Where do you get the info that bandits were "pretty finished" at any time in the game? You said they were practically finished in lbd times aka a15/a16, and now you say in A17 they were even more aka "pretty finished"? But where are they? TFP hired an additional programmer specifically for the AI and now 4 more years of working at least partly on bandits have gone by and A22 is still without them.
Sure, TFP could have just dropped all work and just put out whatever they got on hands and called it finished. But they didn't and there is no indication that they would have viewed those old zombies in bandit skins as finished, except if they got into severe money problems or they needed to finish for some external reason.
Few post ago you said: " If bandits were included they would be rather disappointing zombies in bandit skins (just like they were in a few mods that had enabled them)".
Am i right? So... this is good enough. Because... what do you expect? it's not simulator like Arma or closed linear FPS like fear 1. How human AI works in let's say CoD mw3 zombie mode ? just stand or hide behind cover an eventualy make few steps and that's all. And it's good enough. Okay before you say "but cod mw3 zombie mode was release during last year" then is another game which can serve as example - Bordelands . What enemy doing there? If melee charge at you, if range just sit on ass and shoot while "shield" just walk at you and shoot. And it's good enough. So where would be a challenge? simple - bandits use weapons so higher damange + range hitscans for guns + using armors so can stand more or force to use armor piercing weapons. It would be enough.
Well do you know why bolt rifle guns won with lever action guns? cheaper, easier to make, easier to fix, less thing to be broken. So - 7dtd is not hardcore game but casual like cod mw3 zombies or bordelands so you don't need hyper advanced AI - just put them into strongholds and design them in style of older FPS - matter not AI but what type and position start fight.
In 2013 didn't exist "life service games" as "usable" idea. So looking on kickstarter - they assumed what will be added depends on number of money. So it's logical that they assummed that " we have X number of money so we can make game Y period of time" like every other company do - well i remember many games from that period was release pretty unfinished {like Sillent hill) because of lack of time (which mean money too). So compare with situation with other games - in 2013 would be totaly logical that they assumed "specific" time of production not make it for years.
Personally I don't like Valheims building system. The system is much more constrained and only good if you want to build something nice looking. I am playing 7d2d because I want to make functional buildings that are traps to zombies, I want to construct complicated mazes, not shiny lookalikes of the same boring hut.
Valheim has no tower defense gameplay. It doesn't need such a complex building system. 7D2D has tower defense and would be a lesser game with a valheim building system.
Well Valheim have tower defence gameplay and even... pretty complexed th :
Events | Valheim Wiki | Fandom
What is diffrent? In valheim you need high tier food - so you need animals, farms etc. so make defence is neccesary - enemies targeting domestic animals xd some of them like trolls can be challenge if you are hungry. But i think we both can agree that this:
Comfort | Valheim Wiki | Fandom in 7dtd would works realy good.
I don't like maze ideas - i have ww1 mentality : base is just bunker with basic defence outside agains single infectred
for blood moons I prefere to use high POI as defences - no problem with birds, limited patches a lot of high quality blocks so don't need a lot of materials
