Animals Surprise Attack

[SaltyCrate]

On recent stream there was brief discussion about how you always see the animals before they can see you and how it can potentially be changed. Which reminded me of a certain short-lived mechanic, which I think could be an interesting solution for this: hide grass.

Here is how it could work:

• There will be occasional patches of hide grass on the map. They will be about as rare as current speed-boost objects, maybe even rarer, and they will be somewhat larger in size than they were previously (maybe like 6-8 tiles in diameter). Certain appropriate animals can be spawned inside patches of hide grass when it is loaded or just wander into it, it can also be empty most of the time. Animals which are inside the grass are invisible when they are not in combat.
• When a character sees the grass he rolls perc*explore to have a chance of detecting if it is empty or not. If he detects some animal inside, then he sees it as usual. If he failed detection or there aren't any then grass appears empty. If a character approaches/enters the grass then he automatically successfully detects what is inside.
• Thus, early these spots will represent potential danger of approaching them, as there could always be angry bear hiding inside. But they also will not be too unfair as there are two ways of avoiding this danger: by raising your perception*exploration score or simply by spending time circling them around. And at a later point of character progression they can become sought after hunter spots, where there is higher chance to encounter the game, compared to random wandering

Also, it might or might not be possible to use grass patches for hiding characters as it was initially meant and it is not the point of this idea.

[Sevenless]

No thanks, surprises in permadeath where noobs are seems a bit excessive to me.

[dantheman540]

Or the animals stay as they are now, except you don't see them at a distance if you don't have the perc x expl stats. i.e. to see a boar at 20 tiles you need 2000, 19 tiles 1900, 18 tiles 1800 etc. until you get to say 7 tiles when all characters can see the animal. Obviously you don't want to get to the point where you have a bear in the tile next to you biting chunks out of you, but you cant see it.

[Aceb]

Removing animals from being visible and perc*exp depend, will render many people getting K.Oed and killed before they can even spot the danger. Don't forget we can out-run boar only.

Removing animals icon from map (stream talk) will make custom clients superior in both ways that blind people will still have red circle (and probably minimaps still updated about animals) while default people would be engaged dry into their buttcheeks.

It's not fun if You can't avoid danger because some not very smart mechanic prevent You from seeing it in the first place.

[dantheman540]

Yes, I wasn't saying I necessarily think its a good idea, just if it were to be implemented, how I think it should work.

[Tamalak]

3 out of 5 noobs on my island have died a horrible death already