Snufkin's Custom Server Side Zombies - PLUS (A20)

[Guest]

oh yeah thats the version i was talking about. sorry my memory has gone down the @%$#ter moms got cancer and her treatment while its effective is painful at the same time so the last 4 months have been incredibly stressful. I hope i dont have any brain damage from all the stress but soon ill be talking to my doctor about getting my brain checked out with scans to confirm if my worries are true or not... I hope their not true as the brain function difficulties are affecting my gaming abilities as well. moms doing alright by the way.

Hyper stress inducing for sure. I hope you have some real life outlets to share your family crisis so you can discharge some of it and bring some sense to the chaos. All the best out there.

 

[Guest]

It was something like 2 Banshees and 2 Mantis for this screenshot as this server was set to 16 entities per player per Blood Moon. Our little party of 4 were the only players on the server and none were shared around elsewhere. Totally inundated.

 

[Guest]

Here is a small update to the Snufkin PLUS collective.

https://github.com/arramus/SnufkinCustomZombiesPLUS-A19-2021Oct30

Mother Clucker is a large chicken with aggressive tendencies. Mother Clucker uses her eggs as projectiles for ranged attack and will readily peck at close range. While she is unable to fly, she has been known to leap high with wing assist. Mother Clucker was inspired from a Catman creation that was kept in a private server.



Harvesting from Mother Clucker brings all regular chicken gains, as well as the opportunity to harvest eggs.



Mother Clucker is usually quite passive until disturbed. Lower level players looking for a quick source of protein need to be on guard.

 

[AndrewT]

Here is a small update to the Snufkin PLUS collective.

https://github.com/arramus/SnufkinCustomZombiesPLUS-A19-2021Oct30

Mother Clucker is a large chicken with aggressive tendencies. Mother Clucker uses her eggs as projectiles for ranged attack and will readily peck at close range. While she is unable to fly, she has been known to leap high with wing assist. Mother Clucker was inspired from a Catman creation that was kept in a private server.

View attachment 21233

Harvesting from Mother Clucker brings all regular chicken gains, as well as the opportunity to harvest eggs.

View attachment 21234

Mother Clucker is usually quite passive until disturbed. Lower level players looking for a quick source of protein need to be on guard.

this is cool its like the chicken demon from robelto's mod but its not undead meaning regular meat instead of rotten flesh.

 

[Guest]

this is cool its like the chicken demon from robelto's mod but its not undead meaning regular meat instead of rotten flesh.

Hahaha, they could team up. And welcome back to robeloto from what I see.

 

[Guest]

Here is an update to the Snufkin Zombies PLUS Mod.

https://github.com/arramus/SnufkinCustomZombiesPLUS-A19-2021Oct31

This update introduces a new entity called 'Wight Radiation Shower'.



It uses 'Radiated Wight' as the base, but adds a particle effect that was commented out by the developers, possibly for future use, to give that glow. In addition @bdubyah kindly gave permission to use a radiation sickness feature, currently used in the Wasteland Mod for the Feral Ghoul and Radiated Scorpion, for the Snufkin Zombies PLUS.

As you can see in the image, the player is receiving a dose of radiation and this is very slowly reducing health. This occurs when the player is in close proximity to 'Wight Radiation Shower' and will be removed when the player moves far enough out of range. However, Wight is a pretty fast zombie and getting out of close proximity range can be a challenge.

Here is an image showing bdubyah's Feral Ghoul and Wight Radiated Shower together. I am just out of range and safe for now.



Step a little closer and the radiation sickness becomes noticeable. Wight Radiation Shower gives a lower dose than his mentor from the Wasteland Mod and also requires players to be closer. In real game play, such as a Horde Night behind defenses, this means players will just need to focus on eliminating Wight Radiation Shower to stop any health loss, or stepping back a little. For players with self healing skill, this may put you in a state where any body hits are not being healed as well as they should be while in the radiation shower. There may be a loss, equilibrium, or gain depending on player progress. Either way, Wight Radiation Shower will not spawn until GS255 during a Horde Night to allow new players a fighting chance.



It is no coincidence they are standing outside a RED MESA facility. ^^

Thank you to bdubyah for permission to incorporate the concept of a radiated entity which causes radiation sickness and code directly from the Wasteland Mod to allow Wight Radiation Shower to become a server side feature.

The Wasteland Mod offers players much more than a DLC, but keeps within most default game parameters. It is as close to an overhaul as you can get without requiring a separate game installation.

The Wasteland Mod can be found on this forum here:

 

[Strifetoe007]

How do I add these to the entity groups that spawn in prefabs ? I tried and can’t seem to figure it out. When I make sleeper volumes they are not included .

 

[Guest]

How do I add these to the entity groups that spawn in prefabs ? I tried and can’t seem to figure it out. When I make sleeper volumes they are not included .

@ErrorNull uses a technique in the EnZombies that adds custom zombies directly into existing default sleeper volumes and removes the need to create any custom sleeper volumes.



Amending the Sleeper Volume settings in existing POIs to match any you create requires creating a whole new world for them to be active. They won’t take if amended in an existing World. I tried this before. Adding to existing Sleeper Volumes/Groups is no problem at all and they will be accepted at any stage of a world. Using enZombies as a template will serve you well if you want the Snufkins in existing buildings. If you have other plans, such as special POIs then feel free to elaborate your plans. 

 

[Strifetoe007]

Omg thank you sooo much !

 

[ErrorNull]

@Strifetoe007 inside the ENTITYGROUPS.XML file, there are various entitygroups that define the zombies that appear inside POIs. the most common group (or like the default group) that the game uses for POI sleepers is called "sleeperHordeStageGS". the numbers next to the name (for example, 'sleeperHordeStageGS50') determines at which player gamestage that this zombie group will spawn.

the game also pulls from many other entitygroups to spawn inside POIs, but sleeperHordeStageGS is the most common one. other entitygroups to look out for are the following.

ZombieBadassGroup

badassOnlyHordeStage

ZombieBusinessManGroup

ZombieFootballStadiumGroup

ZombieBikerBarGroup

zombieHospitalGroup

ZombieSoldierGroup

ZombieUtilityWorkerGroup

zombieLabWorkerGroup

ZombieJanitorGroup

there are others too, but these are just examples. jump into that ENTITYGROUPS.XML file, look for those groups, and use your xpath XML skills to add in those zombies you like. sphereii's xpath modding explanation thread (below) helped me get started when creating my enZombies mod.

 

[Strifetoe007]

Where would I put my append at to merge the zombies from Snuffs into Enz ? Should I create it inside Snuffs entitygroup.xml to send those groups?

 

[ErrorNull]

There are several ways to add new zombies from one mod to another. In this case with Snufkin zombies...

Option 1 - appending the new zombies to existing zombies in Snufkin mod across all spawner groups. Go into the entitygroups.xml file of Snufkins mod and use the following xml template:

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup/entity[@name='EXISTING_VANILLA_OR_SNUFKIN_ZOMBIE']">
<entity name="ENZOMBIE_NAME" prob="NUMBER"/>
<entity name="ENZOMBIE_NAME" prob="NUMBER"/>
... and more rows if desired ...
</append>




For example this can be:

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup/entity[@name='zombieBoe']">
<entity name="enDesertMale1" prob="0.5"/>
<entity name="enForestFemale1" prob="1.0"/>
</append>

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup/entity[@name='ZombieBomber']">
<entity name="enWastelandMale3Feral" prob="0.40"/>
<entity name="enFarmerFemale1Radiated" prob="0.25"/>
</append>




This tells the game to go through all spawning groups within entitygroups.xml and wherever it finds the vanilla zombie "zombieBoe", it will add the enZombies "enDesertMale1" and "enForestFemale1" after it, and using those spawn probability values. Likewise, whenever it finds the snufkin zombie called "ZombieBomber", it will add the enZombies "enWastelandMale3Feral" and "enFarmerFemale1Radiated" for a chance to spawn as well. this method applies to all zombie groups in the game, so it will search through all zombies groups like for wilderness spawns, screamer hordes, bloodmoon hordes, wandering hordes, and not just sleeper POIs.

Option 2 - appending the new zombies to Snufkin mod for specific zombie groups. Go into the entitygroups.xml file of snufkins mod and use the following xml template:

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup[@name='EXISTING_ZOMBIE_GROUP']">
<entity name="ENZOMBIE_NAME" prob="1"/>
<entity name="ENZOMBIE_NAME" prob="1"/>
... add more rows if desired ...
</append>




for example this can be:

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup[@name='ZombieBikerBarGroupGS1']">
<entity name="enBiker1" prob="1"/>
<entity name="enStripper2" prob="0.8"/>
</append>

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup[@name='ZombiesWastelandNight']">
<entity name="enWastelandFemaleCrazy" prob="0.9"/>
<entity name="enSwatMale2" prob="0.5"/>
</append>




ZombieBikerBarGroupGS1 is the zombie group that gets used for strip clubs and trailer park POIs. The above code will add enZombies "enBiker1" and "enStripper2" to also spawn as part of this group. Likewise, ZombiesWastelandNight is the zombie group responsible for spawning wilderness zombies in the wasteland biome at night. That XML example will ensure enZombies "enWastelandFemaleCrazy" and "enSwatMale2" have a chance to spawn there. FYI - the zombie group called "sleeperHordeStageGS1" is responsible for many of the sleeper zombies inside POIs.

As you can see, Option 2 gives you much more control to spawn zombies into specific areas of the map, but the drawback is it's a tedious process because there are many zombie groups inside entitygroups.xml. For example, the zombie group above called "ZombieBikerBarGroupGS1" also has ZombieBikerBarGroupGS50, ZombieBikerBarGroupGS100, ZombieBikerBarGroupGS200, ZombieBikerBarGroupGS400... where the numbers 50, 100, 200, 400, etc represent the players gamestage for which that spawn group will trigger. To view all the possible zombie groups out there, go into the entitygroups.xml file that's inside the vanilla configuration -- inside the /Data/Config folder.

Another option instead of the above, is to start with my enZombies mod as the base, and then add the Snufkin zombies to that. I've already done the tedious work of identifying all the possible zombie groups and packaged it into the Snufkin Zombies Add-on. All you do is download the enZombies mod and the Snufkin Zombies Add-on, then edit the entitygroups.xml file from within the Snufkin Zombies Add-on, and you are on your way. If you have more questions about this method, feel free to post up on my enZombies thread as I wouldn't want to muddy up this thread with enZombie mod troubleshooting, since it belongs to Arramus' Snufkin mod.

 

[Strifetoe007]

In what order to mods prioritize? Since mods have the same xml file names usually (ie items.xml) how does it order it if one file is appending to the items and another is appending to the same xpath?

 

[ErrorNull]

In what order to mods prioritize? Since mods have the same xml file names usually (ie items.xml) how does it order it if one file is appending to the items and another is appending to the same xpath?

If multiple mods are present, it's my understanding that each mod is loaded in alphabetical order based on the value inside the <Name> tag within the mod's ModInfo.xml.

 

[Strifetoe007]

Ok that makes sense thanks.

 

[Guest]

If multiple mods are present, it's my understanding that each mod is loaded in alphabetical order based on the value inside the <Name> tag within the mod's ModInfo.xml.

This is also an important feature for the community made mod loader application as well, as you'll never know where your mods end up heading. It's good practice to match the folder name and the name within the ModInfo.xml as well so there is no mismatch.

 

[Strifetoe007]

There are several ways to add new zombies from one mod to another. In this case with Snufkin zombies...

Option 1 - appending the new zombies to existing zombies in Snufkin mod across all spawner groups. Go into the entitygroups.xml file of Snufkins mod and use the following xml template:

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup/entity[@name='EXISTING_VANILLA_OR_SNUFKIN_ZOMBIE']">
<entity name="ENZOMBIE_NAME" prob="NUMBER"/>
<entity name="ENZOMBIE_NAME" prob="NUMBER"/>
... and more rows if desired ...
</append>




For example this can be:

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup/entity[@name='zombieBoe']">
<entity name="enDesertMale1" prob="0.5"/>
<entity name="enForestFemale1" prob="1.0"/>
</append>

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup/entity[@name='ZombieBomber']">
<entity name="enWastelandMale3Feral" prob="0.40"/>
<entity name="enFarmerFemale1Radiated" prob="0.25"/>
</append>




This tells the game to go through all spawning groups within entitygroups.xml and wherever it finds the vanilla zombie "zombieBoe", it will add the enZombies "enDesertMale1" and "enForestFemale1" after it, and using those spawn probability values. Likewise, whenever it finds the snufkin zombie called "ZombieBomber", it will add the enZombies "enWastelandMale3Feral" and "enFarmerFemale1Radiated" for a chance to spawn as well. this method applies to all zombie groups in the game, so it will search through all zombies groups like for wilderness spawns, screamer hordes, bloodmoon hordes, wandering hordes, and not just sleeper POIs.

Option 2 - appending the new zombies to Snufkin mod for specific zombie groups. Go into the entitygroups.xml file of snufkins mod and use the following xml template:

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup[@name='EXISTING_ZOMBIE_GROUP']">
<entity name="ENZOMBIE_NAME" prob="1"/>
<entity name="ENZOMBIE_NAME" prob="1"/>
... add more rows if desired ...
</append>




for example this can be:

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup[@name='ZombieBikerBarGroupGS1']">
<entity name="enBiker1" prob="1"/>
<entity name="enStripper2" prob="0.8"/>
</append>

<append xpath="/entitygroups/entitygroup[@name='ZombiesWastelandNight']">
<entity name="enWastelandFemaleCrazy" prob="0.9"/>
<entity name="enSwatMale2" prob="0.5"/>
</append>




ZombieBikerBarGroupGS1 is the zombie group that gets used for strip clubs and trailer park POIs. The above code will add enZombies "enBiker1" and "enStripper2" to also spawn as part of this group. Likewise, ZombiesWastelandNight is the zombie group responsible for spawning wilderness zombies in the wasteland biome at night. That XML example will ensure enZombies "enWastelandFemaleCrazy" and "enSwatMale2" have a chance to spawn there. FYI - the zombie group called "sleeperHordeStageGS1" is responsible for many of the sleeper zombies inside POIs.

As you can see, Option 2 gives you much more control to spawn zombies into specific areas of the map, but the drawback is it's a tedious process because there are many zombie groups inside entitygroups.xml. For example, the zombie group above called "ZombieBikerBarGroupGS1" also has ZombieBikerBarGroupGS50, ZombieBikerBarGroupGS100, ZombieBikerBarGroupGS200, ZombieBikerBarGroupGS400... where the numbers 50, 100, 200, 400, etc represent the players gamestage for which that spawn group will trigger. To view all the possible zombie groups out there, go into the entitygroups.xml file that's inside the vanilla configuration -- inside the /Data/Config folder.

Another option instead of the above, is to start with my enZombies mod as the base, and then add the Snufkin zombies to that. I've already done the tedious work of identifying all the possible zombie groups and packaged it into the Snufkin Zombies Add-on. All you do is download the enZombies mod and the Snufkin Zombies Add-on, then edit the entitygroups.xml file from within the Snufkin Zombies Add-on, and you are on your way. If you have more questions about this method, feel free to post up on my enZombies thread as I wouldn't want to muddy up this thread with enZombie mod troubleshooting, since it belongs to Arramus' Snufkin mod.

So just to be clear, I want to add Snuffkin zombies to en zombie mod so i can have both mod zombies in my sleeper volumes when I make prefabs. I need to edit the entitygroups.xml IN the snuffkin to append to /entitygroups?

 

[Guest]

So just to be clear, I want to add Snuffkin zombies to en zombie mod so i can have both mod zombies in my sleeper volumes when I make prefabs. I need to edit the entitygroups.xml IN the snuffkin to append to /entitygroups?

Back in June, we tested a few things with adding Snufkin Zombies to default entity groups in order to troubleshoot an error in some of the POIs.

I appended the Tipsy Squatch directly to default POI spawning groups through the Snufkin xml and they appeared just fine.



I also tried to add entities that appear in one mod to the groups xml of another mod. In fact, this was the way we wanted to add the original Snufkin Zombies to the PLUS version. However, it was very unstable. The best method is to either integrate them all into the same mod or have their own separate spawning appends, even if they will be in the same named groups overall.

I recommend:

- If possible, merge the mods together so that they can run from the same entitygroups, spawn groups, etc. Regular spawning seems to be just fine, but Horde Night spawning can be unstable when attempting to use two sets of entitygroups for different entity mods even though they should really cache in advance. It might just have been the server I was testing it all on but a merged load out was far smoother and didn't lockup like the separates.

- If running two separate mods, make the specific group appends within the mod that applies to the same entities. If you want to add the Snufkin's to default stages, then make those appends within the Snufkin's code. Attempting to piggyback onto another mod caused issues in the past.

- If you are making your own POIs and create your own Sleeper Group names, then you can add the same within the Snufkin xml.

For example, we made a custom POI with a Sleeper Volume called SleeperZombieBoss and used the following for gamestages.xml

<config>

<append xpath="/gamestages">

<group name="SleeperZombieBoss" emptyChance="0" decoyChance="0" decoy1hpChance="0">
<spawner name="MixedZombieBoss" count="1,2"/>
</group>


<spawner name="MixedZombieBoss">
<gamestage stage="1"><spawn group="MixedZombieBossGroup" num="1" maxAlive="1" duration="1"/></gamestage>
</spawner>

</append>

</config>




Which in turn was supported with entitygroups.xml

<append xpath="/entitygroups">
<entitygroup name="MixedZombieBossGroup">
<entity name="ZombieJuggernaut"/>
<entity name="ZombieJuggernautGolden"/>
<entity name="zombieHisser"/>
</entitygroup>
</append>




That was one crazy custom Prefab which had that list of monsters changed from time to time.

As for that POI issue, it was found out to be a default bug relating to the vehicles blocks of all things. It would bring up 'NRE..... sedan(errors). The developer confirmed this was a  known issue. It became more apparent when using mod entities though.

 

[ErrorNull]

For the longest time i am tempted to edit the sleeper volume settings for individual POIs in order to better customize sleeper zombie spawns to my enZombies, but the fact that it then breaks any mod from being server side only, prevents me from doing so. if this wasn't the case, we could make shopkeeper zombies that only appear in the supermarket POIs, student zombies only appear in school building POIs, miner zombies inside cave-like POIs, etc. Of course, these zombies can be made anyway, but they would simply spawn as part of the general sleeper horde population which is currently tied to most POIs indiscriminately.

 

[Guest]

For the longest time i am tempted to edit the sleeper volume settings for individual POIs in order to better customize sleeper zombie spawns to my enZombies, but the fact that it then breaks any mod from being server side only, prevents me from doing so. if this wasn't the case, we could make shopkeeper zombies that only appear in the supermarket POIs, student zombies only appear in school building POIs, miner zombies inside cave-like POIs, etc. Of course, these zombies can be made anyway, but they would simply spawn as part of the general sleeper horde population which is currently tied to most POIs indiscriminately.

I worked with a gaming group who wanted default Prefabs to remain Vanilla but have some custom Prefabs with custom entities. Even if some players didn't download the custom Prefabs, they would still appear. The only trade off was later rendering (just like with a player base) and potentially more FPS hits as rendering took place and needed to constantly update as the data wasn't already cached for use.

It all worked server side without issue even though it was on a limited basis. I also play on a server that uses the Compo Pack of Prefabs (approx 350+) and players entering the server return again and again even though they don't install the custom Prefabs. The gain is better than any pain.

One interesting thing that bdubyah does in the Wasteland mod is to made small amendments to Vanilla Prefabs. They are renamed, given a few extra features, and then added to a world. From the outside, they look just like the Vanilla original and it is only on the inside that you experience custom entities and periodic custom deco blocks. There are some Vanilla Prefabs, such as the cemetery, which have been taken much further than Vanilla though and are a hybrid.

In that light, it would be very possible to add enZombies specifically to custom standalone Prefabs by renaming and amending where needed. Players would enter an building and not be quite sure what is to come if the Prefab was untouched beyond Sleeper Volumes.

In a20, it appears that the distance viewing for imposters is being greater realised and this should remove the effect of Prefabs coming into view rendering in segments for players that do not install the Prefabs ahead of time. It may be a compromise. Naturally, the greatest experience will be for players that download any custom Prefabs, but I have seen servers with many players that continue to return time and time again in a heavily modified World using the Compo Pack that feel the benefit is greater than any inconvenience.