Building on this thread of ideas you after completely a quest that kills all of the zombies from a town and it turns green "safe" zone on the map, humans could start appearing in that area and as you exterminate zips the green zone grows along with a resurgence of immigrants coming back from...
We actually have an early game now that you can't craft alot of these items so early in game. Forces you to create and adapt differently in early, mid and late stages. Honestly for me the less options I have early on equates to a more enjoyable experience of survival.
There is hardly correlation between number of negative threads and the community's overall feedback. Keep in mind while the naysayers are busy posting negative comments the rest of us are too busy playing and loving a17 to fill the forums with positive threads.