Did Knives get nerfed?

[Blake81]

I've come back recently after not playing PZ for a short while (last time I played, clothes had just gotten their insulation thing, as well as the Tailoring skill), and I've noticed I can no longer neck-stab Zeds as I used to, even with a Hunting Knife and the Bladed skill maxed. Did something get changed? I used the knives mainly as a stealth weapon, and now I can't seem to be able to use it CONSISTENTLY (I still neck-stab, but it seem very random), but now I can't, and I find myself dying a lot because of it...

[Charlypizza]

If u have 2 zombies watching you, you cant jawstab. As weird as it sounds but its currently like that. U have to be fighting only one zombie to be able to jawstab. 

[BoogieMan]

7 hours ago, Charlypizza said:

If u have 2 zombies watching you, you cant jawstab. As weird as it sounds but its currently like that. U have to be fighting only one zombie to be able to jawstab. 

What? Like all they have to do is see you? Seriously?

[EnigmaGrey]

To be chasing you*
 

alt. Is people dying stuck in an anim.

 

knives are meant for stealth; they were never supposed to be so op.

[Charlypizza]

2 hours ago, EnigmaGrey said:

To be chasing you*
 

alt. Is people dying stuck in an anim.

 

knives are meant for stealth; they were never supposed to be so op.

i think that was the trade off, u have a long animation jaw-stab where u become vulnerable for a one-shot kill. I think even new players can understand the trade.

 

Just an idea to balance it. The chances to succeed to land a jaw stab could be related to the panic status, to land a hit like that you need to be confident of your actions, specially when landing a close quarters hit on a zombie.  The character may need to take beta blockers to increase the chances of jaw-stab (another trade off) and remove the panic status. This way also means if there are to many zombies u won't be able to jaw-stab cuz the panic status.

 

No better ideas but additional the jaw stab animation could be slightly longer the lower level on short-blade. Higher chances of knife stuck on zombie head at low level.

[Blake81]

7 hours ago, EnigmaGrey said:

knives are meant for stealth; they were never supposed to be so op.

That's the thing, I'm trying to sneak behind a zombie that doesn't see me yet and stab it. However, I can't seem to be able to do it. Is there some new way of doing it?

[Pandorea]

9 hours ago, Blake81 said:

That's the thing, I'm trying to sneak behind a zombie that doesn't see me yet and stab it. However, I can't seem to be able to do it. Is there some new way of doing it?

 

Is your character panicking? Or is their combat skill affected in any other way (tired, in pain, etc)? Are you waiting until they raise their other hand to attack?

[Charlypizza]

I try to play sneaky on high population settings, so when i manage to enter a house without been detected, there are zombies inside i try to use the knife but usually more than one will detect me and cancel any chances of jaw stab then by constantly stabbing the zombies and the noise, the zombies outside will hear the struggle and over run the house, basically the restriction on the knifes is making hard to be sneaky 

[Caturday]

Knives are dead and mostly useless.

RIP knives 2020, never forget, fallen victims of devs babysitting around few bads could not manage the stab animation

 

[Sanctus]

 

37 minutes ago, Caturday said:

Knives are dead and mostly useless.

RIP knives 2020, never forget, fallen victims of devs babysitting around few bads could not manage the stab animation

 

That's not true, I main knives on apocalypse difficulty without much trouble. It takes a bit of planning and some stealth skill but they are still very viable. Using knives makes it easy to transition to spears as well if you need to. It would be nice if the jaw stab was based on both whether you've been spotted AND how close they are to grabbing you though.

[Caturday]

2 hours ago, Sanctus said:

 

That's not true,

 

It's true, knives became "imma roleplaying sneky sneky assasin" niche gameplay.

Back in the days player had to decide should he start animation v 2-33 zombies or not, literally kiss curse, now you can only backstab or gtfo

With high zombie dencity its pretty hard to find lonely target to kill, and if you do find it, in 90% situations its possble to simple stomp it or meele.

Knives are good as spear attachment only.

 

[Blake81]

8 hours ago, Pandorea said:

Is your character panicking? Or is their combat skill affected in any other way (tired, in pain, etc)? Are you waiting until they raise their other hand to attack?

Character's crouching behind  a zed, no panic at all, but hand never goes up (or at least I can't see it). Bladed skill was about average, and was wielding a fully repaired kitchen knife.

[Sanctus]

8 hours ago, Caturday said:

 

It's true, knives became "imma roleplaying sneky sneky assasin" niche gameplay.

Back in the days player had to decide should he start animation v 2-33 zombies or not, literally kiss curse, now you can only backstab or gtfo

With high zombie density its pretty hard to find lonely target to kill, and if you do find it, in 90% situations it's possible to simply stomp it or melee.

Knives are good as spear attachment only.

 

If you're any good at baiting and kiting then knives are still viable. I've survived months on apocalypse difficulty using nothing else. Sure other weapons are better at some things but they don't overshadow short blade at all. Hunting knives have fairly high damage without the inst-kill animation and the damage/hits-to-kill is comparable to your standard one handed blunt weapon. With high short blade skill it's just as viable as any other weapon, except that it is more useful when you are trying to be sneaky.

I do agree that the jawstab mechanics should be changed but I think everyone agrees on that already.

 

@Blake81It is hard to see the hand animation sometimes but you learn to spot it over time.

 

[Faalagorn]

8 hours ago, Sanctus said:

If you're any good at baiting and kiting then knives are still viable. I've survived months on apocalypse difficulty using nothing else. Sure other weapons are better at some things but they don't overshadow short blade at all. Hunting knives have fairly high damage without the inst-kill animation and the damage/hits-to-kill is comparable to your standard one handed blunt weapon. With high short blade skill it's just as viable as any other weapon, except that it is more useful when you are trying to be sneaky.

I do agree that the jawstab mechanics should be changed but I think everyone agrees on that already.

 

@Blake81It is hard to see the hand animation sometimes but you learn to spot it over time.

 

I am also b41 knives user, the animation is indeed hard to spot from certain angles, I think someone posted that suggestion or mentioned it somewhere already – the jaw stab animation also doesn't always trigger when the hand is rised if the zombies sees you and sometimes it's hard to be sneaky even with inconspicuous and graceful, but it is possible.

 

10 hours ago, Blake81 said:

Character's crouching behind  a zed, no panic at all, but hand never goes up (or at least I can't see it). Bladed skill was about average, and was wielding a fully repaired kitchen knife.

I think you can't be in crouch, you need to be standing for it. I know, confusing.

[Pandorea]

12 hours ago, Blake81 said:

Character's crouching behind  a zed, no panic at all, but hand never goes up (or at least I can't see it). Bladed skill was about average, and was wielding a fully repaired kitchen knife.

 

1 hour ago, Faalagorn said:

I think you can't be in crouch, you need to be standing for it. I know, confusing.

 

Once you start aiming - hold RMB or Ctrl - char will switch to the "attack" mode of sorts and this is when the left hand will come up to show that jaw stab is possible. It doesn't matter if char is crouching or not. What matters is where the char is in relation to zed (ideally, right behind) and what zed does the moment char tries to attack (might decide to walk away or to turn around). Hope this helps

[BoogieMan]

What if you have a lone zombies next to you, but have a group of zombies chasing you but are like 30+ ft away - is the head stab still disabled?

[Blake81]

14 hours ago, Faalagorn said:

I am also b41 knives user, the animation is indeed hard to spot from certain angles, I think someone posted that suggestion or mentioned it somewhere already – the jaw stab animation also doesn't always trigger when the hand is rised if the zombies sees you and sometimes it's hard to be sneaky even with inconspicuous and graceful, but it is possible.

 

I think you can't be in crouch, you need to be standing for it. I know, confusing.

I just tried doing that, failed 4 out of 5 times... Either there's something wrong with its detection, or it's simply not working.

[Faalagorn]

4 minutes ago, Blake81 said:

I just tried doing that, failed 4 out of 5 times... Either there's something wrong with its detection, or it's simply not working.

Just having the hand up is not enough, you must be behind a zombie that didn't spot you, else it's random unfortunately, I think the chance is less when you are exhausted.

[Blake81]

1 hour ago, Faalagorn said:

Just having the hand up is not enough, you must be behind a zombie that didn't spot you, else it's random unfortunately, I think the chance is less when you are exhausted.

Yeah, this thing needs SERIOUS buff- it's got so many conditions it's simply not viable anymore, and because of that, doing the stealthy build is simply no longer possible as there are no other ways of taking down zed in stealth.