Zombie spawns, and combat v stealth

[THEINVISIBLEWAFFLE]

So I am a returning player who played the game *briefly* a few years ago. Decided to jump back into nightmare mode recently. Because I am new maybe I'm just missing something or haven't discovered a certain feature, but here's my impressions about progression and zombie spawns, and I'm interested to hear what other people have to say.

In my game, zombies are spawning everywhere in large numbers, especially in towns. Makes sense, but I'm pretty sure their spawn rate is only increasing, which seems counterintuitive as that means I have no incentive to fight zombies... in a game about fighting zombies? Well, there's no reward or incentive to take out zombies throughout the world (to my knowledge) except trivial amounts of influence occasionally. So, stealth is my go-to for looting and getting missions done. The thing is, stealth is really easy. Also very repetitive and tedious. For example, you can defeat an entire horde (unless it has freaks) without standing up, just crouch walk towards them from behind one at a time and take them out with stealth.

So that means looting, and any other task that can be done with stealth, is better done stealthily. If you choose to take the less tedious route and fight them, then at least at my gamestage, the game just spams zombies at you and you can be fighting them for 15+ minutes straight, just to complete one simple task that should take 2 minutes. This gets repetitive because it's just endless of the same zombie horde somehow, and by the time the spawn rates are that high they seem to be easy to eliminate because you've got the loot to match. Some missions force you to fight, but you typically have nothing to lose from just leaving if it is an objective that is legitimately too difficult (which is very rare in my experience). I've only had to defeat two juggernauts, which I typically avoid because they're bullet sponges. One was near my base in the early game which proved very tough and I lost one of my community members in the process. The very next time I returned to my base, another had spawned in the exact same spot. Now knowing there was no point in fighting it, I followed some advice online and led it away with distractions. From this, it seems the main times you need to fight zombies are destroying plague hearts and missions, which are rare or easy enough to complete once you've gotten past the very early game and have even a mildly decent loot stash.

Essentially, as you progress through the game everything becomes easier but more tedious. Sure you can take on the seemingly endless supply of the same zombies that the game spawns, but you get no reward because the world won't spawn any less zombies, even though your alternative is to spend your days crouch walking everywhere that you aren't driving.

If I remember correctly the system in 7 days to die worked by having noise and heat attract zombies, as well as increase zombie spawns near locations with higher noise and heat generation over time. Gamestage also affects spawns. If your base makes too much noise or heat, you can attract more zombies so you may want to limit the heat, move, etc. if you got attacked too much. Here in SoD, that doesn't matter because on higher difficulties in mid game + (so far for me at least), the game just spams zombies at you everywhere you go no matter how many you defeat. I don't mind the game getting easier as you progress, to give an incentive for players to advance through the game, but I do mind that they basically increase the length of a playthrough artificially by making it better for you to crouch walk everywhere. The challenge becomes, do I have the patience to hold w while my character sneaks to my destination. So what do you think? Do you like this system or would you change something about it?

[Protectron]

Shooting unsuppressed on Nightmare spawns in more zombies, at a much higher rate than on Dread. You can eventually kill off everything because the chance of spawning in more when shooting is like 60% and even higher with Shotguns and .50 cal.

In addition, the noise of fighting may bring in even more zombies - but not spawn them in.

Screamers screaming will spawn in more zombies and Hordes. But on Nightmare and Lethal, regular zombies are also quite likely to roar and thus spawn in more zombies. When a lot of zombies attack you, not everyone can reach you at once, and when they can't reach you they will roar instead. So basically, there is a turning point when a horde attack can become self-sustaining.

Basially, when shtf you are better off just leaving. You are NOT supposed to fight all the zombies. Not when attacking Hearts and not when looting or doing missions. The zombies are spawned in to create an obstacle for you to overcome, nothing else. There are no rewards for killing zombies beyond getting xp to level up skills - and a small amount of Influence.

The game is not a zombie shooter; it's about building up a community in a zombie post-apocalypse.

The most important skill in SoD is to know when to flee, not necessarily because you'd otherwise lose a character, but because resource management is important and it is not worth it using 70 7.62 bulles to loot an ammo rucksack... or a full day looting a warehouse.

[Bearji 🌱]

Originally posted by THEINVISIBLEWAFFLE:

I have no incentive to fight zombies... in a game about fighting zombies?

State of Decay is a game about survival and managing a community, not a game about fighting zombies. The fact that going all out is disincentivized is by design.

That said you can pop a silencer on just about any weapon and be as gung-ho as you want. Fire will also clear out a lot of zombies pretty quietly. You also don't need to crouch nearly as often as you'd think though. Zombies really only react to the sound your footsteps make within a dozen meters or so. You can just run (not sprint) most of the time without any issue.

You also really only need to be stealthy in an area before you clear a Plague Heart out of an area. Once I've done that I usually don't bother much with stealth since the zombie spawn rate drops significantly.

Also yeah, Juggernauts are huge bullet sponges. I typically avoid them, or if I absolutely want to kill them, I will often use my Outpost defenses to do so rather than spend bullets.

[Morbidius]

I always start a new map with a new community. I like the beginning the most when your characters are weak and you have no resources. And then you slowly build up and become more and more powerful. It's the same for me in 7 days to die also, the beginning when you are weak and have no resources are the most fun for me.

When I get more powerful in State of Decay 2 the only thing that is dangerous is the triple feral pack on lethal difficulty. But if i load up one of my communities where I have lots of resources and strong survivors. It's almost impossible for me to lose a character. Since I always bring fuel bombs with me in case I run into a triple pack of ferals. Worst case scenario if I have trouble killing them, I set them (and maybe me) on fire and then I have time to flee.

Same thing in 7 days to die. You get stronger and stronger and have more and more loot so it's almost impossible to die. First time was so boring playing 7DTD since the zombies was walking around. Then we reset and played a new random map with a new weak survivor and went with much higher difficulty and that zombies are sprinting at full speed all the time. Was a little challenging in the beginning but eventually you get so strong and have so much loot that everything gets very easy.

I don't see what's so fun about completely stomping the enemy and you never die yourself.

In my mind the beginning is always the most fun since then you have very little resources and it is a struggle. I would say both SOD2 and 7DTD both need even higher difficulties so both mid game and late game becomes a LOT harder!

[Protekt1]

You don't have to be stealthy all the time. I run/sprint most places and stealth kill zombies along the way. Or I use a car. You break line of sight and go quiet and they stop chasing.

It's smart to stealth kill zombies since it levels your wits, often times you can pick the stealth specialization which lets you crouch+sprint for much faster movement. Before then you just gotta learn how sound affects zombies. You can run in fairly close to zombies and then switch to crouch for the rest.