PC Please stop trying to tell us how to play

[BarryTGash]

If they did random stuff like hit support pillars even though they have a clear path, things would get interesting quickly.

I think that would be quite fun. TFP could disable the damage multiplier zeds get when more than 1 hit the same block to balance (tbh, the multiplier is already there - it is x nZombies, so I don't know why an extra multiplier is even deemed necessary).

Regarding the underground base nonsense, it would have been a lot less work for TFP just to say "if you don't like impervious underground bases then just don't build one", then everyone could (not necessarily would) be happier. But I don't have a dog in this fight - the idea all that digging just puts me off the whole underground bunker thing. I ain't a dwarf.

Mods are a thing, and TFP exposed all the xml files - have at it!

 

[unholyjoe]

PREACH IT BROTHER! Although I have been reliably informed that any base which affords the player a defensive advantage - i.e. the zombies have a harder time hitting the player than the player does the zombies - is "cheese". Only going mano-a-mano...mano-a-undead?...in a barren field is non-cheese.

What on Earth is the point of a blade trap or a dart trap or an electric fence or...*waves hands around* any of it...if not to try to get zombies to walk into/near them? The big "plot" point in this game is "a crapton of zombies are coming for you in 7 days, better be ready" and then they give you all of these murder machines and base-building features. Oh no! I built an effective base to keep my cranial goo out of the mouths of the undead! I AM A CHEESER!!! 

i mean seriously, people have seen the vids where joel will use some of these tactics like blade traps under the iron bars he is standing on up where zeds cant reach him... i do it as well and have since i been playing and testing 7dtd.

biggest problem i think, is some people just want to complain if they see someone having fun. well i play sp and mp with my daughter, what we do and what others do is their own business and it doesnt affect my game nor does how my daughter and i affect any other game.

i will point out tho.. i dont waste my time with designing and using blocks that thwart the zeds... and thats just me.. others... have fun if thats what is fun.

just remember to stay off my grass and we be good..

 

[fragtzack]

What is a honest defense without any abuse? 

Easy answer: Any defense that allows the player to be 100% safe from harm without fighting. 

Currently in a20:

Kill corridor is not cheese, the player is not 100% safe.

I can think of zero current horde night strats where the player is completely safe without needing to fight. 

 In my last horde night (getting end game high game stage) , I used 3 different horde bases on same night:

1. A close range hatch hall

2. The killing corridor (Jawoodle build)

3. Elevated strong tower, with shoot down bars.

The close range hatch hall build fell, the Jawoold killing corridor also fell but I managed to finish the horde night safe on the last build.

2-3 green cops at a time, multiple demo at same time, green vultures. Probably had about 10-15 demo's through the night..Yes, they will break that Jawoodle killing corridor. 

IMHO, late game high game stage hordes now requires multiple bases for fall back purposes.

Therefore, job well done TFP.

To hear the OP and some others  "Don't tell us how to play" is very discouraging to me cause I think TFP have done an incredible job of making the game more challenging for my play. 

 

[fragtzack]

.

"They want a base that is 100% safe from harm" and yet they can not do that (to my knowledge), but they used to be able to if they so wished.  Is that not the very definition of OP's statement.  

What anyone thinks should or should not be allowed, for what ever reason, is not an argument to a factual statement.

There is the option to turn off zombies and/or turn off horde nights thus making the underground base completely safe. 

Therefore, the OP statement of "telling us how to play" isn't a fact. The player is very  clearly  given a choice in game settings.

 

[RipClaw]

Easy answer: Any defense that allows the player to be 100% safe from harm without fighting. 

By that definition is my base a cheese base. All I currently do is repairing the blade traps and electric fences during the horde. I may also refill the dart traps, but so far I've never had them run long enough to use up more than half of the darts.

Technically, the zombies can reach me, but most don't even survive the first two blade traps. Not even Demolisher. And behind those 2 blade traps there are 4 more waiting.

The close range hatch hall build fell, the Jawoold killing corridor also fell but I managed to finish the horde night safe on the last build.

2-3 green cops at a time, multiple demo at same time, green vultures. Probably had about 10-15 demo's through the night..Yes, they will break that Jawoodle killing corridor. 

Maybe no one has told you this before, but you shouldn't shoot at the green light on the chest of the demolisher. Only in the the head or at his legs.

 

[fragtzack]

The demo also chews through normal blocks without exploding I thought, at least that is what seemed to kill most of my hatch base. And then a green cop exploded.

On the Jawoodle base, what did the base in was a 2 cops exploding at top of stairs, totally demolishing the ramp up for the zombies to killing corridor.

No, your base is not cheese. Going around and repairing your traps is considered fighting. You are not 100% safe.

huddling underground and crafting while horde night rages above, that is clear cheese.  

 

[Maharin]

A new movie, "Field of Blades... build it and they will come!"

Maybe they could get Kevin Costner to be a zombie in it.

 

[RipClaw]

Therefore, the OP statement of "telling us how to play" isn't a fact. The player is very  clearly  given a choice in game settings.

I can also turn off the zombies completely but that's not the point. The point is that nerfs and changes affect different play styles differently.

The nerf of the blocks, for example, has mainly affected melee bases.  Poles were reduced to 25% of the HP of the full blocks. Since poles allow players to hit zombies and give some protection they where very popular in melee setups.

At the same time bars retained all thier HP despite containing less material than a plate, which was reduced to 50%. Bars allow a player to shoot through them.  Yes, the cop can spit through it but it's not really an acute threat since you can easily dodge it.

Now you could conclude that the fun pimps don't like melee bases and prefer playstyles with firearms.

That's certainly not the case, and perhaps they weren't even aware of the impact of the changes at the time of the decision. But you can't blame the players for assuming that.

 

[Roland]

Some people are always going to accuse others of cheesing horde night. “Cheese” has become simply a trash talk way of saying that you handle horde night in a way that I think is easier and takes less effort than how I handle horde night. 
 

The devs aren’t designing a la trash talk.  They want the zombies to be able to reliably path through the world and navigate the often complex terrain and they really don’t care how players develop strategies to survive. If they see behavior by zombies they did not intend they fix that. If that fix ends a particular strategy, it was just collateral damage.
 

There have only been a very few enemy behaviors they have changed because of player strategies and in those cases they were up front about the fact that they didn’t want players to be able to do something they were doing. Zombies digging, zombies swimming, and vulture hordes attacking vehicles during blood moon are the only actual dev design vs player strats situations I can think of that were put in because of how players were playing. 

 

[unholyjoe]

yep and actually digging was in for a long time... it just didnt work and if it did, it was seen as a bug because people didnt think it was possible way back then.

i play (AND NO i am not telling anybody how to play) with feral sense on and they jog during the day... everything runs at night.. and i still can deal with them a whole lot easier then starting a new game in ark completely naked in the mouth of a couple raptors... that is game play i really dont like... but after a couple deaths i manage to quickly survive and come back for revenge...

 

[Kyonshi]

On 1/2/2022 at 12:11 AM, Ray Garraty said:

I hope the Pimps never listen to such annoying YouTubers like this [YouTuber] and push the game design further to pump up the challenge. The Pimps are not worse than any other developer and they don't think cheesing their game is the way to go. That's perfectly legitimate, id do the same. If they don't like what they're seeing, they will change things because if their game and they'll tailor it the way they want it.

TC displays the most obvious and blatant example of monumental entitlement ever. The game isn't made for your pretty eyes only. If you're unhappy with the design the Pimps conduct, go play something else. It's like you're telling someone how to drive their car the way [you] want it while you're the passenger and not making the payments on it. Stfu, seriously.

Hiding from the horde underground is the dumbest thing ever. If someone don't wanna deal with the hordes... just turn them off.

And I stopped watching the video when he went "this game's in developement since 753 years...". This moronic argument is so old, it's deader than a dead horse.

The better the mechanics of zombies are developed to get to us, the happier I will be. Keep up the good work Pimps.

 

[Krougal]

huddling underground and crafting while horde night rages above, that is clear cheese.  

And here I would just call that a smart design.

Although I'd also call it laziness and a waste of an opportunity for xp.

 

[playlessNamer]

second point:

Do you live in your hordebase? I always do that. On day 7 and 14 i have some separate structures but then i always include the defense in my actual single base. Everything else is, you know it, cheese!

 

[Crater Creator]

By that definition is my base a cheese base. All I currently do is repairing the blade traps and electric fences during the horde. I may also refill the dart traps, but so far I've never had them run long enough to use up more than half of the darts.

Technically, the zombies can reach me, but most don't even survive the first two blade traps. Not even Demolisher. And behind those 2 blade traps there are 4 more waiting.

How's this for a definition?  A player's actions are cheesy if they take advantage of a significant oversight or imbalance in the game's design.  And then, what is balance?  The game is balanced when what you put in is commensurate with what you get out.  For example, if you put in a limited effort towards base defense, and get out unlimited safety on horde night, that is imbalanced.  This can be (but isn't necessarily always) assessed without making any moral judgment about how other people play: by focusing only on what the game is designed to allow the player to do.

Since you ask, I don't think what you describe is cheesy.  Your traps require you to actively maintain them to keep you safe.  That takes effort in the short term (making the repairs) and the long term (acquiring more iron/electric parts/ammo).  If you were to stop putting in any effort, the base - or in other words the result of the actions you've taken - would fail.

 

[Aldranon]

Killing the zombies on BM night is a no brainer, for me.

-A person can get most (if not all) of their ammo back (and more stuff) from loot bags.

-The shotgun still seems a bit bugged in POI fighting, so I use some of the thousands of shotgun shells I have (and my pump shotgun) to fire down on the zombies heads.

-I only use the MG's to mow down the exploders.

-I now WANT more EXP to make the game more interesting and I moved to the wasteland as it's the place to be, late game!

All while playing Dead-is-Dead.  I would not even try to say my way is the best way (edit: for everyone).  But its the best way... for me.

 

[Viktoriusiii]

Cheese (for me):

knowing exactly what the Z's will do and building your horde accordingly, maxing out the effectiveness.

So yes funneling is cheese, because there are no Z's that go against the grain. 

I can optimize my defenses to a point where those zombies might as well Bloons, because I know exactly what path they will take.

Yes it is a tower defense game (supposedly), but it feels gamey. And what you DON'T want in a horror survival game, is for it to feel gamey.

Imagine dark souls introducing a slot machine at campfires.

It feels out of place. Just because they add "casino-sim" in the tags doesn't mean it feels right. Even if that was the plan from the start.

YES this is hyperbole. Obviously it is not that big of a genre breaker.
But those stupid dangerous zombies just suddenly become pathfinding masters that always follow a set path (in 99% towards a door) 

So basically every base that uses this knowledge is cheese for me.

And yes I cheese them too. Because they are way too strong to not cheese. Also it is not possible to do a 360° defense anymore, so I have to cheese it.

Basicially: It won't kill me, but I'm not a friend of these horde A.I. zombies and even if <A16 A.I. had issues (running in circles and stuff) but at least I never knew what these mindless hordes would do next. They would be stupid, but still dangerous (if you didn't exploit certain bugs in the A.I., which is different from cheesing the intended A.I.)

 

[Jason Tamosiunis]

if there were a way to chose between old (dumb horde) and new (intelligent tower defense) A.I. that would be the dream.

Because I absolutely loved the horde A.I.
It got better over time, but kill corridors will now always be a thing. I will no longer be scared because I know how the Z's will react to any obstacle.
They are "intelligent" but predictable.

fataal said he worked on zombie dumbness, and sure there are no conga lines anymore, but on horde night they all find the entrance 100% of the time and avoid spikes and other traps like the plague (yes because they are coded like a block, but they shouldn't be. They should be considered airlocks by zombies)

I really dislike that change, but sadly this won't ever come back.
Thing is: with "intelligent" zombies, you will always be able to abuse them because they follow a set of rules that can be abused.
If they did random stuff like hit support pillars even though they have a clear path, things would get interesting quickly.

But instead with age a counter-less demo zombie that just blows your base up... YAY fun

Dont give roland and madmole ideas

 

[RipClaw]

Thing is: with "intelligent" zombies, you will always be able to abuse them because they follow a set of rules that can be abused.

And you can plan for it which is important if you want to use traps that can't move and only shoot in one direction.

If they did random stuff like hit support pillars even though they have a clear path, things would get interesting quickly.

And things would move even more towards "I sit on a tower or a roof and shoot at the zombies" which I hate as much as you hate intelligent zombies because it's just dull.

Writing a bot for Unity that does this for me would be more fun than this.

 

[Darklegend222]

Cheese (for me):

knowing exactly what the Z's will do and building your horde accordingly, maxing out the effectiveness.

So yes funneling is cheese, because there are no Z's that go against the grain. 

I can optimize my defenses to a point where those zombies might as well Bloons, because I know exactly what path they will take.

Yes it is a tower defense game (supposedly), but it feels gamey. And what you DON'T want in a horror survival game, is for it to feel gamey.

Imagine dark souls introducing a slot machine at campfires.

It feels out of place. Just because they add "casino-sim" in the tags doesn't mean it feels right. Even if that was the plan from the start.

YES this is hyperbole. Obviously it is not that big of a genre breaker.
But those stupid dangerous zombies just suddenly become pathfinding masters that always follow a set path (in 99% towards a door) 

So basically every base that uses this knowledge is cheese for me.

And yes I cheese them too. Because they are way too strong to not cheese. Also it is not possible to do a 360° defense anymore, so I have to cheese it.

Basicially: It won't kill me, but I'm not a friend of these horde A.I. zombies and even if <A16 A.I. had issues (running in circles and stuff) but at least I never knew what these mindless hordes would do next. They would be stupid, but still dangerous (if you didn't exploit certain bugs in the A.I., which is different from cheesing the intended A.I.)

If funneling is cheese, then don't bother playing a zombie game. Don't even build walls, it's stuff for them to path around. In fact, remove everything between you and them. What's your first instinct in the apoclypse? To barricade entrances and make sure enemies can only enter from one place as you still need to get out.

Also, as an avid Dark Souls player, a slot machine? Really? How does that even compare, what purpose or role would it serve other than you coming up with a truly dumb, out of the way analogy which doesn't make sense.

I will agree with you that the hordes are much more about pathing than they used to be, and a major part of that is spikes being nerfed to a point of uselessness. In A16.4 and below, one wood spike trap could kill 7-10 zombies. Now you need 3-4 to kill one.

I don't even bother with the passive traps anymore, pipe bombs or guns are the way to go now. Up until you get a crucible then you need to build a cheese box with 8 blade traps, 4 electric fence posts and all the forged iron, steel, mechanical and electrical parts you can carry for repairing. That way they never reach you and you don't waste 2-3 in game days just mining and repairing endlessly.

 

[Viktoriusiii]

If funneling is cheese, then don't bother playing a zombie game. Don't even build walls, it's stuff for them to path around. In fact, remove everything between you and them. What's your first instinct in the apoclypse? To barricade entrances and make sure enemies can only enter from one place as you still need to get out.

Back in the days, we had big open bases. 

Nobody really built a horde base. Because it wasn't just one small corridor. 
You needed a perimeter defense. 
Sure they were too dumb to know what a support pillar was, so you could simply let them run in circles below you, but that was an exploit and could have been fixed.

Nowadays you basically NEED a horde base, because your real base is too big, doesn't#t have a small corridor and if a demolisher shows up, you might lose all your stuff.

We actually built spikepits and gun towers in all directions because they would just straight up run towards you, no matter the cost.

Exactly like a horde SHOULD act.
Now they are all magically attracted to the door.
This is great for complex mazes like underground bunkers, because they will find their way downstairs, but awful for above ground defenses.


 

Spoiler

The more I talk about it... the more I miss A16... might install that when I come home.
I doubt I will have fun, because the rest (visual and feature stuff) was improved A LOT since then... but I think LBD... real horde nights... sneaking :'D
The more they improve, the more they move away from my ideal zombie game I guess...

Well at least there are awesome A16 mods still out there... hope I'll get them to work ^^

Or it is a bias of "everything was better when I was younger" ^^ we'll see