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Starting with AI Survivors


Syntaxpiggum

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Well now. It's another day for me, and I had an idea I would like to share.

I would like to say this: If anyone mentions that NPC's aren't released yet - yes, I know this, I know this and I know this already. This is for when they eventually are released. (;

 

What if, at the beginning of the game/character creation screen, we could choose if we wanted to start with other survivors we could customise to our hearts extent (using the current character creation options)

 

Perhaps then, you could choose what kind of relationship you have with that person (work colleague, family, married, friends, etc) that strengthens how well you get along with that person... like a bolster in relations that makes it harder to piss them off, or if they like you in a survival group.

 

This sounds like it could be fun, right? Like a kate and baldspot kinda thing?

 

Leave your thoughts, extensions, questions, etc. c:

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This is a great idea. I would like to add that if your partner dies, depending on you relation it would affect you in different ways. Like if its your work mate you would not be to sad, if its your girl/boy friend you would be devastated, and if you were married your character starts thinking of suicide ( ab it dark i know, but thats probably what would happen.)

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This is a great idea. I would like to add that if your partner dies, depending on you relation it would affect you in different ways. Like if its your work mate you would not be to sad, if its your girl/boy friend you would be devastated, and if you were married your character starts thinking of suicide ( ab it dark i know, but thats probably what would happen.)

I like the thinking, as there definitely should be something to indicate the feelings of a loss of a person you were close too - not just for people you start with, but for people you've grown accustomed too as well.

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This has been suggested a bunch of times. Generally speaking, I'm afraid that it would be much too powerful an option to have. Not without nerfing the idea of it in some way. Otherwise there'll be no point at all in not starting with friendly survivors in your group. It'd be too much of an advantage to pass up.

 

I like the possibility of including it as an option, but making it so that anyone you started with would have something about them that makes surviving difficult in one way or another. A sibling who is a complete asshole, making it harder to join up with survivors later on down the line. A spouse who is horribly injured and will need a significant amount of time to recover before being useful. A group of people who all fucking hate each other and getting them to work together on anything is next to impossible.

 

If you include something like that, it would maintain the feasibility of deciding to go it alone yourself since the hassle of starting with people could outweigh the benefits.

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<SNIP>

 

Well actually, there would be no reason to nerf it.

People play the game to survive - if people find it easier and more comfortable to survive in a group, why should we stop them?

If people want it harder, they still can have no starting AI.

 

 

The idea of starting with NPC's that you can optionally customise their appearance and your brief history might make the players who are in it to play visionarily/romantically (as opposed to mathematically) feel more involved. Plus, the gameplay mechanics of moving from group to group, each one's demise more gruesome than the last, actually has a lot of replay value despite an otherwise limited start. It'd be on the level of those other games where you stand with a colleague near a water cooler and tell your stories of surviving with 8 somewhat depressingly abstinent playboy models.

 

The idea is that, eventually, like everyone else, they will die if the slightest thing goes wrong (as always), and then you move on to the next group and do it all over again.

Or go slightly deranged and live in as a hermit in the middle of the woods for the rest of your life.

 

And yeah, sure, there is more firepower involved when you have a small group, but that's just one element of the survival picture. A small group would need more food, more water, attract more attention, etc. It's not solely an overpowering factor. Especially with head-shot deaths coming in the future. A lone wolf stalker could tactically quickly eliminate members of a group at opportune times adding to chaos and confusion of the group.

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I don't agree with any of that. At all. Having more hands means being able to perform more tasks quickly and easily. One person could be securing the safehouse while another is out looting and still another is setting up the farm or the traps. You start by yourself and your options are limited by your capacity to do stuff at all. You start with friends and family and you can get more done more easily than you could by yourself. Starting with a capable group guarantees long term survival because you'll have people you can trust watching your back. It'll make the game too easy.

 

It's like the perks you select on character creation. You can't just take everything you want for all the advantages you can get and not have any downsides to it. Starting NPC group members should be the same way or else there'll be no point in not starting with them. Positives and negatives. Pros and cons. You must achieve balance for there to be any meaning at all, or else why bother in the first place? If there's no way to balance, what's to stop me from checking every positive listing on the board and just start the game out as the Undisputed God King of Stats and Traits™? Everyone will do it, because it's seen as the most optimal way of playing.

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Because they are nerfing the endgame?

You still have to feed them, and water them, and keep them from obsessively killing each other when you inevitably run out of food or there is a dispute over who gets to read the last magazine?

 

Besides, the game can already be made piss easy in the sandbox options.

What's the most infective way of playing? Making sure power never goes off and water never goes out, and making the zombies all dumbdumbs that barely have to capability to stand during a gentle breeze.

What stops people from doing that?

hint: nothing. People don't do it because a) they wouldn't take the game seriously and b) there's no challenge 

 

There's nothing to lose when you can start with AI. Nothing at all. Starting with 16 perfect human AI's is, sure, seen as 'optimal' (let's just pretend for a moment they are impervious to the endgame nerf), but who's going to do it?

another hint: it's the same problem as the other hint

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Sandbox is sandbox and survival is survival. Just because something can be implemented in sandbox doesn't mean that it should be the de facto baseline for how the main game is to be played. I'm sick of people using that as justification for including something in the main game.

 

Having more people makes the game easier. Too easy. Far far far too easy. If you're by yourself, you have a ton of things to do and not enough time and energy to do it. It's a constant balancing of effort and resources. Do I go set up some traps or do I finish building that wall around my base? Do I secure myself a source of fresh water or do I go out to try and loot some medical supplies in case I get injured? There's too much stuff to do and not enough time and energy for you to do it all easily.

 

But let us say that you start with a group. Maybe four people, yourself and three others. While you're out looting medical supplies, the other three are taking care of other stuff. One guy is setting up the traps. One guy is building the wall. The last guy is building rain barrels. Because of this division of labor, each job is more successful than it would have been if you'd been forced to do it all by yourself. More traps are set and more food is gathered to feed the group. The wall is built, giving everyone a safe place to plant crops, rest and sleep off any injuries being treated by the medical supplies you recovered. No one is thirsty because the person working on the rain barrels was able to build a substantial amount of them because he didn't have to worry about anything but the one job he was assigned. There is a net gain of resources that resulted from working together as a team. A team that gives you an unfair advantage because you started with it.

 

This gives the lone survivor an unfair disadvantage. As such there is no reason for anyone to be a lone survivor. Starting with a group would be seen as the most optimal way of playing the game. Sure, you could find a group later and enjoy all of those benefits, but this comes at a cost. It costs you time to find these survivors. It costs you effort to get them to know you and trust you enough to work with you. It costs you the risk of them deciding to just shoot you and take what little stuff you've acquired for yourself by yourself. Meanwhile the guy that started with a group at no disadvantage to himself is miles ahead in the game because, once again, he started with an unfair advantage.

 

I'm not saying don't start with survivors at all. I'm saying don't make it the default mode of gameplay. Don't make it the only choice that matters. Give it an offset that causes players to rethink the viability of it and maybe opt to start by themselves and form a group from people they find later. It's fair. It's balanced. It's good game design. It gives the player a choice with any pick being equally viable with all the rest, leaving it up to the player to pick whichever one fits their preferred playstyle.

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Now, mind, if the game were more complex (16 people exhaust the game within a few days, run out of fish, crops fail, a survivor goes on a scavenger hunt and never returns .etc), this could work, but until we see just what NPCs are going to be (and whehter they're going to be focused on the player or not), it makes it very hard to judge whether this would be an appropriate addition to sandbox . . .

But yes, I understand the argument is weak when things like abundant loot exist as options if it's considered an addition to sandbox.

I very much doubt an option like this will exist within the main game, though.

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Sandbox is sandbox and survival is survival. Just because something can be implemented in sandbox doesn't mean that it should be the de facto baseline for how the main game is to be played. I'm sick of people using that as justification for including something in the main game.

 

Having more people makes the game easier. Too easy. Far far far too easy. If you're by yourself, you have a ton of things to do and not enough time and energy to do it. It's a constant balancing of effort and resources. Do I go set up some traps or do I finish building that wall around my base? Do I secure myself a source of fresh water or do I go out to try and loot some medical supplies in case I get injured? There's too much stuff to do and not enough time and energy for you to do it all easily.

 

But let us say that you start with a group. Maybe four people, yourself and three others. While you're out looting medical supplies, the other three are taking care of other stuff. One guy is setting up the traps. One guy is building the wall. The last guy is building rain barrels. Because of this division of labor, each job is more successful than it would have been if you'd been forced to do it all by yourself. More traps are set and more food is gathered to feed the group. The wall is built, giving everyone a safe place to plant crops, rest and sleep off any injuries being treated by the medical supplies you recovered. No one is thirsty because the person working on the rain barrels was able to build a substantial amount of them because he didn't have to worry about anything but the one job he was assigned. There is a net gain of resources that resulted from working together as a team. A team that gives you an unfair advantage because you started with it.

 

This gives the lone survivor an unfair disadvantage. As such there is no reason for anyone to be a lone survivor. Starting with a group would be seen as the most optimal way of playing the game. Sure, you could find a group later and enjoy all of those benefits, but this comes at a cost. It costs you time to find these survivors. It costs you effort to get them to know you and trust you enough to work with you. It costs you the risk of them deciding to just shoot you and take what little stuff you've acquired for yourself by yourself. Meanwhile the guy that started with a group at no disadvantage to himself is miles ahead in the game because, once again, he started with an unfair advantage.

 

I'm not saying don't start with survivors at all. I'm saying don't make it the default mode of gameplay. Don't make it the only choice that matters. Give it an offset that causes players to rethink the viability of it and maybe opt to start by themselves and form a group from people they find later. It's fair. It's balanced. It's good game design. It gives the player a choice with any pick being equally viable with all the rest, leaving it up to the player to pick whichever one fits their preferred playstyle.

 

Just a quick thing:

Have you actually played multiplayer in with a group?

Yes, everyone has their assigned roles, many of our roles rely on people actually going back into the world to risk their life.

4 out of 5 times - we don't have enough food to sustain 5 people (even with farms, traps), we don't have enough rain barrels to sustain 5 people, we don't have enough weapons and solely rely on running from place to place, avoiding confrontation.

You're painting surviving in a group as much easier than it actually is. It isn't. It's hard work, and 4 out of 5 times, it doesn't work at all.

 

That isn't even mentioning what happens when one of us get's caught in a corner in a locked room, surrounded by zombies pounding on every wall. Or when we get lost from each other.

Not that anything like that would happen to an NPC, but they can probably still be cornered and eaten while out, looking for rarer-than-gold garbage bags. 

Now, mind, if the game were more complex (16 people exhaust the game within a few days, run out of fish, crops fail, a survivor goes on a scavenger hunt and never returns .etc), this could work, but until we see just what NPCs are going to be (and whehter they're going to be focused on the player or not), it makes it very hard to judge whether this would be an appropriate addition to sandbox . . .

But yes, I understand the argument is weak when things like abundant loot exist as options if it's considered an addition to sandbox.

I very much doubt an option like this will exist within the main game, though.

 

But it's not like people are just going to go

"Yep, let's start with 16 AI survivors :D" - tho I'd imagine that would be fun and chaotic.

 

I can see how this would fit well within the main game, because most of the time you're not going to start with 16 people. You're going to start with 1 - 4, for logics sake. xP

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Just a quick thing:

Have you actually played multiplayer in with a group?

Yes, everyone has their assigned roles, many of our roles rely on people actually going back into the world to risk their life.

4 out of 5 times - we don't have enough food to sustain 5 people (even with farms, traps), we don't have enough rain barrels to sustain 5 people, we don't have enough weapons and solely rely on running from place to place, avoiding confrontation.

You're painting surviving in a group as much easier than it actually is. It isn't. It's hard work, and 4 out of 5 times, it doesn't work at all.

 

That isn't even mentioning what happens when one of us get's caught in a corner in a locked room, surrounded by zombies pounding on every wall. Or when we get lost from each other.

Not that anything like that would happen to an NPC, but they can probably still be cornered and eaten while out, looking for rarer-than-gold garbage bags. 

Yes, I did. Have a couple friends that play it. We had more supplies than we knew what to do with. After a few days of solo scavenging, we met up at our chosen base with enough tools and supplies to last until we could setup the farm and rain barrels. After that we were capable of self sufficiency forever, just about. Had more food than we even needed. Most of the food rotted because we couldn't eat it fast enough and we never ran out of fresh water. And this was before the addition of trapping and fishing. Ended up quitting the game and going back to singleplayer because we had everything we needed and it got boring.

 

You're asking for something that's completely and totally game breaking. There has to be a way to balance out it. Introducing various hindrances and hangups to balance things out is something that needs to be done, or else you shouldn't be able to start with people at all. It's just too much of an advantage. The only way it wouldn't be is if the AI was too incompetent to take care of itself.

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just accept that not everyone will agree with your idea, because that is the reality of making suggestions.

 

myself, i would never opt to start with a group of people. does not interest to me in the slightest.

NPC's when they arrive will be enough of a pain in my butt to try and work with/around, last thing i want is someone i knew before the zombies to worry about when it's already hard enough to keep myself alive now, before The Governor and the plans they have for build 31 and beyond arrive.

 

and yes i do play on a server with some friends....and some people who are only there to grief, steal and start fires.

lead to the main server regulars moving far away from everyone else and making damn sure the other players knew that entering our base will result in a bullet to the face. with 5 of us there, using build 30.6, it is indeed quite easy to survive, even with 3 of us hobbled by fractured legs

 

( if you DO find yourself cornered in a room with zombies all around, that's your own fault for apparently not paying attention to your surroundings and placing yourself in harms way. )

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@kaijn You mean, aside from the already mentioned planned nuke-endgame?

It's not as game breaking as you make it out to be. I've already said this as well, but AI players will never be as smart and dynamic as human ones.


just accept that not everyone will agree with your idea, because that is the reality of making suggestions.

 

myself, i would never opt to start with a group of people. does not interest to me in the slightest.

NPC's when they arrive will be enough of a pain in my butt to try and work with/around, last thing i want is someone i knew before the zombies to worry about when it's already hard enough to keep myself alive now, before The Governor and the plans they have for build 31 and beyond arrive.

 

and yes i do play on a server with some friends....and some people who are only there to grief, steal and start fires.

lead to the main server regulars moving far away from everyone else and making damn sure the other players knew that entering our base will result in a bullet to the face. with 5 of us there, using build 30.6, it is indeed quite easy to survive, even with 3 of us hobbled by fractured legs

 

( if you DO find yourself cornered in a room with zombies all around, that's your own fault for apparently not paying attention to your surroundings and placing yourself in harms way. )

 

I like to live dangerously. (;

 

That being said, disagreeing with a suggestion doesn't make you immune to any replies I might have.

I'm more than accepting of the fact that people will disagree with a suggestion, they should just be ready for a refutation. c:

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Just because an AI character isn't as smart or diverse of ability as a human character would be, doesn't make it useless. They can still hunt. Still fish. Still farm. Still make trips from the base to the town to loot supplies. Still fight and defend. Still be helpful.

 

Starting with an AI character would vastly increase your odds unless, as I said before, the AI is utter shit to begin with. Creating with a disadvantage to counter that advantage is the only reasonable way to balance things out and make the game fair. I have to take a negative trait to balance out any positive traits I take. Why shouldn't that be the same for the positive trait of an NPC companion?

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Just because an AI character isn't as smart or diverse of ability as a human character would be, doesn't make it useless. They can still hunt. Still fish. Still farm. Still make trips from the base to the town to loot supplies. Still fight and defend. Still be helpful.

 

Starting with an AI character would vastly increase your odds unless, as I said before, the AI is utter shit to begin with. Creating with a disadvantage to counter that advantage is the only reasonable way to balance things out and make the game fair. I have to take a negative trait to balance out any positive traits I take. Why shouldn't that be the same for the positive trait of an NPC companion?

 

So we should nerf AI's, even when they are still in the game and surviving as they usually would in other groups?

People are still going to be making groups, and hunting, and fishing, and farming, and still making trips from the base to the town to loot supplies, and still fight and still defend

Why should the player be exempt from all that fun?

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I have no idea what anyone is even arguing anymore.

Having 1-4 survivors that you customize would be an awesomely powerful asset. That's not going to happen for survival, as it'd make survival incredibly easy, even with the tweaks meant to occur in build 31. Just think of it this way: "How much better off would I be with 1 - 4 of me?" and you'll get to "Groovy, baby" rather quickly.

If you want to change your plea to "Create a diverse group of survivors with their own personalities and interpersonal conflicts and varied abilities, enforced by a complex rule set on character creation, meant to prevent you from gaming the system" then sure, in principle maybe I'll agree: that might be a feature that fits the game.

Though personally I've always seen PZ as more of a story of a single individual attempting to survive and overall failing. The whole starting with a group thing just doesn't seem to fit that ideal -- it cuts down the need to ever leave your home, unless the AI is much much more sophisticated than my personal vision of it. (Maybe it will be! It's all speculation until there's something clear-cut from the devs.)

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I'm saying offset the advantage. Starting in a group right from the word go gives the player an advantage a solo starting player wouldn't have. The solo player would still have to go out and find other survivors and build up enough trust to work together as a cohesive unit. This takes time and effort and you don't get to pick and choose who you group with anywhere near as easily if you're literally creating the group you want from scratch. You have to work with the resources you get and they may not be optimal.

 

Having starting group members come with disadvantages and drawbacks acts as a counterbalance to even gameplay out so that no one option becomes the default method of play. Or what would the point be otherwise? Why start with nothing when you can start with everything? Why not check off every tick on that list and become the Undisputed God King of Stats and Traits™? Why not just go to sandbox and make the easiest, most banal game in existence because you dislike the idea of having any disadvantage at all?

 

It's all about balance. Making sure that everything is even. Being tough, but fair. If one option is clearly the better option, then everyone will flock to it. Starting with a group is clearly the better option over going solo and finding a group later. So you break someone's leg or you make them an asshole nobody can get along with. It's something that can be overcome and compensated for, so it's still a viable option, but no more so than it would be if you just went solo.

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I'm saying offset the advantage. Starting in a group right from the word go gives the player an advantage a solo starting player wouldn't have. The solo player would still have to go out and find other survivors and build up enough trust to work together as a cohesive unit. This takes time and effort and you don't get to pick and choose who you group with anywhere near as easily if you're literally creating the group you want from scratch. You have to work with the resources you get and they may not be optimal.

 

Having starting group members come with disadvantages and drawbacks acts as a counterbalance to even gameplay out so that no one option becomes the default method of play. Or what would the point be otherwise? Why start with nothing when you can start with everything? Why not check off every tick on that list and become the Undisputed God King of Stats and Traits™? Why not just go to sandbox and make the easiest, most banal game in existence because you dislike the idea of having any disadvantage at all?

 

It's all about balance. Making sure that everything is even. Being tough, but fair. If one option is clearly the better option, then everyone will flock to it. Starting with a group is clealy the better option over going solo and finding a group later. So you break someone's leg or you make them an asshole nobody can get along with. It's something that can be overcome and compensated for, so it's still a viable option, but no more so than it would be if you just went solo.

Oh I see where the problem now, and I have an idea to offset it.

Random personalities. Randomise their traits, without the player have the specifically pick one. That way, they can get a rough idea of what the person likes and dislikes but not being stuck with them (after all, in real life, you choose who your friends are).

Let's say that, with the current traits system, you can only have about half of them at any one time (since some are mutually exclusive) but I'm oversimplifying it.

Regardless, you can only have about 17 traits for any character. That's anywhere from 289 to 827,240,260,000,000,000,000 (I know that's an extraordinarily large margin of error, but I can't be bothered doing actual maths right now - however, it's much much closer to the former than the latter) possible combinations.

Save the Undisputed God King of Stats and Traits™ trait picking for Sandbox mode, and have the random button for the main game (;

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In survival no, in sandbox hell yes !

If you think its too easy even for sandbox you can make game piss easy right now in sandbox (max loot, exp x500).

I would like the option in the main game too, because even without it there is nothing stopping you from joining a group and being like "well dur I guess I'm of ultimatus magnus now". xP

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In survival no, in sandbox hell yes !

If you think its too easy even for sandbox you can make game piss easy right now in sandbox (max loot, exp x500).

I would like the option in the main game too, because even without it there is nothing stopping you from joining a group and being like "well dur I guess I'm of ultimatus magnus now". xP

 

But a key part of that is "finding" the group, not making and starting with it.

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I don't understand why people just simply can't be content with a sandbox option for this. I don't think anyone is really arguing for putting this in survival.

 

All I want is zombie cams back after you die and get infected. If I get that then the world will shine down on me with a ray of glorified awesomeness. (No, I'm not dropping this. lol) I will give Lemmy a nice big kiss and everything.  (fedora)

 

Back on topic (sorry for straying). Seriously, sandbox is the way to go for this suggestion. Please just understand that I think the devs have left survival as their little play ground. They want to build the game of their (and my) dreams while still making everyone else happy. The sandbox is for the making everyone else happy part. So when you make suggestions like this if you suggest it for sandbox then I'm sure everyone would be content. I think both sides of the argument are good but ultimately unnecessary. This is a wonderful idea for sandbox and it would add to RP as well. 

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In survival no, in sandbox hell yes !

If you think its too easy even for sandbox you can make game piss easy right now in sandbox (max loot, exp x500).

I would like the option in the main game too, because even without it there is nothing stopping you from joining a group and being like "well dur I guess I'm of ultimatus magnus now". xP

But a key part of that is "finding" the group, not making and starting with it.
But its sandbox, the game is about surviving in zombie world and in sandbox options you can set zombies to none.

Survival - play it just like devs wanted you to play

Sandbox - as you like.

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