(Originally this post was simply supposed to be about rolling around a lot, which is why it’s first and possibly disjointed, but I eventually decided to just dump any and every feature-related idea I could reasonably fit into one post here to save space on the forum. And to vent. Sorry if this gets really disorganized.)
TL;DR: Crouching stance transitions, speed damage, breaking limbs, surviving with lost limbs, fluctuating RPM, 2.0 shell system on steroids, Bullets! How do they work?, ropes, less thicc memes, chokeholds, proper melee fighting, pumped up kicks, arena fisticuffs, human AI.
Movement
I really hope I’m not the only one who saw this under the Movement card of the 4.0 Trello and got really excited by the idea of crouch-sprinting.
Well, a while after I got over that (IE a few minutes ago), I thought: well, dive by sprint-to-prone and slide by sprint-to-duck are being considered: what about stance changes for crouch-sprinting?
Basically my idea was, holding the prone key while running in crouch could make you roll into a prone position, while holding the jump key while running in crouch could make you do a sort of high-jump. Another idea was that holding the crouch button while crouch-running would simply make you do a roll without changing stances. But why would you ever want to do that? Well, the hitboxes would shift dramatically, making your head an incredibly difficult target to hit during the roll and overall reducing damage intake dramatically. And for those concerned about being disoriented by rolling, that could be part of the point; either that, or it could be handled like in Reach, where the screen bobs with your character but always faces forward.
And then I thought a bit more, and I decided that if I’m going to suggest this, I might as well also suggest parkour rolls (holding crouch just before you land reduces damage by up to a certain percentage based on falling velocity) and long jumps (jumping out of a slide makes the jump more horizontal and less vertical, and makes you crouch in midair). Also, climbing. Climbing and vaulting. Oh, yes, speaking of falling…
Damage
Right now, damage in Unturned is pretty normal. My biggest idea for damage is instead of having falling damage, there should be impact damage.
Essentially the difference between falling and impact damage is that falling damage is only taken into effect when landing on a non-liquid surface after falling, while impact damage would apply damage when your speed lowers too rapidly.
For example, if you’re driving a vehicle at around 50 miles an hour and you slam into a tree, normally only the vehicle would take damage; with impact damage, you’d also take damage. In this example you’d probably die, too.
There’s also a couple more minor things about damage I wanted to put here - others have talked about how getting shot in the arms or legs should break them and prevent you from doing certain actions. On top of this, you shouldn’t be able to die from getting sprayed in the limbs - the only way you should be able to die from limb damage is via bleedout.
Also, if dismemberment gets in, allow players to survive dismemberment. This would basically apply the broken bone effect permanently, or perhaps fixable with a prosthetic.
Guns
I really just wanted to discuss an idea not many other games take into account - guns don’t have a single RPM value. They have a range. Now, this could work in one of four ways, but all of them would require new Firerate_Max and Firerate_Min values.
The first way it could work is the weapon could simply permanently fire at a random value between these two values. This would probably be the simplest.
The second way it could work is if the weapon started at its maximum firerate at 100% durability, and slowly transitioned to the minimum firerate by 0% durability. This would likely be the most logical way for it to work, and it would really emphasize the gun’s degradation.
The third way it could work is that the firerate could fluctuate (or simply go from maximum to minimum) during extended periods of fire (the point at which this would be put into effect would be defined by a Firerate_Fluctuate value). This is the most interesting one to me, however it would likely be the most frustrating due to inconsistency.
The fourth way it could work is a combination of the second and third ways - basically the lower the durability, the faster it begins to fluctuate and the more crazily it fluctuates.
If nothing else I really just want support for this.
Moving away from firerate, everyone, their mum, and I seem to want 2.0’s shell system back (fractional loading pretty much). It should also be taken a step further with the ability to load multiple kinds of shells at once. Also, add it for other kinds of weapons that load one at a time (like revolvers and clip-feds) along with speeloaders/clips. Because why not.
Bullets also shouldn’t just disappear at their max range. I don’t know what bullets do at that point but they shouldn’t disappear.
ROPES
I like ropes. I have a fascination with ropes. Maybe it’s swinging. Games with grappling hooks make me happy.
What I’m trying to say is add a Far Cry 4-esque grappling hook. And Rainbow Six Siege-esque rappelling. And ziplines. I don’t care if they’re items or objects or if they can only be used on certain materials. I have no tail, and I must swing.
Inventory
It seems Nelson’s already going to slap weight on top of slots in 4.0 so that’s excellent. It’d also be interesting if clothes were divided up into pockets and had their own maximum weights to avoid shoving an assault rifle in your pants.
Playermodels
Please, at the very least give them more human proportions. I like thicc memes as much as the next guy, but the player models are just ridiculous. I’d also suggest add hands with fingers, but that might turn out really weird.
Melee
Let me grab people. Please.
Also to avoid the sort of running around flailing your arms about PVP melee combat that goes about in 3.0, maybe force players into a sort of GTA lock-on type deal when fighting with melee weapons.
On top of that more fighting moves like kicks would be more then welcome. And the ability to fist-fight in Arena. Seriously, why was that removed? I don’t understand.
AI
I think everyone knows I’m going to suggest fightable human AI. So fightable human AI would be nice. Honestly they could probably work like spitters…but with guns…and instead of chasing you they try to take cover. And some of them shoot at you so others can flank around. They could also flee if they’re about to die, that’d be cool.
Conclusion
Yeah. I just wanted to get these ideas out of my mind, really. If they’re bad or unreasonable then okay that’s fine. 4.0 seems like it’ll be a massive improvement regardless. Also I spent like an hour over a period of 3 or more days writing this. What’s wrong with me.