The possibility/ability to Surrender

[Saighdiur]

Will I be able to say, eat them?

Yes, but if you shoot or eat everyone who surrenders to you, you'll get a reputation and pretty soon, everyone's going to try to run instead of surrendering. Of course, if you kill them all and leave the bodies deep in the wasteland, you might just get away with not having whatever reputation you have dinged...

I really like the run/surrender mechanic. I don't expect there to be many cases in which the player can surrender usefully, so I think there'd need to be party chatter to assess the option ("Surrender to these crazy ****s? They'll rape us, kill us, and eat us, and not necessarily in that order!"). But if you start a fight in a bar in town or with one of the few good guys, or with one of the few honorable bad guys, then maybe you'll just be sent off minus the best of your weapons and all of your cash. The more honorable they are, the more they leave you with: Borderline guys like scavengers might leave you to wander off naked in the wasteland.

But it certainly opens up all sorts of morality options for rangers, in terms of accepting surrender of any rational human opponents. The less you hurt them and shake them down for cash and equipment, the more you get a rep as an honorable/soft ranger, and the more likely it becomes that future outmatched opponents might consider surrendering rather than running if they don't really hate you for some reason.

Might also be interesting to see an enemy group fracture. One guy surrenders, then the boss shoots him, and such...

[Orko]

Will I be able to say, eat them?

That's the whole point of this mechanic. To make you stop and think even if its just for a second to shout "f U Eat lead sucker"

Depending on the presentation it gives you another layer of dept to the world. When it isn't just some meaningless target to kill, but a person you just killed.

[dnr]

It's a cool addition if you're playing a "dead-is-dead" type of run. jagged alliance has it.

[moomoos]

It would be hilarious to be captured as a slave and then break free.

Also if surrendering is going to be an option, I sure hope some npcs just say fuck you and kills you anyway.

[dmazz]

Well there would be 'fake surrenders' too, just a pretend surrender by a baddy so that they can get closer. Knife and grenade attacks are a possibility. Surrendering will complicate combat in a good way.

[dehen]

In Pirates, upon defeat you basically were jailed and imprisoned. You lost time, money, and assets. I think you eventually would escape or be set free. When you caught other captains you could execute them on the spot, ransom them, deliver them to hostile gov'ts, or hold them in the brig until they escaped. In the old Koei strategies, you could even try to recruit them.

Perhaps better in-game relationships could mean quicker escape (old friends could hatch an escape plan) or ransoms could be paid earlier. If the battle ends in a k.o. and not a kill there could be a little notoriety check, that checks friends vs foes in the area, and you wait a few seconds to see if you're sprung or sold for execution to a rival faction. Additionally it would add real bounty-hunting and other business opportunities to the game.

I'm just fleshing out the idea and don't feel really deeply one way or another, but it's worth noting that in some of the most war-torn places in the world capture and ransom is a pretty common business practice. The idea that desperate people would always go for the straight kill because there was no geneva convention is pretty overblown, there's plenty of reasons why someone might do otherwise (even beyond economics).

[Orko]

I liked that in Pirates. Would be cool to see something like that in wasteland. even if its only a quest plot in witch you get thrown into prison.
But the changse to let that happen randomly would take the obviusness of beeing a quest thing out of it.

Also remember that you could be thrown into a cell in Deus Ex. Don't remember if it was part of the main quest or if it was an optional way to progress.

[cbu]

Can only surrender to people like enforcement officers and people with reputation.
Anything other than that is suicide.
Maybe cease-fire sounds a little better if strength is similar and many turns have passed.

[VetaZombiSlayer]

I can see the ability for the PC and for the enemy to surrender would add depth to this game.

For the PC, the player could surrender to enemies, and hope they'll accept it. It could end up him near death, stripped of money in the middle of the wasteland, or perhaps tied up at a cave nearby, waiting for someone to come along. Of course, to some enemies like slavers, the player would end up being a slave, or with other enemies, the player could end up somewhere unpleasant (Like a mutant's feeding pen), in which the player will have to escape and such.

For the enemies, the player will definitely have the option to loot his enemies, of course. But he'll have to be careful. This feature of surrendering could mean that the enemy is feigning in order to get close to you, and thus close combat occurs. There should be other ways to get an enemy to surrender, such as. You could go around their base before fighting them, disable some machines or activate them, raise a robo army, steal their bullets... Possibilities are endless that could ultimately lead the enemy to surrender the second they see you. This definitely will add more depth to approaching a hostile situation without the use of combat, if the player wishes to do so (Perhaps he's a pacifist, or a thief, or simply low on bullets.) And then there's showing prowess on the battlefield. Blow up a wall or two, perhaps some beams, or even just whip out a big gun, and they'll be inclined to surrender.

[WolfStark]

I applaud to this "What to Include" topic, that is really something which should be implemented. Flee and Surrender options are a great way to prevent a break in the flow of play. Often mistakes end up in getting yourself killed. Getting killed is not bad at all but the possibility to survive some of those otherwise fatal mistakes is tempting. Sometimes you could just pay a little price, sometimes you're losing an item or health. There are many ways to make that and I don't really care which one is used as long as there is a possibility. Of course, as many mentioned not only for the player but also for the enemy.

[tuluse]

I really like this idea, even if it just gets partially implemented.