Hungry (Sometimes) Like The Wolf

[Medenagen]

It'd be hilarious and great if sometimes a carcass would, when mostly/completely consumed, spawn a Particularly Interesting Bone that you could carry about, and play fight over, and try to get two wolves biting-and-holding at the same time for tug-of-war. Maybe there's an Exceptionally Good Abandoned Boot around that one might find, and a Fascinatingly Amusing Stick with the same properties.

Hehe... That would be both funny and awesome.


I can't wait till TowerFall is done. Looking forward to it! Just hoping I can get it when it is completed.

[perenril]

This looks much more complex but I do like it ^^
I can see it would get a little annoying when XP farming but I suppose we'll have to make do?
I'm really loving the realism that's being added to the game and love it's somehow keep the 'WQ' feel to it.

Keep up the great work! Still really looking forwards to the Anniversary and TowerFall updates!

[Invar]

Seems like a potential mistake. Cats spend 70% of their lives asleep, but replicating lethargy does not constitute rewarding gameplay. While realistic, making the character sleep away time or perform on reduced stats seems like negative reinforcement for completing a successful hunt.

In single player, having a sleep doesn't take anything from the player.

I imagine people will just figure out how to judge how many bites to eat to heal up as much as you can without tipping into 'gorged myself silly, must sleep' territory.

I like it. I've always felt it's a flaw in the game that it rewards killing anything you come across, and even requires surplus-killing (or at least, hunting near some nice scavengable carcasses) to succeed. I'd agree that this change could make that problem more annoying, but I think the vid hints that there will be more not-so-strenuous things to do, and we know the new maps are massive so there will be some exploring.

It might be a gaming-style thing. If the developers were my playthings and I could force them to make my personal Ultimate WolfQuest, I'd take this to an extreme and have a much more complex and differently paced game where you'd have to meet needs for sleep, food, exercise, water and social contact, suffer injuries that just stun you/knock the wind out of you, and others that heal slowly or never, and your goal would not be to take a lot of prey but to balance this stuff to maintain your wolf in Splendid Condition. And then rear pups so they're Splendid all through their growth so the next generation wolf you can jump into has greater potential than the previous. Points would be for finding novel stuff, you'd get lots as a youngster (first time you see an elk, first time you chase one, first time you bite one, etc) but then they'd be pretty rare. You'd spend them to unlock clever behaviors like flipping over porcupines, catching fish, opening gates, and packmates might learn them if you can get them to be watching when you do them, so you could eventually create a dynasty of nearly-super superwolves.

[loboLoco]

You won't have to gorge yourself when you eat (though food will be harder to come by, so that's not generally a bad idea).

This blog post focuses on the new energy mechanic, but please bear in mind that this won't exist in isolation. We're redesigning many other things to better model wolf physiology so they'll all work together as a whole.

[Nayoxii]

• _{The new hunger / energy mechanic is actually quite interesting, you guys are doing an amazing job cx}

[2wolf22]

I liked this video. Its such a cute little idea to have the wolves rest after eating!

[Rustic]

It'd be hilarious and great if sometimes a carcass would, when mostly/completely consumed, spawn a Particularly Interesting Bone that you could carry about, and play fight over, and try to get two wolves biting-and-holding at the same time for tug-of-war. Maybe there's an Exceptionally Good Abandoned Boot around that one might find, and a Fascinatingly Amusing Stick with the same properties.

I LOVE this suggestion. You should post it in the suggestions thread as it would be totally awesome if someday it was implemented into the game.

[DawnWings]

I mean no offense, but this sounds like a bad idea from a game play perspective. I know you're trying to be realistic and discourage the kill-em-all mentality, but no one is going to think real wolves kill continuously just because the player is capable of doing this, and all I see this doing is irritating the player by needlessly forcing them to use the sleep option continuously. I also think a third meter for hunger wouldn't be that confusing or hard to keep up with.

[ChillyTiger9807]

I know you're trying to be realistic and discourage the kill-em-all mentality, but no one is going to think real wolves kill continuously just because the player is capable of doing this

I agree with DawnWings here. Besides, WolfQuest only has a few ways of continuously making the game fun to play. Once you get past the learning aspect, either having learned everything or not caring, you can either roam around in singleplayer, or play with others. If you get into multiplayer you can raise pups, which is sometimes annoying because people like to claim pups and also drown them. Exploring is fine but like the learning aspect, you see everything and then you get tired. And roleplaying is nice but there are so many toxic players that kick you from games for "not roleplaying correctly" that it loses its touch. The most fun I ever had was XP farming and playing a game I made called "WolfQuest E-sports" which was entirely based around hunting. I can see people still XP hunting despite this new bar but it slows them all down having to wait two days or so to have more energy. I think it's good for realism purposes but bad for catering to a whole realm of WQ players.

[Phasoli]

Will our current wolves still be listed? Like their current exp/the wolf itself/etc? What about achievements?
You’ll be able to import your 2.7 wolf into WQ3 (but not import it back to 2.7). We are designing something new to replace XP, but you will be rewarded if you’ve earned a lot of XP in 2.7. We plan to archive all 2.7 achievements and have a new, larger set of achievements for WQ3.

According to Dave, the EXP system will be replaced/modified, so hunting and killing for EXP will likely change altogether. I do agree that some people might not come to the conclusion that real wolves repeatedly kill just because it's possible to kill excessively in-game, but I feel like this mechanic--while realistic--may not completely limit a player's activities.

You won't have to gorge yourself when you eat (though food will be harder to come by, so that's not generally a bad idea).

This blog post focuses on the new energy mechanic, but please bear in mind that this won't exist in isolation. We're redesigning many other things to better model wolf physiology so they'll all work together as a whole.

It seems like the player can make the choice to gorge to the point where the player's wolf needs to rest, or eat just enough to sustain its energy. So it doesn't exactly seem like the player will need to rest for a while every time they eat.

[Frodo1]

I know you're trying to be realistic and discourage the kill-em-all mentality, but no one is going to think real wolves kill continuously just because the player is capable of doing this

I agree with DawnWings here. Besides, WolfQuest only has a few ways of continuously making the game fun to play. Once you get past the learning aspect, either having learned everything or not caring, you can either roam around in singleplayer, or play with others. If you get into multiplayer you can raise pups, which is sometimes annoying because people like to claim pups and also drown them. Exploring is fine but like the learning aspect, you see everything and then you get tired. And roleplaying is nice but there are so many toxic players that kick you from games for "not roleplaying correctly" that it loses its touch. The most fun I ever had was XP farming and playing a game I made called "WolfQuest E-sports" which was entirely based around hunting. I can see people still XP hunting despite this new bar but it slows them all down having to wait two days or so to have more energy. I think it's good for realism purposes but bad for catering to a whole realm of WQ players.

These are definitely fair points, but keep in mind that hunting won't be the only system that's getting a total overhaul. A lot of other things will also change completely, and even the hunting system will shift to make it a more long-term quest. Right now, we just have to run to a hunting ground and we know the elk will be there within a small, isolated region. We know from other blog posts that the elk in WQ3 will dynamically traverse large portions of the new maps, which are 12 times bigger than the current one. So hunting won't be as simple as "go to an elk hunting ground and kill a whole herd" anymore-- you'll have to track your prey from a distance just to even find it.
If the new hunger system was the only thing implemented into WQ3 then sure, that would probably be a catastrophe. But so much else is changing that I personally don't think it will have as much negative effect as it might seem right now just from looking at WolfQuest's current systems. Also, the devs have confirmed that "We are designing something new to replace XP" (here), so I have a feeling that will play into everything as well. But that's just my two cents on the matter

[Polynesia]

I mean no offense, but this sounds like a bad idea from a game play perspective. I know you're trying to be realistic and discourage the kill-em-all mentality, but no one is going to think real wolves kill continuously just because the player is capable of doing this, and all I see this doing is irritating the player by needlessly forcing them to use the sleep option continuously. I also think a third meter for hunger wouldn't be that confusing or hard to keep up with.

I think this is a good point. Like Frodo said, many things are being changed, and some of those things will prevent people from over-killing anyway, like migrating herds, so what is the point of having energy fluctuate? It doesn't seem like it would have any positive effects on gameplay. Instead, you could just have less XP be rewarded every time you kill one elk immediately after another, until no XP is rewarded at all until you take a break from hunting.

It seems like this energy system will be most annoying in the last mission. That's when everyone gorges themselves as much as possible whenever they can, which means they will have low energy, which means it will be too annoying to carry puppies, and that's problematic because the puppies are so slow that leap-frogging them is the only efficient way to get them to the rendezvous site. Carrying puppies drains your stamina very quickly as it is. (It's barely enough to get them over the river without dropping them in the water.) It would be more annoying with low energy and will lead to even more inexperienced players drowning puppies in the river by accident.

Also I have a suggestion about the wolf icon in the new graphic design shown in the video. I think it would be more personalized if the wolf was facing at you. The particular angle in the video really emphasizes the snout and makes it hard to see the face. It would be nicer if you could focus on the eyes and other distinguishing features of your wolf, like scars or torn ears. I think wolves are the most beautiful when they are looking at you. (And the new wolf model's face is so cool, I would love to always see it in the icon.)

[ForeverEverest]

I personally like the new energy idea. I think it'll make things more challenging, and encourage players to use a little more strategy. If there's not going to be experience in WolfQuest 3, I don't think there'll be a reason to hunt so excessively.

We’re making each quest more complex and (hopefully) interesting, which should make them last longer. As part of that, we do want to make pup-raising more holistic and less a linear series of quests. As part of that, we definitely want to ensure that players can (and have to) spend substantial time hunting and maintaining their territory while raising pups.

(Quote from May Q&A)

As the raise pups mission seems to be changing, it will most likely go through plenty of testing. If it proves a little too difficult to keep the pups fed and get them across the river safely, I'm sure they'll do something about it, so I don't think that's anything to worry about.

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It'd be hilarious and great if sometimes a carcass would, when mostly/completely consumed, spawn a Particularly Interesting Bone that you could carry about, and play fight over, and try to get two wolves biting-and-holding at the same time for tug-of-war. Maybe there's an Exceptionally Good Abandoned Boot around that one might find, and a Fascinatingly Amusing Stick with the same properties.

Hehe... That would be both funny and awesome.

I love this idea!

[Phasoli]

It seems like this energy system will be most annoying in the last mission. That's when everyone gorges themselves as much as possible whenever they can, which means they will have low energy, which means it will be too annoying to carry puppies, and that's problematic because the puppies are so slow that leap-frogging them is the only efficient way to get them to the rendezvous site. Carrying puppies drains your stamina very quickly as it is. (It's barely enough to get them over the river without dropping them in the water.) It would be more annoying with low energy and will lead to even more inexperienced players drowning puppies in the river by accident.

I would agree with this if this hunger system were being implemented in the current game as it is, but I like Frodo1's Argument that things will likely change due to the great number of different systems being updated and redone. The game is also very far from completion, so during testing, I'm sure that any negative effects will be tweaked for realism and satisfying gameplay.

[loboLoco]

I would chime in here, but Frodo1 and Phasoli and ForeverEverest have done a fine job putting this change into the larger context (which admittedly is unknown to you all, so I understand why people keep trying to put individual things into 2.7 context). Please just keep in mind that we are redesigning the entire game from scratch, we're not retrofitting hunger/energy into the existing game.