneous death is both more realistic and more fun gameplay wise than my suggestion (or the certain clause of it you are referring to)

[Darth Fool]

Be that as it may, unless they had multiple puncture wounds, they would most likely die of infection sooner than blood loss (again, very unrealistic) yet REALISTICALLY, if the internal bleeding was somehow stopped, the effects of injury I have mentioned above are approximately what would be suffered due to, and most likely the lethal cause of, the injury. Unless, of course, an infection occurs which requires surgery.

If I recall correctly, prior to the discovery of antibiotics, most wounds from muskets that did not kill you immediately were fatal precisely because of infections.

The wound would have fragments of cloth and dirt driven into it, although not immediately fatal,  it would certainly become septic quite soon â€" causing a prolonged and painful death to the victim.