[Gameplay] - Sleep in Darkness

[T4T3RGR3NAD3R]

Bug Submission:

Category: Gameplay

Issue Title: Sleep in Darkness

Issue Description: A while ago I posted a bug about going to sleep as darkness falls. I now realize that it doesn't matter when you go to sleep. Sleeping in darkness does not properly restore sanity. The drain/increase indicator goes crazy and it drains a little sanity.

Steps to Reproduce: -Go to sleep when not near a fire

[imsomony]

I haven't tried this myself, but it seems like this is normal game function because you're doing two contradicting things.

 

• When you are in the dark, your sanity drains like crazy (big down arrow).
• When you are sleeping, your sanity regains slowly (small up arrow).

 

So when you combine the two, the sanity meter has to balance the two functions. I'm not looking at the math in the files, just in-game observations. A big arrow is the equivalent of 2-3 small arrows. So 2-3 down combined with 1 up equals 1-2 down, hence the sanity drain.

[rezecib]

@imsomony, I agree with your interpretation, but I think if we want parity with single-player behavior, the nighttime sanity drain should be nullified while in a tent/on a roll. It removes Charlie, after all, so why not the rest of the night penalties?

[imsomony]

@rezecib, I can see that making sense, especially once compared to Charlie not attacking. But they did have to make some changes and accommodations to time-skipping mechanics between SP and MP, such as the ability to snap yourself out of it.

 

I haven't actually tried to sleep in full darkness, I've always made sure I'm near a fire. Now that I think about it, I should have tried it to see the effects though. If the fire light goes out completely while sleeping, does the player wake up? Or does the screen just go black and Charlie doesn't attack at all?

 

Since players can't go to or continue to sleep once a situation becomes dangerous (hound attacks, for example), it seems like Charlie *not* coming out to attack in complete darkness would be the bug. Otherwise, nighttime and all its effects can be easily avoided by exploiting sleeping mechanics.

[rezecib]

Otherwise, nighttime and all its effects can be easily avoided by exploiting sleeping mechanics.

 But that's what sleeping was in single-player. It completely avoided all the negative effects of night-time; that's the purpose of the sleeping items/structures.

[imsomony]

Hmmm... this will be an interesting one for the devs to comment on then. I was looking at it like they changed the sleeping mechanics so that it's similar, but not a 1:1 match to SP.

[T4T3RGR3NAD3R]

It doesn't seem like the darkness is just countering the sleep. It seems more like they tried to make it work and failed. The arrow goes crazy instead of just going down like if the darkness was countering the sleep regen. At the beginning of the next morning, I've only lost a few points of sanity.

[SethR]

Yeah, this sounds like a bug. It's been some time since I implemented the first pass at this, so I'd have to look back at it in order to sort out exactly what's going wrong and what the desired behavior is. It was definitely a first pass, so I'm not surprised there are issues -- added to the list!