#tld mathis

[milocholy]

mathis the kinda guy to say "you won't like me when I'm angry"

[donner-mathis-official]

I was looking at the long dark wiki page for Mathis (I wanted to find his in game description to talk about how the game is inconsistent in its portrayal of the convicts) and uhhhh

who did this

[milocholy]

Old draft but I still agree with this all so much

Finally playing through the story mode of the Long Dark (based on the achievement numbers, I'm not one of the only ones who primarily plays the survival mode)

Good shit first - I'm AM for sure enjoying myself. Seeing the old locations in a new light is fun. Having characters to interact with is fun. And the final shot of ep 3 actually made me pause and pay attention.

I made it to ep 4, and I'm starting to see some cracks. I was pretty thoroughly annoyed with the cave-in/sparkplug mechanic when getting through the mines, and then the opening to ep 4 was very... I can see what they were going for, but why let the player start playing again just to have the foregone conclusion of Mackenzie getting captured again? They could have streamlined it much better.

And not to sound like a big ol lefty commie or anything but you can have the Blackrock warden say all the spooky shit you like about Donner and Mathis, I'm still gonna take it with a grain of salt.

Like, you've got a prison warden saying someone in solitary is pure evil. Uh huh. Sure. I know Mathis clocked me a couple times, but like. These are not natives to the island. They're incarcerated. Even before the Collapse, they were getting the shit end of the stick. And going by real-world catastrophes, people in prison systems are among the first to be abandoned. They've been here, scrounging for who knows how long. Of course they're desperate to get off the island.

[mathisphobe]

mathis in my tomolife is genuinely. So worrying. Like he should not be acting like this Ever?

[cronchcake]

the way I started episode 4 and immediately understood exactly why Mathis is a fan favourite after less than 10 seconds of him on the screen. incredible.

[tabrisfam]

guard wanted to take a picture idk

[donner-mathis-official]

I would add Methuselah to episode 4. love that old guy, where is he at?

If you could add one thing to The Long Dark what would it be?

the convicts to be a genuine threat towards Mackenzie, Jace and the population of Great Bear as a whole... and also just more convict lore...!

the convicts, but mostly Mathis function as a more of a mild inconvenience than a genuine threat... Mathis isn't nearly as threatening as he could be, and I mean that through the games mechanics.

Mackenzie can disappear for in-game weeks at a time doing fuckall despite Mathis' whiny warnings of not loafing around the region... and when he returns several millennia later? Mathis doesn't even mention it, neither does Vachon whilst he idles around the fire barrel. Kind of pisses me off.

Sure, maybe having a mechanic wherein he might dispatch some of his dogs after Mackenzie if he's stayed outside for too long (~4-5 days) would be great, though it would likely piss the three players that do the cache side quests off --- which would maybe lead to a secondary mechanic of being able to bribe Vachon or Heller for more days to complete tasks, like a reworked predux trust bar that would also allow us to converse with them about their life or - even better - know what the fuck Donner Jr Mathis did to be locked in a supermax prisons SHU? like tf he do?

abuse warning below...btw....smiles and klicks my heels together... but its just me going more in depth with some penalties for dawdling

... and with the "getting dragged by the scruff of your neck back to the prison" if you take too long to get back, I feel like there should be a penalty for it, since Mathis just squinting at Will funny for having botched the steam tunnels to be a bit strange for his established character?

maybe I'm a bit too kerdoinked in the head but maybe Mackenzie getting a few fingers broken or torn off to further emphasize Mathis' point not to disobey him or keep him waiting? this would of course severely impact his ability to shoot, throw, scavenge and harvest carcasses. what about having the convicts restrict Mackenzie's access to food and water, making it so when he gets thrown out into the great outdoors his hunger and thirst meter will be in critical condition? maybe even having some convicts come out of the prison to stalk him through the region (and also spooking passive wildlife away) if Mathis' trust with Mackenzie is too low? Alternative to that since the convicts are often too scared to go outside, having them shoot at Mackenzie if he returns to the prison too early, or simply just to scare him? there's a lot of groundwork laid down for the convicts to genuinely be some forces of fucking nature in the game that ep4 misses by miles but. thats all i can say without sounding. deranged. because ive pondered this exact orb for centuries..........!!!!!!!

[totus-ardeo]

pinnacle humor

[tldsurvival]

How Mackenzie thought Mathis wouldn’t spot him sticking his head through the window there is beyond me. How Mathis actually didn’t spot him is even beyonder me

[bowlofmeat]

[scowling-owl-with-a-cowl]

Was talking to my brother the other day about what Mathis’s first name is, and we came up with a few solid ideas:

Dave. I thought Dave Mathis Band was a lot funnier than it probably is

Donner. Egotistical fuck probably would name his son after himself.

Dylan. Imagine if he was named Dylan that would be hilarious. He would hate it.

Donald. Mod the game so that everything is the same except Mathis is replaced with Donald Duck. Profit

[milocholy]

I would kill a man(mathis) to have a lengthy discussion with someone about the long dark. Like is there a discord for the 7 tld fans on this app? Specifically wintermute fans

[donner-mathis-official]

Swap AU make my pea-sized brain ping around my head like one of those brick breaker games.

Mathis was on a flight to Great Bear to visit his son in prison. He booked a flight with Archer Remote Transport, flying with a serious woman named Molly who doesn’t seem to particularly like him. Their plane goes down, and he finds himself in a quiet apocalypse.

Molly is a pilot who hunts in her spare time. After her husband died in mysterious circumstances, she’s generally regarded with suspicion by the people around her, and it weighs heavily on her.

Astrid is a doctor in the small town of Thompson’s Crossing. Shes taken over the community centre as a clinic. She would go out and search for crash survivors, but the people here need all her attention.

Mackenzie is a convict who recently got transferred to Blackrock. After one of his guys, a stern man named Jeremiah, got sent here, he got himself sent up to break him out. By the time he reached the prison, that had already happened, so he started searching the island for someone who could get them off it.

Heller takes Jeremiah’s position almost exactly.

Jace takes Methuselah’s position, but isn’t quite as cryptic about it and instead speaks in scientific terms that leave Mathis like “please have mercy I got a C in high school physics”.

Lilith Barker takes Jace’s place, ensuring that Donner doesn’t escape. She was climbing Blackrock mountain when the first flare happened, and when she saw from above what was happening, she rushed down to try to help.

Vachon takes Hobbs’s place but isn’t as obviously dead meat after his cutscene though. Hobbs is the guy who they mentioned got shot with arrows (who is Leclerc in canon).

Mackenzie, in spite of being a convict, isn’t actually a bad guy. He’s exceedingly practical, but he cares for his people, and when he learns Mathis is trying to get to Blackrock, he immediately agrees to help him. Then a faction conflict happens in Blackrock because some dudes are like “hey fuck you and fuck this guy from solitary you’re not the boss of me”. So Mackenzie wrestles with that and keeps them in line while Mathis goes to do all the quests.

The warden and Father Thomas sort of swap places except the warden ends up more in Molly’s position. He went off the deep end a bit with the fire and brimstone and most people stopped attending his services, which he resents them for. He kills the convicts because “it’s the will of the Lord”. Just fully cuckoo bananas with the religion.

Grey Mother is Mackenzie’s other henchman because I think epic gun grandma should get to commit crime and also hang out with Mackenzie more. It’s part of why in this AU, Donner does actually escape; because Lily gets distracted by her mom being there.

Methuselah goes where Grey Mother does. He has the player go look for buffer memories instead so they can write down the story of Milton because he doesn’t want it to die. They need to go to the farmhouse to get the key to the office, not the lockbox.

Father Thomas isn’t locked up (because in this AU, the convicts didn’t murder everyone bc the staff weren’t as horrible to them) but he is completely useless in sorting out the conflict in the prison. Just like “oh no, please don’t— oh no you’re doing it anyways :(“

[morballs]

um. okay.

[mathisphobe]

what have i done to you Ever you ancient canadian cryptid of the winters to come ????

[tabrisfam]

no matter what you think of mathis you have to admit that kicking a wolf as big as you straight in the balls is pretty incredible