Perk preview feedback

[RestInPieces]

For argument's sake, let's say that perks in A17 are theoritically divided in 3 categories. Survival-related perks, Gameplay style perks and Recipe-related perks. It would certainly be much better to wait until A17 before giving feedback but anyhow here's some feedback on the perks preview and a counter-suggestion for "recipe perks".

 

 

Recipe perks tied to exploration instead of leveling

(Recipe perks = all perks related to "tech progression").

 

I think that not taking advantage of exploration, with a very important player motive like tech progression, is a waste. I know the "playstyle freedom is the all-important principle" for a lot of people and I do support it, but a game also needs to make players engage in its content within some bounds and playstyle freedom must be within those bounds, not outside of them.

Outside those bounds, (e.g. encouraging a player to forever stay in an underground base, not experiencing much of the content), will ironically make the players ask for more content (similar to the "encouraging players to actively kill zombies, will make them view the gameplay loop as a grind", but that's a discussion for another day).

 

In short, besides not being immersive, I think it is a wasted opportunity making recipe perks tied to leveling, so here's a suggestion.

 

Description:

-Similarly to Subnautica, many POIs have a (small-large) adjustable chance of spawning a theme-friendly (to the POI), item of interest (recipe item), which the player will be able to inspect so that he can "reverse-engineer" them.

-Items of interest could be crafting stations, destroyed vehicles and everything else recipe-related. I think that even more items can be "gated through" exploration, than the current amount of items gated behind perks.

-Items of interest would be POI-specific so that the player "deducts" and eventually knows which POIs he needs to visit to have a chance to find them, which is tbh realistic. For example, a military base or similarly-themed POIs will have a chance to spawn an inspectable destroyed static jeep part etc, or a hospital can have the chance of having an inspectable chem station or a cabinet with recipes for herbal medicine etc.

-Besides items of interest, better theme-friendlier loot distribution of recipes for consumable and non-vital items.

-Gating progression can be adjusted through chance of item of interest spawning in that POI and number of inspections in "damaged" items of interest, for non-modular recipes (like they are gated in Subnautica). Inspection can still be tied to attributes. "Events" can happen in the vincinity of these items of interest for extra difficulty factor.

 

Goal: To make tech progression rely on exploration, still be dependent on the player's control and choices with only a small amount of RNG and adjustable difficulty/accessibility and making finding cities/villages with various special POIs a more interesting event.

 

Notes:

-It still must be of at least a little worth for the player to visit any non-specific POIs (like generic houses).

-Many recipes/books/loot must still be random but loot distribution overall would be more thematic and less generic (I mean right now, you still find more meds in a hospital, or guns in a military base but I think there's some room for making all POIs matter more).

 

 

 

Survival-related gameplay working with (and not against) survival perks

(survival perks = anything related to survival elements like food,weather,disease etc)

 

As it seems some perks offer increased survival convenience. Same happens in A16 to some extend. I have no idea how changes will affect the meaning survival-related activities. Lack of spoilage already makes food collection more or less obsolete after some time.

While I do think that survival-related perks can work nicely by making your character more resilient to his needs and environment, they should definitely not cancel out survival gameplay like shrugging off diseases/injuries or making food/water/meds less valuable, because this also works against the "gameplay loop" of progressing enough to acquire these resources more easily.

If survival-related resources are easy to acquire though or penalties don't have enough impact, consequently, toned-down perks will not be lucrative enough for the player to get them. For example, if breaking bones, infection, food poisoning or bleeding were impactful enough, it would be worth getting exclusive perks that alleviated their effects.

 

At any case, I feel the survival aspect of the game needs to be more impactful in its core (therefore I can't give specific feedback - too many things "missing" as I see it), with dangerously escalating diseases, injuries, hunger/thirst penalties, spoilage, so that perks related to them can be equally impactful and finally, be more closely tied with "tech" progression ("tech" progression examples - from finding a pot to creating a farm or purification devices).

 

 

 

Gameplay perks

(action or strictly rpg/character-related perks)

 

I liked perks that had more "special/intuitive" bonuses, like stamina regeneration, consecutive blows dealing critical hits or increasing attack speed, even increased chance to stun or knockback. Much better than flatly increasing damage for sure.

One thing I didn't like was getting the extra head damage or stun immunity, exclusively from a perk, because it kind of works against a part of the inherent fps/action aspect of the game. Instead, would prefer that the head multiplier remains inherent and just gets increased by the perk or stun duration/effect being decreased.

 

 

 

In general I am optimistic about this update and the new system because there are a lot of ways to make it more immersive in the future. One way, for example, could be attribute-specific exp/players being able to raise attributes through actions, so that layers specialize through their gameplay style, instead of choosing arbitrary perks to determine their gameplay style. Besides, as an immersion warrior myself, mining all day, raising strength, becoming stronger and hitting harder with melee weapons for example, makes even more sense than the previous system did.

[RestInPieces]

Come on, it's not that long, jeez.

[ricp]

In short my opinion goes as follows...

 

* Seems like change for change's sake, of all the things needing amended the skill purchase/progress model in A16 was not one of them.

 

* The implementation seems rushed and lacking imagination (increase a point, it just sets a multiplier for some variable... meh!)

 

* Lack of reward for general day to day living, in a zombie survival where living as long as possible and doing stuff are your goals that seems short sighted.

 

 

With all that said and done, my opinion counts for very little. TFP have chosen to go down this route and as it's their game I really have no reason to complain. I've certainly got my money's worth out of the title even if it never had another update ever! I do think they are going down the wrong route, but then I am also willing to wait and see if in game the purchase only model in any way benefits the gameplay. As I said in another thread, if A17 is as modable as A16 then the purchase only tree will be ripped out and replaced by what is essentially the system used in A16. I don't want to seem like someone who doesn't want change, I'm all for it, but from experience I have huge doubts.

 

We'll just need to wait and see. Let's get A17 out an into the wild first, then we can all make a judgement.

[meganoth]

-Similarly to Subnautica, many POIs have a (small-large) adjustable chance of spawning a theme-friendly (to the POI), item of interest (recipe item), which the player will be able to inspect so that he can "reverse-engineer" them.

-Items of interest could be crafting stations, destroyed vehicles and everything else recipe-related. I think that even more items can be "gated through" exploration, than the current amount of items gated behind perks.

 

I think this is a great idea to give an alternative to the craft perks. I.e. you can choose to buy the perk (a miner would do that for most perks) OR you scavenge bookstores for such information or extract information from destroyed specimens. Getting the knowledge this way should be a long and expensive process

 

Would this make the perks useless? No, as most of the recipes would be needed long before getting them through exploration. But especially in co-op it would be something the other (non-crafter) players could work up to. AND it would give bookstores a use again

[Primal11]

* Lack of reward for general day to day living, in a zombie survival where living as long as possible and doing stuff are your goals that seems short sighted.

 

What if XP gain is increased by 1% for each day that you survive? As soon as the clock hits 0:00, bonus increases by 1%. This bonus is all lost when the player dies. It would also make it easier to progress at later levels.

[Scyris]

I think this is a great idea to give an alternative to the craft perks. I.e. you can choose to buy the perk (a miner would do that for most perks) OR you scavenge bookstores for such information or extract information from destroyed specimens. Getting the knowledge this way should be a long and expensive process

 

Would this make the perks useless? No, as most of the recipes would be needed long before getting them through exploration. But especially in co-op it would be something the other (non-crafter) players could work up to. AND it would give bookstores a use again

 

Val mod does this, most things that are gated by books can either be gotten from the book, OR you can choose to spend skill points to learn it instead. Its the best way, you want it now? Spend skill points, something you'd like but its not something you need right now? wait and find the book. Gives players a choice.

[Scyris]

What if XP gain is increased by 1% for each day that you survive? As soon as the clock hits 0:00, bonus increases by 1%. This bonus is all lost when the player dies. It would also make it easier to progress at later levels.

 

I've never found leveling too slow in the game. I often do stuff in game to find out later i've gained 5 levels and I never noticed till then. There is lots of stuff to do so you don't pay attention to the grind. Insted of a bonus to exp, i'd prefer a bonus to finding better or higher amounts of loot instead. As a large part of 7dtd has always been scavving and looting.

[meganoth]

I've never found leveling too slow in the game. I often do stuff in game to find out later i've gained 5 levels and I never noticed till then. There is lots of stuff to do so you don't pay attention to the grind. Insted of a bonus to exp, i'd prefer a bonus to finding better or higher amounts of loot instead. As a large part of 7dtd has always been scavving and looting.

 

Yes, the A16 system had the disadvantage that you often couldn't use the points because a perk you wanted needed for example 16 points and you only got 5 or 6 per level. Because of that (and the level gates) I often ignored getting a new level and spent the points much later. You can't be excited for something you ignore.

 

A17 has removed that disadvantage (at least half of it, some level gates may still return), there is no need to accumulate perk points.