PC Stealth, monster closets and clear quests

[meganoth]

Okay so you said running away... what about traprooms you have to fall into to trigger the Z's?

I did say trap rooms are the exception, but they are an exception anyway. If a "normal" player falls into such a trap, he often has a good chance to be dead as well. This is where even an AGI player has to use his guns and hope for the best ( if he falls into the trap). Me, if I know there is a trap I put ladders on the wall and trigger the room from safety, no matter what attribute I spec into

And if one irradiated feral feral (what are these big guys called now?) wakes up, you are screwed. I play with friends on only warrior and one spawned right next to me and nearly twoshotted me, even though I was wearing good armor (not playing stealth anymore until this gets fixed )

Now zombies should not spawn and immediately attack directly beside you, this may be something that should be fixed.

If such an irradiated feral spawns sufficiently away from you to react you should be able to run away and stealth. Or kill him, I don't think zombies are meant to kill you in a one-on-one fight.

Stealth in this game is not absolute and safe because normally players have the means to handle zombies. Now you probably tell me you also set zombies to nightmare speed? Well, don't.

I will FIGHT for the removal of the early dog horde till I breathe my last breath.
New players just die for no reason, veterans dread it and hope they can get enough ammunition in time and since they understand supports now, you cant even pillar up anymore and shoot them with arrows!

Also sure. With enough balancing, making it as unnoticable as possible is an option. But if you argue "hey if we make the chance REALLY low its not that bad anymore" why have it at all? It doesn't offer anyone anything except TFPs' feeling of "we give them moments to remember and streamers will scream, so publicity" i guess.

I didn't argue that, so its all good. My idea in the last paragraph would not really have improved the situation the way you look at it, but make stealth even more random, but dependably random. I.e. you would know that with stealth X you will wake about Y zombies in one hour of stealthing through tier-Z POIs. But which ones, no idea.

You would find out that some rooms usually wake up more zombies and many rooms often not even one, but you would not be able to depend on a specific room to behave always the same.

Either you don't care because you have big guns or you hate them. I have not yet seen someone going preparation (stealth/int) say "oh man I love it when they randomly wake up! So tense!"

And I say it again the "its realistic because in real life you can't be perfect" argument does not fly in a survival rpg, except it is made to be unpredictable. Like developing an infection. But then there needs to be counterplay to that. Use better medicine, treat it with something you gathered earlier...

Well, and my idea is exactly that. Stealth like infection would be random, but you can use a better stealth perk to give you less zombies waking up.

Give me one counterplay to the hidden drop in Z's that just wake up once you land.
You can't run, because you will need to open the exit first and the Z's are already awake.


If they reduce wake up sleepers by >95%... whatever.
I will still say it is stupid, but at least it does not invalidate a whole playstyle anymore.
But I seriously doubt they will do that. Because every POI is built around these sleeper volumes.
So either they scrap the mechanic completely, or they leave it because MM played it once and he thinks its fine.

#sorryfortheagression. But this is just such a glaring flaw that is super easy to fix, and yet mods and devs seem to think this is totally fine.
 

View attachment 22902

 

[SG1-09]

Now zombies should not spawn and immediately attack directly beside you, this may be something that should be fixed.

I think it depends on the volume blocks use and how the player triggers them. Usually the trigger zone = spawn zone but spawn and trigger are two separate things. In the current system, spawn should allow the player to anticipate his approach and aggro area should be used sparingly to trick the player.

Note that verticality is important, to make the triggerless spawn work, the player must be at the same height as the volume blocks. The player cannot make zombies spawn from a volume that is just above or below him. But it's possible to do it using a volume area without sleepers linked by its ID to a volume area containing sleepers. The volume area without sleepers will also make them spawn. In any case enemies will spawn if the player is close at least 7 blocks to the sleeper volumes limit.
Maybe delta should be 10 blocks.

 

[Viktoriusiii]

I didn't argue that, so its all good. My idea in the last paragraph would not really have improved the situation the way you look at it, but make stealth even more random, but dependably random. I.e. you would know that with stealth X you will wake about Y zombies in one hour of stealthing through tier-Z POIs. But which ones, no idea.

You would find out that some rooms usually wake up more zombies and many rooms often not even one, but you would not be able to depend on a specific room to behave always the same.

You are right that would at least not be a gamedev sin, but down to personal preference.

But I would argue that it should go to close to 0 the better you get at sneaking.
I mean we are only talking about POIs here.
The whole seperate issue of overall effectiveness was not included. (the whole point of stealth was to clear pois effectively and with very low risk, so what is the strength of stealth now? It doesn't have DPS, it does not have looting for better equipment, it doesn't have vehicles and workbenches/cement/steel/traps, can't go mining and it doesnt even have anything survival related (like medicine or food).
So it is slower, more dangerous/harder to clear POIs and sucks at everything else too? )

So I do not see ANY reason for this nerf (except as mentioned, TFPs wanting to make it entertaining for streamers)

Rant incoming (again)
 

Spoiler

Actually this can be compared to WWE nowadays. Instead of trying to deliver a good product with talent and logic, they try to make moments.
And this is the biggest reason why more and more fans jump the ship. Because this goes well for a while until ppl realize what is happening.

 

[meganoth]

You are right that would at least not be a gamedev sin, but down to personal preference.

But I would argue that it should go to close to 0 the better you get at sneaking.
I mean we are only talking about POIs here.
The whole seperate issue of overall effectiveness was not included. (the whole point of stealth was to clear pois effectively and with very low risk, so what is the strength of stealth now? It doesn't have DPS, it does not have looting for better equipment, it doesn't have vehicles and workbenches/cement/steel/traps, can't go mining and it doesnt even have anything survival related (like medicine or food).
So it is slower, more dangerous/harder to clear POIs and sucks at everything else too? )

Is it really more dangerous? We have the trap rooms, sure, but even I (and I'm a mediocre player) have been very carefully inspecting floors anytime I have entered a POI I don't know, and I usually know the trap rooms in known POIs and have multiple ways to do them savely. Bear Den? I can't remember getting killed by the bears, if I did it must have been me trying something new or I fell down from ladder or scafolding.

If even forgetful me remembers most of the times to be careful in new POIs I expect good players to not fall into them.

Now the new tier5 book POI is a new one and big and even seems to have multiple traps(?). I haven't done it yet and there is a chance I still fall into one of the traps, at least the first time. So yes, I went into what is supposed to be one of the most dangerous POI and maybe get killed by traps or zombies (which could happen if I played INT or PER or ... as well). That is a challenge I want to face in the game, independent of the stealth issue.

I can't tell you what the perfect balance is for stealth now with all the changes (I'll have to play without feral sense first) but without a doubt a balance where stealth is fun to play is possible even with occasional wake ups of zombies at any stealth.

If I had to guess, I would say as long as you 1) can clear a tier2 POI at night with on average say 1 zombie waking up, 2) clearing a POI at daylight with stealth has some advantages too and 3) restealthing works effectively, then stealth as an alternative will be viable.

Just to clarify something: While we talk about pure stealth builds ATM, the optimal strategy may never be to push stealth to 5 as fast as possible. The optimal strategy might involve (for example) that if you want to play stealth you have to perk into run-and-gun whenever possible. Is this still pure stealth? No, but it is pure AGI. Or it might be that either running shoes or college jacket or high parkour is necessary on higher difficulties.

We don't know where stealth will ultimately land, but we surely know it is still one of the features that is still in flux and being worked on.

So I do not see ANY reason for this nerf (except as mentioned, TFPs wanting to make it entertaining for streamers)

Rant incoming (again)
 

Spoiler

Actually this can be compared to WWE nowadays. Instead of trying to deliver a good product with talent and logic, they try to make moments.
And this is the biggest reason why more and more fans jump the ship. Because this goes well for a while until ppl realize what is happening.

Well, I don't think this is supposed to be a nerf. It is a change that (as usual) starts out unbalanced and needs a lot of actual gameplay experiences to know in which direction it has to be balanced or changed. I have said this often and I say it again: We are the guinea pigs.

Nice example is that now stealth quest runs often leave undetected zombies behind. This is an undesirable result that is easily overlooked when designing such a feature. This is what the guinea pigs have found and now it is up to the developers to think of an appropriate fix for this.

Say, is WWE in Early Access too?

 

[Viktoriusiii]

[...loads of stuff...]

Okay so only a short reply here:
!. I simply dislike that you have to fight the Z's. Make it harder, but not impossible to clear a T5 POI without ever being detected. The best feeling of a stealthbuild is when it finally works right and you just sneak up with your fast sneakspeed and just machete them to death.
That has become nearly impossible. Not only bc of traprooms but because of wallzombies and zombieplacement.

And I wanted to clear something up:

When I say traproom, I mean rooms where you have to fall down and are (often) completely locked in with the Z's (who always wake up).
This can be unintentionally by a breaking floor, or intentionally by falling down because the path guides you there.

Everyone has died to the bears den, because we didn't know that there are bears down there
This was the first and biggest trap room.
But in A19 I didn't mind. Because it was ONE poi that you could avoid.
Now every god damn POI has them.


I suppose I go AGI STR and tage a sledgehammer with me and just break the damn walls. At least then the Z's won't wake up anymore

Say, is WWE in Early Access too?

Well it has been available for the public for about as long xDDD

 

[Gr.o.m.]

I suppose I go AGI STR and tage a sledgehammer with me and just break the damn walls. At least then the Z's won't wake up anymore

Well it has been available for the public for about as long xDDD

The moment I read the pimps changed stealth i knew that they had nerved it to the ground.

Problem was, they also changed farming into the old grind days. So I decided that in our multiplayer game I would avoid fortitude untill we start with a mod, that doesn't use that nonsense. So I had to adept. The most interesting change for me, was to perk and wear heavy armor. Funny thing it worked far better than expected.

So I would say a AGI + STR build is they way to go. Just don't waste any points into stealth and youre good.

 

[meganoth]

....
This can be unintentionally by a breaking floor, or intentionally by falling down because the path guides you there.

Everyone has died to the bears den, because we didn't know that there are bears down there
This was the first and biggest trap room.
But in A19 I didn't mind. Because it was ONE poi that you could avoid.

...

Why should anyone avoid the bear den? I feel it is legitimite for the player to assume he notices a trap or dangerous situation and prepare for it (and this is possible even if he sees this the first time). I.e. put a ladder on the side and slowly descend into the room until he sees the bears. This isn't even break the walls, this is a survivor being very careful seeing a dangerous situation

And if I see some opening I should jump through in a new POI, you can bet I won't simply jump down until I have an exit ladder ready. Have done this no matter what attribute I specced into.

 

[Shelgeyr]

Been struggling with this in my current "Ninja" playthrough.

One of my least favorite / most reproducible encounters is with the zombie cop sitting on the floor behind his desk in the video store/police station POI.

I can see his big blue butt by looking between the legs of the desk, but the game treats that piece of furniture as solid so I can't shoot him.

If I enter the room, no matter how quietly, he will wake up and aggro on me as soon as I reach the appropriate spot on the floor which, by the way, occurs before I get a clean line-of-sight to pop him while he's still sleeping.

"Best" solution to that jerk? Demolish the desk with my axe, then shoot the cop with my crossbow.

That one encounter, right there ... that's enough to leave me feeling like the game is fighting against itself and losing.

Devs want players to feel stealth is a viable option, but also feel the need to have encounter triggers that make stealth practically meaningless.

Feral sense on or off? What gamestage? how much points in stealth perk? Day or night? If night, do you use night-vision or headlight or is there illumination?

Feral sense off.

I know I've encountered that cop during daylight hours, not sure if I've ever hit him up at night.

Also not sure how early in my progression I first ran into him, but on day 34 I did a short game capture of my "ingenious solution".

In this clip I was using the helmet light mod and my crossbow got 5.5x sneak damage bonus which means I had 4 ranks in Hidden Strike, and since I've been balancing my skill progression that means I had either 3 or 4 ranks in From the Shadows.

 

[meganoth]

7 hours ago, Shelgeyr said:

Feral sense off.

I know I've encountered that cop during daylight hours, not sure if I've ever hit him up at night.

Also not sure how early in my progression I first ran into him, but on day 34 I did a short game capture of my "ingenious solution".

In this clip I was using the helmet light mod and my crossbow got 5.5x sneak damage bonus which means I had 4 ranks in Hidden Strike, and since I've been balancing my skill progression that means I had either 3 or 4 ranks in From the Shadows.

Yeah that is extreme. You might make a bug report, but I'm not sure this will be changed.

In your video it was dark and helmet light should not make it impossible to stealth as you otherwise can't really stealth in early game without night vision googles, which you usually only find later in the game. Players should not be forced to turn up gamma on the monitor. Maybe the immersive solution would be for TFP to implement a helmet light with color filter that isn't visible to zombies as well as white light

But the main problem here probably is that you are still outside the room so the zombie is not alert. The zombie in the cubicle should (for unstealthed players) wake up when they open the door, therefore making the room and zombie alert before the door gets opened is also not a good solution. And I assume this is the reason you can break the desk without making noise because you are still outside the area where this room is made active.

But don't take my word for it, only the tester and developers of TFP can really decide what is wanted or unwanted behaviour of the game.

Also breaking doors

 

[Laz Man]

Everyone has died to the bears den, because we didn't know that there are bears down there
This was the first and biggest trap room.

The bear den was changed in A20.  There is no longer a drop in with the 2 bears .  There is actually several ways to approach it now but won't spoil it for you.

Also, It is worth pointing out that that POI was always set one tier higher (loot wise) due to the harder difficulty because of the bears.

9 hours ago, Shelgeyr said:

Feral sense off.

I know I've encountered that cop during daylight hours, not sure if I've ever hit him up at night.

Also not sure how early in my progression I first ran into him, but on day 34 I did a short game capture of my "ingenious solution".

In this clip I was using the helmet light mod and my crossbow got 5.5x sneak damage bonus which means I had 4 ranks in Hidden Strike, and since I've been balancing my skill progression that means I had either 3 or 4 ranks in From the Shadows.

I'm pretty sure the metal and wood desks will be eventually updated just like many of the older block entities in the game in which time the coliders should be adjusted.

Regardless, it is probably a good idea to submit a bug report on it in the bug forum (see red banner link above) so it doesn't get overlooked.  Thanks.

 

[Viktoriusiii]

The bear den was changed in A20.  There is no longer a drop in with the 2 bears .  There is actually several ways to approach it now but won't spoil it for you.

Also, It is worth pointing out that that POI was always set one tier higher (loot wise) due to the harder difficulty because of the bears.

Glad to hear that.
I mean it was only one poi, so it is an actual surprise (not like every closet being the home for a zombie nowadays ), so it felt exciting AND you could just jump down the stairs if you were quick of mind and the bears would have trouble following you.
So while it was extremely difficult and I think most of us failed the first time, it did have counterplay ^^


Oh ok... I always felt the loot was underwhelming... weird Maybe I misremember it

 

[Shelgeyr]

Yeah that is extreme. You might make a bug report, but I'm not sure this will be changed.

In your video it was dark and helmet light should not make it impossible to stealth as you otherwise can't really stealth in early game without night vision googles, which you usually only find later in the game. Players should not be forced to turn up gamma on the monitor. Maybe the immersive solution would be for TFP to implement a helmet light with color filter that isn't visible to zombies as well as white light

But the main problem here probably is that you are still outside the room so the zombie is not alert. The zombie in the cubicle should (for unstealthed players) wake up when they open the door, therefore making the room and zombie alert before the door gets opened is also not a good solution. And I assume this is the reason you can break the desk without making noise because you are still outside the area where this room is made active.

But don't take my word for it, only the tester and developers of TFP can really decide what is wanted or unwanted behaviour of the game.

Also breaking doors

Honestly, I don't think it's worthy of a bug report because I believe this behavior is a direct result of the volume system.

And to your point about when the cop wakes up - I have confirmed that he stands up and turns around the moment I step across the threshold of the door.

This is at my current gamestage (149) with 4 ranks of From the Shadows, mostly silenced armor (10% from one piece of Military Armor that has no reduction mod, 6% from three other pieces of Military Armor that have the Advanced Muffled Connectors, 0% from Military Stealth Boots), Night Vision Goggles, and Urban Combat 3 (sneaking over trash makes no sound).

Don't get me wrong. I do recognize and appreciate what the devs are accomplishing with the system.

It allows them to give us a pseudo- Resident Evil experience despite the fact that most of the game is pure open-world randomness, and honestly that's really cool.

It's just that the system really isn't designed with Ninjas in mind