Play as zombie
We had quite a few discussions on the forum whether or not to facilitate zombie play or not. Thus we should start by stating that we want a game which focus on co-op gameplay and not player killing and a game where zombies are inferior to even low level humans.

The current status is that we will allow zombie play at a later stage but only offering some very basic functions and we will make it easy to revived back to human (a player playing zombie can convert anytime back to human by going to special locations on the map). The concept is that when you die you can choose to accept dead and become a zombie instead of being rescued, or if you have been dead and inactive for say 14 days you will turn into a zombie. When being a zombie you can’t use items, you can’t communicate with others, your map markers won’t be available to you but you will be able to attack buildings and players who are not in a “secured” buidling. So playing a zombie will have limited gameplay and they will be inferior to human players but yes we are planning on offering the option.

I dont like the way this sounds. Turning back to a zombie being easy. No. Sounds like Urban Dead. You revive someone and they kill you. If you want to be a zombie, you should be a zombie. It should be like 2 mass teams battling for the map. A player dieing should rarly happen. It should be getting knocked out or incapacitated. If you are fed up with being a human or tired of your clan not helping you, you can revive as a zed and attack them. But then your a zed for good. Or maybe its just very hard to get revived. Being a zombie should be just as much a major part as being a human. I know the game is going for co-op, but zeds can co-op together too. A player who wants to be a zombie should have an entire differnt game expierience than a survivor. They should have different perks, hide outs, sides of the map they tend to flock to, places that heal them, ect. Its just not going to be very fun to constantly kill NPC zeds and get attacked by NPC zeds. It sounds like your just going to tack on a mini game verson of a zombie mode.

This one is a bit of a pickle. I disagree with seth that reviving will be easy. You the admin, said it in your post that players would have to go to a certain location to be revived. So its not like some random player could revive you. So it is easy, but not easy for live players to revive you.

I like the idea that you can't communicate with players, but I think it should be you can't communicate with living players vs. zombie players.

Any case you might hear people talk about balance, but that is all bs. Bottom line a horde of player zombies has a great strength, a bs strength. They can all slowly, but surely gather to a location, be gunned down, and then on a coordinated date rise up and attack at once (UD). As long as they have that ability they always win. So it isn't imbalanced like some would suggest.

You can give zombies no ability what so ever, but they still have the ability to rise up at once and attack. Means they win as long as they have the numbers. I've suggested it before (UD) where a drag or carry or a random spawn area be implaced. Something where you can move the zeds away frm the defended area so they have to blow all their sp to get back. Something like that.

Either way what you suggested admin is a good start for a test at least.

Inspired by Kalokains input we have been discussing an arena feature where you can challenge other players at safehouse locations including both clan safehouse and NPC safehouses such as say the college campus.

The concept could be similar to battle mail as you pick some predetermined stances and equipment and have an autoresolve battle outcome to support the asynchronous play. This is currently on the nice-to-have list though. The nature of the challenge would be “friendly” and thus consequence of loosing/winning not fatal but could earn you XP and maybe even waging a small amount of ingame money.

Any thoughts on how you guys would like a concept like this?

 I really wouldnt want ZP to be one of those games where everyone runs around looking for a  character at a lower level to attack.

Posted By Seth Myrrh on 14-01-2010 01:38 AM

I dont like the way this sounds. Turning back to a zombie being easy. No. Sounds like Urban Dead. You revive someone and they kill you. If you want to be a zombie, you should be a zombie. It should be like 2 mass teams battling for the map. A player dieing should rarly happen. It should be getting knocked out or incapacitated. If you are fed up with being a human or tired of your clan not helping you, you can revive as a zed and attack them. But then your a zed for good. Or maybe its just very hard to get revived. Being a zombie should be just as much a major part as being a human. I know the game is going for co-op, but zeds can co-op together too. A player who wants to be a zombie should have an entire differnt game expierience than a survivor. They should have different perks, hide outs, sides of the map they tend to flock to, places that heal them, ect. Its just not going to be very fun to constantly kill NPC zeds and get attacked by NPC zeds. It sounds like your just going to tack on a mini game verson of a zombie mode.

Posted By Helo on 06-03-2010 05:04 PM

 I really wouldnt want ZP to be one of those games where everyone runs around looking for a  character at a lower level to attack.