Developer Discussions: Alpha 17

[Ravnespromise96]

can we have the HB but for everyone that doesn't want it, make it optional but mandatory for bosses.

 

or why not introduce optional Unit frames, what ever the cursor is on, pops up the target unit frame like next to the health bar or something, also for bosses, just have a mandatory frame that pops up (all ideas showing real time health status)

[Ravnespromise96]

That wouldn't work because the game would be constantly checking the static hitbox of every block spawned. That would kill the framerate actually, and besides, that would also create a lot of problems when it comes to the structural integrity.

 

fair, i was kinda thinking having the value of the hit box stay the same even during static, thus not needing the check ?

as in after static re activates on a block that received lets say 10 damage, you go back two days etc later, and its still the same hit box value (allowing players/npcs to cause structure damage permanantley)

 

why would the game need to constantly check static hit box values ?

[Laz Man]

How about the first time a regen is encountered and damaged a hp bar appears and shows the life slowly regenerating and a little paperclip could show up in the corner of the screen to give some helpful tips.

 

 

Make it a zombified rusty paperclip for greater immersion...

 

Or make the zombies hair turn yellow and stick up implying its hp is regenerating.....and its power level is now ovaaaa 9000!!!!

[Ravnespromise96]

Or make the zombies hair turn yellow and stick up implying its hp is regenerating.....and its power level is now ovaaaa 9000!!!!

 

i kinda like this XD

[Ravnespromise96]

'Navezgane County Arizona one of the last true Eden’s on Earth'

 

Message that hopefully devs read!

 

wish i can make a new thread but here it goes

 

so was thinking about one more possible feature from the future ? i might've not looked in the correct areas, but any info on the navesgane map extension ? will it extend ? will it get bigger?

 

referring to the location description of the premade navesgane map, navesgane has roads that continue through the border that goes around 'the last true eden' usually four exits leaving the map each side .

Personally id like to see what the OTHER or current edens, maybe make the map so big that it leaves navesgane and enters a NEW zone/county entirely, maybe destroyed and a lot smaller ?

-to compensate for ingame generation upon entering the game, refer to the navesane map as a zone, then when you enter another zone it loads a new total generation, maybe like a loading screen or something ?

 

not beat around the bush, have a zone at each exit of the map you go through, the design of the zone is comeplete destruction as the atmosphere itself is infected,

 

- debuff (upon entering area causes a debuff to all players that only lasts 30 seconds, but has a 35 %chance to reactivate after every 5 seconds after the 30seconds is up_ the debuff causes the player to have -75% regen on all stats health regen becomes disabled and hunger/thirst degrade by 3% after every 5 seconds during infection)

 

-looks/design (complete ruin, thicker denser bloodmoon - like fog)

 

- reason for entering a zone (basically an endgame zone, not worth entering without raid difficulty amount of supplies/gear/food etc, only one big and specific POI with unimaginable loot)

 

-area (called a Zone, navesgane would consist of 4 (each exit through the radiation zones either sides of the map), a circular area instead of oblong like navesgane as i said earlier alot smaller -half biome sized-, variable AshBiome-Like terrain textures for each of the four zones, idol and random ruins of POI's, un-intractable and no point of looting just ruins )

 

-area 2 (in the zone there will be a road continuing on from navesgane that goes directly to the other end of the circular zone, here will be one large POI, a giant science facility this will contain a fence that goes around the outside of the monolithic facility (above and underground features)

 

-NPCS (The only NPC types in this zone are Feral *of all class of z/animal* and a raid boss, No enemy spawn rate, varying from 300-700 zombies -or more- including the raid boss this is all calling this a HORDE MASS, all enemies will be at the POI outside of the fence including the raid boss, all zombies will be sleepers or investigating around the fence that goes around the large structure until the event-next section- has started. All players will be locked on by ALL enemies in the zone.)

 

 

-events (entering the facility grounds and/or shooting and enemies or when a player biomes hunted, will cause the raid event to happen, thus causing all enemies within the zone including raid boss will LOCK onto the player as if it were a blood moon event. the entire terrain AND POI -including fence- is static, cannot receive any block damage until event has commenced, player can PLACE any block on the terrains surface but restricts the players to a tower-type only defence -harsh but adds to the raid feel-, zombies can destroy structures as normal just at feral difficulty. This will all encourage the player(s) to gear up, get the best structures, best traps, and or best weapons/armour to take on the horde mass in the zone)

-events 2 (defeating the raid boss will end the event, ending the event will lift the static-lock on the terrain and POI's in the zone allowing enemies and the player(s) to destroy blocks and enter the main facility for loot!, the player(s) can actually enter the facility by building block means if they really want but when you enter the grounds of the facility, the event will automatically start and the static lock on the FENCE ONLY will lift, allowing zombies to get in , but every other block, including facility, will still have the lock. so players can build over the fence and get in but wont be able to access/destroy any blocks inside only the fence around the outside, but the event will continue. )

 

-infection buff (

 

-zone variation (the zones will look like the ash/fire zone in navesgane or vary depending on the story, but the first one i imagine one to be ash biome with denser bloodmoon fog and wind, in the wind will be bits of paper its quite light wind, bits of dirt and ash flying about, fog colours will depend on the zone and story too, the facility in the first zone would be a massive giant facility that is monolithic and goes to the depth limit underground, a tall and indestructable metal fence to go around the outside to hold out the zombie mass and boss, random ruins of houes and larger buildings no loot purely for aesthetic. A road will continue on from navesgane going in a straight line through to meet the facility thats in the middle of the circular zone. textures for other zones will vary on the zone story, the boss will vary on the zone story including the feral zombie zombie class/amount. )

 

-event end and irradiation timer afterwards (when players complete the event, an irradiation timer will start it will countdown from 5 ingame hours, when it reaches the end the zone will become irradiated like the irradiated zones in navesganes border. Everyone is to leave and loot everything they can within this time. When all players leave the zone and re enter navesgane, the zone will reset and have a 30 - day ingame cooldown untill it resets. after each zone reset the zone will change, and the plane will no longer appear, will only appear once unill )

 

-reason inspritation (how i would tie it in , would be with the original quote from the Fun Pimps official website, saying "You play a survivor trapped in the savage, gritty, zombie infested world of Navezgane County Arizona one of the last true Eden’s on Earth.", this entire idea spawns from the "one of the last true Eden’s on Earth" section of the description of the game. In theory, navesgane is a pocket in the entire irradiated world, presumably the race got scared and nuked the planet. Certain healthy areas in the world or such would be essentialy unharmed by the radiation there will be areas the nukes coulndt cover, thus leaving the county we know as navesgane. "One of the last edens on earth". Well i wanted to know what was beyond navesgane, i thought, the world in absolute ruin, navesgane would only be safe becasue theres not alot of zombies, just a massive horde nown again, so the beyond of navesgane, i would imagine to be filled with zombie MASSES instead of hordes because of the collection and attraction to the main structure site. Story wise i would say the radiation zone in navesgane is due to mass nukeing, navesgane being a pocket that survived it, so my zones idea would be other pockets that have survived , but only because of ZOMBIE masses, creating a vast C02 emission rate, making a pocket of infectious atmosphere (hence dense bloodmoonish fog, wind and infection debuff). So the idea of what BEYOND "Last Edens" made me compensate for the actual current game state, so zones would have to be rather rewarding and holding somethng that navesgane cant deliver, meaning a particular loot, dependding on the zones story.

Coming on to the stories, the first zone in my head. would bea circular type zone, looks like the black ash biome in navesgane, on a bloodmoon type atmosphere but thicker fog with wind, and a giant science facility, and the loot and is mega because the entire structure is the loot including a particular station thats only obtainable in this zone, nothing that impacts the game too much, but the structure being the loot, it would be a particular bloick thats end game resistance, and an unobtanable skin/texture. All this loot is particular to the facility zone.

Another zone idea i have goes rather out there..A Plane junkyard, large oblong shaped made longer than wider , (maybe introduce a ruined plane and lootable plane POI in Alpha 17), the entrance will be a long junkyard strip consisting of 4 planes wide rows to the end of the zone, either side of a dusty path, quite a dusty plain barrenish. all planes lootable. The zombie mass and raid boss will be at the end of the map, similar to facitly will be a row of 4 GIANT warehouses, each warehouse will have loads of decent loot usually different vehicle parts and constructive parts, some weapons as it will be millitary themed, same terrain adn static lock rules apply to the terrain and warehouses with the loot inside. as in indestructible untill event has been completed, the event is triggered exactly as the facility zone. and finally one more feature for the junkyard, the end loot...would be a new vehicle, thats only obtainble VIA this zone and after the events completion. The vehicle will quite simply be a small plane/spit fire that can fly in navesgane, its an accessable vehicle that cant be disassembled or reassembeldd. its health will determine its speed, when it reaches 0% health, the vheicle model will turn into the POI version of the planes you see in the junkyard before hand. Can mod it with only mods found within the zone, anything to do with the plane apart from fuel can only be obtainble via that particular zone. it will be found with a FULL tank, 3 seats to hold 3 passengers, one to be a gunner. This can get you all out of the zone in time for the irradiation timer end. after the zone resets after players exit, if the junkyard zone is regenerated , the warehouse with the plane will no longer have another plane, it will only have loot like the others, also only ONE plane can be in navesgane at once, this includes server aswell, only one plane per server, unless they add a clan feature.

Zones will vary

-recommendation (

will continue later

[Roland]

A bit. Duke’s casino.

[Ouch Quit It]

I would rather NOT have health bars and make learning the attributes of a zombie the norm. For example...you know that general zombir types need a few shots to the head...DEAD.

 

Radiated zombies need some sort of explosive element. (I have said this before) only explosive bolts, dynamite, oil barrels, pipe bombs, mines etc.

 

Another type of zombie say the fat zombies Hawaiian and grandma can only be damaged with machetes

 

Boss zombies blunt tools and fire

 

ETC

 

I think the whole idea of a health bar ..is TOO "ARCADISH" and takes away all the immersion.

 

 

Ouch

[Laz Man]

i kinda like this XD

 

[Xtrakicking]

fair, i was kinda thinking having the value of the hit box stay the same even during static, thus not needing the check ?

as in after static re activates on a block that received lets say 10 damage, you go back two days etc later, and its still the same hit box value (allowing players/npcs to cause structure damage permanantley)

 

why would the game need to constantly check static hit box values ?

 

Well, if the game doesn't check the hitbox of a certain block how is it gonna know something hit it? You can't, as far as I'm concerned, activate a hitbox when it gets hit, the hitbox is something that, let's say, sends info when it detects "hits" from players. If there's no hitbox, there's nothing detecting hits.

 

- - - Updated - - -

 

I would rather NOT have health bars and make learning the attributes of a zombie the norm. For example...you know that general zombir types need a few shots to the head...DEAD.

 

Radiated zombies need some sort of explosive element. (I have said this before) only explosive bolts, dynamite, oil barrels, pipe bombs, mines etc.

 

Another type of zombie say the fat zombies Hawaiian and grandma can only be damaged with machetes

 

Boss zombies blunt tools and fire

 

Why would a machete damage something but not bullets?

[Guppycur]

Radiated zombies need some sort of explosive element. (I have said this before) only explosive bolts, dynamite, oil barrels, pipe bombs, mines etc.

 

Another type of zombie say the fat zombies Hawaiian and grandma can only be damaged with machetes

 

Boss zombies blunt tools and fire

 

Ouch

 

Screw zombies. =)

 

[Aldranon]

The problem, as far as I can see it, is the current focus on Z's with increasing magic powers. This isn't a bad idea to a certain extent but there should be a reasonable limit instead of just piling HP and perks on the rotting shoulders of a single Z.

 

The true end-game threat should be the human element, smarter and better armed bandits.

 

The Z's should be a mass of mindless individuals which are easy to kill in small numbers but get dangerous in large hordes. It's not often I criticize TFP directly but in this case I think there are enough resource savings to be had in Z spawning and AI calculations to significantly increase the number of Z's available at a single time.

 

Other voxel games keep the number of "NPC"s down to a minimum as well. I think Empyrion: Galactic Survival does have more and you can see them pretty far away (around 300 meters) needed for ranged conflicts. But, I think their team is more focused on getting things done and not so much making sure everything looks perfect. No one can say A17 looks bad.

[Scyris]

I would rather NOT have health bars and make learning the attributes of a zombie the norm. For example...you know that general zombir types need a few shots to the head...DEAD.

 

Radiated zombies need some sort of explosive element. (I have said this before) only explosive bolts, dynamite, oil barrels, pipe bombs, mines etc.

 

Another type of zombie say the fat zombies Hawaiian and grandma can only be damaged with machetes

 

Boss zombies blunt tools and fire

 

ETC

 

I think the whole idea of a health bar ..is TOO "ARCADISH" and takes away all the immersion.

 

 

Ouch

 

Easiest fix is have a option in the options panel to show or hide health bars. This way everyone is happy.

[The Gronk]

Other voxel games keep the number of "NPC"s down to a minimum as well. I think Empyrion: Galactic Survival does have more and you can see them pretty far away (around 300 meters) needed for ranged conflicts. But, I think their team is more focused on getting things done and not so much making sure everything looks perfect. No one can say A17 looks bad.

 

Unity's built-in navmesh system calculates from purely visible geometry, the thousands of blocks which aren't rendered aren't calculated. A navmesh doesn't care what the underlying engine is unless the terrain changes. Even then you have a few frames to recalculate. Who cares if a Z stumbles blindly into a hole you've just created in the ground, such behaviour would be expected from something so dumb.

 

I thought when the Behemoth was announced it also meant the arrival of navmeshes. Under a navmesh system adding such a large piece to the board would have been trivial whereas under the current system it's an absolute nightmare.

 

I'd prefer if the team focused on getting multiple targets to aim at instead of being able to shoot multiple nostril-hairs from a single perfectly-crafted zombie.

[toores]

The true end-game threat should be the human element, smarter and better armed bandits.

 

The Z's should be a mass of mindless individuals which are easy to kill in small numbers but get dangerous in large hordes. It's not often I criticize TFP directly but in this case I think there are enough resource savings to be had in Z spawning and AI calculations to significantly increase the number of Z's available at a single time.

 

I thinking the same way. I don't want so many special ability zombies, rather more of them. Instead of kiting 10 zombies there should be 50 of them. With more zombies, you can't cover all fronts and this makes them dangerous.

 

And also agree that bandits should be the harder enemy with sophisticated AI. You would never have as many bandits on the screen at once but they are better geared, do ranged damage etc.

[Bubo]

I would rather NOT have health bars and make learning the attributes of a zombie the norm. For example...you know that general zombir types need a few shots to the head...DEAD.

 

Radiated zombies need some sort of explosive element. (I have said this before) only explosive bolts, dynamite, oil barrels, pipe bombs, mines etc.

 

Another type of zombie say the fat zombies Hawaiian and grandma can only be damaged with machetes

 

Boss zombies blunt tools and fire

 

ETC

 

I think the whole idea of a health bar ..is TOO "ARCADISH" and takes away all the immersion.

 

 

Ouch

 

Agree. I do like this idea of having certain weapons being able to kill certain bosses (in place of a health bar). This would give you a goal to acquire that particular weapon and go back to that particular poi and kill that particular boss.

[toores]

Agree. I do like this idea of having certain weapons being able to kill certain bosses (in place of a health bar). This would give you a goal to acquire that particular weapon and go back to that particular poi and kill that particular boss.

 

Makes no sense! Damage is damage.

 

So you have different weapons and encourage players to specialize and have different playstyles but then give them quests in which they sill need to fight the same way, using the same weapons...

[The Gronk]

Agree. I do like this idea of having certain weapons being able to kill certain bosses (in place of a health bar). This would give you a goal to acquire that particular weapon and go back to that particular poi and kill that particular boss.

 

This problem was encountered a lot when RPG's were lifted directly from the old-school pen-and-paper books, mostly when dealing with ghosts or lycanthropes because of the need for silver or enchanted weaponry.

 

If you don't happen to have the particular weapon required to kill the enemy what was a relatively simple enemy to defeat suddenly becomes a really annoying immortal threat with no way to stop it. Just sit on the edge of your base and watch as a single Z slowly destroys it.

 

By all means give the Z buffs and debuffs to your hearts content but I reserve the right to be able to punch anything to death... given enough time.

[Cars_Is_Nice]

Agree. I do like this idea of having certain weapons being able to kill certain bosses (in place of a health bar). This would give you a goal to acquire that particular weapon and go back to that particular poi and kill that particular boss.

 

I think he means that u do more damage with certain Weapons to certain enemies? I think that would make sence if its not to strong. So you have to find out what is good against that type of enemy.

[unholyjoe]

I think he means that u do more damage with certain Weapons to certain enemies? I think that would make sence if its not to strong. So you have to find out what is good against that type of enemy.

 

so if not careful, then we end up with a "one weapon kills all deal"... HOWEVER... if a said weapon was found that was needed to kill a special npc, then that weapon should be completely useless against all other npcs. that way you do get the immersion of needing to find a special weapon (and not talking about a space gun or something like that) then after the kill, then maybe the weapon breaks into non repairable piece that you either scrap or sell so it cant be used again.

[Maharin]

Maybe instead of health bars we should have health voxels.

[Bubo]

@toores/Gronk - Okay, I see your point. I'll change that to using certain weapons on certain bosses to yield better spoils (like using the correct tools on a tree for example). Purely optional ..just like an enemy health bar.

 

But then again, TFP could do anything they want with the new quest/buff system coming

[thhrash]

For the great 'health bar or no health bar' controversy one idea is add a device like the night vision goggles. You have them on and they give you a medical readout of what you are looking at. Zombies have their own heat map that shows their status and the scanner picks this up. Don't want health bars then don't equip said device. Have it lootable or purchased from a vendor. Since the guns will have attachments maybe have this as an attachment instead. Lots of options and holds more in lore than some checkbox on a UI.

[Xtrakicking]

For the great 'health bar or no health bar' controversy one idea is add a device like the night vision goggles. You have them on and they give you a medical readout of what you are looking at. Zombies have their own heat map that shows their status and the scanner picks this up. Don't want health bars then don't equip said device. Have it lootable or purchased from a vendor. Since the guns will have attachments maybe have this as an attachment instead. Lots of options and holds more in lore than some checkbox on a UI.

 

Edit

 

Actually, now that I read your post correctly, you mean a device like the NVG, not the NVG themselves.

 

The point still stands though. Why not just allow players to turn it off in the XMLs if they want instead of adding a whole new item to the game? It really is the easiest and most effective solution.

[Aldranon]

Unity's built-in navmesh system calculates from purely visible geometry, the thousands of blocks which aren't rendered aren't calculated. A navmesh doesn't care what the underlying engine is unless the terrain changes. Even then you have a few frames to recalculate. Who cares if a Z stumbles blindly into a hole you've just created in the ground, such behaviour would be expected from something so dumb.

 

I thought when the Behemoth was announced it also meant the arrival of navmeshes. Under a navmesh system adding such a large piece to the board would have been trivial whereas under the current system it's an absolute nightmare.

 

I'd prefer if the team focused on getting multiple targets to aim at instead of being able to shoot multiple nostril-hairs from a single perfectly-crafted zombie.

 

I like a great looking game, but, like you I prefer a great playing game. Not our call what will happen but we can call out what we all prefer.

 

***On a side note, I am glad we all voted for AIRSHIPS! My secret vote was sent to 99.99% of everyone that has ever played 7D2D (in my estimation), only a few people didn't get their mailer, some technical problems at Al's Marina.

[Gazz]

Maybe instead of health bars we should have health voxels.

Or health night clubs.

(where were you going with this?)