enZombies - More Zombie Variations

[arramus]

@errornull Everybody is enjoying the recent updates and in fact they complement a Screamer Beacon mod which is very popular since days are set to 120 minutes and Horde Night is few and far between for some players who can't always time it right.

 

One player is an HP ammo fan. They understand that the soldiers/demolisher, and any other armored type entity will reduce the effectiveness of HP ammo and can live with that as they don't mind splurging extra ammo periodically when the bulk of entities are getting chewed up. They did comment about the armored screamer though as a level 6 pistol with all book perks and penetration skill 5 is doing 0-1 damage to a regular Iron Maiden Screamer and naturally the Radiated version is in a perpetual state of self healing.

 

The player is all about HP and doesn't appreciate that a soldier and enZombie soldier can be taken down with sustained effort (PhysicalDamageResist 50), and the Demolisher (PhysicalDamageResist 60) can have its detonator triggered but the Iron Maiden Screamer (PhysicalDamageResist 60) is taking 0-1 damage depending on set up.

 

I wonder if this was intended and I should ask the player to live with it and adapt or if PhysicalDamageResist could be lowered to 55 or a more fitting value to still give her the edge but not be totally invincible against HP. I know HP is supposed to be ineffective but I wonder if the concept was for it to be totally ineffective. Either way is cool as this is something that can be tweaked locally but just checking on the original idea behind it.

[ErrorNull]

8 hours ago, arramus said:

a soldier and enZombie soldier can be taken down with sustained effort (PhysicalDamageResist 50), and the Demolisher (PhysicalDamageResist 60) can have its detonator triggered but the Iron Maiden Screamer (PhysicalDamageResist 60) is taking 0-1 damage depending on set up.

Hmm that's odd. The only difference between the enSoldiers and enScreamer1 is the PhysicalDamageResist attribute. I did a test with a level 1 pistol (with no book perks or penetration skill) using normal rounds and HP rounds on the vanilla soldier, vanilla demolition, enSolderMale1, and enScreamer1. All zombies behaved in similar manner in regards to health damaged received. All zombies received no damage when using HP rounds, while all zombies sustained similar moderate damage with normal rounds.

 

My intention was just for our iron maiden girl to have similar armor ruggedness as a soldier or demolition zombie, but not to be virtually invincible as is claimed. I honestly was not aware of how ineffective HP ammo was against 'armored' zombies, as I don't think I've ever used them in game. At least for now, this invincible-ness doesn't appear unique to enScreamer1 but also happens in the same capacity with soldiers and demolition too when using HP rounds.

 

Are you able to recreate this effect? If so, let me know under what skill or mod conditions? I'm wondering if there's some other game mechanic with armor, weapons and skill level that i'm missing.. ?

 

 

UPDATE: I also tested with maxing out the Penetrator skill, but still not having read any of the Pistol Pete books. The HP ammo is now able to cause 11 points of damage to the soldier, enSceamer1 and demolition zombies. Nothing unique seems to be occurring with our lady so far.

 

 

Edited July 3, 2021 by errornull (see edit history)

[arramus]

@errornull Nice vids, thanks for showing things in action.

 

I ran a few scenarios at the default Adventurer level in SP as follows:

 

Level 1 Pistol with no skills (No damage)

 

Level 6 Pistol with no skills (No damage)

 

Level 6 Pistol with skill 5 gunslinger (No damage)

 

Level 6 Pistol with skill 5 gunslinger and 5 penetration (12 damage on a full 15 magazine)

 

Another magazine dropped health to 103 (22 damage on 30 rounds)

 

We're just getting to elimination stage (2595 starting rounds - 2471 remaining in inventory and magazine = 124 rounds to drop 120 health)

 

I had used no books for the duration and it was purely Tier 1 Pistol > Tier 6 Pistol > Full Gunslinger level 5 > Full Penetrator level 5.

[ErrorNull]

Interesting. Have you also tried testing with no mods but only enZombies installed? I'm wondering if there's another mod causing some unexpected behavior with enZombies.

 

I did another test using a fresh new map and player, and as before don't have any game mods installed except for enZombies. You can see that when I max out the Penetrator skill, and without any extra perks or weapon mods, I'm able to take down the screamer with about 10 HP bullets.

 

 

 

[arramus]

@errornull Yes, I can confirm that only enZombies mods were installed for testing.

[ErrorNull]

18 hours ago, arramus said:

@errornull Yes, I can confirm that only enZombies mods were installed for testing.

not sure would could be causing this as i'm unable to replicate the issue. maybe my next update will fix it somehow - though the next update won't have much to do with the gameplay behavior of the enScreamers.

 

if you test again with HP ammo on the enSoldiers, do you get the same invincible behavior as the enScreamers?

[ErrorNull]

Version 1.4 Released!

(Updated download link on original post)

 

- added enBurntMaleFlamer and enBurntFemaleFlamer for the burnt forest biome
- added 3 goblins for the burnt forest biome
- updated enFarmerFemale1, enHazmatFemale1, enHazmatFemale2 to use female versions of their clothing
- updated clothing on some strippers
- added more zombies to horde night that were excluded before (soldiers, farmers, burnt zombies, etc.)
- fixed bug with quest distance only 100m-150m away
- added PainResistPerHit to a few zombies that were missing this attribute
- fixed bug in the No Nude Mod with missing dirt overlays (version 1.1 link on original post)

 

 

The burnt forest is heating up now! I'm slowly introducing stronger zombies and experimenting with attaching particles and prefabs to them. These big male and female flamers will set you afire if they catch you. And, these goblins will try to do the same with their torches. These goblins (unlike the forest and snow goblins) have enough confidence to appear during the daytime - since the fog and burnt trees give them enough cover to scavenge about.

 

I feel that the vanilla burnt zombie is rather unique and is still the signature zombie for the burnt biome, so I've ensured they still spawn more often than my burnt zombies. But, the flamers and goblins will still mix up the pace a bit.

 

I started using @DerPopo amazing Unity Assets Bundle Extractor to finally get the COMPLETE listing of all available prefabs and textures in the game. This explains the updates I've been making to clothing and hair on existing enZombies. More interesting clothing variations to come. Enjoy.

Edited July 4, 2021 by errornull (see edit history)

[ErrorNull]

On 6/20/2021 at 10:05 AM, Mickiddy said:

What does this line mean? num="55" maxAlive="150" duration="1"
Does that mean the max alive on the map for that one person at that gamestage?
Im trying to lower the spawn rate. I've had some some members at later gamestages complaining that there is to many zombies attacking them at once. im thinking its just there gamestage and they are Thinking its just more zombies.

I took that code from this line. "<gamestage stage="150"><spawn group="scoutHordeStageGS150" num="55" maxAlive="150" duration="1"/></gamestage>"

 

Hi @Mickiddy sorry didn't realize i completely overlooked your post. Yes, it's my understanding that maxAlive is how many zombies can appear on screen at a time. Now if that's for each player, or in total for all players... I'm not that sure. The num attribute is how many total zombies are available in the pool to spawn until that spawn group is over. For me, it's much clearer when you study the same entry from the BloodMoonHorde spawner:

 

<gamestage stage="7"><spawn group="feralHordeStageGS7" num="10" maxAlive="5" duration="1"/></gamestage>

 

This will spawn at most maxAlive=5 zombies on the screen at once. If two zombies are killed, the game will spawn 2 more zombies to ensure 5 zombies are on screen again. This continues on and on until a total of num=10 zombies have been spawned.

 

In the case of the scoutHordeStageGS150 example, maxAlive=150 does seems high. I haven't paid much attention to these parameters yet as I've simply adopted the similar number ranges from the vanilla setup. But I may have to examine these maxAlive numbers soon.  I've got a geforce RTX 2080 in my PC and I think it starts to lag and stutter once 60 or more zombies are on screen at the same time. If you skim through the vanilla gamestages.xml file, the spawners like SleeperGSList, ScoutGSList, and BloodMoonHorde all have maxAlive that goes up to 256. 😲

 

 

 

[arramus]

8 hours ago, errornull said:

not sure would could be causing this as i'm unable to replicate the issue. maybe my next update will fix it somehow - though the next update won't have much to do with the gameplay behavior of the enScreamers.

 

if you test again with HP ammo on the enSoldiers, do you get the same invincible behavior as the enScreamers?

enSoldiers at 50 are taking decent damage. One full magazine can easily eliminate a single entity and put 2 in critical states.

 

enScreamer1 is just a law unto herself with a full magazine of the same setup as above. I could duplicate this in 2 online dedicated servers and in SP.

[ErrorNull]

Minor Update: 1.4.1

- fixed error with Goblin Raid challenge quest
- fixed issue with animals not spawning during vanilla animal challenge quests

Original post has been updated with new download link for v1.4.1

 

 

@arramus For now, what do you do as a workaround for blue screamer's invincible-ness? Does just lowering her PhysicalDamageResist to something like 50 or lower fix it? What if you were to increase one of enSoldiers' PhysicalDamageResist value from 50 to 60? Will they become invincible like the blue screamer?

Edited July 5, 2021 by errornull (see edit history)

[arramus]

4 minutes ago, errornull said:

Minor Update: 1.4.1

- fixed error with Goblin Raid challenge quest
- fixed issue with animals not spawning during vanilla animal challenge quests

Original post has been updated with new download link for v1.4.1

 

 

@arramus For now, what do you do as a workaround for blue screamer's invincible-ness? Does just lowering her PhysicalDamageResist to something like 50 or lower fix it? I'm curious and waiting to see if anyone else has the same problem with this screamer.

For now, and to keep her more challenging than the regular soldiers but not invincible, she has a PhysicalDamageResist of 55. I tested this setting with a player who uses 100% HP ammo regardless and they can live with it most comfortably. Yes, it would be decent to hear from other players. It is possible this HP ammo only player is a rarity in their choice and it will not be a thing elsewhere.

[ErrorNull]

@arramus alright i think i figured it out. firstly i'm an idiot because a few days ago when you reported this issue, I brought down the PhysicalDamageResist from 60 to 50 for the blue screamer to test... but i forgot to bring it back up to 60 when doing the later tests with the youtube videos. when i released version 1.4.. it still contained the PhysicalDamageResist = 50 for the blue screamer. which explains why i was having an easier time killing her with the HP bullets then you were - since you were still operating at value of 60 for her from version 1.3. so just now, i changed the PhysicalDamageResist back up to 60 for the blue screamer, and i can experience her invincible abilities -- and her radiated version is just.... yea, no. lol.

 

you also mentioned the invincible issue happens to any enZombie if PhysicalDamageResist is set to 60... not just the blue screamer. so it appears to be a broader issue whenever this attribute is set to 60. so i looked into the vanilla zombies too. the demolition zombie is the only one in the game with PhysicalDamageResist = 60. when i tested him alongside the blue screamer at PhysicalDamageResist = 60, he has the same invincible characteristic with HP rounds as the blue screamer. there is no radiated demolition zombie, and i think the devs know why. 😉

i tested with setting any vanilla zombie to PhysicalDamageResist = 60, and i surely get the same invincible issue as with the blue screamer when using HP rounds. and if i did this adjustment to their radiated versions, they truly are invincible against HP rounds. lol.

 

so i went ahead and set the blue screamer to 50, which is a good base that still exemplifies her more armored nature. in the future, i plan to add stronger and more boss like zombies that are more armored than her, so i'll need that elbow room between 50 and 60.

 

so the lesson here is, we should avoid giving any zombie (vanilla or archetype) a PhysicalDamageResist near 60 or higher, because it will certainly give players using HP rounds a hard time. or, the players can just switch off of the HP rounds and then back when needed. 😎

[ErrorNull]

On 7/4/2021 at 3:46 PM, errornull said:

In the case of the scoutHordeStageGS150 example, maxAlive=150 does seems high. I haven't paid much attention to these parameters yet as I've simply adopted the similar number ranges from the vanilla setup. But I may have to examine these maxAlive numbers soon.  I've got a geforce RTX 2080 in my PC and I think it starts to lag and stutter once 60 or more zombies are on screen at the same time. If you skim through the vanilla gamestages.xml file, the spawners like SleeperGSList, ScoutGSList, and BloodMoonHorde all have maxAlive that goes up to 256. 😲

 

@Mickiddy With a bit of testing, I confirmed that the total number of zombies that will be on-screen at the same time (dictated by maxAlive value), will always be limited by the the BLOOD MOON COUNT value you set in the game's Advanced options tab.

 

<gamestage stage="824"><spawn group="feralHordeStageGS802" num="500" maxAlive="250" duration="2" interval="28"/>

 

So in the case of the above code, if your blood moon count = 8, then the game will only spawn max 8 zombies on screen at the same time, even though the maxAlive value is 250 for that gamestage. I believe the blood moon count value applies to per player. So if a friend were to jump in during the horde night, the game will then spawn 8 more zombies, totaling 16 zombies on screen.

 

Now if you had a total of 6 players in your party and all had set blood moon count to 64, this would imply 384 as the upper limit. But, since the gamestage maxAlive = 250, I believe the maxAlive value then takes precedence over the blood moon count total, and then only 250 zombies can show on the screen for your party.

[arramus]

3 hours ago, errornull said:

so i went ahead and set the blue screamer to 50, which is a good base that still exemplifies her more armored nature. in the future, i plan to add stronger and more boss like zombies that are more armored than her, so i'll need that elbow room between 50 and 60.

Lovely, thank you. I shall also set her to 50 (as we put her back on at 55 even with the recent update) to ensure players see the value of upgrading weapon and penetration skill from earlier levels since she can appear from the outset.

[TomGun42]

hey,

 

awesome work, ill be lookingto add this to my server GMR Hades Playground, I already have over 100 custom zombies most of which I made in the server. However the test zombies??? they seem to be out of place..... plus does the entitygroups file mess with any other entitygroup.xml or will it only affect your mod? I know it replaces names however my mod is after yours in my mod list so I was wondering how it would conflict?

Edited July 11, 2021 by TomGun42 (see edit history)

[ErrorNull]

@TomGun42 thanks! Sounds like you have a nice zombie population on your server. What kinds of zombie mods are you using so far?

 

The various colors of test zombies don't actually spawn on their own in the game - or at least they shouldn't. It's there in the XML for me to shift around when experimenting and manually spawning when I'm playing in DM mode.

 

21 hours ago, TomGun42 said:

does the entitygroups file mess with any other entitygroup.xml or will it only affect your mod?

In regards to any mods that are loaded before mine, my mod deletes the contents of many entitygroups they may be using and re-populates them with my own arrangement of vanilla+enZombies and their own spawn rates. If you don't want my mod to smudge up other mods in this way, you may need to rename my mod so that it is loaded before the other mods. Since your mod loads after mine, it should be mostly okay. Let me know if you notice any strange spawning behavior or errors.

 

Edited July 12, 2021 by ErrorNull (see edit history)

[TomGun42]

I'm using the mod pack with the juggernaut in it which tbh I've set to hardly spawn but they are there and old zombie pack that I've edited so much and changed that hardly any of the original zombies are there (basically how I've taught myself how to mod the zombies) and my own almost overhaul mod keeping it all server side. I've also created a whole science kit, many new items and edited current items and recipes. Your welcome to come take alook server name: GMR Hades Playground

 

Yeah the test zombies seem to spawn aswell as the extras you have made. My worry is as you have regrouped the spawning names that it effects whatever is after. So my worry entiygroups file won't work correctly because of your renaming. I'm not entirely sure because if your renaming it only effects your mod pack or it includes, like others do, anything after it.

 

If that's the case I can just make up a new groups file obviously.

 

My next question is in my server I have harvestable zombies and the way I don't is "if name begins with" or "contains" to determine different types of my zombies give different items when harvested. With your zombies this raises a problem, I know you have named then "en_" but to get it to work properly I may need to rename them slightly in order for my harvest edit to work correctly. Yes easy fix however if you were to come in and see your zombies renamed then it doesn't mean I'm trying to claim credit or anything it's just to get the world I'm creating to work correctly. I might just change the "en_" to "infected_" because basically they are just starting to turn, again great work.

 

We do have an info screen when you press escape whilst in game and I do thank all modders that help the server be what it is, just not naming them all, screen isn't big enough.

 

[ErrorNull]

On 7/13/2021 at 12:00 AM, TomGun42 said:

I can just make up a new groups file obviously

Since you have a tuned server to manage, I would prob just ditch my custom spawning behavior and just pull the core enZombie code from entityclasses.xml and merge them into your existing files. It's a bit more tedious that way, but you have more control and prevent unintended glitches. Don't forget to copy over the 'itemshands' from items.xml, and the decos from 'buffs.xml'.

 

On 7/13/2021 at 12:00 AM, TomGun42 said:

We do have an info screen when you press escape whilst in game and I do thank all modders that help the server be what it is, just not naming them all, screen isn't big enough.

That's cool. Renaming my zombies is fine. If you could, just have a link or mod named somewhere in your website or discord or whatever so that anyone who wants to mention bugs, feedback, or try my mod for themselves can reach me here.

 

Edited July 14, 2021 by ErrorNull (see edit history)

[ErrorNull]

Version 1.5 Released!

(Updated download link on original post)

 

- Added green screamer girl

- Added farmer girl #2

- Added five giants, one for each biome - forest, desert, snow, burnt, and wasteland

- increased jump distance of female jogger zombies

- Fixed more bugs and cleaned up code

- Completely redid blood moon horde spawning from scratch for easier spawn control and tweaking within the XML

 

 

 

 

@arramus I loved the screen effects the Banshee zombie causes (from the Snufkin's zombie mod) when she screams. Though not as powerful as her, my green screamer girl follows in Banshee's footsteps. The farmer family continues to expand - with a twin sister who's a bit more lethal wielding a pair of bone knives.

 

Giants are non-zombie creatures like the goblins, but bigger than demolition zombies! They spawn outside within their biomes during both days and nights, but do not spawn often. They will appear during later stages of screamer hordes (within any biome), but do not appear in wandering hordes, or as sleepers, or during the blood moon horde (yet). New challenge quests are also planned for clans of giants+goblins.

 

After redoing the horde night spawning XML, it is now easier to read and more straight forward to control zombie spawn rates down to the individual zombie. The full range of vanilla and enZombies now spawn within every gamestage. I ensured that feral and radiated zombies still appear in later gamestages like before.. and strong zombies like cops, soldiers, demoliions still appear in later gamestages like before. Giants and goblin clans are being planned for horde night - coming soon.

 

Let me know if you encounter any errors. Enjoy.

Edited July 14, 2021 by ErrorNull (see edit history)

[[email protected]]

I have not been able to download this mod.....all I get is a html page

[TomGun42]

 

As I said before and you can see in the spawning list, the test yellows and the other test zombies keep spawning in...

[ErrorNull]

8 hours ago, [email protected] said:

I have not been able to download this mod.....all I get is a html page

@[email protected] if you get to the google drive site like shown below, look for the download icon that at the upper right of the page.

 

 

Edited July 15, 2021 by ErrorNull (see edit history)

[ErrorNull]

28 minutes ago, TomGun42 said:

As I said before and you can see in the spawning list, the test yellows and the other test zombies keep spawning in...

thanks for letting me know. the yellow test zombies was an experiment to see if any mod is using the following vanilla animal groups:

 

WildGameForest

EnemyAnimalsWasteland

EnemyAnimalsSnow

EnemyAnimalsForest

EnemyAnimalsDesert

EnemyAnimalsBurntForest

 

if they do, it will spawn those yellow zombies. my mod does not use any of those above animal groups, and so during my playtesting i haven't seen any yellow or other color test zombies. what you can do is comment out or delete lines 80 to 110 from the file ENTITYGROUPS.XML my enZombies mod.

 

let me know if you are seeing any other color zombies, if so let me know from which biome or POI location. thanks.

[TomGun42]

ill test it out on my server now, join me if you like, GMR Hades Playground

[AndrewT]

Ok this sucks because increasing the SizeScale for the giants only makes them appear to float in midair