YMMV / Zombie Stories (Roblox)

• Anti-Climax Boss: The Noob Leader. He sets himself up as one of the toughest bosses since the Tank with his newly-developed Psychic Powers... yet, all of his attacks are very easy to avoid, and the only attacks that's a threat is his opening attack, which can lure unsuspecting players in for a nasty surprise... of 25% damage. The Noob Clones are legitimately the real threat, and they can be easily cleared.
• Breather Level: After at least two infamously hard levels that involve unusually powerful zombies and an absurd Zerg Rush in the Legacy Stories, Area 51 is surprisingly more relaxing in terms of difficulty, since the hordes are easily handled due to their smaller size and more cover, along with more space to shoot them, and the boss is one of the easiest bosses in the game. The only hard part is the Assault Noobs, and even then, they spawn in a short section.
• Broken Base:
  • One thing that commonly divides players: HK21 or RPK? Defenders of the former claim that its massive ammo reserves it great for suppressing fire, especially since the RPK was nerfed through its magazine being reduced from 75 to 50, while defenders of the latter claim that it has DPS advantage due to its headshot multiplier, while the HK21 doesn't have it, and the RPK requires some skill to use efficiently.
    • Later, the Ultimax 100 usurped the HK21 in the debate, meaning that the debate nowadays revolves on either the RPK or the Ultimax 100.
• Demonic Spiders:
  • The Assault Noobs are one of the few enemies to carry guns... and they're actually pretty good at using them, taking off a good chunk of your health and requiring cover and shoot tactics to carefully kill one.
  • All of the special infected in "Contamination", much like in the original, though some of them are easier to deal with thanks to the modifications Zombie Stories makes to the level. This still doesn't stop a few mentions:
    • Hunters are supposed to be the fastest yet weakest of the special infected, yet in practice are Lightning Bruisers with taking at least 4 headshots from a Ruger 10/22 to take one down. They're also fast enough to catch up with focused Assault and Snipers, resulting in a rush to kill them before they kill you.
    • Chargers exchange some speed in exchange for more health, basically making them tankier Hunters. Furthermore, one of them appears in the hallway alongside a Smoker, and a zombie horde not long after, meaning that you have to kill the Charger and Smoker before things turn south very quickly.
    • Smokers, while thankfully are only two in the whole level, suffer from severe Hitbox Dissonance in which you sometimes can aim at the head, but sometimes the hit counts as a body shot, resulting in multiple ammo being wasted to take one down. Oh, and the aforementioned last one spawns in the same area as a Charger, meaning that you have to kill them both before the zombie horde arrives quickly, unless you want to end up like the Greenhorn Team from Goblin Slayer, in which you will likely be slaughtered!
    • Boomers, while not as durable compared to the others, makes up for it being an Action Bomb that jumps right out of places where you think it's safe, but aren't. For example, after dealing with at least 2 hordes in the beginning of the chapter, you think that, after all those, you might as well camp right at where you spawn before Mike directs you to the next area. Nope! One spawns right near you, and if you're not careful, you might as well lose a life.
• Goddamned Boss:
  • The "Base Hawk" boss is this in the "Base Hawk Samurai" scenario. Good news: You have a very powerful shield that can withstand a shockwave and are also equipped with a Katana. Bad news: The boss' health wasn't adjusted for the Katana's pitiful DPS, meaning that you're going to need a team of Assaults/Snipers to whittle it down. Later updates lowered the boss' health in response to this.
  • The boss of Base Hawk Chapter 3 is quite annoying, since while its attacks are heavily telegraphed, you're being continuously hounded by zombies. Furthermore, this marks the first time a boss ever has armor, meaning that every weapon that doesn't have AP properties will deal reduced damage until the armor is broken off. Once his health reaches halfway, he'll ditch the gun in favor of charging you, which is dangerous since you're being hounded by zombies and being attacked by him at the same time.
• Junk Rare: Inevitable in a game where obtaining skins allows you to obtain weapons earlier than usual, such as the poorly-received shotguns, but one notable case is the Jack Carbine. You think that, being a former gamepass weapon turned skin exclusive, it's highly valuable. Nope! It actually has terrible stats, being a poor cross between a Assault Rifle and a Submachine Gun, with numerous Assault Rifles downright overshadowing it, and the Medic has access to the Vityaz and the PPSh-41.
• Loot Drama: Inevitable in a game that has loot boxes, but this is usually balanced out by either of the great guns being easily available as Typical skins (Vityaz, RPK) or easily unlockable (Ruger 10/22, Makarov, G17). However, the one that doesn't fit both can create enough trade requests to fill up the lobby chat to the point of sheer annoyance. It's often not surprising for people to sometimes decline trades because the person trading them doesn't have the item mentioned in this list, even though they have other Rares or Mythicals. Here are some examples:
  • The first is the ACR, which not only has as of October 18, 2020, the best all-around stats, but is locked away at Level 35, and only available to use early if you get its skin... Which is only available at Rare and Mythical.
  • Yet another one was the sudden release of the Ultimax 100, which has notably a superior HK21 that can be unlocked at level 25 (less so than the ACR, but still!). Much like the ACR, it's skins are currently as of December 20, 2020 available only at rare (but thankfully not Mythical).
• Low-Tier Letdown: The Sniper is considered to be the worst class in the game, due to being a Long-Range Fighter in a game that encourages Close Range Combatants with zombies, and while they have Focus to make up for it, Assault also shares this ability, thus making it redundant. Furthermore, most of the weapons the Sniper has are plain terrible due to sharing the same issues with the Shotgun, though notable exceptions exist with the Ruger 10/22 and the M14 EBR. They also lack sights, which is ironic for a Sniper, since most Snipers tend to aim down their scope for precision skills. That being said, this only applies to first three difficulties: In Nightmare, they're considered to be at least viable due to their weapons having a innate penetration stat, while the Assault needs to sacrifice some of their damage potential to be as effective over there. Even the M14's Balance Buff wasn't enough to save them, as while it did give them a full-auto option, it had a massive drawback of lowered reload speed, and thus poor DPS as a result.
• Obvious Judas: Extraction's The Boss is obviously not trying to infect people with OPV MRM to turn them into Super Soldiers. The writing found across Base Hawk is probably just written by an insane person.
• Scrappy Mechanic:
  • The fact the ammo boxes are removed from the Hard difficulty setting on Zombie Tower has been a massive point of contention, as it turns the remake from an exciting zombie slaughterfest to basically slowing the entire game down to a crawl as it forces players to literally Run or Die unless they bring a Support to provide ammo.
  • Also, the fact that you can't transfer XP from a weapon skin to another is a massive point of contention. For example, any XP made by the Ice ACR will not have its levels transferred to the vanilla ACR, even though they're basically the same weapon, and vice-versa.
  • You cannot jump at all in "Base Hawk". Aside from being frustrating when trying to move past an easily-bypassed obstacle via jumping, there's also the fact that this renders you helpless against the boss.
• Scrappy Weapon:
  • Shotguns are considered by many to be unanimously the worst weapon type in the game, due its poor RPM not being made up by high damage. Furthermore, the two classes that wield them, Medic and Support, have other weapons that have higher DPS than them. While this is alleviated with the introduction of the M1014 which is a semi-automatic shotgun, it still somewhat lags behind the Medic and Support's SMGs and LMGs respectively, which have better DPS and have mods to make up for it. It got so bad that a shotgun rework was made in an attempt to fix them, and while the Maverick, M870, and Wingmaster got the short end of the stick in terms of modifications, both the Persuader 500 and the M1014 got upgrades that allowed them to keep up with other primaries, with the Persuader getting an actual drum magazine and later was given a buff by reducing the reload time with the drum magazine, and the M1014 got a mod that allows it to reload much faster, and while it doesn't downright replace the Support's LMGs due to their high magazine capacity, it does make it a viable alternative towards the Medic's SMGs due to having DPS that rivals them as well.
  • The HK21 is a prime example of a weapon being power crept by another useful weapon. Prior to the release of the Ultimax 100, the HK21 big selling point was that it had a massive magazine, thus compensating for the lack of headshot damage and was a reason for passing over the RPK, especially after the RPK got its magazine size nerfed. However, the release of the Ultimax 100 caused even the most fervent defenders of the gun to jump ship for it, as it's basically that but with actual headshot damage. Nowadays, whenever it's brought up, it's considered to be a prime example of how one flaw can kill a weapon's viability overnight. Eventually, a buff that gave the HK21 an actual headshot multiplier made it Rescued from the Scrappy Heap, since it's now generally downright superior compared to the Ultimax 100, due to a faster reload speed and higher DPS, but an later update nerfed its headshot damage, with its current headshot multiplier being not enough to compensate for the RPK's high DPS. Because of this, another buff was made by exchanging recoil control and reload speed in favor of a headshot multiplier and a damage buff, now making a high-risk, high-reward weapon compared to the RPK and Ultimax.
  • Machine Pistols, such as the CZ 75 and the G18, have the honor of being the only secondaries with full-auto. Problem is, their damage output is really poor even by pistol standards, and equipping one is a good sign that they lack knowledge. While the CZ 75 got a damage buff, it came at the cost of magazine size, thus still making it not useful. Eventually, an update which pretty much rebalanced every pistol saw the G18 get a mod that essentially allowed it to compete with the Makarov.
  • The AE-21 can only be unlocked by the Assault class reaching Level 40, or by participating in the Live Event when it first came out. Unfortunately, upon its release, many players has deemed the grind not worth it, because it has an incredibly painful reload time, and subpar RPM means that it has an incredibly low DPS compared to other high-end rifles, especially the SCAR-H and the ACR. Unlike other examples on the list, this one started a massive riot at the playerbase because of how it took a long time for the second part of the Live Event to be released, only for them to be rewarded with an subpar reward, to the point where even a hotfix that umped the RPM of the weapon and a slight damage buff being not enough. Another buff was later released in which it reduced the reload time, but at the expense of decreasing the RPM buff, much the playerbase's annoyance, as even with that, it's generally inferior to both the SCAR-H and the ACR. Another buff was made that increased its magazine size a bit, but even then it's regarded as a poor man's substitute for an AK-12... which actually has gotten some buffs to make it more stronger.
• That One Boss:
  • The Tank is considered to be the hardest boss in the game, for good reason: It simply opts to charge right at you mercilessly at you every opportunity it has, and has boatloads of health to boot. To make matters worse, it becomes faster after losing half of its health, meaning that the only way to keep it from running you over is to run constantly while hoping that your teammates are at least competent enough to kill it before it kills you. Oh, and if you're down to two players? The player who is down has to either give up, or revive with either an AED or 4 Robux, since the way his A.I works is that he will rush to the player reviving other players, and prevent them from reviving. This also works with gathering ammo, so players who are working together have to literally use every ammo they got against him, including their secondaries, and pray that they don't run out before the Tank kills them. Thankfully, the Tank doesn't become faster on Solo... provided you survive the onslaught of zombies prior to facing it.
  • The boss faced at the end of "Base Hawk" not only is about as fast as the tank, but also has a shockwave attack. Unlike "Zombie Tower"'s Giant Zombie, you cannot dodge it at all: This is because the ability to jump is removed for this level, rendering it impossible to survive unless you keep attacking, which considering the bloated health boss has and how cramped the arena is, makes it impossible to simply stand around unless someone else is distracting the boss.
  • However, all of them pale in comparison to the absolute rage-inducing nightmare that is Nick's Squad in "Findings". At first, it starts out easy enough: A Close-Range Combatant who can be easily be stunned by shooting him many times while he is in Blitz Mode. The real difficulty comes in when the Long-Range Fighter eventually decides to fight together with them. If the squad tries to alleviate this by killing the first boss, then the third one will toss grenades while the shooter get an easy shot on them while trying to avoid the blast radius of the grenades. Oh, and don't think that being downed and exploiting the Last Stand mechanic will save you: There's a Game-Breaking Bug in which their bullets will miss even if aimed directly at them. Thankfully, once two of them are killed, it gets much easier, but good luck trying to do that. On easy, they're already a pain to fight, but on Hard, it's borderline insanity.
• That One Level:
  • Contamination is considered to be one the hardest level in the game. Part of this is because it retain the original's difficulty too well: Aside from the zombies taking forever to kill even with headshots, there's also the fact that the Special Infected tend to spawn in places where breathers aren't tolerated, and to make matters worse, on higher difficulties, some of them even spawn right after a horde! And to top it off, the boss, the Tank, is considered by many to be the hardest boss in the game. And if you're playing Solo? Hope you got a specific build for this, unless you're willing to get slaughtered!
  • Lab Breach. Take whatever positives 2 Days Later have, except remove those, and replace it with a bunch of Zerg Rushes with no hiding place, and you have a contender for the second hardest level in the game.
  • Underground. While as of October 18, 2020 is still undergoing some fixes, is reviled by many to be the worst level in the game for very good reason: Not just because of the fueling sequence, but the finale is considered to be one of the hardest parts of the entire game. For starters, the zombies, rather than spawning through the doors, spawn from above (and pre-hotfix Underground was worse; They randomly spawned straight from above, veering it straight into Fake Difficulty), and they come in hordes, which is not helped by the cramped space. Second is that, unlike other levels in which the boss spawns after the horde disappears or the map ends, another horde appears, this time becoming much stronger thanks to them being comprised of dark zombies, effectively turning the mission into a massive Marathon Level. After that, then the boss appears, and while it's thankfully easier compared to the rest of the level, players have to watch out for the zombie reinforcements that come with it, which, unlike the rest of the zombies in that level, spawn randomly from above. Good luck trying to find a Hard lobby with these.
    • For additional reasons why it's hard: The above 2 levels can be soloed under the right conditions. Underground is nigh-impossible to solo even with the right build. That's how hard it is.
  • Due to how the level is design, it's not the entirety of Zombie Tower that gets this, but rather the floors, mostly regarding Floor 6, which is a massive Zerg Rush, forcing players to use up every single amount of their ammo, before forcing them to run quickly to the ammo box before the zombies slaughter them. Oh, and in Hard, it's even worse; The ammo box is removed from that floor, meaning that if you don't have a good Support, you are forced to run for your lives!
  • Some tasks in Wild Holiday have been proven to be a pain, especially in higher difficulties:
    • "Repair the Train!" and "Redecorate the Tree!" are frustrating to complete, since it involves you slowly getting supplies to repair the train and redecorate the tree by standing in certain locations, some of which are conveniently located near places where zombies can ambush you, though the former deserves special mention that if you get this as your first objective, then the location where you have to repair the train is right where zombies can ambush you. The only saving grace for the former is that the location of the train repair is usually near an infinite ammo box.
    • "Escort the Elves!" involves an Escort Mission in which you escort the Elves back to the train. Depending on the location, not only is the Elf far away from the train, but they sometimes have a tendency to go straight into the path of the zombies. Fortunately, Invulnerable Civilians is in effect for these elves.
• That One Sidequest: The Special Rush for Contamination. Since it replaces every normal zombie with Special Zombies, combined with the faster pace of the level, it's already hard enough without bringing the high-leveled gun, but what really puts it here is that you can't play this with multiple players. Hope you brought that Sniper you've been neglecting, since their weapons' piercing allows for multiple zombies being hit with one shot!