500 zombies at random hunting lodge?

[Pooh]

I appreciate this game, I really do, but why is the density in this game still ludicrous?

EDIT: Thanks to Shurenai's info I've concluded that it's the broken "urban" spawning on roads that causes unrealistic groupings of zombies in remote locations. The spots would otherwise never even dream of that many people (and therefore customers!), but in Zomboid they're in abundance due to wonky spawn conditions. Thanks everyone who contributed. c:

Every highway (and I mean EVERY highway, even HWYs in the middle of nowhere) have hundreds of zombies on them just mulling around. Some random coffee shop in the middle of the forest had 400 zombies there and in the surrounding forest was another 1,000+.

Zombies count is normal, density is urban, and vanilla everything...
This is Kentucky with a population density of around 100 per sq. mile.
A lot of those people either died, left, spread out, etc. so it's probably way less now...


So... why is there 1,000 zombies at a 4-bedroom hunting lodge in the bush? Gas station in the middle of nothing is just swarmed too. This isn't even Jefferson county or on the outskirts of any residential areas...

It just doesn't feel very realistic for a game that attempts to be. Some areas are better than others, but there's some seriously deranged calculations going on in the backend in regards to zombie counts and more importantly their distribution method.

[Armagenesis]

Who knows, it might be peak tourism season and somehow people flock in KY or something. Or maybe it's a state-wide clown convention and they are trying to fit as many clowns in a single room. Everywhere.

[Death]

Maybe it was a group of people just trying to hole up there figuring it safe, but it turned out it wasn't.

[𝔗𝔢𝔞 ❀]

I remember that lodge. Almost died multiple times, and went through all the ammo.

[Retro]

Originally posted by Pooh:

So... why is there 1,000 zombies at a 4-bedroom hunting lodge in the bush? Gas station in the middle of nothing is just swarmed too. This isn't even Jefferson county or on the outskirts of any residential areas...

It just doesn't feel very realistic for a game that attempts to be. .

Why can't it just be random? Why do you expect a solid reason for that horde to be in that specific area?
I don't always have a horde of zombies downtown, but sometimes I run across them in weird places outside of town. That's pretty much real life, groups of people get together for various reasons.
You are overthinking something that doesn't need analyzing

[Retro]

Originally posted by Armagenesis:

Who knows, it might be peak tourism season and somehow people flock in KY or something. Or maybe it's a state-wide clown convention and they are trying to fit as many clowns in a single room. Everywhere.

Originally posted by Death:

Maybe it was a group of people just trying to hole up there figuring it safe, but it turned out it wasn't.

These are both logical answers

[TankGoodness]

I turned that Lodge into my home and spent much time barricading it and moving belongings into it. I then tried to boil a bucket of water in a microwave. I thought it was a plastic bucket. I was wrong. I barely escaped the burning lodge.

[Pooh]

Originally posted by Beltneck:

Thats weird, I usually bang out about 400 in the trailerpark by Riverside. Another 100 by the factory and warehouse. Then the road is pretty clear until I get into the Town Limits.

Whats your peak population set to, and had your peak day been reached?

Peak was set to 1.5 and ya, it was reached, but 0.8 population modifer with 1.5 peak = Rapidly approaching 2k zombies at a lodge in the middle of nowhere?

I'm not saying it's not possible, but I just wish it wasn't like this for so many different locations that are seriously out of the way. Another example, construction trailer park with 8 housing units yet it had almost 1,000 zombies. Just seems... wrong? Y'know?

Originally posted by Retro:

Why can't it just be random? Why do you expect a solid reason for that horde to be in that specific area?
I don't always have a horde of zombies downtown, but sometimes I run across them in weird places outside of town. That's pretty much real life, groups of people get together for various reasons.
You are overthinking something that doesn't need analyzing

Because it's a coffee shop with no other buildings around it for miles? Why is there a thousand zombies there? It literally seats like, 30 people.

I'm not searching for an isolated causation of why there's a massive sea of zombies at a lodge; I'm trying to diagnose why there's massive hoards EVERYWHERE we go where there simply shouldn't be.

Dismissing me now? Lol. "you don't need to analyze it", says who? Some nerd with a blank profile? I'll ask questions if I want to, thanks. Don't like it, then get lost. No one asked you to be here or take the time to even post your crappy dismissal.

Originally posted by TankGoodness:

I turned that Lodge into my home and spent much time barricading it and moving belongings into it. I then tried to boil a bucket of water in a microwave. I thought it was a plastic bucket. I was wrong. I barely escaped the burning lodge.

Thank you for sharing, made me laugh. <3

[Shurenai]

It sounds like either your spawns are dramatically over-done for some reason; Or you're over exaggerating by quite a lot.

Even in the middle of Louisville I don't have to clear out 1,000+ zombies like you're claiming to visit a single point of interest, let alone 400+ in the middle of nowhere 50 maybe? Sure. And a hundred more in the surroundings if I scream and shout till my characters blue in the face? Maybe. But 400 just lingering around the building and then thousands more in the forests? Nu-uh.

[Pooh]

Originally posted by Shurenai:

It sounds like either your spawns are dramatically over-done for some reason; Or you're over exaggerating by quite a lot.

Even in the middle of Louisville I don't have to clear out 1,000+ zombies like you're claiming to visit a single point of interest, let alone 400+ in the middle of nowhere 50 maybe? Sure. And a hundred more in the surroundings if I scream and shout till my characters blue in the face? Maybe. But 400 just lingering around the building and then thousands more in the forests? Nu-uh.

Shoot a 9mm in the forest and be amazed at how many bush wookies there are.

(I am over-exaggerating, but only by a little. We have pop at 0.8, there was literally 500 zombies within 2 minutes of shooting a handgun.)

[𝔗𝔢𝔞 ❀]

The forests are often not safe. The forests near some of those focal points are death traps.

It is why when I find quiet pockets to forage, or forests near heavy zed areas that can actually be cleared out and aren't totally infested woodlands, I am thankful.

[Shurenai]

Originally posted by Pooh:

Originally posted by Shurenai:

It sounds like either your spawns are dramatically over-done for some reason; Or you're over exaggerating by quite a lot.

Even in the middle of Louisville I don't have to clear out 1,000+ zombies like you're claiming to visit a single point of interest, let alone 400+ in the middle of nowhere 50 maybe? Sure. And a hundred more in the surroundings if I scream and shout till my characters blue in the face? Maybe. But 400 just lingering around the building and then thousands more in the forests? Nu-uh.

Shoot a 9mm in the forest and be amazed at how many bush wookies there are.

(I am over-exaggerating, but only by a little. We have pop at 0.8, there was literally 500 zombies within 2 minutes of shooting a handgun.)

The loudest pistol is an 80 meter/tile sound range, which equates to roughly 5000 tiles of coverage. The quietest pistol is a 30m/tile sound range, which covers 700~ tiles.


So..yeah. Firearms are Loud. Firing them WILL attract attention, and more likely than not from a very wide range- Much wider than many players think. And it's more likely than not that you fired a loud pistol compared to firing the sole quiet one.

Firearms in PZ are, in most cases, little more than a dinner bell. Fire once, even out in the middle of nowhere, and you'll have hundreds after you. If you're going to fire it, be prepared for a fight; Or have a silencer mod enabled and installed.

For the record, Shotguns are an even bigger dinner bell- All of them clock in at 100m/tile range, covering a whopping 7800~ tiles.
Here's a visual aid to put that somewhat in perspective:
https://preview.redd.it/9ohlkw6i1ax61.jpg?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3dcbccdc57bf196ee7ed91de433561c4e909866d

[Pooh]

Originally posted by Shurenai:

For the record, Shotguns are an even bigger dinner bell- All of them clock in at 100m/tile range, covering a whopping 7800~ tiles.
Here's a visual aid to put that somewhat in perspective:
https://preview.redd.it/9ohlkw6i1ax61.jpg?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3dcbccdc57bf196ee7ed91de433561c4e909866d

Very fascinating, thanks so much! That picture is very illuminating in particular! Enjoy some silly points. >.<

This is why I make these threads, learn so much from discussion. Always so infuriating when kids come into them and say we can't discuss things because 'reasons'.

I understand the gunshot, but people go hunting around where I live a lot too; I think the game still overestimates how many zombies would actually be in the forested area and on some of these back highways. The setting is set to urban density, but they are legit freaking everywhere in huge swarms.

It just doesn't feel correct, especially when we have them turned down. 0.0

[Shurenai]

Originally posted by Pooh:

Originally posted by Shurenai:

For the record, Shotguns are an even bigger dinner bell- All of them clock in at 100m/tile range, covering a whopping 7800~ tiles.
Here's a visual aid to put that somewhat in perspective:
https://preview.redd.it/9ohlkw6i1ax61.jpg?width=1920&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3dcbccdc57bf196ee7ed91de433561c4e909866d

Very fascinating, thanks so much! That picture is very illuminating in particular! Enjoy some silly points. >.<

This is why I make these threads, learn so much from discussion. Always so infuriating when kids come into them and say we can't discuss things because 'reasons'.

I understand the gunshot, but people go hunting around where I live a lot too, but I think the game still overestimates how many zombies would actually be in the forested area and on some of these back highways. The setting is set to urban density, but they are legit freaking everywhere in huge swarms.

It just doesn't feel correct, especially when we have them turned down. 0.0

Highways iirc are considered 'urban', so they do get a more dense smattering compared to forests.

For forests, they aren't really everywhere in huge swarms- In fact they're pretty spread out, and unlike zombies in towns, they wander individually instead of forming groups. If you walk through the forest quietly and kill any you come across quietly with melee weapons you'll find that along an intended path you might run into 5-25 zombies depending on path length. It's when you do something loud that there's a huge swarm.

Someone's previously done the math, On default settings in the entirety of the PZ map there's roughly 50,000 zombies if you don't count Louisville (Louisville wasnt added at the time the math was done) or respawns.

Kentucky's actual population circa 1993 was 3.7~ Million So...yeah, I think that the density really is pretty far off. It's actually extremely toned down to make the game playable.

Edit: Slight correction and sauce, 52,000 zombies before any population modification, again, not counting louisville.
https://www.reddit.com/r/projectzomboid/comments/ojcoc6/analyzing_the_zed_population/

[Pooh]

Originally posted by Shurenai:

Kentucky's actual population circa 1993 was 3.7~ Million So...yeah, I think that the density really is pretty far off. It's actually extremely toned down to make the game playable. :winter2019happyyul:

Edit: Slight correction and sauce, 52,000 zombies before any population modification, again, not counting louisville.
https://www.reddit.com/r/projectzomboid/comments/ojcoc6/analyzing_the_zed_population/

Well, I checked the math in the OP. It's ~100 people per sq. mile atm, but the game is NOT realistic at all and doesn't lend itself any lenience in this regard.

Louisville alone had a population of about 800,000 in 1995, so that's about 20% of the state's population right there, so really once you start doing the math, it becomes pretty clear that the density isn't exactly logical, haha.

Thanks for the info about roads being "urban". Guess that makes sense for a lot of this.

I think that's the problem...

It's not the forest having lots of zombies, it's the roads being labelled as "urban". That's exactly what's 'wrong' with the game's distribution. It's turning roadside garbage chutes into zombie bar mitzvah's, lmao.

[Kal]

follow the power lines south for about an hour. Zombie free zones by the edge of map and a river near by