Therein lies one pet peeve of mine with demolishers; you're almost better off either using a POI as a horde base or simply using an open field to run around and shoot everything.
PC Demolisher balance
- Thread starter paladylan
- Start date
Outlaw_187
New member
Going by this thread, I'm taking it no one likes the demolishers, lol.
Again, I haven't encountered them yet but I'm not looking forward to it.
I kinda like seeing destruction though so I won't mind seeing them blow my
up.
I do get why most people hate them cuz it ruins their hard creative work. I just turn prefabs into a makeshift base
Again, I haven't encountered them yet but I'm not looking forward to it.
I kinda like seeing destruction though so I won't mind seeing them blow my
up. I do get why most people hate them cuz it ruins their hard creative work. I just turn prefabs into a makeshift base
Viktoriusiii
New member
Easy fix:
Decrease the radius of the chest beeing hit and make it so that IF you can snipe that thing, he can't explode. He can still deal massive amounts of damage with his fist, but no more exploding.
That is litereally the only way to balance this without reworking the entire design.
Either he is tanky
or he deals damage
or he can explode and take half your base with it.
He can't do all 3.
And if he does, at least give us a countermeasure (like shooting his chestpiece).
Decrease the radius of the chest beeing hit and make it so that IF you can snipe that thing, he can't explode. He can still deal massive amounts of damage with his fist, but no more exploding.
That is litereally the only way to balance this without reworking the entire design.
Either he is tanky
or he deals damage
or he can explode and take half your base with it.
He can't do all 3.
And if he does, at least give us a countermeasure (like shooting his chestpiece).
Orclover
New member
They killed our server when we were playing. Which is a sad statement.Going by this thread, I'm taking it no one likes the demolishers, lol.
Again, I haven't encountered them yet but I'm not looking forward to it.
I kinda like seeing destruction though so I won't mind seeing them blow my
I do get why most people hate them cuz it ruins their hard creative work. I just turn prefabs into a makeshift base
At first just 1 showed up on horde night, we could handle one once we learned the ropes. But within a few days of playing we had 4+ showing up at a time and inevitably one would destroy a huge portion of base/kill-base. We started going offsite and using POI's, but they had to be completely rebuilt. Eventually our players just got sick of constantly having to rebuild or being forced to build/play only one way to deal with 1 threat. So we nerfed and then removed demolishers from the server.
It was too late, what few regulars we had were done with this version of the game.
It was just me and sometimes 1 other player on the server logging in daily so we scrapped it and will probably skip A19 and wait for A20 when bandits will hopefully replace demolishers. Maybe within a year or two.
I think Demo's were a design choice of desperation to keep the game challenging for the truly hardcore and the devs. They didnt mind having the bases built only certain ways and they needed SOMETHING to keep end game from being boring. Some of us could handle the change but we found it irritating, and others.....well....that was their limit. Builder/gatherer types were not into the extreme challenge that comes with head shooting constantly and no room for mistakes. That is 0 ROOM for any mistakes on dealing with these guys or kiss your base goodbye. So they just went to other games.
Just wait a ~ couple years, 7D2D will prob be completely different again. I'll personally play a bit after every patch but I get pretty bored playing alone and the game will probably have to change a lot to bring back our regulars again.
Boidster
New member
A friend and I were looking for something different to finish up our time in A18, so we made a very simple horde base to see how we could survive demolishers without wedge tips and extra cheese, and, well ....
We build a solid steel block 2 blocks wide, 7 blocks high, and 12 blocks long. The ends were mirrored - the end row was a generator, the next to end row was a pair of electric fenceposts, the 3rd row in was 4 dart traps facing into the middle of the base. We had a 1 block high wall of steel plate around the ends to give the generators some protection. For the 6 middle blocks we built a cage of iron bars 3 blocks high (including in front of the dart traps) with stairs going up on either side at one end so zombies were free to climb up into the cage. We had blocks alternating high and low across the cage so the zombies had to jump through it instead of just walking. Then we hooked up the electric fences (starting from the generator at the end where the stairs were), wired the dart traps up to motion sensors that for once we remembered to set to look at zombies and ignore us, climbed up onto the dart traps at the far end of the cage from the steps, and whacked the time back to 9.58pm on the last horde night.
We were both around gamestage 150 and the game was set to 16 zombies each per horde, so it was a heck of a horde. More than half of the zombies were rads and demolishers turned up in small groups every couple of minutes, and every last one of them streamed up the stairs into the cage and started trying to jump their way down the cage to smash through the bars at the end to us - and almost immediately died.
The electric fences stunned them while they were trying to jump towards us and the dart traps rained steel death on them. Nobody had a chance to explode, even demolishers that got their nipples pinched by other zombies were dead before they had beeped more than a couple of times. We just stood on the dart traps with shotguns nuking the pelicans and taking potshots at zombies coming in on the ground for the lols, and repairing the dart traps and fenceposts at our end. With electric fences all of the damage is taken by the 2nd post and none by the first post, by wiring them up from the other end we got the second posts on each fence at our end where we could keep them tuned up. And it worked amazingly well.
At the end of the horde the steps had taken a few hits but that was expected as we hadn't messed around making it easy for them to get up, a couple of railings from the side of the cage by the stair openings were gone, and that was it - nothing in the half of the cage closest to us took any damage, and the bars covering the dart traps at each end were untouched.
We're a lot less worried about horde nights in A19 without drop traps and wedge tip slopes now, even the demolishers have stopped being scary.
We build a solid steel block 2 blocks wide, 7 blocks high, and 12 blocks long. The ends were mirrored - the end row was a generator, the next to end row was a pair of electric fenceposts, the 3rd row in was 4 dart traps facing into the middle of the base. We had a 1 block high wall of steel plate around the ends to give the generators some protection. For the 6 middle blocks we built a cage of iron bars 3 blocks high (including in front of the dart traps) with stairs going up on either side at one end so zombies were free to climb up into the cage. We had blocks alternating high and low across the cage so the zombies had to jump through it instead of just walking. Then we hooked up the electric fences (starting from the generator at the end where the stairs were), wired the dart traps up to motion sensors that for once we remembered to set to look at zombies and ignore us, climbed up onto the dart traps at the far end of the cage from the steps, and whacked the time back to 9.58pm on the last horde night.
We were both around gamestage 150 and the game was set to 16 zombies each per horde, so it was a heck of a horde. More than half of the zombies were rads and demolishers turned up in small groups every couple of minutes, and every last one of them streamed up the stairs into the cage and started trying to jump their way down the cage to smash through the bars at the end to us - and almost immediately died.
The electric fences stunned them while they were trying to jump towards us and the dart traps rained steel death on them. Nobody had a chance to explode, even demolishers that got their nipples pinched by other zombies were dead before they had beeped more than a couple of times. We just stood on the dart traps with shotguns nuking the pelicans and taking potshots at zombies coming in on the ground for the lols, and repairing the dart traps and fenceposts at our end. With electric fences all of the damage is taken by the 2nd post and none by the first post, by wiring them up from the other end we got the second posts on each fence at our end where we could keep them tuned up. And it worked amazingly well.
At the end of the horde the steps had taken a few hits but that was expected as we hadn't messed around making it easy for them to get up, a couple of railings from the side of the cage by the stair openings were gone, and that was it - nothing in the half of the cage closest to us took any damage, and the bars covering the dart traps at each end were untouched.
We're a lot less worried about horde nights in A19 without drop traps and wedge tip slopes now, even the demolishers have stopped being scary.
Boidster
New member
We're about to try a similar-sounding base, a modified version of blugold1's in this thread. A hallway with electric fences, jumping obstacles, and dart traps. In sandbox testing, it destroyed a group of 10 demolishers AFK, and we do not plan on playing AFK. We hope that no demolishers reach the base, actually. They and cops will be priority targets for us from the rooftop. The riff-raff can get shredded by the base defenses. Anyhow, if the base survives, but with significant damage I will still consider it a success. It can be rebuilt from scratch in one game day. Maybe two if I have to go mine up 12000 rock for cement.
FileMachete
New member
Just a visual of what a couple demolishers going off do.
Built a newish horde base. Just a 2-wide corridor with 4 rows of doubled electric fencing and 7 rows of dart traps firing down from ceiling.
Main corridor has 2 shotgun turrets mounted up high to shoot zeds in the back but positioned so they can't hit me at the end of corridor.
No falls or exploits. If zeds make it to corridors end there's doubled r-concrete poles then me.
Had it built for Day 49. Had a couple demolishers. Switched to different Marksman rifle w AP rounds. No issues. Didn't use shotgun turrets.
Pics are the aftermath from Day 56 horde after 2 demos blew up near beginning of corridor. Not sure what triggered the first one. There was a big mama in front of him and I didn't have an angle to shoot him before he blew. I think I triggered the second one when he jumped up out of the hole the first one had made in the floor. (which I'd thankfully had the foresight to double up so two layers of r-conc) While I'd tested the shotgun turrets earlier in the horde, they weren't on during either demo explosion.
Explosions took out all but one of the trigger plates for the first 3 rows of dart traps. E-fences were far enough away to not get destroyed.
(the hatches protect e-fences on the outlying, not-connected pylon bases. On main corridor part hatches prevent cops from puking at me in end cage when they're still at ground level) Even with those dart traps 'down' (they were high enough to not get destroyed) rest of the horde went fine (only 8 alive, old pc).
Debating switching to trip wires instead of trigger plates. Issue is that the trigger plates work better. Larger area? compared to the trip wires, where it seems like even when zeds get zapped, they often move far enough forward to be out of the activation zone for the trip wires.. would be nice if there were a way to use both. don't think it'd work to use a relay or switch in between the activation signals and the dart traps?
Built a newish horde base. Just a 2-wide corridor with 4 rows of doubled electric fencing and 7 rows of dart traps firing down from ceiling.
Main corridor has 2 shotgun turrets mounted up high to shoot zeds in the back but positioned so they can't hit me at the end of corridor.
No falls or exploits. If zeds make it to corridors end there's doubled r-concrete poles then me.
Had it built for Day 49. Had a couple demolishers. Switched to different Marksman rifle w AP rounds. No issues. Didn't use shotgun turrets.
Pics are the aftermath from Day 56 horde after 2 demos blew up near beginning of corridor. Not sure what triggered the first one. There was a big mama in front of him and I didn't have an angle to shoot him before he blew. I think I triggered the second one when he jumped up out of the hole the first one had made in the floor. (which I'd thankfully had the foresight to double up so two layers of r-conc) While I'd tested the shotgun turrets earlier in the horde, they weren't on during either demo explosion.
Explosions took out all but one of the trigger plates for the first 3 rows of dart traps. E-fences were far enough away to not get destroyed.
(the hatches protect e-fences on the outlying, not-connected pylon bases. On main corridor part hatches prevent cops from puking at me in end cage when they're still at ground level) Even with those dart traps 'down' (they were high enough to not get destroyed) rest of the horde went fine (only 8 alive, old pc).
Debating switching to trip wires instead of trigger plates. Issue is that the trigger plates work better. Larger area? compared to the trip wires, where it seems like even when zeds get zapped, they often move far enough forward to be out of the activation zone for the trip wires.. would be nice if there were a way to use both. don't think it'd work to use a relay or switch in between the activation signals and the dart traps?
That's exactly the video that we watched before we built ours, although we only built the platform and the cage with the electronics on each end. We didn't bother with the rest of it, it was only a proof of concept and we figured (correctly) that standing at the end of the platform furthest from the steps would be enough to legitimately get the zombies pathing where we wanted them.
Turned out that just a half built tunnel of terror ("tun'o'ter" ?
) with iron rail walls not steel blocks (so we could see what was going on properly) was more than enough to do the job.Try it, you'll love it. We probably could have used reinforced concrete not steel, but steel is just more comforting
That's why I went with motion sensors, the activation zone is the whole corridor and quite a bit outside it which is a good early warning - if the dart traps suddenly fire up you know something's coming. It's totally a using a sledgehammer to crack a nut approach to firing darts along a corridor, but a nut that's been hit with a sledgehammer is well and truly cracked ...
FileMachete
New member
That's an interesting idea @Grolbu , I haven't used the motion sensors much. Wonder if their 'view' can be restricted by a tunnel of blocks? If so then maybe I could rig something where only a couple dart traps would fire, instead of all 14 in the corridor.. hmm...
Posted more pics of my base here if anyones curious:
https://community.7daystodie.com/topic/19658-a184-fairly-basic-no-exploit-base-before-after-2-demos-explode/
Morning after day 63 horde. Went very well.
Posted more pics of my base here if anyones curious:
https://community.7daystodie.com/topic/19658-a184-fairly-basic-no-exploit-base-before-after-2-demos-explode/
Morning after day 63 horde. Went very well.
We don't build horde defense bases anymore. We just take over a POI and put in a murder hole or two for spraying death down on the zeds. Next horde night, find a new POI and let them wreck it.
Boidster
New member
Not in 18.4, no. Our motion sensor's visibility extended through concrete blocks down to the outside of our base. So zombies ambling along the ground near the base wall would trigger the dart traps to fire even though the zombies were 6 blocks below, still needing to climb the stairs.
Extra bizarre is that a couple of months ago I specifically tested motion sensors and found that if a zombie's head was not visible, the motion sensor would not trigger even if the shuffling feet were clearly visible. I cannot reconcile my results from that testing with our experience last night.
Also regarding using motion sensors, be sure to put it somewhere safe from friendly fire. The last calm thing either of us said during blood moon last night was "uhhh, I think I shot the motion sensor". All traps disabled, much screaming and dying ensued. Demolishers blew out 30% of the base. It was ugly.
FileMachete
New member
Thanks for the info @Boidster , was kinda afraid that would be the answer, but hey fixable in the future!
Ha! Sounds like fun though :biggrin1:
Boidster
New member
If you consider trying to sprint from home base back to horde base with naught but 8x 9mm, 15x 7.62, and a single arrow 'fun'. If you consider trying to bash your way through the temporary wood-bar railing with your fists because your tools are in your dropped backpack and your friend can't really stop shooting the radiated taking over the base 'fun'. If you consider a mad dash with a wire tool to direct-connect at least half of the dart traps and the fences to the generator so at least you'd have some type of active defense, even though the dart traps would just fire at all times because your idiot friend killed the motion sensor 'fun'. If you consider emptying one set of dart traps just to scrounge enough darts to try to make the other set partially effective 'fun'. If you consider dying for the 3rd and final time when the 3rd demolisher blows up right in the party's face 'fun'.
Okay, yeah, it was fun.
Okay, yeah, it was fun.
FileMachete
New member
Ideas
1 - Make the green light area bigger to have snipers able to set them off before getting to the base.
2 - Change limb HP(?) so it’s easier to immobilize them. And/or include their need for an arm to make the explosion happen. Like they have to use a trigger in their hand to explode when they are close to a player, and blade traps could chop of arms easier when they are at the appropriate height.
1 - Make the green light area bigger to have snipers able to set them off before getting to the base.
2 - Change limb HP(?) so it’s easier to immobilize them. And/or include their need for an arm to make the explosion happen. Like they have to use a trigger in their hand to explode when they are close to a player, and blade traps could chop of arms easier when they are at the appropriate height.