Alpha 20 Dev Diary

[wicketness]

@Devs

 

Will this be enough to run one 20 player server for A20?

 

I mean I just want to minimize lag and frame drops as much as possible for players. 

Or should i double down maybe triple?

 

i know 8 is all that is supported so i think it is close to enough to have a constant 30-35 FPS. we wanted to aim for 60 FPS but i don;t think players want a server tower outside there houses.

 

 

MUH HAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!!! PRETZELS!!!!!!

[Jost Amman]

1 hour ago, LTKarhel said:

Oh has my text been deleted? Then I apologize if it violated the guidelines. It was just supposed to be fun.
That's when you wait for the patch A 20 .. And I wanted to thank you for the great game, dear FUn PIMP team. It's one of the coolest games I've played. Keep it up.

If you get banned at THAT age, can't imagine what you will do when you grow up! 

[Blake_]

17 minutes ago, Roland said:

 Of course I can. I got significant hours playing ALL of the game before traders were even added and "quests" were just what I set as my own objectives.

 

In this Bach must agree as well since he modded traders out of his game and then proceeded to play ALL of the game without them-- further proof that it can be done. So whether you mod them out or ignore them it comes down to the same thing that you don't have to use traders.

The fact still remains. Quests are content, therefore you cannot state "ALL" as a valid argument. Can a lot of the basic gameplay be experienced without quests? Yeah, you won't lack anything, except guided experiences with lore that this game provides (aside from placeholder loot notes/treasures ) , however lacking they might be at the moment. 

 

"That's right, do the math" 

 

[bachgaman]

43 minutes ago, Roland said:

 Of course I can. I got significant hours playing ALL of the game before traders were even added and "quests" were just what I set as my own objectives.

 

In this Bach must agree as well since he modded traders out of his game and then proceeded to play ALL of the game without them-- further proof that it can be done. So whether you mod them out or ignore them it comes down to the same thing that you don't have to use traders.

I agree that this can be done by workarounds, but still the trader's settings should be in the game menu. Why is there the amount of loot, the amount of experience, but there are no settings for the value of the merchant's rewards, his assortment? Why can't I just disable the trader with one button? Just why?

[Roland]

6 minutes ago, bachgaman said:

I agree that this can be done by workarounds, but still the trader's settings should be in the game menu. Why is there the amount of loot, the amount of experience, but there are no settings for the value of the merchant's rewards, his assortment? Why can't I just disable the trader with one button? Just why?

 

Simply because adding such buttons to the option page hasn't been prioritized highly enough by those who can do it. Its not because TFP is against adding such options.

[Vintorez]

Perhaps traders should have most of their high tier stuff be behind it's own per-player tab. Then, in order to for the trader to actually start stocking that tab, the player has to sell/donate their own high tier stuff to the trader to level it up.

Could be done with a "Requested items" board that rotates with quests. Sometimes they might want a ton of raw materials, or maybe they want some high tier food you happen to know how to make. Obv A21 stuff, but would be neat IMO.

[bachgaman]

13 minutes ago, Roland said:

 

Simply because adding such buttons to the option page hasn't been prioritized highly enough by those who can do it. Its not because TFP is against adding such options.

This is sad. The game lacks so many basic things. Do I understand correctly that they are turning 7DTD into a testing ground for some new project?

[Blake_]

2 minutes ago, bachgaman said:

This is sad. The game lacks so many basic things. Do I understand correctly that they are turning 7DTD into a testing ground for some new project?

No. 7dtd is in active development. It is no more of a testing ground than Mass Effect 1 was to Mass Effect 2. Different titles, improved upon core mechanics based on bussiness experience. Your understanding is not true, just a valid fear (starting several projects at once with little resources is usually a very BAD choice, look at Telltale Games). Also, there are 2 chickens and 1 pidgeon working on next projects on merely the design fase, while 7dtd has 40+ people in it.

[LTKarhel]

43 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

If you get banned at THAT age, can't imagine what you will do when you grow up! 

Sry dude, but I have no idea what you're talking about.

 

[meganoth]

22 minutes ago, LTKarhel said:

Sry dude, but I have no idea what you're talking about.

 

 

He is probably refering to your icon. In other news: your post is back again.

 

[faatal]

1 hour ago, bachgaman said:

This is sad. The game lacks so many basic things. Do I understand correctly that they are turning 7DTD into a testing ground for some new project?

It is hardly a basic feature. A difficulty setting is a basic feature.

 

No. You do not understand correctly.

[Roland]

1 hour ago, bachgaman said:

This is sad. The game lacks so many basic things.

 

Bach, anyone who has read you knows that what you call "basic" isn't even close...

 

1 hour ago, bachgaman said:

Do I understand correctly that they are turning 7DTD into a testing ground for some new project?

 

No. You must have misunderstood what I posted in another thread where I said that the streamer weekend itself is a testing ground for how we will do streamer events for future projects. We will take the things we learn and once everything is a fresh new start we will change the parameters to suit us without messing with the expectations of how the streamer weekend has been working for this game. 

 

7 Days to Die is going to be a complete game in its own right and while the devs certainly will learn from the experience of developing this game, it cannot be said that 7 Days is being turned into a testing ground for a different project.

[crazywildfire]

I personally never had a issue with traders. But just like most things it will be an opinion that everyone will see it differently. A lot of it will come down to how big of a map you play, how many people are playing on that map. I can tell you I hardly find anything good as it is because it is already cleared out 8 out of 10 times with all the really good itmes.

 

Also, sure anyone can play the game without traders. You don't need them to be able to play. Nobody can argue that. Think from what I have read is that you can't enjoy all the content of the game without them. Quest are content in the game so without traders you will not be able to enjoy the content it offers. 

[khzmusik]

6 hours ago, meilodasreh said:

We are all milkywaians.

 

Speak for yourself, I'm from the lactoseintolerancyway galaxy.

 

Regarding traders - I do agree their prices need nerfing a bit, but also I'd like to see them specialize much more. They are already specialized to some degree, and that's good, but I'd like to see it go further.

 

For example: Trader Jen could spawn only in the same neighborhoods as hospital POIs, Trader Rekt would spawn only in farmland areas, etc. Both would only sell things that are relevant to their specialties, so they wouldn't sell any car parts or forged iron for example, and other traders wouldn't sell anything more than basic medical supplies or foods.

 

It would also be cool if they had a limited supply of dukes, and wouldn't buy anything if that supply ran out. That supply could get replenished when their stock did, but possibly not to what it was before - like, each trader would start out with 200,000 dukes in total and only replenish 2,000 dukes each time they got new stock.

 

Just some suggestions, take them or leave them.

[Khalagar]

Devs look what you've done, the state of this thread is what happens when you won't give us release dates for A20.

[Gazz]

Nah, it's cool. No furries, yet. Uwu.

[BFT2020]

2 minutes ago, Gazz said:

Nah, it's cool. No furries, yet. Uwu.

Well, we know Gazz's redline now  😁

[bachgaman]

1 hour ago, faatal said:

It is hardly a basic feature. A difficulty setting is a basic feature.

 

No. You do not understand correctly.

Then why are there loot and experience settings there? The "difficulty" parameter is also rather strange. It has little effect on the game. It is unlikely that a parameter that affects only the relative health of the zombie and the player can be fully considered a difficulty setting in such a multifaceted game.

The world settings menu looks incomplete right now. You can turn on 25% of the loot, but you cannot make it so that the trader does not give you 200 bullets on the first day for the quest in which you killed 2 zombies. This is very bad.

1 hour ago, Roland said:

Bach, anyone who has read you knows that what you call "basic" isn't even close...

Setting the level of the merchant's rewards is on a par with setting the amount of loot, because if you are playing with 25% of the loot, then the current merchant rewards becomes incredibly OP.

 

Do you understand how ridiculous it looks? Anyone who asks why there is no option in the settings gets an answer like “go to the xml files”, “generate the world in kinggen”, “install the mod”, “ignore this opportunity”, etc. There is a request in community for the "1 life mode", for the trader's settings, for the quest settings, for the settings of number of zombies and others. I don't understand why absolutely no attention is paid to this, especially considering that all of you unanimously say that this is a sandbox, but why the player should find out about this only after he thinks of entering this forum and creating a topic in response to which he will receive a link in which talks about how to manipulate xml files?

 

I believe that the current game settings menu (when creating a world) should be significantly improved and reworked. And I also think it should be possible to fixate the world settings so that they cannot be changed during the game

3 hours ago, Blake_ said:

No. 7dtd is in active development. It is no more of a testing ground than Mass Effect 1 was to Mass Effect 2. Different titles, improved upon core mechanics based on bussiness experience. Your understanding is not true, just a valid fear (starting several projects at once with little resources is usually a very BAD choice, look at Telltale Games). Also, there are 2 chickens and 1 pidgeon working on next projects on merely the design fase, while 7dtd has 40+ people in it.

Answered above. It's just that I get the impression that developers are in a hurry to try everything new that comes to their minds, but they don't want to improve the old one, even if it's not worth the significant effort (like pulling sliders from xml files into the world creation interface)

[faatal]

30 minutes ago, bachgaman said:

Then why are there loot and experience settings there? The "difficulty" parameter is also rather strange. It has little effect on the game. It is unlikely that a parameter that affects only the relative health of the zombie and the player can be fully considered a difficulty setting in such a multifaceted game.

The world settings menu looks incomplete right now. You can turn on 25% of the loot, but you cannot make it so that the trader does not give you 200 bullets on the first day for the quest in which you killed 2 zombies. This is very bad.

Setting the level of the merchant's rewards is on a par with setting the amount of loot, because if you are playing with 25% of the loot, then the current merchant rewards becomes incredibly OP.

I'm fine with how it is for now. Someday we might even make it better to us. You may still hate it.

You could go make your own game or a mod. Then you can do it exactly as you like and avoid all those horrible bad decisions we made.

[bachgaman]

9 minutes ago, faatal said:

I'm fine with how it is for now. Someday we might even make it better to us. You may still hate it.

You could go make your own game or a mod. Then you can do it exactly as you like and avoid all those horrible bad decisions we made.

I think I presented a rather constructive criticism, and not just "hate", sorry if it was rude

[Falcon197]

2 hours ago, faatal said:

I'm fine with how it is for now. Someday we might even make it better to us. You may still hate it.

You could go make your own game or a mod. Then you can do it exactly as you like and avoid all those horrible bad decisions we made.

 

Rule number one for projects like this: you can't please all the people all the time.

 

While some critics make noise on the forums, the greater player community will vote with their feet, so to speak.  Everyone I know who plays 7DTD is hyped for A20 and happy to wait for it, as there's plenty of other stuff to play in the meantime.  The new alpha looks solid and is worth waiting on.

 

Although, one thing I'm still having a tough time comprehending is the decision to simplify the material upgrade chain by removing rcon, metal, cobble, and some of the other mats.  Pulling out rcon in particular was a real gut-shot for me, but I'm willing to wait and experiment with the new system before leveling judgments on it. 

 

Can someone answer whether the addition of all the new block shapes influenced the mats change for performance reasons, or was it done purely to reduce the number of building materials?

[meganoth]

9 hours ago, bachgaman said:

Then why are there loot and experience settings there? The "difficulty" parameter is also rather strange. It has little effect on the game. It is unlikely that a parameter that affects only the relative health of the zombie and the player can be fully considered a difficulty setting in such a multifaceted game.

The world settings menu looks incomplete right now. You can turn on 25% of the loot, but you cannot make it so that the trader does not give you 200 bullets on the first day for the quest in which you killed 2 zombies. This is very bad.

Setting the level of the merchant's rewards is on a par with setting the amount of loot, because if you are playing with 25% of the loot, then the current merchant rewards becomes incredibly OP.

 

Do you understand how ridiculous it looks? Anyone who asks why there is no option in the settings gets an answer like “go to the xml files”, “generate the world in kinggen”, “install the mod”, “ignore this opportunity”, etc. There is a request in community for the "1 life mode", for the trader's settings, for the quest settings, for the settings of number of zombies and others. I don't understand why absolutely no attention is paid to this, especially considering that all of you unanimously say that this is a sandbox, but why the player should find out about this only after he thinks of entering this forum and creating a topic in response to which he will receive a link in which talks about how to manipulate xml files?

 

I believe that the current game settings menu (when creating a world) should be significantly improved and reworked. And I also think it should be possible to fixate the world settings so that they cannot be changed during the game

Answered above. It's just that I get the impression that developers are in a hurry to try everything new that comes to their minds, but they don't want to improve the old one, even if it's not worth the significant effort (like pulling sliders from xml files into the world creation interface)

 

I don't get the impressions you are making any concessions for the game still being in development. The 200 bullets quest reward was acknowledged to be a bug months ago and is supposedly fixed in A20.

I agree that the difficulty setting should include some further changes, but adding to it and balancing it when the game isn't feature-complete is possibly premature. While we players can give suggestions it is the advantage of being a developer to be able to decide on what work needs to be done now. In the meantime the game is working well enough.

 

You were warned that EA is not without downsides, weren't you? Play something else and wait for this game to be released if you want to play a finished game

 

[Astronomical]

5 hours ago, khzmusik said:

Speak for yourself, I'm from the lactoseintolerancyway galaxy.

 

Technically not classified as a galaxy. It's a gassy nebula.

[Roland]

4 hours ago, bachgaman said:

Do you understand how ridiculous it looks? Anyone who asks why there is no option in the settings gets an answer like “go to the xml files”, “generate the world in kinggen”, “install the mod”, “ignore this opportunity”, etc. There is a request in community for the "1 life mode", for the trader's settings, for the quest settings, for the settings of number of zombies and others. I don't understand why absolutely no attention is paid to this, especially considering that all of you unanimously say that this is a sandbox, but why the player should find out about this only after he thinks of entering this forum and creating a topic in response to which he will receive a link in which talks about how to manipulate xml files?

 

Its only ridiculous if you think they are finished and the options that are currently being offered is all that will ever be offered. You are told to go to the xml files and use mods to get what you want by helpful people as an interim solution if you cannot wait for when the developers decide to shift from the work they are doing to filling out the options menu with additional switches. There is no guarantee that all the switches you want will every be included but the fact that they are missing right now isn't a statement that they are against including them in the game. It simply is that their priorities are pointed elsewhere which is perfectly reasonable and not ridiculous at all seeing as how they are the developers of the game.

 

Its also perfectly reasonable for someone such as yourself to not necessarily be happy with the desync between YOUR priorities and THEIR priorities. But hopefully you understand now that the game is not finished and there is still a year or so of future development and the options page may yet change in ways that will be more to your liking.

 

But first....Twitch Integration and Drones.

[Jost Amman]

9 hours ago, LTKarhel said:

Sry dude, but I have no idea what you're talking about.

Sorry, sometimes I make jokes that are very difficult to understand...