I believe there is a way of having a fair mechanic in which a player turns into a zombie and is able control themselves, but people may or may not like it, because the only way for it to be reasonably fair would be having it very restricted, in that certain conditions must be met for a player to actually become a zombie (to prevent an overload of player zombies) and for when the player actually assumes control of their corpse. Obviously, a condition for a player to become a zombie would have to be for them to die, but if everyone turned into a zombie after they died it would take the exclusiveness from player-controlled zombies, it would happen to everyone, it wouldn't be very special and it would just be a nuisance, because of this, I feel the condition for someone to become a zombie would be for them to die of infection, or to die (from something besides headshots or explosions) while infected, this gives the infection system another use besides a means of blood loss and it will also make Antibodies more valuable. I understand that Rocket stated that all players are immune to the zombie virus, but who's to say that a new strand of the virus has mutated inside the already "living" zombies? Possibilities, my friends. Working out how someone would be a zombie is very logical and easy to go with and I feel it's the same way when it comes to the player actually controlling their recently animated corpse. Think about how a zombie acts, it stumbles, walks, or crawls in one direction (while periodically changing direction) until a survivor alerts it, after which it locks onto them and sprints after them until it beats them lifeless and consumes their tasty flesh or when the survivor breaks line of sight, upon which the zombie returns to it's endless shamble, this is how I feel player controlled zombies could be possible in that it makes sense and it would keep player zombies from running everywhere, thus giving people a reason to not want to be a zombie as they would be stuck to walking until another survivor alerted them, allowing them to run. Now, while I like the idea, I also see how (being as restricted as it would be) a player zombie chasing down survivors could get annoying if not downright pointless. I say annoying because the survivor could very easily kill you or break line of sight (as you are just a simple zombie) and I suggest a possibility of pointlessness because there would really be no reward aside from bragging rights or points towards statistics (if they are implemented) but at the same time, if you're going to call it pointless off of that, then what business do you have playing games non-professionally? Well, in conclusion, I'd like to point out that the game is still very much in development, and it is entirely open to change on various things in the future. Rocket may have slight idea about player controlled zombies sitting in reserve (I say reserve because we all should know at this point he has his head focused on making the standalone) but never-the-less, take my ideas into actual consideration and really think about the impact they'd have on the game and since I may actually forget to come back to this thread, I'll list off what I said a bit more clearly and include some things I didn't. THIS PARTAINS SOLELY TO AFTER THE PLAYER DIES WHILE INFECTED, -Timer pops up saying how many minutes/seconds they have until their body reanimates, they should have a choice if they don't want their body to reanimate, if they choose NO, the body isn't transformed and is treated as a normal body. Simply allowing the timer to go out will set the body to reanimate -After reanimation, the player receives a set amount of blood/health -Body is reanimated, player takes control, immediately after reanimation, they recently deceased player drops the weapon they had in hand but they retain all their gear, this includes backpack and inventory. Pistol in hand = pistol dropped, ammo/bandages are kept and if the player has a primary, primary stays on their back. Vice versa with primary, ammo, gear and pistol are kept, but primary is dropped. -After reanimation, the player is allowed to walk (or crawl if legs are broken) in one direction for a duration until they are alerted by a survivor or the duration ends, after which they will be able to choose another direction, the player is also not allowed to not move, if direction is not changed after the duration, the previous direction is resumed after a few seconds (I feel 3-5 seconds plus the time passed walking is more than enough time to make a decision of where to go) -While walking, the player can look around via the Head Camera or 3rd-person camera -The player is only allowed to sprint and attack after they have been alerted by a survivor -A player controlled zombie has the same aggro radius of a normal zombie -A player that has been alerted will receive a notification via marker as to the direction of the survivor that alerted them -The player can, at any time, choose to respawn. I'd like for their zombie self to maintain "life" but it could possibly prove stressful on the server if many player zombies are made, but, at the same time, the server could have a cap on "abandoned player zombies" and just start killing them off after they reach a cap -If the player kills or knocks out a survivor, they immediately begin feasting upon the corpse/soon to be corpse, regaining any lost blood, even if no blood is lost, the player is still driven to feed, that's zombie nature, baby! -If killed (again) the player immediately respawns as a fresh spawn -The player cannot drop, equip, pick up any items or check inventory, you're a zombie now! Flesh eating is your only concern -If a player is infected and dies to an explosion or headshot, they are not given the opportunity to turn into a zombie (for obvious reasons) Keep in mind that the aforemented is entirely my opinion and that I merely posted this to express an idea.
