meganoth

No, but you need more bullets to clear a room on higher difficulties.

A good balance 😉

Yes, but even if ou are right it could be fixed either through providing more stages OR fixing trader rewards. Now I know that TFP intends to publish this game with exactly this scarcity of game stages, maybe because they want to have room for 7D2D 2 on top or because they don't mind that modders fill the gap for veteran players. Likely both of this is the case. So this leaves trader fixing as the only solution we have a chance to see in the forseeable future. By the way, I don't see how more game stages help if you always get much better stuff at the trader than through loot or crafting. Sure, the trader will not give out end-game stuff in the first week, but it would still be OP. And eventually he would give out end-game stuff while crafting and looting would still give stuff that you got a long time ago from the trader. In other words, in a race between rabbit and turtle it doesn't help the turtle to increase the race track length. 😉

Does that happen as well when there is a sizable delay between emptying those two magazines? On what difficulty do you play for this to happen? One player in our group has an M60, but I would assume we still don't generate that much noise in our typical run as we don't see screamer waves when we exit such a quest POI I mean there must be a lot going on for you to have to unload two magazines in quick succession. And if it happens at higher difficulties then the screamers may just be part of the package. I.e. either find a way to kill the less dangerous enemies less noisy or accept you have to deal with screamers as well. And if it is not intentional (and it is very likely TFP did not test this) then relating this in your bug report would be a very reproducible example.

I can only say that we felt the motorcycle accelerating faster when we added the supercharger, but there seems to be nothing in the xml directly that would make that happen. So maybe we were just hallucinating.

On our server we have done lvl5 and even lvl6 quests and see no screamers. So there must be something very different between our and your game. Maybe you should make a bug report and mention exactly the circumstances: which world you are on, location, important game settings (though that can be found in the logfile it is easier to assess if you tell them as well)

Correct, I forgot that the supercharger was already included in A20. Though as zombiehunter said the numbers were adjusted in A21, probably to make it so you gladly take detours to search all garages for them. I just checked XML and the bonus seems to be 15% to top speed for every vehicle and 25% to cruising speed (i.e. without hitting shift key). I would have expected an acceleration modifier as well since we had the impression the motorbike was accelerating faster as well. Maybe that is just a derived stat from top speed or we have been imagining things

Yes and no. One limit is how fast the client PC can load the next chunk ahead of you. For that (worst case) it would need to read savegame data about changed blocks in the world from the server. So read some data first over the internet into your cache, then create the resulting chunk by combining that with world info read from hard disk, then finally displaying it. Depending on the load of the server and maybe 8 players simultaneously asking for chunk data or invoking other server-heavy events like zombie spawning(?) multiplayer could have an influence. I am not sure about my memory here, but I think I remember that when we played an overhaul mod with faster vehicles that rubberbanding was more frequent when we all were driving at the same time. At that time our game was also hosted on a weaker server than it is now.

They nerfed basic speed so that they could include a vehicle mod with which you can reach the old top speed again (AFAIK). THis top speed is a hard limit for vanilla since TFP has to support 8 minimum spec PCs playing together.

Is it possible that just the default for LOD has changed between alphas? When I started playing A21 I went into a city and wondered why I only saw very few buildings ahead. It seemed much less than in the previous alpha.

Different styles of plays, different experiences. I don't remember us having much problems with Cops in our games, but naturally we shoot them because their spit hits us and the spits hinders sight. A cop seldom explodes in our game as he needs to "dodge" exactly when he is on his last breath and needs just one or two more bullets. Whether spiders are a problem is largely defined by base design, most designs we use seem to be spider-proof. I don't remember exactly when a cop was really a problem in a horde night for me, I think I died from multiple cops in A16 once. I like cops, but as far as looking at them as a danger on horde night, not really. While the demo is never an empty threat for us. I think everyone in our group has died at least once from his explosion directly and either died or got close to death when a demo breached defenses (but we almost always have secondary defense positions). You may be so reliable in shooting that you only hit the trigger of the demo when you want to, we are not, and I would guess at least 1 out of 5 to 8 demos explodes unwanted. You take your own experience as a measure of the demo's danger and conclude he isn't one (except for newbies). I take my own experience and say he is. You may call me a newbie if you want, but for me the demo is decidedly a step up in difficulty from the rest (including the cops) and needs special care, and even without a shotgun guy around we regularily do make the mistake of activating him. Are we bad shots? From comparison I'd say definitely worse than your troupe. Now if most players are like you and your friends, then I would agree that TFP f** up. If most players are like me and my friends, I'd say TFP did not.

Oh thank you for telling me I am **purposefully** dodging your points. You are so charming today 😎. While you at the same time did not react to my argument above why the demo is actually a good design ( https://community.7daystodie.com/topic/33300-how-do-you-deal-with-demolishers/?do=findComment&comment=535032 ). Yes, he is two steps above all other zombies. Which is exactly how boss enemies are designed in lots of other games. And as I said in that post, he makes sense as a sort of beach head that can create opportunities for the other zombies to reach you. Which is, according to my own experience in a 4 player MP game a very possible outcome. I see you finally explain your reasoning instead of expecting us just to swallow it: The tower defense part of the game is (or should be) based on you continually improving your base. If you can **easily** build bases say with a field of spike traps around and keep that working even in end game by just upgrading blocks to steel it would be a rather trivial tower defense game. Ever played a tower defense game? It is based on you continually improving and adapting your base to different and stronger enemies. Mechanical spike traps are very basic defense traps for early game, why should they still function for every zombie in end game? You say it punishes your base, then next paragraph that you have no problem with the demo yourself. So why would he be badly designed when you, an experienced player have obviously found out how to cope with it? Really, the demo only punishes your base if you can't handle him, and there are ways to handle him. In this thread alone I think people listed quite a few ways (shooty AND architectural ways) to combat him and you yourself say you know how to handle him. And there are also ways to harden a base against demos. Without demos there is no real necessity for steel, it is not really difficult to make a late game horde base just with concrete. And there is no necessity to make changes to your base in late game unless there is a new unusual (and real!) threat like the demo You say "punish" as if it was a bad thing! But you yourself acknowledge with your own ideas of kamikaze or driller zombie that there needs to be dangers to the walls of your base. Just that, depending on how kamikaze or driller for example are balanced, they don't seem able to put me in front of new problems as a base designer, they in fact seem more about making base design A16-trivial again, i.e. that you just put yourself in a high position where you can see all around you. I may be wrong, this would need playtesting, but I just don't see it. (Before you say the demo neither, sure he does: You can for example design your horde base so you can shoot him in the back or throw him in a pit and throw explosives to actually explode him while far enough away). What do I mean with shooting at a zombie "trivially". Well, just pull the trigger of a fully loaded M60 and point it at the torso of a zombie or group of zombies. What often is also called "spray and pray". I can tell you 2 of my friends in the MP game are happy just pointing at zombies in horde night and just "bury" the zombies in bullets. Naturally they will prioritize a cop for example, but they don't need head shots for a cop when using an M60 (or a shotgun at short range). Notice how the demo is the only zombie where we tell the shotgun guy to not even shoot at it and let the sniper or desert eagle wielder do some work. I also try to build the late game base with "traps" designed for the demo (pits for example), but I can't get my co-players to be organised enough for some of the more complex schemes. I suppose you mean "artificial" as in artificial in that scenario of a game where the other zombies are maybe magical? Even though the actual reason for the existence of the zombies is still not known. Is that such a big difference for you? First of all the game is not just about unloading lots of ammo on hordes of zombies. It can be if you want and in a MP game you might not have a choice depending on your co-players 😉(I for example have to play SP for that). But whether you simply mine for ammo and shoot everything that moves or mine for cement and iron and build an intricate base with traps and pits and funnels and secondary positions and alternate positions, that is your decision. Secondly in end game with steel the normal zombies are not able to break the blocks well enough that you would have any problem defending against them even with the simplest designs like square steel blocks to stand on. But this is a balancing act, you can't simply increase block damage as they also can't be too good at breaking blocks, otherwise you would need 2 days every week just repairing your base and new players might not be able to defend against them Now we have seen both designs in previous alphas: We had block-breaking zombies in A16 damaging your base from all sides. They didn't have a chance but you needed days to repair your base as almost all blocks were damaged. Then we had even better block-breaking zombies who knew where to attack in A17 which made the game impossible to play for new players as you needed advanced knowledge about the zombies even in early game to build a working horde base. And now we probably have the final iteration where the normal zombies have block-breaking on a level that will not overpower new players but we have a special boss, the demo who turns up rather seldom in a night and is actually a danger of breaking your walls, but even when he explodes the damage to your base is not everywhere but in a few specific points you can usually repair in less than a day. This is an advantage that I did not know immediately when the demo was introduced. This came from my experiences after having played with the demo in the game for some time now. And I can say that I don't like the constant guessing which traps can trigger the explosions and which don't in every alpha (something that should be solved by final release). But in general I definitely like the demo, I like it when he appears and I like the challenge of redesigning my base in late game to accomodate for the demo. And I like that there is an enemy that you should not just gun down in continuous fire. Now I listed multiple reasons in this thread why I like the demo and why I think it is good for this game. And considering I have fun with the demo why shouldn't I? But I can accept that you might not like the concept because you have a different way of playing the game and other tastes in respect to realism for example. Sadly your universe ends with everyone not agreeing with you as "people blindly defending it".

If a single demo destroys your base if you miss a shot you have a badly designed base 😉. *I* don't have anything against zombies with lots of HPs, but the demo adds the additional difficulty to kill him safely without just trivially keeping your thumb on the trigger. That volatility you seem to fear is exactly what makes him into a danger. If the kamikazes have in sum the same hps as a demo then what is the difference really? What makes the kamikazes NOT a bullet sponge in sum when you need exactly the same amount of bullets to get them off the map and they spawn at the same time (if I get your idea right) ? You were repeating your "bad design" mantra without having first argued why really, while some of your new ideas seem like weaker copies of some of the demos features so you presumably have an easier time. At least in your last post you brought up a short summary why you don't like the demo, thanks for that. I don't think most of your ideas are really bad, but I also don't want to waste my free time analyzing each and every idea someone brings up. Actually it would be more your task to argue for your ideas with a honest analysis of advantages and disadvantages. Ideas are like food recipes, everyone has dozens of them, but only a few are really good. Worse, ideas are recipes without quantities so someone assessing them has to do most of the real work himself. At a first impression I would say some of your ideas would not bring that much difference to the game **unless** they were actually bullet spongy. I could say a lot more, but I would need to write a few paragraphs to discuss every single idea of yours and its likely consequences. And then you would simply come back with "But I meant this zombie to have this additional characteristic I forgot to mention" and it would go into another round. Sorry, I have seen this too often.

You forget that it wasn't me that brought up the old "bullet sponge" complaint. The demos explosion has 3 effects: 1) You have a choice exploding him in a save distance if you spot him early enough and have a long range weapon (range is otherwise very useless in the game due to the limited distance that gets loaded). 2) It makes it more difficult hitting him without exploding him when you don't want to explode him. Give me a auto shottie or m60 and I can simply burst-kill any demo without explosion ability because I don't need to actually aim too carefully. Our group has seen lots and lots of demos exploding unwanted because we were not careful enough with shooting at him. Every other zombie in the game is killed easily with burst-shooting, the demo finally rewards players when they aim carefully. 3) The demo himself (depending on base design) seldom kills you. His most interesting effect is that he randomly "changes" your horde base, removing access ways and at worst thinning protective walls to you or opening new access ways for the normal zombies to go through. This tests the redundancy you might have built into your base or your own ability to react to changed circumstances. Ever built up your base so much that the zombies had no chance anymore? Some players like that, but usually it means even horde night gets boring. Only the demo explosion has the chance to mix that up again. Some of Rhinos ideas have some of the same effects, for example the kamikazes, but I really don't see why the kamikazes should be such a great idea and the demo the worst idea ever.

The demo without the explosion would be just what you deride, a bullet sponge. Kamikazes with low hps can just be targeted as priority and are easy cannon fodder unless just one of them has the same destruction potential as a demo and then what is the difference really? Same goes for driller zombie, just that you can easily shoot at him without having to fear the explosion.

They might be because you learn crafting compound bows before crafting compound crossbows (AFAIK)

Without demos later horde nights with everyone having best weapons would be boring as the zombies have no chance. So glad the absolute worst enemy design got added to the game 😉

You mean about Pluto being no planet? Yes, what a shame 😉

Sadly shadows (and reflections) eat FPS like crazy. I have a RX580 and I simply turn off shadows completely. May be momentarily a loss of quality, but in the long run you have way more fun with the game. I think the drop at 21:50 is because the sun goes down and the shadows of all trees, POIs, etc. get really really long

You are correct, but see it this way. If I said that Australia and New Zeeland are continents, wouldn't it be sensible to correct me on the wrong part even though the other part was correct?

No, someone invented it and departed that knowledge through books. Is it more believable that that lonely adventurer you play in the game learned his knowledge to build a drone from some books or that he invented practically 200 years of innovation all by himself in a few years? You were starting the argument that LBD would be more realistic. But it isn't, it is much easier to believe that the lone survivor in this game uses knowledge of the lost civilization than inventing all knowledge again by crafting and improving something a hundred times. The latter is frankly ridiculous. Nasa didn't build a moon rocket by starting with building stone axes, they started with all the knowledge from previous scientists they read in books and built up on that. I didn't dispute or even comment on that. And I agree, it can be done that way.

Strange. I got the knowledge to not eat brightly colored frogs or some specific mushrooms like a death cap from books. Note the guy who learned that death cap is poisonous likely didn't survive and could not learn from that knowledge. Only his surviving friends could and likely gave that knowledge to the young, first mouth to mouth, later through books.

You wouldn't even know what a drywall is without learning it from your peers. But that wasn't one person who crafted a musket a hundred times to learn how to build semi autos. Each generation learned weapon crafting knowledge from previous generations (through teachers and books) and from that base knowledge sprang new ideas, improvements and innovations. Do you know the phrase "standing on the shoulders of giants"? Every scientist will tell you that his innovation would have been impossible without the work of all his predecessors which he learned from teachers or books

Bobs Boars and Carls Corn Though I agree, there should be 2-3 more of those locations to make player explore. Not with superior loot, but similar to bobs boars with an item that you can't get elsewhere, for example recipes similar to the secret recipe of shamways.

1) You are correct about it being terribly balanced at the moment. The worst balance currently is for weapon magazines. 2) If you want to find more bow magazines you need to perk into bows (which will increase the chance to find them). Also hitting every gun shop you can find is beneficial (just like it is beneficial to loot hospitals if you are after medical magazines) 3) Don't forget that crafting is only one of three sources for almost everything. You can also find better bows in loot and you can buy them at the trader or get them as reward from the trader.