Is stealth broke again? Also a19 is generally not fun. Various other things.

[Scyris]

I am asking because I have level 1 in the sneaking perk, full padded armor with 3 pieces with -8% sound in them, and zombies still seem to be able to hear me when I am sneaking from half a 20 block room away. Also, the a-hole move by the poi designers with putting glass or paper in front of every door in the path you have to take was not needed in the dungeon style poi's for one it breaks immersion as it makes NO damn sense why its ALWAYS in those spots. Stealth is useless enough as it is due to it just not seeming to work. Not to mention all the zombies in stupid places that seem to be put there specifically to screw stealth builds, as you cannot get a clear shot without aggroing them.. ever, nevermind the paper and glass in front of every single door on the maze's path.

 

I mean the zombies have some of the best hearing i've ever seen in a game that has stealth. Its just too good, if using full padded you should be able to get within 2-3 blocks at least without them waking up. In another game, again full padded armor so 0 extra sound from armor, and 3-4 pieces with -8% sound reducing mods+level 3 in the stealth perk, its still super easy for zombies to spot me. The aggro rooms should go to, everything in a room shouldn't just aggro because you walk past the door way, it completly breaks stealth builds and makes them useless. The last time stealth was good honestly was A16, its been pretty much garbage since.

 

Honestly, I may just drop the game for now till a20, its just not fun anymore what with stealth being compeltly broken from what I can tell, and the loot system being super boring as its the same every single game with 0 variance, its just not fun to play now. I really liked the loot randomness A17/18 had, no gaurnteed 5-6 quality items in every single box/chest, completly random whatt you got and mostly quality 1-3, with 4-6 being very rare even at high gamestage. A17 was pretty linear as you were shoehorned into stats since schematics weren't a thing then, this was fixed with a18, but kinda broken again with a19, as the randomness is gone, and all loot is completly linear. I much prefer a18's loot system as does most people, if you got lucky you could have steel tools on day 1, thats just the thing though its luck, however there is a problem with the loot system as a whole i'll go into detail below.

 

The main problem with loot also is the fact that every single dungeon style poi has a loot chest at the end, this makes it far to easy to find things. Its much worse in a19 with how super linear all the loot is, you know your never going to find anything of value for sure depending on what gamestage your at. IMO the loot chest should only have a 10% chance to spawn, maybe 20% max in each poi, do that then put back a18-style loot.

 

The dungeon style poi's, Ok some poi's should be like this, maybe a very few of them, but seriously? almost every one? what the hell kind of world does this game take place in where every little house is setup like a maze? Barricaded doors make sense, but the way every poi just about is a preset maze is kinda silly. In A17 when this was new, I loved the idea, but in A19 with the garbage loot system, stealth being seemingly busted, and poi's being designed to screw stealth builds anyway possible due to spawns that never have a clear shot and you cannot get one with waking up the room, or the whole room waking up second you walk in system no matter how high stealth is. Its just a bad combo. I mostly loot poi's thru trader quests so I can double dip, 1 on the loot chest 1 for the turn in at trader. I usually never purposfully loot a poi twice using the quest to reset it, personal choice, some do it, I don't just like I don't junk turret cheese, I never use them period except on horde nights as static defense.

 

I do like the new graphics though, but seriously, less work needs to be done on graphics now and more on improving things that are broken, like the poor loot system in a19, stealth and the stuff specifically set there to screw stealth builds over, the dungeon style poi's honestly need to go or be made super rare and only specific poi's.

 

Don't get em wrong usually I have little issues with most alphas but this one just seems like ugh, so many things done/gone wrong.

 

P.s. props to you if you read this far, I know reading is hard for some people who have the attention span of a gnat people tend to have these days.

[Mday]

90% of the time stealth is OP, zombie's detection range is like less than 4 blocks. 10% of the time zombie detects me from miles away. Feels like something is broken.

[beHypE]

40 minutes ago, Mday said:

90% of the time stealth is OP, zombie's detection range is like less than 4 blocks. 10% of the time zombie detects me from miles away. Feels like something is broken.

The thing is, it works that way regardless of being specialized in stealth or not. Some rooms are designed for you to be able to play a heavy armor AK47 build with no crouching and not wake up a single sleeper, while others seem to have sleepers with a lighter sleep than my 2 year old daugther. It's really a double edged sword with the way sleepers are designed, basically it feels as if there are invisible "checkpoints" that when crossed wake the zombies up regardless of any sound made; on the other hand you can empty an M60 magazine if you stay in the hallway next to a room full of sleepers and be just fine.

[Reckis]

 

12 hours ago, Mday said:

90% of the time stealth is OP, zombie's detection range is like less than 4 blocks. 10% of the time zombie detects me from miles away. Feels like something is broken.

You must be playing a different game than I am, seems totally random to me. Sometimes I can sneak successfully even when the detection meter is at 50+, other times as soon as I sneak into a building every zombie in a 5 city block radius zeroes in on me (this is a bit of an exaggeration). I am currently running an agility/int build on my MP with my wife and a str/fort build on a single player game, and I have found that my style of clearing poi's in both builds has become identical. What is the point of sneaking when even sleepers have super human senses?

[sadpickle]

I don't have a problem sneaking into a POI, my only grievance is ferals, their sprinting and higher HP makes them very dangerous to melee. If you don't get knockdowns they can @%$*#! your @%$*#! up. You shouldn't be able to crouch-walk through a house with no danger anyway.

[Mday]

1 hour ago, Reckis said:

 

You must be playing a different game than I am, seems totally random to me. Sometimes I can sneak successfully even when the detection meter is at 50+, other times as soon as I sneak into a building every zombie in a 5 block radius zeroes in on me. I am currently running an agility/int build on my MP with my wife and a str/fort build on a single player game, and I have found that my style of clearing poi's in both builds has become identical. What is the point of sneaking when even sleepers have super human senses?

Interesting. At this point I am only doing the T5 shotgun something factory POI over and over again. I can kill 90 % of the enemy by stealth bow/crossbow. I notice there are spot where I need to switch off flashlight, cannot run/jump or else risk waking up zombies from another floor/room. Then there are areas where I can use sniper rifle without waking up anyone. I don't have "From The Shadow", but I am using Padded Armor with Advanced Muffled Connectors mod.

[Boidster]

I am much more successful sneaking in A19 than I was in A18. I finished a T1 clear quest yesterday without waking a single zombie in the POI and one-shotting all of them (except the "boss" biker at the end) with a primitive bow and stone arrows (1 point into Hidden Strike, no points in From the Shadows, padded helmet only). I chop all of the trash on the floor of course and I don't open any containers until the POI is clear.

 

Outdoors it is almost too easy to snipe them and, if they don't die on the first hit, just move laterally about 15 blocks and wait. They will wander to where the first shot came from and then lose interest. <pop> Hidden Strike #2 takes them down.

[ElCabong]

It is not broken it's always like this with one point. You're not going to get very close until you have like three points in stealth and noise reducing mods to your armor. at level 3 of stealth and a full set armor with each one having the noise reducing mod, improved fittings?, I am able to get close enough to stab them with a knife. I also manage to bushwhack most of the z's in the building. I find that when that's not happening I am in a hurry and moving too fast.

 

With just one point you're only going to be a little north of 60% successful at best. The z's are also better placed in alpha 19, you're not going to be able to stealth shoot all of them at one point in stealth.

 

No matter what you do or your skill, there are traps that you set off that trigger a mob response. That sucks.

[warmer]

Stealth skills stack up super fast. Like Nomad said, level 3, I can sneak right up on a mutha and sledge them in the head, so I don't know what you are doing wrong aside from not being patient with the build progression. Maybe break the piles of trash with your ax as intended or go through the walls. 

500 POI in game is doing pretty good given all the other systems they are fleshing out. The POI design/variety only has gotten better as time has gone on. I honestly can't think of a single RWG game with the variety of POI 7D2D has. Not even close. Granted the awesome loot can be in predictable places, but so can people's cash/safe/guns in real life. Bedroom or basement 90% of the time.

I personally do like the ambush traps. That gives me a nice jolt of adrenalin when I'm surprised, and when playing a stealth build the most exciting moments are the surprising ones in my opinion.

[Reckis]

@Mday Huh, maybe I just need to adjust. I will give it another shot when I have more points.

[iejen]

I like the new loot system. 

[Scyris]

5 hours ago, Reckis said:

 

You must be playing a different game than I am, seems totally random to me. Sometimes I can sneak successfully even when the detection meter is at 50+, other times as soon as I sneak into a building every zombie in a 5 block radius zeroes in on me. I am currently running an agility/int build on my MP with my wife and a str/fort build on a single player game, and I have found that my style of clearing poi's in both builds has become identical. What is the point of sneaking when even sleepers have super human senses?

This, I noticed this has gotten really bad in A19 along with the loot. Part of the problem is the poi design peoples have rigged the poi's to screw stealth builds over, I mean like I said you got the paper/glass piles in front of every door in the path your meant to take in dungeon poi's, and then you got the trigger rooms where second you walk in, everything aggros no matter what, then you got othe fact many zombies are positioned in ways you cannot get a clear shot unless you get into melee range as they are behind a cabinet in a corner, or inside of a closet. The litter in front of both sides of doors and the zombies in closets honestly make 0 sense, and seem to be there 100% to screw stealth builds. My problem is partly that agi is a mostly useless stat save for the stealth/sneak attack modifiers, Pistols and Archery just don't cut it later on when your dealing with mainly raidated zombies, as you need dps for the most part, I mean if you can get sneak attacks they are good for the bows/crossbow, but, if you can't, I also hate the fact I have to hit a key to reload the bow/crossbow after firing it, i'd love a toggle in options to turn auto-reload on/off... Mind you the Desert Vulture is apparently really awesome, but by the time you'd normally get one you'd most likely have better weapons. Which is another problem with the crap loot system the game has now, its too linear, so there is virtually 0 chance of finding stuff early, only exception is the trader. I'm pretty much going to give up on a19 till a20 and hope they put the loot system back to what a18 had as it was actually FUN in a18. Was nice getting lucky and getting a steel tool early or a gun.

[hiemfire]

13 minutes ago, Scyris said:

you got the paper/glass piles in front of every door in the path your meant to take in dungeon poi's,

Stone axe while crouching is your friend.

[ElCabong]

On 7/22/2020 at 1:52 AM, Scyris said:

I am asking because I have level 1 in the sneaking perk, full padded armor with 3 pieces with -8% sound in them, and zombies still seem to be able to hear me when I am sneaking from half a 20 block room away. Also, the a-hole move by the poi designers with putting glass or paper in front of every door in the path you have to take was not needed in the dungeon style poi's for one it breaks immersion as it makes NO damn sense why its ALWAYS in those spots. Stealth is useless enough as it is due to it just not seeming to work. Not to mention all the zombies in stupid places that seem to be put there specifically to screw stealth builds, as you cannot get a clear shot without aggroing them.. ever, nevermind the paper and glass in front of every single door on the maze's path.

 

I mean the zombies have some of the best hearing i've ever seen in a game that has stealth. Its just too good, if using full padded you should be able to get within 2-3 blocks at least without them waking up. In another game, again full padded armor so 0 extra sound from armor, and 3-4 pieces with -8% sound reducing mods+level 3 in the stealth perk, its still super easy for zombies to spot me. The aggro rooms should go to, everything in a room shouldn't just aggro because you walk past the door way, it completly breaks stealth builds and makes them useless. The last time stealth was good honestly was A16, its been pretty much garbage since.

 

Honestly, I may just drop the game for now till a20, its just not fun anymore what with stealth being compeltly broken from what I can tell, and the loot system being super boring as its the same every single game with 0 variance, its just not fun to play now. I really liked the loot randomness A17/18 had, no gaurnteed 5-6 quality items in every single box/chest, completly random whatt you got and mostly quality 1-3, with 4-6 being very rare even at high gamestage. A17 was pretty linear as you were shoehorned into stats since schematics weren't a thing then, this was fixed with a18, but kinda broken again with a19, as the randomness is gone, and all loot is completly linear. I much prefer a18's loot system as does most people, if you got lucky you could have steel tools on day 1, thats just the thing though its luck, however there is a problem with the loot system as a whole i'll go into detail below.

 

The main problem with loot also is the fact that every single dungeon style poi has a loot chest at the end, this makes it far to easy to find things. Its much worse in a19 with how super linear all the loot is, you know your never going to find anything of value for sure depending on what gamestage your at. IMO the loot chest should only have a 10% chance to spawn, maybe 20% max in each poi, do that then put back a18-style loot.

 

The dungeon style poi's, Ok some poi's should be like this, maybe a very few of them, but seriously? almost every one? what the hell kind of world does this game take place in where every little house is setup like a maze? Barricaded doors make sense, but the way every poi just about is a preset maze is kinda silly. In A17 when this was new, I loved the idea, but in A19 with the garbage loot system, stealth being seemingly busted, and poi's being designed to screw stealth builds anyway possible due to spawns that never have a clear shot and you cannot get one with waking up the room, or the whole room waking up second you walk in system no matter how high stealth is. Its just a bad combo. I mostly loot poi's thru trader quests so I can double dip, 1 on the loot chest 1 for the turn in at trader. I usually never purposfully loot a poi twice using the quest to reset it, personal choice, some do it, I don't just like I don't junk turret cheese, I never use them period except on horde nights as static defense.

 

I do like the new graphics though, but seriously, less work needs to be done on graphics now and more on improving things that are broken, like the poor loot system in a19, stealth and the stuff specifically set there to screw stealth builds over, the dungeon style poi's honestly need to go or be made super rare and only specific poi's.

 

Don't get em wrong usually I have little issues with most alphas but this one just seems like ugh, so many things done/gone wrong.

 

P.s. props to you if you read this far, I know reading is hard for some people who have the attention span of a gnat people tend to have these days.

I started a new character and it only had one point in bow, pistol, armor, hidden strike, and the other one that makes you sneak better I forgot what it's called. I only had three armor items, padded hood, chest, and legs. Level 1 armor. While I was looting I managed to loot 2 muffled connectors mods. I put them in my armor immediately. I was able to get close enough to the z's to club them while they were still dormant. I have to say stealth is working.

 

This was in a very dark attic. I'm not sure if I would have been as successful in a better lighted room. I think light has something to do with it.

 

I frequently move past an area and the z isn't there until I move beyond it and it hits me from behind. This is a bug, I think. I've also shot at those cabinets they hide in and it was empty only to see the z materialize a minute or two later. And then you can enter a room and trigger every z in it. These are obviously traps. I can see why you think stealth is not working.

[kuratowakiru]

you know you can break the glass and other trash on the ground and don't have to walk over it right? I just clear a tier 5 shamway poi with mostly a bow. The only zombies I woke up are the one that outside my los that just around the door... plus that drop trap that I forgot about. I have no sneak point and wearing junk armor and have flashlight on most of the time.

[Ripflex]

Scyris, there's a book perk, I think Stalker, that you make Zero sound over garbage.  And also a book perk, I think urban combat where you can jump over 1 block (or more if you have parkour) while you sneak.  Learn the game man.

 

[SenpaiThatIngnoresYou]

40 minutes ago, Ripflex said:

Scyris, there's a book perk, I think Stalker, that you make Zero sound over garbage.  And also a book perk, I think urban combat where you can jump over 1 block (or more if you have parkour) while you sneak.  Learn the game man.

 

yeah, they also have stealth shoes you can make. It's the trash. You can beat your way around a room, open a zombie closet, and the sleepers won't know you are there even if you are next to them. But if you live in a poi, and walk over trash, then a wandering horde will KNOW exactly where you are. 

 

It's the trash. I stopped hitting walls in rooms to aggro the zombies, i just now walk over the trash to make them run out to me for a good ole bashing. 

[Ghostlight]

 I may just drop the game for now till a20, its just not fun anymore what with stealth being compeltly broken from what I can tell, and the loot system being super boring as its the same every single game with 0 variance, its just not fun to play now. I really liked the loot randomness A17/18 had

 

I am completely with you on this one. The game feels much more drab and dull than usual and I eventually realised it was because the loot is now generic and dull early game. Getting that fluky T3 Shotgun on day 2 was the little quirk that made every play through interesting, different and fun.

[writeright1]

22 hours ago, Ghostlight said:

 

 

22 hours ago, Ghostlight said:

 

 

 

I am completely with you on this one. The game feels much more drab and dull than usual and I eventually realised it was because the loot is now generic and dull early game. Getting that fluky T3 Shotgun on day 2 was the little quirk that made every play through interesting, different and fun.

I agree with this assessment.  Now with gated looting every early game is 99% the same. 

With true random loot this game was the ideal post apocalyptic zombie game I've always wanted.  I was finally free to scavenge the wasteland without being tied to some settlement of whiny idiots like in State of Decay and Fallout 4.  Just me against the wasteland.  Crafting was only a side thing, I preferred to live mobile and scavenge for supplies and ammo.  I loved the freedom to go anywhere and find anything and play the way I thought was fun.  Now with the changes I have to avoid looting good places because I know I'll only find stone trash at early game.  Add a toggle or something to turn gated looting on or off and let the players have their own fun in their own way.

[12pack]

adjust and adapt..

it's easy to do, just play along..

you always seem to have some problem with some thing or other..

try slowing down when you are stealthing..

come here, @%$*#! about everything..

 

[hiemfire]

On 7/23/2020 at 7:55 PM, Ripflex said:

Scyris, there's a book perk, I think Stalker, that you make Zero sound over garbage.  And also a book perk, I think urban combat where you can jump over 1 block (or more if you have parkour) while you sneak.  Learn the game man.

 

Both are Urban Combat volumes. No noise from sneaking over trash is vol. 3, Sneak jumping is vol. 4 (also reduces the sound you make when landing after dropping off of something while sneaking).

[Scyris]

On 7/24/2020 at 6:23 AM, Ghostlight said:

 

 

 

I am completely with you on this one. The game feels much more drab and dull than usual and I eventually realised it was because the loot is now generic and dull early game. Getting that fluky T3 Shotgun on day 2 was the little quirk that made every play through interesting, different and fun.

Yeah loot in A18 was the best it ever was, it didn't need to be changed espeically to the crap system they have now, it removed all randomness to a playthru, and every damn playthru is now the exact same loot wise in a19. Its made it extremly boring. As you said finding that random fluky pump shotgun or steel tool early by pure rng luck was happy times. Now? you know it'll never ever happen in loot. I do admit they could have tweaked the values in a18 so it was a little harder to get the higher tech stuff early. the rate you find 4-6 items was fine, they were rare, as most stuff regardless of GS was tier 1-3. This made finding that random tier 5 item a real happy event. But now? once your gs is around the midpoint to the next tier, or a little bit past mid EVERY Damn item is quality tier 5-6 in every single chest, its just stupid, its too easy to get quality 5-6 stuff in A19 and the loot is just too linear that its boring. Lets be honest here, who the hell is going to store a stone axe or stone shovel in those metal chests? you'd realistically expect to find guns or something actually of value in them.

 

I just hope they switch it for a20, hell they could even switch it for a19.1, just copy over the loot tables from a18 and add in the new items, like auto shotgun, desert vulture etc. Then again TFP has a habit of not really listening to players, and just doing what they want, they can be real hard-asses about certain things. Most players want learn by doing back, except maybe only for weapons and mining tools, yet they are being stuborne and refuse to do it for some inane reason. Instead we have this skill system that honestly imo is garbage, if the weapons were decoupled from stats i'd be fine with it. just have maybe a melee weapon and ranged weapon tree. While keep the rest of the perks (except weapon ones) out of the stats.

 

A mod I play darkness falls, uses learn by doing for weapons and mining tools, though crafting tier is convered by a level locked perk. The weapons perks though can be upped as you learn by doing and raise skill. Think you need 60 skill in the mod to be able to get level 5 of the perk, might be 80, its been a while.

2 hours ago, hiemfire said:

Both are Urban Combat volumes. No noise from sneaking over trash is vol. 3, Sneak jumping is vol. 4 (also reduces the sound you make when landing after dropping off of something while sneaking).

That just makes it sound like they put the trash piles there solely to justify that book now when I think about it. One of my fave books though is the urban combat one that removes all encumbrance from armor while in combat (and for about 20 seconds after it). Soon as your hit, or hit a zombie, you can move in that steel armor as if you had no armor, or padded which has no penalties.

[watzlp]

Honestly its just like in earlier builds where EVERY SINGLE DOOR IN THE GAME was barricaded including bathroom and bed room doors in a house that already had barricaded windows and a front and back door. There is NO SENSE in half the things they have done at this point other than artificial difficulty. NO there is NO REASON there are trash piles in every single door way. ITs only meant to make it so that any players actually trying to play the game properly and stealth have to stop literally every 4 steps in some buildings and beat a trash pile. The fact that they did so also makes no sense in alot of cases because the buildings youre going through will be 100% intact, but for some odd reason have trash everywhere just to make a noise. Meanwhile IVE found this funny "glitch" that if your stealth is High enough and youre down to 2% or lower, every 3-4th step, your noise will kick up to near 10% for NO REASON. Meanwhile If youre stealth is high enough, you can fire a Magnum and some how not wake a zombie, yet the glass pile on the floor will..

[Gideon]

I'm remember that in A18 I could easily get to the point where I stomp through in full iron armor with a reinforced club and smash the crap out of everything with zero need for stealth at all. If necessary switch to my AK and mow down everything. Got even more comical in later game stages.

 

Perhaps tuning some of the difficulty settings would help you? I know setting loot to 50% has made a big difference in our A19 playthrough right now. We do find a load of ammo, but so far only a couple of blunderbusses. Armor is much harder to come by as well. Food is a challenge still (oddly not water, but I think this is because water and food needs degrade at the same rate which is very strange feeling).

 

Maybe its less about changes between versions, and more about customizing your world settings to give you the play experience you desire?

[Bhaaltazar]

Stealth is broken in current build...
With latest patch I decided to play agility again after awhile. Invested 4 points into stealth, full padded armor with adv. Muffled mod in each piece of armor. No specific POI's are broken, but sometimes in same POI whole room wakes up for no reason, with my stealth meter down at only 3. Just did a clear tier 3 POI ( house old bungalow_11 - the one with a big underground tunnel/bunker system under a house and a shack ). Every floor I entered I just saw all the red dots started moving. 

So sneak wasn't working at all and it is broken in the current patch. At level 4 in sneaking and with The night stalker books - no noise when moving over trash - zombies still just wakes up for no reason and starts moving - like there is a trigger when zombies spawn in when you enter the area at the end, except it is happening in most of the POIs on every level.