Which is the more important main feature of the game II

[fragtzack]

Despite my last poll being the dumbest poll ever , instead we present a straw man argument disguised as a poll.

 

Corrected

[Northstar63]

The voxel world is what sets this game apart. A boatload of zombies attacking you just becomes a run of the mill arcade style game after awhile. The ability to change the world into your vision is most important aspect. Both options I agree would be ideal though.

[OzHawkeye]

@CC: I’m just glad I was quick enough to “Part Two” one of my polls before you did.

 

@Rest: yes. Assuming 64 zombies is the limit with voxel terrain what if 300 were the limit with static terrain. Would you trade voxels for significantly larger numbers that definitely couldn’t be done (as far as we know) with voxels standing in the way.

 

Well, specifically on the assumption you listed there, I voted for destructible terrain.

 

It would be a real shame though, imho, if that came at the price of lack of zombie numbers. A16 for me was where it (lack of zombies) got so bad that it impacted my enjoyment of the game, most especially in cities, so if it's an either/or choice, then it's a lose/lose for me I think.

[TotallyNotABot]

Just a question of picking the most valuable feature.

 

Or just stronger zombies.

 

I know it was a question on which is more valuable, the question at the beginning of my post wasn't really meant to be taken seriously.

 

Stronger zombies to me sounds like a cheap and annoying loop hole. Many of us want more normal zombies to fight instead of bullet sponges or OP zeds. Sure strong support zombies such as the wight, zombie bear, and cop are great additions to the game, but when you give EVERY zombie much more health/damage it kinda defeats the point of those more powerful zombies now doesn't it? They wouldn't be special anymore and melee combat would be way harder then it has to be. If you ask me it would be much better to keep zombies the way they are and to just raise the max limit once the game can handle it without becoming a lag fest.

 

Think about herds from TWD but instead of a million zombies imagine about 100-500. That's what I would love to see in this game. Now of course at the time it can't handle a number that large but that may not always be true. The future holds many possibilities.

[DeadMole]

Sure strong support zombies such as the wight, zombie bear, and cop are great additions to the game, but when you give EVERY zombie much more health/damage it kinda defeats the point of those more powerful zombies now doesn't it?

 

Not only that, but I think larger numbers would serve the tower defense aspect of the game better also. I'm all for more zeds if we can get some and also the option to decide how many are spawning in the world, not just turning them on or off.

[Tin]

Neither and both at the same time.

 

I think it could have both. I think the terrain itself could be done where only the area you're digging/destroying needs the voxels along with buildings.

 

Humor me a sec.

 

Have it work backwards, instead of the world already being comprised of millions of voxels from the get go.

Have the terrain built like a normal terrain gen without the voxels BUT! have the player insert the voxels when it hits at that specific point.

 

Lets say: When the player hits a point on the terrain to dig it transforms a 3x3 layer of the terrain into blocks under the player to allow them to dig.

First hit tells the system to copy the terrain in a 3x3m area.

2nd hit replaces the terrain with the 3x3 voxel layer.

3rd hit starts breaking down the voxel like it does now.

 

You break that block and hit the terrain below it the system rinse repeats and replaces another layer with voxels.

and ofc have the buildings still be voxel to allow for them to be brought down.

 

Just thoughts..

 

edit: as an aside. Probably not something for this game but maybe another?!

[TotallyNotABot]

That sounds so crazy that it just might work.

[Roland]

Ah, I'm not looking for "excuses" to boost my post count, since I don't even care about it. Quality over quantity.

 

Look at Guppycur's post count and then look at yours and you'll see that I wasn't talking about you. It was Guppycur that called my last poll the dumbest one ever. It's not all about you, Deadmole.

[Roland]

I voted zombies based on the current state of the game. If they make the underworld more interesting so that it actually utilizes voxels to their full potential then I'm all for voxel landscape but right now it isn't nearly as cool to dig as it would be to fight hordes of 300 zombies.

 

If the developers will develop the underground game then I'll change my vote.

[Guppycur]

It's all about me.

 

...but voxels.

[zombie4hire]

Are you made of voxels?

 

Are we all?

[Guppycur]

Yes. And some render more poorly than others.

[Gipothegip]

Look at Guppycur's post count and then look at yours and you'll see that I wasn't talking about you. It was Guppycur that called my last poll the dumbest one ever. It's not all about you, Deadmole.

 

Yeah, it's all about who has the most posts, you're way at the bottom.

 

All hail Guppy, master of ♥♥♥♥posts

[Guppycur]

Hey, that's not accura.... oh wait, it is.

[OneArmedBandit]

hmm, I like digging and building and terraforming in this game too much to vote against it...but larger hordes with weaker zombies would be really awesome...hard decision

 

I would really like to see Tin's idea come to life - or any Idea for that matter if it leads to an overall better performance and therefor more Z's while keeping our beloved fully destructible world

 

 

Edit:

I voted for voxels...couldn't help it xD

 

Another Idea: would it help to reduce the height of the map? I for one almost never build ultimately high in the air, so for me the sky might as well be 20 blocks or whatever lower above my head. For the people who like to build big but never dig one could implement a variable ground level in the startoptions of a map, something like: "would you like ~10, 20 or 50 Blocks beneath your feet before bedrock"....

limits us of course, but could it be worth the price if it boosts performance immensely?

[Bubo]

It's all about me.

 

...but voxels.

 

=)

 

[DeadMole]

Look at Guppycur's post count and then look at yours and you'll see that I wasn't talking about you. It was Guppycur that called my last poll the dumbest one ever. It's not all about you, Deadmole.

 

Yeah, I picked up you were messing around with him afterwards and facepalmed then haha.

 

I voted zombies based on the current state of the game. If they make the underworld more interesting so that it actually utilizes voxels to their full potential then I'm all for voxel landscape but right now it isn't nearly as cool to dig as it would be to fight hordes of 300 zombies.

 

But voxel is very much about building structures that are made of blocks as well, correct? Besides, where "the ground" is can actually be anywhere in the environement as well. In other words, you can build your own ground with dirt blocks so zombies can reach where you are.

 

Yeah, it's all about who has the most posts, you're way at the bottom.

 

Well, I think I had the most posts lately spamming the Diary Thread with my deadly walls of text hehe.

[KanedaSyndrome]

@CC: I’m just glad I was quick enough to “Part Two” one of my polls before you did.

 

@Rest: yes. Assuming 64 zombies is the limit with voxel terrain what if 300 were the limit with static terrain. Would you trade voxels for significantly larger numbers that definitely couldn’t be done (as far as we know) with voxels standing in the way.

 

That's the thing though, I don't get why voxels stand in the way of larger numbers of zombies. How do you calculate the world? Use the voxels to define the mesh and then coat a polygonial mesh (traditional graphics), and only access the voxel array when changes to the environment occurs.

 

Make the changes to environment run on a heartbeat, where the immediate effects are stored in memory (RAM), utilize a typical physics engine, rasterize the result and write that to the voxel geometry on the heartbeat. Re-mesh the new result (which would be 99.9% identical to the physics engine result, some rounding errors is the only divergence).

[Maharin]

For this game? The voxels are FAR more important. For 7DTD2? I'd vote for mega zombie hordes.

[DeadMole]

For 7DTD2? I'd vote for mega zombie hordes.

 

I'd vote for the game running on Unreal 4 which supports voxels now. That would look mindblowing.

[lil_joha]

How about the game asking "How deep to make the ground and how high the sky?" Then using the rest of the Memory to up the zombie count? That way Builders, Diggers and explorers can have their fun (that group includes me) And the Zombie Master killers can have their fun too!

 

Its just figuring out how to get that pie of memory usage divided up. Only so much pie to go around.

 

And for those who love super numbers of folk on the server those pie slices have to divide smaller as more players mean more memory usage.

[bishopsbourne]

The Entire point of the game, is the fully destructable world in which it sits. To remove it would be not only undermine the kickstarter goals, but take away the uniqueness of the game itself. Simply adding more zombies and removing these types of features is making it yet another boring FPS. There are other games that can do this better and are more suited to that style of play. If TFP can add more zombies then nice, otherwise best be kept as is.

[Aldranon]

I think some people are not sure what would be fun for them.

 

Would clicking 300+ times to kill each wandering horde be fun? For anyone? Anyone at all?

 

I heard there are "free to play" mouse clicking games where you click a LOT on your mouse to play. But being free tells just what people think of them.

[Crater Creator]

Being free does not tell you what people think of them. Not anymore at least, in an age of free to play games. Adventure Capitalist, to name one, has 89% positive user reviews on Steam.

 

Anyway, loads of zombies could mean loads more challenge and/or loads more fighting, but it doesn't have to. One zombie with 10,000 hit points takes the same amount of damage to kill as one hundred zombies each with 100 hit points. I'm not advocating for the former, but my point is how tough the zombies are to kill, or how many clicks it takes, can be adjusted separately from how many of them there are. More emphasis on killing zombies doesn't require more zombies, and vice versa, and in fact many people asking for more zombies want them to be individually weaker.

[Crater Creator]

Replies inline...

 

Those ambient zombies would provide much more gameplay value then you're suggesting.

 

*Shooting your gun has serious consequences, atm it doesn't.

If you're picturing that every time you fire your gun an average of X zombies spawn, to simulate zombies in the world being attracted to your gunfire, the game could just as easily spawn one zombie that's X times as tough as a baseline zombie.

*Kiting the "8 zombies you can pay attention to" is very easy, having "ambient" zombies means you'll draw much more in by running around.

In my experience they cluster pretty easily, day and night, regardless of how many there are. So drawing in many weaker zombies would be analogous to drawing in fewer stronger zombies.

*Stealth gets a totally new perspective, it would actually be easier at times.

When would stealth be easier?

*You would have to plan and work hard to reach some POIs instead of just walking there.

Only in the sense that more zombies have more eyes & ears to detect the player. If the player is detected, one zombie hanging around 'guarding' the PoI will cause as much trouble as X zombies, if the one zombie is X times tougher than a baseline zombie. Moreso, in fact, since in the many zombies scenario you might still avoid detection from some zombies after being detected by others.

*Real challenge and reward for bigger cities. Lots of zombies and lots of loot.

You could also scale up the challenge and the reward of each individual zombie, instead.

*Manipulating with a horde would become a thing. Can't kill them all, lure them away!

Can't kill all of a smaller number of zombies because they're individually stronger, lure them away.

*Using high ground to move around has advantages. Moving from rooftop to rooftop.

It makes no difference whether you're evading a smaller or larger number of zombies this way.

 

Again, I'm not advocating for fewer, stronger zombies. But it's wrong to think scaling up the zombie count will change the gameplay in radical new ways. If that happens, it'll be more because the overall challenge has been re-balanced as a side effect. This is switching from gallons to liters: the numbers get bigger, but the underlying quantities need not change.