How are you dealing with the increased chance of spawning a screamer?

[ElCabong]

If you're into analysis to paralysis 

https://youtu.be/3DtK0aDxgG8?si=hYGHTammzQyyB-TH

[Krougal]

On 8/11/2024 at 9:07 AM, zztong said:

I'm far enough into a game now to have evolved my thinking on this.

 

In the past I would normally not have a base early in the game. I'd just plop down stuff in a field, keep a sparse inventory as I would likely be a nomad. With V1.0, screamers show up enough that having a small defensive position is handy.

 

Now, later in the game, with a vehicle and settling down into a base, I find myself fixing up a remnant in a snow biome city and I'm amazed how little it takes to get screamers to show up. I swear, I was just digging out rubble with a pick -- my various workstations all still in the motorcycle inventory -- and two of them wandered in. While it was a fun encounter, it feels like their too sensitive. I mean, I think my heat was 0. There were no workstations deployed, much less operating. There were no torches or candles, and I had dismantled the burning barrel that was part of the POI.

Yeah, a bit of salvaging and/or mining or just a bit of gunplay and they show up fast. Too fast I think. I really don't even care for the wandering horde to go stomping through when I am doing a mission, but at least it is like 50/50 if they will just pass right by unnoticed. Uninvited screamers kinda spoil my questing.

At base where we're generating all kinds of heat it is expected but it is like they are trying to overcompensate for the emptiness of the world with the screamers now.

 

[Rotor]

From one of the comments on that video:

 

"My takeaway is we still need more info. Tons of useful info in this video, but it feels like we have more questions than answers in the end."

 

 

[zztong]

4 hours ago, Krougal said:

Yeah, a bit of salvaging and/or mining or just a bit of gunplay and they show up fast. Too fast I think. I really don't even care for the wandering horde to go stomping through when I am doing a mission, but at least it is like 50/50 if they will just pass right by unnoticed. Uninvited screamers kinda spoil my questing.

At base where we're generating all kinds of heat it is expected but it is like they are trying to overcompensate for the emptiness of the world with the screamers now.

 

 

I've not yet seen any mining, but I'm still swinging a pick. Maybe that's the difference. Is the Auger attracting them?

 

I've not seen them during POIs / Quests, but I'm a stealth player using a bow. It takes a "aww-crap" moment to get me to fire off a gun. The Assassin armor has meant fewer "aww-crap" moments, or at least fewer of those that led to gunfire. But I get you. The struggle is real for those who are blazing away.

[Krougal]

2 hours ago, zztong said:

 

I've not yet seen any mining, but I'm still swinging a pick. Maybe that's the difference. Is the Auger attracting them?

 

I've not seen them during POIs / Quests, but I'm a stealth player using a bow. It takes a "aww-crap" moment to get me to fire off a gun. The Assassin armor has meant fewer "aww-crap" moments, or at least fewer of those that led to gunfire. But I get you. The struggle is real for those who are blazing away.

No, no auger yet. Still using iron. I am mostly stun baton, but at 55 in the wasteland, t5 pois everything is feral or radiated or both so the pump action is getting some use too.

I don't know how much noise the pair of junk turrets make either. I know though from f8 and debug that salvaging generates probably more heat than anything, even sneaking while doing it; which makes less noise but not none.

[Paiper Zombee]

Basically dealing with it by just dealing with it. lol. Like others have said it used to take a lot more to cause a Screamer to show up at a base, and I never even knew Screamers would show up while mining unless I was using an auger. Now it seems like if I even sneeze while at home base Screamin' Mimi shows up to see who did it, and if I mine for more than five minutes with any tool above stone age, here she comes again singing "Diamonds Are Forever".  She's gotten so common now that she might as well be one of the regular zombies. 

[Krougal]

I been doing ok, but today disaster struck.

Was clearing one of the military forts, t4 but t5 infestation, and in the wasteland.

Got careless and overwhelmed by a lot of radiated soldiers, my first death in 19 days on survivalist.

Then I get back and I got screamers while I am cleaning up that mess. It was pretty @%$#ing intense.

 

[Adam the Waster]

It's getting better. A good old lever action does the job 

[Syphon583]

On 8/11/2024 at 7:07 AM, zztong said:

I'm far enough into a game now to have evolved my thinking on this.

 

In the past I would normally not have a base early in the game. I'd just plop down stuff in a field, keep a sparse inventory as I would likely be a nomad. With V1.0, screamers show up enough that having a small defensive position is handy.

 

Now, later in the game, with a vehicle and settling down into a base, I find myself fixing up a remnant in a snow biome city and I'm amazed how little it takes to get screamers to show up. I swear, I was just digging out rubble with a pick -- my various workstations all still in the motorcycle inventory -- and two of them wandered in. While it was a fun encounter, it feels like their too sensitive. I mean, I think my heat was 0. There were no workstations deployed, much less operating. There were no torches or candles, and I had dismantled the burning barrel that was part of the POI.

It's funny you say that. I posted a reply earlier on in this thread basically expressing that my screamer experience has remained largely unchanged from previous releases. Friends, I have now seen the light. Or rather, I have heard the screams...

 

I am now comfortably in the mid-game. It took a bit longer to make a move to a different biome than I had wanted, but finally, after the day 35 horde, I packed up and moved myself to the desert. While in the forest, I would still say my screamer activity was fairly low. Almost as soon as I set up shop in the desert, though, I was getting regular screamer spawns- usually at night when I was at home, so they were easy to quietly dispatch. Mind you I have not drastically increased my activity, usually running a single forge or other workstation at one time. I only have two dew collectors and I have not collected from it since arriving, so it should not be generating any heat. On the morning of day 40, I started prepping for the day 42 horde by building a fighting position on the side of my home base.

 

Admittedly, I was generating more heat at this point. Running a forge for cement production, the occasional workbench, and 2 cement mixers for concrete. I was expecting screamers. I have no problem with screamers (in theory). However, during that 3 day span leading up to the horde of day 42, I had a total of 7, yes 7, screamer spawns, all spawning 2 screamers, and 2-3 of those spawned other screamers, creating the dreaded screamer loop. The frustration mounted as I was rushing to complete my position (delayed because of said-continuous interruption) that I had multiple screamers spawn 1 hour before horde night was about to kickoff.

 

Now, I fully admit my faults in this ordeal. I was generating more heat and was sticking around my base. But running 2-3 workstations at any one time should not be enough to garner this much attention. I've never in my playtime minded screamers. Contrary to many players, they were a welcomed part of the game. However, with the latest change in their frequency and the fact that they spawn in pairs, I will say the my opinion on them has changed. This isn't even about the challenge. There really is no challenge. They remind me of how vultures were prior to A21 (I think) where they would attack you simply because you were in a vehicle. They're more annoying than anything. And for a game that prides itself for it's base-building features, this change sure encourages players to not want to spend time at their base, building their base.

 

Sorry, the TL:DR of this is that I'm finally seeing the frustration others have. I also know there's players who don't mind the change. What I'm wondering is if the needle was pushed just a little too far. Do we really need 2 screamers spawning at once? Should the cooldown between spawns be increased? I really do hope the devs look at all the feedback and make some tweaks. Again, I really don't mind the idea of screamers. However their implementation just makes them an annoyance instead of the unique game mechanic they're meant to be.

[OneManStanding]

I'm feeling the 25% is a little tight. I moved my dew collectors further away - they were a fair distance but their heat was affecting my base when they were working. I replaced my candles with two electric lanterns - zero heat. Just one forge running spiked as high as 18%. I used to have two campfires - one for meals, one for drinks, now I use just one and stagger the outpot (10 food, 10 water, 10 food, 10 water...). Haven't had a screamer since.

 

When the dew collectors got their heat attribute, we had a fair few of them in the base. We had to create two water farms in non-poi fields around the town to stop screamers turning up. Beyond that screamers only turned up when we were making concrete or ammo, but I felt that was fair. Currently I'm thinking I might have to create little bases around the place for specific purposes - like ammo or making cement. But that feels a little bit of an elaborate work around.

 

I'm wondering -- I like to have a longer day, so that stretches out the minutes. Does that slow down the heat decay? Took a lot of time for even a door slam to fade away.

[zztong]

In Forest I had boxes in the open. In Burnt Forest I had boxes on top of a Rest Area POI. In the Desert I had a tiny base in a Wind Turbine. I kept a low profile only ran one Dew Collector and one other thing at a time. I had one set of screamers and didn't hear them so they poked a hole in the steel turbine wall.

 

Now I'm in the snow biome, not far from the wasteland. I've got a generator running powering a motion sensor and some blade traps. I'll add a speaker soon. The base entrance has a protected area with bars and a sludge turret. I'm starting to let the heat loose and encourage screamers.

 

So, I guess it's been like this: At first I played like normal ... "How bad could it be?" ... then I started to think the complaints were right... now I'm thinking I've adjusted and the game is probably in good shape for a veteran player but perhaps a new player might find it rough, or maybe they'd just face it and learn, specially if the veterans are saying "adapt, overcome."

[Suxar]

14 hours ago, Syphon583 said:

Should the cooldown between spawns be increased?

The fact that it appeared is already good. Yes, and it is already quite large. With a day of 120 minutes, they have never come to me more than 2 times a day. This was when 8 forges were working.

Perhaps the time between appearances depends on the length of the day, but I have not checked this. It’s even strange that they came to you 7 times in 3 days.

[OneManStanding]

14 hours ago, zztong said:

So, I guess it's been like this: At first I played like normal ... "How bad could it be?" ... then I started to think the complaints were right... now I'm thinking I've adjusted and the game is probably in good shape for a veteran player but perhaps a new player might find it rough, or maybe they'd just face it and learn, specially if the veterans are saying "adapt, overcome."

 

I can spread out my workstations or simply fortify my base easily enough. The screamers do not pose any actual "threat" as such, and if I wanted to I could easily ignore them and let them kill themselves to death on the defences around my base -- I'm no slouch in that regard. Maybe I'm stuck in an old way of thinking that screamers are an in-game penalty for generating too much heat -- and allowing them to spawn at only 25% of the old value gives me a mental failure state more often...? For the longest time they've been something to be avoided, but I feel they've just been made artifically harder to avoid.

 

 

There are times you need to be industrial - smelting, making fuel, ammo, cement, cooking - and screamers are going to be unavoidable. Maybe it's cheapened the screamer by making them too common in the meantime...? I mean, one mag of AK was all it took to call one to me at a POI. Like feral sense, maybe the screamer heat percentage could be player controlled? Some players might like the challenge, but I personally think it's more of a nuisance thing at only 25%. The basic rule -- too much heat = screamer -- was more logical, as opposed to simply running more than one workstation.

 

Consider how you might have played prior to this change - you could have two forges running, one doing brass the other doing lead or both doing stone. Two campfires - one doing food the other doing water. A chem station and a workbench at the same time. If you play that way now you'll get screamers far more often.

[Hybridthunder]

With my preference for underground bases, seeing how screamers act now made me have to turn them off, as they are just irritatingly not zombie-like. They don't even bother with doors - open or not, they just know exactly where the heat comes from and start digging because they retain their engineering degrees and ground-penetrating radar qualifications despite being dead.

[TWORDY]

5 minutes ago, Hybridthunder said:

they just know exactly where the heat comes from and start digging because they retain their engineering degrees and ground-penetrating radar qualifications despite being dead

 

Just a regular construction worker looking for his/her/their/them/themZzz lost cigarettes and lighter, and screams across to communicate with mates... no certification required... basic health and safety... 🙄

 

I only have a hard time playing with Perception build with other mates who use mostly automatic weapons. I may only run like a clown around POI during the ongoing mission or climb somewhere high, otherwise RIP. Screamers ❣️

[Suxar]

45 minutes ago, Hybridthunder said:

With my preference for underground bases

How do you play them? I hate being in a situation where I can’t look around the area.

[Hybridthunder]

1 hour ago, Suxar said:

How do you play them? I hate being in a situation where I can’t look around the area.

I usually use the cellar door and a ramp down to the bottom. Wandering hordes usually just walk on by since they are actually zombies. and there are no corners for them to get stuck on and attack The problem is the screamers dont bother with pathing in this case. They know exactly where you are, and stop directly above and depth charge down to you. So your options at this point is jumping into a jagged hole and they always scream, or wait for them to tunnel all the way down. Its super immersion breaking, so I disabled them in the xml.

[Adam the Waster]

Spikes help alot with a rough screamer 

[Rotor]

I nerf the zombies to 25% block damage.  I wish I couldo take it to .0000001.  I mean of you want to play Resident Evil then knock yourself out.  Nice game, movies, but not a "true" Z apocalypto.

[ElCabong]

I spawned five of them. Not all at once. I killed the first two pretty quick but the third managed to get a scream off just before I killed her. There were so many Z's I only found the fourth one when she screamed. The fifth one I shot, knocked it down, but then had to kill two other Z's got in the way. She got a scream off just before I killed her.

Luckily that mob didn't bring another screamer with them.

 

Some of them didn't know where I was and a few of them were attacking the base so I ran up and got them lined up on me. Then I moved to the head of the line and started shooting and moving backwards. worried about falling into a ditch but didn't. When I ran out of arrows I pulled out my 9 mm and started counting headshots. 

 

When I got back the base everything was finished. I didn't feel like starting anything else. All that and nobody dropped a bag. Lol

[Krougal]

1 hour ago, Rotor said:

I nerf the zombies to 25% block damage.  I wish I couldo take it to .0000001.  I mean of you want to play Resident Evil then knock yourself out.  Nice game, movies, but not a "true" Z apocalypto.

Yeah, I have used that since they put it in.

Of course I was the loudest screamer for it, especially decoupling the block damage from the combat damage, so I was particularly pleased when it became a thing.

 

I want to have a base like the traders surrounded by walls with battlements or even just chain link fence. Those old junkfort POIs with walls made of various scraps and even car wrecks. Those would be fun. I still want to have to defend it and have horde nights, but I don't feel like they should just rip through everything like it is tissue paper. I guess it is hard to find a way to make bases more durable without trivializing hordes. 

 

I also hated the way wandering hordes used to just destroy a POI that was standing there minding it's own business because they decided to path through the corner of it instead of just going around. I don't know if they still do that, but not with 25% they don't.

Edited August 20 by Krougal (see edit history)

[Old Crow]

I've started referring to Screamers as "Karen from the HOA." Seriously, they need to be toned down. They don't need to come knocking every 5 minutes to tell me my stereo's too loud.

[Suxar]

14 hours ago, Hybridthunder said:

Wandering hordes usually just walk on by since they are actually zombies.

With my “levitating” base, they usually pass by as well. Unless by chance they notice me.

[Banginurz]

Like HybridThunder said, I just modded them out.  They're not dangerous (to me, anyway).  Just annoying more than anything.  Yay for mods!  Problem solved.

[weldabar]

On 8/19/2024 at 7:24 PM, Old Crow said:

"Karen from the HOA."

Lol, that is also what I call them!