fast and highly observant zombies are bad for the game

[Katana67 2907]

I think you raise a few good points.

 

I'd like to see faster zombies still be commonplace, but have them do more damage per hit and be less of a laser-guided missile.

 

Like it or not, having zombies as a blanket ambient system really shortchanges what they could be. They need to put in some form of AI to the zombies, which would differentiate the experience, rather than having them (as you say) be the same every time.

 

I've spoken about this before, but I'd like to see them have a system akin to the police in GTA. If they get triggered by a noise, they investigate the general area. If the player has moved from their LOS, they will enter a "loiter" mode and actively search around for the player. If they do not find the player, they return to their inactive state.

 

If a zombie detects someone via LOS, they'd rush the player so long as LOS is maintained. If LOS is broken, they'd search the place the player was seen last and the above cycle is repeated.

 

As of now, the zombies have unfettered access to your EXACT location at all times. Which is silly and more provided for by the rudimentary zombie mechanic than anything.

 

I don't like slow zombies at all, I'd rather them just behave in such a way that they can be evaded by a clever player rather than making them easy to evade by slowing them down. That and if they do that, it would justify them upping the damage of zombie hits.

[Atomizer 53]

The zombies are the way they are right now(highly observant) because they are not finished, there are many mechanics surrounding zombies that are just not in yet.

 

The most noticeable thing, is there is very little "stealth" elements in right now, I believe zombies do become less observant at night in the SA currently(haven't really "tested" this), however there is no "visibility" system in, which means it doesn't matter if you are prone or standing upright, the zombies will react the same to sight. I do believe however zombies might react a bit to noises, as I notice if I am near a zombie, that is not aggro, the moment I start sprinting, whether I am in line of sight or not, they more often then not, aggro, but again, I can't confirm this for sure.

All I can really confirm is zombies are nowhere near being finished, and neither is the systems surrounding them, but I do imagine they will be a bit like in the mod, and yes, they might seem "too observant" to you, if you're standing outside in the middle of the day, but at nighttime they would mostly only respond to noise more then anything, unless you're using some kind of light source.

 

Zombies just glitch through just about everything right now, as far as I know its because only a few buildings have been configured for zombie pathing so far, so for the most part, once zombies have been finished, they will have to navigate obstacles as well, and not just glitch through them.

 

And one last thing I would like to address is: zombies are not as fast as players in SA.

You can double tap and hold W to sprint, and you go faster depending on what mode your "held item" is in.

1. No item in hand, fists lowered - Fastest

2. Item in hand, but lowered

3. Item in hand, raised

4. Item in hand, raised, and "aiming" (enter aim mode by tapping right mouse button, even if you just have your fists/melee weapon) - Slowest

[Antiklimax 2]

The zombies are the way they are right now(highly observant) because they are not finished, there are many mechanics surrounding zombies that are just not in yet.

 

 

Imo the mod suffers from the same problem

 

 

 they might seem "too observant" to you, if you're standing outside in the middle of the day, but at nighttime they would mostly only respond to noise more then anything, unless you're using some kind of light source.

The thing is, if a zombie triggers me (either the mod or standalone) i dont think "Shit, they got me". Instead i think "This again? *sigh*"

And in a game, that has its main focus on zombies, thats not a good thing.

[Clumzy (DayZ) 377]

I've noticed that a lot of people just let the zombies get really close before even reacting to them. Maybe zombies should be able to grab players and impede their movement?

[Guest]

Nobody else appears to be having the same problem with the Zombies/Infected that I am having. I'm finding it incredibly hard to actually evade them without having to spring a good distance away from them. Going into buildings, around corners, behind bushes, or crawling when out of their line of sight (around 2-3 corners from the Zombie/Infected) and they still manage to track me to my current location. It was significantly easier in the mod to get away from them.

 

One thing I do like is that they're not zig-zagging all over the place which allows me to get a decent shot on them, but I do not want to be firing upon them whenever they approach me as it's too noisy and alerts other players.

 

I think slow and powerful is the way to go with them, they should have an aggro'd run speed off around 3/4 the players sprint, but I think once you manage to lose their line of sight and they no longer "know" where you've gone they should start wandering around the area looking for you, a little more sensitive to noise and sight than they would be in their passive states.

[dusty_nuttles 130]

But they have neither. :S

 

You can pretty much walk up to them and smack them in the face with an axe before they react nine times out of ten

 

I think your math is off. My friend was laying down doing something with his inventory so I was covering him. We were in the middle of two tree's. Not in the branches, just open ground.

 

I know distances pretty well in the game, I know how far 300 meters is from playing so much of the mod. Now I'm telling you w/o a doubt we hadn't stirred up any zeds prior, complete stealth...and this one zed see's us from at least 300 yards. Probably more. I tell my friend a zed is coming so hurry up. He looks around and says I don't see anything, where is it...I tell him its on the way lol.

 

I get zeds aggro at closer distances all the time too and not running, crouched slow walk will do it.

 

If the moon is in line with the sun I can creep on a zeds backside and wack them before they see me. Real number here is more like 15%-20%.

[ninjacalypse 551]

What would be nice is if at some point in the development they add different types of zombies, one might be a runner, one might be a straggler and one might be slightly more tanky for example.

[Noctiluxx 48]

I personally am ok with their response time and speed.. just obvious things like clipping through walls and such.. and otherwiese im good..

 

Just now, i rang off a shot in the airfield, and instantly 5 of them came for me from quite a distance.. it was fun.

[Gdaddy22 299]

I really like the idea of zombies running with different speeds and the idea of alerting the zombies in the area. For me it's a must-have for Standalone and I hope the devs will try to put that into the game. There is 0 threat from zombies by now. 

[__redruM 7]

I've been playing mostly night servers with moonlight, and had little trouble with zombies.  Last night ended up on a day server and couldn't move one block without alerting a zombie.  It would be nice if crouch walking cut their view distance a bit.

[Vertisce 158]

Zombies cannot run as fast as you.  Learn to run.

[Karmaterror 982]

Varied run speeds is already in. I ran from a bunch of about 8 of em yesterday and some fell away quickly, some took longer as they were a bit quicker and then this 1 persistant one chased me at even speed for ages:)

 

I say give em great view distance and chain the agro. Then if one spots you on the fringe of a city....all of a sudden there could be loooooads running up the hill at you from all over the place :)

[Antiklimax 2]

Zombies cannot run as fast as you.  Learn to run.

 

In DayZ Mod, which i referenced in my post beside the original, they did...

[psychopigeon 32]

Change the title of the topic, it discredits your argument.

 

Your suggestions have no merit either. Strong zombies will make people come together and put aside their differences to help each other. Unless you want the game to end up with players being the real threat while slow-walking zombies are used just for target practice which is how it is now.

[Antiklimax 2]

Change the title of the topic, it discredits your argument.

 

Your suggestions have no merit either. Strong zombies will make people come together and put aside their differences to help each other. Unless you want the game to end up with players being the real threat while slow-walking zombies are used just for target practice which is how it is now.

You havent really read my post, have u?

[daze23 549]

as far as the view distance, if you can see them, they should be able to see you (if their looking in your direction)

[Bocui 13]

I just sprint. Works perfectly. I dont think you can outsmart them yet, as they have been running through walls after i hide

[nebuuuu 11]

Hi :-)

I wish that zombies are more dangerious as in the mod and be more different.

We had the crawlers, the "hoppers", the runners and this stuff, which hopefully get back in the SA.

A horde (15-20 of zombies) would be awesome.
And if there is someone in a bigger city and make loud noises (gunshots, explosions), there starts eventually a bigger "horde" or like the zombies near to this (150-200metres) going in this direction.
So this situation would explode dramatically into a "damn, i have to get out of here as quick as i can!".

But, i have to agree, this needs a better AI and i honestly think that this is not possible for dean hall and his crew. :-/
So maybe the different types of zombies and then alot of them in bigger cities.

I normally love the "oldschool" zombies like in dawn of the dead, op wwz (book), from j.l. bourne and this stuff.
So, not the running zombies. But okay, it`s DayZ and there are always running zombies. :-)

[Firstbornchicken 34]

I would like to see zombies "Power up" if they kill a player, or stumble upon a dead body.

 

I like the idea of thinking the zombies can starve as well, giving merit to the idea of them feeding making them stronger :)

[Psyl3nt 125]

Hordes is a definite do want. 

 

Every time I think of what would be actually scary I think of hordes of them, if you are sneaking into town and you climb something then realise you are smack in the middle of about 200 zeds with more wandering in . . . .  

 

Also any gunfire at all should attract basically all zeds for miles around. 

[AP_Norris 1018]

I wanna see more, and the melee system hit register a bit better.

Once thats done I want armour and to be the melee tank that carry's almost nothing incase it gets damaged.

But I just run into town for my group take out 20 zombies or more before my friends enter.

Zombies need to have slower wake up times after being knocked out, and also fluctuations in health so some zombies have the chance to survive fire axe shots, while others might also spawn with motorbike equipment on making him his own melee tank.

No magic giant zombies or anything, just rare chances for zombies to spawn with good but reasonably damaged gear.

[AP_Norris 1018]

I would like to see zombies "Power up" if they kill a player, or stumble upon a dead body.

 

I like the idea of thinking the zombies can starve as well, giving merit to the idea of them feeding making them stronger :)

But then if you get people kill themselves in churno because nothings there you will get super zombies that are next to invincible.

[bad_mojo (DayZ) 1204]

Using the slightest bit of stealth in the standalone goes a long ways. You can literally crouch and watch a zombie 100m away stop his full sprint and lose sight of you.

 

Just don't run in the open and expect not to get seen.

[Vembumees 3]

Zombies in this game are too weak, don't understand how u die from one. You outrun the zombies and can pretty much beat them up with your fists. Yesterday my friend was just beating up zombies with just his fists without dieing while I played rocky theme in skype. Maybe I am wrong but the zombies felt as they dealt more damage at the release of SA. Yesterday I was alt tabbed and was beaten by 3 zombies at the time and still survived.

[Atomizer 53]

Imo the mod suffers from the same problem

 

 

The thing is, if a zombie triggers me (either the mod or standalone) i dont think "Shit, they got me". Instead i think "This again? *sigh*"

And in a game, that has its main focus on zombies, thats not a good thing.

The mod had reasonably understandable mechanics in regard to zombie aggro, there was just this weird odd out zombie that seemed to come from miles away, if you proned around in the mod, you would usually not aggro anything, unless you got too close, and you could usually crouch around pretty successfully, this is during the daytime, at night time, you could just about sprint through cherno(avoiding the barrel fires) and not aggro the zombies(at least from sight). And in my opinion, thats not too unreasonable, except, that one odd out zombie that seemed to ignore all the rules.

 

To be honest, I don't think DayZs focus is the zombies, otherwise they would be done, DayZ is a survival game, that just happens to take place in a zombie apocalypse, players are drawn to DayZ because of the zombies though.

 

Yes, zombies are too easy right now if you know how to deal with them, I had about 10 zombies on me the other day and all I had was a wrench, I figured I would try, killed every single zombie without taking a single hit.

And once you get a fire axe, that one hits zombies, they are no longer a threat, though you can still get caught off guard by the unfinished aggro mechanics and a zombie will get a hit off and cause you to bleed.

 

A lot of work needs to be done to the zombies before they can become challenging, and the first step isn't adding more, its fixing pathing so they no longer glitch through things, and optimizing them so they can add more, and of course, respawn mechanics.

Usually you go through an area that has already had other people clearing out the zombies, so you don't see many, yet as I mentioned, I ended up with at least 10 zombies on me near Komarovo, the next person to enter that area on that server wouldn't have seen any zombies.

 

One mechanic for making groups of zombies more threatening I discussed with some friends was to have a zombie have a chance to grab you if you "move past it", it will cause you to stop for a second or 2, it won't deal any damage itself, but if you have multiple zombies, being stopped for a second or 2 could be fatal.