Roland

And I think your play testing feedback on glue production will be important once you get your hands on it. That could lead to changes like a more efficient version being added higher up in the Forge Ahead ladder or perhaps a mod to add to it that allows for a fourth or fifth slot for water if it turns out the existing collectors just can't support reasonable glue production.

If it makes you feel any better, any time long discussions start forming that do not directly involve developers, they get moved out of the dev diary. There were 125 posts moved-- not just your conversation and not because anything is sour. Criticisms are still posted in the dev diary along with expressions of support. Only when long conversations evolve do those things get moved. When things get all hot topic questions get lost in the mix and normal people stop reading after two pages of arguing. Staff read this thread too.

The perk rebalance is another big piece of the puzzle but it is still a work in progress and completely Madmole's baby. He will talk about it when he's ready most likely in a developer stream. He is totally aware of the holes left by moving crafting over to magazines. We will have to wait and see how he decides to fill them.

Glad you found the command to set the day to where you were. The books you read can be found in the creative menu that you enabled with cm. Just type the name of the book and give yourself a copy.

Only when @unholyjoe himself is in the water... In seriousness though, the water voxel overhaul has a narrow and specific scope. Performance, works with terrain and submerged blocks and decorations, doesn't result in holes or Moses partitions, and looks good.

Removal of empty jars was the starting place. It actually goes way back to the beginning when the game used to never return an empty jar after drinking water. There was a lot of discussion about that on the forums and in team meetings. Those who were more reality minded of course wanted the empty jar returned-- after all, where did it go? So they changed it. Since that time empty jars have been a pain in the development ass and there have been multiple discussions about just removing empty jars to bring jars into alignment with the other containers in the game that are not returned. It was always put on the back burner. WIth A21 we got a new XML Developer and when that happens you get new perspectives on what should take priority. One of his priority tasks was to try and balance drinks and food with the trader and in loot and that led to the issue of jars for miles and the fact that they were infinitely refillable and players were getting a stack by the end of Day 1. Removing empty jars came up again and they pulled the trigger as well as reverting the game to its original design of drinking water not returning a jar. At the same time Madmole had designed the magazine system for crafting progression. As the team talked they decided that a new workstation that provided water could help with early to midgame water survival now that jars were gone. That would help fill out the Forge Ahead ladder as well as provide a new type of farming focused on water. Then it was fine tuning and balancing from there. In the first iteration the uncraftable part of the dew collector was a blue barrel but that later changed to a water filter. Other changes that followed were to change loot so that pure water could no longer be found-- only murky water and that a pot was to be required once again to boil murky water into pure water. Finally, the game was reverted once again to allow players to be able to drink water directly from water sources. All of these changes significantly increased murky water as a game asset. Very few people were drinking murky water and nobody was having to deal with dysintery at all. Simply lowering stack sizes of jars would not have accomplished this. The team also felt that being able to drink straight from a water source would be a safety net for new players who might not be able to quickly find a pot and not loot enough to find enough water to keep their hydration up. We played with these changes and really enjoyed them. Madmole added the final touch (so far) of making murky water parallel Old Shamwiches in that they hurt your health in return for improving your hydration. That's where it is right now and there may be more minor changes by time you get your hands on it but it definitely isn't going to be reversed before the larger population gets it and plays it. The removal of empty jars has literally been years in the works and simply delayed time and time again. That is not likely to change again.

And that goes for TFP as well which is why there is a team that discusses and when things are implemented it is tested and then adjustments are made and then most importantly it is released to larger gamer population in early access so that drawbacks and ramifications can be seen. That is exactly why some things are removed after being implemented. Some people think the devs remove stuff because of negative criticism being typed out but more often it is because of what they have observered and the trends they've seen that work against the design they envision. Unfortunately, some players become married to some features and start to think those features define the game for themselves and that they should define the game for everyone. Others also mistakenly believe that the devs don't have the right to change things if it forces those people to change their playstyle. No amount of criticism or praise written about the water changes and the crafting changes are going to stop TFP from releasing them to experimental and possibly even for months of gameplay in the stable alpha version so they can assess all those things they were possibly too close to see when they implemented them. Its funny how people claim that once it is released that it probably won't ever get changed and yet...these are the same people who criticize TFP for changing things previously released yet again..lol

Great. Thanks for your patience.

Me too. But neither of us are calling the shots for the game. The two that are, care very much about visuals and are unwilling to compromise their visual standard for variety as has been demonstrated many times. It wouldn’t impact performance but it takes a lot of time to do. They are creating new models as we speak— bandits…a dozen or so of them I believe was mentioned. So TFP has obligations to fulfill for their base game and are working towards that while modders simply do whatever they want and using inferior methods such as the legacy UMA or free domain models or even asset store models which are three methods to more quickly get variety but none that TFP uses opting to use in-house artists to draw, model, and rig up original assets. They are also adding variety to the world to make the environment better looking. All of this work has to be managed and divided. Great. And I don’t see much or any performance drops when I double the spawn numbers of zombies in the xml files and yet TFP won’t do that either. The game isn’t feature complete and they know what adding the rest of the features is going to cost them so they are being conservative with what they do now. Sometimes they do push things like the city center tiles with high density buildings and spawn volumes and higher spawn numbers and faster spawn rates. And look at the guff they get because of the performance hits people experience in those areas. He already knows but apparently thought it sounded more impactful for his argument to say it doesn’t have one at all rather than say that it has one that he feels is not very good.

Everyone should. I’ve never claimed to speak for everyone like some around here do…

Well cans aren't completely gone... There is a new resource block like the blue block full of cobblestone and the cardboard block full of paper and the cement pallet full of ...ah...cement. There is now a block that looks like a crushed block of tin cans from a recycle company and it gives iron. So empty cans converted into iron gameplay still exists in A21.

That's not how I operate. If you're getting upset and ready to go toxic then take a break and come back when you can be calm. I don't want you banned from the forums and I welcome your criticism as long as you can do it without getting upset. You said that the graphic doesn't exist in your original point and not that "it exists but I think it sucks". Why would you present your argument with an outright lie? Whether it sucks or not is subjective. It works well enough for me. That's not to say it couldn't be improved. But your point was based on the idea that TFP never created one at all and you knew that they had. This is what you call valid complaints and criticism? Just be truthful from the getgo and say that TFP put in a graphic but you don't like it instead of trying to spread disinformation. I suppose you'll say I'm reflexively defending because I'm pointing out what you did... Please provide examples. I've played a few overhaul mods with a greater variety of zombies and the visuals are definitely not better. I'm okay with that because its just a mod and I appreciate the effort and I'm much more of a gameplay over visuals kind of player anyway. But the developers could never release the game at those standards. The other thing about those mods with many many varieties of zombies is the performance hit to play with them. Again, modders are forgiven these things because they aren't held to the same standard as developers. The way they create those varieties is also different than how TFP creates new models. But I admit I haven't played every mod so I'd be willing to play a new mod and if the visuals of those zombies are better and the performance is just as good, I'll pass that info along to the devs. No need to put option in quotation marks. It really is an option you can choose to do or not. Why should you get the 4 skill points if don't do the quest? I never do the starter quest any more and I start with 0 points and earn them doing things other than the starter quest. What makes it disingenuous of me to mention that the starter quest can be cancelled if you don't want to do it? Its the truth. How did I know you already knew you could cancel it in the game? I wasn't even defending TFP by telling you that the tutorial quest can already be cancelled. You do realize that even if a top menu option to forego the quest existed you still wouldn't get the 4 skill points, right? The skill points are for doing the quest. If you don't do the quest you don't get the skill points. As for why there isn't a top menu option? I don't know. There may never be since it can be cancelled so easily from within the game. Its actually better that way. I play with my brother and he may want to do the starter quest and I may want to opt out of it. A top menu option would force us to play it the same but an ingame option (that already exists) lets us each choose how to start the game. I could go either way but if I did have to defend one way or the other I would have to choose the way it is because it offers more versatility. Either way, I know Joel Huenink, and he doesn't give out points for doing nothing. Top menu or in game--if you opt out of the tutorial quest you start with zero points and not four points however the way to opt out of the starter quest ends up being presented They haven't put all the settings they plan to in the interface...yet. But no I am not saying that xml edits = interface. I am saying that xml edits = the most amazing interface any game could ever have. Even once they finalize the interface it will be nothing compared to going in and adjusting values in the xmls. Those who are willing to do that will have the most powerful means of adjusting settings to their liking than any game menu can give. That's not horsecrap. That's pure truth and they pay me with current A21 access. Like I said, you can take a break if you need to as you seem to be getting into personal attack mode. Here's me being a moderator: Please keep your comments focused on the topic and not attacking the person. It has not been in alpha for over a decade. But it most likely will be. So what? You've already admitted you enjoy playing mods and even feel like the game is even more enjoyable than the vanilla base game the devs are designing. Why can't you be happy with that? Why does the game already have to be finished? What is it you think is going to happen when we have 7 Days to Die 1.0? I'm not dismissive of valid complaints. I accepted your valid complaints and called you out where what you thought were facts were not. You can't say there has never been a graphic to show if a book is read or not and have anyone remotely familiar with the game accept that as valid. I do accept your valid complaint that in your opinion the default graphic is poorly executed. If you say there is no option to opt out of the starting quest, how can I not dismiss that? It isn't true. If you say that you would prefer the option be on the top menu, I can accept that criticism even if I don't necessarily agree since that would be more limiting than having it right where it is. If you say that you should get to start with 4 free skill points even if you cancel the quest, I guess I would have to hear your reasoning on that since I disagree. But that doesn't mean I dismiss it. I already agreed with you multiple times that not being able to fill empty jars at the nearby lake is weird and unrealistic. I totally accept that criticism. I don't want you to hate these boards but I also can't just let false information that might make new forum members get the wrong idea fly unchallenged. A thing can be a mix of good and bad. For each person that plays 7 Days to Die there will be good and bad things. TFP is going to do what seems good to them in their own timeframe.

Okay. You'll be able to confirm that for yourself once A21 releases to experimental. Agreed. But you are talking about realism vs gameplay in that pronouncement. The Navezgane Universe is already full of dumb oddities that you've already accepted and are perfectly fine forgiving for the sake of the fun gameplay you like. This one you don't care about since you'd rather TFP focus on cool tech to help with the increasing blood moon instead of early game water concerns so you aren't going to forgive and you are going to pull the realism card. I get it. This game is quirky and off-kilter. It is not a simulation. You will either accept the oddities or you won't. The game can definitely be modded to be more simulation-like if realism is what you want. I agree that it may work for some and it may not work for others. I'm not sure what you mean by reflexive defending. I'm simply reporting information based on my experience. I know it isn't realistic. I also have enjoyed the changes to water. I'm not trying to speak for 90% of the player base. I'm saying that the progression of developing a renewable water source is more interesting and fun in A21 than it previously has been for me. I'm excited for others to play with it. The only time I defend is when someone states an inaccurate assumption or speculation about motive or reasons behind the change. Why? Because I'm an eyewitness who can state what was witnessed rather than some rando who is guessing. Maybe you like the guesses by randos. You can always put me on ignore if you don't like the reports I make of actual experience with A21 and actual conversations with the team. I dunno...maybe you're talking about others who like the sound of the changes and start defending and saying we should trust and play it first before criticizing? If that's the case then I guess I would ask why the reflexive criticizing? Where does that come from? Worries the game will suffer and be worse? Most people around here are more hopeful than worried. They tend to defend what they hope will be good. Maybe you meant something else. You'll have to clarify maybe. I can't argue with that. This game is often not logical at all. As players we pick and choose what violations of logic are okay by us and which are not. You are picking and choosing because I know I could find something absolutely stupid and illogical about this game in regards to reality that you not only won't complain about but that you would reflexively defend because it supports the gameplay you enjoy. We all do it. Sorry that empty jars is your breaking point. I shrugged years ago and now just go with it and stupid or not I have fun.

It was....almost immediately after the schematics were introduced because players gave feedback at the time that it was needed. I never buy a book or schematic that I already have because of the closed book/open book icon that exists right on the image of the book or schematic you wish to get. I have no problem selling duplicate books and schematics because I can see at a glance the graphic that tells me I read it. Really.....and what pray tell is that degree and how easy is it to do exactly? Yes it does and always has. You open the player interface and flip to the quest tab (Exclamation Mark) and make sure the tutorial quest is selected as the active quest (it should be) and then you.......CANCEL IT. The icon looks like a crossed out exclamation mark inside a circle. You can turn off every quest in the game by canceling it. Yes it does. And it does for other extended settings as well. The xml files are the deepest and most versatile extended settings options that exist. It might take a bit of getting used to but you can easily adjust recipes, loot settings, zombie settings, and more with much greater depth and detail than what appears in the options menu. I'll grant that these aren't perfect but the game also isn't finished yet. A21 greatly improves the POI description with the quest description. I've read plans to add a decomposing effect to corpses so that they can be despawned faster without just having them pop out of existence. If your beef is that it is taking too long to do these things and they should have been done long ago, I can't argue with your opinion or preferences about development timelines. Others are fine continuing to follow development for as long as it takes. Which things? The ones that are already in game that you apparently weren't aware of or the things that are still pending....? I don't think fans are split on all things. We have been discussing one change regarding the removal of empty jars upon which it seems fans are split. Some are excited to try the change and others think there are bigger fish to fry and wonder why time was wasted on making the change. Some think it sounds terrible and others think it sounds like fun. Some already know they won't be able to suspend disbelief while others have already let it go. Well sure anyone can make a mistake. I'm not saying TFP can't make a mistake. I haven't personally agreed with every design choice although that doesn't prove their choice was a mistake-- only that I wouldn't do things that way if I had final development say. I'm not sure why you think I'm defending TFP about being infallible. I'm not. I'm simply describing the change, my own personal experience with it, and dispelling incorrect assumptions that some people are making (such as the idea that a graphic to show whether a book or schematic has been read is long overdue...)

This hasn't really come up yet but you should know that while vitamins and the purifier mod will protect you from contracting dysintery, they don't protect you from the -5 hp hit you take from every gulp of murky water. It isn't a huge deal to supplement your murky water diet with first aid items to bring your health back up after hydrating yourself on the murk but it is a difference between A21 and A20 that could affect the playstyle you describe. In A20 murky water doesn't affect your character's health at all but in A21 it does and vitamins and purifiers don't mitigate that. That's not how it went down. Your speculation is wrong. Also, water is still harvestable in A21 so that premise is also wrong. Incorrect. Harvesting water is not removed in A21. You can drink as much water as you wish from a water source. You just can't fill up bottles to make infinitely renewable pure water from day one. So staying hydrated is no problem as long as you use murky water and supplement your health loss with first aid items. But characterizing water as not harvestable is inaccurate. You can harvest it from any stream, gutter, sewer, lake, pool, or water treatment plant you find. You just can't store it and transport it in empty jars that are returned to you to do it all again. Once you have dew collectors built you can also harvest water from those on a predictable schedule. I doubt any playable scenarios have been reduced. Some will be more challenging but that should be good news to anyone who is a veteran of this game. More challenge scenarios are always a good and welcome thing.

If you were able to recover your world and it is just your character progression that you need to recover you can open the command console by typing F1 and then type: giveselfxp 50000 You can repeat that command and increase or decrease the number to fine tune how many levels you jump until you get back to whatever level you were at. Then just respend the points on whatever perks you want. For your gear, type: cm into the command console Then, open the interface and click on the lightbulb icon over to the far right. Now you should be able to search for and give yourself anything you lost. There is a command to increase the day but I can't remember it. Someone else can probably help out with that.

They know but it is a joke. There is a lot of humor and silly stuff embedded in the game. Drinking an iced drink to help you survive in an icy biome is funny. This game was never meant to be a simulation. "fans" are made up of many and divers groups and sub-groups of players according to the preferences they share. All companies listen to their fans and when they make a decision there will always be a group that can claim that the devs were following their feedback. You just need to get into the right group and stop assuming that your group is representative of all "fans".

I like it. I like that I am drinking murky water at times in the beginning. I like building the dew collectors. They are a nice new objective that competes with all the other start of game objectives you have. Before when I'd open a cupboard in a some POI and there would be pure water inside I wouldn't even think about it as I pressed R to auto loot the cabinet and add that drinkable water to the stack already in my inventory. Now it feels great to loot pure water from the dew collector you built. The removed empty jars, the dew collectors, the new magazine learn to craft by looting all combine to make the experience fun and interesting. As veteran player it did take some adaptation on my part but it is fun. I doubt simply adjusting stack limits and recipe costs would have had the same effect these changes have had. I understand that fun is subjective, though, and not everyone will like the change and I'm sure we will hear some feedback on it after experimental hits. But I think we will get a lot of positive feedback about the changes as well.

The Water Purifier Mod recipe is still in the game but you have to find the schematic in order to be able to craft it. The pure mineral water recipe is also still in the game if you find Wasteland Treasures Volume 5.

First of all, they HAVE been optimizing the game but they are also adding things to the game still so gains in performance are often spent in order to get the next feature in. Once the game is feature complete then all optimizations will be 100% for increasing performance. The game is almost feature complete so we are close. Second of all, the defenders of 7 Days aren't involved AT ALL with optimizing the code. Whether they retort with "It's Alpha" or join you with "FIX IT NOW!!!!" the optimizations will not proceed any faster. When you host the game on the same computer you are playing on you significantly increase the load on that computer. If you look at the required specs listed on Steam for the game it notes that when hosting a game on the same machine you are using to play you need to double the listed requirements. A dedicated server takes a huge load off of the host so that the game runs smoother for everyone. The other advantage of a dedicated server is that anyone can join the world and play at any time. Hosted games can only be played when the host is playing. So if I am hosting and want to go to bed but my three buddies still want to play, they can't if I log off and go to sleep. But on a dedicated server, they could keep playing without me. Finally, this game is intended for up to 8 players. Sure. Just make sure that the person with the best rig, most stable internet connection, and most flexible and open schedule for gaming among you is the host. Actually just realizing that 7 Days to Die is their very first game could get you to that conclusion.

You unlock the recipe by reading Forge Ahead magazines (2 or 3 if I remember correctly) You craft it and place it somewhere with open sky above it. It automatically starts making water until at some point there will be a jar of clean water. It will do this three times and then stop until you remove the water. Then it will begin again.

I was responding to someone who was saying that in A20 it is easy to get a second or third tier gun in the first couple days. That seems to be much more rare in A21. The first two days of free weather protection has been removed so exploiting that to get an easy higher lootstage from the more difficult biomes is not going to be as simple as it has been. Trader rewards are more focused on magazine acquisition now. I haven’t even been offered a weapon yet but I’ve only made it to tier two quests before having to start over. You’re welcome. We’ve made such things easy for you after all.

Yes. I just demonstrated how as containers, jars act like all other containers. Now, if you’d like to talk about the separate issue of water survival va other aspects of survival that’s fair. Agreed that shelter is super easy to come by and definitely easier in A21 than hydration maintenance. Agree that hunting is too easy but disagree that farming is the stroll in the park you claim. You are glossing over having to spend points in LOTL and creating the farm plots. I’d say that building a water farm is comparable to building a crop farm. If setting up a crop farm is simple to you then so will water be about as easy. Again you are just glossing over the perk points needed and the material gathering needed. You could also just say that after reading a couple forge ahead magazines and placing a few dew collectors wam bam easy peasy by day 6 you’ve solved water. So if we’re just going to gloss the details we can say water is pretty consistent with these other things. yeah just tear down a parking lot of cars with that free wrench in your starting inventory. Wrenches are a lot more rare in loot in A21 (as are weapons) so nobody is going to be disassembling stuff right away unless extremely lucky. You also act like chemistry stations are available easily. In fact the process of crafting a workstation in order to produce gas is pretty consistent with crafting a workstation to produce water. In A21 the dew collector is the very first item on the Forge Ahead ladder while a chemistry station is one of the last items so water is going to be easier to get up and running than gas and yet in a very parallel manner. In this case you are comparing A20 mechanics with an A21 mechanic. Perks will no longer unlock first aid recipes so your comparison doesn’t even track. This is why it is better to try changes out in the context of the new version rather than try to understand it from the perspective of the old version. There is no way that you will understand the changes until you can play them in the context of the overall A21 experience. That’s what early access is for. Nope. Didn’t need that one. In fact it’s your experience with the A20 version and inexperience with all of the A21 changes and how they work together that is getting in your way. Now, maybe after you become experienced with A21 you may decide that hydration survival is disproportionately tougher than the other aspects of survival. We definitely will appreciate that feedback.

Sorry but I’m on team Milkshake! plus it would be hilarious and right in line with Pimp humor for Big Mama to have a 100% chance of having a jar of milk in any loot bag she drops… 😂 Nobody asked for Big Mama to not drop milk!!!