F*cking Shady Zombies

[Straume21]

Shady zombies make this game terrible. Can someone please make a mod that disables them, or could someone tell me how to manually disable them?

How can I be swarmed with enemies that literally come out of nowhere, for no reason? I could see some sort of mutant, light-fearing zombie that is stronger, faster, or has some other quality about it that makes it more dangerous than normal zombies, but simply having random spawns of zombies that come out of thin air ruins the game for me.

Who put this enemy into the experimental, and why? It’s just… bad. It’s not a good concept, and it takes away from the experience of the game. Not to mention, I don’t even know how it’s lore-friendly. Is it a zombie from another world? A human that fell into a portal? How would the goo create a zombie that is shrouded in darkness? And how the f*ck are there so many of them, all the time? In the first day of my new character, I encountered upwards of 20.

[Wally-kun]

You could always try turning the lights on.

[Straume21]

I understand the mechanic of shady zombies. I’m not asking for tips on how to fight them, I just want to disable them.

I could totally see them being a part of the game for a character that is suffering from poisoning, radiation sickness, a chemical imbalance, or some other mental problem that could cause hallucinations, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

This enemy seems pretty equatable to Boogeymen in DF, which I always disable when I generate new worlds.

[Valiant]

You can simply manually add them in “Mundane Zombies” mod, which disables all special zombies.
We should do this for experimental too, though.

[Coolthulhu]

This enemy seems pretty equatable to Boogeymen in DF

Not really. Boogeymen spawn from thin air, shady zombies are just invisible in darkness.

[Wally-kun]

Shady zombies are pretty pathetic fighters to be honest. Even if you walk into a group of 20, I don’t see what’s stopping you from just walking around them or backing out of the group. They’re almost completely blind, aren’t they?

[defraggler]

I like em. They are spooky.

[Coolthulhu]

They’re almost completely blind, aren’t they?

They’re supposed to have good night vision, but looks like it got lost in the vision calculations somehow. They seem to use their day range (3 tiles) even in total darkness.

They could use a giant buff to all stats, at least to tough zombie levels. Then nerf to spawn rate, because they’re way too common.

[Aesop]

It looks like they’re supposed to have a night vision of 40, which would make them much more active in pursuing the player in the dark. It makes since given the reasons for their implementation. Weren’t they implemented specifically to be a threat to players stumbling around in the dark with impunity? Given that, making them more rare and similar to tough zombies as opposed to a super annoying nuisance would go a long way towards making them an actual threat instead of just a nuisance.

As for the lore:

The blob is an alien, extra-dimensional entity that transforms creatures to suit its purpose. It can raise the dead and create “necromancers” that instantly repair any bodily damage inflicted on their host. That it could create a creature with a sort of active camouflage that only works at night doesn’t strike me as one of the most fantastical elements of the lore.

As for removing them, I would try adding them to the mundane zombies blacklist as Valiant mentioned. In the monsters.json it also looks like they have a categories flag that says CLASSIC. Would that flag override the mod?

[pisskop]

Dont get me started on bogeys in DF.

People want to claim they are small, the size of an large beetle.

They arent. They are smallish animals, but the idea is that in DF, size determines mass, and the material of composition determines density and thus weight per mass.

Boogies in DF are made of air. literally half-ethereal creatures.

Thats my story.

=========

Shadies in the game are meant to harass you. They are a touch more supernatural than hey could be, but making a mod to exclude them would be like a 3 minute job.

Are you using any mods that add more shadies? (mine)

Shadies are hilarious in the daytime though.

[Caplin]

I haven’t been playing CDDA as much this week, but I just wanted to say I totally endorse anything to make the game a bit scary. A zombie that can track players in the dark is definitely that.

Ironically, I’m blind.

[Valpo]

As soon as they have there nv back they ll be much better already.
I was wondering why i rarely ran into a shady z at nightime when i have seen so many at day.

[pisskop]

hmmm?

what wrong with night vison? It works for everything Ive seen.

[Straume21]

If they were to be stronger, faster, or have more DPS, ect, and the spawn rates were nerfed to rare, perhaps only spawning in notoriously dark areas like caves, mines, subways, and superstores, that would be cool. Basically I’m just saying I don’t like them the way they are, as they’re just annoying to encounter at this point. And it would be great if they could be added into the blacklist for the Mundane Zombies mod.

[pisskop]

,{
“type” : “MONSTER”,
“id” : “mon_zombie_shady”,
“name”: “shady zombie”,
“species”:“ZOMBIE”,
“default_faction”:“zombie”,
“symbol”:“Z”,
“color”:“ltgray”,
“size”:“MEDIUM”,
“material”:“flesh”,
“diff”:3,
“aggression”:100,
“morale”:100,
“speed”:70,
“melee_skill”:4,
“melee_dice”:2,
“melee_dice_sides”:3,
“melee_cut”:0,
“dodge”:0,
“armor_bash”:0,
“armor_cut”:0,
“vision_day”:3,
“vision_night”:40,
“death_drops”: “default_zombie_death_drops”,
“hp”:80,
“death_function”:“NORMAL”,
“special_attacks”:[
{
“type” : “bite”,
“cooldown” : 5
},
[“GRAB”, 7]
],
},{
“type” : “MONSTER”,
“id” : “mon_zombie”,
“name”: “zombie”,
“species”:“ZOMBIE”,
“default_faction”:“zombie”,
“symbol”:“Z”,
“color”:“ltgreen”,
“size”:“MEDIUM”,
“material”:“flesh”,
“diff”:3,
“aggression”:100,
“morale”:100,
“speed”:70,
“melee_skill”:4,
“melee_dice”:2,
“melee_dice_sides”:3,
“melee_cut”:0,
“dodge”:0,
“armor_bash”:0,
“armor_cut”:0,
“vision_day”:40,
“vision_night”:3,
“death_drops”: “default_zombie_death_drops”,
“upgrades”:{
“into_group”: “GROUP_ZOMBIE_UPGRADE”,
“half_life”: 28
},
“hp”:80,
“death_function”:“NORMAL”,
“special_attacks”:[
{
“type” : “bite”,
“cooldown” : 5
},
[“GRAB”, 7]
],
“description”:“A human body, swaying as it moves, an unstoppable rage is visible in its oily black eyes.”,
“flags”:[“SEES”, “HEARS”, “SMELLS”, “STUMBLES”, “WARM”, “BASHES”, “GROUP_BASH”, “POISON”, “BLEED”, “NO_BREATHE”, “REVIVES”, “BONES”, “PUSH_MON”],
“categories”:[“CLASSIC”]
},{

Shady zombies are zombies. Like same attacks.

If you want stronger shady zombie they wouldnt be zombies. They be shady tough zombies, or shady fat zombies. Or o.o

Shady spitters.

[Straume21]

What about faster shady zombies, like, say, doubled movement speed, and less spawns?

[pisskop]

What about faster shady zombies, like, say, doubled movement speed, and less spawns?

shady runners sounds like a thing Id endorse. But it raises it own problems since the niche of shadies is to see in the dark

[Coolthulhu]

I’d go the opposite way: hard-hitting and tough, but slow

[pisskop]

I have a brute that does just that.

I was saving it for a dark laboratory, but honestly I dont mind using it in genpop.

[deoxy]

Shady spitters.

Even thinking of suggesting that should be grounds for banning. ACTUALLY saying it out loud should be grounds for a professional assassin hit. Seriously, giving those guys any kind of ranged attacked, much less a ranged ACID attack, would be basically saying that night time activities are just officially impossible.

[glow=red,2,300]That said, “shady necromancer” would be better, anyway… :evil grin:[/glow]