Nyctophobia

[Night-Pryanik]

Summary

Content "Added nyctophobia trait"

Purpose of change

AKA fear of dark. Add trait for RP and gameplay.

Describe the solution

• Players with nyctophobia can enter tiles with cloudy and dark light levels. Tiles with very dark light level are off-limits to them, unless player character is running or took a xanax.
• Players have a chance to see monsters (represented as hallucinations) in very dark tiles in 5-tile radius around the player, even if players themselves are standing in lit tile. The chance to spawn hallucinations is 2% per turn if player is standing in lit tile, and 10% if player is standing in very dark tile.
• Players have a chance to hear auditory hallucinations while staying in very dark tiles. The chance is 50% every 30 seconds.
• Players suffer several mental and physical effects if they are standing in very dark tiles. 2% chance per turn for every effect, i.e. they can happen all at once. Among them:
• • shaking hands (penalties to dexterity and strength);
• • trembling legs (player will fall down);
• • sudden suffocation attack (loss of stamina);
• • paralyze by fear (loss of turns).
• All negative effects are alleviated if player has taken xanax.

Describe alternatives you've considered

• Instead of strict blocking of entering very dark tiles, use a chance.
• Add more effects.

Testing

Got nyctophobia. While standing in lit tiles, looked at very dark corners. Eventually hallucinations monsters appear in these corners. Tested the same while standing in very dark tiles.
Walked over very dark tiles. Eventually was knocked down, got shaking hands, lost some stamina, got paralyzed for few turns.

Additional context

None.

[Venera3]

If you key it off a JSON character flag (checked with has_flag instead of has_trait) then effects/bionics could apply this temporarily as well - it would work great as an on-attack effect from shadows and such.

[Night-Pryanik]

@Venera3 done in c97e8ff.

[NetSysFire]

I like this, it has a good amount of potential but I am unsure about the point cost. Raiding houses at night becomes much more dangerous this way and the dark is present almost everywhere.
I do not have a strong opinion on this but I would potentially increase the points you gain from taking this trait.

Also, can you work in the dark (e.g making flour) by wearing a blindfold? This seems like a fun edge case.

it would work great as an on-attack effect from shadows and such.

Or portal storm effects, e.g when the sun is snuffed out like a candle and you fail an int check.

[Night-Pryanik]

I do not have a strong opinion

Me neither. I'm open to suggestions.

Also, can you work in the dark (e.g making flour) by wearing a blindfold?

Yes, when you're wearing a blindfold, the tile you're standing on has the same light level as your surroundings have.

[x-qq]

In my opinion this is incomplete if added without:

• ways to alleviate the effects temporarily: anti-depressants, diazepam, beta-blockers
• ways to eventually treat the effect permanently: meditation, therapy (+others implant/mutation/etc-based ?)

[Night-Pryanik]

ways to alleviate the effects temporarily: anti-depressants, diazepam, beta-blockers

I'm not a doctor, I'm not sure which in-game medication should be used. Is it feasible IRL to alleviate the effects at all? @I-am-Erk ?

ways to eventually treat the effect permanently: meditation, therapy (+others implant/mutation/etc-based ?)

In short, I'm not interested in implementing it. We have tons of traits which should be "curable" in theory (the most known example is Illiterate trait), and I don't want to be the one who breaks the current situation.

Personally I consider this trait as a "challenge" and "game changing" trait which should be left with character for all his game duration with no way of removing it permanently.

[x-qq]

ways to alleviate the effects temporarily: anti-depressants, diazepam, beta-blockers

I'm not a doctor, I'm not sure which in-game medication should be used. Is it feasible IRL to alleviate the effects at all?

Most phobias are curable, but no single treatment is guaranteed to work for all phobias. In some cases, a combination of different treatments may be recommended. The main treatment types are:

self-help techniques
talking treatments
medication

There are 3 types of medication recommended for treating anxiety:

antidepressants
tranquillisers
beta-blockers

https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/phobias/treatment/

[NetSysFire]

Perhaps by getting a night vision bionic or pair of nv goggles.

[RelMayers]

What about performance? Does this affect it?

[Night-Pryanik]

What about performance? Does this affect it?

I didn't notice any impact on performance.

[Night-Pryanik]

Ok, I added Xanax as a medication to fight the nyctophobia.

[Inglonias]

I like the concept, but it seems a little excessive for two points. Being completely incapacitated in the dark is a really big deal. Either tone down the debuffs or bring up the point cost.

[Night-Pryanik]

While I don't agree that you become "completely incapacitated" in the darkness with the addition of way to alleviate the debuffs with xanax (take one pill - and you're completely protected from all debuffs), as I said, I can increase the cost to any value - just name it.

[AtomicFox556]

I don't think completely preventing characters with this trait from entering dark tiles is a good idea.

First problem is that it often can be circumvented in many ways, such as closing all the windows if the trait prevents you from going into a dark basement, or turning off your sources of light if you're unable to go outside at night.

Second problem is that this can potentially create weird edge cases such as 1-2 tiles between light sources placed in an otherwise dark place being impassable. Unlikely to be a problem right now, but if we ever have more static sources of light, this could be a problem.

Third problem is that the character can potentially actually have a very good reason to enter the darkness, such as fleeing from fire that is consuming the building if the character happens to have both nyctophobia and pyrophobia (in case the latter is ever implemented as well).

I'd also add a severe morale penalty that starts right when the character enters a dark tile, and ends once they enter a non-dark tile.

Regarding using a blindfold to circumvent this: I'd apply the same effects (except hallucinations, of course) as well if the character is blind no matter the actual light level, which can represent them being afraid of their light source going out if they can't see any light (yes, even if they're outside during the day; phobias aren't a rational fear after all). Otherwise it is implied that the character can somehow "sense" the darkness even if they can't see at all.

[I-am-Erk]

I'd suggest making hallucinatory sounds more common than visual monsters, because that will tend to mess with players more directly.

Xanax stopping the effects entirely is all right I guess (really there should be some minor effects that xanx can't beat but it would be very tough to model right now). Until we make antidepressants work better, taking an antidepressant should do something like reduce the effects by 1/3 for 24 hours.

Regarding being blinded, most blinded effects allow you to sense at least a little dark and light. I think a blindfold should just not do anything about the effects. Being blindfolded in the dark won't make you less terrified, and if it's irrational, knowing you're blindfolded in the daylight will not necessarily trigger your phobia

[Night-Pryanik]

I'd also add a severe morale penalty that starts right when the character enters a dark tile, and ends once they enter a non-dark tile.

Adding morale penalty was my first intention, but I quickly discarded this idea. Morale mostly matters for skill gaining, and in the darkness you simply can't do most things to raise your skills. Morale penalty which works only in darkness is useless.

@AtomicFox556 all in all, if not direct ban on moving into very dark tiles, what do you suggest to replace it with?

[Inglonias]

I'd also add a severe morale penalty that starts right when the character enters a dark tile, and ends once they enter a non-dark tile.

Adding morale penalty was my first intention, but I quickly discarded this idea. Morale mostly matters for skill gaining, and in the darkness you simply can't do most things to raise your skills. Morale penalty which works only in darkness is useless.

@AtomicFox556 all in all, if not direct ban on moving into very dark tiles, what do you suggest to replace it with?

Cut speed in half, perrhaps?

[Night-Pryanik]

Cut speed in half, perrhaps?

This might be good for gameplay reasons, but I simply cannot imagine why would character suddenly starts moving two times slower after entering darkness? Because he's afraid and tries to move slower in order not to accidentally bother monsters living in darkness?

[Inglonias]

I'm apiphobic IRL,, and I'm quite hesitant to go into areas with bees. That said, if I absolutely have to, I'm in and out as fast as possible.

So maybe forbid walking through very dark areas, instead forcing you to run? I'm just spitballing here.

[AtomicFox556]

Adding morale penalty was my first intention, but I quickly discarded this idea. Morale mostly matters for skill gaining, and in the darkness you simply can't do most things to raise your skills. Morale penalty which works only in darkness is useless.

Well, it's in addition to the current effects, even if it ends up being a very minor effect on its own. And it may indeed matter, in that you're going to learn fighting skills much slower if you actually try to fight in darkness. Negative morale by itself can give stat and speed penalties as well, last I checked.

@AtomicFox556 all in all, if not direct ban on moving into very dark tiles, what do you suggest to replace it with?

Probably just a warning that requires player to confirm moving into a dark area. If you're talking about more severe effects in general, then rarely, actual fainting involving loss of consciousness (rather than just falling down) could also happen.

[dissociativity]

I'd make antidepressants make the effects smaller, so you'd still have a chance of shaking hands and hallucinations (pretty bad still, much like jittery can suck a lot), but other effects wouldn't happen as you'd be less anxious overall.
I don't seem to recall antidepressants acting as they do IRL (more or less like an addiction beyond compulsion to dose the drug, with withdrawl that is very unpleasant), but I may very well make a PR with an antidepressant dependant trait, addiction to them, and increased antidepressant spawns given how much of the population of western nations, america included, have antidepressant prescriptions.

[I-am-Erk]

I agree that fully blocking movement in the dark isn't in the spirit of the game. I think forcing the player to sprint is a really fun idea actually. And perhaps an escalating penalty of some sort for staying in one place

[Night-Pryanik]

Negative morale by itself can give stat and speed penalties as well, last I checked.

Wow, that's new to me. Could you point me to direction where to check this?

[AtomicFox556]

Wow, that's new to me. Could you point me to direction where to check this?

I've just checked it myself. Well, the effect of negative morale is there but it turns out to be very difficult to get major debuffs from it. For instance, this is the result of a character with Bad Temper and no Cannibal or Psychopath traits eating four misshapen fetuses in a row. In fact it probably should be stronger, but that's not relevant for this PR.

After using debug menu to set morale to -300:

[ghost]

i had made a separate issue for my ideas on fears in #59074 but i will summarize the main points here that relate. I think it could be a fun solution and perhaps more realistic.

-A new mechanic, sanity, for the character (possibly hidden). A value to track mental state regarding fear and, well, sanity. This will trend and remain 100% usually but drops when engaging with a fear.
-A new status effect, panic, that develops as sanity drops. Panic can lower accuracy, focus, and many other effects. Panic does not usually last for long as sanity rises.

The distinction between sanity and panic is important because panic is just 1 effect the loss of sanity brings, but it is a very important one with fears. A simplified version would involve only making the panic effect.

With nyctophobia your sanity will drop in darkness and rise when away from it. Sanity would drop quickly in very dark. Stay in the dark too long and you begin to panic. As sanity worsens, auditory and eventually visual hallucinations happen, with increasing strength. In the very worst cases with no sanity left, self injury is possible in action. This does allow the player to still enter the dark, but it can be dangerous and more so the longer you are exposed, incentivizing using a light or running quickly through dark places.

My main reason for wanting a system like this is it can be applied to other things. New fears, like the fear or heights or water, can use the same system with sanity drain. We can even apply this to certain creatures (Arachnophobia anyone?) and drain sanity accordingly when engaged. Certain otherworldly enemies or even places could have an effect of draining sanity (or even directly causing panic) as well.

Also proposed a couple traits - afraid and fearless - which would affect how quickly sanity drains or could lessen or worsen effects. (along with a lot of other proposals i wont go into here)

If expanded upon greatly, my thoughts are a possibly new section of character creation and player info to group "favorites and fears", distinct from other traits. And some other ideas...but that is getting out of scope of this topic.

I do like most of the ideas here though, just my thoughts on how this could be expanded to work with other ideas.

[Night-Pryanik]

Ok, now restriction to enter very dark tiles is only applicable to walk movement mode. To force yourself to move into very dark tiles, players must switch to run movement mode (and face with dire consequences of staying there).

[AtomicFox556]

Ok, now restriction to enter very dark tiles is only applicable to walk movement mode. To force yourself to move into very dark tiles, players must switch to run movement mode (and face with dire consequences of staying there).

From reading the code, I think it still wouldn't prevent player from switching movement mode to running, and then immediately switching it to something else (such as walking) right after they enter the darkness.

In my opinion, as it is, it just makes the problem of circumventing the effect of this trait even more apparent.

[Night-Pryanik]

Fixed. Now you can only run through very dark tiles (or take a pill). Walking through very dark tiles if forbidden.