tzaeru

Possibly same cause as here: "Someone in PZ Discord suggested that this may have happened if the server was closed with Ctrl-C instead of `quit`. Ctrl-C is indeed the way I've been shutting the server. If this is indeed it, PZ really should react to SIGINT gracefully. Closing software via Ctrl-C is standard." Though, still a bit weird that zombies would respawn in buildings that were already cleared, while all dead zombies are still on the ground as before.

Possible cause: Someone in PZ Discord suggested that this may have happened if the server was closed with Ctrl-C instead of `quit`. Ctrl-C is indeed the way I've been shutting the server. If this is indeed it, PZ really should react to SIGINT gracefully. Closing software via Ctrl-C is standard.

When the server is restarted to e.g. apply some setting changes, zombies have a habit of respawning/redistributing, including inside buildings. After restart our bases, even when completely shut off, typically have 2-3 zombies inside them. One thing I was wondering about if the population on the cell actually respawns or if it is just randomly redistributed?

So yeah. Every item that was indoors inside specific crafted containers (at least Metal Crate and Wooden Crate) was lost on server restart. Random junk respawned in to replace the items previously within. Quite a lot of effort went into stockpiling these crates with canned foods, car repair supplies, construction supplies etc. Stuff in crafted bookcases was not lost and stuff in these type of containers when the containers were outdoors was not lost. We did not modify loot settings and we don't run mods. This was on a dedicated server.

Getting bunch of java.lang.IllegalStateException: Keyboard must be created before you can query key state at org.lwjgl.input.Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.java:406) at zombie.iso.IsoCamera.update(IsoCamera.java:119) at zombie.ai.states.ClimbOverFenceState2.enter(ClimbOverFenceState2.java:75) at zombie.ai.StateMachine.changeState(StateMachine.java:48) at zombie.ai.states.ClimbOverFenceState.execute(ClimbOverFenceState.java:108) at zombie.ai.StateMachine.update(StateMachine.java:130) at zombie.characters.IsoGameCharacter.update(IsoGameCharacter.java:9837) at zombie.characters.IsoZombie.update(IsoZombie.java:1767) at zombie.iso.IsoCell.ProcessObjects(IsoCell.java:1353) at zombie.iso.IsoCell.update(IsoCell.java:4662) at zombie.iso.IsoWorld.update(IsoWorld.java:2589) at zombie.gameStates.IngameState.update(IngameState.java:1273) at zombie.network.GameServer.main(GameServer.java:694) as well. Also, java.lang.NullPointerExceptions start with all zombies disappearing after the server's been on some minutes, though this might be due to one of the mods. Currently disabling and enabling them one by one to find the potential culprit!

Dedicated server doesn't seem to be updated properly. Still getting 35.11 instead of 35.12. Tried a reinstall too.

Been hoping for sleep in multiplayer for a long time now. As with the OP, I almost solely play with my spouse and frankly, the lack of sleep as a game mechanic makes the game too easy and streamlined. You can literally just stay on an endless looting spree, only using your base to dump stuff off and then run out again. Since you don't get fatigued, running almost non-stop is not an issue. I did look into if something like this could be modded in, but with speeding up the time the resulting sync issues seemed a little difficult to handle. Minecraft-like sleeping would be awesome. Have it disabled by default and let small servers enable it. I do believe this is in "things we'll eventually do" list. EDIT: Yup, "sleep in multiplayer" is on the list

I really wish there'll also be a SP-style sleep system, where time accelerates when everyone is at the bed at the same time. This is the perfect system for small groups of people, who play together as a squad on their own private server. I'm not sure how large a marketshare these people really are, but at least for me, it's pretty much the only way how I play. Having a few different, configurable sleep systems wouldn't be a bad idea, even if it's a bit extra work. One general solution could be configuring the duration required for sleep (for private servers it can be full-time, for public servers it can be 10th of the normal time) and if time acceleration happens when everyone's in the bed at the same time.

I suppose the bottom 'issue' here is that PZ wasn't originally designed with multiplayer in mind. Therefore, a lot of the code is based on the premise that there's only a single player. If I'm correct in my assumptions, when multiplayer was implemented, it was basically done in a manner where selected functionality and data was written special synchronization methods for. Done this way, there's no central, authoritative server, but rather each client simply synchronizes their actions and parts of their state to a server which, without much further checking, synchronizes this data to the rest of the clients. While it'd make sense that saves were stored on the server and clients weren't capable of modifying any game data, but merely sent "I leveled up like this, can you do it given that I've actually enough XP?"-message to the server, it's probably quite a lot of work at this point. I'm sure The Indie Stone is pretty well aware of the short-comings of the multiplayer system, but understandably the obvious fixes are not easy fixes. It's not enough that you merely store the player saves on the server and send them to new clients when they connect; You also need to make sure that clients can't claim they can level-up when they don't have the XP for it, need to make sure that clients can't just send any game world coordinate for their position, need to check if the client really killed the 1000 zombies it claims it killed.. A server authoritative system would work better, but it's hard to change to when the code wasn't designed for it. (server-authoritative: a multiplayer client-server set-up, where server maintains all the game world and player information and stimulates what would happen based on client input. For example, client says "I move to left" and server sees a chasm, simulates player falling there and tells the client that "You fell into a chasm and died, sorry pal". client-authoritative: a set-up where server doesn't simulate the whole game world, but mostly synchronizes client input with other clients. For example, client says "I'm now in this and this coordinate", server tells other clients of this, then client sends "This is a chasm, I just took damage and died", then server sends other clients this information. With naive client-authoritative systems, cheating is much easier since client can send anything it wants to send. You can make checks on the server and make checks on other clients, but it gets pretty complicated pretty fast and is never going to be fool-proof)

Well, "start game before infection" and "start game right after first infections" are not the exact same things. But I would imagine that adding a mode such as suggested here would be a lot, a lot and a lot of extra work. While I'm obviously not a developer of PZ, I would imagine that the NPC AI and behaviour routines are currently being built with the premise that the surrounding world is extremely hostile. Rebuilding all this behaviour to accommodate a world where there's no immediate danger, would be a huge bit of work to do! Consider, for example, that the default NPC behaviour in zombie-infested world for meeting a new person is aiming a gun at them. This wouldn't work in a world set to be just after the infestation. All the behaviour for finding a safe house, protecting it and so on would need to be removed and replaced with different set of behaviours for going home, greeting the neighbour and walking down the street to corner store. So from someone's perspective who knows not a bit of PZ code, this idea just seems very impractical to pull through for a small studio. Was it easy to implement, it'd of course be a great addition though. =)

It's just not possible on most OSes natively. Special libraries do exist (at least on Windows), but aren't exactly used often. Mmh yea, I guess the straightforward way of doing it would be a bit complicated with all the direct talk to the input devices. I've ran to a few handy multi-platform libraries for it, but obviously taking any such to use would easily become more work than worth. So it's pretty understandable. ^^

..And now I was informed that split screen has this added, but there's no support for multiple keyboards and mice. That's a shame, I'm so very unused to controllers!

Indeed? Awesome! I didn't see it listed in the "Commonly Suggested Suggestions" thread, so figured it could be a worthy nudge. Well then.. I'll wait, drooling, for it.

Heyas, I mostly play PZ with my spouse, whom I sit right next to. Currently the biggest gripe I have in our multiplayer experience is really the nights and sleeping. The problem is not finding things to do at night per-say, but that with no exhaustion and no requirement to sleep, we can basically make infinitely long looting runs with no need to ever hole up in a temporary safe house to survive through the night. Instead we can just.. Run home, no matter how far it is. We get a lot more done a lot faster than in singleplayer, which makes the game much easier than it should be. Instead of spending time to sleep, we can read up skill books, farm, level up carpentry, et cetera.. This means that the end-result is more than twice the loot, farms and rain barrels when water and electricity go out. With nightlengthmodifier, we can shorten the nighttime, but well -- that merely intensifies the problem of looting runs being too easy and temporary safe houses being generally unrequired. Therefore, it would be absolutely amazing to have an optional, Minecraft-like sleeping option in multiplayer, where you get the standard singleplayer fatigue effect if you don't sleep. In Minecraft multiplayer, the night is skipped ahead when all the players go to a bed at the same time. Otherwise, time advances at the standard pace. While this might not be ideal for public servers, it would be perfect for friends and couples playing together who can cooperate with the sleeping times. By default, the sleeping requirement can just be kept off, so dedicated servers need to not adjust their settings. Alternatively, we could just have a simple, manual way of temporarily speeding up the game in multiplayer when everyone is in bed. I've looked into some modding options, and it does seem that the API for adding exhaustion and modifying server time are there, but the potential issues with syncing and so on make it seem like a very burdensome route to be taking. Thanks for reading!, Tz

To be honest, I actually pirated the game at first. I think it was build 19 or somesuch. Not very long after that, as I came to establish the awesomeness of the game, I promptly bought it.. And then I bought another copy for my spouse. Now I'm pondering on buying a third copy for some random friend.. Hmm.. Alpha or not, it's an awesome game as is and blows all the other current zombie-survival games out of the water! *thumbup* There are other zombie survival games? Hardly any worth even mentioning!