PC Alpha 20 Dev Diary

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Speaking of which, just for consistency's sake, is there a reason why the steel club and steel spear don't have schematics? Seems like a waste of a book slot to me. On top of that, I think I've brought this up before, there's no reason to lock the M60 schematic behind a high gamestage if the book to craft the item can be found on day 1.

 
Faatal
I have a few questions regarding the "weather system;sky manager".

Why do the clouds not have variable opacity?
Can a gradient be used to allow for an opacity layer dependent on speed of change
parameter?
Is it possible to achieve without making clouds particles or objects?

What is the absolute variance rate of weather, wind ,fog, cloudthickness ,fogfade ,precipitation, snow?
Which if any parameter can be adjusted to allow for a subtle ebb and flow, instead of
a constant per biome.

Can a similar system to the "ambientInsideSpeed" be used to periodically change the
lighting and atmospheric conditions when outside?

Example: If fog is set 0,100 prob 1,  Then it would gradually get denser fof then slowly
regress. I ask because I was only able to achieve it during one playthrough, as I stood
in place in the desert, the bright sun cast shadows, then it became overcast; shadows
were removed.

I can use to gradient and shade it accordingly to partially achieve it, but it is still
a constant, because it goes according to time of day an not cloud cover windspeed parameter.

The thing that made me think of this is if you have 100% fog set, overcast sky blocking the
sun rays, and stand in the snow biome, the white snow particle screen will make distant objects
POIs, entities, etc. visible then enveloped by your fog overlay giving the appearance of interactive

environment.

So I wondered if this same principle can be used for the sunlight to simulated random cloud
density without a lot of extra calculations.

 
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It seems like Legendary gear is being pushed towards 7 Days 2 Die instead of an update for this game right? I'm fine with it either way,  super excited for the second game, just curious if there's even any intent / point in putting it in this one

 
@madmole Am I correct in assuming that the gamestage of the trader's stock will vary depending on which biome he chose to set up in? (I believe you mentioned in the first A20 stream that the traders would probably have slightly better loot versus what could be found in the wild at the time.)

 
Guys just wanted to say thank you for creating such a stellar game! I know this isn't the place but appreciation where it's given y'know! You've been a gold standard IMO on how an indie team with a big following+EA game should sell themselves!

PS: When's the next dev stream?

 ed thumbs up.jpeg

 
Do you want to discuss, debate, and give your opinion about Alpha 20?

Do you have a huge list of suggestions for Alpha 20?

Do you want to post memes and poke fun at what other users post?

Do you want to ask about A19 bugs?

Are you wondering where all your posts got moved?

This is your ticket to understanding.

 
Blake_ said:
Are you guys planning to touch the animal code in some way ? meaning combat hit feedback (like the Zds currently have, currently the dogs just stop ) ; ability to bend and turn a bit more organically (IK bones stuff) ...etc ?
Click to expand...
No plans, but it could happen months from now.

 
KingSlayerGM said:
This feature is listed on the first page of this thread, and no work has been done on it?
Click to expand...
Correct. That list of features is just a list of what we plan to do. It may be months before someone works on it and often features will get pushed back, because it can't be done in time or at all due to unforeseen circumstances. As the alpha progresses, the list tends to get updated to reflect where we are at, but is no guarantee of anything.

Irushian said:
@faatal, any chance of plugging one of the biggest exploits we see online with players clipping their head underground to see and also fire through everything? (This also works for turrets)
Click to expand...
We have bug tickets for such things, so eventually they should get looked at.

khzmusik said:
Thank you for the reply. It piqued my curiosity. Does this mean there is no longer global weather (like a global rainstorm or snowstorm), and that the weather is specific to a biome?
Click to expand...
Basically yes. There are and may still be some global parts, but it is all WIP.

MechanicalLens said:
Is the animal AI getting some polishing in Alpha 20? 😆
Click to expand...
Not planned.

 
4sheetzngeegles said:
Faatal
I have a few questions regarding the "weather system;sky manager".

Why do the clouds not have variable opacity?
Can a gradient be used to allow for an opacity layer dependent on speed of change
parameter?
Is it possible to achieve without making clouds particles or objects?

What is the absolute variance rate of weather, wind ,fog, cloudthickness ,fogfade ,precipitation, snow?
Which if any parameter can be adjusted to allow for a subtle ebb and flow, instead of
a constant per biome.

Can a similar system to the "ambientInsideSpeed" be used to periodically change the
lighting and atmospheric conditions when outside?

Example: If fog is set 0,100 prob 1,  Then it would gradually get denser fof then slowly
regress. I ask because I was only able to achieve it during one playthrough, as I stood
in place in the desert, the bright sun cast shadows, then it became overcast; shadows
were removed.

I can use to gradient and shade it accordingly to partially achieve it, but it is still
a constant, because it goes according to time of day an not cloud cover windspeed parameter.

The thing that made me think of this is if you have 100% fog set, overcast sky blocking the
sun rays, and stand in the snow biome, the white snow particle screen will make distant objects
POIs, entities, etc. visible then enveloped by your fog overlay giving the appearance of interactive

environment.

So I wondered if this same principle can be used for the sunlight to simulated random cloud
density without a lot of extra calculations.
Click to expand...
Clouds/sky/weather are legacy systems. They work how previous devs made them and then we refactor them to better meet the final design of the game. The why of designs is often lost and in the end I don't care, we just need to make it work to meet the goals of shipping the game. I've been cleaning up and rewriting those systems as time permits, but it is a big WIP.

Some of what you describe are just side effects of a combination of things and it may change by the time we go gold.

Games'n'Grumble said:
@faatal Hi! In one of the updates in the game, there is a test shader for an improved batching/instancing process. Will it improve in the A20? Any details?
Click to expand...
Test features are usually for debugging and generally don't become normal features. I'm not sure what you are referring to, but probably not a change for a20.

 
irontusk341 said:
once officially introduced, Will Bandits be optional to toggle in the menu before starting a new game?
Click to expand...
I would guess yes. Not sure new game would matter. A bandit POI could just not spawn them if the option was turned off in an existing game.

 
just curious here but for peer to peer games will we ever get the ability to pause the game if the players are paused in a game for example there are 3 people and if they all press escape it will pause the game and depends on how many people there are to do this of course completely random just i've thought about it for a long time as usual guys keep up the good work.

 
Faatal

Thank you for the answer.

The reason I asked is because the particle effects that you worked on
previously, stopped the huge fps drop from previous alphas. The fog overlay
adds atmosphere to my playthroughs. I do wish it were closer to the camera.

Visually fog\sky\atmospheric-weather seemed or felt like separate systems

created by unlike thinking individuals, not one cohesive.

Your answer explained why for me.

 
Just an idea, but how about having 1 or more electrical traps. ik you guys said your mostly done, but i think a really good t3, or t2 electrical trap would be a high voltage tesla coil. that functions like an area denial system. if something walks in range it strikes them with a lightning bolt, and rebuild charge to strike again, the bolt could do significant single shot damage, and also stun or even knock zombies down, perhaps even make them smoke/smoulder a bit from the direct strike for a while after. upside is it would need a bunch of fancy animations, the electrical attack animation already exist. the tower itself would be a simple 2 or 3 block tall design. it would be an easy, but excellent choice of a new electrical trap. As for the second idea. How about a punji plate/wall it would look similar to a dart trap, but would instead shoot out 5 or 6 spears. stabbing targets 1 to 2 blocks in front or above it. also easy, and unique.

 
I understand that RWG for A20 is probably in very early stages of development, but will a toggleable option be added where the player could spawn in the middle of the wilderness as we used to? Spawning on a road next to a town is great for new players, but I personally enjoy the journey of locating my first town on day 1. I would present the same "argument" if the player was guaranteed to always spawn 10 meters away from a trader.

 
I'm new to the forum but have been playing the game since 2015 and read here about new updates regularly. I have a question. Do you guys ever plan on improving blood and gore mechanics? I know the game has dismemberment on death but there is no blood spilling on the environments at all. Can we see proper blood spilling added to the game at some point kind of like Dead Rising or Killing Floor 2? Can you imagine how cool it'd be to kill zombies or bandits eventually and its just a absolute blood bath? This could technically add gameplay mechanics to if you wanted to go deep with it because if you let blood sit it could technically attract more zombies. However I don't care about that to much I'd just love to see more proper blood spilling and possible dismemberment activating outside of death.

 
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