PC Game stage in single and multi

[Shockwave1]

I'm confused about how game state works in single and multi.

I have a SP game example with game state 297. Hordes are relatively light with half irradiated guys and ZERO demo guys.

In my MP game with 3 people, the gamestages of the players are 176, 140, 140. Every horde for the last few hordes (4 or so so that's 4 weeks now) the hordes have included multiple demo guys, more than half a dozen in our last horde. They are mostly irradiated guys as well.

I thought MP averaged the Gamestage of players. the 3 player hordes are massively harder than the single player horde even if that is upped to 24 active zombies (since it is 8 a piece in MP). The difference is stark.

MP with 3 people is nowhere near 3 times as easy as SP, but it almost seems like MP is ADDING the game-stages together instead of averaging them.

 

[RipClaw]

With a gamestage of 297 it is unlikely that there are no demo zombies in the horde. At a gamestage of 150 the first demo zombies are showing up. Sometimes you get a horde without demo zombies but usually there are demo zombies in the horde.

The group gamestage is described in the gamestages.xml file.

This is how the gamestage of a party is calculated:
The gamestage of all (up to) 6 players is calculated.
The players are sorted by gamestage and only the 5 highest numbers go into the calculation.

The highest GS number is multiplied by "startingWeight".
This then loops down the list and "startingWeight" is reduced by "diminishingReturns" every time.

Example:
Players with GS 120, 30, 60, 91, 5, 80.
startingWeight= 1.7, diminishingReturns=0.22

So we get
120 * 1.70 = 204
91 * 1.48 = 134
80 * 1.26 = 100
60 * 1.04 =  62
30 * 0.82 =  24
5 (is ignored)

... or a total party GS of 524

The values in the example calculation are not up to date. The actual values are startingWeight = 1 and diminishingReturns = 0.2

For your example the calculation is

176 * 1 + 140 * 0.8 + 140 * 0.6 = 372

 

[Shockwave1]

Ouch. That's terrible 3 people is not that large an advantage over one. There are triple the baddies already and you are all in the same base. The game stage should be averaged and maybe bumped a tiny bit... That would mean my Party game stage on Day 63 is 682 and solo at day 100 is 297. No wonder the game got so much harder by adding people. I can't believe being in a party makes it harder than not being in a party.

That means if we don't party up for horde night the game stage would calculate separately for each us so we'd have 8 zombies coming at me at gamestage 176, 8 at 140 and 6 more at 140? Why does partying pump the game stage so much? Solo day 100 I can take 24 zombies MUCH easier than 3 of us can take 24 zombies at day 63.

3 players gives you not even twice the "stuff" as 1 player. Having twice the stuff doesn't let you make a base that kills twice the zombies, yet you have triple the zombies, and they are much stronger than if you were alone. I don't understand that at all.

 

[meganoth]

Look at quests. While the single person drives to a quest, makes this one quest and has to return to the trader for the next quest, 3 persons can do 2-3 quests, also because they save some time for driving to and back from the quest. But each killed zombies gives them ~150% XP because of the group XP thing. 2 to 3 quests times 150% is 100 to 130% more xp.

But the important thing is: You get 2-3 times the quest rewards and more loot that you can share. While the single AGI player has no real use for the lucky find of a high quality shotgun, the AGI player in the group gives that shotgun to the STR player. This means your equipment gets better at a rate of 2 to 3 times faster.

Notice how fast you complete book series if each player gets priority on all books from specific series, compared to the single player.

The same happens with utility skills. While the single player is dependent on finding good armor if he doesn't happen to spec AGI or FOR, at least one of the 3 players usually can craft armor and share the crafted armor with another one while the third one gets ALL the armor of the other type. If one of the player is doing STR he supplies the others with better mining equipment and mines for 2 while he doesn't have to look at getting food because someone else is building a farm or cooking with bonuses as single player normally can't dream to get.

Apart from all the theoretical arguments, I have been playing a single player game and a 4-people co-op game parallel in A18. In the SP I advanced slowly, for example I still drove a minibike around day 40. In the MP we all have gyros usually around the third week

 

[Liesel Weppen]

Ouch. That's terrible 3 people is not that large an advantage over one. There are triple the baddies already and you are all in the same base. The game stage should be averaged and maybe bumped a tiny bit... That would mean my Party game stage on Day 63 is 682 and solo at day 100 is 297. No wonder the game got so much harder by adding people. I can't believe being in a party makes it harder than not being in a party.

It makes the game easier.

In your singleplayer the only one player has to deal with gamestage 200.

With 3 players each gamestage 200 200you do not have to deal with a gamestage of 600, but only 480.

So you have tripled your e.g. damageoutput but get only 2,4 times the "quality" of enemies.

The difficulty in 7d2d is not based on the current day, but on the character progression. 3 player together progress faster of course. So comparisons like "singleplayer on day 100 is easier than 3 players on day 60" are useless.

That means if we don't party up for horde night the game stage would calculate separately for each us so we'd have 8 zombies coming at me at gamestage 176, 8 at 140 and 6 more at 140? Why does partying pump the game stage so much? Solo day 100 I can take 24 zombies MUCH easier than 3 of us can take 24 zombies at day 63.

Yep, that means if you do not party up every player will get his own gamestage but in total that's still more then partied up.

Only reasonable difference is, if the overal gamestage exceeds specific limits, you won't get demolishers in separate waves, because of low "gamestage per player", but in the combined gamestage you will, because it's a higher value.

3 players gives you not even twice the "stuff" as 1 player. Having twice the stuff doesn't let you make a base that kills twice the zombies, yet you have triple the zombies, and they are much stronger than if you were alone. I don't understand that at all.

No, you don't find twice the "stuff", but you are still more players you can do triple the amount of whatever. However you indeed get more loot with 3 players. You can either decide to loot one POI as a group, which makes it faster and safer. You can carry triple the amount and stuff them in a crate, optimize stacking and on the way back to the base be more efficient. Or you can loot different buildings in parallel, which is also faster. Usually we do big POIs like the factories or hospitals together, but when it comes to small POIs we spread out and loot different buildings. No matter which way, it is much more loot in the same time.

You seem to expect that the difficulty should not change when adding more players, but then it would become way to easy.

You can adjust the game to become easier in multiplayer. Lower the XP-ratio to get slower progression. Increase the loot drop rate to find more "stuff". Nobody forces you to use the same game settings for single- and multiplayer.

Lets say demolishers will appear above gamestage 300. In singleplayer you have gamestage 300, demolishers appear, but you have to deal with them ALONE.

With 3 players, everybody has to have "only" a gamestage of 125 (not 100!) before demolishers appear. Each payer is lower skilled then, has worse equipment, BUT then you are three people that can deal with the demolisher TOGETHER.

Or in other worde: Singleplayer is not easier, it just takes longer to reach the same gamestage.

BTW: it's gamestage, not gamestate.

 

[Shockwave1]

Lets say demolishers will appear above gamestage 300. In singleplayer you have gamestage 300, demolishers appear, but you have to deal with them ALONE.

With 3 players, everybody has to have "only" a gamestage of 125 (not 100!) before demolishers appear. Each payer is lower skilled then, has worse equipment, BUT then you are three people that can deal with the demolisher TOGETHER.

.

No... you deal with THREE demolishers together.... not 1, 3.You already get 3X the ZOMBIES in a blood moon. Now you get 3 time the zombies PLUS they are stronger, and now if two people EVER shoot the same zombie when one bullet would do you have just LOST ground on horde night. PLUS you can't build a base with 3x the traps or 3x as big, you just can't, assuming you want to play together and not in three separate horde bases..

Other posts here have used similar faulty math. Quests? Quests are SLOWER in MP than in single. In single you go do you do a quest. In multiplayer you only get 3x the quests if you do them all alone. If you do them to gather and EACH drive to EACH quest to help each other out and actually play together it takes longer. It's less efficient to play together, but that's why we play together... to actually play together. Someone mentioned stacking your stackables in a chest to synergize and carry more home... but somehow forgot the time invovled to do that.

If you want to loot the surrounding area for food you have to loot an area 5 or 6 times the size to get triple the food and gear. not 3x the size, 5 or 6x the size. People don't seem to get how to calculate the area of a circle around your base.

A base? If you use say a killing corridor in single player you can't make one 3x as long in multiplayer as the entrance would be too far away. So your base is necessarily smaller with less traps. You do get 3x the weapons shooting at 3x the zombies, so that's a wash, but any time a zombie beats on your wall THREE stronger zombies will now beat on your wall, and 3 zombies do MORE than triple the damage of one zombie because the adjacent zombie bonus (plus being irradiated due to higher game-stage)..

Want to surround you base with 5 deep wood spikes on day 7? With three people you have triple the zombies. That means you need 15 deep spikes (since the zombies will come down single file on the area that's been cleared). surround your base 15 deep is like 8 or 9 TIMES the spikes as 5 deep, not 3x as many.

Someone said better gear? only slightly. You have to loot triple the places to get enough gear for all of you, especially good armor. One person in low armor is still a weakest link. You do get some synergy in that you have more weapon options when you have a lvl 6 weapon, but again, it takes much longer to loot triple the place with three people.Your duplicate books do go to another player so that's a slight advantage.

You also loose a ton of loot time to talking. Unless you never do much together and never talk about base setup, storage, horde base design, who's doing what, and you are seemless, you have lost looting and quest time to that. So again, not triple the resources.

The real advantage MP has over single really is you can split up SOME stats. Again not 100% unless there is NO overlap. So if everyone gets cardio and healing, and a couple get lucky looter, etc. Sure this is there are that is an advantage. You tend to get more science skills and that's not nothing, but even the extra forging savings doesn't boost you back up that high and better barter, while good early, well eventually you have more dukes than you need, still it helps early. But double the Gamestage and then some seems a bit high.

I would think the default calculation would be less than that and then people could increase other game settings it if they thought it was too easy.

 

[theFlu]

While I get most of your points, and don't entirely disagree (most things are somewhat on a gradient, you can talk your plans while mining/killing etc, you'll save a lot with specialization etc etc)

This one I don't understand your logic with:

If you want to loot the surrounding area for food you have to loot an area 5 or 6 times the size to get triple the food and gear. not 3x the size, 5 or 6x the size. People don't seem to get how to calculate the area of a circle around your base.

One house yields X amount of food, 3 houses yields 3X, the "area size" is double that because..?

And for another, firepower ratios aren't a linear thing. For example, simulating just simple missing, 10 guys hitting say 3 targets "per round".. 100 guys faces 200. After first exchange, it's down to 40 vs 170. After second it's 0 to 158. Losses are 100 to 42. Now that's not directly applicable in a horde fight, but added firepower is pretty king. Plus for 3x the zeds, your aoe becomes 3x effective.

 

[Liesel Weppen]

No... you deal with THREE demolishers together.... not 1, 3.You already get 3X the ZOMBIES in a blood moon. Now you get 3 time the zombies PLUS they are stronger, and now if two people EVER shoot the same zombie when one bullet would do you have just LOST ground on horde night. PLUS you can't build a base with 3x the traps or 3x as big, you just can't, assuming you want to play together and not in three separate horde bases..

No, you don't get 3 times the zombies. Especially if it is locked to 8 Zs per player. You get tougher zombies, not more.

Other posts here have used similar faulty math. Quests? Quests are SLOWER in MP than in single. In single you go do you do a quest. In multiplayer you only get 3x the quests if you do them all alone. If you do them to gather and EACH drive to EACH quest to help each other out and actually play together it takes longer. It's less efficient to play together, but that's why we play together... to actually play together. Someone mentioned stacking your stackables in a chest to synergize and carry more home... but somehow forgot the time invovled to do that.

What? Have you ever played the game? Only one player needs to have a quest, share it, and all three get the reward. You don't even need to have every player the same quest. Basically every player can have different quests and you can do all three in a row without need to return to the trader. Once you return you get 9x the reward.

If you want to loot the surrounding area for food you have to loot an area 5 or 6 times the size to get triple the food and gear. not 3x the size, 5 or 6x the size. People don't seem to get how to calculate the area of a circle around your base.

Food is an issue in MP in the begining. Don't search for food, do quests instead. Especially the beginner quests give food as reward.

You do get 3x the weapons shooting at 3x the zombies, so that's a wash, but any time a zombie beats on your wall THREE stronger zombies will now beat on your wall

No, you don't.

Want to surround you base with 5 deep wood spikes on day 7? With three people you have triple the zombies. That means you need 15 deep spikes (since the zombies will come down single file on the area that's been cleared). surround your base 15 deep is like 8 or 9 TIMES the spikes as 5 deep, not 3x as many.

On day 7 there maybe more Zs since the waves are so small that you haven't reached the "Zs per player" limit. But you don't need triple the amount of defenses.

Have you ever tried it, or do you just speak in theory of which you know obviously NOTHING?

Someone said better gear? only slightly. You have to loot triple the places to get enough gear for all of you, especially good armor.

*sigh*

Have you even read the answers, especially that one from meganoth? If you are playing as an egoist it becomes harder. Yes... but if you are such an egoist, why are you in a party then?

You also loose a ton of loot time to talking. Unless you never do much together and never talk about base setup, storage, horde base design, who's doing what, and you are seemless, you have lost looting and quest time to that. So again, not triple the resources.

If you are not able to play in a group using synergies, it's your fault, not the games fault. Then don't play multiplayer.

For me your stupid complaints sound like: It plays different then singleplayer and what i did in singleplayer doesn't work in multiplayer. That's right. Multiplayer works somehow different, but it's not broken. Adept or die... or don't play multiplayer, if you are a rambo anyway and are not capable of playing tpogether.

 

[Shockwave1]

No, you don't get 3 times the zombies. Especially if it is locked to 8 Zs per player. You get tougher zombies, not more.

Uhs you get 3x the zombies on horde night. 8zs PER PLAYER, menas 1 player gets 8, 3 get 24.... maths.

The only time MP becomes an advantage in that regard is if the 300 limit is still in place and you "finish" a horde night early, which only happens the first couple if any.

What? Have you ever played the game? Only one player needs to have a quest, share it, and all three get the reward. You don't even need to have every player the same quest. Basically every player can have different quests and you can do all three in a row without need to return to the trader. Once you return you get 9x the reward.

Sorry we are partied, we are allied. We've NEVER, not once gotten a trader reward for another player's quest. Are you using a mod?

Food is an issue in MP in the beginning. Don't search for food, do quests instead. Especially the beginner quests give food as reward.

Yes it is, because you actually get less food available in range the more people join. This is a prefect illustration as to why you don't get 3x the loot. You get the same mount "less" ammo and other things because of the 30 day respawn loot radius. to triple the looting done, you have loot outside the SP loot radius, which is a very much larger circle and far more travel time.

No, you don't.

yes you do. I guess we'll have to disagree on that one since you don't explain. What I said was correct. If you are single player and get 8 zombies attacking and can handle 7 and you let one through to beat on your wall, then 3 players get 24, if you can each handle 7 before getting to your wall, you get 3 beating on your wall, but because of gamestage those three are stronger, and they get the bonus.

On day 7 there maybe more Zs since the waves are so small that you haven't reached the "Zs per player" limit. But you don't need triple the amount of defenses.

Have you ever tried it, or do you just speak in theory of which you know obviously NOTHING?

Don't get this. *zombies per player means 8 active zombies per player playing. there is no "reaching the Zs per player limit on a horde night".

*sigh*

Have you even read the answers, especially that one from meganoth? If you are playing as an egoist it becomes harder. Yes... but if you are such an egoist, why are you in a party then?

*sigh*

Yes, just as I have read your nonsense above. No idea what you mean by playing as an egoist, or how that would apply. Perhaps actually saying what you mean. You do have to loot more loot drops get a full set of L6 armor for each player.

If you are not able to play in a group using synergies, it's your fault, not the games fault. Then don't play multiplayer.

For me your stupid complaints sound like: It plays different then singleplayer and what i did in singleplayer doesn't work in multiplayer. That's right. Multiplayer works somehow different, but it's not broken. Adept or die... or don't play multiplayer, if you are a rambo anyway and are not capable of playing together.

I can play in a group. I just don't think that you can possibly loot 3x the "stuff" with 3 players. You can't. Fact. Just fact. Since that was the premise of the argument it seems like you are just being a and looking to be condescending. There are losses to playing with other people unless you are a hive mind, there are losses due to loot distance from base, there are losses. So it's still my opinion that horde night is good enough

 

[RipClaw]

Sorry we are partied, we are allied. We've NEVER, not once gotten a trader reward for another player's quest. Are you using a mod?

Players can share their quests with other players. This feature is available in Vanilla in the quest menu. If you share a quest with another player, the quest will appear in the quest menu of the other player. He has to accept the invitation then. Both players have to do the quest together and both get the reward.

Since each player can take a different quest from the trader, you can complete several quests at once without having to return to the trader.

 

[Synvastian]

Shockwave1 doesn't play MP as a cohesive whole with the others, probably spends all his time hording items away from teammates, and then complaining they don't share, he doesn't get how the numbers work and despite people explaining, he'd rather just say "its not how I see it" than actually listen, in short...he doesn't want help, just wants to complain.

 

[Ghostlight]

I'm confused about how game state works in single and multi.I have a SP game example with game state 297. Hordes are relatively light with half irradiated guys and ZERO demo guys.

In my MP game with 3 people, the gamestages of the players are 176, 140, 140. Every horde for the last few hordes (4 or so so that's 4 weeks now) the hordes have included multiple demo guys, more than half a dozen in our last horde. They are mostly irradiated guys as well..

Your SP game is somehow bugged. GS 297 horde should be substantial with tons of irradiated and several Demos. I just did my GS 330 SP and I got 20+ Demos.

In your MP game, your GS is 176 + (0.8 x 140) + (0.6 x 140) = 372, not that much higher.

Other Considerations: Remember with 3 players you each get your own horde, so you get 3 times the zombies a SP gets overall (easily proven if you each ally up but spend horde night at different locations - you will each get an equal strength personal horde).

Also very important to bear in mind your maxAlive setting (page 2 of general settings when you start your server). This defaults to 8 (wth!!) and is the max number of zombies that can be in the world per player at any one time. If you left this on 8, then GS will hardly matter for SP, your horde will feel crappy no matter what with only 8 alive at any time. In MP, with 3 of you it is 24 concurrent enemies if you left it on default 8, and this will feel a LOT more like a tough horde even if your GS was less. This setting is extremely important and in many ways has a bigger effect than difficulty or GS, especially in SP.

 

[Ghostlight]

No, you don't get 3 times the zombies. Especially if it is locked to 8 Zs per player. You get tougher zombies, not more.

This is wrong. Each player gets their own horde. So 3 players get 3 x the zombies one player would get. It's easy to prove it by counting the total zeds killed by all of you in your stats. Or just hang out at different locations on horde night and you will each get the same horde strength. Same strength, not same zombies of course as the actual horde contents are random.

 

[Ghostlight]

Sorry we are partied, we are allied. We've NEVER, not once gotten a trader reward for another player's quest. Are you using a mod?

You need to share quests with your allies, then you all start and complete it together then you each get your own reward. If 3 players go to 1 trader, they each get 1 quest but they can each share theirs with the other 2 so each player now has 3 quests and will get 3 individual rewards on completion. I am guessing you are missing the step where you share quest with allies. There's a specific button to do this in the quest screen. Your allies must formally accept every quest you share to have it added to their quest list.

Don't get this. *zombies per player means 8 active zombies per player playing. there is no "reaching the Zs per player limit on a horde night".

Yes there is. You can lookup the XML and see the horde strength and total number, cross-referenced by GS. This total is per player. So if GS 150 gives a 100 zombie horde then 1 player will get 100 zombies at GS 150 strength. Two players allied and with combined GS 150 will get 200 zombies total, also at GS 150 strength. The strength determines the type of zombies but it's random. The maxAlive setting just dictates how many of these 200 can be spawned in at any time per player, and is not really related to the total horde size.

 

[Laz Man]

Before I played MP, I thought the scale up would be too punishing but actually it's felt pretty good difficulty wise at least on adventurer difficulty...

We successfully repelled 30 plus demolishers as a team with no major damage to the base we used on one of our horde nights.

However, I can see how easy things go to hell quickly if demos are not managed well as a team. I have a video posted in the images and videos section as reference.