Last 5 zeds on the map

[Althamus]

When you are down to 5 zeds remaining before the trader arrives, they all start to uncontrollably rage.

I don't think this idea is necessarily a bad one - it discourages people from wandering off from the team at the end, and makes the zeds move faster to reach the players (nothing worse than spending half an hour trying to find the last crawler hiding on the map).

However, if you have a few big zeds remaining (scrakes/fleshpounds) they will start raging uncontrollably, and won't stop until dead. This seems unfair as 2-3 scrakes on near-full health raging all at once will badly damage a team, and sometimes (if the big zeds spawned just before the end of the wave) there's nothing that can be done to mitigate this.


Solution: When you are down to 5-10 zeds remaining, all the smaller zeds (ie. not scrakes or fleshpounds) will start raging and rushing the team, and one randomised scrake/fleshpound will auto-rage as well. When this scrake/fleshpound has died, the next one will start auto-raging (and so on until there are no more remaining).

This will ensure that people don't run off, keep the finale of the wave nail-biting (as it should be!) but doesn't end up with the team swamped with frothing big zeds tearing through your ranks.

 

[2Clicks]

You're abit late to the party but yeah... the thing is that you as a group need to own the situation by stop mindlessly shooting trash the nearer you get to the auto-rage zed counter! I usually tell which ever pub Im on to stop at 20 if there are FP about. This gives you the chance to kill a few if say you are down on health, or surrounded.

Doing this means the FP wont perma-rage giving the group a chance. The other thing is that you dont necessarily have to do this if only scrakes are left though its advisable. SOme players (i.e. the ones running non-movement bonus perks can still die if they dont focus)

So the mechanism most ppl would agree is a good one but it need player control if they are to get past it. At least some of the time and only until they know what the situation is with the final zeds.

 

[vealck]

No. It's terrible and should be removed. Or at least biggies should be immune for it.

Even a group of players that is well aware of mechanic and stay together have no chance when a circus of 2 enraged fleshpounds and 3 scrakes arrives, especially when everyone is low on ammo at the end of the wave.

 

[Escadin]

It's only a problem if those scrakes and FP spawn as the last mobs. There is no need to keep them alive until the end so having them rage due to that is avoidable.

However, practically every wave(6+) on HoE there is a scrake among the last 5 spawns and not too rarely it will even be 2 scrakes and maybe a FP ontop. That really feels like the game is cheating.
Especially since these bosses never seem to find their way to the camp spot but instead will jump the first or second person from a ledge, after said person impatiantly started heading for the trader on their own because none of zeds would show up for 2 minutes...


I really really want them to fix the orange part because it's just ridiculous.

 

[random]

in some cases/perks even 4 scrakes can be manageable, and not that many will spawn at once, however at the very least the FP should be able to unrage like normal or not be affected by the counter at all since he will rage eventually anyway.

 

[Escadin]

in some cases/perks even 4 scrakes can be manageable, and not that many will spawn at once, however at the very least the FP should be able to unrage like normal or not be affected by the counter at all since he will rage eventually anyway.

Yea they can be managable but it's not fun to get killed during high waves and lose your weapon because the game bugged out and didn't proceed until you decided to head for the trader.

 

[Johnny Darko]

Scrakes and FPs should be immune to it, they're not the type of zeds that get stuck or have to be hunted for in the first place (the entire point of having it there to begin with). It being there for the other types is fine.

 

[DBShinigami]

At least :
- Make it so that FP/Scrake does not spawn in the "last 5 ZED",
- FP should maybe enrage once (when there is 5 ZED left) but that it. After that, it goes back to normal.

 

[Gallic_Taffer]

Everyone seems to forget the alternative to this: party in Paris with the Scrake Conga Line. No. I dealt with that in KF1. I dealt with it here in the game's younger days. No more of that. The endwave perma rage completely turns orthodox gameplay on its head. Not only that, it requires players to both think and invest in the gitgud stock market.

The only part I agree with is the fleshpound rage. Five scrakes can be managed by any single perk. One rampaging fleshpound can drop an entire team due to its speed and sheer inability to be corralled by demo or zerk. Sigmar forbid you don't have one of those, better grab the lube and call a map vote in that case.

Best / easiest fix without trying to implement a bunch of stupid exceptions and corollaries: perma rage on the fleshpound, he uses his old running animation, the slower one reminiscent of the KF1 charge. This way he is fast but not absurdly so, the players cannot escape but have plenty of time to formulate a counter attack, and most of all, his front becomes open to attack. <---- this is what makes the perma rage on him so horrible. You. can't. hit. him. Ever.

I...assume the files for that old rage run animation are still in the game...?

 

[FoolishNinja]

Five scrakes can be managed by any single perk.

how the **** are you going to kill 5 scrakes with commando or support?!

 

[Shadaaaa]

I dont mind scrakes raging. If you have multiple scrakes left standing till the end wave then its kinda players fault for ignoring all of them for a whole wave. You should be disposing them 1 by 1 when they spawn.

Endless raging FPs however....that shouldn't be a thing. It never un-rages and stays red with its arm in front of it or pounding someone with it while endlessly running in full-throttle. They already auto-rage every 15 seconds or so and thats already enough imo.

 

[Insert Name Here]

Assuming that Tripwire decides not to get rid of the end-of-wave frustration mechanic for the big zeds, here are the changes I would like to see:

• For Scrakes, make them auto-rage one at a time. Maybe Tripwire could put a limit to how many can be auto-raged at once, but this isn't too important to me.
• For Fleshpounds, get rid of perma-rage and instead cut their normal enrage timer in half. Normal timers are 10 to 14 seconds, so frustration mode timers would be 5 to 7 seconds.

 

[Rattler]

how the **** are you going to kill 5 scrakes with commando or support?!

I am wondering how he is gonna kill 5 scrs with fb lol

 

[ScrakeMorgendorffer]

Frustration mode is fine, provided that squads with scrakes in them are tweaked to ensure they spawn before the last 15 zeds, and squads with fleshpounds in them are tweaked to spawn before the last 25 zeds.

 

[TheTCREngineer]

I...assume the files for that old rage run animation are still in the game...?

It definitely is fam, I actually have version 1002 but I recently deleted it and I might get it back to do comparison videos in the near future.

 

[Shambler]

Considering the point of that mechanic was to reduce the standing around time at the end of waves, It is 100% awful.

I would much rather spend 30 secs standing around waiting for the last few zeds to walk up (you sometimes have to do this anyway ) than experience the slowly rising panic of watching that zed counter drop to 5.

 

[2Clicks]

how the **** are you going to kill 5 scrakes with commando or support?!

Stop shooting trash at 20.... kill gores and crawlers if you have to (they are fastest) until you have a clear idea of the final spawn situation, forumlate the teams plan of attack and then execute it... I guess a little coordination and self-discipline is asking to much! Otherwise you could just wipe!

 

[vealck]

I guess a little coordination and self-discipline is asking to much!

Yeah, except sometimes biggies get lost somewhere. I witnessed many games where everyone stuck together at the end of wave for 5(!) minutes, and there was no sign of zeds anywhere. Then, suddenly a clustered 5 scrake or 2fp-2sc rage party appeared and just killed 2-3 people on the spot, reducing chances of survival of the rest of team to virtually zero.

That mechanic is pure bullcrap, and there are no arguments that could defend it. Running Benny Hill style several laps on the map to shepherd remaining ~10 zeds together is just as silly as endgame in KF1 was. Perma rage only adds unfair disadvantage if your team has lost some members.

 

[Cinderblocks]

If git gud is a mechanic's best defense, its probably a bad mechanic. End-of-wave was never this big a problem, its just a whole different kind of tedium.

 

[2Clicks]

Yeah, except sometimes biggies get lost somewhere. I witnessed many games where everyone stuck together at the end of wave for 5(!) minutes, and there was no sign of zeds anywhere. Then, suddenly a clustered 5 scrake or 2fp-2sc rage party appeared and just killed 2-3 people on the spot, reducing chances of survival of the rest of team to virtually zero.

That mechanic is pure bullcrap, and there are no arguments that could defend it. Running Benny Hill style several laps on the map to shepherd remaining ~10 zeds together is just as silly as endgame in KF1 was. Perma rage only adds unfair disadvantage if your team has lost some members.

Ive seen it too! On outpost mainly... the audio queues should give you an idea but even thats not foolproof as sometimes the zeds change (when teleporting mayb.)

The only thing I can suggest which is what "we" do is have one person nominated as sort of a leader OR be the first to say get to the trader /& spam follow me.... so the rest will follow you, unless you have some Russian. They seem to want to do things their way! ^^

Thats why I suggest 20 as a guide because it gives you a chance to stop and kite to another spot, get ammo along the way. Pick off a few fast zeds or the lone scrake.... but ofc the real deal is finding the fp while avoiding the trash and dealing with them first and fast. Like I said its not easy on a pub server but Ive had few problems once the rest of the team "zeros" on what the idea is! Its just a tactic/strategy. One that overcomes this mechanism. One which originally I agreed with you and disliked but with a little discipline... well you know the rest...^^

And yes it can still ****ed up by "green" players!