Is "Horde Night" a bad mechanic?

[pApA^LeGBa]

I only wish for a setting to turn off the short bloodmoons at start. Once they go on all night, our chars are pretty much already OP. Especially in MP.

 

Other than that it´s fine with the bloodmoons. Apart from the AI, but that is WIP, so i am not going to consider that a fault right now.

Edited August 9, 2021 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Boidster]

On 8/8/2021 at 5:40 AM, geengaween said:

I know this will get kneejerk disagreement because everyone is so used to it, but IMO it is a bad mechanic and holds the game back from what it should be.

 

Aside from the good arguments on all sides about how "good" or "bad" it is, IMO calling it a "mechanic" kind of undersells its importance. It is literally the central idea of the game(1). It's right there in the name!

 

If they removed the 7-day (adjustable) horde, they'd really need to call it something else. It'd be like removing goats from Goat Simulator.

 

(1) At least it is now; see replies below for How It Used To Be

Edited August 9, 2021 by Boidster (see edit history)

[JCrook1028]

2 hours ago, Boidster said:

It is literally the central idea of the game. It's right there in the name!

When the game launched the 7 days was how long it took for the infection to kill you and there was no horde night at all...

[unholyjoe]

7 minutes ago, JCrook1028 said:

When the game launched the 7 days was how long it took for the infection to kill you and there was no horde night at all...

100%

things have and may still change but that was the origin.

 

when i joined in a4 you died within 7 game days if you did not find or make an antibiotic and it had a couple stages that were a PIA couldnt walk fast and couldnt run, health was minimal.. all the joys of what it used to be. glad i am not the only one who remembers and how long it took to find the ingredients and to make 1 pill.

Edited August 9, 2021 by unholyjoe (see edit history)

[Boidster]

6 minutes ago, JCrook1028 said:

When the game launched the 7 days was how long it took for the infection to kill you and there was no horde night at all...

 

Fair enough. It is currently the central premise of the game. I will edit accordingly.

[geengaween]

On 8/9/2021 at 11:20 PM, Roland said:

I still think that a solution could be to have horde nights be more rare if you feel it overwhelms gameplay in its current form.

 

It's not that it overwhelms the gameplay. I'd be OK with more zombies and more defense. Personally the vanilla zombie spawns are never enough for me in random gen, I always edit the .xml to make them at least 4x as numerous. Difficulty is not what this topic is about, I'd be very OK with a new and more complicated horde mechanic making the game even more difficult. But with a difference of it being directly influenced by your decisions, in some way or form. Instead of just an arbitrary "Day 7" event that always happens on a scheduled day no matter what.

 

I always thought the game needed some kind of "infestation nodes" which you have to clear or face consequences for ignoring. The zombie spawns shouldn't be random in explored areas. Maybe if you don't clear them, the zombie presence in the chunks around the "nest" becomes more and more numerous until it's too difficult to move around and you have to gear way up and go full on assault mode to clear it.

[SnowDog1942]

On 8/8/2021 at 6:40 AM, geengaween said:

I know this will get kneejerk disagreement because everyone is so used to it, but IMO it is a bad mechanic and holds the game back from what it should be. It reduces the open-endedness of the game and forces players to build and stockpile in one area instead of exploring the massive map.

 

You can turn it off. thread closed?

[Roland]

50 minutes ago, geengaween said:

 

It's not that it overwhelms the gameplay. I'd be OK with more zombies and more defense. Personally the vanilla zombie spawns are never enough for me in random gen, I always edit the .xml to make them at least 4x as numerous. Difficulty is not what this topic is about, I'd be very OK with a new and more complicated horde mechanic making the game even more difficult. But with a difference of it being directly influenced by your decisions, in some way or form. Instead of just an arbitrary "Day 7" event that always happens on a scheduled day no matter what.

 

I always thought the game needed some kind of "infestation nodes" which you have to clear or face consequences for ignoring. The zombie spawns shouldn't be random in explored areas. Maybe if you don't clear them, the zombie presence in the chunks around the "nest" becomes more and more numerous until it's too difficult to move around and you have to gear way up and go full on assault mode to clear it.

 

I didn't mean that the horde night overwhelms YOU as in it is too difficult for you. I meant that if the horde night overwhelms the GAMEPLAY in that you spend a lot of time prepping and repairing and then prepping for the next one each and every week and you want to lessen that dominance, then you can use the settings to make it happen less often. From your description and desire to be able to control how intense and how often they occur through player actions I figured that you were feeling that the horde night was taking over the whole game and not leaving room for other things. 

 

I like it as an arbitrary occurrance beyond anything I can do to stop it. It's a force of nature-- or at least the blood moon is which triggers the zombies to go feral and heightens their senses and hunger. It would be like you saying that you'd like to be able to affect when Haley's Comet returns next because once every 75 years is just not enough. Well too bad. It's not something that can be controlled by you or me. You'll just have to wait until 2039 no matter what actions you try to take here on earth.

 

Frankly, there is not enough events in the world that happen completely out of the player's control that the player has to adapt to and respond to and survive.  I hope they are still committed to the random encounter system they talked about. Haven't heard anything about that in a long while....

[BFT2020]

23 minutes ago, SnowDog1942 said:

 

You can turn it off. thread closed?

OP was asking to change the mechanic on how it is done, not that it is there.

2 minutes ago, Roland said:

 

I didn't mean that the horde night overwhelms YOU as in it is too difficult for you. I meant that if the horde night overwhelms the GAMEPLAY in that you spend a lot of time prepping and repairing and then prepping for the next one each and every week and you want to lessen that dominance, then you can use the settings to make it happen less often. From your description and desire to be able to control how intense and how often they occur through player actions I figured that you were feeling that the horde night was taking over the whole game and not leaving room for other things. 

 

I like it as an arbitrary occurrance beyond anything I can do to stop it. It's a force of nature-- or at least the blood moon is which triggers the zombies to go feral and heightens their senses and hunger. It would be like you saying that you'd like to be able to affect when Haley's Comet returns next because once every 75 years is just not enough. Well too bad. It's not something that can be controlled by you or me. You'll just have to wait until 2039 no matter what actions you try to take here on earth.

 

Frankly, there is not enough events in the world that happen completely out of the player's control that the player has to adapt to and respond to and survive.  I hope they are still committed to the random encounter system they talked about. Haven't heard anything about that in a long while....

Don't forget that we now have the option of randomizing when the Bloodmoon occurs so it is not always on a set schedule, though I have not personally done it yet in one of my games - I think when I get bored of my current playthrough, I might try this setting

[meganoth]

2 hours ago, BFT2020 said:

OP was asking to change the mechanic on how it is done, not that it is there.

Don't forget that we now have the option of randomizing when the Bloodmoon occurs so it is not always on a set schedule, though I have not personally done it yet in one of my games - I think when I get bored of my current playthrough, I might try this setting

 

I can recommend it, but it doesn't change game play enough to scratch any itch geengaween seems to be having

 

[BFT2020]

13 minutes ago, meganoth said:

 

I can recommend it, but it doesn't change game play enough to scratch any itch geengaween seems to be having

 

Correct.  Though at this point, I think the best thing to do to get that feeling is a mod.  I don't see TFP changing the horde night mechanics at this time, and haven't really seen any interest from Madmole to go in a different direction than what they have today.

[warmer]

On 8/8/2021 at 4:08 AM, meganoth said:

A) You could put up fake forges and cooking fires anywhere and burn some wood and they would converge there.

This is a good tactic. Place several campfires in a valley and get random hordes for XP grinding. My first big base had roughly 30 torches on the outside and I was killing Witch/screamers ALL DAY because of it. Every 5 min.

Decoys will draw hordes to the source of the "heat"

[KhaineGB]

I'm getting kinda bored with it, cos it's like...

Get base built, wait for horde night, deal with it, repair base.

Everything in-between feels kinda like just grinding to make sure you're ready for the next one (which can be pre-defined, or random).

Unfortunately, there's no easy way to fix that.

[Morloc]

On 8/9/2021 at 9:20 AM, Roland said:

Make it even more tower defense like instead of less and that would be the path to improvement, imo

 

 

Bah....just do this:

 

 

 

Someone's gotta' tug on one of the devs' sleeves for this.

 

 

 

-Arch Necromancer Morloc

 

 

 

[doughphunghus]

7 hours ago, KhaineGB said:

Unfortunately, there's no easy way to fix that.

This got me thinking….sooo…

1. Telric has “thumper” mod which is like a alien crash landing and zeds come out. It’s fun and can really mess you up if you’re not ready to fight them if they land nearby your base/location. Additionally, you can get parts from thumpers to make your own thumper and then it acts like a zed beacon and you defend it for a bit…

2. There’s gnamod horde mode, which is a “defend the beacon forever” thing, where the zeds really really hate the beacon and attack it, and eventually it will blow up and make a big hole once you fail to defend it enough.

for both mods, the “zombie beacon” is essentially “player placed” or “purposefully placed”…

 

taking these “existing things” and smooshing them together may create a mini in game “event” that might shake things up….I present the half baked idea of: make a beacon (of unknown type/duration/health) randomly drop.  When the beacon is damaged enough, it leaves a masive crater in the ground, massively damaging all entities and blocks like a bomber zed x10.

 

”randomly drop”: I imagine the supply plane could drop it, but then it wouldn’t always be “close enough to make you deal with it”, so maybe “randomly drop” could be like a screamer spawn (except beacon spawn) where it crashes down when the heat level is too high (and near your base/location) or maybe a zombie randomly drops a beacon like a loot bag drops. Maybe a bomber zed drops them more often if you kill them before they explode . If you’re “out and about” and one drops: run away if you want to. If it’s near your base: you choose to defend/defuse or deal with the damage.

 

it would be kind of like a “oh crap!” Game moment, even during horde night,  and you almost would have to defend the beacon or it wrecks havoc to your base or the land around it until it auto defuses (or you defuse it or maybe just pick it up?), and it would also kinda add a “secret mini boss” to the game.

[KhaineGB]

9 minutes ago, doughphunghus said:

This got me thinking….sooo…

1. Telric has “thumper” mod which is like a alien crash landing and zeds come out. It’s fun and can really mess you up if you’re not ready to fight them if they land nearby your base/location. Additionally, you can get parts from thumpers to make your own thumper and then it acts like a zed beacon and you defend it for a bit…

2. There’s gnamod horde mode, which is a “defend the beacon forever” thing, where the zeds really really hate the beacon and attack it, and eventually it will blow up and make a big hole once you fail to defend it enough.

for both mods, the “zombie beacon” is essentially “player placed” or “purposefully placed”…

 

taking these “existing things” and smooshing them together may create a mini in game “event” that might shake things up….I present the half baked idea of: make a beacon (of unknown type/duration/health) randomly drop.  When the beacon is damaged enough, it leaves a masive crater in the ground, massively damaging all entities and blocks like a bomber zed x10.

 

”randomly drop”: I imagine the supply plane could drop it, but then it wouldn’t always be “close enough to make you deal with it”, so maybe “randomly drop” could be like a screamer spawn (except beacon spawn) where it crashes down when the heat level is too high (and near your base/location) or maybe a zombie randomly drops a beacon like a loot bag drops. Maybe a bomber zed drops them more often if you kill them before they explode . If you’re “out and about” and one drops: run away if you want to. If it’s near your base: you choose to defend/defuse or deal with the damage.

 

it would be kind of like a “oh crap!” Game moment, even during horde night,  and you almost would have to defend the beacon or it wrecks havoc to your base or the land around it until it auto defuses (or you defuse it or maybe just pick it up?), and it would also kinda add a “secret mini boss” to the game.

Oh, i've been experimenting with no BM and completely random wandering hordes.

4-8 hours so you can get several per day, with 30-60 zombies.

THAT makes things interesting.

[Kam R.]

The predictability of the bloodmoon event makes it a short lived source of excitement. I'm definitely seeing it more of a chore these days than something to look forward to. Sure until a player has figured it out there will be a few exciting weeks of figuring it out. Then it's pure routine.

Sure, we have randomization for the day they happen now, but it's still pretty predictable, even with the red warning day number turned off.

After playing a bit every player knows "at 22h I got to be ready, so watch out for the glaring warning signs roughly 10 minutes ahead of it happening". Whatever ready may be, in the fortified trapped base or on the roof of a strong prefab.

 

 

Khaine's random hordes mechanic is a step in the right direction, imo, however the pathing of those wanderers is kinda messed up since a few alphas and they often straight up miss you and end up scattered somewhere on a meadow.

If the bloodmoon event mechanic with the GPS-Zs could be randomized in a similar fashion it would be epic.

No specific time of the day!

No sound effects, music or skybox giving it away, only Z sounds and footsteps.

A randomized duration for the event. A randomized set of waves of enemies only ROUGHLY based on gamestage, but with a chance to be way more difficult.

Biome specific hordes attacking.

Modified and stronger GPS events when near heat sources aka tower defense situations - just with the twist you have to always be ready for them.

This would keep the player on their toes and guarantee a lot of fun oh-@%$#-moments.

 

And then have a new rare event type - actual bloodmoon. The sky turns red as we know it, but as soon as the sky turned red you have 7 days before a massive mega flood that lasts for 7 days will come for you. :]

 

As a main premise current BM-mechanic feels pointless to me. I applaude mods like "true survival", which actually put in obtainable long term goals through long chain quests that make you explore, craft, build and fight to find a solution to the problems of this world and not just make you kinda live with it until you're bored. That's the sorta stuff that should be the main premise of a Zombie apocalypse game. I'm curious to see whether TFP will ever cook up some good main quest line for the vanilla game.

[TWORDY]

Honestly, Blood Moons are one of many features that keep me playing 7DTD, but not the most important in my humble eyes. New people to the title are excited but only for like first Blood Moons. Unfortunately, but after discovering that this particular event goes on and on, there is nothing to look forward to in that matter. Hopefully, after beating the horde night there are no longer meat piles, that`s a plus. Constant repairments of the base might seem notorious, resource-draining, grindy, (you name it) but that`s the current mechanic of horde nights. Some of the mates are waiting for the next alpha and game-changing updates, and for them, not much has changed since alpha 17 when it comes to gameplay mechanics.

 

For me, more interesting would be defending objects/bases in different biomes specifically designed by the devs rather than constantly build and repair Your own base in a never-ending loop. In the form of a mission acquired in the trader menus, the game still would have tower defense features and lose a taste of compulsory grindness.

The biggest issue that I encounter is sudden frames per second slashed during horde nights by about 50%, same happens when screamer(s!) come at me in the 5th LVL building around day 60. Once we had to deal with like (me and my mates while I hosted the game) 30+ zombies roaming around a building causing serious problems, having dropped to like 20FPS - R9 3900X, RTX 2070... hello sunshine? 

 

I would definitely see more random events like roaming hordes, defending pre-created POIs like fortified bases created by the devs, and having them burnt to the ground. Please work on missions, add a variety of objectives, explore other games, and even genres to look for inspiration.

On a positive note, everything gets predictable and boring after hundreds of hours...

[KhaineGB]

1 hour ago, Kam R. said:

The predictability of the bloodmoon event makes it a short lived source of excitement. I'm definitely seeing it more of a chore these days than something to look forward to. Sure until a player has figured it out there will be a few exciting weeks of figuring it out. Then it's pure routine.

Sure, we have randomization for the day they happen now, but it's still pretty predictable, even with the red warning day number turned off.

After playing a bit every player knows "at 22h I got to be ready, so watch out for the glaring warning signs roughly 10 minutes ahead of it happening". Whatever ready may be, in the fortified trapped base or on the roof of a strong prefab.

 

 

Khaine's random hordes mechanic is a step in the right direction, imo, however the pathing of those wanderers is kinda messed up since a few alphas and they often straight up miss you and end up scattered somewhere on a meadow.

If the bloodmoon event mechanic with the GPS-Zs could be randomized in a similar fashion it would be epic.

No specific time of the day!

No sound effects, music or skybox giving it away, only Z sounds and footsteps.

A randomized duration for the event. A randomized set of waves of enemies only ROUGHLY based on gamestage, but with a chance to be way more difficult.

Biome specific hordes attacking.

Modified and stronger GPS events when near heat sources aka tower defense situations - just with the twist you have to always be ready for them.

This would keep the player on their toes and guarantee a lot of fun oh-@%$#-moments.

 

And then have a new rare event type - actual bloodmoon. The sky turns red as we know it, but as soon as the sky turned red you have 7 days before a massive mega flood that lasts for 7 days will come for you. :]

 

As a main premise current BM-mechanic feels pointless to me. I applaude mods like "true survival", which actually put in obtainable long term goals through long chain quests that make you explore, craft, build and fight to find a solution to the problems of this world and not just make you kinda live with it until you're bored. That's the sorta stuff that should be the main premise of a Zombie apocalypse game. I'm curious to see whether TFP will ever cook up some good main quest line for the vanilla game.

Adding the GPS to the wandering horde SHOULD be fairly easy. But in my experience, it doesn't matter if they have it or not. They head to your last known position.

So if you happened to be looting a POI at the time...

[Roland]

37 minutes ago, KhaineGB said:

They head to your last known position.

 

There is supposed to be a random distance at which they pass by your last known location. So they could pass by 10 meters away and have a good chance of noticing you or they could pass by 40 meters away and neither you nor they notice each other. Very few wandering hordes should be zeroing in and heading straight at you. Of course, with feral sense enabled in A20 even the ones 40 meters away have a good chance of sensing  you and turning from their course to come after you, 

 

There are daily wandering hordes in A19 but they start small and because they pass by at a variable distance it is very easy to not notice them. People think wandering hordes were taken out or are bugged but they still spawn and wander daily and it isn't until your gamestage results in larger hordes that you start really noticing them. I increased the horde size dramatically for A19 and was amazed to see regular wandering hordes from Day 1-- now very noticeable even when walking by at a distance.

[KhaineGB]

1 hour ago, Roland said:

 

There is supposed to be a random distance at which they pass by your last known location. So they could pass by 10 meters away and have a good chance of noticing you or they could pass by 40 meters away and neither you nor they notice each other. Very few wandering hordes should be zeroing in and heading straight at you. Of course, with feral sense enabled in A20 even the ones 40 meters away have a good chance of sensing  you and turning from their course to come after you, 

 

There are daily wandering hordes in A19 but they start small and because they pass by at a variable distance it is very easy to not notice them. People think wandering hordes were taken out or are bugged but they still spawn and wander daily and it isn't until your gamestage results in larger hordes that you start really noticing them. I increased the horde size dramatically for A19 and was amazed to see regular wandering hordes from Day 1-- now very noticeable even when walking by at a distance.

Yep, there is. It picks a pos close to you and heads that way and there's a random variable applied to it.

But still, when you have 4-8 hour gaps of 30-60 zombies... even if they are a chunk away, they WILL hear you if you're in a POI looting.

It's absolutely insane. I love it. (obviously this is A19. I would love to test it on A20 with the feral sense)

[meganoth]

17 hours ago, Kam R. said:

The predictability of the bloodmoon event makes it a short lived source of excitement. I'm definitely seeing it more of a chore these days than something to look forward to. Sure until a player has figured it out there will be a few exciting weeks of figuring it out. Then it's pure routine.

Sure, we have randomization for the day they happen now, but it's still pretty predictable, even with the red warning day number turned off.

After playing a bit every player knows "at 22h I got to be ready, so watch out for the glaring warning signs roughly 10 minutes ahead of it happening". Whatever ready may be, in the fortified trapped base or on the roof of a strong prefab.

 

 

Khaine's random hordes mechanic is a step in the right direction, imo, however the pathing of those wanderers is kinda messed up since a few alphas and they often straight up miss you and end up scattered somewhere on a meadow.

If the bloodmoon event mechanic with the GPS-Zs could be randomized in a similar fashion it would be epic.

No specific time of the day!

No sound effects, music or skybox giving it away, only Z sounds and footsteps.

A randomized duration for the event. A randomized set of waves of enemies only ROUGHLY based on gamestage, but with a chance to be way more difficult.

Biome specific hordes attacking.

Modified and stronger GPS events when near heat sources aka tower defense situations - just with the twist you have to always be ready for them.

This would keep the player on their toes and guarantee a lot of fun oh-@%$#-moments.

 

And then have a new rare event type - actual bloodmoon. The sky turns red as we know it, but as soon as the sky turned red you have 7 days before a massive mega flood that lasts for 7 days will come for you. :]

 

As a main premise current BM-mechanic feels pointless to me. I applaude mods like "true survival", which actually put in obtainable long term goals through long chain quests that make you explore, craft, build and fight to find a solution to the problems of this world and not just make you kinda live with it until you're bored. That's the sorta stuff that should be the main premise of a Zombie apocalypse game. I'm curious to see whether TFP will ever cook up some good main quest line for the vanilla game.

 

Surely TFP will cook up a vanilla story line (with or without quests). But don't expect too much as it will be a story fit for vanilla, i.e. a story that first-time players will have a chance to reach. For old time players it will look like any of the mods has cooked up 5 times of that and they will race through that story content.

 But that is because vanilla is the entry-level for new players and the mods are supposed to entertain players in the long run. And for vanilla and new players a fixed blood-moon is more than enough.

 

 

 

 

 

[ijese]

On 8/11/2021 at 4:35 PM, geengaween said:

I always thought the game needed some kind of "infestation nodes" which you have to clear or face consequences for ignoring. The zombie spawns shouldn't be random in explored areas. Maybe if you don't clear them, the zombie presence in the chunks around the "nest" becomes more and more numerous until it's too difficult to move around and you have to gear way up and go full on assault mode to clear it.

 

I like this idea very much.

 

I usually set the world to intentionally prolong the time it takes me to feel secure and all-set, when I get bored and just start a new world. (Last dozen games were: no traders, no nerdpole, dead-is-dead, lower loot, no loot respawn, lower xp, random bloodmoon, pure wasteland map... first several tries were terrifying).

 

If we had pressing reason to actually prepare and clear that SGM factory ASAP, that might be a great motivator to "step up".  And also I feel somewhat cheated when I clear half a city and soon zombies are again all there, not just random stragglers. So the mechanic of having zombie "spawn POIs" might really improve both of the above.

[saltychipmunk]

To be fair , static worlds are a problem most of the survival genre has, not just 7d2d.  Its why crossing the very low bar of having even one interesting event  is enough to keep 7d2d relevant in the survival genre despite basically being mostly .. mincraft block mechanics with  higher fidelity zombies. 

 

I really dont understand why so many are like this when you have a few standouts like terraria or don't starve  and rimworld (especially dont starve) that deliberately throw tons of different events at the players to keep them on their toes. 

 

The funny thing is  if you look at rimworld and don't starve.. those two games  utilize many of the same mechanics to keep things interesting.

 

Weather.. being something that actually forces you to change up your play style and gear in a cshort period of time

Seasons.. for forcing play style changes over the long term 

indirect hostile forces that wont kill the player  immediately  but make life harder the longer the players leave it alone ( defoliators, ground poisoners , weather adjusters , infestations, bandit camps setting up shop near by)

Heck once TFP get the AI for bandits working properly.. the game could have a mechanic where survivors ask for help over a radio  at traders and you go help some npc survivors fend off  some bandits. 

 

The possibilities are quite extensive. 

When the good thing is that if you have all these other mechanics .. you don't necessary need a super complex blood moon anymore

 

Edited August 25, 2021 by saltychipmunk (see edit history)