PC Another Screamer complaint, or "Why artificial difficulty is poor game design"

[theFlu]

If TFP were to bring that feature back, how many complaints would there be about "artificial difficulty" being a bad way to design a game?

Depends on the implementation. I do want something like the old smell back. But, if anytime you carry around a piece of food, you have a chance of spawning 20 drop zeds with 15m of you, I'd join the complainers; not necessarily the complaining, but the opinion for sure.

That's the major gripe with screamers, as I see it; they're rather ... unstable. You might get one "whenever", hard to tell as the game doesn't really indicate it in any way. Not that it needs to, but it could just be a 10% chance every 10 mins for all the game tells us about them. That "one" can now be "two" straight up, and get out of hand exponentially.

Most of the time they're fine - for me at least. I can hear the moans relatively early, go and intercept them even before they reach the POI. Sometimes they do get close and start summoning.

The latter option seems to be very common for the couple youtubers I follow. I often hear their screamer moans way before they do. I don't think the tubers are "acting", they're just not that perceptive; maybe focused on other things, or having their own game sounds way lower than what the video shows. If I'm chatting away on VC, or listening to some podcast, I might miss them myself. "20 zeds right next to you" seems to be a somewhat common way of finding out they're there. That's rough.

A little less rough would be if you actually heard them beforehand, and they would only scream within 5 meters off you. And they'd actually scream when summoning.. That way they wouldn't get stuck downstairs and summon the horde before breaking down a wall and coming at you _with them_. I don't know if that would be "better", but just an idea of a simple change that might make them feel less random.

I dunno, they're in a weird spot atm.

 

[YourMirror]

It used to be a lot harder because you had to get 100% heat, not just 25% heat, and I don't think JaWoodle was really trying to do that.

My main point was that, to put it in less diplomatic terms, some people on here are accusing others of lying to them because they haven't had the same experience. Have a look at this two posts:



This has nothing to do with whether I think the screamer mechanic is broken or not. I have so many workstations running anyway that I got screamers without end even before 1.0. So nothing new for me. I just don't want people to be labelled as liars just because some people haven't had the same experience.

Take a chill pill and read OP again. Statement was "day 1, the moment you light up a campfire". Thats pretty specific. Nobody counters the possibility to get screamers on day one. You just have to do MUCH more than just lighting a campire. Thats just the same old old fart way of ranting about something that never happens. 

Oh, take another chill pill.

 

[RipClaw]

Take a chill pill and read OP again. Statement was "day 1, the moment you light up a campfire". Thats pretty specific.

Maybe you should take less of those chill pills.

I read what the OP wrote but I learnt a long time ago that what people say is not always the whole story. People tend to leave things out, not out of malice, but because they often consider them unimportant or sometimes simply don't notice them. You often have to fill in the gaps by asking questions or by testing it.

A well-known example of this is the story of the car that won't start when you buy vanilla ice cream.

https://www.marketcalls.in/fun/vanilla-ice-cream-that-puzzled-general-motors-amazing.html

From the OP's perspective, lighting the fire was the action that spawned a screamer. This statement may well be correct. But what he left out because it probably wasn't important to him was what he did beforehand. As @theFlu noted, many actions generate significant amounts of heat. Actions that you might not associate with heat. Lighting the fire may well have been the last action that pushed the heat above 25%.

Thats just the same old old fart way of ranting about something that never happens. 

That is exactly the kind of statement that I find inappropriate. Instead of giving it a bit of thought, you are simply assume that the OP is lying.

 

[Old Crow]

From the OP's perspective, lighting the fire was the action that spawned a screamer. This statement may well be correct. But what he left out because it probably wasn't important to him was what he did beforehand. As @theFlu noted, many actions generate significant amounts of heat. Actions that you might not associate with heat. Lighting the fire may well have been the last action that pushed the heat above 25%.

I'll admit to a bit of hyperbole there - It likely wasn't lighting the campfire that did it of course rather it ended being the last drop in the bucket, so to speak.

 

[InfiniteWarrior]

We were in the middle of the POI, and it would have been impossible for it to see us.

Same here and no guns were in use. I was using melee, which can be loud but certainly not heat inducing, I wouldn't think. I'm normally a stealth player, though I don't personally find that playstyle feasible for me in a game with as many proximity triggers as this one; think it's a broken mechanic as is; and have used a mod to get rid of them altogether until it's fixed. I've also noticed all zombies apparently have x-ray vision and can see through supposedly solid walls.

I wouldn't say it's "bad design" or adds artificial difficulty, but -- my God -- are they annoying in 1.0. It was bad enough to get one every other minute when my base was producing a lot of heat in A21 -- six in all in seemingly as many minutes -- so I totally get what Old Crow is saying about there being no cooldown or cooldown not working. Got so fed up with it in A21 at times, I quit the game for a while and am sure the proximity triggers have something to do with Unity limitations. (Things that would more normally be coded have to be scripted in Unity.) I also get what Roland is saying about consequences in a survival game, but this is happening when it shouldn't be and that is definitely a problem somewhere in the design, cooldown or otherwise. So I do indeed hope they give the mechanic a good once over in the next patch.

 

[Slingblade2040]

So if the intent is to make players more careful how the heck do they clear out tier 6 infested quests or tier 5 quests within a reasonable time frame because spending 45+ minutes in a POI by keeping gun use to a minimum to avoid calling in screamers doesnt sound fun. All screamers do is create a ridiculous amount of lag if we are inside a PoI and one of them gets summoned. This has happened at shotgun messiah factory, the hospital, that big apartment complex and a few others like the prison.

If the pimps want players to be more careful or face dangers why not just add in zombies with special abilities like healing their buddies or throwing fire balls or other nonsense? 

This whole screamer thing seems like a lazy way to try and force a slow down in progression and throw in artificial difficulty. Many of the things the pimps have done have been anti-player from zombie rage mode, zombies get extra block damage when grouped up, cars don't work on horde nights because magic, nerf to tier 6 quests loot and making underground bases obsolete.

 

[Roland]

So if the intent is to make players more careful how the heck do they clear out tier 6 infested quests or tier 5 quests within a reasonable time frame because spending 45+ minutes in a POI by keeping gun use to a minimum to avoid calling in screamers doesnt sound fun. All screamers do is create a ridiculous amount of lag if we are inside a PoI and one of them gets summoned. This has happened at shotgun messiah factory, the hospital, that big apartment complex and a few others like the prison.

If the pimps want players to be more careful or face dangers why not just add in zombies with special abilities like healing their buddies or throwing fire balls or other nonsense? 

I agree that the slowdown that can result from a screamer summoned horde joining in with all the POI zombies...especially in a T5 or T6 infestation quest is bad and that is something that needs to be improved or if it can't there has to be a threshold that the game detects and it just kills and despawns all the screamer zombies immediately.

I disagree that the idea of a horde of zombies sweeping into your quest area and causing panic and mayhem is a bad idea. If they can get the slowdown managed, then it is an awesome event. We just played a T6 infestation and had screamers see us and call in zombies. We were in the sub-basement levels of that Higashi Exec's home or something and dozens of additional non-quest related zombies were falling into the underground labs through windows at the ground level they'd pounded through. We didn't get unplayable slowdown and were able to survive and kill the screamers and finish the quest and it was a lot of fun.

This whole screamer thing seems like a lazy way to try and force a slow down in progression and throw in artificial difficulty.

I haven't felt slowed down in my progression by screamers. If anything they increase my progression by bringing additional xp to me. As for artificial difficulty, it only ever feels artificial when I can see the zombies spawning in. But when I am inside my base or inside a POI and can't witness the actual spawning it doesn't feel artificial at all. Just because we know how the mechanics work, that shouldn't be held against the game. It's the player's own fault if they refuse to accept what the underlying mechanics are trying to simulate even when they can't see those mechanics taking place.

Many of the things the pimps have done have been anti-player from zombie rage mode, zombies get extra block damage when grouped up, cars don't work on horde nights because magic, nerf to tier 6 quests loot and making underground bases obsolete.

How are ANY of these things "anti-player"? I don't begrudge you your distaste for this list of game features and I won't try to convince you that any or all of them are good. People like what they like. But please explain how they are anti-player. I'm a player and none of these items you listed feel like a personal attack against me. Many of them I appreciate for the challenges they enable.

And underground bases haven't been obsolete for a long time now. A17 was the only time they could have been labeled obsolete but even then there were plenty of people still making them work. But since then? Underground bases are perfectly viable.

 

[lord_ahriman]

I agree that the slowdown that can result from a screamer summoned horde joining in with all the POI zombies...especially in a T5 or T6 infestation quest is bad and that is something that needs to be improved or if it can't there has to be a threshold that the game detects and it just kills and despawns all the screamer zombies immediately.

I disagree that the idea of a horde of zombies sweeping into your quest area and causing panic and mayhem is a bad idea. If they can get the slowdown managed, then it is an awesome event. We just played a T6 infestation and had screamers see us and call in zombies. We were in the sub-basement levels of that Higashi Exec's home or something and dozens of additional non-quest related zombies were falling into the underground labs through windows at the ground level they'd pounded through. We didn't get unplayable slowdown and were able to survive and kill the screamers and finish the quest and it was a lot of fun.

I haven't felt slowed down in my progression by screamers. If anything they increase my progression by bringing additional xp to me. As for artificial difficulty, it only ever feels artificial when I can see the zombies spawning in. But when I am inside my base or inside a POI and can't witness the actual spawning it doesn't feel artificial at all. Just because we know how the mechanics work, that shouldn't be held against the game. It's the player's own fault if they refuse to accept what the underlying mechanics are trying to simulate even when they can't see those mechanics taking place.

How are ANY of these things "anti-player"? I don't begrudge you your distaste for this list of game features and I won't try to convince you that any or all of them are good. People like what they like. But please explain how they are anti-player. I'm a player and none of these items you listed feel like a personal attack against me. Many of them I appreciate for the challenges they enable.

And underground bases haven't been obsolete for a long time now. A17 was the only time they could have been labeled obsolete but even then there were plenty of people still making them work. But since then? Underground bases are perfectly viable.

Try it as a solo player, then came back here and tell me "it was a lot of fun". I have no problem with the increased spawning rate, but screamers should not be allowed to spawn if a T5/T6 infested quest is active.

 

[Roland]

Try it as a solo player, then came back here and tell me "it was a lot of fun". I have no problem with the increased spawning rate, but screamers should not be allowed to spawn if a T5/T6 infested quest is active.

I have. We have a family server but I've gone on alone and done a T5 infested solo quest and had the screamers show up with friends. Maybe it's because I play through the progression more slowly but I don't even get to T5/T6 infested quests until I'm pretty much maxed out in perks and gear and I just slice through all the zombies without very much trouble at all. The added screamer zombies don't suddenly make it impossible for me to succeed. I do play on Nomad most of the time and occasionally Warrior but never at higher difficulties than that. I believe our family server is default difficulty.

I don't know if difficulty settings is a component here in why people have different experiences but if they are, then in my opinion it is better if we, as players, reduce our difficulty settings if a game change starts making things seem impossible rather than expecting the developers to change the new conditions of the game just so we can continue to function at the same difficulty level we used to be able to play at.

 

[pahbi]

When I looked at the xlm, I was pretty surprised to find out just how many trivial things generate heat.

Anyways, here's a modlet that nulls heat generated by most player actions.  Campfires, forges, workbenches etc... will continue to generate heat as usual.

Modlet

https://github.com/pahbi/7DTD_Modlets-updated-for-V1.0/blob/main/remove_sound_heat.zip

Thread

https://community.7daystodie.com/topic/26048-craft-magazines-fast-plant-growth-less-wasteland-rubble-and-more-updated-for-10/

- Pahbi

 

[lord_ahriman]

I have. We have a family server but I've gone on alone and done a T5 infested solo quest and had the screamers show up with friends. Maybe it's because I play through the progression more slowly but I don't even get to T5/T6 infested quests until I'm pretty much maxed out in perks and gear and I just slice through all the zombies without very much trouble at all. The added screamer zombies don't suddenly make it impossible for me to succeed. I do play on Nomad most of the time and occasionally Warrior but never at higher difficulties than that. I believe our family server is default difficulty.

I don't know if difficulty settings is a component here in why people have different experiences but if they are, then in my opinion it is better if we, as players, reduce our difficulty settings if a game change starts making things seem impossible rather than expecting the developers to change the new conditions of the game just so we can continue to function at the same difficulty level we used to be able to play at.

Difficulty is a major player because warrior and above zombies will hit harder and harder (I don't play below survivalist) that's why, imo, screamers should not be able to be spawned if a T5/T6 infested is active. Not to mention, I always go feral sense on all the time, so yeah, screamers are a problem in this case. As I mentioned, I couldn't care less about the increased spawn rate and you don't really need much to defend your base: 2/3 double rows of wood spikes is enough to kill radiated screamers, so not a big deal at all.

 

[Slingblade2040]

How are ANY of these things "anti-player"? I don't begrudge you your distaste for this list of game features and I won't try to convince you that any or all of them are good. People like what they like. But please explain how they are anti-player. I'm a player and none of these items you listed feel like a personal attack against me. Many of them I appreciate for the challenges they enable.

And underground bases haven't been obsolete for a long time now. A17 was the only time they could have been labeled obsolete but even then there were plenty of people still making them work. But since then? Underground bases are perfectly viable.

Zombies getting a magical buff to block damage because they are grouped up is ridiculous, zombies throwing a tantrum because they fell a few blocks so they go into destroying all blocks mode is also dumb and let's not forget that whole zombies can't die from fall damage. 

Those are easy example of things implemented that are anti-player. What exactly was the reasoning behind zombies need a magic buff if they group up that enables them to do extra block damage? Or vultures magically appear if you enter a vehicle during horde night which makes them useless to drive off with. Vultures that are special than any other vulture BTW because only those can keep up with vehicle speeds which shows they were intentionally made to be anti-player.

 

[Roland]

Zombies getting a magical buff to block damage because they are grouped up is ridiculous, zombies throwing a tantrum because they fell a few blocks so they go into destroying all blocks mode is also dumb and let's not forget that whole zombies can't die from fall damage. 

Those are easy example of things implemented that are anti-player. What exactly was the reasoning behind zombies need a magic buff if they group up that enables them to do extra block damage? Or vultures magically appear if you enter a vehicle during horde night which makes them useless to drive off with. Vultures that are special than any other vulture BTW because only those can keep up with vehicle speeds which shows they were intentionally made to be anti-player.

I guess I still don’t know what you mean by anti-player. Do you mean unfair?  Even with all those abilities that you mention, players still have the advantage. 

The reasoning behind letting zombies do extra damage if they pile up is to give us a greater reason to kill them and keep them from piling up. It’s a threat for us to manage. It adds to the danger of large numbers of zombies. 
 

The reasoning behind area destruction was to create varied behavior and avoid simplistic situations where every zombie acts in predictable and repetitive ways. It also represents a threat that must be overcome. As a player you need to take out those zombies or they may destroy support structures or create new access points.  Players wanted more varied behavior. That was the number one feedback topic from A17 when the AI was simplistic and all zombies did exactly the same thing. 
 

The horde night vehicle change is actually one of the few examples where TFP acted to stop a specific player strategy. There’s no denying that. The problem is that since that time certain influential people have incorrectly attributed many other changes for the same reason and  think it is common when it is actually pretty rare that TFP does it. 

 

[Roland]

Difficulty is a major player because warrior and above zombies will hit harder and harder (I don't play below survivalist) that's why, imo, screamers should not be able to be spawned if a T5/T6 infested is active. Not to mention, I always go feral sense on all the time, so yeah, screamers are a problem in this case. As I mentioned, I couldn't care less about the increased spawn rate and you don't really need much to defend your base: 2/3 double rows of wood spikes is enough to kill radiated screamers, so not a big deal at all.

So like I said, the changes seem to work well at default settings. If it is only by turning up difficulty to the point that it becomes unmanageable then perhaps after such changes advanced players like yourself need to do a reset and reassessment on your difficulty settings. 
 

Why should TFP need to undo what they did if it works well at the normal settings of the game just so you can keep playing at the same alt settings you’ve chosen?

What if there are players who don’t find what you think is impossible to be impossible for them and they are enjoying the challenge?  Tuning it down to suit the limits of your skill would wreck the new level of challenge for them. Much easier is if you scale back to Warrior or turn off feral sense until you get used to the changes and work your way back up. 

Then again, this is a good argument for making an option slider for screamer sensitivity so players can tune the difficulty they want.

 

[Slingblade2040]

I guess I still don’t know what you mean by anti-player. Do you mean unfair?  Even with all those abilities that you mention, players still have the advantage. 

The reasoning behind letting zombies do extra damage if they pile up is to give us a greater reason to kill them and keep them from piling up. It’s a threat for us to manage. It adds to the danger of large numbers of zombies. 
 

The reasoning behind area destruction was to create varied behavior and avoid simplistic situations where every zombie acts in predictable and repetitive ways. It also represents a threat that must be overcome. As a player you need to take out those zombies or they may destroy support structures or create new access points.  Players wanted more varied behavior. That was the number one feedback topic from A17 when the AI was simplistic and all zombies did exactly the same thing. 
 

The horde night vehicle change is actually one of the few examples where TFP acted to stop a specific player strategy. There’s no denying that. The problem is that since that time certain influential people have incorrectly attributed many other changes for the same reason and  think it is common when it is actually pretty rare that TFP does it. 

That makes no sense to give them a group buff to block damage when they pile up. We already have a way to increase block damage that zombies do so giving them a magical buff is definitely designed to be anti-player. We already have a reason to kill them if they pile up and thats to prevent them from breaking blocks giving them a magic group buff makes no sense. 

Varied AI? How exactly is that varied if it's fall damage from X amount of blocks? Varied AI would have them attacking from different paths and them taking different routes to us instead of the uniform easy path to us that they all currently do. Most bases now are the usual zombie walks up stairs or ladder then zombie does tight rope walk and hopefully most fall down to repeat the cycle. How exactly is that a Varied AI path if it's so predictable? If anything it's more predictable now than ever.

I know zombie pathing is very difficult to do but making them go into rage mode from dropping a certain amount of blocks definitely isn't trying to add variety and more like trying to defeat certain base styles players came up with especially since fall damage doesn't kill zombies anymore. 

I wouldn't say it's rare that the pimps make changes against the players when a decent amount of time it is because of what the players have come up with that for some reason the pimps didn't like cause that isn't how they want us to play the game so they nerf or make changes to spite us. Which is kinda ridiculous to do in a sandbox game. 

 

[theFlu]

We already have a way to increase block damage that zombies do so giving them a magical buff is definitely designed to be anti-player.

It doesn't make logical sense, of course, but you can also think that a single zed is just being nerfed here. A single zed will basically never be a problem on the other side of a wall. Groups of zeds are roughly the "default" level of danger, they are able to actually break defenses eventually; and large groups can then pose an actual threat.

The mechanic is obviously made to breach defenses, so "anti-player" sorta applies, but horde nights that never get through a steel block would be .. pointless. With the amount of zeds that are able to attack a single block being roughly 3, they either need the group buff or a massive boost to single zed damage. I kinda prefer the group buff, that way the one guy stuck in a wall won't take the whole thing down before dawn ..  

 

[4sheetzngeegles]

Couldn't the event spawn be more of a cascade.

Level one increases base spawn group in an area.
Level two increases to a feral sense group, feral speed.
Level three increases to feral sense zombears, dogs, wolves, and vultures.
Level four is the scouts.

Basically if enough heat is generated to bring L1 these would need to be dispatched
quietly and expediently. Because the heat level would lead to 2, then 3, then All
hell breaks loose. Since it would happen is a basic sedentary or localized area, Fps
and load should only take a minor hit. But it would make head on a swivel the new
catch phrase, while still including the interactive environment and event generator.

Kind of like a "Flood".

PS. not trying to start any, but if the zombies are attracted to the heat being generated
and unless a player is using firearms, that means that the heat is being generated by, Dew
collectors, campfires, torches, workstations, and vehicles. Why are these never directly
attacked? Why is there no event for them attacking these? Wouldn't that be more expected
in full base and asset protection?

 

[theFlu]

Why are these never directly
attacked? Why is there no event for them attacking these?

In my current game, started in 22.0, I had a screamer show up and destroy two of my campfires. They were on top of boxes, so at face-height; which means it may have been an accident of the rage mode, but at least it looked like they were after the heat sources. Whether or not it was intentional, I think I'd like the idea (lost quite a bit of food and drink there, but nothing actually significant... might've been rather miffed if it was a forge with a bought crucible.. )

Some tiered spawns would be nice too; I'd like some unique signifiers to heat-event zeds though. Just so you know it wasn't an accident and the horde-mode is about to kick off. But I don't know how it should be implemented in the case when you're not around;

If you only summon the first wave when you show up for a few minutes, then you've essentially neutered the threat entirely.

If you summon all the waves your forge called, at once, you've just made it a whole heck of a lot worse ..  

 

[4sheetzngeegles]

Some tiered spawns would be nice too; I'd like some unique signifiers to heat-event zeds though.

The thought came from a cascade I designed, but it was prior to the present config.
If you were in the open a basic group of two or three were spawned. If you could
headshot them back to back, be it either stealth or standing, and take them out quickly
approx 30 seconds. Then it was a basic encounter, If on the other hand you body shot and
missed a bit then they began to spawn more after 30 secs then 1.5 min then 3 min, which

increased heat, which increased spawn.Sort of a round robin setup. It made for variable

encounters while still limiting spawn and potential fps drop. I also edited 3 groups, progressive

in danger combined with volume. I often had to bow out, but it created some tense moments.

Because i would often forget in the beginning.

Image: variable 1 to 2 meter tall grass, and suddenly even if you were on the road, you
have to pick your battles. When in a poi, the ai was set to spawn and gather with a bit
more sound reaction, so I would have to choose, finish a poi, go to the roof, fight in
the street or be cornered, or just run away for now. I like choices.

If you only summon the first wave when you show up for a few minutes, then you've essentially neutered the threat entirely.

Basically it was just an event. 30 sec kill 3 quietly, or heatmap heattime increased, now you have 5 of the stronger faster plus whats left, 1.5 min real time to quietly dispatch, or here come more from the tall grass from all sides, meanwhile all the fighting was naturally building up the heat, and spawn. Sometimes it went my way, other times i had to run away. Fight or flight response is key with that event setup.

 

[theFlu]

Basically it was just an event. 30 sec kill 3 quietly, or heatmap heattime increased, now you have 5 of the stronger faster plus whats left,

Right, so the idea is a single event with several stages; if you "complete" one stage before the next one triggers, the event ends early? That could be interesting as well. Make the first step be a screamer that doesn't actually summon anything, just makes those loud screechy moans until it's time to fire the next wave - from the special enemy you now know you are in a real hurry and/or danger if you can't get out of the POI fast enough to deal with her. (I like clear indications for non-standard stuff )