Armor system - what do you prefer?

[Matt115]

This time my question will be short and connected with A21 - What do you prefer : redesing armor system or better to left how its work now ( of with some fixes)?

Edited January 9, 2022 by Matt115 (see edit history)

[theFlu]

I know nothing; I'll refrain from voting.

I can guess that when the changes drop, I won't really like it at first, then I'll get used to it, and sometime after that I will be in a position to vote on this.

My biggest fear is that I may end up feeling constrained to a specific set of gear... which is completely silly because I will happily wear a full set of Padded for entire playthroughs, for about 9/10 of my playthroughs...

[hiemfire]

Not enough is known about the change to the "clothing system" that TFP has planned for A21 to make a reasonable assessment about it. What I saw of it in the concept images of the new outfits that madmole showed a couple years back did peak some concerns, but we haven't seen anything more than those and it has been a couple of years so...

9 minutes ago, theFlu said:

I know nothing; I'll refrain from voting.

I can guess that when the changes drop, I won't really like it at first, then I'll get used to it, and sometime after that I will be in a position to vote on this.

My biggest fear is that I may end up feeling constrained to a specific set of gear... which is completely silly because I will happily wear a full set of Padded for entire playthroughs, for about 9/10 of my playthroughs...

 

I'm worried that the "nomad" gear, the rad resistant outfit, was tagged in the concept image for it as heavy armor. I hard focus on stealth when I play solo and if the penalties that heavy armor applies to sneaking isn't changed along with the outfit up date it'll mean that I'll probably be hard locked out of entire regions, iirc the Wasteland biome is supposed to be an irradiated area starting in A21, of the map for my solo play sessions.

[playlessNamer]

The truth is i dont really care what i am clothing actually. I just wear what i find and thats mostly good. Also i dont care about design until the boring midgamehole when you wanna do anything else between.

 

The characterscreen is to hidden and uncomfortable to reach. Also dealing with mods on cloth is tedious. You have to put it off, click it in inventory...

I dont really feel the effect of damaged clothes. I dont even know how to repair it after 1700 hours playtime, repairkit?

 

I would like a better HUD for this. It must be more visible and more often just there. Next to the inventory maybe. Or make a little special HUD at the hunger/thirst bars with a little dummy where you can see your actual arm, leg, torso, head,... status.

 

tl;dr: Actually it feels like not existant until in mid- to lategame when i dress the men in black suit or check it once to get any complete outfit.

[bloodmoth13]

1 hour ago, Matt115 said:

This time my question will be short and connected with A21 - What do you prefer : redesing armor system or better to left how its work now ( of with some fixes)?

Nobody can have an opinion on this before TFP actually implement it.

Next major patch i believe will be model updates, gear updates and bandits if im not mistaken.

[JoeDaFrogman]

4 hours ago, bloodmoth13 said:

Nobody can have an opinion on this before TFP actually implement it.

Next major patch i believe will be model updates, gear updates and bandits if im not mistaken.

we can certainly comment on the ideas they showed us 9 month ago or so.  I for one did NOT like the concept AS conveyed.   As always the devil is the details, but my initial concern if they have 5 or 6 clothing items that give specific bonuses is:  Do I need to carry around 2(or whatever the number a user needs) extra sets of clothing so that I can swap out while I am out and about OR will they increase the backpack size (or better use something like The Division eventually implemented with "armor" sets so you could change on the fly... TBH, I HIGHLY doubt they are thinking this approach though).   

 

Otherwise, consider people who go out raiding on multi day excursions.    There very well could be cases where you spend a tank full of gas and be like "oh man, I need to drive back to change closes."   Yes that situation happens today with things you forget, but not with your freaking armor where IMHO the current system works quite well with the armor mods.   No, I am likely not going to be farming.   But yes, if I am wrenching, there very well may be a situation where I am like "oh man, I am 3 km from my base using the "wrenching" set and I have used up way to much ammo, so I need to switch to the mining set because I see a nice grouping of 3 iron nodes real close together.    

 

I will admit that a bit more planning ahead can partially ameliorate these issues, but WHY?    The current system is quite damned good in my opinion and would be 1 step forward and 2 steps back.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Survior]

From what I recall/heard via youtube the new "armor" has sets like "farmer clothes", that will give some bonus to farming. And honestly this sounds so horrible to me I don't know where to begin.

 

Need to go farm put on your farm clothes

Need to stealth/pick a lock, put on your pick lock gear

 

No thanks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[PoloPoPo]

Current clothing / armor / mod system is kind of complex and impossible for newer players to understand quickly. Even after >1k hours in the game I still don't know how exactly my choice of clothing / armor affects my stats. Surely I could have tested or read that somewhere here or in the wiki long ago but it should be intuitive and more comfortable. Also there is quite a variety of different pieces of clothing in the game but eventually I end up with actually wearing nearly the same stuff every savegame.

 

Therefore I am sure whatever the devs come up with will be an improvement to the current system.

[pApA^LeGBa]

Depends. If there is a light/heavy version of each set i don´t mind the new system. If not it can you know what. 

 

Also i hope the redesign the nerdy armor. It looks like someone in a jumpsuit visiting the opera, just doesn´t fit the whole game atmosphere at all.

 

@PoloPoPo It´s easier than many games out there. Armor rating of 50 means 50% less damage taken. How you wanna make that easier? And it´s a tool tip during the loading screen, also pops up as a journal entry during the game. If reading is too complicated then i don´t know what it could make even easier.

Edited January 9, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[PoloPoPo]

Here are my current player stats. I see that not all are affected by clothing / armor.

 

- What does mobility 76 % mean? Movement speed? Jump height? Something else? Best is 100 % I guess? With a new game and being nearly naked we have 100 %?

- What does jump strength 22 % mean? And how is that calculated? What is the best value here? 

- What does carrying capacity 72 mean? My backpack does not have 72 slots.

- Damage 77? 

- Block damage 83?

- Rounds and attacks per minute?

 

I wear 5x steel armor with noise increase +20 % each. Does that mean I make twice as much noise (+100 %) as normal? More noise regarding movement or weapon usage or everything?

 

Edited January 9, 2022 by PoloPoPo (see edit history)

[BarryTGash]

43 minutes ago, PoloPoPo said:

Here are my current player stats. I see that not all are affected by clothing / armor.

 

- What does mobility 76 % mean? Movement speed? Jump height? Something else? Best is 100 % I guess? With a new game and being nearly naked we have 100 %?

- What does jump strength 22 % mean? And how is that calculated? What is the best value here? 

- What does carrying capacity 72 mean? My backpack does not have 72 slots.

- Damage 77? 

- Block damage 83?

- Rounds and attacks per minute?

 

I wear 5x steel armor with noise increase +20 % each. Does that mean I make twice as much noise (+100 %) as normal? More noise regarding movement or weapon usage or everything?

 

 

 

Seems like a ui issue, not an outfit issue. A simple mouseover tooltip describing each item would help; eg. Mobility 76% - default naked mobility is 100%. <100% is slowing you down, >100% speeding you up.

 

Seems pretty intuitive to me. Besides, how long does a player remain 'new'? 1 week, 2 weeks? 8 hours, 24 hours of total play time? Either have a better, skippable, tutorial or more, toggleable, tooltips - or both. If we consider 1000 hours as a not unreasonable amount of hours an average player will play 7D2D, catering primarily to those players in their first 24-48 hours really just gives the middle finger to those players who 'graduated' from new player status. Work on bringing new players up to experienced speed, don't bring the majority of players down to 'newbie' speed.

Edited January 9, 2022 by BarryTGash (see edit history)

[bloodmoth13]

12 hours ago, JoeDaFrogman said:

we can certainly comment on the ideas they showed us 9 month ago or so.  I for one did NOT like the concept AS conveyed.   As always the devil is the details, but my initial concern if they have 5 or 6 clothing items that give specific bonuses is:  Do I need to carry around 2(or whatever the number a user needs) extra sets of clothing so that I can swap out while I am out and about OR will they increase the backpack size (or better use something like The Division eventually implemented with "armor" sets so you could change on the fly... TBH, I HIGHLY doubt they are thinking this approach though).   

 

Otherwise, consider people who go out raiding on multi day excursions.    There very well could be cases where you spend a tank full of gas and be like "oh man, I need to drive back to change closes."   Yes that situation happens today with things you forget, but not with your freaking armor where IMHO the current system works quite well with the armor mods.   No, I am likely not going to be farming.   But yes, if I am wrenching, there very well may be a situation where I am like "oh man, I am 3 km from my base using the "wrenching" set and I have used up way to much ammo, so I need to switch to the mining set because I see a nice grouping of 3 iron nodes real close together.    

 

I will admit that a bit more planning ahead can partially ameliorate these issues, but WHY?    The current system is quite damned good in my opinion and would be 1 step forward and 2 steps back.

 

What were the bonuses again? quicker harvesting? better harvesting? you can ONLY harvest with correct gear? 

The current gear system doesnt really work with the models and such, everything clips and looks awful, i will miss more armor slots for the sake of collecting and progression but i dont mind otherwise.

 

I think stating you will NEED 5 armor sets when roaming is a little extreme, no bonuses are mandatory, and if you really want to keep the perks of armor sets you are trading bag space for those bonuses and have to consider whether it is worth the tradeoff.

 

Also if you are trying to loot an entire city 5km from your base and you really want to do a thorough job perhaps building an outpost and taking your bonus sets to that outpost and setting different tasks per outing would provide more variety of gameplay than just burning through everything.

you dont HAVE to loot everything you see as you move past them, you can have different trips for different material.

 

IMO it just depends on WHAT the bonuses are, collecting more resources would feel mandatory, while collecting them faster wouldnt. Armor sets that give bonuses to certain weapons would feel good as you use all weapons in basically the same cases, but armor for different tools would feel clunky because you would feel the need to swap between tasks. 

Personally i think armor sets should be bound to combat or QoL bonuses, not resource gathering, we have tools and mods that already cater to that and being bound to tools already basically grants that swap out functionality. For example it is common to walk around with a knife, an axe, a pickaxe, a prench and a shovel for harvesting animals, chopping trees, nodes, cars or cement. that is already 4 slots for those different tasks, and we already have talents like miner 69er, salvager and huntsman for increasing gathering to differentiate players. On top of that we have gravedigger mod, bunker buster and wood splitter mods that add further bonuses. adding another layer to harvesting wont make the game better, it is about at capacticy for bonuses tbh.

 

For combat though, an armor set that grants bonus armor if using a sledgehammer or gives you movespeed or a dash when attacking with a knife would be fine as it would double down on selecting a specific role. A bonus to pistols or rifles would feel fine too. It accentuates what you were already trying to do.

 

Im open to the concept, ill just wait to see what they do with it though.

 

[BarryTGash]

1 hour ago, bloodmoth13 said:

we have tools and mods that already cater to that and being bound to tools already basically grants that swap out functionality

 

Quite. Picking any single minute in a random POI, I might go between bow->club->shotgun->pickaxe->wrench->axe and back again, all in that short time. The idea of being optimal by also swapping out an entire outfit for each weapon/tool swap to get the most out of them is too much. Weapon and tool skills/mods are fine as is (in so far as it would be detrimental to push those bonuses to the outfit, whether skills or mods could benefit tweaking is beyond the scope of this conversation). 

[ElCabong]

I don't like the current system. And I don't know how the new ones going to work. I've read how developers want it to work. That would be a definite improvement

[Urban Blackbear]

12 hours ago, PoloPoPo said:

Here are my current player stats. I see that not all are affected by clothing / armor.

 

- What does mobility 76 % mean? Movement speed? Jump height? Something else? Best is 100 % I guess? With a new game and being nearly naked we have 100 %?

Mobility is how fast your base movement speed is. I don't know the m/s that is and it's a little hard without that. Basically the lower it is the slower you move Here you have enough mobility penalties to lower it to 76. I've gotten to 109 or better with Light Armor.

- What does jump strength 22 % mean? And how is that calculated? What is the best value here? 

Same with Mobility; lower is worse, higher is better.

- What does carrying capacity 72 mean? My backpack does not have 72 slots.

You have your backpack plus your toolbelt plus your armor and clothing slots. Should all add up to whats displayed here.

- Damage 77? 

This is the damage to entities that the tool or weapon you're currently holding does.

- Block damage 83?

This is the damage to blocks that the tool or weapon you're currently holding does.

- Rounds and attacks per minute?

How many rounds the weapon you're holding fires. The other is how many attacks per minute you can do in one minute with regular attacks.

I wear 5x steel armor with noise increase +20 % each. Does that mean I make twice as much noise (+100 %) as normal? More noise regarding movement or weapon usage or everything?

Yep, you make 200% noise or twice as much as without it for everything

 

 

I've bolded some answers into your post I quoted above. Hopefully it helps a bit. I'm sorry I don't know more about Jump and Mobility beyond the causal relationship between the numbers.

[Matt115]

20 hours ago, playlessNamer said:

The truth is i dont really care what i am clothing actually. I just wear what i find and thats mostly good. Also i dont care about design until the boring midgamehole when you wanna do anything else between.

 

 

 

15 hours ago, JoeDaFrogman said:

we can certainly comment on the ideas they showed us 9 month ago or so.  I for one did NOT like the concept AS conveyed.   As always the devil is the details, but my initial concern if they have 5 or 6 clothing items that give specific bonuses is:  Do I need to carry around 2(or whatever the number a user needs) extra sets of clothing so that I can swap out while I am out and about OR will they increase the backpack size (or better use something like The Division eventually implemented with "armor" sets so you could change on the fly... TBH, I HIGHLY doubt they are thinking this approach though).   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

13 hours ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

Depends. If there is a light/heavy version of each set i don´t mind the new system. If not it can you know what. 

 

Also i hope the redesign the nerdy armor. It looks like someone in a jumpsuit visiting the opera, just doesn´t fit the whole game atmosphere at all.

 

From my point of view- armor works good in current version. 

"new"  sets loooks so bad - honetly i think person who made this concept art just doesn't care how character designs in modern zombie game  looke like. If this arts were made in 2014 well i woudn't complain because this person didn't had any reference. But now we have days gone, dying light , walking dead and more. This person could take a look how survivors and bandits look in this games - like normal people not  like someone who ran away mental asylum or bdsm fan. 

So i don't like to complain only so i will give advice how it could work to looks good and like something "realistic".

Farmer outfit - high  cowboy shoes, jeans pants and flannel red shirt and cowboy hat.

mercenary -  just do something in  f.e.a.r  1 style

hunter - just let leather armor how it's looks like now

heavy - riot armor

medic- just typical doc clothes

lumberjack- just copy zombie lumberjack' outfit

geek- normal workers shoes, worker'pants with some tools, bulletproof jacket and forehead lamp

sniper - ghil suit or  something in  rainbow six vegas style

merchant - something similar to trader from re4

mechanic - similar too geek  but looks like streaotypical  mechanic- dunno something maybe in F1 style.

So damn please guys - add something logical and "normal" not " mental asylum style" outfit. 

Well please guys-  don't change 7dtd into 1985 mad max with zombies xd 

[JoeDaFrogman]

17 hours ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

 

@PoloPoPo It´s easier than many games out there. Armor rating of 50 means 50% less damage taken. How you wanna make that easier? And it´s a tool tip during the loading screen, also pops up as a journal entry during the game. If reading is too complicated then i don´t know what it could make even easier.

 

Wait, there's a journal?

 

Spoiler

Yes, it's a joke even some of the Devs have mentioned....

 

17 hours ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

Depends. If there is a light/heavy version of each set i don´t mind the new system. If not it can you know what. 

Obviously subject to change, but from what I RECALL, yes there is essentially heavy armor sets and light armor sets.   

[JoeDaFrogman]

6 hours ago, bloodmoth13 said:

 

What were the bonuses again? quicker harvesting? better harvesting? you can ONLY harvest with correct gear? 

The current gear system doesnt really work with the models and such, everything clips and looks awful, i will miss more armor slots for the sake of collecting and progression but i dont mind otherwise.

 

Im going by memory as I am too lazy right this min to go back to the dev streams, find, and re-watch.    I am also going by my INITIAL impressions while watching and a tiny bit of some of the stuff I had seen earlier in the A20 planning here on the forums.

 

Something like that.  Each "piece" gives "something" as a bonus plus some armor and elemental resist.  if you have all armor of a given set, you get a nice bonus.   This works very much like the in game book sets work(don't know if they are planning to REMOVE those, or if they will be in addition to)

 

  

6 hours ago, bloodmoth13 said:

I think stating you will NEED 5 armor sets when roaming is a little extreme, no bonuses are mandatory, and if you really want to keep the perks of armor sets you are trading bag space for those bonuses and have to consider whether it is worth the tradeoff.

 

 

well, I never said I would "need" all 5(but I could be wrong), but i could easily see 2 or three.   As I mentioned in my original post, adding one additional row of storage in the backpack to accommodate 1 or possibly 2 changes of cloths would likely easy my mind a bit on that issue for the most part.  

 

Now, perhaps I "likely" would not need the farmer gear when going to a new place in the mid game.  However in the early game it might be much more important "IF" increased harvest is one of the item bonuses and I am trying to grow my initial garden size.  This especially with the recent front end nerf to LoTL(and YES, I know LONG term it's far more powerful now)

  

6 hours ago, bloodmoth13 said:

Also if you are trying to loot an entire city 5km from your base and you really want to do a thorough job perhaps building an outpost and taking your bonus sets to that outpost and setting different tasks per outing would provide more variety of gameplay than just burning through everything.

you dont HAVE to loot everything you see as you move past them, you can have different trips for different material.

 

Yes, while this is true, even in the Jeep, I have found times when I ended up having to decide what to leave behind and that's a LOT of slots of space between the vehicle inventory and myself.  

 

  

6 hours ago, bloodmoth13 said:

Im open to the concept, ill just wait to see what they do with it though.

 

Yea, they have had 9+ months to adjust the design.  Im certainly open to hear more, but as I said, my initial impressions on what they shared was thanks, but no thanks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[bloodmoth13]

12 hours ago, BarryTGash said:

 

Quite. Picking any single minute in a random POI, I might go between bow->club->shotgun->pickaxe->wrench->axe and back again, all in that short time. The idea of being optimal by also swapping out an entire outfit for each weapon/tool swap to get the most out of them is too much. Weapon and tool skills/mods are fine as is (in so far as it would be detrimental to push those bonuses to the outfit, whether skills or mods could benefit tweaking is beyond the scope of this conversation). 

Its relevant because i think the only real problem with the item sets is that they edge into what should be bonuses for tools.

An intellect set that allows me to place 3 turrets, grants armor per nearby turret and reduces charge of stun baton wouldnt be something you need to swap out between rooms, but you might swap out between days. A set that gives 50% bonus to ore harvesting would feel mandatory between harvesting a car and harvesting a node. A mod, a special pick axe or a candy however wouldnt feel bad to use before doing the task.

 

Candy, mods and tools should be where those types of bonuses should exist. So long as those bonuses are on mods or candy then i dont see any problems with the item sets. If it is role defining combat effects or quality of life effects i think the gear will feel great. For example a strength set with a waffle iron that allows you to craft campfire good on the run without a campfire, or an intellect set that allows you access to a built in workbench. You dont NEED those bonuses out in the field but they would be NICE. 

6 hours ago, JoeDaFrogman said:

Im going by memory as I am too lazy right this min to go back to the dev streams, find, and re-watch.    I am also going by my INITIAL impressions while watching and a tiny bit of some of the stuff I had seen earlier in the A20 planning here on the forums.

 

Something like that.  Each "piece" gives "something" as a bonus plus some armor and elemental resist.  if you have all armor of a given set, you get a nice bonus.   This works very much like the in game book sets work(don't know if they are planning to REMOVE those, or if they will be in addition to)

 

well, I never said I would "need" all 5(but I could be wrong), but i could easily see 2 or three.   As I mentioned in my original post, adding one additional row of storage in the backpack to accommodate 1 or possibly 2 changes of cloths would likely easy my mind a bit on that issue for the most part.  

 

Now, perhaps I "likely" would not need the farmer gear when going to a new place in the mid game.  However in the early game it might be much more important "IF" increased harvest is one of the item bonuses and I am trying to grow my initial garden size.  This especially with the recent front end nerf to LoTL(and YES, I know LONG term it's far more powerful now)

  

Yes, while this is true, even in the Jeep, I have found times when I ended up having to decide what to leave behind and that's a LOT of slots of space between the vehicle inventory and myself.  

 

Yea, they have had 9+ months to adjust the design.  Im certainly open to hear more, but as I said, my initial impressions on what they shared was thanks, but no thanks.

It really depends on what those bonuses are. Bonus to shotgun damage or damage when using scopes would be perfectly acceptable, bonus to harvesting though would just be tedious for anything other than a single item.

 

My only real rule for the system would be no harvest bonuses. Quicker harvesting, weapon perks and defensive bonuses are perfectly acceptable. So long as there are no harvesting bonuses i think the system will be successful as emphasizing differing combat playstyles could be a lot of fun especially for replayability. 

[pApA^LeGBa]

9 hours ago, JoeDaFrogman said:

 

Wait, there's a journal?

 

 

Yep, press tab and then press the "!" icon on the top right. there is also a popup over your toolbar if you get a new entry.

Edited January 10, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Darklegend222]

I know very little of the armor system that will arrive. Yes we've had pictures and "concept art", but that doesn't mean anything. Currently I wear cloth armor until I get a vehicle of any kind, then I move back to heavy armor. I mostly play higher difficulties and fast movement is a necessity early game.

 

I'm not gonna try and think of what the sets entail as some have said "this set gives 10% wood" or some random things like that. As long as my heavy armor is still in the game, and I can actually be protected then I don't care.

 

My only real concern is how you acquire them. If armor crafting gets removed then I'll be creating mods to craft the sets.

[Weazelsun]

As a concept it looks nice, but I'd rather prefer if they could do those things as mods instead. So that players don't have to be locked down to a specific armor set to get the bonuses. 

[Kasad]

The problem is the UI not the system itself. I like it, but I think heavy armor should not have that much of a speed penalty and light armor should actually have a movement speed increase.

[Catdaddy]

I would like a two-slot system, one for actual armor, the other purely cosmetic. This is something I remember fondly from my days in DDO.

 

Then, using "Farmer" as an example, we would gain the Farmer perks by simply collecting the complete Farmer outfit. The reward would be added to our stats, much like what happens currently when completing a book set.

 

Those collected pieces could then be applied to the cosmetic slots if we wanted to sport a certain look for MP or role-playing, but we wouldn't be required to wear them or switch sets to benefit from the associated perks.

 

For those worried about masking armor strength in PvP, simply add an option in server settings for the cosmetic slots. That would be similar to the Persistent Profile thing we have now, where servers have some control over how a player's appearance changes.

 

Best of both worlds?

 

Just spit-balling here. I am sure there are things I have not considered, but I want to nip in the bud the "not worth dev's time" argument. The UI needs some love anyway, and any change to the armor system is already likely to involve some UI changes, so why not something like this?

[Boidster]

21 hours ago, Urban Blackbear said:

- What does carrying capacity 72 mean? My backpack does not have 72 slots.

You have your backpack plus your toolbelt plus your armor and clothing slots. Should all add up to whats displayed here.

 

The carrying capacity stat is kinda broken. It adds together the following:

 

1. Number of non-encumbrance backpack slots (including the Nightstalker Vol 4 bonus)
2. Number of clothing pocket mod slots not already included in (1)
3. Number of armor mod slots not already included in (1)
4. Number of slots given by Pack Mule not already included in (1)

It does not include any of the paper doll slots nor the toolbelt.

 

My near-certain guess is that @PoloPoPo has Nightstalker Vol 4 and the stats were taken at night. With fully-pocketed 5 pieces of armor, he gets +15 slots, and with 3 fully-pocketed clothing items he gets +6 slots. Add a point of Pack Mule for +3.

 

48 from Nightstalker + 15 from armor + 6 from clothing +3 for Pack Mule = 72.

 

They really should max it out at 45 - the size of the backpack.

Edited January 10, 2022 by Boidster (see edit history)