PC Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

[madmole]

As in he fixed 92 bugs? Or are you down to 92 bugs?
Hopefully fixed. Because that would bring it down to only about 10 or so, right?

LOL no, 92 MFs. A bunch were removed from MF's but he did fix a lot.

 

[RipClaw]

@ Faatal:
Not to add another bug to slow down the hype train and release, but Jawoodle on youtube found another easy ai exploit that needs fixing. Zombies won't walk on arrow slits if they are on the ground! He placed a floor of them, and literally had a working forcefield and could just pick them all off one by one with a sledge, even on a day 40 horde night.

:sad:

Now you've told them. I wanted to protect my crafting base in A18 with this exploit. In contrast to a trench with spikes it would be maintenance free and I wouldn't have to build a drawbridge to access my base.

 

[Viktoriusiii]

How dare that bastard play how he wants to... This'll teach him!
(Sorry, but this is the exact line of thinking I abhorre. Nothing personal.)

He can do whatever he wants in cheatmode.

But if I play a survival game, where there is a focus on survival and everything you do is basicially meant to aid survival... and some guy just offs himself because there are no consequences... that ruins my immersion. It makes me feel like death is not a big issue, basicially negating all reason to play survival.

If you want to play a no deathpenalty no bloodmoon no feralrunners no hunger/thirst, no falldamage game, please be my guest.

But if you play online with me, I expect the game to "force" certain behaviours to enforce gameplay.

I don't care if you cheat in Counter Strike against the bots. But if you play against me, I don't want to play with or against you if you have infinite weapons. If we play an mmo and you cheat yourself to lvl 80 I do not want to play with or against you.

And yes those "cheat" examples can easily be replaced with cheese, exploit or buguse.

 

[MajorMunchy]

I like how you, @MM, Mentioned a ticket for a 5 wide draw bridge.

That makes my OCDness happy as hell! I was wondering, can you tell us of any other cool door designs/changes you've made to A18?

I juts read up and something about a prison door...see through bars on a door?

I just remember the glories days of Ark when it first released (played/bought Literally at midnight release etc) where you would narc someone and trap them in a wood cage and just feed them narcos and meat so that the only way to play was to start a new char.

yes this is cruel as hell in PVP especially when u trap a lvl 100+ and force him to restart a char. but thats how ark is, unforgiving o.o

 

[sillls]

If i use 700 rounds and come out with 200 that's negative rounds. Main thing I need over all else is ammo. So doing a t5 tower is a 100% waste of time for me
Except for the fun factor. And they are fun.

Ok so what your saying is that you bring 10,000 rounds of ammo on you and burn through 500 rounds. Leaving you with 9,500 rounds you took with you, plus all the loot you can carry, possibly in several trips of just pure looting of a cleared tower, is that right?

Why carry so much ammo? 10k of rounds equals a lot of space used. You only used 500 rounds. Why carry that much ammo?

I have cleared both the hospital and that bookstore skyscraper with mostly a bow and arrows. I try hard not to use firearms due to the fact that I will wake up every zombie in the place. Which makes quite a mess and is very confusing to say the least.

Then spend the rest of the day (and the next) just looting that POI. I end up with more crap than I know what to do with at times.

But that's what traders are for.

But anyways I may go through 500 arrows clearing both POI's But then again I get loot, which includes ammo.

Besides I don't understand why your so worried about ammo if you got 10,000 rounds to start with. You got enough to stop an army and from what your saying, you could clear 19 to 20 of these before having to worry about ammo.

Ammo is not the problem.

 

[madmole]

I hate it.
Firstly, on multiplayer the weakest player is the one most likely to die, and the experience penalty means they'll get further behind the rest each time they do, making it even more likely that they'll die again.

Secondly, on single player you can reach a point where you can no longer increase in level because you can't stay alive long enough; and there's no way back from there.

The idea of using the same score for both character advancement and avoiding bad things (in this case you're effectively paying 25% of a level's worth of xp to "avoid" permanent death and merely have a near death experience instead) is one that's been used at various times over the decades in tabletop roleplaying design, and it's proved to be almost universally unpopular for these reasons and is something that's pretty much never used in modern games.

Sure, there should be a penalty for dying. But it shouldn't be something that makes it harder to avoid dying in the future by slowing and possibly stopping character progression. It should be something that you can recover from in time, not something that permanently sets you back compared to others who haven't died.

Its not a race to see who's at what level. Whoever logs more hours and grinds harder will always win that. This is a tangible penalty that doesn't affect your abilities, and will certainly stop people from eating glass I think. Forget about leveling and just enjoy the game, like its Alpha 1. I don't see the problem. Leveling is your reward for staying alive, like Roland's mod experiment. I am playing extra careful now, and that is a REALLY good thing. When you lose caution you either don't care or the punishment is nothing.

 

[unholyjoe]

:sad:
Now you've told them. I wanted to protect my crafting base in A18 with this exploit. In contrast to a trench with spikes it would be maintenance free and I wouldn't have to build a drawbridge to access my base.

thats alright... i found different exploit while testing his and submitting the report shortly after video is uploaded

 

[Callum123456789]

Ok so what your saying is that you bring 10,000 rounds of ammo on you and burn through 500 rounds. Leaving you with 9,500 rounds you took with you, plus all the loot you can carry, possibly in several trips of just pure looting of a cleared tower, is that right?
Why carry so much ammo? 10k of rounds equals a lot of space used. You only used 500 rounds. Why carry that much ammo?

I have cleared both the hospital and that bookstore skyscraper with mostly a bow and arrows. I try hard not to use firearms due to the fact that I will wake up every zombie in the place. Which makes quite a mess and is very confusing to say the least.

Then spend the rest of the day (and the next) just looting that POI. I end up with more crap than I know what to do with at times.

But that's what traders are for.

But anyways I may go through 500 arrows clearing both POI's But then again I get loot, which includes ammo.

Besides I don't understand why your so worried about ammo if you got 10,000 rounds to start with. You got enough to stop an army and from what your saying, you could clear 19 to 20 of these before having to worry about ammo.

Ammo is not the problem.

I don't think he was being serious about taking that much ammo in

 

[sillls]

I hope so... That's a crazy amount of ammo.

 

[Frankencow]

Its not a race to see who's at what level. Whoever logs more hours and grinds harder will always win that. This is a tangible penalty that doesn't affect your abilities, and will certainly stop people from eating glass I think. Forget about leveling and just enjoy the game, like its Alpha 1. I don't see the problem. Leveling is your reward for staying alive, like Roland's mod experiment. I am playing extra careful now, and that is a REALLY good thing. When you lose caution you either don't care or the punishment is nothing.

I personally like a more meaningful penalty in a survival game. I'm sure this one will get tweaked as it gets played, but I'm generally for it. I'd also be for an approach that gave a continuous advantage the longer you stayed alive but lost on death. Whatever makes death meaningful. But I'm one of those who would enjoy a dead is dead mode, as well.

 

[meganoth]

thats alright... i found different exploit while testing his and submitting the report shortly after video is uploaded

Unholyjoe AGAIN delayed the release by finding bugs. Where's the tar and feathers? Where's the righteous mob of law-abiding citizens in murderous frenzy? :yell:

:fat:

 

[RipClaw]

thats alright... i found different exploit while testing his and submitting the report shortly after video is uploaded

So back to the wall surrounded by a trench with spikes and a drawbridge for access. Works and keeps the zombies off my back when I work in my workshop.

 

[Guppycur]

My turn at an attempt for a Hitler Video:

https://www.captiongenerator.com/1478942/A18-Hitler-Video

 

[Noctoras]

When you guys fix all those bugs what happens?

wait for the streamer's weekend

 

[unholyjoe]

Unholyjoe AGAIN delayed the release by finding bugs. Where's the tar and feathers? Where's the righteous mob of law-abiding citizens in murderous frenzy? :yell:
:fat:

even tho i reported an exploit... its not a game breaker as you can play the game but someone (as it is proven) will use the exploit to gain an advantage... so no need to break out the tar... and i am not ticklish so feathers wont help. so there is still hope runs away quickly to find more...

- - - Updated - - -

So back again to the wall surrounded by a trench with spikes and a drawbridge for access.

all castles need a moat and drawbridge

 

[Guppycur]

He can do whatever he wants in cheatmode. But if I play a survival game, where there is a focus on survival and everything you do is basicially meant to aid survival... and some guy just offs himself because there are no consequences... that ruins my immersion. It makes me feel like death is not a big issue, basicially negating all reason to play survival.

If you want to play a no deathpenalty no bloodmoon no feralrunners no hunger/thirst, no falldamage game, please be my guest.

But if you play online with me, I expect the game to "force" certain behaviours to enforce gameplay.

I don't care if you cheat in Counter Strike against the bots. But if you play against me, I don't want to play with or against you if you have infinite weapons. If we play an mmo and you cheat yourself to lvl 80 I do not want to play with or against you.

And yes those "cheat" examples can easily be replaced with cheese, exploit or buguse.

Playing AGAINST you, I'd agree. Playing on the same SERVER as you, it's none of your business.

 

[JamesKirk]

Ok, Hitler videos are released.

Now it's time to summon the KRAKEN!

 

[Tin]

Its not a race to see who's at what level. Whoever logs more hours and grinds harder will always win that. This is a tangible penalty that doesn't affect your abilities, and will certainly stop people from eating glass I think. Forget about leveling and just enjoy the game, like its Alpha 1. I don't see the problem. Leveling is your reward for staying alive, like Roland's mod experiment. I am playing extra careful now, and that is a REALLY good thing. When you lose caution you either don't care or the punishment is nothing.

The system is fine.

It affects the higher level players the most. One stupid mistake, and they need to spend a whole lot more time just to break even, so they can start leveling again.

It also promotes teaming up with someone in a MP CoOp or PvP games for a small amount of time, if you happen to have died. Just be the back up, not the lead, and get that group xp.

Along with: They can also just do less dangerous stuff for awhile. Like: chopping down trees, busting boulders, mining, crafting, and so on.

Stuff you would end up needing to do anyways.

Which also makes it fine for SP games.

imo at least.

 

[meilodasreh]

Its not a race to see who's at what level. Whoever logs more hours and grinds harder will always win that. This is a tangible penalty that doesn't affect your abilities, and will certainly stop people from eating glass I think. Forget about leveling and just enjoy the game, like its Alpha 1. I don't see the problem. Leveling is your reward for staying alive, like Roland's mod experiment. I am playing extra careful now, and that is a REALLY good thing. When you lose caution you either don't care or the punishment is nothing.

Well i guess he might have played several alphas before, so he knows about "endgame abilities", and he might therefore be concerned that he gets stuck at a lower level which feels being permanently encumbered, especially if you already know how much faster/better u could be with a few more perkpoints to spend.

I mean for example you cannot yet craft advanced mining tools, so whilst knowing how fast you could mine with an auger, you're stuck to a stone axe cause u keep dying.

That example might be a little over exaggerated (although true if u are too clumsy :smile-new: )

I totally get your point, playing careful should be rewarding in a survival game, but i can understand his fears also.

I personally like the ideas mentioned already here more, like surviving X hours gives u an XP bonus.

I know at the end it's the same thing, but cancelling a reward back to standard feels somehow better than reducing/removing something u already achieved.

Just my opinion.

Jumping over a slope of a hill and accidently running into a rouge horde of dire wolves that came out of nowhere sucks either way :glee:

 

[Gazz]

If (as you claim) it's not a penalty in any way then it's clearly an utter failure as a "Death Penalty" mechanic, so I assume you'll be replacing it with a different mechanic that is an actual penalty, yes?

Some people think of it as a penalty, I think of it as a bonus. It's all a matter of perception and goals.

There is not always an objective right and wrong.

No sorry, this was posted yesterday: As you can see, Gazz only had 50 yesterday. Today he as 92.

People are just tossing numbers around without context.

It's always just one bug. And another. And another.

Keep fixing them and you get... more bug tickets.