Idea for Zombie respawns with real gameplay benefits.

[TheScruffyBandit 382]

Currently on experimental zombies seem to respawn randomly around towns, which is a great improvement over not respawning at all, however it's far from idea.

 

I recall Rocket mentioning liking the idea of including large herds of roaming zombies at some point and, with that in mind an idea dawned on me: Spawn all zombies in herds.

 

Sounds stupid right? but stick with me. If all zombies spawned in huge 500+ strong herds, roaming in from the edges of the map along the west and east side of the map I feel it would help greatly in adding risk to certain key high value areas like NW, NE and Balota airfields. Going there with the intention of gearing up and PvPing would still be possible, but the risk of a huge mass of zombies roaming through at any given moment would help balance the risk/reward ratio and increase the tension around these areas.

 

Unlike the current respawn system, It would allow groups of players to team up and create safe zones, clearing out a town of the undead and so long as they defend it from swams of roaming undead & rival groups of players, it would stay safe. It would also solve the immersion killing issue of zombies that just appear without any explanation, we'd all know where they came from.

 

 

As the zombies move south and east have small groups break off from the main herd in and around towns, distributing zombies around the map till the few remaining reach the coastal towns where most of the player spawns are. This would also mean new players are less likely to be thrown into the thick of it right from the first moment they spawn and as they work their way inland toward higher value, less player populated areas it would insure that the difficulty ramps up in sync with the rewards.

 

It would also mean that players raiding high value areas such as the airfields would from time to time be forced to team up or call a truce at least for a short time just to survive the huge tide of zombies as it crashes through the area looking for fresh meat.

 

Obviously this idea isn't properly fleshed out and would require quite a lot more AI coding than the existing system, but regardless, I was curious what people thought of it.

Edited February 28, 2014 by TheScruffyBandit

[maxotaur 135]

I like the idea of spawning in herds, but think about it, peoples computers couldn't handle that... not even some of the great PCs designed for this kind of stuff could handle that, and there would be too much Desync. a decent thought but just a bit too farfetched atm.

[Nicko2580 398]

I like the idea of spawning in herds, but think about it, peoples computers couldn't handle that... not even some of the great PCs designed for this kind of stuff could handle that, and there would be too much Desync. a decent thought but just a bit too farfetched atm.

Why not? 

They already plan to have more than 1000 zombies on the map. Hordes of 500 might be a bit much, but hordes of 20, 30 shouldn't be a problem and would be a major, major obstacle for both solo and small groups of players. Especially if they buff the zombies somewhat.

[MrAkenatom 16]

I like the idea of spawning in herds, but think about it, peoples computers couldn't handle that... not even some of the great PCs designed for this kind of stuff could handle that, and there would be too much Desync. a decent thought but just a bit too farfetched atm.

i think the spawn come from the host  and not our computers, and yes a powerful computer can handle it

and i like the idea

Edited February 28, 2014 by MrAkenatom

[TheScruffyBandit 382]

i think the spawn come from the host  and not our computers, and yes a powerful computer can handle it

and i like the idea

Considering we're running "mostly" on one CPU core currently, if they get multi-threading working properly and optimized, there's alot more they could do I'd imagine, even on fairly modest quad core cpus.

Edited March 1, 2014 by TheScruffyBandit

[roflcopter127@yahoo.com 168]

the idea of defending a city/outpost with my friends from a hundred zombies sounds intense

[Monkfish (DayZ) 339]

I like the idea of spawning in herds, but think about it, peoples computers couldn't handle that... not even some of the great PCs designed for this kind of stuff could handle that, and there would be too much Desync. a decent thought but just a bit too farfetched atm.

Eh? The dev's have confirmed that they can run 4000+ zombies if they remove all of the loot -  and this was on earlier builds than we have now that have seen a 15+ boost in FPS over those earlier versions - so once they've fully optimised the code and graphics, there's no reason why they can't implement high numbers in one place. Hell, the Arma series on which this is all based regularly boasts players numbering in the hundres and that copes fine, so I can't see similar numbers of zombies in one place (because, realistically, we're only talking a max of a few hundred on screen here) being much of an issue at all.

 

I like OP's idea. I think the zombies should respawn in greater density in towns/cities, and their numbers be proportionate to the size of town/city they've spawned in, and then wander about slowly and spread out. Any group of structures and their outskirts would become quite dangerous places. Of course, some should spawn randomly in the middle of nowhere and a few in the small villages, but those should be at a far less density than the towns/cities. Similarly with the military locations, a fair number of military zombies should be present at each location.