PC Basebuilding is NOT an Outdated Survivalstrategy!!!

[IgnyteZero]

In other words predictable conga-line zombies are not bugs but a development decision because adding randomization last makes development easier.

Which is fine and dandy if that's the case. But if this behaviour persist it might be problematic. TBH, zombie behaviour is my greatest worry in A17. Skillsystems and whatever will be tweaked to no end in patches coming, that's what TFP has always done more or less. Zombiebehaviour has so far not been something they've prioritised. But maybe they are now, and this is not some overblown basebuilding nerf backfiring on gameplay making it tedious and boring as some fear. Then all is good. But I do think no matter that it is imperative that we report how easy and boring it is to circumvent this so called AI, and how much we think a bad zombie AI might hurt the game experience.

And at the same time enemies need to have decent AI. There has been a huge improvement towards that goal. As you said, they do need to be more erratic and I am sure more improvements will be done on that front, with more zombie profiles, for example with some zombies that keep hitting foundations even if you move to the next pylon, some others not using the 1st most optimal path to you etc.

Yeah that's what I'm hoping. Having some zombie types act smarter and some less smart would make things really interesting I think. In theory.

 

[meganoth]

Which is fine and dandy if that's the case. But if this behaviour persist it might be problematic. TBH, zombie behaviour is my greatest worry in A17. Skillsystems and whatever will be tweaked to no end in patches coming, that's what TFP has always done more or less. Zombiebehaviour has so far not been something they've prioritised.

Well, somewhere near the start of A17 development TFP have hired a new programmer (Fataal) specifically for redoing AI (he has a few more areas to work on like everyone else in the team, but AI is probably the "center piece" of his work, at least for A17). And Fataal has more than once said that randomized behaviour will be done in the polishing phase which is not clearly defined but still a few months away, at least.

 

[Luzifer]

Heya guys nice to read your debate here, i just wanted to tell ya, that I uploaded a Vid on YT showcasing the base i posted and also uncovering a Bug in the process of it. I had to be very silent tho, because everyone else was sleepin already so maybe bump your speackers/ headset a tad up. I get louder the longer the vid goes so please stick with me and or just see what i Uncovered.

 

[InSanity]

Im glad that something like that worked. From where did you shoot? I see no angle from top floor to shoot the zombies beating on the columns that are destroyed.

You can't clearly see it but I have 4 3x3 sections of the floor on that first level made of iron bars that I can see every angle of the columns from.

 

[RipClaw]

Heya guys nice to read your debate here, i just wanted to tell ya, that I uploaded a Vid on YT showcasing the base i posted and also uncovering a Bug in the process of it. I had to be very silent tho, because everyone else was sleepin already so maybe bump your speackers/ headset a tad up. I get louder the longer the vid goes so please stick with me and or just see what i Uncovered.

You where in debug mode when testing this. If you hit the * key on the numblock this disables the AI and the zombies stop walking. Maybe this is what happend.

Thanks for the showcase of the base. It looks nice but against stronger horde you should add some traps to slow them down like barbed wire on the floor or electric fence posts. And dart traps would also be an idea. The downside of this many traps would be the you need a loot of ressources to keep this base up and running.

 

[RipClaw]

Well, somewhere near the start of A17 development TFP have hired a new programmer (Fataal) specifically for redoing AI (he has a few more areas to work on like everyone else in the team, but AI is probably the "center piece" of his work, at least for A17). And Fataal has more than once said that randomized behaviour will be done in the polishing phase which is not clearly defined but still a few months away, at least.

This is a little problem. The only way to defeat a enemy which is stronger than you, outnumbers you and behaves in a unpredictable way is to use as much firepower as possible and this is not very elegant or creative. And in the end you will loose because you are out of ammunition.

 

[meganoth]

This is a little problem. The only way to defeat a enemy which is stronger than you, outnumbers you and behaves in a unpredictable way is to use as much firepower as possible and this is not very elegant or creative. And in the end you will loose because you are out of ammunition.

But there is all kinds of random, for example ALL zombies attack a random location or EACH zombie attacks a random location or a gauss function is used.... I think a combination of random behaviour and lower block damage of the zombies will keep the difficulty at the same level but make the defense much more interesting.

 

[Luzifer]

You where in debug mode when testing this. If you hit the * key on the numblock this disables the AI and the zombies stop walking. Maybe this is what happend.
Thanks for the showcase of the base. It looks nice but against stronger horde you should add some traps to slow them down like barbed wire on the floor or electric fence posts. And dart traps would also be an idea. The downside of this many traps would be the you need a loot of ressources to keep this base up and running.

...really? i´ll try again but i doubt i pressed anything but walk in the second it happened

I know i know its just a basic design, there is plenty room for more Turrets n fences n wires and and and.

I was just surprised with the Ai not doin anything but attack the me in 1.5 m

 

[Krougal]

...really? i´ll try again but i doubt i pressed anything but walk in the second it happened
I know i know its just a basic design, there is plenty room for more Turrets n fences n wires and and and.

I was just surprised with the Ai not doin anything but attack the me in 1.5 m

It's an interesting design. I'd like to see a vid how it does against an actual horde if you find the time to do one. Really curious too if you fill the paths with barbed wire how it will affect pathing. If it doesn't then this would work well even without turrets & blades since they have a path to you but are slowed enough for even 1 person to be able to keep up with killing them I think.

 

[sadpickle]

I found it's incredibly easy to use the zombie pathing to make zombies walk on spikes. Zombies will treat spikes as a platform they can stand on, and attempt to use them to scale a wall that is 2 blocks high. As an illustration, this is a crude cutaway side view of my defenses

=====#

^^^^#

^ are spikes and # are walls. = is empty space. If a spike is placed on the ground next to a 2-high wall, they zombies will attempt to jump on the spike, to then jump on the wall. However the spike breaks before the zombie can use it (if they can at all), and they move to the next spike, and so on. In this way a 2-high wall or platform surrounded with spikes can use every spike directly adjacent to the wall before the zombies attempt to break through. They will sporadically hit walls, but if there is a spike available to step on they will attempt to do so.

I have since closed in the design I'm using and am waiting for the next horde night to see if they will still take the bait. There are no doors reachable from the ground, so they have to tunnel through the bottom or jump over the wall (now impossible) to get to me. I'm at work so no pictures, but I'll try to take one when I get home.

 

[Luzifer]

I found it's incredibly easy to use the zombie pathing to make zombies walk on spikes. Zombies will treat spikes as a platform they can stand on, and attempt to use them to scale a wall that is 2 blocks high. As an illustration, this is a crude cutaway side view of my defenses

=====#

^^^^#

^ are spikes and # are walls. = is empty space. If a spike is placed on the ground next to a 2-high wall, they zombies will attempt to jump on the spike, to then jump on the wall. However the spike breaks before the zombie can use it (if they can at all), and they move to the next spike, and so on. In this way a 2-high wall or platform surrounded with spikes can use every spike directly adjacent to the wall before the zombies attempt to break through. They will sporadically hit walls, but if there is a spike available to step on they will attempt to do so.

I have since closed in the design I'm using and am waiting for the next horde night to see if they will still take the bait. There are no doors reachable from the ground, so they have to tunnel through the bottom or jump over the wall (now impossible) to get to me. I'm at work so no pictures, but I'll try to take one when I get home.

Awesome! Would've never thought of that design

 

[unlike them]

If a spike is placed on the ground next to a 2-high wall, they zombies will attempt to jump on the spike, to then jump on the wall. However the spike breaks before the zombie can use it (if they can at all), and they move to the next spike, and so on.

Good job! I'm gonna try it.