Alpha 21 Discussion Overflow

[Roland]

18 hours ago, Khalagar said:

and now building and stuff will be very sub-optimal because you aren't spending that time looting for skill books instead.

 

And yet building and stuff remains as much fun in its own right as it ever was-- more so with all the cool blocks. I suspect that people who enjoy playing the game for all of what it has to offer will do some building, some looting, some farming, some mining, some crafting and feel very satisfied while those who must chase the optimal path in order to level as quickly as possible will once again paint themselves into a corner where they think the devs have forced them to go.

 

If building in A21 all of a sudden feels pointless and with every block someone places they feel an itch that they should be out there looting instead because that is what is what is going help them progress faster, then I say that person never really enjoyed building anyway. They were just doing what they felt was the optimal action to progress quickly.

14 hours ago, RipClaw said:

I admit that the new shapes are an improvement for builders, but building itself is still optional. There is no real advantage to build a base from scratch since many POIs are suitable as horde bases after minor adjustments.

 

uh...fun and enjoyment? I usually modify an existing structure because I find it quite fun to gut it and then change it to my needs and as a builder I am not very creative. But others love to build for the enjoyment that it offers and the satisfaction they get from surviving a horde night with their design. There is nothing wrong with it being optional. Honestly, for those who care most to optimize their gameplay, nothing is optional. They are forced by the devs to follow only one pathway. The one that is the most efficient.

 

If the developers made building from scratch advantageous then all the players who care most about optimizing and preferred to modify existing structures would be mad that TFP was suddenly forcing them to build from scratch.

[RipClaw]

2 hours ago, Roland said:

If building in A21 all of a sudden feels pointless and with every block someone places they feel an itch that they should be out there looting instead because that is what is what is going help them progress faster, then I say that person never really enjoyed building anyway. They were just doing what they felt was the optimal action to progress quickly.

It all depends on how fast you make progress even if you spend, say, 50% of your time building. If the progress is so slow that people feel they have to loot more to survive the next horde, they will do that. Not because it's the most efficient, but because they feel they have to.
 

Of course, players who only loot will have a much faster progress. And this is where balancing comes into play.

 

3 hours ago, Roland said:

If the developers made building from scratch advantageous then all the players who care most about optimizing and preferred to modify existing structures would be mad that TFP was suddenly forcing them to build from scratch.

As long as the developers don't forget that building still exists and don't throw it out of the game because nobody builds anymore anyway.
That's always my fear when aspects of the game are neglected. The developers might feel that it is unnecessary and can be removed.

 

[Jost Amman]

4 hours ago, Matt115 said:

This is paradox Roland because 1. IF crafting is buffed this mean looting is less effective or 2. If looting is buffed that mean crafting is even less effective. There is not other options. LBL will forced players to scavengig even more - why to waste time to make workbench etc. if you can do quest to get candy and have better chance to find good eq. 

It's only a paradox for people who play in an "unbalanced" (or should I say "unnatural") way.

I don't want the game to be tailored and balanced over people who choose to ignore the (integral) looting part of the game. It's their problem, not the dev's or ours.

[Jost Amman]

43 minutes ago, RipClaw said:

As long as the developers don't forget that building still exists and don't throw it out of the game because nobody builds anymore anyway.
That's always my fear when aspects of the game are neglected. The developers might feel that it is unnecessary and can be removed.

Sure, they were neglecting the building part so much that they just added 1K shapes for building in A20! 

Where the heck did you get that? 

[RipClaw]

39 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

Sure, they were neglecting the building part so much that they just added 1K shapes for building in A20! 

Where the heck did you get that? 

These shapes were added primarily not for the player but for the POI designers. Many of the shapes existed before but you could only get them from the creative menu. The player now has access to them.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm thankful that I can use these shapes now but what do you think happens when 99% of the players only loot and only 1% build a base at all? Do you think the developers would still invest time and work to improve building?

 

[RipClaw]

1 hour ago, Jost Amman said:

It's only a paradox for people who play in an "unbalanced" (or should I say "unnatural") way.

I don't want the game to be tailored and balanced over people who choose to ignore the (integral) looting part of the game. It's their problem, not the dev's or ours.

Is it a balanced way when people spend all their time looting? For my part, I think it is just as unnatural and unbalanced.

 

[Melange]

11 hours ago, Laz Man said:

 

Building your own base versus retrofitting a POI comes with their pros, cons and different gameplay which is a great thing imo.

I do both. And yes as you say they have their pros and cons. Which is best? Can't really say. Depends on what POI, how the game smiles with RNG and if I want to stay with my current base build or try something else because of inherent flaws I've found. Easy to change, start again with another type of POI. I don't consider starting over as shameful. Not happy with the way its going? Reroll the dice and give it another go, this time it may be spectacular. 

[Melange]

2 hours ago, Jost Amman said:

they just added 1K shapes for building in A20!

I like to build. I am happy I have more shapes to use that in my SP game no one will ever see in my fortress (sarcasm in case it wasn't obvious)

1 hour ago, RipClaw said:

It's only a paradox for people who play in an "unbalanced" (or should I say "unnatural") way.

I play in an unbalanced world. More XP. Zeds are weaker and I can inflict more damage. Paradox...meh, its what I can expect based on my initial game choice.

1 hour ago, RipClaw said:

Is it a balanced way when people spend all their time looting?

Dunno about balance in that regard. I have to loot to get what I need to advance. Always did. So I don't see that as being a major change to gameplay

2 hours ago, RipClaw said:

Many of the shapes existed before but you could only get them from the creative menu. The player now has access to them

Thanks for that being out of the creative menu. Creative is a big 'get these things too' temptation.

 

 

[Jost Amman]

2 hours ago, RipClaw said:

Is it a balanced way when people spend all their time looting? For my part, I think it is just as unnatural and unbalanced.

I completely agree... and if you only play by looting, you won't have a wonderful base to live in, and you'll be stuck out in the rain! 

Ok, maybe they'll just cut and place a few blocks in a POI and be done, but still...

 

2 hours ago, RipClaw said:

Don't get me wrong, I'm thankful that I can use these shapes now but what do you think happens when 99% of the players only loot and only 1% build a base at all? Do you think the developers would still invest time and work to improve building?

I don't think that will ever happen (and I don't need statistics to know!).

 

19 minutes ago, Melange said:

I like to build. I am happy I have more shapes to use that in my SP game no one will ever see in my fortress (sarcasm in case it wasn't obvious)

Yeah, and the same people won't see you winning against a huge horde or admire your great outfit.

Single player games have always been like this, and now you put that on The Fun Pimps? 

 

And by the way, I can enjoy my single player made base anyway even if I don't get the approval from someone else... but if I really, REALLY need to show off, then I take a few pictures and show them on Steam in the right discussion. 

 

Edited August 22, 2022 by Jost Amman (see edit history)

[Melange]

23 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

and now you put that on The Fun Pimps? 

Well, no @Jost Amman. I said it as a fact and cast no blame on anyone. 

 

Behrugen sich bitte*

 

Spoiler

Please relax

 

Edited August 22, 2022 by Melange (see edit history)

[Jost Amman]

1 hour ago, Melange said:

Well, no @Jost Amman. I said it as a fact and cast no blame on anyone. 

 

Behrugen sich bitte*

There was a bit of a misunderstanding, I'm not upset or anything like that... I understand your frustration.

However, that has nothing to do with lack of improvements for builders gameplay (which was RipClaw's initial argument), that's why I replied like I did.

[RipClaw]

28 minutes ago, Melange said:

Dunno about balance in that regard. I have to loot to get what I need to advance. Always did. So I don't see that as being a major change to gameplay

It's about the amount of looting that is necessary to get what you need. In A20, you can get surprisingly far with just a little looting. All T1 recipes can be unlocked via skills. Also all workbenches, electric traps and vehicles. I can make a bicycle, a workbench, a forge, iron tools, a baseball bat, a workbench, and a concrete mixer with only 2-4 days total of scavenging.

 

As far as I know so far, you can only craft Q1 pipe weapons, Q1 melee weapons and Q1 stone tools without magazines in A21. How many magazines you need in detail is currently unknown.

 

I would like to see a healthy mix of looting and other activities used as a baseline for balancing. Maybe half of the week for looting and the other half for other activities. Does that sound fair for all play styles?

 

 

[Diragor]

3 minutes ago, RipClaw said:

In A20, you can get surprisingly far with just a little looting

Yeah it really is. I started a game on Medium difficulty and played nomadic. Only looting, buying and questing was allowed. The only allowed Block was cooking place and damn was it easy to survive like this. doing some quests to get the Bike and leave everything important in it. I can tell you it was so much fun and felt so much more real to just wander around, loot buildings and try to survive in the wildness. The worst part was BM xD don't even try it

7 Days is such a nice survival game. I Love all the aspects that are possible. The only thing thats left are the Bandits that are hopefully coming in A21 and more traps in A22? (Please ❤️ )

[Matt115]

12 hours ago, Arma Rex said:

Some new art from about a week ago from the Dekogon contract, this time showing off the new ammo crate pallets.

 

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/qQlele

 

 

Looks rly good

11 hours ago, Roland said:

 

Looting is better because of the wide variety of magazines there are now and the fact that you need multiples of the same one to work up the crafting ladders. In this way, looting is better because it feels rewarding to get a magazine and read it-- especially when it is a magazine that hits the next threshold so you learn how to craft something new or something better. Crafting is better because with this new system I am learning how to craft things that are of higher quality than what I can find. So when I advance a level in tool crafting because I just found a magazine that lets me craft a green stone axe I can craft one immediately and replace my previous yellow one.

 

You are using A20 thinking about looting vs crafting. In A20, you loot and find a weapon or you craft a weapon and most of the time the one you find is better than what you can craft. So yes, in that context better looting means worse crafting.

 

In A21, the thing that makes looting better is the means to being able to craft better rather than the item you want. So looting isn't better because suddenly the containers all have blue bows which means you never ever craft one. The looting is better because you've found enough archery magazines that increase your crafting skill to the point that you can make a blue bow while you are still only finding orange or yellow level bows in weapons containers. 

 

So looting better and crafting better does exist. It's called A21.

You say about stone axe. Yes this will be working for stone axe. But steel tools still be pointless to make because there you have STEEL PARTS. And magazine will not help with that only forced you to even more looting. "looting isn't better because suddenly the containers all have blue bows which means you never ever craft one." for primitive bow for sure. But until you will find enough bow parts to create blue wooden bow you will probably find or buy wooden bow much faster.  So  if you told : " number of parts neccesary to make tools/guns was reduced by  25%-50%" I would agree that crafting was fixed. Now it's  "magasine hunting" make looking for parts and magasines making mining even less efective - why spend time mining while you can do quests and looting poi in this same time? in A17/A18 i spend a lot of time on mining  and i get steel tools so fast and this was rly rewarding

 

7 hours ago, Jost Amman said:

It's only a paradox for people who play in an "unbalanced" (or should I say "unnatural") way.

I don't want the game to be tailored and balanced over people who choose to ignore the (integral) looting part of the game. It's their problem, not the dev's or ours.

Well there is diffrence between ignoring and see that something too much focused.

A16 - I spend 5 H mining now i have steel tools

A20- I spend 10 h looking for 1 steel part because i don't have one steel tool parts so it was much faster to do quest to restart POI's/ buy steel pickaxe.

 

So yeah this is natural way - what are you doing in for example minecraft to get better tools? mining. Terraria? mining. Medieval dynasty? mining. Mining mining mining -  this is just standard : harvesting +looting ---> mining --> a little bit looting ----> mining 

Edited August 22, 2022 by Matt115 (see edit history)

[Laz Man]

1 hour ago, RipClaw said:

I would like to see a healthy mix of looting and other activities used as a baseline for balancing. Maybe half of the week for looting and the other half for other activities. Does that sound fair for all play styles?

 

I don't think all activities need to be equal with each other.  I believe looting, questing / exploration, and bloodmoons is the main gameplay loop while all other activities support those.

 

This will probably be even more evident once the main story quests come online.

 

Edit: However, although things like mining / crafting are not primary, I would love to see unique rewards for those who invest in those activities heavily.  For example, a master crafter would somehow gain a unique / exlusive craft while a master miner can acquire a unique / exclusive ore.

 

Edited August 22, 2022 by Laz Man (see edit history)

[Doomofman]

51 minutes ago, Laz Man said:

 

I don't think all activities need to be equal with each other.  I believe looting, questing / exploration, and bloodmoons is the main gameplay loop while all other activities support those.

 

This will probably be even more evident once the main story quests come online.

 

Edit: However, although things like mining / crafting are not primary, I would love to see unique rewards for those who invest in those activities heavily.  For example, a master crafter would somehow gain a unique / exlusive craft while a master miner can acquire a unique / exclusive ore.

 

 

Sounds dangerously close to Learn by Doing 😛 

[Falcon197]

12 hours ago, Arma Rex said:

Some new art from about a week ago from the Dekogon contract, this time showing off the new ammo crate pallets.

 

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/qQlele

 

 

 

These!  These look amazing!

 

One suggestion I'd offer for a new block, if feasible, would be pallets of gold bricks / bullion for POIs like banks or other vaults.  They could be broken for gold nuggets.

 

They'd also go really well with my Fort Knox base.  Just saying 😁

 

[Roland]

9 hours ago, RipClaw said:

It all depends on how fast you make progress even if you spend, say, 50% of your time building. If the progress is so slow that people feel they have to loot more to survive the next horde, they will do that. Not because it's the most efficient, but because they feel they have to.
 

Of course, players who only loot will have a much faster progress. And this is where balancing comes into play.

 

As long as the developers don't forget that building still exists and don't throw it out of the game because nobody builds anymore anyway.
That's always my fear when aspects of the game are neglected. The developers might feel that it is unnecessary and can be removed.

 

Building is one of Madmole’s favorite activities. I can’t imagine a universe in which building is forgotten. 

[Melange]

3 hours ago, RipClaw said:

I would like to see a healthy mix of looting and other activities used as a baseline for balancing. Maybe half of the week for looting and the other half for other activities. Does that sound fair for all play styles?

 

Seems fair. But neither of us has had our hands on A21, so its all supposition at this point. I have walked away from 7dtd before because of what I perceived as forced radical changes in playstyle.  I'll give A21 a go. Not looking forward to hits on my health and possible dysentary when I need to drink from some gutter whilst looting for who knows how many magazines though. At minimum I forsee a lot of restarts of the game for me. And I'll be looking for a change of clothing. Perhaps quite often...🚽

 

Edited August 22, 2022 by Melange (see edit history)

[Slingblade2040]

18 hours ago, meganoth said:

 

Meanwhile in the Dev diary someone just explained to me that 7D2D has a more severe food and water management than most survival games. Consider me confused. 😉

 

In multi-player I can see the problem but I can't imagine food and water being an issue even on day 1 or even as a new player  if they are on the single player version. the snow biome has a ton of animals for meat, farming  also for food  and water from the lakes and rivers. they do have perks to slow down the rate at which food and water is used.

 

Honestly I think if the option was there for those people to remove food and water use they would take it out. since a lot of people seem to consider the task of feeding and keeping the character hydrated as tedious and would rather loot and shoot zombies and at that point this game is just a looter shooter and less about survival which seems like its leaning towards more and more each alpha.

[Melange]

3 hours ago, Laz Man said:

I don't think all activities need to be equal with each other.  I believe looting, questing / exploration, and bloodmoons is the main gameplay loop while all other activities support those.

 

This will probably be even more evident once the main story quests come online.

 

Edit: However, although things like mining / crafting are not primary, I would love to see unique rewards for those who invest in those activities heavily.  For example, a master crafter would somehow gain a unique / exlusive craft while a master miner can acquire a unique / exclusive ore.

 

Only asking: Have you been given access to the current rendition of A21, and are you playing it? 

[Jost Amman]

5 minutes ago, Melange said:

Only asking: Have you been given access to the current rendition of A21, and are you playing it? 

He should be... he's part of the QA team! 

[unholyjoe]

Just now, Jost Amman said:

He should be... he's part of the QA team! 

and he is on the level design team.

 

[Melange]

27 minutes ago, unholyjoe said:

27 minutes ago, Jost Amman said:

He should be... he's part of the QA team! 

and he is on the level design team.

 

Dunno how to respond except for "Doh, I should have known" and "So feed us a little then". Honestly, @unholyjoe you do a good job of being kinda vague (nebulous?) in your posts. Probably comes with the territory. I get that. But if the QA moniker is ignored, you'd come across as a moderator, not one of the TFP crew. 

 

 

Edited August 22, 2022 by Melange
not a fair question - removed (see edit history)

[unholyjoe]

13 minutes ago, Melange said:

Dunno how to respond except for "Doh, I should have known" and "So feed us a little then". Honestly, @unholyjoe you do a good job of being kinda vague (nebulous?) in your posts. Probably comes with the territory. I get that. But if the QA moniker is ignored, you'd come across as a moderator, not one of the TFP crew. 

 

 

i sometimes will offer tid bits but i will not jeopardize my job/position because the public wants to see the candy. some people have such permission... all i can say is... i signed an NDA and i honor it.. i let those with permissions do the revealing.

 

what i do show on forum has been talked about or already released on one of the socials that i do not participate in. no i do not try to tick people off but those who get offended need to understand that there are rules and bosses and wives .... ooops