Introduce yourselves here....

[Trehkan]

I see your point. I guess if people weren't so eager to run away from trouble, I wouldn't be so annoyed when they did it. It seems that the difference between fleeing and strategically retreating has been reduced to almost nothing for most of Malton.

[Animatronic Daemon Skwerral]

Strategically retreating = moving to non-resource buildings near the mall
Flee = Going to the next suburb and mall rating there

[Trehkan]

And when a mall comes under siege, it's usually mostly the second.

[Specialist290]

Unfortunately true. It seems more people care about ensuring self-preservation (for however brief a time) to sacrificing themselves for the benefit of the greater cause.

[Trehkan]

What I wonder about is, where are the people who defended malls heroically (if ineffectively most of the time) or implemented brilliant tactical withdrawals before. Did they just leave? Or did they become as cowardly as the others?

[Specialist290]

I'm guessing that most of the very oldest players of this game have left for one reason or another, with a very few exceptions. It might be the "nostalgia factor" coloring my memory a bit, but I do recall that there were a lot more actual heroic "last stands" in Malton's past history.

[Trehkan]

I don't know. It's possible that there were a lot of disgraceful situations too and you're only remembering the good ones. I wasn't there.

[Animatronic Daemon Skwerral]

I'm one who was in Blackmore I&II, Bear Pits 1&2, the Marvin Mall incursion, Nichols fall to Big Bash, Shearbank battle between the Shackers and PTT, and a bunch of others. Were all still here.

The game is different than it was in Caiger mall sieges.
First you have to look at the updates.
Single Body Dumping, Ransack, Easier destruction of barricades, modifications to weapon use of inventory have all been in favor of zombies and are partially why river tactics are more appealing because the one AP usage advantage survivors have would be in the area of CadeVDecade.

Second the tactics have changed greatly.
In the old days 100+ zombies would just stare outside the cades, occasionally 20 or so would coordinate together to try and swing momentum. People would freak and flee and thats how they would get in. Now we have to deal with groups that are extremely well micromanaged. the type that can swing open the doors and move 50+ zombies into a building. Looking at LUE they can do that with 300 zombies. In addition to the RRF, extinction, and ferral undead that are probably aiding them.

Part of smart tactics is knowing when you're out gunned. Never fight an enemy on their terms. So what, you made a last stand that gets steam rollered, you will not delay anything in this situation of hildebrand mall just made some zombies more dangerous by giving them EXP. You may not liking us using river tactics but whenever people like you try making a pathetic stand, we're the ones that revive you and clean up the mess afterwards.

[Trehkan]

But only because you weren't there to make the stand with us.

While it's true that zombies have gained some advantage in the game, tactically we have every single advantage they do. Even more, because we can communicate in-game as well. In (relative) peacetime, malls and surrounding buildings usually house more than a few hundreds of people. It's only because the majority of those people flee at the first sign of danger that the ones who stay don't have a chance at defending the mall.

[Animatronic Daemon Skwerral]

First off, Hildebrand doesnt have a few hundred. Neither does Thompson or Marvin mall. If theyre lucky they can break 200 but just barely. Thats something usually exclusive to Caiger. Also even if there is 200 people thats 200 dispersed between 4 corners, whereas zombies just have to coordinate on one corner.

Secondly, zombies are more prone to the metagame because in order for them to take down malls and win, they have to coordinate on a mass scale. This is something theyre familiar with because theyve been doing it alot longer than survivors and is also why zombies are usually closer knit together. Survivors on the other hand can dont need as much coordination in their ranks because Cade Strafing allows for more loose coordination.

This group's ability to mobilize itself is what will make them win not because i stepped 2 blocks away to wait out the storm. In order for you to do what you suggest you need alot of people in all 4 corners of the mall willing to dedicate themselves at round the clock cading. It's not going to happen at hildebrand. Sorry but thats the plain reality. Alot of people are dispersed and regaining their footing after having Bale, Nichols, Blackmore, and Ackland fall. Also the people of hildebrand are more concerned with attacking the quartly and other jack-off activities to be real defense force, which is why I will most likely kick open the doors for the zeds at the first sign of a siege... It takes alot of planning and intergroup coordination to make a good stand against something like this.

[Trehkan]

That's exactly my point. The problem is not innate to the game, it's with survivor attitudes. And I don't know about Hildebrand, but I don't think a high survivor concentration is exclusive to "famous" malls or Caiger. When I was at Blesley, just before the Mall Tour attacked, there were about 4-500 people in the mall, at least 100 in every corner, plus some more in adjacent buildings. Of course, that number quickly went down after the Tour began the siege.

No, you stepping away from the scene isn't what will make the defenders lose. It's the other 100 people who think the same way doing the same thing that will do that.

[Magatsu Taito]

I'm wit Animatronic on this one... There is almost no way to fight back a hoarde of 200+ if they are well co-ordinated, unless you spy on them and know when they are going to strike. If they break in, you will most likely not be able to get them out again, unless you are lucky enough to notice seconds after the breach, and then get about 100 survivors to fight the zeds before they're all zed snacks.
Those odds are very bad for survivors, since when we day the AP watsted on getting a revive, and then healed, will give the zeds an advantage. Unless the survivors form a hoarde themselves and fight the first one... That could be kinda fun when you think about it.
Ponit is i dont think it's possible to stop a well co-ordinated zed break-in. Unless you have double the amount of survivors, consisting of big groups in diffrent time-zones, so that at least one group can stand guard at all times.

[Trehkan]

All of those problems can be solved easily with a little coordination. The problem is that the survivors have hardly any coordination, since they don't even think of defending anything except for a few brave people and they just do it randomly.

[Specialist290]

Exactly. As you said before, though, this has more to do w/ people's attitudes, and attitudes are unfortunately very difficult to change, even in the face of superior logic.

[Magatsu Taito]

Sure, in case of retaking places co-ordination will of course work best, but when fighting a over a mall you can never know when the zeds will strike, and therefore, because of the zeds co-ordination, it can't be defended very easily. Of course that depends a bit on how co-ordinated the zeds are.