Please don't introduce humans as battle-able enemies

Recently a new community update was posted with a poll asking which enemy you are most excited about.

Humans are winning by a landslide already, and I want to express my dismay about this and implore the developers to reconsider, or at least if this will be implemented, to do so with great caution.

-Trigger warning for hunting and animal killing below-

All of us here probably like wolves. Why would we be on this site otherwise? However, it's important to remember that not all people do. By some, wolves are seen as a pest at best or a danger at worst. Many would gladly shoot and kill wolves if given the chance. 

For example, a certain US state legalized wolf hunting this year. Hunters were so eager to participate that they killed more wolves than the quota allowed before the agencies could stop the hunt. Why they did this can't be said for certain. It could be for a trophy. It could be "predator control" to protect deer populations (a popular notion in some places with deer hunters). It could be because they think "the only good wolf is a dead wolf." And yes, I have heard that phrase uttered by people before. A law in a different state, recently passed, has relaxed wolf hunting restrictions and allows for 90% of the state's wolf population to be killed.

Now of course I don't think that allowing wolves in this this niche wolf sim game to attack humans is going to directly cause people to shoot wolves. But it is no secret that wolves are not held in high regard for the majority of people.

Allowing your wolf player character to seek out and attack humans contributes to negative stigma associated with wolves. If people share screenshots of your wolf crushing a human's windpipe and "hearing something breaking under the pressure" it reinforces people's feelings that wolves are dangerous. Or if they feel neutral to wolves, it may cause them to reconsider. They may not advocate to kill them, but they won't want to protect them.

Oh, but it's just a game! True - but media has real-world influences and can change and shape people's opinions. There is a huge recent and welcome push to include more diversity in media because it shows everyone from all walks of life that these people exist and live normal, happy lives. Representation - GOOD representation - is important.

Oh, but you don't have to fight them! That's true (and I probably won't), but I am not worried about me specifically, or anyone else here, really. I am concerned about how wolves could be stigmatized if they bring home a severed human leg trophy for their pack to gnaw on, and what other people would think when they see that. By word of mouth or images online, I am concerned that some people are going to see that and think, wow, wolves really are dangerous animals. Maybe the world would be better off with fewer of them.

With the great lengths this game goes to showcase the beautiful diversity of animals and scenery of the natural world, that would be such a shame.

Edit: adding to this, now that I have more time to think about it. I also believe the poll is poorly designed and human's "landslide victory" is not as representative or clear-cut as it seems. We already have a Morelets Crocodile enemy, which is very similar to the American Crocodile and Alligator option. There already exists in game a Lunar Condor and Turkey Vulture enemy, both very similar to the Condor poll option. So I can see why these options aren't exciting for players.

It also splits the poll between "people who want to battle humans" vs "people who do not want to battle humans" and those in the latter category then split their votes between similar animals. If you add up the votes in all 3 of the animal categories, it is much closer than it appears.

1 to 1 my Thinking. I think we must be carfull with this thema to hunt Humans in this game. 

Agree on this one. Something just rubs me the wrong way about humans being a battle-able enemy in-game, but yeah, like you mentioned, the idea of the Big Bad Wolf in anything is what we need to avoid the most right now.

I agree for all the points listed above! As another point, I hate the idea of humans as enemies because it breaks my immersion of the world. I love how there’s no humans in this world and I’d prefer it stay that way. Maybe it’s not how the devs see it, but I imagine this world as one without humans. I play WD as a break from reality and I just don’t want the additional morale quandary of having humans in it. :’(

Strong support. Took all the words right out of my mouth. It doesn't help that humans are almost always villainized in video games or in games involvijg wild animals and I am personally very fed up of the trope of Human Bad And Kill For Fun. I mean... after 50 games of the same evil human killing everything in sight and being insulted to hell and back, you pretty nuch get the point across that most humans are shitty. Not to say that crappy people don't exist, thry absolutely do, but I would love a game where humans would not be the assholes or troublemakers for once.

As an extra suggestion, maybe instead of making humans battleable (I'd really rather them not be in the game at all, but let's sah they WERE in the game), we could have special encounters with conservationists where your wolf could interact or watch from a distance for things like SC or exclusive amusements that could be crafting items in the future. It would help destigmatize the notion of humans being bloodthirsty machines (Because some humans ARE trying to fix things) and of wolves being dangerous, and the flavor text could include fun facts or educational material about what conservationists do. It likely wouldn't do a ton, but it might encourage some players to think "Huh, didn't see it that way before". Yknow? 

Support.

Don't have anything special to add that hasn't been said already. I'd just rather not see humans pop up at random during exploration.

My post from page 4:

Going off of @Redpineapple1's idea with the toggable mode button, I'd be okay if there was a Human specific biome, so those who don't want to fight/see/interact with human characters can just stay away from that biome, and those who want to, can go there. I think that's solves some problems, and hopefully please a larger amount of people, instead of it being a "humans vs no humans".

Support. 

I'm not entirely against the concept of having humans in this game, because at the end of the day we are an important and influential part of the ecosystem and do affect the lives of wolves, but... the idea of humans as a battle enemy really rubs me the wrong way.

Not only is it not realistic - since as other have pointed out, wolves rarely attack humans in real life - but I think it adds a level of violence that I'm just not comfortable with in a fun animal sim. Especially with the general climate of the last few years, it just seems in poor taste. 

If we absolutely have to have humans as battle enemies, I would hope that at the very least the game would never require players to fight them (i.e. no battle quests that ask you to kill humans/primates, and no humans as lunar event enemies).

Full support! Every point made in this post is very good! Just like glasswort said, humans as a battle enemy aren't realistic, and it gives an uncomfortable level of violence to the game, as I do love this game as a nice little wolf sim as well. Just.. don't add them as a battle enemy. Please.

Semi-support! I'm not 100% against adding humans to the game at all, especially since they already canonically exist in WD's world (judging from some puppy death prompts and some backgrounds we have). However, I would appreciate if there's an equal number of "positive" and "negative" encounters with humans. Maybe, battling can even be avoided altogether (or for the most part). For example, if you find a poacher in the forest, there might just be two options to "scare him away" or "run for your life" which give different items/karma/whatever as a result.