Red loot bags

What a shame after killing such a powerful beast.
True that. It wouldn't hurt to have a few guaranteed drops. Not everything has to be a random chance and the loot in the bags is random enough, don't you think? But -- yes -- there should be an incentive to fight the tougher enemies whether you feel you're ready or not. Otherwise, might as well just avoid them all unless you're an XP nut.
 
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Well I did kill the fat lady zombie and she dropped a blue loot bag, along with landing 4 yellow from a 5 zombie roaming horde earlier. So the drop rate isn't to bad I guess.
 
So, I am used to Beta being the balancing point. But I am also used to those updates being done weekly. I.e. developement will change a number, wait a week for feedback and adjust.

I guess once they decide what system they are sticking with, we might get to the above, or just go for release and do it after V1.......oops, "Did I do that?"
Yeah, it's normal to adjust things and try them out to get feedback. They felt the original value of 0.02 was too low. They may have felt that already, or it may have been only after the cut the red bag drop chance in half. Either way, they felt it was too low, so they raised it. But the feedback given was that the new value was too high, so the lowered it a little. Now, unless there's still strong feedback that it's too high, they'll most likely leave it where it is.

That really isn't much back and forth, and is not at all unusual during development. If you were part of a dev team on a game that isn't available to the public during testing, the devs will be regularly making changes and spending time testing them to see if the values work or need more adjustment. You just don't see it because it is behind closed doors. If you play a game that is available to the public during development, you're going to see these kinds of changes and testing phases.
 
it's normal to adjust things and try them out to get feedback
That's not what's happening with these numbers for the most part, though, and you all know it. How many quests to complete a tier? Seven? No, ten? No? Seven? No? Ten? How many screamers to a spawn? One? No, two. Think we should make it three for more "difficulty"? How much of a heat index to spawn screamers in the first place? 100%? 20%? No? How about if someone sneezes --.you know, for the sake of "difficulty"? How about a "new enemy type"? Why don't we just replace all those lumberjacks with a Yeti no more difficult, but maybe more annoying, than a regular zombie. Too many? Yeah? Well, there were too many lumberjacks, too.

No. Every change is a change either to slow the player down (because zombie combat AI can't exactly be all "Dark Souls-like," can it?) or make everything sheer drudgery to do or because we just can't seem to make up our minds or...for no apparent reason, really. Too many complaints (as opposed to suggestions)? Change it back. Meanwhile, it takes 20 real-life seconds to put together a forge, complete with stone and mortar, and six real life minutes to build a workbench made of wood with no animation whatsoever. Do we suppose that's more sensible than 100 pieces of cloth to make a pocket for your jeans?

These numbers -- especially recipes and recipe numbers -- have been played around with so arbitrarily, none of them make any sense. It's ridiculous. Please, make them make sense and if anyone has a problem with that, let them mod them their liking. Kindly consider not designing your game around the preferences and playstyles and supposed "exploits" of a few YouTubers and Streamers while you're at it and we'll be good.

And those timers? My God. You'd think they were placeholders for yet to be implemented animations or "minigames," like searching a car or picking a lock, but no. They were just hella easy and cheap to put there as placeholders while the devs got on with more important things. Now? Put them there and leave them there while driving players up a wall trying to think of something else to craft or somewhere else to go, especially early game when they have few resources, while those timers run...and run and run and run, leeching away our real lifetimes in the process. I suppose we should give people "perks" to lower the six minutes it takes to boil up a few teas, so they won't notice their real lifetime slipping away. Distraction (aka "stuff to do") and time sink is all they want from a video game anyway. Isn't it...? Isn't it?

Meanwile, major portions of the game are still unfinished after over a decade in development. It's no wonder faatal has too much to do and no time to do it in. He's being piecemealed to death changing numbers from .02 to .03 and...probably back again.

As for loot bags...
The loot in zombie drops is about as cookie cutter as it gets.
When it comes to the tougher enemies, they're talking specifically about the relatively rare red (or orange depending on your eyesight) bags with a chance for a good something. I don't get the impression people are taking on Dire Wolves -- with marked trepidation, especially early on, I might add -- for funsies. Nope. They want that loot bag. As for the rest, people are making mods to tweak those numbers -- for solo play balance opposite multiplayer numbers too ridiculous for solo; to make a modicum of sense; and/or just to their liking.

I don't make the rules. I just observe.
 
That's not what's happening with these numbers for the most part, though, and you all know it. How many quests to complete a tier? Seven? No, ten? No? Seven? No? Ten? How many screamers to a spawn? One? No, two. Think we should make it three for more "difficulty"? How much of a heat index to spawn screamers in the first place? 100%? 20%? No? How about if someone sneezes --.you know, for the sake of "difficulty"? How about a "new enemy type"? Why don't we just replace all those lumberjacks with a Yeti no more difficult, but maybe more annoying, than a regular zombie. Too many? Yeah? Well, there were too many lumberjacks, too.

No. Every change is a change either to slow the player down (because zombie combat AI can't exactly be all "Dark Souls-like," can it?) or make everything sheer drudgery to do or because we just can't seem to make up our minds or...for no apparent reason, really. Too many complaints (as opposed to suggestions)? Change it back. Meanwhile, it takes 20 real-life seconds to put together a forge, complete with stone and mortar, and six real life minutes to build a workbench made of wood with no animation whatsoever. Do we suppose that's more sensible than 100 pieces of cloth to make a pocket for your jeans?

These numbers -- especially recipes and recipe numbers -- have been played around with so arbitrarily, none of them make any sense. It's ridiculous. Please, make them make sense and if anyone has a problem with that, let them mod them their liking. Kindly consider not designing your game around the preferences and playstyles and supposed "exploits" of a few YouTubers and Streamers while you're at it and we'll be good.

And those timers? My God. You'd think they were placeholders for yet to be implemented animations or "minigames," like searching a car or picking a lock, but no. They were just hella easy and cheap to put there as placeholders while the devs got on with more important things. Now? Put them there and leave them there while driving players up a wall trying to think of something else to craft or somewhere else to go, especially early game when they have few resources, while those timers run...and run and run and run, leeching away our real lifetimes in the process. I suppose we should give people "perks" to lower the six minutes it takes to boil up a few teas, so they won't notice their real lifetime slipping away. Distraction (aka "stuff to do") and time sink is all they want from a video game anyway. Isn't it...? Isn't it?

Meanwile, major portions of the game are still unfinished after over a decade in development. It's no wonder faatal has too much to do and no time to do it in. He's being piecemealed to death changing numbers from .02 to .03 and...probably back again.

As for loot bags...

When it comes to the tougher enemies, they're talking specifically about the relatively rare red (or orange depending on your eyesight) bags with a chance for a good something. I don't get the impression people are taking on Dire Wolves -- with marked trepidation, especially early on, I might add -- for funsies. Nope. They want that loot bag. As for the rest, people are making mods to tweak those numbers -- for solo play balance opposite multiplayer numbers too ridiculous for solo; to make a modicum of sense; and/or just to their liking.

I don't make the rules. I just observe.
That's your opinion, and you're entitled to it. However, this discussion was about the loot bag drops and I pointed out what happened with those. Not sure when quests per tier changed, but it's been 10 since I have been playing in A20. Screamers have been set to random 1-2 all along from what I have seen. Though I have seen 3 once in 2.0, but that could have been one being called in by the scream. As far as the frostclaws, they are new and as of yet, I haven't seen their spawns change unless it has happened in 2.1 since I haven't tried that yet. If you want to talk about lumberjack spawns being high before the frostclaws were added, sure... they were. But that's a different discussion from what you're stating regarding numbers changing. Obviously if they are adding a new zombie to a biome, the biome spawns will change to adjust for that, so that's hardly a case of changing numbers "just because", which is what it seems you're claiming.

Anyhow, think what you will. You claim arbitrary changes, but I have a strong suspicion that TFP had reasons for each change. You may not know those reasons, or you may not agree with those reasons, but if they had reasons, then it's not arbitrary.

Anyhow, feel free to be negative.
 
No. They're not a guaranteed drop from zombie bears nor dire wolves anymore. But my crew and I have gotten plenty of them to drop from both animals in our current playthrough (default loot settings).
 
It wouldn't hurt to have a few guaranteed drops.
On the one hand, a guaranteed drop is nice, but on the other hand, you start to exploit it and ignore other aspects of the game.

In version 1.X, I lost the motivation to clear POIs after getting a machine gun and a car. Why waste time on POIs if I can come to the wasteland at night and just shoot red bags? During the night, with 40% loot, I completely filled the trunk of the car, the drone (with 3 cargo modules) and the inventory. And 1/3 or 1/4 are ammo.
 
And 1/3 or 1/4 are ammo.
Now with the different loot bags for different zed types, the dire animals could well have a 100% drop but containing:
0-50 arrows
0-50 arrowheads
0-50 bullet tips
0-50 buckshot
0-5 armor parts
Low chance for running shoes for the big dogs (or armor parts)
Low chance for bladed weapons, sticking to the sides

Ofc, most of that shouldn't be in a bag, but gathered during the harvest process, but hey .. :)
 
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