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Yet another idea for Wilson's rework


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So, I was thinking – how to rework Wilson in such way that he still is himself yet new.

When I think about Wilson, I don't think about him being a scientist – he's rather a failed one however, he's the one who had beaten the adventure mode, the one who survived all the traps Maxwell set. That's why I believe Wilson should be more focused on staying alive in wilderness than having a "portable science machine" or something like that).

So, here's my ideas:

1.Now, Wilson loses 10% hunger over time.

2.Now, Wilson cuts his beard in stages (on stage 3 using a razor cuts his beards to stage 2). Reasons are following:

  • Introduction of beard skins made me like to keep Wilson's beard on stage 1 and 2, which currently requires me to wait 10(ish) days.
  • Accidental razor usage on myself when cutting beefalos definitely won't feel like such a problem.
  • Sometimes you just need one or two beard hair patches, not 6.

3.Now, Wilson being the only one able to build the Meat Effigy. Reasons are following:

  • I rarely see Meat Effigies being present on servers, with the exception being me putting them around when in need.
  • It looks like Wilson (duh)
  • It could raise the amount of Wilson players (so break the WX, Wolf, Wicker meta that I always see) in Survival worlds.

4.Now, Wilson can sleep on stage 3 beard. Reasons are following:

  • In most of my games, Wilson becomes the scavenger of Winter, as he's able to withstand the low temperature. Naturally, during journeys it's not hard to lose health from enemies or hunger, and I do believe that Wilson could (and should) be able to regenerate health after a day of looting. During sleep, his beard would prevent him from freezing. This wouldn't regenerate his sanity though.

5.Now, Wilson's beard will get dirty over time. This happens when his beard (stages 2 and 3) is kept unclean for more than 5 days.

Penalties of having a dirty beard:

  • Small sanity loss for both Wilson and players in 1 tile radius.

  • Animals will flee from dirty Wilson from greater distance

  • This penalties would raise (bigger sanity loss and greater distance) with the time the beard is kept mucky.

Now, how you keep it clean you may ask. The answer is: Beard Oil (Survival tab)

With one egg, 3 seeds and a log, no beard will be filthy!

Beard oil lasts 2 days and provides following effects

  • Animals will have a harder time smelling the player, thus allowing Wilson to get closer to them without frightening or provoking animals.

  • +15 sanity upon usage + (declining with time) small sanity gain

6.Now, standing near Wilson's magnificent beard (dirty or not) will prevent other players from hurtful freezing – by that I mean freezing state in which players lose health.

7.Now, beard hair can be traded for one gold with The Pig King. The reason is to give beard hair an usage when not playing as Wilson (so as when getting beard hair from rabbits).

8.Now, Wilson can craft ropes with 4 beard hair. Reasons are following:

  • Has been suggested many times, could vastly help in rough situations in which there's no grass (e.g. Summer, far-away biomes <winter gatherer playstyle) and there's a need for a campfire asap!
  • Would give beard hair more usage.

Now, negative stuff:

9.Now, since Wilson is a terrible scientist, there's a 25% chance for crafting "faulty" items on science stations above Science Machine, including:

  • Alchemy Engine
  • Prestihatitator
  • Shadow Manipulator
  • both broken and factory-new Pseudoscience machine

Faulty items have a lower durability (60-90%, depending on Wilson's sanity)

 

And now, here's a little commercial from our sponsor!

beard oil comic.png

If you have any suggestions, or want to critisize my ideas, please comment as that means you read that and are willing to discuss the topic!

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24 minutes ago, Squirrel12 said:

He's the vanilla character. Choosing him, is choosing to play the game "normally". So no power ups, no downgrades. He is the character every new player should start with, before choosing more complex characters .

Disagree. Wilson was "the default one" when you had to unlock all other characters. In DST however, there's no unlocking (besides spools, but at the same time you can buy them), which means that players may and will naturally pick the characters that looks the nicest or seems like funnier to play.

Also, since when Wilson was actually the default one? He can grow a beard which helps him during winter and hinders his survival in summer. That's a pretty "powerful" passive ability that stands far from "normal gameplay". The closest one to "normal" would be Wes, but he's a bit weaker. Other than worse stats, he has no abilities (no, baloons don't count)
 
If Wilson was the case for "every new player", then other characters wouldn't have items that help in early days (or make it easier at the beggining with the usage of character's abilites. (firestarter, meat for Wigfrid/Webber, Nightmare fuel for Maxwell etc).

To finish, Klei stated that every character will get a rework, so this falls flat.

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Ok so here is my unpopular opinion.

Tbh I don't really want Wilson to be reworked I kinda liked the ideal of 1 advantage no downsides, and having a character that you can just play the game normally as without some sort of game changing perk. I understand why people want him reworked but I think it would be better for him to stay the way he is.

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7 minutes ago, researchlab_2 said:

Also, since when Wilson was actually the default one?

Since Day 1.

8 minutes ago, researchlab_2 said:

Also, since when Wilson was actually the default one? He can grow a beard which helps him during winter and hinders his survival in summer. That's a pretty "powerful" passive ability that stands far from "normal gameplay". The closest one to "normal" would be Wes, but he's a bit weaker. Other than worse stats, he has no abilities (no, baloons don't count)

His beard is not intrusive in any way though. His health and sanity should be used as the baseline for every character. Wes is therefore not "normal".

9 minutes ago, researchlab_2 said:

If Wilson was the case for "every new player", then other characters wouldn't have items that help in early days (or make it easier at the beggining with the usage of character's abilites. (firestarter, meat for Wigfrid/Webber, Nightmare fuel for Maxwell etc).

To finish, Klei stated that every character will get a rework, so this falls flat.

Their items are designed to ease players into their different play styles (e.g giving meat to Wigfrid, so that players can get used to her carnivore diet).  

13 minutes ago, researchlab_2 said:

To finish, Klei stated that every character will get a rework, so this falls flat.

I'll believe it when I see it. 

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15 minutes ago, Squirrel12 said:

Since Day 1.

His beard is not intrusive in any way though. His health and sanity should be used as the baseline for every character. Wes is therefore not "normal".

Their items are designed to ease players into their different play styles (e.g giving meat to Wigfrid, so that players can get used to her carnivore diet).  

I'll believe it when I see it. 

Right, by "Also, since when Wilson was actually the default one?" I meant DST, my fault here.

Wilson's beard allows him to survive winter easily. No other character has that. Just because others were built upon him doesn't mean he has to be regarded as "default", especially in DST.

Wes doesn't have anything special (useful). Him being weaker is more of a "normal" playstyle (as you always need to gather resources) than Wilson's who doesn't have to care about one of the main parts of the game.

If theu're there to ease players, then it literally means these items are there to help at the beggining.

Experienced players don't need that meat from Wigfrid, they can outright start attacking Tallbirds, Pigs and whatnot. Experienced players don't need that Lighter for Willow from the start – it's easy to make a science machine in day one, and getting three grass and three petals isn't even a challenge.

This items have clearly been given at the start (no need to craft them) to help new players checking out characters. It helps them understand how characters work. It's not like this characters don't have short overviews written there to help them understand how each work.

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1 hour ago, researchlab_2 said:

So, I was thinking – how to rework Wilson in such way that he still is himself yet new.

If you have any suggestions, or want to critisize my ideas, please comment as that means you read that and are willing to discuss the topic!

I'll be disappointed if this rework would be only about beard. I mean everything you wrote could be the 1st chapter of his rework. 

I had this idea of "failed crafting" in a recent same thread, but it was from a special crafting station he would be the only one to have (it leads to his own tab), and my idea was not failed craft but random craft if he failed.

As you said, he beat the adventure mode and sit on the throne, even if he didn't stay long. So the question is: What power we have when we sit on throne ? Maxwell have some answers: Does he have this quote by looking tall birds: A failed experience or something like that ? So I'll repeat that Wilson deserve his own tab with few unique crafts, like something similar to the alchemy station from Halloween event. Because he should have some knowledge from his throne's experience.

His weirds ideas should perfectly fit in a weird world like the constant. A kind of success time, whatever he'll craft.

The meat effigy should have a rework though, it should have different skins depending on who craft it.

 

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1 minute ago, Moonatik said:

The meat effigy should have a rework though, it should have different skins depending on who craft it.

I'll stand with my point here. Wilson should be the only one able to do that, but, well, people may think differently.

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1 hour ago, researchlab_2 said:

Wes doesn't have anything special (useful). Him being weaker is more of a "normal" playstyle (as you always need to gather resources) 

The fact that he's significantly weaker than the default presets (Wilson's), makes him not normal.

1 hour ago, researchlab_2 said:

Wilson's who doesn't have to care about one of the main parts of the game.

Still needs Winter gear to survice. For new players, it makes sense that the only perk Wilson has is for Winter. Winter is one of the elements that messes up new players the most. Most players are not aware of freezing conditions and are under-prepared for it. However, by that time, they've grown their beard, so the consequences aren't as bad...

1 hour ago, Raeku said:

What on earth makes you think Wilson is a "terrible scientist?"

And how would you even define a "failed" scientist?

I do get what he means by this. Wilson does have that "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" kinda vibe. Scientist that builds things that blows up in his face. 

52 minutes ago, researchlab_2 said:

I'll stand with my point here. Wilson should be the only one able to do that, but, well, people may think differently.

I don't disagree with this. 

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1 minute ago, Squirrel12 said:

The fact that he's significantly weaker than the default presets (Wilson's), makes him not normal.

So, I'll still hold this topic.

I agree that Wes being weaker makes him "not normal", however, it's only stat-swapping, not giving out talents. Experienced players will get more than enough food, which will keep him survive, same with smaller damage - so-called veterans will be waving their Ham Shank from left to right.

Wes is not normal, however he doesn't have anything special that makes him, well, better in a certain field.

However I believe that this topic has ended, let others decide.

4 minutes ago, Squirrel12 said:

Still needs Winter gear to survice. For new players, it makes sense that the only perk Wilson has is for Winter. Winter is one of the elements that messes up new players the most. Most players are not aware of freezing conditions and are under-prepared for it. However, by that time, they've grown their beard, so the consequences aren't as bad...

Yes, Winter is the first challenging season to encounter, and it helps that Wilson is prepared for that, but I still believe that the same point could be said about Willow, even in single-player DS. You only need to survive 8 total days, less than what takes to reach Winter. She's also a starter character, as her abilities combat two of many major problems new players may have – sanity loss and getting cought in the darkness.

Willow is the female Wilson, yet she's also the Queen of Summer – opposite of Wilson's King of Winter nature. I really do believe he could be more fleshed out in this field. I really want to, because DST is the sequel to DS, and we don't need ***"Third Degree"*** in this game.

***In Team Fortress 2, there's a weapon for Pyro which only has an upside, comparing to default Fireaxe, which should be "objectively the best". Every other weapon in this game comes with both upsides and downsides, offering "Sidegrades"

ddd.png

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Wilsons upside is his lack of downside, the problem is more in the fact that a lot of other characters (namely Wicker, Wolfgang, and WX) dont have big enough downsides to make picking Wilson a good choice.

 

Thats just my opinion, atleast.

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19 minutes ago, Ogrecakes said:

Wilsons upside is his lack of downside, the problem is more in the fact that a lot of other characters (namely Wicker, Wolfgang, and WX) dont have big enough downsides to make picking Wilson a good choice.

 

Thats just my opinion, atleast.

the problem with wilson is that he's boring. even if you nerf all of the characters to the point where their downsides are large enough that having no downsides might genuinely sound great, the majority of the playerbase isn't going to pick him. because what none of you guys are mentioning is that as a result of his little to no gameplay mechanics or quirks he is one of the most boring characters to play as. there is nothing to do beyond the basic survival routine. there is no niche filled. there's nothing there to have fun with, and in the end the purpose of a video game is to have fun. i am saying this as a wes main. wilson and wes are objectively the least fun characters to play as. nerfing all the other characters until they're all on the same level is just going to make the game overall less fun.

i'm not saying we should take wilson out of his role as a sort of tutorial character, but there needs to be something there beyond his beautiful, beautiful beard.

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1 hour ago, researchlab_2 said:

Yes, Winter is the first challenging season to encounter, and it helps that Wilson is prepared for that, but I still believe that the same point could be said about Willow, even in single-player DS. You only need to survive 8 total days, less than what takes to reach Winter. She's also a starter character, as her abilities combat two of many major problems new players may have – sanity loss and getting cought in the darkness.

What do you mean 8 days? Winter is 15 days long.

 

1 hour ago, researchlab_2 said:

Willow is the female Wilson, yet she's also the Queen of Summer – opposite of Wilson's King of Winter nature. I really do believe he could be more fleshed out in this field. I really want to, because DST is the sequel to DS, and we don't need ***"Third Degree"*** in this game.

Willow isnt a female Wilson, she has downsides, she freezes more easily, has much less maximum sanity. And about that "Third Degree", Wilson's power is still pretty weak. It helps, but only in not freezing to death. He is the default character, because although (almost) all characters are unlocked for everyone, he was the first one in DS, and for a reason: He is beginner friendly. He doesnt have a downside, so beginners dont have to worry about one. His upside is that he doesnt have a downside basically, which isnt OP, because the reason characters have downsides, is to balance their upsides, of which Wilson has only one, and a weak one at that. If he got reworked, beginners wouldn't have anyone to fall behind for starting out, and would immediately have to worry about downsides

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Wilson should get some optional characterspecific content, that could have the up- and downsides. So he would stay easy for beginners, but could get more interesting to more experienced players, especially to the ones who like him as a character and would like to play him, if he just wasn't that boring to play. He could craft some experimental equipment, that could be very useful but also very painful in many different ways (because he isn't that good as a scientist - even if his ideas are good, they have undesirable side effects).

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10 minutes ago, DaZoul said:

What do you mean 8 days? Winter is 15 days long.

And unlocking Willow in DS requires 8 days. Most new players will die after than and are going to try out Willow instead, then survive even more.

 

10 minutes ago, DaZoul said:

Willow isnt a female Wilson, she has downsides, she freezes more easily, has much less maximum sanity. And about that "Third Degree", Wilson's power is still pretty weak. It helps, but only in not freezing to death. He is the default character, because although (almost) all characters are unlocked for everyone, he was the first one in DS, and for a reason: He is beginner friendly. He doesnt have a downside, so beginners dont have to worry about one. His upside is that he doesnt have a downside basically, which isnt OP, because the reason characters have downsides, is to balance their upsides, of which Wilson has only one, and a weak one at that. If he got reworked, beginners wouldn't have anyone to fall behind for starting out, and would immediately have to worry about downsides

See, I wasn't talking about, imo, minor differences. She survives Summer with ease, same as Wilson and Winter. Wilson wasn't the first character because he was beginner friendly – he's beginner friendly because he was the first. The sole reason he's "boring" gameplay wise is because Klei didn't have a foundation for what to do with the characters.

This changed in DST however. He's one among one and half a dozen, and it's not like there aren't different characters which can help new players. Yes, he's a good choice for new players, but he shouldn't be restricted to such role just because some people don't feel like changing him.

Wickerbottom's +1 level of science is a great thing for new players who want to get things done more quickly. It can be used by new players to get a backpack, a spear and an armor to not fear getting food.

Wigfrid is a meat eater only, yes, but her role is to break the fear of touching monsters.

WX-78 makes players not care about the state of their food - something new players often may forget about. The rain is almost non-existent in Autumn.

See? All these characters can be used by new players, they just have to experiment.

Yes, Wilson is the number one in the field of newbies, but it feels unfair to lock a character behind being "experiment-proof".

 

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2 minutes ago, researchlab_2 said:

And unlocking Willow in DS requires 8 days.

 

See, I wasn't talking about, imo, minor differences. She survives Summer with ease, same as Wilson and Winter. Wilson wasn't the first character because he was beginner friendly – he's beginner friendly because he was the first. The sole reason he's "boring" gameplay wise is because Klei didn't have a foundation for what to do with the characters.

This changed in DST however. He's one among one and half a dozen, and it's not like there aren't different characters which can help new players. Yes, he's a good choice for new players, but he shouldn't be restricted to such role just because some people don't feel like changing him.

Wickerbottom's +1 level of science is a great thing for new players who want to get things done more quickly. It can be used by new players to get a backpack, a spear and an armor to not fear getting food.

Wigfrid is a meat eater only, yes, but her role is to break the fear of touching monsters.

WX-78 makes players not care about the state of their food - something new players often may forget about. The rain is almost non-existent in Autumn.

See? All these characters can be used by new players, they just have to experiment.

Yes, Wilson is the number one in the field of newbies, but it feels unfair to lock a character behind being "experiment-proof".

 

the point isnt why he is beginner friendly, but that he is beginner friendly. Those characters can be used by new players to experiment, and that is good, however their downsides make them harder overall, and Wilson is the best to experiment with the whole world. A beginner should worry about, i dunno the hounds coming, or trying to figure out why a tree is trying to kill them, and it is much more  helpful to not have to worry about only being able to eat meat as well. 

I dont think its unfair to lock Wilson, as he isnt only used by beginners. Many people (for example James Bucket, a youtuber) like to play Wilson the most, as he is refreshing by making you not limited to some aspects of the game (for example Wortox cant really use crock pot foods, Webber cant use pigmen or bunnymen for anything etc.).

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4 hours ago, Lovely Roses said:

Ok so here is my unpopular opinion.

Tbh I don't really want Wilson to be reworked I kinda liked the ideal of 1 advantage no downsides, and having a character that you can just play the game normally as without some sort of game changing perk. I understand why people want him reworked but I think it would be better for him to stay the way he is.

I totally agree. Leave him the way his is. 

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58 minutes ago, DaZoul said:

I dont think its unfair to lock Wilson, as he isnt only used by beginners. Many people (for example James Bucket, a youtuber) like to play Wilson the most, as he is refreshing by making you not limited to some aspects of the game (for example Wortox cant really use crock pot foods, Webber cant use pigmen or bunnymen for anything etc.).

Right, I agree on that one. The thing is, and that's only my opinion, my changes didn't make him horrible to play for new players (yes, the stinky beard and worse items are downsides, but I do believe that Wilson still should get more interesting, especially since he comes off as bland when compared to new characters or reworked ones. He still can be kept pretty straight-forward, but giving him some dynamic.

I want Wilson to fruit in Winter, I want him to be more team-based.

  • By making the meat effigy exclusive for him, he could "revive" other players without health penalties.
  • By hugging to him, players could survive freezing to death.
  • By being able to craft ropes from his beard, he could save grass for others.
  • By using hair tonic, he could be a better hunter, makes sense considering he's "the survivor" (there's even a figure dedicated to Wilson's survival)
  • By not using hair tonic, he could help the team to scare koalefants to base or lure harsher enemies away more easily
  • By sleeping on his beard he could save tents for other injured players.

I know I may be asking for too much, but I want Wilson to be helpful. He still can be "idiot-proof", but I do believe that the argument "I want to keep him unchanged because he should be the newbie character" isn't that great of an argument when you consider that this game is meant to be played with friends and that having a character who's main ability helps only themselves just doesn't sound like a great idea for a co-op title.

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2 minutes ago, researchlab_2 said:

I do believe that the argument "I want to keep him unchanged because he should be the newbie character" isn't that great of an argument

That aint my argument. My argument is simply to keep him unchanged, for a variety of reasons

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I would like him to have an exclusive craftable or two, he is fine as he is in the rest of departments. 

What craftables I don't know,I would leave that to Klei. But I guess he should use the beard hair in said craftable's recipes. 

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