Idea for a realistic/hardcore combat inventory and ui system

[KillerHappyFace]

Just a random thought that hit me while reading a post about hotkeys.

 

In combat, people don't have these wonderful item sorting and instant-equip systems for pausing to get a better spell or quaff a potion to heal. I realize that this idea is completely useless until the hotkey situation is improved and greatly expanded.

 

-Combat locks the tab and esc keys: no pausing, equipping, or map-checking in combat. You only have yourself, what's already equipped, and whatever is in your hotkeys/favorites menu.

-All weapons have a unequip animation, equipping/unequipping slows you down a bit.

-Hefty items are dropped when unequipped in combat: all 2-h weapons, OH weapons, anything that seems like it would take too long to sheathe is dropped in the battlefield when unequipped. This could cause several headaches post-battle unless steps are taken to save the item in the hotkeys/favorites and to prevent the item from being knocked around.

-Shields take a long time to equip in battle, no changing armor.

-Limited space on your person for weapons, and all weapons shown weigh you down: All weapons and your shield in your favorites are rendered on your person at once. Means at most 1 1-H weapon for each hip (or 2 for 1 hip) and 1 2-H weapon or shield for your back. Maybe a dagger, too. No other weapons can be favorited.

-No searching items/bodies, but weapons picked up will be directly equipped.

-Potions and poisons take a bit of time to apply, potions don't heal instantly.

-Compass directions are hidden in combat, but enemies you have a line of sight to are still displayed: Not realistic per se, but it helps emulate things which don't work well in games like spotting moving enemies, tracking projectiles to their source, and using peripheral vision.

 

I'm not posting this in requests because I'm not entirely certain I would enjoy many of these for a full playthrough, but think it's a cool concept regardless. It may even work well, with the right handling of implementation and the right balancing.