PC Developer Discussions: Alpha 17

[PiercedFromWithin]

Hopefully that will help change it from "every time I loot a house/spend time working in my base those stupid hordes full of zombies I've killed a million of start smashing through the walls and annoying me" to "every time I get lost in doing things for a while and then go back outside there's zombies wandering around everywhere and making it seem like the world is flooded with zombies."

 

[Pico]

Hmm, I can see the change to clay will quite significantly change how I play around my base.

It used to be that I'd choose a flat site for my base, and a flat site for my garden, and a wide flat area for visibility and safer melee play.

But for digging clay I'd deliberately go some distance from my base so that the cavity I create didn't mess with my bases flat area and create a potential trap for myself.

Now all that has changed. I can build on any 'soil', regardless of its topography, and simply work on leveling the land as I go.

So my digging of clay/soil now will simultaneously give me cleared flat land for gardening, and flat land for melee, clay for the forge, clay for cobblestone, and for players who use trenches, they can also gain those defenses at the same time, while in the past all these 'tasks' were seperate time consuming activities, all with different pre-planned objectives.

It'll save me time. I can get a lot more done all around my base with this degree of 'multitasking' with the ground. In fact, I can imagine I'll be stripping my base area of all its soils, right down to stone over time, all the time gaining materials, and ultimately making it harder for digging Z's to reach me once the base foundations hit stone.

 

[faatal]

Will count and zombie types are reload if zombie walk out from POI and we kill him outside POI?

Yes, you can kill him anywhere. The POI (edit: sleeper volume) tracks all its zombies. Position does not matter.

 

[XCOUNTRY]

Were the clay and soil changes just a way to clear more space to add more items/objects into the game or help reduce the strain the game put on your GPU/CPU (forgive me for not really knowing which parts of the game utilize certain parts of my computer)? I mean if the end game is to allow more zombies on screen for everyone, really I'm all for it. It would be cool, maybe impracticable, to have different settings that added more content based on how beefy your system was. Again still not well versed in the intricacies of building a game enough to know what affects what, and what just isn't feasible.

 

[XCOUNTRY]

Yes, you can kill him anywhere. The POI tracks all its zombies. Position does not matter.

Is there a max alive for this? As in could I go into a town and activate ALL the sleeper volumes and lead them around or will you eventually cap out and some POIs just won't spawn any?

 

[Gmad03]

Anyone know if the ground textures are being reworked. All the new textures look good but new ground textures would really make it look like a new game since that’s a lot of what you see all the time

 

[DaVegaNL]

Wait.. you can pick up vehicles now, so they'll just end up in your inventory? That sounds awfully.. cheesy.

I'm all for fun>realism, but does this not seem to be rather over the top?

If one encounters a particular rough piece of terrain (mountain, lake, ravine), isn't is rather cheesy that you can just stop your jeep, get out, pick your jeep up, cross the obstacle on foot, and plop your jeep back down?

 

[The Gronk]

Wait.. you can pick up vehicles now, so they'll just end up in your inventory? That sounds awfully.. cheesy.I'm all for fun>realism, but does this not seem to be rather over the top?

If one encounters a particular rough piece of terrain (mountain, lake, ravine), isn't is rather cheesy that you can just stop your jeep, get out, pick your jeep up, cross the obstacle on foot, and plop your jeep back down?

To be fair, the gameplay footage doesn't look that bad.

 

[JaxTeller718]

Hmm, I can see the change to clay will quite significantly change how I play around my base.
It used to be that I'd choose a flat site for my base, and a flat site for my garden, and a wide flat area for visibility and safer melee play.

But for digging clay I'd deliberately go some distance from my base so that the cavity I create didn't mess with my bases flat area and create a potential trap for myself.

Now all that has changed. I can build on any 'soil', regardless of its topography, and simply work on leveling the land as I go.

So my digging of clay/soil now will simultaneously give me cleared flat land for gardening, and flat land for melee, clay for the forge, clay for cobblestone, and for players who use trenches, they can also gain those defenses at the same time, while in the past all these 'tasks' were seperate time consuming activities, all with different pre-planned objectives.

It'll save me time. I can get a lot more done all around my base with this degree of 'multitasking' with the ground. In fact, I can imagine I'll be stripping my base area of all its soils, right down to stone over time, all the time gaining materials, and ultimately making it harder for digging Z's to reach me once the base foundations hit stone.

And this is exactly what I was trying to convey. On the surface it is no big deal. But it DOES simplify your specific gameplay, to a degree that it saves you a lot of extra time. On the surface that change MAY appear to be QoL BUT when you add in all the other "meaningless" tasks that are being simplified slowly it gnaws away at the time spent in game to do the next thing.

The game is already very short in its basic form. Most people have concrete fortresses by day 21, purple items even sooner. Removing these types of time sinks is taking things in a simplified, quicker direction. You NEED time sinks to some degree in a survival game. Time should always be something you are concerned with especially with the threat of a 7 day horde looming, and nightfall. The more and more these types of sinks are removed (also think of fertilizer crafting, gun part assembling and storage management) the quicker you get to an end game that does not even exist.

 

[Jedo]

You NEED time sinks to some degree in a survival game. Time should always be something you are concerned with especially with the threat of a 7 day horde looming, and nightfall.

I would think that in a survival game you need failures which prompt trying again or improvising a new plan. Man has tried so long to tame the wilderness, but when you're away from the concrete jungle, that still proves to be difficult. The wild is unpredictable, and sometimes ♥♥♥♥ hits the fan. More of that would go a long way.

Of course, the upshot of this is that people probably don't like what would end up being random failure destroying their work. For too many that would not be "fun."

 

[Kosmic Kerman]

Wait.. you can pick up vehicles now, so they'll just end up in your inventory? That sounds awfully.. cheesy.I'm all for fun>realism, but does this not seem to be rather over the top?

If one encounters a particular rough piece of terrain (mountain, lake, ravine), isn't is rather cheesy that you can just stop your jeep, get out, pick your jeep up, cross the obstacle on foot, and plop your jeep back down?

Presumably this is a temporary solution to a currently intractable problem. In A16, you can disassemble a mini bike when it gets stuck or bugs out. In the new system you can’t disassemble. So this solution is the lesser of two evils. Hopefully, they will come up with a better solution in the future.

 

[kamer1337]

Wait.. you can pick up vehicles now, so they'll just end up in your inventory? That sounds awfully.. cheesy.

thats nothing new. you can pickup minibikes in A16.

 

[RestInPieces]

The game is already very short in its basic form. Most people have concrete fortresses by day 21, purple items even sooner. Removing these types of time sinks is taking things in a simplified, quicker direction. You NEED time sinks to some degree in a survival game. Time should always be something you are concerned with especially with the threat of a 7 day horde looming, and nightfall. The more and more these types of sinks are removed (also think of fertilizer crafting, gun part assembling and storage management) the quicker you get to an end game that does not even exist.

The game does have a lot of content but, as you said, it feels short. The progression curve is too fast, many materials are never used, survival elements are there but survival activities are mostly non-existent and exploration needs more incentives.

Btw instead of using "fun", which is vague, ambiguous and convenient for various different things - it's better to say directly *why* something is fun, if one knows the reason that is.

 

[XCOUNTRY]

Wait.. you can pick up vehicles now, so they'll just end up in your inventory? That sounds awfully.. cheesy.I'm all for fun>realism, but does this not seem to be rather over the top?

If one encounters a particular rough piece of terrain (mountain, lake, ravine), isn't is rather cheesy that you can just stop your jeep, get out, pick your jeep up, cross the obstacle on foot, and plop your jeep back down?

I suppose they could add a significant 'time to pick up' delay like the forge and workbench, or even make it so you can only pick up the vehicle if its within your landclaim block. This would discourage players from cheesing the system and require extra resources if they get the vehicle stuck in a body of water. Want your vehicle back cuz you did something dumb? Make a landclaim block first, or make it take 30s to pick up--or both.

edit: You could also make it require a wrench to simulate taking it apart.

 

[JaxTeller718]

I suppose they could add a significant 'time to pick up' delay like the forge and workbench, or even make it so you can only pick up the vehicle if its within your landclaim block. This would discourage players from cheesing the system and require extra resources if they get the vehicle stuck in a body of water. Want your vehicle back cuz you did something dumb? Make a landclaim block first, or make it take 30s to pick up--or both.
edit: You could also make it require a wrench to simulate taking it apart.

I think vehicles drive in water fine now if i am not mistaken. Someone can correct me if i am wrong.

- - - Updated - - -

I would think that in a survival game you need failures which prompt trying again or improvising a new plan. Man has tried so long to tame the wilderness, but when you're away from the concrete jungle, that still proves to be difficult. The wild is unpredictable, and sometimes ♥♥♥♥ hits the fan. More of that would go a long way.
Of course, the upshot of this is that people probably don't like what would end up being random failure destroying their work. For too many that would not be "fun."

I agree. It would be difficult to determine how many times something should fail. I would like to see crafting have a chance of failure until you level up your Fixer perk. maybe a .5 percent chance that club you made would be faulty until your skill increases.

Sure it wouldnt be fun, but a very low amount of "unfun" should be expected in a game that challenges you to get better via skill raising.

 

[The Gronk]

I think vehicles drive in water fine now if i am not mistaken. Someone can correct me if i am wrong.

They travel at a greatly reduced speed in water. With a lot of work going into the RNG terrain engine I strongly suspect there will be pinch-points that can trap your vehicle.

 

[Gamida]

maybe they could add a snorkel as a modification for the jeep that you need before you can cross water with it

 

[faatal]

So based on description, a potential new way to game the system is to visit as many POIs as possible when low level even if you just run through fast and not kill anything. Then come back later when tougher but still face a lower gamestaged Sleeper spawn set.
Are there any plans to add a reset if left uncleared for X amount of days and not visited (thus making it so player would at least have to revisit to keep the same spawn set)?

Running through fast is asking to die, since sleepers are lurking all over and you would have to get near each volume, since they each have their own timer and you can't see the volumes.

I have no plans to change any of it, unless a problem in the design is shown to actually negatively effect game play.

 

[littlegreen]

I am awfully curious to know whether a player-to-player trading system has ever been discussed ?

There's plenty of public servers going on and I can't help but wander how would p2p trading work in the game? If at all?

Maybe it's just "Kill thy neighbor and steal their bread instead of sharing" kind of philosophy-based game ?

Just joking hehe. .. or was I?

Anyways - any info on this will be greatly appreciated

 

[The Gronk]

I have no plans to change any of it, unless a problem in the design is shown to actually negatively effect game play.

Isn't that going to end up with a lot of n00bs on servers trying to loot their first house and being faced with sleepers far higher than their level can deal with because a higher level player popped past and spawned them earlier?