PC The question is... where are the zombies?

[Matt115]

And yet the truth is that A20 has increased the zombies and also added the feral sense option that brings more zombies in from your surroundings thus increasing them even more. I'm not saying that A20 increased the numbers enough for full satisfaction but your statement that every update has been a decrease is not true and once they have finished adding things that cost performance they will be able to finalize their zombie spawn numbers and I bet they will be higher than they are currently.

Also, they increased sleeper populations quite a bit for A17 and were met with a huge backlash of complaints that there were too many zombies packed in the houses. I, personally, thought people were crazy for complaining about that but there was no denying that a lot of people hated more zombies inside POIs and it was scaled back in A18. 

So the number of zombies have fluctuated over time as one would expect for a game that is still under active development.

Hard disagreement on this one. It is something to celebrate and thank the developers for opening up their code and making it so easy to mod. The things you don't care for other people like. The things you really want and think are integral to a zombie survival game others feel meh about. The developers know they can't please everyone and they have a plan for the scope of this game and they will stick to it but also allow modders the ability to increase the scope of the game in ways they wish.

So be glad that you get to download a mod to get the features you think are important. I certainly am glad for mods, modders, and the way TFP planned from the beginning to make the game a playground for modding. You say you would have quit this game without mods. Fantastic. You have done exactly what the TFP developers hoped that you would do: Find further enjoyment of the game through the mods they always planned and hoped would emerge for the game. Nobody feels bad or ashamed that the default game would not have kept your attention forever.

In short, on behalf of TFP, I would like to say, "You're Welcome!!" for the fantastic experiences you have gotten from using mods. 

1. about A17 - and people were right. Even now in few POI number of zombie is too big. i will try to explain : " people was complaining about small number of enemy snipers in our game so in remake in mission 5 we increase number of sniper into 8 ( but rest of the game have usualy 0-1 snipers when all game have 20 missions). So increase number of zombies in POI don't help - because streets are empty and put 3 zombies into small room looks... stupid. 

2.  Well 8 players idea was... wrong - idk how even have so many friends that have this same game - maybe streamers or yt- guys. 

3. again modders- mods are is not solving problem - it's like - your friend have terrible job so you suggest him to start drinking in bar .  When i see mods made for 7dtd i think " what the hell go wrong??". So  mods will just change 7dtd into enemy front ( game killed by mods) that help.  I know it's 5-6 years to late- but i think the best option here would just - reduce player number into 4 , focus on expension packs after gold and if mods could be added in future cool if not well happens

Well, would you have read further you would have read my explanation. In short, the numbers of zombies is geared to a minimum spec machine and to 8 player multiplayer. Why? Because TFP has to guarantee what it promises on the steam page for default vanilla.

That a mod can exeed that by ignoring minimum specs is an advantage to all of us players. But no counter-proof, because I'm quite sure a minumum spec machine would not be able to play DF.

Something like DF can't be vanilla default. Not at the moment.

Well i agree that TFP guarantee this but still - 8 eight people is too much. 

 

[Roland]

this zombie in yellow thirt

How do you think the unthinkable?

Spoiler

with an itheberg!

 

[meganoth]

1. about A17 - and people were right. Even now in few POI number of zombie is too big. i will try to explain : " people was complaining about small number of enemy snipers in our game so in remake in mission 5 we increase number of sniper into 8 ( but rest of the game have usualy 0-1 snipers when all game have 20 missions). So increase number of zombies in POI don't help - because streets are empty and put 3 zombies into small room looks... stupid. 

2.  Well 8 players idea was... wrong - idk how even have so many friends that have this same game - maybe streamers or yt- guys. 

3. again modders- mods are is not solving problem - it's like - your friend have terrible job so you suggest him to start drinking in bar .  When i see mods made for 7dtd i think " what the hell go wrong??". So  mods will just change 7dtd into enemy front ( game killed by mods) that help.  I know it's 5-6 years to late- but i think the best option here would just - reduce player number into 4 , focus on expension packs after gold and if mods could be added in future cool if not well happens

Well i agree that TFP guarantee this but still - 8 eight people is too much. 

Whether I agree or not (I don't), the decision for 8 players was made and can't be easily changed retroactively without inviting lawsuits or pitchforks. Also changing it to 4 players max will not suffice, they would have to increase minimum specs as well to be able to increase zombie numbers massively.

But I'm always glad that you are here to tell the developers how many bad decisions they have made to have created one of the best selling indie-games. They must be absolutely crushed with despair about their failure.

 

[Matt115]

Whether I agree or not (I don't), the decision for 8 players was made and can't be easily changed retroactively without inviting lawsuits or pitchforks

But I'm always glad that you are here to tell the developers how many bad decisions they have made to have created one of the best selling indie-games. They must be absolutely crashed about their failure.

1. I know about that. I just complain about that for "future " because i don't think TFP will end with making games after finishing 7dtd.

2. 7dtd is not failure but some thing can be done better right?  let's take biding of issac for example - some thing were better some worst but most of them were fixed in next dlc/ new games in series.  COH2 it good  RTS but people complaning about commanders so they will be change in COH3  etc So - Mount and blade is one of the best selling indie game too but warband change a lot of things better - well TFP said there will be not 7DTD 2. So - they can just make idk RTS, Racer ,  hobo similuator ,whaterever but ..- until there is a chance for let  say 7dtd pirates i will complain because i hope thing will be avoided in future.  Well LBD was added and now is scrapped right?

 

[Jugginator]

You're just missing them. As suggested, feral sense will make sure you aren't left alone outside of POI's. End of day 1 starting in a snow biome in a test new test run I started a little over an hour ago:



And I avoided quite a few, likely could have had 150-160 kills if not, but I was testing balance for something.

 

[Roland]

You're just missing them.

Well I think we all miss them and want them back in greater numbers…

 

[AtomicUs5000]

Regarding the player count, I know a few streamers who stream during the day but then at night everybody gets together in Discord and they start up their community servers. Most of the time it is over 4 players. I think 8 is better because you can have 2 rival teams of 4 and that is great fun.

 

[meganoth]

1. I know about that. I just complain about that for "future " because i don't think TFP will end with making games after finishing 7dtd.

2. 7dtd is not failure but some thing can be done better right?  let's take biding of issac for example - some thing were better some worst but most of them were fixed in next dlc/ new games in series.  COH2 it good  RTS but people complaning about commanders so they will be change in COH3  etc So - Mount and blade is one of the best selling indie game too but warband change a lot of things better - well TFP said there will be not 7DTD 2. So - they can just make idk RTS, Racer ,  hobo similuator ,whaterever but ..- until there is a chance for let  say 7dtd pirates i will complain because i hope thing will be avoided in future.  Well LBD was added and now is scrapped right?

But the problem is to find the good decisions. If those were obvious all developers would always create excellent bestselling games.

And your method of finding "good desicions" is fundamentally flawed. You look at a feature and when a successful game you like does that differently you post TFP should do that too. Well, guess what, there are dozens of games who made the same decision as that successful game and they turned out bad.

Example 1) You once said 7D2D should be much darker because l4d, DS, ... are dark and they are successful. But there are lots and lots of unsuccessful dark games as well. The intelligent move is to find a big market niche, not follow everyone else. If 7D2D had followed all those dark games into their full niche, maybe it would have entered a saturated market and never reached the success it has now.

Example 2) You said recently that 8 players was a bad idea because all the other successful games you played have 4 players. But maybe 7D2D did get more players simply **because** it built for 8 and even allowed for more players unsupported. Market niche again. By the way, TFP has numbers that show them how many people actually play MP with >4 players. They know a relevant fact about 7D2D players, we don't.

Example 3) You argue against mods and name Enemy Front as a game that was killed by mods. So what? Bethesda games, minecraft and many other games are evergreen smash hits because of mods. In fact I myself don't know a single game that did worse because of mods but only games that got longevity through mods. So why should TFP look at Enemy Front for guidance but not at Bethesda or Minecraft or all the other games were mods didn't hurt at all ? 

 

[Matt115]

But the problem is to find the good decisions. If those were obvious all developers would always create excellent bestselling games.

And your method of finding "good desicions" is fundamentally flawed. You look at a feature and when a successful game you like does that differently you post TFP should do that too. Well, guess what, there are dozens of games who made the same decision as that successful game and they turned out bad.

Example 1) You once said 7D2D should be much darker because l4d, DS, ... are dark and they are successful. But there are lots and lots of unsuccessful dark games as well. The intelligent move is to find a big market niche, not follow everyone else. If 7D2D had followed all those dark games into their full niche, maybe it would have entered a saturated market and never reached the success it has now.

Example 2) You said recently that 8 players was a bad idea because all the other successful games you played have 4 players. But maybe 7D2D did get more players simply **because** it built for 8 and even allowed for more players unsupported. Market niche again. By the way, TFP has numbers that show them how many people actually play MP with >4 players. They know a relevant fact about 7D2D players, we don't.

Example 3) You argue against mods and name Enemy Front as a game that was killed by mods. So what? Bethesda games, minecraft and many other games are evergreen smash hits because of mods. In fact I myself don't know a single game that did worse because of mods but only games that got longevity through mods. So why should TFP look at Enemy Front for guidance but not at Bethesda or Minecraft or all the other games were mods didn't hurt at all ? 

1. Yep it's true and i'm 100% sure about that.  if you mean by success a lot of players bought and play in this game. But you have game like Pathologic - it visual, gameplay and story success but.... a small number of people bouught this game. Why? Because this is not game for everyone, Well... even more. But it was success.  I agree - if 7dtd would be  much darker  maybe 1/8 of actual playbase would bought this game. But if it would done good  7dtd would be even better know for players , more info about 7dtd in media etc. Well this is hard to say "what if...." and there is no chance for 7DTD 2 so it's a little bit pointless

2.  I don't have number - is just see that people saying number of zombie is small - you wrote about min spec for 8 players , in diffrent POI right? So if number of player would be reduced to  4 it would allow to add more zombies on streets right? Ofc this would change  a lot - zombie hp and dmg etc. So... probably nobody expect in let say 2014 that 7dtd will get HD redesign. But IF there will be idk - sci fi , medieval , pirate whatever 7DTD i future i hope there will be more zombies - probably  diffrent solution how to implement zombie would be use so x2 more zombie will be possible with 8 players. 

3. Bethesda game are smash because.... this is TES and Fallout- i think when SKYRIM was annouced nobody was thinking about mods but about - what will happens now? ( i mean lore and story). TES was game series with expended lore - dragons were something strange because there was skeleton dragon in redguard so this mean that queen.... ( this same thing with SW) so people liked this universe. I'm not into Fallout so i will not say a lot of about this series - i just remember that F3 was bad game. If mods were imposible or hard to made for skyrim we would get   TES 6  probably MUCH MUCH FASTER. But we don't get TES6 yet  so... story is death after last dlc released but you can play with  NEKO ANIME BIG TITS GIRLS MOD! xd  Minecraft is... just for fun - i think nobody care about minecraft lore. So minecraft is like.... Lego as game so mods for this game are like "bootleg "sets - it is fun and nobody care if WW2 tank is near medival castle with space marines.  it will be mixed with  example 1 - if 7DTD get darker setting it would be still got longevity. How? Lore + theories. Example - you find  dead body of girl in wardrobe and woman zombie in rich house - you are looting this house and find a note about boy who ran away because her mother became zombie and he want to find his father to save his sis. So you can make theory that this boy was a Duke son but in this time Duke was in his cassino ( and in cassino in his office you can find woman clothes that suggest he was cheating his wife etc) so now he is mad because he feld guilty about that. And every updated = more lore so 7DTD would be still alive even after years because people will still looking for clues. But - when i see how 7DTD looks like i feel something go wrong - even star wars and  skyrim have more "in this  same style " mods - immersive armors and creature for skyrim or  the clonse wars mod for SW batllefront 2. What 7dtd have? Darkness fall mod with succbuss and laser guns , snufkin weapon expansion or snufkin custom server side zombies which looks like enemies from some asia  F2P bootleg of CS 

 

[pApA^LeGBa]

I am sick of games that we can´t play because we are 5 people who pretty much always play together. Ofc there is games that not evereyone likes and we might end up only being three but that doesn´t happen too often. If everyone comes together we are even over the 8 player limit. That is pretty rare though.

And there is a lot of people who enjoy playing on public servers.

Saying the 8 players idea was wrong because you don´t have enough friends playing this or don´t like public servers is a pretty egocentric view.

But there should be a solution where the spawns are adjusted to the number of players so that the game simply doesn´t assume it´s 8 players and tries to optimize for perfomance for no reason at all. Or simply a slider in the menu so everyone can deceide for themselves. It already existed and was taken out for balancing purposes. But someone from the team or the mods back then said it´s very likely to make a comeback. I think it was Roland, but don´t nail me on that. It´s been quite a while since then.

@meganoth DF doesn run on a i5 6600/GTX1060 6GB/16 GB RAM pretty well on medium. Can´t tell for older CPU´s as that´s the weakest in the group. That´s not too far away from a 2.9Ghz quadcore as listed in minimum. (Yeah, RAM and GPU are way worse in the minimum specs, but we all know that the CPU is the most importnant in this game) And tbh a CPU like the i5 6600 should be the minimum specs. We look at least like it´s  another 2 years i would assume, including beta. Making 2015 the minimum specs wouldnt´really hurt. Maybe even later tbh. Unless they can optimize it really really well ofc.

 

[Matt115]

I am sick of games that we can´t play because we are 5 people who pretty much always play together. Ofc there is games that not evereyone likes and we might end up only being three but that doesn´t happen too often. If everyone comes together we are even over the 8 player limit. That is pretty rare though.

And there is a lot of people who enjoy playing on public servers.

Saying the 8 players idea was wrong because you don´t have enough friends playing this or don´t like public servers is a pretty egocentric view.

But there should be a solution where the spawns are adjusted to the number of players so that the game simply doesn´t assume it´s 8 players and tries to optimize for perfomance for no reason at all. Or simply a slider in the menu so everyone can deceide for themselves. It already existed and was taken out for balancing purposes. But someone from the team or the mods back then said it´s very likely to make a comeback. I think it was Roland, but don´t nail me on that. It´s been quite a while since then.

@meganoth DF doesn run on a i5 6600/GTX1060 6GB/16 GB RAM pretty well on medium. Can´t tell for older CPU´s as that´s the weakest in the group. That´s not too far away from a 2.9Ghz quadcore as listed in minimum. (Yeah, RAM and GPU are way worse in the minimum specs, but we all know that the CPU is the most importnant in this game) And tbh a CPU like the i5 6600 should be the minimum specs. We look at least like it´s  another 2 years i would assume, including beta. Making 2015 the minimum specs wouldnt´really hurt. Maybe even later tbh. Unless they can optimize it really really well ofc.

No this is pretty "logical" view - cod , l4d1 , NZA , strange brigade , Bordelands and more - 4 people is max. So there is reason why most of devs "set" max limit on 4.  I don't say i don't like public server - i don't like empty streets. And i think if  7dtd was developed for 4 players max number of zombie would be much bigger 

 

[JCrook1028]

DF doesn run on a i5 6600/GTX1060 6GB/16 GB RAM pretty well on medium.

Is that supposed to be does or doesn't?

No this is pretty "logical" view - cod , l4d1 , NZA , strange brigade , Bordelands and more - 4 people is max. So there is reason why most of devs "set" max limit on 4.  I don't say i don't like public server - i don't like empty streets. And i think if  7dtd was developed for 4 players max number of zombie would be much bigger 

Lmao, you know how many people complain about the max of 8 being too low? Many is the answer. You're the first and only person I've ever heard say it's too high.

 

[Matt115]

Is that supposed to be does or doesn't?

Lmao, you know how many people complain about the max of 8 being too low? Many is the answer. You're the first and only person I've ever heard say it's too high.

But you hear about small number of zombie right? Well i see only two realistic option to solve this problem - increase minimal spec machine or decrease  number of players. I'm not technlogy master mind so i say know by my solutions. Ofc probably there is some technology or  solutions how to increase number of zombie on streets but i don't know them. Well i see guy who suggest even 200 players but honestly this would be not possible

 

[meganoth]

I am sick of games that we can´t play because we are 5 people who pretty much always play together. Ofc there is games that not evereyone likes and we might end up only being three but that doesn´t happen too often. If everyone comes together we are even over the 8 player limit. That is pretty rare though.

And there is a lot of people who enjoy playing on public servers.

Saying the 8 players idea was wrong because you don´t have enough friends playing this or don´t like public servers is a pretty egocentric view.

But there should be a solution where the spawns are adjusted to the number of players so that the game simply doesn´t assume it´s 8 players and tries to optimize for perfomance for no reason at all. Or simply a slider in the menu so everyone can deceide for themselves. It already existed and was taken out for balancing purposes. But someone from the team or the mods back then said it´s very likely to make a comeback. I think it was Roland, but don´t nail me on that. It´s been quite a while since then.

TFP already proposed one solution with the encounter system. 64 zombies at the same time in the game is quite a big number, but when you distribute that statically to 8 players, all you get is 8 max. Distribute it dynamically and you would have no problem giving one player a lot more for a short time.

@meganoth DF doesn run on a i5 6600/GTX1060 6GB/16 GB RAM pretty well on medium. Can´t tell for older CPU´s as that´s the weakest in the group. That´s not too far away from a 2.9Ghz quadcore as listed in minimum. (Yeah, RAM and GPU are way worse in the minimum specs, but we all know that the CPU is the most importnant in this game) And tbh a CPU like the i5 6600 should be the minimum specs. We look at least like it´s  another 2 years i would assume, including beta. Making 2015 the minimum specs wouldnt´really hurt. Maybe even later tbh. Unless they can optimize it really really well ofc.

Is "doesn" supposed to mean does or doesn't ?

Generally when you remove RAM from memory or GPU you also tax the CPU more because you have to transfer data more often and that over data lines that are not very fast in an old system. So if this system is able to run DF it tells us not much. And if it can't then we would have to try low settings to be really sure.

I'm sure that eventually they will add sliders for zombie count anyway so min specs will not be as important anymore.

But you hear about small number of zombie right? Well i see only two realistic option to solve this problem - increase minimal spec machine or decrease  number of players. I'm not technlogy master mind so i say know by my solutions. Ofc probably there is some technology or  solutions how to increase number of zombie on streets but i don't know them. Well i see guy who suggest even 200 players but honestly this would be not possible

I just listed 2 more: dynamic event system and a simple config slider. The silder could change HPs of zombies at the same time and allow for balance adjustments.

 

[Matt115]

I just listed 2 more: dynamic event system and a simple config slider. The silder could change HPs of zombies at the same time and allow for balance adjustments.

Yep this would do a job because  i understand that zombie have to have  big number of hp to be any challenge because their number is low. So if this config slider would be implemented it will solve the problem. Dynamic even system woudn't solve anything because this zombie would be active right?  So this streets would be pretty empty .

 

[pApA^LeGBa]

It´s "does"

 

[Feycat]

It really is interesting to me how we can get such divergent reports from people. You say all of the sleepers are pinatas and others say nothing stays asleep anymore and stealth is broken. The truth is in the middle. They are not all pinatas and you can still stealth kill a good portion of them.

TFP publicly announced that bandits would be a part of the game long before Subsistence even existed. You can't expect them to drop a promised feature just because another game gets made later that has something similar.

I'm not too worried. They are being conservative right now because they are still adding features and they don't want to increase the zombie population only to have to pull it back. I'm certain that zombie populations will increase once the game is feature complete and they have the full scope of what the performance requirements is going to be. I'm also confident they will include a slider for zombie spawns in the menu. There is already an option to turn them off and all they need to do is change that to 0, 50% 100% 200% 300% much like many other options. 

Until then just mod in more zombies for yourself.

I didn't mention stealth and it has nothing to do with my point. The "pinatas" referred to the fact I have to whack like 4 zombies in a normal POI and then I get to take all the loot. Even at higher gamestages, I hardly ever encounter zombies unless I seek them out.

I DO mod more zombies in. I've got 2 of Khaine's mods to get better wandering hordes and more ambient zombies. The point is that this is a zombie game and it's silly they took out the slider to make more zombies. Feral senses just pulls more zombies from elsewhere. It doesn't add more, at least, that's my understanding.

Also, the fact that TFP said 5 years ago that they'd add bandits is irrelevant. Other games have done it really well since then and I'm not excited for the balance issues bandits are going to cause. TFP still hasn't properly balanced the zombies in a zombie game. I'm not looking forward to another 5 years of weird bandits also taking up space that should be for zombies.

 

[Matt115]

It´s "does"

which one?

 

[meganoth]

Yep this would do a job because  i understand that zombie have to have  big number of hp to be any challenge because their number is low. So if this config slider would be implemented it will solve the problem. Dynamic even system woudn't solve anything because this zombie would be active right?  So this streets would be pretty empty .

Yes, active, like zombies outside of POIs always are.

And you would not see a difference if suddenly 10-30 zombies stood in your way while driving through a forest or town?

 

[Matt115]

Yes, active, like zombies outside of POIs always are.

And you would not see a difference if suddenly 10-30 zombies stood in your way while driving through a forest or town?

Active  i mean "player detected and they are agresive"  - i mean i would see 10 - 30 wandering zombie without point on streets. You know just walking and do nothing..  So if you don't want to fight with them you have to sneake around. 

10 - 30 zombie spawning and being almost in this while agresive sounds like just wandering hordes. So yeah this would help but - i will give you WD as example- sometimes there is zombie horde  walking thought highway , sometimes you just meet 20 zombie near hospital just ...standing  

A little bit off topic but - damn it would be so good to have game being like mix of 7dtd and thief - focused on stealth,  resource managment with bigger number of zombie, making base like in 7dtd but without blood moon. This would be so good. Well i know nobody would be interested to make such undynamic game