Roland

There is going to be a problem if you don't use the trader and you want explosive bolts for horde night. Period. I can tell you that right now. There may even be a problem if you don't want drinking water be a survival struggle for your entire playthrough. I can also say that choosing to play without traders is a choice that is going to bring certain challenges and limitations. The devs are not obligated to try and balance the game for those who choose to ignore a portion of the game. Their assumption is that players are going to use the elements in the game that are present and if a player chooses to ignore a part of the game then it is to challenge themselves and so any subsequent imbalances that occur would be part of that challenge. It would be like a player resolving not to use any vehicles because they strongly believe that the vehicles in the game are unrealistically easy to craft with the tools and workstations present in the game. So they don't use vehicles but then complain that some quests are 2km away because that is too far to go on foot to make it worth it. And then they complain that the devs are forcing them to use vehicles which goes against their preferred playstyle. I'm 99% certain that those who want to be able to find enough filters to mass produce glue and to progress beyond the hydration struggle but also play without traders are going to have to mod the loot tables to increase the chance of finding filters.

Well, it only exists in my brain as an example of the type of things Joel is thinking of for “legendary” items. But when he starts adding such things I’ll be sure to mention 0l’ Sodbuster!

The problem right now is not that purple tier items are loot only and so that invalidates the blue tier items you crafted. The problem is that purple tier items are so common that you can be entirely kitted out with them. That was the mistake, imo. If you could only get 2-3 pieces of equipment or armor total in a play through of highest tier then everything you crafted would stay relevant and the few things you found would be special items. Legendary items are going to have various tier levels but they are going to have a permanent mod attachment that cannot be removed and that will provide an awesome ability not available in any other way. So, yes, that legendary shovel, Ol’ Sodbuster, might be a yellow tier steel shovel with a non-removable mod that increases attack speed for every clump of grass you destroy with a 10 second window so that you can clear all the grass in an area blindingly fast. Stuff like that and you probably won’t get very many in any particular play through and they won’t be necessarily meant to be the next tier up that you would try and obtain for every weapon, every armor piece, and every tool.

Speculation. We don't know whether the zombies are being sent by the Duke or not. From the interview tonight it seems that the two factions are Noah and the White River Settlement and the Duke and his casino dwelling bandits. The story looks like it will be told and progressed using the quest system. In the original kickstarter, we were told the story would be progressed by finding notes that would lead to new notes. The quest system replacing that first proposal seems like good news and should make for a better story telling device-- not to mention that there would potentially be two stories to experience depending on which faction you decided to follow. It explains where all the empty jars went. One jar for each hair which is why there are none left for the game.

Or to put off for a bit longer the pulling weeds, finishing honeydo's, or completing homework that needs doing in the real world, amirite?

Crossplay is definitely on the roadmap for this game. They plan for the XBOX, Playstation, and PC versions to be able to play with each other on servers. In fact, they have begun the process of developing the networking code to facilitate just that which has caused some growing pains and negative reactions in the PC community as some bugginess has been the result in the Alpha 20 version for playing multiplayer. Their goal is to have these things all sorted out so that everyone can play together regardless of the platform they chose to play the game.

Really great interview. They answered a lot of questions regarding their design philosophy and their goals with the game. A lot of the anger from some people seems to go back to the idea that the community should have a voice in what goes into the game, what gets cut from the game, and what gets changed in the game. The developers were clear that these aspects of game development are not the domain of the community. The community is here to play what is offered and to give their feedback which will help with balancing and adjusting the fun-factor of the features TFP decided to make part of their game. I understand that some may feel that development should operate differently than that model but now that the facts are known straight from Rick, himself, and not just me saying it over and over and over these past years we can have an end to people complaining that they never agreed to a change or that there should be a community poll to decide if a change should occur. That is never going to happen. The community helps through feedback after playing what is offered by the developers. Glimpses and reveals about what is upcoming is not to give the community a chance to change the devs' minds, it is simply to satisfy our curiosity about what is coming and give us time to acclimate how we will adapt to the new meta. Another sore point over the years has been the lack of a public roadmap and they explained why they don't subscribe to that model even though they are fully aware that other game studios do it. That being said they did offer a few core features they see as critical for the full release launch of their game (and shortly afterward) and I have listed those on the first page of this thread. It was disappointing and a surprise to me to hear them say that bandits are not likely to make it into A21. I want to emphasize that it was a surprise to me because up until tonight it was close enough to go either way and it looks like they don't want to put in a partial unfinished version of them that isn't ready and so they are going to be in A22. I know this will cause reactions from the conspiracy theorists who say that bandits are smoke and mirrors and will never be in this game, to the streamer followers who predicted they would not be in A21 and will now gloat that they were always right, to the fans who still believe in bandits and trust that TFP knows best about when they are ready. I'm sure there will be lots of lively discussion on that count. Finally, it was good to see them acknowledge their ongoing preparations for the console version and that they are aware of community desire for some kind of acknowledgement about the failure of the first title perhaps in the form of a discount of the new title by previous owners. They know that the community wants it and are willing to do it if they can get all stakeholders on board and a good methodology for making it happen. It was also good to hear that they are currently working on the console version as they also finish up the PC version. Nobody believes Spring of 2023 for Alpha 22 right? Lotsa knuckle rubs to Rick for saying that....

I've seen this argument made again and again but the reality is that the developers are never going to listen to feedback based upon a partial description of what a new feature in A21 is going to be. It is possible that they will later say "Too late, it's already in and we're not going to change it" but it is also possible that they will take negative feedback and use that to rebalance the feature to make it more fun for everyone. What is definitely not possible is them taking the suggestions of people to adjust or revert it now who've never played with it. They just don't see all these hypothetical fixes to hypothetical problems as being worthy of their time. They want actual data. So while it may be true that they might reject any feedback after the fact because its already done and in, that is really the only window of opportunity that exists. Until that time they debate and consider issues internally on the team. I can say that every concern that people bring up are concerns that have been considered and discussed by the team. So far, nobody has brought up anything that the team never considered. That doesn't mean, though, that the level of importance that they place (on the dew collector footprint for example) will always match the the level of importance that some of the players place on such things and so there will sure to be opportunities for feedback and revisiting certain things. In the end, the final decision rests with the developers. They re-iterated that design philosophy tonight in their interview-- that they appreciate player feedback on balance and fun-factor on implemented features players have actually experienced whereas they retain design decisions for what goes into the game, what gets cut from the game, and what gets changed in the game for themselves. So, if you really think about it, they aren't even asking for our input on things that haven't been released yet which means the community has zero chance of speaking up now to get things cancelled or reverted before its too late. It's already too late once the development team decides a change is going to happen. There won't ever be a community poll for whether something new is going to be added, cut, or changed before the fact. That same philosophy will surely continue into their next projects as well.

November 2022 TFP announces that work is currently being done on performance and optimizations with the console edition in mind Rick says he would like to do a discount program for previous owners of original console version but it will depend on Sony and Microsoft store policies and is something that will involve a lot of stakeholders so no promises as to whether that will happen. Rick states that they are committed to making crossplay a reality though there are a lot of obstacles to be worked through but they will be working with both Sony and Microsoft to make sure their console version is able to handle crossplay between the different consoles and PC. When answering the question about what he is working on, faatal confirms that there is currently a team working on console optimizations and readying the game to work on both PC and consoles. TFP has "console guys" on staff! The newly announced chunk reset timer option came about as a necessity for the new console edition in order to keep the save game files below the limits needed for consoles. Reverting chunks back to their pregenerated state will eliminate tons of save data.

Until legendary gear becomes a thing I don't think there is a chance. If legendary gear makes it into the game (something Joel really wants btw) then there is a chance that T6 could be returned to the crafting progression and the legendary tier becomes the one that is non-craftable.

I’d say that this is all we are asking pedestrians to do. Actually cross the bridge and report on oscillations. The good news about our venture is that no real lives are in danger by doing so.

What glue problem? The only glue problem that exists is in your fears. Until you play A21 you can’t know whether there is even a glue problem at all. The loot tables are different, the trader prices and product balance is different and even the glue crafting recipe is different. Everything you are worried about as a potential problem are things that should be worked out or changed after we get feedback from players who have played. Even hardcore builders should actually play A21 first before concluding they are completely screwed. There are magazines available to buy at the trader and you get nine magazines as an optional quest reward per quest not to mention all the magazines you’ll find while questing. Bookstores are the mother lode. Honestly, filling vending machines with even more magazines would be overkill. The food and drink prices were adjusted to better balance the survival game as they were too easily purchased allowing the player to ignore completely murky water. They raised the prices on purpose. Why would they then erase that change by increasing quest reward money? Again, this is something that should actually be played first and then give your feedback on whether you think prices are too high and keeping yourself fed and hydrated too difficult. Well, we wouldn’t want to be odd alpha pattern breakers…lol It’s impossible for us to convey in words all the changes that make A21 work. I’ve noticed that people keep slipping into thinking that player progression is tied to the magazines and that builders will be stopped in their progression. I can understand this because even when playing it the first few times I would forget that I could still spend skill points to progress my skills independently of what magazines I had found or what I could craft. The change code wise was simple and design wise just a step apart from what we have in A20 but gameplay-wise it’s a whole new meta that you absolutely have to play to fully understand the new puzzle of early to mid game survival.

Okay but if we are going to choose two voices out of the cacophony, why choose that one and call it the voice of “the players”? What makes that voice vs the dev’s vision the black and white choice? What if the devs listen to that voice and deviate from their plan to follow that voice and it turns out that voice they followed was only 2% of all the players and now 98% are unhappy? I have lost count of the times I’ve read in game reviews that the game was going great until the devs listened to a loud minority and ruined it. That simply is flat out false and the result of you trusting Saven’s reporting where he picked out two instances and represented the totality by those two examples. That’s been my point all along. If you go back and read the whole thread around the time the feature was revealed you will see plenty of information and questions answered and tons of courteous reassurances that the new changes work well. In the one example he shows of my supposed insulting response it turns out to not be an insult at all. I wasn’t even saying what he claimed I said and if you read the original conversation, the guy was here to stir up trouble and demand that the devs should obey player polls when choosing new features for the game. He wasn’t interested in having his concerns massaged, he wanted the new features to be cancelled outright. I don’t know what you keep referring to about nobody addressing glue. There have been a number of conversations about glue and in none that Inrecall did anyone at TFP tell someone to not use bows and bolts. Whatever…most of the information we’ve given predate Saven’s video and there’s been no change in how info is released as a result of any of this discussion. We’ve been giving answers about glue, team dynamics, empty jars, and dew collectors all along since the feature was announced but Saven searched (while not logged in) for two instances that rubbed him the wrong way and presented those as how we always do it. I certainly plan to continue to mix in humor with straight answers so there may be another quote coming up for a future Saven investigation. Look, if you want your guy to get credit for a new era of TFP openness then go hit those like and subscribe buttons. That was his motivation all along anyway.

All of that has been taken into account. I'm not sure exactly how they will deal with it. Raising people up to the surface seems probable. Since it is just an option I'm sure servers will land on a setting that works best to avoid any situation where active players would find themselves logging into a reset chunk. Also a player can drop an LCB or bedroll to prevent it from happening.

Can we at the very most call it "the Sentiment of some players"? I have fully thought out what I said and would 100% say it again and 1000% disagree that it was an insult in any way. Just because some people would like to re-engineer what I said into something else so they can spin the narrative to their way of thinking, doesn't make it so. Telling someone they don't have any friends is insulting. Pointing out to someone who publicly shares how they're being treated poorly by their friends that they should make a change is not insulting. Real concerns and legitimate concerns are two different things. I acknowledge that some players have real concerns but if those real concerns are based on false assumptions and faulty information then they are not legitimate as real as they might be. I have helped several people understand the crafting feature who came here angry about the change because they heard about it from on online personality who completely bungled what the change actually was. In all cases, once the person understood what the change entailed their level of concern went way down. I know it may be hard to believe that I was helpful and courteous to several people who didn't like the change but I have a pretty good sense these days for those who are here to learn and want to actually know the reasons and who are here just to bash and troll and cause trouble. As far as the fun pimps betraying or failing the consumers of late, I really don't get where this comes from. I can only surmise that "of late" must refer to the last few major updates as in A18, A19, and A20. Well, every one of those updates has resulted in growth and popularity of the game. I'm sure that there are some players who feel betrayed because their favorite feature was changed or the way they liked to play became more challenging to do, but the game and business is not going to go away because of some of the players. Maybe if it was a majority of the players there would be some risk of that happening but the majority still seem to be playing the game and trusting in the direction TFP is going or at least are willing to reserve judgement for when A21 comes out and they can try it out for themselves. I don't remember anyone from TFP telling someone that they can't play bows/bolts anymore. Bows/bolts are still in the game for A21. Maybe you can show the response by TFP staff that said for someone to kiss their bows and bolts goodbye. Maybe there have been voices in the community making fatalistic doom and gloom statements that bows and bolts are going to be dead in A21 thanks to the change in water jars but not TFP. You say this is just one of many examples but I encourage you to try and find some. In my recollection TFP actually coming out and telling players that their playstyle has been developed out of the game is extremely rare. It is usually players making that claim-- which is usually proven false not much later when other players report successfully playing in exactly that playstyle. TFP usually claims that a particular playstyle might be a bit more challenging or have some risk associated with it that previously was not there but rarely tells anyone they can't play a particular way any longer period. The three instances that come to mind are using an underground base risk free during bloodmoon, treading water risk free during bloodmoon, and driving around in vehicles during bloodmoon without risk. They absolutely did tell people in those instances that those playstyles would no longer carry zero risk to them. I agree with this. Fortunately, we are standing so far away from the edge of that precipice that there is zero danger of there not being a game. The game is more popular than it ever has been among the general player base. All evidence points to the players mostly wanting what TFP is giving. There will always be a few unhappy elements of the player base and if they congregate together on a couple of Streamer chats they might feel like some kind of majority to themselves. But TFP monitors several outlets of player sentiment as well as having tracking software built into the game to give them feedback on how players like to play the game and what type of gameplay is going on so they do have an early warning system if it appears what they wish to do is going to alienate a significant portion of the player base. I'm all for the ideal of continual improvement. We will keep communicating what we can. Again, I'm not sure exactly what you are referring to in terms of glue. I don't remember anyone at TFP posting that glue would be broken in A21 nor that people who crafted a ton of glue would be out of luck. Glue crafting isn't even governed by a magazine so you can do it from day one without having to rely on RNG for the recipe sooner or later. I'm just trying to figure out where this concern about glue originated from-- TFP? or baseless fears of folks who haven't experienced A21 yet? I suspect the latter but if you can show me a TFP employee telling people that mass glue crafting is no longer supported or possible, I'd like to see it. Yes, we make mistakes and we are human. But....listen to "the players" will fix our mistakes? Which players are you talking about? You can't honestly believe there are only two voices that exist: "The Devs" and "The Players". The only way to develop is for the team to stay true to their vision and hope that most of the players continue along through the ride and more players hop on the ride as we go. There is not just a single "The Players" voice to listen to. Philosophically, I agree with your stance that the game is only going to live so long as the player base agrees that it is worth their time to play. I suppose where we disagree is whether the voice of the people have drawn the devs right up to edge of that precipice where the game is in danger of failing and sinking into obscurity just like boxee box. I don't believe they are even close enough to the edge to even see the edge. Part of that is that for the last several years we have had individuals coming here predicting that the game won't survive the next update because TFP isn't listening to the people and in every single case it wasn't the people-- just that individual. The closest we came was the A16 change to A17 and yet not even that turned us into boxee box. The game has grown in popularity far beyond what it was in A16 and in that case there were a lot of individuals coming here to express that THIS time TFP had angered "the players" and unless they reverted the game it would be doomed. I was a bit worried it might be true seeing as how I'm the closest of the staff to the forums but the devs weren't worried at all and the historical evidence is all on their side. Did we lose some individuals due to the A16/A17 changes? Absolutely. But did we lose "the players"? Not at all.

Game time

I think it just returns to its pregenerated state. I started a mine before I knew and went back to my base to get some coffee. When I returned everything I had dug and placed was gone and the original iron node I had started from was there again. So I don’t think it rolls an entirely newly randomized chunk as much as it reverts it back to the way it was when it originally generated—but others would know more. It’s not just terrain though. A city not visited for the timer length will completely reset. It’s an option so it can be disabled if you want your scavenged cities to remain emptied or your excavated mountain to remain a crater or if you’re glad all those cars you wrenched are gone for good. But all you quest poi double dippers are about to get the mother lode…lol.

Yes! The picture of the three feet represents “options” and of course it’s all on a menu. The boy depicted is “chunk” and the symbol on him is “reset”. At the time I did the clue, 15 days was the planned default time for MP but that might change. For SP the default will be off. A placed bedroll or LCB will prevent the reset and you can choose from several preset time frames that you wish. The timer counts down from the last time a player entered that chunk. Probably not the most exciting feature people have been looking for but still pretty cool and nice for server admins.

I guess that’s true. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt since, you know, I wouldn’t want to misrepresent him… Yes. I see that. It just goes to show that when you don’t present the whole picture you can easily get it wrong. I admit I probably got it wrong simply by highlighting two dates and not considering everything. Good thing I didn’t broadcast that out on YouTube and am willing to see the flaw in my reasoning when it is pointed out…

Okay, this is my last one...lol He's obviously not doing his own research. He definitely did not read any of the original conversation nor did he use anything that I gave him. He got screenshots sent to him with some guy's interpretation and he went off of that. He never even visited afterward to check the source or read the whole conversation. It does seem to be about par for the course based on the rest of his video. So if unprofessionalism is the deal-breaker for you well.... NOW, I'm done.... haha

Fixed that for you. I did just go back and read all that original conversation and that guy I responded to did not come here desiring information about his concerns. He came to rant that TFP doesn't poll the community before making any decisions and that he should get to help with the direction the game takes since he paid money to play it. I did answer him point for point without any snark or condescension and gave him true answers for all of disagreements and he completely ignored my answer but went on for pages drawing people into his arguments that were never going to come to anything. If @Saven really wanted to get to the truth and share actual information he could have highlighted those answers. But he didn't because he is an entertainer and not a legitimate source of actual news regarding 7 Days to Die. Saven made the same mistake the guy, himself, did in misreading what I wrote. Here is what he said in response to my advice that he should find new people to play with that won't yell at him. I said you should find new people to play with that are less abusive. I never implied or stated that you have no friends. You were the one complaining that your friends yell at you when you open a container. I pointed out that they are not being friendly and that not all groups treat each other like that. Don’t try to spin that into me dissing you as a friendless person because you dared to criticize the lack of community polls for development. To be clear, I think you probably have lots of friends and probably a nice family. But your own description of the people you play the game with is something I would never put up with. I would take the passion you are using to criticize TFP and stand up for yourself in your gamer group or go find a new group who won’t yell at you. My point was the game doesn’t make people act that way. They’re just jerks. You deserve better. Anyone does. If you go back and read exactly what I wrote to him originally you will see that he is wrong about me implying he has no friends. That isn't even close to what I said in even the most loosely comprehensible interpretation. Yet, for his show, @Saven did the same level of "research". Why didn't my full explanation about my own remark make it into his show? I'll tell you why. It would have wrecked the segment. This is about all the time I care to spend on this. You don't have to like the way I post but I'm not going to change. I think my style is in keeping with a video game website about killing zombies. If you want hotel front desk customer service professionalism then go stay at a hotel for a night and get your fill or visit a forum on more serious subjects where I'm sure nobody jokes around ever. If someone comes with legitimate concerns and asks questions then I answer them courteously and with a desire to help them understand. If someone comes just to rant and bash the developers and the fans of the game then their claims and accusations are going to be challenged.

Heheh..I’m pretty sure he picks and chooses what information fits his narrative because that is exactly what he did. He definitely didn’t use the entirety of the information I give. He can’t since the information itself would debunk all of his speculations and also show that I’m not dismissive and condescending to people who simply disagree with the Fun Pimps. What a gross over-simplification. I actually spend a lot of time protecting the ability of people to disagree with the Fun Pimps. But obviously Saven can only work with what he’s given…lmao. Look, if you’re a fan of the guy and love his episodes then enjoy yourself. He’s doing entertainment for views and if it feels good to do some TFP bashing and feel super worried about the direction of the game together in his chat then I’m glad you have a place to do that. We don’t allow TFP bashing here, that’s true. TFP disagreeing is okay but not bashing and some people have a tough time figuring out the difference. They are probably the type of “friends” others should try and avoid…😂 Parce THAT @Saven…

I admittedly do many of these things from time to time but not in the quoted case. It was good advice, not gentle mocking. Their team dynamics as described aren't healthy. Period.

I just want to be clear that I wasn't mocking the guy or even insulting him in any form. I was absolutely seriously advising him to get new friends to play the game with based on what he shared about his experience with them. He literally needs to be playing with different people if they are treating him that way. As a teacher I advise students all the time when they tell me how their "friends" treat them or encourage them to do bad things and there is no mockery. There are plenty of use cases when someone could tell someone else to get new friends and it is not an insult at all. Just because Saven interpreted my response as mocking doesn't make it so. 10/10 I would tell that guy or any guy who shares on the forum that his friends yell at him and stop him from opening containers to find new people to play with. Those people are not his friends and if there is any insult involved it isn't vs the guy getting yelled at, it is vs the people calling themselves his friends. It is true I did not address the rest of the guy's rant directly to him even though I had already addressed those concerns within the thread. I didn't mock or insult his concerns. I just ignored them since the answers were already posted.

I feel like typing something that is sure to appear on a future episode of Saven's World... The guy has to frame everything in absolutes in order to deliver on the shock value of his click baity titles. Its all about likes and subscribes. Saven has no inside information and is simply choosing to use the worst case scenario and doom and gloom philosophy in order to get views. Later he will either claim that he was always right (If bandits do end up getting delayed) or he will claim that the pressure he and the community brought to the concern successfully pushed them into doing the right thing (If bandits make it into A21). Either way he makes himself the hero of his own world....uh....Saven's World.