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Combat Tweaks - Deadly, Balanced, and Fun!

A small combat tweak based on various other combat related mods I've tried. It's essentially a merge between "Bleeding Requires Aid Kits", "Realistic Combat", and "Battle Hardened - Hardcore Combat" with some personal tweaks based off testing, focusing on small group RPG style play (Solo works fine as well). The overall goal for this mod is to help alleviate the need to save scum your deaths, while keeping it semi-realistic. An "Ironman" type of playthrough!

All of these settings (besides the two animation changes) are "Global Constants" which should be compatible with any mod. Not many mods (outside of the ones listed above or other similar ones) change those specific settings. Worst case scenario, you can load it towards the bottom.

Below are a lot of words if you're curious of methods of how/why I adjusted things.

Please let me know if you have any suggestions!

General Overview:

• Bleeding is more significant, leading to a quicker death if left untreated. Heavily tested this particular tweak, generally I like to tend to wounds of everyone after combat (works well if used with "Improve Relationships by Healing" or other similar mods). Depending on types of wounds and force of impact, you may be better off equiping higher quality armor (heavy armor is better, but High/Specialist Grade light armor is fine too). Blunt weapons can "bruise" you (permanent damage, non bleeding which can lead to knockouts), while bladed weapons will immediately make you bleed. Arrows also have a lasting impact, you can cause someone to have a blood loss KO in the middle of combat with a couple of archers.

Overall, this is the most important change. The new bleeding rates will help prevent zombie mobs of dust bandits self reviving in the middle of combat, even after you cut off one of their arms. Now, low level bandits will have bloodloss KOs more often, while battle hardened Shek warriors may stand up one or two times before finally succumbing to their wounds. Do you choose to leave your fallen attackers behind, or do you turn back and save some of the starving vagrants from their fate? You only have a moment to decide.

The balance I attempted to achieve was through testing in large brush strokes before dialing it back to keep it balanced and engaging. First, by starting off with a straight doubling/tripling of rates, it made it nearly impossible to actually save anyone unless you had very high toughness levels (made the 0-50 Toughness levels very difficult, normally total party wipes). Slowly after testing different brackets, I found a good middle ground which is fair for both you and your opponents. With these changes, you'll have a lot of dramatic moments where you have seconds to revive and save your teammates, before it's too late!

• Combat between characters is more dangerous if opponents are higher level! Blocking has been changed to reflect this. Your base chance to block has been increased, while successfully blocking is more difficult. This makes for more flashier engagements where you can trade blocks much more often, occasionally landing hits. In turn, this actually increases your knowledge of Melee Defense much faster! Makes it more important to keep a faster sidearm for heavy weapon users, might need to switch weapons in order to take down your opponent quickly.
  
  
• Damage resistance has been tweaked. Generally everyone can resist some type of damage, based on armor and toughness levels. Higher end enemies will require a group effort to take down, or a very skilled fighter.
  
  
• Attack Slots has been increased to 5, as that's the limit. This adds dangers (and rewards) for using longer range weapons, you can hit as many targets as your polearm can reach! Archers do not count towards this limit. A group of archers can drastically change the results of a battle, as in real life. Animals do count towards the limit, so you may need to direct your Bone Dogs to attack the enemy archers while your main tank focuses the Beak Thing!
  
  
• Increased body weight for carrying other people to 80kg, this is to account for wearing armor, weapons, inventory, etc. Original value was 30kg regardless of what you're wearing. Makes Strength training easier without requiring cheesing (carrying 12000 rocks in your pocket), while making it more important for when you actually need it to flee a fight.
  
  
• Changed the level requirement for Rear Blocking, the original value is set to -100 for both animations. It didn't make sense that everyone, to include starving bandits, could rear block. At 50 Melee Defense, you'll be able to rear block an attack. You will need to pay attention to not get flanked. This idea was inspired by "Battle Hardened - Hardcore Combat", I may change other animations in the future, but the base game (and various animation mods), are generally balanced.
  
  
• The lower your Medical skill, the more of the bandages you'll use. It's very important to practice! At level 1 Medical, you're using almost double the supplies to treat even basic wounds. At higher levels, you will be able to proficiently use your resources. A simple bandage might heal a single limb, while Standard and Advanced kits can heal multiple limbs. At higher levels, this should balance out.
  
  
• Stumbling (the animation where you fall backwards) has its theoretical "Max" increased. This will require you to have a finely crafted blade (or mace) in order to stagger opponents completely. Your rusty sword won't be able to knock over an Empire Samurai!

Note: Due to these changes, if you're having difficulty in the very early game (0-20 toughness), you can adjust the "Death Chance" on New Game or by Importing your save to 0.90. This will make it slightly easier for those levels, later levels will still be balanced. I also generally recommend increasing the overall population of your world (1.5 population / 1.25 squad size in "Gameplay Settings") to account for all these changes. With the increased attack slots, it's very easy to gang up on people. With this increase, you'll find larger squads roaming around to match you toe-to-toe in combat.