PC What was the point of the water change?

Artfu1D0dger said:
I logged into this forum after years just to complain about this

not even going to bother with presenting logic and reason just going to say this:

bring back the jars and all the old methods of collecting/making water

I do like the addition of rain collectors, but having them produce 'heat' especially at the rate they collect water (which is reasonable) is ridiculous

conclusion: bring back the jars and mechanics, leave the rain collectors without the heat production

The new mechanics are not reasonable.
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Welcome back!

In the case of the empty glass jars you should expect to mod those back in if you want them. One of the major reasons for the changes was that the devs wanted to remove the empty container and have jars work just like everything else that holds a consumable. So even if they choose to somehow adjust the current mechanics again or allow us to gather water from sources and bring it back to boil, it won't involve bringing empty glass jars back to the game.

As for heat, I don't get why people care so much what does or doesn't generate heat. There is no meter for it that we are supposed to track or manage. Frankly, I never worry about it at all. If I get screamers I kill them and any resulting horde and continue with life. If it gets too bad then I start separating workstations to separate locations to reduce the centralized source that is generating the heat. I usually stop at five dew collectors and have plenty of water and no discernable increase in screamer activity from that. You mentioned not wanting to hear anyone try to explain how the feature might be reasonable so I'll forbear from doing so but I definitely can understand why a large dew collector farm would add to the amount of noticeable activity and attract zombies....

Artfu1D0dger said:
also, i just finished putting the old jar/water mechanics back in the game
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Great job. But the devs left those assets in the code on purpose so that modders could uncomment them and get them back if they wanted. It shouldn't have been a very tough "mod" to bring jars back....

 
Roland said:
...But the devs left those assets in the code on purpose so that modders could uncomment them and get them back if they wanted. It shouldn't have been a very tough "mod" to bring jars back....
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I wish it was just removing comments, the inventory icons have been removed from the asset bundle and they changed the way you collect water from the ground, so took some guesswork

 
Artfu1D0dger said:
I wish it was just removing comments, the inventory icons have been removed from the asset bundle and they changed the way you collect water from the ground, so took some guesswork
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Well then really good job. I didn’t know it was going to be that difficult to reverse. I’m glad you were able to make it happen.

 
meganoth said:
No they didn't. And it is so obvious they didn't that I really can't imagine how anyone could write this with a straight face.
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Just like still using the term "alpha" for the game, one can of course always choose to call the introduction of the magazine system a "small adjustment" instead "complete change", as always a thing of perspective/definition. Of course also influenced on one's general attitude towards that topic. I admit that because I don't like that change, I'd rather call it a big change away from how I'd used to like the game.

 
Roland said:
As for heat, I don't get why people care so much what does or doesn't generate heat. There is no meter for it that we are supposed to track or manage. Frankly, I never worry about it at all. If I get screamers I kill them and any resulting horde and continue with life. If it gets too bad then I start separating workstations to separate locations to reduce the centralized source that is generating the heat. I usually stop at five dew collectors and have plenty of water and no discernable increase in screamer activity from that. You mentioned not wanting to hear anyone try to explain how the feature might be reasonable so I'll forbear from doing so but I definitely can understand why a large dew collector farm would add to the amount of noticeable activity and attract zombies....
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I think the majority of people don't understand the concept of "heat" and instead take it as the device generates literal heat; which as it started with campfires, torches, the lab, etc. is somewhat understandable I guess. So they are angry and confused why a water collector would generate heat.

It doesn't seem like heat generates while the chunks aren't active, so loading up everything in the morning and heading out while it burns away is a good way to cut down on screamers. 

 
Krougal said:
I think the majority of people don't understand the concept of "heat" and instead take it as the device generates literal heat; which as it started with campfires, torches, the lab, etc. is somewhat understandable I guess. So they are angry and confused why a water collector would generate heat.
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I understand the concept of "heat equals activity" but still think the balancing of the heat from the dew collectors is off. 4 dew collectors generate the same heat as a forge but they run 24/7 and if you want to craft larger amounts of glue then you need more dew collectors. I have 12 dew collectors which equals 3 forges. If I then turn on another workstation then a screamer spawns shortly after.

In multiplayer, the amount of dew collectors needed just to supply players with drinking water is often enough to spawn screamers.

Krougal said:
It doesn't seem like heat generates while the chunks aren't active, so loading up everything in the morning and heading out while it burns away is a good way to cut down on screamers. 
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The chunk is sometimes kept loaded longer than you think. I once had the case that I did a longer quest and on the return flight I saw the green box from my land claim block already from several kilometers away. The chunk must have been loaded the whole time and at my base several screamers were waiting for me.

 
Maharin said:
Glass jars are now sharp sticks.  If you find one you've found them both.
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I don't think many people are gonna get that joke, but I remember and Salute you.

The_Great_Sephiroth said:
I didn't realize people were still finding out about the jar change. I don't mind it. It was hard at first, but now I just setup a field of dew collectors at our farm and we're good. Granted, we run my mod that reduces heat from them down to 2% max instead of 10% max (I expect the devs to tweak this value at some point), but beyond that we're good with the change. I do miss grabbing water from lakes and rivers, but it's all good. Now it generates automatically for me.

I do wish that the collectors would rapidly produce water while it rains though. That or give us a water-collector. Either could be very useful.
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Wait until TFP bring back that zombies attack farm plots... Do zombies attack dew collectors?

Krougal said:
I think the majority of people don't understand the concept of "heat" and instead take it as the device generates literal heat; which as it started with campfires, torches, the lab, etc. is somewhat understandable I guess. So they are angry and confused why a water collector would generate heat.

It doesn't seem like heat generates while the chunks aren't active, so loading up everything in the morning and heading out while it burns away is a good way to cut down on screamers. 
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I can recall "back in the day" setting up 10 campfires on the sides of an abandoned building to call zombies to kill. We would set them all up, load them with wood and perch on a different building and pick them off for xp. Can't recall what version that was, but the ferals could teleport (i don't think literally, but frack they were fast.)

 
Ianua said:
I don't think many people are gonna get that joke, but I remember and Salute you.

Wait until TFP bring back that zombies attack farm plots... Do zombies attack dew collectors?

I can recall "back in the day" setting up 10 campfires on the sides of an abandoned building to call zombies to kill. We would set them all up, load them with wood and perch on a different building and pick them off for xp. Can't recall what version that was, but the ferals could teleport (i don't think literally, but frack they were fast.)
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No, they don't attack the dew collectors. I don't know if that was an oversight or by design, but as of right now they are safe outside on the ground.

 
I once noticed some of my dew collectors weren't at 100%HP after a while, never found out how it happened.

Maybe some stray zombies got stuck in the row and started to hit them, but then snapped out of it again supposedly?

Don't know. And until now I'm not concerned, they weren't anywhere near to being destroyed, and fast to repair (scrap polymer iirc).

 
Ianua said:
Do zombies attack dew collectors?
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No, but I have already lost several dew collectors either due to friendly fire from my turrets or spit from cops or radioactive vultures.
 

By the way, an underground dew collector farm is possible. You only need to have 5 blocks free on top of the dew collectors. Or if you want it a little more realistic you can create vents that lead to the surface. The vents must be above the center of each dew collector.

 
RipClaw said:
No, but I have already lost several dew collectors either due to friendly fire from my turrets or spit from cops or radioactive vultures.
 

By the way, an underground dew collector farm is possible. You only need to have 5 blocks free on top of the dew collectors. Or if you want it a little more realistic you can create vents that lead to the surface. The vents must be above the center of each dew collector.
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AP ammo in your junk turrets are great when you are out and about but will bring down the real estate value around your home.

That and stray fire from shotguns and 44 mag passing through everything can make a mess too.

I keep them just at the edge of my LCB property line and they generally don't take much damage. If you've got them around your horde base, you can always pick them up for horde night and put them back in the morning too.

Underground is a good solution, or on the roof/upper levels if you've got the room.  You can put security grates over them too.

 
The_Great_Sephiroth said:
Incorrect. We have lost several to zeds on more than one occasion.
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Maybe they were poorly placed and attacked by raging zeds?

They do not target them directly unless something changed in the last patch.

Since I am late game and don't need as much water anymore, I have taken to putting 1 or 2 on the roof of each base and calling it good.

My 1st base where I have 4 on the ground still I don't visit too often lately.

 
Vaeliorin said:
Don't screamers target things that generate heat?  That would be my guess for how they're getting damaged/destroyed.
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I always thought so, but then most of us don't leave our chemistry tables outside.

The only thing I can think of for the discrepancy is that mine might be in another chunk so the heat that is drawing screamers isn't there but where my base is.

I tend to have the forges, campfires & mixers running almost all the time, which is a lot of heat.

That and a daytime horde is easy XP so I am quickly out there to deal with it, but I can say with 100% certainty that any damage I've ever had to any of my water collectors is incidental.

 
In our last game the first 3 of our >15 dew collectors were standing openly in the driveway of our residential home-turned-crafting base. Nothing around them at all, the screamer spike traps were all directly on the house walls. In about 50-60 days of playing not one of them got destroyed.

 
I think zombies only target players as of A17 and also fresh corpses as of A21. There are no AI tasks that set objects or entities other than players as targets for destruction. If workstations, containers, or vehicles, or traps are destroyed by zombies, it is simply bad luck from their random "destroy area" task they sometimes go into when they can't detect any pathway to where the player is. Prior to A17, zombies had an AI task to target doors specifically but that was removed in A17.

As far as screamers, from what I can tell, the source of heat that sets them off simply forms a waypoint for them to travel to much like wandering zombies have a waypoint that they go to. They do not target the heat source to destroy it but simply go there looking for players.

 
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