Suggestion:20080226 Forensic Pathology

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	This suggestion has finished voting and has been moved to Peer Rejected.

20080226 Forensic Pathology

Aeon17x 02:44, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Suggestion type
New skill for survivors, particularly for the Doctor subclass of scientists.

Suggestion scope
Players with this skill, and revivifying bodies

Suggestion description
(Alternative titles: Forensics, Pathology, Yet Another Autopsy Idea)

Forensic Pathology is a new skill for survivors. It is a Science skill: it costs 75 XP for scientists, 100 XP for civilians, and 150 XP for military. It will be placed under the Diagnosis tree, with Diagnosis as its prerequisite. In a player's profile page, it reads as follows:

• Forensic Pathology (Player can distinguish revivifying bodies, and target them for healing.)

Details:

Forensic pathology is the field of study concerning the cause of death. In UD terms, it would let you know whether a body is just a normal dead body, or a revivifying body. I wanted to call this Autopsy before, but there's already a peer-reviewed suggestion about that.

First, it's a partial clone of the Scent Death skill. I always found it odd that survivors can still smell revivifying bodies while they're alive, now this provides a likelier medical reason why. If a player has both Scent Death and Forensic Pathology, one of them would work depending on whether they are a survivor or zombie at the moment.

An example of the dead-bodies message when you are alive and you have this skill: "There are forty two dead bodies here. You identify seven of them as revivifying."

Next, this presents as well a totally new mechanic: healing revivifying bodies. Think about it. Revivifying bodies come from zombies who are revived, e.g. brought back to life. They can be thought of as survivors who are just very unconscious at the moment. Therefore it's very beneficial for the survivor cause if they can be healed, to restore them to full health and get rid of their infection before they stand up.

With this skill, the following happens:

• Revivifying bodies are added to the target list of a first aid kit ('a zombie', Survivors, Dead Undead or Reviving Contacts, 'a revivifying body', Christmas Trees, Christmas Lights) if there are any in the vicinity.
• Applying FAKs on revivifying bodies targets the topmost revivifying body on the stack. To target the other revivifying bodies, you must have them in your contacts -- bodies are just as anonymous as zombies.
• Revivifying bodies start off with 0 HP. Healing them works the same way as living people, except the maximum limits of health are only up to half the total HP: 25 HP without body building, and 30 HP with body building.
• When the revivifying body stands up, it will add another 25 HP to their total health (30 HP if they have body building), potentially supplying them with full HP if they were fully healed while in their revivifying state.

For this skill to be fully effective in a suburb, medics and doctors should shift to a more active role; instead of waiting in a hospital or mall for the injured to come in, they heal the revivifying in the field. Besides, the game is way more fun if there's a chance you could stand up with full HP and uninfected, to get back into whatever it was they were doing as a survivor much quicker.

Miscellaneous:

From this suggestion's discussion, the most common comment is that the amount of healing done by a FAK on a revivifying body should be lower than that of a living target by around 20% or 1 HP less. I did not integrate this into my suggestion since first aid kits always give 5 XP, and if they heal less that means you have to heal your target more -- instead of five FAKs to restore 25 HP, you have to use seven. That's a huge XP boost for newbie survivors.

Swiers also pointed out that if revivifying bodies can be healed, then it should be possible to damage them as well. I pointed out that zombies have no instinct to damage what they see as a dead body that smells strangely, and that only people with this skill realizes that those revivifying bodies are not actually dead and are therefore possible targets for healing. Further replies to that can also be found in the discussion.

Voting Section

Voting Rules

Votes must be numbered, justified, signed, and timestamped. # justification ~~~~ Votes that do not conform to the above may be struck by any user.

The only valid votes are Keep, Kill, Spam or Dupe. If you wish to abstain from voting, do not vote.

Keep Votes

1. Keepish - I like it, unless someone points out a serious flaw--Corndoghero^T-S-Z 02:48, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
2. Author Keep - Well... due to the lack of NT facilities, this skill is rather useless in Monroeville. --Aeon17x 02:56, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
3. Keep - Useful, but not overpowered. --FXI 03:28, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
4. Keep - As FXI --Raynor16 04:06, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
5. ? - Makes a current skill more powerful, but people can still use it for evil. -doc crook 04:19, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
6. Keep - Sounds good to me. This would be especially helpful for new players who might not have an FAK on them when they first start out. Prevents them from getting caught in the cycle of dying again as soon as they stand up.--Dr Doom86 06:58, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
7. Keep - As FXI. --Carnexhat 07:41, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
8. Keep - This is awesome. --Vandurn 13:53, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
9. Keep Gives medic characters a way of earning xp. --Jon Pyre 14:25, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
10. Keep - I liked it in Discussion, I like it here. --Hhal 16:34, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
11. Keep - I liked it then, I like it now, great suggestion! Acoustic Pie 20:30, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
12. Keep - Interesting idea. --Pgunn 21:47, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
13. Keep - As Dr Doom86 --Rick Best 22:16, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
14. Keep - I like it.--Jamie Cantwell3 22:21, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
15. Keep - Great. --Heretic144 02:31, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
16. Keep Why not? ----Secruss^|Yak|Brahnz!|CGR|PKA||EMLN|Templates|RRF|RFTM|Crap|WHOZ||MU|GN|C2008||15:34, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
17. Weak Keep - I'm not sure about this idea but it definately has potential. I also vote keep because the spam brigade annoy me.--Studoku 00:18, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
18. Keep - I agree with 3, it's useful, but you have to go outside to do it.--Labine50 ^{MEMS | MHG} 01:50, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
19. Keep - Gives survivors the opportunity to help the newly revifed rather than standing around waiting for them. --Kamikazie-Bunny 13:41, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
20. Keep - Simply makes sense --Horcoff 16:41, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
21. Keep --_LH779 08:37, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Kill Votes

1. Kill - Survivors already have 7 different ways of earning twice the exp of zombies. --Gregarious Instigator 04:12, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
2. Kill - Healing dead (or revivifying) bodies is kind of a nonsensical idea IMO ... And his is a huge survivor buff that just isn't needed on any level -- is both overpowered and doesn't really improve the game. --WanYao 07:43, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
3. Change - 1) Allow zombies to do the opposite 2) Do not allow healing of infection (makes sense since the metabolism is not active). I would suggest zombies be able to eat to 25%, survivors be able to heal to 75%. - Pardus 10:39, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

   1.) I have provided an explanation why zombies will not hurt revivifying bodies; 2.) Infection is cured since the target is not dead, just dormant. Prior to standing up there are biological processes particular to a living person taking place, such as "buzzing in the ears" and an active bloodstream. --Aeon17x 06:36, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

4. Kill - I have to agree with Gregarious InstigatorWanYao, healing dead bodies is not so cool. Plus, as The Hierophant, nerfs infection, which really isn't that big of a deal to begin with.  Billy Club Thorton  T!  RR  18:35, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
5. Kill - Change. --BoboTalkClown 21:28, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
6. Kill - I really like this suggestion. I wish I could vote for it. I just think that it is too much of a survivor buff and is unbalanced. Sorry. - Headshot Hal 17:24, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
7. Kill - Survivor buff. Too much of one I'm afraid.--Seventythree^Talk 21:55, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
8. Kill - if you can heal a dead body, zombies should be able to attack it as well --Scotw 23:48, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
9. Kill - Seems like an unnecessary buff. --Pdeq^Talk* 05:28, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
10. kill - You gotta love the pure fear you get when standing up in a foreign red burb, with no Faks and a nasty infection. *shudders*--xoxo 05:38, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
11. Kill -I always carry a spare FAK, suggest everyone else does too!--Airborne88^{T Zom MIS} 08:15, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
12. Kill - Coming back with 1/2 HP from revivification and needing more attention to be back at full strength after death than just a needle poke makes a lot of sense, somehow being able to heal a body that's going through the byzantine process of revivification doesn't. Plus it's somewhat overpowered. --Riseabove 16:24, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
13. Change If this was just the human version of scent death, without group sense, it'd be good. Padfu-Zomfu 16:59, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Spam/Dupe Votes

1. Spam - Nerfs the already pathetically weak Infection skill, lessens the danger of being killed upon standing up (one of the few downsides to getting killed in any location other than a red zone) and provides another unneeded way for survivors to gain experience points. --The Hierophant 04:40, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
2. Spam - As above. Zombies in UD have an instinct to hunt the living. Either funny smelling bodies are living (and hence can be hunted by zombies, who are nearly as smart as humans and have sharper sense of smell) or they are not (and hence can not be FAKed).  Swiers 07:20, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
3. Spamish - As above....--/~Rakuen~\^Talk I Still Love Grim 16:04, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
4. Spam - Hel mechanic. -- Iscariot 20:27, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
5. Spam - As WOOT. -- John Rubin^{T! ZG} 07:43, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
6. Spam - AS soon as I we nerf headshot, we'll look at weakening infection, m'kay? - Bisfan 07:50, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
7. Spam - I don't like it, buffs newbies sooo much..just go to a place like Walrond square where are 30-40 revived bodies 24/7 - I think it is supposed to be hard at the start, like it would be hard if you suddenly got plunged into an apocalypse. Also, YOU WERE NOT THERE AT THE BEGINNING OF THE INTERVIEW.--Thekooks 21:10, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
8. Spam - Nerfs infection way too much. --Midianian|T|T:S|C:RCS| 15:01, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
9. I am on a voting spree, but to make this vote valid, I'm in agreement with the above voters. --Axe Hack Talk 15:11, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
10. Spam - The thing is, this just shifts the battles to the RPs. The humans there healing the bodies, and the zombies there countering that effect. Then nobody would bother going there (as it only benefits zombies) to heal bodies, and they'd be afraid of being devoured by the horde while they do their stuff. Both sides would just XP farm it anyhow.--Kolechovski 04:20, 5 March 2008 (UTC)