S.O.S.

Survivors On Strike
Abbreviation:	S.O.S.
Group Numbers:	82 at peak
Leadership:	None - this is a movement of equals.
Goals:	Remain inactive until the game is brought back into balance.
Recruitment Policy:	Anyone who feels the game remains imbalanced against survivors.
Contact:	This page.

Thoughts as of December 7th, 2008

I was the one that started this page – I didn’t sign my name to it because I really didn’t want to lead a movement – I just wanted to draw attention to a problem that I saw getting worse and worse and see if we could get some attention. I felt that the game was badly out of balance and I have no regrets about speaking up on the issue. I still think I was right – the game WAS out of balance. However, shortly after I started spreading the news on this, Kevan tweaked the search rates in favor of survivors. This was done without any sort of official announcement and I didn’t notice it as I wasn’t searching for anything. I’ve since spent the last couple of days searching in both repaired and ruined buildings. I have to say that I feel the game is no longer out of balance and survivors have no more need to be ‘on strike’. Already, the percentage is rising and I expect to see some changes on the map soon, too. The high AP to fix long ruined buildings will be a challenge, but since one can search those buildings with a reasonable rate of success, a ‘burb can be redeemed at a slower rate. I don’t delude myself into thinking that this action resulted in the search change – it was just getting off the ground when that happened. As he has often in the past, the developer saw a problem and he moved to correct it. My hat is off to him once again.

As expected, we did have a lot of zombie players chime in with some opposing arguments. I’d like to address a few of them.

1. You wimps. Suck it up and fight. Zombies don’t complain when things favor survivors. And it would create a very bad precedent if the developer responded to pressures from players. Hello, where have you been? I got this idea from On_Strike – a movement by zombies a couple of years ago to agitate for changes in their favor. A movement that did not end until the changes were made.

2. It’s supposed to be a zombie apocalypse game. That means survivors are supposed to be living like rats in the sewers. Sorry, don’t agree – and from all signs, neither does the developer. He has always seemed to want a balance between the two sides. For those who wanted a true zombie apocalypse, he created the side-cities where people can’t be revived when they die.

3. You all are asking for a bunch of rule changes without going through the proper channels. Wrong – no specific demands were made – all that was said was that we wanted to see something change – and hoped that the developer would do something for us. There are tons of approved suggestions he could have picked from and not all would agree on what ones should be made. This was only an attempt to get a discussion going.

4. Survivors need to get better organized and stop complaining. I agree, actually. I tried to find an active survivor message board and failed. The closest was the board where they spend most of their time worrying about who should be on the PK/GK/Zerg ‘liste’ – talk about fiddling while Rome burned.

Anyway, I feel that survivors no longer have anything to complain about, so I am going back to normal. May I direct your attention to Operation_band-aid – a page started up so survivors can talk about the best ways to redeem all those red and grey suburbs? To any and all who helped spread the word – thanks for joining me. I’m going to leave this page up and may I wish you all a Merry Christmas? I hope we can soon start to search for Christmas trees! And to all those Zombies out there, I have a present for you, too. A big, fat combat revive! LucasBlack 14:06, 7 December 2008 (EST).

Statement of Appreciation for Kevan

First, let us state that we very much appreciate the work that the game designer has put into this game. It’s a free game and we get a lot of enjoyment out of it. This is not meant to be taken as whining or complaining; simply a request for some attention.

The Current Problem

We are of the opinion that this game has fallen out of balance. All of the major rule changes for the past year have favored the Zombies. While there is nothing wrong with any of them individually, the cumulative effect of them without anything offsetting them for the survivors has resulted in a downward spiral. As of now, survivors only represent 38% of those standing and this number has been falling at a steady rate. More and more blocks are listed as ghost towns because they have been ruined and it would take more than a survivors’ entire point total for the day to repair a single building. As of Dec 4, 2008 there are no more "green" zones. Zombie raids are made easier with the passive skill of barricade blocking that even 1st level zombies get for free. Free running corridors have been made useless by the requirement of a hard-to-find generator and fuel needed to repair clubs, banks and cinemas – made even worse by the addition of injuries. Likewise, these same buildings, when dark, are harder to barricade, which again favors the zombies. FAKs have become harder to find, yet Zombies can just stand up from being killed while survivors only get half points and more often than not wake up with an infection. If this continues, Malton will eventually be out of survivors.

Additional Views

While I wholehearted agree on the difficulty of restoring ruined buildings, these should certainly feature AP cost caps and XP incentives proportional to the AP investment to repair, it is my opinion that a large part of the problem is the survivors themselves, due to their selfish overemphasis on Trenching and combat. However, in turn, it is the fault of the underlying XP incentive structure for this self-defeating behaviour. Invaluable support roles critical to the survivor effort such as healing, and maintainence (refueling/repairing) are grossly under-rewarded, or even harshly penalized. This needs to change in order to encourage, reward, and ultimately bring about more intelligent and functional survivor activities. It is far too much to expect survivors to continually self-sacrifice for the greater good in the absence of any worthwhile individual incentives. In short, we'd like to see meaningful, competitive XP rewards for:

-Installing generators/radio transmitters.

-Repairing buildings (XP rewards proportionate to AP cost), generators and radio transmitters.

-Refueling generators.

-Creating/repairing barricades up to VS++.

-Healing (XP rewards should scale with HP healed, at least partially beyond the first 5. Perhaps 1 bonus XP for healing infections).

--The God Emperor 22:46, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I would suggest a change on how ransacking/ruining works. Right now, it's only a few AP to ruin an undefended building and an ever-escalating number of AP to repair it again, based on time left ruined. Why not increase the amount of AP needed to ruin a building based on how "lived in" it is? For example, a single ransacking could destroy a single placed decorative object, and the building can only be ruined once all the decorative objects are destroyed first. Put a cap on the total decorative items a building can hold, and it creates a certain equivalence. That gives an incentive for Survivors to search museums and place decorative items, and increases the total AP needed to ruin a building.

I also strongly agree with XP rewards for more non-combat (but survival-based) activities.

--Extropymine 04:16, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Seeking Attention

So, what should be done? Past experience has shown that the developer is responsive to reasonable requests to redress game balance and he can see the stats just as easily as anyone else can. It may be that something is already worked on. But in the mean time, change your group label to S.O.S. (which stands for Survivors On Strike). There is no need to all go and gather in one place – that would just bring on a huge Zombie hoard, anyway – but spend your time going to populated areas and spreading the news. Let’s make some noise!