Alpha 20 Dev Diary

[RipClaw]

3 hours ago, Callum123456789 said:

hey guys i have a question: would there be anyway to create radiated spawns at night or in the wasteland biome in the spawning.xml files?

There is a separate entity group for the night in the wasteland in the file entitygroups.xml. You can change the zombies that spawn at night there.

 

[BFT2020]

6 hours ago, Callum123456789 said:

hey guys i have a question: would there be anyway to create radiated spawns at night or in the wasteland biome in the spawning.xml files? because its something ive been thinking about doing in the later game just to make things more difficult because night looting at that stage isnt very dangerous 

 

To add to @RipClaw's post, you can also adjust the rates in the spawning.xml file and customize how they will spawn - especially if you add some new custom entity groups.  The biome spawns are at the beginning of the file.

[Guppycur]

So I did a quick M-word that allows you to rent a workbench from the trader for 15 real minutes at a time, I was wondering if that was going to be something planned for vanilla since y'all are destroying the workbenches.  Making things more difficult is cool and all, but I also like multiple ways to achieve a goal.  For those that use traders, it'd be cool to be able to rent them.

[Jost Amman]

1 hour ago, Guppycur said:

So I did a quick M-word that allows you to rent a workbench from the trader for 15 real minutes at a time, I was wondering if that was going to be something planned for vanilla since y'all are destroying the workbenches.  Making things more difficult is cool and all, but I also like multiple ways to achieve a goal.  For those that use traders, it'd be cool to be able to rent them.

I think that mod is maybe good for someone playing nomad who doesn't want to rely on the INT tree.

However, I agree more with what TFP did in A20, since we now have true progression with crafting and stations.

 

Also, each workstation you find has a chance to give you the schematics, so I don't see how that approach is helping unless you want to make traders even more OP than they already are. I like more the idea of "paying a night" to have shelter inside the trader (Joel once talked about this idea), that would be fun in some way.

 

---

@faatal : sorry to bother you again... but I'm really curious about something; in your opinion, will A21 be the version where you'll finally tackle the job of fixing and improving water? I guess you'll already have your hands full with the implementation of bandits, but you also said they're bringing in some new guys that could help with the AI, so I was hoping you may have more time for "other stuff". 

Edited January 31, 2022 by Jost Amman (see edit history)

[Damolann]

How exactly are they destroying the workbenches?  I think I missed something.

[savemulder]

1 hour ago, Damolann said:

How exactly are they destroying the workbenches?  I think I missed something.

You will no longer find working benches , mixers , forges , chem station , in poi's or traders. Higher chances for recipe(s)

Edited January 31, 2022 by savemulder
A more complete thought (see edit history)

[Damolann]

oh, cool.  I usually wrench them anyway for the parts because when I did find them, they were too far away from base to be consistently usable for me.

[faatal]

On 1/30/2022 at 2:32 PM, Blake_ said:

@faatal disabling graphic jobs did decrease average fps significantly, but I noticed improved stability in heavy duty areas, like downtown. When I say stability I say stutters, which are usually CPU-bound and don't usually show on the fps display but they do show on the performance graph.

 

Better CPUs should only see a decrease in fps and no further stability gains, though I agree that disabling the feature for now is the best course of action until we get a future 7dtd Unity upgrade that doesn't cause crashes in some pcs.

 

Very nice job on the "disengaging behaviour of zds". I hate that I love that their awareness works as intended now.

 

BTW, what a21 feature are you working on in these early days? Please do tell ! So exciting :3

Friday I started on bandits. I made the entity/sound xml and prefab. He runs around in the A pose saying mean bandit stuff, since we already have a bunch of sounds for it. None of the bandit meshes are skinned yet, but our new animator is working on it.

On 1/30/2022 at 3:12 PM, mr.devolver said:

I bet the feature he's working on right now is an auto responding bot on forum to automatically answer those who frequently call him using @ faatal.

I don't mind. It is not like @faatal forces me to answer. Now I'm calling myself.

[Damolann]

It only becomes a problem when you answer your own callouts.

[Strykhar]

On 1/21/2022 at 2:56 PM, faatal said:

We are a company of many people with a variety of ideas on how things should work. Over the years you also get new people coming onboard with new ideas. Opinions also change over time, so what I thought 4 years ago when I started, may be different now.

 

AI uses rounded block health in their pathing calculations, not SI. It is tower defense and we want them to be able to reach you, but since we can't do massive piles of zombies, smarted ones will do. My zombies have xray/heat/magic vision that lets them see weak spots in blocks and their semi functioning brains lets them decide to go there. They also have a dim recollection that doors allow them to get places, so they favor them. My lore for now until I change my mind or the company decides to have some official lore.

@faatal  Any slim chance we might see some conversion of the code to ECS or DOTS with Unity for zombie entities so that processing of those things can be done more efficiently opening up the possibility for massive piles of zombies?

[faatal]

22 minutes ago, Strykhar said:

@faatal  Any slim chance we might see some conversion of the code to ECS or DOTS with Unity for zombie entities so that processing of those things can be done more efficiently opening up the possibility for massive piles of zombies?

Not likely. That would be a lot of work and we are pushing features towards gold, not wanting to rewrite stuff.

[Blake_]

1 hour ago, faatal said:

Friday I started on bandits. I made the entity/sound xml and prefab. He runs around in the A pose saying mean bandit stuff, since we already have a bunch of sounds for it. None of the bandit meshes are skinned yet, but our new animator is working on it.

I don't mind. It is not like @faatal forces me to answer. Now I'm calling myself.

Lol, that oughta be hilarious, I remember some pretty nasty speech from the bandit tryouts back in a15. The gliding A-pose just adds to the fun.

 

Are bandits going to have predefined models then? Right now we are just madly in love with the idea of them in the game, but I can see them getting old real quick if we get "Borderlands" non-random faces.

 

Anyway, just stealing info from you here, thank you very much for the answers we don't yet deserve ! 

[Strykhar]

1 hour ago, faatal said:

Not likely. That would be a lot of work and we are pushing features towards gold, not wanting to rewrite stuff.

 

Not likely.... so you're saying there's a chance! 🤣

 

The game is already a success, but it would certainly take it to the next level stuff.  Maybe in another fun pimps release or tech demo in the future. 

[The Gronk]

2 hours ago, Strykhar said:

@faatal  Any slim chance we might see some conversion of the code to ECS or DOTS with Unity for zombie entities so that processing of those things can be done more efficiently opening up the possibility for massive piles of zombies?

ECS is nowhere near production ready and is unlikely to be for around 18 months.

 

The current codebase will be entirely replaced sometime this year and it only works with HDRP until then.

 

I'm waiting for it to be ready myself.

[Jost Amman]

1 hour ago, Strykhar said:

Not likely.... so you're saying there's a chance! 🤣

Spoiler

 

[jorbascrumps]

3 hours ago, faatal said:

Friday I started on bandits. I made the entity/sound xml and prefab. He runs around in the A pose saying mean bandit stuff, since we already have a bunch of sounds for it. None of the bandit meshes are skinned yet, but our new animator is working on it.

 

Obviously it's way too early to start getting hyped but this is great news. Thanks for sharing.

[faatal]

2 hours ago, Blake_ said:

Lol, that oughta be hilarious, I remember some pretty nasty speech from the bandit tryouts back in a15. The gliding A-pose just adds to the fun.

 

Are bandits going to have predefined models then? Right now we are just madly in love with the idea of them in the game, but I can see them getting old real quick if we get "Borderlands" non-random faces.

 

Anyway, just stealing info from you here, thank you very much for the answers we don't yet deserve ! 

They are predefined meshes of different types with tougher versions within the type. Don't know how many changes we will be able to make within a specific version as this is not UMA.

[Blake_]

8 minutes ago, jorbascrumps said:

 

Obviously it's way too early to start getting hyped but this is great news. Thanks for sharing.

Too late. Forum already be like:

 

[faatal]

1 hour ago, Strykhar said:

Not likely.... so you're saying there's a chance! 🤣

 

The game is already a success, but it would certainly take it to the next level stuff.  Maybe in another fun pimps release or tech demo in the future. 

Next game maybe, but depends on how much of the stupid they fix in DOTS/ECS. We are planning on HDRP next game. I'm looking forward to using it.

[iamnuff]

3 hours ago, faatal said:

Friday I started on bandits. I made the entity/sound xml and prefab. He runs around in the A pose saying mean bandit stuff, since we already have a bunch of sounds for it. None of the bandit meshes are skinned yet, but our new animator is working on it.

 

Skinless bandits running around A-posing while saying 'mean bandit stuff' sounds terrifying.

[Jay_ombie]

Using Experimental 20.1

Is there a alternative way to get around broken Quest's when a player crashes during a shared quest ? Its happened twice now and its like the quest doesn't know what to do next when a player crashers out. i.e. Last night friend crashed (again)  it showed a marker to the last zombie for instance but there isn't one at the marker..

[Blake_]

2 hours ago, Jay_ombie said:

Using Experimental 20.1

Is there a alternative way to get around broken Quest's when a player crashes during a shared quest ? Its happened twice now and its like the quest doesn't know what to do next when a player crashers out. i.e. Last night friend crashed (again)  it showed a marker to the last zombie for instance but there isn't one at the marker..

Happened to me too ! the marker shows but the Zd is nowhere to be seen, I thought it was because a big horde came and filled the entity cap before it spawned or because it did spawn and run off and fell off the world, but it could very well be because a crash or network issue. There's no work around either. Current console commands can give you the same quest by pure chance, but there's a big chance that it's a NO TRADER one. It's a very annoying issue. Gazz's fault for sure.

Edited February 2, 2022 by Roland (see edit history)

[pregnable]

6 hours ago, faatal said:

Friday I started on bandits. I made the entity/sound xml and prefab. He runs around in the A pose saying mean bandit stuff, since we already have a bunch of sounds for it. None of the bandit meshes are skinned yet, but our new animator is working on it.

 

Sounds rad. 

 

Have you guys worked anymore on the new armor sets, and if so, have you worked out some of the set bonuses so that it does not become a clothes swapping simulator?

[Laz Man]

3 hours ago, iamnuff said:

 

Skinless bandits running around A-posing while saying 'mean bandit stuff' sounds terrifying.

 

I was able to snap a short clip of it in action...😅

[faatal]

On 1/28/2022 at 1:35 AM, Jost Amman said:

Thanks for the clarification. Regarding the turrets... I was using a sledge turret during a BM night, and it worked ok, until it was half in the night, and it fell down "one floor" in my base. I have A20.1 latest, but still using a map generated with A20 b238.

Turrets falling was probably the delayed collider mesh baking. Turrets were very sensitive to their sphere cast hitting below what they were sitting on.

 

Fixed turrets falling through blocks (Start cast higher, delay fall, move linearly, use current pos for entity pos and recheck hit every frame during move).