I recently lost a soldier at the very beginning of the turn because he had 160 poison.
I realize it was probably my fault since the enemy ran across the map and spit poison on him (I had just started in the middle of the map), but I wanted to make a suggestion which may have an exploit, but I think it would be a lot better:
I suggest instead of applying the full poison and bleed effect at the beginning of the turn (and thereby killing whomever it affected a fair amount of the time), the game is changed so that the hp loss and poison effect is applied based on how many action points the affected party uses.
IE: If they have 20 bleed, and 4 action points a turn, they lose about 5 hp per action point used, and since action points can be partially used by movements, they may lose even fewer hp per step taken.
This allows players to quickly apply med kits or something to try to heal the poisoned or bleeding person during the turn - before they instantly die.
It also stops players from running while spurting blood everywhere - and knowing they can’t possibly die from blood loss until the next turn.
The exploit danger is you could have someone with a medkit run up to the bleeding or poisoned person and heal the poisoned/bleeding person without using the dying person’s action points. This would allow a complete cure without the hp loss or poison loss.
My suggestion for handling this exploit (if it is deemed such) is to look at how many action points have been used by the medic by using the med kit, and by moving, and then apply the hp damage to the poisoned/bleeding person and saying that they weren’t cured on the poison or the bleeding until the med kit was fully used. If you don’t mind the heavier computations though, you could have the med kit apply linear healing across the 2 action points it uses to decrease the poisoned and bleeding effects while the player is being healed. This would allow more realistic healing of poisoned/bleeding.
This does open up a risky danger where the poisoned/bleeding person uses a couple action points to run to the medic, and then the medic simply uses 2 action points to heal the poisoned/bleeding person: Do you want to apply the full 4 points of action point damage because the poisoned/bleeding person used 2 action points to run to the medic, and then the medic used 2 action points to heal the poisoned/bleeding? Just make sure you don’t apply more than 4 action points of damage (or however many action points they have).
All great, Play Balancing questions and requests. 
Salute
I love your idea @Crius, but I think maybe just a tad bit of tweaking would be required to make it more feasible and easier to balance (i.e.: the possible “exploit” you mention).
I’d say they always lose at least the equivalent of 1/3 (or maybe 1/4) of the amount of poison/bleeding/fire per turn no matter what. Then, add 1/3 (or 1/4) more for each AP used.
If the character gets healed by a medic, remove at up to half their (remaining?) AP (rounded up) due to the shock of the meds required (they must give quite a jolt and take a toll of some kind!).
Keep the math simple. No matter how well the computer (and code) can do a bunch of math, the users can’t (well, most can’t anyway) and it makes the game mechanics too obscure!
And yeah, that is kinda of ridiculous.
You are suggesting 1/3 hp (or 1/4 hp) lost at the beginning or end of the turn minimum, and 1/3 hp (or 1/4) lost for each action point used… Since each person gets 4 action points a turn, they will lose… lets go with 1/4 hp lost per action point used.
Your idea is more complicated than mine, but still very similar.
Basically, you are starting with my idea and changing:
- The affected party can reduce hp lost by not using all their action points in a turn.
– This differs from my idea which always has the person lose all the hp per turn (since each person has 4 action points a turn). I don’t reduce hp lost because I equate action points to time units instead of actions.
++ Your idea is more complicated than mine because instead of always losing the exact same amount of hp per turn, they can choose to reduce their hp lost by not using action points - but always lose at least 1/4 hp per turn. - If the bleeder gets healed, they lose about half of their remaining AP, but there are no details about if they lose hp during this time. I’m assuming they are, but this has different effects depending on if the bleeder runs to the medic, or if the medic runs to the bleeder. If the medic runs to the bleeder, more action points are lost than if the bleeder runs to the healer. IE: If the bleeder is huffing and puffing from the run, they can do more actions total in the turn after being healed.
This is difficult to figure out and calculate.
Even though you say Keep the math simple, I find your math considerably more complex than mine.
Am I misreading your ideas?
I think it would be nice if bleeding and poison didn’t actually “Kill” your soldier. They go out of action in the mission (same way as now), but if you can get a medic to them in the field, they stand a good chance to revive (A chance to die this way would still be acceptable imo)
Maybe do what a bunch of other similar games do and have a countdown timer on their body, so you still have to get there swiftly. But it gives you a chance.
Good suggestion, I’ve had the same thing.
I can get behind an AP reduction, and damage from poison counters starting lower, multiplying the longer it persists. And why keep rounding things to 10?
That way you’ll still take some initial damage, but won’t die instantly with the aforementioned 160 poison/bleed at the start of your first turn. Medikits might be limited to healing 100 counters a turn or similar, and boosted by the medic perk, actually making it a bit more useful.
On a similar note, you’ll also find similar issues with viral - if all three shots in a burst from a redeemer hit, you get 15 viral, which usually knocks out that squad member from the start of next turn for the entire mission. Particularly frustrating as there’s no cure, and panic’d units still tend to run towards the enemy persistently, rather than the nearest exit, or behind their nearest colleague. That needs more behaviour tweaking.
Perhaps something like a “suspended animation” kit (carried in active inventory). The device automatically stops bleeding/poison damage at the start of a player’s turn if the character would die at the start of the turn.
A balance feature could be something like the character is out for the rest of the engagement (and could still die from explosions or fire) and perhaps has stamina reduced to zero at the end of the engagement (effectively taking that character out until resting at a base with living quarters for the requisite time)?
The closest analogy I can think of would be a soldier using atropine when there is a nerve gas attack.
Not really a “fix”, but if you can get frenzied on a soldier, they can’t panic. So can ignore viral for the most part.
There should be some sort of adrenal pack or amphetamine or something (with side effects - don’t want to promote drug use) that can prevent a soldier from panicking. Even if only for a couple of turns
The Stimpack is something that brings these two points together, an adrenalin pack that instills frenzy. It is available from Anu tech later in the game. Another tech that helps is Project Hekate, also very late in the game, that provides “All soldiers are virus-resistant, …”. (http://wiki.phoenixpoint.com/New_Jericho_Research#Project_Hecate_.282000.29)
But unfortunately that doesn’t help much in the earlier stages of the game …
I disagree with the suggestion, not or delaying action should not save you from the effects of DoT’s. especially not the listed ones as they do actually have a fair number of options that provide protection
viral, poison and bleeding have counters in place, all can be cured (viral can be cured by the more advanced version of the medkit later on, while the base medkit cures poison and bleeding) viral and poison have options of resistance in place. and there are a few options that make troops immune to panic (priest mental ward, frenzy or the berzerkers level 6 skill).
acid and paralysis can be a pain, as there is no cure and no resistance option. large quantities of acid can kill a trooper if evac isn’t possible quickly (ambush) and paralysis can doom troopers where evac is required (lair, scavenge etc)
because of acid I really like the suggestion from a “suspended animation” kit from taraiym, it could apply to bleed/poison as well as acid. I’d just call it a trauma injector or something like that and make it a leg mount slot item, triggers passively…would have to be replaced if it did.
I don’t like how damage over time instantly kills people by applying all the damage at the beginning of your turn.
This isn’t damage over time at that point, it’s simply damage before you have time to deal with it. I mean, the very concept of damage over time is that it causes damage… over time… which is why I made this suggestion that you do not like which is about delaying the damage over time to actually taking time to cause the damage… over time…