PC Alpha 21 Dev Diary
- Thread starter Roland
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unholyjoe
QA
may just start flooding the forums with hope.
DarlingCows
New member
I have a couple questions regarding the learn by looting mainly is it still balanced for the player that loots vs the player that stays in base and crafts. Also when looting will the magazines be in the book related loot-able or in more places and will the drop chance of any magazine be guaranteed? In A20 when I am looting and I get to a room of book shelfs and such it is super frustrating to only get paper and stuff I’ve already found while knowing there’s still 50 or more schematics or books that I have not found.
Roland
Moderator
If you go out and loot you will find magazines. If you stay at the base you won't. That's how it's balanced. You can still perk into tools and weapons of choice and become very proficient at using them but you won't be able to craft your own without doing something to acquire magazines and build your knowledge.
Magazines are more likely to be found in places that match up thematically with their topic. So you will find more mechanical themed magazines at gas stations and cooking magazines in kitchens than vice versa. But you also find a random mix of everything everywhere.
There is no guarantee of getting the magazine you have perked into but there is a boost to the probability of getting it so you will often find the books you need mixed in with others randomly. But it is subtle so you definitely don't feel like you are only getting the mags that match your specialties.
As of now there are tons of magazines everywhere. Getting a bookshelf or filing cabinet or mailbox that is just paper is pretty rare now. Whether that will get nerfed or not will depend on continued play.
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Gotta say, I think I'm a little too excited about the water overhaul (whenever it comes). What will really be the bees knees, though, (yeah, I used "bees knees", deal with it) is whether or not the game adds in water-related equipment like fins and O2 tanks (especially if we get water-themed POIs).
Jost Amman
Well-known member
Don't expect much... I warn you. You'll be disappointed.
It'll be a BIG win, even just having water flow as intended without lagging the game to 1 FPS.
Yeah, let me clarify. I'm excited about the idea of free-flowing water. That's it. If that's all that happens, I'd consider that a win. But that overhaul could open up the possibility for either TFP or modders to make some really cool things. As water is right now, it's super difficult and glitchy to build out on the water. Not impossible, but the water blocks have a tendency to react in funny ways. Hoping that a water overhaul can fix that.
Roland
Moderator
I'm not adding new information. I'm just reiterating what I already said....
The main goals are that it 1) spawns correctly in rwg, 2) behaves well around other blocks, and 3) doesn't hurt performance.
Those of you imagining all sorts of new features associated with a "water update" should lower your expectations. It is a water update to fix the current state of water and not to bring Subnautica into the mix. There are lots of water associated features that people really want TFP to add to the game and pretty much all of these are probably beyond the scope of what they are doing for A21. The current impact of water in the game is likely to remain mostly the same but water blocks are broken in a number of ways and they are set on fixing them.
Sorry to be a downer. If you expect water to mostly stay the same as far as gameplay but be fixed and no longer act buggy or wonky like it currently does then you will have reasonable expectations and IF TFP does something extra or adds a water related feature or two then it will be a happy surprise.
D
doughphunghus
Guest
I guess I’ll just settle for being able to ride my boat and shoot zeds on the shore as I fly off a flowing waterfall into the rippling whitecaps below.
I do hope that “water is used up as you take from it” stays in some form just so you can’t use 1 water block at your base forever. If it has the capacity to “flow” downhill at all I would be elated, even if it accidentally floods a town it would still be neat. I really like it when there’s “something underwater to swim to” like a chest (there’s a desert mine? POI that uses this) and it’s not used a lot but if it flowed then it might make a nice use of “traps” (like underground) to catch the player and make them have to move fast/backpedal as a room fills up.
I might have asked this before but is there any possibility or ideas to have “red” (or any nastier looking) water blocks? I could see this useful for POI builders
Odetta
Tester
Laz Man
Fun Pimps Staff
POCKET951
New member
Well, there is an entire Yacht POI in the world editor, I assume as soon as water is where TFP wants it to be for A21 they will 'turn on a switch' and we will start seeing a yacht POI in alpha 21 generated maps.
That said, my expectations for water are mostly scoped around what you said.
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Laz Man
Fun Pimps Staff
Technically, there are already water POIs in the game......Navezgane. From a level design perspective, we have talked about more water specific POIs but nothing more then that currently.
spud42
Active member
all i want is for water to be flat on the top and if a block is placed underwater then removed that the block is replaced with water and not an air block as it seem it does now! just to be able to build a castle with a moat and not have holes in the surface of the water would be a win!
Arma Rex
Active member
Really? I had no idea. Guess there's a lot of hidden gems within the POI files. What's the name of the prefab?
faatal
Fun Pimps Staff
Yes, I added block tech that allows some mesh "sides" to be opaque and others transparent, so a window block can have a frame and glass with each being in the chunk's combines meshes, instead of each window being a separate prop, which did make for a lot of draw calls. Allan has made many window blocks using this tech for the POIs.
I still have a few tasks with drops from and how upgrades work with those blocks, but nothing major.
It is just a tractor model used by a tractor block and not a vehicle. You can't drive it.
faatal
Fun Pimps Staff
The water simulation is completely new code. It flows into neighbor blocks that are marked to allow it, like into air blocks. Water is no longer a block. It is a water voxel, which means the water voxel can be in the same place as a block, so you could have water flowing into and past grass, a fence or a pole block.
The game is not a real water simulator. The new water sim is designed to be performant and work in a basic fashion that makes sense for our game play.
Zombiepoptard
Active member
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