Make Autopsies & Vivisections give useful info

[Yokes]

@MichaelIgnotus

Autopsies should give game-relevant physical info, like HPs per Location, Armour & the Damage of inherent armaments. Vivisections should add to that info with useful game hints, like ‘the trigger range of a Sentinel is X’, ‘A Pain Chameleon relocates within a Y-tile radius’, or ‘the RF range of a Crabbie is Z’… so to make a Viv worth the effort there should also be a nice in-game buff, be it a boost to damage inflicted or a reduction in the detection range or whatever.

With current state of the game and all things that we already know… your proposal is quite interesting. BUT:

• damage - I’m not sure if I would apply damage buff. Such damage would be justifiable if we would make precise melee attacks or precise shots with sniper rifle. With other weapons I suppose it is too hard to hit particular vulnerable spots when enemy is not paralyzed. Btw. Snapshot would need to make new hit box dummies to apply this effect. I wouldn’t modify damage, because it would mean need for balancing around 2 different values (before and after research). Leave the damage as some constant unchanged value over the course of the game. Enemies get new mutations, we get new weapons, lets not mess with modifiers of those already possessed.

• perception - I’m not sure why our knowledge of enemy would modify his perception (unless we will develop special camouflage against one particular enemy). I don’t think it is good way of changing combat.

There is one vital thing that players seek - information about enemy. Both autopsies and vivisection should reveal that partially and that would be enough reward for doing these researches. In my opinion it should be similar to what you and Rainer have written:

Autopsy (required only one specimen, but shows up after each new mutation encountered) reveals:

• ability to highlight particular body part
• info about general armor and health of a creature with
• armor and health of currently researched body parts,
• damage pop up messages
• there may be a hint about purpose of those mutations, but nothing specific.

So before autopsy we don’t see HP and armor stats along with the damage we have done (as pop up information above enemy). Info screen is not present. I suppose that even information which part we have hit (creature silhouette with grey/yellow/red icon) should be hidden. When we aim we just see general highlight of a creature not its body parts. We would need to act blindly and guessing what is the condition of enemy. That could be horrific on its own.

Vivisection (required capturing few live specimens) unlocks:

• info screen with all information related to specimen abilities (only those we have encountered), so
• range and power of attacks,
• other ability stats you have mentioned with
• creature’s willpower, speed, perception etc. along with
• pop up information above enemies which we have now (-2 Will Points after death of Arthron, Daze, 8 paralyzis)

In my opinion this information is so much vital (especially on higher difficulties) that necessity of having this only, would compel players to do these researches.

So there is no need to give resources, or damage buff or anything else.