PC Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

[Gareee]

Ok, after watching the first 5 minutes of the new Dying light 2 play footage:

I REALLY want the para-sail for descending from high locations (the gyro code could be repurposed with new arm animations), And the grappling struggle minigame might be a nice addition as well. (Maybe a instant power shove knock down could be a book learnable skill?)

They have a contagion zone that could work like the radiation zone addition Joel mentioned, and the portable uv light defenses are really nice. Those could work in 7 days as well, and might make a nice new additional low lag powered trap defense to slow horde night attacks to give us more time to thin the herd.

I wonder if the slide knock down mechanic could also be added as a book unlockable melee skill?

We LOVED Dying light in a different way to love 7 days.

 

[Caesar65]

@Madmole that day day 84 horde night video was intense just watching,

I cant' wait to get my hands on A18. Those Demolisher zombies are bruisers to be sure, I did laugh when you blew up your own gyro and your f bombs after the fact. Awesome loved the video keep up the hard work.

 

[Thecolours]

Which weapon A18 has the potential to do the most damage per shot?

 

[Gazz]

Most likely the rocket launcher.

 

[DaVegaNL]

I'm all for new mechanics but you know what felt really samey? All the non-dungeon POI's with their repeated mechanics (zombie on the floor in middle of the room, zombie in the corner unobstructed by anything and killable from the doorway, walking into a building and seeing everything there is to see from the door, a room with a couch, a dresser, a tv on the wall, chairs, and drapes, maybe a duffel bag in the corner, go up stairs --> end of hall --> bedroom --> ladder --> attic) It grew old and new was made. In the future new new will be made and hopefully with new mechanics.
But why more of old?

I'm not against dungeon-style POI's. On the contrary, they certainly add something to the game. And make for great quests.

However, why would all these POI's be designed this way? Why would every building in a city have a basement or attic where one has to go through to get to the 'living areas'? Not to mention that all of these basements and attics are filled with the same décor (those same pallets with cement, the blue bags, old couches). Like I said before, it starts to feel old very quickly. Why more of the old, you asked?

Yeah you make a point that you can chop through a wall to get to the kitchen, like in the good old days (pretty much like your new avatar), but is that not the same as nerdpoling to the top of the roof where the good loot is? In other words, is that the intention of the system? Yes, you can chop into the kitchen of a house, but you still need to go through three bathrooms and their broken-through walls, to get to the living room (as an example). Fun? Yes. Fun after a long time? I don't think so.

Let's have 50% dungeons and 50% old-style POI's.

Edit: Man.. A whole post of mine without mentioning rocks or.. adult stuff.. I must be sick.

 

[meganoth]

Why would you do that? If you're not looking for an essential item, why would waste time switching POIs all the time for no reason? It seems inefficient and unnatural unless you know where the pinata rooms of dungeon are. It's like an artificial disadvantages that has to be taken to prevent the dungeons from harming the game.
You basically say meta-knowledge about the game is required to have a reason to ignore large parts of a prefab. Imo that's not a good argument. I mean the workstation and other important stuff could be as well deep inside the building why would stop looking for it on the ground floor?

Workstations in private houses are usually found in the cellar, and much less likely in the attic. And that is not 7D2D meta-knowledge, that is real world knowledge. As far as I remember you will find workstations in private POIs mainly in cellars too. I don't see Roland saying you should look for them on the ground floor.

To me your argument sounds like that: 'You can play in such a way that the dungeons don't feel artificial and linear'. Yes, maybe you can. And? That's not a good enough reason to have them in rough quantities.

That is a reason I can relate too. There might be a little too many design rules set up that restrict the designers into too similar designs. I'm refering especially to the one path rule that should be broken up much more often. Who cares if a dungeon is only half looted, this is a game that prides itself on replayability. Next time a player is in the same POI he might find the other path and be happy about not having seen it all the first time. Or he goes in a circle and gets lost. Not a bad way to increase anxiety levels in a survival game.

EDIT: Thought about it and yes, the ability to get lost was nearly removed from the game. Sometimes when zombies break the single path by going through walls or doors there is a chance our co-op group is having frantic discussions about "Where am I? Where are you? How do I get to you? I hear zombies. PAAANIC!!!" This is something the game should enforce, not prevent, especially in big buildings.

 

[meganoth]

However, why would all these POI's be designed this way? Why would every building in a city have a basement or attic where one has to go through to get to the 'living areas'? Not to mention that all of these basements and attics are filled with the same décor (those same pallets with cement, the blue bags, old couches). Like I said before, it starts to feel old very quickly. Why more of the old, you asked?

Yeah you make a point that you can chop through a wall to get to the kitchen, like in the good old days (pretty much like your new avatar), but is that not the same as nerdpoling to the top of the roof where the good loot is? In other words, is that the intention of the system? Yes, you can chop into the kitchen of a house, but you still need to go through three bathrooms and their broken-through walls, to get to the living room (as an example). Fun? Yes. Fun after a long time? I don't think so.

This is exactly Rolands point: It is you who thinks he needs to follow the path and not break through walls and not nerpole. Neither the game nor the developers (as far as I know) have ever stated that you should not do that. Maybe this is a myth the users of this forum created for themselves because getting at the best loot was always too predictable and easy.

Which points to the real fault: The big loot-bonanza end room. And the solution: Distribute or randomize the loot in POIs

 

[Lonestarcanuck]

what is the logic behind not being able to get seeds from Snowberry plant? maybe perk tie to 4/5 like Mutant Corn?

 

[meganoth]

I thought that was the whole idea of him having that light you had to shoot. If you could shoot it before he exploded then he would take out some of his zed brothers for you. If he got past and exploded on his own then he would also damage surrounding blocks. You were pretty overwhelmed by them on horde night so it looked like most if not all get to you or your doorway. What difference would shooting them do if they exploded either way. I couldn't tell if they did not explode if you did kill them. That would not make sense for the light then as if I had to kill him instead of shooting the light to stop him from exploding what is point of the light? I may be seeing it all wrong and may have to watch the video over a few times. Or someone in the know could explain a bit more about how he works.

The idea is that if he gets to a wall, he will destroy it fast (not by exploding, but with his hands). If you kill him near you he might also kill you like a cop does. So the best result is If you shoot him from afar so that he explodes without damaging structure and he even might kill other zombies. Unlike the cop you can use him to your advantage if you let him near your structures and then explode him around other zombies.

If he does much damage to structure (without changing anything else about him), you have practically no options anymore as soon as he advanced to your walls. And you can't prevent that all the time.

what is the logic behind not being able to get seeds from Snowberry plant? maybe perk tie to 4/5 like Mutant Corn?

Was asked a few times already: Because snowberry juice is so powerful. If you could mass-produce it they might have to tone it down to the level of other food you can mass-produce. Also variety, not everything needs to be craftable.

On the contrary for the stealth player. You can stealth past every zombie and open up every loot container without waking a single zombie sometimes, or at most stay crouched and kill a couple. If you stay in stealth and use a sledge...easy peasy. A medium sized house...10 minutes. A bookstore, 5. Albeit it takes some perks, but quickly doable.

Yes for a player who knows what he does. But make one mistake or with bad luck(*) and you are surrounded because your exit is blocked by the zombies you didn't clear behind you.

(*) stealth seems not to be a fixed range beyond which you can't be detected. Stealth seems just to reduce the chance for zombies near you waking. If I'm wrong, Fataal may strike me with lightning.

 

[RestInPieces]

This is exactly Rolands point: It is you who thinks he needs to follow the path and not break through walls and not nerpole. Neither the game nor the developers (as far as I know) have ever stated that you should not do that. Maybe this is a myth the users of this forum created for themselves because getting at the best loot was always too predictable and easy.

It's not some baseless myth, it simply is not efficient to do so most of the time. Roland conveniently mentioned the 1% early game and how you can break into a kitchen to get a cooking pot, some curtain cloth or whatever. But in most cases the player will loot the whole POI, not just enter a room, kill almost half of the POI's zombies, which will hear them entering if they do not use stealth, and then just leave - that would be nonsensical - as nonsensical as suggesting that the player has the "choice" to do something inefficient such as destroying walls, in order not to be subjected to a linear experience. Players are guided by incentives after all and it is the designer's job to guide them through that experience - and as you mention below:

Which points to the real fault: The big loot-bonanza end room. And the solution: Distribute or randomize the loot in POIs

Completely agree, and can't stress enough how important this is.

 

[Zombie_Jam]

I'm not against dungeon-style POI's. On the contrary, they certainly add something to the game. And make for great quests.
However, why would all these POI's be designed this way? Why would every building in a city have a basement or attic where one has to go through to get to the 'living areas'? Not to mention that all of these basements and attics are filled with the same décor (those same pallets with cement, the blue bags, old couches). Like I said before, it starts to feel old very quickly. Why more of the old, you asked?

Yeah you make a point that you can chop through a wall to get to the kitchen, like in the good old days (pretty much like your new avatar), but is that not the same as nerdpoling to the top of the roof where the good loot is? In other words, is that the intention of the system? Yes, you can chop into the kitchen of a house, but you still need to go through three bathrooms and their broken-through walls, to get to the living room (as an example). Fun? Yes. Fun after a long time? I don't think so.

Let's have 50% dungeons and 50% old-style POI's.

Edit: Man.. A whole post of mine without mentioning rocks or.. adult stuff.. I must be sick.

Try searching out my previous posts. We addressed this.

I'm completely with you. It's unrealistic and quite frankly stupid that pretty much every house has been done up like that. As much as people see it as a way of extending playtime, I see it as artificial, and more of a way of slowing you down. Same end - different perspective.

If we had more old style, but spruced up houses the place would feel a lot better. I will repeat my own personal objection - the whole 'every house a dungeon' is precisely the reason I do very little to no looting.

I think Roland made the point than another poster on here that one may 'take what one needs from a POI then move along', a point he reiterated rather less intelligently. Why?

Because old houses had some familiarity, and even without that familiarity, one could raid a house as a house quickly and easily with hit and run tactics.Try it with a new POI.

Walk in, fall though the floor and either die smashing your legs in the basement or nerdpole back out so you dont end up forced to navigate, then break walls down just to be met with barbed wire and walls made out of fridges and microwaves just to be forced to fight and navigate your way through a complex mess to get to a room with some cupboards. Which may be kitchen cupboards, not good when you need a jacket - and vice versa re: side stands and food.

It's a nice feature on a stealth build, it's nice as a new addition, and it's perfectly fine in moderation but as it is - its Just. Too. Much.

Proposed suggestion (one among others) is a slider for random gen to specify the player chosen Dungeon POI to 'old style' (spruced up) buildings.

*On Topic*

Two questions:

1. Regarding the new system, should I choose to spec into crafting (my own stuff), farming, and mining - is that going to gimp my personal ability to defend myself? (Aside from traps, crafted weapons, and the grind to get those things)

2. Since weapons have randomised stats, does this also apply to player weapons? And if so, what will define the 'better quality' which separates player created vs random looted weapons?

Corollary to No.2, so yeah, maybe three questions

 

[madmole]

autoturrets just shoot at what they see. so limit what they see by using the camera section to direct it upwards into the sky. that way all the turrets camera sees is the vultures. doesnt waste ammo that way, and keeps the buzzards off your back
for dart traps, pressure plates is the way to go, but some have complained that too many pressure plates can cause lag. in SP I have not experienced this.

edit: for future use, can we get a zoom in and zoom out for the camera on the turrets and motion sensor?

Oh I thought you meant there was a way to rig the dart traps to take out the vultures, yeah makes sense now.

It would be nice to adjust the field of view on the motion sensor.

 

[AlabasterW]

I love the demolisher zombies! The design is rad as hell; I like how it looks like a biker realized he was turning and just strapped some C4 to himself to go out with a bang :smile-new:

The beeping is terrifying!

 

[madmole]

Joel, can i ask you a question.While watching your videos, i noticed, that nail gun has grey durability line and no quality tier. So it means that in A18 nailgun will be a default repairing item with no quality, tier and also unmoddable or it is like for testing?

Thanks in advance.

There was no good reason for the nail gun to have quality ranges as it was never intended to be a weapon.

 

[madmole]

I'm just curious, has anything to do with treasure maps/treasures changed in A18?

I don't know for sure. We're talking about every 10 to 20 blocks tighten the radius because you can still get that bum luck that requires digging up 10k of clay to finally find it.

 

[Roland]

@Pille: My point pure and simple is that you never have to fully clear and explore a POI nor do you have to follow the path of least resistance. For those who struggle to find the fun or even the ability to stay alive during the early game because they are spending so much time going through entire POIs there is an alternative to that and it has nothing to do with how a building has been designed and everything to do with player choice.

@Meganoth: I agree that randomizing best loot location or spreading it around more would be awesome. I’m also in favor of mazes instead of one path gauntlets. That would only enhance the experience more. Removing the lights that hint toward “a proper path” is would go miles all by itself in my opinion.

@Davega & Poptard: I agree additional decorations and textures would be grand if they can do it for variety’s sake.

@everyone: the level designers did their job with full knowledge of voxel destruction technology. There is nothing wrong with going to the roof first or going through a door or a window or building your own stairs in a stairwell shaft that only has remnants of the old stairs. No level designer is lying awake at night shaking with fury that players somehow managed to bypass their lighted pathway.

They would’ve landclaimed their POIs to force platforming and staying on their path if that was the case.

 

[madmole]

Thought and care. And boxes to go. A little more complexity and no inventory saving because now you have boxes + bullet stack going into a T5 POI making that 2 slots. And added time to unpack a stack every 10 zds because of the decreased size.
I still don't feel the fun. You say It works and there you were with almost a full inventory when you always work towards a lighter one.

May I suggest a similar design ? Reducing gas stack to 120 and allow gas boxes/barrels to be a thing to pack gas. Good stuff -_-.

I will leave this at that. Maybe it plays better.

I can clearly perceive the only thing that this design creates is possibly? Probably? Maybe? A little more depth in the tough survival aspect of the game resulting in annoyance when you achieve late game.

But then again late game is always a fight for bullets so it wouldn't really be much of a problem.

There's a game on Steam called "Subsistence". It's a survival game that does some mechanics like this one among other questionable ones. It's a chore, but somehow generates a brief and mild acomplishment .

Most players will NEVER get their hands on the bulk crafted boxes unless they play MP and share books, cheat or play a 200 hour game. I'm pretty sure its a bug I can bulk craft plain 762 ammo right now. So get used to the smaller ammo stacks and prepare accordingly. I still don't see what is annoying about any of it. The bulk crafting is to save mats, not to save space, but its nice that it does. You cannot take bullets and craft them into a bundle, only craft a bundle from 80% of the resources to make 100 rounds, and that is after finding all 7 books on a particular weapon that uses the ammo you want.

 

[meganoth]

It's not some baseless myth, it simply is not efficient to do so most of the time. Roland conveniently mentioned the 1% early game and how you can break into a kitchen to get a cooking pot, some curtain cloth or whatever. But in most cases the player will loot the whole POI, not just enter a room, kill almost half of the POI's zombies, which will hear them entering if they do not use stealth, and then just leave - that would be nonsensical - as nonsensical as suggesting that the player has the "choice" to do something inefficient such as destroying walls, in order not to be subjected to a linear experience. Players are guided by incentives after all and it is the designer's job to guide them through that experience - and as you mention below:

You forgot that the player as easily can make a ladder or nerdpole to the top floor, destroy a wall and raid the likely "loot-room" there. This is by far the optimal strategy even if you sometimes fail to find that room. So yes, following the path IS a myth and leaving the path is not nonsensical. Anyway, since we agree on the big point (distribute thte loot), who cares if it's a myth. :cocksure:

Because old houses had some familiarity, and even without that one could raid a house as a house quickly and easily with hit and run tactics.Try it with a new POI.

Selective memory on your part: The old houses were easy to raid and because of that had mediocre loot. Practically they were ignored by everyone after day 14 because of this.

2. Since weapons have randomised stats, does this also apply to player weapons? And if so, what will define the 'better quality' which separates player created vs random looted weapons?

Crafted weapons are not randomized and provide average values for their quality level.

 

[madmole]

Yeh and that actually concerns me... are late game players with thousands of late game hours going to have a challenge? I know for game design/business purposes you have to cater difficulty to a certain demographic, but day 84 is no joke, should be past the days any "casual" plays, and you took it like it was cake. You were getting beat on pretty hard and were going through bandages yes, but it wasn't always necessary.
Yes you had some "oh poop" moments but overall it was a pretty successful night for you.

/asking for a friend, I suck at this game.

- - - Updated - - -

If they're aimed upward, pretty much only vultures will be up there TO shoot. You can pre-aim the turrets after placing and powering them.

I used to be like an aim bot with supreme strategy at quake 25 years ago and played 8 hours a day every day for a couple of years. So my reflexes and skill were what made it look easy. I am specialized in heavy armor, most players might go with light as the movement penalties suck. I got the letter jacket and every advanced fitting you can find to make the armor bearable to move in. Most players will hate heavy armor its slow AF and wrecks your stamina, but I gain stamina with every machinegun kill so I was able to run around in the yard and not get caught.

So if you playing to your builds strengths is important. Its not the one character build game anymore, its an RPG with important choices now. I'll never be able to craft gyro's because I'm not willing to play 300 hours to unlock that. I murdered 500 guys last night and gained one level basically. So you can see how slow it is to level at a high level, IMO level 80 is going to be the average guy's attention span before rolling a new build for ♥♥♥♥s and giggles. That will be 100+ hours in at this rate unless you change the xp slider. Even so unlocking everything is a thing of the past unless you just play one build for months or 8 hours a day or something.

If I were a different build I'd be playing different and my base would be different.

 

[Callum123456789]

hey madmole hope your having a good day (; I am first day back at school and its good