Radiation - important feature

[Sub-Human]

I'd like to see radiation as an important feature included in the game. For example, you will need a geiger counter to see radiation levels. Otherwise, your characters will be poisoned and they will need to visit a doctor/wash the dust etc. off as soon as possbile. Similarly, in certain areas they will simply be fried.

Anti-radiation suits help, but not for long. For example, if there's an area which is heavily radiated (like a part of LA) your characters shouldn't stay there for no longer than 30 minutes in-game, or maybe certain buildings for no more than 5 minutes. You will also need to clean the radiation off as soon as possible (don't need to be since it sounds like tedious micromanagament).

Do you think this is a good idea? I think this could be another enemy to combat in LA outside robots and mutants. Of course this could put too much pressure on players...

[clippedwolf]

It is difficult to explain how the earth remains radioactive for so long in games like WL and FO. We have to assume that the original nuclear powers designed super effective salted bombs, but I'm not sure if there even exists a practical method to irradiate a large area via a bomb for 100+ years. Here's some wiki info:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salted_bomb
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobalt_bomb

You could find a way to mass produce highly radioactive substances and just disperse them via other means (i.e. dumping massive loads of stuff like melted fuel rods/etc. onto targets), but I think that would just be a very inefficient strategic weapon. Of course, in our fictional timeline and universe we can allow for special technologies to accomplish these goals and create our post apoc setting. I don't think WL2 will be nearly as unrealistic as Fallout 3 and some other games with regard to radiation levels. I expect small areas and high value targets that were hit with dirty or salted bombs to be really hot, but not huge areas or regions.

I'd like to see radiation as an important feature included in the game. For example, you will need a geiger counter to see radiation levels. Otherwise, your characters will be poisoned and they will need to visit a doctor/wash the dust etc. off as soon as possbile. Similarly, in certain areas they will simply be fried.

Guaranteed death from radiation is from 200-800 rads and up (it differs from person to person) and can take weeks to kill.
Insta-death from radiation takes somewhere around 5000 rads of radiation being blasted into the heart or brain. That is an event, not something you would stumble into in the wasteland 70 years after WWIII.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acute_radiation_syndrome#Fractionation_of_dose

[Ekaros]

In Fallout universe it made a bit sense as its attitudes were kinda like early 20th century where radiation was either something positive or used lot more...

Really there isn't much radiation around after such long time, probably worst spots are power plants...

I'm not sure but some biological or chemical weapons might be potent after such long time, this would be more realistic approach. Also I believe those might have been used too...

[Ronin73]

Was radiation not important enough in the first Wasteland game? A Geiger counter was needed to best detect radiation, (although it could be seen at night) standing in radioactive areas without a rad suit was a guaranteed trip to the infirmary and standing it too long was certain death.

I liked what they did with radiation overall and hope they use something similar and don't dumb it down.

Is there anything that could be improved upon?

[clippedwolf]

I think people expect to see it so it will be featured. But here's to hoping it is downplayed.

[Drool]

I liked what they did with radiation overall and hope they use something similar and don't dumb it down.

Well, it was pretty dumbed down in the original. I mean, you could stand 10' from radioactive sludge from a nuclear reactor for weeks on end and suffer no ill effects as long as you didn't actually step in said sludge. Personally, I have no problem with how it was treated in the original (and wouldn't mind it being roughly the same in WL2), but I wouldn't consider it complex or elegant in the slightest.

[Hasenklein]

I agree that radiation is an important feature in a game like Wasteland. Usually, it serves as an explanatory concept to justify the existance of oddities of all kinds, just like magic does in fantasy RPGs, and I'm pretty sure that the devs are aware of that, as well as its possible applications to create various limitations for the character's actions.