Alpha 21 (A21) Preppocalypse

[arramus]

Ah... the burnt zombie wearing a stove and 'fondly' referred to as Crispy. He is pretty much a boss type zombie and can certainly run. Watching him run with the fire particle tailing behind him is quite something...unless you're the one being chased.

[Hell-Fire]

Out of curiosity, have you considered making the no smelt forges as a permanent thing for your mod?  One of the reasons I asked before was, when re-organizing the base or moving to another location, it takes a lot of time to smelt out the materials before we can pick up the forge.   Thanks again for the info though, keep up the great work with this mod.

[arramus]

I have not considered making it a permanent built in feature. I shall add it as optional mod just as with the 96 slot inventory, and always open trader which are linked to in the opening post.

[arramus]

This is an additional optional mod for Preppocalypse.

 

1. Fast Forge Fill And Empty
A request to remove the need to smelt resources and fill the forge was suggested. This reduces the speed of filling the forge since resources are taken from inventory instead of directly from the forge. It also removes the need to empty the forge should a time come to relocate and bring workstations with you.

 

This is possible by removing all forge smelt recipe items and replacing them with their best alternative. However, there are two issues with this:

 

a) There is a ratio on some units such as resourceClayLump is 1:5 ratio with unit_clay and resourceCrushedSand is 1:4 ratio with unit_glass. Scaling the replacement recipes to be proportional requires a lot of juggling values.

b) Replacing the recipes no longer allows them to benefit from the passive_effect from increasing skill in Intelligence > Advanced Engineering. Juggling new proportional would no longer allow such passive_effect benefits to be offered. This is an issue we sometimes see in custom food mods that have very low values that cannot receive the passive_effect.

 

An alternative to this is go directly to the source which is the values for unit_clay, unit_glass, unit_stone, unit_brass, unit_iron, and unit_lead.

 

This optional mod provides 2 features to address the need to empty the forge quickly and reduce the time it takes to fill the forge which a no smelt mod will address.

Adding base materials for clay, sand, stone, brass, and scrap iron to the forge will be smelted quickly. In addition, they will be able to be removed very very quickly.

 

This may not be exactly what was suggested but adding the no smelt format will bring its own set of issues which will be commented on in the future and cannot be addressed due to resource:unit ratios. Emptying the forge will sound like the ringing of a fire alarm bell, and it is easy to further amend the timings in the mod as the process is based on simple core values.

This has been added to the optional mods in the opening post.

6 hours ago, Hell-Fire said:

...it takes a lot of time to smelt out the materials before we can pick up the forge.

A no smelt forge causes issues with Advanced Engineering Skill Perk for recipe amounts. An alternative optional mod has been added to the optional mods in the opening post that allows the forge to be emptied very very quickly and also filled quicker using base resources. Adding a no smelt forge will cause posts in the future about losing Advanced Engineering Skill Perk benefits and replacement recipes cannot gain the benefit since the values are too low to begin with.

https://github.com/arramus/A21-Preppocalypse-Optional-Mods

[arramus]

Here is a small update for Preppocalypse:

 

1. Rocket Fire (Ammo)

This new ammo variant can be added to the Rocket Launcher. It is basically a rocket propelled molotov with greater distance, and a little more precision aiming. It was added to Outback Roadies for the spider infestations but will serve Preppo as well. It unlocks at the same level as other rocket ammo, and can be found in loot and during visits to the trader.

 

The recipe is quite similar to existing rockets but with closer consideration of the molotov.

 

That additional propelled range will add to its effectiveness. It is also good for close range and within the confines of a horde base since its blocks damage is as low as that of a molotov.

 

 

[arramus]

Here's a small update to Preppocalypse:

 

- 100 HP addition to Electric Fence Post
- Adding Murky Water to Fire Hydrant wrenching
- Boss from 1.25 to 1.2 scale
- Adding Silver Magnum Bullet to Prepper Ammo Press

 

A Silver Magnum Bullet can be crafted on the Prepper Ammo Press as a bundle of 13 to match the Swiss Vetterlli Rifle, which has not been locked to 13 capacity to reflect its true value. This was added for a few reasons.

- Silver had no function beyond economic.

- Magnum rounds are not fully hooked into Penetration Skill for the Swiss Vetterli Rifle. This new Silver Magnum Bullet is fully integrated.

- This Silver Bullet possesses AP properties and is effective as a boss stopper.

- Provides longevity as Game Stage increases and brings it a little closer to the Sniper Rifle. It will now exceed the Sniper Rifle for this particular bullet, but the Sniper Rifle still has the edge for general usage.

 

The Silver Vetterli offers ranged damage of 100 compared to 84 for a regular AP Magnum round. However, since it is hooked up for the Penetration Skill, it has the capacity to pass through multiple entities at once. With a Targer Armor of -75% compared to -50% it offers boss stopping power.

 

A Box of Silver Vetterli .44 Magnum Ammo contains 13 rounds as a bundle. This matches the set Magazine size for the Swiss Vetterli. This ammo cannot be used on any other weapon due to its additional powder requirements. The Magnum revolver is beefy for sure, but these rounds are best served by a rifle. The recipe is very reasonable for what it can offer.

 

Maxing out your Penetration Skill just for this type of ammo will pay dividends as Game Stage increases for single boss types and multiple grunts in a row.

[Alan Lau]

Are there any end-game goals, besides doing all the the tier 6 quests?  I'm at the point where I literally fear no evil with my 2 tier 6 M60's with drum mags and a few other mods.  Horde night is over after 2 in game hours.

 

[arramus]

Ahhh, that million dukes question. Where and when does it all end?

 

Preppocalypse, along with other expansion mods/overhauls faces a similar challenge that the base game has not yet added in an end-game beyond reaching that level of 'thriving survivor'. As such, it has been difficult to add anything concrete because we really aren't sure the direction of the game when it goes Gold.

 

As such, each modder tends to add in a few strategies to address that in their own way. Preppocalypse adds in:

 

- Weapon specific quests to battle the boss types. Eliminating the baton cop with only a baton being a challenging one that players can take on quite early. The M60 one comes later and is a very easy one. Completing all of those offers an end-game goal since they can be taken at any time depending on weapon finds and specialty.

- Completing all stages of the animal quest for all 4 wave stages offers those cyclic goals for players who like the hunting specific elements.

- Completing those boss T6 Infested POIs, which you appear to have achieved.
(These specifically include the Hell Hole, Floppy's, Preppo Construction Site, and the public Bunker)
- Completing the radiated boss type Quest. This motivates us to visit the Wasteland where they appear in much greater number, and connects to how the game is moving into Biome progression game play, and the boss POIs.

Along the way, you've naturally seen the smaller side quests for the Screamer, zombie elimination loop, and Prepper Quests.

 

Since Preppocalypse remains quite close to default game play in many aspects, completing your Horde Nights early is certainly caused by eliminating so many zombies so quickly and depleting the Game Stage amounts ahead of time. Now you've become the 'boss' of your own play through, adding further mods to increase that specific challenge to ensure Horde Night remains until 4:00am can help, along with other mods.

 

Once the game adds in its own end-game, modders will have a much better understanding of where to take things. Until then, it's kind of in limbo because taking end-game in the 'wrong' direction can require huge revision when the official version arrives. Adding in extras now will also require a knowledge of coding and patching beyond xml modding that is pretty limited within the community. The NPC Mod adds in some of those extras now which The Wasteland is incorporating, along with its own.

 

We know end-game will bring the bandits, and potentially a scripted and progressive story line with the Duke and other specific characters, but even then the core of the game remains those 7 day survival horror moments which an M60 can handle most superbly regardless of what we face. It sounds like you've reached the pinnacle of success based on your weapon choice and other progression points, and the rest is purely maintaining it. This is the way single player tends to play out.

 

Community/Party players can throw in their own dynamics to extend things and mix it up further since there are so many open world choices to make, such as specialising, competition, custom community events and questing, etc. but until that Gold drops, it is what it is.

[Alan Lau]

@arramus, Well, thank you for the detailed answer!  I love the prepper pois, and Floppy's.  Very tough and fun.  I forgot about all those side quests.  Some I'm interested in doing, others, like using a baton, not so much.  Thanks for all the hard work you did/do in making this mod.

[arramus]

Here is an update for Preppocalypse:

 

1. Raised Gyro Heli ceiling from 200 to 260 to match TFP Gyrocopter settings for A21.

2. Added 0-Score Mod to Preppocalypse as an additional stand alone mod.

 

Here is some more detail about adding in 0-Score. 0-Score is made by @sphereii. This mod serves other mods and overhauls to incorporate additional features that cannot otherwise be done so through regular xml modding. By default, the following has been turned on:

 

- Craft from Containers from a 12 block distance.

 

Preppocalypse adds a lot of new custom recipes, and material. Keeping up with the recipes and storage requirements can be a real challenge in community servers. This additional allows for more communal sharing of assets. If a player wants to keep their assets purely for their own needs, they can ensure their storage crate is greater than 12 blocks away from a Workstation. However, for shared assets placed between multiple workstations, it reduces the need for storage crates and helps with logistics and sharing.

This has been a popular feature in Outback Roadies, EndZ, and other overhauls. Preppocalypse can now benefit from it as well.

 

0-Score offers additional options such as Fire Features, Food Spoilage System, and Advanced Farming. These can be turned on and off in the 0-Score blocks.xml for players who would like to further expand their game play experience. Thank you to sphereii for sharing this tool for the benefit of overhauls and mods.

 

This image shows that we are able to make Prepper Crushed Card Defences on the Workbench as the materials are in storage within the 12 block range.

[arramus]

This update will see the following:

 

- EAC now needs to be set as OFF. This is because 0-Score uses custom code. Many communities Whitelist or Password protect their servers these days, and tend to keep it OFF for performance gains.

- The Mod Launcher download increases from about 155mb to 187mb. It is still incredibly marginal but may add a few seconds to unpacking.

[arramus]

Just a heads up on the most recent update. Using just Preppocalypse and 0-Score has shown no issues with items switching to a different item.

It was tested on an existing World and player save on a dedicated test server prior to release.

 

However, it has been reported that picking up a Junk Sledge turned it into a Junk Turret when reverting to the 'item' in the players' hands.
The report was from a player who has also installed a number of additional mods and the potential for issues certainly raises with IDs being shuffled around.

 

With this update, as with any update, make a back up of the save files just in case a roll back is necessary.

[Hell-Fire]

8 hours ago, arramus said:

Just a heads up on the most recent update. Using just Preppocalypse and 0-Score has shown no issues with items switching to a different item.

It was tested on an existing World and player save on a dedicated test server prior to release.

 

However, it has been reported that picking up a Junk Sledge turned it into a Junk Turret when reverting to the 'item' in the players' hands.
The report was from a player who has also installed a number of additional mods and the potential for issues certainly raises with IDs being shuffled around.

 

With this update, as with any update, make a back up of the save files just in case a roll back is necessary.

Hello, 

 

That happened to my friend and I as well.  We only have one modlet installed and that is Donovan's longer lootbag.  Everything else installed is just for Preppocalypse.

[arramus]

Thank you Hell-Fire. It is an unexpected oddity and feedback suggests it is quite minimal. The gains are certainly being noticed though and this hiccup should pass.

[thunk]

On 3/23/2024 at 2:59 PM, arramus said:

Just a heads up on the most recent update. Using just Preppocalypse and 0-Score has shown no issues with items switching to a different item.

It was tested on an existing World and player save on a dedicated test server prior to release.

 

However, it has been reported that picking up a Junk Sledge turned it into a Junk Turret when reverting to the 'item' in the players' hands.
The report was from a player who has also installed a number of additional mods and the potential for issues certainly raises with IDs being shuffled around.

 

With this update, as with any update, make a back up of the save files just in case a roll back is necessary.

On our world, all player vehicles sitting in the world lost all of their mods and dyes. Also, all vehicles lost their ownership, meaning all players now see all of the player vehicles show up in their compass, and they are unlocked for all to use. Those were the only differences we noticed after the update. Love the new QOL for crafting from storage.

[arramus]

Thanks for sharing about that thunk, as we can monitor the type of things which may occur with this update. I can warn streamers who sometimes ask directly if it's safe to update about the potential risks they may face, so they can make an informed choice based on the risk. They are particularly careful to ensure their play throughs can continue without any stream breaking changes. The ones so far are an inconvenience, but player saves and progress have all checked out.

[kagaroko]

Hi was wondering what the latest version this works with (21.2 Stable?) before I add it to my dedicated server.

I know adding mods is usually a no-no for overhauls, but was wondering if Izayos gun mods are included or if there's any compatability.

Thanks for all your work!

Edited March 25 by kagaroko (see edit history)

[arramus]

We talked in Discord, but I'll add this here for anyone else considering using Izayo's weapons for Preppo, since they make a good combination.

 

Izayo very gently adds Izayo weapon packs and they are not intrusive at all. As such, adding any of Izayo's weapon packs should be just fine, except for those with rifles.

This is because Preppocalypse totally rewrites the rifle progression to include the Swiss Vetterli.

 

Izayo's rifle pack loads before Preppocalypse.

 

However, by renaming 2 of the rifle pack folders from the A21_Izayo_Firearms_762_packVAL V.2(2of3) pack from:

 

A21_Izayo_Firearms_762_packVAL

A21_Izayo_Visible_Mods_mod

 

to

 

A21-Preppocalypse-A21_Izayo_Firearms_762_packVAL

A21-Preppocalypse-A21_Izayo_Visible_Mods_mod

 

it will allow them to load after A21-Preppocalypse because they load in numerical and alphabetical order. After performing this change, they could be unlocked and crafted without issue. In addition, no red warnings appeared in the load out.

 

There will be additional changes such as icon updates and new ammo types in additional Izayo packs, but all good.

 

This image shows an Izayo rifle taking out a Battle Chicken. It could be unlocked and crafted on the Workbench to Level 5.

 

 

[arramus]

Here is a small update for Preppocalypse.

 

1. Basic Twitch Integrations.

 

Twitch streamers using 7D2D integrations have access to 2 commands for chat. These are:

- #spawn_preppomelee

- #spawn_prepporanged

 

#spawn_preppomelee makes one of the basic Quest Melee Preppocalypse entities appear at random.

#spawn_prepporanged makes one of the basic Quest Ranged Preppocalypse entities appear at random.

 

Here are a couple of images to show how they work. The spawns list shows the spawn commands for preppo melee and ranged.
They are set to 50 PP by default and dropped to 25 for testing. ^^

Typing #spawn_preppomelee in the Twitch chat will perform a game event that will randomly spawn a melee entity and in this case it is Machete Party Girl.

 

The same applies for the Ranged type.

 

These will potentially allow Twitch streamers playing Preppocalypse with 7D2D integration to receive some Quest Zombies...

 

Cran5000 is currently doing a Preppocalypse play through, and uses Twitch integration for 7D2D constantly...

BayWanders subbed me a month on this stream, and these commands will serve BayWanders well.

https://www.twitch.tv/cran5000

[thunk]

On 3/25/2024 at 3:16 AM, arramus said:

Thanks for sharing about that thunk, as we can monitor the type of things which may occur with this update. I can warn streamers who sometimes ask directly if it's safe to update about the potential risks they may face, so they can make an informed choice based on the risk. They are particularly careful to ensure their play throughs can continue without any stream breaking changes. The ones so far are an inconvenience, but player saves and progress have all checked out.

YW. One last thing we noticed was that all diamonds, silver, and gold apparently disappeared from storage bins.

[arramus]

Thank you. I checked up on this with our own test server, and fortunately these resources remained. I could also see a streamer who just updated with that update, and the new Twitch integrations. They still had silver and gold in two separate boxes. It seems there are some case by case disappearances and I will warn the regular streamers and communities that loss of storage container assets may be a thing.

[arramus]

Here is a small update for Preppocalypse:

 

1. Steel Spear

The Steel Spear has been hooked into the repulsor mod settings for late Game Stage ragdoll antics. Since it appears quite late, based on its Tier appearance, it will better coincide with the more challenging entities and maintain balance. Here is a short video of SpecBytes demonstrating functionality.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wdBUKMMBaI

 

2. There have also been some small and incremental updates in the background for further Twitch Integration. That will continue with a new 'spawn group' on top of the existing individual spawns. These will be more challenging but can be toggled on and off at the streamers leisure.

[Nattylight]

I was wondering if there is a way to up the prepper poi's occurrence in the worldgen? or if anyone has a seed that is more packed with them?

[CajunBeauty]

40 minutes ago, Nattylight said:

I was wondering if there is a way to up the prepper poi's occurrence in the worldgen? or if anyone has a seed that is more packed with them?

I would like that as well!

[arramus]

Hello Nattylight.

 

There is a way of using a weighting feature for the random world generator file, but I need to spend more time experimenting with it for A21.2. I tested it in A21.0 but it wasn't really making an difference. It may have changed with updates.

Have you tried the Preppo8K02 World linked in the very first post?

 

It has been updated over the months by manually placing additional Preppocalypse POIs at strategic places to let them have more coverage around the World.

For example:

 

- Hell Hole x 7 and placed just outside many of the towns. (T5/T6 Boss)

- Civic Bunker 0233 x 6 and placed just outside many of the towns (T5/T6 Boss)

- Floppy Games Workshop x 4 and in the city locations (T5/T6 Boss)

- Preppo Bunkerlands x 2 and in commercial areas (T5/T6)

- Edes Lets Plays Toy Store x 2 and in commercial areas (T4/T5)

- The Compound x 4 and placed just outside towns (T4/T5)

- Good Neighbor x 7 in country town

- Misha Bunny Clothing x 2

and a converted book store, hardware store, gas station, and others here and there.

 

I'm sure you've seen that the Prepper POIs come in two types with those that allow regular zombies + Prepper zombies at the same time, and those which only allow the Prepper boss types at the high Tier levels.