Rationing food and drink/Deeper survival mechanics.

[Mungaloid 21]

Just an idea that occured to me when thinking about the survival theme of this mod. Rocket said, that survival was his train of thought when developing this mod, and that the infected are basically just a set dressing, because he likes them, everyone is fimilar with them, and, they are an easy compeling means of delivering a situation of desperation. But the survival elements of the mod overall are very simplistic and and don't offer much depth or require much critical thinking and I certainly do not feel desperate.

For myself at current, the hunger and thirst systems are more of a nusance then my primary objective. They are both very easily overcome and only seem to slow my progress while I look for a bigger gun. To me that doesn't offer that authenticity that this mod and eventually the full game is suppose to be leaning towards.

So my suggetion is make food and drink a little more rare and, a bit more precious. But not to the point where it's stupidly impossible to find them. Just enough so that when I find a magazine for my favorite uber-gun but its sitting right beside can of beans that it becomes a dilema. Less animals aswell. That way when I find that wild boar in the woods, I feel excited that I have such luck and that I'm having good eats for awhile.(Not endangered species level just less of them less often.) Who's to say the infect wouldn't eat a goat or someones pet turtle. There are far more of them then there are of us and their numbers don't seem to be dimishing so they must be eating something other then hapless survivors.

This is where rationing idea, and, authenticity come into effect. Slow down the hunger and thrist depletion levels a bit and maybe add negitive effects to higher levels of dehydration and starvation. Allow us to ration our food and drink into portions and only satiate us accordingly.(i.e. hunger gauge is red, I eat a quarter of my tin of beans and my gauge changes back to orange. I'm still hungry and maybe my gun sways slowy while I aim, but, atleast for now I'm not dying of hunger.) I find it a bit funny that it's the end of the world, I'm trying to survive but can't help myself from woofing down a whole can of beans when I'm only a little hungry and could be satisfied with a few mouthfuls. Or that I absolutely must chug my entire cantean when my mouth feels a bit dry.

As for critical thinking, my example would be if a 'needs" system like this were in place would be. I have one full can of pop left and, I'm approching a town looking for more to drink. It's not guaranteed that I will find some here, but I am closing in on my limit with thirst. I'm so dehydrated that my sprint becomes limited or maybe my top running speed is decreased. (maybe both if my thirst is high enough.) I may have to run from infected but, I also might make it in and out of the town without any troubles and, possibly without more to drink. Do I chugg this whole thing cross my finger and prepare for the worst? Maybe drink half and sit down for a little while to save energy to slow my gauges? Or do I save my last can of mountian dew for later, walk in there as is with penalties to my movement because I'm nearly dying of thrist and, hope for the best? Lastly do I move on andwait it out till the gauge is almost empty, drink the can while on to the next town to face the same situation, but with nothing to drink?

How I think it should work specifically is divide food and drink into 4 uses that each restore one tier of the thirst and hunger gauges with the options laid out in the right click menu, Drink 1/4, Drink 1/2, Drink 3/4, Drink all.

Also divide the gauges into four tiers of severity.

Green/Full bars = not hungry, Yellow/three bars=ok, but getting there, orange/two bars = minor penalties (gun sway/shorter sprint) Red/one bar severe penalties (Hunger shakes. growling stomach? farts?/lower running speed, tripping? fading blackouts maybe?) Black/empty = flies and looting.

Makes killing for beans more rational and legitimate lol.

TL;DR - make food, drink and, animals more rare -slow down the rate of thirst and hunger gauges -divide food and drink items into 4 portions and hunger/thirst meters into 4 degees of severity -add penalties to to higher levels of thirst and hunger to make food and drink more important -adds dilemas and critical thinking to survival (i.e. drink/eat some or all?, or hmmm. Beans or Bullets...?) - killing for Beans more legit instead of just lawls -zombies ate your pets

I would like something like this, not sure how many others would. What do you guys think?