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Author Topic: Nerve damage is too common  (Read 2470 times)

BurnedToast

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Nerve damage is too common
« on: February 20, 2011, 04:05:16 am »

Like the title says, nerve damage is just FAR FAR too common. If real life were like this, everyone would be crippled because of nerve damage.

Damage to the nerves should be a LOT less common. Like, cut down by a factor of 100. Or (non spinal) nerves should (partially) heal. Or both. Spinal injuries are fine (since getting your spine broken is a really, really bad thing) but it's absurd and unrealistic that some goblin could stab you once in the arm with a knife and bam, crippled forever. It just does not work that way. Some damage? maybe. Total and permanent loss of the use of the limb? no way.

I thought about making a bug report for this, but I'm not really sure if it's working as intended or not. If it is working as intended.... please reconsider it. If it's a bug, I guess it will get fixed eventually.
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Uristocrat

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #1 on: February 20, 2011, 04:14:37 am »

Damage to the nerves should be a LOT less common. Like, cut down by a factor of 100. Or (non spinal) nerves should (partially) heal. Or both. Spinal injuries are fine (since getting your spine broken is a really, really bad thing) but it's absurd and unrealistic that some goblin could stab you once in the arm with a knife and bam, crippled forever. It just does not work that way. Some damage? maybe. Total and permanent loss of the use of the limb? no way.

I'm not sure it's "unrealistic" actually, but it might be nice if we could do alchemy or something someday so that dwarves weren't permanently crippled in most cases.

This won't be as bad, though, if the bug with assigning crutches gets fixed someday.  I have a jeweler with an injured foot who will never walk again.  He was injured in my first year, I think, and I've been too lazy to arrange an accident for him.
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MonkeyHead

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #2 on: February 20, 2011, 05:19:56 am »

I have 15 low skilled "veterans" locked in the starvation wing of my hospital waiting to be disposed of for this very reason - single nerve damage in one foot/leg making them permacripples. i palmed face very hard when i worked it out - turns out they all neglected to put on a left high boot and left gauntlet, instead preferring thier silk sock and leather glove as protection. Needless to say these are now removed from my uniform.
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Neonivek

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #3 on: February 20, 2011, 05:43:50 am »

Quote
If real life were like this, everyone would be crippled because of nerve damage

Well in real life you tend to die from being stabbed almost regardless of where you were actually stabbed.

Though to my knowledge there are many ways more common then having nerve damage that can cripple you. For example cutting the Achelies Tendon.
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Silverionmox

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #4 on: February 20, 2011, 06:12:01 am »

Quote
If real life were like this, everyone would be crippled because of nerve damage

Well in real life you tend to die from being stabbed almost regardless of where you were actually stabbed.

Though to my knowledge there are many ways more common then having nerve damage that can cripple you. For example cutting the Achelies Tendon.
The Achilles tendon is a tendon or sinew, not a nerve.. (Some languages have a variation of the word "sinew" that has the meaning of the English nerve. Shows the precision of early anatomy.)
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Pilsu

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #5 on: February 20, 2011, 08:24:21 am »

Doesn't damage like that cause permanent changes? I mean, you hear about seemingly minor injuries ruining the prospective careers of athletes all the time.
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Emily Murkpaddled

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #6 on: February 20, 2011, 09:17:11 am »

I think the OP's request that nerve damage should be less binary and more of a modifier/coefficient in the less serious cases is pretty good! I'd add, though, that I wish in general injuries of this nature had prominent announcements ... whether passing them to the 'Announcements' screen outright, alongside the 'Urist has bled to death' messages, or adding something new ... like an "Alerts" pane to the military management screen, and a big, red set of !! on the firstmost military screen -- and maybe even on the 'hotkeys' sidebar of the main play window, next to the word 'military' -- if the entries on that "Alerts" pane have changed since last viewing it.

I think that you might want to cede ground in the language used, to avoid stepping on the toes of our dwarf diagnosticians, but it should still be workable; 'Urist has lost the use of his right hand!' is an observation that Urist alone can make, even before he is diagnosed and the player is then most prominently made aware of the nerve damage in the current model, under the medical-management screens.
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NW_Kohaku

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #7 on: February 20, 2011, 10:25:25 am »

Doesn't damage like that cause permanent changes? I mean, you hear about seemingly minor injuries ruining the prospective careers of athletes all the time.

Modern sports medicine is very, very good.  I completely destroyed my ACL (the tendon that connects the upper and lower leg in the knee), and by "completely destroyed", I mean my body absorbed all the remaining tissue so that there was no part of the tendon left, and had a graft of my hamstring put in, and it now functions perfectly fine.

Bones, in fact, are living organs, in spite of the common perception, and when you exercise, the bone will actually get thicker, and remold itself so the muscle will have better leverage so that the strenuous activity you are doing becomes easier.  Plus, they of course knit themselves back together stronger in the place where they are broken.

Don't underestimate the regenerative capacity of the human body, especially with the benefit of real medicine.

That said, yes, slitting the nerve is potentially crippling, but the thing is, nerve severing is very rare in real life, wheras it's extremly common in this game.  In order to sever a nerve in the leg with a knife, for example, you have to actually hit the nerve, which is on the inner thigh right next to the bone.  Oh, right, and in order to cut it, you pretty much have to go through the femoral artery, which is basically a death sentance unless you get a tourniquet on immediately, anyway.

The OP is right, nerve damage should be much more rare than it is in the game right now.
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Andeerz

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #8 on: February 21, 2011, 06:20:13 pm »

I think the OP's request that nerve damage should be less binary and more of a modifier/coefficient in the less serious cases is pretty good! I'd add, though, that I wish in general injuries of this nature had prominent announcements ... whether passing them to the 'Announcements' screen outright, alongside the 'Urist has bled to death' messages, or adding something new ... like an "Alerts" pane to the military management screen, and a big, red set of !! on the firstmost military screen -- and maybe even on the 'hotkeys' sidebar of the main play window, next to the word 'military' -- if the entries on that "Alerts" pane have changed since last viewing it.

I think that you might want to cede ground in the language used, to avoid stepping on the toes of our dwarf diagnosticians, but it should still be workable; 'Urist has lost the use of his right hand!' is an observation that Urist alone can make, even before he is diagnosed and the player is then most prominently made aware of the nerve damage in the current model, under the medical-management screens.

^ what she said!
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blizzerd

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #9 on: February 21, 2011, 06:51:58 pm »

at one hand the dwarves live in a much more hospitable environment then we humans do in real life

at the other handnerves seem to sever very very quickly on dwarves, while actually this is really really hard in real life
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ricemastah

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #10 on: February 21, 2011, 08:08:59 pm »

at one hand the dwarves live in a much more hospitable environment then we humans do in real life

at the other handnerves seem to sever very very quickly on dwarves, while actually this is really really hard in real life

at one hand the dwarves live in a much more hospitable environment then we humans do in real life

Are you sure about that... Are you really sure?? Cause last time I checked I DIDN'T have goblins that wanted to stab me and take over my house. I also didn't have kobolds that could bypass a locked door and several layers of terrible traps in order to steal my shiny socks.

Of course dwarves have a lot less going for them in the whole 'modern medicine' department. Errr back to my point. Yes, I think severing nerves happens too often, and I think crippling injuries should occur. Maybe just not because of the whole nerve issue.
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xl 4ndre lx

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #11 on: February 21, 2011, 08:10:34 pm »

When I read the nerve has been severed I automatically substitute nerve for tendon,then it seems reasonable. Tendons seem like,a better fit. Any major cut has a high likelyhood of cutting a tendon IRL. Also, even a highly skilled surgeon has to get it reattached perfectly to regain full use of the limb.
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Neonivek

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #12 on: February 21, 2011, 09:05:52 pm »

Quote
The Achilles tendon is a tendon or sinew, not a nerve

I am very aware of that.

The point WAS that Nerve damage as it is now could serve as a catch all for the many kinds of crippling injuries you can get.

Especially since currently you can turn your entire body into goo and as long as there isn't serious organ damage or bleeding, you will heal up all fine. (Which frustrates me since I've gooed enemies with hammers before)
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anon_outlaw

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #13 on: February 21, 2011, 09:42:51 pm »

i melted the face off of one of my miners before and he didn't even need to go to hospital... didn't even take a lie down! as for the nerve damage thing? yeahhhh, as someone already stated; if you get cut deep enough to hit a nerve your already gonna bleed to death anyway. it's just seems like 'Urist McRecuit steps on a nail, severing a nerve' 'Urist McRecuit is now unable to walk ever-ever-ever again, suck it'
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TheyTarget

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Re: Nerve damage is too common
« Reply #14 on: February 21, 2011, 09:55:54 pm »

Quote
If real life were like this, everyone would be crippled because of nerve damage

Well in real life you tend to die from being stabbed almost regardless of where you were actually stabbed.

Though to my knowledge there are many ways more common then having nerve damage that can cripple you. For example cutting the Achelies Tendon.

Been stabbed on two separate occasions. Stabbed in the face through the cheek gums and top of the jaw, and gashed open arm with visible bone I think there was a tendon but the blood pooled to fast, as well as numerous gashes in the thighs. I suffer no permanent disabilities and have only a scar on my arm, the rest are unnoticeable. This is modern science, though in all of them nothing more serious then stitches and some cleanings were required. Though my wound in the torso was considerably more painful and I lost the ability to move for some days. Thanks to modern medicine I suffer no lasting problems from this either. You'd be surprised how much damage you can take.
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