Alpha 19 Dev Diary

[MechanicalLens]

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[Snowydeath]

1 minute ago, MechanicalLens said:

*Shudders* Snowdog, do your thing then.

As the oracle it is my job to watch, so I shall take shelter in the nearest closet.

[Gazz]

3 hours ago, MechanicalLens said:

After building these tower bases for a couple years now, I've never thought of filling in the bottom section that is taking the brunt of the damage. Thanks for the tip, like literally, thank you. Lol

I once built a base in the forest on top of / around one of those giant rock formations.
Use it as a solid core, just fill in walls outside.
You get a really solid core that's hard to topple.

[MechanicalLens]

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[Laz Man]

31 minutes ago, Gazz said:

I once built a base in the forest on top of / around one of those giant rock formations.
Use it as a solid core, just fill in walls outside.
You get a really solid core that's hard to topple.

That's a good tip for an early game base.  Lots of people jump up on those to catch a breather especially when zeds are running.

[JayzenFreeze]

pics look amazing, so bored here.

[madmole]

10 hours ago, JCrook1028 said:

Sincerely doubt that. never used a single fortbite or other buff pill. Occasionally will drink a coffee, if I'm out looting and need the inventory slot that is.

Eye candy gives +50 to loot stage which is very significant. I take one to the top of the teir 5's to the loot room get a big loot bonus on every chest I open, then pop an oh @%$*#!z and jump down 200 meters and I'm out of there. Not to mention the health bars are amazing and boost max HP 25 plus give you faster crit healing,etc. They might not be everyone's cup of tea but for 100 dukes its a no brainer to me. Oh and one helps you get a nice barter boost too.

[MechanicalLens]

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[madmole]

9 hours ago, MechanicalLens said:

I second this. Let me go over the buffs and my personal experiences with them.

Steroids: I rarely take steroids very early game to assist in travel when I'm completely full on inventory
Mega Crush: I rarely take Mega Crush very early game to assist in travel when I have yet to buy or a craft a bicycle
Beer: I occasionally chug a beer or two if I'm doing a Fortitude build
Grandpa's Moonshine: Never used
Blackstrap Coffee: Never used
Fortbites: Never used
Coffee: I only use it to get it out of my inventory while looting
Yucca Juice Smoothie: Only used early and mid game when I travel to the Canadian biome, and only if I can justify the money to buy one from a vending machine
Recog: Very rarely used during late-game horde nights
Grandpa's Learn'n Elixir: Rarely used during late-game horde nights when demolishers are already showing up
Grandpa's Awesome Sauce: Occasionally used with the intention of getting bartering bonuses, when I have saved up chests upon chests of sellables

In summary, I forget that most of these buffs exist most of the time, and when I do remember, I can't be bothered/I don't need to use them. Grandpa's Awesome Sauce is an exception here, since I am always looking for a way to get lower prices. I think I read that one of the candys will give a bartering bonus, and if so, I'll be using that one as well. Otherwise, the other candy/drugs are very situational and, like I said, I can't be bothered/I forget to take them and/or I don't need them. I think they're fine additions, but like I said, I'll probably never legitimately use them.

Note: For the most part, I'm not being lazy. But I like to always keep busy in my games - even if I decide to pretty up my base, I typically only spend about 3% of my time in my base anyway - and to stop and think and go, "I'm about to go mining. Gotta bring some coffee!" just doesn't come naturally to me. Grandpa's Awesome Sauce (along with Pumpkin Cheesecake) is the exception here due to the fact that trading is almost as important to me as looting, and any bonus I can get is a must. Mining... Not so much, I do fine without coffee. Fortbites? If I really need Fortbites, I'm probably dead anyway. Grandpa's Moonshine? I legitimately forget this is a thing in the game basically 95% of the time. Blackstrap Coffee is never used for similar reasons to regular coffee, but since it's traditionally not found in loot (outside of T1 buried supplies) I, once again, often forget it exists. Beer is useful for Fortitude builds and encourages me to get a hops farm going. Yucca Juice Smoothies are useful on occasion, as is Recog. Grandpa's Learn'n Elixir I refuse to take pre-demos, and I don't find Mega Crush or steroids very helpful at all once I've gotten a vehicle.

But you can't swing a 2 handed pickaxe without gassing out unless you have coffee, and black strap is even better, you can get a LOT more power attacks on on zeds and mine endlessly when on it depending on how much sex rex you have.

Agreed steroids are only good early game, but I was thining of making them easily craftable so people can avoid pack mule easier and just live on steroids until you get enough pockets crafted. Mega crush is amazing to get to a POI or home from one early game, but again yeah once you get a vehicle it isn't needed.

Once we get proper weather surival in the yucca juice will play a big part in keeping you cool in the desert.

[MechanicalLens]

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[madmole]

9 hours ago, Mechanimal said:

Yeah, so, I ignored Mega Crush pretty regularly, no good reason why really, until I randomly tried one out of boredom/curiosity as a fresh spawn on an MP server one night and... whoa. I'm an idiot for ignoring those for so long. Now I really love finding them, especially early game when I like to scout locations/flesh out map, make runs to the trader before I make a vehicle, or just to quickly get my dumbass back to base at night because I ignored the time.

So I'll learn from that years-long ignorant mistake and try the new candy early on this time. Still can't believe I ignored Mega Crush, and it's benefits, for so long. And for no good reason really... ha, actually, tbh, twas probably my subconscious trying to avoid what I assumed would become a new addiction. Anyway, too late cause I'm an addict now, that and coffeeee. Blackstrap FTW.

Will the candies ever become craftable? Like a high level thing one must perk into, not commonly, like the elixirs etc.

 

No they won't be craftable. There is way too much crafting in the game now and needs to be loot and or purchase only things. Now before anyone over reacts, crafting is back in a big way. The slowed loot progression you end up crafting a lot more weapons and gear now.

[faatal]

On 5/24/2020 at 2:46 PM, Crater Creator said:

That’s an admirable outlook when faced with setbacks... but from watching the Steam forum, I can tell you that nothing is frustrating players more these days than disappearing backpacks.  I had hoped that the new art for backpacks was part of an effort to redo them to be less buggy.

Well, I've looked at backpacks several times now. They never want to disappear for me. That is why it now logs every step of backpack creation, destruction and teleportation. It may require some type of death, respawn, teleport loop automation to track down.

[MechanicalLens]

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[madmole]

8 hours ago, MechanicalLens said:

After building these tower bases for a couple years now, I've never thought of filling in the bottom section that is taking the brunt of the damage. Thanks for the tip, like literally, thank you. Lol

They will just chew away at the blocks for a long time The only downside is if they get underneath you but your base will not fall the whole thing can sustain itself from one pillar, so it would take more than all night IMO to fall. The other thing I do after my 7x7 is done is build a garage port next to it and it is elevated with a draw bridge for access. Then I fill IT up. Tear out the old floor of your 7x7 but don't fill it in, put bars in the floor. If they break in so what shoot them in the head from above, your gear and boxes are in the garage part (moved after early game).

[Laz Man]

2 minutes ago, faatal said:

Well, I've looked at backpacks several times now. They never want to disappear for me. That is why it now logs every step of backpack creation, destruction and teleportation. It may require some type of death, respawn, teleport loop automation to track down.

I dunno, chasing that one down almost feels like a rabbit hole.  If people are getting that upset losing their bags maybe they should play "drop nothing" on death.  

 

*shrugs*

[MechanicalLens]

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[faatal]

On 5/24/2020 at 3:52 PM, Khalagar said:

 

I'm sure they'd fix it if they could, but it seems like that's just a "Survival game" bug in general. Basically every single survival game I've ever played has had a bug where you die and your backpack / loot bag falls through the map. Even ones on entirely different engines still do it for some reason, I'm playing Fallout 76 and basically just assume I'll lose all my junk on death =/

 

At least it was only a loot bag. On one of my most recent runs, me and a friend had JUST got a jeep, and before we took it out I spent several minutes lecturing him about how expensive it was and to make SURE he protected it with his life because it was worth more than him.

 

5 minutes after leaving the base, we were driving the jeep and it drove right off  the edge of the map as it loaded in and we lost jeep and both our inventories lol

 

What else can you do (besides cheat) but go ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Backpacks teleport randomly above where they started and will retry it thousands of times. I've thrown many through the ground and they always recover, so that is probably not what is happening to them.

[Laz Man]

3 minutes ago, MechanicalLens said:

Excellent suggestions, thank you for this.  In my first A19 world I'll be implementing these into my tower design.

 

5 minutes ago, madmole said:

They will just chew away at the blocks for a long time The only downside is if they get underneath you but your base will not fall the whole thing can sustain itself from one pillar, so it would take more than all night IMO to fall. The other thing I do after my 7x7 is done is build a garage port next to it and it is elevated with a draw bridge for access. Then I fill IT up. Tear out the old floor of your 7x7 but don't fill it in, put bars in the floor. If they break in so what shoot them in the head from above, your gear and boxes are in the garage part (moved after early game).

That sounds neat, might be nice to also have some hatches instead of bars for a few of them to drop some nades down if needed or just for fun.

[MechanicalLens]

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[Roland]

9 minutes ago, MechanicalLens said:

I've heard that backpacks tend to fall through the world more readily if you die on an uneven surface, like a mountain or a hill.

Again, spears can do the same thing, but both of these might be one of those one in a thousand bugs that might take too unrealistically long to replicate.

 

Actually, with the new nav beacon feature I have discovered that a good portion of the time thrown spears go entirely inside the body of the zombie so that they cannot be seen at all. I wonder how many times I lost my spear simply because I didn't wait around for the body to disappear from around my spear...

[MechanicalLens]

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[madmole]

7 hours ago, MechanicalLens said:

Also madmole I am curious, sort of branching off of a previous discussion that took place on these forums a little bit ago. How much time would you say that you spend at your base on average, as well as other tasks? (To give an example, I typically spend approximately 60% of my time looting, 20% of my time mining, 15% of my time upgrading and building my base, and 5% other. Other = organizing storage, crafting mods, keeping my forges running, etc.) What I'm most curious about though, is how much busy work do your in-game days consist of vs just kicking your feet back and admiring your base, taking in the scenery, etc.?

 

Once A19 hits, I'm planning on dialing back my old habits quite a bit, I hope. Instead of taking the time to smell the roses, right now, everything for me must be faster, more efficient, no time wasted, and regarding any time where I'm not progressing as a "waste of time"; even on 90 minute days I treat everything as a constant scramble. Perhaps my mindset has been in the wrong place all along, or this is the intention of the game? Something for me to ponder about

I go in phases. Like I'll take 3 days off from everything and work on my base, typically when the horde is coming, then just do small things at night or early dawn but I have to be to work by 8am (on the road to a paid job clearing a POI).

But typically day 1-3 I'm finding my first trader, doing dig quests for food. I'll set up a bedroll and storage box right outside the traders front door and put my loot in there. I'll mark mines all over the place most of them I won't ever even use because I'll find one closer and closer to the trader I'm at as I progress or get closer. I'll mine at night on night 2+. I often will spend the night at a POI I cleared just before dusk and mine everything I can.

I take dig quests until I can't because all that clay I can use to make cobblestones. I started building with wood again because I can get more XP upgrading through the wood and straight to bricks. By placing flagstone you don't get any xp for the wood upgrade. Wood is cheap enough. I'll get my 7x7 done and 4 high walls with wood bars by night 4 at the latest, and I'll keep doing POIS all day getting all the cobblestone and cement I can from the tarps at POIs. Those brick piles are amazing for xp and stone get those too.

Typically by day 7 I'll have brick all the way up 4 high and sometimes I'll even have 2 rows of concrete starting above the foundation and stopping at eye level where the zombies tend to strike the most.

 

After that I do the find the trader quests and get a 2nd or 3rd trader if I haven't already, and start doing clear the zombie quests.

I'll mine every night get the blacksmith perk and start making iron for repair kits as soon as possible. I chop every corpse so I have a large supply of glue. I'll craft the first few dozen in my campfire then start doing larger batches at the traders chem station if it works.

I guess my normal day is leave at 4-6 am to clear a POI. Be home by dark or sooner so I can sell to the trader my loot for the day. I repair everything above tier 1 for maximum coin and xp. Scrap tier 1 because the parts are worth more. Save parts of specialized guns I find. Unload my gear into boxes, then by dark or so I'll mine until dawn, then repeat. I tend to take a couple days off before the horde sometimes, if I feel like I'm due for some fort upgrades. If I'm getting into it I might spend 3-4 days on it, but this isn't until day 30 or so when I have enough food to spend time at it. Early game I'm constantly in search of food so I don't have the luxury of working on my base like that. Before you get a motor vehicle all the jogging/mining/combat use a TON of food. I really like what we have done with food. The stamina bonus for the good foods is very cool and it makes wanting a farm and cooking because there is a very tangible reward now.

[Laz Man]

5 minutes ago, Roland said:

 

Actually, with the new nav beacon feature I have discovered that a good portion of the time thrown spears go entirely inside the body of the zombie so that they cannot be seen at all. I wonder how many times I lost my spear simply because I didn't wait around for the body to disappear from around my spear...

[madmole]

31 minutes ago, MechanicalLens said:

This is very coincidental since I thought this morning, "They'd never add a candy that gives +loot bonus." It appears I stand corrected. 🙂

Also, thanks for the cost info. 100 dukes, got it.  Will they all cost 100 dukes, or is that depending on the candy?

They all cost 100, although the barter one should cost more, but its probably ok as is.

25 minutes ago, MechanicalLens said:

Hold on a minute, coffee gives you a stamina boost now? I... didn't know that...

Sounds like a good change. As of A18 I rarely, if ever, see bears in my games, and my worlds typically last quite a while. I get all of my steroids in loot, and past a few days, I just end up selling them.

One idea I had was that if your character is currently encumbered, then they should be slowed while riding a bike as well (with the decrease in peddling speed being dependent on how many slots you are encumbered by), but steroids would obviously eliminate that. You know, if you're encumbered pre-bicycle and you have a mega crush on you, you chug one of those. That might become too tedious to manage though, Idk.

Also, don't Steroids have a chance of giving you a temporary "debuff", making you addicted to them, along with a possible other debuff? If so, then I'll probably never use them anyway. 😛 Unless it's very temporary, like a few minutes only.

Ahh, so that is why it was removed.

It boosts stamina regen speed. FOOD now boosts actual MAX STAMINA. So before combat eat some shepards pie and chase with blackstrap? OMG amazing +40 max stamina and +35% stamina regen = crazy power attacks or mega mining.

[faatal]

On 5/25/2020 at 8:31 PM, Roland said:

The breadcrumb system is still in. Zombies following forever was a glitch that was removed. That was not the breadcrumb system being removed. 
 

the breadcrumb system is best noticed at night or when you are inside a POI and zombies are outside. It is what draws those zombies towards you as you make noise. 
 

During the day, when outside, zombies usually just see you before the breadcrumb system kicks in to draw them closer to your position. 
 

The glitch before was probably an error with the “forget” timer. You could probably change some easy numbers to make it so they never forget and always continue to move toward you. I remember collecting half a dozen snakes traveling through the desert. 5 minutes after getting to my base they would show up and start attacking.

Whatever breadcrumb system was in before a17 is not in the game. The one I added in a17 or a18, can't remember, is used for AI seeking noises. The breadcrumb makes seeking noises less accurate, so it is helpful to the player.