State of Decay

[Turisas]

Any new zombie types?

 

[SuicideBunny]

Any new zombie types?

nope.

 

[Metro]

Thought about it at $10 but the fact the game sort of runs (survivors run low on supplies) while you're not playing is kind of annoying.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

That feature is pretty forgiving.

Another feature of the game is dynamic progression; the game world continues acting whether or not the game is being played. If the game is not being played, friendly survivors within the home can still use and gather supplies, explore, and possibly be injured. Some characters may take weapons and ammo from the supply cache and may level up their abilities. New survivor enclaves can appear or disappear, cars the players' survivors own can be repaired, and weapons can be repaired. Non-plot-essential NPCs can become injured or fatigued with the player absent, but cannot die nor abandon the base.

 

[anus_pounder]

I think the game has a kind of cap on exactly how long the un-life lasts. Went back to my save after...4? months of non-playing and the amount of resources used (and a bit of gain here and there) was equivalent to when I continued a game after 4-5 days wayyy back.

 

[moraes]

Is there some way to make it look less blurry? Do NPCs ever use guns?

 

[Xeon]

Seem they only shoot while watching in the Watch Tower other than that they only use melee.

NPCs are kinda inept, they barely do anything and expect your help with everything I think. Killing zombies they can't group up with the other survivors but instead they ask for your help and will wait for you to show up or fail or something like that. If the base is attacked they run around taking cover and only act if the zombie is about to attack them.

The world is kinda nice but I kinda wish if I can lessen the zombies numbers or something, I must have killed a few thousands by now training the MC and a few others and there are no changes to their numbers which kinda sucks. I don't think skills matter to NPCs, like if you level their fighting and give them abilities they will still use normal attacks from what I noticed so its pretty pointless to train all of them.

Base management is bare bone I think, You can build facilities and research stuff and all that but you can't do anything with the NPCs, you can't kick the trouble makers and you can't assign people on guard duty and whatever. You can't directly strengthen the base or expand it I think, you can move the base to another location for more options and you can build outposts but that's about it. Only played for a little bit so I might be wrong.

Edit:
They also want you to help them with their life crisis like someone is scared or angry or something like that and they always contact you to help. There is another NPC taking the Pastor role with one of his traits/skills is Counseling and he doesn't help AFAIK.

 

[Metro]

Was $5 on a GMG sale a couple days ago and should be $5 during Steam Summer Sale starting later next week.

 

[Metro]

So I grabbed this during the Steam sale for $5 (along with the Breakdown DLC) and was... overall pleased. The biggest problem is that they set up all of these mechanics and systems that, on paper, look great. Unfortunately the game balance is so wonky they end up being shallow and largely meaningless. Breakdown mostly corrects this as it's a sandbox with increasing difficulty but even then the concept of building characters and having specialists is undermined by the terrible AI and the inability to assign people to various tasks.

Still, worth it. You will need the Breakdown DLC as the base game acts as a 10+ hour tutorial -- it's far too easy to be interesting. Shame the next thing they're making is an MMO. With a decent enough overall they could make a great game.

 

[spectre]

Another DLC is out, lifeline, this time you act as a team of military guys who are there to evacuate key personnel. It's all mostly the same shit, but it seems its much more linear than breakthrough. There'a also a new, smaller map.

Is it just me, or did they royally screw up the performance in some recent patch? I mean my PC is not really coal-powered and It used to run pretty fine, but now I am getting a barely unplayable stutter, regardless of the settings.
I downloaded some config packs some guy made, but they only help a tiny bit. I suspect the issue is more with the GPU overheating... which didn't really happen until I fired the game for the first time in a while recently.

 

[Metro]

Lifeline has been out for awhile and, yes, it's more campaign oriented than sandbox survival. That said it looks like it delivers a different experience with the wave defense scenarios. Was only 30% off during the Steam sale so I put it off until later.

Re: peformance - yes, the game is horribly optimized. I'm also using a config pack (probably the same one) because the default graphic options are horrible. The game sometimes sets your resolution to something higher than your native resolution so that might be causing overheating. My card doesn't go over 50c when playing.

 

[Name]

So does Lifeline progress the OC plot or something?

 

[Metro]

Sort of. Not like the plot was anything more than OMG ZOMBIES. Lifeline is OMG ZOMBIES CONTROL THE CITY!

 

[Burning Bridges]

I can see the problem now. Saved the game yesterday and now all my medkits and rations are gone. What a stupid idea that games now play without us.
Also, what can be done about the graphics? Everything is red and dark and completely fucked up, and with Demonfists SweetFX it looks no longer red but still fucked put.

(Here is what I found, basically it adjusts modified date to the the current date.)

While playing
As I mentioned above, I only just recently bought State Of Decay. Because of this, i was informed about a mod capable of doing something similiar to my method only after creating the guide. If you wish to download it I have provided the links below.

Note- I haven't downloaded this mod myself, however I have been informed by a number of individuals that the posted links are safe and that the mod functions properly. But until I get around to testing that theory myself I have to say download at your own risk.
Be forewarned that updates to State Of Decay from the developers may cause these mods to cease functioning, if that occurs you'll need to wait for & update to the mod itself. This shouldn't effect my method of avoiding the persistent world however. In anycase, id appreciate a heads up in the comments below if you experience any issues with the mods so that I can keep this guide as up to date as possible, thank you.
http://www.zombiestandardtime.com/

Step 1
First you are going to want to find the location of your State of Decay save file. You should be able to find it here " C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\userdata\5301462\241540\local ". Your save file should be titled something like Class3.0.ulsave. If the file is not there, you either haven't created a profile in State Of Decay yet, or you are in the wrong file.

Step 2
Create a short cut to this location & put it onto your desktop, as you'll be required to visit here very often throughout your playthrough of State Of Decay.

Step 3
I'm going to write this step as if you have just started playing, if you have been playing for a while don't worry, just follow the same steps. First, make sure you are in a good position that you want saved, such as having all your characters alive & your resources at a respectable height etc etc. Make sure that the game has saved this data, the best way to ensure this is to complete any random mission, although the game does autosave very frequently.

Step 4
After you have confirmed the data has been saved pause your game & alt-tab out. Now you'll need to go to the save file location listed in step 1 above. Then copy & paste the class3.0.ulsave file onto your desktop. If you want to be even more precautionary, make a folder on your desktop and label it steam saves. Then proceed to make another copy of the save file inside the new folder, just incase something should go wrong & you for whatever reason wish to roll back more then just the persistent world.

Step 5
Now, in order to restore your save file to a later date without the persistent world taking effect, you'll first need to adjust the clock on your computer to the time that the copy of your save file was last modified. First right click on the class3.0ulsave file that you created on your desktop. Go into properties & you should see a list of three seperate time tables ordered created,modified & accessed. Now access your pcs clock, go to change date and time settings, click change date & time, you may require administrative abilites to do this. Now change your computers time to the exact day,year and time that the back up save file was last modified according to the properties. Note- You can afford to be a few minutes off, just make sure not to set your clock to before the file was created.

Step 6
Go back to the main save file in your local- steam folder and delete an replace it with the copy on your desktop & walla. If you followed these steps to the letter you should entirely subvert the persistent world & restore your data back to the exact time that your save file was created. You'll want to consistently create new copy & pasted backups of your save file onto your desktop, incase things suddenly go haywire. I recommend you do this every time you successfully complete a mission without much trouble.


Important note
Keep in mind that using my method will make certain things, such as repairing cars & weapons far more difficult. As of the last time I played, the repair system operates on "Real time" which I believe currently takes up to twenty four hours to cycle. This means without the persistent world in effect, your weapons and cars will likely break faster then you'll be able to fix them. Because of this you'll need to be a bit more careful, but since weapons are in relative abundance, you shouldn't have to much trouble.
Do this before going to bed or quitting for the day.
Before you go to bed, you'll want to create a new copy & pasted file of your main save an put it onto your desktop, then delete the main file. This is to prevent the save from being altered or otherwise tampered with by steam, since only you can access the files on your desktop. Afterwards, you may want set your pcs clock back to the correct time. To do this, go back into your clock settings as explained above, go to Internet Time tab, click on change settings & then click on Update now, your computer should automatically synchronize. "Note this wont work while State Of Decay is running, atleast it didn't for me."

Important Before playing State Of Decay again don't forget to always switch your computers time back to the date the save folder on your desktop was last modified before placing it into your steam save file.

 

[Metro]

tldr

Avoid mods. There's some config settings tweak on Steam forums/discussion that also includes some Nvidia inspector toggles, too. Game is piss easy. There's a menu that displays how many supplies are drained per day. Doesn't really matter since the base game is maybe ten hours long so I can't imagine anyone taking that much calendar time to play it unless you game in thirty minute sessions twice a week.

 

[spectre]

Looking at the bother required to stop the persistent world, I think it's just better to roll with it.
I agree the game's not that complex to warrant that much effort. You should be able to finish the base game in 2 days tops and make good progress in breakdown in the same amount of time.
When playing breakdown, I would just focus on buildiuing the dream team on lower levels than just try and push the RV thing as fast as I can.

Building the shit out of your home base is usually not worth it unless you want to unlock a guy. You won't be taking the buildings with you anyway. However, if it suits you may wish to twiddle your dick and play the builder,
it can be enjoyable just make sure to stock up on the basic things and stick with the two basic rules - never stock up on building materials unless you want to immediately build something - better to leave them in backpacks near the base,
second rule is don't let peple go missing when you're ending the session, unless you can live with losing them to random chance.

There's a menu that displays how many supplies are drained per day.

That can actually be pretty misleading, because it doesn't account for random events which can give a random + or - to different resources. Usually it doesn't matter, but a random -10 building material wall repair event gets annoying, and even a random +/-2 can skew your building math. Other resources are less important, cause they tend to fluctuate less.

 

[Burning Bridges]

I'm using this for the colors, much better than default: http://www.nexusmods.com/stateofdecay/mods/157/?
in conjunction with a mod that removes shadows: http://www.nexusmods.com/stateofdecay/mods/38/?
Persistent world seems a no brainer, I'll just reset the system time to approximately the last modify date. and yes, it's probably not as much of a deal as I thought, I have rucksacks lying around everywhere.

Yes, the game is kind of easy but I really like it. Basically this is what I had expected from Fort Zombie or Dead State.

 

[WhiteGuts]

I dunno, I find it boring. Getting supplies and doing the same quests over and over again gets really tedious. They could've done a lot more regarding interactions between survivors, but they kept it to a bare -stereotypical post-apo- minimum.

 

[Burning Bridges]

You're probably a storyfag.

 

[spectre]

Yeah, scavenging is basically 75% of the game. Especially at higher breakdown levels where you have to work your ass off for a bit of supplies. If you can't make yourself like that, tough luck.

I have to sympathise. To be honest, the more you look at Space of Decay the more butthurt you get about what it might have been if the devs could be assed to add some depth to what's already there.
Now there's a game I would look forwards to (and not to mention, if they would sit down and optimize that sorry excuse for a console port, doggammit)
Still, the main appeal of SoD in my case was that it was so much better and more polished than all the other bugged indie shitware like Fort Zombie - with a bit more strategic (I am using the term loosely) approach to the zombie genre.

 

[Burning Bridges]

When playing breakdown, I would just focus on buildiuing the dream team on lower levels than just try and push the RV thing as fast as I can.

I haven't played breakdown yet. Can I head straight to the Alamo and build my base there (in Breakdown)? It seems to be my favorite base and investing anything to the Church would be a waste.

 

[Metro]

Yes, the Alamo has the lowest requirements of any base in Breakdown -- 20 materials (you start with 30 assuming you had enough carry over from the last level) and no population requirement. And you're right, it is the best base in the game at least as far as repeating Breakdown goes. With the right outpost placement you can claim almost the entire half of that city and there's more than enough resources there to progress to the next level (RV requirements: 30ish gas, 35ish materials, 10 medicine). Played the game way too much because I find it addicting (but also wish it were strategically deeper). Even on Breakdown level 44 (no sane person would play that long) there isn't much of a challenge. It's more tedium hacking through the two dozen or so zombies that spawn/come running whenever you pull up some place in a car. Finding materials isn't hard at all and the number you need isn't that high since you don't have to build pointless stuff like upgraded workshop or libraries or gardens or training areas, etc. Level 2 infirmary and bedroom are all that's required.

That said, on the first or second level you might want to upgrade to the bigger bases to build all the facilities for the character unlocks and such.

 

[spectre]

@BB
The entire map is accessible in breakdown, including the fairgrounds where you can loot all the military munitions. So long as you meet the requirements, you can settle wherever.
The fact that you can skip the opening sequence is by far the best feature in breakdown imo.

Actually, at level 1 you first need to join a group of survivors first, but there should be at least 3 locations to choose from at the start.
Myself, I've grown quite fond of the Savini Residence (the one with the starting library) for the first few playthroughs, its great to levelup wits on levels 1-3 when you're still looking for the dream team.
But I like to change the home site every now and then for a bit of variety.

With Alamo, I have a problem with the limited number of outposts, with just 4, every one must count, and sometimes a second horde will actually slip by the fireworks.

Even on Breakdown level 44 (no sane person would play that long)

 

[Metro]

Around level 15ish (I think) it starts to add some GOOD difficulty modifiers like you no longer see zombies on the minimap and then eventually hordes. The number of cars doesn't seem to go lower than a dozen or so total. Freaks increase although ferals are the only hard ones to deal with and a sufficiently leveled character usually has no trouble with them solo. The level of resources doesn't seem to decrease, either. Pro Wrestling move on Powerhouse characters gives you the ability to solo a dozen or so zombies (anymore and you're going to start taking hits will you execute the move). Legs weep on a nimble character = gg. It takes so little stamina you can spam it forever.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

Space of Decay

I'd play that