Isle Dev Q&A session 1, 1/22/2020 (Rough)

Ask-a-Dev Answers:
Dondi answered all questions below.

Q: Can we expect to see AI herds and packs as opposed to single AI and creatures wandering about?
A: "Yes, yes you will see groups."

Q: Inherited traits on nesting?
A: "Absolutely. That's something i absolutely want. Like if your parents sucked you get sh*tty traits."

Q: Will night vision ever gradually fade in as light fades rather than being toggled on by a button press?
A: "No, and the reason not is because there are certain elements being introduced into the world such as artificial light and fire and sh*t like that, that's actually very important."

*Paradym mentions "thermal" while Dondi talks about night vision, no further details on what he meant.

Q: Will there be a family tree interface for nesting?
A: "I'm not sure if there will be an interface, I think there will be an immediate sibling/parents, but beyond that we have discussed prior and we still want no dino incest, so obviously to some degree there will be tracking of your family. You cant all just start breeding with your mum, and then populating the planet. None of that, thats bad."

*Paradym says he believes the question was actually reffering to a long term chart of your dinosaurs lineage covering multiple generations. Dondi responds with "No, that's unnecessary."

Q: If the smaller dinosaurs such as the Utah get hit by an attack like a tail swipe, will the Utah be knocked away or will it just take the damage?
A: "Well as we've seen by the Trike flinging the Utah like a b*tch, yes it will be knocked away."

Q: Will large sauropods such as Camarasaurus and Diplodocus ever be playable in survival?
A: "It depends on who wins the fight between me and KissenKitten."

Q: Can we expect inherited colours sometime after the recode hits, or is that a scrapped concept?
A: "Inherited colours are totally a thing, I love that, I absolutely love being able to see the blending of characters. Especially because if we ever do something like mutations where you get a random colour that's very different that no one else has, and it's unlocked and now its part of your entourage of colours you can pick or something like that."

Q: Will it be possible for roars to be cut off in the future due to certain triggers, such as getting bitten, falling, eating, etc?
A: "I think that would be great, and it's something that i've wanted, and it has been put forth. I don't particularly know. But if it's do-able it will be there."

Q: Assuming the feather system is still planned, how will it effect the colour/skin customisation if feathers are applied to pre-existing dinos like Galli and Utah?
A: "Well the colours just go over the feathers."

Q: Will there ever be a more in-depth scent system for different dinosaurs. Such as Utahs being able to track blood better, and different dinosaurs having different benefits based on what they are and what they should be doing?
A: "Actually, everything right now is kind of the same. It will probably remain the same until much later down the line. The scent system right now is being investigated purely because we want to do it with materials and stuff and make it all nice and pretty and easy to follow, instead of it just being large glowing raves on your screen because that's awful."

Q: Will dinos like Pachy, Trike or Diablo be able to tackle other dinos. Could a Pachy charge a Dilo and knock it to the ground?
A: "Fat boy knock down small boy."

Q: Will burrows have more stuff to them, such as having more/other rooms, tunnels, more enterances, etc?
A: Thats a f*cking nightmare but we do want to have it. We're gonna try it but we cant promise anything."

Q: Will we have caves on the new map?
A: "Yep."

Q: What will the new server capacity be. Will it be lowered or raised?
A: "Only time will tell. I want it lower because the less people you have, the less issues you have with them messing up the entire ecosystem. I'm not saying you can't have it higher, I'm saying officially supported."

Q: Will there be cross-life benefits that are server side, such as inheriting traits and benefits from a past dino life on the same server?
A: "Okay so long story short, in the pipeline that is 'everyone likes it, it just hasnt been officially approved'. Thank god im the boss, I just officially approved this. So theres an 'elder' system that Kissen proposed, which is:
    After your dinosaur has been an adult for X amount of time and you fulfil requirements you become an elder. An elder, much like all the other dinosaurs where you go up in power, elder is a big powerspike. You are just sick nasty.
    You are the Jedi amongst the clone troopers. You are just a beast. Then over time that power slowly tapers off and then you actually become weaker than the average adult dinosaur of your own species.
    However, the elders have this wonderful ability called 'schmeemeemee' which means, they lay down, they close their eyes and they dont wake back up. After this, you basically select perks that then transfer into your next life, forever.
    So becoming an elder several times, you get to add more perks onto your dinosaur. So you basically, by living life over and over, become the best you that you can possibly be.
    As I told Kissen, I don't remember if she agreed to this, but it was my executive ruling. If you're an elder and you die.
    Not 'hey i've lived my life and me go nap-nap, but if you die, you get nothing because you still died and I'm not rewarding you for losing.
    Kissen thinks you should still get things for making it to elder and you die, but my opinion is no, dont die you're in the endgame. It's important."

*For example. If you have completed the elder process 2 times and your third elder dies before it can finish its life cycle, you don't lose the rewards of the previous 2 elder lives.
 You just don't get the rewards of your current third life cycle.



Q: Are there plans to make nesting more engaging. Some examples are gathering sticks to form the nest or eating a specific food to help speed up egg production?
A: "Secretly, yes there is. Can we release those details? No, because whats going to happen is when we release the Utahraptor, the other systems come after, which then those systems you get to kind of see and as we get closer it's easier to answer in an accurate fashion, in a way that's not nebulous."

Q: Will there ever be a queue system for entering servers?
A: "We want one so it's highly likely. It's not like it's particularly difficult."

Q: Will the environment effect your scent. Example; predators will have a tougher time tracking you if you swim through a lake?
A: "100%. Because we very very specifically wanted to make scent feel intuitive and the smart people still capable of getting away as opposed to "Oh I'm bleeding I may as well just lay down and die now"."

Q: Will Pteras be able to pick up really small dinos/chunks of meat and fly away?
A: "If it's bigger than a Compy then no. Bigger than that and it becomes a redundant creature that doesn't have to do anything to survive."

Q: Will dinos take damage if they hit a tree or  cliff-side at full speed, or if flying animals hit the ground without slowing down?
A: "I know that the flying animals definitely will. I'm sure if we ask the 'trio of terror' hey can we have dinos hurt themselves if they run full tilt into an object the answer is going to be HAHAHAHA yeah.

Q: Is there any plans or a slim bit of hope for something like the replay system to stay in the game?
A: "None of us care about it at the moment, like,  i wouldn't count on it."

Q: Will there be any way to handle 'bull fights' or battles for dominance in packs/herds that doesn't involve damage or killing one another such as Trikes clashing or Pachys butting heads?
A: "That's kind of on Kissen, I'm fine with it."

Q: Is sexual dimporphism going to change the stats or abilities of the dinos?
A: "As of right now the answer is no, we want it to be just visual."

Q: Is a 'poor playstyle' skin still planned to indicate cannibals, groupkillers, mixpackers, etc. Therefore warning other players?
A: "Absolutely, because that was one of the best things ever. The big 'f*ck you' albinism was awesome."

Q: Will there be any sort of screen that shows us our stats from our life, like how much damage we did, total time alive, number of kills, total distance traveled?
A: "I don't think that's actually something that has been considered but that's actually a really neat idea. If you saw it when you died that would be fine but being alive and letting people see things like their kills, they suddenly care about killing everything."

Q: Will trees be climbable or perch-able?
A: "We actually have a discussion on this and it's on the table. It has not been cut but has not been someone we also want to pursue."

Q: Will nest invites ever tell you what species is inviting you?
A: "Yes, it will actually give you a detail on it."

Q: With certain creatures taking specific environmental niches and others needing certain food, will creatures spawn in the environment that aids them such as Deinosuchus spawning in swamps?
A: "Actually yes. That is a good one. We have a nutritional system that is definitely going to happen."

Q: Will fake limping ever return?
A: "Fake limp is actually on the table to be discussed."

Q: Will there be a grouping system for herbivores to form multi-species herds?
A: "Nope. There will be a way for you to travel together though."

Q: Is there going to be an animation for hatching?
A: "Good question for Bryan, cause he confirmed that there are going to be hatchling models."

Q: Will all dinos be resized to fit accurate maximum estimates or will there be exceptions?
A: "Yes, dinosaurs will be their maximum size estimate."

Q: Will friendly fire be disabled for group members?
A: "Bryan has strongly implied that it should be disabled because realistically people (in the same group) should be beating the sh*t out of each other. There will be a compromise somewhere in there, of either reduced friendly fire or them not slamming into one another. I don't know what it is yet, but if Bryan wants it i will concede that to Bryan."

Q: Will swimming as a Deinosuchus drain stamina?
A: "well yeah, why would it not?"

Kissen responds in chat: "The Deino loses stam when swimming because otherwise, you'd never need to leave the water. You will have to sunbathe to regain stamina. The drain will be way different than it is for the dinosaurs."


Q: Right now, anywhere from 70-90% of the maps are either completely uninhabited, or only used for travel because of how drinkable water is distributed. Are there any plans to fix this?
A: "Yes. The new outlet rivers are great, but nutrition is very important and plants which will attract certain dinosaurs because their value is important to specific animals, will then attract specific carnivores."

Q: How will Carno handle hunting with the new systems. Since it can't run through things anymore due to collision?
A: "Well you don't just simply run at things that you shouldn't be running at. No more Carnotaurus running at a Diabloceratops and biting it in the a*s 50 times."

Q: Are there any actual plans to implement a sort of sleeping feature where your vision is greatly if not completely decreased and you have to rely on distorted senses to tell if predators are coming, etc?
A - Kissen responds in chat: "WE'RE FIGURING IT OUT!"

Q: How will it be to start off as a Pteranodon. Will it be able to take to the skies as a juvenile?
A: "As a juvenile yes as a hatchling no. As a juvenile you're basically a pigeon. Less lift but basically a pigeon. Climb up high and off you go, but the larger you get obviously the further you glide. Most of what you're doing is gliding. To be able to start power flapping your wings or gaining altitude is what really drains your stamina. Gliding not so much."

Q: Will thermal currents be a thing over rock formations for flight mechanics. Has that been considered?
A: "It's been considered but we haven't looked at it. It's possible."

Q: Will it be possible to buy a full soundtrack of old and new music pieces?
A: "Certain old pieces are archived, like fully archived into the nether, so they're gone. But we're gonna have a soundtrack, like they're all fully itemized, numbered, everything."


Paradym touches on the 3 things he has seen most often asked in the chat. Art book, plushies and statues:
"I can tell you that we have the capacity to do an art book. Will we see this immediately? No. We're looking at 6 months to a year out but it is possible for us to do a hard cover art book. We have very talented artists on our team and it would be great to demonstrate that." He is also looking at doing limited runs for certain merch, and plans on talking to different artists to explore avenues for plushies and things such as pre-painted models or models you can paint yourself. All of this is a hard maybe but it is being considered.
"I will not put anything out there that i wouldn't produce, paint or put in my house. I refuse to push out merch just for the sake of pushing out merch. That's not the way it will ever be."


Q: Will there be any symbiotic or mutual relationships between certain medium-large carnivores and other small creatures where they actually want to co-exist instead of killing one another?
A: "Yes. Now hear me out. Instead of carnivores being giant *ssholes and killing smaller ones, you can actually just follow them like vultures and eat the remains. The way we've split up gore corpses, there's going to be meat left over for smaller things. Unless you're like, a Utah pack in which case all the small little faces are gonna get in there, but T-Rexes aren't gonna around murdering Troodons. Could a Troodon bite Rex in the foot? Yeah, and the Rex by proxy of simply walking forward will crush it so it doesn't matter. Most of these should be fixed on their own. I don't want to spoil some of the dynamics we've thought of already, but its beneficial not to 'murder hobo' everything in front of you for once. Same goes with the herbivores, some of the smaller ones might have better eyesight so to speak."