Air Drops Rework Idea

[Vinceras]

Going on an idea riff on JaWoodle's Day 4 Agility video where he said that he would like Fun Pimps to make some kind of beacon to direct the Air Drops, I came up with this possible idea:

At the start of the day, you get a notification saying an air drop is on it's way and you have by NOON to set up your beacon/signal fire.

The beacon/signal fire is a crafted item that you place down.  Maybe the signal fire is easily crafted and early game and has a weak hp bar, and the beacon is late game and has more hp but is harder to craft.

To make it to where the event isn't too easy, it cannot be placed near buildings.  It has to be in an open area and on ground.  You can place junk turrets down, but the beacon acts like a trader zone, where you cannot build around it.  OR, if you want to allow building, maybe it can only be a structure quality based on game stage.  ie, wood for early game, cobble and metal for mid-game, and concrete for late game.  The beacon has a hp bar like a regular block, and when the hp is gone, the beacon is destroyed. 

The air drop comes at say 3 or 5pm and you MUST keep the beacon going and defend it from waves of zombies depending on your game stage. If the beacon survives, drop happens at the beacon location and you get the full loot. If you don't have the beacon going by the time of the drop, it does the normal random drop with a reduced loot.

 

So, normal loot is like 2-5 food items and a chance at a book/recipe. Full beacon loot is a sizeable stack of a random ammo, 5-10 food items, a guaranteed book/recipe, and a chance for a at game stage or higher piece of armor or weapon. You could even make the loots bigger and better by increasing the time between the air drops.  Of course the loots would totally depend on what Fun Pimps deem appropriate, I'm just riffing.

 

I just feel like the drops are rather inconsequential and don't really add anything substantial to the gameplay other than just something to search out.  This could give a horde-day-like experience to the game, add a level of danger and fun to air drops, and give players another risk/reward thing to think about.

[Jost Amman]

This idea (with some degree of variation) has been posted many times over the years here and on the Steam forums.

In general, I agree that Airdrops should get a second pass and be made more significant but also more dangerous.

On the other hand, it's very easy to create something unbalanced, so I guess we should leave the final implementation to TFP's experience.

 

The most probable change (if they'll ever change it) would be that airdrops will spawn a mini-horde each time you try to get them, but the loot will stay the same.

Anyway, thanks for opening this discussion (again) because I think that before going gold TFP should definitely have another look at this.

[TWORDY]

I believe that having some feral zombies spawned if a player is nearby to the drop area would do the justice. Right now the drop is not worth much and anyone can grab it without a fight. Also taking the loot could spawn some wave then drops become an incremental part of the game.

Edited June 30, 2021 by TWORDY (see edit history)

[Vinceras]

3 hours ago, TWORDY said:

I believe that having some feral zombies spawned if a player is nearby to the drop area would do the justice. Right now the drop is not worth much and anyone can grab it without a fight. Also taking the loot could spawn some wave then drops become an incremental part of the game.

What's to stop a player from parking their vehicle next to the drop and hopping on and circumnavigating any risk? 

 

Maybe they could make the drops well worth it if the beacons are protected.  You could work together with each other on PvP servers and have larger spawns if players are within a small radius of the item.  If a player or players want to steal from each other, you could do that as well.  I would make it to where the beacons cannot be damaged by players to avoid someone just hitting it with a rocket or sniping from distance to just troll people...but otherwise, I think it would add worthwhile content.

[TWORDY]

2 minutes ago, Vinceras said:

What's to stop a player from parking their vehicle next to the drop and hopping on and circumnavigating any risk? 

 

Maybe they could make the drops well worth it if the beacons are protected.  You could work together with each other on PvP servers and have larger spawns if players are within a small radius of the item.  If a player or players want to steal from each other, you could do that as well.  I would make it to where the beacons cannot be damaged by players to avoid someone just hitting it with a rocket or sniping from distance to just troll people...but otherwise, I think it would add worthwhile content.

 

Also the opening of the crate could take up to 5 seconds so a player(s) would be exposed for a brief period of time?

[Vinceras]

1 minute ago, TWORDY said:

 

Also the opening of the crate could take up to 5 seconds so a player(s) would be exposed for a brief period of time?

I'd be okay with that.  It's a risk in a PvE sense, and a risk in a PvP sense.  I think it would be fair that loot on the PvP side would be higher.  Though, there could be parts of this working theory that could be exploited...like your help staying outside the radius and sniping zombies to keep the amount of zombies spawning lower.  But, that's part of making new systems...finding counter measures for exploits.

[TWORDY]

1 minute ago, Vinceras said:

I'd be okay with that.  It's a risk in a PvE sense, and a risk in a PvP sense.  I think it would be fair that loot on the PvP side would be higher.  Though, there could be parts of this working theory that could be exploited...like your help staying outside the radius and sniping zombies to keep the amount of zombies spawning lower.  But, that's part of making new systems...finding counter measures for exploits.

 

I believe there is no straight answer in order to make loot crates/drops fun to the core and I'm aware of the possible exploits.

 

What I would do in this case you`ve mentioned...

 

Entering vehicles by pressing E may require 2 seconds by holding a key so players would not be able to instantly hop into a seat and drive off like that (same with seat switching, some E action icon could appear on the screen with entering progression - in similar as opening the crate). Additionally player would have to run the engine by pressing and holding some key shown on the HUD as well and that action could take some time also. In such a scenario becoming an easy target is a higher gamble and getting away unpunished becomes lower.

 

Also, every attempt of a player when it comes to shooting the target (except bows and suppressed/silenced weapons) might be shown on the compass, I mean the general direction of the shots fired. By doing so the game would become much more balanced and fun.