[2021] Basic Game Mechanics

We should try to get away from calling it a heat map, and call it an activity map, for the sake new players not getting confused when screamers come for activities that don’t put out much heat in the thermal sense.

Anyway, I think gamestage is the most important mechanic for new players to understand. Gamestage is a number the game computes that’s directly related to your player level, and it dictates what zombies you’ll face as well as what loot you’ll find. Raising your XP gain in the options is, for most people, not going to make the game easier. And if you find some cheap/unbalanced/artificial way to make a ton of XP fast, you’ll likely only hurt yourself. The game is designed to work with your rate of progress, whatever it may be. You get ahead of the curve through efficiency, not by inflating your XP.

Originally posted by Equinox: If you're upgrading your base blocks, use rebar when you have the ability to access the forge and a bunch of cement. Saves a crap ton of resources.

Instead of upgrading from Frame
You just go RebarAn addendum to this, You can also just craft Flagstone blocks directly, and skip the frame/wood step. Or alternatively make scrap iron blocks iirc which is a side-grade to the flagstone/cobblestone blocks.
So your options in actuality are as follows:

FrameFlagstoneIron FrameRebar
Of note, is that upon upgrading to Concrete or Reinforced concrete, you will get a 'Wet Concrete Block' that have a drying period before becoming hardened. The wet blocks also ahve different structural support values than dried ones, iirc.

So a full upgrade path counting the drying period would be:
Frame
There is no visual structural or HP difference between the two stages of drying concrete, It may appear when upgrading a second time that you're just making concrete again, but it will in fact become reinforced. :)

Originally posted by vgifford:

Originally posted by Shurenai:
There is no visual structural or HP difference between the two stages of drying concrete, It may appear when upgrading a second time that you're just making concrete again, but it will in fact become reinforced. :)

Are you sure on that? I thought wet concrete isn't as strong as dried concrete?

It's not. I didn't say there wasn't. I said there was no difference between the two stages of Wet concrete; Both the first time it dries (From Wet to Concrete)and the second time it dries(From Wet to Reinforced) have the same HP/support/etc. Both have 1500 HP, both have the same structural values, etc.

Dried concrete very much has more HP and structural strength than it's wet counterpart, and reinforced even more so.

Edit: To clarify, the 'Wet Concrete Block' used in the first drying stage is identical to the wet concrete block used in the second. There is no difference, it is literally the same block.

Originally posted by Darkside99x: First and foremost that the game, despite appearances is neither a survival game nor a horror game by default at this point.

Anyone attempting to play the game as such is in for a bad time.

On the contrary, To a newbie, it is more of a survival game than it ever has been. It's much harder to survive in general, harder to reliably acquire adequate amounts of food, harder to manage your health due to the critical injuries system, Infection is an actual threat if you don't have antibiotics, and more..

To an old hat, sure, the game isn't much of a survival game anymore. But, that's purely because we're so experienced with the game at this point that it doesnt matter what changes, or how much more difficult it gets... We're just that good at the game. We could go back to A16, or A12 and still not feel like it's a survival game because we have a practiced methodology of clearing the game.

A newbie does not have that. Newbies struggle to find food for weeks. Newbies dont know the tricks. Newbies are..well.. New.

The only thing that has been made more arcadey is temperature/weather survival- Instead of actually dying of heat or cold now you just rapidly drain water or food respectively when under the effects of the hot/cold debuff.

Originally posted by Darkside99x: I meant more that the tower defence aspect pretty much overshadows the other aspects after a certain point.

New players going about the game as someone would a typical survival game will be in for a rude awakening once they hit a higher gamestage and have hours of work ruined by attacks that are more severe than they expect.

If someone new plays a builder and perks into that (especially if building aesthetically) likely wont have a great base design or the means to defend it, and theres been a fair few rants from new players on the forums for similar issues from new players.

Knowing from the start that you have to prepare for what comes later needs to be clear, while 7days has pretty good survival mechanics the game cant be played as a true survival game after a point without tweaking the settings.

True. But at the same time, gamestage is determined by player advancement, and newbies inherently advance slower due to not knowing what they're doing. They're not going to hit high gamestages super early into a game the way veterans do. It might be well into day 30+ before they start seeing more difficult to manage zombie types, and well past 50 before they ever see a demolisher.

A player who plays the builder and perks into it isn't likely to gain a great deal of levels in a short time, especially if they're building aesthetically; So the hordes they get on horde night will be very easy to manage comparatively speaking.

On top of which is that dying during horde night will cancel the horde night until you encounter and engage a new zombie; So even IF a newbie does get overwhelmed because they weren't prepared, they are not unduly punished. It's a learning experience.

It is all relative...But even still, the survival elements will last far longer for a newbie than for a veteran, as it takes significantly longer for the game to advance to the stage where it is completely overwhelming.

Originally posted by vgifford:

Originally posted by Shurenai: Edit: To clarify, the 'Wet Concrete Block' used in the first drying stage is identical to the wet concrete block used in the second. There is no difference, it is literally the same block.

They are wet and dry, are they not? Or am I missing a step?

Had to backdate to stable and log in to check, but you're right. I stand corrected. The first wet concrete stage does actually have 250 less hp than the second. The structural properties however are the same between the two.