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[beorn080]

I think the current mongroup system works well enought, although it might be more realistic to have zombies already spawned on any maptile you enter. That'd make things awfully difficult though. Also, have roving mobs - like the current mongroups, but moving around. Maybe have them represented as a red '!' on the overmap? You could do this for zombies, and then also maybe for giant locusts or something?. Maybe have the giant social insects (ants bees wasps) swarm occasionally?

Split giant bees/maybe wasps into two types. Workers and Soldiers. Workers fly around, gathering things, perhaps mostly sweet food items, and ignore zombies and humans unless they get attacked, at which point they sting once/a few times then try to run. If they make it away, then, depending on the distance to the hive, a swarm of 10-30 warrior bees come after a certain period. Also, the bees buzzing would be quite loud and routinely attract zombies.

Thus, if you stockpile certain types of food, namely sodas and possibly fruits, you attract bees. If you wish to kill them, you must do it fast and hard, else you summon a horde of warriors, which attack everything, but also attract even bigger hordes of zombies due to the mass noise they produce.

[Girlinhat]

I'm in support of population control, but I'm against total removal.  If a tile has a population of 20, and you kill 50 zombies with on box of bullets, then the game is going to get awfully boring once the town is empty.  I know that there's always more towns, but abandoning your base to go play the game won't be very entertaining.

A "Game of Life" style system might be best.  A tile may be cleared via repeated killings, halting all spawns.  For every neighboring zombie tile, an empty tile has a chance to regenerate by a certain amount.  This way, it's possible to clear an area and build a safe house, but you still have to make regular patrols to keep the horde from encroaching on you.  And to keep the game from losing all difficulty, you could still encounter roving horde events (events right now, not overmap movement) that would trigger a large wave of some 20-30 greens plus assorted specials as befitting your skill and/or what day it is.  A roving horde event could depend on the cleared size.  If you've cleared out 9 tiles to do a little base, then it's unlikely, but if you've cleared out 50 tiles and started reclaiming the town, then the roving horde event is more likely.  If you have a small area cleared you're more likely to step 2 paces outside and encounter zombies, so a roving horde would just be a pain.  If you've got 5 miles around you clean, then you're probably looking for excitement and wouldn't mind a bit of a horde to keep you entertaining.  In future releases, hordes could be roving overmap entities spawning some distance from the player, perhaps lead by a smart zombie scientist and leading the horde along some random path and/or directly towards the player.

For the record though, I'm against total extinction.  You need infinite spawns if you want to keep the game infinitely interesting, otherwise you get a "win" scenario, and let's be honest, no one is meant to win a roguelike.

NINJA: Soda is in cans, insects can't smell it until it's opened.

[Angle]

I don't think making individual tiles have populations is worth it, It's a lot of effort for very little reward. the current mongroup system is more than sufficient. As for clearing zombies, I actually think they should die out naturally over time, as they get predated by giant insects and such. But the other monsters should multiply and become a greater and greater threat as time goes on.

[Whales]

I don't think making individual tiles have populations is worth it, It's a lot of effort for very little reward. the current mongroup system is more than sufficient. As for clearing zombies, I actually think they should die out naturally over time, as they get predated by giant insects and such. But the other monsters should multiply and become a greater and greater threat as time goes on.

This is pretty much how I feel about it.

It also removes the self-balancing difficulty system, where a big horde is followed by a breather period.

[Angle]

So how about the roving hordes? Do you think those are worthy ideas>

edit - You know what? I'm going to tackle this myself. Moving hordes, coming right up.

[Flare]

How loud are bows? Whenever I'm traveling thruogh the city, if I shoot one, more will often come. Also, is there a way to edit things in the windows port, or do I have to partake in a Linux emulator of some sort?

[Whales]

How loud are bows? Whenever I'm traveling thruogh the city, if I shoot one, more will often come. Also, is there a way to edit things in the windows port, or do I have to partake in a Linux emulator of some sort?

They're silent.  You're seeing a coincidence there.

You can edit things in the windows port, the main page of Aposos's github has the source.  You'll need a compilier, of course.

[forsaken1111]

Idea:

One in every 15 zombies should be a screamer. When hit or when it sights prey it will scream, alerting others. And you will never know which ones will scream because they look like normal zombies.

[fred1248]

Idea:

One in every 15 zombies should be a screamer. When hit or when it sights prey it will scream, alerting others. And you will never know which ones will scream because they look like normal zombies.

Oh god. It's like a shit sundae with cherry on top

[forsaken1111]

Idea:

One in every 15 zombies should be a screamer. When hit or when it sights prey it will scream, alerting others. And you will never know which ones will scream because they look like normal zombies.

Oh god. It's like a shit sundae with cherry on top

Wait does that mean you like it?

Because I'm gonna be honest with you, that doesn't sound tasty.

[G-Flex]

Why would we need that when we already have shriekers and boomers making noise?

[forsaken1111]

Why would we need that when we already have shriekers and boomers making noise?

Because in the movies sometimes a zombie yells for no goddamn reason and it makes drama happen.

[Angle]

Neh, screamers are enough trouble when you can see them. No thanks.

edit- although actually, now that I think about it, I had an idea like that. Basically all zombies are randomly generated. So some are larger, or faster, or tougher, some scream, some spit, some zap, some are necromancers, etc. Some may have multiple of these things at once.

[forsaken1111]

I'd love if we couldn't tell a zombie's type on first glance. Maybe hulks would be obvious but maybe identifying them could be tied to a skill. -evil-

[Whales]

Neh, screamers are enough trouble when you can see them. No thanks.

edit- although actually, now that I think about it, I had an idea like that. Basically all zombies are randomly generated. So some are larger, or faster, or tougher, some scream, some spit, some zap, some are necromancers, etc. Some may have multiple of these things at once.

Yeah, I've been toying with ideas like that.  One of the thing I loved about Borderlands was the randomly generated guns, but that doesn't really fit here.  However, a similar system for zombies could definitely work.  The tricky part would be displaying it so that a zombie's abilities are apparent instantly (or at least after they're used once), like they are now.  No fun to try to guess which monster spat at you, or worse, tracking it manually.