metalmunki

the everyday stuff certainly is more interesting as it gets you thinking about regular skills that could be useful in a survival situation. I've got to put my foot down about forensic scientist though, as that was my favourite that got me posting the idea in the first place :D Just being the guy that can go 'this guy wasn't killed by a zombie...' and suddenly realise there may be a bandit close by! Awesome.

Rather than a direct diary, what if your character's movements are being tracked by the game the whole time so when/if you die, you can save it some format that can be viewed online? Like an Indiana-Jones style travel map line and what loot you found at stopping points or people you met etc... I imagine the tracking and viewing in game would be straightforward enough, but not sure what format you can download the data in that would be best. Perhaps just leave that part out and people can just FRAPS it themselves if they want to show others.

Yeah a slightly better starting weapon for the soldier would be a good idea! At first glance it would seem like the 'hell yeah!" option but once you meet others with better weapons, find some yourself or really wish you had that 'thief' skill it'd even out pretty quickly. I like that, I never thought of the profession choice affecting the inventory directly instead of the abilities before. You'd probably get newbs selecting it to just get used to how the game works and have a touch more survivability before deciding on more specialist skills for their next characters. Interesting!

I'm not talking getting bogged down in tons and tons of skills, but how about some to make characters more unique, so you can pick say, just 1 skill and you live with it. They could represent what your character was before the fallout. examples: Doctor: bonus to healing, needing less equipment perhaps? Mechanic: bonuses to vehicle repair Survivalist: bonus to hunted/cooked food. Forensic Scientist: able to tell how someone died (zombie attack or shot) Soldier: ??? not sure, something to do with weapons would make sense, but don't want to unbalance that too much. Thief: harder to hear/spot by zombies. Civilian: bonus to humanity. Stuff like that, anyway. I think it'd be more in fitting with the hardcore way the game plays that you have to pick something to begin with and stick to it, rather than picking new skills up along the way.