Alpha 21 Dev Diary

[pApA^LeGBa]

@Roland I highly doubt that a magazine for a crafting skill can be more exciting than beeing able to step on mines or extra 50% sneak damage or getting a chance to one shot ores. It´s just a crafting skill. That is now kind of luck based. Please note the "kind of" before going all over me about how it works.

Edited January 11, 2023 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Jost Amman]

1 hour ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

Still talking to you who claimed that looting is so much more dangerous when it really isn´t that much more dangerous. @Jost Amman No matter what you discussed originally, i only reacted to that part. Or am i not allowed to do that?

I just put my reply into context. If you can't understand I was talking about people that specifically choose to stay home, then it's your own fault.

You can't just barge into a discussion and reply out of context. If you do that, this is what you get.

 

54 minutes ago, RipClaw said:

Why should I defend anything ? I just made it clear that building is not doing nothing. That what you claimed at the beginning.

But you have already admitted that building is an activity and an activity is by definition not not doing nothing but doing something.

Splitting hairs, are we?

 

Edited January 11, 2023 by Jost Amman (see edit history)

[pApA^LeGBa]

@Jost Amman I can. If you can´t accept that part of your argument is simply not true and can´t have someone telling you that, that is not my problem. Maybe i just didn´t want to participate in the whole topic because i don´t care about the rest of it, but still wanted to say that you are wrong with that particular argument. Valid if you ask me.

 

And there was nothing out of context. Stating that going looting isn´t that much more dangerous than doing the mining for a big build is within it´s own context. It doesn´t change anything if it is a discussion on it´s own or part of a more complex discussion. The facts for it stay the same.

Edited January 12, 2023 by Crater Creator
D1 discussion of moderation actions (see edit history)

[Jost Amman]

15 hours ago, RipClaw said:

I know all this, I just don't care. The Fun Pimps have assigned specific XP to specific activities. When you kill a zombie you get a certain amount of XP and when you upgrade a block you get a certain amount of XP. Apparently risk is not the only factor for the Fun Pimps. Deal with it.

True. But it's not the least important, either. Actually, TFP seem to give risk vs. reward a very important role in how they weigh gameplay in 7D2D. That's why players who go out and fight and take risk, generally get a little better rewards than those that stay at home all day bashing blocks with their stone axe. Deal with it.  

 

That's the whole point of my argument here, and from what I understand, you think people who "stay at home" should be instead equally rewarded.

I disagree with you on that.

 

15 hours ago, RipClaw said:

I only explained that you can't unlock everything via perks in A20 and that will not be able to unlock anything via perks in A21. It is just a simple fact and has nothing to do with my personal view.

Miscellaneous.

 

15 hours ago, Roland said:

It will be interesting to see what happens when people actually play it. The book sets and mod schematics are still in the game as single volumes you can find to get a bonus. So that type of design is still in the game. Magazines are also in the game so you get to play both designs alongside each other. The magazine design is a lot more exciting and delivers more rewarding moments than the individual book volumes. I don't think people will think it is far worse.

Are you serious? And what about people who absolutely don't want to go looting and don't have friends? What about them? And what about me? I don't want to lift a single @%$#ing finger because I like to look at the weather all the time. Why can't I get the same XP and stuff of the other guys in my team?

 

The Fun Pimps are really cruel! They're ruining my life! 

 

Edited January 12, 2023 by Crater Creator
D6 unsolicited critique on writing or post quality (see edit history)

[Jost Amman]

17 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

And there was nothing out of context. Stating that going looting isn´t that much more dangerous than doing the mining for a big build is within it´s own context. It doesn´t change anything if it is a discussion on it´s own or part of a more complex discussion. The facts for it stay the same.

Except (IMO) you're wrong. When I'm digging near (or under) my base, I have a lot of stuff from my base to help me defend from screamers.

You can put a lot of spike traps to protect the area while mining, you can have turrets from your base ready to shoot (just in case), you can, as I often do, have a mine accessible just under your base (I often do this, and I'm also ok with SI because I know how to do it).

 

See? If you took it in context, you'd probably agree with me that having screamers coming while digging at your base, is much less risky.  

Ok, now I'll refrain from bantering on the subject because I've already taken too much space from the dev diary! 

Edited January 11, 2023 by Jost Amman (see edit history)

[Grue]

5 hours ago, unholyjoe said:

magazines are different from the books (which still exist) reading the magazines increase the crafting tiers appropriately when you read enough. the books have nothing to do with crafting now but still have perk benefits as they did before.

 

example and this is only an example.... you may need to read 75 magazines for tools with each tier increasing after every so many mags are read. so if you read say 15 tool magazines then you will be advanced to crafting tier 2.

 

so now you read books for the perks they give and the last volume bonus and you read magazines to improve your crating tiers. (the mags do not offer any bonuses) and the rules are still the same for now as you can only craft as high as t5 blues.

 

5 hours ago, Doomofman said:

Why do you hate us?

 

Lol, my sentiments exactly!

 

With crafting tiers locked behind looting dozens of magazines, AND capping it at Blues...

It seems like good odds that you will loot a tier 6 of any given item long before you will ever be able to craft a tier 5 of the same item. Which would make the whole collection of magazines and item crafting itself an exercise in futility.

 

It feels like the player agency/control inherent to being able to craft the things you want/need is taking a back seat to an RNG grindfest.

[pApA^LeGBa]

1 hour ago, Jost Amman said:

Except (IMO) you're wrong. When I'm digging near (or under) my base, I have a lot of stuff from my base to help me defend from screamers.

You can put a lot of spike traps to protect the area while mining, you can have turrets from your base ready to shoot (just in case), you can, as I often do, have a mine accessible just under your base (I often do this, and I'm also ok with SI because I know how to do it).

 

See? If you took it in context, you'd probably agree with me that having screamers coming while digging at your base, is much less risky.  

Ok, now I'll refrain from bantering on the subject because I've already taken too much space from the dev diary! 

 

Yes, for a playtrough were you only build what you really need and nothing more this is viable. But not for big builds as you mentioned in your example. It´s part of the discussion about A21 and the whole forced to be going out thing, so i don´t see a problem discussing this here?  There is no way you should do a big mine for building a whole castle big enough under your base.

 

And the people who wanna do this should be able to rely on others without any disadvantage, wich also means they should be able to level their crafting as fast as when looting themselves. Everything else is simply a F u for builders/miners/cooks/farmers/crafters who purely play the game for those aspects, having not the slightest interest in raiding POI´s. Punishing playstyles is simply a no go (and it doesn´t matter if that was the intenion or not, TFP knows exactly what the effcets of those changes are). No matter who risks more tbh. And while we are beeing honest, what risk? My last two playtroughs in permadeath SP both ended out of boredom and not because i died. On Survivalist. No traders. and no building other than what is really necessary aka hordbase and a small crafting base, mainly going out to the POI´s.

 

Allowing to have stay at home playstyles (mining isn´t really stay at home though) for years and then suddenly making them unattractive by giving them disadvantages is just rude to say it nice.

Edited January 11, 2023 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[pApA^LeGBa]

And talking about forcing people to go out. The whole water change plays a role there aswell i assume. It´s not only that you need to loot for magazines to skill crafting, it might also be a problem for the looters to provide enough murky water for the whole group. Not sure as i can´t say anything about the droprate of murky water yet. But i assume that it won´t be too high as the whole change was intended to make the survival part more challenging.

Edited January 11, 2023 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Roland]

1 hour ago, Grue said:

 

 

Lol, my sentiments exactly!

 

With crafting tiers locked behind looting dozens of magazines, AND capping it at Blues...

It seems like good odds that you will loot a tier 6 of any given item long before you will ever be able to craft a tier 5 of the same item. Which would make the whole collection of magazines and item crafting itself an exercise in futility.

 

It feels like the player agency/control inherent to being able to craft the things you want/need is taking a back seat to an RNG grindfest.

 

It seems that way on paper but in reality I craft much more often in A21 than I ever did in A20 or A19. It does seem counter-intuitive but it is true. I still do occasionally find something better than what I can craft but it is nowhere nearly as often as it has been in the past.

 

I just want to clarify that when Joe said that it takes about 15 magazines to reach tier 2 he was talking about tier 2 level gear as in the iron level. He wasn't saying that it takes 15 magazines to start crafting orange quality stuff. Its about 3 magazines to advance up to each next milestone.

31 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

And the people who wanna do this should be able to rely on others without any disadvantage, which also means they should be able to level their crafting as fast as when looting themselves.

 

Who established this gameplay morality?

[Roland]

1 hour ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

@Roland I highly doubt that a magazine for a crafting skill can be more exciting than beeing able to step on mines or extra 50% sneak damage or getting a chance to one shot ores. It´s just a crafting skill. That is now kind of luck based. Please note the "kind of" before going all over me about how it works.

 

I would have doubted it too and yet I'm always happy when my quality tier for a piece of gear increases or I can suddenly craft something new that I had been waiting for. Maybe it seems like "just crafting skill" because in the context of A20 it is just an obligatory part of the perk trees and you are completely in control of which recipes you are unlocking. Most people fall into a pattern of always doing the same thing so learning recipes can certainly be a bit predictable and boring in A20. With it out of your control and as a prize for opening containers it ends up being more exciting.

 

Maybe it's just me and nobody is going to be thrilled every time they get magazines and learn new and better recipes as a separate thing. Maybe everyone will still think "It's just a new crafting recipe, big whup!"

 

Somehow I doubt that.

[RipClaw]

4 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

True. But it's not the least important, either. Actually, TFP seem to give risk vs. reward a very important role in how they weigh gameplay in 7D2D. That's why players who go out and fight and take risk, generally get a little better rewards than those that stay at home all day bashing blocks with their stone axe. Deal with it.  

I only said that risk is obviously not the only factor for the Fun Pimps. I have never denied that they have a preference for risk vs. reward.

Nevertheless, they don't seem to consider building as doing nothing and therefore give the player tons of XP.

 

15 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

That's the whole point of my argument here, and from what I understand, you think people who "stay at home" should be instead equally rewarded.

I disagree with you on that.

What makes you think that? Actually, I think the current system is a good compromise. Some things you can unlock via perks, other things not. If T1 weapons and tools are sufficient, you can stay at home. If you want more you have to go looting.

 

[BFT2020]

37 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

Everything else is simply a F u for builders/miners/cooks/farmers/crafters who purely play the game for those aspects, having not the slightest interest in raiding POI´s. Punishing playstyles is simply a no go (and it doesn´t matter if that was the intenion or not, TFP knows exactly what the effcets of those changes are).

 

The thing is, this game is not a building simulator.  it is not a crafting simulator.  It is not a mining or farming or cooking simulator.  It is a zombie game that has all of those elements as part of the game, and TFP are working to balance all of those aspects together.

 

If you want to play this game solely as a builder or a crafter, you have to understand that this game is not going to be designed around your playstyle and you will need to make adjustments, either in the way you are playing (so yes, going out to loot and find magazines to get your crafting levels up or spec'ing into certain perks so you can mine better or gather resources for your big builds) or modify the game to fit your playstyle.  Or simply turn on CM and gift yourself all of those items that you don't want to raid POIs to get.

 

I only play SP so I don't have a team to help me out, so I understand that some days I am doing trader missions, other days I am just going though targeted POIs to get the items I am looking for, other days are simply mining, and even days strictly dedicated to base building, whether it is converting the rubble POI into a base for both crafting and horde, or building a massive base from ground up.

 

 

[pApA^LeGBa]

22 minutes ago, Roland said:

Who established this gameplay morality?

 

Years over years where the game made no difference between playstyles at all established that. And who would want to make their own game less attractive for a certain group of players when it´s not absolutly necessary? And that change is far from beeing absolutly necessary. Something similar could have been done without having disadvantages for certain playstyles.

 

Yeah, i know they wanna make the game how they like to play it, yada, yada. But doing this that late in development? Really? Changing game mechanics is fine during EA, no matter when. But not at the cost of players not beeing able to play how they like anymore after all those years.

Edited January 12, 2023 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Roland]

Just now, pApA^LeGBa said:

 

Years over years where the game made no difference between playstyles at all. 

 

Because we've never over the years and years had many threads at every major update of outraged players who claimed changes to the game stepped on their playstyle? If the game has continued to allow "all playstyles" until recently it is only because in every single case, once players get used to the changes, they realize that their playstyle still works after all.

[Callum123456789]

I know its been said a million times but try not to be too harsh on the new changes announced it's better to play first and get a grip on things and once you've completed a high day playthrough you can come to your own conclusion of what you liked what you didn't like and what could be better this is how constructive criticism is born.

[pApA^LeGBa]

@RolandYeah, seeing how they said several times that they don´t like people staying at home and the combo of water and magazines, i doubt that. Sure you can still play like before. But with disadvantages, unless TFP didn´t tell us everything on purpose about those changes and left out crucial information, that´s a given fact. And why would they hold back information that they know is gonna stop people from complaining?  So i don´t think there will be any surprise regarding that and there is no way that nothing at all changes for certain playstyles. Not gonna happen, there will be disadvantages, maybe for the whole group. That´s the point. I never said you can´t play like that at all.

 

@BFT2020 I know it isn´t a building/crafting or whatever simulator. Point is that a big part of the success is that you still can play it like one in MP. A lot of people would have never touched this game if it wasn´t for those playstyles beeing possible. I don´t think TFP realizes how many tbh.

Edited January 12, 2023 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[zookeeper]

If ya love the game its pretty easy. Kill or be killed.lol

[Roland]

28 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

@RolandYeah, seeing how they said several times that they don´t like people staying at home and the combo of water and magazines, i doubt that. Sure you can still play like before. But with disadvantages, unless TFP didn´t tell us everything on purpose about those changes and left out crucial information, that´s a given fact. And why would they hold back information that they know is gonna stop people from complaining?  So i don´t think there will be any surprise regarding that and there is no way that nothing at all changes for certain playstyles. Not gonna happen, there will be disadvantages, maybe for the whole group. That´s the point. I never said you can´t play like that at all.

 

Every single time before every single update the people who felt like their playstyle was going to be dead were certain 100% that they could no longer build underground, or no longer play nomad, or no longer build basic pillbox style bases and that only exploitive bases would ever work. In every case this confidence that old playstyles were dead lasted....until others were seen to still be doing them. There is crucial information you are missing-- play experience. You're just not going to fully get it until you play it. I talk to people all the time who yell that the magazines are going to stop their perk progression and they should get to use points. After I remind them that the magazines only affect recipe learning they back off until just 10 minutes later when they seem to forget again that the magazines don't manage perks.  People are just going to have to play it to fully understand it.  My detractors will say that is super convenient. Well, maybe, but it is also true and when A21 releases there for sure will be an initial knee jerk reaction from some initial plays where people will say "Team play is dead!" but then other teams will be having success and actually playing more like a team than 5 guys playing parallel solo than ever before as they figure out the adjustments and pretty soon all these dreaded changes will become the new sacred cow that the devs better not touch for A22. This same scenario has just played out exactly the same too many times for me to not believe that it will be the same again with this issue.

[Roland]

44 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

 

@BFT2020 I know it isn´t a building/crafting or whatever simulator. Point is that a big part of the success is that you still can play it like one in MP. A lot of people would have never touched this game if it wasn´t for those playstyles beeing possible. I don´t think TFP realizes how many tbh.

 

Multiplayer is not going to be affected by the change much if at all. Builders are going to be able to ignore looting and be just fine when playing with allies. The entire motivation for reading magazines is different than all the other books you have experience with. I've already gone over this a ton of times so I'm going to spare you the explanation. I'll just say that I believe the magazines by their nature are going to enhance team play and push teams to greater cooperation and coordination and communication than ever before. The purpose of the magazines encourages specialization and teams supporting their members in their specializations.

 

Single player is going to make it so that a no looting run is very challenging and an extremely slow progression since you will be using primitive gear and building lower tier blocks for a lot longer. The thing is that I doubt there are many builders out there who build in the survival game instead of creative mode and who also detest looting to the point that they never want to do it. The change is going to force the single player who wants to build in survival to do more looting. There is no question. But if most people who play SP are at least tolerant of looting they are going to be fine.

 

Speed runners are going to be the ones that go out of their minds, imo. Power grinding to buy their way up the skill ladders at lightning speed and having what recipes they learn and when they learn them completely 100% under their control is now gone completely. You can power loot but that still gives no control over what magazines will be found or how quickly you will find them. Maybe in this playthrough you'll get to cement by the first horde night but in the next you might not get cement going until much later with no control over being able to speed it up.

[Jinx_DG]

3 hours ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

@Roland I highly doubt that a magazine for a crafting skill can be more exciting than beeing able to step on mines or extra 50% sneak damage or getting a chance to one shot ores. It´s just a crafting skill. That is now kind of luck based. Please note the "kind of" before going all over me about how it works.

So you don't get excited anytime you find a schem to craft something that you don't already know? If so I find that.... strange. But you do you, because I love learning how to craft something new or better. As for the books, I'll feel equally excieted when I find one I haven't read before. It's all a matter of perspective and player. 

[Gamida]

I just caught up on the last 3 or 4 pages...wow....TFP's better get A21 out soon before everyone goes completely bonkers lol. Some heated debates here.

Debating is good though. Get to see different side of things. For me, I feel no matter what the changes I will still play the game. Been playing since 2015 and

don't think there is much they will do to turn me completely off from it. Plus as long as they leave it modable like it is now, I think I and others will be fine.

I mean those of us who dabble into the modded versions.

[SnowDog1942]

41 minutes ago, Gamida said:

 

Debating is good though.

 

Yes - I am a Master de baiter

Edited January 12, 2023 by SnowDog1942 (see edit history)

[Vedui]

17 hours ago, meganoth said:

Remember the arrow slits that zombies could not traverse at all? Many players loved it and simply made unbreakable bases on horde night. And complained that the obvious bug was fixed.

 

 

Actually, most people I ran into complain because fixing the zombie pathing over arrow slits was done at the expense of using them as arrow slits. You used to be able to reach in through the gap, which was immensely useful for base building to wire your base up. Put up your trip wires, electric fences, dart traps and even restock. After the change, you have to break them every time you need to access them. I can't overstate how bad this is now, making their use extremely frustrating every single time you need access.

 

In other words, the price for preventing "some" players from using them in "cheesy" ways, was to prevent EVERYONE from using them properly. This is probably the worst trade off the TFP has ever done, where legitimate players gets punished by TFP trying to prevent cheesy players. It's one of the "fixes" that TFP really should revert, as punishing all those of us who never use them to cheese, just to stop those who might cheese, is really an unacceptable trade.

 

While I think fixing the lack of pathing in this case was good, if it can't be done without punishing regular use, it really shouldn't be done

19 hours ago, Jost Amman said:

19 hours ago, Grue said:

Now that you mention it, I have hated the zombie AI since A17. 

Please bring back the zombies that actually act like zombies instead of the conga line of structural engineers who magically detect and path to the weakest block.

It was far less predicable and exploitable when the zombies would just swarm in waves and start beating on random parts of your walls. Now all horde bases are basically identical because the zombies are too "smart" for their own good.

 

I think you bought the wrong game then... did you miss the part about "tower defense" elements? That's exactly how monsters behave in a TD game, so unless you want them to also change this game's sub-genre, I suggest you adapt your gameplay to it.

 

 

I'm with Grue on this. Alpha 17 change over to a new AI pathing while it has benefits in POI's etc (less swiss cheese POI's), when it comes to Blood Moon Horde it's far inferior. Not only are zombies omniscient, they don't act like zombies. There are no more tower defense elements of 7dtd as a result. You used to be better off making layered defenses as zombies would come in from a direction and break down the base walls trying to get closer to the player from that direction. Now they lemming their way to their death seeking the path of least resistance and just making a kill-entrance is sufficient as you know the zombies won't go anywhere else.

 

I think TFP should keep the omniscient pathing in POI's (the zombies lived there, so it makes sense they'd know where to go), but use a different AI for blood moon hordes, make it cheap computationally, waves of zombies storming the base, and maybe we can have a horde defense game as opposed to small squads of zombie commandos.

 

 

[Vedui]

5 hours ago, Roland said:

 

It seems that way on paper but in reality I craft much more often in A21 than I ever did in A20 or A19. It does seem counter-intuitive but it is true. I still do occasionally find something better than what I can craft but it is nowhere nearly as often as it has been in the past.

 

And that's a good change. I think many of us have seen that over the years crafting has been de-focused, to the point of obsolesce for weapons/armour/tools.

 

However, this change likely has nothing to do with learn-by-looting, and more due to looting/buying/questing for gear the last few years was simply far superior, as you'd pretty much always have access to higher quality gear than you ever could craft. I'd definitely prefer if loot/quest/bought gear was much more rare, and inferior quality to what you can craft.

 

What I would like to see is Q6 gear crafting restored, and removed from loot/quest/trader ... want that top quality shotgun? Better skill into it, as you'll never get it from buying or looting it. That would flip the current situation where eventually you still are better off using a looted/quested/bought Q6 piece of gear as you can only craft Q5.

[bdubyah]

16 minutes ago, Vedui said:

You used to be able to reach in through the gap, which was immensely useful for base building to wire your base up.

True, but you could also argue that being able to do that was a bit silly. You can reach through that tiny slit with a repair tool and materials to fix a fence post? Or pull an M60 out of a loot bag into your inventory? Meh.

 

17 minutes ago, Vedui said:

I think TFP should keep the omniscient pathing in POI's (the zombies lived there, so it makes sense they'd know where to go), but use a different AI for blood moon hordes, make it cheap computationally, waves of zombies storming the base, and maybe we can have a horde defense game as opposed to small squads of zombie commandos.

Now this I agree with completely. I also believe faatal has mentioned wanting to maybe do something like that, but I think it was mentioned as more of a "If I have time" type wishlist item. But simplifying the AI during BMs would both help with performance, while allowing for more zombies and make you defend your whole base as controlling their pathing would really be possible. If they spawn on the north side of your base, they should come straight towards you and break anything that stops them till they get to you. This would make BMs much more fun and intense.