PoshRocketeer

I've made a couple of posts about this as well, two about how the super intense music triggers way too often, such as when there's only a few zombies or you're on a high floor where the zombies can't even see you, and one about how the game needs to allow room for silence to add impact to some of the quiet moments, as right now there is no silence in the soundtrack. Both of them got a react from Pandorea (one of the QA testers who collects feedback), and coupling that with the stuff they've been showcasing in thursdoids, it looks like the dynamic music system is getting a pretty major rework.

Mmh, tasty fluoride poisoning

Also would like to add that frankly, I think the idea of a trait that reduces your stress for killing zombies at ALL is not a particularly strong idea, for the same reasons I mentioned above. You're being rewarded for engaging with one of the most common mechanics in the game, which already rewards you with items and XP. Also never said it had to be all at once, just in a relatively short period of time, leading zombies away could still very much be a part of that. It just seems that if you want to reward someone for killing zombies that they shouldn't be rewarded for every zombie they kill. ALSO don't agree with making Empath +6 either. I would only agree if the game already gave you a stress penalty for killing zomboids and Empath only increased it.

Really don't agree with your assessment of bloodthirsty. If someone is of a similar mindset to a serial killer, in that they enjoy causing pain, it stands to reason that them killing zombies would be boring, maybe even frustrating for them. Think about it from the context of the role that the trait fills, it essentially rewards players for playing like sadists, sadists wouldn't find killing zombies enjoyable for more than a few days when they realize that they don't feel any kind of pain. It would just be work. Additionally, it's a negative trait, it's not supposed to just give you a buff with nothing in exchange for free points. It's give and take, you manage your stress killing zombies by finding other ways to cope or finding an animal or person to kill. They are directly related, and it wouldn't make sense to split them into separate traits. Being sadistic in an apocalypse isn't really a good thing.

I had a similar idea, though I have a few gripes with your chosen implementation: Killing zomboids is the most common activity in the game aside from transferring items between containers and walking, any trait that reduces stress for doing so would need to be WAY more expensive than -4, otherwise it would completely nullify the stress system in its entirety. Additionally, not adding stress when panicked is really silly, as panic would absolutely increase your stress levels just in itself, and you still know that you did it, it's not like your brain just shuts off and you return to consciousness after the fact. People who've killed in self defense while panicking still get traumatized, and people who enjoy killing zombies would still get the satisfaction of actually killing them, and may actually get more satisfaction owing to the feeling of relief after everything is safe and they've calmed down. On top of just not making sense, this would make perks like Agoraphobic, Claustrophobic, and Cowardly even more unbalanced as not only do their downsides diminish over time, but you could completely cancel out the negative side effects of your Empath. Here's what I ended up landing on when I made a post about social traits related to NPCs, there were more but they weren't relevant: 1: Bloodthirsty/Cruel (negative trait, +4), You've always been a little bit twisted, massively reduces stress and unhappiness when harming animals and humans, but gains stress and unhappiness when killing zombies. (the line of logic being that zombies don't react to pain, therefore it's work, not play) Personally I think your stress should go up when panicking and fighting zombies for all characters anyway, as far as I can tell this isn't the case. If you really want a perk that decreases stress from killing zomboids, then here's something that might be a little more balanced: -6, Resolute. Whether duty bound, or just a thrillseeker, you see it as your duty to make the world a safer place. Reduces stress and unhappiness when clearing out groups of zombies. (6+ zombies in a short amount of time, continuing to reduce stress the more you kill in that timeframe which does not refresh upon getting another kill), when that timeframe resets you have to kill another 6+ in that timeframe to refresh the effect. Cost is increased to reflect how powerful this benefit is, and the trigger condition is made a little more elusive, but still very reasonable as zomboids tend to clump in groups of 5-12 on their own. If panic were to naturally increase all character's stress, this would have a similar effect to what you proposd, but it'd be more of a 'push and pull' type of system, where the more you kill the more you counteract the negative effects of panic.

That sounds great on paper, but in practice it's really clunky and ruins the way the combat plays out. You think this is bad? wait until you swing through a zombie to hit the one behind them. THAT is bad. Personally I think you're grossly overstating the issue, in over 1500 hours I hadn't even noticed that it happened until you mentioned it, and even now that I know it can happen, it's still yet to actually come up in gameplay.

The only problem I see with this is a problem that actually comes up in Brutal Handwork, it uses pretty much exactly the same targeting system you proposed for its unarmed attacks, but this can cause an issue where unlike in the vanilla game, where your target will automatically swap to the closest zomboid in that direction mid-swing to adjust for the larger threat, you'll be left striking the zomboid who is standing still in a painstate while another is lunging at you, which can cause some injuries that feel a little unfair, so atm I'm happier with the way it is.

A louisville defense gamemode kind of like a beefed up cabin in the woods where you play with military NPCs would be kind of cool. Imagine if after holding out for 5 days infected civvies start attacking you from behind, and the game just gives you access to progressively stronger guns, the obvious catch being that you can't leave the area and escape. Would be awesome to see some fun little gamemodes added.

Man this is brutal, even by Zomboid's standards.

Isn't that... kind of the point?

Dual-wielding swords is definitely practical, there are loads of old dueling texts and historical documents that detail how it was not uncommon for people to carry 2 different types of weapon, or even 2 of the same. Dual wielding with guns probably shouldn't be included though, if it is, it should be comically bad.

Air conditioning is cool, but going ridiculously in-depth to the point of having to do math just to determine whether or not you can reliably climb up a few sets of stairs without croaking is very much not

We get told pretty explicity that this is the case through the news broadcasts.

This seems like mod stuff, way too complicated for players to actually have any kind of fun with.

So uh, who said we need realistic temperatures?

I suspect that when NPCs are added that the wall will be way too swarmed to do anything, and if you do manage to get close you'll probably get shot.

Expanded a few concepts and made the explanation a little more thorough

It doesn't actually effect how far the zombies hear you from, sadly. It's just an aesthetic difference.

Junkyards almost always have a sliding gate.

Ahh okay, gotcha.

I think that the grouping is meant to reflect a "pack hunting" mentality in its most basic form. The zomboids spread out and disperse in a way that essentially forms a "net" that makes it exceptionally difficult for any prey to move freely in the areas that they inhabit, which to me seems like a very deliberate choice that reflects the nature of the virus/parasite/whateverthefuck. It aims to divide and conquer until nothing is left, essentially. It also offers a challenge unique to other zombie games where survivors have to cut at individual links in this "net" to make the area safe to pass through. Other than that, I agree. Zomboids definitely need to be attracted to one another. It's always seemed really silly to me that one zomboid can notice you without at least the two zomboids it walks past on its way to you taking notice as well. Not saying that discretely pulling individual zombies in a group should be impossible, but it should be a lot harder to just pull one. Not sure what you mean by "narrative hordes", tbh.

I don't think so, to me it feels like a natural progression of what the infection system was already supposed to be. Separated like this it seems complex, but really it just boils down to this: Infections cause pain and fever, infections can get worse or better depending on how the player treats it, traits, and a little bit of luck. If you don't treat the infection, it will get worse and spread. If you don't treat it, it will start to damage your player, and will do more damage if it spreads. You can stop it from dealing damage by treating the wound in a manner conducive to its threat level, or heal infections faster by treating them better than what is strictly necessary. You can use medicines and poultices to deal with symptoms and help them heal faster. If the infection is bad enough you will have to use antibiotics or it just won't heal. When you take all of the numbers away it really isn't much more complicated than what we had before, where infections made you heal slower. We're not dealing with specific types of bacteria and different antibiotics for every kind of infection, just a generalized system that makes infections actually matter. EDIT: I misread, yeah it would definitely be a little complex to implement now, though I do hope that they add something along these lines. Something not too complex but complex enough to have an impact.

I'm fully inclined to disagree. The zomboids in PZ absolutely do not feel pain, when you hit them, they jerk back from the force but in no way do they react anything like a living victim would. Serial killers, for example, tend to enjoy inflicting misery. This is pretty well exemplified when you listen to people like John Wayne Gacey speak. What misery is there to inflict on something that just doesn't feel and doesn't care about any kind of punishment you deal? Sure, you can blast its ribcage out, but it won't really effect the zomboid, they'll just get up and keep walking like nothing happened, or lay there with a dumbfounded look on their face and not really react at all, I imagine that'd be quite boring for someone in the business of inflicting pain. Even animals would be more reactive, I just don't feel comfortable encouraging the harming of animals via a trait outside of maybe the Hunter trait. Coupling this with the fact that it's not intended to be a positive trait, I stand by my original explanation. From a gameplay perspective even a positive trait that just gave you stress reduction for interacting with one of the most common activities in the game aside from walking is just broken overpowered. Maybe as a positive trait it could give you reduced stress from fighting zomboids, but right now I don't think fighting zomboids stresses you out unless you're indoors. You know what you can get from Joe Schmoe that you can't get from a zomboid? Kicking, screaming, begging for their life, flailing and trying to act with self preservation, and a tangible reaction to your actions as opposed to it just trying to walk at you. TL;DR, Killing zomboids is work, not play,

This is a super old post, but the idea is that people who are bloodthirsty are usually in it for the reaction they get from their victim. To them, killing zombies would probably just feel like work more than anything, and I doubt they'd get much out of it.

I believe there is the intention of adding vehicle interiors to things like trailers, so you may just get your wish.