PC Alpha 18 feedback and balancing thread
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Trunks_Budo
New member
I gave alpha 18 an honest try and got to day 44 without dying. You can learn how to adapt to rage mode and glancing blows, but you can't just always go for headshots like you used to be able to. With firearms headshots are easy enough, but melee requires keeping distance between you and the enemy zombie, thus it is necessary for one to use the knife and spear if they want to have a safe melee combat experience. Essentially you power attack each zombie with the knife in a horde, give them bleeds, then spam spear throws while keeping a safe distance; If one triggers rage mode and starts running at you, you switch to your firearm (I use the pistol) to keep them at bay until your stamina is recharged enough to sprint some distance between you.
The only aspect I don't like is the fact that attributes exist, I believe the game would allow for much more player freedom and creativity if the wall of attributes was removed in regards to how one chooses to specialize their character. For example, maybe I want to be able to put 3 points into sexual tyrannosaurus, then 3 points directly into living off the land. But in the current build you can't do that, it's a grindy chore to do that because you have to fulfill the attribute requirements first. If anything, just have one universal perk list that you can invest into at-will, and bring back/create other perks to give more player selection diversity. Things like Olympic Swimmer, you know? I actually liked that, if I happened to generate an island-based world. Maybe you could create weapon-based perks also, like Spear, knife, and club etc, all weapon types, and add them to the universal perks list. A player can gain experience for weapon perks through usage, or point investment, just like alpha 15/16. Remove the wall, add more selections to choose from, promote player creativity.
Right now the game seems linear in design, you're kind of punishing yourself if you don't level up better barter and lucky looter, and what sucks is if you want those, you have to invest in perception and intellect, even if you don't favor any of the weapons associated with those trees. The best recourse, in my opinion, is to change the leveling system to allow for instant selection of any perk, while adding a greater quantity of diversified perks to the universal list. Experience required doesn't need adjustment, I like how grindy leveling gets around level 30, it promotes more long-term play and encourages one to combat blood moon hordes for experience rather than just running away on a bicycle. Even at level 40, I got a solid 3 level ups on my day 21 horde night just by utilizing a good fortress, some grenades/pipe bombs, and my firearms. Made me look forward to horde night even more, encouraged me to take my potential success or failure more seriously.
Random gen is kind of wonky in the current experimental build available to us, the roads are nowhere near as clean and inter-connected as Navezgane. My usual dislikes remain but they're smaller issues, like how you can never repair a sloped road back to its former state if you put a wood frame on it. Once you displace that terrain, it's permanent, and through rigorous trial and error I deduced it could not be undone. My beautiful sloped road leading away from my rangers station base was no longer beautiful, or sloped, nor could it be restored to such. Water as well, that dipping effect occurs and breaks worldly immersion from time-to-time. That marina POI with the large boat, I recommend you guys put a support pillar beneath it. I literally harvested a garbage bag on it then the entire boat collapsed and created a massive dip on the shore line next to the marina, which was impossible to repair.
Zombie movements are something I've gotten used to, you just can't go for headshots as much anymore, with spear throws you're best off aiming for the body, as 2 body shots knocks down the majority of zombie types, then the third throw can be a headshot, since the zombie is getting up and it's way easier to land the headshot in that case. Using bleeding effects and running away is a good strategy too, stab then run, even in a POI you can close a door and continually repair it while they bleed out. I can often get repetitive headshot power-attacks with the knife, but it's 50/50, sometimes I miss repeatedly until my stamina runs out, other times I nail their head 4 times in a row and they promptly flop to the floor dead. Best option in my experience is to cause a bleed and run, use the pistol for emergencies, and use the spear while they're bleeding. Bleed effects debilitate movement speed now as well, if you specialize into Deep Cuts, which only adds viability to this build.
Lastly if you guys want to challenge yourselves, play on 25% loot abundance. Just put 1 point into Living off the Land and 1 point into Iron Gut, then you can amass Snowberries 2 at a time, and eat them safely. You should get enough canned food from questing, but in the off chance you can't or don't, you have emergency food. The knife/spear strategy ensures you can tackle a death is death run, you just need to learn how to construct a good horde base. I prefer two concrete towers connected by an Iron Bar bridge, with large Iron Bar walkways around the top of each tower. Just load the floor beneath the towers with Barbed Wire Traps to slow movement, and spam grenades and gunfire for maximum experience gain. You'll definitely need to prioritize buying the crucible from the shop, because if you're never dying, the gamestage is going to make sure you have a lot of cops and demolishers coming your way later on. You NEED reinforced steel structures at that point. Right now you have no choice but to get level 10 intellect to make your own crucible, so perhaps for the first two weeks you could invest in intellect and Advanced Engineering, make a crucible, then respecialize with the Fergit'n'elixer to something else. Kind of brings me back to the point about attributes being unwelcomed, you have to get beyond the end game at this point just to have level 5 deep cuts and level 5 heavy armor. I think this game needs attributes to be stripped from it, and it benefits from a large perk list.
I'd like to apologize for my behavior in the Alpha 18 developer diary, I was in a different place mentally. I was channeling my insecurities/misfortunes into the mistreatment/belittlement of strangers, even the developers who are doing their best to make the game better, and I feel sorry for doing that. It's a good game with a lot of good qualities, requires practice to master, and at this point, my only main problems with it after learning everything it has to offer is my problem with the world, IE water and terrain physics, as well as the attribute-gating. Remove attributes and refine terrain and in my opinion, 7 Days to Die will warrant a full release. But you developers are perfectionists, so maybe another five alphas after that point just to make sure your vision is met lol.
The only aspect I don't like is the fact that attributes exist, I believe the game would allow for much more player freedom and creativity if the wall of attributes was removed in regards to how one chooses to specialize their character. For example, maybe I want to be able to put 3 points into sexual tyrannosaurus, then 3 points directly into living off the land. But in the current build you can't do that, it's a grindy chore to do that because you have to fulfill the attribute requirements first. If anything, just have one universal perk list that you can invest into at-will, and bring back/create other perks to give more player selection diversity. Things like Olympic Swimmer, you know? I actually liked that, if I happened to generate an island-based world. Maybe you could create weapon-based perks also, like Spear, knife, and club etc, all weapon types, and add them to the universal perks list. A player can gain experience for weapon perks through usage, or point investment, just like alpha 15/16. Remove the wall, add more selections to choose from, promote player creativity.
Right now the game seems linear in design, you're kind of punishing yourself if you don't level up better barter and lucky looter, and what sucks is if you want those, you have to invest in perception and intellect, even if you don't favor any of the weapons associated with those trees. The best recourse, in my opinion, is to change the leveling system to allow for instant selection of any perk, while adding a greater quantity of diversified perks to the universal list. Experience required doesn't need adjustment, I like how grindy leveling gets around level 30, it promotes more long-term play and encourages one to combat blood moon hordes for experience rather than just running away on a bicycle. Even at level 40, I got a solid 3 level ups on my day 21 horde night just by utilizing a good fortress, some grenades/pipe bombs, and my firearms. Made me look forward to horde night even more, encouraged me to take my potential success or failure more seriously.
Random gen is kind of wonky in the current experimental build available to us, the roads are nowhere near as clean and inter-connected as Navezgane. My usual dislikes remain but they're smaller issues, like how you can never repair a sloped road back to its former state if you put a wood frame on it. Once you displace that terrain, it's permanent, and through rigorous trial and error I deduced it could not be undone. My beautiful sloped road leading away from my rangers station base was no longer beautiful, or sloped, nor could it be restored to such. Water as well, that dipping effect occurs and breaks worldly immersion from time-to-time. That marina POI with the large boat, I recommend you guys put a support pillar beneath it. I literally harvested a garbage bag on it then the entire boat collapsed and created a massive dip on the shore line next to the marina, which was impossible to repair.
Zombie movements are something I've gotten used to, you just can't go for headshots as much anymore, with spear throws you're best off aiming for the body, as 2 body shots knocks down the majority of zombie types, then the third throw can be a headshot, since the zombie is getting up and it's way easier to land the headshot in that case. Using bleeding effects and running away is a good strategy too, stab then run, even in a POI you can close a door and continually repair it while they bleed out. I can often get repetitive headshot power-attacks with the knife, but it's 50/50, sometimes I miss repeatedly until my stamina runs out, other times I nail their head 4 times in a row and they promptly flop to the floor dead. Best option in my experience is to cause a bleed and run, use the pistol for emergencies, and use the spear while they're bleeding. Bleed effects debilitate movement speed now as well, if you specialize into Deep Cuts, which only adds viability to this build.
Lastly if you guys want to challenge yourselves, play on 25% loot abundance. Just put 1 point into Living off the Land and 1 point into Iron Gut, then you can amass Snowberries 2 at a time, and eat them safely. You should get enough canned food from questing, but in the off chance you can't or don't, you have emergency food. The knife/spear strategy ensures you can tackle a death is death run, you just need to learn how to construct a good horde base. I prefer two concrete towers connected by an Iron Bar bridge, with large Iron Bar walkways around the top of each tower. Just load the floor beneath the towers with Barbed Wire Traps to slow movement, and spam grenades and gunfire for maximum experience gain. You'll definitely need to prioritize buying the crucible from the shop, because if you're never dying, the gamestage is going to make sure you have a lot of cops and demolishers coming your way later on. You NEED reinforced steel structures at that point. Right now you have no choice but to get level 10 intellect to make your own crucible, so perhaps for the first two weeks you could invest in intellect and Advanced Engineering, make a crucible, then respecialize with the Fergit'n'elixer to something else. Kind of brings me back to the point about attributes being unwelcomed, you have to get beyond the end game at this point just to have level 5 deep cuts and level 5 heavy armor. I think this game needs attributes to be stripped from it, and it benefits from a large perk list.
I'd like to apologize for my behavior in the Alpha 18 developer diary, I was in a different place mentally. I was channeling my insecurities/misfortunes into the mistreatment/belittlement of strangers, even the developers who are doing their best to make the game better, and I feel sorry for doing that. It's a good game with a lot of good qualities, requires practice to master, and at this point, my only main problems with it after learning everything it has to offer is my problem with the world, IE water and terrain physics, as well as the attribute-gating. Remove attributes and refine terrain and in my opinion, 7 Days to Die will warrant a full release. But you developers are perfectionists, so maybe another five alphas after that point just to make sure your vision is met lol.
You probably tried an x8 scope, I don't think they ever could be put into a pistol. x2 and x4 scopes work in pistols.
There is this thread: https://7daystodie.com/forums/showthread.php?142298-Zombie-Counts-and-Options
I believe the books needs some tweaks:
Needle & Thread books reward is stupid. BDU is easily found in game. It shouldnt be a reward. Vol 7 allowing to craft cargo pockets is much more rewarding.
Wasteland Treasures reward is underwhelming. Military fiber can be found, bought and scrapped into. The time it takes to get all 7 books (about 60 lvls worth of playthrough - unless you're lucky), military fiber is barely needed anymore. Mineral water book is a more fitting reward, as people dont care about water anymore, since mineral water is so easy to make.
What's the point of one shoting wooden blocks with a shotgun, anyways? (shotgun messiah reward)
To me, these are the most troubling problems with the book rewards and I think it needs balancing (improving).
If we take scrap armor, iron armor and steel armor as tier 1, 2 and 3 heavy armor.
And padded, leather and military as Tier 1, 2 and 3 light armor.
I think it's a bit ♥♥♥♥ed up that a tier 2 set of heavy armor will provide more armor ratings than a tier 3 set of light armor. I understand the light x heavy armor thing and all, but I think that's bit much. Steel armor can rule them all, sure. But if you put in it in a scale, military armor becomes the 3rd best armor in the game, instead of the 2nd. And it sure as hell work for the soldier zombies!
Bottom line: iron armor shouldnt have 5 more armor rating than military armor. It should be 2 more, at best. Or even.
Balancing-wise, I find it weird that solar bank and solar cells are only obtainable through better barter 5 (when everything else in the game can be obtained via other means) and that a lvl 6 solar cell will cost 31k with BB5.
For the same reason as above, I believe scrap metal turrets shouldnt be lootable. They make things too easy on lower levels. They should be attached to better barter 3's special loot and above. And should not be repairable unless you've spected into turrets syndrom.
Ideally, Intellect tree should hold its own using scrap turret and baton. Its the only2 weapons its got, why other tree-users get 3 weapons of choice + the possibility of having a little friend also covering their backs?
Needle & Thread books reward is stupid. BDU is easily found in game. It shouldnt be a reward. Vol 7 allowing to craft cargo pockets is much more rewarding.
Wasteland Treasures reward is underwhelming. Military fiber can be found, bought and scrapped into. The time it takes to get all 7 books (about 60 lvls worth of playthrough - unless you're lucky), military fiber is barely needed anymore. Mineral water book is a more fitting reward, as people dont care about water anymore, since mineral water is so easy to make.
What's the point of one shoting wooden blocks with a shotgun, anyways? (shotgun messiah reward)
To me, these are the most troubling problems with the book rewards and I think it needs balancing (improving).
If we take scrap armor, iron armor and steel armor as tier 1, 2 and 3 heavy armor.
And padded, leather and military as Tier 1, 2 and 3 light armor.
I think it's a bit ♥♥♥♥ed up that a tier 2 set of heavy armor will provide more armor ratings than a tier 3 set of light armor. I understand the light x heavy armor thing and all, but I think that's bit much. Steel armor can rule them all, sure. But if you put in it in a scale, military armor becomes the 3rd best armor in the game, instead of the 2nd. And it sure as hell work for the soldier zombies!
Bottom line: iron armor shouldnt have 5 more armor rating than military armor. It should be 2 more, at best. Or even.
Balancing-wise, I find it weird that solar bank and solar cells are only obtainable through better barter 5 (when everything else in the game can be obtained via other means) and that a lvl 6 solar cell will cost 31k with BB5.
For the same reason as above, I believe scrap metal turrets shouldnt be lootable. They make things too easy on lower levels. They should be attached to better barter 3's special loot and above. And should not be repairable unless you've spected into turrets syndrom.
Ideally, Intellect tree should hold its own using scrap turret and baton. Its the only2 weapons its got, why other tree-users get 3 weapons of choice + the possibility of having a little friend also covering their backs?
Adam the Waster
Well-known member
i was just talking about over all Zombies just found.
yes there's a way to do it Via XML files (THXS Zombiesurvivor)
but not everone knows how to do that. IMO its best if any things kind of settings are Accessible to everyone. like the Blood Moon hordes i always set them to 60 and Nightmare speed.
ZombieSurvivor
Banned
Post moved here. Accidentally posted in wrong thread.
Hey man I read earlier that you posted links to modlets already made for increasing zombie spawn. For some reason I cannot find your post anymore but anyways, thanks for posting that link for Adam. I figured one of you modders must have already written up some modlets I just wasnt sure where to find them. +1 rep
Adam the Waster
Well-known member
TBH
i dont think military Armor looks very, well ARMORED!
the vest , helmet and boots are OK but the Legs look kinda weak and the Gloves! how does that protect you
if it kinda looked like this then yes i think it would protect you
I wasnt talking functionality-wise, I meant that since Demolishers were added to the game, military zombies became the 2nd toughest armored unit, as Demolishers are equivalent to the steel armor.
And I find it unfair that one class (out of only 2) gets the 2 best equipment sets. As a long-time rpg player, I know that's not balanced. These things were supposed to work in a rock-paper-scissors kind of thing. But we know if we put a light armor user versus a heavy armor, the heavy armor wins easily.
Doesnt matter how agile a light armor user is, he's only got a bow, a smg and a knife against 30 more armor rating points (than him) and a M60 (argubly best weapon in the game) that is also backed up by pain tolerance, healing factor, Cardio and effect resistence more than make up for their lack of mobility.
der-wespe
New member
Apologies if this was already stated, but it would be GREATLY appreciated if we could switch from a Toggle for zooming with bow/guns/etc... to hold-and-release right-click for zooming instead, and/or other hot-key.
Until zooming out, one cannot switch weapons, jump, or run, and there are situations where timing is everything.
If there is already a way to do this that I have overlooked, I would equally appreciate if someone could please fill me in. If not, submitted for the Devs consideration.
Toggle has its uses, but speaking only for myself, more often than not it places one in too many compromising positions.
Thanks in advance!
Until zooming out, one cannot switch weapons, jump, or run, and there are situations where timing is everything.
If there is already a way to do this that I have overlooked, I would equally appreciate if someone could please fill me in. If not, submitted for the Devs consideration.
Toggle has its uses, but speaking only for myself, more often than not it places one in too many compromising positions.
Thanks in advance!
Maybe try buried treasure quests (even better with a point in daring adventurer). Quest reward often is (herbal) antibiotics.
Hospitals and newer versions of Pop'n'Pills shops are less likely to have any antibiotics, in my experience, than the average home's bathroom. The original Pop'n'Pills, if you can find one, will probably net you 2-3. Airdrops and buried treasure quests have a good chance of getting you antibiotic-type items, also. If you absolutely must go stump-grinding, as I did in my most recent single player game, the snow biome has more stumps than the greenlands or burnt biomes.
Choosing to not do quests (last couple game starts were very quest-heavy) I got up into the 30%-ish infection by day 4 (120 minute day cycle) and didn't find any after 3 small towns' worth of targeted high value / low time PoI dashing so I put the best cold gear I had found on and spent most of a night and day hunting stumps. After maybe 5 honey and the one true antibiotic I had found I finally got back to healthiness. At least the first week was exciting!
ArNaLdInHo
Tester
Starting Quest ... gives trader location !!!
but if i already found trader and talk to him, it will show the same trader i found by my self
Grass at trader have no price shown.
but if i already found trader and talk to him, it will show the same trader i found by my self
Grass at trader have no price shown.
ZombieSurvivor
Banned
In real life gloves are just gloves and offer no real protection. I mean do not get me wrong, every soldier has a pair of gloves because it is a must in the military, ever handle concertina wire with bare hands? Thats not going to be a pretty sight lol. In the U.S Army, this is assuming AR 670-1 has not changed, soldiers are permitted to wear there own gloves in uniform so long as it is solid black with no logos. In the end, gloves offer basic hand protection physically as well as protection from the elements/nature. I do not really see any issues with the gloves in this game.
Adam the Waster
Well-known member
my problem is that they give protection.
if Gloves were just a Term for Arm armor like Wrist guards , Elbow pads , Shoulder pads and gloves for Climbing and grip. then thats Ok
but its just gloves and it makes no sense that it protects you. im fine about the way they look but they just need a bit more protection.
as a side note the reason i drew it like that is just "in my Head cannon" the Military in 7DTD had to modify their armor with wrist guards due to the fact that zombies like to go there and so they can hold them back.
ZombieSurvivor
Banned
Ohhhhh.... lol sorry just woke up. I thought you were advocating for gloves to have no armor protection.
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