Alpha 19 Dev Diary

[Laz Man]

5 minutes ago, RhinoW said:

Entire book, tier 3 knuckles + a buff.  Well, I would be severely scared if THAT didn't work.

Experiment with the book series and consumables.  Even without t3, I bet u could stop get some good results.

 

Edit: For the record fist build doesnt interest me much.  I am more of an Int/Per guy.  Still it felt fun.

[RhinoW]

Just now, Laz Man said:

Experiment with the book series and consumables.  Even without t3, I bet u could stop get some good results.

But that's an issue right there, relying on buffs. They should be an extra, not the necessary to make something work.

[Laz Man]

3 minutes ago, RhinoW said:

But that's an issue right there, relying on buffs. They should be an extra, not the necessary to make something work.

Ah ha! That's where some will disagree with you.  Not everything needs to be 100% like for like across the board to be fun.

 

I bet the number one reason some play fist builds is because they are fun and can care less of x y z comparisons.

 

Edit: Again not saying they dont need alittle more balancing.

[hiemfire]

15 minutes ago, Laz Man said:

Experiment with the book series and consumables.

Sorry, but this, and every time one of the Devs say "just use x item that requires a drop or to be in the trader's list of wares", irks the hell out of me since it really is just saying "Get lucky."... If the viability of any weapon relies on good rng with buff items (perk books included) then the item is not viable. Fortuna can be a fickle @%$*#!, and only a fool expects her to grant them anything...

[Gazz]

Sure, if you add extra limitations like "must not use consumables" then several parts of the game will feel unfairly hard to you.

 

[Khalagar]

8 hours ago, Gazz said:

One example: With your approach 2 turrets must be as strong as an auto shotgun or M60 because they are "a weapon" and all weapons are to be tested in isolation and in the same manner.

 

Err, yeah, preferably the end goal would before the dual junk turrets to be around the same level as an Auto Shotgun  or M60 in overall utility, since the Dual Junk Turrets is the int equivalent to a T3 weapon as the drone isn't offense focused. It's not about straight damage, you get utility from the range, autonomous attacking, resource expenditure, armor pen etc, but I think their over all utility should be directly balanced against the overall utility an M60 or Auto Shottie can bring to bear for other builds. Sniper too I guess, but it's kinda irrelevant lol

 

ATM dual junk turrets use a TREMENDOUS amount more resources than the shotgun and do less damage than it, but that's because the shotgun is just flat out OP. Not sure how you can say it's the closest to the best weapon when it is the best weapon in almost any situation that matters. It's not the best at medium range and long range obviously, so you either ignore zombies at those distances or run over to them without fear of retribution because it will tear through an entire horde of irradiated one sidedly. Even an unperked Auto Shottie is a staple "Oh Crap Theres a Zombie in My Face!!!" weapon on any other build because it will clear a room faster than their actual perk weapon

 

 

Junk Turrets vs M60 is closer to balanced, they don't seem to clear as fast as an m60, take twice as many mods, and have set up times to place and pick up etc so I lean towards them being a bit weaker but they are fine and the m60 has it's drawbacks like using more expensive ammo. It's more just ATM Shotgun and Steel Club are outlier on every test as they are overtuned imo

 

 

3 hours ago, Gazz said:

"Everyone knows" that the stun baton does not measure up to other melee weapons. Then the other day I saw Jonah on a stream clearing a T5 POI on insane/nightmare with a stun baton and very rarely a regular pistol. It's not even supposed to do that without the bots but it's clearly doable anyway.

 

That doesn't mean he couldn't have done it 10 times faster and easier with a steel club.  The game is easy enough where *any* weapon will work, you could clear a T5 with a bone shiv if you wanted, it would just take drastically longer than and be more dangerous than if you were using a better weapon

 

That's my point with a standardized test. Set up a custom made maze with static zombies, run through it with each build, time results. Just doing a rudimentary version of that on an open road spawning the same zombies and disregarding any test that had an RNG dismember chance proc had pretty obvious clear time differences and risk differences.

 

If X takes 20 seconds to clear and you run it 10 times and never take a point of damage, and Y takes 4 minutes to clear each time and you nearly die 5 times per run, that's a pretty instant indicator that Y is not good for that situation. If you run different tests for different situations like groups, armored enemies etc, and Y does bad in every test and X does good in them, it's pretty much undeniable that X is better than Y

 

You get the "Well I like using a spear!" thing which is fine, it's not so bad it's unusable, it just bad enough to be worse than another option in enough common situations to be a mid or low tier weapon. The main issue with the spear is just the mechanics. Mechanically, it's extremely high risk because you can lose it to the void or miss and have to go get it, and it's payoff is lower than much safer options. It's over all DPS is drastically lower because of the "The zombie won't let go of my spear" thing too where you hammer the E key and can't get the spear back for 8 seconds that leave you open to other zombies, where as with a different weapon you would have been attacking. 

 

High risk + low reward = low tier weapon you use for challenge or fun

[katarynna]

2 minutes ago, Khalagar said:

Err, yeah, preferably the end goal would before the dual junk turrets to be around the same level as an Auto Shotgun  or M60 in overall utility, since the Dual Junk Turrets is the int equivalent to a T3 weapon as the drone isn't offense focused

Just a bit of a nitpick, but i think dual junk turrets compared to an auto shotgun/m60 have to included the added damage of either the stun baton or and unperked gun from another tree. Your junk turrets are sitting on the ground firing at things so your hands are free to contribute with another damage source. 

[Aldranon]

A full stack of Coffee or better, Blackstrap coffee, should be in every melee players inventory before entering a POI 4 or 5 OR once at high GS.

 

They are cheap to make and can make a difference with other items and perks.

I like A19 cooking, so its not wasted points to me when I go melee, so many boosts in the food! 

[hiemfire]

18 minutes ago, Khalagar said:

The main issue with the spear is just the mechanics. Mechanically, it's extremely high risk because you can lose it to the void or miss and have to go get it, and it's payoff is lower than much safer options.

Which is why I like @Adam the Waster's idea of being able to toggle from power throw to power stab with it via a rotary menu.

[Aldranon]

<Duplicate entry>

 

[meganoth]

1 hour ago, RhinoW said:

Sorry but that's flawed logic when it comes to the knuckles. By saying "they come with the fortitude package" you're almost saying that they are a little extra for getting the entire fortitude tree, which let me tell you, is not as good of a tree as one might think for what it offers. The idea should be "the fortitude tree comes with the brawler", not the other way around, otherwise the knuckles are just a placebo that you CAN get.

 

Maybe he is almost saying that, but really he is saying that the best ranged weapon set (at least if we include all ranges) comes with the worst melee weapon set. Which is a balance over the attribute.

 

But the only unique feature of the knuckles, avoiding infection, really lost its appeal after all the other ailings were added to the game. So I agree with whoever said the knuckles should now protect against lacerations and cuts as well.

 

I don't see a problem with the brawler being only really effective with bear, by the way.

[Aldranon]

3 minutes ago, Aldranon said:

On Sledge turrets: They are with out a doubt the most OP defensive weapon when used correctly!    

-On the outside of doors a bit off to one side. 

-At the corner of an "L" turn, facing the direction of incoming zombies.

-To the side of a high (damage dealing high) path getting to you.  (Kage848 has to take credit for that, see one of his recent vids).  I added the height thing.

 

Now, here is where it gets even better!  Imagine you can make a near infinite number of turrets... and you have a lot of doors in your BM defense...  Al's Fun-house and Burrito Bar is now open!  😎

 

oops.

[MechanicalLens]

Pistol Pete Vol 1 states that when you are ADS with a scope or the iron sights with 9mm weapons it increases their damage by 10%. Does this buff also work if a reflex sight is attached to them?

[Laz Man]

1 hour ago, hiemfire said:

Sorry, but this, and every time one of the Devs say "just use x item that requires a drop or to be in the trader's list of wares", irks the hell out of me since it really is just saying "Get lucky."... If the viability of any weapon relies on good rng with buff items (perk books included) then the item is not viable. Fortuna can be a fickle @%$*#!, and only a fool expects her to grant them anything...

Yeah i hear you.  I am not speaking for the devs here but what if they wanted a to balance out a high output/damage weapon with RNG so its not OP out the gates?  Not every weapon needs to have the exact same progression or use the same combination of buffs/perks/consumables/etc.  If they all did, everything would feel the same eventually but with different skins...

 

I can appreciate spreadsheet balance but what trumps all of that are 2 things.  Is it fun and different from other weapons and can the player obtain good results eventually when using it?

[RhinoW]

17 minutes ago, meganoth said:

Maybe he is almost saying that, but really he is saying that the best ranged weapon set (at least if we include all ranges) comes with the worst melee weapon set. Which is a balance over the attribute.

 

But the only unique feature of the knuckles, avoiding infection, really lost its appeal after all the other ailings were added to the game. So I agree with whoever said the knuckles should now protect against lacerations and cuts as well.

 

I don't see a problem with the brawler being only really effective with bear, by the way.

Let's not forget the fortitude tree is based on being resilient, taking hits, which you usually take when fighting with melee. So I find the fact that it has machine gunner rather irrelevant (they are overpowered even without the perk at max rank aswell), so it would actually make sense that you would get at least an interesting melee weapon. Since all of the perk trees have ranged + melee, it makes little sense to not put the same amount of effort in the fortitude tree when it comes to those 2 weapon types (both should be equally important).

 

Well sure you can say it counter-balances it, but then what's the point of having the brawler perk? A perk tree is not supposed to have something useless and then say "but the other perk fixes the balance issue because instead of using that, you can use this, that's better". Once again, my issue is the fact that fist weapons are almost rendered useless, unless your REALLY TRY to make it work (i've already wrote this like 4 times and provided suggestions).

[hiemfire]

8 minutes ago, Laz Man said:

I am not speaking for the devs here but what if they wanted a to balance out a high output/damage weapon with RNG so its not OP out the gates?

Rng isn't balancing though. It's gating with a dice roll, and gating something doesn't change disparities in effectiveness.

[Laz Man]

5 minutes ago, RhinoW said:

Let's not forget the fortitude tree is based on being resilient, taking hits, which you usually take when fighting with melee. So I find the fact that it has machine gunner rather irrelevant (they are overpowered even without the perk at max rank aswell), so it would actually make sense that you would get at least an interesting melee weapon. Since all of the perk trees have ranged + melee, it makes little sense to not put the same amount of effort in the fortitude tree when it comes to those 2 weapon types (both should be equally important).

 

Well sure you can say it counter-balances it, but then what's the point of having the brawler perk? A perk tree is not supposed to have something useless and then say "but the other perk fixes the balance issue because instead of using that, you can use this, that's better". Once again, my issue is the fact that fist weapons are almost rendered useless, unless your REALLY TRY to make it work (i've already wrote this like 4 times and provided suggestions).

Haven't looked closely at the fortitude perks but yeah it would be nice to have something that makes the player more resilient to criticals (e.g. reduce timers etc.)

[Darinth]

The point that Gazz makes above about some weapons may be weaker if looked at in isolation, but that they come as part of a particular package is really important. All of the weapons don't actually need to be (and I'd argue really shouldn't) be balanced against each other. They're each part of various sets that you get for specing down a perk tree. Maybe knives and bows are weaker in a one-on-one fight, probably not the best option for a character designed to stand toe-to-toe with creatures on a blood moon. But they're a park of agility, which gives you the ability to stealth through POIs and complete fetch quests sometimes without ever killing zombies. When you do need to kill them, you can frequently kill a zombie in a room with another zombie, walk through that room and might not ever realize the other zombie was there to begin with. Because it also never found you when you missed it.

I promise you my junk turret's 'ttk' is lower than what my friends get with shotguns or rifles. I can drop my pair of tricked out turrets in the room with 5 zombies and drop my friend in a room with 5 zombies and a shotgun with relevant perks and he'll clear out the zombies from his room and come finish mine off. But the junk turret's ability to stagger a bit on every hit and continuously auto-target the closest zombie makes them an indispensable aid on blood moon nights to keep the zombies from swarming up the ramp too quickly. Combine that with the intellect tree's reduced forging costs and faster crafting time (which can add up when you start crafting bulk amounts of all sorts of materials), their ability to choose up to 2 of 5 quest rewards (as opposed to 1 of 2), the increased dukes that they get, etc... and I'm certainly not going to call it 'OP', but certainly I don't feel like I'm so far behind that it's not worth it.

[Laz Man]

7 minutes ago, hiemfire said:

Rng isn't balancing though. It's gating with a dice roll, and gating something doesn't change disparities in effectiveness.

Well, other games have used variations of RNG for class builds.  For example, many mmorpgs out there have critical hit builds that % based damage increases versus sustained damage output.  One could argue that those classes roles are not balanced but they sure are fun to play.  At least for me.

[hiemfire]

8 minutes ago, Laz Man said:

Well, other games have used variations of RNG for class builds.  For example, many mmorpgs out there have critical hit builds that % based damage increases versus sustained damage output.  One could argue that those classes roles are not balanced but they sure are fun to play.  At least for me.

And we're back to being told "Get Lucky"...

[meganoth]

32 minutes ago, RhinoW said:

Let's not forget the fortitude tree is based on being resilient, taking hits, which you usually take when fighting with melee. So I find the fact that it has machine gunner rather irrelevant (they are overpowered even without the perk at max rank aswell), so it would actually make sense that you would get at least an interesting melee weapon. Since all of the perk trees have ranged + melee, it makes little sense to not put the same amount of effort in the fortitude tree when it comes to those 2 weapon types (both should be equally important).

 

Well sure you can say it counter-balances it, but then what's the point of having the brawler perk? A perk tree is not supposed to have something useless and then say "but the other perk fixes the balance issue because instead of using that, you can use this, that's better". Once again, my issue is the fact that fist weapons are almost rendered useless, unless your REALLY TRY to make it work (i've already wrote this like 4 times and provided suggestions).

Machine gunner being OP is relevant to the balance.

 

"useless" or "Almost rendered useless" is such a hyperbole sentence. Should I say now the knuckles are the best even though I know they are just the least best of them all 😉 ?

I have a friend who still recounts his turn as brawler in the previous game as great fun (and he isn't someone who would have fun with an ineffectual weapon). Did you ever try brawler together with beer or are you just theory-crafting with the stats?

 

[Khalagar]

I've been thinking about it, and really I think what a lot of the "problem" with balance at the moment is, is that there are no ranged enemies. Adding bandits with guns will DRASTICALLY change the balance of what weapons are good and add situations where you actually *need* to switch weapons.

 

Right now, the only range that matters is close range. The only enemy in the game that has a single ranged attack is the cop, and they still run to you. Not a single other enemy can damage you outside of melee range, so therefore, no other range matters. If you see a zombie a mile away, it's not a threat and it doesn't matter if you only have a shotgun, it will either come to you, or you ignore it. The shotgun is insane at close range and will churn the entire horde into paste, so you don't need any other weapon

 

Spears, shotguns, snipers, even the m60 etc will all be pretty heavily balanced against each other when there are ranged enemies. Being able to throw a spear currently is fun but not really that important, but throwing it at a guy with a gun who's shooting you will be a legit asset over the club

[hiemfire]

Just now, Khalagar said:

he only enemy in the game that has a single ranged attack is the cop,

Irradiated Vulture's do. Same vomit attack, just from the air.

[Khalagar]

Just now, hiemfire said:

Irradiated Vulture's do. Same vomit attack, just from the air.

 

I actually didn't know that, but that would explain why I get hit in the back of the head with random spit sometimes during hordes! I thought cops were artillery'ing me from across the map

[RhinoW]

8 minutes ago, meganoth said:

Sorry, what? Machine gunner being OP is relevant to the balance. Why has machine gunners relevance anything to do with it making sense that the knuckles need to be an "interesting" weapon?

 

"useless" or "Almost rendered useless" is such a hyperbole sentence. Should I say now the knuckles are the best even though I know they are just the least best of them all 😉 ?

I have a friend who still recounts his turn as brawler in the previous game as great fun (and he isn't someone who would have fun with an ineffectual weapon). Did you ever try brawler together with beer or are you just theory-crafting with the stats?

 

I never theory craft... I have tried it, you would know that if you read my previous replies. I'm talking based on my experience, i have already tried all the builds and i play with 2 others friends that also share their feedback. I always go main tree + subtree, and the brawler perk and fist weapons in general are not as good as they COULD be. And again, i never said they weren't fun, because i myself had fun the first few hours, but that was it.