Very Early Overreaction To The Latest Update

[Porter2455]

Hello! You probably don't know me, as I'm a regular, but I have played my fair amount of zs over the years. This is my first post on hg, so please excuse my ignorance if I make an error here or there, or if this is not regular to do.

 

Just to put context, the date is December 4th, 2016, and the newest zs update just got put out earlier in the day. Now, I probably don't have enough time under this new update, but there are a few pieces to this new update that I feel need to be urgently addressed.

 

Before starting, I must express my gratitude that the coders put into making the game better. I'm not trying to be a "The new update is shit because now I can't <insert some broken aspect before update> anymore." There are really cool ideas in this update that have a place in the game! So, let's get into it.

 

THINGS I THINK ARE GROOVY

 

- NEW GUNS:

I love guns being added to the game. When you have been playing for a while it's always fun to go and use some random weapon just for the hell of it. The m19 and mauser are badass, and the gernade launcher(which I haven't used yet) could add a unique element to the game. I haven't tried the other weapons, but I only assume a shotgun worth as much as a grim is pretty freaking good.

 

-The Idea of buffing Zombies Based on Map:

Now this may seem ironic considering other points I'm going to make, but I truly do like buffs to the undead. I like to play as a zombie, but there are some maps that becoming a zombie truly dooms you to an incredibly boring experience. If humans are winning that map nearly half the time, then the zombies deserve an equal playing field. This could also help return broken maps that were just unplayable before-hand(old version of mall beta comes to mind). On the flip side, maps that are incredibly difficult to cade on are now playable, as zombies will be weaker. The execution of this idea, however, is a different story.

 

-ZE Gun Select:

Whoever thought of this deserves a reward. The lottery of getting a good gun to make points was very annoying on ZE. If you got stuck with a crackler or some other shitty weapon, you were useless that round. And if you got a good gun and became a starting zombie, it was even more annoying.

 

THINGS I THINK ARE NOT SO GROOVY

 

-The Difficulty System:

I'll just lead off with the big one. As it stands, this cannot work. Just playing a few hours made it evident that this system must be balanced. As I understand it, the difficulty curves with win rate(although rampage had 2.0x difficulty with almost no wins at all). This is great, as it balances OP maps. But instead of balancing the system, it dropped a 10-ton weight on the zombie side of the scale. Maps like abandoned_mall_c1 are over in minutes. Since no cading is usually done before wave 1 starts, as everyone is in the safety corner, people need to defend the caders for a wave so props can be collected. However, normal zombies are impossible to kill before they deal out huge damage. Now I don't know for certain that the difficulty increases zombie health or decreases human damage to them, but I know for certain that zombie hit strength is greatly increased with difficulty. A single hit from a normal zombie did over 50 DAMAGE. ON WAVE 1. This leaves humans no chance to defend, and the babycade is easily destroyed, as zombie damage is increased on props as well. It's easy gg at that point. All caders have been wiped out, and those alive are running around until 50% of humans die and fasties pick them off.

 

Now I know that under that the way this system is built(or at least how I think it's built), it will get balanced as win rate plummets on all the maps. However, I know that during the weeks that every map is unwinnable, people are not going to want to play. That is concerning, as I don't want the server to be barren for weeks on end. That's how servers die. I'm not even sure if the win rate is working correctly though, and that will be my next point.

 

As we know, rampage is a hard map. While the map is hard, it's one of the few obj maps where I feel have a good shot at potentially winning a fair amount of the time. There are not very many first-time-playing death traps on the map (sewer parkour...), and it really comes down to the wire at the end most of the time I play. So why in the hell was the difficulty on the map 2.1?! With a win rate of 7%, there is no reason we should have medium difficulty(assuming the orange colors means medium). The map is close quarters with the zombies, so people are going to be hit. The first room is a complete deathtrap, as the zombies quickly overpower the humans standing close to the spawn, and swarm the whole room. It was even more strange that once we got to the steam point, the difficulty shot down to 1.0. At that point it was gg though, as nearly half the humans were dead so early in the map. I personally feel that objective maps are very well balanced, and that difficulty isn't even necessary for them.

 

I'm not worried that the system won't be fixed or removed quickly. Coders have been quick to fix major issues in the past, and this will certainly be one of them. I hope that this system isn't abandoned, though, as I feel it has great potential.

 

-Too Many Bosses:

I have a feeling that this is tied to the difficulty system, but the point was dragging on, and this was a good way to separate it. I really like the idea of adding more bosses. It's another great balancing on OP maps. For maps like pub, you need shades to stand any chance against the hallway. Bonemesh work, but if humans really want to, they can just huck gernades down the hallway. With more shades in the later rounds(5 and 6), you have a good shot at eventually crumpling the cade. However, as it stands, its not working. Simply put, way too many bosses, way too early. Not even the hardest maps in the game can handle six bosses on wave 2. We had six bosses spawn on abandoned_mall_c1 on wave 2 with 50 PEOPLE ON. No map in the game has a remote shot at handling six nightmares boosted by difficulty coming at a cade on wave freaking 2. If a team of humans somehow manage to get a cade setup, just run six bonemesh. Humans won't always throw gernades, as it is extremely wasteful on points.

 

-ZE (at least mushroom forest) is Broken:

This again is another glitch that I really hope will be fixed soon, as I really enjoy a fair amounts of ZE. While lots of people hate it, it's a really good mixup to the usual mode, the same reason we all love obj maps. Once we hit the ladder, everyone(or almost everyone) would get booted from the server, and it happened every time. I think the difficulty system applied to ZE as well, as even though people can choose their gun, we were nearly overrun at the underground door part every single time. I shouldn't say for sure, but it was certainly a lot more difficult than ZE of the past.

 

-PUKEPUS:

This is a small point, as I'm sure it will get fixed/already is fixed by coders. I had a good time playing with the pukepus with its new "buff", but it's incredibly overpowered. The puke has infinite range seemingly, and completely obliterates cades. It was actually quite funny, watching everyone cower in the corner as to not get instantly killed by six pukepus.

 

 

That's all I have right now! I'm not sure what else was added yet, as this is a new update. As the post title says, it's an early reaction, so if this stuff is already been addressed, all the better! If you made it to the end, thank you for your time reading my wall of text. Good luck zombie killing HG!

 

-Porter2455

Edited December 5, 2016 by Porter2455

[FoxHound]

It's not often that feedback is constructed so well, especially for ZS. So thank you, normally I would just like your post but I'm out of likes for the day :/ Hope to see you around more. I don't really have anything to say about the update because I haven't played it yet, but I'll probably post here once I have played.

[Grim Raper]

God damn that was a lot to read, the update was reverted and will be re-implemented later on when it has been balanced. Thank you for your concern

[->SK<-]

Hello! You probably don't know me, as I'm a regular, but I have played my fair amount of zs over the years. This is my first post on hg, so please excuse my ignorance if I make an error here or there, or if this is not regular to do.

 

Just to put context, the date is December 4th, 2016, and the newest zs update just got put out earlier in the day. Now, I probably don't have enough time under this new update, but there are a few pieces to this new update that I feel need to be urgently addressed.

 

Before starting, I must express my gratitude that the coders put into making the game better. I'm not trying to be a "The new update is shit because now I can't <insert some broken aspect before update> anymore." There are really cool ideas in this update that have a place in the game! So, let's get into it.

 

THINGS I THINK ARE GROOVY

 

- NEW GUNS:

I love guns being added to the game. When you have been playing for a while it's always fun to go and use some random weapon just for the hell of it. The m19 and mauser are badass, and the gernade launcher(which I haven't used yet) could add a unique element to the game. I haven't tried the other weapons, but I only assume a shotgun worth as much as a grim is pretty freaking good.

 

-The Idea of buffing Zombies Based on Map:

Now this may seem ironic considering other points I'm going to make, but I truly do like buffs to the undead. I like to play as a zombie, but there are some maps that becoming a zombie truly dooms you to an incredibly boring experience. If humans are winning that map nearly half the time, then the zombies deserve an equal playing field. This could also help return broken maps that were just unplayable before-hand(old version of mall beta comes to mind). On the flip side, maps that are incredibly difficult to cade on are now playable, as zombies will be weaker. The execution of this idea, however, is a different story.

 

-ZE Gun Select:

Whoever thought of this deserves a reward. The lottery of getting a good gun to make points was very annoying on ZE. If you got stuck with a crackler or some other shitty weapon, you were useless that round. And if you got a good gun and became a starting zombie, it was even more annoying.

 

THINGS I THINK ARE NOT SO GROOVY

 

-The Difficulty System:

I'll just lead off with the big one. As it stands, this cannot work. Just playing a few hours made it evident that this system must be balanced. As I understand it, the difficulty curves with win rate(although rampage had 2.0x difficulty with almost no wins at all). This is great, as it balances OP maps. But instead of balancing the system, it dropped a 10-ton weight on the zombie side of the scale. Maps like abandoned_mall_c1 are over in minutes. Since no cading is usually done before wave 1 starts, as everyone is in the safety corner, people need to defend the caders for a wave so props can be collected. However, normal zombies are impossible to kill before they deal out huge damage. Now I don't know for certain that the difficulty increases zombie health or decreases human damage to them, but I know for certain that zombie hit strength is greatly increased with difficulty. A single hit from a normal zombie did over 50 DAMAGE. ON WAVE 1. This leaves humans no chance to defend, and the babycade is easily destroyed, as zombie damage is increased on props as well. It's easy gg at that point. All caders have been wiped out, and those alive are running around until 50% of humans die and fasties pick them off.

 

Now I know that under that the way this system is built(or at least how I think it's built), it will get balanced as win rate plummets on all the maps. However, I know that during the weeks that every map is unwinnable, people are not going to want to play. That is concerning, as I don't want the server to be barren for weeks on end. That's how servers die. I'm not even sure if the win rate is working correctly though, and that will be my next point.

 

As we know, rampage is a hard map. While the map is hard, it's one of the few obj maps where I feel have a good shot at potentially winning a fair amount of the time. There are not very many first-time-playing death traps on the map (sewer parkour...), and it really comes down to the wire at the end most of the time I play. So why in the hell was the difficulty on the map 2.1?! With a win rate of 7%, there is no reason we should have medium difficulty(assuming the orange colors means medium). The map is close quarters with the zombies, so people are going to be hit. The first room is a complete deathtrap, as the zombies quickly overpower the humans standing close to the spawn, and swarm the whole room. It was even more strange that once we got to the steam point, the difficulty shot down to 1.0. At that point it was gg though, as nearly half the humans were dead so early in the map. I personally feel that objective maps are very well balanced, and that difficulty isn't even necessary for them.

 

I'm not worried that the system won't be fixed or removed quickly. Coders have been quick to fix major issues in the past, and this will certainly be one of them. I hope that this system isn't abandoned, though, as I feel it has great potential.

 

-Too Many Bosses:

I have a feeling that this is tied to the difficulty system, but the point was dragging on, and this was a good way to separate it. I really like the idea of adding more bosses. It's another great balancing on OP maps. For maps like pub, you need shades to stand any chance against the hallway. Bonemesh work, but if humans really want to, they can just huck gernades down the hallway. With more shades in the later rounds(5 and 6), you have a good shot at eventually crumpling the cade. However, as it stands, its not working. Simply put, way too many bosses, way too early. Not even the hardest maps in the game can handle six bosses on wave 2. We had six bosses spawn on abandoned_mall_c1 on wave 2 with 50 PEOPLE ON. No map in the game has a remote shot at handling six nightmares boosted by difficulty coming at a cade on wave freaking 2. If a team of humans somehow manage to get a cade setup, just run six bonemesh. Humans won't always throw gernades, as it is extremely wasteful on points.

 

-ZE (at least mushroom forest) is Broken:

This again is another glitch that I really hope will be fixed soon, as I really enjoy a fair amounts of ZE. While lots of people hate it, it's a really good mixup to the usual mode, the same reason we all love obj maps. Once we hit the ladder, everyone(or almost everyone) would get booted from the server, and it happened every time. I think the difficulty system applied to ZE as well, as even though people can choose their gun, we were nearly overrun at the underground door part every single time. I shouldn't say for sure, but it was certainly a lot more difficult than ZE of the past.

 

-PUKEPUS:

This is a small point, as I'm sure it will get fixed/already is fixed by coders. I had a good time playing with the pukepus with its new "buff", but it's incredibly overpowered. The puke has infinite range seemingly, and completely obliterates cades. It was actually quite funny, watching everyone cower in the corner as to not get instantly killed by six pukepus.

 

 

That's all I have right now! I'm not sure what else was added yet, as this is a new update. As the post title says, it's an early reaction, so if this stuff is already been addressed, all the better! If you made it to the end, thank you for your time reading my wall of text. Good luck zombie killing HG!

 

-Porter2455

 

See this? This is feedback. This right here. I thank you for constructing points that in your opinion are incorrect about updates. Please keep doing it like this.

 

- Signed; Everyone.

[->SK<-]

Yeah skay you are right ! Screw those people not writing properly their feedback and not explaining enough their suggestions, it's their own fault if they get trolled on the forums !!!

 

It is actually. At least you agree.

[Trazix]

The diffilculty system is the problem on this update

 

Boss was affected by this diffilculty, It was make the boss invincible at the wave 2 the best solution was to run around and not to stay inside the cade

 

- Nightmare over 60 damage

- Pukepus damage almost doubled by diffilculty

- 1 zombie = 55 damage human/cade (mlg fake nightmare with 300 hp)

 

There are no too many boss its just diffilculty made it too harder the new system boss is enough for bring some map more harder and fix the boring we have since 4 years, dont need to add the diffilculty dynamic, we should tried in the better conditions without diffilculty or never this new update. Otherwise I had a good laugh for 3hours damm it I ever saw human rapped so hard haha fucking massacre.

Edited December 5, 2016 by Trazix

[Thomasjosif]

Lol my posts are still randomly disappearing ^^ I think some people still want to get me banned from the forums, or simply add me some more abusive warning points, maybe both ?? Here is the last deleted post content, the heating counter trolling part being hidden inside the spoiler :

"disappearing"? No they're not disappearing. They are being hidden by staff. Continue to re-post! It's a healthy way to get warning points. P.S. No, I don't want to get you banned, if you want to cause this yourself by starting drama that's on you.

[Thomasjosif]

Yes I already know that !

I also know that some staff let some people troll around these forums for free, while giving warning points to the people actually trying to get things done !

It's a cool feature of the HG ZS forums lol but go ahead man and distribute your all mighty warning points ^^

If you already knew that why did you continue to reverse a staff's action? Do you know how immature and childish that is? And no, the staff don't go and troll around the forums for free. You're also not trying to get things done, you're trying to stir up drama. This is your final warning, do not repost it. End of discussion.

[jonm312]

I completely agree to the pukepus overbuff and too many bosses. I have only played about two rounds of the update so far and those were the main issues I saw. I will probably play again tonight and will post a bit more elaborately after that.

[Porter2455]

It's not often that feedback is constructed so well, especially for ZS. So thank you, normally I would just like your post but I'm out of likes for the day :/ Hope to see you around more. I don't really have anything to say about the update because I haven't played it yet, but I'll probably post here once I have played.

 

See this? This is feedback. This right here. I thank you for constructing points that in your opinion are incorrect about updates. Please keep doing it like this.

 

- Signed; Everyone.

 

Thank you! I just went out on a whim and wrote it, I'm glad people enjoyed it. I was a recruit last year, but school and other things took over my life. I'm thinking about reapplying, as free time comes much more often in college. I'll try posting some more from time to time if people like feedback like this.

Edited December 5, 2016 by Porter2455

[futo]

Nicely detailed post. Firewall should learn from this guy.

 

I haven't been playing too much these days because of those 5 pages essays and public speech non-sense. However at a glimpse I also found the difficulty system kind of broken.

 

Yes I certainly did not try out everything due to time constraints, but I will still whip down my 2 cents here.

 

-----

 

Porter already illustrated the situation properly so I will simply add what I think can use some attention.

 

 

High Win Rate =/= Should be more Difficult

As much as the system might make sense, I would like to point out the server is certainly not always full.

 

There are a handful of factors that contribute to late games being easy, which inflates win rate.

 

[spoiler=TLDR prevention spoiler tab]

-Even if human:zombie ratio remain constant to say 2:1, it is much less intimidating to see 4 zombies charging than 20. The ZS instinct already sealed in our mind (at least for me 4 years) trained us that we should turn around and run if we feel overwhelmed. Which lead to poor defense in high population compared to low population.

-Props hp are not scaled means low population = 3 zombies vs 1000hp shelf; compared to high popluation = 20 zombies vs 1000hp shelf. If repairer and shooter are at constant ratio, then low population is certainly easier.

-Less incentive to afk for wave 4 weapons because individual performance is more important in low population.

-4 zombies feel weaker than 20; discouraging those who were picked as initial zombie from playing. AFK time bois!

-Low skilled kids and squeakers are in bed, deflating player population compared to skill level.

 

 

 

Some of these factors are not something we can fix (like ZS instinct to run away from large amount of zombies despite there are also more humans around), therefore low population will continue to inflate win rate; hence contribute to the fact the difficulty system is currently flawed because it does not seem to take time and population, as well as the immeasurable skill level to consideration.

 

I am not sure about if point rate changes when higher difficulty is inflicted against humans; but from what I heard human deal less damage in high difficulty. Which certainly can bring back to the topic on some weapons being under powered and too hard to profit off of.

 

[spoiler=TLDR prevention spoiler tab]

The whole reason to afk for tier 5 is because profit; another way to illustrate this is the fact almost all low tiered guns are piss poor even with ammo trait active. Remember when Alyx came out? It immediately became the favorite gun for all and like 1/3 of the server always bought up and fought rigorously until the nerf? I am not trying to justify weapons should all be over powered, I am just getting to the idea that only high damage per shot weapons are welcomed to the house of profits; which is the same idea that low damage bullet hoses suck big time and are actually not balanced, despite having damage per minute similar to slow firing high dps weapons. I did not do exact math calculations (maybe save those for Lord Atro), but I can think of 2 potential examples where they reside in the same tier, same price range but widely different in terms of profitability: Bullet Storm vs. Reaper; Eraser vs. the older automatic Glock.. 2 other weapons outright too inferior to consider buying that I can think of on top of my head are Cresent (Crackler on tier 2), the Beretta.. With what seems to be a constant point rate of 40 dmg/pt and constant ammo price, bullet hoses are only here to make people download extra content. They are all overshadowed and out-competed by high damage per shot weapons. (make them dynamic perhaps?)

 

 

So yeah that's what I think about the difficulty system. The system is currently flawed and will certainly help killing the server if human get wrecked even more than all these poor games we are already having. The new generation players simply won't handle this well.

Edited December 6, 2016 by futo

[Andrew Wilson]

As for too many bosses, I think it still is fair as only a couple can be used in a given situation. For example, the wendigo and butcher are only good if there are humans running around outside. The shade is only decent if there are humans outside with loose props everywhere or a cade and a stack of zombies.

[Link3588]

your first post is longer then probably all of my posts combined.... Well played