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Alpha 19 Dev Diary


madmole

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2 hours ago, madmole said:

I am playing an agility character now so if it feels weak we can always boost it. It's main advantage is superior sneak damage to everything else so it isn't meant to really keep up damage wise with pistols. Cheap ammo, best stealth and sneak damage means it is going to have to be worse damage wise than firearms. We are adding core visuals for mods to all weapons that don't have them yet.

It is already disadvantaged in that it has horrendous reload time and is single shot. The sneak damage bonus is a great idea that means it will always have a niche, and being effectively silent is a nice boost so there is a stealth option before you get a silencer, but it still feels far weaker than it should. You could stand to reduce the stealth multiplier and up the base damage a bit.

 

Cheap ammo doesnt really count for much when your swimming in bullets before you even assemble your first gun, in my last game i had about 10 stacks of 7.6 ammo before i even found a gun to use it (default loot).

 

I just played a game before the last patch reset everything as an agility build (loving the desert vulture) and built a level 5 compound bow as soon as i could, it was nice for stealthing through a PoI but outside of that it felt worthless, and being a high risk weapon in most scenarios the reward feels like it should be much higher.

It doesnt feel like the difficulty of using those weapons is rewarded, and they could be a lot of fun outside of pure stealth builds.

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9 minutes ago, Vintorez said:

I've only fiddled with it in creative so I don't know how it plays economically or at high GS levels, but have you tried loading up with explosive or at least flaming arrows? Being able to rapid fire bombs with the compound bow feels really strong, but I as I said I don't know how they fair against mutants and irradiated Z's.

I played around with explosive arrows & bolts a bit ago in a18.4. Didn't really compare recipe costs vs. grenades/etc. but seemed cheap enough.

No idea bout a19 but in 18.4 each shot raised the heat map by a full 5 points. So might need to be careful using them, unless you want screamers.

Also I found I preferred the crossbow over the compound bow for explosive work. Instant fire after reload vs. the bows draw timer (nice when you're switching weapons) & with 4/5 in run & gun (zero bow spec) reload times were pretty quick & very similar.

 

While I'd planned on using explosive bolts for tougher horde nights (gs 200+), turned out my base was too powerful for the 8 alive that my old pc can handle. So while I fired a few for luls I never needed to. But it's fun to send the zeds pinwheeling across the sky none the less. :)

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50 minutes ago, SheeleMara said:

 I officially regret telling friends and online friends that I would be hosting a dedicated server once A19 Stable was out, now have people hounding me for when the server will be up. Realized that if I multiply that feeling by 100x that I might understand what it's like be a member of the Fun Pimps Staff. I sincerely apologize for any hounding I might've done in the past in asking when stuff will be released. 

Yeah, you really only know when you're "a part of the team", so even though it's not my place to say this here, you're forgiven in my opinion. Quite a many years ago I attended a summer camp where the kitchen staff were "notoriously grumpy" and most of us, as kids, were pretty demanding for meals. Towards the end of my 3 week stay me and my cabin, being the oldest ones there, were assigned roles to assist some of the other cabin leaders with handling their young ones, to teach us some basic leadership skills. Unfortunately some of the kitchen staff had fallen ill, so I volunteered to take up one of their positions, although I somewhat regretted that decision immediately after I had raised my hand. I didn't want to become the scrooge of the kitchen like I perceived the rest of them to be. Haha. Fast forward three days later, and while I kept my smile up at work, I was constantly rolling my eyes and shaking my head at the "demanding ungrateful children", often giving facial expressions similar to Squidward from the Spongebob Squarepants cartoon; after my shifts had concluded and our cabin reunited before our trip home, the rest of my cabin thought my position must have been torture, and it was, but for unexpected reasons. Takes one to know one. ;)

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5 hours ago, faatal said:

Posting here is fine. Mostly I just want hardware specs and circumstances in which it is happening.

 

I just ran 7d7d from my HD. Flying around, visiting all the biomes and towns and still pretty smooth. No freezes. I do drop to 30 FPS for a few frames while it loads, but quite playable. I even have some of those console warnings, but they don't seem to be doing much to my FPS.

 

I added a "mem objpre" console command for testing to precache block entity data and never remove them.

 

People with big freezes can try disabling their antivirus on the game's folder to see if that is slowing down loading.

------------------
System Information
------------------
      Time of this report: 7/20/2020, 03:25:04
             Machine name: MARK-PC
               Machine Id: {0771F2D6-BE7F-4F90-AAA3-4A0EC9EEF69B}
         Operating System: Windows 10 Pro 64-bit (10.0, Build 18363) (18362.19h1_release.190318-1202)
                 Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
      System Manufacturer: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
             System Model: X570 AORUS ELITE
                     BIOS: F20b (type: UEFI)
                Processor: AMD Ryzen 9 3900X 12-Core Processor             (24 CPUs), ~3.8GHz
                   Memory: 32768MB RAM
      Available OS Memory: 32712MB RAM
                Page File: 11850MB used, 30588MB available
              Windows Dir: C:\Windows
          DirectX Version: DirectX 12
      DX Setup Parameters: Not found
         User DPI Setting: 96 DPI (100 percent)
       System DPI Setting: 192 DPI (200 percent)
          DWM DPI Scaling: UnKnown
                 Miracast: Available, with HDCP
Microsoft Graphics Hybrid: Not Supported
 DirectX Database Version: Unknown
           DxDiag Version: 10.00.18362.0387 64bit Unicode

 

---------------
Display Devices
---------------
           Card name: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti
        Manufacturer: NVIDIA
           Chip type: GeForce GTX 1660 Ti
            DAC type: Integrated RAMDAC
         Device Type: Full Device (POST)
          Device Key: Enum\PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_2182&SUBSYS_12E110DE&REV_A1
       Device Status: 0180200A [DN_DRIVER_LOADED|DN_STARTED|DN_DISABLEABLE|DN_NT_ENUMERATOR|DN_NT_DRIVER] 
 Device Problem Code: No Problem
 Driver Problem Code: Unknown
      Display Memory: 22346 MB
    Dedicated Memory: 5991 MB
       Shared Memory: 16355 MB
        Current Mode: 2560 x 1440 (32 bit) (75Hz)
         HDR Support: Not Supported
    Display Topology: Extend
 Display Color Space: DXGI_COLOR_SPACE_RGB_FULL_G22_NONE_P709
     Color Primaries: Red(0.672852,0.319336), Green(0.267578,0.672852), Blue(0.151367,0.060547), White Point(0.313477,0.329102)
   Display Luminance: Min Luminance = 0.500000, Max Luminance = 270.000000, MaxFullFrameLuminance = 270.000000
        Monitor Name: Generic PnP Monitor
       Monitor Model: Q3279WG5B
          Monitor Id: AOC3279


------------------------
Disk & DVD/CD-ROM Drives
------------------------
      Drive: 😄
 Free Space: 27.6 GB
Total Space: 121.5 GB
File System: NTFS
      Model: C300-CTFDDAC128MAG (Corsair SSD Boot Drive)

      Drive: 😧
 Free Space: 125.5 GB
Total Space: 228.9 GB
File System: NTFS
      Model: TOSHIBA-TR200 (Toshiba SSD)

      Drive: E:
 Free Space: 155.7 GB
Total Space: 238.5 GB
File System: NTFS
      Model: HDT722525DLA380

      Drive: F:
 Free Space: 145.1 GB
Total Space: 476.9 GB
File System: NTFS
      Model: ST3500630NS

      Drive: G:
 Free Space: 551.0 GB
Total Space: 953.9 GB
File System: NTFS
      Model: WDC WD10EADS-00L5B1

      Drive: H:
 Free Space: 897.2 GB
Total Space: 976.8 GB
File System: NTFS
      Model: GIGABYTE GP-GSM2NE3100TNTD (M.2 NVME PCIE4.0) Game drive

 

Pauses happen when moving around on vehicle, entering new building, entering a room, all sorts really.

 

My game loads and runs very fast, and ran fine before the latest patch.

 

I have started a new game tonight, just got my motorcycle so will see how it behaves now I am mobile.

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I have not tested it yet this build, but you could quick fire(tap fire without really charging) the bow and it made it more on par with the pistol. 

 

Not sure if you are supposed to be able to do that, but it made it a lot better than the crossbow and does not need run and gun. 

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3 hours ago, rivle said:

A quick feedback for stun baton.

 

Im on day 10 now and I found my first stun baton in my current game. I tested it and I like it, its now a really nice melee weapon. But at that point in game most people already invested some points in other melee weapons (club, sledge, knife).

 

Yeah stun baton is nice but why should someone at this stage switch to it and invest points in stun baton? In this game I already have 3 points on pummel pete and have my baseball bat (usually sledge) and collecting parts for the steel one.

 

You can’t craft early game a stun baton because you need parts for it. Maybe this point needs a rethink.

We are adding pipe weapons to the game, so a pipe baton could be crafted early game so INT players can specialize in melee right away.

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4 minutes ago, madmole said:

We are adding pipe weapons to the game, so a pipe baton could be crafted early game so INT players can specialize in melee right away.

 

Pipe Junk Sledge? Pipe Junk Turret? Piped Blow Pipe? Will we have any kind of early game ranged options for int?

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2 hours ago, bloodmoth13 said:

It is already disadvantaged in that it has horrendous reload time and is single shot. The sneak damage bonus is a great idea that means it will always have a niche, and being effectively silent is a nice boost so there is a stealth option before you get a silencer, but it still feels far weaker than it should. You could stand to reduce the stealth multiplier and up the base damage a bit.

 

Cheap ammo doesnt really count for much when your swimming in bullets before you even assemble your first gun, in my last game i had about 10 stacks of 7.6 ammo before i even found a gun to use it (default loot).

 

I just played a game before the last patch reset everything as an agility build (loving the desert vulture) and built a level 5 compound bow as soon as i could, it was nice for stealthing through a PoI but outside of that it felt worthless, and being a high risk weapon in most scenarios the reward feels like it should be much higher.

It doesnt feel like the difficulty of using those weapons is rewarded, and they could be a lot of fun outside of pure stealth builds.

I disagree. Cheap ammo does matter, and we nerfed ammo some. Not to mention you can build up a nice supply of horde ammo looting and using your bow for 1 shot stealth kills, where every other build is crafting ammo, buying ammo, and basically struggling for enough ammo for hordes, at least later game, coming out of T5 POIs with a net loss of ammo, where the bowman profits. Not every build is based  or balanced purely on its combat merits, we take the entire perk line into account and all its benefits.

 

I only have 3 ranks of bow, and 2 of the stealth perks and I'm able to move freely at night and one shot everything. Try that with another build. Plus you can craft exploding arrows, which are mini rockets. You can knock the cupboard doors off silently with it and stealth kill the sleepers hiding in closets too. Its fine IMO.

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3 hours ago, Star69 said:

Eh, I got that lost backpack bug last night for the first time. Was surprised by a direwolf and my blunderbuss shot missed and he ate me :(. I respawned, the backpack sprite was there and I went to where it was and no backpack. I admin'd god mode and flew up high and way below.....no backpack. I pulled the log file and it stated it was present and hadn't despawned, gave the location.....it is definitely not there. Not sure how much help I can be with this since log says everything is fine. I died on a flat road, one building away from a trader, nothing weird happened during death. This is on a dedicated server, not single player. Stinks....I had the materials for 4 bicycles I was going to make at the trader workbench. Then I rage quit lol. Wish I could give more valuable info.

 

19T01:01:23 7933.890 INF GMSG: Player 'Star' died
2020-07-19T01:01:23 7933.957 INF 258872 EntityBackpack id 653, plyrId 176, items 40 casinoCoin, resourceLockPick, Start (-830.3, 61.9, -1923.8)
2020-07-19T01:01:36 7946.979 INF 259359 EntityBackpack id 653, plyrId 176, items 40 casinoCoin, resourceLockPick, OnEntityUnload (-829.8, 60.0, -1924.9), markedForUnload False, IsDead True, IsDespawned False
2020-07-19T01:01:36 7946.983 INF 259359 EntityBackpack id 653, plyrId 176, items 40 casinoCoin, resourceLockPick, OnDestroy (-829.8, 60.0, -1924.9)

Am I reading that wrong or does that show the bag spawned, then dropped 2 blocks and was destroyed. Maybe it spawned on top of grass or something?

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5 minutes ago, JCrook1028 said:

Am I reading that wrong or does that show the bag spawned, then dropped 2 blocks and was destroyed. Maybe it spawned on top of grass or something?

Bags normally drop and get unloaded (destroyed), because you respawn some distance away, so those chunks unload, then they reload as you get near the chunk. The reloading is where I think the bug is.

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1 minute ago, MechanicalLens said:

You mean a hunting rifle? We already have one of those.

 

 

 

 

(jk. I've actually grown fond of the hunting rifle since A18.)

How dare you!  Leave my hunting rifle alone.  The hunting rifle is the gentleman's gun.  1 shot, 1 kill....

 

48szt2.jpg

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24 minutes ago, madmole said:

I only have 3 ranks of bow, and 2 of the stealth perks and I'm able to move freely at night and one shot everything. Try that with another build. Plus you can craft exploding arrows, which are mini rockets. You can knock the cupboard doors off silently with it and stealth kill the sleepers hiding in closets too. Its fine IMO.

If anything archery might be too good thanks to exploding arrows for hordes and being 2nd best at POIs just behind Int thanks to stealth clears.  I mean just look at this exploding arrow madness!  After several blood moons I started limiting how many explosive arrows I was allowed a night because they are just that good.  Fairly cheap to craft, pretty good AOE damage, and minimal block damage delivered accurately at range.

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We decided before we tweak more settings and try to do anything more with zombie count that we would do one more duo horde night (126). Partied up and went balls to the walls -- man that was an intense battle! FPS started out strong 50-60, at about 2230 fluctuation between 25-44 fps. Managed to capture some photos that I thought I would share before video's done.

 

Photos:

Spoiler

Birds1.thumb.jpg.969daf67f3dc693ace6a250c7e3875fe.jpg

 

Bird2.thumb.jpg.5d2de62bedd492c38e0b216280f46e8a.jpg

 

SayAh.thumb.jpg.c5df1e749baf789f78d0964cf86292a8.jpg

 

Video:

Spoiler

 

 

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1 hour ago, Ralathar44 said:

If anything archery might be too good thanks to exploding arrows for hordes and being 2nd best at POIs just behind Int thanks to stealth clears.  I mean just look at this exploding arrow madness!  After several blood moons I started limiting how many explosive arrows I was allowed a night because they are just that good.  Fairly cheap to craft, pretty good AOE damage, and minimal block damage delivered accurately at range.

Until Demolishers.. then not so much, least from my experiences..

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1 hour ago, faatal said:

Bags normally drop and get unloaded (destroyed), because you respawn some distance away, so those chunks unload, then they reload as you get near the chunk. The reloading is where I think the bug is.

@faatal, is it remotely possible to spawn all POI sleepers as blocks and make the switch to entities on demand like, say when you make noise or hit them for stealth kills? 

 

 

The fps gains could theoretically be worth the trouble. Also, that might be A LOT of work and may affect texture limits depending on how you do stuff. 

 

About the backpack. It could also work to treat it as a block on death when far away from the chunk and as an entity if close. I might be spitting nonsense though. 

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7 hours ago, madmole said:

That would be dumb, we need the warnings to see what the bugs are so we can fix them properly.

dumb is not knowing the definition of temp

 

I never said to push it out disabled.  run it on some machines that are having the issue, disable it, see if issue clears, if it does, then he knows if that is the cause.

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Game Breaking Bug!

 

7 days did an update when I started up steam and now my Steel knuckles are broken.

The regular attack (left vclick) range is decreased to where I have to stand literally against the zombie/wall for it to reach. I can't even destroy trash on the ground while sneaking.

 

I repaired my steel knuckles and unloaded all mods. Still buggy. I started my test world and the same bug exists.

 

EDIT: I guess it has already been repoted and will be fixed when the next patch drops.

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@madmole

 

General questions:

- Is there an updated list of all weapons for A19 B169 showing their different tiers? The WIKI page is outdated

- Why do some armor items only have hot/cold resi on it and others armor etc.? Comparing these makes no sense. There should be ONE template for all.

 

Some things that don't work as I would expect:

- Unfortunately coloring bikes/motorcycles doesn't work. It only chanegs icon color in bag.

 

Some QoL improvement hints:

- Please let us confirm quest cancelation or move this button to the end of the line (NOT next to the sharing button) 🙂

- A mini map would be helpful (only show it when on a bike/truck so you don't have to stop to look on the map)

- Let us access trader's trade window simultaneously

- Compare stats of armor/cloth to the one you wear instead comparing with the last selected item (this is EXTREMLY confusing). Or do it by pressing ALT or something

- Let us directly drag&drop mods to/from selected items instead to have to do one step more by pressing "adjust/change" first

- Maybe add the slot type to armor description

- A calculated "DPS" display for weapons would be cool (below dmg and attacks/minute) for direct compare

- Let us pick up placed storage containers

- Add a "Search" bar to bags / containers

 

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44 minutes ago, toores said:

Game Breaking Bug!

 

7 days did an update when I started up steam and now my Steel knuckles are broken.

The regular attack (left vclick) range is decreased to where I have to stand literally against the zombie/wall for it to reach. I can't even destroy trash on the ground while sneaking.

 

I repaired my steel knuckles and unloaded all mods. Still buggy. I started my test world and the same bug exists.

I spent several hours finding the mats for the steel knuckles and when i finally crafted them they dont work . I cant hit anything 99% of the time and the once or twice i have has been a fluke that i could not successfully recreate.

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12 hours ago, madmole said:

Any interactive icons "expand" when you hover over them. Perhaps a loading screen tip for that, and this specific issue would be a win.

Honestly I had no idea about sorting until i read about it on the forums. Thing is I had no clue it is INTERACTABLE icon, so no reason to hover over it.

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