Do Zombies Dream Of A Good Nights Sleep? (Zombie feedback)

[Kanthos 9]

The thing with zombie games is the fact that it´s the fucking apokalypse. Zombies need to be a threat, otherwise no one would have died. The question is how to make it a threat. I think there are different ways to do so, for example the many-but-weak-zombies-way or the few-but-strong-way.

 

I don´t have a problem with the zombies in towns, because you can stealth around them. But it´s not cool that they can see you from miles ago AND are as fast as this. 

 

Maybe it would be a idea that they recognize you in a closer radius around them AND are this fast. 

 

By the way imho zombies are dead creatures, not rocketlike killers, but that´s just a point of view.

 

Sorry for mistakes and greetings from Germay, you´re doing a great job with DayZ, i really enjoy it :)

[Spatz 2]

WTF?!? Bambis are even more death meat now. One Zed Punch and you're blooding till you death....

[glemmar 88]

The faster zombies are an improvemt, because now they are more of a threat than just a mild annoyance. The animation looks good most of the time, but if they do really sharp turns they tend to look a bit spazzy.

Of course the zombies still need a lot of work to improve the spawning, from how far they can spot/hear you, wall glitching and so on, but all this has been gone through so many times that I don't need to address it any further.

Edited March 23, 2014 by Klemingway

[komadose 190]

Yes their speed has been increased to be faster than the fastest player running speed. This combined with the usual server lag/desync, your ping, and the lack of collision for the zombies, it is now nearly impossible to avoid having to kill every single zombie that ever spots you and tries to chase you down - if you don't, they will catch up and hit you incessantly. I've also found that I can get hit while running away from the zombies, and if I stop to bandage myself then obviously I get hit even more. The only way I can even stop long enough to eat or bandage myself is to run into a multi-story house where the zombies are too buggy to follow me up stairs...

glitch or be glitched, eh?

[komadose 190]

The thing with zombie games is the fact that it´s the fucking apokalypse. Zombies need to be a threat, otherwise no one would have died. The question is how to make it a threat. I think there are different ways to do so, for example the many-but-weak-zombies-way or the few-but-strong-way.

 

I don´t have a problem with the zombies in towns, because you can stealth around them. But it´s not cool that they can see you from miles ago AND are as fast as this. 

 

Maybe it would be a idea that they recognize you in a closer radius around them AND are this fast. 

 

By the way imho zombies are dead creatures, not rocketlike killers, but that´s just a point of view.

 

Sorry for mistakes and greetings from Germay, you´re doing a great job with DayZ, i really enjoy it :)

hard zombies are good, but having them run through walls and spawn right in your face is kinda bad...

[chysgoda 3]

Are they suppose to be able to damage gear with their hits, had 2 assault vests ruined and stuff inside.

[Baraak 0]

To the dev team. First let me say that Dayz WAS one of the best games out there. After this patch it's junk. The zombie re-spawn is a joke. Strong? Sure go for it!!!! Fast? Sure go for it!! But wtf did you all think with this re-spawn crap? You hit/kill one and 20 zombies rush you. They don't even need to be spawned yet. They pop right in front of you and kill you. It almost endless. Causing you to waste all the ammo you have acquired just to kill "ghost" zombies. We all wanted more zombies yes. But MORE!! not re-spawns. If you did this because of server stress issues get better damn servers or change the way the information is sent. As of now I will no longer play this game as I feel it's broken. I'll keep an eye on patch notes and hope for a fix. Took the best game and ruined it. I hope you guys fix this issue.

[goli4th 2]

I felt the need to sign up to support the new zombies.

 

After 95 hours as a solo friendly surviver, this game just got really fun. This is getting very close to what i hoped for, when I read this game was in the making (never played the mod).

 

I know that pathing/spawning/desync is an issue, and if you decide to nerf the zombies untill this is improved, that is fine by me. But please bring them back to this state afterwards.

The feeling I got when I first saw a zombie sprinting and jumping after me, was great. But they do fall behind eventially. They also lost my path when I circled/sprinted around a block (that was Svetlo).

I have not noticed the spawning issues, but I only carry guns as a precaution for bandits/KOS'ers.

 

I see some complaints about not being able to run through a city anymore. I find that unrealistic to do in a zombie apocalypse anyway. The travel from one building to the next should be (now is) the main consern. You should have desperate needs to enter a main city in my opinion.

 

Keep up the good work :)

(English is not my native language, so please be nice)

 

Edit:

I have a small wish:

I would like my corpse to turn into a zombie after some time (for instance 5-10 minutes). The sniper should have to take risks to get my stuff. The though of zombie-me revenging myself, after being shot in the back from 500m away, is a small comfort :)

Edited March 23, 2014 by goli4th

[hannibaldaplaya 1095]

A zombie hit me last night in Elektro from a distance of roughly 10 meters away, but I still got away and was able to bandage.

 

Did I mention he saw me through a wall?

 

Yeah.

 

We need stealth and better hit reg before you can make masses of difficult zombies, please.

[Karmaterror 982]

Grrr this is how dayz should be....fire a shot in a built up area and expect death! Didn't you guys see those doodle rants, death to zombies should be commonplace. It should go die 20 times to zeds.....find a gun....die because the shots your fired pulled every zombie around you.

 

Even in the mod if I went for some gunplay vs zombies in a city, id leave my good gear in a tent. Just take an LMG few mags and couple food and drink. Why? because I fully expected to die. If not from the constant stream of zombies my shots pulled....then from the bandit who followed the train to kill me. Point being avoiding agro, or managing it when you do agro one is all part of the experience. Not continuing to fire when your first shots pull zombies is a good start! haha

 

Many ways to manage agro...

 

Don't fire in built up areas unless you have to

Use melee and stealth (just staying out of zombie LOS for now)

Just because you have 1 agroed, don't stand up and run, stay crouched and keep moving properly, don't fire in panic....it will just pull more zeds

 

Agro is your friend!

 

Agro points out a survivor so blatently when your scoping from the treeline

In teams 1 guy can agro the zombies and keep them busy, allowing a buddy to loot pretty much unhindered.

 

This is all part of the dayz experience. Ok so I agree this system needs work, but its still an big step forward towards that Dayz feeling.. And enough about collision....we all know about it. Just use your imagination, think when they follow buildings properly, spawn out of our LOS, and exist in much greater number......Its gonna be EPIC :D

[Chucknorris405 83]

I love it! They are almost a threat now at least I have to put them onto consideration when I go into towns now. I still think there should be more.

Why the respawb could be better it is just a place holder used to put More zombies in towns and not kill fps

I never thought I'd hear so much complaining over zombies being the focus of a zombie game

[discipled 62]

My opinion is that, at this stage of the game process, they're fantastic! it's make for much more exciting experience and anything more than 1 zombie and i'm freaking out, especially when they sprint right up into your face. I'm excited for the day when the spawning system isn't just a simple place holder and it'll be implemented to be what it's meant to be. The zombies themselves just need to stop being able to hit you from more than 3m away, unless they're jumping at you, and the melee system needs tuned. But i'm really excited about the direction things are going. As a personal opinion, masses of slow zombies is more of what I would love but if the devs wanted more of the fewer but faster zombies I'm not going to complain. They're infected people, such as from "28 Days Later" and if that's the direction the devs want that's an understandable direction and with fewer zombies it will cut the load down on the servers or whatever. In all I say it's a positive step in the right direction.

 

tldr:

1. faster zombies good

2. spawning needs tuned

3. melee needs tuned

4. excellent direction for zombies :)

[Electi 149]

i do not understand why ppl cry overhere, zombies are great, now you can make a fun by shooting them, so much bloody mess, after that you just run on elbows and it's finished. Axing them now is more pleasant then before

[nautic 40]

The Zombies need to be a real threat in order to force players to hold together.

 

It's good that they got harder, but i still don't like them because:

- The Path-finding is not good enough.

- They run through walls.

- They are stuttering and hard to aim at when they are closed by and running. It feels like aiming with 4fps.

- Respawning is good, but they should not respawn in range of a player. You need to be able to clear an area!

- Zombie-Aggro is totally random. Some recognize you from miles away, while you can just walk by others.

- I think they should be just a tiny little bit slower, but thats a matter of taste.

- I think they should additionally have another type of attack, where they hold you tight (like being handcuffed), which they'd only do if you're unhealthy, low on blood or out of breath. And if you cant get out in time, they bite and infect you. Some hours later you would get unconscious, die, and wake up as a lootable Zombie. Still carrying all the same gear that you had. Looking like you, just a bit more like a Zombie. And controlled by AI of course (NPC). This would allow new kind of Drama and Stories :)

Edited March 23, 2014 by nautic

[AAtlas 16]

Zombie animations - the new zombie animations are nice although their static stance can make them look like they are holding a gun from a distance.
Zombie speed -  The speed of the zeds for the current state of the alpha is too fast mainly for the following reasons: 

                         

1) For survivor to get from point A to point B they will have to go around walls/buildings/fences while the Zeds currently have wall hacks and bad pathfinding meaning most of the time they will take a direct route to the survivor running right through the building/walls/fences that survivors have to go around, the knock on effect being that in comparison they can cover the same ground alot faster than a survivor.

2) Cannot enter buildings to escape zeds to hide/bandage because of their x-ray vision and wall hacks. then once the zeds inevitably spot you through a few objects and arrive though the nearest wall into your building melee combat inside structures is so fubar (atm?) its almost impossible to combat multiple zeds because 80% of the melee attacks will hit the roof/wall/anything other than the zed. so you try to run and bandage but then... (see reason 1). 

Also i suggest that when zombies get within their melee range of the player that they would slow down to maybe 60% of their running speed so they don't constantly overshoot the player or run around you in some insane sonic the hedgehog style orbit making it quite dangerous to try to attack zeds with your buddies standing anywhere near you.

I understand that IF the zombie collision problems were fixed and IF the pathfinding was better how epic this would be but the current state of these issues in the alpha mean that rather than being a genuine threat zombies have now become really frustrating to combat and escape. imo it's not so much of a question of are zombies too fast? but more are these changes being made too soon? because its not really possible to gauge whether these changes are good or not with all of the collision/stealth/pathfinding mechanics in the state that they are currently in but i suppose a step in the right direction.
 

Edited March 23, 2014 by AAtlas

[HazZarD87 166]

Zombie animations - the new zombie animations are nice although their static stance can make them look like they are holding a gun from a distance.

Zombie speed -  The speed of the zeds for the current state of the alpha is too fast mainly for the following reasons: 

                         

1) For survivor to get from point A to point B they will have to go around walls/buildings/fences while the Zeds currently have wall hacks and bad pathfinding meaning most of the time they will take a direct route to the survivor running right through the building/walls/fences that survivors have to go around, the knock on effect being that in comparison they can cover the same ground alot faster than a survivor.

2) Cannot enter buildings to escape zeds to hide/bandage because of their x-ray vision and wall hacks. then once the zeds inevitably spot you through a few objects and arrive though the nearest wall into your building melee combat inside structures is so fubar (atm?) its almost impossible to combat multiple zeds because 80% of the melee attacks will hit the roof/wall/anything other than the zed. so you try to run and bandage but then... (see reason 1). 

Also i suggest that when zombies get within their melee range of the player that they would slow down to maybe 60% of their running speed so they don't constantly overshoot the player or run around you in some insane sonic the hedgehog style orbit making it quite dangerous to try to attack zeds with your buddies standing anywhere near you.

I understand that IF the zombie collision problems were fixed and IF the pathfinding was better how epic this would be but the current state of these issues in the alpha mean that rather than being a genuine threat zombies have now become really frustrating to combat and escape. imo it's not so much of a question of are zombies too fast? but more are these changes being made too soon? because its not really possible to gauge whether these changes are good or not with all of the collision/stealth/pathfinding mechanics in the state that they are currently in but i suppose a step in the right direction.

 

Exactly, the combination of their new speed and the "appear out of thin air" - clipping - ESP-senses issues is what is making them hard trough the wrong means. By all means make them a threat but in a proper way that players can do something about. Like someone said before: You'd have to be blind with fanboyism to say they are fine in this state.

[netron 0]

I think this patch is a step in the right direction.

A greater threat by zombies will result in less KOS and gives me a better feeling for the zombie apocalypse.

The only things i would love to see improved, are the respawn system as well as the aggro mechanics.

 

There shouldn't be two zombies respawning and exactly know where you are after killing the two before,

especially if you try to avoid noises by using axe.

I could imagine a simple spawnpoint based system. The respawn time should be increased but there should be more zombies overall.

 

Won't mention the noclip thing here, but don't forget it ;)

Edited March 23, 2014 by NetronTheDK

[amiasfree 262]

Last night, I died on my fully geared char I spent hours on, slipped down a cliff, broke an arm and a leg then died, so I had to start fresh.

 

Current zeds on a fresh char are terrifying, and I LOVE it. Barely scraping by after beating six zombies to death with a fire extinguisher is intense.

[Katana67 2907]

On Zombie Spawns

 

Yes, it needs to be reworked. Although it's a placeholder, the concept of spawning zombies pre-aggro'd and within the sight of the player is laughable.

 

For one, if relied upon to "simulate" aggroing a large group of zombies... it really doesn't allow for realistic "threat assessments" on the part of the player. It'd be too formulaic if I went into a relatively unpopulated area, fired, and was immediately accosted by an infinite number of zombies.

 

Even if they put an artificial limit on how many zombies can be spawned around the player, it's still highly formulaic. Go into an area, fire, kill 20 zombies, you're good. Rinse and repeat.

 

As opposed to just having large amounts of zombies be spawned in the world already, which allows the player to assess the situation and make a judgment based on that assessment of how to approach the situation.

 

But first and foremost, they need to revamp how zombies draw aggro. Zombies now rely almost solely on line of sight to draw aggro, which is a mistake (and contrary to Rocket's description of zombies as having poor sight but amazing sensitivity to sound). Likewise, they do not respect tangible changes in distance, silhouette, movement speed, and other factors on the part of the player.

 

Simply put, with the current (and previous) zombie mechanic, there's only two options... run away or fight. There's no third way, meaning stealthily sneaking past the zombies (making oneself vulnerable). Stealth is non-existent in the Standalone. It was essential to some of the earlier versions of the mod where zombies were difficult, I remember having to crawl into every town just to loot. I'm not saying everyone should HAVE to do this, but it should at least be a viable option. Whereas now, whether you're prone in a bush or sprinting across an open field, zombies aggro you regardless.

 

That needs to be addressed before they up the count. Tweaking the spawns is fine, and I suspect it's the main goal of this tweak. But it raises the overall number of zombies encountered by the player, even when the zombie-player interaction mechanics (i.e. aggro and damage-dealing) aren't finished/good. Nevermind that it's a bad approach to spawn zombies within 100m.

 

I have no issue with zombies being a threat. I've advocated for it for a while. But the current status of zombies isn't anywhere near what I had wanted, and am glad it's a placeholder for something else.

 

On Zombie Animations

 

This is always an area that I felt they needed to improve on massively.

 

Zombies need to actually interact with the player somehow, through animation. They can't just lunge vaguely at the player and impart "damage" randomly. The way in which two objects interact with one another has always been a weak aspect of the engine/game in my opinion.

 

That said, I welcome faster zombies. I'm not a fan of shamblers.

Edited March 23, 2014 by Katana67

[makomachine 263]

I've got about 3 hours in on the new patch and really like the changes.  Besides the no dsync, the zeds are now an actual factor in my thought process while playing.  Do I climb that ladder?  Do I have another way out if I go in there?  Do I stop and use the fireaxe, or do I keep running?  Is it worth it to loot that building? 

 

Not perfect by a long shot, but a definite step in the right direction.  Let's get the physics/pathfinding worked out, along with a better spawn mechanic, then add even more.  Got to be in that order though.

[Karakoz 141]

Maybe you're the noob here? Play smart. Do you enter villages/cities without your weapon ready, you're doing it wrong. I never get hit. Infact, and if you want, I can make a video and a step-by-step tutorial for you how to kill a zombie.

 

Stupid melee animations and bad hit detection is a common topic of whine. The hit detection isn't based on that little dot so called crosshair, it's rather where your blade of the axes swings. Study how the axe works and where it lands when you swing, then you'll see that the zombies are easy as hell.

Sorry man, I know how to kill zombies. And only noobs enter cities with their melee weapons ready. Actually, before the patch, only noobs spent their time killing zombies when running was obviously less dangerous. And only noobs don't understand that you run faster without your melee weapon.

 

Simply put, with the current (and previous) zombie mechanic, there's only two options... run away or fight.

 

Some zombies manage to follow you on a very long distance, even when you sprint, they run faster than you. So fleeing isn't an option anymore. They can catch up and jump on your back.

Edited March 23, 2014 by Karakoz

[makomachine 263]

Some zombies manage to follow you on a very long distance, even when you sprint, they run faster than you. So fleeing isn't an option anymore. They can catch up and jump on your back.

 

I'm guessing you are carrying a second primary.  If so, then agree.  If not, then that's only true for about 3 seconds.  After that first leap, you can outrun the fastest of them.  This patch is definitely requiring people to consider that second primary...

[Katana67 2907]

Some zombies manage to follow you on a very long distance, even when you sprint, they run faster than you. So fleeing isn't an option anymore. They can catch up and jump on your back.

 

This is another thing.

 

Running away shouldn't JUST involve putting distance between you and a zombie. It needs to involve more hiding and breaking LOS (if already aggro'd, never mind when drawing aggro) actually needs to make a difference.

[AlphaDogMeat . 493]

 And only noobs enter cities with their melee weapons ready.

 

A week ago maybe.  Now all you pvp'ers going in with guns blazing end up:

 

a.  Back on the beach.

 

or

 

b.  In here QQing about how everything's broken and the magic zombies are being beastly to you.

.

 

I love it.

[Olorin 1]

My impressions:  This patch has drastically decreased the gameplay.  I'm all for harder zombies to make you play safer but with how zombies act this patch - 1) aggro from miles away (based on LoS); and 2) almost impossible to break LoS in town so if you aggro, you just have to run out of town (basically just move on to next town and hope they leave) - there is almost no counterplay to them unless you have a weapon.  You cannot sneak past them in order to look for a weapon.  Additionally, the glitches with them make playing this patch almost unbearable.  I finally made it into a police station but aggro a zombie from somewhere and the invisible zombie killed me while i was on the roof looking for him.

 

TL;DR:  Zombies are too buggy to increase their run speed and respawn.  It makes the game almost unplayable unless you get REALLY lucky in finding a quick weapon (or already have a weapon).  There needs to be a counterplay to them:  i.e., fix them so you can at least sneak past them (rummaging slower) with less risk.

 

The risk/reward isn't there yet.  Thanks for the opportunity to play/test the game.