Missing - Presumed Zed

I feel this would be a good addition if/when movable furniture is re-added. Caster wheels are extremely common (shopping carts, beds, office chairs, etc), and adding them to a board wouldn't be a huge project. Put it under a crate and you could have a user-crafted equivalent to the old wheelie bins.

I feel this would be a good addition if/when movable furniture is re-added. Caster wheels are extremely common (shopping carts, beds, office chairs, etc), and adding them to a board wouldn't be a huge project. Put it under a crate and you could have a user-crafted equivalent to the old wheelie bins.

I feel this would be a good addition if/when movable furniture is re-added. Caster wheels are extremely common (shopping carts, beds, office chairs, etc), and adding them to a board wouldn't be a huge project. Put it under a crate and you could have a user-crafted equivalent to the old wheelie bins.

This is a very good point. I remember how tense the game was when I first started playing. Entering a house filled me with a creeping sense of dread, of not knowing what might be behind every corner, or whether that door hides a zombie waiting to lunge at me.
 
That quickly faded as I discovered just how toothless zombies are in this game. I think that realization marked the death of treating my character like the desperate survivor the lore intends as opposed to the battle-hardened badass the game mechanics make him into. My last several playthroughs have been knife-only runs because it's at least slightly dangerous (although safely getting the jaw stab 100% of the time is child's play if you've ever played a parry/riposte build in Dark Souls).
 
I would love for looting to feel as tense as it did as a newbie again. A simple tweak that would help immensely here is to make 'e' actions reset your weapon timer and temporarily slow you. Right now you can charge your melee weapon and open a door while backing away, making hidden zombies a non-threat. If opening that door slowed you and made you lower your weapon (you did have to grasp the doorknob after all), suddenly things have become much more dangerous.
 
And as Akiruu said, more indoor zombies with better hiding please. Zombies can't open doors by default and hiding at home should have been common in such an apocalypse, so why are most houses completely empty with their curtains open?

That's one of the changes I'd like to see, Moose. Right now, I just ignore farming for that reason -- not only does it effectively win the game, it's annoying to have to baby carrots.

The approach to make the game as realistic as possible is admirable, and it does often add more than mere flavor. It's cool if the players get the feeling that they would (sort of) have a chance in a real life apocalyptic situation if they were doing the same things as in the game, and vice versa: Once you are comfortable with the controls and UI you get to use real logic and survival skills to survive, without having to deal as much with weird game logics.

 

But we know that we play a game and we should accept some decrease of realism if it makes the game play more fun, right? So what Im saying is that the ability to plant crops to survive is fun, and it should be hard to get it right sometimes, but I don't want to play a farming-simulator 70% of the game time because the more thrilling aspects of game play have died down after the first in-game month. Im not saying that’s how the game is now (I wouldn’t know because I haven’t tried farming), but some talk in this thread about how to make farming more realistic doesn't really float my boat. For me, the fun Endgame lies in constant or near constant threat; 

in the: "We’re safe for now” *wiping sweat from brow*

as opposed to: ”We’re safe for all eternity” *planting some potatoes*

 

The reason for all the realism must be to make game play fun.

Hey guys, first post here. Please forgive my bad english, it's not my first language. I think everyone is missing the point entirely - it doesn't matter if the "official" survival difficulty is harder, if there is a beginner mode, or whatever. The only sure way to please everyone is to have very detailed game customization options, so everyone gets their cup of tea.  It's obvious that each person wants a different thing for the game (as it should be). Some want to feel like their lives hang by a thread every single second; others want to get a sense of progression and feel that they can make their way with enough effort and skill. Some don't care if realism is thrown out of the window for the sake of difficulty, and others feel the other way around. And, I think, most people want their own personal middle ground somewhere between the extremes. What I humbly think that could address all concerns is making more aspects of the game customizable in Sandbox Mode - let each person play the game like they want to. Set sliders for food spoilage, zombie horde strength and behavior; enable, disable, and set difficulty levels for things like food preservation, refrigeration, fishing, loot respawn, overall survivor behavior... Stuff like that. I could make a huge list! That would not just make Project Zomboid tailored for every player, but would also make each new game a different, unique experience each time you play it. It would make the game live longer for everyone. 
Some may argue that more customization sliders would bring more complication to the game; but those customizations are optional - you can still play your preset beginner or survival difficulties without picking any variables. 
 Also, the devs should take into account that not everyone plays multiplayer (I do, actually, with a small group of five), and if "classes" are too specialized, lone survivors wouldn't have a very fun game.  I agree some specialization would add up to the game (it's nice to depend on your friendly medic to heal, your creative chef to cook, your violent serial killer neighbor to whack the zeds around the base), but people playing in single player shouldn't feel like they are one trick ponies.  TL;DR: Don't alienate part of your player base by setting fixed game variables - make those, well, variable. All of those, way more than sandbox allows now. Let we decided how deadly or realistic our version of undead Knox County is going to be.

That's just trading difficulty for boredom, and also entirely against the "players shouldn't be surviving for several months" concept this whole thread is about.
 
Upon further reflection, I think the real problem in the current version is that there are entire basic game mechanics that reward not doing anything. Right now we have four main sustenance routes:
Farming: safe, somewhat reliable once you know the system, and produces a truly ridiculous amount of food if you focus on it. The downsides are the arcane rules, that it's mind-numbingly boring and requires constant tedious busywork, and finally that it rewards players for sedentary behavior instead of actually taking risks and having fun. So yeah, not a fan of farming in its current form. Trapping: not as safe as farming as the traps must be placed in unoccupied areas, but as a consequence it's not as boring either. The randomness and lack of feedback as to why a trap isn't working are probably my biggest gripes with it right now. Fishing: I haven't played around with this one much, but it's fairly easy to comprehend without a wiki (unlike the prior two) and even an unskilled character can survive on a few good catches. It also puts you in a bit of danger as you'll have to relocate occasionally and you are vulnerable while fishing, but since the area around the river is free of obstacles and thus easy to keep clear, you'd almost have to be trying to get caught by a zombie. Looting: the most dangerous and unpredictable route (and honestly the most fun), this is the only gameplay mechanic that forces you to leave your comfortable base for extended periods of time. It leads to interesting encounters (dealing with the weather, zombie hordes, other players, and eventually NPCs; all in unfriendly and uncharted territory) and allows you to obtain loot other than food. I consider looting the heart and soul of Project Zomboid's gameplay, but a lot of players stop doing it once they have the tools to reach self-sufficiency. More game mechanics that kept it relevant in the end-game would be very welcome. (-ish) Foraging: Not really a valid food gathering method since AFAIK you can't find enough early on to sustain yourself, but it's a good supplement to the others in a pinch. It's also moderately dangerous (zombies in the woods, man!). All in all a good addition to the game.

This is a very good point. I remember how tense the game was when I first started playing. Entering a house filled me with a creeping sense of dread, of not knowing what might be behind every corner, or whether that door hides a zombie waiting to lunge at me.
 
That quickly faded as I discovered just how toothless zombies are in this game. I think that realization marked the death of treating my character like the desperate survivor the lore intends as opposed to the battle-hardened badass the game mechanics make him into. My last several playthroughs have been knife-only runs because it's at least slightly dangerous (although safely getting the jaw stab 100% of the time is child's play if you've ever played a parry/riposte build in Dark Souls).
 
I would love for looting to feel as tense as it did as a newbie again. A simple tweak that would help immensely here is to make 'e' actions reset your weapon timer and temporarily slow you. Right now you can charge your melee weapon and open a door while backing away, making hidden zombies a non-threat. If opening that door slowed you and made you lower your weapon (you did have to grasp the doorknob after all), suddenly things have become much more dangerous.
 
And as Akiruu said, more indoor zombies with better hiding please. Zombies can't open doors by default and hiding at home should have been common in such an apocalypse, so why are most houses completely empty with their curtains open?

Hi Guys! Long time player here from pre 1.5d days!
 
Here are some of my suggestions to kill us more: (btw i def agree that the "kill us first" philosophy is the correct direction to go in for PZ endgame!)
 
1. Decrease weapon damage and durability. I played a bit a few days ago on normal mode and killed 98 zeds with one unmodded bat in one continuous killing spree during the 1st few mins of a new game with no skills allocated & no traits. I felt the bat should have broken maybe around 30-60 zeds. Perhaps 3 hits min to kill a zed for an unskilled person? No idea - just seem too easy to play L4D style at the moment. At least make us have to carry 2 bats or constantly be worried about duct taping it up during fights to keep us on our toes. You could even make it more hardcore and give us a chance to drop the bat or a zombie knock it out of our hands, forcing us to use our secondary weapons. Probably make a skill to not be disarmed so easy :]
 
2. Stamina System: Killing 100 zeds with a bat in one go is superhuman imo, esp for a new char. Things like the Exhaustion Mod/Passing are onto the right idea.
 
3. Better Zombie Footwork and Balance: Most zeds got knocked to the ground in one blow from my bat. Please give them better balance, because its almost mechanical killing them. ATM: 1 swing to ground them, 1 swing to pound them. 
 
4. Tougher Combat: I loved the changes in 2.0q (i think it was q?) that added growing and shrinking circles that simulated our accuracy for melee and guns. Maybe return this as a Hardcore option - Like Hardcore Reload, but for melee? How about axes getting stuck in zombies and we need to "pull it out" - that could create tense situations. Getting  "stuck" should be a big problem with edge weapons imo. And blunt weapons should be more tiring to balance - with longer recovery times after swings. 
 
5. Medicine and Antibiotics: I know you guys are working on this as well. But make scratches and other injuries have a high chance to get infected unless we use disinfectant and antibiotics. This would force us into making dangerous looting runs into zed filled areas to seek medicine. Deep lacerations should require we stitch up wounds as well to stop bleeding - it should be more effective if a friend/npc sews u up. 
 
6. More Jump Scares/Zed corpses indoors/Less Speed Looting: Right now i can break a window, loot a fridge, and be out of there before alarm draws a horde or even the indoor zeds eat me. Looting a house is one of the scariest parts of a zombie movie! Its dark, its unknown terrain, and there could be zeds anywhere!  Maybe have more zed corpses all over indoors slumped against walls and in hallways. We cant run in and speed loot since they may reanimate, so we need to slow down. More curtains so we cant peek in and know the lay of the land and zed numbers, and make it way way way darker indoors (At least for some houses/bldgs) so we need to use a light source). 

Anyways love the game! Keep up the good work Indie Stone - you guys are my fav devs by far!

These are my thoughts exactly, especially if an established player safehouse attracts NPCs looking to raid or team up (with all the drama that entails).
 
I'm not complaining about OFLGBKYBYGT - the difficulty increase is welcome and a lot of the mentioned plans are long-requested additions - but NPCs should disrupt the status quo more than any other tweak you could make. Although the reintroduction of hordes is a close second. 

These are my thoughts exactly, especially if an established player safehouse attracts NPCs looking to raid or team up (with all the drama that entails).
 
I'm not complaining about OFLGBKYBYGT - the difficulty increase is welcome and a lot of the mentioned plans are long-requested additions - but NPCs should disrupt the status quo more than any other tweak you could make. Although the reintroduction of hordes is a close second. 

In case you haven't seen it yet, one of the greatest survival games of all time is currently on steam greenlight:
 
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=249428292