Gameplay tips

[GodOfGrain 191]

Thought we could share some gameplay tips how to deal with the new zombies. Especially for players who have just recently joined the alpha community. Just add your tips below and I'll edit some of them in this post.

This thread is for gameplay tips only.

No discussion of patches, suggestion for further futures etc.

If any particular tip is bullshit, feel free to quote and criticize it.

Hf :)

Hm. Better once more: This thread is for gameplay tips only.

ZOMBIES

Keep distance! New Zombies are very dangerous:

- High chance to bleed, braking a leg, heavy pain

- 1 hit knockout possible (if under 10000 health)

- Higher attackrate

- Shorter attack animation -> has improved their hit-%

It is possible to avoid some zombies in towns an villages by crouch running/ cruch walking. To avoid them comepletly is too time consuming in some cases. The main difference to earlier versions is that you will attract zombies at some point of time.Try to avoid them as long as possible, usingthe new LOS system. Zombies have a narrow field of view (+/- 30 degree in movement direction.

"Another tips to lose the zombies is to run around big bushes and trees (the last one works best). Try to get some distance from the zombie and run around the tree so he looses FOV and then lay down and crawl away (try to strafe all the time and block his fov if he moves). This works best with maybe 1-3 zombies. It does not work every time but you get hang of it after a while." (by Nulpax)

Every building with 2 entrances is a good opportunity to lose the agro of all zombies chasing you. In this case you can just run into a village / town, aggroing zombies carelessly and "park" them somewhere. If you don't have a weapon don't go in a building with one entrance. (Death trap).

An alternative is to run up and down a hill, you will get rid of some zombies at least.But overall out of bigger cities we will have to shoot more often on Zombies to defend ourselves. This is dangerous for the player as this can attract hostile survivors.

THE HATCHET "is a pretty powerful weapon and from what i've seen they can be found all over the place. They actually work like a very short range gun (It shoots a projectile where you aim) and just like with guns hitting the head is an instant kill. The range seems to be about 2m so with a bit of practice you can kill them before they get close enough to hit you.

I found it easier to kill zombies with a hatchet than with a gun so i'm going with a hatchet/pistol now rather than rifle/pistol. Infinite 'ammo' and no noise plus you can chop wood with it! If it runs out of 'ammo', just drop it and pick it up and it'll be fully charged again. Note that when you first pick one up, you have to reload it to be able to swing it." (by Ahris)

Killing Zombies without a weapon:

"I haven't read all three pages, but my addition to the list is; Find a steep hill crest, semi smooth one side, quite steep other side of crest. Run up it, get them behind you then run down the hill. Make sure you don't catch air going off the edge. If done right, the zombies should go flying through the air behind you, crash to the ground and die. Because they run so much faster than you do." (by DeathHaze420) [Approved, it works]

How to find a weapon in the start?

Hello, you are in a big town? Stay right there!

Hello, you are somewhere on the coast? But you dont know where exactly? Just throw a dime to decide about left or right and get going.

Just pass the smaller cities [small reward]. Run until you find Cherno or Elektro on the south coast or berenzino in the north.

Look out for barns on your way along the coast. Overall you have a good 50% chance to find a rifle with ammunition there.

The danger of Zombies in big cities is currently very low.

PvP is a imminent danger, but you still have a good 70% chance to come out alive. Just keep running and loot the churches, supermarkets and living houses. Dont spend much time sneaking, not worth the effort here.

Your aim is to get some equipment together within a short period of time (30 minutes?). Then you can leave this deathtrap and move up north.

What is the minimum you need before you head north?

1 weapon with some rounds of ammunition, a couple additional bandages, 1 morphin 1 painkiller.

I personally would not leave until i have:

Primary weapon (winchester / enfield) (PvP)

A pistol (PvE)

map

(compass)

Chzech backpack or alice pack.

2 morphin 3 bandages 2 painkiller

By then you will have also found 2-3 water bottles

and something to eat.

This should just take 30 minutes. If I am not lucky to find the map or kompass, i might leave anyway. Leaving without

morphin, at least 1 bandage and 1 food / water + 1 weapon with ammunition is too dangerous.

If you want to take some more risk (and reward) visit the firestations for military hardware. You can visit them even 2 times to look for respawns. But be aware, there is the chance of about 5% that someone will shoot you each time you are in the firestation Smile

Always useful to make a short stop at a hospital or medical tents.

Good opportunity to get some bloodpacks, you cant find them up north.

In any case, just keep running in the big cities and finish up quickly Smile

[berenzino is actually quite different in this regard... dont run through berenzino :) ]

[dunji 0]

So far with the new update the only success I've found :

If you're in a town : crawl. crouch walking will still pull zombies even from far away

[amlaborde@windstream.net 94]

Zombies now have God like hearing... And when you anger them and go into a house, they are impossile to get past and you have no choice but to die.

[CosmicOsmo 1]

I am totally going to necro this thread when the version number reaches 7.1.1.4.

[jonryan32@gmail.com 2]

So far with the new update the only success I've found :

If you're in a town : crawl. crouch walking will still pull zombies even from far away

Also if you enter a building do not go up or down stairs as that will make you loud enough to aggro zombies over a block away.

[dinsdale1978@gmail.com 19]

I crawled to a barn and made it inside and up to get a rifle. I turned to leave and two Zeds

ran in the door. I had to waste bullets for shift-crouch walking up the stairs. Turn down the aggro.

[TheMightyMush 0]

I think Rocket has broken the mod with the last patch, it makes it nearly impossible to gain any sort of momentum when starting with a new character. You have no weapons, 1 bandage, no food, and are up against a never ending barrage of zombies with X-ray vision and super hearing. It makes absolutely no sense, and to put a topper on top of it all, it seems to me like the spawn rate for all items has been DRASTICALLY reduced. Usually when going into buildings in Cherno, you would find at least something in each of the rooms, whereas now, I'm lucky if I find 1 bandage in the whole damn house. As for now, I think I'm done playing until he has time to fix this. And it angers me to see all of the well established players with encampments stocked with weapons, ammo, and food saying that the game is perfect now. I challenge them to create a new character and see just how difficult (read as: impossible) it is do do anything.

[GodOfGrain 191]

deleted

[Rabbican 1]

it seems buggy for me LOS wise, sometimes I can lose 100 zombies simply by rounding a house corner... other times, I can run through a 2-3 exit building, around corner, and (crouch running walking prone-ing) and I'll have 5-8 faithful keep with me.

[Imbalanxd 59]

The zombie AI in the first patch and following hotfix was great. They were heavily sight based, which meant that a good approach was required, and sneaking was mostly about keeping specific zombies in mind, and staying behind them or around corners. The zombies hearing seemed significantly diminished from 1.6, but not completely so. This made sense as I don't know how a zombie was telling the difference between me walking and one of its brethren.

Now, however, the AI rely far too heavily on sound, and are far to good at hearing the living. I am currently stuck on the top of a firehouse. It is pitch black, and I can see nothing. About 10 zombies chased me up here, and when I got to the top, they went to their normal patrol routine as they could not find me. Every time I move a single step forward, while crouching mind you, every single one of them goes absolutely berserk. From the TOP of the firehouse, they know exactly where I am every time I make any moves. This really is retarded.

[zealous 13]

best 1.7.1.4 strat

alt+f4 then wait for a patch

[Peyj 1]

I crawled to a barn and made it inside and up to get a rifle. I turned to leave and two Zeds

ran in the door. I had to waste bullets for shift-crouch walking up the stairs. Turn down the aggro.

Hm, I guess this is what happened to me last night. I had been hiding in a barn (unluckily didn't find a weapon), and thought I'd quite sneakily come back down, but I'd managed to pull a zombie, who then must have called out for his friends to join the party. That character was a very short-lived one. :p

[Ahris 6]

The hatchet is a pretty powerful weapon and from what i've seen they can be found all over the place. They actually work like a very short range gun (It shoots a projectile where you aim) and just like with guns hitting the head is an instant kill. As for body hits it's about as powerful as a 5.56 assault rifle, they went down in two hits as far as i could tell.

The range seems to be about 2m and a bit longer than the zombies' reach so with a bit of practice you can kill them before they get close enough to hit you.

I found it easier to kill zombies with a hatchet than with a gun so i'm going with a hatchet/pistol now rather than rifle/pistol. :) Infinite 'ammo' and no noise plus you can chop wood with it! If it runs out of 'ammo', just drop it and pick it up and it'll be fully charged again. Note that when you first pick one up, you have to reload it to be able to swing it.

I found a lot of pathing problems with the new AI, Z's will get stuck a lot and pick very strange and long routes to get to you, it makes things very unpredictable but can also be a lifesaver.

For example, when i hid from a horde in a warehouse at the docks, half of them got stuck by a wall and the rest ran into the ocean and started swimming away. :P Not a single one came near the warehouse entrance...much to my dissappointment as i had lit up the interior with chem flares and was going to try out my new hatchet...

Here's a little something for everyone acting like little kids because they can't evade zombies anymore, it does contain a few tips too :)

The AI has bugs but i really don't see what some people are complaining about, i haven't died from any zombies yet and i've had conflicts with hundreds of them today. I spawned two villages from Electro and lost my pack in the water (To explore an island), i scavenged both of them and killed every z (20 or 30) that went for me with a hatchet i found, i only started bleeding once, using my only bandage.

Then i went to Electro where i massacred every zombie i met on the way to the northern fire station with my hatchet, there i found a backpack, supplies and weapons and stocked up on smoke grenades.

I went towards the school, shooting zombies with my new akm on the way until they became a bit too many.

At the school another player who was out of ammo was hiding (He was talking on com). I could hear a loud heartbeat so i was suspicious of him but he didn't shoot, still i decided to get out of there in case he would kill me. I shot as many zombies as i could before i ran out of ammo and went across the street to the diner when i heard the guy saying he was bleeding, he was stuck on the upper floors of the school. Since i brought the zombies there and my gunfire had brought a huge amount of zombies to him (Which were now after him since he fired his gun last), i stopped looking for ammo, ran past the zombies who was in the diner with me and tossed a smoke grenade on each side of the school after which the guy came running out like a rocket and went to the supermarket while the zombies were busy and then i had the z's around the supermarket chase me and i pulled them off into the city. That's when the local bandits woke up and started shooting at me...and attracted more zombies, i probably had the whole city after me but since the bandits kept shooting, the z's eventually started leaving my trail and followed the sniper fire instead! :) I managed to get to the shore and headed north where i logged out once i was in the clear with no ammo left but a pack full of supplies. :)

It made a good story but what i mean is that this is the first time i've had use of all the crap i usually carry around so the zombies are having exactly the effect that they should, there are bugs but most of the complaints i've heard are just ridiculous. :P For me the game is better than ever because now looking for a single can of beans and a coke can get you into an adventure like the one above. :)

[Reign19k 1]

I like the direction he is trying to go with the zombies.

Zombies should be a threat, and raiding large cities should be a coordinated effort that requires more than one person. A lone survivor should be stuck with daunting odds and raiding small towns until he can come across people to work with. I like this, he should concentrate on how to keep the zombies a huge threat imo. Keep it the way that it is and work out the kinks. I would have just held off on taking the starting gear for when the zombie mechanics are working as intended. Do you really think in a real life situation like this you would be able to survive on your own? Do you really think that without an arsenal at your disposal you are going to be able to raid Atlanta on your own? Fix the quirky mechanics, then focus on how we can make the zombies even more dangerous.

[allbusiness 5]

I like the direction he is trying to go with the zombies.

Zombies should be a threat' date=' and raiding large cities should be a coordinated effort that requires more than one person. A lone survivor should be stuck with daunting odds and raiding small towns until he can come across people to work with. I like this, he should concentrate on how to keep the zombies a huge threat imo. Keep it the way that it is and work out the kinks. I would have just held off on taking the starting gear for when the zombie mechanics are working as intended. Do you really think in a real life situation like this you would be able to survive on your own? Do you really think that without an arsenal at your disposal you are going to be able to raid Atlanta on your own? Fix the quirky mechanics, then focus on how we can make the zombies even more dangerous.

[/quote']

1) A smart lone player should be able to avoid Zombies. Currently impossible. In real life, a smart person by himself is far more capable of looting a city because he's one person and attracts less attention. Taking a group only complicates matters and brings many more "oh shit we fucked up" possibilities. In spec ops missions or undercover missions, most military/police forces/etc. send in as few people as possible. Why? Because it attracts way too much attention if you send a large group in.

2) The current Zombies aren't a threat in a realistic way; they are just a threat because they literally almost cheat. Zombies from a "realism" standpoint do not hear footsteps from 50m away, and even if they did, could not exactly pinpoint you. Even if you let off a gunshot, you should still have enough time to abandon your original position to get away, because a gunshot in a city would distort the sound tremendously, only giving Zombies a general direction of where to go. Right now the Zombies run STRAIGHT to where you let off the shot, and do so at insane speeds.

[Slyguy65 499]

Zombies now have God like hearing... And when you anger them and go into a house' date=' they are impossile to get past and you have no choice but to die.

[/quote']

Yep...the way this mod is updated is silly some times it will put multiple things in one update that just shouldnt be there

In my experience updating balance issues is like a seesaw you go up and down up and down but with this mod it tries to "fix" things in one go

(making survivors weaker and zombies stronger...one or the other please)

[SDCowboy85 1]

The zombies now are broken and cheap. Plain and simple. Earlier I was alone, in a closed building. All I did was swing the axe to test it out and I agro'd like 10 zombies somehow. The game has gone from amazing to completely cheap and not fun.

[Reign19k 1]

1) A smart lone player wouldn't be lone. Taking a group of idiots that aren't prepared complicates matters. Special forces train , they don't send them on high risk missions. Only highly sensitive missions. Why in the shit would you take needless risk with millions of dollars and decades of training. A lone person would probably last less than an hour in a major city like Atlanta if he was active. Raiding a town like this would most indeed require more than one person and a proper operation order....

2) Until the point in time when the engine and resources allow for making zombies "realistic".

(not sure how I feel about that because they are imaginary ... we don't have any fucking clue how a "zombie" should act ... How the fuck do we know what an infected person can and can't hear. What if their senses are actually boosted beyond normal due to the infection)

Until they can be made to be "realistic", they should cheat and make them harder.

[SDCowboy85 1]

1) A smart lone player wouldn't be lone. Taking a group of idiots that aren't prepared complicates matters. Special forces train ' date=' they don't send them on high risk missions. Only highly sensitive missions. Why in the shit would you take needless risk with millions of dollars and decades of training. A lone person would probably last less than an hour in a major city like Atlanta if he was active. Raiding a town like this would most indeed require more than one person and a proper operation order....

2) Until the point in time when the engine and resources allow for making zombies "realistic".

(not sure how I feel about that because they are imaginary ... we don't have any fucking clue how a "zombie" should act ... How the fuck do we know what an infected person can and can't hear. What if their senses are actually boosted beyond normal due to the infection)

Until they can be made to be "realistic", they should cheat and make them harder.

[/quote']

They want this game to eventually be a stand alone, retail game. If they want this game to sell at all, they'd better realize that ultra hardcore/cheap doesn't sell. 1.7 was a great blend of hardcore and user-friendly. Now the game is brutal, cheap and downright unplayable.

[Imbalanxd 59]

Ye, I'm not really phased about the difficulty. Its still just as easy as ever to run into a building and headshot all the walking zombies with my Makarov. The only thing I'm worried about is that stealth is being removed from the game entirely with this patch. If a zombie can see you from a mile away when facing you, and hear you from a mile away when its back is turned to you, then there is no point in doing anything other than running and gunning.

[Johnny Walker 0]

Yeah I want zombies to be the primary threat in this game, but right now they seem to be seeing and hearing through walls and at very large distances. I want them to be a major difficult threat, just somehow a better one. It just feels cheap right now, like the ai is cheating a little to much. Its like I wish I was a zombie in this game, and had all those superpowers :)

[SDCowboy85 1]

Oh glorious 1.7...where has your perfection gone? :(

[Reign19k 1]

I think it's more of a matter on how we as a community and Rocket, the creator, feels the "infected" should behave. What traits should they posses? What traits shouldn't they posses?

What is doable with the resources and knowledge he has to cater to that?

I want them to be hard, because I feel it would be damn near impossible in a real situation.

Something like this would probably be our extinction event more than likely. Look at all of the dead soldiers about the world ... if they couldn't prevent being overrun, what chances do you think you would have?

---

They want this game to eventually be a stand alone' date=' retail game. If they want this game to sell at all, they'd better realize that ultra hardcore/cheap doesn't sell. 1.7 was a great blend of hardcore and user-friendly. Now the game is brutal, cheap and downright unplayable.

[/quote']

That's what difficulty modes are for

[SDCowboy85 1]

That's what difficulty modes are for

You can't have difficulties in an online game. This isn't single player...

[Reign19k 1]

That's what difficulty modes are for

You can't have difficulties in an online game. This isn't single player...

See Arma2...