Sleeping Beauties

Find out what we're doing and thinking as we develop WolfQuest 3: Anniversary Edition and the Tower Fall expansion!

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loboLoco
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Sleeping Beauties

Post by loboLoco » Thu Jun 25, 2020 4:08 pm



One of the tough design issues with multiplayer mode in WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition has been sleeping, health recharge, and time acceleration. Those three elements are bound together in the single-player game, and we’ve pondered over the past few years how to make them work when there are multiple players, each of whom might have different ideas about when to sleep. Such disagreements are inevitable, but they could seriously detract from players’ experience in the game. A few weeks ago we dove back into the issue and, after some intensive brainstorming, we finally figured out a solution: the essential thing is to keep everyone’s sleep cycles in sync. Then there may be still be some disagreement about exactly when to sleep, but everyone’s *need* to sleep will be the same. So as players join the game, their Sleep meter will be synced with that of the host, whether it’s high or low or somewhere in between.

But that only solves half the problem. The other half is that sleep is necessary to restore your health. What if your health drops quite low and yet the pack does not need to sleep for many hours. For that, we created a new “Quick Heal” function — a special, if not quite magical, power for wolves in multiplayer. When using Quick Heal, wolves draw on their food reserves to boost their health. It only boosts health to 40%, to minimize potential abuse — just enough to get you back on your feet and through the rest of the day with your pack.

Both these are coming to multiplayer….soon! How soon? We have not set a release date, but it’s a lot closer than it was a year ago!

______________
We have released the first episode of WolfQuest 3: Anniversary Edition (Amethyst Mountain) for PC/Mac on Steam and itch.io, as Early Access. While in Early Access, we are updating the game frequently with more features, multiplayer, and ultimately the Slough Creek episode with pups. The mobile version will come after the game is completed on PC/Mac platforms. We’ll then resume development of the next episode, Tower Fall (DLC).
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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by elkhunter123456 » Thu Jun 25, 2020 4:51 pm

So thats how the sleeping solution will work. Really smart solution as well :D I also liked seeing the bison again in this episode! Cant wait to hunt them as a pack (or on easy mode with a mate)

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by TimberWolf0450 » Thu Jun 25, 2020 4:57 pm

This is very clever! It will definitely reduce arguments among players and make sure they can sleep when needed.
The "quick heal" option is great too. I know I'll be grateful that it's a feature :lol:

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by BlackMetal » Fri Jun 26, 2020 2:05 am

In any case, the sleep mode is much better than in the old version. Fortunately, health can be regenerated reasonably well, for which I'm very grateful!

Keep up the good work and stay safe and healthy WQ-Team! :wink:

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by wolfadore » Mon Jun 29, 2020 10:08 pm

I feel like its a good idea that will become frustrating. It all makes sense, but I think a better solution would be to let each player sleep when they want to, and to the rest of the players the time is the same and the sleeping wolf is just laying there. For the sleeping wolf, time will go fast as normal. The other players could have an option to wake up the sleeping wolf if needed. That way, everyone can sleep when they like, and can choose to do it together if they please. That would also solve the healing issue.

I feel like the quick heal just isn't realistic, and will give players a way out when in real life, there isn't one. Sometimes some wolf pack members aren't as healthy as their counterparts, and have to figure out how to live with that.

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by kagewan » Tue Jun 30, 2020 12:36 am

wolfadore wrote:
Mon Jun 29, 2020 10:08 pm
I feel like its a good idea that will become frustrating. It all makes sense, but I think a better solution would be to let each player sleep when they want to, and to the rest of the players the time is the same and the sleeping wolf is just laying there. For the sleeping wolf, time will go fast as normal. The other players could have an option to wake up the sleeping wolf if needed. That way, everyone can sleep when they like, and can choose to do it together if they please. That would also solve the healing issue.

I feel like the quick heal just isn't realistic, and will give players a way out when in real life, there isn't one. Sometimes some wolf pack members aren't as healthy as their counterparts, and have to figure out how to live with that.
Given how the time of day in anniversary edition effects where elk herds and other animals are, that probably just wouldn't be a very viable solution technically and, logically I guess,!

I think what the WQ team came up with works well ,, making a multiplayer version for anniversary edition would be difficult with all the new mechanics, and quick heal being unrealistic really isnt, that bad, in order to keep things actually enjoyable to play as a game sometimes realism is probably gona have to be sacrificed,! Its not like its available in the main singleplayer gameplay.

i duno though,,! just my opinion on it,!!

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by xc92u3 » Tue Jun 30, 2020 1:39 am

kagewan wrote:
Tue Jun 30, 2020 12:36 am
wolfadore wrote:
Mon Jun 29, 2020 10:08 pm
I feel like its a good idea that will become frustrating. It all makes sense, but I think a better solution would be to let each player sleep when they want to, and to the rest of the players the time is the same and the sleeping wolf is just laying there. For the sleeping wolf, time will go fast as normal. The other players could have an option to wake up the sleeping wolf if needed. That way, everyone can sleep when they like, and can choose to do it together if they please. That would also solve the healing issue.

I feel like the quick heal just isn't realistic, and will give players a way out when in real life, there isn't one. Sometimes some wolf pack members aren't as healthy as their counterparts, and have to figure out how to live with that.
Given how the time of day in anniversary edition effects where elk herds and other animals are, that probably just wouldn't be a very viable solution technically and, logically I guess,!

I think what the WQ team came up with works well ,, making a multiplayer version for anniversary edition would be difficult with all the new mechanics, and quick heal being unrealistic really isnt, that bad, in order to keep things actually enjoyable to play as a game sometimes realism is probably gona have to be sacrificed,! Its not like its available in the main singleplayer gameplay.

i duno though,,! just my opinion on it,!!
No, I agree with you, too, @kagewan. If time passes quicker for one player than it does for all the rest, then it's gonna be nighttime for one of the game's players, morning for another, afternoon for another. It'd throw the entire game out of wack. That, and I think the fast-healing isn't too intrusive on the game's educational atmosphere. It only works in multiplayer, and it sucks up a lot of hunger, so in a way, it sort of keeps your stats even. Echoing @kagewan, some newbies would get extremely frustrated with the game if the fast-healing option did not exist. That, and I'd enjoy using it too ^^ especially if I was trying to roleplay while hunting, hah.
My apologies if I sound a bit... harsh. oof
Anyway, I'm super excited for MP, Dave! Keep up the great work! It sure takes some time and work to think up reliable solutions for gameplay shenanigans. :P

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by -Wolfdog- » Wed Jul 01, 2020 11:15 am

Unpopular opinion but I actually like Wolfadore's idea but with a few tweaks. If I remember correctly, Dave mentioned in an earlier video that a player could sleep when they want too, except time wouldn't progress. I like the first idea better. I can easily see the game host abusing this feature to mess around with people. Like being teleported near the host constantly? What if you join the game with a very low sleep meter but the host won't go to sleep? What about if you're low on health and you're low on hunger? Wouldn't you starve yourself to death to get more health? So in a sense, the feature is nice, but it has some weaknesses.
I actually think it would be more realistic if players could sleep whenever they want, because wolves don't always fall asleep at the same time. Some might be exploring, others might be resting, etc. Time should only progress faster when ALL players fall asleep. I think health should recharge when an individual is sleeping albeit slower. I think the healing should only kick it when a player has a good food storage and maybe it can also do that when the player wolf sleeps?

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by xc92u3 » Thu Jul 02, 2020 1:46 am

Yeah, but then if you sleep when no one else is, you will have to wait an extremely long time for the benefits of sleeping to actually come around. For instance, if your health is low-ish and you want to go to sleep to try to bring it back up a bit, it would take practically forever, unless, of course, the sleeping cycles were sped up so that time does pass normally but the wolf somehow sleeps for a much smaller amount of time and their health regenerates as it would when they're playing single player. This would definitely mess around with the reality of wolves' real life sleeping cycles, shortening them and such. But the host could easily use this new sleeping dynamic against the rest of the game's players, yes, so this new sleeping dynamic may not completely work in the way we'd want it to, but it still is creative, and it might work a lot better with a few tweaks. ^^

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by loboLoco » Thu Jul 02, 2020 12:53 pm

GoldenBeauty wrote:
Wed Jul 01, 2020 11:15 am
I can easily see the game host abusing this feature to mess around with people. Like being teleported near the host constantly? What if you join the game with a very low sleep meter but the host won't go to sleep?
Find a better host.
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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by -Wolfdog- » Thu Jul 02, 2020 2:18 pm

loboLoco wrote:
Thu Jul 02, 2020 12:53 pm
GoldenBeauty wrote:
Wed Jul 01, 2020 11:15 am
I can easily see the game host abusing this feature to mess around with people. Like being teleported near the host constantly? What if you join the game with a very low sleep meter but the host won't go to sleep?
Find a better host.
Fair point Dave! That's an easy fix. :o

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by xc92u3 » Fri Jul 03, 2020 12:37 am

loboLoco wrote:
Thu Jul 02, 2020 12:53 pm
GoldenBeauty wrote:
Wed Jul 01, 2020 11:15 am
I can easily see the game host abusing this feature to mess around with people. Like being teleported near the host constantly? What if you join the game with a very low sleep meter but the host won't go to sleep?
Find a better host.
Hah, even I'm a bit guilty of forgetting to go to sleep myself XD

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Re: Sleeping Beauties

Post by DinoDogDude209 » Mon Jul 20, 2020 11:53 am

Personally I think this new sleeping system will work well in multiplayer, and I'm glad that a good solution to this issue has been found. Of course, I think that the amount of time on the countdown before you are essentially "Put to sleep" could probably be extended to about a minute or so, just so that if a player needs some extra time to finish what they were doing, they have a little bit more time to do that before having to sleep with the rest of the pack. But I do think that this new sleep cycle system will definitely help to resolve conflicts over sleeping in the game, and, if the game host abuses it, then as Dave said, find a better game host. Although I wonder how the team will deal with problem players that do abuse things like that in the game, will there be an in-game user reporting system like in 2.7? :?:

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