my problem with gas masks

[jabberwok]

Since I haven't played much so far, I could be misunderstanding something about this, but my impression is that you use gas masks on expeditions to protect you from radiation, and when you're just going right outside, you can use a radiation suit?

This doesn't make sense to me. A gas mask might stop you from breathing irradiated air, but what about the rest of you? It would make more sense for them to want to use a radiation suit all the time. If anything, a gas mask could be a stopgap if you don't have a suit, that would provide less protection.

I would rather see reusable radiation suits that could sometimes get damaged in combat or random events, and need to be repaired. Seems more realistic to me, and possibly less of a pain, with the added danger of suits being punctured while outside.

If you don't want the family members hidden behind suits all the time, it might be better to remove them completely and keep things consistent. If there were no radiation suits available, a gas mask would make a lot of sense to use.

[Sonny]

The original thinking was indeed that we didn't want the characters in the wasteland to always wear the suits. It's something we're looking into though, as there is a discrepancy between the gas masks and suits.

[jabberwok]

Hmm, yeah, that is a difficult problem. Maybe players shouldn't start with suits, then, and they could just brave the radiation for short periods on the surface, using gas masks for trips. Suits could be a rare find or something, since they are pretty cool.

[GarbageCollector]

Originally posted by jabberwok:

Since I haven't played much so far, I could be misunderstanding something about this, but my impression is that you use gas masks on expeditions to protect you from radiation, and when you're just going right outside, you can use a radiation suit?

This doesn't make sense to me. A gas mask might stop you from breathing irradiated air, but what about the rest of you? It would make more sense for them to want to use a radiation suit all the time. If anything, a gas mask could be a stopgap if you don't have a suit, that would provide less protection.

I would rather see reusable radiation suits that could sometimes get damaged in combat or random events, and need to be repaired. Seems more realistic to me, and possibly less of a pain, with the added danger of suits being punctured while outside.

If you don't want the family members hidden behind suits all the time, it might be better to remove them completely and keep things consistent. If there were no radiation suits available, a gas mask would make a lot of sense to use.

Honestly, in a situation like this, the primary concern would be the gas mask only. A radiation suit is really a contamination suit. It keeps you from getting covered with liquids and the "dirt" of radioactive particles, but does virtually nothing about radiation itself beyond simple clothes. Even being in the fallout shelter wouldn't help much after a while, as contamination would seep in with a double-airlock system or go through the vents, but wearing a gas mask while outside would raise your life expectancy considerably. Wouldn't take long breathing in loads of particulate alpha emitters to jack you up really bad.

[jabberwok]

Originally posted by smokytehbear:

Originally posted by jabberwok:

Since I haven't played much so far, I could be misunderstanding something about this, but my impression is that you use gas masks on expeditions to protect you from radiation, and when you're just going right outside, you can use a radiation suit?

This doesn't make sense to me. A gas mask might stop you from breathing irradiated air, but what about the rest of you? It would make more sense for them to want to use a radiation suit all the time. If anything, a gas mask could be a stopgap if you don't have a suit, that would provide less protection.

I would rather see reusable radiation suits that could sometimes get damaged in combat or random events, and need to be repaired. Seems more realistic to me, and possibly less of a pain, with the added danger of suits being punctured while outside.

If you don't want the family members hidden behind suits all the time, it might be better to remove them completely and keep things consistent. If there were no radiation suits available, a gas mask would make a lot of sense to use.

Honestly, in a situation like this, the primary concern would be the gas mask only. A radiation suit is really a contamination suit. It keeps you from getting covered with liquids and the "dirt" of radioactive particles, but does virtually nothing about radiation itself beyond simple clothes. Even being in the fallout shelter wouldn't help much after a while, as contamination would seep in with a double-airlock system or go through the vents, but wearing a gas mask while outside would raise your life expectancy considerably. Wouldn't take long breathing in loads of particulate alpha emitters to jack you up really bad.

For exactly this reason, maybe the airlock needs to have some sort of decontamination system, like a shower to hose people off, which I think would especially make sense if they are wearing suits. It's possible this is an upgrade that I haven't noticed yet...

[Vagineer1]

Originally posted by jabberwok:

Originally posted by smokytehbear:

Honestly, in a situation like this, the primary concern would be the gas mask only. A radiation suit is really a contamination suit. It keeps you from getting covered with liquids and the "dirt" of radioactive particles, but does virtually nothing about radiation itself beyond simple clothes. Even being in the fallout shelter wouldn't help much after a while, as contamination would seep in with a double-airlock system or go through the vents, but wearing a gas mask while outside would raise your life expectancy considerably. Wouldn't take long breathing in loads of particulate alpha emitters to jack you up really bad.

For exactly this reason, maybe the airlock needs to have some sort of decontamination system, like a shower to hose people off, which I think would especially make sense if they are wearing suits. It's possible this is an upgrade that I haven't noticed yet...

If you look at the top of the middle part of the two-door entrance to the shelter there is a decontamination shower, I remeber seeing it in use a long time ago. As far as I know currently, it has no use yet.