TOX444 Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 My thought is why not have both types of Zombies. The ones that have been dead for a while use the old AI while the ones who are more recently deceased still may retain a little bit of valid grey matter that give them an edge. Or maybe different zombies follow different AI routines. Some fast, some slow, some climb, some dig, some go for doors, some ladders, some shortest distance between A and B. etc. etc. Mix it up a bit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JaxTeller718 Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I voted current because I like scary zombies and nothing's scarier than running upstairs into a house and having a few zeds follow me in. The 16 zombies were infuriatingly dumb and illogical. They ran in circles and often wouldn't even go after me if i ran in circles enough. I don't build ramp bases or cheese bases so none of the tactics people impose on themselves bother me. They are often NOT predictable to me at least. And I like it like that. The zombies are probably my most favorite aspect of 17. - - - Updated - - - This poll is so evenly split it is amazing. Bloodmoon behavior of A17 zombies really seems to be the sticking point for most people who hate A17 zombies. POI exploration seems to be held favorably thanks to the new A17 behavior. Most people are hoping for a mixture going forward and not wanting the fact that the zombies know where you are to be so blatant and obvious. Is it ok if I read this in John Madden's voice? I love John Madden Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gen-Eric Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I voted current because I like scary zombies and nothing's scarier than running upstairs into a house and having a few zeds follow me in. The 16 zombies were infuriatingly dumb and illogical. They ran in circles and often wouldn't even go after me if i ran in circles enough. I don't build ramp bases or cheese bases so none of the tactics people impose on themselves bother me. They are often NOT predictable to me at least. And I like it like that. The zombies are probably my most favorite aspect of 17. Is it ok if I read this in John Madden's voice? I love John Madden John Madden is a gift to Football and comedy. So many happy times regardless of how the teams were doing... "Well, when you're playing good football, it's good football and if you don't have good football, then you're not really playing good football." John Madden Src: https://www.azquotes.com/author/9268-John_Madden Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TargetPractice Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I can't pick either because I like for the Z's to have variant behaviors. Meaning that some Z's are "smarter" or have more functioning basic hunting instincts than others. Ideally, all Z's would have a variety of behaviors they could engage in, with certain types of Z's "weighted" towards one or more. For example, a wight would "prefer" to charge straight at me by the most direct and fastest route, breaking through minor obstacles, doors, even walls to get to me. But a wight could also "run with the pack" - join any other Z's nearby and hang with them, or occasionally take a "smart route". The hawaiian shirt Z might "prefer" to take a "smart route" - easiest/least hp route to get to my meaty bits, but occasionally charge straight in or run with the pack. Ms. blue-shirt-missing-part-of-skull might "prefer" to run with the pack, but will occasionally "lose focus and wander". Soldier Z's might "chain aggro" nearby Z's, causing them to be more likely to "run with the pack" - with the Soldier Z as the pack leader. But they will occasionally go AWOL - "lose focus and wander". The infected survivor might prefer to "run with the pack", but will stop and attack anything that injures him - with the player injuring him causing him to switch to charge straight at me until something else injures him. Give them variable times to chase the player before they "recheck" their behavior and you potentially have Z's that give up, beat on the nearest block a couple of times in frustration, then go join another Z for a while. While others continue the chase. All of that keeps the Z's fresh and interesting, since players will take along time to figure out what behavior a Z is likely to engage in (without checking the xml files - make this configurable). The random factor will keep me guessing. It also makes the Z's more dangerous in crowds, since I can't rely on them ALL following a consistent behavior pattern. That's the problem with both A16 and A17 style Z's - they're ALL easily predictable. So I guess the poll is missing an option for me - a mix of both, with extra behaviors thrown in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SnakeWildlife Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I'm heavily for the A16 AI, A17 totally kills the game for me to the point i dont want to play. What i would like to see is: In A17 style: -Keep the A17 AI code for the future-planned Humans. In A16 style: -A16 Hordes with direction of attack being from all 360' -More zombies on Horde nights. (dumb AI means more zeds using less cpu time) -Even more zombies on Horde nights. (we dont use Gore blocks or loot zombies anymore, so less cpu/lag even still, plus we have more types of traps to use in our arsenal) -Significant increase to wandering zombies (seriously theres nothing out there, we can walk around at night knowing we're totally safe, on busy servers you may not even see ANY wandering zombies at all) -A return of the random wandering hordes Tweaks to Zombies themselves: -Loot bags need to persist for longer or loot needs to be dished out to us in a different way. On horde nights the loot bags disappear before we can get to most of them, and if we run out to collect them, its usually suicide. On our last 7 day horde, over 80% of the loot bags, were unobtainable. -POI Sleeper zombies need to spawn corresponding to the AGE of the player, not the amount of days that have gone by in the server. New players on servers which are over 100 days find they just keep getting instantly screwed by the glowing ferals which spawn and shred any new player over and over before they are able to level up and be actually able to deal with them. On a side note: -Please lower intelligence required for Forge to 2, default 4 is too high. Currently, it feels like im playing a zombie game, that doesnt have zombies..morelike, supermutants with superpowers and gps, and barely any zombies spawn at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meganoth Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 This poll is missing an option "I want world peace and the neighbor's dog to shut up". Please add this or I can't really vote. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Fun Pimp Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Not sure why a poll was needed for a self evident thing like this. A16 lacked challenge, zombies spun in circles stuck on small world details, you could avoid zombies on a the smallest safe place 2-3 meters up, you could cheese the game digging underground. If the game is too difficult you can always turn down the difficulty a lot of ways never run, novice difficulty. If we can't get zombie AI good we can't do human bandit enemies so the debate is really moot. Cheers Richard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crazywildfire Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 fixed Thanks Richard for the explanation. I just woke up so not fully awake but am I missing something or did you mean to say A16 and not A17? Maybe I'm miss reading it will look again in a few. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
giltirn Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Not sure why a poll was needed for a self evident thing like this. A16 lacked challenge, zombies spun in circles stuck on small world details, you could avoid zombies on a the smallest safe place 2-3 meters up, you could cheese the game digging underground. If the game is too difficult you can always turn down the difficulty a lot of ways never run, novice difficulty. If we can't get zombie AI good we can't do human bandit enemies so the debate is really moot. Cheers Richard With all due respect Richard, it's not that the new zombie AI is too difficult; plenty of people have demonstrated ways to cheese this AI just as badly as that of A16. The problem is their behavior in itself. Zombies should not be master structural engineers, piling onto a single weak spot in your base in a completely robotic fashion. They should not avoid traps. This AI makes base building extremely boring and wipes out any element of creativity in base design. While I'm sure I could load up on guns and endlessly plink into a conga line of jackhammer-wielding robots it is *boring*. It's unintuitive. It's unbelievable. Please remember that these are zombies and should behave like zombies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roland Posted January 5, 2019 Author Share Posted January 5, 2019 With all due respect Richard, it's not that the new zombie AI is too difficult; plenty of people have demonstrated ways to cheese this AI just as badly as that of A16. The problem is their behavior in itself. Zombies should not be master structural engineers, piling onto a single weak spot in your base in a completely robotic fashion. They should not avoid traps. This AI makes base building extremely boring and wipes out any element of creativity in base design. While I'm sure I could load up on guns and endlessly plink into a conga line of jackhammer-wielding robots it is *boring*. It's unintuitive. It's unbelievable. Please remember that these are zombies and should behave like zombies. With all due respect, if you read what he posted you will see that he is saying that they are getting ready for bandits with the AI improvements. It is easy to restrict smart AI and make entities behave stupidly but it is impossible to enhance dumb AI to make entities behave intelligently. The A16 code could not have handled bandits but the A17 code will be able to handle bandits and zombies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
giltirn Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 With all due respect, if you read what he posted you will see that he is saying that they are getting ready for bandits with the AI improvements. It is easy to restrict smart AI and make entities behave stupidly but it is impossible to enhance dumb AI to make entities behave intelligently. The A16 code could not have handled bandits but the A17 code will be able to handle bandits and zombies. I read what he posted and its clear that he feels the A17 zombie AI is good as it currently stands because it fixes the exploits and if we are losers we can turn the difficulty down to carebear mode. I honestly don't understand how you can read this whole thread and think that people just want to simply revert to the A16 AI *code*. What they want is for the zombies to *behave* more like they did in A16, spreading out around your base, being damaged by traps, acting more believably zombie-like. If you say this is in the works then surely having one of the devs come onto this thread and explain what their plans are rather than just "git gud" would go a long way to calming people's nerves? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roland Posted January 5, 2019 Author Share Posted January 5, 2019 I read what he posted and its clear that he feels the A17 zombie AI is good as it currently stands because it fixes the exploits and if we are losers we can turn the difficulty down to carebear mode. I honestly don't understand how you can read this whole thread and think that people just want to simply revert to the A16 AI *code*. What they want is for the zombies to *behave* more like they did in A16, spreading out around your base, being damaged by traps, acting more believably zombie-like. If you say this is in the works then surely having one of the devs come onto this thread and explain what their plans are rather than just "git gud" would go a long way to calming people's nerves? You got too angry after taking what he typed in the first paragraph as an insult and you didn’t put it into context of the last line. He didn’t even use the words “Loser” and “Carebear”. That was you. If you look at the last line it is clear that he is telling us that bandits are coming and need the better code of A17. You can’t talk about zombie behavior without talking about the code that drives it. Behavior of zombies doesn’t just spring from nothing. Faatal isn’t convincing them to behave a certain way. Whether the people in this thread understand that or not is immaterial. The old code can’t do smart bandits and dumb zombies but the new code can. That’s good news. Faatal has posted a number of times that he will be able to randomize and dumbify things for the zombies as time goes on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gen-Eric Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I read what he posted and its clear that he feels the A17 zombie AI is good as it currently stands because it fixes the exploits and if we are losers we can turn the difficulty down to carebear mode. I honestly don't understand how you can read this whole thread and think that people just want to simply revert to the A16 AI *code*. What they want is for the zombies to *behave* more like they did in A16, spreading out around your base, being damaged by traps, acting more believably zombie-like. If you say this is in the works then surely having one of the devs come onto this thread and explain what their plans are rather than just "git gud" would go a long way to calming people's nerves? I agree. If that's what was intended as his main point then he would have said something to that effect and not a single throw away sentence to support his main point after... 1) Stating the answer to the question posed which has been greeted by the participants with a near 50/50 split is self-evident and a waste of time. (Debate is moot etc.) 2) Cherry pick a few reasons why A16 was failing to meet expectations. (Even though I do not recall anyone in the discussion espousing the virtues of those flaws and instead why A17 AI is perceived as less engaging and fun. As you said yourself with the fact this discussion identified Blood Moons as being the only real point of contention for the two systems.) 3) Insert a git gud or turn the difficulty down. (Okay... Kind of off topic and out of no where but thanks for the meme.) Even if this was their goal stating such during A17 launch/teasing would have been a great step towards setting player expectations. I wish TFP communication in this regard was anywhere near The Indie Stone or Unknown Worlds. Both set a high bar in communicating the goal, status and intention for ongoing indie early access development studios. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roland Posted January 5, 2019 Author Share Posted January 5, 2019 Fine. But now it has been clarified for you so take the good news and drop being butt hurt over any unintended blow to your gamer ego. I can assure you that Richard did not mean what he posted as a passive aggressive zinger. He was literally being helpful with some suggestions. I’ll reiterate what he said: While zombies are being used to perfect the pathing and AI in anticipation of bandits you may: Play with them as is Turn down the difficulty Make them always walk Revert to A16.4 Use any mod that helps you enjoy them better. Currently, the AI is a work zone and really the very epitome of early access gaming. Some people can’t enjoy unfinished features but they buy indev games anyway. In this particular case the above options may help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JaxTeller718 Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Jesus even I understood what he was saying. If zombie AI is not good, bandit Ai is not coming. What is so difficult about that. This time I feel people really ARE making a mountain out of a molehill. Richard could have just NOT posted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilverWolf Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Faatal has posted a number of times that he will be able to randomize and dumbify things for the zombies as time goes on. Wouldn't randomizing AI behaviour hit performance, especially in larger number of zombies/bandits etc, due to different simultaneous calculations? Sorry about this if it's off-topic, but I'm indeed curious(professional habbit) how it was/is going to be handled, so any link to that topic would be aprreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RestInPieces Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Wouldn't randomizing AI behaviour hit performance, especially in larger number of zombies/bandits etc, due to different simultaneous calculations? Sorry about this if it's off-topic, but I'm indeed curious(professional habbit) how it was/is going to be handled, so any link to that topic would be aprreciated. I don't think it would have any impact on performance. Game still needs to run the script for each zombie, I don't see how each zombie being assigned a script with a different AI profile would be a problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anabella Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I do prefer the AI better in a17. My only issues with zombies at the moment is the bonus buff they get to damaging blocks when the group up and the fact that game stages are getting me ferals and rads way sooner than I am personally ready for them. Makes looting POIs a pain with one to two people. Part of that might be that I am getting stunned and bleed constantly. There might be things I can put points in to help that but there are too many things that need points and too little points per level to do it if that is the case. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gpcstargate Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Pre Alpha 17 .. should be correct .. DUE to they are DEAD Beings and only purpose is Feeding. Not path finding computers that can pin point the weakest spot on a Base. OK .. if they want them to be a little smarter than average Dead person _ because of it being a game .... But at the moment they are to smart. Just my thoughts on that subject ... Personally I just want them fix the game .. it is so messed up (RGW) at the moment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
giltirn Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 Fine. But now it has been clarified for you so take the good news and drop being butt hurt over any unintended blow to your gamer ego. I can assure you that Richard did not mean what he posted as a passive aggressive zinger. He was literally being helpful with some suggestions. I’ll reiterate what he said: While zombies are being used to perfect the pathing and AI in anticipation of bandits you may: Play with them as is Turn down the difficulty Make them always walk Revert to A16.4 Use any mod that helps you enjoy them better. Currently, the AI is a work zone and really the very epitome of early access gaming. Some people can’t enjoy unfinished features but they buy indev games anyway. In this particular case the above options may help. For a moderator your posts are awfully aggressive (or defensive). "Butt hurt", "gamer ego" - nice. Regardless, I understand that early access means unfinished features, and my desire is simply for the devs to hear my concerns with the current situation and suggestions for improvement. If it is indeed recognized by the devs that the new zombie behavior is undesirable and that steps are underway to improve it, I will simply wait for an update. There doesn't seem to be much value continuing to wade through this morass of misconceptions and ad hominem attacks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hek Harris Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 For a moderator your posts are awfully aggressive (or defensive). "Butt hurt", "gamer ego" - nice. Hey survivor, assign some skill points to hard skin perk. These lands are hard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roland Posted January 5, 2019 Author Share Posted January 5, 2019 For a moderator your posts are awfully aggressive (or defensive). "Butt hurt", "gamer ego" - nice. Regardless, I understand that early access means unfinished features, and my desire is simply for the devs to hear my concerns with the current situation and suggestions for improvement. If it is indeed recognized by the devs that the new zombie behavior is undesirable and that steps are underway to improve it, I will simply wait for an update. There doesn't seem to be much value continuing to wade through this morass of misconceptions and ad hominem attacks. I'm glad it is clarified for you and I apologize for those parts that felt offensive to you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Fun Pimp Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 With all due respect Richard, it's not that the new zombie AI is too difficult; plenty of people have demonstrated ways to cheese this AI just as badly as that of A16. The problem is their behavior in itself. Zombies should not be master structural engineers, piling onto a single weak spot in your base in a completely robotic fashion. They should not avoid traps. This AI makes base building extremely boring and wipes out any element of creativity in base design. While I'm sure I could load up on guns and endlessly plink into a conga line of jackhammer-wielding robots it is *boring*. It's unintuitive. It's unbelievable. Please remember that these are zombies and should behave like zombies. Didn't mean to offend or incite anyone. Its easy to make the AI more random or a traditional dumb zombie but its harder to make them smarter and more challenging which has been requested for at least 3 years. Most people want us to close the exploits. At the end of the day its a game and we want to make it fun and a game without challenge is a game that is no longer fun. We have and will continue to attempt to make the game scalable to a wide audience with game options to tweak the simulation. Even then its impossible to please everyone. It's entirely possible in future builds we scale back the zombies and leave the smarter bits for the bandits but only after we get them really great challenge wise. For the record zombies have been climbing ladders since like Alpha 1 and bee-lining too you on blood moons and nobody complained about this Cheers Richard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crossed Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 For the record zombies have been climbing ladders since like Alpha 1 and bee-lining too you on blood moons and nobody complained about this Wasn't like every night blood moon back then? I haven't been around, I just watched older let's plays. Also zombies used to always run inside (dark?) buildings and slowed down when they got into the light? I'd love to see that mechanic again, having to remove the barricade from windows just to light up a room and make it safer... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Varg Posted January 5, 2019 Share Posted January 5, 2019 I (long time lurker) created an account just for this poll, as i am very confused right now. My vote goes to post-A17 behavior, but only because I don't need to gather as many resources as in A16 to repair everything after a blood moon night. My confusion stems from the fact that most of you are repeating yourself that the AI is harder / better. A friend of mine is no fan of cheesing the zombies and refused to build a design involving any looping zombies. So we went ahead to build a "+" shaped bunker. It has a single flagstone column in its centre with ladders on all 4 sides leading to the second floor with normal wooden hatches ontop in case they break in. Guess what? They made a single point of entry in the outer wall as expected, but the AI failed shortly after that. With all of us on the second floor the zombies were unable to find their way up. Only after opening the hatches they were in the mood to come upstairs. Closing the hatch again would make them run around in circles again on the first floor, just like their A16 counterparts with a bit more jumping. Not only did they run in circles but it didn't take long for them to destroy the central column with their only legit way up to us. The result was a totally safe night with us shooting down on them. It was a let down for my friend who was so eager to fight them, only to let the AI cheese itself. Are they really doing that much better then before? At least they seem to better navigate POIs. I hope faatal can tweak it once he has the time for it, as of right now it wasn't the best experience. Anyway, thanks for this game and the many hours of enjoyment nonetheless! But i had to use this Poll for feedback Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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