Upgrading from a while back - map note limit?!? And other tidbits

deoxy · 2018-02-15T05:26:54.901Z

So, I got annoyed with the new changes that weren’t really finished for a while and just stopped keeping up. I’m WAY behind.

I’ve tried upgrading a few times in the last couple of months, and some stuff just got WAY harder. For one, shady zombies can see in the dark really well, so night time sucks HARD in the early game, and there are more zombie types. Altogether, I’ve dialed back the spawn level from x5 to only x2, and it’s still harder early game than it used to be. Also, some kind of “don’t spawn masters, hulks, necros, or other crazy crap in the first game day” option would be very nice. Starting a new game and having a shocker brute in the starting room with you is a bit silly.

But the one thing that just bugs me half to death is the mega-short map notes (referring to character limit). I used to put a lot of things in there, and now it’s SO very limited. Anybody know why? It’s very annoying.

Zhilkin · 2018-02-15T07:52:10.771Z

I guess that was a bug previously - map notes are ought to be 45 characters long.

Mantar · 2018-02-15T22:49:55.054Z

deoxy:

Also, some kind of “don’t spawn masters, hulks, necros, or other crazy crap in the first game day” option would be very nice

That’s the evolution factor in the options. Crank it up higher to increase the time needed before they evolve to the next stage. And be wary of Zombie Masters, they basically hang back and bump up a nearby z’s evolution counter with their black mist thing.

BuckDashing · 2018-02-15T22:58:58.935Z

There was a spawning bug recently introduced, where map things like Drug Deals gone Bad would spawn up to 8 Mi-gos, when they are really only supposed to have the chance of spawning one. This may apply to elite Z’s as well, I’m not sure.

But I know under normal play that unless you’re going way down into town, in the early game I almost never run into Z masters. Shadys are uncommon, but do dissuade you from looting willy-nilly at night.

deoxy · 2018-02-16T03:25:30.412Z

Mantar:

That’s the evolution factor in the options. Crank it up higher to increase the time needed before they evolve to the next stage. And be wary of Zombie Masters, they basically hang back and bump up a nearby z’s evolution counter with their black mist thing.

I’m well aware of the evolution system. I’m talking about things like “starting with a shocker brute in the room with you” or “having a hulk smash down the wall next to you three steps into the game” and such. Pretty much the OPPOSITE of evolution.

The problem is that higher level zombies take up more spawn points, so when it feels like it has too many spawn points, it starts spawning in the higher monsters, even on initial load. Evolution setting is utterly irrelevant to that.

deoxy · 2018-02-16T03:29:18.817Z

Zhilkin:

I guess that was a bug previously - map notes are ought to be 45 characters long.

That seems… arbitrarily short. REALLY short. Any idea why it would be so short? I often put 100+ characters on map notes (things that are there, condition of vehicles I want to loot later, etc)

Zhilkin · 2018-02-16T03:38:19.744Z

Map note input popup was always 45 characters long (as far as CataclysmDDA goes):

github.com

CleverRaven/Cataclysm-DDA/blob/a8f2d91f27e17d6aa6e7c60b1679fa7721d75431/src/overmap.cpp#L1946-L1947


add_note(cursx, cursy, zlevel, string_input_popup(_("Note (X:TEXT for custom symbol):"),
                                                  45, note(cursx, cursy, zlevel))); // 45 char max

It was 49 characters long in original Cataclysm:

github.com

Whales/Cataclysm/blob/master/overmap.cpp#L1025


 cursy += diry;
} else if (ch == '0') {
 cursx = origx;
 cursy = origy;
} else if (ch == '\n')
 ret = point(cursx, cursy);
else if (ch == KEY_ESCAPE || ch == 'q' || ch == 'Q')
 ret = point(-1, -1);
else if (ch == 'N') {
 timeout(-1);
 add_note(cursx, cursy, string_input_popup(49, "Enter note")); // 49 char max
 timeout(BLINK_SPEED);
} else if(ch == 'D'){
 timeout(-1);
 if (has_note(cursx, cursy)){
  bool res = query_yn("Really delete note?");
  if (res == true)
   delete_note(cursx, cursy);
 }
 timeout(BLINK_SPEED);
} else if (ch == 'L'){

But I guess character limit was not enforced due to some error.

NuG · 2018-02-16T21:03:21.237Z

Maybe the starting scenario you are choosing has the “zombies nearby” tag, or whatever it is called. I had a Shocker Brute start outside the Bookstore I spawned in, in my most recent run, with the Fled the Riots scenario. Also a bunch of Shady Zs were outside that could see me, because I was in an area where there was no light in the bookstore, so they came right for me which also drew in the Shocker. It spawned me in the Bookstore that has a ton of windows, instead of the smaller one with only a single window.

deoxy · 2018-02-17T04:32:50.471Z

NuG:

Maybe the starting scenario you are choosing has the “zombies nearby” tag, or whatever it is called.

Nope. Standard house (well, on fire). Sometimes it’s fine… sometimes it’s insane.

I like having lots of zombies around, but the spawn mechanic that sometimes spawns stronger zombies instead of more of them is a bad mechanic for the beginning of the game. I don’t want to blacklist them (I want them around later), but the beginning of the game shouldn’t have hulks, shocker brutes, necromancers, masters, feral predators, etc., right out of the gate.

A feral predator for a new character is instadeath in the overwhelming majority of cases. Feral hunters at the beginning, if you don’t yet have a decent weapon, are nearly as bad.

Zhilkin:

Map note input popup was always 45 characters long (as far as CataclysmDDA goes)

Then it was disabled for a long time. I started playing just before 0.C came out, and I’ve never noticed a character limit on the map notes, and I’ve used the map extensively. I missed the last couple thousand builds (about year?), but before that…

psyxypher · 2018-02-17T04:49:16.561Z

Well, I can’t say that Shocker Hulks shouldn’t spawn (they aren’t “Evolved” zombies), but any zombie that’s clearly an evolution of another zombie shouldn’t be appearing in the first few days when people are still dying by the millions and being turned into zombies.

Evolved Zombies should only be able to spawn after a decent amount of time in game, because they are, by definition, improvements of designs The Blob has had previously.

I’m not sure how spawns work in this game, but they should be reworked to accommodate that. At least, that’s what I think.

I also think that would shouldn’t be getting updates every single god damned day, but that’s something else entirely.

deoxy · 2018-02-17T18:46:44.063Z

psyxypher:

Well, I can’t say that Shocker Hulks shouldn’t spawn (they aren’t “Evolved” zombies), but any zombie that’s clearly an evolution of another zombie shouldn’t be appearing in the first few days when people are still dying by the millions and being turned into zombies.

Shocker Brutes evolve from shockers, last I checked.

Otherwise, yeah, that’s what was pointing out.

NuG · 2018-02-17T20:44:09.885Z

I did a run a while back where I doubled the evolution rate(made it 8.0 instead of 4.0, I think it was), but I’m pretty sure that some evolved monsters still showed up pretty early. I’m not sure exactly how it all works unfortunately, but I came to the conclusion that some evolved enemies would spawn early/right away, just not as many as if it were later in the game. This was just an observation though, and I didn’t know whether it was supposed to be that way or not.

I stay at the default 1.0 spawn rate nowadays and there seem to be plenty of enemies, especially at places like schools, malls, and mega-stores. When I (V)iew the monsters around me at those places, or when driving through the middle of a town, I’m pretty sure I have to scroll down the list to see them all.

Is there a flag or something in the code that one of us could look at to see whether they are available to spawn at the start or not?

@psyxypher… You don’t have to update the game everyday if you don’t like the updates, right? You could always do what deoxy is choosing to do and use an earlier build, stick with it, and wait for 0.D or wait to update once you feel the game is at an sufficient build for you.

edit:

psyxypher:

in the first few days when people are still dying by the millions and being turned into zombies.

Also, I thought we started 5 days after widespread zombie outbreak and 2 days after 99% of the population had already died off.

psyxypher · 2018-02-17T23:04:21.133Z

NuG:

… You don’t have to update the game everyday if you don’t like the updates, right? You could always do what deoxy is choosing to do and use an earlier build, stick with it, and wait for 0.D or wait to update once you feel the game is at an sufficient build for you.

It’s less about that, and more about the fact that a lot of bugs tend to pop up because of the frequent updating. I mean, I already don’t update that often, so I’m fine, I guess.

deoxy · 2018-02-18T05:34:52.889Z

NuG:

I did a run a while back where I doubled the evolution rate(made it 8.0 instead of 4.0, I think it was), but I’m pretty sure that some evolved monsters still showed up pretty early. I’m not sure exactly how it all works unfortunately, but I came to the conclusion that some evolved enemies would spawn early/right away, just not as many as if it were later in the game. This was just an observation though, and I didn’t know whether it was supposed to be that way or not.

As I said, that has to do with the way spawns are generated. Spawning a hulk takes 16 “points” or whatever, while a regular zombie takes 1 (note: I don’t remember the exact number, this is just for example), so when there’s a LOT of zombies to spawn, instead of spawning all of them, in some instances, it starts dropping higher level ones, instead (somehow, this doesn’t seem to happen in hospitals, malls, or home improvement super-stores… could we just have that rule apply EVERYWHERE for the first game day?).

At least, that’s how it was explained to me by one of the devs long ago.

BorkBorkGoesTheCode · 2018-02-18T06:37:12.912Z

Both malls and home improvement superstores use GROUP_MALL, quoted below:

  {
    "name": "GROUP_MALL",
    "type": "monstergroup",
    "default": "mon_zombie",
    "replace_monster_group": true,
    "new_monster_group_id": "GROUP_ZOMBIE_MID",
    "replacement_time": 14,
    "monsters": [
      { "monster": "mon_zombie", "freq": 100, "cost_multiplier": 1 },
      { "monster": "mon_zombie_fat", "freq": 30, "cost_multiplier": 1 },
      { "monster": "mon_zombie_cop", "freq": 10, "cost_multiplier": 2 },
      { "monster": "mon_zombie_child", "freq": 20, "cost_multiplier": 1 },
      { "monster": "mon_zombie_crawler", "freq": 10, "cost_multiplier": 1 }
    ]
  },

Zanos · 2018-02-18T07:44:16.142Z

deoxy:

For one, shady zombies can see in the dark really well, so night time sucks HARD in the early game

Yeah, still not sure that I like this change. Shady zombies aren’t exactly rare even on day 1 with normal spawns, which makes night raiding on day 1 even more RNG than it was before, but there really wasn’t ever a good way for a starting survivor to raid during the day.

NuG · 2018-02-18T13:06:52.380Z

Ah that’s good to know, thanks deoxy & BBGTC.

Is it possible to start the game with the “classic zombies” option on, and then turn that off after a certain amount of time? Not sure if that would work or not, or achieve exactly what you want, though.

kevin.granade · 2018-02-18T15:26:12.910Z

NuG:

Is it possible to start the game with the “classic zombies” option on, and then turn that off after a certain amount of time?

Yes, and i think that might actually give you what you want, except evolution will be rather sudden when you turn it on.

NuG · 2018-02-19T15:01:12.044Z

Well how about that @deoxy, maybe try that?

Serkas · 2018-02-19T21:46:29.680Z

You can turn of “classic only” later on in a running game? Just by disabeling the option in the game menu or do I have to do savegame editing?