theFlu

I'm back in warehouse_06, testing the rest of the POI. I think some QA-eyes might be needed for the POI, I just don't have a clue what to report about it. @Laz Man? For now, having mostly tested the ground floor of the POI; the behaviour has repeated for everything except one heavy drinker at the far end of the ground floor. (As I described above in https://community.7daystodie.com/topic/27522-so-i-decided-to-track-sleeper-volumes-in-pois-and-how-many-are-ambushes/?do=findComment&comment=471522 ) Everything activates with my stealth meter at 1, and whenever they activate, none of them are "just active", they're all coming at me. (Goes against what faatal described above) (Then again, for all I know, could just be an issue with the stealth meter giving too little info at the low end. But I am looking at the Light: 3.3 in the debug info as well) I can drop agro in direct line of sight now. The condition? Give the zeds *actual* agro. Once an auto-agro zed is after you, pull out a torch, step out of stealth - let him see you. Put the torch away, step back into stealth, observe the zed lose you. This removes the 90 sec counter. Easily testable with walking zeds in the night. (This feels like a bug, but might be an obscure feature just as well) Sure, but in that case, the stealth meter is useless.

Because they're a real life feature that is made redundant by the crosshair in game. You wouldn't need them IRL if you had a similar crosshair. You might of course need to shoulder your weapon for stability and/or preserving your limbs, which would be the opposite to what is being proposed here, but it would basically work the same. The game gun blocks half your screen and your vision zooms in making close shots real hard. I think it also uses the zoomed-in-mouse setting, which is way too slow for close quarters. With a real weapon, you're able to look with both eyes, essentially seeing through the weapon. No zooming either .. That all said, the only weapons that would really need it in game are the rifle family. And with those, a folding stock and a fore grip and run&gun combined do turn one into a usable hip-firing tool. Add a laser dot for perfect shots.

Well, you can, but with the POI reset, you're not getting a huge advantage. Showing up at night, getting inside fast and killing fast with blocking doorways and such was what I was mostly thinking.

Oh right, I guess they'll have to cut a couple rows of inventory from all the vehicles.

As in, some burnt houses had "broken" blocks with an upgrade path to a relevant frame or a ramp? I think I upgraded some roof pieces in A20 like that, but it may well have changed a lot with the block system changes.

I've been messing around in a few POIs, warehouse_06 turned out to be a good spot to test out an attack volume. tppoi brings you to the front door, the volume of interest is the small break room in the opposite corner, the first zeds in the POI. The zeds in that room spawn in when I walk across the yellow line outside. They will agro 100% of the time when I sneak up the one block staircase towards their break room. Not even stealth level of 1 in the meter allows me to avoid agro. The zeds are showing light at about 3.3 at that point in the debug info. Once agroed, they sprint at me at full speed. With the task ApproachAndAttackTarget First I noticed I can drop their agro by doing a loop outside, leading them out, running a circle around them and then running back inside, crouching once back up in front of the break room. Takes less than 10 seconds, nowhere near a minute at least. Any faffing about can make them not drop agro, but the agro drop is quite repeatable. Can't say it isn't abusing line of sight, it probably is; but the 90 sec timer doesn't have time to count down. Then I just did a loop in the parking lot with both zeds coming in agroed, was able to drop agro from both on the flat parking lot 3/3 tries. It's quite a dance, but perfectly repeatable. No LoS abuse there. Additional info: A20.1 b6, navezgane, no relevant skills or gear, free use of sleeperreset and killall -commands. I haven't tested resetting the POI, changing the world or the save, so if any of those effect the spawns/mechanics/other_rng, I won't know. For my opinion of it... it feels a bit bad. They'll come at you regardless of your stealth display being at 1, and the way to avoid getting hit is a silly dance routine on a parking lot. I don't want the stealth gameplay to be popping sleepyheads, but this specific version is rather the opposite. The sleepyheads are popping you just for existing. EDIT_1: I did take out a light source or two at the entrance area, at least one above the door; so if one can't get to stealth 1 at the stairs, that might be the reason.

Your .rnd() is broken.

The good old pole is sort-of usable, but firmly on the inconvenient side. Zeds won't path on those, and you could make a criss-cross that is hard to fall through.. not something to regularly drive on though.

The noise-activated zeds seem to go with an "ApproachSpot", not "ApproachDistraction." Looks like they'll run to the spot first and then go after the distraction, but I should probably slow down my zeds to get a proper test, the timing for the throw is a little tight in the Crack-a-book ..

Butt naked, no skills. Wouldn't have the patience to dance for a minute.

Ehh, you've misread me, probably due to the term "Line of Sight" having taken its negative as its meaning. I was arguing - and doing - exactly what you call impossible. I've now cleared half of the Crack-a-book tower by: Showing myself to a zed Ensuring it goes into "ApproachAndAttackTarget" on the debug info Running away in the tight space offered Stealthing while the zed HAS line of sight to me. It loses agro if I manage to succeed the stealth check*. Doesn't need a block in between us, just a successful moment of stealth. The "stealth check" I refer to is the mechanic as Boid describes; zeds are always checking if they can detect you. If they can't, they stop chasing. Sleeper volumes may or may not have a separate check at entering, that I don't know.

In my testing the "AppoachAndAttackTarget" doesn't seem to survive a stealth check though? It's not necessarily easy to accomplish, but I can drop a Darlene while she has line of sight with just stealthing. Making the functional end result a current-stealth-check for both cases, no?

Turn on "Drop on Quit: everything". Not exactly the thing you want, since the pickup is way too easy, but at least it poses a little threat on a server.

Could you explain that part to me, like I'm five? Falls out of closet Runs to sound-origin Once there, attacks the player if player's current stealth isn't sufficient to prevent it Which is this, and what is the other? EDIT: I didn't see your latter para, I think you added it in after I opened. But honestly I still don't see the difference. What you describe there is dependent only on the question "does the zed see me currently" - which is a stealth check.

Well, you were lucky. Or hiding better

They time out and die after a few minutes. They also shouldn't just dig and dig, they're trying to get to a player. If you're not in the area, they shouldn't dig too much. Still a good idea to fill whatever they dug out, less surprises that way.

Perfectly normal, they spawn in the night in every stage of the game. A bit rough for newbies, but at least it makes the nights scary.

You have to react to either type by moving. Moving will drop agro. Wait, is that it - do you know that when an agroed zed no longer sees you, it will also drop the chase? Even stealth is sufficient for this, line of sight is more certain of course. Shoot a zed in the night, scoot 5-10 meters, watch the agroed zed run towards where you stood before and stand there. Even after taking a hit. I'm testing this right now - I just took a hit from a Feral Arlene (so definitely agroed), ran ahead of her for 10 meters and crouched right in front of her. Intuitively I was too close for her to stop, but she actually stopped her chase right in my face. At the pause menu showing AI as "Alert 4.90, canBrk, 1 Look, wait 1.6" A20.1 (b6)

Indeed, we agree, there's a technical difference. One that you can (possibly) see having the AI data displayed. Functional difference? in case one) zombie moving towards you, you need to move away or it attacks you. in case two) zombie moving towards you, you need to move away or it attacks you. After you've moved away, you sometimes find out that it doesn't follow you. That's a slight plus whenever it happens, you'll save 20 secs from your normal agro-dropping routine. Not exactly a functional difference though. And we're talking sleepers here, "ambush", remember. Testing the feature outdoors to see the difference... functional difference; the difference is so great that I can't test it in the environment I'm supposed to use it? I know I can throw rocks and gather a pile of zeds outdoors, but throwing rocks at heads of sleepers does very little. Mostly reduces the rock counter on my tool belt by one.

I don't really disagree with anything you've laid out there; I was just pointing out that it doesn't really make any difference to the experience whether a zed is walking to me or to the spot under my feet. You'll have to maneuver like you have agro anyway, unless you're willing to risk getting pummeled.

How much of a net loss in ammo should that situation be in your opinion? I'd say it should be balanced to the point where you need to be lucky to be able to flee...

There's talk of "wandering" vs "ambush" or some such.. I have an issue with describing something as "wandering" when it instantly breaks something that is clearly one-time use obstacle. If it's pretending to be a "patrol", have the behaviour limited to the ones who can activate without "breaking out." There's no suspension of disbelief sufficient for "it happens to break out from its hidy-hole exactly now" combined with "it happens to wander to the exact spot the player was when it broke" .. If the difference between "ambush" and "not ambush" in only seen in an aggro-tag only visible via DM, then ... distinction without difference.

I'll save the points unless I need it for something. I never end up needing it.

If someone was inclined to make a tiny modlet for it, while keeping the antibiotic effect of it. - remove the <use> from glass - add an item "panacea pill" - add a recipe for "panacea pill": 1 glass, crafted in inventory, Death upon <use>.

You can make a copy of the game to keep multiple versions; probably better to make the copy of the stable, since you might want to have the EXP updated. You'll have to run it from the exe of course, but it should work. There's always a chance of cross-corrupting stuff when doing such things, so, remember backups and whatnot.