Alpha 16e Electric Fence posts - Damage vs power draw

[Vedui]

Hi,

I was testing out the electric fence posts, and really love them. The electrifying effect is awesome, and it not only stuns the zombies but does a fair bit of damage at the same time.

However I realized they only draw 10w (per pair), which makes them fairly cheap to just waste zombies. The only drawback being zombies running past them can easily be mitigated by barbed wire on the ground, and as the zombies patiently wait for the one ahead to get buzzed, it's very easy to funnel them.

I was personally hoping that the posts would draw a lot more power every time they buzzed something, which means stacking wouldn't necessarily work against groups of zombies as it'd go "dark" letting them past as individual zombies got electrocuted. This especially as traps like turrets take ammo, making them consume resources which fence posts don't the same way.

Short Clip: Alpha 16e Electric Fence Post test

Thoughts? Are they a little too good for the low (constant) energy drain?

[gerokzule]

I like them as well but i find that the electric fence alone is slow to kill things. especially the cops and irradiated zombies. overall i think they feel good as a suport to your other traps and to help stun cops who are about to explode.

[Vedui]

Yeah! I love the effect tho, and it does help to stun them.

Are you saying that stunning cops about to explode helps? Does it simply delay the explosion a couple of seconds, or does it restart it?

Either way, far easier to headshot/kill the cop when it's stunned than running around preparing to explode :P

[Patouski]

Originally posted by Vedui:

Yeah! I love the effect tho, and it does help to stun them.

Are you saying that stunning cops about to explode helps? Does it simply delay the explosion a couple of seconds, or does it restart it?

Either way, far easier to headshot/kill the cop when it's stunned than running around preparing to explode :P

You can often avoid an explosion by shooting the cop at the right moment. It sometimes seems like it resets its counter completely - if timed right. Sometimes - that extra 2-5seconds is all it takes, especially with the irradiated cops now.

I feel the electric fences are like barbed wires - on acid. Damage is minimal in my book, but the stun is sometimes a godsend, giving you that one headshot you missed. Much like the barbed wires do.

[zingo2]

Hey @Vedui

Nice to see yu here too!

Indeed Fence helps with killing Zombies- especialy on horde nights! Easier to see them in dark!

The thing is the more hordes you get those Zomberts become very strong- even for fences! So you need a secondary defense after fences. While they can kill small zombies they wont stop the big guys!

[Vedui]

@Patouski: Good point~ I think weeding out the normal zombies allows one to focus on the bigger threats, cops, ferals, radiated ones, which can be tough if you can't slow them down sufficiently to land shots consistently.

@zingo2! Hey mate! Small world ;) Yeah I agree the later hordes, and zombies would overwhelm ... but as a first line of defense they give you very useful additional time to take down the big threats while the zombies are some distance. Always tougher once they get up and close to walls in numbers, hard to make out individuals as they rush around :)

[Vedui]

Originally posted by gerokzule:

I like them as well but i find that the electric fence alone is slow to kill things. especially the cops and irradiated zombies. overall i think they feel good as a suport to your other traps and to help stun cops who are about to explode.

What other traps do you use together with the fences? I did some test setup putting electric fences stunning the zombies, combined with pressure plates and dart traps firing at them as they stand there stunned That seemed to work pretty well, but had to combine with barbed wire to get them slowed down enough if it was night/feral/running.

[YamaKami]

I've just used it to slow them up and make them easy to spot at night in darker spots I do not yet have lights for. A zombie doing the electrial jig is an easy head shot ;)

They probably should draw more power when in use though. That said if too much draw it will become impossible to make a perimiter fence with them or any size without a shed load of generator/solarpanels/battery banks if it is too extreme. Blance is key and well 1st pass on electricity so I would expect some changes down the line yet.

[Vedui]

Originally posted by YamaKami:

I've just used it to slow them up and make them easy to spot at night in darker spots I do not yet have lights for. A zombie doing the electrial jig is an easy head shot ;)

They probably should draw more power when in use though. That said if too much draw it will become impossible to make a perimiter fence with them or any size without a shed load of generator/solarpanels/battery banks if it is too extreme. Blance is key and well 1st pass on electricity so I would expect some changes down the line yet.

Yeah they look quite funny "lit up" as they are electrocuted.

What I think they should do is drop the passive W draw to a couple of watts, and boost it to 10-20 for each zombie being electrocuted. That way once they start triggering it'll cause some blackouts, not all will get electrocuted which introduces some randomness unless you got a good power feed to back it up :)

[YamaKami]

Originally posted by Vedui:

Originally posted by YamaKami:

I've just used it to slow them up and make them easy to spot at night in darker spots I do not yet have lights for. A zombie doing the electrial jig is an easy head shot ;)

They probably should draw more power when in use though. That said if too much draw it will become impossible to make a perimiter fence with them or any size without a shed load of generator/solarpanels/battery banks if it is too extreme. Blance is key and well 1st pass on electricity so I would expect some changes down the line yet.

Yeah they look quite funny "lit up" as they are electrocuted.

What I think they should do is drop the passive W draw to a couple of watts, and boost it to 10-20 for each zombie being electrocuted. That way once they start triggering it'll cause some blackouts, not all will get electrocuted which introduces some randomness unless you got a good power feed to back it up :)

I like it, have your people get in touch with TFP's people ;) lol

[Vedui]

Originally posted by YamaKami:

I like it, have your people get in touch with TFP's people ;) lol

Haha ;) Reminds me of when they told people who wanted to join as streamers to email them ... and people were complaining they were emailing and never getting replies :P I suspect they get a lot of mails!

[YamaKami]

Originally posted by Vedui:

Originally posted by YamaKami:

I like it, have your people get in touch with TFP's people ;) lol

Haha ;) Reminds me of when they told people who wanted to join as streamers to email them ... and people were complaining they were emailing and never getting replies :P I suspect they get a lot of mails!

Attacth the message to a fine bottle of (Insert whatever TFP drinks here), and it just might get priority over email #3647 of the day. ;P Having the right "people" for the right job make it easier. lol

[T-man]

I actually think fences are fine. Especially as they damage themselves when they electrocute something. Also, with a lot higher power draw they would be quite useless (10 maybe, but 20 per zombie is crazy that's 500+ for each post mostly on horde nights), as barbed wire does the same job without any upkeep.

[Vedui]

Originally posted by Seelenernter:

I actually think fences are fine. Especially as they damage themselves when they electrocute something. Also, with a lot higher power draw they would be quite useless (10 maybe, but 20 per zombie is crazy that's 500+ for each post mostly on horde nights), as barbed wire does the same job without any upkeep.

Well, I think of it this way. With a reasonable build, you might have say 10 zombies stuck in fence posts at any given time at horde night at the top range. at 20 power draw, that's 200 watt, which is very manageable. If you're getting a rush of 20 zombies, and your production is 200 watt, you'll be electrocuting 10 out of the 20, and 10 will make it through (to be dealt with other traps) ... alternatively, requiring you to have 400 watt on standby to power.

Right now, you can run 10 lines of fences (100 watt) and 50 zombies can get stuck in them simultaneously. It gets to the problem we had with wooden spikes, just spamming down these in rows becomes cheap, and all but radiated/cops are going to die in 10 lines of fences. In contrast if each zombie stuck drew even 20, it'd be 1000 watt you'd have to supply as opposed to 100, making other traps such as blade, darts, turrets good alternatives.

I always felt barbed wired was OP though, even though they can be destroyed which the electric fence posts wont if you just protect the wire poles. :)

[YamaKami]

Originally posted by Le_Cr0c:

Finally people realizing how ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ op the electric fence posts are. Cheap and overpowered traps ! If you set a kill box and funnel zombies into an alley of electric cables that are protected behind walls with a tasty door at the end (zombies LOVE doors) they will all rush to their death in there do that on ground floor with access to their loot and ability to repair the poles and destroy their gore blocks and you just built yourself a zombie loot farm and a safe base ! Because they won't attack exterior walls as long as there is a door and a path between you and them.

Finally? lol A16 stable is not even out yet this stuff is all new.

[Vedui]

Originally posted by Le_Cr0c:

Finally people realizing how ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ op the electric fence posts are. Cheap and overpowered traps ! If you set a kill box and funnel zombies into an alley of electric cables that are protected behind walls with a tasty door at the end (zombies LOVE doors) they will all rush to their death in there do that on ground floor with access to their loot and ability to repair the poles and destroy their gore blocks and you just built yourself a zombie loot farm and a safe base ! Because they won't attack exterior walls as long as there is a door and a path between you and them.

Yes :) That's why I've been advocating for them to hve lesser passive power draw, but considerably more.. and per mob, active draw instead. That way placing fences all over catching hordes of them won't be as overpowered, as we can find a good balance of how many watt per zombie per second it requires. Right now there's just no limit to the amount you catch. And even if you don't kill them all, a couple of pipe bombs or molotovs will catch everyone electrocuted in area of affect attacks.

Maybe even make radiated, or feral zombies unaffected by the traps, or some type of immunity.