guardianangelmp
New member
So that's where the snarkiness and barbed comments get built up from.
PC Catering to New Players hurts Replayability for Experienced Players
- Thread starter stallionsden
- Start date
Ornias
New member
Every POI now is loaded with loot. After a play through or 2 you know where every loot room is. This last play through I had 2 pistols and over 100 rounds before dark on the 1st day. Turning the z's into bullet sponges via difficulty level seems like a cheap way to up difficulty. I would love for headshots to greatly increase damage done with body shots being all but useless. I really miss the days of the center city crawling with deadly z's and loaded with loot. Now its just 1st POI and you are good.
KhaineGB
Well-known member
Oh god no. I don't want to see the complicated craft system come back just for that.
But I do feel some tweaks need to be made so players can't just run away from combat, make what they need super fast and then re-engage. That new onCombatEntered trigger might be the solution... i'll have to play with it later.
Basically i'm thinking something like....
Code:
<triggered_effect trigger="onCombatEntered" action="AddBuff" buff="buffNoCombatCrafting"/>
The difference with the A18 system is you scrap a gun to get parts, then use that to make a new gun. In the earlier alphas (A12 and earlier) you had to find all the gun parts, and then decide if you wanted to save them to make a gun, or destroy them to make a mold, to make many guns.
As for the cement, I do wonder if that's partially due to how easy it is to just loop around traders until you find the working workstations you need. The blockplaceholders could probably do with some tweaks.
Kubikus
New member
See, what you are sharing is your perspective. Aka your opinion.
"Truth" he says. Funny. No! Adorable!!
But how is that motivating? What motivates you? I mean, you're really doing all this work for free? On the official forum of a company that makes millions? I still find that hard to believe.
Yes yes. (lol)
If, Roland, I would criticse your behaviour in an example like you lay out here and you would then explain yourself like so, that would make sense. But I criticise your behaviour in this thread, where you attack and ridicule reasonable criticism, and nothing of the absurdities you describe above are happening.
Why are you being mean here?
And the criticism here is perfectly valid. For a significant number of people the game has lost it's replay value with and a because of the design changes that A17 brought. And not, as the silly title you gave this thread implies, because we played too much. Your initial argument, that the game has an increased player count, can also indeed be explained with the reduced difficulty, though, as he admitted himself, stallion did initially not phrase that thought perfectly, you know, the one or two sentences you base your harsh attack on.
So yet again, you're using rethorics to refute my criticism. You don't even bother dealing with it. I could lay that out in more detail, but, well, I don't really care anymore. Contrary to your portrayal, I came by after I started a new game in A18, only to find myself with a pistol, 100+ rounds and the unanswered question "ok, what now" after 20 minutes. Came to the forums to see what's going on. Were welcomed by that thread that mirrors my opinion, to have it found ridiculed by the company man. Left a note. It's really no elaborate scheme to stick it to the man, buddy. I am, though, honestly interested in what drives you to do "what you do", I find it kinda weird to come back after months only to see you in the middle of the same old same old.
I can also help you out: I really think, and honestly so!, that ppl should just give up this large scale criticism about the game's direction. Like I have. Yes, it's valid, but you're only wasting your time, as it will lead to nothing. I understand the frustration, I was addicted to 7dtd, played it pretty much every day, often for hours. It's sad when you loose a hobby of great significance. But it's kinda like love, better to have loved and lost love, than to have never loved at all, right? Appreciate the good times you had. And there is still some hope, I'm waiting for gold and then we'll see what modding will eventually be able to do. What kind of options the dev will provide, what professional programmers will be able to pull of. Maybe it will bring much of the magic back. Until then, look for something else to fill the void. Myself, for example, I picked up the electric guitar again, now wondering why I had put it down for so many years.
Kubikus
New member
The treasure rooms are sooo terrible. I think they're inspired by Skyrim and such, but they simply don't work in 7dtd, because you don't have to go through the "dungeon" to get to them. "Dungeons" are great, but the loot should be distributed along the way. Ideally - and isn't it ironic, that NOW they removed zombie-loot! - as drops from the zombies, so you have leveled loot for when the zombies become stronger.
Oh yeah, the hub-city... Mmmhhh.. those were the days. When they had endless spawn, meaning you could never clear the city, the zombies would just keep coming. What an atmosphere that created, like you were in a metropolis overrun by zombies. How great it would be if we had stealth in such an environment.
Zombies spawning outside buildings (spawned by the buildings, called the "static spawner") was generally a great mechanic, as you would have to fight your way into the buildings to begin with. It also was a great method to populated towns and cities. Instead of removing the static spawner, they should've just added a few sleepers that pop out of closets and such, not even one in every building, but truly jump scare material. One that would be hard to kill, at least every now and then. That would be so much better.
There is so much potential in combining old and new mechanics.. Sad!
Edit:
Regarding dungeon POIs here is an idea I had a long time ago:
Make these dungeon-experiences quests. Make it so that in order to trigger a POI full of zombies, you have to activate a quest with the big yellow mark outside. That will reset the POI, create the sleepers and a sealed box with treasure. Then you have to clear out the whole building, and only if you did, it will unlock the otherwise unbreakable box in the treasure room.
Easy. Reasonable. Elegant.
- - - Updated - - -
Drastically increase crafting time as soon as the player holds something. Decrease it when their hands are empty.But I do feel some tweaks need to be made so players can't just run away from combat, make what they need super fast and then re-engage. That new onCombatEntered trigger might be the solution... i'll have to play with it later.
Basically i'm thinking something like....
Then have a buff with say... 2 or 3 second duration that massively increases the craft time, and the buff stacks duration or the like... just as an example. Would be a bit complicated, but do-able.Code:<triggered_effect trigger="onCombatEntered" action="AddBuff" buff="buffNoCombatCrafting"/>
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How do you guys get a gun and 100 ammo in less than 30 minutes ? On MP we are struggling to find decent weapons early on and often have to fight with a wooden club first 2 days.
Or maybe ... my friend who manage the server reduced the loot by quite a margin.
THAT sounds really good : more z's in cities so not anymore looting building 1 while my friends kill building 2 !!
stallionsden
Tester
Ya think... havent played this for ages. Apart from mod fixes changes and prefabbing in the editor...many great games that have replayability and actual challenge and fear and real threats in game... this game is nothing of what it use to be. Not talking bout modding capabilities, prefab editor, new items and blocks either...
Yes, that buff sounds nice. I would hope such a thing would be implemented low-level into vanilla though. It is save to say xml-buffs use a lot more cpu cycles than anything done in the libraries directly and this buff would be activated quite often. That idea should be posted in the A18 suggestions thread or the dev diary.Oh god no. I don't want to see the complicated craft system come back just for that.
But I do feel some tweaks need to be made so players can't just run away from combat, make what they need super fast and then re-engage. That new onCombatEntered trigger might be the solution... i'll have to play with it later.
Basically i'm thinking something like....
Then have a buff with say... 2 or 3 second duration that massively increases the craft time, and the buff stacks duration or the like... just as an example. Would be a bit complicated, but do-able.Code:<triggered_effect trigger="onCombatEntered" action="AddBuff" buff="buffNoCombatCrafting"/>
Ok, that is different.
Traders, lots of stacks in POIs, easy availability of better tools and workstations, a lot of reasons. I would think small changes in all areas probably would help a lot here.
I also think another reason is that the HP difference between upgraded cobblestone and unupgraded concrete is too big leading players to dismiss cobblestone as inadequate.
Anecdote about this: I know someone who upgraded some higher-up cobblestone to concrete because he feared cop spit. Cobblestone has a frightfully bad reputation.
If I have no need to use concrete sparingly I don't need bad experiences to always use the better material.
On the other hand my anecdote did end on a "promising" note: After he upgraded so many blocks I had made with cobblestone, our concrete supply did indeed run out before we were finished with the day 21 horde base :distrust: . And since a 4 player co-op does get lots of (concrete-worthy) glowies and even demos at day 21 it doesn't look as much out of balance as I thought.
The problem might be more about multiplayer generally being just so much faster than singleplayer in everything.
Boidster
New member
I was a volunteer moderator on the forums of a company that MakeS billions. I moderated in their game console forums. It was Xhausting sometimes, but I did it because I was engaged in the community, cared about the product, and wanted to contribute. The desire to be helpful without compensation is a difficult thing for many, many people to understand. You are not alone.
RipClaw
Well-known member
But you might want to save it for later base. The first base is often only a temporary solution until you have the material for the final base.
There was a change in A18 that you did not consider. In A17 you got ready to use concrete mix from the bags you find in POIs. In A18 it is only cement and you need a working cement mixer, stones and sand to make the concrete mix. For me that sounds like a pretty big nerf.
That' s the group gamestage. The more players the higher the group gamestage. The 5 players with the highest gamestage are used to calculate the group gamestage. The details can be found in the gamestages.xml file.
I think you overestimate the meaning of having concrete to upgrade your base. The concrete does not make you invulnerable. It's a little more durable, but still the zombies can break through in no time thanks to their group bonus. I know that everything used to go a little slower, but there were not the same threats. The hordes in the early game have become much stronger compared to earlier Alphas.
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Roland
Community Moderator
To your point that I wasn't speaking to the actual criticism: I usually don't engage people on their direct criticism unless I disagree with it. I don't disagree that the game has become streamlined and that currently the balance is such that for experienced players it is very easy to get going and established. As an experienced player I don't like the middle steps of crafting being removed nor do I like the lighted path inside dungeons. I've stated that myself elsewhere many times which is why I haven't been disagreeing with that aspect of the criticism.
What I do disagree with is:
1) That for new players the game is too easy and simplistic and becomes boring quickly. Contrary to the picture painted by stallionsden there are people who started in A17 and already have 100's of hours. There are people migrating from the console edition and based on the threads we are getting asking for help it doesn't appear that they are coming from a straight up more complex version to a more simplistic version. Of course, there will be those who get bored of 7 Days to Die very quickly but that has also been true since the beginning.
2) That the developers should cater to experienced players who find the game simplistic and easy because they "solved" it long ago.
3) That allowing modders to be the ones to complexify and ramp up the challenge from a base vanilla experience that is accessible to a wider range of people is a bad thing.
Those are the things I've responded to because I don't agree. But if you need an affirmation from me
1) that the game has been made more streamlined and simplistic in some ways and
2) that for experienced players there is no longer any threat of starving, or dehydrating and
3) that the dungeons with their guiding lights are more simplistic than they would be without the clues and
4) that all empty containers are presented as opened and non-interactive blocks which simplifies looting and
5) that crafting in general has lost interesting intermediary steps that made it more of a process rather than a single click event and
6) that there aren't enough outdoor zombies to make exploration threatening for experienced players
then here you go: Yep. I agree.
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Laz Man
Fun Pimps Staff
Most of things you mention are subjective and will vary from player to player and will honestly improve over time. MM, has already acknowledged that the single POI loot rooms probably should be redone (e.g. loot spread out throughout POI). Regarding zombie counts, I wouldnt be surprised if those increased as more optimizations are done as we get closer to gold release.
The only thing I dont see coming back is the crafting grid that required many players to look up recipes online.
I admit it was fun at first (e.g. trial and error) but dont miss it at all anymore as the novelty wears off over time. Leaving in that old crafting system would of probably left this game forever a niche game and thus no more future updates (e.g. no sales, no additional development), in which we all probably would of stopped playing the game already.
Given the game continues to get sales and develop, and continues to be highly configurablr/ moldable (ty tfps), I have been able to enjoy the game much much longer.
Big picture, I feel the trade offs / changes has been worth it and most have gotten more out of the game otherwise.
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TWORDY
Active member
I've almost played 7dtd for 650 hours and I can't say that the game is boring. I`d rather take a break from the title instead of making baseless claims that only produce additional sorrows. But with the experience gained, the 7dtd becomes more predictable and repetitive like any other game on the market. It's not a triple-A title (nowadays even those do suck), players hit many hours and game is rising in popularity. I don't find things overly complicated as a fun factor, especially while new players assisting me cleary struggle. Some of the aspects of the game have been simplified, and I take it for a good coin. There are mods to ramp-up difficulty level with other content, or people may simply edit XML files by themselves.
stallionsden
Tester
You kinda missed what i said so your statement is off by far. But they are not baseless claims and i not the only one saying it.