Alpha 18 feedback and balancing thread

[madmole]

No, I don't. The fact of the matter is most players will boot up a game and go "Oh look how pretty the stuff in the distance is!" and that's it. After that, they don't care because it's just background. It's not in the fore-front where all the action is. And that's why I don't notice it. We're playing an FPS game where what's in front of you matters more than the pretty stuff at the back.

 

And THAT is why it's an unacceptable performance loss.

 

As for the other stuff, okay, you made a decision. Good for you. It's still wrong, especially when you outright said folks COULD mod the farming back in when there were complaints about the hoe being removed.

 

Fact of the matter is, no it can't with microsplat because it always changes the ground to whatever the topsoil of the biome is, so you have no idea if it's been hoe'd or not.

 

I would stop being stubborn on features you add/remove for once... just once... please. Because you're turning a game with a lot of promise into a looter/shooter, which i'm pretty sure most players did NOT sign up for when they saw "survival crafting game."

 

Dirt is a placeable block, if people can't get that to hoe then they are doing it wrong.

[n2n1]

I think your missing the purpose here. The prefab is placed afterwards but the ground is placed then the spot customised itself using this to be able to allow a prefab to spawn on it.

But then, why just not to give for all blocks on a flatness spot - full density, that would prefab not hovered in the air.

How can these non-smoothed corners on the edges of the place help the case?

(maybe we're talking about different types of prefab levitation...)

[madmole]

I finally gathered enough steel to make a tier 3 m60, I was so happy! And then when I went to make it I realised because I'd upped my skill in machine guns I actually couldn't afford to make an m60 because now I can only make tier 4 machine guns... and the tier 4 m60 cost 30 more steel than the tier 3.

 

Can we have tier crafting options please? I'd rather have a tier 3 m60 than no m60 at all...

 

Maybe, it might add an uneeded complexity. What is a better design, static recipe amounts or ones that inflate? I like inflation because it keeps the market sane.

[madmole]

a common problem on servers is one person doing a POI Quest and someone else walking in and looting the place while you are doing the quest. is there a way to lock the quest to the player or party until success of fail?

 

Why is that a problem? Ask them to leave, and if not, let the shooting begin. Let the players have dynamics like that, if there was a force field keeping them out it would feel less immersive, and what if they were being a good Samaritan to help? What if you had a buddy who you asked for help because you were in over your head? The less control we shove down people's throats the better IMO.

[madmole]

Thanks for answering with more information and not taking this stuff personally.

I need to work on that. I think too much forum time gets to me one rotten egg at a time lol.

[madmole]

are knives getting buffed?

It seems like theres no feedback for bleed, and even if there was I don't think it does enough damage.

 

I think Gazz was going to make some tweaks, so every knife hit causes bleed... so if every shot does it, you don't need special feedback.

 

(It already is on 18.2 / experimental - Gazz)

[madmole]

The only feedback is audible. Nothing visual. All they have to do is slap a particle effect on the buff and it's good to go. I know there are a couple mods that have added it, myself and moongaming are the two most recent but I'm sure there's more. Check out the Mods section until TFP fix it worst case.

 

Lots of particles that look good take time to develop and consider knives an experiment at this point. We might change them completely so doing special particles would be a waste of time right now. Once knives feel right we'll task some improvements on them such as particles, sounds, etc.

[madmole]

@Madmole

 

Gun distant sound.

What happen to the sound of distant gun shots that was in A17?

Now its just the generic sound of the weapons regardless of distance heard from. The distant gun shot sound affects in A17 was amazing and helped a lot with immersion........

 

Should be working, can you try it on every gun? Maybe new ones were forgotten? Which gun doesn't have a distant gun shot sound?

[madmole]

The current system also promotes min/maxing imo, the important perks are mostly in Str and Fort, so Many people get those decently high early, str to 7 for miner 69'er/motherload, and shotgun is awesome in a18.2, fort is all about heavy armor, healing factor, and the Machine gun skill. The other perk lines IMO don't really offer anything i'd personally consider a must have. I like knives, but I can't really bother with agi, for just knives, as str/fort (a bit less than str though) has too many useful perks so I just go sledge or clubs.

 

There is truth to this, we'll add more value to other perk trees so the decision is harder perhaps. But with an auger you don't need mining, it depends if you want it early game with primitive tools or not. Heavy armor perks don't do much IMO a good athletic jacket and mods feel more valuable than the armor perks IMO, unless you craft it. We havne't got sniping with a rifle or rockets to a great state yet. I think when there are bandits like the gunners in Fallout 4, the perception build will really come into fruition IMO. Sniping at a great distance can be a lot of fun, especially combined with stealth if done right.

 

Even now you can't snipe more than one zed, that will get fixed. I want it so that if you have a silenced weapon or bow you can score multiple sneak shots (doing sneak damage) before they know where you are for sure. Like they will look around and move generally closer to you, but not know for sure where you are and sneak damage will still apply. This will make rifles and stealth much more appealing IMO.

[madmole]

Yeah Tree quality affects all LOD settings on blocks but also on zombies. I am not sure they can set this specifically for trees or not, but there are a lot of objects that have very poorly set LODs and even on high settings appear to pop in when you are really close (like the food piles, the new utility carts, tilt trucks etc).

 

Should be renamed LOD Quality I am guessing.

[faatal]

Madmole, the game freezes way too often even more so in A18.2

 

I kept thinking how I needed more ram for this game until I tried to open the console to test a few commands when this appeared in multiple lines

 

"detail rendering shaders not found for the active render pipeline falling back to default shader"

 

I've searched it and it appears it is a VERY serious Unity issue. You need to check it out.

 

That is simply Unity saying the default terrain shaders are missing. We don't use the default terrain shaders, so it does nothing bad that I can see. Unity changed that in a newer version, so it auto includes those shaders and the message won't happen, so when we update Unity, no more message.

[faatal]

I use wood clubs. They are cheap and extremely powerful if you invest in them. With the bonuses they can be brutal. Eventually I switch to bats though. Sledges are beasts but too slow for my taste both in handling and moving with them. Knifes are awesome as they have an extremely high chance of making stuff bleed and you can power beat 3 times in the time it takes for other weapons to do 1 PA. Their only drawback is the range and the fact that in each bleed the enemy recalculates its rage.

 

Knuckles are too close and personal to be any good in crowd control, but they certainly are a lot of fun.

 

Rage percent from a bleed tick are only 10% of the normal rage percent.

[madmole]

Question for Faatal and Madmole. I put it in the video because I couldnt word it properly and an example would make it clearer.

I will take the vid down after i get a response from you guys.

 

https://youtu.be/Rc_RpAAdHes

 

Thanks, we'll have testing look into it.

[Chairkicker]

Maybe that wall safe is a full meter long

 

Doesn't this game have an AKS? That has a folding stock, and so would prob fit.

[KhaineGB]

Dirt is a placeable block, if people can't get that to hoe then they are doing it wrong.

 

I'll have to re-test that, but the last time I tried it, it just looked like the topsoil of the biome.

 

It's especially noticable if you grab some dirt from the creative menu, put it on the road and then try to hoe it. Just stayed looking like asphalt.

[madmole]

My god this is sad. If this is the best knife/spear build, hitting and running and climbing, how does the average build look like? He barely uses spears because they can't kill anything.

"I can't deal with two guys,one guy is too much"

 

I can do the same with a stone sledgehammer (preferably iron sledgehammer because it actually deals damage) . Zombies get stunned and I can headshot them when they are down. He also never becomes encumbered because that's it means death in higher difficulties.

 

The only different thing I somewhat knew but didn't realise is power attacking with knives instantly stuns zombies? while I can't stun zombies 100% of the time when I use sledgehammers.

 

Yeah knives are mediocre and spears are garbage alright, thanks for clarifying it.

 

So don't use them. I'm not a conjuration guy in Skyrim, I like to do my fighting myself and not minions. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it is broken or bad, it's just not your thing. Not all combat is going to be equal, it matches and offsets their other strengths. A blade guy might not be as nasty as a sledge guy, but he will be able to one shot quietly with sneak damage, where the bulky sledge steel armor guy can't get close and his death blow will wake up the whole POI if he does. In skyrim you can get 30x sneak damage as an assassin with knives wearing DB armor. But if you fail, they do a pathetic amount of damage to an alert opponent so you might have to run and let them go back to sleep before you try again. Its fun though, the risk reward is very high.

[madmole]

How was your holiday Joel? Hope you enjoyed yourself. Did you eat a whole turkey?

 

It was good, thank you. I had some help. I hope yours was good!

[TSBX]

So don't use them. I'm not a conjuration guy in Skyrim, I like to do my fighting myself and not minions. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it is broken or bad, it's just not your thing. Not all combat is going to be equal, it matches and offsets their other strengths. A blade guy might not be as nasty as a sledge guy, but he will be able to one shot quietly with sneak damage, where the bulky sledge steel armor guy can't get close and his death blow will wake up the whole POI if he does. In skyrim you can get 30x sneak damage as an assassin with knives wearing DB armor. But if you fail, they do a pathetic amount of damage to an alert opponent so you might have to run and let them go back to sleep before you try again. Its fun though, the risk reward is very high.

 

Don't expend all of your positive energy your time off has built for you.

 

Spears COULD use some work, in the form of a base bleed chance of 2-5% based on material tier for instance, and adding perkDeepCuts. Doesn't do a ton of alpha damage, but allows for an agile "stick and move" style of gameplay. Maybe add some AOE or Penetration effects to later levels of Javelin Master and you've got a nice tree there.

[madmole]

Doesn't this game have an AKS? That has a folding stock, and so would prob fit.

 

Given that we can pull 4x4 trucks out of our backpack immersive safe sizes are low on the totem pole of priorities.

[madmole]

I'll have to re-test that, but the last time I tried it, it just looked like the topsoil of the biome.

 

It's especially noticable if you grab some dirt from the creative menu, put it on the road and then try to hoe it. Just stayed looking like asphalt.

 

I thought dirt was a block you can place, but I could be wrong. I think level design uses them for little farm plots and stuff at POIs.

[Scyris]

lmao. uhm... need better structural support? SI is a pita? or was that a horde wrecking crew?

 

I hate the SI system, if something is going to collapse ONLY the most recently placed block should fall, not the entire part, or worse what usually happens, is the entire structure mostly falls apart due to ONE block being over the tolerance in 1 section of the base. Made a 3 floor tower-style base, was building the roof, I put 1 wood frame to many, not only did the entire roof come down, but it somehow took down the other 2 floors below it, even though they were completly stable until then. If only the most recent block would fall it would notify the player they need a support there, and not nullify everything else they built when it all comes down due to the 1 block over tolerance.

 

Because of this in a16 I mostly build my base underground, however in a17 and a18 zombies now dig, so this is not as good as a option especially with how zombies can hear perfectly thru blocks, which is another issue entirely, if the walls are more than 3-4 blocks thick, it should block most noise other than really loud things like a auger or gunshot. In a17/a18 I mostly rely on certain poi's for bases, as they are pretty sturdy. However, with a18, we now have demolishers, which throws another wrench into making bases, as you have to abuse the AI even more now to deal with demolishers, otherwise they will just totally destroy your base, their explosion block damage imo is set WAY to high, its currently 5000 in a 5 block radius, it should be dropped down to 1000, this still makes them a threat with how easly they are to set off, but at least it won't demolish your entire base if 1 or 2 blow. There is very little you can do to defend against them other than somehow killing it before it gets close, which is not always an option due to how they sometimes come from random sides. Nevermind the fact even traps and other zombies can trigger the vest to explode. Besides, when you think about it the demolisher makes no sense, who the hell strapped that vest on a zombie and let it loose in the first place. The radiated zombies make sense as in the games lore nukes were dropped to try to stem the infection, but the demolisher in the games lore makes no sense and feels completly out of place.

[Scyris]

I think the problem with the perk system is they are looking at it mostly from a Multiplayer perspective, in MP with other players you can specilize more, however in single player you have to do everything yourself, and there just is not enough points to go around. I force myself to go str and fort mainly till lv 60+, because those 2 stats offer the best weapons (Sledgehammer for melee, and mguns/shotguns for guns) and other must have perks. I never get anything in Intel, perception or agi. Perk wise, I get nerd glasses and get 1 in grase monkey for a early bike adv engineering 1 for the forge and the 20% craft speed increase, lockpicking 1 since that allows me to craft them, agi.. I usually take nothing in agi as there is nothing decent for 1 perk point. I also hate how they added perks that make crafting forge items cheaper, but to compensate they upped the crafting cost of virtually everything in a18, and to get it back down to a17 level you need to perk into it.

 

As to people complaining about the wrench, I usually never take any points in salvage ops, and by day 7 I have more parts than I know what to do with, there is lots of wrenchables in poi's. If you quest a lot you also get a refreshed poi you can wrench/loot everything again. I actually get most of my mechanical parts, electric parts, plastic, springs and iron pipes from inside poi's than I do from cars. In fact I only wrench cars if I need gas, a engine or a car battery.

[Scyris]

Blades were good before. Now they are very good.

 

You don't even have to believe me.

is doing a play-through using melee only on nightmare/insane/permadeath, is using blades and is doing so without constantly cheesing the pathing.

Granted, as a player he's somewhat above average but... you might learn a thing or two.

 

Would be nice if the bleed effect didn't pretty much perma rage zombies, thats blades 1 major downside, you bleed a zombie, which you will, its pretty much in perma rage. IMO dot's should not trigger the rage effect, only the actual hit from the player.

[JCrook1028]

But there is a console command to type in to set the FOV, yes? We need to discuss adding it back. Sorry but no games I play have FOV Sliders. Ark, Rust, Fallout, Skyrim, Outer Worlds, Red Dead 2 do not have FOV sliders AFAIK. It makes the game ugly, and is kind of a cheat because you see a lot more screen than everyone else, and it does impact performance on some systems. A lot of games are 60, we are 65.

 

I'd like to see batch commands you can add to your steam launch command, like --fov 90 would set it to 90 every time you launch. Then its not a PITA. Would 70 or 80 be enough to remove the motion sickness? To me games look horrible at 90 with extreme fish eye of objects on the side of the screen and characters look tiny when you want to see the details of the NPC you are talking to and zombies need to be in your face attacking you and not look like they are back 10', all side effects of a high FOV.

 

Just a quick feedback on FOV settings. I use 75.

[Scyris]

What I find interesting is how we are told over and over that the perks and skills are designed so we arent pigeon holed into one play style but that that is EXACTLY what it does. Good luck being pure blunt, or pure blade. It isnt happening.

 

At SOME point you need some points in ranged. Sure Jonah can show us it can be done but he is the exception to the rule not the normal. Try to be a Michonne in 7 Days. It isnt happening, ever.

 

So just how diverse are the gameplay and the perks if eventually guns is the only way to go after a certain gamestage.

 

And end game blade and blunt weapon could go to alleviating this problem a bit. A Katana? Or some sort of Saw Bat/Spiked Aluminum Bat?

 

Only melee weapons that are viable later on are probably sledgehammer and then clubs, the rest, not so much, they lack the range, or damage, or crowd control ability, or a combo of all 3, or even all 3 in the case of knives. Perked sledge, you'll almost always be knocking zombies down on the first or second swing no matter what zombie it is. This is the only thing that makes sledge viable later, a downed zombie is no longer much of a threat. A power attack with sledgehammer will generally knockdown anything even with body shots. So if you got a runner, aim a power attack at its torso for knockdown then go up to headshot it for the kill. With clubs, their main way of knocking down is via power attacks, any power attack has a high chance to knockdown when perked into it, and with sex t-rex club power attacks are extremly low stamina.

 

Mind you as you stated past a certain gamestage its just easier to go ranged, as it has the dps to kill things much faster, plus the saftey you don't need to get close.

 

As for the perk thing I agree, your pigeon holed into certan stats if you don't wanna totally suck at things, like without miner 69'er/motherload, it takes forever to mine anything and you get crap resources back, so everyone is going to need at least 3-5 str. In fort, living off the land at least 1 point is needed (more is a waste imo), healing factor is great later on as it saves quite a bit in medical supplies. Pain tolerance stacks nicely with armor and being immune to stuns is wonderful. Since were mostly pigeon holed into str and fort, I just run with str and fort weapons, Sledgehammer and shotgun from str, and machine guns from fort. I don't even touch the rest of the weapon perks are they are rather.. garbage compared to the str melee for melee, and the shotgun/mguns, especially mguns are the best guns lategame. Shotgun was made great in a18.2, more damage, more effective range, but very sharp damage falloff at block 6 and up, with 10 blocks resulting in 0 damage done. Its a close range handcannon that always stuns so if the first hit doesn't kill them, the 2nd will and they are slowed to a crawl with that first hit.