View source for Suggestion talk:20080406 Sledge Hammer

In regards to the weapon for newbie thing, I had been thinking also in terms of Civilians, who get only Bargain hunting, and Scouts, who get only Free Running. Both of these groups are terrible at low levels. Sledgehammers being available in hardware stores make sense because... well... it's a hardware store, but more importantly, if a civilian gets free running, they have access to a sledgehammer easier, which at low levels gives them a better chance for combat.  For Scouts, they can go into a mall and search - they'd have just as good a chance of getting a -good- weapon like a sledgehammer as a bad weapon like a golf club (at least for their level).  I'm mainly interseted in the 'needs some work' part of your vote though - what can be done to make this idea more palatable for you, while not making it overpowered?--[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 06:54, 7 April 2008 (BST)
(''Moved from user page to talk page'')--{{:User:Airborne88/sig}} 07:00, 7 April 2008 (BST)
::Wait a minute.. What is this page??? Shouldn't this be [[User:Tselita/discussion]] or something? Sorry, I just got confused...--{{:User:Airborne88/sig}} 07:03, 7 April 2008 (BST)
:::Sorry, was trying to recreate something Viktor did with me when he wanted to discuss an aspect of a suggestion away from the rest of the page. I guess I goofed.--[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 15:36, 7 April 2008 (BST)

== Sledgehammer Weight ==

Honestly, I really don't think they're all THAT heavy. I've used a nice big slegehammer before, and unless you're only four feet eight and weigh 50 pounds, I don't think you should have a ton of trouble lifting a sledgehammer.<br>Plus, if you seek RP justification, just don't use the sledgehammer until you buy body building. --{{User:Hhal/Sig}} 16:12, 7 April 2008 (BST)
:: Personally I feel I can swing anything that a hippie like Gallagher can swing. --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 16:29, 7 April 2008 (BST)
:::Fire axes are also rather heavy, with heads running up to 8 or so lbs (4 being more typical).  Sledge heads generally start at 8 and go up to... well, I've seen 20lbs, but I wouldn't try to use that, but obviously somebody does.  {{User:Swiers/Sig}} 05:01, 8 April 2008 (BST)

== Sledgehammer for Newbies ==
Karek, to be honest, what you're suggesting isn't fair 'to all players' - it would be fair only to zombie players ... it would be therefore unbalanced. The suggestion as is, is fair to all players, without giving some unnatural advantage to zombies which no other weapon gives, for no reason other than to give zombies an advantage. Zombies with a bat or a crowbar can't use vigor mortis to make the attack stronger - so there's absolutely no reason to do this for a sledgehammer. As for firefighters killing sledgehammer, I don't see how you figure that - firefighters have 25% at 3 damage, and have gotten axe proficiency instead of some other skill.  Unless you're suggesting that all survivors should be starting as firefighters, and the other classes are useless and should not be played. If that's the case, we'll just have to agree to disagree and to each their own --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 12:57, 9 April 2008 (BST)
:That's just crap. 25% at 3 damage ''is the best starting damage rate in the game'', zombies start at 25% for '''2''' damage, and non vigor mortis starts at 15% for 2 damage. That being said almost every other survivor class can level faster than a Firefighter, Scientists have their max leveling potential at level 1 which is a possible 200+ experience a day. Ignoring that you're point lacks validity around the part where you mention other melee weapons, the reason they don't get bonuses is so they aren't better than claws or bites, most of them would be and it would make getting Rend Flesh or any other claw skills pointless, making a Sledgehammer max at 25% for 5 damage, the same as with survivors, would not do this and 15% at 5 damage increases the speed at which a killed survivor can get vigor mortis. ''That is a good thing'', it means it's easier for survivors to start on zombie skills, it means game parity with how easy crossover is, '''that is the definition of balancing'''.--<small>[[User:Karek#K|Karek]]<sup><font face="Monotype Corsiva">[[User:Karek/ProjDev/OmegaMap|maps?!]]</font></sup></small> 02:11, 10 April 2008 (BST)
::::It's also easy for zombies to crossover and start on survivor skills - my zombie kept getting revived over and over by random revives and by people too dumb to bother to check that she has all zombie skills only. If I had wanted to I could have easily used those opportunities to start buying survivor skills like Bodybuilding and Diagnosis (but all I bothered to do was get a flak jacket then jumped off a building). Oh... and again, the sledgehammer is 4 damage, not 5. My initial suggestion was 5 but that was altered from Talk:discussion to 4. I wish some people would go into there and see the discussions that are made about the suggestions they're voting on, or participate in it. I've found talk:discussion to be incredibly useful for getting other points of view. If certain people refrain from complaining about a suggestion i make, or if they say they like it, I feel it's ready for voting. --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 04:57, 10 April 2008 (BST)
::::By the way, you say that 'currently, zombie variance is a joke'. How? Zombies can, with one single attack, infect the other person, while at the same time healing themselves, at the same time, having 30%+15% accuracy rage (if you hit them previously at 50% accuracy with grappling) while at the SAME TIME getting 4 damage per hit. All without having to worry about burden at ALL. That's pretty powerful if you ask me. Zombies are generally not 'weapon users'. Humans are. Zombies rely on numbers and resiliency... the fact that they can't get killed. Especially in Urban Dead. That's fine - that's where zombie strategy is supposed to lie. Survivors don't have all these nify auto-powers at their disposal. They're supposed to rely on tools and weapons. If you want to change the game so zombies can rely on weapons in addition to their superpowers, better be ready to give survivors some sort of superpowers to even things out. Otherwise, you can't even hope to claim that your ideas about zombies vs survivors are 'balanced'. --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 05:07, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:::::I'll let someone else explain how foolish what you just said was. You're currently a waste of my time and represent much of what made me stop commenting on suggestions in the first place, specifically that it's a prosurvivor circle jerk where the authors of most of the suggestions don't know anything about the game and act like everyone who says they're wrong or there is a better way to do something is completely out of their minds and advancing some pro-zombie agenda. Enjoy getting a crap suggestion in peer reviewed  it's nice to know nothing has or will ever change in this portion of the wiki.--<small>[[User:Karek#K|Karek]]<sup><font face="Monotype Corsiva">[[User:Karek/ProjDev/OmegaMap|maps?!]]</font></sup></small> 05:16, 10 April 2008 (BST)
::::::Oookaaaay. So now the 'premise of the suggestion that you like' (your words not mine) is a crap suggestion. I'll consider making a suggestion in the future to give zombies 'death screeches' which happens as an automatic action before you bite a survivor. It will do 10 damage only, so that finally the zombies have a chance at that 100% zombie population. Lord knows they need the help, they're gettin' slaughtered in those mall sieges. :) However could I have mistaken your wanting zombies to be able to use Vigor Mortis in addition to sledgehammers at damage 5 (unlike any other weapon in the game which zombies can use) as you advancing a pro-zombie agenda. <s>If I make a suggestion that zombies can shoot fire from their eyes and laser beams from their nostrils, will you believe that I've finally learned to understand the game? I'll get right to work on that, sir de sir-dee sir sir! :)</s> (I've decided to refrain from mocking...) Seriously.... you're getting a bit too upset about this. --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 07:51, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:::::::Fine, you want to push for one more reply here it is. You're taking my criticism too seriously, not the other way around. I'm saying your getting your suggestion passed because it helps survivors, not because it's actually good. See that's how the suggestion system here works, it's not a judge of a balanced suggestion it's a judge of how well you can make people think the suggestion will help them, so, in a very real way I would say yes, because you don't want to consider the criticism on your suggestion it is by virtue of being unrefined(Talk Suggestions is not refinement), crap. There can be good crap and crap with a good premise but if you don't actually do the work to try to make it not crap and chose to stick with 'fine enough' it's crap. Now, I started off by basically telling you it would be better if you changed this in a manner to make it easier for survivors who get killed to play as zombie until they became survivors again, you ignored that because what? You thought it unbalanced the game in favor of zombies. You then went and used something that is specifically advised against, the recent state of things, as justification, ignoring, of course, that the only reasons that it even got as far as 20% were not only because of an absurdly large group of players joining the game on the zombie side<sub>(this altering the percents about 5% without even doing anything)</sub>, but because survivor revive rates are abysmally low<sub>(1500 reviving bodies avg for and before the time when survivors were at 20%)</sub>, and zombies just got another update which, regardless of whether the update does actually change anything, always results in a swing of about 10% in zombie numbers. All of that tells me that survivors don't need an easier time of it but that they need to coordinate what they are doing better, they need to give revives a higher priority<sub>(something that still hasn't been done the revive rate going up can be largely attributed to survivors finding twice as many needles)</sub> all of that is part of why you should ''never'' use that stats page to justify a suggestion. You don't have to agree with my method of "balancing" the suggestion or the suggestions idea so it spreads outside of the survivor group which you seem to think needs so much damn help, regardless of the fact that they can effectively do whatever they want without any real restrictions that can't be lifted by even a small level of coordination and regardless of the fact that survivors have 8 classes about 4 of which can gain a level on day 1 and be at a point where they can be gaining more xp a day then even a maxed out zombie who doesn't have to deal with barricades. All you need to realize is that you are ignoring this, you're ignoring a large portion of the "game balance" to justify helping survivors at early levels because, apparently, they have difficulties leveling because they can't deal enough damage accurately enough without skills, All you need to pull from all of this, you don't even have to understand half the crap I said, all you need to take from all of this is that Yeah, it's kinda hard on survivors to level when they have no combat skills, it's just as hard for zombies, if the goal of the whole suggestion is to make them less dependent on that first skill, to make it easier to get that first skill, then why would you exclude zombies? I know I go on to mention allowing Vigor Mortis to boost it, you know why? Because you suggest allowing H2H to boost it, it's parity, if you're trying to have it be a good early combat item then you're removing it's original purpose, if you want it to be a decent item when maxed then you should consider giving a similar benefit to zombies because, frankly, buffing survivor melee combat for the sake of buffing survivor melee combat is not balance, it's making survivors good at what is the only thing zombies are actually better than them at, that's pretty far opposite of balance, the point of that portion of my "change" vote was that if you're going to buff survivor melee combat you need to buff zombie melee combat, even if it is just by giving them more options that aren't actually better than their current ones, even if it isn't buffed by TG. And now, I'm done with this suggestion, whether you will ignore me is your choice, I'm also not going to be replying to swiers below again, even though odds are he will reply to me again.--<small>[[User:Karek#K|Karek]]<sup><font face="Monotype Corsiva">[[User:Karek/ProjDev/OmegaMap|maps?!]]</font></sup></small> 09:00, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:::::::: Um... Karek... I've gotten keep votes from PK players, Survivor players -and- zombie players on this one. Also, I didn't use the stats page to justify my suggestion - it stands up on its own accord. And it's not as hard on zombies. At the lowest levels, the survivors mostly are weaker than zombies, except for firemen. Anywhere over level 5/6, the tide switches massively to zombies. It's not even funny how many things a zombie can do with a single bite, all at the same time. But I don't complain about that, because they're zombies. They are supposed to use that as their primary weapon anyway.  Also, I -did- buff ombie melee combat. I just didn't give them the massive unbalancing, and unprecedented example of using Vigor Mortis that you insist on.  And I really do think you're ignoring what I say as well, since you've yet to explain how to justify your Vigor Mortis comment when there's absolutely no precedent for it whatsoever with any other weapon a zombie can use. Oh, and I've never been hit by a weapon-wielding zombie. Beacuse even at low levels, the bite attack is superior to anything a survivor melee'er can do (again, except for firemen)... at least until the zombie reaches level 3. Then it goes from being superior to being far superior :)  the suggestion buffed zombies, as is, because the zombies were being allowed to '''''USE THE SLEDGEHAMMER IN THE FIRST PLACE'''''.  My god you write a lot. And if you had bothered to read the suggestion, it isn't 'buffing survivor melee combat for the sake of buffing survivor melee combat. It's adding a weapon type which was very obvious in its absence... a high damage, low accuracy weapon to contrast with the high accuracy, low damage and moderate damage/moderate accuracy weapons already existing.  Please, read the suggestion before you say something that is totally opposite of what it already says.  Frankly, Swiers is making a lot of sense, btw. You don't have to respond to him but he's still right. And Swiers disagrees with me on several of my suggsetions, but he usually makes a really good argument in his defenses of his point, without ignoring what the other person says in the process.  Hope you realize I have nothing against you personally. I just think you've been very misguided and blindly following a pro-zombie-only mentality to the point where its skewed your entire perception of what ''balance'' means. But again... no offense :) By the way, you forced me to write this novel at you by writing that novel back at me. --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 09:18, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:And if your whole complaint is that zombies would have a way to start off with max efficiency but survivors wouldn't there are two problems with that. 
:'''1)''' You're ignoring that the zombie would have to coordinate and/or get a revive and then would need to find those buildings. 
:'''2)''' You're forgetting that this would actually be a major buff to two already existing classes, Civilian who could have this set as their starting weapon, and Scout who starts with free running, both of those classes have enough mobility that a starting weapon like the Sledgehammer would mean they could level nearly as fast as a Firefighter<sub>(5 xp per hit puts them just barely below the FF starting dpa)</sub> ''and'' would have the ability to actually exploit their skills, which are currently horrible starting skills because of a lack of a decent leveling mechanic, to their full potential ''or'' they can start in other trees that gain better xp gain with less work.
::Actually my complaint would be that you're wanting something for sledgehammer for zombies which zombies don't have for other weapons, so your reasoning is illogical and inconsistent. And you're acting like all survivors start as firefighters. Mine started as a necrotech engineer and my other character started as a zombie (and has only zombie skills so far). For those of us who do NOT start as a fireman, including zombies (or starting players who start as a civilian and then become a zombie after getting a sledgehammer, flak jacket and bodybuilding), Sledgehammer is definitely the better of the two between an axe and hammer. 10% at 4 vs 10% at 3. --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 04:55, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:Just from adding this you're already giving survivors two weakest classes a significant leveling buff making them, quite possibly, two of the stronger starting classes in the game.--<small>[[User:Karek#K|Karek]]<sup><font face="Monotype Corsiva">[[User:Karek/ProjDev/OmegaMap|maps?!]]</font></sup></small> 02:17, 10 April 2008 (BST)
::I find it a bit disingenuous that you stated that you 'liked the suggestion, but would like it more if' then gave a list of unbalanced choices for zombies only to be able to use. And now that you find I had no intention of tailoring the suggestion to let zombies use sledgehammer for something that they can't use Bat, Tennis Racket, crowbar, etc for, suddenly sledgehammer is making survivors two weakest classes 'two of the stronger classes'. That's untrue, and you know it. If I'm basing my character on being a fighter, I'd rather be a zombie than a scientist or civilian any day of the weak, because it's a lot easier to turn them into a significant fighting machine. I had my zombie doing 3 and 4 damage at 50% and 30% respectively in no time, while at the same level, my survivor was still doing 10% at 3 damage on her fireaxe. Even if she had the sledgehammer, she'd still have been doing 10% at 4 damage, which is still massively inferior to a zombie of equal level. But I'm not going to be able to convince you of this - I think you've been too used to playing zombies. And you're definitely not going to be convincing me of your side. So like I said - agree to disagree, since I'm in no mood to argue  any more about a game. --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 04:55, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:::I like the premise of the suggestion, I don't like the current "Screw you if you aren't a survivor" mechanic of it.--<small>[[User:Karek#K|Karek]]<sup><font face="Monotype Corsiva">[[User:Karek/ProjDev/OmegaMap|maps?!]]</font></sup></small> 05:03, 10 April 2008 (BST)
::::karek, honestly, I don't think 'screw you if you aren't a survivor'. I play a zombie AND a survivor, on opposite sides of the map. I just helped to break into haslock a couple of days ago. The Sledgehammer doesn't screw over zombies. Iscariot told me that zombies can use other blunt weapnos, so I decided that zombies should also be able to use sledgehammers as well. I was later told that actually, zombies can use all SPORTS EQUIPMENT melee weapons, not all blunt weapons, but I didn't suddenly remove zombies ability to use the sledgehammer. It's still a great weapon for any newbie, zombie OR survivor. Just because the two weakest survivor types now would get a 10% chance of doing one additional damage, doesn't make it better for survivors, because zombies can do the same thing! Honestly, I think you need to start playing a survivor again, just so you can see what it feels like. I know you're a long time old player, but according to some people like Airborne and others, survivors have had a huge advantage for the first two years, and only RECENTLY have been the underdog, so I think you've been stuck in the mentality that survivors are still the advantaged group because it's probably been a long time since you've played a lower level survivor.  MAybe if I was here in early 2007 or late 2006, I'd be making tons of suggestions about how to power up and balance the game to help zombies. But they don't need help, so I havent seen the need to make suggestions like that yet. I have seen the need to make weapon suggestions (and if you think that I only make suggestions that help survivors, please remember 'Too Many Shotguns, not enough Ammo') Zombies are currently running the grid, completely and utterly, at least for now.  I've only been playing for 5 months, 3 of which I've been -really- playing, and since I started playing, let me tell you... survivors have squat. Between PKers and the Dead and the big bash (which I actually like) and feral zombies, survivors NEED some love. If it wasn't for the DIRT:NAP technique that started getting implemented when they were down to 32%, they'd be under 30% by now--[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 05:11, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:::::''I was later told that actually, zombies can use all SPORTS EQUIPMENT melee weapons, not all blunt weapons, but I didn't suddenly remove zombies ability to use the sledgehammer''<br>Zombies can use both all blunt weapon (for example: pipes, crowbars, baseball bats) and all "sports equipment" weapons (for example: ski poles, foils, hockey sticks).  There's obviously some overlap, but they can also all of the items that may fall only in one category (blunt) or the other (sports).<br>BTW, I wouldn't really consider survivors the "underdogs" right now.  They haven't been down long enough to get that status.  Thier dip below 40% was quite short lived, and are recovering despite MASSIVE zombie advantages (both in rules updates and new player recruiting).  Even the stronger team has an occasional loosing streak- but that doesn't make them underdogs.   {{User:Swiers/Sig}} 09:38, 10 April 2008 (BST)
::::::: Well, you'd probably know about survivor 'good times' a lot more than me. Most of my time since I made my characters have had survivors in the 30-40% range. I missed the 'survivor easy times' Though when I looked at the map and saw almsot everything red, nothing green and very few things even light yellow.... looked pretty underdog-ish to me. But yeah I agree. The DIRT:NAP technique really did stop survivors from going beneath 30%. I wouldn't really consider survivors the 'stronger taem' though. Mainly because that 40% doesn't only include survivors. It includes PKers, Death Cultists, and zed spies... not to mention zerg throwaways (meatshields, zed scouts, etc) --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 09:56, 10 April 2008 (BST)
''That's just crap. 25% at 3 damage is the best starting damage rate in the game, zombies start at 25% for 2 damage, and non vigor mortis starts at 15% for 2 damage.''<br>
Karek, that's not only crap, its plain WRONG.  Zombies with Vigor Mortis get 35% for 2 damage, and (better yet) 20% for 4 damage.  Hmm, 20% time 4 damg e is, um, .8 damage.  And 25% of 2 damge is .75 damage.  So, who has the better starting damage rate again?  And NOBODY gets 15% to hit with claws; its 20% for claws, 10% with bite even if you have NO zombie skills.  Admittedly quite bad, but then I also don't see you complaining that a revived zombie lacks effective attacks because they have no survivor skills.<br>As for "sqcrew you if your not a survivor", huh?  Since when has any weapon suggestion ever helped zombies?  This one is more useful to zombies than most- the only reason its not an actual zombie buff is because zombies suck at using weapon- ALL weapons.  As it is, it would still be one of the most effective melee weapons a zombie could have.  The pool cue would be (very slightly) better, but breaks and can't be repalced.  The knife would be as good, except zombies can't use that.  The other weapons trail by a WIDE margin, so really, that's where your complaints should be focused.  And vigor mortis boosts zombie attacks so much tat all weapons are left behind.<br>Also, zombie variance is not a joke, not by a long shot.  You just need to plan ahead and take MULTIPLE bites; each bite you string on compounds variance exponentially.  If a survivor has 24 health, you could try to land 8 (rending) claws, or 6 bites.  Go for the 6 bites if you want high variance.  Don't wait till the guy is down to 6 HP and them bitch about the lack of variance...   {{User:Swiers/Sig}} 05:49, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:Oh, wow, 35% for 2 damage, color me impressed. Even with 10% tacked on it's still a fucking joke and you're still getting less than 50% of the dpa you're claiming is so fucking great. And no, zombie variance is crap not only when compared to survivor variance but when compared to nothing, the only reason it is even worth noting is because of how much of a joke 50% to hit for 3 damage is when you factor in how the whole game works and any lack of stored AP bonuses that make survivors get much more from combat on a bad day than a zombie can even if most everything is in their favor. I may have been off by 10% but you're completely ignoring the game mechanics for just about everything else so yeah, survivors ''still'' have the best starting dpa.--<small>[[User:Karek#K|Karek]]<sup><font face="Monotype Corsiva">[[User:Karek/ProjDev/OmegaMap|maps?!]]</font></sup></small> 08:25, 10 April 2008 (BST)
::Like it or not (I think its good enough) its a plain fact that zombies have aq staqrting D/AP OF .8 - what is it that survivors have that beats that?  Even the 35% for 2 damge that you mock is only a lousy .05 D/AP lower than what a starting fireman gets; gee, 2.5 damage in 50 AP more, color me impressed.  Both the survivor and zombie go up to D/AP of 1.2 with one skill, so its largely moot anyhow.<br>Zombies do get better than 3 damage for 50% when you throw in tangling grasp, and the jury is still out on whether guns beat that when you factor in AP searches.<br>However, I will easily concede that, although their D/AP is not superior, survivors dish out more damage per day for one simple reason- they spend much less AP reaching their target.  Then again, with relatively few exceptions (exceptions where zombies actually do have an easy time finding targets) zombies spend much less AP recovering from damage than survivors do.  But again, that is totally irrelevant to this suggestion, and expecting this suggestion to fix (or even concern itself with) that is absurd.  {{User:Swiers/Sig}} 09:12, 10 April 2008 (BST)


'''REMEMBER THE GOOD OL' DAYS WHEN I MADE THIS PAGE TO DISCUSS THE SLEDGE HAMMER? I MISS THOSE DAYS.''' --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 09:57, 10 April 2008 (BST)
:For god knows why i have just read this entire page, and it does nothing but re-affirm kareks place as a twat. '''!Viva la Sledge Hammer!'''--[[User:GomerPyle41|GomerPyle41]] 11:12, 10 April 2008 (BST)
::You're a brave man, Gomer. I look forward to your Keep vote. '''!Viva la Sledge Hammer!''' --[[User:Tselita|Tselita]] 15:02, 10 April 2008 (BST)