L4D update - Jan. 14, 2009

Elihu

Tribe of Judah Staff Manager
Left 4 Dead has been updated with a host of fixes, tweaks and new features, including enhancements to Versus mode for improved competitive play. The full change list is below. For PC users the update will be applied automatically via Steam. Meanwhile, the update will be made available to Xbox 360 players in the coming weeks.

General

* Fixed Survivors being able to climb surfaces marked for versus infected only
* Fixed a class of SurvivorBot bugs dealing with rescuing downed players
* Players can no longer grab ladders while flying through the air after a Tank punch
* Shooting near a car with an alarm that has already fired the alarm will no longer make chirping noises
* Improved loading time
* Fixed mini-gun physics exploit
* Fixed propane tanks (and other physics objects) causing players to fall through elevators
* Fixed rare achievement bug issues
* Fixed several map exploits
* Fixed various match making issues
* Fixed NAT traversal issues


Versus Changes

* Added HUD elements to show status of other infected players
* Changed color of infected player name in chat to red
* Fixed exploit where players could spawn infected bots
* Fixed instance where a Survivor changing to the infected team would be attacked by infected bots
* Normalized special infected melee damage
* Made the following client commands cheat protected: "Kill" and "explode"
* Fixed exploit where infected players could run away and teleport back to gain health
* Players can only change teams once per map
* Players can't change teams while other players are still loading
* Tank spawns at the same % through the map for both teams in versus mode
* Made the Tank and Witch spawn directly on the escape route
* Increased chance of getting the Tank or Witch
* Fixed team swap issue


Hunter

* Easier to pounce a Survivor who is meleeing
* Increased Minimum damage a Hunter pounce does


Smoker

* Fixed Smoker tongue tolerance
* Smoker now has to be killed or the tongue destroyed for the tongue to break
* Survivors cannot bash someone off the tongue until the Survivor being pulled is paralyzed or hanging
* Tongue attacks that fail to paralyze or hang a Survivor will use the shorter ability delay timer
* Fixed cases where the ability timer was not using the correct time
* Fixed case where you could point at a Survivor but not register a tongue hit
* Fixed Smoker tongue not targeting and landing properly through PZ ghosts
* Smoker tongue does damage every second while dragging paralyzed Survivors


Tank

* Bashable objects now appear with a red glow
* Tanks hitting a car with an alarm disables the alarm permanently
* Tank frustration timer is only reset by hitting Survivors with rocks or fists
* Reduced autoshotgun damage against Tanks


Witch

* Witch spawns at the same % through the map for both teams
* Avoids spawning within a certain % of the tank
* Fixed an exploit where the Witch could be woken up and tricked into attacking Survivors
 
Played through 2 campaigns in versus mode last night (with almost complete ToJ groups) and the new updates definitely make the game more challenging.

Some key components that make the game different IMO already are:

1. Smokers do damage as they drag their victims.
2. Smokers must be killed or the tongue seperated to stop a survivor from being dragged, otherwise you can't right-click a survivor off anymore til they are choking.
3. Auto-shottie toned down a bit for tanks.
4. Right-click to win against hunters has been toned down too, making it a bit easier to pounce a survivor while they are swinging.
5. No more stair hiding on top of No Mercy campaign.
6. New HUD for zombies, makes it easy to see health of other zombie partners and respawn times.
7. Fixed random team swap issue.
8. Tank appears now at same spot for both teams.
9. Cars with alarms will be disarmed if hit by tank.
10. Witch spawns in same place on both teams.
 
me, personally, I don't like the changes in 8 and 9. It give the second survivor team too much knowledge on where and when to be expecting tanks and witches. I think it should still be more random. If I was infected first and knew right when that tank spawned and where to expect the witch then as survivor I could antisapate the attacks.
 
Yeh, but I think they were thinking fairness in terms of their scoring system, which includes distance traveled. Not to mention that the zombies can also switch up tactics to make it more difficult for the opposing team by combining their forces with the tank, instead of dying right before he spawns, in preparation for whatever the surv's plan out.
 
Moderator's note: Thread moved to Tribe of Judah General Discussion Forum.

I tried to launch Left 4 Dead for 10-15 minutes after installing the update last night, but eventually gave up and went back to my Playstation 2.

From what I read, though, Versus might be considerably less frustrating now. I almost feel bad for saying that Versus was broken and Valve had no intention of fixing it.

(But I still don't think they'll ever fix the facestab-as-backstab bug in TF2.)

I hope to get on for a game of L4D Versus either tonight (before or after the TF2 scrim practice) or tomorrow night.
 
Seems to me when I play Smoker that I'm having a lot more trouble registering far hits, or at least angled ones. The ground level grabs seem fine, but when it comes to rooftops, I'm not getting the red crosshairs. :( And where's our new Versus maps? :p
 
I've noticed that too Keero, it seems that not only is the ranged reduced for some reason, but also it's harder to get an actual grab.
 
Ooh, they added stats to the our Steam pages. It's all at 0%, but still. xD
 
(But I still don't think they'll ever fix the facestab-as-backstab bug in TF2.)

Lets just face it the hit detection is bad in TF2. Medics melee'ing you from ten feet away, running directly behind an engy and stabbing 3 times hearing the impact and not getting a backstab, flames that work in water, flames that grab you from across the room, the list goes on. I've heard that the origin of the ray tracing is too far forward on the models. This means that if you are close to an opponent your strikes are detected as being on the opposite side of the person. Factor in lag not giving your position accurately and you've got bad hit detection.

I bet when the new map does hit Valve will have a sale on L4D.
 
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