Infections in a17

[Kerantli]

So, I've been playing a17 and I've noticed that even bandaged/"healed" infliction's are getting infections now, is that a bug or is that intended now?

For example, one of my colonists was burned (I hate incendiary launchers so much), treated as soon as was possible but they still ended up with an infection.

Guess what I'm mainly asking is, has the infection chance increased?

[Raccoon]

what quality had your bandage? i think when you using "best" medicine with 60+% you will get no infections. But no idea atm.

[Kerantli]

I've not changed anything from a16, I've always tended to leave the "best" medicine for operations or plague or something equally as dangerous, with the smaller damage from raids as herbal or no medicine (but doctor care). didn't think that it would come back and bite me as hard as it did.

Can't remember what the % was, in the end, I just dev mode healed them

[Zhentar]

It was a bug in A16 that tended wounds couldn't get infections.

[firefistus]

I definitely think this needs to be looked at.  I have had several starts as tribal rough difficulty in the mountains, they get hypothermia day 2, ok that's fine.  Then they get infected, alright.  Then Day 3 I get them warmed up, they are healthy with food stuffs, they work through until they have immunity, (full health, no injury at this point except for infection)  And they die as soon as they gain immunity.  I would understand if someone was bed ridden, and got to the point where they needed immunity and couldn't hack it because they were too sick or hurt or whatever.  But if they are fully healed and only have a flu infection?  The rate it kills you is actually quite alarming.

[KillTyrant]

I know in the through the lens of the modern world that the flu doesnt seem that deadly but even with current standards of medical care around 12000 to 56000. The flu kills more people on average than AIDS which is at about an estimated 13,712 people in 2012. Now put that into the context of this game. Middle of nowhere, no medical infrastructure, poor personal hygiene (no one washes their hands or showers) and people are in close proximity to each other and food might not be the most nutritious. The Flu should have a high rate of mortality in that setting.   

Citations - Flu related deaths https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/disease/us_flu-related_deaths.htm
             - AIDS related deaths https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HIV/AIDS_in_the_United_States

I know wiki is usually a no-go for citations but this isnt a book report.

[b0rsuk]

Hospital cleanliness matters.

[Ukas]

Sounds like infections work again like they did A15. I've been missing them, infections weren't a thing in A16.

[DariusWolfe]

Sounds like infections work again like they did A15. I've been missing them, infections weren't a thing in A16.

Heh, well, almost. I actually had a colonist die of an infection in an A16 game shortly before the A17 unstable release. She'd been involved in taking down a raider, and my doctor healed the raider, then went to bed; Next morning, both colonist and raider were on bed rest, and I was microing my doctor (also best shooter aside from the wounded colonist) to go do some hunting, so the wounded colonist still didn't get medical care. Got an infection, died of it despite me eventually noticing and trying to doctor her.

But the rarity of infection in A16 definitely contributed to my complacency.

[Canute]

It was a bug in A16 that tended wounds couldn't get infections.

If this will be true at A17, it will very hard to survive, special when 2 or more raids happen shortly, special when half of your pawn's are in the bed with infection.

[Sian]

Sounds like infections work again like they did A15. I've been missing them, infections weren't a thing in A16.

Heh, well, almost. I actually had a colonist die of an infection in an A16 game shortly before the A17 unstable release. She'd been involved in taking down a raider, and my doctor healed the raider, then went to bed; Next morning, both colonist and raider were on bed rest, and I was microing my doctor (also best shooter aside from the wounded colonist) to go do some hunting, so the wounded colonist still didn't get medical care. Got an infection, died of it despite me eventually noticing and trying to doctor her.

But the rarity of infection in A16 definitely contributed to my complacency.

Actually had a colonist die to Infection the other day in A16 ... from an infection in their hand after they crash-landed and rescued ASAP

[giltirn]

Infections certainly are brutal now. I just lost a colonist to it for the first time since A15 to a scratch from a wayward panther. In A16, as long as you were careful and treated wounds immediately there was virtually no chance of an infection killing a colonist. A17 it seems that RNG plays a much larger role, which I can't say I'm a big fan of. Punish me for my mistakes, but not otherwise.

[Limdood]

In A15, tended wounds could get infections, BUT healing was pretty fast.  I know when i played, i expected to get infections when a body part was blown down to next-to-no-hp, as those took the LONGEST to heal, expecially torso, because it had the most HP to heal.  The notable part was the short heal times.  It was actually unusual to get a raid while a pawn was still injured, just because they healed so fast.  Most any degree of damage was completely gone inside a day.

In A16, tended wounds could no longer be infected, BUT healing was DRASTICALLY slowed down.  A 3/40 hp-left torso will take several days to heal, even in a hospital bed with vitals monitor.  Significantly longer if the pawn is up and about and working.  Infections were rarely an issue, so long as you could get to injured pawns and bandage them in a reasonable amount of time, but with heavy raiding storytellers, you'll often be sending injured pawns back out to fight.

In A17, you now have to face the worst of both worlds.  The healing rate stays slow, but now tended wounds can get infections.  Not only will this eat thru medicine MUCH faster (infections are quite serious, and a pinky infection will kill you in 2 days), but with raid-happy storytellers, you'll be sending out wounded pawns to fight, much like A16, but now they might also be infected and thus gaining infection severity while slowing immunity gain.  This will DRASTICALLY increase difficulty for back-to-back raids where the colonists actually take damage.

Ideas?
- drastically reduced, but not eliminated chances of tended wound infection.
- infection reaching 100% will destroy the body part and perhaps (50%?) spread to adjacent body parts to start again.  No more deadly pinky infections, but the chance to spread still gives incentive for amputation if it becomes obvious it can't be cured.

[giltirn]

- infection reaching 100% will destroy the body part and perhaps (50%?) spread to adjacent body parts to start again.  No more deadly pinky infections, but the chance to spread still gives incentive for amputation if it becomes obvious it can't be cured.

I like this idea. Nothing is worse than watching your colonist waste away with nothing you can do about it. With organ destruction you can at least fix the poor bastard back up given sufficient effort.

[Ukas]

In A17, you now have to face the worst of both worlds.  The healing rate stays slow, but now tended wounds can get infections.  Not only will this eat thru medicine MUCH faster (infections are quite serious, and a pinky infection will kill you in 2 days), but with raid-happy storytellers, you'll be sending out wounded pawns to fight, much like A16, but now they might also be infected and thus gaining infection severity while slowing immunity gain.  This will DRASTICALLY increase difficulty for back-to-back raids where the colonists actually take damage.

Oh yeah this all sounds so great I can hardly wait! With Randy on intense there can be 4 even 5 raids in two days, which means I will have to make decisions like shall I send seriously sick people from hospital to fight battles. There were no scenarios like these in A16, so I'm expecting a lot of fun.

And caravans! I'm using set up camp mod, so people will definitely die because of infections when camping during caravan trips. Which will make the whole business much more riskier, and exciting. Awesome!