The power level curve really needs to be flattened a bit

[Llamageddon]

Because right now there is such a disparity between lower level and higher level content, that even mid-level characters will shrug off ordinary zombies 100%, high level characters become demigods, and certain things are a death sentence to any but the most well equipped.

I know that it would be a huge undertaking, but I feel like right now the whole situations is such that the only way for the game to remain challenging is to roleplay and avoid the best gear, while the high level content is mostly instagibby stuff that has to be cheesed, with no option for any alternative approaches.

[EnDSchultz]

I once got crazy lucky and found a suit of basic power armor in a military surplus store on, like, my third day. I ended up ditching it after realizing that, even unpowered, in its current implementation it is completely broken and turned my idiot refugee fresh out of Evac into an untouchable zombie slaying machine and basically ripped all the fun out of the game.

There’s definitely a lot of work that needs to be done in this area. The problem is I’m not entirely sure what, exactly. Some amount of stat rebalancing, certainly, but perhaps also changes to combat mechanics that make getting surrounded by zombies dangerous even to a seasoned survivor.

[Llamageddon]

Lower armor and damage values of everything bar the lowest stuff, so the weak stuff can sometimes slightly get through the armor, and that the stronger stuff(turrets…) isn’t necessarily an instagib to an under-equipped char. Put more importance on aspects that aren’t directly power-curve related(base-building, farming, NPC interactions), introduce more low-mid level “dungeons”, like say, expanding on bee house hives, bank vaults, or slightly less rare semi-artifact items, so that more interesting stuff happens on the lower levels, etc.

Personally I would also absolutely love it if the overmap had large regions that actually varied a lot - like ocean, or wilderness with tribal settlements, many of which are still untouched, or wasteland, etc.

I’d also love it if mining got buffed(right now it’s inferior to smashing walls), ores and gems were introduced, add smelting/jewelry books and random natural caves you can manage to dig through to, etc.

Getting rid of the power curve is one thing, but introducing content that doesn’t directly depend on it is another.

[Llamageddon]

Oh yeah, and something definitely needs to be done about the start. Because right now tailoring is basically mandatory, and most of the time you’ll be spending the start of the game on that. I overall feel like most classes are considerably lacking. It should probably be more common for various classes to start with semi-relevant skills at 1 or 2, plus cell phones, warmer clothing depending on weather, etc.

Another idea I’ve had for ages is to introduce a “cognitive delay” to monsters, so that e.g. zombies do not notice you immediately, but take 2 or 3 turns. I think it would make tactical play considerably more viable.

Reducing the need to grind skills would also be nice. Say, a pay-for-bionic-installation machine in hospitals, except you need to get it wired up and powered, bringing tailoring back to more reasonable repair/reinforce chances, increasing without-skill medicine heal values, making lower level electronics skill less useless, gating stuff behind books less, etc.

I think that metallurgy and farming are both nice, since they’re sort of “industries” that take some work to get into, and I feel like more such stuff could be nice. One thing is mentionned jewelry, another would be being able to disassemble guns(receivers for specific calibers, auto/semi/burst mechanisms, other assorted parts) and craft others(or mods) from them, making building take a bit less time so it’s not more laboring than vehicles while being less worthwhile, dunno I’m just throwing stuff at the wall.

[kevin.granade]

[quote=“EnDSchultz, post:2, topic:13239”]I once got crazy lucky and found a suit of basic power armor in a military surplus store on, like, my third day. I ended up ditching it after realizing that, even unpowered, in its current implementation it is completely broken and turned my idiot refugee fresh out of Evac into an untouchable zombie slaying machine and basically ripped all the fun out of the game.

There’s definitely a lot of work that needs to be done in this area. The problem is I’m not entirely sure what, exactly. Some amount of stat rebalancing, certainly, but perhaps also changes to combat mechanics that make getting surrounded by zombies dangerous even to a seasoned survivor.[/quote]
Zombie grabbing is supposed to be the fix for this, being surrounded by 8 regular zombies should quickly lead to your (non superhero strength) character getting knocked down and pinned, which in turn should be a death sentence. On the other hand, if your character is super strong and has powered power armor, they should be able to wade through regular zombies with impunity. Specials would still be a problem.

Lower armor and damage values of everything bar the lowest stuff, so the weak stuff can sometimes slightly get through the armor,

Regular clothes probably have too high armor values in general relative to basic zombie attacks, so I agree with that point.

and that the stronger stuff(turrets…) isn’t necessarily an instagib to an under-equipped char.

I’d much prefer to keep current turret danger levels and limit them to dangerous areas with high payoffs (such as military bases and bunkers). Making high calibre and/or automatic fire not immediately lethal is kind of silly.

Put more importance on aspects that aren’t directly power-curve related(base-building, farming, NPC interactions), introduce more low-mid level “dungeons”, like say, expanding on bee house hives, bank vaults, or slightly less rare semi-artifact items, so that more interesting stuff happens on the lower levels, etc.

I’m all for more mid-level areas, and some if the ones you mention are great ideas.

[quote=“Llamageddon, post:3, topic:13239”]Personally I would also absolutely love it if the overmap had large regions that actually varied a lot - like ocean, or wilderness with tribal settlements, many of which are still untouched, or wasteland, etc.

This is my primary content goal, but I haven’t had any time to work on it.

I’d also love it if mining got buffed(right now it’s inferior to smashing walls), ores and gems were introduced, add smelting/jewelry books and random natural caves you can manage to dig through to, etc.[/quote]
Mining for an individual survivor is nonsensical, useful amounts of minerals are incredibly hard to come by, and similar amounts of scavenged materials are incredibly easy to come by.

Oh yeah, and something definitely needs to be done about the start. Because right now tailoring is basically mandatory, and most of the time you’ll be spending the start of the game on that. I overall feel like most classes are considerably lacking. It should probably be more common for various classes to start with semi-relevant skills at 1 or 2, plus cell phones, warmer clothing depending on weather, etc.

I feel like “mandatory” tailoring is mostly a problem with basic clothes providing decent armor, if you didn’t have the payoff of a nearly zombie-proof outfit, grinding tailoring would be a lot more niche, though you’d probably still want some tailoring for maintenance and filling gaps in what you loot.
The scenario starts are not remotely similar to typical game “classes”, they generally represent people from all walks of life getting caught unprepared for the cataclysm.

Another idea I’ve had for ages is to introduce a “cognitive delay” to monsters, so that e.g. zombies do not notice you immediately, but take 2 or 3 turns. I think it would make tactical play considerably more viable.

That might work, I especially like the visual of a survivor sprinting through a group of zombies and the group slowly turning to chase the survivor after they’re already gone.

Reducing the need to grind skills would also be nice. Say, a pay-for-bionic-installation machine in hospitals, except you need to get it wired up and powered, bringing tailoring back to more reasonable repair/reinforce chances, increasing without-skill medicine heal values, making lower level electronics skill less useless, gating stuff behind books less, etc.

I’m a bit sceptical this is a real problem, high skill levels are only necessary to play like an action hero, which is something the game is fairly bad at, so it’s not a great idea to make it the norm.

I think that metallurgy and farming are both nice, since they’re sort of “industries” that take some work to get into, and I feel like more such stuff could be nice. One thing is mentionned jewelry, another would be being able to disassemble guns(receivers for specific calibers, auto/semi/burst mechanisms, other assorted parts) and craft others(or mods) from them, making building take a bit less time so it’s not more laboring than vehicles while being less worthwhile, dunno I’m just throwing stuff at the wall.

I’m not sure what the point of jewelry would be.
I’m super uninterested in a detailed component system for guns in mainline, the main reason being those parts aren’t nearly as interchangeable as people seem to think they are, for the most part all you’d be able to do is have individual parts break and then use parts from other instances of the same gun to repair them. If we want that I’d rather just have a system like fallout 2 where you can use copies of the same kind of gun to repair each other.
Some better ui when building stationary constructions would be nice, e.g. persistent designations for constructions and maybe some templates for common structures.
Also if it was easy enough we might make structures a bit more mandatory, e.g. rain ruining items left out.

[StopSignal]

Actually the cognitive lag idea is incredibly great. It would help being stealthy viable. Making having to run in backalleys and stuff instead of being spotted automatically.

[Llamageddon]

I feel like “mandatory” tailoring is mostly a problem with basic clothes providing decent armor, if you didn’t have the payoff of a nearly zombie-proof outfit, grinding tailoring would be a lot more niche, though you’d probably still want some tailoring for maintenance and filling gaps in what you loot.

I’m afraid that’s really not the case with tailoring. It’s strictly necessary if you want to avoid freezing to death, being unable to carry anything, or losing a good chunk of health to each ordinary zombie without putting 60+ encumbrance on each of your bodyparts. Even 4 starting tailoring is grossly insufficient right now tbh.

I’d much prefer to keep current turret danger levels and limit them to dangerous areas with high payoffs (such as military bases and bunkers). Making high calibre and/or automatic fire not immediately lethal is kind of silly.

I think being able to survive a turn wouldn’t be that bad, really.

Mining for an individual survivor is nonsensical, useful amounts of minerals are incredibly hard to come by, and similar amounts of scavenged materials are incredibly easy to come by.

Mining on the scale you can do with farm vehicles is also nonsensical. I don’t think that this kind of unrealism would be a high price to pay for a new “branch” of activities.

I’m a bit sceptical this is a real problem, high skill levels are only necessary to play like an action hero, which is something the game is fairly bad at, so it’s not a great idea to make it the norm.

That might be true for combat skills, and stuff like mutagens/bionics/survivor gear, but even other than that, there’s tons of recipes gated behind skills and skillbooks, and right now, skillbooks are orders of magnitude faster than grinding manually, not to mention not using up resources.

[quote=“Kevin Granade, post:5, topic:13239”]Some better ui when building stationary constructions would be nice, e.g. persistent designations for constructions and maybe some templates for common structures.
Also if it was easy enough we might make structures a bit more mandatory, e.g. rain ruining items left out.[/quote]

Right now it’d still be easier to make a vehicle for that purpose. It takes less resources, time, is more portable, and more fun to boot.

I think that what constructions need is being more expansive, e.g. electricity, furniture being pseudo-vehicles, e.g. the fridge, oven, etc. so that they don’t feel like static props, but are actually useful, interactive, possible to build and deconstruct, etc.

I briefly mentioned on git, that I think separating examine from vehicle/detailed inspection would be great, because it would let you “masquerade” more things as “complex entities”, e.g. vehicles, as well as make vehicles a bit less broken, in favor of it taking more time and effort to inspect and mend individual parts, and make keeping track of repairs a bit more difficult.

With construction, I feel like a big bonus to static bases would be being able to organize NPCs around, set up stockpiles, have jobs around the base capable of automatically fetching resources from other stockpiles/zones, NPCs helping with stuff, construction being a bit easier(especially relative to vehicle building), and having goals such as wiring things up, or wandering zombies/bandits/whatever to defend against.

Sigh, I wish I had the energy to do anything.

[EnDSchultz]

Actually the cognitive lag idea is incredibly great. It would help being stealthy viable. Making having to run in backalleys and stuff instead of being spotted automatically.

Got to agree that this jumps out at me. When I’m trying to stay out of sight by taking back roads to do a quick looting run, and I’ve suddenly got the horde on my ass because I’m fighting some zombie that blitzed after seeing me for a single turn through a tiny gap between the buildings… well, that’s a bit frustrating. They’re zombies, not military spotters.

Honestly, I’m okay with the deadliness of automatic firearms and turrets at close range, at least once the shooting starts. An automatic weapon on a fixed robotic platform, likely using some sort of laser targeting, is going to be insanely stable and more than capable of plunking multiple rounds into your brain even before the first one sends you to the ground.

That said, it’s not unreasonable that an unencumbered character who opens a door to find a turret would probably have enough time to dive out of the way before the turret is able to acquire them and open fire… maybe turrets have a very short “cognitive lag” upon spotting you to simulate the amount of time it takes them to train their weapons on you. Not sure if something like this is already implemented in some fashion.

In any case, opening a door to “RATATATATATA Would You Like To Watch The Last Moments Of Your Life?” is an exceedingly frustrating and unrewarding way to go.

---

As a random anecdote, I have to say the most fun I ever had with turrets was the time my mid-late game character decided to raid a military outpost at night. The turrets, at least as of that build, didn’t have any sort of night vision as far as I could tell and so relied on sweeping searchlights to find targets in the dark. Sprinting around in the dark dodging searchlights to get close enough to take out anti-materiel doomturrets with super-precise bow shots is up there with my most exciting and fun scenarios to date.

[gakm4]

The cognitive lag would be nice for line of sight but i think that any sounds should draw their attention right away.

For the turrets killing you as you open a door well that shouldn’t really be an issue due to the fact that safe mode will activate and you are able to instantly close the door before they are able to cover you in a lead blanket. Also if using a tileset turn off any light source you have and the walls of rooms with turrets in them will be lit.

[StopSignal]

The cognitive lag would be nice for line of sight but i think that any sounds should draw their attention right away.

I think there is a neat concept here, I hope some coder finds it interesting as well to try it!

[ribblle]

I agree. The early game is too much too fast for new players.

[Weyrling]

For the turrets killing you as you open a door well that shouldn’t really be an issue due to the fact that safe mode will activate and you are able to instantly close the door before they are able to cover you in a lead blanket.

The way turns work is by rolling time over every 100 points or so, which means that if you spent 99 or 101 points doing something then when you open a door you can have between 0 and 2 free moves before the turret responds.

IE, you can effectively use up 2 turns when doing something leaving you literally no reaction time, but in my experience if you hit 5 to wait a turn or two before you open a door you have better odds to have a chance to avoid sudden turret death.

[Taberone]

I thought Turrets already had a delay before they shoot you? I remember them beeping when they spot you for the first time, giving you a one free turn to do something before they instakill or instacripple you.

[Weyrling]

I thought Turrets already had a delay before they shoot you? I remember them beeping when they spot you for the first time, giving you a one free turn to do something before they instakill or instacripple you.

Yes, I was just saying that due to the way turns and moves work, in some situations you can spend 2 turns to open a door, leading to instant death.

[SpadeDraco]

My biggest problem with the “power level curve” has more to do with the massive bookgrinding gate between Early Game and Mid Game. A character that wants to graduate from “town raiding” to “lab raiding” has to sit through a massive 30-45 day grind-fest where they do nothing but read books, craft gear, and work on vehicles. Its realistic, but also mind-numbingly dull as the player has to spend several real-life hours doing literally nothing (unless you consider watching your character’s skills slowly tick up fun).

I’m aware that I could break up the grind with other activities to make it a bit more palatable, but by the time I’m hunting for specific skillbooks I usually have literally everything else that I need for the transition to Mid-Game and running around doing “busy work” out of pure boredom would be more likely to get me killed than accomplish anything productive.

[Llamageddon]

Yeah, and so much stuff is locked behind books/skill levels… 80% of the early->mid game transition is gathering books, and 80% of the mid->late game transition is cheesing labs with skulking around and EMP nades, because turrets can instashred you while everything else is mostly harmless due to the huge powerlevel disparity.

Crafting gear and working on vehicles… is fun, I just wish it had more variety. With vehicles, I always end up doing the same thing: One seat, cargo spaces, freezer, UPS mod on one of the spaces, stowboards all around(actually modded in heavy duty stowboards for my own use… I’m thinking of putting this into the game and as a PR though tbh)

I think that a lot would need to be done to encourage a more stationary style of life, and to buff/spice up building, farming, NPCs, etc. Currently those are way too tedious, especially compared to the “breeze” that vehicles are.