PC Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

[AngryGamer]

madmole What about "holding LMB and drag mouse" to place multiple blocks at the same time? Clicking for every single block gets old fast.

 

[sillls]

Ah the good ol' days when you could just punch people and throw fridges and get what you wanted.

I'd just thrown my fridge out. lol

I loved that post it seemed like a good idea.

 

[Aldranon]

I disagree! Diablo is not a survival game.
So the new death penalty worsens from the nuisance for 30 min to a permanent penalty.

How should that improve game play? Hey there is a new penalty so the players will no longer enjoy dying while suffering lag hits, getting instakilled by driving over mines, entering rad zones...??? Sorry for that sarcasm.

Dying in a suvival game means you FAILED! If you died during a quest. You also failed the quest. You have to get your backpack. Probably dying a couple of times while trying.

Game-stage(difficulty) drops when you die. The problem would be if you die a LOT.

If you die a lot, you should set the difficulty down a notch or two.

 

[sillls]

If Duke Nukem had a base in A18 then it would be a really boring Alpha.Cause all zombies would already have been totally obliberated.

Most likely his base would even be on top of a huge pile of dead zombies.

Wait..."dead zombies"...is there even a correct term for a dead undead?

dead dead body?

or is dead x dead = alive?

Roland, mathematics please :smile-new:

Itat's called an Oxymoron.

 

[Adilaris]

god i cannot wait for symmetry Q.Q

XD! haha, I don't know why that got me.

 

[agrastiOs]

Simple: you know of it, that is why it loses its effect on you (not 100% but a lot compared to the unaware)there are so SO many other marketing tricks that DO work on you and me, because we don't know its a trick.

From most expensive food beeing on shoulderheight (only works if you have enough money to not seek out the cheapest food) to where wares are placed (most bought items are the furthest away from the counter so you have to walk through the entire mall to maybe pick up extra stuff or sweets on the counter so that kids that are staying in line for too long start nagging their parents)... there is SO MUCH stuff that unconciously gets you... because we are subconcious beeings. most of our thinking goes on beyond the veil. Our mind is just really REALLY good at making nicely sounding excuses.

Punishment is better. You're supposed to feel bad when dying, which reduces suiciders who fix debuffs, makes you want to survive more and increase tension.

 

[The Gaffer]

Not to sure if this been spoke about yet but on Navezgane map you have a some of the wasteland you cannot get into because of radiation, will we now be able to enter this area in Alpha 18?

 

[sillls]

The death penalty

You know... I never knew that the dying thing would be such a big deal.

For me, dying is something to avoid at all cost. There are plenty of times when I just don't do so well and I find myself in a bad way.

I fall and break my leg or just get hurt real bad, like lose most of my health bad. Or when the virus followed the theme of the game and the only way of getting cured was antibiotics.

That's when the virus got worse over a seven day period and it really took a toll on you. Seven days to die.

I didn't think, well I'm not doing so well so lets commit suicide. For me, it was another challenge to stay alive. When I started playing back in Alpha-9.3 that virus scared the crap out of me and added more to game play.

Don't get me wrong. It sucks when I find myself doing poorly but when I overcome that, I find the game much more rewarding.

Also when I make some really bad mistakes like underestimate zombies on hoard night and literally have to spend the night swimming in a lake all night just to stay alive and figure out how not to freeze to death while swimming.

I was like this is great!

To hear all this stuff about using suicide as a means to teleport or used as a get-out-of-jail-free-card just feels boring and the game play loses something in it.

I normally play SP so I don't really care about what others do but I don't understand why others would cheat themselves like that.

 

[RipClaw]

Punishment is better. You're supposed to feel bad when dying, which reduces suiciders who fix debuffs, makes you want to survive more and increase tension.

I don't need punishment to feel bad in a game after a death. Death in itself is enough for me to feel bad.

If someone commits suicide because he has a broken leg then he doesn't care about the game anyway. No punishment, no matter how severe, would prevent these players from using this tactic.

 

[Viktoriusiii]

Punishment is better. You're supposed to feel bad when dying, which reduces suiciders who fix debuffs, makes you want to survive more and increase tension.

taking away the reward IS the punishment. That was my whole argument. But it feels like a fairer argument.

remember wellness? If it was a bit better structured (since you could raise it to such a high level that dying became penaltyless) it was exactly what I was talking about. You got a reward (hp/stamina) for eating well and surviving.

Once you died you lost 10 points of that reward that you had to regain in a painfully long time.

 

[RipClaw]

taking away the reward IS the punishment. That was my whole argument. But it feels like a fairer argument.

Above all, it would not be a death penalty but a survival bonus. Survival bonus sounds much better than death penalty. I think most people don't realize how much psychology there is in games. The video linked by you shows that quite clearly.

 

[Gazz]

I'm not sure, gazz might know more. EDIT: If I skip your question its because I don't don't know or don't have the most informed answer usually.

Kinja was working on it at some point... because of the junk turret.

Unless he already did that, porting that to the block turrets is not happening for A18. It's not a game stopper.

 

[Kage848]

friendly challenge for Kage (or others if they wish)...
forget about A17 and what you used to do....

Welcome to A18, get yourself to an appropriate level (you'll know when it is if you're not dieing a lot) and get damn good gear and weapons, buy or find some useful mods and perk where the points will help you the most. have some food/water and firstaid with you... you most likely will find food on the way.

IF you go to a t5 poi and you're only ready for t2-3, then be prepared to fail. remember... gamestage will affect the types of zombies you meet and the loot.. BUT a t5 IS NOT MEANT for low level players or newbies... (that is not meant as an insult to anyone).

so my challenge is... do this and then let us know here in forum how you made out...

also... we testers have already and currently test this... also... we dont use external mods nor do we mod any xmls, our games are default.

now if you want fun and can manage it... then a team of 5 players will make a world of difference (if all are equal).

so again... actually look at this as a dare to actually enjoy it.

but the team does want to hear how the runs went.

This has me confused. Your saying that t5 towers ate only meant for endgame?

Doesn't your game stage make the enemies harder? I'd argue the tower will be much more manageable when your facing all normal zombies.

 

[NukemDed]

i do the towers as soon as i have about 250 rounds combined and something that shoots them. day 2 is normally fine. i just take my time.

 

[Kage848]

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.

You missed alot of the conversation. Understandable in this thread lol.

I never have 10k ammo. That was just an example. I usually have between 500-1k ammo. Now maybe you use no ammo going through a poi. There could be many reasons for that. Its irrelavent to me. I come out with negative ammo. I can only speak for myself and my own game.

All the extra stuff you get in there is stuff i can get elsewhere and without using ammo.

And for my game ammo is king.

- - - Updated - - -

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

Wait I'm confused. I'm not sure why but I never thought youd be one of the "let them play the way they want" guys.

 

[Kage848]

I'm sure people will have to edit it in the XML file. just like with NDT (Near Death Trauma). There needs to be a penalty to dying. its a survival game and people use dying to get around "annoying" mechanics because they know that if they kill themselves that they will be back to their old self with out the annoying 10-30 min debuff.
A 25% xp "tax" per death is a good one. it can easily be off set by the XP modifier slider. So idk why people are crying about it. go play creative mode if you don't like survival and the consequence of dying.

Let me be clear. I'm ok with it. But others wont be. Or maybe I'm wrong. Who knows.

Ps: going to get your bag is all the penalty I think the game needs. Having a double penalty is overboard imho. I like the exp penalty better tbh so I won't be dropping anything on death.

Pss: people that abuse death to travel dont bother me. Does not effect my game one bit.

 

[MechanicalLens]

Even if you're at gamestage of 1, there will always be radiated and feral zombies within the t5 buildings. If you want proof, just create a creative test world in Navezgane and fly to the top of the Shotgun Messiah Factory, for instance.

 

[Gazz]

Right now there is a hard loot list limit, which y'all are pretty close to maxing out (255 I think), so adding in special custom loot would get you even closer to that hard cap, so

The max cap for lootcontainer ids is 1023.

 

[Kage848]

Kage. Can you tell us how you feel about ammo in A17, especially regarding higher tier quests?

I thought T5 quests were bad. I stopped doing then ages ago. But that might have been a mistake. They can give an ammo reward, although not often. And I can sell that useless 5th green auger for dukes to buy ammo.

Thing i hated about t5 quests in a17, and maybe a18 too, is the t5 tower takes 2 days to complete. I hate having to spend the night there so I dont fail the quest. I'm not going through it at night and if i just stay somewhere quiet for the night it's a boring waste of time when i could be home mining, building or whatever.

- - - Updated - - -

The rewards don't match the trouble. I'd have it so the trader has high tier rewards for completing a t5. Like a cache of ammo, high end mods, mutated seeds, top tier weapons and armor, high end schematics and blueprints, and t5 quest only rewards.
This would not only make doing t5's worthwhile it would also make them a sought after endgame activity.

That's just how I see it anyway.

That's some good ideas there.

And to be fair I bet TFP will address this, sound like they already have.

I just think it needs to be talked about, on both sides. And let TFP balance as best they can.

 

[Kage848]

It should be obvious, we don't want players eating glass to get out of infection, dysentery, broken legs, etc. You are getting rewarded now by staying alive, you aren't losing XP. Feels great already. Your method is just reward and more reward. People would have their glass and eat it too with that design.
Our system takes away nothing. You die at level 42 you are always going to be level 42. It ensures people will avoid death no matter what, which they should, unless they think its a fair trade to get rid of infection to lose some XP. SOme will still eat glass, and we're fine with that now. Before no matter how you sliced it, people would suicide to get out of things because it was safe and convenient and had not much drawback. Now I think people will think twice and thank us for the game play it took to heal their leg or get rid of infection. Those "needs" produce great stories. Being stuck at a certain level might feel good to overcome.

If I had it my way I'd take away a full level, -5 to all attributes, gaining back 1 per day, respawn starving with 1 health and food and water how they were when you died. But thats my own hardcore version I'd like and realize that would be a nice mod and horrible for a retail release.

My god madmole. Thank the lord someone is there to tell you no lol.

Any chance we can get an option in sp to drop nothing on death? I dont think it's fair to double dip on death penalties. I'm sure you disagree but still, whatta say?