The Necromancer needs a better grunt minion!

[MegaFrog64]

It's been said before but the zombies need major rework as the necromancer's grunt minion, they make the early and even mid and late games way too annoying. Their pitiful ability to haul compounds their weakness to sunlight and the babysitting you have to do to make sure they don't burn up while gathering wood at a snail's pace, and if they DO burn up you have to waste what is a very limited resource until you can farm corpses at an easier rate. What's worse is that if you don't want zombies as a combat unit they will still equip weapons and consumables that could be going to other units so you have to micromanage that as well.

Please just make a pure grunt unit rather than putting the deed onto the zombies

EDIT: While this infinite carry balsam is nice, I still think overall it would just be better to have a zombie grunt (it can still be as poor as the old zombie if it's for balance reasons) separate from the regular zombie. As, iirc, there's not a way to autosort minions by their balsams, so it'd just be easier to completely relegate zombies to grunt only, which makes their combat capability in the necromancer faction a little redundant.

[The Pollie]

They aren't all that bad. The limited carrying capacity is easily their biggest issue. You practically have to dedicate a full night solely to hauling exterior goods like lumber, or you risk either not getting it done in one night, or worse having zombies caught out during the daylight.

Since you can't modify undead after-the-fact, your initial horde are effectively fodder after a certain point and you have to destroy them somehow just to replace them with objectively better units.

[MegaFrog64]

Originally posted by The Pollie:

They aren't all that bad. The limited carrying capacity is easily their biggest issue. You practically have to dedicate a full night solely to hauling exterior goods like lumber, or you risk either not getting it done in one night, or worse having zombies caught out during the daylight.

Since you can't modify undead after-the-fact, your initial horde are effectively fodder after a certain point and you have to destroy them somehow just to replace them with objectively better units.

They aren't gamebreakingly bad but it gives a good deal of tediousness that the other ingame factions lack

[Morkonan]

Originally posted by xward555:

...
They aren't gamebreakingly bad but it gives a good deal of tediousness that the other ingame factions lack

^-- This.

The only sort-of solution that I found to the most aggravating issue, wood gathering, was to dig down to level 3 and hopefully find some 'shrooms. That and locking/forbidding the entry doors to the dungeon are the solve for "Where did my other zombie go" problem... :)

[Bacon & Eggs]

They need to expand the rule system (Activity & AI Type) to the doors and equipment. Allow/disallow specific minions from using specific doors (at specific times) and also equipment. This should remove a lot annoying micromanagement.

[Panic Fire]

You think that's bad, try the peasant. Lower carry weight than the zombie, worst digging speed in the game ect. Zombies suck early game but can simply be fixed via crafting. Peasants always suck.

[Morkonan]

Originally posted by M.:

They need to expand the rule system (Activity & AI Type) to the doors and equipment. Allow/disallow specific minions from using specific doors (at specific times) and also equipment. This should remove a lot annoying micromanagement.

A sort of "Filterable" Forbid Zone tile?

While practical, it'd also remove that bit of Management necessity that's a necessary counter to the advantages of certain Sunlight-Adverse units. They have some strengths that do have to have some downsides, somewhere. (Though, honestly, I use all of those units as "Garrison" units while I'm away, raiding with more flexible units. With the exception of the opening portion of play with those up until the base-map is clear.)

Zombies are pretty dumb, tho... Historically speaking, that is.

PS: I miss the "nighttime behavior" of Wolves, though. That nighttime "hook" could be applied to Zombies et al as well, one assumes. I don't know that it's still in the game/engine, though.

[SpitefulSpirit]

you can offset all their shortcomings with the upgrade system

[GuiltyGun]

Every faction needs some drawbacks. Don't need some overpowered auto-win faction, and if for necromancers its a slower economy, that's not the end of the world.

[MegaFrog64]

Originally posted by GuiltyGun:

Every faction needs some drawbacks. Don't need some overpowered auto-win faction, and if for necromancers its a slower economy, that's not the end of the world.

There is a difference between a balancing drawback and making something that's just bad. Unless you can give me written proof from the game dev that this is a purposeful balancing caveat rather than issues coming up from the zombies being converted to a grunt unit from a combat unit, then I refuse to engage the mechanics of the zombies as anything other than poorly built grunt units.

Originally posted by SpitefulSpirit:

you can offset all their shortcomings with the upgrade system

This brings up another problem because this effectively makes the zombies even less intuitive as a combat unit because, iirc, you cannot differentiate different kinds of balsam units.

The zombies are not good game design in any way. At the bare minimum just adding in a zombie with a hardhat or something as a separate grunt unit would be a step up.

[SpitefulSpirit]

Originally posted by xward555:

This brings up another problem because this effectively makes the zombies even less intuitive as a combat unit because, iirc, you cannot differentiate different kinds of balsam units.

The zombies are not good game design in any way. At the bare minimum just adding in a zombie with a hardhat or something as a separate grunt unit would be a step up.

why would u use a working unit for combat
just use one of the other units

[MegaFrog64]

Originally posted by SpitefulSpirit:

Originally posted by xward555:

This brings up another problem because this effectively makes the zombies even less intuitive as a combat unit because, iirc, you cannot differentiate different kinds of balsam units.

The zombies are not good game design in any way. At the bare minimum just adding in a zombie with a hardhat or something as a separate grunt unit would be a step up.

why would u use a working unit for combat
just use one of the other units

Because the zombie is a combat unit (although a low level one) that was given the grunt slot for the necromancer. My issue is if this is the intended solution then just make a sole grunt unit for the necromancer rather than using the zombie.

[SpitefulSpirit]

just treat it as sole grunt. problem solved. plus it can carry a weapons so i dosnt run away from rats.

[MegaFrog64]

Originally posted by SpitefulSpirit:

just treat it as sole grunt. problem solved. plus it can carry a weapons so i dosnt run away from rats.

Unless the dev literally goes "I would rather keep it this way for X reason" instead of having a sole grunt unit then problem not solved.

Whether or not the player can work around it is not the issue, the issue is "Are these workarounds actually adding anything? Can they be removed?". The zombie grunt unit is, in my eyes, flawed with no actual reason (aside from speculation).

[SoftMonster]

Recommendation: Skeletal Imps for necromancers instead of zombie workers.

[SoftMonster]

Originally posted by SoftMonster:

Recommendation: Skeletal Imps for necromancers instead of zombie workers.

Log this in the community discord and I will upvote it.