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

[AidenwithAnAxe]

Just going to get right to the point here - Screamers on day 1-

woah woah, slow down there with that claim. It took me til day 13-14 to see my first screamer. Then again it might vary on your difficulty, and then not only that. it took me til the 60's and mid 70's to consistently see screamers. (The reason i was at 60's so fast was me being an idiot and played 10 minute long days at the beginning of day 20 and stopped at 75 or 76) still takes a while to even consistently see screamers. but idk

 

[Old Crow]

woah woah, slow down there with that claim. It took me til day 13-14 to see my first screamer. Then again it might vary on your difficulty, and then not only that. it took me til the 60's and mid 70's to consistently see screamers. (The reason i was at 60's so fast was me being an idiot and played 10 minute long days at the beginning of day 20 and stopped at 75 or 76) still takes a while to even consistently see screamers. but idk

aka "It never happened to me, so it's impossible."

 

[RipClaw]

woah woah, slow down there with that claim. It took me til day 13-14 to see my first screamer.

That doesn't mean anything. As far as I know, there is no code in the game that protects you from getting a screamer except during the Blood Moon Horde. Basically, you can get a screamer in the first 5 minutes of the game if the heat in the chunk is high enough. You don't need work stations, torches or campfires to raise the heat. For example, I once got a Screamer just by looting metal shelves. When you loot a metal shelf, it generates the same amount of heat as if you were destroying a metal block.

 

[zombiehunter]

Another case of "screamer mechanic kind of ridiculous."  I'm doing a T3 quest in the burnt forest.  It's day 18.  I fired 8 shots from my pump shotgun.  Voila!  Screamer!  How should 8 shots from a shotgun spawn a screamer?  Kind of ridiculous.  IMO, of course.

 

[Roland]

Another case of "screamer mechanic kind of ridiculous."  I'm doing a T3 quest in the burnt forest.  It's day 18.  I fired 8 shots from my pump shotgun.  Voila!  Screamer!  How should 8 shots from a shotgun spawn a screamer?  Kind of ridiculous.  IMO, of course.

She was already in the area ready to swoop on Old Crow but then your 8 shotgun blasts distracted her.

 

[BFT2020]

I had screamers show up at my base at night and when I was low leveled.  I was not prepared to take them on.  So I just went upstairs and hid in a room until they lost interest and stopped searching for me.  Then when the morning bells rung, I just went back down and cleared them out.

You don't have to engage with them, you can just let them lose track of you and then clear them up later.  I like the chaos they bring.  Did I miss out on some crafting time during the night because of them downstairs wondering where I went off to?  Sure, but that forces me to react and readjust what I was doing that day.

 

[RipClaw]

You don't have to engage with them, you can just let them lose track of you and then clear them up later.

Unless they see you. I can't say for sure, but it seems to me that screamers like cops can see through many blocks. I've had screamer hordes spawn even though I was inside my base or underground.

 

[pApA^LeGBa]

Unless they see you. I can't say for sure, but it seems to me that screamers like cops can see through many blocks. I've had screamer hordes spawn even though I was inside my base or underground.

Yeah, it used to be enough to have no windows on ground level. Now they do spawn hordes even when there is no line of sight to you. I guess it´s not just sight anymore but also sound and movement. Which means you can still hide from them if you recognize them early enough.

 

[BFT2020]

Unless they see you. I can't say for sure, but it seems to me that screamers like cops can see through many blocks. I've had screamer hordes spawn even though I was inside my base or underground.

If my stealth meter goes green, they don't know where I am anymore.  Then eventually they stop looking and just wander around.  When they were below, I turned off my forge and campfire so that they were not generating any activity from that point on.  So eventually my stealth meter went from yellow to green, then 50 seconds later (agility build so one level in From the Shadows), they stopped trying to get to my location and just hung out downstairs until I dropped down and started to stealth them with my bow.

 

[Javabean867]

Full Blocks folks.  Make the insides of your bases out of full blocks and they can't see you.  There are a few other blocks that count as 'full' blocks, but not many.  Anything else and you are playing with fire.

I'm sure if you want to fancy up the outside of your base, then i am sure the partial blocks are fine to gussy it up some, but the insides should be full blocks.

PS. by full blocks i mean completely filled.

 

[seven]

Full Blocks folks.  Make the insides of your bases out of full blocks and they can't see you.  There are a few other blocks that count as 'full' blocks, but not many.  Anything else and you are playing with fire.

I'm sure if you want to fancy up the outside of your base, then i am sure the partial blocks are fine to gussy it up some, but the insides should be full blocks.

PS. by full blocks i mean completely filled.

Yep. Pseudo Posse did a video on the many, many blocks that screamers can see through. Just make your home an ugly box and you should be ok. Ignore the pages and pages of blocks in the shapes menu, those are only for POI builders.

 

[RipClaw]

Full Blocks folks.  Make the insides of your bases out of full blocks and they can't see you.  There are a few other blocks that count as 'full' blocks, but not many.  Anything else and you are playing with fire.

I know all this, but many use POIs as a base. You can't choose whether the outer wall is made of full blocks or half blocks. The POI designer decided that.

It also shows that the concept of line of sight in the game is completely broken. In reality, I can break a line of sight with a thin piece of plywood. In the game, the zombies switch to x-ray vision and can still see you if you're not behind a thick wall.

There are so many rules you have to follow to avoid attracting a screamer. Don't do this and don't do that.
I read somewhere that games should be fun. This isn't fun anymore, it's just annoying.

My solution to this at the moment is that the first thing I do in a new game is set up a makeshift horde base connected to my crafting base and then kill that stupid Karen and her minions.

 

[MirkoVawsk]

Hot take, the screamers aren't that bad and they help me test the horde side of my base. I enjoy hearing that scream and running up my stairs and flipping my switches to battle the oncoming horde. I use screamers to test flaws in my base.

 

[Javabean867]

Yep. Pseudo Posse did a video on the many, many blocks that screamers can see through. Just make your home an ugly box and you should be ok. Ignore the pages and pages of blocks in the shapes menu, those are only for POI builders.

There shouldn't anything stopping you from making the outside of your base fancy.  What are you talking about?  Just make sure the structure is made of solid blocks.  

 

[Uncle Al]

There shouldn't anything stopping you from making the outside of your base fancy.  What are you talking about?  Just make sure the structure is made of solid blocks.  

More to the point, according to Pseudo Posse's testing, far more blocks do prevent line of sight than don't.

They didn't test everything, but it seems very likely that the only blocks that don't block LOS are 'cube' blocks thinner than a 3/4

Thin blocks like 1/4 7m rounds block LOS just fine, as do 6m ramp wedge tips, which are actually thinner than a plate.

The determining factor seems to be 'is it a cube?' - i.e. it comes up when you sort your block shapes into the cube category.

Oh, even thin cube blocks work as LOS blockers if you use the centred version. Certainly plate and 1/2 block do.

 

[ElCabong]

Screamers are spawning too often

 

[Ttocs]

Too early is a problem, but past day 7 a weak wall perimeter with some wood spikes and screamers are no longer a problem when at base.
No issue with them spawning at T5+6 quests because you're well armed by then and picking her off from range not a problem or just blocking entrances and flat out ignoring them till quest is over no problem.

TDLR; Should be an early grace period or adjusted spawn threshold for early days. imo.

 

[warmer]

Well I finally got them to spawn suddenly. It took emptying 4 dew collectors, and starting a forge and a campfire. Got back after a day in another biome. All 4 dew collectors were full. Emptied them, started up my campfire to boil water, started the forge to smelt, and BAM 2 screamers. I am guessing the dew collectors each stop generating heat when full, so all 4 generated heat immediately, then my campfire/forge started.

First time I have ever had two spawn at the same time. No torches or candles in the entire base.

Where do you see heat as it's generated? I didn't see it in the console view.

 

[RipClaw]

Where do you see heat as it's generated? I didn't see it in the console view.

You can see it when you go into the Debug Mode and press F8 twice. It shows FPS, the heat and all actions.

 

[warmer]

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.

I think a varied tiered system makes the most sense. Offset by applying your gamestage to the tiers spawn pool. Another option is raising the spawn RNG by a specific offset based on how many times the witch screams. First time typical Zeds, second scream apply your game stage to the spawn, third scream increase spawn count