PC So was the point of A19 to get rid of "Realism"?

[Bashtiks]

Imagine you find yourself in a zombie apocalypse and you know there is a store-room of weapons at the top of the gun store. Would you open the front door and fight your way through the former employees, or throw your extension ladder up the wall and try to grab the guns unseen? You have chosen to play in a world where several other people have the same incentives and goals as you do. Why are you angry that they are accomplishing those goals in their own way? Seems to me that "crap, someone has already looted this place" is a pretty damn realistic portrayal of a true multiple-survivor every-person-for-him/herself apocalypse. Even PvE is PvP in this game.

I'm keen to read how, in a sandbox, fully-destructible/buildable voxel world, you could ever solve the issue you are concerned about.

you got me wrong ...

It was as example why there is NO reason to be angry or annoyed and similar situations may occur even playing ''fair'' ..

 

[Boidster]

you got me wrong ...

It was as example why there is NO reason to be angry or annoyed and similar situations may occur even playing ''fair'' ..

You got me wrong - I was responding to Onarr. But I think in the end I agree with both of you for the most part. Also I agree with Roland. Look, I'm generally a pretty agreeable person is what I'm saying. Unless, of course, you're wrong and then it's:

 

[Ralathar44]

 Again, it is obvious that realism in games is never regarded as the absolute imitation of reality, because more often than not, gameplay has to take precedence. Depending on the genre and game itself, figuring out when to use realism to your advantage, or when realism would harm gameplay, is no rocket science, so no double standards and nothing subjective about it.
 

Suspension of disbelief applies pretty much to every multimedia form of art. I don't know where you got that "realism simulator" thing but it is irrelevant. 

I suggest that you watch this to understand what I said in my previous post: 

You're absolutely making double standards because you're trying to personally dictate what realism matters and what realism doesn't.  You are, by definition, creating two sets of standards on where realism should and should not matter.  No amount of handwaving you do changes that and you can't speak circles around it.  It's the foundational basis of your argumentation and it's why you will continue to find a lack of success.  You'll find a few folks that agree with you online, but games will not be designed that way and most people do not want games designed that way.

Also linking what is basically a visual novel done in game form doesn't support your point any.  The Walking Dead games barely have any gameplay.  They are essentially just a comic story rendered inside of a game engine with limited choices available to you.  It's almost pure story and pure "immersion" because that's all that product is.  That is totally fine and appropriate for that specific game.  But the rules of each game do not apply to all other games.  Each is designed specifically to deliver different experiences and most games are not a "walking simulator" with marginal gameplay.  Drawing parallels between two radically different games implying that the same rules apply to both is incredibly disingenuous and shows a remarkable lack of understanding of even the most basic levels of game design.

The Long Dark for example is a fantastic story based and more immersive survival game that's most closer to what 7DTD is.  But despite being the same genre they are still incredibly far apart in the experience they try and deliver.  TLD survival mode is bland and uninteresting and the game had very little success before it unveiled it's story mode despite being far more realistic in terms of gameplay.  However once they had a story to back up their mechanics their more realistic mechanics helped you become immersed in that story.  The mechanics served to make you appreciate the setting of the world and the danger of the environment along with the risk of the people.  Essentially in TLD mechanics are used as story telling of their own to enhance the core story.  It's in service of the story.  Everything comes together as a cohesive whole to deliver the primary drive of that game: the story experience.    But the mechanics on their own kinda suck for any long term play. TLD delivers on story, not gameplay.  7DTD doesn't have that, it's a game @%$*#! game you play for the mechanics.  Not the immersion, not the story, the gameplay.  That is what 7DTD is aimed at and that's what it delivers in spades. 

TFP knows what kind of game they are making, your argument does not.  I hope they change the appearance of the loot containers in accordance with gamestage though so people can start @%$*#!ing about it without throwing realism around so disingenously .  Have low gamestage containers be previously opened and already "looted" and have higher gamestage containers sealed.  That way the reason you're getting lower tier loot is that someone else beat you to it.  Air drops could be easily explained even with current boxes in a lore friendly way, they are dropping essential supplies...not their best stuff that they are keeping for themselves.

 

[JaxTeller718]

Well the weapons would be behind lock and a key in secure room, so you can not just get to it. And that is also the solution to the problem. Loot room is encased in steel blocks and strong door and key spawns in random loot container or drops from random enemy inside PoI.  The hardiness of the blocks would of course be varied based on Tier. This way you could still nerdpoll, but you would have hard time breaking in. Seems like good balance to me. Early game its better to find the key, later when you have good tools and explosives you just blow your way in.

Second way to counter it is to spread the loot through out the POI instead having it in one single room. 

Third way is to implement randomly generated PoI, where you do not know where loot room is. I fully intend to do this as a mod once the game hits gold.

You forgot the 4th way. People COULD stop being cheesy and selfish when on servers. But we already know even suggesting that playing fairly or level designers "dictating" how they want you to play their...designed levels..... is fascist so.

 

[marbu]

thats why i teached myselfe LUA, C++, 3D Studio max so i can change whatever @%$*#! i want in almost any game

 

[RestInPieces]

You're absolutely making double standards because you're trying to personally dictate what realism matters and what realism doesn't.  You are, by definition, creating two sets of standards on where realism should and should not matter.  No amount of handwaving you do changes that and you can't speak circles around it.  It's the foundational basis of your argumentation and it's why you will continue to find a lack of success.  You'll find a few folks that agree with you online, but games will not be designed that way and most people do not want games designed that way.

Ok, here's what "double standards" means:

A double standard is the application of different sets of principles for situations that are, in principle, the same

Applying different principles to similar-looking situations may or may not indicate a double standard. In order to distinguish between the application of a double-standard and the valid application of different standards towards circumstances that only appear to be the same, several factors must be examined. One is the sameness of those circumstances - what are the parallels between those circumstances, and in what ways do they differ?

A few examples of how there are actually different situations, in which realism is evaluated differently:

Structural Integrity: Realism is used to make building more interesting.

Biome temperatures: Realism is used to diversify biomes.

Injuries: Realism is used to diversify gameplay and give players different challenges to deal with.

All of that while adding to immersion.

Item weight: Realism in this case would be completely restrictive for core parts of the game e.g. building.

Zombies destroying steel etc: Realism in this case would make the TD/Survival part obsolete.  

Injury duration: Realism in this case would make the game borderline unplayable.

So here you have it. Realism can be either great or harmful, in different situations and quantities, judging by the effect it has on gameplay.

Also linking what is basically a visual novel done in game form doesn't support your point any.  The Walking Dead games barely have any gameplay.  They are essentially just a comic story rendered inside of a game engine with limited choices available to you.  It's almost pure story and pure "immersion" because that's all that product is.  That is totally fine and appropriate for that specific game.  But the rules of each game do not apply to all other games.  Each is designed specifically to deliver different experiences and most games are not a "walking simulator" with marginal gameplay.  Drawing parallels between two radically different games implying that the same rules apply to both is incredibly disingenuous and shows a remarkable lack of understanding of even the most basic levels of game design.

The Long Dark for example is a fantastic story based and more immersive survival game that's most closer to what 7DTD is ................ Not the immersion, not the story, the gameplay.  That is what 7DTD is aimed at and that's what it delivers in spades. 

Saying that only "pure story games" should care about immersion is just unheard of. First of all, the video doesn't only refer to those "pure immersion" games you are talking about. Immersion is much more than narrative and even a game with zero narrative can invoke it. Not to mention that narrative doesn't only include writing, but also visual cues, environment etc.

Here is a good article that explains this: https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/120720/Analysis_The_Psy@%$*#!gy_of_Immersion_in_Video_Games.php

- Multiple channels of sensory information- Completeness of sensory information- Cognitively demanding environments- A strong and interesting narrative, plot, or story

- Lack of incongruous visual cues in the game world- Consistent behavior from things in the game world- An unbroken presentation of the game world- Interactivity with items in the game world

7DTD already ticks a lot of these boxes. I'll let you guess which one of these is affected by the rigid level scaling.

So again, no, I am "not drawing parallels" apparently.

TFP knows what kind of game they are making, your argument does not.

:rolleyes2:

 

[HungryZombie]

I really like being limited by stone tools to start with, then moving to Iron, etc. It was really lame to just jump past stone and iron tools into steel by week 2. In my 1000s of hours playing I'd make the starting stone axe and use it till I found a steel axe and pick. Iron stuff just got scrapped or sold. I like the feeling of progression the new system gives.

The issue people have I think, is with loot crates. I agree It does feel odd that gun safes only have blunderbusses in them and tool crates only have stone axes.

For me it would be better for them to decrease the amounts of crates in the world so we are not faced with the frustration of finding a great loot box and only finding crap items in it. Make the loot boxes only start spawning as your game stage increase.

This makes it a win/win. People won't have immersion problems because they won't find any weapon crates early on.

 

[Roland]

Immersion is a strange double edged sword.  But, one thing I'd like to point out is the TFP have also stated that this game has arcade elements.  I like that the tech levels are spaced and pacing is meant to become more relevant.  I feel this is a good thing.  Yes, opening up a crate of fresh meat in the desert sun is immersion breaking, but the game as a whole is still pretty enjoyable.  There are compromises to consider.

No, but see...keeping stacks of meat in a wooden crate in the desert is okay with the immersion police. It’s the finding a blunderbus when they wanted an assault rifle that apparently gets them swarming.

For me it would be better for them to decrease the amounts of crates in the world so we are not faced with the frustration of finding a great loot box and only finding crap items in it. Make the loot boxes only start spawning as your game stage increase.

This makes it a win/win. People won't have immersion problems because they won't find any weapon crates early on.

I’d rather they have “broken t2 items” In there that can’t be repaired and can only be scrapped for parts. That would allow players to craft basic t2 weapons that they find a schematic for possibly before the primitive stage ends. 

 

[Ralathar44]

The issue people have I think, is with loot crates. I agree It does feel odd that gun safes only have blunderbusses in them and tool crates only have stone axes.

For me it would be better for them to decrease the amounts of crates in the world so we are not faced with the frustration of finding a great loot box and only finding crap items in it. Make the loot boxes only start spawning as your game stage increase.

This makes it a win/win. People won't have immersion problems because they won't find any weapon crates early on.

Or just make safes and loot crates that are low gamestage spawn a new variant that look like they've already been looted.  That way you're getting what people left behind rather than what was originally there.  Also make them unlocked.  As the gamestage rises and the areas get more dangerous you start finding the traditional locked/sealed safes/loot crates because the danger has deterred would be scavengers....so you find better stuff.

But those upset are not arguing for these solutions, they are arguing that they want better stuff earlier, they are just doing it in a really roundabout way to disguise their true intentions.  I mean look at the OPs poll.  If we were REALLY talking about immersion then we would not be finding a ton of sealed crates full of loot packed up "probably over a hundred years ago. " as they said in their poll.  Everything would have already been looted long ago and finding an undisturbed cache freshly sealed still would be insanely rare.  But you don't see them complaining about that despite it being incredibly immersion breaking.

In what post apoc world 100ish years past the apocalypse are you going to find unlooted locations everywhere?  We couldn't even go a week into a pandemic without buying out the supermarkets, gun stores, and especially toilet paper lol.

 

[Roland]

I agree that some of the posts seem to be thinly disguised pining for early op loot. Even when TFP adds zip guns, pipe guns, and other primitive weapons for each type they won’t be glad for the variety because “those guns suck and are boring”

 

[Boidster]

I agree that some of the posts seem to be thinly disguised pining for early op loot. Even when TFP adds zip guns, pipe guns, and other primitive weapons for each type they won’t be glad for the variety because “those guns suck and are boring”

Zorg ZF-1 or GTFO.

 

[RestInPieces]

No, but see...keeping stacks of meat in a wooden crate in the desert is okay with the immersion police. It’s the finding a blunderbus when they wanted an assault rifle that apparently gets them swarming.

Anyone who says it's ok not to have spoilage is not a true officer. Fridge existence in the 7DTD world is a mystery that keeps many of us up at night.

I’d rather they have “broken t2 items” In there that can’t be repaired and can only be scrapped for parts. That would allow players to craft basic t2 weapons that they find a schematic for possibly before the primitive stage ends. 

That would make more sense for "high value" containers. Even better, if they adjust POI/zone difficulty and make it less dependent on the player.

 

[Boidster]

adjust POI/zone difficulty and make it less dependent on the player.

I'm out of likes for today, so here's an internet fist bump.



I very much like the idea that Forest=easy, Wasteland=hard, other three are different levels of 'medium'. And certain types of loot can only be only found in certain biomes. So there's a geographic progression along with character progression, and incentive - maybe nearly mandatory pressure - to explore other biomes as the game goes on. Right now, the Wasteland can be a pain in the @%$*#!, but frankly I have no need to go there really. Worst case I'm just passing through, kiting some vultures.

 

[Onarr]

No, but see...keeping stacks of meat in a wooden crate in the desert is okay with the immersion police. It’s the finding a blunderbus when they wanted an assault rifle that apparently gets them swarming.

Well the immersion police, that is just argument they use. You just translate it into - I do not like it. And I think we can agree that current stone age implementation has a lot to be desired. Can we? 

I agree that some of the posts seem to be thinly disguised pining for early op loot. Even when TFP adds zip guns, pipe guns, and other primitive weapons for each type they won’t be glad for the variety because “those guns suck and are boring”

I really see the problem in those items having absolutely no value. Add some value to them and problem should be solved. It could be sold for 100 caps, scraped for some more rare components like duct tape etc. Or instead of those just put there a some weapon parts so with perk you can craft T2 firearms. What sucks is that you bother with clearing PoI and in loot you have almost no value. That is what needs to be balanced.

 

[Solomon]

This update only managed one thing to do greatly and that is breaking the immersion.

Imagine my situation, i load up my server with my friends, get our crafting game starting and make an ugly base in the middle of the freakin desert. One of us spots a military base lookin thing nearby in the forest, we go in, die and kill a bunch of shambling dead. We enter this room with the closed door and the bulletproof glass and start to smash it.

After a long and exhausting smashing period we enter the room to be ambushed by 4 more dead what we manage to kill without a single death, we see safes and gunsafes!

"Finally some actual tools to fight these shamblers!"

We beat the hell out of the safes and see a bunch of stone tools, the exact same stuff what we already have on us. We decided to stop playing for now and most probably will revert back to A18 after this experimental failure.

I dont ask for full realism but atleast make sure that the efforts are always rewarded in some degree and fit the area where they are in. We did not loot a prehistoric cave expedition where archeologists were trying to kill us but a military base. I shouldnt have to mod the game so the loot actually makes sense.

 

[Raestloz]

"Immersion" basically translates to "things I like". I hate that word with passion. Every single game I see people saying "mechanics change! muh immersion!" and then rant to what amounts to "gimme back my favorite things"

But people making "funny" strawman comments about "Oh so how about this and this, huh? Oh you don't like it? But ImMeRsHuN?" is also disingenuous

There's this concept of "suspension of disbelief". I know, I know, this might be difficult but bear with me. Basically, people are willing to overlook things as long as its accepted as "well ok that's how it works"

Science people complain about visible lasers in basically every single sci-fi in existence, especially once you can block with reflexes. But that's fine as long as they all work like that. Laser rifles would guarantee your victory IRL because the only moment you can see the projectile is when it's already piercing your eyes, but we can all accept that Jedi can block them with Jedi reflexes because, hey, literally every single laser weaponry work that way in Star Wars Universe

Similarly, despite having what amounts to Ancient Magick, just called The Force(tm) this time, the Star Wars Universe doesn't simply conjure Avatar of Holy God or whatever. The Force, despite deliberately not elaborated upon, has a basic, consistent mechanic: it's magic, but it's limited to immediate physical prowess. Having The Force does not allow you to conjure perfect clones, or to teleport between planets, or to hack machines or whatever. It's limited to allowing you to do cool tricks. It behaves consistently across multiple trilogies.

===========================================

So how does that relate to 7DTD? The original question is this: Why the hell would sealed pre-apocalypse crates have post-apocalypse stuff in them?

It's not like people are asking "why the hell does this unassuming moldy backpack not have an AK-47 day 1"? No. They're talking about a pre-apocalypse, sealed crate not having what it should have: pre-apocalypse items. Really, it's not an unreasonable chain of logic. You'd walk into Shamway factory expecting it to have some stock of canned food, and walk into Shotgun Messiah factory expecting it to have a (shot)gun somewhere. Having a stone axe in a sealed crate breaks that logic.

You won't hear people complain that it only has a stone axe if the container is an unsealed box named "survivor cache" or whatever. That makes perfect sense

"But what about these totally unrealistic stuff? No comments on those?"

1. That's not what the question was about
   
2. People are not unreasonable monsters who think in extremes.
   

For example, "what about boxes storing meat"? Storage is gameplay mechanic, players have accepted that a human being is capable of carrying non-spoiling hundreds of items on their person since 1995. That is just how the game works, for the sake of gameplay. Disbelief has been suspended decades ago.

Just because something is "fiction", it doesn't mean all hell can break loose. The world needs to make sense, it needs to be consistent, and since 7dtd is based on our reality, suspension of disbelief works with the chain of logic that works similarly to our reality, you don't see Priests of Cthulhu calling in Tentacled Abomination, now do you?

 

[Solomon]

Or just make safes and loot crates that are low gamestage spawn a new variant that look like they've already been looted.  That way you're getting what people left behind rather than what was originally there.  Also make them unlocked.  As the gamestage rises and the areas get more dangerous you start finding the traditional locked/sealed safes/loot crates because the danger has deterred would be scavengers....so you find better stuff.

But those upset are not arguing for these solutions, they are arguing that they want better stuff earlier, they are just doing it in a really roundabout way to disguise their true intentions.  I mean look at the OPs poll.  If we were REALLY talking about immersion then we would not be finding a ton of sealed crates full of loot packed up "probably over a hundred years ago. " as they said in their poll.  Everything would have already been looted long ago and finding an undisturbed cache freshly sealed still would be insanely rare.  But you don't see them complaining about that despite it being incredibly immersion breaking.

In what post apoc world 100ish years past the apocalypse are you going to find unlooted locations everywhere?  We couldn't even go a week into a pandemic without buying out the supermarkets, gun stores, and especially toilet paper lol.

Im all for legit solutions, i just want the damm stone age out of the loot tables.

Make the safes opened up, make repairing items harder, add in more guns and tools into the game what all come with their own downsides and soo on.

Also on a sidenote im not sure how far this game plays in the apocalypse but since electricity is still running and most gear is relatively looking fine i wouldnt claim that the apocalypse has been going on for more than 10ish years.

It's not like people are asking "why the hell does this unassuming moldy backpack not have an AK-47 day 1"? No. They're talking about a pre-apocalypse, sealed crate not having what it should have: pre-apocalypse items. Really, it's not an unreasonable chain of logic. You'd walk into Shamway factory expecting it to have some stock of canned food, and walk into Shotgun Messiah factory expecting it to have a (shot)gun somewhere. Having a stone axe in a sealed crate breaks that logic.

Over on the reddit someone suggested that all these items outside of "perfect containers" aka safes, sealed crates or indoor "good condition" storage should come with various defects and such because if the reason for this stone age nonsense is to slow down the progression atleast do it in a way that the immersion stays relatively intact.

As you said finding an AK in a moldy backpack doesnt make much sense but finding a rusted away AK what barely deals damage and has low durability is actually okay.

 

[Raestloz]

I agree with having a different crate on early gamestage really. The sealed part is the problem, as long as there's nothing perfect, finding low level stone age tools would be fine

 

[katarynna]

I think the problem with that is the crates are generated when the map is. There is no way for the game engine to know you are going to loot a t5 poi at level 3 and make sure to generate the early gamestage crate.

Maybe i'm wrong, because i certainly don't have much technical knowledge in that area. But common sense tells me the crates and boxes are already generated, since poi's are not instanced.

They could probably do it for quest poi's, since the building resets when you start the quest. The crates there could be generated as different models based on gs of the quester. (again, relying just on common sense and deduction since i don''t have the technical knowledge to say for sure.)

However, it seems unlikely that every poi in the world would transform when you walk into it to make the crate appearance match your gamestage.

Unless you want some sort of mechanic added that makes it impossible for you to enter or build on a poi with crates that are meant for higher than your gs (such as the tradere auto-teleport when you get too close to a poi that is higher level than you are) which is more immersion breaking and a horrible mechanic for this type of game.

Just throwing out ideas here. I could very well be wrong.

 

[Raestloz]

Assuming for a moment that they put the loot in an area occluded from view, they may very well be able to regenerate crates based on current gamestage the moment you step on the perimeter

How this would work if you've already blasted open that room? I have no idea
But personally, the easiest solution right now is simply remove stone age tools from sealed crate entirely. I'm not saying good high level stuff have to be in there instead, I'm just saying the loot should not contain stone age tools