About Double clearing POIs and how to fix it

[Sjustus548]

5 minutes ago, Blake_ said:

I have a quest here, here it is the quest marker. Wait, Imma go inside and explore, loot and kill everything and get lots of stuff, and then I will hit the mark for double goodness. Now THAT'S a problem.

That's not a problem in my opinion.  Let's say you start a new map and do some looting to get supplies and equipment.  A while later you are doing some quests for the trader and you get a house you have already looted previously.  Do you not do a quest at that POI or not loot anything due to the principle of hating double looting so much?  What happens if you get a quest for a POI that you have already done a quest at?  Do you not loot anything and just finish the quest and leave?  Or is it just looting the same building twice in a row and not looting it over and over while doing quests that you hate so much?  Just trying to figure out where you draw the line at multiple lootings.

[Liesel Weppen]

2 minutes ago, Sjustus548 said:

 Do you not loot anything and just finish the quest and leave?

I do that. That's why i prefer fetch quests. Rush to your supplies, rush to the main loot, return.

[Sjustus548]

2 minutes ago, Liesel Weppen said:

I do that. That's why i prefer fetch quests. Rush to your supplies, rush to the main loot, return.

I'm the kind of guy that takes everything apart for parts, breaks every door for the knobs, and generally takes way too long to clear every building lol.  

[JCrook1028]

6 minutes ago, Sjustus548 said:

I'm the kind of guy that takes everything apart for parts, breaks every door for the knobs, and generally takes way too long to clear every building lol.  

Me too. Then later game I rarely even need to loot and I can concentrate on building. When you have several thousand mech parts etc more really isn't worth the time.

[Liesel Weppen]

18 minutes ago, Sjustus548 said:

I'm the kind of guy that takes everything apart for parts, breaks every door for the knobs, and generally takes way too long to clear every building lol.  

With that said, you shouldn't even take the word repetitive into your mouth. For some people pure grind is the best game just for the sake of heaving even more stuff of what they won't need ever anyway. I have no problem if you da that, but i still won't. 😛

11 minutes ago, JCrook1028 said:

When you have several thousand mech parts etc more really isn't worth the time.

And that's the point where you realize (or not) that you never ever will need thousands of mech parts. If i had 5000 mech parts and after building whatever i want to build still 4000 mechparts are left, i'd ask myself for what reason i ever looted them anyway

 

Just like people that go explicitly for hunting animals just to fill the third chest with meat, already having a full chest of best-value food...

[JCrook1028]

12 minutes ago, Liesel Weppen said:

With that said, you shouldn't even take the word repetitive into your mouth. For some people pure grind is the best game just for the sake of heaving even more stuff of what they won't need ever anyway. I have no problem if you da that, but i still won't. 😛

And that's the point where you realize (or not) that you never ever will need thousands of mech parts. If i had 5000 mech parts and after building whatever i want to build still 4000 mechparts are left, i'd ask myself for what reason i ever looted them anyway

 

Just like people that go explicitly for hunting animals just to fill the third chest with meat, already having a full chest of best-value food...

Ahh but the first 10,000 or so parts I sold to get all my crafting stations/vehicles etc. I only spec Intel in late late game when I want solar. Early on it's better for my points elsewhere and my wrench takes care of anything from intel that I need.

[Liesel Weppen]

6 minutes ago, JCrook1028 said:

Ahh but the first 10,000 or so parts I sold to get all my crafting stations/vehicles etc. I only spec Intel in late late game when I want solar. Early on it's better for my points elsewhere and my wrench takes care of anything from intel that I need.

Scrapping the hell out of anything and selling it for dukes just to buy stations and vehicles is also a valid way to play.

And those are exactly the people who will complain, if another "exploitable" mechanic will become fixed, because then they can't continue (fully) to play in their way they got used to.  😛

I usually also don't spec into int too. I do a mixture of buying stuff from the trader and hoping to find the books for that stuff. Still never had the need to spamloot and selling tons of crap just for dukes. I wouldn't even play the game if this would be necessary, because imho that is overally anoying. 😛

[Blake_]

1 hour ago, Sjustus548 said:

That's not a problem in my opinion.  Let's say you start a new map and do some looting to get supplies and equipment.  A while later you are doing some quests for the trader and you get a house you have already looted previously.  Do you not do a quest at that POI or not loot anything due to the principle of hating double looting so much?  What happens if you get a quest for a POI that you have already done a quest at?  Do you not loot anything and just finish the quest and leave?  Or is it just looting the same building twice in a row and not looting it over and over while doing quests that you hate so much?  Just trying to figure out where you draw the line at multiple lootings.

Clearing it before by pure chance is natural and ok by me. But not by intelligent design. What you said is the only case scenario that can't be avoided in my suggestion and I'm ok with it, as long as there is variety in the future (first time clearing it there are bandits, next time zds, etc). But changing the quest to resetting on acceptance like I stated on the OP would reduce that and improve quest design, in my opinion. 

[Kosmic Kerman]

32 minutes ago, Blake_ said:

Clearing it before by pure chance is natural and ok by me. But not by intelligent design. What you said is the only case scenario that can't be avoided in my suggestion and I'm ok with it, as long as there is variety in the future (first time clearing it there are bandits, next time zds, etc). But changing the quest to resetting on acceptance like I stated on the OP would reduce that and improve quest design, in my opinion. 

Of course spending time on that would mean less time spent working on new features.  At this stage in development, I'd rather have new features than a redesigned quest system where the main benefit is protecting players who lack self-control from ruining their own experience. However, even if Lathan had nothing else to do but polish questing, there are other aspects that I'd rather have polished first (better POI selection, less repeating selections, etc.) but that's just my personal preference. 

[Vampirenostra]

For me it is only the cement which is outside the pois im double looting and only in case I do not have a forge to produce it. As soon as I get a forge I just put 2-3 of em and off you go to the mines to dig for stone and melt it to cement, not big deal anywhere after. For the rest of the loot I prefer the traders rewards. For XP it is mining and building this stuff gives huge xp boost, I doubt you can farm so much with poi clearing as me digging and building.

[th3s0n1c]

13 hours ago, RipClaw said:

From at least tier 4 quests on it is too time consuming to clear and loot the same POI twice.

Nerd pole up for the goodies then reset... double profit still at a fast rate.

[Kalen]

Honestly, like many others here, I don't see a problem.   So called double dipping still requires you to spend the effort to loot a POI twice... which makes it, effectively, no different than looting 2 POIs.   In fact, you'd be better off looting it once then going back for another quest.  I'd rather loot 2 POIs for 2 quests than 2 POIs for 1 quest.

 

[Boidster]

3 hours ago, Vampirenostra said:

For me it is only the cement which is outside the pois im double looting

For us it's AC units and brass light fixtures, if the house has them. Mailboxes too, though that even brushes up against my very narrow definition of "cheese". Dem books, tho.

[th3s0n1c]

Suggestion: how about just tie the whole quest thing to players instead of traders/POIs? Lemme explain better: instead of giving traders the power to decide which POI the quest will be in, just have it tied to the player talking to the trader. That can allow for players not be given the option to repeat the same POIs over and over (if you already did.. I dont know.. old victorian house_01, you never get that option again) but still allow resets for new players/different players.

I know it doesnt fix the doubling problem, but it would shut down further exploitation.

 

One could say "but there are only so many T5's in the game!" Make them the only replayable option or you can only repeat them 3 times over different types of missions (fetch/clear area/fetch+clear in this order for progression)

[DaChibii]

Not that I'm really for or against POI resets, but.. the Trader could simply do a check to see if the POI has been looted when the quest is rolled, and if so just reroll until an unlooted POI is found. It can be as simple as checking whether the main stash has been looted, or a random combination of stashes, or even if the zombie closets are unbroken. And if no suitable POI is found then it selects the initial result and the player has to accept the POI reset.

Really the only pro's of POI resets is that on small maps it allows for a longer times on that map. On other maps it's just a trade off between speed versus exploration (some players prefer speed progressing, while others prefer the joys of exploring new places).

Personally, I prefer not to double dip but my cohorts prefer to. In MP it's way easier to stripmine a POI, since players can focus on one task (one goes to clear, the other follows behind loots, and a third immediately starting salvaging). So resetting is beneficial in that case because the travel time between quest POIs is more significant than the actual POI clearing time. So it's mostly a MP balance issue, which frankly TFP should be concerned with but that's such a pain to get right that I'm expecting that the game balance be focused around SP. And in SP it's not that much of an issue.

[Blake_]

7 hours ago, Kosmic Kerman said:

Of course spending time on that would mean less time spent working on new features.  At this stage in development, I'd rather have new features than a redesigned quest system where the main benefit is protecting players who lack self-control from ruining their own experience. However, even if Lathan had nothing else to do but polish questing, there are other aspects that I'd rather have polished first (better POI selection, less repeating selections, etc.) but that's just my personal preference. 

Well, of course given that it's not  the highest priority right now and more of a "quality of life feature", I think I posted it in the right timeframe because a20 might be all about that. I mean, Prime is doing quality of life quest tweaks and npcs are still a bit in the medium term and the Art team and animators' hands are full with the Special infected stuff and assets.

 

If put against a wall and asked for, I would of course prefer many other features over this, though this seems like the right moment.

2 hours ago, DaChibii said:

Not that I'm really for or against POI resets, but.. the Trader could simply do a check to see if the POI has been looted when the quest is rolled, and if so just reroll until an unlooted POI is found. It can be as simple as checking whether the main stash has been looted, or a random combination of stashes, or even if the zombie closets are unbroken. And if no suitable POI is found then it selects the initial result and the player has to accept the POI reset.

Really the only pro's of POI resets is that on small maps it allows for a longer times on that map. On other maps it's just a trade off between speed versus exploration (some players prefer speed progressing, while others prefer the joys of exploring new places).

Personally, I prefer not to double dip but my cohorts prefer to. In MP it's way easier to stripmine a POI, since players can focus on one task (one goes to clear, the other follows behind loots, and a third immediately starting salvaging). So resetting is beneficial in that case because the travel time between quest POIs is more significant than the actual POI clearing time. So it's mostly a MP balance issue, which frankly TFP should be concerned with but that's such a pain to get right that I'm expecting that the game balance be focused around SP. And in SP it's not that much of an issue.

The closest POIs could've already been looted and then what? Back to my solution. I thought of that. Might work on par with my OP.

 

Longer times on smaller maps? I'm all for that, let's reset every time we take a quest. But not artificially doubling if it can be avoided. As I stated, a more varied POI situation pool like bandits, then Zds, then animals or npc stuff, etc... could give variety to the non-avoidable resets.

[DaChibii]

1 hour ago, Blake_ said:

The closest POIs could've already been looted and then what? Back to my solution. I thought of that. Might work on par with my OP.

Well... This sounds like a public MP server issue, more than a co-op or SP issue. And if that case... then it's more an issue with new player placement then it's about actual POI resets. Otherwise, it's just a behind the scenes fix since it's doubtful a new player is going to loot every available POI before the quests run out. And if they do, then they don't need the quest XP or rewards since they've already progressed so much. And even then... it still doesn't remove the reset, it just places it at the end.

Granted, if my suggestion actually got implemented (doubtful; TFP has a production schedule and process) a player would then get a choice: loot nearby POIs to trader for quick sales and risk losing out on close quests, or be more selective which POIs to loot so not to mess up the pool. At extremes a savvy player could exploit it to alter the available pool to their desire, but... that would be alot of effort.

 

[Rince]

If isn't broken don't fix it.

 

The system as it is now works well. If some people enjoy doing low tier mission twice each time, be my guest. I not gonna decide how they play.

 

[Kosmic Kerman]

9 hours ago, Blake_ said:

Well, of course given that it's not  the highest priority right now and more of a "quality of life feature", I think I posted it in the right timeframe because a20 might be all about that. I mean, Prime is doing quality of life quest tweaks and npcs are still a bit in the medium term and the Art team and animators' hands are full with the Special infected stuff and assets.

Since I don't believe I've said this in any of my posts, I should state that I agree with you that the current implementation of starting quests and resetting POIs should be reworked before the game goes gold. The ability to loot a POI and then immediately reset it is too gamey in my opinion for a finished game. I just don't think it's a priority and it's probably best to wait until TFP has more things in place before reworking quests. What likely needs to happen first is that TFP needs to focus on finalizing how questing, POI resets, and loot rooms are intended to work rather than leaving those for the indefinite future. However, depending on their bandwidth there may be other areas of the game that require that focus first (RWG, Bandits, etc.)

[Blake_]

1 hour ago, Rince said:

If isn't broken don't fix it.

 

The system as it is now works well. If some people enjoy doing low tier mission twice each time, be my guest. I not gonna decide how they play.

 

I drawn to the beauty within the simplicity of your comment. It sure can be improved though. 

[RestInPieces]

On 9/30/2020 at 2:29 PM, Blake_ said:

While I agree that not having it at all would be the designer's "wet dream", resetting is needed for cleanup and handling quests in a way that enforces a minimum pleasant experience to all the players in all the possible environments

This is an easy fix imo, scrap this 90s mmo-style abomination, that is called "quests", as well!

[mr.devolver]

So if I understood this "problem" correctly, you guys seem to have an issue with this so called "exploit" which works like this: You go to a POI for a quest and before activating the quest, you run through the POI, clear it and loot it, activate the quest and do the same thing again.

 

Question: What's the actual exploit here? What's the unintentional feature here that gives me an edge over the other players? What's the advantage that allows me to gain something that I would normally have to work for much harder otherwise? More importantly, when it comes to gaining something out of doing this so called "exploit", is it still worth it if it takes the player double the time they would normally spend doing the quest? And most importantly, since it takes double the time the player would normally spend doing the quest, is it still an exploit at all? Seriously, guys?!! What's the difference between clearing the POI randomly BEFORE even accepting the quest from the trader AND clearing the POI after accepting the quest from the trader, BUT still BEFORE activating the quest? The only real difference is the time you choose to clear the said POI for the first time, therefore you are FREE to choose if and when exactly you want to clear the POI and you are free to do it at your own pace, but there's no real exploit there because it's not an unintentional feature that would let you gain something for nothing, you still have to work your ass through the POI as you would normally do at different time! In short, if you're asking for a "fix" for this so called "exploit", you're essentially asking for removal of this freedom of choice from you. There's absolutely nothing to gain out of removing this option, quite the opposite - you're giving up the freedom of choice to clear out the POI immediately before activating the quest there which ultimately doesn't make sense, simply because you SHOULD be able to clear out the POI at ANY time you want!

 

TL;DR: If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

[Vampirenostra]

I've got a better question!

If I made a quest of clearing the poi why it is not marked as cleared on the map and there are no troop fending it against re-invasion of zeds? I'd like to have some npcs patrolling the area and even help me defend my base on horde nights!

[Blake_]

23 minutes ago, mr.devolver said:

 

Question: What's the actual exploit here? What's the unintentional feature here that gives me an edge over the other players?

Double clearing by a single player because of the current design of the quest acceptance and quest marks. If you have cleared it before by chance, no problem. It's ok. But going there and double dipping methodically at one's leisure doubling the earnings... mmm no. I'm all about freedom. There's absolutely no wall against freedom here. Just a tweak in design to avoid the exploit of getting twice the reward for little the effort ALL the time. I argue that it's boring and the reset should occur at the trader + my suggestions for edge cases. Unintentionally done by TFP? I don't know about that.

 

You know... games usually reset on quest acceptance. Here it's just a little trickier for multiplayer reasons + voxel nature of the game.

10 minutes ago, Vampirenostra said:

I've got a better question!

If I made a quest of clearing the poi why it is not marked as cleared on the map and there are no troop fending it against re-invasion of zeds? I'd like to have some npcs patrolling the area and even help me defend my base on horde nights!

That feature will come in future updates but not exactly as you envision. Followers will be limited to one or two tops and npcs will behave as they do now in Fallout 3 give it or take (limited chores + limited patrolling).  When I say future updates I mean 24+ months at the very least. Edit: the funniest thing is that IT WILL come, unlike other early access titles.

[mr.devolver]

12 minutes ago, Blake_ said:

Double clearing by a single player because of the current design of the quest acceptance and quest marks. If you have cleared it before by chance, no problem. It's ok. But going there and double dipping methodically at one's leisure doubling the earnings... mmm no. I'm all about freedom. There's absolutely no wall against freedom here. Just a tweak in design to avoid the exploit of getting twice the reward for little the effort ALL the time. I argue that it's boring and the reset should occur at the trader + my suggestions for edge cases. Unintentionally done by TFP? I don't know about that.

 

You know... games usually reset on quest acceptance. Here it's just a little trickier for multiplayer reasons.

 

So you're ok with it if I cleared it before by chance, but not if I clear it before activating the quest? But there's no difference besides really just the time at which I choose to clear the POI, not to mention it really takes me double the time it would normally take me to clear the POI just once during the quest, so there's no such thing as "getting twice the reward for little the effort", because in reality it is double the effort = double the reward. It doesn't feel like an exploit to me, it feels like it's only fair. If you work twice as hard, your reward should be twice as big. You obviously have a different play style, but please don't try to "fix" it for everyone with your idea of perfect play style, because we all love different stuff.