PC Please Stabilize What You Want This Game To Be

[Niil945]

I did not make that claim in either of my responses to Bob so I must have been referring to someone else and not Bob.

Correct. You did not state that to Bob. You said it to me while making vague statements about 'people'. I can quote you the relevant section of your post to me for like the third time where I explicitly responded by saying I have no idea what you're talking about and you glossed it over every time.

I'm not going to debate you about another thread in this thread. I responded in that other thread directly to the person you say I maligned so we will see what comes of that. I went back and read that other conversation and I stand by what I posted when I summarized everything.

The point you missed was it was about how you're speaking to people.

You can disagree, that is your right but you would be w-word.

Again, if a person says A and you try to spin it as B where B != A, then you try to argue why B is dumb/bad/wrong, you can repeat that you're right and everyone else is wrong until you're blue in the face. That's a strawman fallacy. No amount of saying you're right actually makes you right.

I mostly post for laughs. Glad you got some. You don't know me at all really. You're new and you think I'm being mean spirited and you have started your time in this community being aggressive with me right off the bat.

Project much? I started by saying I agree with people and empathize with them and you tried to be snarky about it. Empathizing with people is aggressive? Saying I agree with people is aggressive? I won't deny I have very little tolerance for unsound arguments or positions that don't differentiate between objective and subjective correctly and I aggressively point those things out. But that's not the same thing as being aggressive/snarky.

Maybe you just want to show you don't care about people with authority or maybe you want to show that you don't care about long time posters

In every single case where I've joined in discussions it's because I have an opinion about the topic and I've pointed out fallacious arguments.

I'm not mean spirited. I always let bygones be bygones in this forum and I never punish anyone for disagreeing with me using my forum tools. In fact, if someone does start getting too personal with me I turn over all moderation of that person to the other moderators of our team so there is no conflict of interest if/when that person gets banned. So relax a bit and read me as more glib and light hearted because that's what I am. If I was truly the way you seem to be painting me our interactions would be very different.

I've never, ever expressed that I was worried or bothered by the way you moderate. You keep bringing that type of stuff up as if it obviates you from making unsound arguments in general. It doesn't. In fact the one time I brought up that you were a moderator I explicitly stated that I didn't want to bias the way I thought about you because you were a moderator. I'm pretty sure if you were the power tripping type our conversations would have ended quickly heh.

I never said any of those things. I said there was no need for 3rd party meddling.

Meddling being defined as, what, exactly? Because what I've done thus far is respond to people's arguments that I agree with by supporting them, point out arguments that aren't logically sound, present my own opinions and thoughts, and I've asked questions.

That was us two working it out without really needing your input.

Ah there's that 'need' argument again. It was as valid previously as it is here. If you want a private conversation feel free to have a private discussion.

You can continue to interject into people's conversations and tell them how Person A misunderstood Person B.

In the other thread I pointed out that the arguments you and another person made about a position put forth by someone weren't accurate. I posited that you misunderstood the person because I'd rather assume it was unintentional rather than intentional. Here I posted in agreement with Bob. I did not express that you misunderstood him.

But it isn't really needed. Why not? Because Person A can post back to Person B and clarify their position to show Person B how they got it wrong. But keep doing it if you want Niil. It's your thing now.

Irrelevant argument. The forums don't 'need' to even exist. None of us 'need' to be here engaging each other. You didn't 'need' to respond to Bob. I don't 'need' to respond to you.

Should I just pretend I can't see you analyzing me....? lol

No by all means, if you want to engage me on that and maybe provide some context I'm missing or elaborate on the tone that's hard to get via text that I might be misreading, I'm more than open to changing my mind and my outlook about your posts.

Yeah, maybe stick around and give people the benefit of the doubt and learn about who we are before jumping in as mister aggressive from the get go. Or not. I mean if you don't like me you don't like me.

The latter point is highly possible. I don't know though yet to be honest.

For the sake of ending the back and forth that's not really on topic, you clearly understand how I perceive your posts and we're long past talking circles about that, what are your thoughts on the broad strokes, the system level changes that seem to be pretty dramatic? I saw a video someone posted of an older alpha that had LBD and hub cities with lots more zombies (and bees or wasps or something). I know from previous commentary that you're of the mind that the best loot should be scarce. Are there any system changes that you're not a fan of? What are your thoughts about the balance between looting/crafting right now or do you like it as it is? What about the attribute changes tying them to specific weapons? Are you fatigued by any of the changes that have happened to the game like the OP? If you're not really in a position to comment I understand (I say that because when I've asked before you've not responded).

 

[Roland]

What are your thoughts on the broad strokes, the system level changes that seem to be pretty dramatic?

TFP has always made broad strokes changes for the first iteration. Joel says that he likes to swing hard when making a change and then bring it back little by little to tune in on what feels best. It isn't surprising that he dramatically switched things away from crafting and now plans to slowly bring it back to somewhere between the current extreme and what we had in A17. I personally wish it was a bit faster process of bringing it back. I hope that he puts his plan for the loot nerf into play for an 18.3 rather than waiting until A19 but there is no rushing them when they are focused and easing back from his initial changes with the loot for A18 doesn't seem to be his current focus so we can probably expect to continue to find high level stuff before having a chance to craft it for awhile longer.

I saw a video someone posted of an older alpha that had LBD and hub cities with lots more zombies (and bees or wasps or something).

I have a mod with greatly increased zombie numbers and my rig which is not top of the line by any stretch seems to handle the load just fine but the developers follow a much more stringent standard than I have to with my mod. They have to care that most people can run the game for the fully supported number of people whereas I only care if I can run my mod and other people can either play it or not if they can. I liked the old hub cities for sure in regards to their zombie spawning rules and I was always a fan of the bees. In fact my vote was to make them fit in better with the world by adding a couple other giant mutant insects or arachnids. But it was not to bee....

I know from previous commentary that you're of the mind that the best loot should be scarce. Are there any system changes that you're not a fan of? What are your thoughts about the balance between looting/crafting right now or do you like it as it is?

I'm not a fan of the current system but I also know it is a WIP and I have hopes regarding the proposed system that has yet to be implemented. I'm not a fan of the speed at which they are working on the loot system and wish they would fix it before upgrading the graphics on the zombies again. The proposed system would have all common loot containers yield broken gear that could only be scrapped for parts or brown or orange weapons. Yellow through Blue quality items should always be extremely rare finds so that players are mostly crafting those quality levels out of the parts they scavenge from the low quality stuff. But the chance for high level loot still remains. I think that it is fine for traders to sell higher quality wares since players can choose to ignore traders if they want to play a game where they do for themselves. I'd much rather find broken guns and scrap them for parts than find individual parts laying around so I am for getting rid of plain parts in loot containers.

I'm not a fan of xp in general. I believe that it introduces an incentive that causes players to behave towards zombies in an unnatural way to how they would in an actual zombie apocalypse if that were possible. I created a mod that removes all xp rewards and players simply earn skillpoints each day they stay alive. If they die then the timer resets and they have to wait a full day from the moment of respawn to earn a skillpoint again. I like it.

I'm not a fan of the farming system but I didn't really like the last one either. I'd like something that requires proximity to water and involves quality of crops and seeds, seasons, and food spoilage. I don't necessarily want daily tending like Stardew Valley but a system that isn't as shallow as the one we have now would be nice. But I also see something like a "farm mod" taking care of this in the future if TFP doesn't care about farming.

I'm not a fan of LBD so I'm happy the devs made the choices they did in that regard.

I'm not a fan of crafting simplification. I'm the complete opposite of Joel in this regard. I like complex layers of crafting with raw resources, refined materials, intermediate components, and finished products. I enjoy crafting by physically pounding or wrenching a starter block and having the components get used up from my inventory as the block changes into the thing I'm making. That is so much better to me than simple lists of generic items automatically crafting at the touch of a button. That sort of thing is fine for workbench crafting but crafting out of our backpack should be more than press and forget and then go and do other things while you are simultaneously supposedly crafting.

But that would be a pretty radical change....

I love the direction of the zombie AI. I love that they can find ways to get to you. I think that is so much more important than whether they could realistically suss it out or whether it seems like they have an engineering degree. The way they can pathfind to you since A17 is so much superior to pre A17 that I hope the devs never listen to the people who are asking for wholly stupid zombies. It is terrifying and fun when I think my defenses are tight but then the blighters find some pathway I didn't account for and I have to improvise or abandon base.

What about the attribute changes tying them to specific weapons?

I have no problem with the perk system. I don't think proposals of shifting things around or creating a generic tree with miscellaneous powers in it is the answer. It will just shift who in the community is pissed off and who is happy. I see the attribute and perk system as just needing some adjustment. Tying attributes to specific weapons are just rules and like any game you try and operate and survive using the rules you've been given. I've had a lot of fun with the current ruleset and am not bothered in the least that I have to perk into intelligence if I'm really in the mood to play with stun batons and junk turrets. I don't spend time lamenting that I can't pair up a stun baton with a machine gun without spending extra points if those might have been arbitrarily paired together in the same attribute tree instead of the current config. I think the current system has more to explore than any the past rulesets.

Are you fatigued by any of the changes that have happened to the game like the OP? If you're not really in a position to comment I understand (I say that because when I've asked before you've not responded).

Not in the least. I am Green Lantern to the OP's Yellow. Each major change in all its broad sweeping glory gives us a brand new game to explore. I've played a dozen similarly themed zombie survival games all named 7 Days to Die and will be truly sad once the development process is finally over. I paid to witness the development process when I pointed my Steam wallet this direction and I haven't been disappointed. Even changes I personally am not excited about are interesting to me and I like to see how they change the dynamics.

Once the game goes gold it will be up to the modders to keep the transformative changes alive and I hope they do. I could play new iterations of 7 Days to Die for years to come. It surprises me that people buy into early access and then hate the development process. I know some of them thought they were just buying a fun game but the true entertainment for me has been all the changes. And it continues to be.

 

[Niil945]

Lots of good stuff there and I don't want a massive post so I won't quote it.

So there's a definitive loot nerf coming? I'm absolutely not opposed to that in context of crafting as it stands right now. Even then I think the issue with crafting goes beyond simply loot being too good. Crafting armor and weapons that caps at 5 is silly in a system where it's easy to acquire tier 3 quality 6 loot. But if they nerf loot so that tier 3 quality 6 loot is actually rare then that leaves me in a spot where armor and weapon crafting with the current parts system is still very cumbersome. Beyond the acquisition of the armor parts, it's also annoying that I can't craft decent armor unless I take an armor skill that doesn't really net me much else and requires a 21 point investment in specific attribute, either agility or fort. For weapons everyone is going to be able to craft their prefered weapons as they'll get the associated weapon skill for the weapon perks and damage boosts. But that still leaves a plethora of weapon parts out there that are, currently, completely useless. Not to say that I hate the system, just pointing out the negatives to it. I know it's a system in transition and there's talk of reducing some skills to 3, reworking items a bit, etc. I hope they can find elegant solutions to refine the system.

Regarding how plentiful the zombies are in the world, I'm not really sweating that too much. Right now the game isn't exactly optimized. I know people have mentioned performance issues with lots of z's. Maybe they're talking about multiplayer servers as I haven't really experienced that in my coop/solo games. But hopefully in the later stages when they start optimizing they can address things or maybe bump up the spawns. Or maybe their event system will fill in the gaps sufficiently.

The idea about part removal is probably one of the biggest item issues I have. Inventory space is a at a premium right now and with having dozens of different part types it's not really feasible to carry them all around and to add to it they don't feel like loot if they're not usable. If I open a sealed crate and and see 6 different types of parts I'm disappointed.

The skill points over time concept seems great actually. It incentivises people to stay alive and doesn't result in massive disparities in level in multiplayer presuming people play equally skillful. A very simple buff could be given to people new to aged servers to allow them to catch up without artificially boosting them to the max level. I don't think zombies providing xp influences me as much as my concern is often efficient use of my time and the goal isn't to level. It's to get things done and get back to safety or to the trader before he closes for the day.

Farming doesn't really bother me beyond the fact that it's very tedious to try to make enough farm plots to even plant crops early on. Then as the game progresses it eventually becomes trivial. I didn't see previous iterations so I'm not sure what the issue was that necessitated farm plots to begin with. I can imagine it was too easy without requiring a plot to setup a farm?

LBD seemed neat but I've heard about people gaming the system by constantly damaging themselves on a cactus to increase their medical skills.

For crafting I've gotten used to the build stuff in your inventory while doing other things system from other survival games. I dig Subnautica's fabricator station but the build times are minimal too. It's not really feasible for a player to sit at a workbench crafting something for multiple minutes. If they could make that engaging I'd be down for it, but the sheer amount of crafting we do and the time we spend would need to be drastically reduced.

As far as zombie smarts, I'm okay with them finding paths through stuff. I'm more annoyed by things like zombies trying to stand on wedge tips that are vertical and falling resulting in permanent fall loops or some of the odd behavior. Like, one base I had 2 vault hatches placed vertically at opposite sides of my base. They'd beat on a hatch, I'd open it and after a couple second delay they'd run to the other hatch. I could close it and they'd come running back. Effectively I could open the hatch, shoot through for a couple seconds, they'd run, I'd close it, they'd come running back before they could really do anything meaningful. It was just very easily gameable. I expect with a complex system it's difficult to account for every oddity though so I'm not too worried about each and every weird behavior. I think overall the pacing is very good, particularly early game. Without trying to cheese the ai I find I'm often on the cusp of being overrun as the first couple of bloodmoons end. It's even more prevalent if I don't go int and end up not able to find/craft a forge to upgrade to iron. Past that point most zombies though stop becoming a big deal until demos. Even then, I think the change that makes them not detonate if killed was a big step forward in balancing them.

I don't disagree regarding attributes. I understand the negatives of a system tying specific weapons to an attribute but at the same time it encourages people to play things that they might not otherwise have played. I'm good with that as I have fun trying different builds and utilizing different weapons because I'm picking different stats and any system they come up with is going to have pros and cons. To me this restriction is acceptable. The two concerns I have with the system that could easily be addressed is it severely limits effective crafting with the crafting also tied to the weapon skill (talked about above) and I don't feel that each tree is comparable in value point for point. I feel like I have to invest way more into some attributes to get the same quality of benefit or that some just aren't comparable. Like I dig agility thematically but it's way too many points to spend for something that isn't really even viable on bloodmoon nights. Also the melee attack speed is kinda silly. I can't justify ever taking that over taking sexual tyrannosaurus and just perma power attacking and melee attack speed isn't useful in stealth when your goal is to one shot anyways. The big kicker with agility (for me in comparison to other attributes) is that I can look at each attribute and see something I want for use outside of combat except agility. IMO I'd like to see them combine the stealth perks (doing stealth damage and more effective stealth) and add a noncombat skill of some kind to replace the missing skill. Maybe find a way to buff the attack speed or combine it with the run and gun talent. That said, I see strength, fortitude, and intelligence as strong choices. Perception I think is okay. I don't see a meaningful difference with lucky looter and I'd prefer a spear power attack that isn't throwing it but that's just a personal preference thing.

I think most can agree that 7d2d is a bit of an anomaly in the way development is progressing through EA. I've bought many games in EA and only rarely do they undergo large redesigns. In most cases they're more like late betas than anything and typically games don't stay in EA anywhere near this long. There might be tweaks but not as large as what I've seen here. As far as the fatigue, as long as there's enough time to explore the depth of each iteration I'm cool with it but that's because a typical game I'm not going to play for years and years so it's just refreshing my interest. I'm getting to the point where I'm almost done exploring all the options but I've been playing heavily since Halloween.

 

[RipClaw]

LBD seemed neat but I've heard about people gaming the system by constantly damaging themselves on a cactus to increase their medical skills.

Yes, some players have done that and then complained that they supposedly had to do it. The same players now light 20 campfires and farm screamer hordes.

These players are the type of player who want to max out everything, no matter if they need it or not. This has nothing to do with LBD but with the mindset of this players. If you hit your thumb with a hammer all the time than the problem is not the hammer but the guy who holds it.

 

[meganoth]

snip.

I can agree with what you said about agility. I think the stealth perk is sort of meant to be the combined non-combat heal+resource gathering skill of that tree. Heal because stealthing around avoids you getting hit and resource gathering because saving ammo leads to the same result as gathering/crafting new ammo. It is hard thinking about it that way though. Especially because at the start of the game food and building resources are at least as important as ammo and in single player you need to buy perks elswhere to get that, but other attributes can save ammo as well through doing melee.

 

[Niil945]

Yes, some players have done that and then complained that they supposedly had to do it. The same players now light 20 campfires and farm screamer hordes.
These players are the type of player who want to max out everything, no matter if they need it or not. This has nothing to do with LBD but with the mindset of this players. If you hit your thumb with a hammer all the time than the problem is not the hammer but the guy who holds it.

I don't see that as an issue of player behavior but how a system encourages behavior that doesn't make sense. Swinging a weapon to get better at it makes sense. Running into cactus to take damage so that one can heal trivial damage does not. Campfires drawing in screamers also makes sense within the gameworld. Gaming that for persistent xp farm could be reigned in by having the screamer waves amp up within a proximity rather quickly so that it disincentivizes people from doing so, or a myriad of other solutions. That's the system not being designed in such a way that it covers all angles of how it impacts player behavior.

I can agree with what you said about agility. I think the stealth perk is sort of meant to be the combined non-combat heal+resource gathering skill of that tree. Heal because stealthing around avoids you getting hit and resource gathering because saving ammo leads to the same result as gathering/crafting new ammo. It is hard thinking about it that way though. Especially because at the start of the game food and building resources are at least as important as ammo and in single player you need to buy perks elswhere to get that, but other attributes can save ammo as well through doing melee.

Maybe in previous iterations it was much easier to do so, but A18 arrows are a pain the ass. Let me say it this way as I've tried stealth builds. In the beginning ammunition/guns are far easier to acquire though it might be a time saver to stealth bow/xbow kill things presuming you spend time farming feathers. As buildings get bigger that's not the case. Later on it's far faster to brute force than it is to stealth it and it's not like healing supplies are limited as it's sorta feast or famine with consumables. Then add to it that arrow costs (particularly scrap polymers) are excessive. I can spend one easy day mass farming gunpowder materials and have enough to last me for several weeks but when I tried a stealth build using bolts/arrows I was constantly running out and having to fall back on other weapons as scrap polymers are farmed in such low quantities from the objects it's sourced from.

In the end though I get what you're saying about how it's supposed to cover ammunition/consumables but you're right that other attributes can just melee and powerhouse through 5's. With fortitude and strength melee is a breeze and with int turrets can easily handle the threatening areas with some foresight about which areas are the rough ones in the POI's. Perception seems to me the weakest of the lot for daily use but I can imagine with penetrator that it's really good pending base builds on bloodmoon nights. Right now I'm trying my first pistol/stealth build as I got a silencer schematic early on and I'm hoping that resolves my ammunition issues. The only other build I haven't really tried is the rifle/penetrator one so that's probably what I'll do next. I don't really have high hopes for its performance though relative to the other builds.

 

[RipClaw]

I don't see that as an issue of player behavior but how a system encourages behavior that doesn't make sense. Swinging a weapon to get better at it makes sense. Running into cactus to take damage so that one can heal trivial damage does not.

If you got injured it did not increase your medical skills but your armor skills. I simply increased my armor skills naturally by fighting zombies in close combat.

By the way, the same players who hugged a cactus for hours used the shotgun while mining to level it. They used the shotgun to shoot at the rock when it had only a few HP left.

The only gun I levelled was the sniper. I used it in the gang night for head shots at cops. It just naturally levelled it.

You didn't have to do all that crazy stuff. If you played the game naturally, you levelled what you needed to. Like I said, it's just a mindset of those players.

Campfires drawing in screamers also makes sense within the gameworld. Gaming that for persistent xp farm could be reigned in by having the screamer waves amp up within a proximity rather quickly so that it disincentivizes people from doing so, or a myriad of other solutions. That's the system not being designed in such a way that it covers all angles of how it impacts player behavior.

There are players who have special screamer bases. These are there to either keep the screamers running in circles or keep them captive until they can't spawn any more hordes. With more and bigger screamer hordes you are just doing these players a favor because they get more XP.

The only way to stop such players from abusing these mechanics would be if you remove XP.

 

[Roland]

The only way to stop such players from abusing these mechanics would be if you remove XP.

Hello!

 

[Niil945]

If you got injured it did not increase your medical skills but your armor skills. I simply increased my armor skills naturally by fighting zombies in close combat.

I was referring to comments I've seen where people do that to max out physician (or whatever the equivalent was then). I wasn't around then but my point was some behavior incentivized by LBD made sense and others didn't. Crapping on my point by arguing exactly how is missing the point.

By the way, the same players who hugged a cactus for hours used the shotgun while mining to level it. They used the shotgun to shoot at the rock when it had only a few HP left.
The only gun I levelled was the sniper. I used it in the gang night for head shots at cops. It just naturally levelled it.

You didn't have to do all that crazy stuff. If you played the game naturally, you levelled what you needed to. Like I said, it's just a mindset of those players.

Sure absolutely. Some people are just min/maxers by nature. And nitpicking every teeny tiny thing those people do to gain an edge and "fixing" it isn't necessarily making the game better. But if it can be fixed in a way that doesn't negatively impact the typical player then there's little reason to not fix those things. Aside from just how high on the priority list it is.

There are players who have special screamer bases. These are there to either keep the screamers running in circles or keep them captive until they can't spawn any more hordes. With more and bigger screamer hordes you are just doing these players a favor because they get more XP.
The only way to stop such players from abusing these mechanics would be if you remove XP.

That's simply not true. They abuse those mechanics because of a combination of factors, the most blatant you described is the perma fall loop bases that render an infinite number of zombies inconsequential. The problem there is not screamer farming. It's exploiting flaws in zombie AI. There's no reason to encourage people not to try to farm skill points. D&D doesn't encourage people not to get experience. RPG's don't encourage people not to level up. The only thing consistent between genres of RPG's is power progression. There's nothing wrong with wanting to do it efficiently.

 

[meganoth]

One arrives at different conclusions depending on how much the player knows about internal mechanisms of the game. Especially about gamestage.

Does the design of 7D2D expect the player to know that gamestage increases with your level and thereby autolevels the opponents as well?

If the answer to that is no, then xp is one of the carrots in the game and players will prefer activities that give xp, minmaxers will try to farm xp. Gamestage is then an internal balancing method, the player should optimally feel like the world is advancing and he has to keep up improving to deal with upcoming dangers. That is AFAIK the "normal" method of autoleveling, game designers would like to keep such details under the hood, but naturally it is hard to keep such a thing secret.

If the answer to that is yes, then players are incentivised to find and upgrade their gear, but avoid xp-generating activities. But players also want to have and try out new capabilities provided by perks. At least in my case it works out so that I ignore xp even if I consciously think about xp gain. Which I don't do generally anyway.

Even RPGs like D&D have a gamestage sort of progression rigidly fixed on player level. It is called a Dungeon Master, is operated by a meat bag and autolevels the enemies :smile-new: . It is assumed that the player does not know this, the secret is hidden away in the DM part of the manual and preferably not mentioned. If it weren't for new feats and spells to try out many players desire to make a level might be quite low when they inevitably find out that mechanism.

 

[BobTheBard]

One arrives at different conclusions depending on how much the player knows about internal mechanisms of the game. Especially about gamestage.
Does the design of 7D2D expect the player to know that gamestage increases with your level and thereby autolevels the opponents as well?

I think this is a big reason why people seem to have such wildly different experiences with the game. If you know how to properly manipulate gamestage then you'll have an entirely different game compared to someone who doesn't and gains it too quickly or too slowly. One could say the 'meta' of 7D2D doesn't involve any particular skill or perk or weapon or base right now so much as it involves carefully metering the rate at which you gain XP. The only playstyles this negatively affects are those that require a lot of skill points to function optimally (Looking at you crafting); everything else is viable.

Even RPGs like D&D have a gamestage sort of progression rigidly fixed on player level. It is called a Dungeon Master, is operated by a meat bag and autolevels the enemies :smile-new: . It is assumed that the player does not know this, the secret is hidden away in the DM part of the manual and preferably not mentioned. If it weren't for new feats and spells to try out many players desire to make a level might be quite low when they inevitably find out that mechanism.

There's one very, very important distinction though. In D&D the tools at the player's disposal are also gated by their level. You will eventually reach a plateau where you're not gaining any new spells, any new feats, any interesting treasure, or even much money, simply because you haven't progressed at all. You don't see level 8 PCs running around with +5 gear unless you have one of the most permissive Monty Haul DMs in tabletop history.

That's not true in 7 Days though, where loot is largely disconnected from the gamestage and thus it's possible (and without careful balance, even probable) to find or buy the game's equivalent of a +5 weapon while still very low level and thus very low gamestage. You can then afford to keep your gamestage low for a long time; there's no real reason to raise it since the only real reward is more difficulty. Since that is the case right now, it circles back to why I think gamestage manipulation and XP metering is the real meta.

 

[Niil945]

One arrives at different conclusions depending on how much the player knows about internal mechanisms of the game. Especially about gamestage.

That's a level of ignorance of how RPG's work that's hard to accept. Players don't need to know exactly how a specific game mechanic works in order to experience and understand that difficulty is increasing and assess that level impacts it. Hell, that's how every RPG system that uses levels I've ever seen works. Gamestage is just an additional abstraction of that difficulty that incorporates more than just level. Difficulty ramping up as power progresses in RPG's is sorta the entire point of the system in the first place. We'll use D&D as an easy example since we've been using it already...

The expectation in D&D is the challenges are going to increase as player power increases. It's not an unknown. It's not unexpected. In fact people look forward to their own hero's journey where they start off facing goblins and kobolds and other trivial monsters and eventually end up slaying dragons and gods. Perhaps to the completely new players who have literally no idea how the game works but anyone who has leveled up once and seen the corresponding increase in both their own power and the difficulty of their enemies understands what you're saying people are expected not to know about. And it's not really any different for about every RPG ever. As players increase in power they face ever greater challenges. Some games started muddying the waters with always scaling worlds (gamestage is an example of this) whereas the older design philosophy was areas with set ranges of power that if you went back to it you would decimate things. If the obstacles players face don't scale up in difficulty through some systems then the power progression system is incomplete as power is relative to the rest of the world and in short order there wouldn't be any challenges left.

So to go back to your original question, yes, the expectation is that most players (players who have ever played an RPG with a level system) will understand exactly what's going on with power progression even if they don't explicitly know the nuances of the system. You put forth the idea that that would disincentivize people from wanting to level. That's simply not true. It's not true for me. It's certainly not true for Roland who mentioned he likes to build screamer farming bases.

That said I'm sure some people go the other way and minimize experience gain to draw out the progression but I'd be hard pressed to believe they're a substantial percentage of players. That's a fine way to play if one enjoys it as really it's all about player preference/fun, but your assessment of how game systems motivate players is the polar opposite of how it actually works for the average player. I'd bet there's far more people min/maxing experience gains via screamer farming than there are people min/maxing their power via gear relative to gamestage, and neither of those are probably meaningful representations of the average player.

 

[RipClaw]

It's certainly not true for Roland who mentioned he likes to build screamer farming bases.

You misunderstood Roland. He has created a mod for 7 Days to die which removes the XP from the game. You only get skill points by surviving. The longer you survive the more points you get per day.

You'll find his mod here:

https://7daystodie.com/forums/showthread.php?114413-0XP-RolMod

 

[Niil945]

You misunderstood Roland. He has created a mod for 7 Days to die which removes the XP from the game. You only get skill points by surviving. The longer you survive the more points you get per day.
You'll find his mod here:

https://7daystodie.com/forums/showthread.php?114413-0XP-RolMod

Ah you're probably correct. I interpreted that statement to mean that he has also played games where he built bases to farm screamers for experience in addition to playing using his xp over time mod. But that makes more sense.

Do you think that changes anything I said in some way? Do you think there are more people who avoid gaining experience to prevent their gamestage from increasing than there are people who farm screamers for experience? Do you think either of those groups represent the behavior exhibited by the average player?

 

[Roland]

I’ve never constructed anything to farm xp. My first year or so of playing this game had zero XP. I like the feeling of surviving in a world destroyed by zombies. I play to experience that world and not tonplay a xp economy game with leveling up as the central feature. Leveling up is a side effect to me.

Having played the game before there were xp incentives, and then with xp incentives, and now again with my mod without xp incentives I like playing much better without them.

 

[Cernwn]

I ...mind changes and improvements... these changes are drastic and not needed...

Just my opinion, but I fixed that statement for ya If it were me, I would try to keep the feedback more constructive and concise.

My 2 cents: whether the changes are for good or for bad, we cannot tell, as we are STILL IN EARLY ACCESS. However, if the early access build NEVER changed, I guarantee it would be bad. Here is a link for you to peruse - see "What is Early Access":

https://store.steampowered.com/earlyaccessfaq

Remember, you can always rollback to an older build through the game launcher, but may have issues getting others to play an outdated MP build with you:

 

[Niil945]

I’ve never constructed anything to farm xp. My first year or so of playing this game had zero XP. I like the feeling of surviving in a world destroyed by zombies. I play to experience that world and not tonplay a xp economy game with leveling up as the central feature. Leveling up is a side effect to me.
Having played the game before there were xp incentives, and then with xp incentives, and now again with my mod without xp incentives I like playing much better without them.

This is the first survival game like this that I've played that I can think of that blended RPG (experience, character levels and skills) and survival elements (base building, teching up, exploration for resources). I was having a conversation with a buddy the other night about The Forest since they announced a sequel and how it was cool to progress through the story and find better weapons. But that also resulted in people looking up that info and just getting the best weapons (within that range of the story) in a few minutes. There are pros and cons to either system.

 

[BobTheBard]

If it were me, I would try to keep the feedback more constructive and concise.

While I agree, you undermine your own point with all that followup that is neither feedback nor especially relevant.

Having played the game before there were xp incentives, and then with xp incentives, and now again with my mod without xp incentives I like playing much better without them.

I'm rather inclined to agree this would be better, especially in the current alpha. Might just be me, but after XP-farming in a game or two I'm beginning to see XP as a bit of a 'beginner trap' since you're pushing your gamestage artificially high before you have the equipment to properly deal with it. Might have to give that mod a try and see if the game feels better.

 

[guardianangelmp]

My 2 cents: whether the changes are for good or for bad, we cannot tell, as we are STILL IN EARLY ACCESS. However, if the early access build NEVER changed, I guarantee it would be bad. Here is a link for you to peruse - see "What is Early Access":

https://store.steampowered.com/earlyaccessfaq

Whether a change is good or bad is totally subjective. So, while we can't tell if a change is good in respect to getting the game to the goal the devs have for it (since we aren't informed on what that goal is) we can say whether a change is good or bad in regards to our enjoyment of the game, and really that is the only thing that matters to the individual gamer.

So, yes, we can say whether a change is good or bad while a game is still in early access.

Also, if the early access build never changed then the game would not be in early access because it would be "released".

Remember, you can always rollback to an older build through the game launcher, but may have issues getting others to play an outdated MP build with you:

This is the same as saying "remember, you can always play Mass effect 1 if you don't like Mass effect Andromeda", or basically......."if you don't like the game, leave".

It is a worn response to people who express displeasure with current builds and feel aspects of previous builds were better.

Your post has nothing to offer other than the usual platitudes that are used to minimize criticism.

 

[Laz Man]

Yes, some players have done that and then complained that they supposedly had to do it. The same players now light 20 campfires and farm screamer hordes.
These players are the type of player who want to max out everything, no matter if they need it or not. This has nothing to do with LBD but with the mindset of this players. If you hit your thumb with a hammer all the time than the problem is not the hammer but the guy who holds it.

Screamer farming is not really an issue now since raising XP/Level before your ready has consequences (higher GS).