Land Squid

Thing is, the 1866 isn't a damned shot gun! Remove the 1866 pellet ammo. Rename the 1866 slug ammo to ".44-40" and tone down it's damage to just a bit over .45ACP. Decrease accuracy of the 1866 weapon substantially and give it significant bullet drop back 200 meters. Those are what is needed to bring that weapon back into aligntment with reality.

Something else I'd like to see is hesco barriers. Essentially they are just folded up metal and cloth mesh. You open them up, set them somewhere and then fill them in with dirt/sandgravel. The game already has placeable models for small, medium and large versions, but really I'm just looking for a head height solid baricade item we can use to build effective defenses around a base camp. Oh as to american weapons not being effective against zombies: I call shenanigans. The M4 CCO SD and MP5SD are the two single more useful weapons for infiltrating the more zombie infested areas. A 4 man team with two shooting and two looting can clear out Stary Sobor in about 10 minutes.

An idea some friends and I were kicking around regarding rage type virus infections was what about those primates that share a significant genetic similarity to humans? I know it's sort of a "Zombie Type 2" situation but it does fit with certain medical aspects and what not. Imagine some pissed off chimps or gorillas rampaging through the woods. That'd be some bad time right there.

Batteries aren't going to disappear that fast. This isn't a major catastrophe where you suddenly have millions of people trying to subsist on the remaining resources in a small area. It's a contageous outbreak where you now have a few people trying to subsist on the remaining resources over a large area. Also just a small note about real-tech: A modern set of NVG's will run for 50 hours on a single AA battery. A four pack of AA's will keep you in greenvision for a month. :P Also EOTechs have a run time of something on the order of 500 hours on a single CR123A lithium, Aimpoints have a truly absurd 50,000 hour runtime on a single AA (that's 5 years run time), ACOG's are either fiber optic or tritium powered which is a 10 year half life, and the surefire flashlight I personally carry has a 40 hour runtime on a pair of CR123A's. Like with barrel life in another thread, it seems folks really underestimate just how long some of these things last. GPS is the only system I see biting the dust fast, and not so much from the handheld receivers running out of juice but a lack of ground side support keeping the satellite constellations in order. You'll start getting orbital or chronometer drift, loss of groundside links due to natural phenomenon, etc. and with nobody to actively correct those issues you'll see either the coordinates slowly become less and less accurate or a lack of GPS service all together. Little known fact, due to relativity (the satellites are moving some 20,000 MPH faster than we are ground side) the clocks on the GPS sats lose a couple seconds each day compared to the clocks ground side. If this isn't corrected for you'll see your coordinates on a GPS receiver slowly drift in one direction or another.

So basically a simple thing really. If someone disconnects/quits out within say one or two minutes of killing a player (basically they ambush the person and then quit before his friends can kill them) Have the server revert their characters to a previous save point. The kill-and-quitter loses any items he may have snatched off the body before quitting, and the person killed gets restored, life, limb and gear, back at the location of his death. If you want to go a bit harsher, have the person who quit immediately after killing someone automatically respawn when they next connect, basically guaranteeing the death they were trying to dodge. Thoughts?

*dons his Gunsmith's hat* (Yes, I actually went to gunsmithing school after I got out of the Navy, Colorado School of Trades if you're curious.) 1: I have a French Lebel rifle that was made in 1889, saw extensive use in MENA and was acquired by me in Afganistan in 2006 and it is still fully functional. I think you are underestimating the durability of smallarms. 2: Durability is not based on rarity, but on materials, craftsmanship and end-user care and use. An M4A1 CCO SD is going to be made out of the same materials and on the same tooling as a civilian AR-15. An M24 will be made of the same materials and on the same tooling as a civilian Remington 700 (though perhaps to a more exacting standard). So this really doesn't work. 3: Realistically, you're looking at about a 10,000 to 15,000 round barrel life for an M4, longer if you only single fire it. Pistols can last much longer seeing 50,000 to upwards of 100,000 rounds before the barrel is fatigued beyond use due to the much lower pressures and temperatures to which they are subjected. Rapid or full-auto fire tends to eat barrels a bit faster. The first effects you'll see in high round count is the accuracy will worsen as the clearances open up. Throat and muzzle erosion, pitting, etc. Eventually it will make the weapon unusable because the barrel will not be able to stabilize the bullets effectively and they begin tumbling midflight (known as keyholing). Silencers (aka suppressors, moderators, mufflers and cans) will have about a 5-10,000 round life expectancy, looking at the same problems as the barrels with flame cutting, erosion and pitting on the baffles inside. As a can is shot out it will become louder. As an asside, shooting with a can on a barrel that is out of spec can have the potential to end rather spectacularly with a baffle strike. A baffle strike for the uninitiated is much like bad chinese food. It takes everything that is inside and puts it on the outside. It can be as minor as slightly bending the bore aperture on the end of the can to as catastrophic as tearing the end off and ejecting all the baffles down range. With tracer ammunition a bad baffle strike can even grenade the suppressor. Baaaad ju-ju! Edit to Add: Just to give some additional comparisons for barrel life, an AK will probably last upwards of 40,000 rounds, while certain sniper rifles will only see 4000-5000 rounds between barrel replacements. This is especially true considering the accuracy expectations from the two different firearms, the sniper rifle might be expected to be able to shoot sub-minute of angle and the barrel will be changed as soon as it exceeds a certain threshold, while the AK would be kept in service so long as it was shooting "minute of bad-guy". However, some of the seriously overbore cartridges such as the .375-50 can see barrel life as short as 800 rounds. When you're shooting at that level though, whether for the military or in civilian competition, premium barrels become regarded as a disposable item. Now, long before you shoot out the barrels you'll probably run into weakening springs as they are either fatigued, lose their temper, or suffer other detrimental effects. This could result in misfeeds and jams of all sorts. I've seen springs last as long as a barrel, and I've seen others where the recommended replacement is every 5,000 rounds. *shrug* Certain small parts are also subjected to stresses that tend to cause them to break first. Firing pins (remember, with every firing this little piece of metal is being smacked by something hard (if hammer fired) and being rammed into something else) and extractors are some of the most commonly problem parts and can usually be fixed in the field by even the least trained with a simple part for part replacement. I've personally seen the striker (it's a firing pin being driven by a spring, rather than being struck by a hammer) on an M24/47 Yugo Mauser torque over a 1/4 turn rendering it inoperable, and an extractor claw on an M1928-A1 Thompson shatter jamming up the action. Finally, cleaning! Shooting is dirty business. Carbon fouling, copper and lead shavings in the action, etc. Don't clean your guns and, well, as a Staff Sergeant once explained to me during weapons training: "If you fi-fi your rifle, your rifle will fi-fi you." Give it a good cleaning after shooting to keep the gunk from solidifying and locking up certain parts (such as the free floating firing pin in the M16, you probably don't want that stuck in the forward position from carbon fouling). Give it a good cleaning every few days in hot humid weather to keep it from rusting. Give it a good cleaning in dry dusty weather to keep the action from accumulation grit. Just keep your weapon clean damnit! I'd say give the in-game weapons about 2,000 rounds or a real life week between cleanings. Past that and they should start short-stroking, stove-piping, etc. and only get worse the longer you don't clean them. 4a: Cleaning kits - Non-consumable item (you'd be amazed how long a container of CLP, Hoppe's #9 or Rem-Oil will last, and you can make patches and clothes by cutting up old t-shirts). 4b: Repair kits - Eh, more like a set of armorer's tools (which is basically a screw driver with half a hundred bits, a set of brass and steel punches, a small 4oz hammer, a rubber and plastic double headed mallet, some fine and rough jeweler's and bastard files and a few specialty tools), a suitable workbench and the replacement parts as needed, and we're not even talking about full on gunsmithing yet. Lets see, fixing a bent barrel on an M16: You'll need a bench vice, an upper receiver block, a barrel wrench and a replacement barrel of course. Also you'll need a wrench to remove the muzzle device, steel punches and a hammer to drive out the taper pins holding on the front sight/gas block, and a special set of pliers to remove the retaining ring on the delta spring so your barrel wrench will be able to do it's work. All together probably not something you'll be able to fit into your backpack along with your beans and bandages. Unless it's something as simple as replacing a broken firing pin, without a work shop to perform some of the more intensive tasks, let alone a machine shop well stocked with blank material to crank out new replacement parts for you (I'm assuming freighter ships full of spare gun parts are no longer showing up at the Cherno docks), you'd realistically be down to just discarding broken weapons in favor of a battle-field pick up replacement. *takes hat off and looks at post* Wow. That wound up a lot longer than I expected it to be. *shrug* Some minor edits to fix typos and toss in some additional info.... I hate typos.

Has potential I think. Still have the option to just kill the person, but you have to get close to deliver the coup-de-grace. Or it could just be a system where if you bleed out to 0 you remain permanently unconcious and any delivered hit after you reach zero kills you: for instance, the zombies are going to keep whacking at you when you hit zero blood, so you die, but if someone snipes you, you drop and bleed down to zero, but the sniper is too busy getting shot to pieces by your friends, you still have a chance to have someone come over, bandage your butt and bloodbag you). ETA: This obviously breaks the "reality" of being DRT if shot in the head, but meh, lets see what the others think about it.

Because the americans printed off a bunch of maps for their troops and they got lost in the zombie apocalypse. Next question. :P

I may be a masochist, but after the suggestion of a log off delay, I think that would work nicely, but honestly it should be longer. Lets say someone snipes you, or you see someone and are trying to catch them but they are over a hill from you. How long is it going to really take for you to close distance with them? I know my character certainly can't sprint 4-500 meters in under 30 seconds. I'd say one to two minutes for non-combat situations. If you want to quit normally, sit down, this will start a 1-2 minute timer. When it ends you can log off with no penalty (or you can stand up and carry on if you feel like it). If you just alt-f4, your char stands there with his thumb up his ass for the 1-2 minutes. Now, if you are under combat (the little anti-disconnect warning is lit up on the right) the timer should not count down at all and if you alt-f4 it should be a full 10 minute penalty (why yes, I hate pvp-disconnectors, how'd you guess?) and it should scream to the whole damned server that you DC'd and the timer is running. (I also still think that anyone you killed before DC'ing should be restored to a previous save point as an additional penalty and to protect people from snipe-and-quit players.)

I wasn't aware a hand grenade was the equivalent of a 500 lb Mk-82. :P

+∞

Minor pedantry... burn pits with remains would be more likely in the event of a major contageous outbreak. Think Black Plague taken to the nth degree. Probably would be several outside of every major population center and a few scattered throughout the rural areas where-ever they were collecting up the bodies from small outlying places.

Or you could just stack the deck. Die for the first time after playing the same character for 10 hours? Good chance at getting the field gear and better pistols. The more respawns you have inside of an hour the less and less likely you'll get get the field gear and better pistols (leave food and medical supply chance the same for all respawns).

+1 As Grunt said, there's plenty of reasons why military gear would be in places other than just the military bases, not the least would be that when things really went to hell in a handbasket the surviving military people would likely have scattered like cockroaches and wound up dying in other places. Also ex-military folks who went home but kept some of their issued gear or bought their own after they got out. Hell, it isn't even the zombie apocalypse and if you went digging through my apartment you'd find a DMR, a PVS-14 nvg, civi SA Mk12 and loads of other gear. Sure, I'm probably the only guy in my entire neighborhood with that stuff, but it still shows the possibility to find it in a residential area.

I'd like to see player groups (minimum player threshold of say 10?) in game, and perhaps some sort of uniform item for your group (like maybe an arm band of a certain color combination) that is overlaid on whatever your skin is. As to spawn points, while I would like to be able to spawn in my groups base camp I think the problem with that is everyone will have that set half a klick from the north airfield, and if you think the airfield battles are bad now? Wait till everyone can get back to it in under 5 minutes after respawning. :/ How's this? Being able to select a spawn point for your organization.... but it has to be within 500 meters of the coast outside of the major coastal cities (Cherno/Elektro).

I'd say something a little more random. 0-3 random food items. 0-2 random medical items 0-1 random field gear (map, compass, watch, knife, matches) random pistol (Mak, M1911, M9, revolver) with 2-4 magazines/clips ETA: Also this might keep people from spawn-surfing till they get the starting location they want, for instance if they manage to spawn with a map + 1911 w/ 4 mags.

+ for Melee. I'd love to be able to use the hunting knives and entrenching tools we can already find as a last ditch weapon. There's few things that quite scream "GTFO!" so distinctly as bashing a zed in the fact with a small shovel.

To the field expedient landmine (using the frag grenade with a tin can) here's a more accurate methodology: Fragmentation grenade Tin can (of the appropriate diameter to hold the spoon down after the pin is removed, c-ration tins worked well) Fishing line (for the trip wire and to tie the can to something) Optional: Smoke grenade (taken apart for it's instant fuze, otherwise your landmine is going to have a 5 second delay in exploding) Optional: One Pair of Tent stakes (taken from a camping tent, one camping tent = 4 pair, used to mount the tin can and anchor the far end of the trip wire when setting up outside of a wooded area) Without the tent stakes you'll be limited to setting it up in a wooded area, tying the tin can to a tree and the other end of the trip wire to another tree. Blast effects same as standard fragmentation grenade so you might not want it to be too close to your encampment. As to limiting their proliferation: Requre they be placed within 100 meters of things like tents. That way players are only using them to protect their isolated encampments and not noob-trawling with them in Cherno. Also requiring the tent stakes is going to severely curtail their placement in cities or other non-forest locations. Three step placement: First place the device, then the anchor point for the trip wire, and lastly remove the pin from the grenade mine in order to arm it. Coincidentally, players that find, say, a box of small cotter pins would be able to disarm any mines they happen to find and collect them for their own use.

PPSh-41, PPS-43, Skorpion vz.61, Nagant M1895, TT-33, DP-28, PKM, PKP, AEK-999, RPK-47/74, RPD, SVT-40, M24/47, M91/30, M91/30 PU, M44, M91/59, SKS, SVU, AN-94, GSh-18, VKS... Hell, why not even a Kord! Yeah, I kinda got a long wish list. :) If the Soviets were known for one thing, it was never throwing away old hardware when it might be needed to fight off the fascists and imperalists. As I understand it there were warehouses and bunkers crammed full of outdated T-64 tanks all the way into the early 90's just because they might have needed them. I would expect any former Soviet bloc country to be damn near awash in military materiale dating all the way back to the Great Revolution.

Just something that was brought up several times during group scavenging missions.... Canteens really should be more than single use items. You don't stop and chug a liter of water in 20 seconds when you start feeling thirsty. It would be highly appreciative if we could have, say, 4-6 draws on a canteen. I'm not sure how the current canteen system works, if it's just switching between two items, one being full and the other empty, or if it's using a value system. If the former why couldn't there simply be five total canteen items. Full, 3/4, half, 1/4, empty. Each drink changes the item to the next one down, refilling changes any of the lower four back to full.

I thought about it some more. Really seems like the canteen and camelbak would be tool type items and go in a slot along with your matches, toolbox, etc. You simply don't throw away those items, you reuse them. Only the one-use consumables should be in general inventory and perhaps the canteens can be replaced by small bottled waters instead. Have players start with a couple bottles of water and make the 3-4 use canteens be an uncommon find, and the 8-10 use camelbaks a very rare find.

Again, accuracy issue, the .45ACP is actually substantially quieter than the supersonic 9mm Luger (aka 9x19mm, 9mm Parabellum). Here's a quick chart showing relative "loudness" between the cartridges... dB ---- Cartridge 155 - .223 rifle (M4/M16/M249) 156 - .308 rifle (M14/DMR/M240) 157 - .45 ACP (Revolver/M1911) 159 - .30-06 (equivalent for CZ550) 160 - 9mm Para pistol (M9/G17) 164 - .357 Magnum revolver (equivalent for Winchester) P.S., every 3 decible increase is a doubling of the sound energy, so the 9mm is actually twice as loud as the .45.

Sweet! Nice job getting a Yankee model up a running. Have you figured out a way to rearm them yet?