The Harder and Uglier Update

[Frepo]

Scrap zombie

It's basically a dead former survivor. In full scrap armor. The twist: Bullets hitting it have a chance to bounce off in a random direction, potentially harming other players and the environment (could be an interesting combo with highly explosive containers like gas and fuel tanks). Better stick to good old melee brawling when fighting them.

 

More zombies

I would love to see more options at game setup to customize your game even more, especially to crank up the amount of zombies. The mods (I'm currently running with x8 zombies) are a little quirky. Seems like no extra zombies spawn in towns. When I head out into the wilderness there are zombies everywhere (awesome!). Problem being, 95% of the time your are in towns doing clear/fetch quests and looting. Since there really isn't anything of interest in the wild, you only go there for buried treasure quests. The difficulty option, if understand it correct, only makes zombies tougher and hit harder. It's much more fun with greater amounts of zombies than turning them into bullet sinks that take forever to kill.

 

For people who din't like hardcore: Add a separate zombie-multiplier setup option.

 

More surprise elements

I love the traps with floors breaking, zombies hiding in closets and above you. But still I find myself in sticky situations far to seldom. Perhaps there could be buried zombies (dirt, sand and gravel blocks etc. only) that pop up around you. And if you hit a zombie with a bicycle, a minibike, or a motorcycle there is a chance you fall of your vehicle (with a short animation of you falling to the ground and getting back up before you can control your character again). And perhaps other situations where you simply lose your footing.

 

And when you make a loud noise, sometimes a group of zombies spawn nearby (out of vision) and homing in on your position. This could make for some really interesting situations when you are inside a house fighting zombies and suddenly another group shows up behind you. This happens sometimes (but far to seldom), and it gets really hairy because you were not expecting an ambush from behind. Love those situations when it becomes chaotic like that!

 

For people who don't like hardcore: Add a zombie-ambush chance setup option.

 

Faster and more punishing infection

Never ever, has the infection become a relevant threat. You got all the time in the world to cure yourself. Perhaps not at a very early stage of the game, but at that point you are probably below level 6 so it doesn't matter at all if you die. I suggest speeding up the infection so that you really have to consider aborting your quest if you get infected and didn't bring a cure. Or, the effects of the infection could be more severe (even in the first stage of the infection) and take MUCH longer to cure. That would make you want to get a cure ASAP. Then I would make the recipe for proper antibiotics more expensive, and add the bonus that it cures much faster than honey and herbals (perhaps honey and herbals could even be somewhat unreliable, curing only 1-X% of the infection). So only at the very late game you have (or at least have a way to craft) a reliable cure that makes the infection recede at a faster rate.

 

I would even go as far as adding additional penalties to the near-death-debuff if you die while infected. The higher the stage of the infection, the more severe the near-death-debuff becomes after respawn.

 

For people who don't like hardcore: Add an infection-severity setup option. OPTIONS; Mild: 0.5 infection speed, no additional penalty upon death. Dangerous: 1.0 infection speed. x2 near-death penalty / infection stage. Deadly: x2 infection speed. x3 near-death penalty / infection stage.

 

Harsher climate

Add "events" like periods of extreme heat or cold (even worse in desert and snow biomes) that you have to struggle to endure. And feel the relief when it's over. Bring in the concept of ice and fridges to help against the heat, radiators and a large cozy fireplace to combat the cold. The game needs to give electricity more love anyway.

 

Sand and snow blizzards that reduces vision and directly hurts your health without proper clothing/shelter. Ski goggles could help see clearly, but still not very far.

 

Freezing or being over-heated don't really bother me. Sure my food/drink stats drain a little bit faster, I'll just get an extra snack or drink when I get home. No no no, that's not enough. Going around without proper clothing too long should lead to sunburn/frostbite. Ailments that reduces your max health and makes you take more damage from all sources. And you take continuous damage if e.g. you're suffering from frostbite and are freezing on top of that.

 

Add thermometers to help you get a heads up when a heat/cold season is drawing near. Glass needs more uses anyway.

 

For people who don't like hardcore: Add on/off option at game setup. Or a slider ranging from off - mild - hazardous - severe.

 

Zombies can grap a hold on you

E.g. a zombie coming up from behind could grab you and start chewing on your neck, draining your health, causing bleeding and infection. You can't move or do anything while grabbed. Or perhaps you and the zombie grabbing tumble around a little during the struggle, if you're unlucky you tumble off a ledge and fall to your doom. You have to play a small mini game to break free. The hood prompts you to either click the LMB or RMB as fast as you can, you have to keep your cool and pay attention as it can switch the button at any time. Every correct click brings you one click closer to breaking free, each miss-click brings you one futher away. Strenth and agility could help your break free easier. Stronger zombies makes it harder to break free.

 

For people who don't like hardcore: Add on/off option at game setup.

 

Less mineral nodes

As I mentioned earlier, you don't have many reasons to venture into the wilderness. As it is now, I find everything I need just around the corner, and I've never mined out an entire ore vein. And if I ever do, there's likely another one 100 meters away anyway. The amount of mineral nodes needs to be greatly reduced, so that you actually have to go out and search for them. I like that oil shale is only available in the desert biome (I think). Nitrate should only be available (at surface level) in snow biomes, and coal (again at surface level) in burnt forests. I know, it's not realistic, but from a game play point of view it forces you to travel around, it gives you more reasons to go out into the wilderness, to actually make it an effort (and a risk) to obtain it. Perhaps mountains could have more ore nodes, and contain any type of mineral regardless of biome. I like the rocks indicating that there is a vein below. But the vein should be deeper underground and not necessarily directly below the indicator. You only know that somewhere below is a vein, but you have to search for it. Perhaps a new tool like a rock hammer (prospector's hammer) could help you find the vein faster. Hitting the hammer on stone will give you a clue to any nearby minerals. It could say something like "small traces of nitrate", and when you get closer it say "rich traces of nitrate".

 

For people who don't like hardcore: Add an ore-node amount multiplier option at game setup.

 

Poison

Add poisonous plants and small animals like spiders so that you have to watch your step. These could be even more abundant in swamp/jungle biomes, if such biomes should ever be implemented. Poison wears off over time, of course antidotes can be found and crafted. Every 1% of poison in your body deals 1 damage as the poison wears off. The hunter perk can help you detect these hazards by highlighting them or something. The poisonous plants can be used to craft poison-tipped arrows that paralyzes animals (useful when hunting but has no effect on zombies).

 

Radiation zones

Some POI's are radiated, restricting you from venturing there until you have proper protection (hazard suits). Perhaps some random areas are radiated as well, zombies spawning there can afflict radiation onto you. A geiger counter could help you detect radiation before stepping into lethal areas. It could be a handheld tools and/or an armor mod.

 

Repairing items

Bring back "The Fixer" perk. Repairing requires much longer time and each time you repair an item, there is a chance that the quality level is decreased (even breaking Q1 items). The perk lowers this risk and speeds up the repair process. Implement a repair bench that also lowers the risk and time needed to repair (plus it has it's own "crafting queue" like the workbench). Only at the highest level in combination with a repair bench can you safely repair without risking any permanent damage to the item.

[H01101001]

I know that it would be really hard to implement, but I would LOVE having the ability to create way more zombie hoards, on the level of They are Billions.  That would be epic.   And I think your "Scrap Zombie" idea is amazing.  It would be annoying in game to have to overcome them, but make a lot of sense, kind of like wild magic in DnD.

[Frepo]

In general, I would like to see some rare super-dangerous zombies. Like a big, bulky, mutated abomination of a zombie that could bash your head in with ease. Something  that actually makes you wanna sneak around it, or try to avoid it in any way. This would make sneaking (and minding your noise level) more relevant. Bears and lions fills this role somewhat, if you are ever surprised by one you're in big trouble. Unless you have a machine gun, they usually get to ram you once before you've blown it's head off. And they never show up inside buildings (except for that Bear bar, where you are prepared for them). So a big threat that you can't just see as walking experience would be nice. Something that makes you flee in panic

 

[H01101001]

8 hours ago, Frepo said:

In general, I would like to see some rare super-dangerous zombies. Like a big, bulky, mutated abomination of a zombie that could bash your head in with ease. Something  that actually makes you wanna sneak around it, or try to avoid it in any way. This would make sneaking (and minding your noise level) more relevant. Bears and lions fills this role somewhat, if you are ever surprised by one you're in big trouble. Unless you have a machine gun, they usually get to ram you once before you've blown it's head off. And they never show up inside buildings (except for that Bear bar, where you are prepared for them). So a big threat that you can't just see as walking experience would be nice. Something that makes you flee in panic

 

How about a powerful Zombie that once it sees you, or maybe gets a swipe of your blood, will never stop chasing you.  It moves very very slow, but you never quite know if/when it will catch you in the long run.  (Perhaps while looting a building a few weeks later you see them ambling along the road toward you once again...) Or it sends minions after you as well.  It makes staying in the same place more difficult, the need to always be aware of the immediate area, and sneaking to get away, when they catch up to you more relevant.

[Frepo]

I like it! A STALKER
Yeah, more boss-like zombies would be cool.