PC Well ... that escalated quickly!

[Liesel Weppen]

We are at a combined gamestage of ~350ish during our bloodmoons, possibly much higher.

Sounds similar to our bloodmoons since we reach a gamestage of ~300. Almost only radiateds, also mostly at least 1 demolitioner per wave.

How do you defend?

We have a small towerplatform, roughly 10x10 4high. Then 5 blocks of metal spikes around that and around that we built a "fence" of those 1/4 reinforced concrete blocks with 1-2 rows barbed wire which stops the Zs first time and we can shot them. The floor is completely reinforced concrete.

Even if we don't force the Zs in a specific direction, they pile up on 2-3 places.

Every player puts a scrap gun and shots with his specialized weapon.

The fence is supposed they break through, then they are in the spikes.

When they pile up somewhere we are throwing pipebombs and molotows at them (maybe grenades next time).

That works pretty well. The outer layer of our tower itself gets damaged, 5 to 6 blocks get destroyed, but usually not more.

But there have been no huge jumps in difficulty yet that we didn't expect. We level up, look at the gamestage and can estimate what comes.

If you think it is to hard, why don't you lower the difficulty settings? We play on difficulty modifier 3. If it gets to hard, but we still want to continue, we would simply lower that to 2 or even 1.

 

[Liesel Weppen]

Whats worse is how it calculates group game stage when you party up.

As far as i understand if you party up, the gamestages of the players add up like the formula told above.

Lets say 4 players, each gamestage 50 will result in a bloodmoon at gamestage 140. That will cause zombies to spawn according to a gamestage of 140 of course.

If you do not party up waves are calculated for each player with only each players gamestage of 50, which contains much weaker Zs.

(Might be another less cheesy way to make BMs easier: Don't party up during BM)

So yeah, that's what i'm talking all the time about multiplayer. MP is currently much more difficult than SP. Gamestages add up and with shared XP all player level even faster, which pumps the gamestage up even quicker. On the other hand loot is not multiplied. You still loot the same but need brass for ammunition for 4 players to handle the higher gamestages. Also food, you need to feed 4 people but you don't loot more. Traders don't sell more either, afaik.

But i think that's a limit in the game. More players should not add up the gamestage of each, but spawn more Zs at lower gamestage levels. But the game can't handle such a huge amount of Zs in time which would be necessarry to correspond to the players. So you get harder instead of more Zs. But harder Zs are harder to handle then more weak ones.

 

[Orclover]

We have currently I think 4 different blood moon locations (none of which are our bases). The most effective one and the one we used last BM was the burned office tower POI (almost all brick). It is ~20 meters high, has a couple cars out front, huge holes in a couple floors and not too wide. A broken metal stairwell is inside. AC ducts and a hatch (sealed by us) on the roof with more zeds. I reinforced the ground floors and some of the walls with concrete and built staircases (1 block hopping) from the roof to the ground extending from the building. We just sit on the roof and shoot them coming up the staircase. I had a drop off block where they would fall down and run around at the end of the staircase but I filled it in because they never reach the top since we maxed out our combat/penetrator skills. Now the problem is the demo's who inevitably blow up the staircases at some point.

We also have my buddies monument against nature, a giant concrete and steel super bunker with blade traps. However the insane repair bill due to demo's makes that one pointless. Filter system not working.

Also the nightclub/music hall with blade traps to filter out the demo's and tall zeds. But the filter system does not seem to work in multiplayer very well and every horde night in that base ended quickly with the demo's simply blowing the crap out of the entrance. Filter system not working.

Other players on the server made a smaller blade and drat trap reinforced concrete base but they stopped using it after the demo's showed up and made it all rather pointless.

We are on standard difficulty now. We might edit out the demos and stick with glowing cop zeds and other stuff but if I have to lower the difficulty itself to make the game playable then I will simply quit playing. Which is maybe what you are suggesting?

 

[Laz Man]

Now it looks good but it is made out of paper. :tickled_pink:

I hope those are not brick painted wood...

 

[Laz Man]

We have currently I think 4 different blood moon locations (none of which are our bases). The most effective one and the one we used last BM was the burned office tower POI (almost all brick). It is ~20 meters high, has a couple cars out front, huge holes in a couple floors and not too wide. A broken metal stairwell is inside. AC ducts and a hatch (sealed by us) on the roof with more zeds. I reinforced the ground floors and some of the walls with concrete and built staircases (1 block hopping) from the roof to the ground extending from the building. We just sit on the roof and shoot them coming up the staircase. I had a drop off block where they would fall down and run around at the end of the staircase but I filled it in because they never reach the top since we maxed out our combat/penetrator skills. Now the problem is the demo's who inevitably blow up the staircases at some point.
We also have my buddies monument against nature, a giant concrete and steel super bunker with blade traps. However the insane repair bill due to demo's makes that one pointless. Filter system not working.

Also the nightclub/music hall with blade traps to filter out the demo's and tall zeds. But the filter system does not seem to work in multiplayer very well and every horde night in that base ended quickly with the demo's simply blowing the crap out of the entrance. Filter system not working.

Other players on the server made a smaller blade and drat trap reinforced concrete base but they stopped using it after the demo's showed up and made it all rather pointless.

We are on standard difficulty now. We might edit out the demos and stick with glowing cop zeds and other stuff but if I have to lower the difficulty itself to make the game playable then I will simply quit playing. Which is maybe what you are suggesting?

What's wrong with lowering the difficulty for now? If anything it may give you guys the breathing room that you guys need to figure out new countermeasures. There is no shame in that. You could also turn up the difficulty later on if it becomes to easy.

Modding stuff out is really the same thing but more work plus you risk making the game too boring for your group which is worse then dealing with the challenges instead.

In A17, I remember I had to make zombies only walk except on BM night so I could adapt to what had changed from A16.

Edit: Honestly, the struggle your group is going right now is part of the fun. Keeps you guys on your toes....nomadic even....almost like there is a real threat to be worried about. Sounds very apocalyptic to me...

I'd go out on a limb and bet that some of your group's most memorable A18 moments were the chaos after a few demo explosions...

 

[Orclover]

But why would I want to lower the difficulty on everything if only 1 tiny aspect is even causing an issue? Thats like hating the dessert when it come so you throw up your entire meal and go to try another entree.

Don't you think you are kind of over reacting?!? Horde night is a breeze, demolishers wrecking everything in the area seems to be the issue at hand for most people. A more logical approach would be to actually up the difficulty of the other mobs and remove demolishers or at least twiddle down the damage a bit so it takes 2 or 3 of them to completely wreck reinforced concrete, kinda like cop zeds. Cop zeds are great, you cant ignore them or you get deaded but it takes a few of them to demolish your POI and at that point you earned it.

THE most logical solution would be to make demolishers not completely destroy every block within 6 blocks AND trigger detonation of every demolisher around them because joe-zed swung his arm too close to his ****ing chest. But we don't do those kinds of solutions here obviously. So what we will get is MORE Demolishers per spawn, bigger explosive area, C4 strapped to glowing vultures and and a mighty chorus of "QQ some more newbies!" from the forums when people raise a slight objection. BECAUSE THAT is how we do it here! AmIWrONG?!?

 

[Orclover]

BTW Vultures with C4 strapped to their chest dive bombing players. I want credit for that one when it is implemented, And it WILL be.

 

[pApA^LeGBa]

@Orclover Don´t you worry, we the players got you if TFP doesn´t. We will credit you if this comes. Yes we will. Just not in a way you think off right now. (Admit it you are satan in disguise)

 

[Orclover]

@Orclover Don´t you worry, we the players got you if TFP doesn´t. We will credit you if this comes. Yes we will. Just not in a way you think off right now. (Admit it you are satan in disguise)

Disguise?

 

[HungryZombie]

But we did not just run away, we still used the base (although not in the way it was intended to) and killed the zombies. Sure you can jump on your minibike and just drive away, or you build the ramp trick and let the Zs run circles, or you can stop playing 7dtd.

Besids if you plan to avoid the bloodmoon and just loot and build, you can turn of bloodmoon in the config entirely.

Or you can decrease zombie block damage

 

[Jenshae]

I hope those are not brick painted wood...������

Worse. Canvas tent. >

Some lucky newbie will be so happy!

I am going to try the bridge trick where they slide into the middle, I have upside down blades to give them a bit of a grinding. Then they can run around, up and back through. Thrown a few turrets up there and it is possible to stand on a plate to fire dart traps where they will try to walk.

 

[Ghostlight]

OP you crossed the magic gamestage number of 158 I suspect. Once you are there, Demolishers begin to appear on horde night and that is a game-changer. With 4 of you, gamestage is scaled and you can easily hit that magic number earlier than you can possibly handle them (without AI exploits). With only 2 of us we hit them on day 28 horde. You can lower the difficulty to delay them by a horde night or two, but as Orclover rightly said above, that makes every other part of the game super-boring.

If you're going to build a legit base (i.e one that doesn't exploit the A17 AI with infinite ramps or mazes) then you absolutely need to have a solid plan to deal with these guys. Their explosion destroys any type of block except Steel (takes 3 explosions from them to take out Steel). This is why I have been arguing that the Crucible must not be locked behind Int 10. Players who want to play legit without exploiting the AI need Steel bases by the time Demolishers show up. Even then, if they go off in chain reactions, even Steel will get melted.

If you can't be arsed with them - and they do somewhat spoil the game as many base designs becomes useless and most traps equally so - then go ahead and exploit the AI and horde night becomes trivial. Or mod them out the game.

We are giving them one more chance. We have a new base design we are going to try on a new map to see if we can fight them without AI exploits. If it doesn't work, then they are getting modded out as they are fun-killers that ruin the game for us. We will NEVER build an infinite ramp to exploit the AI (which would make Demolishers easy to deal with) - we want to fight legit. But you can't when a half dozen Demolishers rush you in the middle of 32 other zombies.

 

[Ghostlight]

The gamestage per player is as followsserverDays - (playerDeaths * 2)) * difficulty level

This is wrong. You forgot about player level! It is

(your level + days alive) x difficulty

where days alive = (server day - 2 x num deaths) and is capped by level

 

[Ghostlight]

Since when did the amount of days that passed on a server ever become part of it??? and proof please

Everything you need is here; https://7daystodie.com/forums/showthread.php?135768-WTB-more-info-on-quot-game-stage-quot-mechanic&p=1068625#post1068625

- - - Updated - - -

We are at a combined gamestage of ~350ish during our bloodmoons, possibly much higher. Standard settings, 8 zeds per player and cap of 60 zeds spawned at a time. Bloodmoons are just about rediclous. We have stopped building bases and just use modified POI's. It would take 2 or 3 weeks in game time to repair the damage to our "built from scratch" super concrete base, it is just not worth it.

Concrete, even re-enforced, is useless once Demolishers are in play.

 

[Whorhay]

Perhaps try something like the picture below, but do one for each player, minus 1, facing the cardinal directions. You then have up to 4 choke points to defend but each is only 1 block wide. Dedicate a player to being the Demolition sniper and have them sit in the center so they can just turn to face whatever direction is called. Put junk turrets facing each choke point above and a few blocks behind where the defending player stands. The junk turrets should take out any swooping vultures and help stun lock anything that gets too close, buying time for reinforcements to help out. If the zombies are flowing in too fast keep the stairs as straight blocks so that the zombies have to jump up each. You can also put barbed wire fences in a perimeter around each stair pyramid to slow the flow down a bit more. Honestly my only problem with that defense is that it slows the influx of zombies such that I top out around 300 kills in a BM because they simply can't get into the choke point fast enough.

 

[Orclover]

Concrete, even re-enforced, is useless once Demolishers are in play.

Yea my bud was trying to upgrade with steel on everything saying "that should do it".

I just shook my head, because nothing would do it. When you take 6,000 damage and multiply that times the amount of demo's coming at you....well the endless pitt starts to look a lot more appealing as a solution.

 

[Orclover]

We have tried the great blade filter from the other thread, this was our last attempt with that feature:



Yea no it doesnt work any more. They quietly patched it as near as I can tell. I think they simply took all the tall zeds that were standing at 2 and a half squares and shrunk em down a half block while nobody was looking during one of the late october hotfixes. So that wont be working, ever again. The giant pitt you see in the center is what used to be mostly reinforced concrete and cobblestone. We actually cleanly killed MOST of the demo's that showed up, maybe 3 or 4 managed to blow up. Which speaks of the stupid damage they do.

Our game stage is...I have no clue. Heres a pic of us and do the math



So we managed to kill most of them and we didnt die so thats a win right? Lol no. The amount of repair work required to repair all that is just simply not worth it compared to a cheap POI with only a half hours worth up upgrades, its just not worth building a big or extravagant base that is going to be demolished in 45 minutes or less.

Or maybe MM wants us all to quit building bases and just fight in the street. I dunno, the devs are not talking about it lately I noticed.

My bud has built a giant concrete super horde base. its basically useless now and disheartened is a good description of what he feels about that. He's pretty close to throwing in the towel on 7d2d until A20 and hoping things change. Me. I figure we will just remove them from the xml and replace them with glowing cops or something.

Because this is just stupid.

 

[Laz Man]

We have tried the great blade filter from the other thread, this was our last attempt with that feature:View attachment 30802

Yea no it doesnt work any more. They quietly patched it as near as I can tell. I think they simply took all the tall zeds that were standing at 2 and a half squares and shrunk em down a half block while nobody was looking during one of the late october hotfixes. So that wont be working, ever again. The giant pitt you see in the center is what used to be mostly reinforced concrete and cobblestone. We actually cleanly killed MOST of the demo's that showed up, maybe 3 or 4 managed to blow up. Which speaks of the stupid damage they do.

Our game stage is...I have no clue. Heres a pic of us and do the math

View attachment 30803

So we managed to kill most of them and we didnt die so thats a win right? Lol no. The amount of repair work required to repair all that is just simply not worth it compared to a cheap POI with only a half hours worth up upgrades, its just not worth building a big or extravagant base that is going to be demolished in 45 minutes or less.

Or maybe MM wants us all to quit building bases and just fight in the street. I dunno, the devs are not talking about it lately I noticed.

My bud has built a giant concrete super horde base. its basically useless now and disheartened is a good description of what he feels about that. He's pretty close to throwing in the towel on 7d2d until A20 and hoping things change. Me. I figure we will just remove them from the xml and replace them with glowing cops or something.

Because this is just stupid.

Thanks for sharing...that does look disheartening... condolences...

 

[Ghostlight]

Yea no it doesnt work any more. They quietly patched it as near as I can tell. I think they simply took all the tall zeds that were standing at 2 and a half squares and shrunk em down a half block while nobody was looking during one of the late october hotfixes. So that wont be working, ever again.

This is why I never talk about base design on the forums when we figure out something that works - the devs immediately add a sly patch to negate your ideas.

Our game stage is...I have no clue. Heres a pic of us and do the math

384

its just not worth building a big or extravagant base that is going to be demolished in 45 minutes or less...Or maybe MM wants us all to quit building bases and just fight in the street.

With all this talk of MM's regret of going the voxel route re-enforcing this idea further, sadly I am coming to that same conclusion. Or they want you to just take over an expendable POI and sit on top of it till it's morning or it's destroyed, or ride around all night on a bike, or - the most horrific thought of all - build a base to exploit the AI with an infinite ramp. It's heart-breaking for me as building huge fortresses with layers of traps is what we enjoy most.

My bud has built a giant concrete super horde base. its basically useless now and disheartened is a good description of what he feels about that. He's pretty close to throwing in the towel on 7d2d until A20 and hoping things change.

I'm down to one buddy left, and I had to convince him hard to stay after the first major Demolisher incident. Like I said above, we have one more design to try and that's the last straw, it'll be mod them out or quit after that, not sure which.

 

[theFlu]

We have tried the great blade filter from the other thread, this was our last attempt with that feature:View attachment 30802

Heh, well, now you have a good start for that endless pit, just slap a drop ramp on top of that hole and let the demos do the rest of the digging for you ...