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Alpha 19 Dev Diary


madmole

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I have some more feedback about quests.  Quests were my main way of playing the game, and the thing I do when no other task around the base needs doing.  I've found myself not wanting to play the game as much because the Tier 5 POI's are just too big and take too long to do. 

 

I went through a lot of very well designed POI's in the Tier 1 through Tier 3 range, and some of the Tier 4's are cool, but the size of these dungeons is just too big.

 

Or, maybe more accurately, the CLEAR objective is just not a fun one to do when the POI gets bigger than a two-story house.  I don't know how to fix it other than have the POI's be faster to get through.

 

Or maybe have different varieties of quests, because the only ones I see now are Tier 5 clears, or Tier 5 clear/fetch, and every now and then a Tier 2 buried supply or something.

 

Assassinating a bandit?

 

Assassinating a boss zombie?

 

Planting a bomb?

 

Planting a supply drop?

 

Planting a radio transmitter?

 

Just brainstorming things that aren't clearing the entire POI.  You could probably come up with more stuff.

 

Cheers. :)

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@x3eemguy , it's a part of the new "Critcals" and expanded Primitive Stage now. And also a PSA from MadMole;

 

"You never went to the gym. You stayed on the coach and ate Cheetos and Redbull."

"Now you're in a Zombie Apocolypse."

"Bet you wish you would have taken better care of yourself."

'Warning: over exertion in the first weeks of a Zombie Apocolypse may lead to massive heart attacks and death.'

 

 

heh heh, totally kidding here :biggrin1:

sry, no idea and haven't seen anyone posting similar.. might be something in the Bug Reports though.

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2 hours ago, faatal said:

People make a lot of guesses as to why the AI does something and it is often wrong. I see people test their designs with a bunch of the same zombie thinking the other types will do the same thing, which is sometimes not true.

 

Blood moon spawner does attack your base from multiple directions, but not all at once, it changes over time, because that is more efficient for pathing. The typical dumb zombie will not go very far to find a weak spot or opening, often preferring to beat on a wall near it instead of walking a bit to go through an opening. Yesterday I was just looking at that issue of being too dumb and beating the walls around a cemetery POI instead of using the opening, but really that is correct, since those are set to be that dumb. Thick walls would change that behavior, just like many things can change their behavior.

 

Dumb Zed is not necessary a bad one. If I set one off and run back though the house or poi and if I'm too fast they get stuck behind a wall or stacked furniture when the opening is just a 6 blocks out of their way. I don't really think this is a bad thing, we are talking about dead brain matter here, hows he even supposed to know where the opening is without seeing it. It just followed my sound which I've seen them do in any movie with zombies. So I just help them out with the block they are destroying and stab them in the head like you would if you found one tangled in barbwire on a fence or similar scenario. How many times have I seen the same thing in walking dead.

That's part of the reason I liked the pathing in early A16 versus later. They were 100% willing to throw themselves off a cliff just to get a little closer which is normally what you would see in any movie/show with zeds. I guess it depends on the type of virus too, I'm more partial to the enraged rabbis zombie myself. Right now I find they are too smart at times, trying to get them to go though the traps already set in a building, barbwire spikes and landmines setup prefabbed in the poi and they'll walk though the whole house to avoid it now. Same with spikes, if you put one down while they are chasing you they'll zig and then zag to avoid it where before they'd run right into it trying to get you.

I'd honestly rather 128 dumb enraged zeds per wave on horde night over 64 smart ones but thats me trying to recreate a walking dead world/World War Z world. I even stab all the zeds I kill in the head after they are already dead, I appreciate that you guys added a sound they make sometimes when I do this, makes me feel justified in my actions. Head explosions are just icing on the cake.

 

They also have a hard time with openings that are not doors, like prefabbed holes in walls. Theres a certain mine they get stuck in all the time if you don't break things open for them.

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19 minutes ago, x3eemguy said:

Hello all, My wife a I have been playing this game for a little over a year now. Since the new update my wife died randomly 3 times now, first time just digging for a buried supply, then in a poi and then again digging for another buried supply. There was no mine or explosion or any other threat whatsoever. We were together at same location, like less than 1 meter and just puff out of the air death comes. This issue never happened before to her or myself, now this looks like a bug and it sucks. We only play permadeath. If any player dies in our group of 3 we start over. Anyone else experience this? It sucks now with this random death issue.

Did you start a new game when latest experimental dropped?

Sometimes NOT restarting can mess up your game... just a guess.

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25 minutes ago, x3eemguy said:

Hello all, My wife a I have been playing this game for a little over a year now. Since the new update my wife died randomly 3 times now, first time just digging for a buried supply, then in a poi and then again digging for another buried supply. There was no mine or explosion or any other threat whatsoever. We were together at same location, like less than 1 meter and just puff out of the air death comes. This issue never happened before to her or myself, now this looks like a bug and it sucks. We only play permadeath. If any player dies in our group of 3 we start over. Anyone else experience this? It sucks now with this random death issue.

No actually and all I play is permadeath as well so I know that could be rather annoying/upsetting. Do you verify game files after every update? If that was happening to me I'd uninstall and reinstall then verify game files. Random death shouldn't just be happening.

Edit: Unless the ground is caving in on top of you guys while digging, that can kill you forsure.

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52 minutes ago, wolfbain5 said:

will arrows and bolts get fixed soon? arrows and bolts float away from zombies. I mean the 2nd pic was a head shot. and the first pic, the bow is loaded and aimed, but no arrow

A19.0_2020-08-11_21-09-43.jpg

 

Holy crap, never seen that many crates together before. What POI is that?

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1 hour ago, faatal said:
9 hours ago, Jost Amman said:

Not quite, faatal mentioned once that AI pathing is the real problem... the more entities you have the more processing power you need.

That's why we can't have hundreds of zombies at the same time all "pathing" around. :ballchain:

It tends to be the character controller colliding with the world, not pathing that uses a lot of CPU.

I have no idea what you just said, but I understand I was wrong... thanks for the reply! :hail::yo:

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2 hours ago, faatal said:

I was referring to it spawning from a sleeper volume. There is no coordination across sleeper volumes. I added that to my todo list, but it will probably not be in A19.

PLUS desynchroniced spawns/sleeper spawns WITH random hordes and biome spawns. Or else, it will still make bumps when any spawn happens simultaneously. Coding that  is a big undertaking for an experimental build; nevertheless thank you for having it on your list.

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20 hours ago, Pegasus said:

 

Well that would certainly explain it.  Hopefully someone in charge can take a look and maybe see about balancing it a bit for the bigger POIs / higher tier quests.  I'm seeing a lot of frustration regarding this issue.  Thanks. :)

Yes, it was balanced for the bigger POI.

Previously you only got the guidance for the last missing zombie room.

 

On a T5 POI it now shows you the last three. Unless you make it a point to tunnel through walls or skip entire floors that should work every time now.

If it is a problem then it is very likely a self-made one.

 

Don't take me wrong - feel free to tunnel all throughout the building. Just go all the way and hit every room while doing so. That works, too.

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15 hours ago, SnowDog1942 said:

Can it just be a percent, once You cleared 95 percent ( or whatever percent).  Quest complete

Yes, it essentially is.

 

The biggest POI have a bit over 30 zombie groups. 3 of those is 10% when it was 3.3% before.

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Tbh I kinda have hard time understanding ppl haveing problems with T5 poi’s. Personally haven’t had any trouble with em my self for a long time now, tho they use to be hard in the beginning when I started ply some years ago. I was a real noob lol. Now it  Takes me about a day moving thought at a normal speed. Half a day if I’m going  relatively  Fast and a day n a half if I’m being slow and Stealthy and looting everything.  These are on average Times. 

Which I found out it’s completely possible to stealth kill every zombie (and vulture) in the shot gun factory tho you do have to completely invest points into accomplishing that, as it should be.

so yeah guess I’ve played to the point where it’s not a big problem for me like it use to be, which is also how it should be. Practice pays off 

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18 minutes ago, Yopo said:

Tbh I kinda have hard time understanding ppl haveing problems with T5 poi’s. 

The problem is that some players have adopted habits over the years that are detrimental to following a given path.

The thinking is "There's a locked door, so I open it with my tools" or "There's a broken staircase. So I build my own path with frames".

 

Also a lot of impatience is involved. If the path is not evident, improvisation is used and many areas are simply skipped.

 

Especially the parts are difficult for these players where you have to solve small puzzles to get ahead like jumping up in an elevator shaft. And if the path is around the outside of the building then a shortcut through the wall is taken because they don't want to fall down.

 

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7 hours ago, faatal said:

No zombie auto targets you except for blood moon spawns and POI volumes set to attack.

Hey @faatal, freshly spawned wandering hordes seem to auto-target you. You cannot get a sneak attack bonus on them - yet they still don't "see" the player as they are not aggroed. Is this on purpose?

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2 hours ago, RipClaw said:

The problem is that some players have adopted habits over the years that are detrimental to following a given path.

The thinking is "There's a locked door, so I open it with my tools" or "There's a broken staircase. So I build my own path with frames".

 

Also a lot of impatience is involved. If the path is not evident, improvisation is used and many areas are simply skipped.

 

Especially the parts are difficult for these players where you have to solve small puzzles to get ahead like jumping up in an elevator shaft. And if the path is around the outside of the building then a shortcut through the wall is taken because they don't want to fall down.

 

This is a habit I am trying to break of my new 7DTD friends.  Every single mission I have to remind them, "Follow the path or you're going to get confused."

Like Refugee stated, I can clear T5 quests in no time.  My friends and I decided to knock one out on horde day when it was already 1700ish.  We were in the air and heading to our horde base at ~2150. 🤪

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11 hours ago, Jost Amman said:

Welcome to the party... too late.

Also, no need to get personal and throw insults around... someone might say the same for your idea. 😉

Sorry didn't realise facts were now considered insults, noted. Don't care if people do say my idea is dumb, I'm a grown up and realise not everyone is gonna agree with me ;)

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26 minutes ago, Orsey said:

 

MM, add this block shape please. This shape is sorely lacking when you make walls from plates. Thanks.

EfOT7OnWkAEosdc?format=jpg&name=large

 

 Guys, leave a like if you support the request 👍

i mean it is not hard to do that normally 

 

 

personly i would rather have them add all the other shapes to make my base look better like Center 1/2, Curved walls, round walls, those roofs of the trailers they uses around the edges that i don't know the name off! like have a Folder like blocks, Walls, Roofs, stairs, floors, others rather then a mosh pit that is unorganized, (also they could turn the scrap metal frame into a Shape shifter so you can turn it into other shapes like Arrow slots) but hey thats my opinion :)   

 

 

 

edit: it seams that Madmole has been liking castles more! i mean @Laz Man and @Toban seem to help feed his hunger for mid evil buildings!  just me maybe?

 

 

Edit 2: Good to see you back @Orsey :)

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15 hours ago, PoloPoPo said:

Is there a particular reason for solar cells being one of the most expensive items the trader has to offer? About 40k Dukes with 25 % discount included already for a quality 6 solar cell seems pretty much to me. Especially as they only deliver energy during daytime and therefore are useless for a lot of purposes.

 

Or are there some things solar cells are specially useful for?

you connect them to a battery bank and you have 100% self-sustaining power 24/7. The solar charges the batteries for night use.

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55 minutes ago, Nugetti said:

Hey @faatal, freshly spawned wandering hordes seem to auto-target you. You cannot get a sneak attack bonus on them - yet they still don't "see" the player as they are not aggroed. Is this on purpose?

Sure you can! Just run away from the initial charge and lose them, then they go idle, go back and pick them off one at a time. I actually did it in a recently posted vid. They are 2hs though so maybe a tough time finding that particular part.

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5 hours ago, STyK_ said:

No actually and all I play is permadeath as well so I know that could be rather annoying/upsetting. Do you verify game files after every update? If that was happening to me I'd uninstall and reinstall then verify game files. Random death shouldn't just be happening.

Edit: Unless the ground is caving in on top of you guys while digging, that can kill you forsure.

No cave in or anything of that sort. I have not verified files, but I did clean all game files on both the PC. It only happens to my wife, and no one else in the group. It started with the latest experimental. I will clean files again today and verify then see how it goes.

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