PC Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

[madmole]

Now we're talking. =)
I've been eyeballing those rad1 and rad2 zones for a while now; rad1, you can go in but need iodine pills, rad2 you better bring your hazmat suit, that kind of thing...

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I hope y'all officially do a booth at a con; I'd go, but unfortunately most of the cons seem to be during my work season.

Yeah I imagine pills will suffice in the biome, but the POI would have stronger radiation so you would need to get in and out quick or blow through all your meds, or have a hazmat suit. I'd want the hazmat to degrade every few seconds or so, so you have to repair it if you screw around too long and of course you take more rad damage while its off and being repaired.

With the new unified buff setup we're moving towards with infection and diseases I can see how it will work now.

 

[CannedSmeef]

I'm not sure if this is off topic or not, but madmole has repeatedly mentioned testers in his videos/posts--is this a volunteer program of sorts? I'd love to participate and help bugtest the game if possible.

 

[Guppycur]

I'm not sure if this is off topic or not, but madmole has repeatedly mentioned testers in his videos/posts--is this a volunteer program of sorts? I'd love to participate and help bugtest the game if possible.

These days I think they pick and choose people who frequent the bug/report section of the forum and can follow the rules, but I'm guessing it also depends on their needs. But yeh, most are people from the community.

 

[Roland]

I'm not sure if this is off topic or not, but madmole has repeatedly mentioned testers in his videos/posts--is this a volunteer program of sorts? I'd love to participate and help bugtest the game if possible.

It's a job that you apply for when there are openings. Some have been hired from these forums. Best is to distinguish yourself by writing top notch bug reports and showing that you have an even keeled personality by not flying into a deva rant if nothing happens from one or more of your reports immediately and generally show you can get along with others and take and follow any directions the QA staff might give you in refining your report and repro steps.

If the testing staff come to know you and like you and respect what you've submitted in the forum format you have a better chance of being hired when and if applications are asked for in the future.

 

[Guppycur]

It's a job that you apply for when there are openings. Some have been hired from these forums. Best is to distinguish yourself by writing top notch bug reports and showing that you have an even keeled personality by not flying into a deva rant if nothing happens from one or more of your reports immediately and generally show you can get along with others and take and follow any directions the QA staff might give you in refining your report and repro steps.
If the testing staff know you and like you and respect what you've submitted in the forum format you have a better chance of being hired when and if applications are asked for in the future.

"Fix this game! It crashed, and is total crap! No wonder you have to have streamers promote you, your game sux!"

...like that?

 

[Survager]

So, MM, can you make a perk to throw stones, granades, coctails Molotov further? :smile-new:

 

[Roland]

Nothing is stopping you from looking at a house and saying, ok this looks like the front door, and break in and loot that room or two, and then leave. IRL if you were to say loot a living room then heard footsteps upstairs you would probably run. Nothing says you have to "clear" a POI. You can break in loot a few rooms and run off to the next one.

Thank you! I have been saying this since A17 experimental and people still act as though the ONLY way to play POI's is to clear them completely.

Newsflash: You can simply clear a room or two and get back on the road with whatever you found.

Newsflash: You can enter the POI at any point and not just the "intended" gauntlet entrance.

Newsflash: You can spend whatever amount of time you wish and then stop and leave at any moment.

This is why what Guppy says he wants with dangerous locations instead of leveled difficulty won't work-- because people will keep entering the wasteland on Day 1 and die over and over and over again and then complain that the game is too tedious, difficult, grindy, etc. This is the same as people entering a dungeon POI on day one and instead of breaking into the kitchen and grabbing a cooking pot and leaving for a total of 15 minutes they will spend the next 2 hours trying to clear the entire house and possibly even dying a couple of times and then rage about how awful it is that every POI is a dungeon POI.

The next time you come to a house walk around the friggin thing and look in the windows and you'll probably locate the kitchen. Break in and you have a good chance of coming away with at least a bottle of water, a can of food, and a cooking pot. THEN LEAVE!

Okay....done....

#triggeredbymadmole

 

[MechanicalLens]

Yeah I imagine pills will suffice in the biome, but the POI would have stronger radiation so you would need to get in and out quick or blow through all your meds, or have a hazmat suit. I'd want the hazmat to degrade every few seconds or so, so you have to repair it if you screw around too long and of course you take more rad damage while its off and being repaired.
With the new unified buff setup we're moving towards with infection and diseases I can see how it will work now.

Will this radiation be visible on the map, and thus, will it be possible to map out these "pockets of radiation" (if what is what they are)? Also, maybe I read a previous post wrong, but would the wasteland biome be the only biome that contains radiation, or will radiation be a threat across most biomes? (Excluding the forest biome, I'm guessing.)

Also, would it be possible for the traders' initial quests (Tier 1) to have a higher chance/guaranteed to send you to a POI within the forest biome, assuming there is such a biome nearby? As you do these early quests, you would inevitably gather clothes that could better suit you for other biomes for tier II and up quests (desert and snow), thus creating a little bit of progression. Just an idea.

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Thank you! I have been saying this since A17 experimental and people still act as though the ONLY way to play POI's is to clear them completely.
Newsflash: You can simply clear a room or two and get back on the road with whatever you found.

Newsflash: You can enter the POI at any point and not just the "intended" gauntlet entrance.

Newsflash: You can spend whatever amount of time you wish and then stop and leave at any moment.

This is why what Guppy says he wants with dangerous locations instead of leveled difficulty won't work-- because people will keep entering the wasteland on Day 1 and die over and over and over again and then complain that the game is too tedious, difficult, grindy, etc. This is the same as people entering a dungeon POI on day one and instead of breaking into the kitchen and grabbing a cooking pot and leaving for a total of 15 minutes they will spend the next 2 hours trying to clear the entire house and possibly even dying a couple of times and then rage about how awful it is that every POI is a dungeon POI.

The next time you come to a house walk around the friggin thing and look in the windows and you'll probably locate the kitchen. Break in and you have a good chance of coming away with at least a bottle of water, a can of food, and a cooking pot. THEN LEAVE!

Okay....done....

#triggeredbymadmole

Well said! Sometimes, I'll come across a house with a garage that has some garage storage boxes inside. Sometimes, I just want those garage storage boxes. Or I just want to raid the kitchen.

 

[Roland]

thank you buddy, and yes, i can imagine it XD
now that you said that, i think that happened in one of my gameplays lol.

also, Roland kinda hinted 3 other "secret" enemies. do you know what he's talking about? or is just a joke?

Not for A18 but just ideas that I've heard the devs talking about possibly for the future. Of course, now we can add a possible fourth with the acid loogie ability.

Point being: The devs love the idea of special infected and think they are fun and so they aren't going anywhere.

 

[4sheetzngeegles]

That said, we're slowly working towards making all the non forest biomes more dangerous and the wasteland super dangerous so the risk reward is higher than normal there. Basically inflate the gamestage by 100 or so in the wasteland and add radiation to deal with. We'll have to let the player know its dangerous in these other biomes and get all spawning in the forest to make this move. The biome GS code is there but we aren't using it so you modders can jack it up once A18 hits the streets.

I'd like to get gamestaged biome spawns too, or GS'd random encounters.

So is your plan to have it get progressively more intense biome spawnwise as you approach the center of the cities. Risk/Reward. And post the most loot heavy POI's in the center

 

[Roland]

Well said! Sometimes, I'll come across a house with a garage that has some garage storage boxes inside. Sometimes, I just want those garage storage boxes. Or I just want to raid the kitchen.

Thanks. It reminds me of when the developer put gun safes in the game thinking they would be something players would break into once they had better quality tools but lots of players tried to break them open on Day 1 with a brown stone axe and it took forever (of course). Instead of marking the location on their map and vowing to come back later with an iron pickaxe, they instead came straight to the forums to complain about how grindy the new gunsafes were and that breaking them down was zero fun....

 

[MechanicalLens]

Thanks. It reminds me of when the developer put gun safes in the game thinking they would be something players would break into once they had better quality tools but lots of players tried to break them open on Day 1 with a brown stone axe and it took forever (of course). Instead of marking the location on their map and vowing to come back later with an iron pickaxe, they instead came straight to the forums to complain about how grindy the new gunsafes were and that breaking them down was zero fun....

While I do think the new Hardened Chests could do with a slight buff in terms of loot (just my opinion), do you know what I do? Early game, I mark down every gun safe/wall safe on the map that I find, and I come back to them once I have the tools to break them down, and the Lucky Looter level (or formerly, Scavenging/Quality Joe) to make them worthwhile breaking into in the first place.

 

[Pille]

This is why what Guppy says he wants with dangerous locations instead of leveled difficulty won't work-- because people will keep entering the wasteland on Day 1 and die over and over and over again and then complain that the game is too tedious, difficult, grindy, etc.

This argument can be applied to almost any game mechanic. People will always complain. That alone is not sufficient reason to have a non-optional rubber band difficulty level.

 

[ecv]

Thanks. It reminds me of when the developer put gun safes in the game thinking they would be something players would break into once they had better quality tools but lots of players tried to break them open on Day 1 with a brown stone axe and it took forever (of course). Instead of marking the location on their map and vowing to come back later with an iron pickaxe, they instead came straight to the forums to complain about how grindy the new gunsafes were and that breaking them down was zero fun....

Don't forget the expectations of high level guns, on day one, without any perks. There should always be high level guns in there, right? Since it takes ages to get into them.

I only go for them when I find an early auger. I suppose that won't work as well anymore in a18? I usually look out for a bank when I find an auger in early game, I feel they have gotten rarer somehow. Rwg. Moderate zombie threat though, and lots of safes

 

[MechanicalLens]

I've been wondering for a little bit now, why were conventional wall safes upgraded in health from 1500 to the 2500 they are today? They almost always have "lesser loot" than gun safes/hardened chests. Just curious.

 

[Guppycur]

This argument can be applied to almost any game mechanic. People will always complain. That alone is not sufficient reason to have a non-optional rubber band difficulty level.

I mean, it worked great when cities at 0,0 were dangerous and going into them unprepared was suicide... People not only adapted, but they loved it and continue to ask for it back. Hell, that was back when the game was at its greatest, but yeh Roland, it won't work. (Sigh)

 

[madmole]

These days I think they pick and choose people who frequent the bug/report section of the forum and can follow the rules, but I'm guessing it also depends on their needs. But yeh, most are people from the community.

Yes, prove your abilities by posting bugs with concise ways to reproduce them and if we like your style we might contact you.

 

[madmole]

So, MM, can you make a perk to throw stones, granades, coctails Molotov further? :smile-new:

No because I spend countless hours learning the right drop and hate it when physics change.

 

[madmole]

Thank you! I have been saying this since A17 experimental and people still act as though the ONLY way to play POI's is to clear them completely.
Newsflash: You can simply clear a room or two and get back on the road with whatever you found.

Newsflash: You can enter the POI at any point and not just the "intended" gauntlet entrance.

Newsflash: You can spend whatever amount of time you wish and then stop and leave at any moment.

This is why what Guppy says he wants with dangerous locations instead of leveled difficulty won't work-- because people will keep entering the wasteland on Day 1 and die over and over and over again and then complain that the game is too tedious, difficult, grindy, etc. This is the same as people entering a dungeon POI on day one and instead of breaking into the kitchen and grabbing a cooking pot and leaving for a total of 15 minutes they will spend the next 2 hours trying to clear the entire house and possibly even dying a couple of times and then rage about how awful it is that every POI is a dungeon POI.

The next time you come to a house walk around the friggin thing and look in the windows and you'll probably locate the kitchen. Break in and you have a good chance of coming away with at least a bottle of water, a can of food, and a cooking pot. THEN LEAVE!

Okay....done....

#triggeredbymadmole

Yes, if you play like its real life, run from dangers its incredibly easy to survive. Its always text book horror movie mistakes that get you killed. Take Rolands example, the dude says Hey I'm starving lets break into this house and see if there is any food. They get in there, find some food, heck even a beer. Instead of leaving suddenly they think they are invincible and think ah lets just clear the whole place out, what could go wrong? Like get what you need, and move on, play it safe.

 

[madmole]

Will this radiation be visible on the map, and thus, will it be possible to map out these "pockets of radiation" (if what is what they are)? Also, maybe I read a previous post wrong, but would the wasteland biome be the only biome that contains radiation, or will radiation be a threat across most biomes? (Excluding the forest biome, I'm guessing.)

I'd guess the entire wasteland is radiated and POIS have more radiation. So if you are passing through you can survive but if you are there too long or start looting you will need gear/meds to pull it off.