#author rant block

THREAT LEVELS

I do have ONE thing that's really important. I have an internal Threat-O-Meter when it comes to the GHE monsters! For me, my Threat-O-Meter breaks down like this, from MOST threatening to least:

The Iris > The Wretch > Gardeners > Rootgrove > Woodcrawlers > Living Tendrils > Fake Humans > Fake Cats > Nature's Mockery > Luring Lights.

My only "Wildcard" are Infected Predators, where an infected bear is going to be a bigger threat than Rootgrove, but an infected fox might be below Woodcrawlers. And the only reason Living Tendrils are rated so highly, is because they actively hunt for you. Fake Beings are easily avoided! Just...don't approach them. You hear a call for help? No you don't. Fuckin leave. GO.

But as you can see...how often has ForestClan encountered Living Tendrils? Four times. How often as ForestClan encountered a Gardener? ONCE. It was horrifying BECAUSE it was rare. By that point, you've already seen two Woodcrawlers, a lot of Tendrils, and Rootgrove lives rent free at the Silver Box zone. (Rootgrove is a bit of an anomaly bc he is both an encounter, and also like...an actual unique character with a storyline to follow through.)

In general, the more dangerous the enemy, the less likely I'm going to use them! Clangen wise, that probably translates to "only used for mass death events....or ONCE to introduce the concept of the enemy (which is what I did for the Gardener)." Like, spoiler alert, yall are NOT getting Gardener encounters for like at least 30-40 moons. A Gardener should be a "oh nooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" type reaction. Weaker threats will be more common, but also more easily avoided or successfully fought against! But there WILL be deaths. A cat can and WILL die to a Woodcrawler eventually because it's just a BUSH. It's a fucking pile of branches. You live in a forest. That's a straight up mimic and someone WILL make a bad judgement call on whether that's a bush or not and just DIE. Living Tendrils target the weak and innocent - to the point where if they just grab ONE newborn, they could easily choke it to death, even IF a cat successfully defeated it...well, that's one life gone anyway. The threats vary! Threat to the group, threat to the individual, threat to the weak...these make encounters tense for very different reasons! Is Rootgrove going to play with his food? Or is he just going to kill you today? Who knows! He's not telling and that's fucking horrifying due to the unknown factor.

MAKE THE "NORMIES" SCARY!

If you're making it based off of a Zombie Apocalypse, using L4D as an example of "specialized monsters" is a great idea! But, ask yourself: are L4D encounters going to work the same way they work in a city center? For example, The Witch is MY FAVORITE zombie type ever...BUT, in a forest, the Witch would act a lot like Fake Beings in ForestClan: you hear crying? No you don't. Fucking leave. Only cats who never heard one before OR have never been warned about them would fall for this.

If your Clan is more isolated - normal infected are a horrible threat by itself! Like if you saw a decaying, shambling body in real life, you would run. You would probably scream. Dead bodies bad. Focus on how horrible that is! More veteran characters might see the normal infected and just feel sick to their stomach, and know the infected have to die, but man, that could've been them. A normal, non-special zombie can and SHOULD be able to kill you, and be responsible for cats' deaths! Fake Beings in ForestClan are horrible, scary and depressing for a reason, even though they're just plain, shambling-type zombies.

Which is why the special zombies would be TERRIFYING when they happen.

SPECIALS ARE YOUR "OH MY GOD" MOMENTS

Like, I need you to understand that a Tank spawning is the equivalent of the Wretch appearing in ForestClan. THIS WILL DESTROY THE ENTIRE LANDSCAPE AND KILL EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE. Tanks in L4D are killed by HEAVY GUNFIRE. Tanks are THE APOCALYPSE for cats. Unless you introduce a vital, unique weakness that you can exploit, then Tanks are dreadful horror for a reader, because you don't introduce that unless you're planning to show a mass-extinction event.

Now, a Hunter? That's your equivalent of a Woodcrawler. That's someone noticing shuffling in the trees. Or they hear a throat rattle...which normal infected do, but...so do Hunters. This is a "scan the trees and get in back-to-back formation NOW" type of deal. This is where you no longer trust your surroundings, because something WILL jump down from a tree or bush at some point.

Usually, I pick an encounter based on what I think would make something narratively interesting OR introduce a concept to the reader. Like. The Woodcrawler was picked bc I wanted to introduce a bush mimic when two cats were just chilling. Which is horrifyingly disruptive. The Gardener was introduced because I wanted a violent wake up call to the entire Clan, and a Gardener stands out in a field of lights.

If you're making an infection story with L4D specials - you have a lot of options to keep things interesting! I think what makes people annoyed by "frequent encounters", is if the people in them never actually LEARN from them. One person getting got by a Hunter is horrible, and tragic. People STILL GETTING GOT BY HUNTERS because they never learn proper shielding and warding tactics after that is annoying, bc it just makes them look stupid. Hence why ForestClan DOES defeat the Living Tendrils sometimes! AND they realized, "okay, fuck, we've been complacent. Yo, we REALLY gotta learn to weaponize fire." This gives the illusion that they ARE competent, and ARE capable of learning and defeating the monsters! Making your characters treat every encounter as a possible "last moment of their life" will make every encounter feel important.

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