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Iv'e been playing PZ for a good 3 years now and one of the things that seriously needs to be nerfed is the DAMN HELICOPTER! Before, it was cool with just the swaying away here and there, but now it seriously looms over you like the freakin eye of sauron. I even did a few tests were I stayed in the building, never went out, and all of a sudden MAGICALLY the helicopter appears over my house and begins its looming killing my character. Seriously unrealistic trick to kill the player.  Just like a poorly cheap magician's parlor trick, this really kills the magic of the game. Another good analogy is those pay to win games where you reach a certain point of the game where you need to start paying because the difficulty gets so hard, same with the helicopter. The game realizes your living a bit too long so they BLAST you with a helicopter without no gradual progression. The game literally is saying TIME TO DIE HERE IS A HELICOPTER NOW WEEEEEE! 

 

Don't you all agree? 

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I for one appreciate the challenge, but what gets me is the flavour. Why is this chopper here? Who is the jerk following me around? Are they observing me? Are they actively trying to kill me? Why not shoot me?

 

I find the lack of story behind it to be more frustrating than the hordes it brings.

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Short answer? No, deal with it. You can turn it off in the sandbox menu if you want to.

 

Long answer? It's been three years, you should be used to the chopper now. Comes by around the seventh day, is easy to lead away from your base and presents an actual challenge. The devs are not going to remove it, or if they do it won't be for a looooooong time. 

 

 

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I agree that the chopper event should stay... But in the name of lore there should be some logic and reason there: Maybe some news reports about how the military is keeping tabs, looking to drop supplies, ANYTHING other than: Look Out Sucka, Run From Da Choppa!

 

In the name of realism too whenever there was a need for choppers on American soil (riots, etc) helicopters would avoid areas they were being fired upon.

 

Maybe the event could be changed: Choppers have different missions (survey, luring zombies away from the perimeter, supply drop offs). If you're friendly the chopper events keep happening with a 1/3 chance of a goodie crate dropping. If you Fire at the chopper with a rifle only the lure mission will happen.

 

Or at least have the copter shoot at the zombies--clear the area and gimmie some corpses to loot. 8-)

Edited by Virindi_Screenwriter
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31 minutes ago, Virindi_Screenwriter said:

I agree that the chopper event should stay... But in the name of lore there should be some logic and reason there: Maybe some news reports about how the military is keeping tabs, looking to drop supplies, ANYTHING other than: Look Out Sucka, Run From Da Choppa!

 

In the name of realism too whenever there was a need for choppers on American soil (riots, etc) helicopters would avoid areas they were being fired upon.

 

Maybe the event could be changed: Choppers have different missions (survey, luring zombies away from the perimeter, supply drop offs). If you're friendly the chopper events keep happening with a 1/3 chance of a goodie crate dropping. If you Fire at the chopper with a rifle only the lure mission will happen.

 

Or at least have the copter shoot at the zombies--clear the area and gimmie some corpses to loot. 8-)

 

Variable chopper activity would be awesome.

 

- fly-by: one continuous line over your area. Quick and not too disruptive.

- observation: watches how you deal with zeds in the name of "science." This is our current jerk who is indirectly trying to kill you .

- care package: hovers in one spot within hearing range. If you get to its location, you find a care package (think annotated map stash).

 

Good things come in threes so I'll stop there. If I had to add a fourth though, an "extermination chopper" trying to take out potentially infected survivors (with guns and bombs) would be awesome in the late game.

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The Helicopter event has changed over time. There was a time when helicopter(s) would kind of randomly fly around the map leading mobs to and fro. I swear in one build it was like the Annual Muldraugh Helicopters Race, with copters all over the map for hours and hours on end. lulz. Now, the Helicopter event targets the player.  The key is to keep moving for the several hours it will take to run the event away from your outpost, then sneak back and enjoy a few days of relative zombie-free loot time.

 

In Sandbox, you can choose to not have a Helicopter Event at all.

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Helicopter Story

I made my base at the North Farm in Muldraugh.  When the helicopters came around on day 7, I was destroying crates in the large warehouse.  I ran outside to watch the zombie migrations and lead them away from my base.  I knew McCoy's was a great place to manage a crowd, so I walked there.  Some zombies came around, sure, but it was pretty quiet for the most part.  I thought I had lucked out with the helicopter, so I looted McCoy's had made my way back to the North Farm.

 

Once I got home, I found that the place was f-%*#&* crawling with zombies.  I carved my way back into my house, grabbed a 9mm and all my ammo,  ran back outside, and used gunshots to lead the hordes over to some run-down cabins away from the farm.  It seems that the helicopter wasn't interested in me, it was interested in my base.  The question is, how did it know it was my base?  Does the helicopter actually target the player, or does it target the player's base, if the program can determine the player has made one?

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19 hours ago, Crazy ManMan said:

The helicopter presents a unique danger that it usually forces you to abandon your base and find a new one. However the fact that it can somehow spot you when you are indoors is somewhat annoying.

Thermal detection can work through buildings. The Dead in PZ only get warm when the summer heat decay's them, so that's why when they find a survivor they tend to hover around I guess.

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33 minutes ago, Legoland99 said:

Thermal detection can work through buildings. The Dead in PZ only get warm when the summer heat decay's them, so that's why when they find a survivor they tend to hover around I guess.

But that goes against my favorite fanwank about it being a crop-duster just trolling people. :(

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6 minutes ago, Svarog said:

I wish that being outside while this event happens random zombies died to the tune of gunfire AND if outside netted a random "Lodged Bullet" wound and if still outside after that for a while, headshot.

It should be way worse than it is.

It was debated when the helicopter was spruced up, but some of us were concerned it'd ruin the fun of the game. That'd kill a lot of people. :P

I'm coming around, though.

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7 minutes ago, EnigmaGrey said:

It was debated when the helicopter was spruced up, but some of us were concerned it'd ruin the fun of the game. That'd kill a lot of people. :P

I'm coming around, though.


Shoot the player once, let him have enough time to get a clue that someone is shooting at everything that moves with intent to kill so he has time to run inside. If not, kill him. (Unless he has lucky, trait, then he gets an additional Lodged Bullet before third shot)

Personally I like this event but more should be done with it.

Edit: Maybe add some stuff to radio before event commences about some rumors of military choppers going in to "Cleanse" (or """"Evacuate""""" but going in with too many snipers) event zone.

Edited by Svarog
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7 minutes ago, Svarog said:


Shoot the player once, let him have enough time to get a clue that someone is shooting at everything that moves with intent to kill so he has time to run inside. If not, kill him. (Unless he has lucky, trait, then he gets an additional Lodged Bullet before third shot)

Personally I like this event but more should be done with it.

Edit: Maybe add some stuff to radio before event commences about some rumors of military choppers going in to "Cleanse" (or """"Evacuate""""" but going in with too many snipers) event zone.

I was going to say something very similar Svarog! I think it would be great if the player could use some of the military grade radios to perhaps intercept a transmission and get a clue as to when a helicopter or swarm of choppers would be sweeping the area. It would allow the resourceful survivor to prepare by finding a working HAM radio and spending enough time fiddling with the knob to accidentally isolate a signal.

 

Perhaps with the integration of clothing when the animation update hits, annotated notes could be found on fallen service members that would provide hints to tuning into military broadcasts. Or perhaps the military could issue some information on the television, such as a random frequency chosen each time you start a new world that the player and other survivors can use to tune in. It would then fall on the player to write this information down for later use once the power is out and you can't get a television signal anymore.

 

Maybe allow an opportunity to contact the chopper and discover what it's intentions are? It could provide the player and eventual NPC characters with an auxiliary objective where the chopper could relay a supply crate drop to collect and force the player to compete or work with other survivors to extract the crate. Or flip the coin and it could be a trap to lure survivors to a location and begin shooting them in accordance with military orders to eliminate anything that moves.

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11 minutes ago, Crazy ManMan said:

I really do not think I agree with snipers in the chopper. A challenging game is fun, but whenever there is an RNG murder machine it goes from challenging to frustrating. I do not agree with the chopper trying to kill the player all the time. Maybe if it was done correctly, but I can not imagine it working well very easily.

It could be a rarity, if we have variable chopper events. Ideally it could also be avoided by staying indoors and listening for hidden radio frequencies.

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3 minutes ago, trombonaught said:

It could be a rarity, if we have variable chopper events. Ideally it could also be avoided by staying indoors and listening for hidden radio frequencies.

And a few warning shots with a bit of dust skipping / windows breaking should really be enough to say "hey, keep your head down."

If not, well. PZ's a game where you sometimes learn by dying. That's what makes it fun to a lot of us that play it.

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If the government determined that the only way to deal with a domestic virus was to eradicate the population in the infected zone, and decided to implement an aerial military response against that domestic target, they'd plaster the area with everything they had.  They wouldn't fly a few helicopters over and have them shoot some guns.  Remember the movie "Outbreak;" the government isn't going to half-ass something like this.

 

 

 

Edited by JM_Forest_64
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I guess what I'm saying is, I don't think the helicopter should be shooting guns.  If there is a helicopter flying around, it has some specific mission, maybe surveillance,  maybe a rescue of some high-value personnel (i.e. not you), maybe simply to move across Knox county as quickly as possible, I don't know.  But sniping from the back of a helicopter seems like an ineffective way to kill many, many things.  They'd use a MOAB for that. 

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22 minutes ago, JM_Forest_64 said:

I guess what I'm saying is, I don't think the helicopter should be shooting guns.  If there is a helicopter flying around, it has some specific mission, maybe surveillance,  maybe a rescue of some high-value personnel (i.e. not you), maybe simply to move across Knox county as quickly as possible, I don't know.  But sniping from the back of a helicopter seems like an ineffective way to kill many, many things.  They'd use a MOAB for that. 

 

Unless they wanted to kill YOU to protect the zeds... we don't know what their motives are!

 

I've been assuming the chopper is also the villain behind the whole outbreak situation.

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I agree with fact,that helicopters are unrealistic. How the hell that asshole in cabin know where am i? Why he continues to stalk me,even if i stay indoors? 

Also,i like the idea with different types of "heli event". Usual helicopter,helicopter with sniper,who tries to shoot you / kills zeds near you. Or even aircraft that will bomb the city... 

Maybe,"helis" should kill only if you surived a few months. Like,the only option to deal with virus. I dunno im sleepy 

Edited by Drama_Setter
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On 29.06.2017 at 4:50 PM, Virindi_Screenwriter said:

I agree that the chopper event should stay... But in the name of lore there should be some logic and reason there: Maybe some news reports about how the military is keeping tabs, looking to drop supplies, ANYTHING other than: Look Out Sucka, Run From Da Choppa!

 

In the name of realism too whenever there was a need for choppers on American soil (riots, etc) helicopters would avoid areas they were being fired upon.

 

Maybe the event could be changed: Choppers have different missions (survey, luring zombies away from the perimeter, supply drop offs). If you're friendly the chopper events keep happening with a 1/3 chance of a goodie crate dropping. If you Fire at the chopper with a rifle only the lure mission will happen.

 

Or at least have the copter shoot at the zombies--clear the area and gimmie some corpses to loot. 8-)

 I hear that if helicopter stalks you,there will be ingame news about "surviver,who randomly run around city". But i never saw that in the game,just hear about it.

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17 hours ago, JM_Forest_64 said:

If the government determined that the only way to deal with a domestic virus was to eradicate the population in the infected zone, and decided to implement an aerial military response against that domestic target, they'd plaster the area with everything they had.  They wouldn't fly a few helicopters over and have them shoot some guns.  Remember the movie "Outbreak;" the government isn't going to half-ass something like this.

 

 

 

I'll admit, you have a good point JM_Forest. It wouldn't make much sense tactically to use such a small weapon to eliminate such a numerous opponent. However given that the lore of the game describes the entire country falling apart, skeleton crews may be tasked with simply patrolling an exclusion zone and eliminating anybody trying to escape. It's actually a concept that I read about in the zombie book Apocalypse of the Dead by Joe McKinney.

 

Basically the premise is that the United States military is stretched so thin due to complete infestation along the Gulf of Mexico coast that they order patrols to only eliminate survivors who are deemed a threat to the safety of the wall (oh yeah, a wall was erected to keep the infected along the coast and prevent them from going to mainland U.S.) or are actively trying to escape. To accomplish this, they would only use what they had to and tried to minimize any excess force being used. They also recorded zombie moans and blasted the moans over loudspeakers as they flew overhead to draw hordes of zombies towards bunkers of resistance. It was a great way to eliminate pesky survivors without shooting a single bullet.

 

There were far too many zombies to kill without simply bombing the entire area, so the military found other ways to accomplish their goals. I can't exactly remember why they chose not to bomb the area in the book though...

Edited by FireOnAsphalt
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