Alpha 20 Dev Diary

[POCKET951]

2 hours ago, POCKET951 said:

 

• So to clarify. does this mean you can no longer stack any drone mods except cargo ones? 
  
  or does it mean you can't stack drone mods at all, period?

Tested b231 Locally.  You can no longer stack drone mods, with the exception of cargo storage mods. you can stack up to 4 of those

in 218 you could stack every mod x4

[Kosmic Kerman]

1 hour ago, Red Eagle LXIX said:

• Most pole and smaller sized shape HP values reduced by 75% 
• Most plate and similar sized shape HP values reduced by 50%

No reduction in upgrade costs though?

 

So now we have to go back to uglier bases and ignore all the good pieces that were put in because not only are they weaker, but they cost way more given their weaker state.

 

 

I don't object in theory to different size blocks having different HP values BUT this should be reflected in the crafting costs. If poles only have 25% the HP of full blocks they should only have 25% of the cost. Otherwise, the game is penalizing creative or aesthetically pleasing bases.

 

If however, this is motivated not by a well thought out design decision and is instead a kneejerk reaction to content creators/players creating cheese bases and people complaining about it, grow a pair.  Some people will use whatever you give them to create low-effort or secure bases.  And other people will complain about them.  But player agency needs to mean something. If people want to ruin their own game by cheesing hordes, that's up to them.  Other people's complaints about how someone else plays the game, unless they are being griefed by those game mechanics, shouldn't matter.  Max efficiency players or tryhards who think the game should only be played in one particular way should not dictate design decisions.

 

Given that I'm not sure how TFP would assign different material costs to blocks and upgrading considering how the current system works, I know which way I lean. If the design decision is smaller size blocks should have less HP, I'm guessing the system would work differently to account for this.  I'm also guessing that some of the new or reworked POIs will have weaker blocks than the POI designers intended. I haven't had a chance to go through the XML yet and maybe this will mostly be a non-issue. I guess the ultimate limitations here will just depend on which blocks still have full HP for use as supporting columns.  Obviously anyone using poles for fighting cages or supporting columns will likely stop using them as regardless of crafting costs, It's probably not worth having 25% of the HP you used to have separating the zombies from you.  

[retrogamingdev]

What are "boss hordes"?

[Roland]

19 hours ago, Guppycur said:

5) You'll note that some of the best poi designers (in my opinion) are now TFP staff. 😃

Yes...and now that they would be disqualified from a community contest, the rest of us have a chance...

[4sheetzngeegles]

There may be an option that can satisfy both the dev and player initiative
without it being a repetitive situation. Presently if a player or group
returns to a previously cleared POI, whether spawn on or off they already
have a map of whats coming because they remember.

 

One of the things that made me think of this after reading, is that i like not
knowing whats going to happen. To approach from the weak position vs the strong.
For me that's what makes a challenge, suspense and a "fight" for survival situation.

 

The idea uses foundations already laid. A poi has a spawn volume, is sedentary,
there are timers, players have an xp level. Once a poi volume is cleared, a random
timer is activated depending on the POI loot level, heat can be set for that POI
just below the screamer spawn. A player generates a certain amount of heat just by
existing.

 

If a player returns to a cleared poi, either by basic sweep and clear, or by trader
quest then their heat plus the poi heat will spawn a screamer. The POI heat level
will never lower below the new threshold, only the player leaving the area will
bring it back down.

 

The spawn group by this screamer is special. It spawns a group based on a formula.
The poi loot level 1-5 plus a multiplier of the players xp plus each one has at least
one player killer in the group. Cop, Cop radiated, Feral radiated, Wight radiated,
Demolisher, Bear, Wolf pack.

 

A logical hierarchy can be set, clear poi, the new heat level alone spawns predator
packs, vultures progress to dogs to wolves to bears and in between come the screamer
player returns and fights, and screamer joins the party. If players have a group the
highest one in the group is the regulated multiplier.

 

Once the timer runs out the poi area is set to active for predator/screamer spawn
permanently.

 

It would provide a filler for a progressive threat level as a person progresses.

 

The image: as you clear more of the sleepers, you progressively open the world to
the walkers and predators. That combined with feral sense makes for a continuous
nightmare, potential XP acceleration, potential death, yet keeping within the
rendering limitations.

 

Either way nothing will be handed to anyone, you fight to survive, and it creates
an accelerated vicious cycle of treat progression.

[faatal]

23 hours ago, MuffinMan said:

Loving A20 so far.

 

There is a bug in the b218, if you increase casino coin stack to beyond 100000, it doesn't save character properly and will quickly lead to your player save being "wiped". Reproduced it 3 times just by increasing stacksize to 100000, restarting, giving myself 100000 and saving/loading a few times.

I would prefer it not corrupt, since it is not clear in xml what the max is. It is 32 bits in memory, but on save and network send we use 16 bits for space.

Clamped item stack counts to 65535 when saved (at 32k it overflowed and would break on read).

[DistantUK]

1 hour ago, retrogamingdev said:

What are "boss hordes"?

 

I have the same question.

[faatal]

On 12/14/2021 at 1:00 PM, Kosmic Kerman said:

I don't know if this varies by POI or requires you to be in a specific volume for this to work properly but I have definitely seen evidence of this not working how you describe. For example, the new Joe Bros Housing Development POI with the Night Power Quest does not appear to work this way. First, when you walk into the volume vultures appear to spawn as soon as you enter. Maybe if you crouched in they wouldn't spawn but this seems like a pretty hard trigger to me. Second, and more importantly, you can stand on the roof of the loot room (first garage on the left) and break the roof and pick off each zombie (while crouched, with an unsuppressed weapon, and no points in stealth) and none of the other zombies wake up even if you aggro one of them.  Walking on the roof doesn't wake up the sleepers. Shooting a zombie with an unsuppressed weapon does not wake up the zombie next to him or her. Walking on the roof from one side to the next after killing the first batch of zombies does not wake the rest up.  The zombie bear does not aggro until you shoot it.  As far as I can tell the "volume" you are in still seems to play a role in whether the zombies wake up. In the Joe Bros example, I gave I am about 3 blocks from the zombies when I am shooting them.

1 Enemies will always spawn when you get near a volume. If crouched you do get a stealth check (provided you are not making light) and will bypass the initial attack, since the vultures are far and you will succeed.

 

2 Yes, there was a bug with attack volumes and noise.
"Fixed damaging a volume enemy from outside a sleeper attack volume did not wake the volume."

 

Thanks

[Kosmic Kerman]

2 minutes ago, faatal said:

1 Enemies will always spawn when you get near a volume. If crouched you do get a stealth check (provided you are not making light) and will bypass the initial attack, since the vultures are far and you will succeed.

 

2 Yes, there was a bug with attack volumes and noise.
"Fixed damaging volume enemy from outside a sleeper attack volume did not wake the volume."

 

Thanks

Thanks for the response. This bug fix should appease those arguing, in good faith at least, that breaking blocks shouldn't give you such a huge advantage over players perked in stealth.

[retrogamingdev]

7 minutes ago, DistantUK said:

 

I have the same question.

 

Why can't anyone of the mods answer this seriously?

[Kosmic Kerman]

1 minute ago, retrogamingdev said:

 

Why can't anyone of the mods answer this seriously?

Have some patience. They are either doing something else or they want players to find this out for themselves. I too am interested in what this means but I don't expect an immediate response.

[Games'n'Grumble]

6 minutes ago, retrogamingdev said:

 

Why can't anyone of the mods answer this seriously?

It's just a twitch integration option (I think)

[hiemfire]

14 minutes ago, faatal said:

If crouched you do get a stealth check (provided you are not making light)

Making/emitting light or just illuminated? From the results of some of the testing I've seen the volumes seem to be going based on just if the player is illuminated and not if the player is the one causing the illumination.

[faatal]

On 12/15/2021 at 7:01 AM, meganoth said:

After 40 days you don't see zeds spawn which is different from what he said would occur.Therefore a bug. Additional to 30 days being too long

Was a bug.

 

"Fixed sleeper zombie respawn time would use a huge amount of days if loot respawn time was disabled."

[MuffinMan]

1 hour ago, faatal said:

I would prefer it not corrupt, since it is not clear in xml what the max is. It is 32 bits in memory, but on save and network send we use 16 bits for space.

Clamped item stack counts to 65535 when saved (at 32k it overflowed and would break on read).

Nice, a quick easy bug to fix.  So just to confirm the limit is actually 65535 now or 32767 in the next build?

[faatal]

12 minutes ago, hiemfire said:

Making/emitting light or just illuminated? From the results of some of the testing I've seen the volumes seem to be going based on just if the player is illuminated and not if the player is the one causing the illumination.

Yes, the normal test is how lit your are vs distance, but if you are making light, like holding a torch or a switched on flashlight in hand/head/weapon, then you automatically fail the check.

2 minutes ago, MuffinMan said:

Nice, a quick easy bug to fix.  So just to confirm the limit is actually 65535 now or 32767 in the next build?

Yes, 65535 now. It was treated as signed, but now unsigned.

[Morloc]

5 minutes ago, faatal said:

if you are making light, like holding a torch or a switched on flashlight in hand/head/weapon, then you automatically fail the check.

 

Burning Shaft mod?

 

 

-Arch Necromancer Morloc 💀

[hiemfire]

24 minutes ago, faatal said:

Yes, the normal test is how lit your are vs distance, but if you are making light, like holding a torch or a switched on flashlight in hand/head/weapon, then you automatically fail the check.

Okay, and the "vs distance" part is supposed to not account for blocks obstructing path and/or LOS to the player?

[SheeleMara]

 I believe the answer is yes based off previous Alpha Versions but I'll ask anyways just to double check, but you're supposed to wipe your data in between each Experimental Patch, right? 

[Kosmic Kerman]

1 minute ago, SheeleMara said:

 I believe the answer is yes based off previous Alpha Versions but I'll ask anyways just to double check, but you're supposed to wipe your data in between each Experimental Patch, right? 

To be confident that a bug you are observing and would like to report is caused by the new patch and not vestigial remnants of A19 or a prior Experimental Build, yes. Otherwise, it's player choice. Everything will probably work fine but there is always the possibility that something won't.  

[dcsobral]

15 hours ago, Generris said:

I'm a complete noob still getting used to the game, but is mandatory skill point allocation the only consistent way to get a workbench? Because if so, that's pretty bad design. All of your free points just go into the workbench, so what's the point? Might as well just give everyone the workbench from the beginning and not bother letting them think they just got some useful skill points...

You can buy them. Maybe you can buy their schematic, not sure. You can loot the schematic from broken versions as well. And it might be a quest tier completion reward.

[Jost Amman]

42 minutes ago, Kosmic Kerman said:

To be confident that a bug you are observing and would like to report is caused by the new patch and not vestigial remnants of A19 or a prior Experimental Build, yes. Otherwise, it's player choice. Everything will probably work fine but there is always the possibility that something won't.  

You can't imagine the flame I received on Steam just for suggesting this... 

I mean, it's common sense.

[Khalagar]

3 hours ago, retrogamingdev said:

What are "boss hordes"?

 

I'm pretty sure "boss horde" is the internal term for the spam of high level sleepers that guard the loot room at the end of a PoI. They will reset and teleport back to position if they fall off a building and deaggro, and it seems there were situations that would cause the quest state to get messed up when the player didn't just kill them outright

 

2 hours ago, retrogamingdev said:

 

Why can't anyone of the mods answer this seriously?

 

Forum mods = / = developers, they either have lives and are busy, don't know because they aren't QA or developers, or don't like you. Possibly all three

[Callum123456789]

4 minutes ago, Eighmy_Lupin said:

Does the new exp update need a server wipe?

i wouldnt say so no i usually only see servers wipe when theres a new alpha but i could be wrong

[unholyjoe]

17 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

You can't imagine the flame I received on Steam just for suggesting this... 

I mean, it's common sense.

i get some doozies from bug reports too.