The Last Stand Community Update



The Last Stand Community Update, or simply The Last Stand Update, is a fourth DLC for Left 4 Dead 2, released on September 24, 2020 and made by the L4D2 community members. It features "The Last Stand" two-map campaign, 20 new survival maps, 4 new scavenge maps, 30 new achievements and much more.

This content update is PC exclusive and won't come to Xbox 360. This update is a second community-based update for Left 4 Dead 2, the first being the Cold Stream DLC released in 2012 for both the PC and Xbox 360.

New content

 * A TON of bug and exploit fixes, too many to list. Also, specific PVP enhancements and fixes.
 * "The Last Stand", a brand new campaign based on the original Survival map—it's no longer impossible to survive.
 * Introduces Versus Survival to the Main Menu, which was formerly a mutation gamemode.
 * Adds 26 new Survival maps based on the first Left 4 Dead and the previously hidden Left 4 Dead 2 survival maps.
 * Adds 4 new Scavenge arenas based on the first Left 4 Dead.
 * Adds 30 new achievements, mainly based on the new features.
 * Adds two new Mutations: "RocketDude" and "Tank Run".
 * The Last Stand Update did originally feature a mutation named "Training Toolbox", which intended to give the player a place to practice a variety of customizable scenarios to improve their skills. Unlike "RocketDude", this mutation was cut from The Last Stand Update because its presentation was considered to be lacking and not polished enough. It was released on Steam Workshop separately on the same day as the update.
 * Adds two entirely new melee weapons, the shovel and pitchfork, which have also been added to existing campaigns unlike previous DLC weapons.

Gameplay and AI changes

 * The once-exclusive international weapons from Counter-Strike are now spawned by The Director in all servers. Thus, the only weapons that remain officialy out of Left 4 Dead 2 are the M1911 Pistol and the weapons from the arcade game.
 * By default, the Counter-Strike weapons are half as likely to replace any usual weapon spawn.
 * Several weapon changes:
 * The Steyr Scout's damage has been buffed from 95 to 105.
 * The Combat Knife's swing speed was reduced by 10%.
 * The Pump Shotgun and Chrome Shotgun's max ammo was increased from 56 to 72.
 * Certain melee weapons can now be found in more areas instead of being restricted to a few campaigns:
 * The Golf Club now spawns in Dead Center, Crash Course, Dead Air, and The Sacrifice instead of only appearing in The Passing.
 * The Axe has also been added to Death Toll and the Frying Pan was added to Crash Course as well.
 * The Nightstick can be encountered in Dead Air, Blood Harvest, and The Sacrifice. This is largely in part to accommodate the appearance of Common Infected police officers in the ported Left 4 Dead campaigns.
 * The Witch now takes far less time to kill an incapacitated target in Normal and Advanced difficulties, like she did in the first game. Previously she inflicted damage to her target every two seconds.
 * The Uncommon Infected now make more appearances in the Left 4 Dead campaigns.
 * The Fallen Survivor can now appear in more campaigns beyond their original exclusivity to The Passing, including No Mercy, Crash Course and Death Toll. The military parachutist from The Swamp can now appear as an unique Fallen Survivor as well.
 * The CEDA Worker Infected now appears during the entirety of The Hospital, equipped with unique white suits. Before the update they were confined to appear only at the front entrance area of Mercy Hospital and during The Sacrifice.
 * The Mud Men now appear in The Sewer of No Mercy and in The Drains of Death Toll. They are also featured in the new map The Junkyard.
 * The Worker Infected now appear in the upper floors of The Hospital and within The Construction Site as construction workers, as well as in The Terminal standing in for baggage handlers. They appear in The Junkyard as well.
 * If a Survivor is incapacitated inside of a rescue vehicle, they will survive the campaign nonetheless.
 * The noise of the oxygen tank leaking before exploding now attracts nearby common infected. This repurposed the weapon making it way more useful.
 * As aforementioned, Common Infected police officers will drop Nightsticks when slain during the Left 4 Dead campaigns. Before the update, the nightsticks carried by them were aesthetic and only Uncommon Infected could drop items.
 * Changes to AI:
 * The Left 4 Dead survivors now have the same weapons preferences as the first game (eg. Francis now favors the Auto Shotgun).
 * Bot survivors now consider their health to be critical below 30HP (was 40). This makes them less likely to waste health items, which they were notorious for doing prior to this update.

Aesthetic changes

 * Removed the "Single Player" option from the main menu carousel, instead adding it as a drop-down menu option for all co-operative game modes, making it user-friendly to play an offline game of Realism, Survival or any co-op Mutation.
 * The update also made it more straightforward to create a new game lobby.
 * New animations and UI improvements. While there are too many changes to list individually, some notable ones are listed below:
 * Jigglebones have been implemented to certain weapons (such as the strap of the Silenced Submachine Gun and the folded stock of the Combat Shotgun) and some other areas (such as Rochelle's jewelry and earrings).
 * Most Survivors have unique animations for certain actions such as using a medkit on themselves or a teammate, reviving an incapacitated teammate, and being incapacitated, much like how Zoey had separate animations in Left 4 Dead.
 * Boomer gibs are now turned on by default, causing killed Boomers to spawn head, arm and organ gibs.
 * When playing as the Charger, his left arm is now visible in firstperson and uses jigglebones.
 * Burn textures on Infected have been restored.
 * Improved brass eject particles for non-shotguns, and all weapon view models emit muzzle smoke from the correct position.
 * Improved weapon viewmodels. Prior to this update, some weapons, such as the M60 or SIG SG 552, had visible cut-off points before they reached the edge of the camera's view.
 * All weapons and items now have individualized UI icons and/or sounds, allowing for easier modding without the use of scripts.
 * New rare skins for several weapons, which replace their default skins in certain spawn points. This list includes:
 * "Gold" Crowbar (an easter egg skin used for certain achievements)
 * "Worn" versions of the Assault Rifle, Hunting Rifle, Auto Shotgun, Submachine Gun and Silenced Submachine Gun.
 * "NamVet" Assault Rifle.
 * "Wartorn" & "Rural" AK-47.
 * "BlueWood" & "Operative" Desert Eagle.
 * "Swapped" Pump Shotguns and Chrome Shotguns, which recolor the shotguns to look like their counterpart.
 * "Trophy" Cricket Bat, previously available only in the Australian release of Left 4 Dead 2.
 * "Green" & "Diesel" Gas Cans, which appear similar to the unusable green gas cans throughout the game, and strapped on the survivor's backs during Hard Rain.
 * Formerly unused dialogue was restored for both Left 4 Dead 2 original campaigns and Left 4 Dead campaign ports, resulting in more potential conversations between Survivors that are specific to the campaign's scenario and surroundings. Many unused lines were already of public knowledge as they could be found in the files from earlier game builds, however, the Last Stand Update restored even voice lines completely unknown previously.
 * The Left 4 Dead Survivors are more vocal when discovering and using equipment introduced in Left 4 Dead 2; as before, this is done by repurposing of existing dialogue, however the range of vocalisations has been greatly expanded.
 * Cut dialogue related to deaths caused by friendly fire, as well as friendly fire occurences during a Tank fight, was restored.
 * When the Survivors are being chased by a Witch, they now scream in terror in addition to their existing dialogue for this situation.
 * When an incapacitated Survivor is running low on health, now they will scream for help in visible despair.
 * Many inconsistencies in dialogue and captions have been fixed; for example, captions for a Left 4 Dead survivor getting caught by a Smoker now properly shows "No, no!" to match the voice line (previously the captions showed "no, No, NO, NOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!").
 * Left 4 Dead Common and Special Infected models appear in campaigns featuring the Left 4 Dead survivors, with Left 4 Dead 2's visual gore systems added to the Common Infected. The Common Infected also had their scrapped skins from the early build of the first game restored.
 * Uncommon Infected (with exception of the Clown Infected and Jimmy Gibbs Jr) have also received new Left 4 Dead-styled skins for the Left 4 Dead campaigns.
 * In special, the Fallen Survivor has entirely new visuals based on the Helicopter Pilot/US Military zombies.
 * The Ceda Worker Infected got an entirely new blue hazmat suit, denoting the clinical environment of Mercy Hospital.
 * While the Riot Infected was not included in any of the campaigns from the first game, they got new skins themed in line with the first game, available as a material for custom content.
 * The soundtrack from the first game was restored and plays during its campaigns as well.
 * In The Last Stand campaign and Survival mode, when the final Tank comes out, a metal version of the Tank theme will play. This is an entirely new addition to the series' soundtrack.
 * The armored truck used by the Survivors to escape from Whitney County can be seen at the beginning of Death Toll since the update. This was, once again, an effort to settle a continuity between the first game's campaigns.
 * The dialogue from the civilian helicopter pilot contacted near the end of Cold Stream now has proper captions.

Reception
Although the update offered "a ton of bug and exploit fixes", it also introduced some new bugs. Most of the bugs in this update were related to the new survival maps and the way the new achievements unlocked. To fix the bugs, Valve and the Community Update Team periodically released a series of patches in the following days after the update was released.

While The Last Stand Update initially garnered overwhelmingly positive reception from both the gaming press and the player base, it gained detractors over time as well. Recurrent criticisms are about some of the balance changes, some mods becoming broken with the update (mainly UI mods and Survivor Animations mods), and the bot AI debatably becoming less intelligent.