This is a continuation of ZehMatt’s previous mod (A19) WalkerSim – Enhanced roaming zombies – Mods – 7 Days to Die but written from scratch. If you ever felt like this game lacks wandering zombies then this mod will be what you are looking for.
What Is This?
Instead of having zombies spawned at random this mod will simulate thousands of zombies on the map and when a player is close enough it will actually spawn them in-game, if the player is too far away the zombie will despawn and be put back into the simulation also remembering the state such as health and class. So if you clear some area then this area is actually clear until the zombies advance in the simulation to that area again.
This is a fast-forwarded illustration of how the simulation reacts to loud noises, the red circles illustrate the position and will fade out over time. WalkerSim will also load the roads which the zombies will prefer to navigate creating a more realistic behavior, even the undead probably prefer a path with least resistance. Most aspects of the simulation can be modified, see the xml file and its schema, proper documentation will follow at some point.
This preview is from the Viewer which is not polished enough yet to release and acts more as a debug tool for him, however you can see the simulation in-game by using the console command walkersim show which looks like following:
I want to see it before I test it!
Guppycur did stream some testing
Contact
Feel free to hop on the Discord Channel if you have any questions or issues, the channel is kindly hosted by Guppycur.
Installation & Usage
Local/Singleplayer
Download the latest version and unpack the zip into <YOUR_STEAM_PATH>/steamapps/common/7 Days to Die/Mods, so when unpacked it will be <YOUR_STEAM_PATH>/steamapps/common/7 Days to Die/Mods/WalkerSim/WalkerSimMod.dll
Servers
Download the latest version and unpack the zip into <PATH_TO_INSTALL>/steamapps/common/7 Days to Die Dedicated Server/Mods, so when unpacked it will be <YOUR_STEAM_PATH>/steamapps/common/7 Days to Die Dedicated Server/Mods/WalkerSim/WalkerSimMod.dll
WalkerSim comes with a standard configuration file which was created to work with Navezgane, the best way to modify the simulation configuration is to run WalkerSim.exe which is located in the Mods/WalkerSim directory, this is a GUI application to help you configure and preview the simulation before starting the game/server. The best way to get started is to import the default configuration Mods/WalkerSim in the GUI and change it as you please, once you are satisfied with the preview simply export the configuration and either replace the default WalkerSim.xml or place it in the world folder, if WalkerSim.xml exists in the world folder it will take priority and load that instead of the one inside the Mods/WalkerSim directory.
EAC NOTE
When using this mod on your computer, EAC should be turned off. When the mod is installed on a server then the clients do not require to turn it off.
LINUX NOTE
In case you see some exception when starting a dedicated server on Linux you may be missing some dependencies, run apt-get update && apt-get install -y apt-utils libgdiplus libc6-dev to resolve the issue, depending on your OS it might be a different package manager, just ensure libgdiplus and libc6-dev is installed.
Beta
The reason he’s putting it out there right now is to get early feedback and suggestions. A lot of the functionality is not properly documented.
Changelog
0.9.2
- Fix: Support for version 1.2.
- Change: WalkerSim.xml configuration changed, old configuration files will no longer work.
- Change: Print a hint to the console when the local configuration does not match the one in the saved simulation.
0.9.1
- Change: Raise density limit to 4000 and max agents to 1000000.
0.9-beta.8
- IMPORTANT: The configuration MaxAgents is now replaced by PopulationDensity to better support multiple world sizes with a single configuration. The new configuration specifies how many agents per square kilometer, so the total amount of agents will be square kilometers multiplied by density, for example having density set to 160 and playing on a 6k map will be 6 x 6 x 160 which will be 5760 agents in total.
- A lot of fixes to the viewer. If you don’t see any Worlds in the Viewer that means it failed to detect your 7 Days to Die Install, he will fix this in the next version.
- A couple bug fixes in the mod.
- Added new movement processors and re-organized them, existing configurations will probably no longer function correctly.
- Added walkersim stats console commands to print some information.
0.9-beta.7
- The simulation is now persistent which means that if a game is continued from a save file the simulation will be also restored.
- The viewer ‘WalkerSim.exe’ should be in a usable state now, you can now setup and preview the simulation and export the configuration.
- Fixed an issue that wouldn’t fast forward the newly created simulation when using TicksToAdvanceOnStartup
- Fixed custom sounds not being registered in the simulation.
- Changed how sound events decay, instead of decreasing the radius it has a duration and stays the same size.
- EnemySpawnMode is now respected, when disabled no zombies will be spawned.
- Added walkersim timescale <value> console commands to modify the simulation speed.
0.9-beta.6
- Fixed a performance issue.
- Implemented more functionality in the viewer.
0.9-beta.5
- Fixed exception when game is starting.
0.9-beta.4
- Fixed zombies not spawning near players that previously died.
- Respawning is now implemented, agents will respawn according the configuration of AgentRespawnPosition
- Added walkersim pause and walkersim resume console commands to pause/resume the simulation.
- Added detection to see if the client is the host and disables the mod accordingly, joining servers with the mod installed will no longer error.
DOWNLOAD (337 KB)
The forum topic of the mod is here.
Credits: ZehMatt
If you have any questions or have any problems/bugs, please use the support link (Discord, Forum Topic, GitHub Issues, etc.) in the post. If there is no support link in the post, please use the comments section.
Interesting modification. And indeed, new zombies appeared that are not in random generation. Only it seems to work in one game session, since after restarting the program, new spawn points appear.
If someone does not display worlds in the program, then there is a solution:
You need to specify the path to the game in the registry editor. Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\Steam App 251570 there should be a parameter called “InstallLocation”
The value of “InstallLocation” should indicate the path to the folder with the game. Example: C:\your path\7 Days To Die\
If you do not have a “Steam App 251570” section. Then you need to create it and add the “InstallLocation” parameter.
I’m always checking the site for an update, I’m exited on what you can bring. This mod has potential to be the best mod ever created. Good luck with your next update! I’ll be waiting 🙂
Sadly exe files are a no go for dedicated online servers. Does it need that file?
uuuuhhhh NEED MORE OF THIS PLZ
Is this mod compatible with Max Animals/Zombies and Claim Blocks , by KhaineGB?
how do you load a world into the Sim editor? i see how to import settings and stuff and change the seed but cant find where to import map so you can see roads and pois
Fun way to use this mod: Use mods that increase the general zombie population, set them all to walk speed, reduce their block damage to 50% or less, feral sense on ALL, and reduce the difficulty to under Warrior.
Hearing the smashing of the walls from all sides by 20-30 zombies while you desperately speed through a house collecting all the stuff is terrifying and high pressure. Being caught in that crowd means certain death for much of the game until you reach really high levels so you end up running more than fighting. I can sometimes get them into a chokepoint and slowly cut through their numbers over time, but I usually will run out of stamina or lose the ability to see past all the corpses so I end up running away anyways.
It also makes trader stops more interesting. You can literally hear them at the gate doors and sometimes they pop over the fence and enter the area. It’s damn scary to open the door, thinking you were perfectly safe, and be jumpscared by a zombie you couldn’t hear because there are zombies surrounding you constantly.
I had to reduce the zombie sounds a bit but overall, it gives me the feeling of living in in a Romero film universe.
I was killed in an ocean of zombies at one point and it was genuinely scary. Very fun.
Works well, but when using with the NPC Mod, no zombies spawn in the wasteland, snow or desert biomes. I had a bunch (20 or so) Harley NPC’s come out from behind the Crack a Book Cafe in the snow biome and had to run for my life.
On the latest Beta 5, my game freezes whenever I shoot a zombie with random guns and almost halts to a stop when using the WalkerSim show command.
I had Izayo’s AIO gun pack so I suspected of it to have been the cause but before removing it, I removed WalkerSim just to make sure it wasn’t the AI but it stopped freezing after removing WalkerSim. It’s probably due to the CPU processing things and perhaps even incompatibilities with other mods. My last suspect would be just a slow processor but I’m no expert so I can’t say but for reference sake, I am on a laptop, with Intel i7-10750H.
I don’t think the log would be of much help here since there was nothing unusual, just slowdowns. But I just wanted to report on things. Do tell me if you want the log though.
I’ve tried everything and can’t get it to work. It says I’m missing dependency an I tried ur solution but still nothing so guess I’m doing something wrong.
LOL why is there an .EXE in that zip?
To run the simulation window
Seems like this may clash with other horde mods. I had this installed with a few others, namely Improved Hordes, EXTRA Mob Spawns 2x 4x 10x, and Return of the Hordes. This combination meant wandering zombie spawns were very rare, I could see them via the ‘walkersim show’ console command, but it didn’t seem like they were spawning.
I had the same experience. Would love to work with you on increasing zombies in the game and comparing notes on what mods we have installed.
It works really well, only annoyance i personally have the spawning of more zombies is a bit too close to the location of the player. And i dont know if its the mod but when i took over a house even when crouched and at 1% visibility the zombies knew where i was. No other mods installed and no feral sense was on. Maybe i just had bad luck.
Doesn’t seem to work or do anything, nothing compared to the video anyways. Might be conflicting with one of my other mods, I have around 30 mods LOL.