Fleas should give the plague

Added some additional stuff to the post!

I wanted to read your first-post tweaks since people have been offering suggestions as well, and you've improved upon the initial idea. I actually got nervous to say anything considering I'm seeing people get heated over medicinal prices in-game, but your 'immune-booster' idea does I think fix that! 'An apple a day keeps the doctor away' but a wolf equivalent for new players sounds great, if supposedly existing diseases getting rebalanced happens.

I actually wasn't aware of a 'flea exploit' until this thread, and I was more just excited in parasites causing worse problems for the reason that they can, and do often irl.

So I thought of fleas/ticks/parasites have a percentage chance to carry a next-stage disease or cause anemia (anemia if left untreated for a couple RO or three), and the Herbalist has to have high enough Wisdom or Smarts to research cures for these next-stage diseases!

I personally find it a little weird we can just find herbs, and then 'research medicine' as long as we have the herbs, but there's no mid-stage. No 'studying herbs'. I say on the Explore page, the Herbalist can be sent out to different pack-known biomes to Study Herbs which will raise their Wisdom/Smarts randomly, and/or they will find unique herbs only the Herbalist position is capable of locating which can be used to make different medicine for next-tier diseases caused by parasites! Similar to Scouting, and a next-step for Herbalists to improve. I don't feel like the Herbalist wolf is really learning things on their own if they're constantly being chaperoned by the site bear. I feel like the harder the consequences are for neglecting parasites, the less likely people are going to want them, again lending towards your desire to fix the flea exploit, but this would perhaps flesh out the herbalist some and make it more exciting and tense in turn!

(also semi-related I have anemia irl and I struggle with it a lot; a wolf with Anemia would be Weak, Dizzied, Pale Gums in symptoms and absolutely should not Scout, Explore, or Hunt, locked at 0% energy with maybe a low chance to recover at RO provided they are fed to 100%(gotta get that iron from them MEATS)--again, just imo, more musing for fun!)

EDIT: In considering a way for new players/new wolves to avoid parasites and their next tier diseases, I think a low cost solution would be finding a Mud Puddle in Explore! Like the drinking puddle, you have two options to Roll In It or Dig; the first option may coat your lead wolf in a protective layer of mud to ward off exterior parasites for a -limited time- and the second option gives the chance to bring home a Mud Ball item which can be slapped onto applied to another in the pack back at the Den! Maybe there's muddy wolf art to indicate it's been applied? Y/N?

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I love the idea of our herbalists being able to forage and study on the explore page! It’d give more depth to the role and also add the ability to gain rarer herbs so that we won’t have to exchange for them or buy them.

I also love the idea of studying herbs. What if we could use the unique herbs to craft general medicinal boosts [such as immunity, energy, and health boosters]!

Herbalists needing higher wisdom to make next-stage cures does make sense. Maybe the medicine could be discoverable after you research whatever illness they evolve from, just like how we can discover rich healing salves after researching all of the other cures.

Yeah, it feels like Herbert is babysitting herbalists too much. Maybe once herbalists reach 50% or so proficiency, he could lay off a bit more. At 70% or so proficiency, it would be nice if our herbalist could diagnose wolves without help.

I am now imagining our wolves taking iron supplement pills anytime they get anemia.

I like the idea of a mud pool; it sounds like a fun Lil encounter. A mud ball item would also be useful. Mud art on our wolves would also be great! I agree with all of this!

If you were to make a separate suggestion thread with these ideas, I would be happy to add a link to it in this thread!

@6523 thank you for understanding! I was very confused as to whether or not 'is this its own suggestion or not, because it's inspired by someone else's specific suggestion' so I think I'll start another thread in the morning with a link-back to yours, as its obviously related!

No support. 

With the way the system currently works, there's bad diseases and then more minor ones. I do not agree with the idea of having to make every illness a potential pain in the ass just for the sake of fixing a loophole.

If not fleas- oh just adjust the other easy ones so people dont use them... no. That just makes all diseases more obnoxious. There are adjustments that can be made but I'd rather keep a mix of hard and easy illnesses rather than trying to make all of them more brutal just because people found a way to work around the illness. Rebalance the system, not the illness.

^^^ agree so much with lesbirds. i was gonna post here before but i couldnt articulate my reasons behind not supporting. making diseases more annoying and obnoxious hurts everyone in the end

Of course a potentially simpler solution (depending on how the game is coded, idk), would be just to make it so that wolves can have multiple illnesses at once. Keep fleas pretty innocuous but have it give no protection from flu or distemper.

I support this, not so much for realism but more to prevent abusing the illness system. If anything, fleas should lead to tapeworms if not treated for a while, as tapeworms aren't lethal, but will cause more hunger, meaning more resources will be necessary to feed them.

I think the plague could be a good addition, though I've never personally knew of an animal, wild or domestic, contracting the plague, so I can't comment on how common it really is. I think it should be a gamble. Fleas for X amount of days can cause plague or tapeworms.

I support this, because you shouldn't have to exploit the game for the game to be easier. 

Illnesses personally have never been a problem for me, but reading through this thread, it does seem like there's a pretty good reason that people are exploiting this, so something definitely needs to change. I think others have put it into better words than I can though :)

Everybody's saying 'support for realism' but is it realistic for wolves to get sick every 2 weeks or get mange from stoats they didn't even catch /j

But on a serious note, I don't support except if illness gets a serious nerf. I don't use this because my pack is relatively small, but still. Getting 2 open wounds and mange in what's supposed to be 2 weeks in-game (which has happened to me before) is absolutely ridiculous. The immune booster suggested sounds like a good idea, but only if it doesn't cost a ridiculous amount of herbs like cure-for-all. Dealing with illness is stressful enough as it is, especially considering what's going on in the world right now. And the devs have already said they have an enormous backlog of things to add and aren't accepting suggestions period.