First of all ,thanks for bringing us such an awesome game,excellent job!
I've play TWOM for 10 rounds and I really love this game.I want to experience more in the following updates or maybe a sequel.I haven't read all the posts so far .so if I'm talking about something already been mentioned,please ignore me.
so far,I just come up with two ideas besides adding hotkeys and interactions between NPCs.
1.The difficulty of the game should be improved,maybe different levels for players to choose from.
Basically,the difficultise come from 3 aspects:1.short of food supply 2.short of medication supply 3.short of enough fuel and wood supply to live through cold days.
I really enjoy the first ten days of the game,I have to carefully choose what to bring back during night,because I got find some food for my characters every other day to prevent them from starving and enough wood to fill up the holes in the shelter, then reinforce the door.especially when the game begins at cold days,the difficult would rise to a whole new level which I enjoyed a lot.but after that,I can't feel that I'm at a war,because I've got crazy amount of food supply and materials,enough for me to build up a new shelter if necessary.I once stayed in the shelter from day 24 until day 45 just because I've already got what I need.Those days were really boring.by the way,I only kill and steal from bad guys.and I'd never touch places like quiet house.then where are my supplies come from?For example,at the night of day 3,the military outpost might be scavangable,all I need is a lockpick.when the trading guy talk to his superior,it gives me enough time to sneak upon the cabinet,steal everything and leave that place with just one warning from them.and I'd scavange the military outpost every 3 days,never feel tired to do that.
So maybe there could be a mechanism that once you stole things from a certain place,you will not find the same supply at the same place,which means the NPC's got a improved AI.they know someone had stole things from them,so they would stock their important items,like food or medication somewhere else.So if the players really want to get what they need,maybe they have to scavange the whole place.and the NPC's route of patrolling could change once you steal from them.Just make them more unfathomable.
I also noticed that the bulbs in the shelter are so bright and we actually have a good fridge working well,where dose the electricty comes from? so maybe we should add a expiration date on our food supply,so that we have to constantly looking for food supply instead of staying 20 days in the shelter with nothing to worry about.
2.New mechanism and interactions
This game offers us a chance to really experience the war,to make choices between survival and humanity,so I'm guessing maybe the choices should be more constant and intensive.For example: a skinny little animal could show up(maybe a cute dog or cat)during the cold days or before,especially when you have little food supply.Helping it and make it your animal friend or simply ignore it just because you don't even have food for your own characters.That's one ocassion,think about another ocassion: No place to scanvange for food due to heavy snow during cold days,bad luck on catching mouse,no one come to trade with you and your character's gonna die tomorrow,all you got is your animal friend,now is your choice,I know it would be extremely cruel,but will you kill and eat your pet to keep your characters alive to see the sun tomorrow? or starve to death holding your pet? I think that's quite possible during wartime and I believe no one would never ever choose the former.Katia won't even think about it, but how about bruno,the cook? humanity conflicts would be quite intensive.
And I don't think the game needs a lot of items,highlighting the humnity conflicts part will make the game perfect.
These are just my shallow ideas and please forgive my poor English.