Zombie Evolution: Suggestions/Ideas thread

[Valpo]

If we had a hygiene system id opt for it to be a comfort hazard.

still covered in goo? moral –

Yet thats a whole nother suggestion which has been done before.

uh my thoughts are traveling far of.

I see people complaining even more about beeing perma infected by the flu. Which some already do.
look at all the omg i has the flu 95% of my play time.

With a new disease system for flu and the like maybe… currently i dunno how it would work nicely.
Well i don t see but you can elaborate on it.

[Sgtanarchy]

[quote=“Valpo, post:41, topic:9544”]If we had a hygiene system id opt for it to be a comfort hazard.

still covered in goo? moral –

Yet thats a whole nother suggestion which has been done before.

uh my thoughts are traveling far of.

I see people complaining even more about beeing perma infected by the flu. Which some already do.
look at all the omg i has the flu 95% of my play time.

With a new disease system for flu and the like maybe… currently i dunno how it would work nicely.
Well i don t see but you can elaborate on it.[/quote]

Was just a small idea, but I shall elaborate. If a boomer bile’s you, there could be a small chance of catching the flu, like a 5% chance or something similar. Of course this could be limited only to huge boomers. And it is perhaps balanced by the fact that taking a flu shot makes you immune to the flu, so until you find one, the huge boomers pose a more irritating threat. No need to implement a new hygiene system of anything. Just a chance for the bile to give you the flu.

While we’re here though, why not the option for boomer huge boomer bile to suddenly harden when you’re covered in it, and if it does so, it locks you in place, and you have to break free, just like you have to do to get free from rubble. Just idea’s though. Not saying these need to become a thing or anything like that.

[Snaaty]

Boomers infecting you with diseases is a fun idea, but I’d rather have them infect the survivors with something more orginial than the flu. We could make up several new different diseases with different penalties and different treatments. Just it giving you the flu is not very falvorful, imho.

[Pthalocy]

Ugh, I can’t remember where the idea came up previously, nor how badly it was shot down.

Would be interesting for one ‘upgrade’ zombie to go after tainted meat or dead zombie corpses and consume them. (maybe not completely, maybe it ‘eats’ the corpse but the parts just become damaged instead of destroyed. Already-pulped zeds would be ignored.) This could cause them to gain extra attacks or something more interesting than my creativity permits at this time. Ideally, I’d like the sort of logic that happens when presented with a field of dangerous enemies and a medic. The medic is less hostile directly, but is a priority target. I guess the difference there is the medic situation just sustains the bigger threats, while this guy would become a bigger threat if you focused on the nearest zombies attacking you first.

Cannibal zombie would make you consider order of fights in a manner besides ‘fastest or nearest first’. The shrieker zombies accomplish this too, at least until they get that first scream off. I like this need to consider how to approach combat. It adds thought.

It’d have to act in a way so as not to eat a ton of stuff far outside of your range, so it doesn’t just become an electric boomerloo hulkerwoky offscreen or some bullshit.

Apologies if this is already ingame somehow and I’ve been living under a rock hiding in the forest this whole time I’ve been gaming.

[Cat09]

bionic zombies - have semi-random bionics (some faulty)
bionic survivor’s zombie - self explanitory
bionics harvester - finds and installs all bionics it can, uses them to great effect, generates a degree of it’s own power. very dangerous loot pinata

[Logrin]

Some ideas for different goo for boomers

*Sticky Goo: Leaves behind ‘sticky’ terrain that is very difficult to traverse/doesn’t go away like spitter acid. Getting goo’ed directly hugely encumbers a random bodypart

*Sleepy Goo: The boomer was a codeine fiend or opium junky in life, getting goo’ed gives you the tired flag. Stacks.

*Conductive Goo: Getting goo’ed amplifies the damage you take from electrical sources.

Goo could have passive debuffs that stay until you take a swim, get rained on enough to be miserably wet or towel/soap off. Like just feeling gross or being extra smelly for regular boomers. As well what if blood, guts gore and especially boomer goo obstructs vision when it gets on vehicle parts? We could include windshield wipers!

Also, for upgraded zombie dogs/animals how about a ‘latches on’ buff to their bites? So that if a dog manages to bite you but can’t get through the armor they encumber the part they bit.

Or stationary water zombies that try to reel you into pools and drown you. Even just the chance for basements to be flooded would be fine

[Rivet]

*Sticky Goo: Leaves behind ‘sticky’ terrain that is very difficult to traverse/doesn’t go away like spitter acid. Getting goo’ed directly hugely encumbers a random bodypart

I like this one a lot.

Goo could have passive debuffs that stay until you take a swim, get rained on enough to be miserably wet or towel/soap off. Like just feeling gross or being extra smelly for regular boomers. As well what if blood, guts gore and especially boomer goo obstructs vision when it gets on vehicle parts? We could include windshield wipers!

I’ve thought this would be a cool idea for some time. Also, smooshing enough normal zeds could coat your windscreen with enough gore that seeing through it would be difficult.

Also, for upgraded zombie dogs/animals how about a ‘latches on’ buff to their bites? So that if a dog manages to bite you but can’t get through the armor they encumber the part they bit.

This idea is great! I really like it.

Or stationary water zombies that try to reel you into pools and drown you. Even just the chance for basements to be flooded would be fine

Rusalka-zeds? It’s a rather cool idea.

[Pthalocy]

Ugh, shit, those ARE good ideas. Again, making you consider your options in combat rather than bottleneck shit or rush it. But terrain driven! I LIKE IT.

[Logrin]

Also, we already have zeds that can smash terrain but how about zeds you -wouldn’t- want to bottleneck? Remember how the lizard-style deadly venom gave boosts for being next to a wall/obstructive terrain? I could see crawling zombies upgrading into wall crawlers…

That or a flavor of crawler that’s basically a living land-mine.

Also, I think allot of the ease of melee is that there really isn’t any enemy out there that can block/dodge or counter-attack you. Bio-operator slam not withstanding.

[joxer]

I’ve been playing in the experimental last night with default spawn rate / enemy difficulty / etc settings with the only changed setting being season length ( 90 ) and a different starting season ( Mentioning that for the chance that it’s relevant )

Only seen a handful of “mundane” zombies next to a motel in the woods during the several hours of playtime

So a suggestion about… Difficulty, As cool as all the concepts for each and every of these special zombies are- well.
They don’t all necessarily require mid-game stats to be a thing.

[Coolthulhu]

a different starting season ( Mentioning that for the chance that it’s relevant )

It is actually. Currently season changes the start turn which in turn “ages” the zombies by that number.
This isn’t how it should be, but changing it is far more complex than it sounds. I tried doing that, but didn’t manage to get it all working. I may retry sometime later.

[joxer]

[quote=“joxer, post:50, topic:9544”]a different starting season ( Mentioning that for the chance that it’s relevant )

It is actually. Currently season changes the start turn which in turn “ages” the zombies by that number.
This isn’t how it should be, but changing it is far more complex than it sounds. I tried doing that, but didn’t manage to get it all working. I may retry sometime later.[/quote]

Yes i’ve had such hunch seeing as my characters had all survived 90 days more than they have on the death screen ( if starting during the summer ) & etc

Good luck with that

On a similar note, I’ve noticed a new world-gen setting called “construction scaling” when i first started the new experimental
Didn’t quite understand what it does based on the description provided >_>

[Logrin]

I’ve got one for zombie children and boy is it a humdinger! It came to me when a bunch of the horrible little tykes clung to me in real life like a pack of rhesus monkeys.

What if upgraded zombie children (clingers) latched onto other zombies to increase their health and armor–to simulate having to cut through the zombie child before being able to harm the host? On normal zeds it would be a problem but imagine wandering passed a schoolhouse and having the student body latch onto a hulk or shocker brute?

Or how about twitchers and convulsing zombies? These would basically be zeds that gyre around in a state of perpetual seizure (So a constant Elaine dance from Seinfeld) They’d attack with allot of very fast low damage attacks and be difficult to strike in melee (A flag like skeleton’s hard to shoot would be best) The real threat they pose would be from either a death from a thousand cuts whittling down or them bestowing an ‘overwhelmed’ debuff on the player, lowering his dodge skill

Maybe a type of zed that eats fallen zeds? (Zombie Glutton maybe?) Each time it does so you’d get a message saying something like “The zombie glutton assimilates the corpse and grows larger.” If left to clean up a battlefield they’d quickly outpower hulks (Especially if each corpse counted towards their growing armor and HP rating based on what zombie left it) Plant one of these in the midst of a horde and you’re going to need a nuke or high-speed collision to take it on. Since this monster seems pretty end-gamey I’d say take a page out of mortal combat’s book. Remember how Shao Khan would stop to laugh at you, and these freebies gave you time to catch your breath/attack? Well what if every so often zombie gluttens took the time to roar/vomit/otherwise throw a fit? Even when fighting the player? Worth considering I think.

On the topic of monster upgrades, what about the inclusion of ‘alpha fauna’. Because any moose/bear/wolves etc you see far enough into the outbreak are going to be those that can take down their zombified brethren. They’d get special combat moves, like a moose charge.

[vache]

I was thinking you were going to say the upgraded zombie children would try to grab on to the player and weigh them down.

[Pthalocy]

The evil cling-on meatshield idea is friggin’ ingenious. ALL OF THE GUILT.

And your cannibal zombie concept is way more solid than my earlier suggestion. Liking the name too haha, and the potential blarglahrbl moments it may have. Somehow that adds character to something that scares the poop out of me? I don’t know!

[Logrin]

Maybe a zombie that zaps your CBM energy reserves from afar? Immobile due to all its fused lumps of biocircuitry? Makes a ranged touch attack like hollows to leech power from you. Maybe uses it to power-up other cyberzeds like shockers?

Maybe a branch of sewer adapted zeds? Filthy swimmers? Way more likely to give you an infection from bites and scratches? Rolled against environmental protection maybe?

A zombie riddled with broken glass, metal debris and splinters. Chance to bleed when attacked or attacking them with unarmed.

Borrowed from dungeonmens but what about mostlys? Reanimated, but not enough to really call it a whole body. Can squeeze under doors to follow the player.

A zombie thats head is basically all mouth now. Really high armor penetration value to its bite. Snapper zombie maybe?

Smogger, smoker zombie with much larger radius. The smoke it puffs out raises body temperature so you shouldn’t remain in it for long.

We have a stamina system now, how about zeds or special attacks that drain it? “The brute knocks the wind out of you!” “The grabber chokes you!” etc.

Upgrade to bio operators - Phantom operators. Basically the same thing but with malfunctioning optic camouflage. It flickers in and out causing them to ‘dither’ from sight every so often. You’d need post-human perception or infrared goggles counteract it reliably, or antenna. If they attack you while cloaked it’s extra effective.

[joxer]

So much hate for Melee survivor it seems, How about more skeletal foes instead? :F
a riot (cop) zombie with a special kind of CBM that’d shoot out a smoke grenades when he’s shot?

The zombie Zombie Glutton/cannibal
sounds fictional, especially the raw stat increase. if anything… i’d expect shoving more weight down one’s dysfunctional rotting stomach would only slow it down
Could be a part all the explody fatties - kind of zombie tho, The mechanic does sound rather fun
Would also a lovely substitute to having all of the zombies bashing everything in sight

phantom ops- really like this one would be interesting to see this ‘sneak attack’ mechanic implemented as something a player can do aswell.

zombie clingers/children - as hilarious[sub](-ly obnoxious)[/sub] as it may be i can’t help but invision some form of Dead Space infant with tentacles & etc, heh.
How about they’d damage the host overtime and if he died due to the DoT instead your hit the clinger got an enraged/confused buff? heh.

also ‘alpha fauna’ - Hell yes. Not necessarily always hostile, hell i could imagine a herd following them around ( incase of some species ofc, No bear herds pls D: ) aswell.
this is both realistic, logical due to the circumstances & can be expanded to further mechanics ^

[Pthalocy]

sounds fictional, especially the raw stat increase. if anything.. i'd expect shoving more weight down one's dysfunctional rotting stomach would only slow it down

It could also arguably be rescuing estranged goo material from the downed zed. Perhaps this zed becomes oily all over from the absurd quantity of Goo in its system, making it harder to hit (which would fulfill your request for more hard-to-hit skeletal types. Sort of.) Maybe Logrin’s suggestion for the zombie glutton to pause on occasion and throw barfy fits could just be getting rid of the consumed corpses after goo-extraction/rescue?

[joxer]

[quote=“Pthalocy, post:58, topic:9544”]

sounds fictional, especially the raw stat increase. if anything… i’d expect shoving more weight down one’s dysfunctional rotting stomach would only slow it down

It could also arguably be rescuing estranged goo material from the downed zed. Perhaps this zed becomes oily all over from the absurd quantity of Goo in its system, making it harder to hit (which would fulfill your request for more hard-to-hit skeletal types. Sort of.) Maybe Logrin’s suggestion for the zombie glutton to pause on occasion and throw barfy fits could just be getting rid of the consumed corpses after goo-extraction/rescue?[/quote]
I’ve actually changed my mind on the matter, I Think this guy would be a great addition & reference!

[sup]a cookie to the first person who knows the game this is from[/sup]

But it’s still gonna be one the joke mobs imo >_>

[WIndburns]

The next evolution for Zombie Bears… Chairs!