Dagwood

That 3rd floor barn pants ruining fiasco happened to me on a sunny day eating beans while crouched. I think that was the barn hurting you and not the rain. But I could be mistaken.

^^^you meant that you choose LOW ping.... Right?

^^ it's been suggested before and you're right, the map just isn't big enough to support this. If it was ten times the size it would be plausible. Unfortunately, the ap is ONLY 225 sq/km and the servers can only support 150ish players at once. Plus there would be issues with DCs, unannounced server crashes/restarts and many more. I wish we could do it that way too :(

Wouldn't my strategy prolong the adrenaline rush of player encounters? Even if you might "lose"?

Ok how about a big campfire instead?

Reposting this post again.... The majority of this community is so cowardly and overly competitive that they almost always shoot armed players without even attempting to communicate. "He's armed and he's on the coast; must be a bandit... BAM!" Where is the fun in that? Play arma 3 wasteland. You won't have to deal with all of these bugs and I completed features. More guns. More vehicles. All of the things you beg for on these forums. "I KOS because there aren't enough features in this game to do anything else yet." This game was made for people willing to risk losing everything to engage in heart pounding interactions with potentially violent strangers. This is the only game where potential friend or foe can honestly only be distinguished by their ACTIONS; not by the color of the arrow floating over their head. "I tried being friendly. I got tired of getting killed so I don't even try anymore." This excuse is the worst. So many of you think the only two options are a.) kill or you will undoubtedly be killed. Or, B.) place your life into the hands of a complete stranger and hope that they are like-minded. The truly skilled survivors asses the stranger, place themselves in a superior position should a firefight erupt, and then you attempt to communicate. If you can learn to do this, not only will you increase your chances of survival (should you choose to interact with others), but when you ARE forced to kill someone in self-defense, it will be so much more rewarding KNOWING (not speculating) that they would have gladly done the same to you. Alas, this kind of tactical thinking (it's a fucking survival game for god's sake) is too much to ask for the majority of dayz's current community. Edit: took out drunk ranting at end of original post.

How about relocating you to blackforest or other low traffic, well covered spots? Or only doing so if you switch servers from a high priority spot? This might punish players that are forced to switch servers when servers crash and such, so is far from perfect. I also think relying on respawning loot to eliminate server hopping is naive. Gamers are lazy and they take the easy route in online gaming. *lightbulb* logging out in a tent saves your (and perhaps your squad's) position. If you logout on server one in your tent, when you log on to server 2 you are in the same spot. But if you logout on server 2 without entering a tent first, your spawn location is random. Could go into more detail but I'm mobile. How could this be broken or exploited? What it punish legitimate players too much?

That last sentence is why a public hive is desirable over private servers. If you have 5 different geared characters on multiple servers, you don't care as much about dying, and your playstyle will reflect that. If your only character is uber geared to the point where you have a big advantage over other players, you might play a little more carefully if losing a needless firefight means you WILL go to the coast as a fresh spawn or have to quit for the night. Private servers create more unwanted variability in player behavior (yolo deathsquads vs survivalists is an unfair combination)

Mosin is simpler to operate. Doesn't apply to the game but I'm being argumentative. Oh ya, and you can't have your cake and eat it too (realism vs gameplay)

You're surrounded by server hoppers, katana. They don't like the thought of actually playing on one server unless they have multiple characters. Your idea is spot on. I think random wilderness spawns is the way to go (upon changing servers). But how do we keep friends from being separated when it's necessary to change servers?

Gibonez, you've never maintained a weapon have you? If you had, you'd know what you just said was nonsense.

Mosin is better for murdering. M4 is better for self defense. Why? One is close range, one is long. M4 is more versatile (with MP parts) Mosin is more accurate at long range. M4 is more efficient for killing zeds. Mosin is probably better for killing players without ruining all of their gear (dat clean headshot). Mosin has only "binoculars" in game currently. M4 allows quick follow up shots. I think it's really up to preference and what you can actually find in the game

@beef bacon Reminds me of the days when the spawns were around balota. If you made it into a barracks and grabbed a weapon, chances were you'd be shooting your way out. And you have to love when lugging that sawed-off around for hours actually pays off

This thread makes me sad. The majority of this community is so cowardly and overly competitive that they almost always shoot armed players without even attempting to communicate. "He's armed and he's on the coast; must be a bandit... BAM!" Where is the fun in that? Play arma 3 wasteland. You won't have to deal with all of these bugs and I completed features. More guns. More vehicles. All of the things you beg for on these forums. "I KOS because there aren't enough features in this game to do anything else yet." This game was made for people willing to risk losing everything to engage in heart pounding interactions with potentially violent strangers. This is the only game where potential friend or foe can honestly only be distinguished by their ACTIONS; not by the color of the arrow floating over their head. "I tried being friendly. I got tired of getting killed so I don't even try anymore." This excuse is the worst. So many of you think the only two options are a.) kill or you will undoubtedly be killed. Or, B.) place your life into the hands of a complete stranger and hope that they are like-minded. The truly skilled survivors asses the stranger, place themselves in a superior position should a firefight erupt, and then you attempt to communicate. If you can learn to do this, not only will you increase your chances of survival (should you choose to interact with others), but when you ARE forced to kill someone in self-defense, it will be so much more rewarding KNOWING (not speculating) that they would have gladly done the same to you. Alas, this kind of tactical thinking (it's a fucking survival game for god's sake) is too much to ask for the majority of dayz's current community. And this post will be ignored and more excuses will be made to defend lazy play styles. If you are another man or woman who plays this game as I do, know that you are not alone. Know that if you continue to play honorably and not sink down to the level of the majority around you, you will be experiencing dayz how it is intended to play. Stay strong, true survivors of chernarus.

What are these mini-game like mechanics from these other games you referenced katana?

^^ and rather than having some uniform skill system, it is up to the player to improve their proficiency in completing these tasks through practice. We need a skill curve I guess? Like working on a car. First time you change your oil or spark plugs, it takes a lot longer than even the second or third time.

The reason games make us sit there and watch our avatar work is to attach a cost to the final product (user invested time). What if instead of heel spinning (as poker hilariously put it) for fifteen minutes, the game made us pay with a different valuable resource: energy and hydration. I basically mean that crafting, building, and healing from wounds and breaks would more rapidly sap our avatars' calorie and hydration reserves. Does that sound plausible?

I totally agree with what you're saying, katana. Survival in a post apocalyptic scenario should be a lot of work (hence the majority not surviving). Fixing a broken leg with morphine? Scopes and iron-sights magically being sighted properly when you pick them up? I like how you modeled the issue with the term "inputs". That is exactly what is missing. But on the same note, we don't want the game degenerating into a runescape or WoW crafting simulator. It could be a slippery slope. I read somewhere dean referencing the survival mod made for skyrim as being an inspiration for him in developing the wilderness survival aspects of dayz. I played it briefly and it did make you work at maintaining your existence if you chose to live outside city limits. What do you think would be an effective input method or mechanic for dayz?

And did you read the second half of my post pooz? The game is in play-test mode. The devs aren't responsible for protecting us from hackers (yet). If you guys are that upset about the hackers, play a game that isn't in testing. Or play hardcore

Making tasks more laborious might seem like a grind, but I think it would promote safer play styles (not coast camping, not blasting away at 500+ yard targets, etc). And having to work your way back to a distant camp in the woods while wounded would add a cool dynamic to the game.

^^^ sitting out in the woods is worthwhile in your own skin. Doing so in a videogame is a time-suck. But if I didn't regenerate health or heal a broken limb without resting or sitting tight for 15-30 minutes, I'd be more inclined to do it in a spot where I could craft (like you mentioned) and where I was away from potentially lucrative loot locations. Imagine if being hydrated and energized only stabilized your condition while on the move, and remaining near a bed or a tent was required to begin health regeneration. Of course we don't want to actually have to watch our character lie still for 30 minutes, so crafting would be a good way to pass this time.

Play on west coast hardcore servers where the officers and gentlemen do it right. No hackers. Good balance of play styles. And playing hardcore will be a challenge for you if you are more accustomed to playing in 3rd person or switching back and forth between both perspectives.

You ever paintballed?

Just because you died and if seemed strange (alpha) does not mean that it was a hacker. I've been called a hacker on 2 different occasions during my time on the mod. People don't like to think that you can sneak up on them and say peek-a-boo at point blank range before you M1014 them in the cranium. Instead they accuse you of teleport hacking. Also, the game is in fucking alpha. Should we really be presenting the end game anti hack to all of the hackers out there years before the game is completed? That sounds like a recipe for disaster and even more resources being devoted to an arms race with the hacking community. Don't be so near-sighted.