Zombears, Antlered Horrors and the Design Outline

[Joe_Carrot]

“It should be just as possible to lead a slow and careful life in harmony with nature outside the cities as it is to make crazy laser-slinging assaults on superscience labs.”

– From the design outline (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LhNpXGXmkPOxp_cp0-c9G7xqnihwApq-eZSa99exfcU/edit?pli=1)

Is anyone else feeling that the inclusion of so many tough new forest monsters makes ‘living in harmony with nature outside the city’ damn near impossible?

It’s at the point where the second I step foot into a forest area, one or the other of these ultra-tough critters is there and kills me in a few hits. Even with some decent armor and melee weapon, theres no way of dealing with these critters. My closest option is to burn the whole forest down, but thats not exactly ‘harmonious’.

[TinHeadDays]

[quote=“Joe_Carrot, post:1, topic:8836”]“It should be just as possible to lead a slow and careful life in harmony with nature outside the cities as it is to make crazy laser-slinging assaults on superscience labs.”

– From the design outline (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LhNpXGXmkPOxp_cp0-c9G7xqnihwApq-eZSa99exfcU/edit?pli=1)

Is anyone else feeling that the inclusion of so many tough new forest monsters makes ‘living in harmony with nature outside the city’ damn near impossible?

It’s at the point where the second I step foot into a forest area, one or the other of these ultra-tough critters is there and kills me in a few hits. Even with some decent armor and melee weapon, theres no way of dealing with these critters. My closest option is to burn the whole forest down, but thats not exactly ‘harmonious’.[/quote]
A few questions, first off…
What ultra-tough critters are killing you, what weapons are you using, and can you show us a map of the area please?

[StopSignal]

I think the same, abd that’s why he last time I played the game took a really huge difficulty buff. Which is not good.

[Joe_Carrot]

[quote=“TinHeadDays, post:2, topic:8836”][quote=“Joe_Carrot, post:1, topic:8836”]“It should be just as possible to lead a slow and careful life in harmony with nature outside the cities as it is to make crazy laser-slinging assaults on superscience labs.”

– From the design outline (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LhNpXGXmkPOxp_cp0-c9G7xqnihwApq-eZSa99exfcU/edit?pli=1)

Is anyone else feeling that the inclusion of so many tough new forest monsters makes ‘living in harmony with nature outside the city’ damn near impossible?

It’s at the point where the second I step foot into a forest area, one or the other of these ultra-tough critters is there and kills me in a few hits. Even with some decent armor and melee weapon, theres no way of dealing with these critters. My closest option is to burn the whole forest down, but thats not exactly ‘harmonious’.[/quote]
A few questions, first off…
What ultra-tough critters are killing you, what weapons are you using, and can you show us a map of the area please?[/quote]

Well, Zombears and Antlered Horrors. I can usually deal with a Grim Howler or the Zombie Cougar. The weapons I use are just whatever you can make from the shelter: Makeshift Crowbar or Cudgel. It’s just a basic map with all the default settings (http://cl.ly/image/0K3S2r161R0t)

[TinHeadDays]

[quote=“Joe_Carrot, post:4, topic:8836”][quote=“TinHeadDays, post:2, topic:8836”][quote=“Joe_Carrot, post:1, topic:8836”]“It should be just as possible to lead a slow and careful life in harmony with nature outside the cities as it is to make crazy laser-slinging assaults on superscience labs.”

– From the design outline (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LhNpXGXmkPOxp_cp0-c9G7xqnihwApq-eZSa99exfcU/edit?pli=1)

Is anyone else feeling that the inclusion of so many tough new forest monsters makes ‘living in harmony with nature outside the city’ damn near impossible?

It’s at the point where the second I step foot into a forest area, one or the other of these ultra-tough critters is there and kills me in a few hits. Even with some decent armor and melee weapon, theres no way of dealing with these critters. My closest option is to burn the whole forest down, but thats not exactly ‘harmonious’.[/quote]
A few questions, first off…
What ultra-tough critters are killing you, what weapons are you using, and can you show us a map of the area please?[/quote]

Well, Zombears and Antlered Horrors. I can usually deal with a Grim Howler or the Zombie Cougar. The weapons I use are just whatever you can make from the shelter: Makeshift Crowbar or Cudgel. It’s just a basic map with all the default settings (http://cl.ly/image/0K3S2r161R0t)[/quote]
I do agree with StopSignal that forests took a HUGE difficulty boost, (I myself have encountered three Bio-Operatives while hunting in the forest.)
Map seems average, but since I’m assuming you’re new, play on Dynamic Spawn, Slow Zombies, and if you want you can lower zombie spawns and/or Mundane Zombies if your playing on Experimental. This should help alot, but keep in mind that your best chance for surviving early game is to hide in the basement for a few days after scavenging enough food, if Wander Spawns are on. This [should] reduce the amount of zombies in the town, and allow you to scavenage without having to deal with +6000 zombies in a small hamlet town.

[i2amroy]

A lot of this problem is based on the fact that wildlife are still using the dynamic spawn system. The eventual goal is to shift everything over to the static spawn system, at which point you could say, build a wall around your enclosure to keep safe from zombies animals, kill everything in your area to reduce wildlife spawns, etc… It should also probably lead to an overall reduction in larger wildlife numbers, while maintaining smaller ones. As anyone who lives in a forest can tell you, you don’t exactly run into a bear, a moose, and a pack of wolves every time you step into the forest, while you certainly could run into squirrels or birds.

[FrankyPlaysGames]

But then you would run out of things to kill, even squirrels if you eat enough. Any possibility to add procreation in the game, time notwithstanding? It would be kinda nice, bears in cave would have cubs, which grow into bears which can then become zombified. Also puppies and kittens! Zombears are my number one woodsman killer, even if I find a cabin or other structure. I’ll just wake up to a window crashing then fall asleep with two rows of teeth around my throat.
Also, I WANT TAXIDERMY. Go to your favorite specialty store and grab yourself a knife, a needle, thread, and a bear corpse (all conveniently in one aisle) and train both your survival, tailoring, and construction (?) by building a tasteful (or nightmare inducing) mounted display!
Antlered horror? More like antlered hat rack. Speaking of which, where the hell are hat racks/coat stands? What thread am I in again?

[StopSignal]

What about making hostile ultra killer things like zomears and zolves and antlered horrors dinamic and everything else that is a normal thing, even if hostile like a normal wolf, but still normal, dynamical?

[FrankyPlaysGames]

But then zombears and antlered horrors WOULD spawn in your bases and stuff. Perhaps they should work off one another, killing more zombears increases the spawn of normal bears and vice versa, same thing with antlered horrors etc.
Kinda like your purging the fucked up woods. Another way would to make a location that somehow has a lot of fucked up animals.
Animal testing facility anyone?

[StopSignal]

I was meaning static, sorry. The Z-Hostile and Ultra Killer things static, and the normal creatures dinamic.

[FrankyPlaysGames]

That’s what I assumed you had meant, I like that idea a bit more, but perhaps add normal bears to the static spawn portion as well. Fuck those things.

[Eric]

[quote=“FrankyPlaysGames, post:9, topic:8836”]But then zombears and antlered horrors WOULD spawn in your bases and stuff. Perhaps they should work off one another, killing more zombears increases the spawn of normal bears and vice versa, same thing with antlered horrors etc.
Kinda like your purging the fucked up woods. Another way would to make a location that somehow has a lot of fucked up animals.
Animal testing facility anyone?[/quote]

What about a “Dead Forest”?

A forest full of dead trees and zombified animals, with radiation (and maybe wreckage too, to make entering them worth it) all over the place.

[FrankyPlaysGames]

[quote=“Eric, post:12, topic:8836”]What about a “Dead Forest”?

A forest full of dead trees and zombified animals, with radiation (and maybe wreckage too, to make entering them worth it) all over the place.[/quote]
That’s stupid Eric. Completely awful and unoriginal. Not totally cool at all. Wouldn’t even exist in the real life. Dead trees? Pfft. I thought you were better than that. An extra forest tile? I think we have enough dude. Forests and swamps, just like in real life. You totally didn’t one-up my idea. I have a thread about mine, where is yours?

I’m being sarcastic

[StopSignal]

I hope you are being sarcastic, Frank.
Anyways, places where the goo totally hitted could be really cool! Specially around nether portals.

[FrankyPlaysGames]

Yeah I’m being sarcastic. I love that idea so much I’m a little jealous I didn’t think of it myself.

[Burnt_Earth]

Just seconding the static spawn of awful hostile creatures, dynamic spawn of everything else. Forests should still have a lot of moderately dangerous creatures like wolves, regular bears and swamp creatures should be everywhere in swamps.

That said, I think it’d be neat if the odd dangerous creature could rarely dynamically spawn, too, to kinda simulate the jabberwocks and Zombears wandering into your neck of the woods every so often and justify boarding up your windows.

[KA101]

Thing is, you get zed critters when a critter dies and nothing takes care of the corpse. Old-age or non-predator-caused-injury, IOW. So zed critters kinda need to become more common over time. This could be handled by making off-camera (outside the reality bubble) critters make a save v. Zombie every so often, but whether that’s feasible to program is another question.

Non-threatening/carnivorous critters, though, should become less common by the same token: increased predation as predators functionally DON’T die off thanks to rezzing. :-/

Critter replenishment should be a thing too, yeah.

[John_Candlebury]

I say that if we wanted to take biome evolution seriously, Earth would more or less degenerate into giant insect country, its quite likely that giant insect scavengers would completely eat more or less every zombie in the planet (things are not looking that hot for the blob unless it manages to turn every zombie into a brute or hulk) and even then ants could realistically topple the bigger zeds just like they do with spiders and other insects IRL.

Current triffids would likely not fare much better against giant ants (neither would normal forests)

Leaving more or less only the fungus as the serious threat to our dimension.

So I think its better to say screw realistic biome simulation and just land a balance between zombie animals normal animals and interdimensional critters that is fun. I personally like the idea of having dead zones that are infested with zombie animals and have more normal forest retain more or less normal pre cataclysm spawn lists, with the very occasional odd stuff thrown in.

[Burnt_Earth]

[quote=“John Candlebury, post:18, topic:8836”]I say that if we wanted to take biome evolution seriously, Earth would more or less degenerate into giant insect country, its quite likely that giant insect scavengers would completely eat more or less every zombie in the planet (things are not looking that hot for the blob unless it manages to turn every zombie into a brute or hulk) and even then ants could realistically topple the bigger zeds just like they do with spiders and other insects IRL.

Current triffids would likely not fare much better against giant ants (neither would normal forests)

Leaving more or less only the fungus as the serious threat to our dimension.

So I think its better to say screw realistic biome simulation and just land a balance between zombie animals normal animals and interdimensional critters that is fun. I personally like the idea of having dead zones that are infested with zombie animals and have more normal forest retain more or less normal pre cataclysm spawn lists, with the very occasional odd stuff thrown in.[/quote]

I like this idea too, but it should occur over a long period of game time, maybe only check for changes every season. So player actions (or inaction) have an impact on the environment. IT shouldn’t be totally crazy right at the start of the game.

[KA101]

[quote=“John Candlebury, post:18, topic:8836”]I say that if we wanted to take biome evolution seriously, Earth would more or less degenerate into giant insect country, its quite likely that giant insect scavengers would completely eat more or less every zombie in the planet (things are not looking that hot for the blob unless it manages to turn every zombie into a brute or hulk) and even then ants could realistically topple the bigger zeds just like they do with spiders and other insects IRL.

Current triffids would likely not fare much better against giant ants (neither would normal forests)

Leaving more or less only the fungus as the serious threat to our dimension.

So I think its better to say screw realistic biome simulation and just land a balance between zombie animals normal animals and interdimensional critters that is fun. I personally like the idea of having dead zones that are infested with zombie animals and have more normal forest retain more or less normal pre cataclysm spawn lists, with the very occasional odd stuff thrown in.[/quote]

Hmm. Fungus is a threat because it can area-effect infest & convert/kill other critters, I believe. Melee is Not A Good Idea.

Blob can blobify (if not the PC) or Slow (the PC) critters it hits: problem is that there’s very little that can touch giant bees, etc. Presuming the blob’s special is based on physical contact, perhaps a defensive use of the same technique could shift the balance back.

Triffids might not do well in an open-field contest, but at the Grove they’ve got biollantes and their slowing sap attacks. Mobile biollantes might evolve over time to combat the ant menace.