[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

Very few shooter games are even close to realistic.

To get that "rock steady" sight picture that are in most shooters you need to be prone and use the gun's sling in various ways.

Then you use your breathing to make the fine aiming adjustments.

 

So, who wants that in a game??

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

With the number of players online almost hitting 100K at one time, I don't think TFP will be in a hurry to change anything but obvious bugs.

 

And rightly so, TFP are on to something. 

 

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

21 hours ago, Roland said:

You of all people want a bear rug?!?  Next you’ll be asking for a deflated blimp to drape across your wall. Oh the betrayal…

 

Hey, I got you a charm bracelet made out of authentic zip line!

Trader Rekt would never lie about an expensive keepsake. 

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

Once the bear rug at Joel's place is craft able, I'd say 7D2D went Gold!

 

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

2 hours ago, Dreyseth said:

 

Perhaps outside the scope of the current game, but maybe one system that could help with trader "availability balancing" would be if a demand economy were further simulated.

 

Could be as simple as having a higher price at the trader for initial availability of an item, but the price drops an amount each day until sold.

 

 

Oh, I like that a LOT!

The game could have a low end price to simulate other survivors buying the bargain priced items.

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

Using the steam popular charts, 7D2D has never been a better game.

Also, I'm pretty sure that TFP will have enough money to finalize their vision of a perfected 7D2D and roll into a Part2 or something altogether new.

 

A21 is better than A20 IMO, but something is not quite right yet (IMO) and I think people have been hitting around the edges of the problem.

Maybe I need to wait for a slightly more balanced release of A21.

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

Well at least one thing that I thought was completely goofy has been partially resolved!

The 7D2D "Fungus Guy" (aka The Last of Us fungus) is now a scientific possibility!

I never thought I'd see that day where a fungus can infect a person internally.  (Look up Desert Fungus, it's a cleaver girl)

The even more strange thing is the fungus has spread to parts of the wheat belt area and isn't that the premise of the start of The Last of Us?  (Infecting the wheat?)

 

What a great yet a bit scary time to be alive!

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

27 minutes ago, zztong said:

I have a question about HEAT. Do zombies home in and target sources of HEAT? That is, if you leave a source of HEAT in the open, will the zombies attack it if they cannot find the player?

 

I've known HEAT wasn't actually heat for some time, so I don't mind the Dew Collector addition, though I wasn't expecting it. Given the response, I'm wondering if anyone has considered HEAT from Farming Plots and Writable Storage Boxes. 😅

 

Best to be fair and make any player made blocks generate heat...

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

The last thing TFP want is ending up making another "Stardew Valley".  They want action, survival and a fight for your very life!

SO, you get Zombies that teleport behind you, fall from unreachable ceilings and from many other odd or even inconceivable locations.

Is that over the top? Maybe, but horde nights don't have anything that's like this.

 

I've thought how TFP could make Horde Nights great again!

1) Make teams of normal zombies that are truly mindless, following one stronger, "structural engineer" big brain zombie!

2) If the Big brain zombie is destroyed, then they just attack the nearest (non zombie?) thing until the red light of Horde Night is gone.

3) This might reduce the CPU burden (only a few path calculations) and make Horde Night not as simple as it is now.   You could have larger Hordes most likely.

 

4 minutes ago, Kalex said:

Blood moon in the newest build (on dedi): We have been seeing a lot of zombies ignoring a clear path to us, going into destroy area mode and NOT ever coming out if it even when doing them damage.

 

Is this recent?  I haven't seen that a few days ago (now waiting on stable).

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

37 minutes ago, zztong said:

 

I've thought about this variant a few times. I thought "7 Days to Live" as a prequel. The world starts out with vague reports of zombies and the player is one of the very few who starts to take it serious. There are reasons to engage with civilization -- buy things -- but civilization is also the source of disease and going through checkpoints is going to eat up your time. Civilization devolves into panic, looting, then the mass of infected, the mass of zombies, a military response ... and if you live, launch 7D2D.

 

I doubt it would be a voxel/blocks game though.

 

 

What the player does in the 7 days to prepare would be critical.

Also, starting wealth and residence location would be a difficulty setting, all the way up to being homeless!

Occupation could be important in helping the player survive.  Some occupations have more survival nature to them, but I can see driving a bus could be a big deal.

 

Yeah, no voxels for sure.

There should be enough natural choke points and evasive methods the player could use anyway.

Boats would be the easiest evasive method except for getting water.

The upper floors of some high buildings have pros and cons.

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

2 hours ago, hiemfire said:

"The city's land area is estimated to be 321 square miles (830 km2).[2] However, a more recent estimate calculates a total land area of 304.8 square miles (789.4 square kilometres)"

 

Perfect!

By the time Part2 is ready, our great-great grandchildren would approve.

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

1 minute ago, Roland said:

 

This would be a very clever ending/beginning from the original game to the sequel. Starting the game from one of the rooms in Navezgane hospital is a pretty fun challenge and would be an awesome way to start the sequel.

 

Maybe a greatly expanded Navazgane, but I was thinking that the player could:

1) Start in the New York area (included the airport to indicate the scale)

2) Start in a hospital and the zombie apocalypse has:

A) Just started.

B) Will start in 7 days (Giving the player time to prepare). 

C) A nod to the start of "The walking Dead" or "28 Days Later".

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

If Zombies are supposed to be dead, then how does blood gush out a corpse when damaged(re-killed)?

 

Nope, the "zombies" are alive (probably 50% modified rabies virus and 50% demonic force straight from hell...)

That or we are back to the "having a bad coma dream", waiting on part 2 to start.

 

I'm with the "bad coma dream" for two reasons. 

1) It fits.  (Too many anti-logical things to list)

2) It adds a great plot vehicle into an expanded world that will be a part 2 when the player wakes up.

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

As I use to say: Guns don't kill people... it's the bullets.

So, pipe weapon would most likely do less damage as the pipe would rarely have an exact 7.62mm opening.  That would give less energy to the bullet and hence, do less damage.

 

For the modern weapons, the barrels condition would play the part in damage (probably a small part however).

 

 

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

8 hours ago, ScipioAsmodean said:

 

The only problem we have with Alpha 21 is this. So simply waiting is the solution? Is the source of the problem already known? (e.g. high percentage of hills/Mountains?)

 

I have built maps with no hills or mountains, and it hangs for maybe a couple minutes at 84% on road smoothing.

[What was the point of the water change?]

I am not 100% satisfied with the current water system.

The difference for me compared to others that just complain is I change some things and see if I like things more or less.

 

1) Adding more skill points at the start let me progress faster through the POI-Trader chain and find more water or money to buy water.

The downside is it might damage mid/late game enjoyment by making things too easy.

 

2) Heading to the desert is probably the best once you can make first aid bandages (your almost unkillable), if you find a water source.  Just save vitamins and/or goldenrod tea.  

Drink your fill of dirt water and top off your health when it gets low with the first aid bandages which you should eventually have stacks of.

 

3) A more indirect approach is to make a map that is conducive to many large towns (No hills or mountains and nothing but "Many" set to towns everything else "None").

This should ensure that abundant sources of loot can be found.

 

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

IMO, A21 will steal a portion of the Project Zomboid population as 7D2D now has an edge to it.

I've died twice so far and both times I got shredded by my own carelessness and A20 thinking.

 

I dodged a pack of 5-6 zombie dogs on day 3 or 4 and came back later and killed all that were still in the area.  That was probably careless too... and I would do it again!

Great, great game!

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

I finally solved my problem I had at not simply getting the water from the side of the roads:  I built an entire map that's desert!

NOW, the water condensers make sense, and I can believe that aspect!

I called the map Arrakis. 

 

Much better!

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

Well, I'll be dang!

 

One of my hypothetical 7D2D part2 ideas was made into "Walking Dead: Dead City. TV series!

Including Ziplines!

The player was to start out on the Jersy side of the Lincoln tunnel, but the TV show skipped all that and they just rode a boat over.

 

My version also had the "Emperor" of NYC lived in the upper floors of the Empire state building and freedom fighters were based in the Statue of liberty Island.

The higher you lived from the zombies at ground level the more important you were.

We'll see how those turn out.  But so far, I must say its looking pretty good!

Nobody gave me any money.  God bless America! 

 

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

17 minutes ago, Ralathar44 said:

That is definitely not the case.  Farming is still quite powerful.  People not spending points on it are not finding forge books or vehicle books as fast as they want.  Harvesting tools and salvage tools fall way behind, etc.

And, playing devil's advocate on my own argument just now, lets say your hunter gathered have all the magazines they need for everything somehow without and perk points put in.  What you say is still not accurate.  Advanced Engineering, Miner69er, Huntsman, Salvage Operations, Living Off the Land, etc.  These bonuses are huge.  Even if you have the same tools you cannot hope to match their returns.  You'll be spending 3 hours to do what they do in 1 assuming infinite resources to harvest.  And in many cases with limited resources like seeds/cars/etc your resources will be limited and you'll just get a fraction of their returns.

Not to mention that every minute you're doing those tasks you're not hunter/gathering are ya? :P.

 

Farming a 10x10 plot area takes 5 minutes.  This is too trivial for one person to do.

Horde base buildings are now compact and that would take a few days and then its done.

A day-to-day base can be almost any POI with minor modifications.

 

But you do you and I support you following your dreams.

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

1 hour ago, Laz Man said:

 

Hmm, perhaps the solution is to give those who enjoy hanging out at the base more fun activities to engage in while they wait for the mags to arrive from the looters...🤔

 

 

 

 

Yeah, it an extremely focused game style now (Loot and loot some more, as fast as you can).

There is little room/need for "support" people as the "Hunter/gatherers can learn everything they need.

 

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

1 hour ago, meganoth said:

Hey everyone: There is a poll here:  https://community.7daystodie.com/topic/32143-poll-which-progression-system-did-you-prefer/

 

Please take a few seconds and vote.

 

 

 

 

Not unexpected results. 

If you get rid of some exploits and balance it a bit more, LBD could be the best.

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

 

So, after experimentation you can ignore water for several days with the (Vitamin + Dirty Water + 5 first aid bandages) in the desert very easy as I have Jen in the desert, it's totally broken.  

 

I plan on stopping that horrible exploit... Soon! 

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

1 hour ago, RipClaw said:

Just a quick note on this. In A21, the game stage depends on the biome you are in. So you will encounter feral zombies much earlier in the desert and the hordes are much harder.

 

 

I'm aware of that and in theory that should be true.  I'm only playing 1 level above default dificulty and its day 5, so things are pretty easy still.

 

As the forest is within sight, I could end up making my horde base outside as looting POI's is GOOD in the desert!

I now have 4 stacks of first aid bandages and will try my binging dirty water until I used up 2 stacks of the first aid bandages.  Once I need water that is (I only have 4 vitamins left).

 

I dumped my spear build as (I had hoped otherwise) the club is still overpowered.  

Having a few ranged weapons is aways a good idea and (of course) the strength's shotgun (even my pipe one) is brutal when you "line up" the zeds. (AND the meta horde base is perfect for shotguns (with some minor changes).

[Alpha 21 Dev Diary]

3 minutes ago, meganoth said:

 

Drinking murky water will damage you, the vitamin is only preventing the dysentery.

 

You should have a first aid kit with you when you do this

 

Ahh!  Thanks!

 

Well, the desert provides with piles of Aloe cream!  So, I guess I could have 200 water in overflow and live, if done carefully.