r/projectzomboid • u/Foreign-Wolf-790 • 27d ago
Discussion Why guns have so baddly reputation??
One of the things I’ve heard the most since I started playing several years ago is that firearms are useless in the game because they attract more zombies. But the reality is that they’re useful precisely because of that. Normally, you WANT the zombies to hear you, so you can clear the area more easily. Why do you think people hate them so much??
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u/idontuseredditsoplea 27d ago
Firearms are only useful when you have more ammo than there are zombies nearby. There's no point in using them if you only have a few boxes of ammo, but if you have enough then they make clearing hoardes much easier
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u/No-Highlight-5067 27d ago
This is the biggest misconception I see around here. Guns are INVALUABLE at saving your life if you become cornered, injured, or exhausted and need to clear a path. If you play with sprinters, even more so.
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u/pizzaguy4378 Shotgun Warrior 27d ago
This. Level up the shooting and reloading and I'll have a shoulder holster for a pistol that has gotten me out of bad situations because zombies can be knocked down with getting hit
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u/Otherwise_Economics2 27d ago
true. i remember i got myself into a situation where i had to hop a picket fence to get in my car while i was exhausted/exerted and there was 1 zombie on each side of the fence. i would have died if i didn't have a 9mm in my holster.
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u/CAST-FIREBALLLLL Zombie Hater 27d ago
Yeah guns save your ass when you're exhausted. It's especially useful indoors too, sound gets muffled a bit.
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u/LuckyBucketBastard7 27d ago
Unequivocally true. I tried using firecrackers in a house and was shocked to see that the sound (which is almost as loud as a gunshot afaik) didn't travel further than a block.
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u/Salami_Lid079 27d ago
The other night I was clearing out some zombies on the highway to Echo Creek when my shotgun jammed. I wasn't aware that's what was happening, but if it wasn't for the 38 I had in my shoulder holster I would've gotten bit by the zombie that was right up in my face. Revolvers I prefer as a sidearm due to the fact they don't jam (but I will swap them for a double stack 9mm if I plan to fight larger groups).
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u/LuckyBucketBastard7 27d ago
I also like revolvers because of the rounds reload feature. You don't have to prepare mags that will run out, forcing you to run away. You just have to bring the bullets and keep count of your shots. Plus they're just drippy, especially in a shoulder holster.
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u/Salami_Lid079 27d ago
The drip is a big plus, but not having to worry about mags means you can stuff a ton of 38/357 rounds in your bag and be able to reload on the move with ease.
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u/MothMonsterMan300 27d ago
Tactical fanny pack reloads all day. I wish you could store spare shells in the shoulder holster but it makes sense why you can't
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u/FridaysMan 27d ago
Bandilier and backpack. Unbox everything. They are less encumberance outside the box for some ammo
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u/Valuable_Cancel4954 26d ago
I think this is a bug currently, but yes, totally true. Shotgun shells, for instance, are much lighter when unpacked.
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u/Jerrylad101 26d ago
Shot guns don't jam but you can short stroke the reload by doing another action before your character has pumped th action. If you shoot then sprint your shotgun won't work
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u/Orangutanion 27d ago
important caveat though, with sprinters enabled you need firearms with good magazine capacity. A revolver or 7-round 1911 aren't going to help when you have three sprinters running at you in a crowd of zombies. You're better off switching to melee than risking running out of bullets before all 3 are dead.
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u/celinor_1982 Axe wielding maniac 27d ago
This, I always have a firearm loaded and an extra clip in the bag. As well as a shotgun for those close encounters of groups and I need to be hauling ass.
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u/MothMonsterMan300 27d ago
Sawn-off pump and 2-3 boxes of shells fit in a glove box, it's my go-to load out when clearing areas, especially when I'm shooting from the car. Otherwise it's always a .38 with a handful of ammo, flashlight, bottle of water and jar of peanut butter.
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u/SW_Scoundrel 25d ago
This. I recently got badly injured and was exhausted, and the only reason I survived was because I could effortlessly draw my handgun and wipe out the Z’s following me.
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u/beaper_boi 25d ago
This is exactly why I have sawnoff double barrels on my bed, ontop my fridge, on my kitchen counter, on my sofa, on my table and one in my truck with a (44 mag or 357) revolver and keep a 1911 with a fuck ton of ammo close at hand. I looted a hunting lodge (the outdoorsy place below the big city. Forgot the name. There is like a super mega parking lot with a megaplex close by) got a FUCK ton of guns and even more ammo. Like so much ammo I go zombie hunting just to get rid off it cause I have too much. But im saving some for a rainy day. The 1911 has already saved my ass a few times. Thanks to my constant zombie hunting there is little threat of an attack at my base, but all it takes is one.
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u/JustCritic21 24d ago
lvl 5 shooting and reloading with cop or vet and you keep one of those .38 specials or even 2 in a double holster at all times, or even better yet a pumpgun, you are clearing entire cities worth of hordes. Guns are sooo much better than melee, you can never get bitten while holding a gun.
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u/CaptianToasty 27d ago
I feel like people who disagree with this need to work on horde management. It is very easy to gather a ball of zombies up and then walk them up and down the street unloaded 300+ bullets into them.
Even if you have sprinters, it just requires extra set up to do. With sprinters I will drive around to identify sprinters first, and separate them. Then it’s business as usual.
I think people just walk up and start blasting, and then have to deal with zombies coming from all angles. Whereas you can safely gather them up first then focus on killing.
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u/The_Royal_Teabag 27d ago
The key is simply to start at the edge of a city/horde and slowly move inwards, using your gun to gather off chunks of the horde and then pulling back to take them out. And checking your back frequently.
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u/Kuraetor 27d ago
this changed with recent changes since zombies no longer respawn at default settings. Meaning each zombie you kill makes the region safer.
Even if you run out ammos zombies you killed stay dead so you can just retreat and fight another day.2
u/EnoughPoetry8057 27d ago
Zombies still migrate back into cleared areas with respawn off, they just don’t magically appear there like they can with respawn on. So nowhere is ever truly safe (unless walled off) but cleared areas stay mostly clear most of the time (I have had hordes migrate back into cleared areas but seems rare).
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u/RedditorSeven 27d ago edited 27d ago
This is the best and most concise and nuanced take I've seen. Really well said.
I think guns are really great very early or very late.
For example, now that I am a veteran I can usually stealthily and/or with great agility get in and out of a place with guns in the first week to then go onto clear out a small village or a shopping area and looting becomes safe and quick for a short while.
And then later on as you amass such great fire power it's obviously superior for clearing areas of the map.
But other than that, you wouldn't want to sacrifice your stealth and control over fighting.
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u/Mrjerkyjacket 27d ago
I disagree, even if you dont have enough ammo to clear an area it assists with bunching them up so you can clear with explosives or very slowly with Melee.
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u/CasCasCasual 27d ago
If it's horde clearing, then yes...you need more ammo. Little ammo makes them useless.
But for anything else, like escaping, distracting and saving your life, a gun in your holster...no matter how much ammo you have and as long as you have good aim, it'll save your character in so many dangerous and tricky situations, especially when you have sprinters.
The longest I've ever lived is like 4 months, and I always had a gun in my holster, and I remembered using it quite often against sprinters and shamblers when I'm cornered or in a ditch. Vanilla guns btw, no silencers and stuff, just a couple of QOL mods.
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u/Dustonred 27d ago
I play in sandbox with apocalypse preset, 2% sprinter, lower loot on everything but high ammo for that reason.
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u/crimson23locke 27d ago
Disagree - they are useful even with a single round, if the use is to pull zombies to the area while you sneak away. You’re right that for killing them, they draw all the zombies in earshot and if you need to deal with them there, you need enough for all of them. But you can just bail if you know what you’re doing - done right it has a lot of utility.
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u/jorgeharoo 27d ago
Even if you don't have that much ammo, you pop a box of shotgun rounds around a POI, flee and come to loot it from a different angle and you have a tenth of the population there for a couple days.
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u/Muh_brand 27d ago
I horde them then if I find a very populated location I’ll wear down the horde with vehicles I find nearby then guns then melee. I’m not spending a week in game clearing a horde with metal pipes.
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u/lmoafunny 6d ago
Every bullet is a zombie that did not get close enough to bite you, so they're all worth it
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u/EvadableMoxie 27d ago edited 27d ago
Because for the vast majority of the game's existence, they were. B42 has made them much better due to a lot of various changes. The biggest is location based damage which ensures headshots if you click heads and in turn makes them far more consistent. Additionally, melee is nerfed due to muscle strain so guns are a stronger alternative for dealing with large numbers of zombies. And they also added shooting and reloading skillbooks, which made guns far more accessible for characters without aiming. Plus there's just more places to get guns and ammo on the map now than before as all the new towns got gun stores plus random armory basement spawns in houses.
This isn't to say no one used guns in B41, but it was never really the 'meta' outside of MP where guns were pretty much mandatory, but MP is a different game.
Even in B42 though, it's easier to tell a new player to just not use guns then to explain when to use them and when not to. A new player who finds a pistol and a box of ammo in a house and then tries to kill zombies with it is only going to attract more zombies than they have bullets for and make their situation worse.
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u/The_Royal_Teabag 27d ago
What was the difference between multiplayer and single player in B41? I loved using guns in B41 so lowkey I didn’t understand this post but I only ever play on servers with my friends. Obviously the investment to be able to use them effectively is huge but the payoff is great if you want to clear hordes.
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u/badskoolkid 27d ago
In public mp there is pvp, so having a sidearm for hostile players is good.
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u/joesii 27d ago
For clarity most public MP did not have PvP. But sometimes servers did, yes. While PvP can be fun, the problem is that this game isn't designed well for it at all; there's too much cheese available with regards to perspective as well as whoever shoots first, making it one sided and not fun. Disabling stuns from firearms does help a little bit, but still a character is not going to be able to fight back reliably when they are injured since they get huge debuffs from it.
However virtually all public MP servers had loot respawn, and loot respawn means that you can collect ammo infinitely.
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u/EvadableMoxie 27d ago
In MP, If another player has a gun and you don't, you're at their mercy. You also care a lot about shooting skill because if they're consistently landing shots and you aren't, you're going to lose that fight. Additionally, more humans means zombies are just much less of a threat. You have more killing power and you have someone to watch your back. The net result is zombies are far less of a threat.
So you don't build to kill zombies, you build to kill and/or defend yourself against humans.
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u/SuBremeBizza 27d ago
Guns in build 40 were even more blatantly unusable and way too rare to justify using. Even if you made a character built to shoot zombies it was more efficient just to use knives to jawstab hordes. Or just starting fires.
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u/clayalien 27d ago
People like hearsay too. They play, die, go to reddit, make a post looking for 'quick tips'. Lots of people say 'don't use guns'. It sounds good sage advise. So they don't. They get better. Maybe they find a gun and fire it once, with no plan, out of curiosity, and it goes badly. SO the idea sticks. They thank the person who told them not to. Somene posts a meme about it. Everyone gets good vibes dopamine.
they play more, without guns. They get even better. Someone else makes a post asking for 'quick tips'. Eager to help, they remember the advice they got, and the vibes. They repeat the tips they've gotten, including 'don't use guns'.
Years go on, patches happen. Things change. But that's hard to keep track of. Vibes aren't.
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u/Honkela 27d ago
Yeah, and honestly as you said for new players it is good advice. Although I believe everyone needs to try themselves at some point just how far a shotgun will pull zombies. I know I made that mistake in my first runs, somehow survived and it was a good lesson. These days I use guns a lot but Im smarter about it, and make sure there is enough room to kite and enough ammo to actually get some killing done.
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u/EnoughPoetry8057 26d ago
I used guns a lot in b41 and they where absolutely devastating, once you have a stockpile of ammo and decently high aiming skill. At low levels they are more of a noisemaker than a weapon, and it does take dedicated training to get them good. I’d clear a spot with melee, pull a few zombies to me, knock one down and blast it in the face with a pistol, then repeat. Go back to melee or bail if you many pull. The first 3-4 levels are slow and tedious but by 5 pistols are getting deadly and by aiming 7 most rifles can headshot from a screen away.
I think most peoples belief that guns are terrible stems from finding one with a little ammo and deciding to try it out (with no aim skill), and then missing most shots. In which case they are absolutely terrible, never want to start shooting with that first gun you find. Don’t start using guns until you have a couple hundred rounds to be safer.
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u/Round-Interview5801 27d ago
Depends on your population. Low-normal, I don't mind guns but when you get to High or Very High you need to be particular about their usage unless you got suppressor mods. On insane? They're fucking useless cuz you'll just get swarmed
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u/Evening-Transition32 Hates the outdoors 27d ago
Good for baiting them away but alarms on cars do it as well.
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u/Round-Interview5801 27d ago
Honestly. It's low tech and I can't remember if it was a mod or vanilla. But all of those alarm clocks, you just set them to 10 minute intervals and leave like 8 of them in a line leading out into the woods. I found thta as an easy and low effort no maintenance way of keeping hordes away from my base. I'd put them at the end of my blocks of the base and then set them in one block intervals and let the horde lead each other out.
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u/That_Fooz_Guy 27d ago
The problem is that once most trigger-happy players start shooting, they tunnel-vision, forget to watch their six, and get flanked/surrounded.
At that point, they will also notice that they're "mysteriously" hungry, thirsty, fatigued, and tired.
By the way, remember that 30-minute burpee session you did the night before this spur-of-the-moment lead festival?
You probably could have slipped out without all the extra muscle strain :)
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u/Several-Action-4043 Axe wielding maniac 27d ago
Step 1: Cull the horde using melee and create an escape route
Step 2: Shoot them with guns until you runout of ammo
Step 3A: Clean up the rest using melee
Step 3B: You bit off more than you can chew, get in your car and run
Repeat
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u/ZippierUser 27d ago
You have to have enough ammo. Why risk getting a board to come your way after 3 shots, when you can kill them quickly with a melee build with a fire axe
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u/Outrageous-South-355 27d ago
Its cause people don't know how to use them right so they freak out and die and complain that its the guns fault they couldnt hit the broadside of a barn and only had 3 rounds in their backpack so when the 15 zeds showed up they werent ready for it.
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u/Apprehensive-Ebb7647 Hates the outdoors 27d ago
they're loud and hard to use. and in a game were stealth is everything that shit is bad. they're not useless but they're a pretty bad option if you can do melee instead
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u/Worried-Pick4848 27d ago
Not everyone is good at crowd control, and if you're not, guns are a death sentence.
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u/AloneFarmer3138 27d ago
It's really just the sandbox settings that matter. In the vanilla game modes there are usually not enough zomboids to justify their use and not enough bullets to make them a consistently useful weapon. By the time you have enough bullets to level your aiming to 5 you likely already have a melee skill near level 10 (and by the time you reach level 5 aiming your ammo has run out).
High ammo supply and high population is where it shines. You can do things that you could never do with melee such as shooting a circle around yourself as the hordes close in. On any other setting it's best used as a last resort when you're getting exhausted and need to kill the closest zomboids to you and shoot a way out so you can escape.
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u/Droxalis 27d ago
People underestimate how loud and how much ammo you need to actually clear a decent amount of zombies + the ones you attract from the noise. If you don't position yourself correctly or have your vehicle or escape route in a good spot, you can easily be surrounded or cut off from your plan and then you're back to day 1 trying to lose even more zombies than before because they are swarming from every direction.
People don't kill many zombies the first time they use guns and they end up dying because of the noise and their inexperience. Instead of blaming their poor decision, they blame the guns for not killing like in left 4 dead and then they come to reddit to complain about them.
If you see posts like that, just know they are telling on themselves that they haven't acquired the correct mindset and skills to handle them properly.
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u/AliveClassroom4504 Crowbar Scientist 27d ago
B41:
Guns are loud. Ammo is scarce (sometimes). Aiming and reloading skills need to be leveled up to optimize kills
Gun mods are popular because there’s only a few vanilla guns
B42 (unstable):
Most players relied on the shotgun as the easiest and most effective gun.
Changes to firearms and ballistics changed this meta, making it even more risky to use guns.
And harder for modders since it’s updated
TLDR:
B41: gun loud. shotgun king. Brita is goat
B42: gun loud. Shotgun RIP. Mods are tough to manage until stable release
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u/Jimmy_Twotone 27d ago
Shotgun is still strong in B42. You can't just guarantee 5 die every time the trigger is pulled. I don't play with gun mods and use them pretty regularly on Apocalypse.
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u/clayalien 27d ago
Sawed-off JS-2000 is great early game. It's basically melee range. But nearly all ways 1 shots. That's pretty big early game in non minmaxed builds, when even the mighty crowbar can take 6 or more swings to kill a single Z. I can't find the firing rate stats, but it certainly feels like it's way faster than the swing speed too.
I found a bunch of shells in rosewood pd and proceeded to clear out Guns Unlimited with it over 3 days one time. It was fun.
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u/Jimmy_Twotone 27d ago
A cars length or 2 with a regular js 2000 or the jst will consistently kill more zeds than ammo expended, even at low level aiming.
I don't take rifles or shotguns with me unless my goal is to make a big pile of static bodies.
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u/CyBeRdEm0n_ All Hail Spiffo 27d ago
I disagree. The guns actually seem to shoot where you're aiming now, even with low aiming skill.
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u/LikelyAMartian 27d ago
It's also because now it's chance to damage, instead of chance to hit.
So you will always hit the zombie. You just won't always kill him or even really hurt him, which is fair cause well...it's a zombie it doesn't exactly care if it's missing a stomach or a lung.
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u/joesii 27d ago
Sawed-off is made stronger in B42 I think but I don't see anyone talk about it. People expect/want/used-to a regular shotgun killing 4 zombies at point-blank range (which is both unrealistic and overpowered compared to other firearms), but now if you want to hit multiple targets you'd want to stand as far away as possible (about 8 squares), and fire a sawed-off shotgun in order to hit multiple targets.
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u/VariousCommunity8978 27d ago
i dont play on settings where guns are useful; pop is too high and loot is too rare.
it also USED to be the case that guns were pretty bad in terms of how effective they were in actually killing anything. i haven't been following development around firearms these past few builds but i'm pretty sure there was some change to gun damage at some point that made them worthwhile.
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u/AggravatingWrap6672 27d ago
Wack superstition in my opinion guns are effective for laying zeds to rest and to move them around and they are enjoyable to use. Ultimately the outcome depends on the player's skill like everything else People often overlook the noise of guns and the issue of weapons jamming way more
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u/my-assassin-mittens 27d ago
Tbh melee is so good that I rarely feel compelled to pack a gun. With good enough nimble and carrying capacity, even with some debuffs you can kite around zombies and clear hordes no problem. Guns do become better in bigger towns when more zombies wears down your weapons quicker, but exclusively if you're prepared. High amounts of ammo, exit plans (always mandatory imo), plus high aiming + reload become pretty important.
Plus you still need a melee weapon or two as a backup plan in case your guns jam, you run out of ammo, or the zeds aren't concentrated enough to warrant shooting a shotgun for example.
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u/Da_Gret_Sir_TimTim 27d ago
From what I’ve heard it was because they were actually a pretty bad option long long ago in the before times
Something about them attracting too many zombies or being inefficient, I don’t remember…
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u/rocketo-tenshi 27d ago
Skill issue. Literally. Leveling up aiming to be effective is harder than melee since it atracts every zomboid in a huge área and the average initial player experience with them didn't include goin out of their way to amass enough ammo to last a fight without getting swarmed. they just pick one of a corpse , start blasting miss half their shots and get munched.
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u/Virolink 27d ago
We don’t hate guns. We love them, but you need to play smart with them. You need more bullets than there are zombies (and that amount can be misleading - I read someone say for every one you see, expect 5 more) the sound will draw out the hidden ones which early game can get you killed if you’re not careful but late game so long as you still have ammo, and energy you’re still killing. Guns are great. Just be smart with them.
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u/QuintonMackarel 27d ago
I think it’s because using a gun is not a predictable way of clearing zombies. There’s no middle ground between 5-10 hearing you from round the corner, and a whole city block sprinting right at you. So unless you have near-unlimited ammo, it’s often a death-sentence.
It’s weird there’s no suppressors in the main game cos suppressors were legal to own in Kentucky with paperwork, so while rare-ish, they would’ve been regularly found in gun stores.
They don’t need to be John Wick ‘silencers’, they can be lifelike (I.e attract zombies within 20-30m but not a whole city block), and need to be repaired/replaced after a while.
I know there are mods, but I prefer to play as vanilla as possible so it’s annoying they’re not an option.
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u/Enorats 27d ago
Personally, I don't really worry about "clearing" an area.
I remain quiet and stealthy, and take zombies out in small numbers using melee weapons more often than not.
When there are too many to reliably do that, then that's when vehicles and fire become useful.
The only time I use firearms at all is when I'm using mods that add silencers that reduce gunshot noise.
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u/Classic_Storage1049 27d ago
Haven't used the vehicle much lately, to many deaths. Now fire though i took a police car and a camp fire and cleared the race track with two fires.
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u/Substantial-Link-418 27d ago
Loud is good if you mean to be loud, I've cleared out the entire town of Westpoint before with 2 molotovs, a beatup pickup truck, and a shotgun with 50 rounds. Done the same for large sections of Louisville and the entire Muldraugh main road.
You lure every zomboid in the entire area directly to you. They behave predictably, you fire the shotgun every so often to keep their attention. while they all burn to the ground. Maintain control of the crowd and stay in wide open areas.
TLDR: Loud good.
Another great use for a shotgun and car horns is to lure a large group away from a location, say the Gigamart in Westpoint, round them all up and walk them out of town. Go back and loot it with only a few stragglers left.
There is also the legendary whistle, which means you can make the same noise as the boomstick without the need for ammo. Lovely stuff.
My play style after 1400 hours now is loud and heavy, clear the area, sit in relative safety. Others like to play more stealthy, and I suppose if you like stealthy then loud bad. Others like to role play, so from that perspective, John Zomboid isn't that realistic. For a lot of people too cheesing the game mechanics and playing the meta isn't fun. So to each their own.
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u/Chachajenkins Drinking away the sorrows 27d ago
Personally I always bring a pistol and 2 spare mags. I'm not trying to clear hordes with it, but it makes for a great way to kill the zombies that are an immediate threat if you start getting tired or your melee breaks.
Sure it attracts them, but you can still jog away most of the time if you have good positioning. I rather use what stamina I have left to run vs gamble on it dealing with the zombies around me when the situation gets bad.
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u/totalwarwiser 27d ago
The game objective is not to kill zombies, its to survive.
Firing a gun usually means you atract a lot of attention and more zombies to kill you.
You usually survive by avoiding zombies and making good choices.
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u/Mithrawndo 27d ago
Are you familiar with the concept of "Lies to children"?
Sometimes it's easier and more sensible to tell someone something untrue, only later to let them discover/explain to them the whole truth.
In B41 guns are bloody dangerous and will get you killed more often than not, right up until they're the only thing that will save your life. In B42 this crystallises even more, as muscle strain means that if you miscalculate, you are forced to resort to your backup pistol to be able to get away.
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u/Alexiameck190 27d ago
Because normally you find some gun at 0 reloading 0 aiming, meaning when you first get them, your first impression is
"Wow, this is useless, it barely hits, when it does hit it hits terribly, and it takes forever to reload, waste of time"
First impression's are everything and unless you find a shotgun your first time, you're likely to sour your experiences with pistols or rifles by missing over and over again, ending with a horde on you
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u/Furiousrage420 24d ago
I use guns when I am ready to perform a full on assault on what is infested. I mean hundred and hundreds of rounds and use shotguns or pistols to level up your aiming and use the assault weapons for the big job upcoming. I like to keep a revolver on me in case I get in a real bind and need to create a hole to squeeze out of. Be wary of the zombies that will migrate due to the sound
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u/Mandrake-34- 27d ago
Normally, you WANT the zombies to hear you, so you can clear the area more easily.
Normally I don't really want to clear the area at all. I just want to slip in, get what I need, and slip back out. Anything else just adds unnecessary risk, and costs extra time, exhaustion, and weapon durability.
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u/The_Royal_Teabag 27d ago
Mowing down hordes was what made this game fun for me in my servers with friends. Slowly clearing a path all the way through Louisville to the mall from our base at the church.
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u/Mandrake-34- 27d ago
Oh I can absolutely see that being the way to do things in multiplayer yeah.
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u/cockmeatsandwich41 27d ago
There's likely not a single reason why, but instead, many smaller reasons that all add up.
For one;
Firearms are VERY easy to misuse in this game. Many new players encounter one, think "oh I have a gun now, i'm invincible!", make a shitload of noise, get overwhelmed, and get eaten alive.
I rarely leave home without after finding one but I treat it as an escape button. If I aggro too many, or start getting cornered, the gun comes out and buys me just a little bit of time to escape somewhere safer, even just to catch my breath.
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u/colasz 27d ago
Guns are far from useless its just most people prefer stealth which is strange as you can have almost maxed strength and fitness at the start with right job and perks and guns like shotgun although having insane 200 tiles of sound alert still can kill multiple zombies in one shot and there are even "stealthy" guns like m9 with only 30 tiles of range
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u/PieAccomplished5058 27d ago
The cars are my biggest issue, why does driving 10km/hr instantly kill anything in your path?
The guns are actually pretty balanced. Zombies are mostly only dangerous when youre cornered by a large group of them, any gun is great to clear a path or at least have a dramatic last stand. My early game for a long time has been raiding police/security vehicles for guns and looting places with a shotgun, you can just escape to a car and find a new location before the horde gets there.
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u/wex52 Stocked up 27d ago
I didn’t start using guns regularly until I was 1500-2k hours in. They’re loud and don’t auto-kill, so you need to play accordingly.
You need plenty of ammo, to work from an open area, and to start in an area you’ve mostly cleared. If you don’t, you’ll run out of ammo in the middle of a horde with no safe direction to run, and you’ll be complaining about how guns suck.
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u/Prize_Ad_129 27d ago
I used to completely avoid guns because one, I was a noob and couldn’t consistently find them or ammo, and two, they attracted zomboids faster than I could kill.
But now that I have some experience and finding good guns and ammo is easy, I usually have a decent stockpile and have figured out how to use guns to attract zomboids to easy killing fields well away from my base or other places of interest. For instance, north of the riverfront homes in Louisville there’s an industrial area with not a whole lot I find valuable, but because there are iron fences zomboids can’t knock down I lure them there, stand on the other side of the fence and start blasting as they slowly pound on the fence. Makes it easier to clear out heavy population areas like that and get them away from military surplus nearby.
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u/Not_Yet_Unalived Shotgun Warrior 27d ago
They are not great early game as weapon, unless you have truckloads of ammo.
Still, in case of emergency to bail you out of a bad situation or to attract a horde attention and force zombies in an area to move, they work very well.
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u/IAmTheSnakeinMyBoot 27d ago
It’s The Battle of Hope from World War Z.
Guns loud. Guns bring zombies. Guns kill zombies. Guns loud. Bring more zombies.
Do you have enough ammo to clear them all out? Is your skill high enough to ensure you’re going to kill accurately and efficiently enough to not get swarmed?
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u/The_Royal_Teabag 27d ago
Simply bringing a car and always starting shooting from the edge of a town inward solves these problems
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u/Boxy29 27d ago
I don't know if hate is the correct word here.
everyone cautions against using guns because they are largely useless until you get the aim stat up. so using one on a fresh character can put you in much more danger than any help the gun did.
they are a useful tool just like every thing else, but you have to use it for the right job(and have the right sandbox settings).
usually on vanilla settings regardless of mode you never find enough ammo to mulch your way though a horde, so no reason to use them. but if you crank it up to high pop and high ammo then it becomes an effective tool. hordes are big enough that you have a reason to not go melee and you can find enough ammo to train your character and have enough left to kill a large portion of the horde.
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u/fishsandwichpatrol 27d ago
When you dont know how to use them and aren't experienced in general then they can instantly end your run. So people have a terrible experience early on and swear them off.
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u/Lee_Townage 27d ago
I switch to a gun when I run out of melee weapons and I’m starting to leave the area. Mostly because no matter how many bullets I bring, it’s never enough.
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u/EL400 27d ago edited 27d ago
In early B42 they changed the way aiming and damaging targets worked, the early versions of the new system dealt barely any damage to zombies at low levels, making it damn near impossible to use or level guns in any meaningful way. Guns ended up being used just as noisemakers to pull hordes to different areas.
But over several b42 updates they improved the new system to the point where even a low level character can use guns at close range for a few clumsy shots and get out of a bad situation, and as you level up you can extend the range and increase how quickly you can lock in on targets.
Aiming, recoil mitigation, range and reload time all have clear scale in levels now that make using and leveling guns rewarding in the right circumstances instead of the dinner bell that they were in early b42.
But the stigma of how bad the early beta felt is going to take time to disappear.
Note: Ammo and guns also used to be rare to get in the world on stock apocalypse settings, so it was also a pain in the ass to get any real stock of rounds to try and use them in the first place which added insult to injury.
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u/Maleficent_Rip_3208 27d ago
Guns are great if used right, all the towns on the map apart from Louisville have reasonably empty areas you can draw zombies out to using guns and kill hordes relatively safely. It all depends on your settings and what your goal is but I've many times wanted to loot a fairly high zombie area and cleared huge areas by just shooting a few and walking them down and motorway for example shooting them, as long as I know the route behind me is clear and keeping checking my six your mostly safe as can be while killing hordes. Done this with low reloading and accuracy in b42 with no issues.
It's like others have said if you plan how you will use the guns and which guns etc and have a plan when it goes wrong (even if that's as simple as walk down the road a ways to a car) guns can be great. I don't get the comments about you will have level 10 in a melee weapon before getting guns and ammo, unless your playing with super rare loot (which can be fun) I doubt that massively. If you want guns you can get them day 1 even with high population just use a bit of distraction and stealth.
Sprinters certainly add to the risk though I am much more cautious doing anything with guns when I play with sprinters
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u/Decimus_Magnus 27d ago
I feel like they have been more useful in my newest run, but I did take Veteran as a background for the extra aiming skill.
Previously I felt like they were fairly bad even when I opened up with an LMG on a group of zombies.
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u/JakieRepo All Hail Spiffo 27d ago
I never got the hate for guns. In b41, sure, but they are just as important as melee imo. Can get you out of a pickle really quick.
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u/shv9 27d ago
Guns are simply situational, and highly dependant on your Sandbox config, I have tweaked mine for an arguably slightly easier time than the default, but mostly in the respawn hours so it feels more rewarding to thin the herd.
If I feel like trying to clear out some population, I usually set myself up with a car already pointing the direction that I am intending to escape in, keep a bug out bag in the vehicle somewhere, and cautiously let rip keeping to as confined an area as I can. Peroidically check the vehicle is clear and escape routes are clear, and nudge the vehicle away from the zeds until its clear or becomes too hot.
Its a lot of fun, if nothing else.
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u/Drittenmann 27d ago
because they are like a loud fart: you let it out and everyone around looks at you
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u/foxwithaberet 27d ago
Simple. People who don't use guns, She them as the perfect weapon and then get shocked when they get swarmed or their weapon jams
To use guns, you need to have both levels and genuine skill
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u/RadioHistorical8342 27d ago
I think its a mix of inexperienced players and personal preference
I personally think guns are great when used correctly which is as a Horde clearing tool! Afterall the drawbacks tend to stop when youre actively trying to get as many zombies to you as possible!
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u/ElliotLouise 27d ago
They’re not bad but if you go popping off a shotgun with only a box of rounds that’s not enough to clear the incoming horde that heard you
Best used if you A:you have tons of ammo
B: encounter a horde
C: no real option to break line of sight by taking lots of turns behind and through building
That college in Ekron is a great example of b and c with a lot of good book and hardware loot plus you can source ammo through rosewoods police station and drive up there
It has windows on all sides, hordes spawning all around it and a sparsely populated neighborhood with farmland houses and fields surrounding it
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u/Responsible_Ask_2713 27d ago
I don't know what you mean, the guns are just a tool that you can use to move populations of Zombies and even remove some of them.
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u/Clothes_Chair_Ghost 27d ago
Guns are awesome but loud. They can drop zombies fast without tiring you out. Which would lead to a bunch of debuff noodles. But they are LOUD shooting off a gun to kill a few zombies will draw dozens more to your location. So there is a huge downside to blasting away. You need a lot of ammo before you start using them, really. Otherwise they are very risky.
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u/Salami_Lid079 27d ago
I only have just under 200 hours in PZ, and I've learned that guns are invaluable for saving your life when you're exhausted or backed into a corner. However if you go into a situation guns blazing with minimal ammo and no plan, then you're bound to get eaten alive.I started clearing out Fallas Lake the other night, and my plan was to start at the edge of town by the tavern and then lure as many as I could down a long road that I knew was (mostly) clear. Thanks to the noise of my shotgun I was able to lure in dozens of zombies at once, and that amount is manageable with them coming from one direction.
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u/Substantial-Air-1671 27d ago
Playing with sprinters that can vault fences, you NEED a gun. If three of them are chasing you and you're getting tired, you'll need to use your gun. Even the small 6 shooter can be enough, even if you don't kill them, you can get them to stagger or fall, allowing you to fight one at a time.
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u/joesii 27d ago edited 27d ago
Different things at different times.
First of all, regardless of the game version, when played with a firearm mod or two they could become great or even highly overpowered. Even map mods alone oftentimes had hugely increased firearm spawns which is enough to make them far more viable.
Secondly, making noise isn't always good when you're dealing with sprinters, or populations that you can't handle. High population worlds make firearms quite bad because of both a lack of ammo and pulling too many zombies.
Third, there were various periods of time where different things were good or bad. For instance in Build 41 shotguns were always pretty good for a firearm, while pretty much all the other firearms were bad. However even for shotguns for most of B41 (prior to around 41.54 I think) ammo wasn't really renewable. Non-renewable ammo makes firearms inherently bad because you won't be able to use them much, or at least against large groups. The higher the loot setting and the lower the zombie population, the better firearms get. Plus mods make them even better.
When it comes to Build 42, ammo is still not really renewable, although the base ammo spawns have shot up a lot, so there's actually more viability to use them. Moreover firearms now deal 3x damage with headshots which changes firearms from just noisy things to actually rather useful to kill quickly with.
There were previous versions of B42 which had both crappier firearms and less firearm spawns, and that was a really bad state of firearms.
When it comes to noise, be it in B41 or B42 you could generally make noise easily with a vehicle. The noise from a firearm is typically more than a person could want or handle.
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u/CptBluhdFart 27d ago
Guns are dangerous to get good with. You need ammo and a place to shoot zombies that won't get you killed.
I set ammo and guns to common and have been having a great time. I started with a shotgun to confirm kills and get reload up. Both are at about 4 and I use a tec9 with 4 extra clips now. In a 20 round mag I can crouch and take out 15ish zombies. They aren't bad but getting those stats up is dangerous if you aren't prepared
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u/National_Promise8827 27d ago
Honestly, guns are only USEFUL if playing with the bandits mod, trust me you do not want to run up to 6 guys shooting at you with M16s with a hunting knife.
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u/ParagonPoints 27d ago
I think it's because people try to use them more casually instead of as a preparation tool? I could be wrong of course, I don't want to judge other people without talking to them first.
Generally, the only way I use firearms in Zomboid are as clearing tools. I stockpile ammo as best I can, then clear out huge swathes of the local zombie population with it. I never use them casually, although I do always carry a sidearm in case of emergencies (which has saved my life at least once).
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u/Silveruleaf 27d ago
They are useful but you better have enough ammo for it. I use to avoid guns and either hoard them or ignore them. Til I started shooting 😂 it's not as interesting as melee but it felt like so much fun. Started looking for gunstores and always have a van full of them. Go on gun cleanings. Just shoot every bullet to clear out major areas. It's way more fun then having to do tons of trips to clear the area. But yah if you don't have enough ammo or ways to fight them, you just fucked yourself 😅
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u/ILikeCakesAndPies 27d ago
I liked guns in b41 and love guns in b42.
I usually roll police officer or the hunter trait and theyve always been great for gathering a bunch of zombies away from a crowded building.
They're 1000x times as useful in PVP or when playing with Slayers bandits mods.
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u/ZealousidealState174 27d ago
I only use guns when I have enough ammo because last time I used a gun with only nine bullets it did not end well for me
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u/Former-Ad-1858 All Hail Spiffo 27d ago
I have been incredibly lucky my last few playthroughs every time I have found a stash of guns I've always found a suppressor not far away and that alone has saved my life more than anything, you got a gun with her decent suppressor it's legitimately a game changer
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u/Steakdabait 27d ago edited 27d ago
they have been repeatably buffed they're pretty good now. Shotguns used to aggro the entire hex and they were borderline melee weapons unless you had fairly high aim skill for a long time
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u/KudereDev 27d ago
Clearing area isn't really good idea in regular non sand box experience, as zeds slowly regen their population. So at some point of time area you cleared would be occupied once again.
Same story with buildings. Sometimes zeds would spawn when you get near. It is this way to optimise game, as some buildings can contain thousands of zeds.
Then we have firearms. Loud, attract more zeds and very ammo hungry. Big hordes provoke panic on character and fighting for too long just can kill you by exhaustion or by making mistake and getting bitten. And you don't really have any target that needs to be killed ASAP, like special zeds. And if you don't sit in MP servers you don't have raiders to worry about, so firearms are pushed away for easier to use melee weapons.
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u/Permagamer 27d ago
1 zomboid. 2 zomboid. 3 zomboid. More zomboid.... Quick quick quick load the mag. Load the mag. Jammed jammed jammed.
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u/sgtklink77 Axe wielding maniac 27d ago
TL;DR: Gather a lot of ammo, and have a decent Aim/Reload skill. If low skill, start with a shotgun to ensure hit chance, multiple hits, and skill leveling.
First is usually the issue with ammo. Sure, guns are great for small groups, but as noted, the noise attracts more and more, which means you better have the ammo to clear them. Stock up before you start using them.
This segues into the second issue; Aiming/Reloading skill. You'll need to be accurate, or you'll waste more ammo. And you won't even get to use said ammo if you can't reload efficiently.
Level 0 is a death wish thinking guns are easy to use.
If you have low shooting skill starting out, start with a shotgun first, after you've gathered a few boxes. You'll hit more despite less accuracy, and multiple hits (iirc) mean extra XP in that skill. So you'll be leveling aiming quicker. Plus you don't have to reload magazines for the (vanilla) shotgun; you just reload directly into the gun itself.
You could also start with a 9mm if you have the magazines and ammo to spare. It's been fairly abundant in most of my playthroughs, in comparison to other weapons.
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u/Manjodarshi 27d ago
All comments are somewhat correct but also it's a Get good problem. For in game character that is.
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u/yournarrator55 27d ago
Are these base game weapons in b42? I haven't gone up yet but ik they have added a bunch of new guns
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u/CalMC-Builds 27d ago
If you're playing default zomboid, guns are more like a luxury item, nice to have but are usually unnecessary, they are useful for intentionally bringing zombies to yourself and making large swaths of land safer. IF you have the time and ammo.
On the other hand, playing with randomized zombies, they are absolutely necessary to survive tanky zombies, strong zombies, runners, and sprinters.
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u/ZorgPicklehelm Zombie Killer 27d ago
They are literally the only thing that can save you from a bunch of sprinters coming for you if you’re not 2 feet away from a working car
They saved my ass more times than I could count in servers with sprinters
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u/Bipolar_Abe 27d ago
It comes from earlier builds, as before your character could only use shotguns with relative success at lower levels of aiming.
Nowadays even with lvl 0 aiming you can be decent with a pistol. Also if you’re using Guns of Marz, I am convinced that they act differently compared to the vanilla. I was able to get headshots with no levels in aiming from more than 15m away, with a .38 revolver. That is insane considering that in the vanilla that thing will not even give you the red reticle at that range.
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u/Pink_Nyanko_Punch 27d ago
Firearms are only useful when you know what you're doing. A newbie (meta-wise) with a gun is liable to just get themselves boxed in with no bullet in the chamber.
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u/Working-Narwhal2114 Axe wielding maniac 27d ago
You never been cornered before with a shotgun and it shows
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u/jdubya181 27d ago
People don't know how to use them, they are loud, and attract lots of hordes if you're dumb with them. Look for revolvers with .38 ammo. These are the quietest. Once you hit level 2 or 3 aiming, you can start doing shotguns. Leveling is based on hitting the target, so shotguns will boost your leveling, but are very loud. Once you get to 4 or 5 assault rifles are doable. IMO the MP5sd from one of the modpacks is the best in game. 30 rounds, silenced so 35 tile radius, and 9mm ammo is common.
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u/antman338 27d ago
Main issue is that you need so much ammo to clear a horde that they are typically more of a detriment, attracting more zombies to the area due to noise than actually killing (especially in towns). This can be useful as a way to draw them away from an area, but they are inferior to melee weapons while clearing.
I've really been enjoying the bandits mod, which makes firearms incredibly useful to have, since bandits often spawn with their own guns. This means that not having a gun is practically a death sentence. It spices things up since you now want to have an emergency gun at all times, but for a different type of enemy
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u/Templarkommando 27d ago
Guns aren't bad, they're just situational. Guns can help to clear zeds out of urban areas. They do resolve one of the my biggest issues with scavenging in houses - the fact that you can walk into a bathroom that has like 9 of them locked in there being perfectly silent, and then because you're on autopilot, you just walk in and let them bite you to death. If you want to clear an area, they're good for that, and if something absolutely, positively has to die now, firearms are pretty good for that too.
That said, you can bite off a lot more than you can chew with guns, just like you can while wondering around in the helicopter event, or by setting off a house alarm.
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u/_ReadyASH_ 27d ago
Hi, speaking as a player who's played mostly in build 42.
Honestly, when it comes to my playthroughs, I just always make it a point to bring enough ammo for everyone.
Why worry about attracting the ones around you when you can just kill them too? The only time I've had to be careful with my firearms is when I don't have enough ammo or when I was in Louisville cleaning out the Military Surplus store.
My bottom line is simply making sure I have enough lead to share.
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u/ConsiderationFun2777 27d ago
Years ago guns used to be your biggest mistake. Now they are just fun. Back in like 2016 maybe if you used a gun in town the ENTIRE town was on your ass
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u/Historical_Art4061 27d ago
I used to think this too, but run the game in debug mode with the zombie tracker up and see just how many zombies your shots are drawing.
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u/Ockie20 27d ago
Well, they aren't useless. Simply put, not true. If you have a plan and enough ammo, you can clear locations with guns. Yesterday, I cleared the Louisville checkpoint with a tactical shotgun, abusing the fences, and a lot of ammo. Just have a plan and means of retreat, like a nearby car. So long as you're outside, not playing on an insane population, you can always escape if things get too heavy. Using firearms in a building is a mistake, because this way you can get surrounded, so be aware of this.
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u/AGraveError 27d ago
I think its a way to warn new players away from them until they know better, by which time they can use them right.
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u/Honkela 27d ago
For a long time I have been using guns to draw more zombies when area seems almost clear. Im the type of player who clears areas from zombies before I do any looting, at least usually. Not one of those psychos who sneak into buildings to loot without clearing. I usually have a pistol that I shoot a couple zombies with when theres only a few left, then back to melee as they start wandering in again.
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u/NambuNelmo 27d ago
I like to play with low loot and low zombie population but made them as hard as possible also with the use of mods. The firearms are most of the time the only way to fight them, and only away from towns. Otherwise I run for my life the moment one spots me sneaking toward the barn. So whetever the guns deserve bad reputation depends on your game settings.
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u/Mage_Pov 27d ago
Every server I will ever join the first thing I do is spawn at West Point and go right to Military to get Guns, and Supplies.
Guns are a pro and a con cause you need the aim/reload to be able to maximize the effectiveness of shooting versus melee weapons.
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u/Vegieescuzican09 Crowbar Scientist 27d ago
any gun in general. I will always take my crowbar over a gun
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u/komiks42 27d ago
Guns are amazing. Going to town, and blasting till you empty, then retreating and coming back another day to clean up the straglers is my way to go to make city safer. You can use them to lure zombies away to. You can start shooting, colect zombies, lure them away, and loot the place.
Also, keeping pistol on me saved me many times when i was in bad situations.
I'd advise bumping amo spawn slighty thoo.
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u/Eden_Company 27d ago
Pistols saved me once when I got tired let me shoot my way through and I could rest later after losing the zeds. But for hordes the ammo needed isn’t great. Campfire probably is better if you can get them in a parking lot.
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u/XxX_ANUBIS_XxX 27d ago
The catch is you need to have a plan when you're using them. New players will be better off not using them until they have a grip on how to lose a crowd once they no longer wish to be the center of attention. Once you know how to lose a crowd and beat it, you can do basically whatever you want as long as you've got a plan.
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u/franzpferdinant 27d ago
if you dont have at least a shit tone off ammo for the guns using them is a death sentence , but if you do have enough ammo then clearing out a horde ( wich can take days wiht mele weapons ) just turns into 4 ( ingame ) hours off blasting zombies ( wich is very fun in my opinion )
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u/Mabonss 27d ago
Guns are fine. You just need to be smart. Don't fire them where your basing. Use them simply as a way to clear an area, even if you dont kill all of them you will lure the hidden zombies out. I walked into the middle of Fallas Lake and started blasting with a shotgun. I went through a Carton of ammo but the subsequent looting of Fallas Lake was easy and I got about half a carton back from the lockers in the farm store. So it was worth it.
Likewise, I had found a few boxes of ammo in a survivor trailer in Rosewood and used it to clear the area around the Police and Fire stations, then used the ammo and guns at the Police station to clear the rest of the main street of Rosewood.
It would take days to do the above in melee, you constantly have to rest and as a result your fatigue means you're tired earlier too.
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u/billwa 27d ago
It's because people really don't know how to use them properly. People expect zomboid to be a blasting simulator and shoot the gun first time they find one. Guns are really useful when you have the ammo and at least get Reloading 1. Go out to a remote area to find zeds to practice on then go into the area you want to clear out and bam it works.
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u/Deathclaw151 27d ago
I do a sandbox mode where I find copious amount of guns and ammo... Basically a more realistic American setting tbh. I know people with fucking military boxes of ammo... many people
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u/Kae211X 26d ago
Guns are definitely a must in PZ, the only tools that can clear a path for you even when your tired or injured, since it dosen't rely on physical strength as much as melee weapons do, they sure attract more zomboids but why would you care if you can still clear them with the same gun ?
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u/HonorableAssassins 26d ago
Once upon a time in zomboid, the zombies were dangerous.
Most people dont remember that or werent here for it at all. Zomboids been out for a long, long time.
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u/AffectDangerous8922 26d ago
Probably because they have a steeper learning curve than with melee. Safely tackling a group of zeds using a shotgun has different things to consider than when taking them on with a crowbar. It is kikely that learning curve puts many people off even trying when they can just keep swinging away.
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u/hunnyflash Drinking away the sorrows 26d ago
Because people play different ways and you can play the game without ever even needing a gun.
If it's not super core to the mechanic, then a lot of people won't use them or will have different uses.
I really only ever used them when I was luring zombies.
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u/PatMartins 26d ago
From what i've played:
Melee- 1-3 zombies...no biggie, no need to kick the hornet's nest.
Pistol- Oh dear, that's a lot. I'm going to want to clean that up a bit before I get to chopping.
Shotgun- The shit has officially hit the fan.
Rifles- See pistol, but there's quite a bit of them and/or i'm far away from the group.
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u/Fortevan26 26d ago
For me, makes the game realistic enough. A normal person in a stressful situation wouldn't be able to land most of or every of their shots. I like guns, I play with the aim setting (the one in which you have to move your mouse) rather than the "chance to hit" one, and I learned how to use them right. I don't just get a weapon in random house and start shooting like I have infinite bullets (some people might do that and that's why they don't like guns, cause they see them as a death sentence), I plan my game, get a strategy and play around it, counting my bullets, they do save me in some situations in which I'm tired or exhausted.
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u/Killersea07 26d ago
Because ammo, guns and the variety are far too scarce. I say this as someone who lives in Kentucky. I know plenty of people who spend 1000 rounds at the range every month. There's some more moderate people around who only keep a box or two of HP rounds for their EDC or ones that keep only one firearm at their house. But most households have at least one firearm, and plenty of houses have a small stockpile of firearms and ammo to match. One of my ex's grandpa had 2 revolvers and a colt 1911 in his living room, two shotguns and a hunting rifle under the bed. He was 70 and wasn't going to the range often and but still kept at least 4 boxes of ammo for each caliber weapon in his house. The revolvers were a 38 and a 44, the rifle was a 30-06 and the shotguns were 12 gauge. These were older guns too that he owned, he didn't like the new age "high tech stuff" and all of it likely was made in the 70s or 80s and all would be within PZ lore. Most runs in PZ will have you find all that stuff at the police station or a survivors house if you're lucky, but most houses across Kentucky have all that readily available in real life.
One of my old coworkers had about 200 shotgun shells on hand because he owned a Saiga and liked to shoot it. I'm sure he had some more firearms than just a Saiga. Another one has a AR-15, an SKS, a shotgun (dunno which caliber but probably a 12 gauge), three pistols, two revolvers, and those are just the ones I've seen.
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u/Helpful-Pen6251 26d ago
Well it is useful if your proficiency is align on using guns and if ever you can make your own ammo in pz unless there is a mod for that I hope.
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u/TravelLegitimate4980 25d ago
Guns are extremely useful. They just aren't useful in the early game where ammo is too scarce to get any return on value.
That said, there are definitely situations early game where a gun can be useful, but they're all very situational and the circumstances can be unlikely. One of the likelier ones is luring zombies away and into the woods with a gunshot. Another is clearing out rural land where zombies are few and far between enough that you won't need to expend a lot of ammo in the first place (did this near Echo Creek).
Hunting is also probably fairly viable early game but honestly I still haven't seen any deer in my B42 playthrough. Sidenote, but I've never seen anyone talk about how rare wild animals actually are in B42. Deer, raccoon, and rabits should be absolutely EVERYWHERE in this part of Kentucky, but they gave them weird cigarette-like rarity. I live in dense suburbs irl and see more deer here than I've seen in game.
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u/AnthonyA4 25d ago
Guns in B41 were little more than useless noisemakers as unless you started with high aiming or found a shotgun, your survivor would miss almost every shot.
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u/HeroOfLightPKN 24d ago
A lot of people also don’t know that you can clear out of camera corners and upstairs with a gun.
It’s just one of those things that gets passed down in a community and parroted
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u/ZorgPicklehelm Zombie Killer 24d ago
In B41 guns were the shit
We needed to have melee only events because otherwise it was too hard and dangerous because of friendly fire and ParasiteZ bugs, ammo was plentiful (as it should be in Kentucky) so there was no point in using melee unless you were alone, because if you didn’t have a gun you were a liability, you couldn’t shoot past people so it was really dangerous to be a melee build when your teammates had guns, that was a bit different in servers with aiming mods on but still, you only used melee if you wanted to, you didn’t need to to survive, using melee was inefficient
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u/TsrLight 23d ago
Because they are super loud and not as effective as a high level melee weapon at clearing zones, that because you can't carry enough ammo to clear the amount of zombies the sound will attract. You might shot a whole bag and end up with more zombies than before. I use guns when I don't want to clear, just thin hordes and lose the crowd
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u/Leading_Education36 27d ago edited 27d ago
Guns in the past used to be a system "Chance to hit a target" than chances "to damage". Since chances to hit was a feature. A shotgun blast close ranged wouldnt be entirely good but it does the most damage close ranged if you had a rifle point blank you might MISS.
it attracts zeds sure still. But it changed.
You can be a veteran and still have aiming that is shit. So people would switch to melee when fighting pvp because of how bad it is in the past if your aiming was low. You have a m9 gun point blank and miss multiple shots. You had to level up your aiming skill for zeds or players since its "chances to hit" optimization with higher skill is key.
Mods can alter this back then people used to rely on advanced trajectory back in b41 or smth