Saethkept

At least it showed up as something. I once spent a lot of time stalking up on one those fake but real looking white cars sitting in the middle of a field. All that low crawling for nothing ...

PvP for certain. I tend to die by nefarious means more often on PvE servers, but honestly that is because I do not understand them. For instance, say you're in a loot rich building on a PvE server - a kill house for instance on Celle - when some other player pulls up outside and asks you if he can give you a lift (he must have seen you enter). You calmly reply "No. Thank you anyway." Well that other player will not leave. He just sits outside in his UAZ asking over and over why you will not accept a ride. Remember now, it is a no PvP server. Well I don't know what you would have done in said siutation, OP. Me, I dropped two grenades out the window and ducked. Problem solved. New problem. I was banned from the server. PvE only servers? I just don't get it. Side not for you OP: The best servers I have sampled were run by admins you never heard nor saw. Just me perhaps, but micro management is a big turnoff.

Nice work. I often hop over to the forums a few times a day, to see if I can kill a few minutes; your comic series did that and put a smile on my face.

I think that fixing and fueling up vehicles is still worth it and always has been. Where vehicles are concerned in DayZ, every aspect related to and governing them is very fluid. Think of the chain of vehicle possession as a variably short/long cycle that can run based on completely random events, or not at all. Someone finds a car, a Skoda for example. That player repairs it enough to drive, throws some fuel in the tank. He then dies. Someone else finds our Skoda, beats the heck out of it and then leaves on the side of the road after it breaks down. You log in, you find the Skoda. You take the time to repair it to cherry, fuel it, use it and then lovingly hide it on the edge of the map. The cycle has begun. You then log in the next day. Either someone else is driving your beloved Skoda, or it is simply gone. Cycle complete. Playing, enjoying and surviving DayZ is all about variables. Everything is wickedly fluid and changeable. Strategy, experience, tips and reading guides can help you to understand and plan for the variance of the many fluid variables, but in the end - nothing you have amassed will permanently belong to you. Glitches, admin intervention, bugs, other players - all combine to create the Bermuda Triangle of PC Gaming. By the way, make sure you don't park your vehicles on the edge of the map.

No, I would not play on such a server - not for long. Nothing is permanent in DayZ for the player. Changing that fundamental concept goes against the grain of the original mechanic and changes DayZ into something else. No place on the map should 100% safe/secure - in my opinion, and vehicle hoarding obviously negatively effects other players on a given server.

Yeah, I gave you some beans, OP and have a can of sardines as well. I've run a server for nearly five months and it will remain donation free. What aggravates the issue even redder I feel, are those servers that draw players in and give them a good time to hook them, and then demand a donation to continue playing. If one cannot afford to run a server, then they cannot afford it. Putting the cost on your player base is contrary - in my opinion - to the spirit of DayZ which is a free mod based on a couple of games you must first purchase. I have also played on servers where the admins were clearly trying to make money beyond server and communication rentals to put in their pockets. That ticks me off, but if players are willing to pay to play, then I suppose that is on them. Above the above issue, is another related matter that also rankles. That is the use of server add-ons and other code written by brilliant scripters around the DayZ community, to attract people to a server and get them to donate. I am no coder, but I have created or modified a few miniscule bits of code for use as server side add-ons and seeing them advertised on new servers as features that should be paid for is somewhat chafing. Obviously there's nothing that can be done as the code was put out there by its authors for everyone to use, but using it in conjunction with advertisements for server donations is pretty darn tasteless. What are you gonna do I guess? The tragedy of playing on private servers is that you have to put your faith in the hands of someone who can on a whim and like some cyber deity, literally change your DayZ life to suit whatever new desire of theirs arises. I think that that is one aspect new players take some time to realize - I know I did. There are some good admins out there on private hives, and I am not claiming to be one of them. Testing dozens of add-ons by rebuilding and uploading mission and server .pbo files over and over takes a lot of time and can be too disruptive to build any sort of long term player base. I just think that newer players need to be made aware of the power held by admins of private servers, along with possible foul play dancing on the fingertips of the less savory ones.

The .50 rifles have been removed from my server for months. The only thing that had reminded me of them - ammo that still spawned - was recently also removed from the loot piles. Thus I voted for removing them and replacing them with nothing else. Other weapons that spawn on my server are more than adequate for long range shooting purposes. Heck, the L85 LSW can hit and kill past 600 meters. I am aware that the LSW does not spawn on official servers however, the G36A and K have similar capabilities, and of course the DMR remains. Case closed.

And a very funerary joke at that. Knowing that Martin has sanctioned the mutant hybrid that is Origins, mated with Taviana, inspires many reactions; humor is not one of them. I cannot believe .com is down to so few servers, while Origins grows. The bad taste leaves a bad taste.

The crash sites on Namalsk are fixed and permanent. On the map in game they are represented as small grey rectangles. Find them here: http://dayzdb.com/map/namalsk#5.043.061

Some of the custom debug monitors - like the OP is talking about - do come with a bindable key option to turn them on or off. Depending on what server you play most on OP, I would ask the server owner/admin if such is the case with debug monitor they use. Unfortunately, the code for most all custom debug monitors is placed in the server mission .pbo init.sqf file which is server side, so I do not think there is anything one could do to turn it off client side.

@the OP, The only way to find out if you like DayZ is to give it a shot. Take the plunge and go for it. While there are a number of key controls to learn, you would eventually master them and find playing quite simple. If you do go ahead and try DayZ, you'll come away with dramatic and overly complex narratives of your adventures which you could then post here to keep the bored masses entertained. So do your part, OP. Get DayZ - keep us entertained. Don't let us continue to be the bored masses.

The direct chat warnings were likely set up by the admin of that server who also likely has a server rule which forbids talk in side chat, but gives you multiple chances to break it before you get kicked. You say the problem you are having with not being able to pick up certain items occurs on all servers you've tried? Have you tampered at all with the @DayZ Code file on your hard drive? That sounds almost like something is wrong with the fn_selfActions.sqf file located in that code, or it could be something else.

Edit: I think that Steak and I posted at about the same time ^^ To play DayZ, all you need are Arma2 and Operation Arrowhead. - Install Arma2 and O.A. - Run them each once to complete the setup - Download and install DayZ Commander - Run DayZ Commander - Click on Install/Update at the top - Click on Update Arma2 - Click on Install DayZ - Install whichever other DayZ Mods you like

I prefer the advantages of other players trying to kill me. The disadvantage ... sometimes they succeed. The advantages, well everyone needs a bit of action, and the spark of tension igniting constant paranoia when someone attacks me, is always appreciated - eventually.

There is always a goal to achieve in DayZ ... if you are willing to put in the effort and allow yourself to be challenged. You could hop on a server where all of your later stage game goals are provided for, where you can fuel your vehicles at gas stations, fix them at repair stations, get any weapon you want out of a box, etc. Or you could seek to experience the true challenge of DayZ - which is rather steep. The DayZ where you must spend hours repairing vehicles, much time refueling them, where you must actually search for the weapons you hope to use or make due with what you have, and where survival is a constant issue you cannot ignore. As for the OP's post, your argument is a priori. Some of us want to be challenged, limited, engaged by difficulty ... others may indeed want super weapons or easy buttons. Cliched though it may be, like most other aspects of life the DayZ player base is a double edged sword at war with itself and highly likely to fluidly change its opinion from week to week. I say let the devs do their job, and be thankful someone is still developing the mod. The community will always influence the development of DayZ to some extent, but assumptive statements will be the least likely to be heard ... I hope.

Regardless of the intended or actual fictional time period, I like to envision post apocalyptic Chernarus as an amalgamation of the early 1980's Soviet Era and our more modern age. Lends the whole show an eerie, twilit 'Outer Limits' feel that suits well my suspension of disbelief. Moving from Chernarus to Taviana and on to Namalsk, the active Soviet flavor thickens, with the effigy of historic Soviet leaders captured in paintings on walls and statuary in city squares. Makes one feel like he has stepped into Cold War Eastern Europe.

Nice guide, one of my favorite weapons. If you ever join a server where it spawns, you should do a guide on the SVD NPSU and the VAL, which has similar but not identical optic.

Nice one ... and welcome to the boards. Next time have your pilot hover and pivot so your gunner can get an accurate shot. Looked like a good time though.

Unfortunately the ability to rent a private server enables most anyone to be an admin - good, bad, sadistic or measures of all three. Personally, I detest the idea of admin bases, as players should be free to roam where they like around the whole map. If I were you OP, I would put this incident behind me as good experience with a bad admin. Also, should you yourself become an admin at some point - of your own private server - hopefully run ins with such types will make you a better admin who treats players as he wants to be treated.

If you find a rubber raft, check its inventory for one of the best backpacks in the game.

It's not beyond the realm of reason to suspect the admin may have spawned it in. Irregardless of who is responsible, it is technically not supposed to be there and if the server owner/admin catches you using weapons that do not spawn on his server, he will likely ban you. Talking private hives - sometimes the admins will bring weapons into the game like this ... usually not every weapon. I do not support such activities, but some do. Best to leave it be or destroy it.

@The OP The stand alone is out there, it's on it its way. A slow but steady train steaming toward us, rattling closer in the night. We the unsuspecting villagers, awaiting for months its arrival at the station, have no idea what devilry gnashes its teeth within those approaching compartments. I like that. It's cool.

Taviana .com is sitting at 130 servers down from over 500, while .EU is way down to 18 servers, respectively. That is going by DayZ Commander. I spend a lot of time over at opendayz.net and the Tavi.com website. Hicks, the author of Taviana.com has not updated us on - well, an update for his mod in some months. Two months ago I would have expected Taviana.com to persist at over 300 active servers for the foreseeable future, but I think that private server admins are loosing confidence the longer Hicks goes without word of continued support. I hope that so long as the big server providers continue to offer Taviana 2.0 for use, it will survive in some form and its popularity will be preserved to some degree. Sadly, it looks like Taviana.EU is on the outs, but at least DayZ.st still carries it - last time I checked. You may also want to check into running a Namalsk server. It is a small map, but packs lots of horror themed features into what landmass is there.

The nationality of the factory in which a modern military weapon meets nascence has little to do with where it spends the rest of its functional life. Realism was never a dire issue in DayZ - in my opinon anyway. The .50 removal issue really is not - in my opinion. Rather, the ridiculous discrimination against weapons such as the makarov SD, PDW SD and other weapons functionally similar to those that already spawn in game is more the annoyance. Would it be a gamebreaker if a South African weapon spawned in a former Soviet state? Not for me. At the end of the day, I'd rather Rocket or the mod team here create their own fictional weapons based on real world hardware, rather than worry about breaking expectations of realism. Frankly, it's common perception - based on movies, books and games and internet searches - of military realism that is flawed.

I ran a Taviana server for four months - both 2.0 and .EU. Taviana 2.0 (.com) is able to be highly customized. The code it runs is 1.7.4.4, but I had zombies spawning while players were in vehicles and attacking them in vehicles as well. 2.0 is the "cleaner" version in that spawn locations in most buildings have been fixed (loot not spawning floating above the floor/ground, and in some buildings, better loot has been added. You can also use Rmod with 2.0. Taviana.eu is quite interesting. Zombies fall to headshots only, will hit you on the run and can run inside some buildings, and it has a custom humanity system based on bandit/hero kills which rewards several different player skins. For all I could tell from chatting with the mod's creators, they do not plan to support it much at all in the future beyond the current 1.5.1 release. Other features unique to .EU include a custom loot table (weapons you will not find in other mods for the most part) but you have to know where to look for them. Also some cool vehicles have been unlocked but would never spawn for me, and there are some custom road clutter and military checkpoints and lighting at night. Taviana as a whole, well it is a lot to manage as far as server administration goes. I think that the default vehicle spawn number is 125 or so, with many other spawn points built in. There are many big cities with streets and boulevards hundreds of meters long - which lend a great atmosphere - and many, many smaller villages and towns. Overall Tavi is beautiful and diverse with interesting land and sea and structural exploration potential. One drawback is the unfinished nature of of some of the buildings relating to how they were placed by Martin Bauer, Tavi's creator. He did an unbelievably amazing job creating the map, but gaps and cracks in textures allow players wise to them to hide whole clan bases with these exploits if they choose to do so. Still, it is one of my favorite DayZ maps, and one I will eventually go back to modding and administering. Epoch - I have not tried it yet. Seems too non Dayz-ish for me.