What the hell is up with the damage??

[NekoiNemo]

I love the game so far in everything but combat. It's just... baffling. Here are some of the situations to illustrate the point (I'm playing on normal, btw):

• A baby jumps onto me and takes away entire point of creepy armour
  
• A dirty cannibal hits me once and takes away a point of creepy armour
  
• A standard (NOT giant, mutant or anything, just a standard upright walking one) cannibal with a bone... sickle(?) hits me twice in a combo (second one happened faster than the character is able to back off or raise axe to block, btw) - i go down from 100% health to being dead.
  
• I untie myself after being killed, with 25% hp or something like that, pick up my backpack and... A dirty cannibal hits me once from behind and kill me instantly
  
• I have 6 points of bone armour that i have spent an obscene amount of time burning corpses for and scavenging tape for - i get hit twice by the lowest tier enemy, a dirty cannibal, and i'm down to no armour.

I'm sorry, am i missing something? What's the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ point of armour if the basic ♥♥♥♥♥ enemy can "undress" me in moments? I played the original game a lot, and being dressed in the full set of bone armour gave you a reasonable chance in taking 4-5 strong cannibals in melee (and you could have full set because bone armour wasn't made out of paper and you wouldn't lose it all in a single encounter), and putting on even a single piece of creepy armour actually felt like getting proper armour - you could tank a LOT of hits before you lose it (and full set of creepy armour, while hard to get, made you borderline invulnerable even against mutants for short while). In this game i'm practically drowning in the creepy armour after going through one cave, but then i get from a full suit of creepy armour to death after 3 cannibals landed 2-3 hits on me each. The. ♥♥♥♥.

I have basically resorted to only fighting with bow headshots, because of it. And yes, headshots only, because even the dirty canibal can easily tank 4+ stone arrows to the body, and the standard cannibals (NOT WEARING ARMOUR, i dread to even imagine tankiness of the armoured ones) easily took 6-7 arrows to the body (it took me some time to get used to aiming) without even falling to the ground. 8+ arrows to kill a single enemy when your carry limit is 16 and they routinely come in the packs of 4-5 cannibals. Who can, see above, take you from full creepy armour to death in the matter of seconds.

Why do i get the sneaking suspicion that game was balanced around being played by 8 people in multiplayer, with guns, and nobody went around and check that this didn't screw up the singleplayer?

[Nostas]

i don't like the armor damage system either. bone armor is to much of an hassle to build for what protection it gives. i only use leaf armor or mutant armor.

in conclusion, armor feels like paper ...

[indigo]

I make bone armor because I make it rain bones when cannibals show up and don't behave themselves. That sign at the edge of the property line that says "Trespassers will be shot in the eyeball with arrows" is not a joke.

I don't mind if they're just walking by, but when they start shoulder-charging my fences or making Kalvin search for his contact lenses, then I take offense and they wind up piled up on a bonfire.

But yes, you've figured out that you're not some super-tough, all-soaking damage-sponge. Enemy attacks hurt, and you shed armor and fast when attacked. It does mitigate the loss of some health, and don't feel bad, because armor works the same way for enemies as it does for us. Catch a cannibal running around in bone armor, shoot it in the chest, the armor breaks.

Makes sense, since it is made of bones, rope and duct tape. I mean seriously, it's made of rope and duct tape. Go out, have yourself a nice full rack of ribs for dinner, keep your bones, bring them home, duct tape and string them together and give it a couple whacks with a stout stick and see how well it holds together. You'd be surprised how little protection this will actually provide, so it doesn't seem at all far-fetched as far as the game is concerned.

Sure, the mechanics could be improved, but... we're not armorers, blacksmiths, or craftsmen. Seems like we're a bunch of corporate mercenaries on a search-and-rescue mission. Not really the sort of thing that falls into the job description.

[threethreethree]

Originally posted by indigo:

I make bone armor because I make it rain bones when cannibals show up and don't behave themselves. That sign at the edge of the property line that says "Trespassers will be shot in the eyeball with arrows" is not a joke.

I don't mind if they're just walking by, but when they start shoulder-charging my fences or making Kalvin search for his contact lenses, then I take offense and they wind up piled up on a bonfire.

But yes, you've figured out that you're not some super-tough, all-soaking damage-sponge. Enemy attacks hurt, and you shed armor and fast when attacked. It does mitigate the loss of some health, and don't feel bad, because armor works the same way for enemies as it does for us. Catch a cannibal running around in bone armor, shoot it in the chest, the armor breaks.

Makes sense, since it is made of bones, rope and duct tape. I mean seriously, it's made of rope and duct tape. Go out, have yourself a nice full rack of ribs for dinner, keep your bones, bring them home, duct tape and string them together and give it a couple whacks with a stout stick and see how well it holds together. You'd be surprised how little protection this will actually provide, so it doesn't seem at all far-fetched as far as the game is concerned.

Sure, the mechanics could be improved, but... we're not armorers, blacksmiths, or craftsmen. Seems like we're a bunch of corporate mercenaries on a search-and-rescue mission. Not really the sort of thing that falls into the job description.

I feel this is an accurate way to view things.

But since we need rope for arrows, and armor, etc, it is quite difficult to get things going if there isn't rope growing on trees. I think that rope (so far?) is a relatively rare precious commodity. I think IRL i may use some cordage for arrows and armor, but not a whole rope every time, when you're also using tape. So, the difficulty in these other areas unbalances the otherwise realism of us not being supermen.

[ericknirvana]

i play on hard and it sounds like the damage output of the cannibals is the same as normal
on the upside the katana can tear limbs/head of in 1 hit if aimed properly, even spamming it they only take like 2-3 swings

[wwi_j]

You literally can cheese enemies by many ways , i cleared a full cave by placing trap and reload it over and over again , you can play around the enemies AI so easily

[[NTOG] Rave]

Yea uhm, last time we checked on cannibals, human meat is terrible for the vitality.

So are we staying with realism or not?

Are you telling me military mercs cannot dumpster a malnutritioned cannibal?
Are you telling me a military trained merc cannot 1v1 a naked person with a fire axe in one hit?
Are you telling me a military trained merc cannot shrug off chip damage?
Or
Is this a video game and the combat is unbalanced?

[DanteBrane]

Once you scavenge and survive for a little, you realize that armor can be plentiful. And it 100% negates damage to health so with its potential abundance and multiple types of armor, you can be very tanky. I used to think that armor was too weak but I think the guy above makes sense. We aren't sitting there making these intricate armors, we are just hastily tying things together with rope and duct tape. It makes sense that it'd fall apart after a hit or 2 from a superhuman cannibal or mutant. I can agree about the babies though, they are still easy to kill but losing portions of armor from one little deformed meatball flinging itself at me is annoying.

[MOJRM_7RB]

Originally posted by Sinopec3M:

You literally can cheese enemies by many ways , i cleared a full cave by placing trap and reload it over and over again , you can play around the enemies AI so easily

i did worse XD. i stayed in the water and the creepy idiots kept coming at me to try to hit me, but they couldnt because they cant swim! so they instantly die XD

[Nik-Naks]

im not sure, and might be talking jibberish right now. but it seems very wise to have different kinds of armor. I had 4 bones, 2 leafs, and 2 tech armors. And when i got hit by one of those open chest looking thingies, i lost the tech but got to keep all the rest of the armors.

So it might register as 1 hit, taking all the leaf armor.. next hit, taking all the bone, depending on how hard the guy hits and what type of move he is making.

Might be something wrong with the way that armor works since it's early access and stuff. But im the last guy to cry about armors, since i just did 2 caves back to back, without losing a single point HP. The armor really helped with this.

[[S.o.E] Papanowel]

Originally posted by *MOJRM_7RB*P$:

Originally posted by Sinopec3M:

You literally can cheese enemies by many ways , i cleared a full cave by placing trap and reload it over and over again , you can play around the enemies AI so easily

i did worse XD. i stayed in the water and the creepy idiots kept coming at me to try to hit me, but they couldnt because they cant swim! so they instantly die XD

Sadly it won't work during winter. I wanted to make a camp on a tiny island in one of the lake and it's frozen, so they can come anytime.

[NekoiNemo]

Ok, just tested it - GRAZING a spiked stick took an entire piece of bone armour off. That's something that won't even damage your clothing IRL. Aka, bone "armour" is less durable than cloth. I was only joking about bone armour being made out of paper, but now i'm not sure anymore...

[threethreethree]

Originally posted by threethreethree:

Originally posted by indigo:

I make bone armor because I make it rain bones when cannibals show up and don't behave themselves. That sign at the edge of the property line that says "Trespassers will be shot in the eyeball with arrows" is not a joke.

I don't mind if they're just walking by, but when they start shoulder-charging my fences or making Kalvin search for his contact lenses, then I take offense and they wind up piled up on a bonfire.

But yes, you've figured out that you're not some super-tough, all-soaking damage-sponge. Enemy attacks hurt, and you shed armor and fast when attacked. It does mitigate the loss of some health, and don't feel bad, because armor works the same way for enemies as it does for us. Catch a cannibal running around in bone armor, shoot it in the chest, the armor breaks.

Makes sense, since it is made of bones, rope and duct tape. I mean seriously, it's made of rope and duct tape. Go out, have yourself a nice full rack of ribs for dinner, keep your bones, bring them home, duct tape and string them together and give it a couple whacks with a stout stick and see how well it holds together. You'd be surprised how little protection this will actually provide, so it doesn't seem at all far-fetched as far as the game is concerned.

Sure, the mechanics could be improved, but... we're not armorers, blacksmiths, or craftsmen. Seems like we're a bunch of corporate mercenaries on a search-and-rescue mission. Not really the sort of thing that falls into the job description.

I feel this is an accurate way to view things.

But since we need rope for arrows, and armor, etc, it is quite difficult to get things going if there isn't rope growing on trees. I think that rope (so far?) is a relatively rare precious commodity. I think IRL i may use some cordage for arrows and armor, but not a whole rope every time, when you're also using tape. So, the difficulty in these other areas unbalances the otherwise realism of us not being supermen.

oops, either this changed, or i screwed up. don't need rope for arrows.

[shmodzilla]

Originally posted by *MOJRM_7RB*P$:

Originally posted by Sinopec3M:

You literally can cheese enemies by many ways , i cleared a full cave by placing trap and reload it over and over again , you can play around the enemies AI so easily

i did worse XD. i stayed in the water and the creepy idiots kept coming at me to try to hit me, but they couldnt because they cant swim! so they instantly die XD

Free armor!

[Hyler]

Originally posted by NekoiNemo:

Why do i get the sneaking suspicion that game was balanced around being played by 8 people in multiplayer, with guns, and nobody went around and check that this didn't screw up the singleplayer?

Wait until you realize how ♥♥♥♥ the compound bow is compared to the modern bow in The Forest. With crafted arrows, at least. Yeah, it really does seem like the combat was balanced around Halo-type gunplay... you should see how powerful the shotgun is. Some "forest survival," sure...

[The Shadow Fox]

Originally posted by NekoiNemo:

I love the game so far in everything but combat. It's just... baffling. Here are some of the situations to illustrate the point (I'm playing on normal, btw):

• A baby jumps onto me and takes away entire point of creepy armour
  
• A dirty cannibal hits me once and takes away a point of creepy armour
  
• A standard (NOT giant, mutant or anything, just a standard upright walking one) cannibal with a bone... sickle(?) hits me twice in a combo (second one happened faster than the character is able to back off or raise axe to block, btw) - i go down from 100% health to being dead.
  
• I untie myself after being killed, with 25% hp or something like that, pick up my backpack and... A dirty cannibal hits me once from behind and kill me instantly
  
• I have 6 points of bone armour that i have spent an obscene amount of time burning corpses for and scavenging tape for - i get hit twice by the lowest tier enemy, a dirty cannibal, and i'm down to no armour.

I'm sorry, am i missing something? What's the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ point of armour if the basic ♥♥♥♥♥ enemy can "undress" me in moments? I played the original game a lot, and being dressed in the full set of bone armour gave you a reasonable chance in taking 4-5 strong cannibals in melee (and you could have full set because bone armour wasn't made out of paper and you wouldn't lose it all in a single encounter), and putting on even a single piece of creepy armour actually felt like getting proper armour - you could tank a LOT of hits before you lose it (and full set of creepy armour, while hard to get, made you borderline invulnerable even against mutants for short while). In this game i'm practically drowning in the creepy armour after going through one cave, but then i get from a full suit of creepy armour to death after 3 cannibals landed 2-3 hits on me each. The. ♥♥♥♥.

I have basically resorted to only fighting with bow headshots, because of it. And yes, headshots only, because even the dirty canibal can easily tank 4+ stone arrows to the body, and the standard cannibals (NOT WEARING ARMOUR, i dread to even imagine tankiness of the armoured ones) easily took 6-7 arrows to the body (it took me some time to get used to aiming) without even falling to the ground. 8+ arrows to kill a single enemy when your carry limit is 16 and they routinely come in the packs of 4-5 cannibals. Who can, see above, take you from full creepy armour to death in the matter of seconds.

Why do i get the sneaking suspicion that game was balanced around being played by 8 people in multiplayer, with guns, and nobody went around and check that this didn't screw up the singleplayer?

Thanks for bringing this up. I wanted to write something similar but haven't completed my list of issues yet.

My biggest concerns are:

-Barehanded enemies deal massive damage. I understand the "dirty" cannibals. They are highly mobile and very fast. They have a place. But why do they also deal massive damage by slapping me and I have to chop them three times with my fireman's axe to kill them? Add to this the fact that they seem to spawn in the forest where it is impossible to keep track of 3-5 of them as they employ their hit and run tactics. You just have to run from these situations. This is on NORMAL mode.

-Cannibals are human beings, like us. Yet they see perfectly in the dark while you can't and light sources provide almost zero light. The flashlight is better but is still far inferior to what an actual cheap LED flashlight can put out. It needs a buff. It needs to cast more light and batteries should last longer. I get it, darkness is a key obstacle in this game. But an actual torch should let me see further than the end of my own nose. The UV lighter is a better light source than the torch, and the torch takes your weapon slot. The torch needs a buff as well.

-Leaping babies don't make physical sense but I cut that some slack because they are just creepy monsters in a survival horror game. They should always die in one hit no matter what weapon you use on them but they can actually take some hits.

-Armor doesn't feel like its worth the time or resources. It gets consumed quickly due to the massive damage of the enemies. It also seems like armor is more effective for cannibals than it is for us. This is on NORMAL mode.

-One regular cannibal will kill you with a small number of hits. Most melee combat is expensive (burns up armor quickly) and too risky (you die easily). I too have resorted to range combat. The crossbow is a godsend. Its easy to aim and get headshots with. The shotgun is amazing as well. It feels like you are meant to run away from most encounters.

-So much great equipment is locked behind the shovel. The shovel is locked behind the rebreather and the rope gun. Those two items are guarded by very large groups of enemies. I've not seen other equipment guarded by such large groups of enemies. In the beginning of the game you are at your weaketest, obviously, yet this is where they have put the biggest combat challenges to overcome. This is where it really feels like they balanced this game around multiplayer. Out of frustration, I just started running past all the monsters just to see what was coming up in order to better prepare, and I ended up running all the way to the end of the cave, scoring the rebreather, stun gun, rope gun, and shovel respectively.

-Enemies spawning seemingly on top of you in the forest when it gets dark. This makes it nearly impossible to throw down a tent and attempt to flip it to day time, as the game will stop this from happening due to enemies being near. Forget all about fighting them, because there are a lot and you can't see them anyway, and they deal a lot of damage as well. You are better off running as far away as you can in the dark, which is highly aggravating, and try to throw down your tent there. If you can make it to the beach, all the better, as there seem to be less enemies there in general. This won't always be an option as the island is a huge place.

-When you load your save, enemies spawn near you and make a bee line to your tent. Then they stand there waiting for you. I tested this on the beach where I can see clearly. I log in, to stand in the ocean, then watch them walk up and stand in my camp for eternity. You can't just log in and dink around, you have to immediately find a safe spot to figure out what you want to do.