PC Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

[SnowDog1942]

Omg nerf demolosher before it exists. Does ANYONE here like a challenge? Madmole said block damage from zombies got nerfed in A18. You all got your way, rejoice!

 

[RipClaw]

Omg nerf demolosher before it exists. Does ANYONE here like a challenge? Madmole said block damage from zombies got nerfed in A18. You all got your way, rejoice!

I didn't say the demolisher should be nerfed. But there should be a possible defense against this type of zombie.

And the question is always what is a challenge for the individual. Standing on a roof with rapid-fire weapons and wasting tons of ammunition when shooting zombies is not a challenge for me. For me, it's a challenge to build a base so that I can take a nap while the base fights the horde on its own without taking much damage and with a minimum of wasted resources.

 

[Genosis]

Omg nerf demolosher before it exists. Does ANYONE here like a challenge? Madmole said block damage from zombies got nerfed in A18. You all got your way, rejoice!

At least that's one of those things that remains a simple tweak in the game settings. If you want all of them to have hammer arms, just dial up the zombie block damage. Watch that 110 lb cheerleader smash steel with her bare hands like the beast she is!

 

[Shineblossom]

You should work on your portfolio and build cool levels in games and get a job as a level designer. That is as close to an architect job you can find and level design pays more and you don't need much math for it.

Senpai noticed me :3 That actually sounds like a good idea. I will look into that! See, how 7DTD can profit people in real life? (Aside for giving people like me the chance to go completely mad and build huge mess of a base / castles etc). Thanks for that!

 

[meganoth]

And even if I'm standing on the roof with the sniper rifle and try to kill the demolisher zombie by hand, it's still not guaranteed that I won't miss him.

Honestly, if I don't get a chance to kill this zombie before it explodes

You do realize that you directly contradict yourself here? Shooting at a demolisher with a sniper rifle IS a chance to kill it, if you miss you just wasted your chance.

You are right though that IF this is just another zombie in the mix single players would be forced to a subset of the possible base types as they would need a method to watch all sides of the horde base ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT.

But there are ways around this: For example this could be one of the "boss" type zombies who only enter the fray at the end of the blood moon (so you know when it will come). And/Or that zombie could be announced by sound (heavy stomping sound for example) so you have time to go up to your lookout position to deal with this one.

 

[DaVegaNL]

I, for one, would like to see any of these upcoming additions to the game in a video.

We haven't seen a video for A18, have we?

 

[meganoth]

@MadMole about the minecraft topic:
contraptions contraptions contraptions! Redstone circuitry, moving pistons, electric doors and trapdoors, automatic farming, item transportation..

In my current game I have:

• automatic chicken farm
  
• automatic wool farm
  
• automatic bamboo farm
  
• automatic sugar cane farm
  
• automatic cactus farm
  
• automatic pumpkin farm
  
• automatic watermelon farm
  
• automatic mobs farm
  
• villager breeder and golem farm
  
• enderman farm
  
• automatic item elevator, that takes the items from my cave up to my house
  
• automatic item sorter, that autonomously sorts my items in different chests
  
• my door plays a sound every time you open or close it
  

You could build so much more... people have built flying planes, giant moving robots, working redstone cpus...

In 7dtd i would have the moat around my base open only at night and stay closed during the day for example. Building these things makes the game so interesting for me.

Verily. A turing complete electrical system (see Factorio as another reference system) would make a whole new game out of this. I suspect a "complete" package is only possible in version 2 of this game, but what would be a minimal set of features to make the electricity system more powerful? Electric doors is the first step, what else?

* I think we can safely ignore item transportation and automatic farming as too big.

* The limitation that any electric device has only one input line seems to be one of the biggest limitations to make "interesting" circuits(?). Maybe it would be possible to make a circuit device that is two blocks wide and has two points to attach wires to. It would be an "or" circuit for power.

What else might be relatively easy to implement and "powerful" at the same time?

 

[The Gronk]

<snipped for space>

Even with a uni-directional electrical system a simple set of logic gates and some different sensors would go a long way to a more interesting and useful system. Some sort of time/repeater would also help.

 

[madmole]

Cralification: I'm reading this as that the mining helmet armor will be made equivalent to the scrap iron helmet armor rating? No changes will be done in terms of what armor type it is classified as right now, right. Since in A17.4 it's classified as light armor. See image.
https://imgur.com/tQ75bW2

The Plastic Plating mod which is a light armor mod can be put into it. So right now in A17.4 in helmets it goes like this:

Light armor

Padded hood = 2 armor rating + repair w/ cloth

Leather hood = 4 armor rating + repair w/ leather

Football helmet = 8 armor rating + repair w/ forged iron

Mining helmet = 8 armor rating + repair w/forged iron

Military helmet = 6 armor rating + repair w/ military fiber

Heavy armor

Scrap helmet = 5 armor rating + repair w/ scrap iron

Iron helmet = 7 armor rating + repair w/ forged iron

Steel helmet = 9 armor rating + repair w/ steel

SWAt helmet = 10 armor + repair w/ forged iron

The values listed are all base amor with no perks or armor mods installed. I hate to say it, but you're gonna have to put the balancing issue again @madmole. Sorry.

Edit: Two ideas I can think of, 1) remove the mining helmet as a head slot and reintroduce it as a armor mod or 2) have the mining helmet replace the model the iron helmet and keep the stats the same.

When I said its like scrap helmet, I meant to imply every single property. So it is now a tier 1 heavy armor.

BTW perks no longer increase armor rating, they just dictate armor crafting quality, lower stamina use and movement penalty and increase durability. Armor is better than it was in A17. This puts more emphasis on looting armor with good stats versus level up as fast as possible to get higher perks all the time.

 

[madmole]

Its kinda like the ak-47 it has a minus to damage due to it being automatic, same casw with the smg, however, in A16 this was valid, in a17 where you have trigger groups that can make nearly any gun semi, full auto, or burst, its kinda pointless to leave tht debuff in. But think about it, if the smg did the same damage as the pistol would you ever use the pistol? I know i'd not use it. Same with ak47 and marksman rifle, if ak47 did full damage the marksman rifle would have no real use as the ak 47 is better in pretty much every way.

Yeah you have the rate of fire so DPS is superior. I finished my strength character and started an agility character, which governs bows, blades, pistol, magnum, and SMG is now also governed by gunslinger, so you have some kind of serious stopping power. I plan on using a magnum when I have ammo, a pistol when Im out of 44 ammo, and the SMG in oh crap situations. Bows for hunting and distance stealth shots.

 

[madmole]

Yeah a 45 round clip with a mag extender is pretty nice, reloads can get you killed in this game, and the cheapest most common to find ammo. I think the whole spawning mechanic needs to be reworked, to be made like loot. Higher gamestage=higher chance of radiated but it should never get to the point its a 100% guarnteed chance for them to spawn for every sleeper. Kinda like loot, even on day 1 you can find a tier 6 item if your lucky, but higher loot rating you have based on Gamestage and loot bonuses the higher percent chance you'll find better things, but it never gets to the point like a16 where you'd eventually always loot tier 6 items no matter what.
I also hope the stats are better balanced so your not like forced to take certan stats high to be viable, like in a17 you kinda need 5-7 str, and 10 int if you wanna craft everything and not be a snail trying to carry loot. I still feel perks like miner 69'er, motherload, pack mule and such should be moved to a statless General perk pool, maybe put their unlocks being you have to have a certan amount of total stats invested across the 5 stat types. This way, you still need stats, but your not locked to only needing say Int to make vechicles and workbenches. Its less of an issue in multiplayer, but when your a single player like me, were bascally forced into certan builds if we wanna be able to be viable at all solo.

There are pockets you can craft for clothing to lighten the load, plus armor perks. Crafting is now governed by the governing skill not INT. The auger and chainsaw will provide ample resources for non perked characters. Anyone can craft vehicles, only grease monkeys can craft parts. Traders now deal in vehicle parts and whole vehicles. With no perks its something like 5k, 12k, 30k, 60k, 100k. If you buy the parts its cheaper to build your own.

 

[DX72]

@madmole

Until recently, in the first comment that the alpha 18 should appear in the first half of the year, has that changed?

 

[madmole]

I am going to assume Hollow points works for almost all zombies, except a few like the football player, soldier and utility one as they have some dmg resistance. Just don't make the recipes retarded like you did with shotgun slugs, I still wanna know what you guys were on when you thought that recipe up. 5 lead bullet tips, 3 brass casings and 3+ gunpowder for 1 shot when it has the same damage as magnum rounds? Its easly fixed with mods but it makes me worry about these new bullet type recipes heh.

Its more about convenience of turning a shotgun into a rifle I think but it does feel excessive. I'll have a look at the damage though. It uses scrap polymer now instead of paper as more modern shells are plastic, but the regular shotty shells still use paper.

 

[madmole]

You have the Bad Omen effect. You get it every time you kill the pillager captain in a pillager patrol. The next time you enter a village, a raid will start. Defend the villagers because they are very valuable in the medium to end game, and you will get a small reward if you help them.
Also every time you defeat a raid, the next one will be stronger, there is a cap tho.

I haven't even found a village yet. Would it be in the direction they were headed?

I'll look at those systems in MC, but most of it sounds a little extreme for the tone of our game and what our players would expect. I would like some kind of moving parts system that doubles as elevators and moving platforms to kind of make a mining cart.

 

[madmole]

Don't give them any ideas.


You assume that there is a type of defense that allows you to kill this type of zombie before he turns half the base into a heap of rubble.

What if he basically explodes no matter what you do? I don't know of a single trap that would allow me to target a particular type of zombie. Let's say you have the resources to run a complete battery of auto turrets or shotgun turrets. These fire at every zombie and so the destroyer zombie can slip through and get near your base.

If it were possible to only target the demolisher zombie, you could get him to explode before he even gets near the base.

And even if I'm standing on the roof with the sniper rifle and try to kill the demolisher zombie by hand, it's still not guaranteed that I won't miss him.

Honestly, if I don't get a chance to kill this zombie before it explodes then I will remove it from the game because I don't see why I have to deal with something like that. I put a lot of work and time into my bases. Of course I don't want to see them destroyed without being able to do anything about it.

It has to be implemented and balanced yet.

 

[madmole]

Omg nerf demolosher before it exists. Does ANYONE here like a challenge? Madmole said block damage from zombies got nerfed in A18. You all got your way, rejoice!

Single block damage. The group buff might get buffed to compensate. So a single zed can pound for hours and not do much, but a cluster of 4-5+ will do insane damage. So you will need to focus on the concentrations of zombies.

 

[maleitch]

I didn't say the demolisher should be nerfed. But there should be a possible defense against this type of zombie.
And the question is always what is a challenge for the individual. Standing on a roof with rapid-fire weapons and wasting tons of ammunition when shooting zombies is not a challenge for me. For me, it's a challenge to build a base so that I can take a nap while the base fights the horde on its own without taking much damage and with a minimum of wasted resources.

So you build your super automated base/zombie meat grinder. You can go grow corn in a garden while your super base wipes out all zombie threats the game throws at you requiring zero participation in the defense of your base at this point outside of reloading turrets and repairing the odd block.

Ok...then what? What is the point in a game if you want a way to eradicate any possibility of risk? Is that your end game or what? I don't understand this mind set.

Having to stand on the roof for defense is a challenge, you may not like it but it most definitely is a challenge. Like you said if things go crazy and you miss certain shots it could mean your base being overrun. You want this no-risk, guaranteed, set it and forget safety of a sure solution that to me totally contradicts the point of a game. It sounds like you don't want a game. You want a puzzle. There is a difference.

 

[madmole]

I didn't say the demolisher should be nerfed. But there should be a possible defense against this type of zombie.

Walls should work. So what if he blows up an outer wall? A proper castle has many walls and towers before the main gate is breached.

 

[KingSlayerGM]

Verily. A turing complete electrical system (see Factorio as another reference system) would make a whole new game out of this. I suspect a "complete" package is only possible in version 2 of this game, but what would be a minimal set of features to make the electricity system more powerful? Electric doors is the first step, what else?
* I think we can safely ignore item transportation and automatic farming as too big.

* The limitation that any electric device has only one input line seems to be one of the biggest limitations to make "interesting" circuits(?). Maybe it would be possible to make a circuit device that is two blocks wide and has two points to attach wires to. It would be an "or" circuit for power.

What else might be relatively easy to implement and "powerful" at the same time?

I agree that electric doors are priority number 1. However I would really not scrap the item transportation system. Man, I love hoppers, droppers and dispensers. Moving items from an inventory to another one, from a machine to the next, thus automating tedious processes. This is just awesome in my opinion.

 

[madmole]

@madmoleUntil recently, in the first comment that the alpha 18 should appear in the first half of the year, has that changed?

Yes June is probably not possible. More like late July early August, but in reality when its done. Its playing really good but there are major missing weapons and perks yet on some books and Attribute perks yet, so there is just no way to put it out with missing/broken books. We're making progress on the occlusion system too, and if that pans out framerate should be significantly better than 17.4 and probably no comparison to 17.

We probably could have hit the date if we didn't improve so many little things that come up along the way. Like make new short descriptions (a fancy rank name) and long descriptions of the perks. Books took a bit of a life on their own and grew in scope. Fixing design inconsistencies. Adding new tabs to items to show what perks or books unlock what. Those little QOL things were not planned but came up and that causes some delays. But in this case its worth the wait. A month or 6 weeks late with all these polish items and way more new weapons than we planned shipping will be worth the wait.