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Is late game forgotten, trivial and unrewarding?


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7 hours ago, Badgzerz said:

TL;DR, a zombie apocalypse would never be a never ending horde of World War Z zombies long term. It would also be a zombie aftermath apocalypse where you have to deal with thousands and thousands of rotting corpses poisoning air. You would have to deal with animals that you would otherwise eat stealing your supplies and feasting on zombies and become inedible/unusable for bait. Zombies that don't die would be too scary to want to take on with melee weapons because they learn to grab, block, or they grow tumorous scar tissue that works like armor.

 

I agree with all of this except that zombies should become stronger. Zombies in PZ are Romero/Brooks lore. That means, they don't have a parasite in their brain or have any need to remain alive. They are dead as a doornail. They will survive years without any kind of food or anything. The only thing that kills them is decomposition, which is already in the game. I think, if anything, the zombies need to become more weak and die off in larger numbers. As you say, the apocalypse wouldn't be about zombies in long term play. Animals will be implemented as you have requested. I hope Wild Boars are added, but we can expect Bears and Wolves forsure. These will be a nuisance in many ways. I do think corpse removal should be more pertinent and deadly, but I wouldn't say that we would need gas masks. PCs are immune to the airborne strain of the virus in the lore. This means we need to treat corpses the same as if they weren't zombified. Enough rotting material will get you sick, but only in the IRL way. Maybe returning to a field of rotting corpses should require this, but idk about all the time.

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  • 3 weeks later...
17 hours ago, numbersixthecat said:

I admit that I'm somewhat clumsy, but I feel there should be a little of autoaim (or a little more than what we have now) especially for the shove mechanic. Sometimes I miss the zed I'm fighting when it's right there and no way my char would have missed it.

 

I agree, sometimes my arms actually make visual contact with zombies, but they don't get pushed. I guess because it was just ever so slightly off center. Often they recover from shoves super quickly and resume lunging at you as well which is like they don't have to overcome inertia, which with the animation update the player has to deal with quite a bit. It seems to me players have to obey the laws of physics more than the zeds do which creates a sort an imbalance and can make things feel off.

Edited by BoogieMan
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On 12/12/2020 at 1:46 AM, TrailerParkThor said:

 

I agree with all of this except that zombies should become stronger. Zombies in PZ are Romero/Brooks lore. That means, they don't have a parasite in their brain or have any need to remain alive. They are dead as a doornail. They will survive years without any kind of food or anything. The only thing that kills them is decomposition, which is already in the game. I think, if anything, the zombies need to become more weak and die off in larger numbers. As you say, the apocalypse wouldn't be about zombies in long term play. Animals will be implemented as you have requested. I hope Wild Boars are added, but we can expect Bears and Wolves forsure. These will be a nuisance in many ways. I do think corpse removal should be more pertinent and deadly, but I wouldn't say that we would need gas masks. PCs are immune to the airborne strain of the virus in the lore. This means we need to treat corpses the same as if they weren't zombified. Enough rotting material will get you sick, but only in the IRL way. Maybe returning to a field of rotting corpses should require this, but idk about all the time.

 

 

they will NEVER add wolves to the game... period... for one simple reason... there are NO wolves in kentucky and havent been for hundreds of years... coyotes maybe but never wolves.

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I too think lategame is a little lack luster. The argument that only a minority of player base reaches endgame and thus subsiding the need to add lategame content is absurd. The goal of the game is to survive, not experience 'early game' then make a fatal mistake and call it a day. Adding late game content is important as it adds depth to your experience surviving the apocalypse, and keeping the player engage which also affects their decision making in the early game. But I'm not here to debate on that so here are my suggestions: (Note - Some of these ideas have already been suggested, but since I liked them I'll share them here anyway)

• Vehicle customization                 - Decking out your post apocalyptic vehicle to better dismember zeds during your loot runs. 
• Wandering / stationary traders  - Got ample of food? Trade them for ammunition or equipment.

• Zeds with unique behaviors       - Some zed may have different mutations making them 'smarter' or stronger. They might scope you out for several days                                                                                during the night before attacking you when your guard is down.
• Blueprints / research                   - These can be use to craft better base defense / improved weapons. May also be obtained through trading. 
• Horde nights?                               - Kinda like 7days, not sure if it fits with PZ

That's all I got. They aren't the best I know but its something. Feel free to expand on them or suggest more I would like to hear yours. 

 

Edited by Araceli
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when human AI gets added humans will be the late game... zombies are 1 thing but surviving gunshots will be alot harder if it doesn't kill you immediately.... not to mention all the zombies npc raiders will attract with said gunshots... they stated they wanted most of the NPCs to be "friendly" but there will still be hostile NPCs that will shoot you and could potentially instantly kill you with a headshot.

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13 hours ago, Araceli said:

• Vehicle customization                 - Decking out your post apocalyptic vehicle to better dismember zeds during your loot runs. 
• Wandering / stationary traders  - Got ample of food? Trade them for ammunition or equipment.

• Zeds with unique behaviors       - Some zed may have different mutations making them 'smarter' or stronger. They might scope you out for several days                                                                                during the night before attacking you when your guard is down.
• Blueprints / research                   - These can be use to craft better base defense / improved weapons. May also be obtained through trading. 
• Horde nights?                               - Kinda like 7days, not sure if it fits with PZ

- Devs have actually confirmed Vehicle Customization in a blogpost. Really looking forward to that. Vehicle horns and car locks would be awesome to fit into this system as well.

- Traders will most likely come with NPCs, however I like the idea of wandering traders that might come to your door. Reminds me of This War of Mine, and could be super useful in allowing you to stay in your base when needing basic supplies.

- Never gonna come to the game. Feral Animals, Raiders, and Enemy Factions will all have different strength levels, strategies, and weaknesses to exploit. This will give the game tons of dynamic challenges during base defense and scavenging.

- Yes yes yes to Blueprints/Research. However, I think Skill Magazines already fill this need somewhat. In Soul Filcher's Learning Time, players can copy down recipes from magazines into notebooks. Maybe these could be used as an alternative for the current system that would make more sense for certain recipes like traps, defenses, and weapons. However, I do think there is room for special items to be found that would be necessary for some crafting If Smithing ever returns, maybe finding the right molds would fit this idea.

- Only if it's triggered by some player action. Sirens basically already function as a Horde Summoner so maybe if we could remove sirens from vehicles and place them on poles and power them up.

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1.Sprinters.

Just try the mods that allow you to tweak the % of sprinter.

So in a group of 20 zombies, there will be x% sprinter.

 

No matter how far you've gotten into the game , sprinters are always dangerous.

 

So what then?Well you can't really progress through early game as easily as before and have to rely on stealth plus luring and playing around fences and stuff.

 

Even when they add crossbow to the game , or when you choose to have immunity , sprinters will always be a game changer.

 

2.Different Horde Mechanics

           I'd agrue that a roaming horde would be a good idea, independent from meta event.

               A perma roaming horde that acts like a homing missile that always move towards the player mysteriously , for some unknown reason will certainly make the game more fun ... and even when you've managed to kill the horde, guess what ? Another will replace them.

 

3.Translate MetalWorking and Electrical to deadly booby traps or a DeathTruck that can mow thru undeads.Open Engineering traps to all ... add more traps and mechanics into the game.

             With random sprinters and a massive horde that will always come towards you, what you will need is a good radar and defense system.

WatchTowers with Binoculars... Using Tactical Walkie Talkie to form a perimeter  to detect movement for example..

 

[Edit] And then use booby traps to thin them down can be a good idea..

 

 

Edited by KanaryS
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Personally I would like to suggest a rescue scenario.  Whether its a set number of days survived (400+) or total Z's killed (20k+) or both this triggers a new radio message on the emergency broadcast.  The broadcast provides a criptic military message giving coordinates to a random location for a LZ.  Obviously the LZ is crawling with undead.  The survivor has to reach these coordinates at a certain time and date or has to wait for the next message several weeks later.  Before the survivor can enter the helicopter needs to be dressed in military uniform and aquired an ID card from a dead soldier/location/vehicle.  If he has not completed these tasks he will be shot as an infected.  

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On 1/14/2021 at 11:32 PM, nirrum said:

Personally I would like to suggest a rescue scenario.  Whether its a set number of days survived (400+) or total Z's killed (20k+) or both this triggers a new radio message on the emergency broadcast.  The broadcast provides a criptic military message giving coordinates to a random location for a LZ.  Obviously the LZ is crawling with undead.  The survivor has to reach these coordinates at a certain time and date or has to wait for the next message several weeks later.  Before the survivor can enter the helicopter needs to be dressed in military uniform and aquired an ID card from a dead soldier/location/vehicle.  If he has not completed these tasks he will be shot as an infected.  

Or some type of map expantion to go to.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Yup. I always get bored in late game. But I think a great multiplayer experience with a few good friends along with increasing amounts of zombies coming for you on late game would make it still fun and interesting!

Ofcourse a bigger map like Luisville will help alot too. I think the game would need some sense of exploration, currently the map is really small actually. But I suppose Luisville will fix that!

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You can leave city on day one, eat berry and fish and get the boring "end game"  feeling at day 2...

 

i have no boring "end game" my end game are fun because i have all the weapon i want and i can really burn and boom everything... to bad it's not possible trigger chain reaction (like set zombies on fire and drag em into a house full of gazoline tanks...(or maybe it is now? haven't tryed since long time). 

 

End game for me isn't about surviving anymore it's more "how can i improve my lifestyle even more?" ... so i need video game, piano, pool, alcool ... 

 

i am horryfied by some suggestion... gathering 10 rabbit for some faction? guys u can do that on a korean mmo why do you want that in a pixel indi game? 

 

Please stop to ask for stuf you can find somewhere els or some direct story line that explain everything to you ... it's an indi game... it's original and kind of unique and i hope it remains like that.

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1 hour ago, Masmassu said:

Wher did you fint the Luisville info? Thats new fro me!

https://projectzomboid.com/blog/news/2020/07/shoving-off/

It's been mentioned quite a bit over the few years but this is the latest screenshot from that blog:

image-1-1024x746.png

 

That and Fort Knox which I'm not sure there's any screenshot of that publicly. There's probably more of Louisville but yeah Fort Knox and Louisville are the last two for "map completion", basically.

Edited by MadDan2013
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  • 3 weeks later...

If player live long at one place, like several months, i think it will be fun if at some point he woke up finding his shelter surrounded by a swarm of zombies trying to breach door, or alrdy inside. it looks easy to implement or maybe mods can do that.

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I personally overcome the boredom of the end game by starting the game out with a monument goal in mind. Of Course these are self imposed rules or goals but it definitely solves the late game boredom problem. For example, if I am playing with Hydrocraft on, my go to challenge is solar park. I have to set up my base in the first week of the game. Thats my permanent base and i cant spend the night outside of my base two nights in a row until i make the solar park. This proven to be impossible challenge for me since once i survived 4 years and still hadnt been able to make the solar park. Another example is the vagabond challenge, this has nothing to do with any mods, you just cant set up a base you have to leave your current city every 7 days. Or pilgrim challenge; start out on one side of the map and you cant set up your base until you get the other side of the map and once you get there you cant stay more than a season before you have to leave it. No burn challenge is also fun, you cant burn zombies ever, ect...   Also even if you dont have any goals you start out with, cabin fever is the number one killer in pz. Boredom will make you slip up and get killed eventually which is literally the purpose of this game, the story of how you didn't survive the zombie apocalypse. So in a way the game is working as designed...

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On 12/12/2020 at 1:46 AM, TrailerParkThor said:

 

I agree with all of this except that zombies should become stronger. Zombies in PZ are Romero/Brooks lore. That means, they don't have a parasite in their brain or have any need to remain alive. They are dead as a doornail. They will survive years without any kind of food or anything. The only thing that kills them is decomposition, which is already in the game. I think, if anything, the zombies need to become more weak and die off in larger numbers. As you say, the apocalypse wouldn't be about zombies in long term play. Animals will be implemented as you have requested. I hope Wild Boars are added, but we can expect Bears and Wolves forsure. These will be a nuisance in many ways. I do think corpse removal should be more pertinent and deadly, but I wouldn't say that we would need gas masks. PCs are immune to the airborne strain of the virus in the lore. This means we need to treat corpses the same as if they weren't zombified. Enough rotting material will get you sick, but only in the IRL way. Maybe returning to a field of rotting corpses should require this, but idk about all the time.

I have some idea's about the Zombie condition. For one thing I don't think that they ARE decomposing. If we look at the passage of years in TWD, they would have lost the ability to move and fallen apart years ago if they were decomposing anything like a normal human body. I think that the zombification makes their tissues so toxic that even bacteria cannot live in them, preventing normal decay. They degrade in capabilities because they desiccate, and they accumulate mechanical damage, but they are not rotting. Unlike in the World War Z book, I speculate that they DO have some limited healing and tissue repair occurring, or else they would have been rendered immobile long ago. Perhaps being able to actually feed increases this.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          I speculate that animals, including insects, can sense how incredibly toxic their tissues are, and will not touch them. Remember, any animal attack involves taking their flesh into the mouth by biting. How do you think THAT will end? I back this up by the fact that there are no swarms of flies and other bugs around "Living" zombies. If flies could lay eggs on a zombie, and the maggots feed on it, the zombie would be skeletonized in a matter of days. After they are destroyed, sure, but not when they are functional. That tells me that when their brain is destroyed, and zombification ended, their tissues lose the toxicity and normal decay can begin. Even in the game, "Dead" zombies attract flies, "Living" ones do not. There is no hint of bugs in TWD universe, and the characters NEVER complain about smell, or are alerted to the presence of zombies by smell, which would be overwhelming, and give their location away long before they are visible.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   A zombie that was swarming with insects and smelled like a rotting corpse could not possibly take a human by surprise or get anywhere near them without giving itself away LONG before getting close. A rotting zombie couldn't be in the same building as a human without it being painfully obvious. Yet in TWD there is no sign that they have any odor at all. I know when the humans cut one open for guts they have a dramatic reaction to the smell. But that is a different matter. The inside of a living human smells intensely if opened. All the more proof that "living" zombies have no smell.

Edited by Dantman40
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9 hours ago, Dantman40 said:

I have some idea's about the Zombie condition. For one thing I don't think that they ARE decomposing. If we look at the passage of years in TWD, they would have lost the ability to move and fallen apart years ago if they were decomposing anything like a normal human body. I think that the zombification makes their tissues so toxic that even bacteria cannot live in them, preventing normal decay. They degrade in capabilities because they desiccate, and they accumulate mechanical damage, but they are not rotting. Unlike in the World War Z book, I speculate that they DO have some limited healing and tissue repair occurring, or else they would have been rendered immobile long ago. Perhaps being able to actually feed increases this.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          I speculate that animals, including insects, can sense how incredibly toxic their tissues are, and will not touch them. Remember, any animal attack involves taking their flesh into the mouth by biting. How do you think THAT will end? I back this up by the fact that there are no swarms of flies and other bugs around "Living" zombies. If flies could lay eggs on a zombie, and the maggots feed on it, the zombie would be skeletonized in a matter of days. After they are destroyed, sure, but not when they are functional. That tells me that when their brain is destroyed, and zombification ended, their tissues lose the toxicity and normal decay can begin. Even in the game, "Dead" zombies attract flies, "Living" ones do not. There is no hint of bugs in TWD universe, and the characters NEVER complain about smell, or are alerted to the presence of zombies by smell, which would be overwhelming, and give their location away long before they are visible.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   A zombie that was swarming with insects and smelled like a rotting corpse could not possibly take a human by surprise or get anywhere near them without giving itself away LONG before getting close. A rotting zombie couldn't be in the same building as a human without it being painfully obvious. Yet in TWD there is no sign that they have any odor at all. I know when the humans cut one open for guts they have a dramatic reaction to the smell. But that is a different matter. The inside of a living human smells intensely if opened. All the more proof that "living" zombies have no smell.

I remember that piles of dead zombises it was a swarm on them.

 

No dont think they will rot but they cant regenerate/ heal unless they eat somthing.

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To me, it seems the PZ zombies, which are modeled off romero/twd canon, essentially do not decompose/break down via biological means. Being truly undead, whatever it is that allows this to happen makes them more or less impervious to other living organisms including bacteria, mold, insects, etc until the brain is destroyed and the body returns to a state of being dead. This allows biological processes to take over again and decomposition. This distance from biological mechanisms also explains why they don't necessarily need to feed to create energy to do things like move, make sounds, etc. 

 

Which means the only thing that should affect zombies are mechanical/chemical in nature. They can be physically damaged and destroyed. They can catch on fire and burn. They can be dissolved by acid, etc. This line of reasoning has always made me wonder about freezing temperatures. Given that zombies don't feel pain, the cold wouldn't affect them like a normal human, however since their bodies are also not producing any heat (again they don't need to eat for energy) then exposure to freezing temperatures should slow them down to the point they freeze, given enough time. If the temperatures are below freezing for several days, zombies should freeze and be unable to move, at least following this line of reasoning consistently.

 

The question is how long does this take? and does freezing destroy the brain? and should this be implemented in PZ, perhaps as a sandbox setting?

Edited by Axiomatic
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1 hour ago, Axiomatic said:

To me, it seems the PZ zombies, which are modeled off romero/twd canon, essentially do not decompose/break down via biological means. Being truly undead, whatever it is that allows this to happen makes them more or less impervious to other living organisms including bacteria, mold, insects, etc until the brain is destroyed and the body returns to a state of being dead. This allows biological processes to take over again and decomposition. This distance from biological mechanisms also explains why they don't necessarily need to feed to create energy to do things like move, make sounds, etc. 

 

Which means the only thing that should affect zombies are mechanical/chemical in nature. They can be physically damaged and destroyed. They can catch on fire and burn. They can be dissolved by acid, etc. This line of reasoning has always made me wonder about freezing temperatures. Given that zombies don't feel pain, the cold wouldn't affect them like a normal human, however since their bodies are also not producing any heat (again they don't need to eat for energy) then exposure to freezing temperatures should slow them down to the point they freeze, given enough time. If the temperatures are below freezing for several days, zombies should freeze and be unable to move, at least following this line of reasoning consistently.

 

The question is how long does this take? and does freezing destroy the brain? and should this be implemented in PZ, perhaps as a sandbox setting?

The freezing issue interests me too. In the TWD zombies have been shown mobile in cold weather, in the Romero movies the subject is never addressed. IRL if zombies are immobilized by freezing it would be a Godsend, they could be exterminated safely once winter sets in. Maybe they should freeze, or maybe their tissues are protected, at least to a certain point.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        Putting myself in the place of the cast of the Dawn of the Dead remake, I would have not destroyed the zombie baby, or the badly maimed zombie in the fountain when they first entered the mall. I would have thrown blankets over it, restrained it in some way as a test subject. I would then have placed it in a freezer, to see what the cold did. The same applies to any zombie movie or show, whenever there is access to a freezer and there is a zombie damaged enough to be "Captured"  Another issue, does the head have to be completely severed, or is it enough to just sever the spine? I suspect the latter, and it would make things MUCH simpler. Severing a spine is much easier than complete decapitation. Another reason to capture a damaged zombie.

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