PC My Thoughts After Playing Alpha 17. Yes I said Alpha 17!
- Thread starter Roland
- Start date
I know it will not be released earlier than (mid?) August. Software development always takes longer as expected and when they give a date x days in the future I'll automatically add 30-50% and that will be the next date they'll announce as proposed release. To which I'll add 30%-50% again, ....
But DaVegaNL seems to have seen signs in Rolands update that points to delays. Is it just his pessimistic nature or does he really have evidence of something Roland said or didn't say which points to it?
EDIT: In Rolands reply to me I have seen the signs now too, well hidden between the lines where he mentioned bugs and "pushing it". :smile-new: Thank you Roland (EDIT EDIT: Really not meant sarcastically)
Last edited by a moderator:
Scyris
New member
I'll be honest I'd probally skip that quest as the reward is not really worth the time commitment it'd take to do it. 300 dukes is not hard to earn, i'd rather the quests offer items as well. Do they? As once I hit day 7 or so, I usually have so many dukes I have multiple stacks, in a16 anyway. I guess, it'd give me something to do with a bonus when I am out exploring/looting poi's anyway.
Btw, how does repairing work in A17? can you lose quality and have it degrade down to the next lower tier? I been wondering about this as quality went from 1-600 to bascally 1-6. Losing a whole quality level for one repair would be pretty harsh. Especally with how easly things in A16 can break. Also did they remove the item losing effectiveness once durability hits half? Thats always annoyed the hell out of me personally.
Btw, how does repairing work in A17? can you lose quality and have it degrade down to the next lower tier? I been wondering about this as quality went from 1-600 to bascally 1-6. Losing a whole quality level for one repair would be pretty harsh. Especally with how easly things in A16 can break. Also did they remove the item losing effectiveness once durability hits half? Thats always annoyed the hell out of me personally.
toores
New member
I've have suggested this years ago:
Make campfires have a chance of having cooking pot or grill in it. Campsite would be the most obvious place to look for such gear for low-level players.
(Additionally, cooking pot mines seem stupid. I'd get rid of them)
Last edited by a moderator:
Roland
Community Moderator
Quests will come with a variety of rewards and I would tend to agree that probably the rewards won't often be enough to coax someone who wasn't interested in doing quests in the first place into doing them. They're icing on the cake for those who like questing for its own sake or as you say, for someone who decided to go out and scavenge and felt they might as well get a bit of a bonus to it.
For someone with a min/maxing playstyle they definitely won't scratch any efficiency itches...
Not sure yet on repairing and item effectiveness/ durabilities. I don't know yet whether certain things are in their intended state or if they just haven't been hooked up yet and I don't like to pester the devs with such questions especially when they haven't given the green light for feedback yet on some features. Lots of things are coming together and starting to get tuned in and there is nothing more annoying than for someone to start giving "helpful comments" on stuff before you are finished with it and have presented it as what you believe is the intended final state. When I give feedback I like to hear, "Oh, good point. I didn't realize it had that result" and not "I haven't gotten to that yet. It's on my list".
This is also the exact reason it doesn't go to experimental until the most obvious issues are cleared. 1000 posts of "Did you know the axe animation and sound aren't syncing?" when you already know they aren't-- is unproductive.
Last edited by a moderator:
Aurelius
New member
Let's think about this for a minute.
In a survival situation, who in their right freaking mind would do anything that doesn't have a risk vs. reward that's good?
The reward either has to be
A) So amazingly good, it'd be foolish to say no
B) Necessary to further your survival - if you don't do it, your odds of surviving are lower.
Don't make the missions like Hello Aurelius! Collect 4 zombie skins for me! Make the missions compelling instead of just tacking them on as an afterthought.
-A
Roland
Community Moderator
Well we will have to see. Good rewards are subjectively perceived. I was happy to do it for the reward offered but I also didn’t compare the time spent to how many gas barrels I could run around and collect in the same amount of time to trade in for better returns on the time investment.
That was one tier one quest I shared. It isn’t necessarily indicative of all quest types or rewards. I’m sure there will be quests you’ll cancel because it’s not worth it and quests you’ll do because the reward is too good to pass up.
My only point was that for a min/maxer there will most likely always be more efficient things to do to get ahead thatnbtobtake the time to do a quest.
That was one tier one quest I shared. It isn’t necessarily indicative of all quest types or rewards. I’m sure there will be quests you’ll cancel because it’s not worth it and quests you’ll do because the reward is too good to pass up.
My only point was that for a min/maxer there will most likely always be more efficient things to do to get ahead thatnbtobtake the time to do a quest.
Scyris
New member
The quests could also be used to lead the player to poi's they never been too yet, like the radiant quests in bethesda games tend to do. Which will be quite useful in random gen I bet.
As for the repairing info, its not a major problem i'll find out eventually when a17-e hits, I've just been curious how its going to work, same with workbench combining if thats still a think in A17 ir not.
As for the repairing info, its not a major problem i'll find out eventually when a17-e hits, I've just been curious how its going to work, same with workbench combining if thats still a think in A17 ir not.
If a quest has not enough reward to do it immediately (and novelty isn't anymore the reason to do the quest) you probably will just wait until you are in the area anyway. If you just need to make a detour of 50 meters, the reward doesn't need to be great. Just more than the price of the bullets you have to expend.
Scyris
New member
I rarely use guns in 7 days to die, the crossbow is more than enough for most things on non-horde nights. However, with silencers added in and such I might be more temtped to use them. I love shotguns in games, but the one in 7dtd is kinda... meh at best, its cone of fire at least in that earlier vid, is far to big. Mostly its because I hate the zombies screeching when they haven't actually "seen" you yet in a poi.
Roland
Community Moderator
Possibly. Maybe I could do 10 minute days to cycle through the week quickly and just cheat in a few tools (AKA tnt) to more quickly get something setup underground. Then I'll change it to 60 minute days just before the blood moon. I'll try doing a simple bunker about 10 blocks down and then maybe a deeper fallback position with a long escape tunnel that leads to a different chunk and see how that goes. My life is pretty busy at the moment but we'll see if I can sneak away. I just noticed a fix faatal put in for digging in the latest build so I am curious....
A Nice Cup of Tea
New member
Sounds good to me. People like me who don't want to use the quest system won't feel like the game is trying to force us into it, and people who do like the quest system can have fun doing quests.
Everybody wins.
If you "think about it for a minute" then if the tasks being given out as quests were that essential to survival the traders/factions/whatever would do them themselves rather than wait for some shmuck to wander along to do it for them.
But even from a game point of view rather than a realism point of view; setting quest rewards to that you'd be "foolish" to not do them, or - worse - making them necessary to survival, would just be forcing the player to do quests they wouldn't otherwise want to do.
If players want to get involved in the quest system then let them. But if they don't, then the game shouldn't be trying to get them to coerce them into doing it. That's actively reducing their enjoyment of the game - why would devs want their players to enjoy the game less?
I'm less interested in horde night and more interested in how an underground (or stilt) base fares against the wandering groups that keep getting thrown at your current position - will an underground or stilt base still let those groups walk straight past/through leaving the base intact, or does the new AI make them now stop and damage it making the base need constant repairs?
Roland
Community Moderator
I can answer that without playing. If the zeds are not in attack mode then they don’t do any damage to anything. They go around or jump to go over.
So if you successfully hide from a wandering horde they will still pass through without leaving a mark. But if they sense you and cannot reach you then a stilt base will be in huge peril now.
So if you successfully hide from a wandering horde they will still pass through without leaving a mark. But if they sense you and cannot reach you then a stilt base will be in huge peril now.
A Nice Cup of Tea
New member
Hmmm... I wonder if my current base design will be adequate so they don't sense me...
..XXXXXXXXX
..X.......X
..X.......|
..X.......|
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
.X.........X....H....X
.X.........X....H....X
.X.........X....H....X
.X.........X....H....X
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX..XXX
.X.........X.........X...X...\
.X.........X.........X...X....\
.X.........X.........X...X.....\
.X.........X.........X...X......\
I use four-block-high stilts, with a solid platform on top. Access to the platform is via ramp and jump (upgraded to a ramp and drawbridge for the later game). There's nothing on that platform except for a second layer of four-block high stilts and a ladder, and I spend no significant time on it.
The ladder leads up to the upper platform which is double-thickness because apart from a border around the edge it's got a layer of soil to act as my garden.
My actual base is a smaller building sat on top of that upper double-thickness platform.
So when I'm in my base I'm twelve blocks above the ground, with three solid layers between me and any zombies.
Currently, in A16, I don't have any problem with zombies sensing me when I'm in my base or the garden - they just walk underneath oblivious to my presence. However, with the new stealth and AI systems in place I don't know how much better the zombies are at sniffing people out and whether this style of base will still be enough. The wandering hordes might spot me moving around or hear me opening cupboards or something.
I hope I don't have to build another two platform layers to the tower to just keep out of sight when I'm in the house on the top. If that's the case, then (somewhat ironically) the new AI might force me to start living underground again...
Roland
Community Moderator
Which (even more ironically) won't be so safe any more due to that same new AI...
I think you will be fine for normal hordes. As long as they can't see you, you should be okay. Hearing you will draw them to the area but I don't know whether that is enough to push them over into attacking mode. You will definitely want a different place to face the bloodmoon hordes unless you can actively defend your stilts since they will always know where you are and if there is no way to reach you they will start beating on your supports. I briefly tested this yesterday by making the simple inverted L out of wood frames. I went up 5 and over 7 and stood at the edge. In the past, zombies would mill around below me. Yesterday, they went straight for the support column and collapsed the whole thing.