Why? I mean risk vs reward? Just curious. Looting should always be better in my mind.
Roland pointed out in a different thread that the "official" reason was twofold:
1) because several other prominent and successful games rewarded the best quality gear only from looting
and
2) because they wanted to push exploration and leaving the base more.
Again, I don't agree at all, but those are the stated official reasons, according to Roland (who, if you see this thread and I mis-spoke, feel free to correct me)
~~~EDIT:~~~
whoops, I misunderstood. I thought you had asked the reason they've made it clear looting should be better.
The reasons I disagree:
1) looting is random. you head out, and you find random gear. You can improve your chances, you can adapt to what you find, but at it's core you're still relying on every container NOT dropping stun batons, double barrel shotguns, and helmet light mods. You don't have any consistent means to put EFFORT towards a specific goal.
2) crafting WAS a non-exploratory, exclusive to INT activity in A17. Now that they've added:
a) item parts
b) loot-only schematics
c) craft quality split among dozens of skills in all 5 attributes
They "solved" the problem. There is no more encouragement to go strictly into INT just for high quality gear. They're making crafting stations easier and easier to get (but still able to be consistently gained with extra bonuses through skills), people can only be GREAT at crafting a relatively small variety of items, the rest will be mediocre at best. People can only craft the highest TIER of items through loot-only schematics and lootable/scrappable parts. The ILLUSION of the hermit crafter doesn't even exist anymore. And quality never needed to factor in.
3) Crafting at the top end takes an investment. It takes sacrifice of other options. If Q6 items were craftable, as they were in B149, a given player can still only craft a few different items at that quality. You won't be running around with a self-crafted Q6 spear, M60, military armor, wrench, and mining tools. Not to mention that in order to get the top tier of most items, you still need to have accrued a vast quantity of item parts and found the relevant schematic.
4) many of those other games have difficult, skill- or teamwork-based challenges required for the chance to get that "best loot." 7DTD simply doesn't. These aren't item "drops" from boss zombies at the ends of high level POIs....these are items found in often unlocked chests and crates at an easily accessible room in a building that can often be looted with little to no fighting. It's a destructible voxel game. placing items in a LOCATION just won't work. It is, and will always be, too easy to access any given location in the game from several different avenues. Many of those other games restrict those top tier items to people who have had to do some challenge, some quest, some raid, kill some boss, in order to get the gear....7dtd just makes you get to a place.
5) while many zombie trope games and movies DO center around finding pre-apocalypse gear and scavenging use from it, there is also plenty of examples in these tropes of survivors having a goal of becoming self sufficient, and often MacGuyvering some insanely effective makeshift gear out of the bits and bobs they find. After all, while the immediate goal is survival by any means necessary, it feels like the viewer/player is supposed to always understand that scavenging just will not last. raiding a supermarket will eventually run out of food. Ammo will eventually run out. Irreplaceable items will eventually break. Therefore there is always the silent, subtle, but pervasive encouragement to STOP scooping up the detritus of a dead civilization, and START finding ways to produce as much as you can, on your own, without reliance on luck or finding things.
