What makes A20 differ from (very) early versions or "Why doesnt the game have the 'it' factor anymore"

[Viktoriusiii]

Okay after being very happy with A20 in the first few ingame weeks
 

Spoiler

And then VERY unhappy once I found out how completely useless stealth is this alpha...
I took a break and gave me some time to reflect on the game.
Inspired by this post

Spoiler

I now want to explain what I think went wrong in the last few years.
Well "wrong" being subjective.
Why the game has lost what made it so very special, maybe replaced by something different, but it DID lose that aspect (defined later)

 

Every game offers something different. I don't play Rocket League for strategic loadouts, I don't play Total war for its thrilling PvP action.
And 7d2d was a great survival horror game.
You were alone. You didn't know anything. And your progress was slow, with every horde looming over you while you slowly try to gather materials to spike your small base.
 

Spoiler

Wanted to build a base? Blocks were very expensive.
Want to go in a city to get some loot? Dogs. Giant Killer Hornets. Zombies EVERYWHERE.
So you try to loot garbage, find a prefab in the wilderness and build it up.
Then you find a small village with not a lot of threats, but also far less loot.
On day 6 you find a crossbow. And you are HAPPY.
You will be able to kill zombies more efficiently now.
Why would you? Well they were guarding loot. They were everywhere, blocking your path.
So go go looting. Then @%$# @%$# @%$#!!! You forgot you had a stew in your backpack and it alerted a lot of zombies to your location.
Now you have to run. But they will not give up chase easily. You will have to leave the village for them to lose line of sight. Because you only have 4 crossbow bolts and healingitems are nowhere to be found.
Night time. You do not know what to do... when suddenly you hear footsteps. They are running. Left to right. You hear them scream, obviously smelling something...
You crouch in the darkness, hopefully removing the candle was enough... then a minute later, they are gone.
Next day.
You will have to start gathering wood to build a spikehaven for hordenight.
Spikes everywhere. You still only have a crossbow with 15 bolts and a blunderbuss with 3 shots for emergencies.

The spikes are your only lifeline.
The horde starts. And everything becomes chaos. They are coming from all sides. You hear them dying like flies on your spikes.
Then you hear them hitting your log spikes and oyu know "they will break through". So you go inside and hope you can repair the blocks or kill the Z's dealing damage.
They break in, you run upstairs and use the ladder. "HA! Stupid A.I. can't get me now."
You just hear them hitting blocks for the rest of the night.
Then it is morning. You survived!
You lure the remaining Z's away and look at the damage.
And you know... "I need another home!"

Everything I just talked about was either removed or changed drasticially.

Spoiler

- Building bases are suuuuper easy now. They do not give as much protection anymore, because they beeline towards the weakpoint, but if you don't have a 5x5 on day 1 you didn't try.
- Cities are lootfests now. There is no threat there. Back then every city was like the wasteland is now. Full of danger.
- villages are lootfests too, since every poi has these stupid "end of POI reward" lootboxes. Add to that traderrewards that are just so easy and plentiful...
- if you don't have at least one good weapon on day 7 with loads of ammo (yes even after the nerf, you have like 10x more ammo than back then where you though you'd never run out because you had 6 shotgunshells)
- go through poi, know every sleeperposition, loot everything or just jump straight to the end, if you are spotted, just shoot'em'up
- night time is usually very uneventful. wandering hordes don't circle around your base. They just go from one place to another and as ong as they don't notice oyu, they will go slow as well. (music is creepy now though)
-base? Or you mean a killbox. Yeah sure. Let me just grab like 100 cobblestones a few iron bars and we are good.
- get loads of XP because all they do is run straight into your shotgun to get to a door that will hold them for minutes (on normal difficulties)

The gameplayloop changed. From being scared and barely being able to get by, you are now encouraged to be rambo.
Everything is given to you on a silver platter.
I am not saying I want sharp rocks and sticks back... BUT there was an elegance in how convoluted it was.
Now everything is accessible at every point in time. At least to look it up.



There are quite a few more things... like how the music changed. (listen to this)
You felt alone. Nothing but unknown out there.
But you survived. And it felt good.

There have been MANY changes. Many good, some bad and some absolutely catastrophic.
But the overall trend was "picking up new players".
A20 has about as much late game as early alphas. What changed most is the Z's behaviour and the world.
The gameplay is largely the same.


No matter what I write as a conclusion, I cna already see some smartass refer to mods or how they like it... so I will just leave this here:

I think 7d2d is a good... no a great game.
It just is no longer the lovechild of mine that I would tell my friends about.
And I have to accept it. It was never mine and it grew out of that phase that I loved so much.
I just wish it had come differently.



PS: the reason why I have so much stuff on day 8 is because A11 experimented a lot with loot I think.
But weapons were never the limiting factor. Ammo was. (until gunparts made guns rare as well... btu that... oh well)


PPS: remember caves? I am old.

Edited March 18, 2022 by Viktoriusiii (see edit history)

[Roland]

Sorry you feel that way, Vik. I definitely miss some things from earlier alphas that got cut but I know that is part of game development. I don't think the game has gotten worse. To me, it feels largely the same as it always has when I don't think about trying to level up. The whole leveling up and character progression aspect of the game is what I feel really changed the way the game played. For myself, I recognize that I probably won't like the game as much if all I do is focus on character progression and so I don't. I strive to play it just like I did in the early alphas and ignore strategies to cheese the blood moon night or focus on gaining xp and dukes as quickly as I can. 

 

In my solo game I played the first horde night on ground level in a house I boarded up and reinforced. I spent the night alternating between repairing and killing and it felt a lot like former days.

 

It is definitely possible to get that old time feeling back as long as you play the game like you did in olden times. Don't do more than one quest a day. Don't worry about xp or skill points. Just set goals for yourself and then do things to accomplish them. As for scare factor, there are a lot of new players who express how scary the game is for them. Expecting a game to still be scary after 1000s of hours of play is a pretty high expectation, imo. I don't get scared very often either any longer but I sure did the first time I came out a building in the wasteland and heard that loud windstorm noise pick up all around me. I was spinning in circles and freaking out about what might be coming but....it was just the wind..lol

 

I know you disagree with a lot of the decisions that were made and perhaps the game has changed irrevocably from what you once loved but I think it is still has a lot of those aspects you remember for brand new players.

[Jason Tamosiunis]

4 hours ago, Roland said:

Sorry you feel that way, Vik. I definitely miss some things from earlier alphas that got cut but I know that is part of game development. I don't think the game has gotten worse. To me, it feels largely the same as it always has when I don't think about trying to level up. The whole leveling up and character progression aspect of the game is what I feel really changed the way the game played. For myself, I recognize that I probably won't like the game as much if all I do is focus on character progression and so I don't. I strive to play it just like I did in the early alphas and ignore strategies to cheese the blood moon night or focus on gaining xp and dukes as quickly as I can. 

 

In my solo game I played the first horde night on ground level in a house I boarded up and reinforced. I spent the night alternating between repairing and killing and it felt a lot like former days.

 

It is definitely possible to get that old time feeling back as long as you play the game like you did in olden times. Don't do more than one quest a day. Don't worry about xp or skill points. Just set goals for yourself and then do things to accomplish them. As for scare factor, there are a lot of new players who express how scary the game is for them. Expecting a game to still be scary after 1000s of hours of play is a pretty high expectation, imo. I don't get scared very often either any longer but I sure did the first time I came out a building in the wasteland and heard that loud windstorm noise pick up all around me. I was spinning in circles and freaking out about what might be coming but....it was just the wind..lol

 

I know you disagree with a lot of the decisions that were made and perhaps the game has changed irrevocably from what you once loved but I think it is still has a lot of those aspects you remember for brand new players.

a note that may ease everyones minds if TFP have any medium or major content they wanna add maybe run it by us in forum to see what we think may make most happier PS; please re-add the key option to pick up plants

[RipClaw]

The thing that bothers me the most about the changes in the most recent alphas is that guns are too abundant and available too early. I started in A15 and if you found a toilet pistol in the first couple of weeks you were the king of the world. But who needs a toilet pistol when you can have a pipe machine gun on day one?

 

Edited March 18, 2022 by RipClaw (see edit history)

[Viktoriusiii]

7 hours ago, Roland said:

It is definitely possible to get that old time feeling back as long as you play the game like you did in olden times.

Thank you for your reply.
I think there would need to be a few key changes for me to enjoy the game again:
-remove lootrooms
-make sleepers less gamey. Their current existence is for streamers "oh no they come out the walls, I can scream now because Pewds did that and it made him famous"
-make traderquests super rare, but give better loot (one every few days so you don't feel like oyu have to grind them out)
-better loottables with everything in the fighting category being SUPER rare
-better zombie A.I. I said this a lot, but this "tower defense" A.I. is just not for me. I am insanely good at pattern recognition and these zombies behave too pretictable
-more densely packed cities with more dangerous types of enemies (a dog was a deathsentence back in the day) I don't want to be in a city before day 21.
-either remove the progression system, or make it the thing... the "Youknowwhat" so it actually feels like a character again


- so many other smaller things that add back in complexity. Gunparts, Ores, crafting unlocking and so on

And yeah... I wish I could play like you. But this is the same problem as hordeexploits. "just don't use it" doesn't fly for me in a survival game.
I need to use every option I have or it doesnt feel real to me.



PS: I am sure the game isn't worse. There are SO many improvements, especially on the programming side of things. The ragdoll, the physics, the blocks and much much more.
But when it comes to pure gamedesign... Whoever is in charge of that... I'd like to slap him once please 😊

[pApA^LeGBa]

My biggest concern is the lack of enemies aka playing in an empty world and no endgame not even for future versions. (unless we get another few years of alpha versions  wich isn´t the plan afaik, bandits alone will not do the trick)

 

The most frustrating thing is finding a Q6 item that has worse stats than the Q5 you have. I am all for random stats, but not that way. And yeah i could find another one that is actually better. But that´s where the no endgame part comes into play. Until i find a better one, i am bored af already because i am overpowered.

 

The base building is a valid point. There is way too much cobblestone and cement lying around. You can easily build a horde base from scratch on day 7 not digging up a single piece of clay or smashing a single stone for it and that base can easily hold up for 4 hordes.

Edited March 18, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[RyanX]

21 hours ago, Viktoriusiii said:

  Hide contents

Wanted to build a base? Blocks were very expensive.
Want to go in a city to get some loot? Dogs. Giant Killer Hornets. Zombies EVERYWHERE.
So you try to loot garbage, find a prefab in the wilderness and build it up.
Then you find a small village with not a lot of threats, but also far less loot.
On day 6 you find a crossbow. And you are HAPPY.
You will be able to kill zombies more efficiently now.
Why would you? Well they were guarding loot. They were everywhere, blocking your path.
So go go looting. Then @%$# @%$# @%$#!!! You forgot you had a stew in your backpack and it alerted a lot of zombies to your location.
Now you have to run. But they will not give up chase easily. You will have to leave the village for them to lose line of sight. Because you only have 4 crossbow bolts and healingitems are nowhere to be found.
Night time. You do not know what to do... when suddenly you hear footsteps. They are running. Left to right. You hear them scream, obviously smelling something...
You crouch in the darkness, hopefully removing the candle was enough... then a minute later, they are gone.
Next day.
You will have to start gathering wood to build a spikehaven for hordenight.
Spikes everywhere. You still only have a crossbow with 15 bolts and a blunderbuss with 3 shots for emergencies.

The spikes are your only lifeline.
The horde starts. And everything becomes chaos. They are coming from all sides. You hear them dying like flies on your spikes.
Then you hear them hitting your log spikes and oyu know "they will break through". So you go inside and hope you can repair the blocks or kill the Z's dealing damage.
They break in, you run upstairs and use the ladder. "HA! Stupid A.I. can't get me now."
You just hear them hitting blocks for the rest of the night.
Then it is morning. You survived!
You lure the remaining Z's away and look at the damage.
And you know... "I need another home!"

 

 

 

 

Wow.  That block really sums up the feel of the game when I started playing around alpha 15 or so.  I remember crouching at night in a house, watching that eyeball to see if I was detected, double checking to see if I stowed my rotten meat away.  Those were the days...

[Feycat]

You do this every alpha since they took LBD away.

[Scyris]

1 hour ago, Feycat said:

You do this every alpha since they took LBD away.

 

Can't you blame him? they took away the perfect system for this piece of crap they use now. I mean yeah LBD in a16.4 needed some tweaks, but it didn't need to turn into the super limiting system we have now. Its not too bad in multiplayer, but in single player the stat system just kinda sucks.

 

As for OP's post, I feel it doesn't have the "it" factor anymore because the game has basically gotten nothing but side grades for a long time. We need a upgrade, like steel has been top tier since I think a9-10? or so. Least thats when I started. We need a tier above steel already, and we also need zombies above radiated ones for more challenge. Both things the game has honestly needed for a long LONG time.

 

I wish the devs would focus less on graphics and more on improving the gameplay, lets be honest 7dtd looks fantastic for what it is, it doesn't need to be made prettier, it needs more actual content and things to do right now. I mostly play 7dtd modded these days because vanilla just bores me just doesn't have the excitement it used to have. I play each alpha unmodded for a bit when its out, but usually switch to modded once the mods get updated for it, as its just more fun.

[Viktoriusiii]

I don't actually think what I did this time is the same.

I have complained about the direction of the game a lot yes.

But this was not specific to one feature (like I usually do).
I just tried to get all the complaints I have into one overarching point:
"It just isn't a horror sandbox anymore"
It is a looter shooter with characterupgrades and a Towerdefense minigame.


We had 8 Alphas I think since the dukes were introduced (in the first few they were useless, since there was no trader :D)
Ever since then thy teased that they would finally get a story in.
Honestly... Just some researchdiary in dishong tower would be a step forward. We already have that starting note.
Maybe if you find a note, you get a questmarker to the next one or something.

But all we ever got since the beginning is reworks and art upgrades.
The last actual big implementation (not talking about arrowphysics or something, but actual content) were more vehicles and electricity. And the latter one is only half finished (even if MM thinks it is perfect right now)
And SOOO many artupgrades.
I won't complain about it. The game looks absolutely stunning and POIs usually don't pop up more than twice anymore.
But it came at the cost of a story... of new additions.
"Well they wouldn't come out faster, since the designers are a different branch"
THEN HIRE NEW GUYS. Sorry.


 

53 minutes ago, Scyris said:

We need a tier above steel already

Remember polished steel?
Pepperidge Farm remembers!

 

And yeah. Agreed on all points.

[pApA^LeGBa]

They always said story will be added at the very end of development. Wich isn´t really a surprise tbh.

 

LBD needed more than just a few tweaks, it needed a complete rework. It was horrible tbh. I wouldn´t mind a good LBD system, but what we had wasn´t good. Not at all. The new system isn´t really good. But it´s still better than the half assed LBD we had in A16.

 

It´s also a question of how many hours you already have in the game. If you played it for like 2000 hours or more, you will get bored, no matter how perfect the game is because you know every mechanic in your sleep and you are aware of everything there is. Can you honestly say that you would put in another 2000 hours if A16 would have been the final version? Even a story wouldn´t make that better.

Edited March 20, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Viktoriusiii]

42 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

They always said story will be added at the very end of development. Wich isn´t really a surprise tbh.

 

LBD needed more than just a few tweaks, it needed a complete rework. It was horrible tbh. I wouldn´t mind a good LBD system, but what we had wasn´t good. Not at all. The new system isn´t really good. But it´s still better than the half assed LBD we had in A16.

 

It´s also a question of how many hours you already have in the game. If you played it for like 2000 hours or more, you will get bored, no matter how perfect the game is because you know every mechanic in your sleep and you are aware of everything there is. Can you honestly say that you would put in another 2000 hours if A16 would have been the final version? Even a story wouldn´t make that better.

 

But why? Every other story driven EA game unravels the story slowly over the course of development. Giving players the chance to theorize and stuff...

Since this is my thread, I don't mind this discussion taking over.
So tell me again what didnt work in A16 LBD.
Spamcrafting? Nonexistent.
Freedom of choice? You had levels and perkpoints, so even if you only used a sledge, you could still level guns.
Exploits? Most were gone due to fixes. I think you could still shoot ore, but honestly, if you use ammo to do that, there is too much ammo in the game.
Balancing? Exactly. This is basicially the only thing that needed  attention.
Certain skills like armor would never level (except if you stood next to cacti), while others would be maxed before day 20.
It also already had perks, so you could increase those easily...

It was a near perfect system for the game.

Every time someone says they hate LBD it is either spamcrafting or exploits. Both of which were fixed in A16 (although they introduced levelgates... a step I still hate nearly as much as removal of LBD)


Honestly... I would be fine if there was no pointbuy system. It is just not immersive, super gamey and in its current state absolutely atrocious.
I loved LBD. But if I had to chose between what we have now (mandetory INT if you wanna progress, mandetory FOR to farm, PER for loot and mandetory STR to get even a sliver of ressources, with AGI being completely useless) I'd rather have no progression system at all.

 

[meganoth]

27 minutes ago, Viktoriusiii said:

 

But why? Every other story driven EA game unravels the story slowly over the course of development. Giving players the chance to theorize and stuff...

 

Since when is 7d2d story driven???

 

And many EA games, especially story driven ones, have shown only an intro or one act (most often the first) of their story in EA. And most EA games have started development in EA only after reaching beta!!! A state  which 7D2D hasn't even reached.

 

27 minutes ago, Viktoriusiii said:

Since this is my thread, I don't mind this discussion taking over.
So tell me again what didnt work in A16 LBD.
Spamcrafting? Nonexistent.
Freedom of choice? You had levels and perkpoints, so even if you only used a sledge, you could still level guns.
Exploits? Most were gone due to fixes. I think you could still shoot ore, but honestly, if you use ammo to do that, there is too much ammo in the game.
Balancing? Exactly. This is basicially the only thing that needed  attention.
Certain skills like armor would never level (except if you stood next to cacti), while others would be maxed before day 20.
It also already had perks, so you could increase those easily...

It was a near perfect system for the game.

Every time someone says they hate LBD it is either spamcrafting or exploits. Both of which were fixed in A16 (although they introduced levelgates... a step I still hate nearly as much as removal of LBD)


Honestly... I would be fine if there was no pointbuy system. It is just not immersive, super gamey and in its current state absolutely atrocious.
I loved LBD. But if I had to chose between what we have now (mandetory INT if you wanna progress, mandetory FOR to farm, PER for loot and mandetory STR to get even a sliver of ressources, with AGI being completely useless) I'd rather have no progression system at all.

 

 

Edited March 20, 2022 by meganoth (see edit history)

[pApA^LeGBa]

AGI useless? Excuse my manical laughter, but seriously? As much as the new system is way too restrictive, there is honestly no useless attribute. Some might not be attractive if you play a min/max style. But that´s boring anyways. You can easily "beat" the game on any difficulty with a build that goes heavily into agility.

 

Talking about gamey aspects. What really sucks is that i can use a ton of grenades next to a sleeper and he won´t wake up, but if i step over the imaginary line with full stealth perks and  stealthy armor not making any noise and just one block away from where i just tossed a ton of grenades he wakes up. That is what bothers me way more.

 

Just a few days ago i blasted away a wandering horde in a house next to a room with sleepers using the M60. None of them woke up. They were like 5 blocks away from a huge carnage that even called in a screamer. That´s what i call immersion breaking. A magic, soundproof and invisble wall around sleeping zombies.

 

Investing skill points is a wide spread  mechanic in RPG´s, and yeah the current system isn´t good, but the basic mechanic of it, using skill points, isn´t actually bad. "But this is a survival game" you say? Yeah and no. It´s a genre mix and that´s intended by the developers. So don´t expect it to be true to every aspect of a pure survival game.

Edited March 20, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Matt115]

4 hours ago, Scyris said:

 

Can't you blame him? they took away the perfect system for this piece of crap they use now. I mean yeah LBD in a16.4 needed some tweaks, but it didn't need to turn into the super limiting system we have now. Its not too bad in multiplayer, but in single player the stat system just kinda sucks.

 

As for OP's post, I feel it doesn't have the "it" factor anymore because the game has basically gotten nothing but side grades for a long time. We need a upgrade, like steel has been top tier since I think a9-10? or so. Least thats when I started. We need a tier above steel already, and we also need zombies above radiated ones for more challenge. Both things the game has honestly needed for a long LONG time.

 

I wish the devs would focus less on graphics and more on improving the gameplay, lets be honest 7dtd looks fantastic for what it is, it doesn't need to be made prettier, it needs more actual content and things to do right now. I mostly play 7dtd modded these days because vanilla just bores me just doesn't have the excitement it used to have. I play each alpha unmodded for a bit when its out, but usually switch to modded once the mods get updated for it, as its just more fun.

Well it is good they focus on graphic because gameplay is good. just change farming perk, add bandit and story and it will be enough. But new props, zombie variants, water overhaul, new pois add more that ten more tiers of tools. L4D2 have better graphic and simpler gameplay that b4b and is still alive when B4B is just... dying.

3 hours ago, Viktoriusiii said:

I don't actually think what I did this time is the same.

I have complained about the direction of the game a lot yes.

But this was not specific to one feature (like I usually do).
I just tried to get all the complaints I have into one overarching point:
"It just isn't a horror sandbox anymore"
It is a looter shooter with characterupgrades and a Towerdefense minigame.


We had 8 Alphas I think since the dukes were introduced (in the first few they were useless, since there was no trader :D)
Ever since then thy teased that they would finally get a story in.
Honestly... Just some researchdiary in dishong tower would be a step forward. We already have that starting note.
Maybe if you find a note, you get a questmarker to the next one or something.

But all we ever got since the beginning is reworks and art upgrades.
The last actual big implementation (not talking about arrowphysics or something, but actual content) were more vehicles and electricity. And the latter one is only half finished (even if MM thinks it is perfect right now)
And SOOO many artupgrades.
I won't complain about it. The game looks absolutely stunning and POIs usually don't pop up more than twice anymore.
But it came at the cost of a story... of new additions.
"Well they wouldn't come out faster, since the designers are a different branch"
THEN HIRE NEW GUYS. Sorry.


 

Remember polished steel?
Pepperidge Farm remembers!

 

And yeah. Agreed on all points.

Well when i was playing in A8 and 9 it was looking like "what if f.e.a.r was focused on zombie and it was sandbox" now 7dtd looks more much more colorful and less creepy. So people complain about horror stuff 

 

2 hours ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

They always said story will be added at the very end of development. Wich isn´t really a surprise tbh.

 

LBD needed more than just a few tweaks, it needed a complete rework. It was horrible tbh. I wouldn´t mind a good LBD system, but what we had wasn´t good. Not at all. The new system isn´t really good. But it´s still better than the half assed LBD we had in A16.

 

It´s also a question of how many hours you already have in the game. If you played it for like 2000 hours or more, you will get bored, no matter how perfect the game is because you know every mechanic in your sleep and you are aware of everything there is. Can you honestly say that you would put in another 2000 hours if A16 would have been the final version? Even a story wouldn´t make that better.

This better that perks connected with weapons. Well because if you want to be good in using shotguns you have use shotguns. Now it is little bit poitless too use guns in early/mid stage because to use shotguns effectivly you need to have perks into shotguns.

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

 

But why? Every other story driven EA game unravels the story slowly over the course of development. Giving players the chance to theorize and stuff...

Since this is my thread, I don't mind this discussion taking over.
So tell me again what didnt work in A16 LBD.
Spamcrafting? Nonexistent.
Freedom of choice? You had levels and perkpoints, so even if you only used a sledge, you could still level guns.
Exploits? Most were gone due to fixes. I think you could still shoot ore, but honestly, if you use ammo to do that, there is too much ammo in the game.
Balancing? Exactly. This is basicially the only thing that needed  attention.
Certain skills like armor would never level (except if you stood next to cacti), while others would be maxed before day 20.
It also already had perks, so you could increase those easily...

It was a near perfect system for the game.

Every time someone says they hate LBD it is either spamcrafting or exploits. Both of which were fixed in A16 (although they introduced levelgates... a step I still hate nearly as much as removal of LBD)


Honestly... I would be fine if there was no pointbuy system. It is just not immersive, super gamey and in its current state absolutely atrocious.
I loved LBD. But if I had to chose between what we have now (mandetory INT if you wanna progress, mandetory FOR to farm, PER for loot and mandetory STR to get even a sliver of ressources, with AGI being completely useless) I'd rather have no progression system at all.

 

well minecraft get story after .... 10 years?

this is not freedom of choice but... "saving ammo". Because there is not point to use shotgun if you can't one hit kill  without perks first and there is much more more importants thing that guns like farming, crafting to invest perks. In LBD when you were using guns only against hordes and dogs you could fast "learn" this skills

21 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

AGI useless? Excuse my manical laughter, but seriously? As much as the new system is way too restrictive, there is honestly no useless attribute. Some might not be attractive if you play a min/max style. But that´s boring anyways. You can easily "beat" the game on any difficulty with a build that goes heavily into agility.

 

Talking about gamey aspects. What really sucks is that i can use a ton of grenades next to a sleeper and he won´t wake up, but if i step over the imaginary line with full stealth perks and  stealthy armor not making any noise and just one block away from where i just tossed a ton of grenades he wakes up. That is what bothers me way more.

 

Just a few days ago i blasted away a wandering horde in a house next to a room with sleepers using the M60. None of them woke up. They were like 5 blocks away from a huge carnage that even called in a screamer. That´s what i call immersion breaking. A magic, soundproof and invisble wall around sleeping zombies.

 

Investing skill points is a wide spread  mechanic in RPG´s, and yeah the current system isn´t good, but the basic mechanic of it, using skill points, isn´t actually bad. "But this is a survival game" you say? Yeah and no. It´s a genre mix and that´s intended by the developers. So don´t expect it to be true to every aspect of a pure survival game.

Well about stealthy : i think this game never was designed on stealth so this "line" is just to make POI's more dangerouse to avoid easy cleaning. About sleepers well... this is not TFP mistake but... way to keep game stable. Because let say there is 10 zombies on street + 10 per poi X 5 poi. sleepers have "simpler" Ai until they are active. so This trick let them make optimialisation. and thing about gameplay- let say they do something and now sleepers can be active after throwing grande. And now.... nobody would use guns in city because most of zombie became active and most of poi would be very fast devasteded by zombies. Making POI need a lot of time right? so Poi makers job would be .... pointless because walls, floors will be collapsed , random destroing crates etc by zombies. So unfortunatly this can't be done in 7DTD. 

[Viktoriusiii]

1 hour ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

AGI useless? Excuse my manical laughter, but seriously? As much as the new system is way too restrictive, there is honestly no useless attribute. Some might not be attractive if you play a min/max style. But that´s boring anyways. You can easily "beat" the game on any difficulty with a build that goes heavily into agility.

You misunderstand.
Agility has nothing to offer besides fighting.
Since stealth doesn't work right now, all it has is pistols and ranged.

Strength has mining and cooking
Fortitude has farming and survivability
Perception has looting
Intelligence has everything trader and progressrelated

Perception has sneaking and high jumps. None of which are a core mechanic (because sneaking is not working as you correctly said bc it is all about invisible barriers and "wake-up boxes")
 

[meganoth]

15 minutes ago, Viktoriusiii said:

You misunderstand.
Agility has nothing to offer besides fighting.
Since stealth doesn't work right now, all it has is pistols and ranged.

Strength has mining and cooking
Fortitude has farming and survivability
Perception has looting
Intelligence has everything trader and progressrelated

Perception has sneaking and high jumps. None of which are a core mechanic (because sneaking is not working as you correctly said bc it is all about invisible barriers and "wake-up boxes")
 

 

Stealth is not working if you have "feral sense" on, but feral sense is optional. Or are you saying stealth doesn't work for you even if you turned off feral sense?

 

pApA said "immersion breaking" about the invisible barriers, not "breaking stealth" by the way

 

And high jumps are in agility not perception.

Edited March 20, 2022 by meganoth (see edit history)

[pApA^LeGBa]

Agility has sneaking and jumping (parkour). And parkour saved me a lot of times already. Sneaking does still work, not as it used to be, but still works. There is just a lot more trigger rooms than before but you can still sneak up on a lot of Z´s. Also usefull if you hunt in the snow. That extra sneakdamage comes in handy if you are hunting bears or cougars for meat.

 

I for myself find perception tree the one where i rarely ever put points into. Really don´t need any looting perks. The lack of endgame and not having any challenge after day 35 makes loot perks really useless for me as lucky looter doesn´t pay off in early game. 

 

Meganoth is right, it´s the invisible barriers that are breaking the immersion big time. It´s a complex problem i know, but the current solution just sucks. From an immersion standpoint they should break out of the houses and leave a mess everywhere once they wake up tbh. For quests the buildings do reset anyways. Really wouldn´t mind them coming out of every hole if you make noise on the streets. At least that would help with the empty world we have outside of downtown.

Edited March 20, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Viktoriusiii]

1. no stealth does not work because of a lot of issues I highlighed before.

Lighting makes sneaking near useless. Oftentimes you don't even know the game thinks you are lit.
Sleeper volumes are atrocious and your 1-8 stealthmeter feels like it is more a 50/50.
Even silent weapons now make so much sound that most zombies just wake up. Full perk bow and they wake up every 3rd shot or so.
Nearly every sleeper is behind a wall or around a corner. So you have to enter the sleepervolume to kill them.
OR as was said: just destroy the walls. No sneaking required. They won't wake up until you are in a certain position.

 

Tell me again how sneaking is not completely broken.


Also yes I meant agility, OBVIOUSLY. Sorry.

3 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

Agility has sneaking and jumping (parkour). And parkour saved me a lot of times already. Sneaking does still work, not as it used to be, but still works. There is just a lot more trigger rooms than before but you can still sneak up on a lot of Z´s. Also usefull if you hunt in the snow. That extra sneakdamage comes in handy if you are hunting bears or cougars for meat.

That is why I said core mechanic.
Every path has something to fight with.

Why would you use bow&arrow, if you could just have a shotgun AND be great at mining as well as have some food?
Why would you want to jump away if you could simply mow everything down with an M60, since the other perks make you nearly invincible (even on higher difficulties) then go home and have a running farm.
Why would you...

Every other perk has something other than fighting to offer.
Just agility is useless.
It had stealth, but since that is useless (yes useless. Because you don't need the perks to be stealthy anymore)

[meganoth]

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

1. no stealth does not work because of a lot of issues I highlighed before.

 

You said stealth is useless at least twice without any highlighting at all. Until this post here the only reason you gave was that you agreed to what pApA did NOT say.

 

But nevermind, with soo much to complain about it would be difficult for you to not loose track what you said and what you forgot to say. 😉

 

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

Lighting makes sneaking near useless. Oftentimes you don't even know the game thinks you are lit.

 

It got more difficult in daytime, that's for sure. Lighting became so important that a stealth player might want to really use the night for questing. Still, if you can use stealth with a shotgun as you say you should be able to use it with a bow as well (forget I said that if you only can use the shotgun when you break through walls)

 

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

Sleeper volumes are atrocious and your 1-8 stealthmeter feels like it is more a 50/50.
Even silent weapons now make so much sound that most zombies just wake up. Full perk bow and they wake up every 3rd shot or so.

 

Again, do you have feral sense on? Or stealth around without any concern about lighting? I think players need to adapt to the new stealth play and not expect to just do what they did x alphas ago.

 

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

Nearly every sleeper is behind a wall or around a corner. So you have to enter the sleepervolume to kill them.

 

Which is how it should be. I'm perfectly fine with a gameplay that doesn't mean easy sniping everything from outside the door. Which is something only someone would want if he absolutely wants to play insane but on easy mode.

 

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

OR as was said: just destroy the walls. No sneaking required. They won't wake up until you are in a certain position.

 

Breaking the wall, just like nerdpoling to the loot room are options you have but the game isn't balanced around them. I agree that a different system would be much better gameplay wise. But an easy fix is impossible because of performance. So break walls and break balance or don't. Your choice.

 

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

 

Tell me again how sneaking is not completely broken.

 

It isn't completely broken because I can play stealth and it works.

 

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

Also yes I meant agility, OBVIOUSLY. Sorry.

 

Maybe I was dense but I thought you really meant perception. Because with the range of a sniper rifle you can stealth outdoors quite well without having perked into stealth. Distance is a very good substitute for being good at stealth

 

1 hour ago, Viktoriusiii said:

That is why I said core mechanic.
Every path has something to fight with.

Why would you use bow&arrow, if you could just have a shotgun AND be great at mining as well as have some food?
Why would you want to jump away if you could simply mow everything down with an M60, since the other perks make you nearly invincible (even on higher difficulties) then go home and have a running farm.
Why would you...

Every other perk has something other than fighting to offer.
Just agility is useless.
It had stealth, but since that is useless (yes useless. Because you don't need the perks to be stealthy anymore)

 

I agree that other trees are easier and faster to level. It definitely could be balanced better, but it seems devs want STR especially as beginners attribute and therefore it will probably always be easier.

 

In POIs I definitely need stealth perks. But I don't use the break walls "exploit". And yes, I call it an exploit and I'm not sure they will find a way to prevent it. Maybe extending the area of trigger to the walls and making sure that breaking a block triggers if it is inside that area.

 

Edited March 20, 2022 by meganoth (see edit history)

[Matt115]

46 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

Agility has sneaking and jumping (parkour). And parkour saved me a lot of times already. Sneaking does still work, not as it used to be, but still works. There is just a lot more trigger rooms than before but you can still sneak up on a lot of Z´s. Also usefull if you hunt in the snow. That extra sneakdamage comes in handy if you are hunting bears or cougars for meat.

 

I for myself find perception tree the one where i rarely ever put points into. Really don´t need any looting perks. The lack of endgame and not having any challenge after day 35 makes loot perks really useless for me as lucky looter doesn´t pay off in early game. 

 

Meganoth is right, it´s the invisible barriers that are breaking the immersion big time. It´s a complex problem i know, but the current solution just sucks. From an immersion standpoint they should break out of the houses and leave a mess everywhere once they wake up tbh. For quests the buildings do reset anyways. Really wouldn´t mind them coming out of every hole if you make noise on the streets. At least that would help with the empty world we have outside of downtown.

Well this is connected with sounds like dunno wooden floors in "quiet place" or random trash in " girl with all gifts" . So this have sens in my opinion. Yep this would looks cool on paper but....  but block can be destroy and turn POI into mess. And world will be still empty- why? because zombie will destroing walls with diffrent speed. Btw some pois are like maze with closed doors which you can find loot. sleepers would make you easy shortcuts by destroing walls , 7000 points doors etc

43 minutes ago, Viktoriusiii said:

1. no stealth does not work because of a lot of issues I highlighed before.

Lighting makes sneaking near useless. Oftentimes you don't even know the game thinks you are lit.
Sleeper volumes are atrocious and your 1-8 stealthmeter feels like it is more a 50/50.
Even silent weapons now make so much sound that most zombies just wake up. Full perk bow and they wake up every 3rd shot or so.
Nearly every sleeper is behind a wall or around a corner. So you have to enter the sleepervolume to kill them.
OR as was said: just destroy the walls. No sneaking required. They won't wake up until you are in a certain position.

 

Tell me again how sneaking is not completely broken.


Also yes I meant agility, OBVIOUSLY. Sorry.

That is why I said core mechanic.
Every path has something to fight with.

Why would you use bow&arrow, if you could just have a shotgun AND be great at mining as well as have some food?
Why would you want to jump away if you could simply mow everything down with an M60, since the other perks make you nearly invincible (even on higher difficulties) then go home and have a running farm.
Why would you...

Every other perk has something other than fighting to offer.
Just agility is useless.
It had stealth, but since that is useless (yes useless. Because you don't need the perks to be stealthy anymore)

Well... it is not possible to make good sneaking in voxel game xd

[Rotor]

On 3/18/2022 at 8:11 PM, RyanX said:

 

Wow.  That block really sums up the feel of the game when I started playing around alpha 15 or so.  I remember crouching at night in a house, watching that eyeball to see if I was detected, double checking to see if I stowed my rotten meat away.  Those were the days...

 

Funny I still do that, but I am new and level 8 day 21.  I clear one PoI a day.  No quests, only sell to the trader never have enough s dukes to buy.

[doughphunghus]

TL:DR;

I agree, and I think the vanilla settings are purposeful for an easy game. You can change the vanilla settings a bit to get "back into hard survival" but I think you're gonna have to use mods (minimally: ones that let you turn down vanilla settings even further) to get back that feeling.  Hopefully once the Pimps work out all the "issues they see" and go gold we'll have the ability to have close to the original experience ( via many more vanilla settings change options... I cross my fingers!) and without mods, but I feel they are looking towards mods for adding a lot of new content, and they want to get in "all the mechanics" for mods to build on.

 

Thoughts:

I have a similar feeling with the "vanilla game" (all vanilla settings).  I literally cannot play vanilla+settings anymore as its such a cakewalk (and I have 1000+ hours, prob closer to 2000+ with console time). So far the best "strategy" to bring it back (for me) is to change the vanilla settings and add mods (all of which add a lot of content, or make the game harder). I know "mods" is not the point of this, but let me throw in some thoughts:

 

- I do believe they are making the vanilla game a bit too easy... but it does seem to be to "get new players", and that's how they get paid to keep making improvements to the game. The vanilla experience likely is going to be like this from now on (IMHO) as I feel this is paying off for them (having a fun game that's kinda hard for new players).

 

- Even if you argue 'but all this time... no real improvements", I do hear and feel a little similar ( I mean, I too want a lot of new content, endgame stuff, etc) BUT they have been incrementally making improvements, its just nothing "amazing wow groundbreaking" from a long time players perspective (my opinion, and what I hear people complain about) but seems to be more fixing underlying issues (water, RWG stuff, etc) and adding "cool new mechanics" that can be built upon or tested out before they commit to building a lot on top of it.  I can elaborate a lot more if anyone wants but some simple examples would be feral sense (sorta like the old smell mechanic, in terms of danger), or the "exit keys' to get out of a POI, or zed "dismemberment" (this may turn out to be visually awesome), or zed "stumbling", zed "crawl through a hole" (my favirote new mechanic).  I feel, from the Pimps perspective, they have a laundry list of things they want to fix/revamp and its just a lot, so until those get "done" they're not interested in making a lot of stuff related to "new zombies" or "massive end game content".  If I were them ( and I am definitely not), I would be in a constant state of "make it so the game is functional and looks decent so if everything goes to crap, company wise (we get hit by a bus), we can just stop developing this and the game will be good enough to go" vs "we just added 100 new cheap zeds and all of them are bad, and that's what we're left with after we got hit by the bus".  and its still in alpha! (yeah, for almost a decade... still nice to have it constantly getting better during this time, even if its visual improvements)

 

- For "all the great stuff they removed": I feel this pain too. I really miss weapon parts (and upgrading my minibike!) and the "dark and scariness" of the game (on default vanilla settings) and the slow progression. Hell, I miss "spawning day 1 in the snow, in the middle of nowhere while its raining, and dying in 5 minutes to 1 zombie because I had nothing and no stamina to fight". in fact, the "putting spikes everywhere and hiding out in the dark as quiet as you could because of the noise and "smell" and light bringing in the zeds is *exactly* why I fell in love with this game, and is literally may of my first games and fond memories.

 

I feel (and its my hope, based on how they are building the game out) that the "vanilla game" will be a fun "slightly bare bones" game (somewhat) and rely on mods for "major content" additions (because the games modding interface is so accessible). For a moderately experienced player, I feel vanilla is likely going to be a bit too easy, and likely "endgame" around day 50-70? I feel the pimps are trying to make the vanilla game fun and "keeps moving" not a tedious grind, but not something you play (with evolving new content/items, unless you want to just keep playing) past day 100.  And I say this because most of what I see (twitch/youtube/public servers/mods) people are playing this game on "easy mode" a lot and "easier than vanilla settings" (mega backpacks, QOL mods, loot % turned up).  People don't seem to want a hard survival game (I know, right?) they DO want to play Rambo like. And when i play on public servers I get why that's fun (sometimes... its a bit boring for me).

 

Anyway:

1. The games "main settings" can be tweaked a lot to make it feel a bit like the early days.  Specifically "turn loot % way down" and "turn zed damage way up". For "its too easy to build", you have to turn player damage "way down". Now its hard to get a lot of stuff from looting ( many empty containers), zeds can tear through structures like its cold butter, and you can't easily harvest resources to build.  After this, there are a lot of (obvious) things like turning daylight hours "way down" and feral sense on.

2. On top of #1: there are mods to allow turning these main settings even farther down. I made one ( and others have too) that lets you turn it down to 0% daylight, all day long, as well as  turn down loot to 2%. I tried 2%.. its waaaaay to low for me (10% seems similar but nice) but it makes looting any POI (even loot rooms) kinda pointless until you perk into looting and get a high lootstage.  On 10% loot, simgle player, I was in my 3rd bloodmoon and still was using bow/club/bone knife/pipe weapon with few bullets. I really wish the Pimps just made a lot of these vanilla settings go "all the way down" like these mods do as it starts to feel like the old days when you do.

2.1: Having vanilla "surface ore markers" is something I wish there was an "on/off" or slider for in the settings. This is how it used to be and I now play like this (with a mod) and man, its tough and easy to forget what it was like before them. It made mining a real job/chore and restricted things like gunpowder/bullets until you could get your mines set up.  Now you just find nitrate/coal by accident and mine it easily.  Having a slider to do this would go a long way in adding difficulty back.

2.2: Having vanilla turning traders "on/off" is another thing I wish there was an "on/off" or slider for in the settings that was like it was before traders. I've tried this and yeah, its nice to not have them in a hardcore game. Having a slider (% trader possibility) to do this would go a long way in adding difficulty back.

2.3 having vanilla options to turn "markers" on/off would help. I've used mods to turn off all markers ( your bedroll, base, traders, backpack, vehicles, etc)  and it really feels like the old game much more, especially with the new "cities" and world generation its easy to get lots and "lose your base"

2.4 having vanilla options to "turn off player spawn points" like the beds/bedroll. I've played this with a mod and it puts a damper on dying quite a bit as you end up "somewhere randomish nearby" and if you die, you generally spawn farther away. Combine this with "no player markers" and you will have a hard time finding your backpack and home.

3. For "mods", I've added a lot of mods to just "add content" (not make game easier) and it starts to feel like ye olden days, mostly because there's so much more "stuff" you don't know how it all works anymore (I looted a can opener?  is this useful? etc).  of course, this newness will wear off too, but the "loads of content" does thin out the vanilla "items" a bit so every time you open a cupboard you don't always get anything useful so its harder to just loot-"grab all"-loot-"grab all" real fast as you fill up your backpack with useless junk

 

 

[Viktoriusiii]

4 hours ago, meganoth said:

You said stealth is useless at least twice without any highlighting at all. Until this post here the only reason you gave was that you agreed to what pApA did NOT say.

 

But nevermind, with soo much to complain about it would be difficult for you to not loose track what you said and what you forgot to say. 😉

oh sorry... I didn't want to go into it AGAIN since I already made two posts about it (and I know you read at least one of them back then :D):
1:

 

4 hours ago, Matt115 said:

Well... it is not possible to make good sneaking in voxel game xd

??? But it was basicially perfect before they introduced sleeper volumes.
It still is great in the outdoors at night.
Zombies reacht to impact, they react to sounds and all that. It really was incredible.
 

[Matt115]

2 hours ago, doughphunghus said:

TL:DR;

I agree, and I think the vanilla settings are purposeful for an easy game. You can change the vanilla settings a bit to get "back into hard survival" but I think you're gonna have to use mods (minimally: ones that let you turn down vanilla settings even further) to get back that feeling.  Hopefully once the Pimps work out all the "issues they see" and go gold we'll have the ability to have close to the original experience ( via many more vanilla settings change options... I cross my fingers!) and without mods, but I feel they are looking towards mods for adding a lot of new content, and they want to get in "all the mechanics" for mods to build on.

 

Thoughts:

I have a similar feeling with the "vanilla game" (all vanilla settings).  I literally cannot play vanilla+settings anymore as its such a cakewalk (and I have 1000+ hours, prob closer to 2000+ with console time). So far the best "strategy" to bring it back (for me) is to change the vanilla settings and add mods (all of which add a lot of content, or make the game harder). I know "mods" is not the point of this, but let me throw in some thoughts:

 

- I do believe they are making the vanilla game a bit too easy... but it does seem to be to "get new players", and that's how they get paid to keep making improvements to the game. The vanilla experience likely is going to be like this from now on (IMHO) as I feel this is paying off for them (having a fun game that's kinda hard for new players).

 

- Even if you argue 'but all this time... no real improvements", I do hear and feel a little similar ( I mean, I too want a lot of new content, endgame stuff, etc) BUT they have been incrementally making improvements, its just nothing "amazing wow groundbreaking" from a long time players perspective (my opinion, and what I hear people complain about) but seems to be more fixing underlying issues (water, RWG stuff, etc) and adding "cool new mechanics" that can be built upon or tested out before they commit to building a lot on top of it.  I can elaborate a lot more if anyone wants but some simple examples would be feral sense (sorta like the old smell mechanic, in terms of danger), or the "exit keys' to get out of a POI, or zed "dismemberment" (this may turn out to be visually awesome), or zed "stumbling", zed "crawl through a hole" (my favirote new mechanic).  I feel, from the Pimps perspective, they have a laundry list of things they want to fix/revamp and its just a lot, so until those get "done" they're not interested in making a lot of stuff related to "new zombies" or "massive end game content".  If I were them ( and I am definitely not), I would be in a constant state of "make it so the game is functional and looks decent so if everything goes to crap, company wise (we get hit by a bus), we can just stop developing this and the game will be good enough to go" vs "we just added 100 new cheap zeds and all of them are bad, and that's what we're left with after we got hit by the bus".  and its still in alpha! (yeah, for almost a decade... still nice to have it constantly getting better during this time, even if its visual improvements)

 

- For "all the great stuff they removed": I feel this pain too. I really miss weapon parts (and upgrading my minibike!) and the "dark and scariness" of the game (on default vanilla settings) and the slow progression. Hell, I miss "spawning day 1 in the snow, in the middle of nowhere while its raining, and dying in 5 minutes to 1 zombie because I had nothing and no stamina to fight". in fact, the "putting spikes everywhere and hiding out in the dark as quiet as you could because of the noise and "smell" and light bringing in the zeds is *exactly* why I fell in love with this game, and is literally may of my first games and fond memories.

 

I feel (and its my hope, based on how they are building the game out) that the "vanilla game" will be a fun "slightly bare bones" game (somewhat) and rely on mods for "major content" additions (because the games modding interface is so accessible). For a moderately experienced player, I feel vanilla is likely going to be a bit too easy, and likely "endgame" around day 50-70? I feel the pimps are trying to make the vanilla game fun and "keeps moving" not a tedious grind, but not something you play (with evolving new content/items, unless you want to just keep playing) past day 100.  And I say this because most of what I see (twitch/youtube/public servers/mods) people are playing this game on "easy mode" a lot and "easier than vanilla settings" (mega backpacks, QOL mods, loot % turned up).  People don't seem to want a hard survival game (I know, right?) they DO want to play Rambo like. And when i play on public servers I get why that's fun (sometimes... its a bit boring for me).

 

Anyway:

1. The games "main settings" can be tweaked a lot to make it feel a bit like the early days.  Specifically "turn loot % way down" and "turn zed damage way up". For "its too easy to build", you have to turn player damage "way down". Now its hard to get a lot of stuff from looting ( many empty containers), zeds can tear through structures like its cold butter, and you can't easily harvest resources to build.  After this, there are a lot of (obvious) things like turning daylight hours "way down" and feral sense on.

2. On top of #1: there are mods to allow turning these main settings even farther down. I made one ( and others have too) that lets you turn it down to 0% daylight, all day long, as well as  turn down loot to 2%. I tried 2%.. its waaaaay to low for me (10% seems similar but nice) but it makes looting any POI (even loot rooms) kinda pointless until you perk into looting and get a high lootstage.  On 10% loot, simgle player, I was in my 3rd bloodmoon and still was using bow/club/bone knife/pipe weapon with few bullets. I really wish the Pimps just made a lot of these vanilla settings go "all the way down" like these mods do as it starts to feel like the old days when you do.

2.1: Having vanilla "surface ore markers" is something I wish there was an "on/off" or slider for in the settings. This is how it used to be and I now play like this (with a mod) and man, its tough and easy to forget what it was like before them. It made mining a real job/chore and restricted things like gunpowder/bullets until you could get your mines set up.  Now you just find nitrate/coal by accident and mine it easily.  Having a slider to do this would go a long way in adding difficulty back.

2.2: Having vanilla turning traders "on/off" is another thing I wish there was an "on/off" or slider for in the settings that was like it was before traders. I've tried this and yeah, its nice to not have them in a hardcore game. Having a slider (% trader possibility) to do this would go a long way in adding difficulty back.

2.3 having vanilla options to turn "markers" on/off would help. I've used mods to turn off all markers ( your bedroll, base, traders, backpack, vehicles, etc)  and it really feels like the old game much more, especially with the new "cities" and world generation its easy to get lots and "lose your base"

2.4 having vanilla options to "turn off player spawn points" like the beds/bedroll. I've played this with a mod and it puts a damper on dying quite a bit as you end up "somewhere randomish nearby" and if you die, you generally spawn farther away. Combine this with "no player markers" and you will have a hard time finding your backpack and home.

3. For "mods", I've added a lot of mods to just "add content" (not make game easier) and it starts to feel like ye olden days, mostly because there's so much more "stuff" you don't know how it all works anymore (I looted a can opener?  is this useful? etc).  of course, this newness will wear off too, but the "loads of content" does thin out the vanilla "items" a bit so every time you open a cupboard you don't always get anything useful so its harder to just loot-"grab all"-loot-"grab all" real fast as you fill up your backpack with useless junk

 

 

Rly rly long ang good post.

I will write what i think about that: they had two chooises : make this game hard with darker setting but with smaller playbase or make this game easier with lighter tones to make playbase bigger. They choose 2 way. Well this was logical choose right?  But about mechanic - game can be simple and you woudn't feel that- if  keys, zombie crawls etc. because... it change less that add 10 more zombie variants. why? because seeing "clone army" feels strange in 2022. even old L4D2 had a lot of zombie variants - and that's is more imporant  that vehicle mods or drones. Because it is the most basic thing - kiling zombies. Well mods into 7dtd in my opinion are still hmm too much cartoonish. i hope we will see more "lore friendly" mods

 

Just now, Viktoriusiii said:

oh sorry... I didn't want to go into it AGAIN since I already made two posts about it (and I know you read at least one of them back then :D):
1:

 

??? But it was basicially perfect before they introduced sleeper volumes.
It still is great in the outdoors at night.
Zombies reacht to impact, they react to sounds and all that. It really was incredible.
 

It is not. Some poi it's almost not possible to make on stealth because you have to jump in hole or kiling zombie bears.  Sleeper volumes was important change because this allow to make POI's harder and avoid fast cleaning