Zombies: What do you guys want in future updates?

[fearz0r 128]

Hi all!

Having spent a while going through posts on this forum as well as posts, comments and articles elsewhere on the net, I think we should really look at what Day Z has to offer and what it could offer us in the future.

Now I know Rocket has said in the past he calls these Zombies "infected" rather than "Zombies", and that he likes the speed and frantic movement etc, but two things to note here Rocket; 1) you called the mod "Day Z", so I would assume the "Z" stood for "Zombie" and not "Infected" and 2) you have to really give your fanbase what they want (from time to time), and so if the majority of users would prefer a slower, more classic style zombie, then really you should appease the masses, no?

However, with that said you could have the best of both worlds. You could do something that no other game really has done (properly) before. You could have both types! I know, crazy huh? But hear me out here...

My suggestion is fairly basic. Here's made up story or scenario to explain how things came to pass; A military virus breaks out on the island of Chernarus. The infection spreads and eventually all the inhabitants, military and civilian are infected. All but a few survivors (us, the player base). The infection causes rage-like behaviour in those that have the virus; they attack on sight, punching, clawing, kicking and basically inflicting damage and death to non-infected. Yet these infected souls are still human. They are still alive but their bodies are on overdrive. They're on a constant adrenaline rush with a burning metabolism, which explains their increased speed and movement when aggro'd. It also explains their ability and desire to furiously attack non-infected when whenever they see them. This is the design of the virus, to wreak havoc and carnage.

Despite this these people are dying. They're alive, but as the virus only serves to cause havoc and death through widespread infection, the body of hosts are no longer being maintained with food, water and rest. Therefore, like all organisms, the bodies of the infected begin to die off through starvation and dehydration. After a few days of being infected, the host's body dies.

But this is not the end! There was an unforeseen side effect to the virus that the makers didn't plan for. This virus is powerful, so powerful in fact that it won't stop just because the host's body packs in and dies. This virus is strong enough to reanimate the host, and in doing so bring the body "back to life". Although this isn't life as it previously was, the virus can only reanimate the body and provide the body with basic movements and functions. These bodies are zombies; they're slow, they're clumsy, they don't have heightened senses or movement, they have primitive motions. However, they still have the virus driving them, and the virus still causes the host to be aggressive and violent when a non-infected is near. The attacks from a zombie are similar to infected, though more primitive. They'll swipe, claw, punch and even bite a survivor. They'll also eat the dead, although this isn't due to anything other than it being a basic primal instinct, which was previously blocked by the virus when the host body was still alive.

How this translates to the game/mod is as follows:

There are two classes of infected in Day Z; Infected Humans and Infected Zombies, or simply 'Infected' and 'Zombies'. Both these classes have different appearances, movements and behaviours.

'Infected' are fast, loud (screamy), violent and have good hearing and sight. They look very similar to humans except for their bloodied eyes and screaming.

'Zombies' are slow, moany, aggressive but only in close proximity to a survivor, and their sight is limited. They look like the walking dead; pasty, bloodied bodies, missing limbs etc.

Infected have human characteristics such as being able to run/sprint, navigate around simple obstacles and have close to normal vision and hearing.

Zombies have primal instincts and are a lot slower, as their bodies have died; no blood flow makes their muscles stiff etc. Their awareness is a lot less than Infected but they can still see and hear things in close proximity, and are still violent and aggressive at close range.

In terms of game mechanics, a basic implementation could be that there are simply both of these classes in game and the infected/zombie ratio is server controlled.

With this in mind, as the mod evolves and develops, this mechanic could be come more "realistic" or dynamic, having infected dying in real time, only to reanimate 5 minutes (or whatever) time later!

How I picture this is as follows; there are a handful of players a large town. There are several infected there. The players don't aggro the infected and so they're merely walking about the place. Some time passes and some of the infected begin to die. Shortly after, their bodies reanimate and they become zombies. As zombies, they're now slower and less aware (being properly dead). This would mean the infected code would need to be able to dynamically swap out for the zombie config, which I foresee to be less than simple.

This isn't necessarily a problem, as having both classes of infected populate the server as standard is just as cool and could have some very nice configurations, for example;

Wandering Zombies - Zombies in the wilderness, the woodlands. Alone, and randomly wandering about, having been dead for a while.. this would add a new gameplay element to survivors hiding out in the woodlands and wilderness.

Zombie hordes - groups of 10-15 closely clustered zombies in larger towns or cities, wandering around together. Imagine being chases by a raging infected and then going into a super market only finding 10 zombies stumbling about, definitely an "oh shit.." moment.

Zombies are stealthy - Only in the sense that they don't walk about screamy and grumbling like the Infected, making it so much easier to be ambushed or for you to stumble into a zombie when entering a building or barn. Zombies only really make a commotion when you've aggro'd them.

Specific Zombie and Infected placements - Large towns and cities have both classes, but remote towns, warehouse and barns could have a higher zombie to infected ratio, making raids more risky because its harder to listen out for zombies inside buildings.. scary!

Different class behaviour - You're being chased by a screaming infected. You run near some other infected, who is then pulled by the commotion of your pursuer. Whereas pulling a zombie would be easier to control as you could out run them, although aggro'ing the zombie will cause it to make a commotion, and if there's any 'Infected' near by.. well, you get the picture.

Different killing methods - Infected are alive. Their bodies are still human and therefore can be stopped/killed etc. Bullets to the head or body do the job nicely. However, zombies aren't alive. Their bodies aren't working the same way they used to and so physical damage to them (melee or bullets) have no effect. Head shots however will destroy the brain, which is where the virus resides and how it controls and reanimates the body. Head shots or chops to the head will kill your zombie foes, where as body shots or attacks are fruitless and only result in the zombie making a commotion, and if there's 'Infected' near by... that's right, we're back there again. All of the above is dismissed by the use of high explosives though. RPG/Grenades/Satchel charges etc will kill all things, living or dead.

These are just a few ideas. If this concept was taken seriously by Rocket and Co, I'd commit a whole host of similar examples.

What do you guys think of the above? Please try to stay on point, and other suggestions are welcome but please try and keep things relevant.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Burro

Edited July 18, 2012 by Burro

[UbiquitousBadGuy 846]

Moved to General Discussion due to OP's request and to facilitate better discussion.

[M O N S T E R 599]

Interesting ideas - all of which given before in other zombie-related thingies.

AI is already buggy however - freezing zombies, despawning and what not.

Would it be a wise decision to invest in this kind of thing now or would it be better to wait until the alpha has smoothed out some?

Normal zombies shouldn't be immune to physical damage though, I have to protest. They should just be more resilient.

All-in-all, well thought-out ideas and logic behind them, as expected of Burro.

-MONSTER

[Pander Beers 21]

Normal zombies shouldn't be immune to physical damage though, I have to protest. They should just be more resilient.

Zombies have 1/3 the health of a player - they're so squishy :3

[fearz0r 128]

Interesting ideas - all of which given before in other zombie-related thingies.

AI is already buggy however - freezing zombies, despawning and what not.

Would it be a wise decision to invest in this kind of thing now or would it be better to wait until the alpha has smoothed out some?

Normal zombies shouldn't be immune to physical damage though, I have to protest. They should just be more resilient.

All-in-all, well thought-out ideas and logic behind them, as expected of Burro.

-MONSTER

Thanks MONSTER,

I agree that these new mechanics would be best introduced once the core game has been stable for a while and Rocket and co are happy to start adding new features and functionality. I just wanted to get an idea of what the community would like to see in future releases.

Regarding the "Zombie" immunity against body hits, I am trying to balance the new class by making them a little harder to kill (especially since a lot of players find the current infected a non-threat) and require head shots to put them down, meaning you need to have fairly decent skills with an accurate weapon or you need to get closer, in their area of attack. Remember, they're described as being slow and a bit dopey, so they can't be too easy to kill. But it's all up for debate at the end of the day, I'm just trying to get things rolling ^_^

[Justin619 11]

in game this would look kind of dumb.. think about this. youre running through a town or just happen to aggro lots of mobs, and while youre running, you will have infected running right behind you, and zombies lagging behind but still following. in game this would just look.. you know..

example -- i=infected/zombie x=you

iiiii iiiii x

oh and i wouldnt mind the running zombies we have now, as long as they didnt zig zag while running at you.. i mean seriously.. you cannot shoot them until theyre right in front of you and theyre still zig zagging.. they should run straight at you, or in a way you cant aim at them -.-

Edited July 18, 2012 by Justin619

[Newbitect 15]

I rather like the random, zig-zag pathing of the Zeds. However, being that DayZ and Arma are "simulations," it is hyper-unrealistic that these "infected" are all able to run at the speeds of Usain Bolt!!! I find it extremely hard to believe that a slightly overweight man who wore a beret had the musculature to run at such speeds! I think it would be much more intense for the infected to chase you for miles, at a constant speed, while you simply slow down due to exhaustion!

So keep the endurance, but slow them down to human speeds. No amount of drugs, or infections, could ever allow a bloke to run like an Olympic sprinter! But they do affect stamina (Lance Armstrong *cough cough).

More specific to the topic, I prefer the Danny Boyle "infected" over the "walking dead." Infection is the only plausible hypothesis to the cause of any kind of "zombie" outbreak. The dead will never walk, see, hear, or smell (necrosis, atrophy and rigor mortis). It's just not possible.

[fearz0r 128]

in game this would look kind of dumb.. think about this. youre running through a town or just happen to aggro lots of mobs, and while youre running, you will have infected running right behind you, and zombies lagging behind but still following. in game this would just look.. you know..

example -- i=infected/zombie x=you

iiiii iiiii x

oh and i wouldnt mind the running zombies we have now, as long as they didnt zig zag while running at you.. i mean seriously.. you cannot shoot them until theyre right in front of you and theyre still zig zagging.. they should run straight at you, or in a way you cant aim at them -.-

I guess I didn't get my idea across clear enough.

The Zombies don't run, they walk. They're your classic Romero style zombies. They attack hard, they make noise when aggro'd but you can evade and escape them relatively easily if you're tactical enough. Infected are the same, well maybe a little bit polished.

So by your example, it'll look more like this:

Zombie = z

Infected = i

You = u

zzzz > ...... iiii u >>>

[Kophka 109]

I don't know if you've been keeping up with the interviews Rocket does from time to time, but zombies, they are a changing. He's already said he'd like to implement a system where fresh infected are super human like they are now (comes from not being afraid to tear muscles and wear themselves out, I suspect) and older infected start to "deteriate" as they age. The longer an infected goes without food/water, the weaker it becomes. There will be "old" infected that can barely shuffle or crawl along, Just have to give Rocket some time guys.

Issues that he has to address : Infected despawning. Can't have old infected if they disappear and reappear constantly, so he'll have to find a way to have them stay on the map. He tried that with the 1.7.2.1, to stress test the servers, but the infected wouldn't move when the time came that they normally despawned. It's a good start, keep it up Rocket!

[Mister Christopher 0]

I think that instead of necisarilly making changes to the zombies we have now, they should focus on the existing zombies stability. I dont know how the production works but id rather see improved custom running animations (like say in "Red Dead Redemption" where they can still keep up with you while looking like zombies instead of olympic track runners) and straight running.

Personally i believe that everything else can afford to be put on hold while they work on this for a bit, as, for me at least, it makes a huge difference in how much fun i have actually playing.

Though i feel they could be a tad slower if it were possible to have more of them in one place ("The Walking Dead"ish (AMC))

[derailed000 20]

It would be nice that you actually need to aim and hit the head to take it down, hitting it in the knee would just make it crawl after you. Hording zombies would be a nice add, if they cant find food they move on to find it. You can never really relax cause zombies might walk up on you even in the deepest forrest, ofcourse their speed needs to be reduced to walking fast from todays running.

[fearz0r 128]

I don't know if you've been keeping up with the interviews Rocket does from time to time, but zombies, they are a changing. He's already said he'd like to implement a system where fresh infected are super human like they are now (comes from not being afraid to tear muscles and wear themselves out, I suspect) and older infected start to "deteriate" as they age. The longer an infected goes without food/water, the weaker it becomes. There will be "old" infected that can barely shuffle or crawl along, Just have to give Rocket some time guys.

Issues that he has to address : Infected despawning. Can't have old infected if they disappear and reappear constantly, so he'll have to find a way to have them stay on the map. He tried that with the 1.7.2.1, to stress test the servers, but the infected wouldn't move when the time came that they normally despawned. It's a good start, keep it up Rocket!

Nice, thanks for the heads up. I followed a few bits, but it's hard during the day (being that I'm at work).

I think that instead of necisarilly making changes to the zombies we have now, they should focus on the existing zombies stability. I dont know how the production works but id rather see improved custom running animations (like say in "Red Dead Redemption" where they can still keep up with you while looking like zombies instead of olympic track runners) and straight running.

Personally i believe that everything else can afford to be put on hold while they work on this for a bit, as, for me at least, it makes a huge difference in how much fun i have actually playing.

Though i feel they could be a tad slower if it were possible to have more of them in one place ("The Walking Dead"ish (AMC))

I agree, stability is key. However, Alpha is here to get in new features and content, get that content stable and then beta thoroughly through Beta. But one thing at a time, Rocket's got his hands full with many other things, suggestions like this are lower priority really. If he gets around to doing something like this in the future, great!

It would be nice that you actually need to aim and hit the head to take it down, hitting it in the knee would just make it crawl after you. Hording zombies would be a nice add, if they cant find food they move on to find it. You can never really relax cause zombies might walk up on you even in the deepest forrest, ofcourse their speed needs to be reduced to walking fast from todays running.

Yeah, that's where I was going with this.

[fosty99 160]

tl;dr but i want one that can run, but not as fast as the player, but there need to be more of them and they should be a lot stronger than the current zombies.

[fearz0r 128]

tl;dr but i want one that can run, but not as fast as the player, but there need to be more of them and they should be a lot stronger than the current zombies.

Thanks for taking the time to reply. Thankfully your response was brief enough to hold my attention. If you took the time to read my post instead of immediately dismissing it with a "tl:dr" comment (which is pretty rude. I don't mind people not reading it, but stating that they couldn't be bothered to read the original post but then expecting others to read and listen to what they have to say is absurd) you'd actually find I suggest both fast and slow zombies, zombie hordes and harder to kill zombies.

Anyhoo, thanks again for chiming in.

[Maca1323 0]

You should get together with the arma game developers and see what they think about making a ps3 and Xbox version!?....

[terex 322]

Zombies need to be able to chase people and keep up in this game.. They would be pretty useless otherwise, aside from knowing there is a player in a town from zombie spawns..

[Hank_scorpio 41]

They just need way more zombies I remember back on one of the older updates when there would be 1500 zombies on a map it was crazy city's were no go areas it made the game savage and brutal and dangerous zombies actually meant something and scared the crap out of you to boot . Try facing off a hoard of 300 Zeds in Cherno with only an einfield