PC Why are the devs screwing over agi/stealth in their POI design?

Your analogy of getting face punched would be spot on as long as you acknowledge that the target can feint, dodge, and counter. The game gives us those equivalents so...

You can’t stop the punch from happening but you can react in a fun and rewarding manner. 

 
How is agi/stealth getting screwed over by the POI design? For that matter how are the devs punching anyone in the face to force them into one thing that they want them to do? Here are some reactions to the auto aggro rooms that I can think of off top of my head

1) Guns Blazing and kill them all (non-stealthy)

2) Break a hole in ceiling or wall and kill them (stealthy)

3) Retreat/ Hide/ Re-emerge/ Stealth Kill (stealthy)

4) Parkour to high safe spot and pick them off (agility)

5) Set traps and barriers to delay them and hurt them while you actively kill them (non-stealthy)

There's five which is a nice variety of options-- none of which are discouraged or stopped by the developers. There are probably even more. Only number 2 requires that you know ahead of time that the room is auto aggro.

The only thing you cannot do is shoot them in the head as sleeping, immobile, heaps simply by walking in the room. But since you can do that gameplay for 90% of the rest of the time what's the loss? Where is the screw over? 

I understand ya'all don't LIKE it and that you would rather be able to shoot every zombie every time while it slumbered every playthrough and there is nothing I have against you liking or disliking the situation. But the options we have to respond to the trigger are plentiful and varied and a far cry from being forced to only respond in the alleged one way TFP wants us to respond and also a far cry from POI design screwing over stealth. Yes, there is a scripted trigger but our ability to respond to that trigger in a stealthy manner is preserved. That is a fact. Opinion is liking or disliking it but-- proven incontrovertible fact is that all the player's stealth perks are preserved to be used in reaction to any POI event and hence there is no screw over. 

 
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Roland said:
How is agi/stealth getting screwed over by the POI design? For that matter how are the devs punching anyone in the face to force them into one thing that they want them to do? Here are some reactions to the auto aggro rooms that I can think of off top of my head

1) Guns Blazing and kill them all (non-stealthy)

2) Break a hole in ceiling or wall and kill them (stealthy)

3) Retreat/ Hide/ Re-emerge/ Stealth Kill (stealthy)

4) Parkour to high safe spot and pick them off (agility)

5) Set traps and barriers to delay them and hurt them while you actively kill them (non-stealthy)

There's five which is a nice variety of options-- none of which are discouraged or stopped by the developers. There are probably even more. Only number 2 requires that you know ahead of time that the room is auto aggro.

The only thing you cannot do is shoot them in the head as sleeping, immobile, heaps simply by walking in the room. But since you can do that gameplay for 90% of the rest of the time what's the loss? Where is the screw over? 

I understand ya'all don't LIKE it and that you would rather be able to shoot every zombie every time while it slumbered every playthrough and there is nothing I have against you liking or disliking the situation. But the options we have to respond to the trigger are plentiful and varied and a far cry from being forced to only respond in the alleged one way TFP wants us to respond and also a far cry from POI design screwing over stealth. Yes, there is a scripted trigger but our ability to respond to that trigger is preserved. That is a fact. Opinion is liking or disliking it but-- proven incontrovertible fact is that all the player's stealth perks are preserved to be used in reaction to the event and hence there is no screw over. 
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So long story short, the question of the topic had a hidden agenda.
I have to agree. If this didn't exist, then there should be some kind of zombie where stealth isn't going to work at all. After all, when they come out with bigger and badder zombies that we can't one-hit with a sledgehammer, this doesn't mean they are trying to screw over a strength build. Maybe there should be a zombie immune to electricity to counter an intelligence build.

 
Danidas said:
The trick is if they auto aggro is to break line of sight, re enter stealth, wait for the forget me timer to hit zero while staying out of line of sight. Now the higher your From the Shadows is the quicker the forget me timer will be and to make things way easier after you break line of sight you can toss a rock to distract the zombies to where it landed. This trick is very easy to use and normally you only need to retreat one or two rooms at most but with the rock tossing trick its possible to avoid retreating as long as you have a way to break line of sight handy.

Edit- Once you pull the trick off the zombies will forget about you and become normal awake zombies who will wonder back to their spawn location. From there it is a simple task to circle back around to sneak attack them while being mindful that they are awake and easier to aggro then sleepers but the same trick can be repeated to deal with them.
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I'm not sure line of sight is calculated. I seem to remember a statement by Fataal that it costs too many CPU cycles. ??

 
Roland said:
Your analogy of getting face punched would be spot on as long as you acknowledge that the target can feint, dodge, and counter. The game gives us those equivalents so...

You can’t stop the punch from happening but you can react in a fun and rewarding manner. 
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For your counter to apply it would require that we can see what the volume we're going into is before we go in (can't avoid or counter what you can't perceive). As is that first punch is a freebee because we're bound, hands behind our back, by forced ignorance of what the volume we're about to enter is.

Roland said:
1) Guns Blazing and kill them all (non-stealthy)

2) Break a hole in ceiling or wall and kill them (stealthy)

3) Retreat/ Hide/ Re-emerge/ Stealth Kill (stealthy)

4) Parkour to high safe spot and pick them off (agility)

5) Set traps and barriers to delay them and hurt them while you actively kill them (non-stealthy)
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1. Default and hardline favored playstyle by the devs.

2. Requires previous experience with that exact location unless that is how you handle every room in the game. (Yes, I caught that you pointed it out. Requiring previous experience with the exact same place while completely excluding said location from being understood by observation the first time a player is about to enter one is bull@%$#.)

3. Freebee punch with our hands held behind our backs is already thrown and has connected. Completely moot to my point.

4. 😆🤣🤣 If only parkour didn't get you killed by bouncing you off the ceiling or ridge just above the exit... Can't not jump the full height, get @%$#ed if you only want to hop out a window. Still moot to my point since the freebee punch has already connected.

5. See 2 or 3 depending on when you think we should be doing that.

Roland said:
The only thing you cannot do is shoot them in the head as sleeping, immobile, heaps simply by walking in the room. But since you can do that gameplay for 90% of the rest of the time what's the loss? Where is the screw over? 
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Ain't even close to 90% unless you are actively avoiding quests and avoiding looting POIs in general. 

Roland said:
Opinion is liking or disliking it but-- proven incontrovertible fact is that all the player's stealth perks are preserved to be used in reaction to any POI event and hence there is no screw over.
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Screw over = Entire room moves to attack the moment the volume is entered regardless of what the player did. I guess you're of the opinion that if a thug slams you against the wall demanding money, you weren't being mugged if you kicked them in the crotch after they slammed you into wall...

 
AtomicUs5000 said:
Why don't they just make it so that the noises of zombies can wake up other zombies, if they want to keep things spicy?
(not to be confused with a screamer that actually spawns in additional zombies).
When a zombie sees you, perhaps a 50% chance it will yell out, drawing in close by zombies, waking sleeping zombies.
Make it so that when you stealth kill a zombie, it has something like 25% chance to groan loudly as it dies.
As you level up in stealth, this percentage goes down... but cap it so that there is always at least a 5% chance.
 
To resolve blood moon, extend Stealth into Stealth and Evasion, which can be a big help during BM.
- chance to dodge melee attacks.
- significantly reduces the player being targeted by cops.
- significantly reduces the player being targeted by vultures.
- significantly reduces the number of vultures chasing you down while driving.
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Previously I posted that in this topic.
Here's another idea, adding onto that, instead of this auto aggro thing that has people all worked up for 18 pages and counting...
Why don't they make POIs with screamers, and the screamers can wake up the sleeping zombies? All while ensuring that screamers can be stealth-killed, but very difficult to do so?
 
Whether or not the devs are truly trying to screw over agi/stealth in their POI design, my thoughts still stand that it's fine to have something to counter each build, provided that it's balanced for all builds. It makes for good gameplay and it's something that countless of games do. Anti-electric/turret-avoiding zombies to give Int a hard time. Very aware zombies (perhaps screamers) to give stealth a hard time. A zombie that jump a little higher, run a little faster, with AI that can flank to counter Agility. Strength has enough countering it already, at least right now since radiated is just about absorbing a ton of damage. 

Likewise, you could set things up so that some zombies are especially weak against a particular build.
 
Make POIs that focus on these concepts. Electric company -> electricity immune zombies. Int will have a hard time. Make the POI with the screamers instead of auto-aggro. Having a stealth on the team will have a better role in clearing that POI, or at least a better chance of clearing it easier. Gymnasium, mainly the agile zombies... best to have an Agility member on the team for that one. So many opportunities and it's not that hard to deliver using what already exists.

 
hiemfire said:
For your counter to apply it would require that we can see what the volume we're going into is before we go in (can't avoid or counter what you can't perceive). As is that first punch is a freebee because we're bound, hands behind our back, by forced ignorance of what the volume we're about to enter is.
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The first punch is not a freebee because it never connects. You walk in the room and the trigger happens and....by golly, you still have stealth at your disposal to avoid the punch. We're still going with the analogy that the punch represents the complete invalidation of stealth forcing the player to handle the zombies in an unstealthy manner...correct? So the punch is thrown and you retreat, hide, re-emerge and kill all the zombies with all your stealth enhanced multipliers. The trigger is just an event-- an event that does not remove your ability to stealth. So it isn't a freebee sucker punch. It never connected.

hiemfire said:
1. Default and hardline favored playstyle by the devs.

2. Requires previous experience with that exact location unless that is how you handle every room in the game. (Yes, I caught that you pointed it out. Requiring previous experience with the exact same place while completely excluding said location from being understood by observation the first time a player is about to enter one is bull@%$#.)

3. Freebee punch with our hands held behind our backs is already thrown and has connected. Completely moot to my point.

4. 😆🤣🤣 If only parkour didn't get you killed by bouncing you off the ceiling or ridge just above the exit... Can't not jump the full height, get @%$#ed if you only want to hop out a window. Still moot to my point since the freebee punch has already connected.

5. See 2 or 3 depending on when you think we should be doing that.
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1. It's just one option, man. What the devs do or do not favor has no bearing on what you choose to do. If you didn't frequent these forums you'd never know what the devs favor or have any kind of paranoia about what you think they want you to do...

2. Some people do this regardless of the room. Its a choice among 4 others. You don't have to have prior knowledge of any room to have five options for how to handle the next room. Prior knowledge would certainly increase the priority you might give this option but I've elevated myself into the rafters of a room and made a hole into the next room before not knowing whether it was an auto aggro room. I just did it because I saw rafters and I thought it would be fun.

3) No and it is completely relevent to your point and you have continued to ignore its implications for a dozen pages because it entirely destroys your argument about stealth being invalidated. You have championed your side from the position that you love stealth and yet you ignore an entirely new stealth tactic that emerged from this discussion all because it is detrimental to your argument. I wake up sleepers now on purpose at times and run and hide and then kill them from the shadows simply because it is more fun than what you want 100% of the game to be.

4) Parkour might not be appropriate at all times but the tactic is there for use when it can be used. Maybe we need a new thread about how the sloped roof designs of POIs have totally screwed over Parkour players...

5) I know people who always carry spikes and barbed wire when exploring pois and have them ready to plant in a doorway or across a hall as needed. You don't need prior knowledge of a particular POI. You treat all rooms as though they could wake up so you are ready to react with a number of tactics at your disposal.

hiemfire said:
Ain't even close to 90% unless you are actively avoiding quests and avoiding looting POIs in general.
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So when I said that shooting sleeping corpses would be boring if that is all there was without any triggers YOU said I invalidated 90% of stealth gameplay. I'm just going by your own hip shot on the numbers. I'm fine with calling it 80% or 70%. <shrug> Of course that means I only invalidated 80% or 70% of stealth by my earlier comments. Are you prepared to be okay with that because 90% sounds more dramatic. ;)

hiemfire said:
Screw over = Entire room moves to attack the moment the volume is entered regardless of what the player did. I guess you're of the opinion that if a thug slams you against the wall demanding money, you weren't being mugged if you kicked them in the crotch after they slammed you into wall...
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If a mugger slammed me into a wall and demanded money and I escaped by kicking him in the crotch I would not call that a mugging. I'd call that a damn fine story I would be telling at every party for the next year. BTW, your little scenario actually does happen. People DO get surprised by an event they could not have avoided and when they somehow avoid and escape that event it makes for a great adventure. These events in the game that can't be avoided create situations for great stories and great adventures depending on how the player reacts and there are many ways to react-- stealth among them.

 
Roland said:
Nope...I'm just using the material I was given. Figured I'd work within the paramaters Hiemy, himself, set. ;)
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In which case then, it @%$#s over 100% of stealth play, because regardless of what you do they move to attack the moment you enter. No amount of in game observation of what can be seen (observe>assess>plan, then act), meticulous control of noise generation (the third step observability "spike" is annoying but can be worked around if cautious), avoidance of illumination (night time is a stealther's fickle mistress, even at low level/GS, so messing up has allot nastier and more immediate repercussions. Nvgs are are blessing.), careful positioning (not always possible with where the zombie's spawn so likely the single most likely failure point outside of moving into an attack volume. Not a complaint about that, even though the hit boxes on some of the blocks suck.), and making sure to move as slowly as possible (this can be a @%$# at higher ranks of FTS since it messes with how far you move and can't be turned off without ditching the perks) allows the player to avoid the activation of an attack volume. Those combined are the "90% of stealth play" I was referring to, silent head shot kills is the reward for pulling it off since they're impossible without being successful in those aspects.

 
hiemfire said:
In which case then, it @%$#s over 100% of stealth play, because regardless of what you do they move to attack the moment you enter. No amount of in game observation of what can be seen (observe>assess>plan, then act), meticulous control of noise generation (the third step observability "spike" is annoying but can be worked around if cautious), avoidance of illumination (night time is a stealther's fickle mistress, even at low level/GS, so messing up has allot nastier and more immediate repercussions. Nvgs are are blessing.), careful positioning (not always possible with where the zombie's spawn so likely the single most likely failure point outside of moving into an attack volume. Not a complaint about that, even though the hit boxes on some of the blocks suck.), and making sure to move as slowly as possible (this can be a @%$# at higher ranks of FTS since it messes with how far you move and can't be turned off without ditching the perks) allows the player to avoid the activation of an attack volume. Those combined are the "90% of stealth play" I was referring to, silent head shot kills is the reward for pulling it off since they're impossible without being successful in those aspects.
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Oh man...you love killing unconscious enemies. What are you going to do when bandits are added and they aren't sleeper bandits but awake and alert bandits?

 
AtomicUs5000 said:
Why don't they make POIs with screamers, and the screamers can wake up the sleeping zombies? All while ensuring that screamers can be stealth-killed, but very difficult to do so?
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I like this. Even if they end up in some out of immediate los (from the player) spot in the volume with their sound and light sensitivity higher than other zombies, this is allot more preferable to what exists currently.

AtomicUs5000 said:
Whether or not the devs are truly trying to screw over agi/stealth in their POI design, my thoughts still stand that it's fine to have something to counter each build, provided that it's balanced for all builds. It makes for good gameplay and it's something that countless of games do. Anti-electric/turret-avoiding zombies to give Int a hard time. Very aware zombies (perhaps screamers) to give stealth a hard time. A zombie that jump a little higher, run a little faster, with AI that can flank to counter Agility. Strength has enough countering it already, at least right now since radiated is just about absorbing a ton of damage.
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I actually agree with this, the problem is that currently it isn't balanced for all builds. There is no equivalent to attack volumes for any other perk spec. If TFP keeps attack volumes in, they most likely will, they need to spread the "love" a bit more and put hard counters for the other mechanics in that completely blind side the player with no warning.

Roland said:
Oh man...you love killing unconscious enemies. What are you going to do when bandits are added and they aren't sleeper bandits but 3.(1. awake and 2. alert) bandits?
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1. What I do with wandering zombies, night or day. Take advantage of range, concealment and positioning to whittle them down while they try and find me.

2. Iirc that would mean they already know roughly where you are and are hunting you. No different than a tough or armored I tapped with a bolt or arrow, though if there isn't a time out for that state there might be an issue for all builds.

3. Did you mean an amalgam of being awake and alert as in casual conversation? If so see 1.

 
hiemfire said:
because regardless of what you do they move to attack the moment you enter.
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Ok, I think I get your problem.   You don't like that some places your stealth gets broken.  Its completely irrelevant to you wants happens immediately before or after... the fact that in that instant your stealth is broken is the entirety of your argument?   If so, then yeah..... you win.  That happens.   It happens by design, and probably will never change.

 
Kalen said:
Ok, I think I get your problem.   You don't like that some places your stealth gets broken.  Its completely irrelevant to you wants happens immediately before or after... the fact that in that instant your stealth is broken is the entirety of your argument?   If so, then yeah..... you win.  That happens.   It happens by design, and probably will never change.
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With a slight addendum: If it breaks because I made a mistake then I'll grump at myself for messing up.

If it breaks because the game's devs say it will without an indication that this will be the case then it is bull @%$#. If there is an indication (doesn't have to be obvious, just noticeable if you're paying attention) then I can adjust what I have set up to use in my "hands" and face it accordingly, if slightly grumpily (Yes, if it hasn't been obvious, I'm a bit of a grumpy @%$# at times).

 
Kalen said:
So you can't imagine any scenario in which you make no mistakes but still fail?
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Hes kind of right that its a terrible game design.

You do not fail because you were moving too fast, were careless or simply didnt have high enough stealth. You fail because the situation is scripted for your failure.

Its the same deal while several people hate ambush cutscenes in video games because it clashes with what was achieved.

Like imagine that during a mission in Splinter Cell you reached 100% stealth, no one ever seen you, no one got killed or stunned, not a single soul knows you are there because you are moving in the absolute darkness in ventillation shafts soo silently you can hear the guards breathing around and then suddenly cutscene "You kick out the cover of the ventillation shaft directly into a some glass wall and the noise causes the nearby guard to sound the alarm.".

Like in the ugly picture i posted here, it makes sense for you to trigger an alarm because you stepped into the line of sight of awaken zeds (green) from the door but if you enter from the top parts where there is no vision theres really no reason for them to get alerted.

example.jpg

 
Kalen said:
it only seems magical because you know about sleeper volumes.   If you did not have that info, you would probably assume that you just weren't sneaky enough.  
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Nope, the Red Mesa makes it clear that this is not just a failed stealth roll. If you enter the intended way, they come from all across the POI. Also you can´t fail stealth, there is no skill checks in this game. Has absolutly nothing to do with sleeper volumes that this feels just utterly wrong.

 
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