PC Alpha 19 Dev Diary

[Kam R.]

@Kam R.

I'm one of those that constantly struggles with spelling & grammar. Have my whole life. (...)

Yeah, I understand that there are actual conditions that restrict spelling ability, which I covered with the "disability"-part of my post. Which hopefully was in no way taken as a derogatory statement. I can't imagine that the vast majority of people making spelling mistakes have such a condition – Then again I have no numbers related to that in front of me. I still think it's mostly laziness (which I can relate to, for sure) and/or an unwillingness to improve (which I can't relate to).
Don't really have a problem with misspelling of others, it just triggers some old reflexes acquired during times I occasionally had to proof read stuff at my old office. A little irritating at worst, amusing at best. :]

My period is still a long ..... Wait, I don't have a period at all !

Non-periodically we all have our period in some way...

 

[Annihilatorza]

That's gonna require some role play or imagination to explain.
Here's mine. The old fire station needed some serious renovations. The city found it to be cheaper and safer to just build a new fire station across the street and then renovate the old one into a mechanic's garage. Then the zombies and it just never happened.
 
They would need to do something like make exclusive POI groups. On map gen, when it comes time to gen the towns, the exclusive groups are only dipped into once per town.

Also like when they build the new stadium right next door to the old one.

 

[Aldranon]

Stop reading the patch notes about them and let them surprise you....

Seriously tho... I haven't given it much thought. Madmole is doing concept work for special infected right now so I doubt he will change what the screamer does to make it more challenging-- instead he is likely to add a new creature that has that more challenging ability in addition to what the screamer does.

Off the top of my head though I'd say that they could make her come out of your television hair first if you don't sell a copy of the game to someone else within 7 days....

Or make screamers come down on your base using Ziplines!

Wow! Talk about pure excitement!  

The player could go into shock trying to decide if they're in "28 Days Later" or "Charles Angels"!

 

[Slingblade2040]

any planned changes to intelligence? since crafting stations are kinda easy to find now and schematics are easier to find since quests can just restock buildings and most buildings have a few books shelves not to mention the trader selling work stations and vehicles It makes the entire or most of the intelligence tree kinda pointless to get. like better bartering is the only decent one to get and that's because it unlocks more of the traders secret stash which then really makes the rest of intelligence pointless.

 

[PoloPoPo]

any planned changes to intelligence? since crafting stations are kinda easy to find now and schematics are easier to find since quests can just restock buildings and most buildings have a few books shelves not to mention the trader selling work stations and vehicles It makes the entire or most of the intelligence tree kinda pointless to get. like better bartering is the only decent one to get and that's because it unlocks more of the traders secret stash which then really makes the rest of intelligence pointless.

Two junk turrets max skilled rip through every group of zombies. That is definitely something else extremely useful within the intelligence skill tree.

 

[Ezed]

It's only pointless if you don't put any points into it...

 

[Adam the Waster]

I don't mind a healthy discussion but nerd polling is now off topic. It has been discussed a thousand times probably more than LBD so just stop already unless we officially make a change to it in a future alpha it is off topic in this A19 thread.

Thank you! im tired of buying livers! im 9,00,000,000 dollars in debt because of this!

Two junk turrets max skilled rip through every group of zombies. That is definitely something else extremely useful within the intelligence skill tree.

yes all it needs is a range class, and more batons and Intellect would be perfect  *cough air/junk rifle* 

 

[LewZephyr]

Catapult. We will happily send you to your destination. How you land is up to you.

I would love to see a launch trap.  Maybe something similar to the sledge turret, but a way to launch the zeds in a specific direction.  Heck if you could make the sledge turret static and not oscillate as an option that may just work.

 

[Darinth]

Nerd poling will not matter if you need a key from a zombie to unlock the loot chest. You'll have to go through the whole POI and hit a certain number of volumes before the special one spawns. We haven't done this yet, but it was talked about. Taking out nerd poling is a futile action because you can build ladders etc. Take out the incentive to nerd pole, problem solved.

TL;DR: Some of the cheaper ways through the building could use a nerf, but I don't want to see getting the loot out of the dungeon cache requiring constant massive clearing. That feels like it goes contrary to the 'multiple ways to deal with a problem' philosophy.

I'd love to see a key (the end chests in all of the Tier V POIs in A18 RWG are already locked), but not to have it necessarily required. Lock picking I still feel should be a valid method, as should just breaking through the lock (though maybe the latter should be a bit more difficult... augers chew through the HP on a chests often faster than they can be picked). Similarly, I'd love to see turrets defending look rooms that you can disable through a switch in the POI or rely on alternative options to deal with. Part of what makes 7 days to die so enjoyable is all of the alternative options and I don't want to see that completely removed. Incentivize going through the POIs, but don't completely eliminate options to bypass chunks. Once you find the stairway in the Shotgun Messiah factory, it's a game changer that doesn't feel cheap like just laddering up the side of the building (or other methods that shant be talked about here). An agility character can break 2 wooden pallets, 1 door, and take the stairway all of the way to the top and bypass almost the entire instance. They can also pick the lock... but dealing with the turrets might be a no-go depending on how they were setup which would still require a detour through the building to get to the switch. Learning the PoI and being able to use the shortcuts is still useful, but it gets a bit of a nerf.

Catapult. We will happily send you to your destination. How you land is up to you.

Give me parachutes and I'll happy take a catapult that I can be loaded into. I've done similar stuff with minecraft mods, and it's honestly a lot of fun and feels really cool. But... I'm not quite certain it's 7dtd's flavor.

 

[RipClaw]

TL;DR: Some of the cheaper ways through the building could use a nerf, but I don't want to see getting the loot out of the dungeon cache requiring constant massive clearing. That feels like it goes contrary to the 'multiple ways to deal with a problem' philosophy.

The idea with the key could be implemented in different ways. For example, instead of one key, there could be several keys that all unlock the crate. The number would depend on the size of the POI. For example, a T5 POI could have 5 keys. So in theory you would only have to kill 20% of the zombies to get one of the keys.

What you should also not forget is that the loot at the end of the POI consists of more than just the big chest. There are always several crates that fit the theme of the POI. In the Shotgun Messiah Factory there is a gun bag and several Shotgun Messiah crates at the end. There are also Shotgun Messiah crates in another tower. Either way you would not need a key for them. And as it is with RNG, the very first zombie you kill could have the key.

 

[pregnable]

any planned changes to intelligence? since crafting stations are kinda easy to find now and schematics are easier to find since quests can just restock buildings and most buildings have a few books shelves not to mention the trader selling work stations and vehicles It makes the entire or most of the intelligence tree kinda pointless to get. like better bartering is the only decent one to get and that's because it unlocks more of the traders secret stash which then really makes the rest of intelligence pointless.

It needs an early game weapon, and it is possible that junk turrets could use a buff when you are shooting them manually(still testing it), but intelligence is pretty good. 

Advanced engineering lets you get the forge cement mixer and crucible early, if you are unlucky, but it also lets you get 33% more of anything out of the forge, and around 50% more steel.  The extra resources is nice and helps you power level faster. 

Once you start questing, barter and daring adventurer are both really nice... especially if there is a rare schematic you are looking for... they are both really good for that. 

Next thing you know you have most of intel, so you might as well pick up physician for extra healing and some rare crafting before you leave, heh. 

This is basically the story of my str/intel build. 

If intelligence had the wrench skill, I would probably go straight for intelligence, and it would probably be OP. 

 

[Grandpa Minion]

Hello, i would like to nominate 3 modders for modders of the year!

OC :                  For his outstanding work and time he has put in to Server Tools:  Making this game a better place to play against Hackers all the while developing Server Tools management.

Prism501:       For his outstanding work and time he has put in to  CPM:  Making this game a better and safter  place to play against Hackers all the while developing CPM management.

giK:                For his outstanding work and time he has put in to Glitch/Xray bot : Making this game a better and safer  place to play against Hackers all while maintaining his own server.

These 3 people have committed countless hours to providing server admins security features for their server 7d2d has simply ignored fixing. People like this in the community is the only reason 7d2d is still alive for PvP servers!

god bless you @oc @Prism501 @gik

I nominate you for modders of the year!

 

[Jay_ombie]

We're probably going to phase out downgrade blocks entirely. It is annoying to break a 5000 hit point block to have a 4k one spawn in its place. We will probably swap models when hit points are a x % instead of completely remove one block and replace it with another which has it's own bugs like deforming terrain and cars popping up and down, etc. Not everything has a downgrade model is the short answer though.

Yeah makes sense. Long as you keep the models for different situations around the map and the cars are not all displayed in the same condition as that will look to uniform.

Maybe you could use the models of the vehicles we the players use and place them around the world as a extra props in different scenarios.

Like cars they can be salvaged from or have them smashed up as if other survivors had previously used them (dead body by the side) etc.

 

[meganoth]

any planned changes to intelligence? since crafting stations are kinda easy to find now and schematics are easier to find since quests can just restock buildings and most buildings have a few books shelves not to mention the trader selling work stations and vehicles It makes the entire or most of the intelligence tree kinda pointless to get. like better bartering is the only decent one to get and that's because it unlocks more of the traders secret stash which then really makes the rest of intelligence pointless.

Crafting stations kinda easy to find? Are you playing A18? In A19 finding a working workstation is the lucky exception

 

[Phoenixshade35]

Crafting stations kinda easy to find? Are you playing A18? In A19 finding a working workstation is the lucky exception

they could also mean finding the blueprints are easy as well, when i was playing with 100% loot it was rather common to get the blueprint from the broken workstations

i almost kinda wish that if you were to only find the blueprints that u needed to find a few to unlock said item instead of 1 and done

 

[AtomicUs5000]

Consideration:

If you get a key in an easier POI, can you keep it and use it in a tougher one?

Just bringing this up as I can see this happening the moment something like this shows itself in the game.

 

[Phoenixshade35]

I know the stun baton is the main weapon of the intelligence tree, i wonder if we could get a police baton and a riot baton as tier weapons in that area as well leaving the stun baton as final tier, if its meant to be special then fair enough lol

 

[MechanicalLens]

they could also mean finding the blueprints are easy as well, when i was playing with 100% loot it was rather common to get the blueprint from the broken workstations

i almost kinda wish that if you were to only find the blueprints that u needed to find a few to unlock said item instead of 1 and done

Not true; the chance of finding the schematics within destroyed workstations has been greatly reduced, and it doesn't even out to what it was before, not even close.

 

[Jay_ombie]

Is anyone finding that B-180 is not exiting to Desktop all the time. ?

 

[madmole]

I'm looking forward to the special infected in particular. Pipe weapons are cool too, but 7D really needs some new baddies.

Could you tell us a little about some of your inspirations/influences for the specials? I realize the concept art phase is pretty early in the whole scheme so there's probably not a lot you want to share just yet, but I'm curious and it wouldn't hurt to ask. To be more speccific, are you aiming for a similar look we have to the infected right now, or do you have other aesthetics in mind? Like really leaning on the grotesque/body horror (Resident Evil or The Last of Us style) or maybe something more fantasy/SF (like System Shock, Dead Space, The Witcher...) I'm just intrigued because some of the current designs like the crawler and the wight are more than just "dead humans, but animate and hungry" and I'm wondering if you're aiming for more of that or less.

Some will be very similar to the original like the screamer and fat cop. Spider looks a little more monstrous now and slightly mutated. The screamer has more of a witch look to her and her mouth hinges very wide and has a glasgow smile and rows of sharp teeth, black eyes, etc. There is a radiated zombie with tumors all over his back like the hump back of notre dame almost and he can tear one off and throw it at players causing radiation damage and several others we can reveal as they progress. We are still working on visual design though so things can change some as we work through the iterations.