Alpha 21 Dev Diary

[POCKET951]

You complain about changing the crafting system to be an unnecessary change. but I think a crafting overhaul is much needed. Currently you are capped at quality 5, also everyone who crafts weapons just perks up to craft rank 5s, finds the tier 3 weapon schematic and then crafts one and it is never ever used again. also because you can only craft up to quality 5 in the current system it becomes really pointless and wasteful and not a very good feeling system.

In an earlier post TFP said that quality 6 crafting might be back on the table with this system, and that is exciting because it means I will be able to craft top tier gear even if it isn't as good as the stuff you find in loot with perfect/random stats

alpha 20 crafting is very narrow and loses its luster very quickly and is completely overshadowed and left in the dust by looting and questing.

 

this new system is imo a much needed overhaul and a welcome change and far more exciting.

this is also like the A20 farming situation, alot of people were skeptical and critical of it before they even played it or tested it for themselves

 

Most people after trying it, didn't mind and grew to enjoy it.

 

There was obviously a very vocal minority who hated it or made there feedback and criticisms posted and known. 

as opposed as I was to the change at first it has grown on me and I quite enjoy it now.

 

I think this new crafting system will be met by the playerbase with alot less friction then the alpha 20 farming change once we get a chance to play with it for ourselves.
 

7 hours ago, Laz Man said:

 

I think Roland said it best earlier.  The crafting change actually adds another option to the players decision tree which is a good thing in my opinion.

 

Do I grind quests for a magazine quest reward or some other type of quest reward that I need?

Do I forgo questing to loot POI x for a chance at magazine y because I (or a teammate) is so close to an unlock?

 

Keep in mind both of these options can lead to progression in crafting.  However, they certainly also have trade offs.  It is up to the player to make the choice which ones they engage in.

This sounds far more intersting than  the current iteration  which is:

 

1. Spec into the skill tree for the weapon/tool you want to craft

3.  Scrap and scavenge any rare weapon parts in A20 you can find or old guns you don't need anymore

2. hope  and wait untill you find the tier 3 weapon schematic( SMG,auto shotgun etc)
4. never ever use the system again because it carries you till you find quality 6

This overhaul solves alot of issues with the current system and creates a far more balanced/satisfying progression curve

[Callum123456789]

alright now thats over i will suggest something: with this whole new loot/crafting system overhaul where the loot is tailored to what you spec in lets say you are in a party with someone wouldnt you want this 100% loot specification to be halved to 50% and in this situation there are 2 players one who perked into pistols and one who perked into rifles there should be an even distribution between each looted container by said players so the rifle guy loots a wooden crate he finds some parts for the pistol guy but the pistol guy finds some parts for the rifle guy etc.

 

this may already be implemented by hey may aswell comment my opinion on it and i feel like this would answer a lot for the mp community too 🙂

[POCKET951]

1 hour ago, RipClaw said:

However, this means that some of the replayability is lost. Whether you find a schematic early, late or never can change the game significantly. For example, a Day 70 horde with a pistol is very different from one with an SMG.

I see what you mean. but I don't enjoy being on day 200 lootstage 330+ in the forest without an anvil schematic because it simply doesn't drop for my gamestage ( i swear I saw this schematic on sale from traders before super late days but I never ended up buying it and I am regretting it because I have to pray they sell anvils) 

also. anvils are hard to find at high gamestages.

 

with this system I will be able to always deterministically make essential crafting stations/accessories

[Callum123456789]

8 minutes ago, POCKET951 said:

I see what you mean. but I don't enjoy being on day 200 lootstage 330+ in the forest without an anvil schematic because it simply doesn't drop for my gamestage ( i swear I saw this schematic on sale from traders before super late days but I never ended up buying it and I am regretting it because I have to pray they sell anvils) 

also. anvils are hard to find at high gamestages.

 

with this system I will be able to always deterministically make essential crafting stations/accessories

absolutely agreed i remember the same thing due to my high gamestage id always find the schematic for crucibles/bellows but no anvil great point here

[RipClaw]

8 minutes ago, POCKET951 said:

I see what you mean. but I don't enjoy being on day 200 lootstage 330+ in the forest without an anvil schematic because it simply doesn't drop for my gamestage ( i swear I saw this schematic on sale from traders before super late days but I never ended up buying it and I am regretting it because I have to pray they sell anvils) 

also. anvils are hard to find at high gamestages.

 

with this system I will be able to always deterministically make essential crafting stations/accessories

The same happened to me once with the bellow. Ultimately, I then visited every know trader on my map every 3 days until one had the schematics.

I'm not saying that this is always fun, but it shows that decisions in the game are influenced by it. Even base designs can be influenced by what you find or don't find.
 

[zztong]

I've got to be crazy to jump into the LBL/LBD conversation. Honestly, I'm easy. Both have appeal, as do probably some other approaches.

 

LBD seems great for things like using weapons, picking locks. I'm not so sure I like it for crafting. How many stone axes do I have to craft and scrap to learn how to make an iron axe? That seems odd. I'd have seen metal tools before the apocalypse. LBD seems like a decent way to slowly improve the quality of what I know to craft.

 

LBL seems great for opening up new options. I could see finding an issue of Popular Mechanics that talks about forging iron into an iron axe.

 

But I can see some overlap. I mean, if LBL turns up "Gun Parts", then some action (say "upgrade") to apply those "Gun Parts" to a gun seems like how LBL enables LBD. You couldn't manufacture the parts yourself, but you can learn gunsmithy via working on your own equipment. Maybe the effect is the durability gets slightly higher.

 

Maybe LBL eventually shows you how to machine Gun Parts, but I'd be okay with that never happening. I mean, many modern parts need advanced engineering and manufacturing that I don't easily see an apocalypse survivor doing.

 

I could see LBL turning up the knowledge to make a bike, or repair a vehicle. Actually, that's kind of an interesting idea. Rather than make a 4x4 on a workbench, you have to keep upgrading an in-game vehicle wreck.

 

I guess I see how both LBL and LBD kind of go together.

 

I may just be one of the "blind, sleeping TFP fan-boy masses" but I'm game to see how any new system plays out before attempting to craft a torch and a pitchfork.

[RipClaw]

10 minutes ago, zztong said:

LBL seems great for opening up new options.

Some mods have similar approaches. For example, in many mods you can scrap duplicate schematics and get generic schematics from which you can then create specific schematics or classbooks. It is a very popular mechanic as it maintains unpredictability but also provides a second way to unlock recipes.

 

[zztong]

Shower thought...

 

Maybe the new bench is some kind of learning center... like a desk or a laptop computer. Then you take the LBL results ... part and magazines ... to this learning center. The LBD is you spend time reading magazines to unlock new things to craft or you spend time working with the parts to improve the quality of things you already know how to craft.

 

At the Desk, Read magazines for gunsmithing and you learn how to make a pistol.

At the Workbench, use Gun Parts to make a Q1 Pistol.

At the Workbench, Use your Q1 Pistol and some Gun Parts and you improve the Durability and/or Quality level of your pistol and of those that you later craft.

 

[Matt115]

11 hours ago, P3rf3ctVZer0 said:

@Matt115 Cannot do VR until performance is 600% better especially during hoards and larger servers XD the only thing laggy VR will give you is a serious headache XD

I can see your point but other then more books being in bookshelves and then just equating to paper and stacking to 500 I can see why it might seem silly. There is nothing wrong with the current system and I agree we should focus on simply boosting performance by any means necessary. (No telling people don't do X is not a solution.) there is very clear issues with
 

• Zombie Spawn Lag
• Party EXP Share Lag
• Structure Spawning Lag
• Even Quest Loading Lag

 

Pretty foolish to ignore the elephants in the room. Not to mention servers should be able to safely host 100 people. (Similar to minecraft and other large scale survival games. Too bad it is not built on the unreal 5 engine - pretty sure they could do this on such a powerful titan.)

1. VR can be done for SP only

2. i usually using a lot of paper for ammo + i'm garthering 20+ duplicates then buying candy and sell them with rest of junk stuff

 

10 hours ago, Roland said:

Honestly Matt, I don’t doubt that your worst case scenario fantasies have come to life. But your worst cases are pretty unique to you. Also, don’t take what I said to extreme. There is still paper mixed in but you will never again loot an entire bookstore and end up with a team of paper and very little actual books. What I am saying is that looting a bookstore will feel rewarding. You will not come even close to finishing one of your skill trees after raiding a bookstore but you will feel it was time worth spent. It’s not raining magazines. I’m sure there will be some tweaking of the balance once everyone gets their hands on it. 

And that's problem. 7dtd happens a lot of years after outbreake right? So the best stuff was looted a lon long time ago and now just remain only uselless stuff like comics, romances etc and if you find something useful this is just effect of  lack of time previose looters or they don't find.  So 5 usefull book and 250 pages is good ratio

7 hours ago, Roland said:

The reasons for the change that I have gotten from Madmole:

 

He wants the design have players move through each tech stage and not so easily skip over one or have one barely be significant.

 

He wants the crafting progression to be longer and to not double or triple up. No longer will being able to craft a blue stone tool mean you can automatically craft a blue iron or steel tool. The player has to learn how to craft every item separately and improve their crafting for that item separately. 
 

He wants more rewarding loot and the magazines fill out the containers. They are an exciting reward to get and there are so many varieties and duplicates that you need that it keeps looting exciting for a long time. 
 

It encourages more scavenging. Containers that used to quickly become boring and irrelevant boxes of worthless junk now often have a magazine.

 

He heard a lot of feedback about people not liking crafting recipes tied to the attributes and he agreed so he wanted to decouple crafting from the attribute trees. 
 

Those are what I’ve heard him say specifically. 
 

 

If looting is buffed crafting is debuffed - why making iron axe if you can find better much faster? why to make gun if you can buy much better one?  And again - this scavenging in 7dtd  should be more early stage and focus on smelting etc in late stage. Why? after X years only way to get something should be by made this -- > you know buidling is burning , tools rusting etc

 

7 hours ago, Laz Man said:

 

I think Roland said it best earlier.  The crafting change actually adds another option to the players decision tree which is a good thing in my opinion.

 

Do I grind quests for a magazine quest reward or some other type of quest reward that I need?

Do I forgo questing to loot POI x for a chance at magazine y because I (or a teammate) is so close to an unlock?

 

Keep in mind both of these options can lead to progression in crafting.  However, they certainly also have trade offs.  It is up to the player to make the choice which ones they engage in.

Well not so rly - if you played on this map you will know with POI will be restarted -->  so you be able to grind what you want very fast. So best option is --> take quest loot poi   bring stuff to base came do quest + loot --> do similiar quest to get this same poi 

[P3rf3ctVZer0]

4 hours ago, POCKET951 said:

I see what you mean. but I don't enjoy being on day 200 lootstage 330+ in the forest without an anvil schematic because it simply doesn't drop for my gamestage ( i swear I saw this schematic on sale from traders before super late days but I never ended up buying it and I am regretting it because I have to pray they sell anvils) 

also. anvils are hard to find at high gamestages.

 

with this system I will be able to always deterministically make essential crafting stations/accessories

Spoiler

I have suffered this too. Actually I am on lootstage 300+ in a war3zuk AIO  and been playing for weeks and I still can't find welder schematic. I cannot make HD bullets. Its a nightmare.

I just want to be able to find anything random because that would be the reality. Loot stage actually annoys me. I would at least like to have the option to ignore loot stage. I am not against change though but that is only because I am a modder so no matter the outcome I can play my way.

[Matt115]

12 minutes ago, P3rf3ctVZer0 said:

  Reveal hidden contents

I have suffered this too. Actually I am on lootstage 300+ in a war3zuk AIO  and been playing for weeks and I still can't find welder schematic. I cannot make HD bullets. Its a nightmare.

I just want to be able to find anything random because that would be the reality. Loot stage actually annoys me. I would at least like to have the option to ignore loot stage. I am not against change though but that is only because I am a modder so no matter the outcome I can play my way.

I don't like gamestage idea to but well nothing can be done

[LordCorellon]

Not going to apologize for what I'm about to say.

What you are doing here is not the 7 days to Die MULTIPLAYER game you created.

This will turn your game into a single player sandbox game. You are removing alot, if not most of the "teamwork" aspect your game got its greatest strength from.

You are erasing this. You are erasing the "working together" and frankly I would not be surprised AT ALL that the old comments that you want 7 days to die to be just a "loot and shoot" and remove building from it entirely.

Thats the way you are going. If thats what you wanted, finish 7 Days to Die, get it out of alpha, and go make a new project and STOP DESTROYING THIS ONE!

Your fans love this game, love the job all the mod makers are doing, (frankly the mod makers are whats keeping this game alive BTW)

Now you are throwing it all away after 20 ALPHAS to make a brand new game that is totally different from the vision you started out with.

This isnt progression, this is regression. This is dismantling the game YOU BUILT for a new game that should be separate from 7D2D.

This is one change you should not be making, and you damn well know it!

Edited May 22, 2022 by LordCorellon (see edit history)

[Red Eagle LXIX]

I'm going to comment.

I don't like that I have to learn to build a robotic sledge to upgrade from a Pipe Baton to a Stun Baton (seriously, what?).   Stun Baton should come before Robotic Sledge from a logical progression perspective.  I gather it is likely just one of those gameplay choices but since everything is being redone, worth mentioning.

 

Also, Robotics adds up to 144 out of 100. 

Sorry couldn't help point out the bug in the screenshot.  To Be Fair I didn't notice it, someone mentioned it on Steam. 

Edited May 22, 2022 by Red Eagle LXIX (see edit history)

[Tmodloader]

New crafting system looks excellent, much better than the current system. 

[hiemfire]

30 minutes ago, Red Eagle LXIX said:

Also, Robotics adds up to 144 out of 100. 

I don't think the progression to each schematic unlock is sequential, ie finishing the previous schematic's tiers before you can unlock the next. Looks more like it is overlapping with the first portion of the progress fraction indicating how many points gained so far and the second indicating how many need to be accrued in total to unlock the displayed tier of the schematic.

Edited May 22, 2022 by hiemfire (see edit history)

[Tmodloader]

On 5/20/2022 at 12:43 PM, ArchonMal said:

I have to admit: the crafting overhaul makes me pretty nervous. The current system works great because the majority of the key recipes (basic weapon for your tree, forge, bicycle, wrench, first aid bandages, etc) are all easily accessible and you can grab them with minimal investment. This means that with zero luck / RNG, you can get the basics set up. I always start a place from scratch in every new world and this is critical to me. With a minimal amount of luck to find a couple components to make the forge, I'm all set in a new world.

 

I'm afraid that the new system could potentially fall into the "progression blocked by RNG" trap where you can't make a key item because you haven't been lucky enough to find it. I still have war flashbacks to the A15 era Calipers. I distinctly remember a world where it was day 150+ and nobody on the server could make any bullets because we never found them. We were swimming in materials but no calipers to actually make anything with them. Our server admin eventually stepped in to give everyone some from the creative menu. 

 

How will the new system work to prevent this from coming back to the game? 

The current system is honestly terrible, do you really use crafting beyond a few points in the game? I don't. I play on delete inventory on death and looting and questing is still the only way to play. Crafting is nearly useless currently so unless you just hate crafting in general, it is not great. Not to mention using your abilities to unlock recipes feels like a huge waste when you can find the same recipes in looting right now. Considering the 100 skill levels for crafting stuff, I doubt you'll end up rng blocked with the abundance needed for those numbers.

Edited May 22, 2022 by Tmodloader (see edit history)

[Matt115]

1 hour ago, LordCorellon said:

Not going to apologize for what I'm about to say.

What you are doing here is not the 7 days to Die MULTIPLAYER game you created.

This will turn your game into a single player sandbox game. You are removing alot, if not most of the "teamwork" aspect your game got its greatest strength from.

You are erasing this. You are erasing the "working together" and frankly I would not be surprised AT ALL that the old comments that you want 7 days to die to be just a "loot and shoot" and remove building from it entirely.

Thats the way you are going. If thats what you wanted, finish 7 Days to Die, get it out of alpha, and go make a new project and STOP DESTROYING THIS ONE!

Your fans love this game, love the job all the mod makers are doing, (frankly the mod makers are whats keeping this game alive BTW)

Now you are throwing it all away after 20 ALPHAS to make a brand new game that is totally different from the vision you started out with.

This isnt progression, this is regression. This is dismantling the game YOU BUILT for a new game that should be separate from 7D2D.

This is one change you should not be making, and you damn well know it!

I agree about even bigger focus on looting with every new alpha

[Deceptive Pastry]

My main concern with this is, there are plenty of people who enjoy playing this game like minecraft. Mine, craft, build. Often times in multiplayer one or more players gravitate toward that role because that is what they like doing. If you have perk weighted looting, the looters will be bringing back less loot that the rest of the team can actually use, forcing the base builders to either go looting or progress slower. The variable shape blocks were an incredible addition, but then this just seems like another step toward looter shooter and away from more of a sandbox survival game.

But then, I still think the best system is a combined system of LBD + LBL like in say Undead Legacy. You get XP just for doing the thing, but you also find +1 skill books to supplement. And LBD is never coming back so...whatever. I'll probably just mod it out like many other changes.

[schwanz9000]

1 hour ago, hiemfire said:

I don't think the progression to each schematic unlock is sequential, ie finishing the previous schematic's tiers before you can unlock the next. Looks more like it is overlapping with the first portion of the progress fraction indicating how many points gained so far and the second indicating how many need to be accrued in total to unlock the displayed tier of the schematic.

Correct. That column shows the current number of magazines read vs how many you need to unlock the next quality level.
As you can see here, I have fully unlocked the pipe baton with 10 magazines. Reading one more will give me the ability to start crafting the robo sledges

[Roland]

3 hours ago, Red Eagle LXIX said:

I'm going to comment.

I don't like that I have to learn to build a robotic sledge to upgrade from a Pipe Baton to a Stun Baton (seriously, what?).   Stun Baton should come before Robotic Sledge from a logical progression perspective.  I gather it is likely just one of those gameplay choices but since everything is being redone, worth mentioning.

 

Also, Robotics adds up to 144 out of 100. 

Sorry couldn't help point out the bug in the screenshot.  To Be Fair I didn't notice it, someone mentioned it on Steam. 

 

You don't have to use the robotic sledge. Its just that you will learn how to craft them. I'm betting the reason is that Madmole wanted something in between a pipe baton and the stun baton that will make it obsolete. This grants you time to play with the pipe baton at the highest level before you cast it aside and start playing with the stun baton. 

 

I don't think the order of the recipes is supposed to reflect one recipe leading to the next logical invention derived from the work done on the previous one.

[Roland]

3 hours ago, LordCorellon said:

This will turn your game into a single player sandbox game. You are removing alot, if not most of the "teamwork" aspect your game got its greatest strength from.

You are erasing this. You are erasing the "working together" and frankly I would not be surprised AT ALL that the old comments that you want 7 days to die to be just a "loot and shoot" and remove building from it entirely.

 

One thing I'm learning in a big way is that not all teams work together in the same way. The change is barely going to register as a disruption in how my group functions.

 

 

 

[Matt115]

15 minutes ago, Roland said:

 

One thing I'm learning in a big way is that not all teams work together in the same way. The change is barely going to register as a disruption in how my group functions.

 

 

 

I was thinking about MP and... maybe 8 players server idea was bad. I mean it is like TNT - concept was good but it create unespected....  situations. Maybe if 7DTD was designed to play in max 4 players there woudn't be so many problems - i mean not about technical stuff so much but more about community - a lot of people complaining that they want to play in more people ( 30-50 ) so if this game was designed for less players i think most people would play mostly with close friends only because "make a deal" who is doing what would be much better. 

 

[Telly G]

On 4/15/2022 at 5:29 AM, wolfbain5 said:

my concern is more with bandit range attack.
1. is its gun range gonna be as soon as they see us and able to snipe us at ranges greater than our own? such as they arent even rendered and we got sniped?

2. will they have infinite ammo? that gets unbalanced.

3. what will their accuracy be like? i mean are they always gonna hit?

4. wait, they were just shooting at us, I killed the little f* but he doesnt have a gun on him? wtf?  played a few games like fallout where this happened. broke immersion.

on weapons and armor in general.

bandits are human too, they will try for every advantage, does this mean bandits weapon, armor, and tools may have mods already in them?

 

If you ever played modded with hostile NPCs they're either cannon fodder even with a gun or they'll blow your head off three times on day one. Though I doubt you'll be encountering bandits armed with high grade guns on day one.  They'll drop bags like anything else, but the drops that bandits drop in bags could be modified to be more sensible, more weighted towards weapon mods and parts and things like that. 

 

Edited May 23, 2022 by Telly G (see edit history)

[Telly G]

I'm not sure how to feel about the fifth total revamp of gear progression. What was wrong with the current system? 

2 hours ago, schwanz9000 said:

(Gear Progression)

 

[meganoth]

14 hours ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

 

The miner and builder do have to deal with screamer hordes. And wandering hordes. Slower progression in their weapons would make this harder for them. So if they wanna be prepared properly they need to go looting more. Wich is not the part of the game they enjoy the most.

 

How much gun crafting are you all doing in A20? Just imagine A20, but without a way to craft guns. Would they even notice?

 

Now lets say A21 is just A20 with more opportunities for crafting guns.

 

In A20 you would find a grey AK and then using it for 5 days and then find a blue AK,

And your miner would get a grey double barrel and get the blue double barrel after 5 days, same as you.

 

Now in A21 you would inbetween craft a yellow AK on the third day and use that for 2 days until you find the blue AK. Same progression but smoother, less abrupt changes. While your miner would still only get the grey and then the blue.

 

So assuming your miner guy got through A20 alive, why wouldn't he get through A21 alive?

 

------------------

 

Naturally I don't know if this is how it will be in A21. This is just one possible way it could play out, but I would think in this case it would not make your miner suddenly panic and go out looting.

 

Another possible way would be that they make weapons drop much more seldom in loot so crafting is the normal way to get guns, then you would be right that your miner might have a new problem. They did deny though that other parts of the game were changed, so I think this possibility is less likely.

 

14 hours ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

The whole problem with this change is that you are forced to play in a certain way. And the freedom how to play is one of the key ingredients of this game. It´s the one thing that let´s people play together that have different interests when gaming. Take that away and a lot of people will be unhappy. Just wait how this will be received by people when it releases, you can be sure it will be a huge s-storm. Propably as huge as A17 death penalty.

 

I think you are forgetting that gun-crafting was an inconsequential feature up to now and you seem to assume that nobody will be able to live without it in A21.

 

Edited May 23, 2022 by meganoth (see edit history)