Fallen Earth: QotW#33: To Hit or Be Hit - That is the question...

Canticle delivered this week's answers answering critical questions concerning gun range, armor, clothing and an update on the development status:

Math is hard! But Questions of the Week? They're easy. Lead developer Lee Hammock tells you what you want to know in another installment. Also, check out the Friday fiction snippet at the end!

This week we have some questions about weaponry, armor, and world issues. Currently in the office, we're plugging away at Credit Bend, Haven, Picus Ridge, Redfield, Old Kingman Prison, and Junk Fortress, in addition to some work involving the balancing of treasure tables and harvesting nodes.

1) I know the gun ranges are MASSIVELY toned down but is a meter an actual meter in game? Or is it some weird distance?

A meter is a meter is a meter. Our game uses centimeters as its basic unit of measure, so 100 meters is 100 meters.

2) Will there be rifled "shotguns?"

Yes. Most shotguns come in two models, shotguns and slug guns which fire over-sized slugs from a rifled barrel.

3) How effective will rifle-class shotguns be?

Basically, we have a formula we use on all firearms based on range, ammunition, rate of fire, desired length of combat, etc. that helps us determine weapon damage. Shotguns that fall under the Rifle skill have short range compared with other rifles, but have a damage bonus to make up for it.

4) Can you specifically create an item with extra materials etc, to improve a statistic of your choice?

Many non-consumable items, such as weapons, have upgraded versions you can make that have better abilities including bonuses to skills, but this depends on the type of item. For example, a corkscrew will never get you a bonus to Melee combat because it's not well-suited for use as a weapon, whereas a swords gets you a +5 bonus to Melee (because it is designed to be a weapon) and a +5 to Evade (because it is useful for blocking in close combat). If you learned how to make a sword, you could then learn how to make an upgraded version that has slightly better bonuses.

5) Will pipes be used on later game weapons? Because the "build your own weapon" thread got revived and people thought that 100-year-old pipes would be sufficient to build a weapon.

Pipes will not really be useful weapons outside the earlier stages of the game, because a pipe doesn't really compare well with real weapons-though you can salvage pipes for raw materials.

6) Please touch on the Cult of the Dead (Vampires? Really?)

We don't want to go too much into specifics on our villain factions as that would give away aspects of the story that we would prefer players to discover in game, though you will get more information about such groups through the Friday Fiction pieces. We would like to ask folks not to jump to conclusions about the presence of supernatural elements in our game and how they'll be handled. We think everyone will be happy with the end result.

7) Will some clothing be as good as armor?

There is a range of clothing options available, and some are better than others, but to stay as protected as possible, eventually you have to leave the jeans and leather jackets behind for the Kevlar-reinforced pants and the flak jackets. A good stout leather jacket may be as effective as some armor made out of battered license plates and worn leather, but, in the long term, just sticking to clothes will mean you eventually will fall behind the armor curve.

8) Can we get protective vests to wear under clothes to make them as effective as, let us say, military armor types, and in what way will it restrict our ability to move and what-not?

Wearing armor is a trade-off. Most types of armor have some type of Dexterity or Coordination penalty in addition to making a lot of noise when worn, and these drawbacks are balanced out by the armor being more resistant to damage. If you want to wear armor that does not make much noise and doesn't penalize your attributes, then you won't be wearing the most protective armor in the game, though you will be sneakier and have better weapon and defensive skills.

9) How many scraps of cotton will it take to make a shirt?

Depends on the shirt and the quality of the cotton used. Anywhere from 1-10.

10) Will Factions be able to chat to one another?

Yes. All factions will be able to talk to each other.

11) In the fiction of the week you have given us some great places to picture in are minds, but I'm wondering will we be able to see places like farms with large areas of crops to walk through? What other kinds of unique places do you have in Fallen Earth?

In the most recent Friday Fiction, another of the interesting places in Fallen Earth was mentioned, the appropriately named Drive-In. We're currently putting the finishing touches on an abandoned golf course (complete with driving range and mini-golf course), working on a writeup for Infinity Mall, and laying out the barter town of New Flagstaff. We've got ruined apartment buildings, abandoned prisons, agricultural locations with fields of crops, highway bridges crossing canyons hundreds of feet deep, and a town called Wut. I mean, the town is called Wut. That's the best name for a town, ever.

And now...a preview of Friday's fiction piece...

Taking a few steps back from the corpses stumbling towards him, Morgan concentrated, energizing his synaptic connection to all the microscopic nano-machines embedded in his body. Leftovers of his last trip to the cloning chamber, most of the nanites were inactive, but he could change that. In a few seconds he had an army of molecular machines at his command, controlling them through his own electrical nerve impulses. He directed them to his motor and optic nerve clusters, increasing the efficiency of both, and a few scant breaths later the whole world became much clearer, and much much slower.