Cassidy
Arcane
STARRING BENNY, THE WORLD'S UGLIEST MEXICAN GANGSTER AND L.A. RIOTS VETERAN
INDEX
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A survival horror roguelike where zombies are not the most dangerous threat, only the most numberful. And being open-source, with my limited programming and script languages knowledge, I added some extras including, but not limited to machete-wielding zombies and being able to cook babymeat in long underwear with enough cooking skills and the right ingredients. Currently the PC can be assumed to be the last man alive in the game world because there are no NPCs in this version of the game.
And here goes character creation choices for you to vote at other than the one in the poll.
DIFFICULTY
Standard character creation points are 6 and more can be gained by picking disadvantages or shitty professions. Considering dynamic spawn was scratched and zombies in this roguelike no longer show up anywhere enough noise is made and thus it is much more possible to totally avoid combat than beffore, that is as far as I'm willing to. Anything more would make this too easy.
Apocalyptic LARP - 6 points
Pack your rice - 4 points
Rearmageddon - 2 points
ULTIMATE DOOM EXPANSION SET FOR KWANZANIA - 0 points
Why bother living?
Essentially a style for playing, what to seek and how to survive. Note that Road Warrior is only hard at the beginning and gets progressively easier the bigger of a vehicle the character has.
Road Warrior - Survive always on the move, and travelling The Road. Mostly ignore the towns, they are too infested and dangerous, but fear not the dangers of mines and other places along the road. Eventually, get a vehicle and learn mechanics, because there is no road warrior complete without one.
Bunker Constructor - Transform the starting evac shelter into a true fortress and into a more comfortable place, and never migrate, instead stockpiling supplies and resources inside it. Eventually build a garage as well because leaving a car exposed to acid rain is not cool.
The Last Gentleman - Don your suit, leather shoes, top hat and monocle, because style and pomp is more important than convenience or body armor, refusing to consume
SurReal World - Pretend the end never happened and make a living like a tree-hugging snownigger during the Iron Age, avoiding any contact with the urbanized graveyards of fallen humanity and surviving with only what nature provides. Hopefully this will not end with someone eaten by mutated megafauna or something.
EXTERMINATUS!!! - Before the undead ITZ came, hundreds of miniaturized nuclear bombs were manufactured. There is no more hope, you are the last man alive, but you're not going down until Earth is completely purged from all mutants, zombies and xenos wherever they may lie. And of course, better put a bullet to the head than become a filthy mutant xenos, and cybernetics are naturally an affront to the purity and divinity of man.
Forever Alone, Drugs and Rock n' Roll - Everything is shit, everything has always been shit. It is time to forget that under loads of hemp, cocaine, crack, heroin, meth and anything more available while always listening to a MP3 player. Twenty eight feet tall monsters between you and some cocaine? You are more likely to try grabbing it than running away.
Transhuman nutjob - What's wrong with drinking that mutagen? NOTHING! Humanity is extinct, long live the Mutant and the Cyborg! Focus almost all efforts into gaining mutations and finding Cybernetic Modules to implant.
Rat Diplomat - You're so shit scared of anything you will always try to avoid combat. Fortunately, it is possible to totally avoid combat in Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead, if difficult. Traps may be your salvation to not die crapping on the pants because you're likely to stand motionless and paralyzed until cutted into pieces if forced to fight, specially in close quarters.
Stats
All start at 8. Increasing any past 14 costs 2 points rather than 1.
Strength - for carrying more weight, melee damage boost and health. You need at least 10 to use a longbow.
Dexterity- important for first aid, electronics and other skills that require precise movements, and also the most important stat for throwing weapons and melee and unarmed combat accuracy.
Intelligence - speeds up skill improvement from both practice and reading books. Advanced books, specially electronics and computer ones, have a minimum INT to be understood.
Perception - Important for archery and firearms, and you need at least 10 to be able to spot any trap. Also important for the Tai Chi martial art in particular.
Skills
Level one costs 1 point, two costs 3, Three costs 5 and so on. It is possible and more fun to survive without any initial investment in skills and there is one important detail before considering to start a new character already having them: Stats in this game are almost impossible to be increased permanently, while skills aren't. Finally, some professions give the character a book to increase some skills.
Combat skills: Dodge, Melee, Unarmed combat(pointless without picking Martial Arts Training), Bashing weapons, Cutting weapons, Piercing weapons, Throwing, Firearms(also helps with archery and is required for refilling empty bullet
cases), Handguns, Shotguns, Submachine guns, Rifles, Archery(allows you to craft wood arrows and bolts, and also a longbow), Grenade launcher.
Computers: Some of the best loot requires you to either hack a computer... or use a miniature nuclear bomb or C4 explosive which may destroy the loot too. Maps of entire regions can also be not removed from an inventory with this skill
Mechanics: a Road Warrior will sooner or later try to learn it. Someone trying to avoid direct combat also will have a lot of help because it is a complementary skill to traps.
Electronics: From water purifiers, which are the most energy-efficient device to clean water to the possibility of crafting the most essential cybermodule in its highest levels, and most importantly, of creating batteries from household materials,this is a very handy skill.
Cooking: At first it increases what you can cook. Later it allows you to produce painkillers, sleeping pills and other drugs, reducing the need of going into pharmacies for scavenging.
Construction: With static spawn becoming the way and dynamic practically pointless after version 0.2, it lost its importance because currently zombies never leave towns and roam in huge packs across the world that may stumble into someone's shelter, while the makeshift bed can be done even at level 0 in this. Construction still has a good purpose: if you are going to do lots of car modifications and construction and don't want to clean a town, building a garage is very useful to avoid being attacked by wild animals while welding. Or if you want to build a house in the middle of the forest.
Survival: It is possible to survive without this skill, but it is possible to survive without ever scavenging a town by having this skill.
Traps: Baiting is a viable tactic to put down a lot of enemies, and a trap may save you from an enemy that can move faster.
Tailoring: Some of the best armor and clothing in this game is not available for scavenging, it has to be crafted. Tailoring also is used to repair damaged clothing, make them reinforced or improve their fit, reducing their encumberance. Only cloth or wool clothes can be repaired, reinforced or fitted.
First Aid: One level in it is enough to craft bandages out of rags, duct tape and booze.
Barter and Speech: Useless
Swimming: Mostly useless.
Driving: If you can't drive well enough, any vehicle will fumble a lot and turn where you don't want it to turn, increasing the risk of crashes.
Traits
With cost or extra character creation points, in the case of the negative ones, shown.
NOTE: You cannot have more than 12 points spent in positive traits or more than 12 points gained by picking negative traits.
POSITIVE
Fleet-footed(3 points) : 15% faster movement
Parkour Expert(2 pts): Obstacles like railings, bushes, benches, tables, etc won't slow you down and getting through broken windows has a smaller chance of getting you wounded by the glass shards.
Quick(3 pts): 10% extra action points for everything, including movement
Optimist(2 pts): 20 points of positive morale. Morale determines how fast you gain XP in the game and the XP is spent in the use-based skill levelling, so if it reaches 0 grinding is pointless. Essentially, this trait indirectly speeds up skill progression and allows the character to have enough mood to craft even if wet, as far as I can remember.
Fast Healer(2 pts), Light Eater (3), Pain(2) or Poison Resistant(1), Night Vision(1), Fast Reader(1) and Fast Learner(3): Self-explaining.
Tough(3 pts): 20% extra health.
Thick-skinned(2 pts): Reduced cutting damaged
Packmule(3 pts): Can carry 40% more volume.
Deft(2 pts): If you miss a melee attack, it takes less action points for you to recover and be able to try another one.
Drunken Master(2 pts): Being drunk turns you into an UFC Champion with titanium bones... sort of. Best combined with Martial Arts Training.
Gourmand(2 pts): Can eat and drink more before getting full or slaked and food and drinks give a bigger morale bonus.
Animal Empathy(1 pt): Peaceful animals like deers, squirrels and rabbits won't run away while wolves, bears, spiders and cougars are less likely to attack.
Terrifying(2 pts): Wild animals that would attack you otherwise will flee instead.
Disease Resistant(1 pt): Flu sucks. For would-be mutants, this trait can mutate into total disease immunity... or not.
High Adrenaline(3 pts): When in a very dangerous situation, like surrounded by machete rape gang zombies, you gain a rush that boosts speed and strength for a while.
Self-aware(1 pt): Shows exactly how many HPs the character has left.
Inconspicuous(2 pts): Reduces the chances of monsters giving you a surprise buttsex wake up call while sleeping.
Masochist(2 pts): Pain has the same negative effects as otherwise, but also gives a morale boost, I think.
Light Step(1 pt): You make less noise when walking, which means a greater chance of a zombie not breaking through the windows of a house because of hearing you inside.
Android(4 pts): Starts with some random cybernetic implants. For sake of roleplaying, cannot be picked with the EXTERMINATUS! playstyle which assumes a bioconservative, and not with SurReal World either.
Robust genetics(2 pts): The chance of bad mutations happening is much smaller. For a would-be mutant, this is a must have trait.
Cannibal(3 pts): I think a character needs this trait to be able to eat human flesh when not almost dying of starvation, and by extension for appreciating the greatest gourmet of the Post-ITZ cooked with cutted underwear. No cannibal trait = no babymeat.
Martial Arts Training(3 pts): Unarmed specialists are fun and risky, Drunken Masters with this trait as well are twice as fun. The options are:
Karate- gives you extra dodges against coming enemy attacks for every successful hit.
Judo- allows rapid recovery from being knocked down and gives throwing special attacks to put enemies off-balance.
Aikido- deals less damage in unarmed combat but a lot more pain(useless against zombies AFAIK), and also allows you to disarm armed enemies.
Tai Chi- another defensive focused martial art, except for allowing precision strikes. It has perception as an important stat for block chances, which provides a good synergy with ranged combat.
Taekwondo- relies on Strength for blocking, is focused on kicking and gives knockdown and sweep attacks at higher unarmed skill levels.
NEGATIVE TRAITS
Near-sighted(2 pts): Without eyeglasses or better, a monocle, you have a very limited line of sight.
Far-sighted(2 pts): You cannot read without reading glasses and will be very poor at melee combat without them as well.
Heavy sleeper(1 pt): The noise of a zombie breaking a window open is probably not be enough to wake up this character.
Asthmatic(4 pts): Not recommended at all unless you want a very short run. It has a chance of making the PC die of asphixia while sleeping and there is nothing the player can do to prevent it. Seriously.
Bad Back(3 pts): Reduces maximum carry weight by 35%.
Illiterate(5 pts): Forget about reading books to learn skills, and naturally, forget about getting inside laboratories, bank vaults and bunkers by hacking computer terminals to open doors. You'll have to use bombs to gain access to certain places if you pick this one. A truly limiting disadvantage.
Poor hearing(2 pts): Self-explaining.
Insomniac(2 pts): Without sleeping pills, sleeping at night will be complicated.
Hardcore Vegan(3 pts): You have such a convinction of your vegetarian ideals the mere idea of eating meat makes you wish to vomit.
Glass Jaw(3 pts): 15% less HP in the head.
Forgetful(3 pts): Free points because I play with skill rust disabled, for it makes the game too grindy.
Lightweight (1 pt): Drugs have a much longer negative effect.
Addictive personality (3 pts): Self-explaining.
Trigger Happy (2 pts): Sometimes the character will burst fire instead of firing single shots with an automatic weapon.
Smelly (1 pt): A much worse disadvantage than what its meager 1 extra point suggests. Makes running away from hordes more difficult.
Chemical Imbalance(2 pts): The character will feel hunger, thirst, sleepy and even high at random.
Schizophrenic(5 pts): A very fun and dangerous disadvantage, not recommended for a serious playthrough. There are drugs to temporarily put out the craziness that may lead a character to self-harm, but they are rare.
Jittery (3 pts): When under heavy stress or stimulants, the character hands shake, giving a serious penalty to dexterity.
Hoarder (4 pts): Unless carrying as much volume as possible all the time, the character will feel bad and suffer a morale penatly that can only be mitigated with Xanax, another not very easily found drug. It is more annoying than challenging to be honest, because of the inventory microing needed to prevent it.
Savant (4 pts): You'll improve one skill twice faster but all others will be improved at half of the normal rate. Fast Learner is pointless when combined with this.
What makes weeaboos wet (1 pt): you have sudden mood swings, both good and bad, like those shitty anime characters the wapanese tend to love.
Weak stomach(1 pt): You are more likely to vomit because of drinking too much alcohol or eating rotten or poisoned food.
Wool allergy(1 pt): Cannot wear anything made with wool.
Truth teller(2 pts): Pretty much free extra points in this version because NPCs are disabled.
Ugly(1 pt): ibid.
HARDCORE PC GAMER MASTER RACE(6 pts): The character health is reduced to 1/4th of the standard hitpoints, which means dying is far more likely. Combine with Glass Jaw and 0 free character creation points for Maximum Hardcore.
Profession
Gives different starting equipment, clothes and items and maybe addiction to drugs. Depending on whether it helps or hinder the start, it costs points or give free ones. All characters start with a pocket knife and with a matchbook with 20 matches. Here are the available options:
Unemployed(0 pts): The default option. Starts with a T-shirt, jeans and sneakers that are perfect fits and give a few extra action points because of it. No books or items at all.
Tailor(costs 1 pt): Starts with a Tailoring book that can increase that skill up to level 3, with a sewing kit and scissors. Starts wearing a blazer that gives 1 of torso encumberance but provides some warmth, an unemcumbering polo shirt, khaki pants and dress shoes. Can't run as fast with those dress shoes as someone with sneakers.
Lab Technician(costs 1 pt): Starts with a Lab Coat, providing a little more storage volume than the previous two professions. Not really much useful.
Wannabe Mechanic(costs 2 pts): Starts with a very useful belt rig because of the extra storage space it gives, with a Top Gear magazine that can bring driving skill to the first level, with a basic mechanics book, which is very, very useful because of the tools that can be done with level 3 in mechanics and finally with a wrench that serves well as a first weapon. However, either as a bug or as an intended feature, the mechanic starts without shoes, which brings a hefty 15% increase in the cost of action points to move.
Chain Smoker(gives 1 extra pt): No really useful equipment, worse starting clothes than those of an Unemployed because of higher encumberance and a few cigarettes. Starts with addiction to nicotine.
And now my small modding extra profession:
Games Journalist(gives 1 extra pt): "You made your living deceiving 12-year olds and yourself to preorder or day-one purchase overrated entertainment. You start suffering withdrawal from popamole console games." Exactly what the description says. Popamole withdrawal reduces intelligence by hefty 4 points, and there is no more popamole left.
Notice that I will play in a very suicidal way should you pick the last profession.
Choose your combination of gender, difficulty, play style, stats, traits, professions and maybe starting skills or maybe not, or just post a general idea of how you want your character to be if you can't bother doing the math.