Merc13

That reminds me of my first couple of weeks in the game. I never thought I would have so much fun basically just wandering around in the woods and sneaking into cities and villages. It's such a contrast to games like BF3 with it's incessant explosions and direct action(still fun too). The first time I had a standoff with three guys and their friends in the chopper though was pretty exciting too, so Dayz for me has become a bit of everything.

I decided to play some Overwatch today-it's pretty much a PVP mod and has it;s fun aspects. I see some ai crash sites-there are at least 15 ai players guarding a chopper and humvee. I only have an ak with 30 rounds, so I know I can't do much until I get a better gun. I figure the radio tower on Green mountain will have a decent gun and as I head toward it I hear a sniper taking shots at the ai. I want first crack at the weapons, so decide to take out the sniper and use his gun to kill the ai. As I am looting, I felt kinda bad for the dude so I tell him over side chat that he should head back to the area and take whatever from the crash sites. He asks for directions and I wait for him-now at some point after coming in to view he decides to change his skin to a bandit ghillie, which I didn't see because I was taking a drink. When I look through the scope, I think I see a bandit lining up a shot so I take him out-nope, the same guy. Well, I felt bad , but I asked him why change your skin without letting me know? He says it's ok, I'll just come back again. Fast forward almost ten minutes later and as I am heading out of the area he says he is lost and could I give him a landmark-np I head back and guide him in. I'm watching through my scope when a player in a ghillie appears behind him out of nowhere, literally out of thin air. I tell him a player just popped in behind him and am I'm wondering if I should shoot, when the guy types in side chat that it is one of the owners of the server. Turns out they are friends and the "admin" teleported to the crash site to help loot the crates. I didn't like this much-so I check the map to get a rough range and decide I'm going to kill him for being an ass. Well as I looked at the map the original guy must have put on a ghillie from the crate, because after I shoot, the name shows up as the guy I tried to help twice, but ended up killing three times. I was so disgusted with myself I just apologized and left the server. I guess the fact that they were cheating softens the pain a bit. In hindsight I should have shot the Admin before I left.

Thx for the replies guys-you know, I still have a character on that server kitted out with a DMR, SVU and an acog M4-I think I'm going to go back there and have some fun trying to get the admins.

That sounds like fun actually. I remember in my COD4 days I used to have an ongoing war with a Clan-it makes the game so much more fun. Hopefully someday I'll have a nice group of people after me-it has to beat the aimless wandering and random encounters.

Kos in general is the expression of the average gamer in Dayz-just like recons who camp towers/hills, and the ever present jet/chopper whores in BF3. People who play objective based game types like they are TDM in every FPS ever made would probably KOS without thinking every time in Dayz.. I still play BF3 from time to time and it is plagued by the same crap over and over-what should be the base game suffers because players just won't play an objective game with the objective in mind. Instead you have the majority parachuting onto cranes, or camping the hill with tanks, or hiding around one flag and so it is actually a tedious game. I don't mind KOS that much, but there are times when I recognize the similar kind of idiots that ruin BF3 doing the same thing in Dayz-yesterday I spawned on Namalsk and head toward the FOB to hopefully get some decent gear. Now I see a guy get shot as I am checking it before going in and I barely see two guys in the tower just waiting for people-say what you want about KOS, but there is no skill in sitting in an area like that using scoped weapons on players who can't see you. There isn't even a stat system in Dayz , so there is nothing to brag about either. Like I said, I am not against PVP per se, but if I want to play a pure PVP game I will load something that rewards skill and do my best to kill everyone instead of hiding in the dark waiting for blind players to come by. Having said that I expect PVP to be the main component of Dayz based on my experience with all the FPS games I have played. Some players just don't get that there is another way to play that is just as rewarding if not more so. Instead they will try to do what a player did when we saw each other and said "friendly"-he asked me to kill a couple of zeds and while I was doing it he tried to kill me from cover, after I put a few bullets into him he asked me not to kill him, which just made me want to kill him more....and I did. The funny thing about Dayz is that without PVP it isn't that much fun, but struggles to find meaning with it in.

Ahh just play you however you want-no one is robbing me or turning me into a slave though. The other day I spawned in and while I was waiting for it to get dark I see three players coming my way. I know they are fairly recent spawns, so I don't mess with them, but I could have. Fortunately for them I wasn't in the mood for meaningless shenanigans. The irony was they came up the building I was on to retrieve the gear one of them had lost. I tell them not to bother coming up to get anything-after some discussion I tell him to leave his weapon behind and he can get his gear. While I am watching him I back into the wall and magically go over it and die-losing all my gear. It was mildly funny, but if I had just shot them I would have been fine. Honestly if I am a new spawn I have nothing to lose to other players, if I have decent gear then I have far more to lose and maybe next time the players might get shot instead of warned. Is there a right way or just better ways? Personally the best way lets me keep my stuff. While I have met decent players by not shooting them I have also lost some nice gear by weighing the risk and delaying my actions until it was too late. Sometimes it is better to just shoot and move on if you have enough to lose.

Might as well get started-if you haven't played Arma before it will take some getting used to the controls and the game mechanics. Besides, if the SA sucks the mods won't be going anywhere any time soon. I would play some Arma missions to work out your controls and stuff before you get into Dayz. There isn't much time to get used to the controls in the game so practising outside the game is good for getting better and will pay off when you play Dayz. Nothing is more fun than seeing a player intent on killing you and when you swing your weapon up it feels like a ten foot log that you can't control. Good luck . EDIT-I see you just posted you only have the demo-I'd buy the full version so you can play other mods if you still like the game after trying it.

I don't care if you shoot at me or kill me, hell I have shot at people and killed players who never knew I was there too just for practice. After my first month or two, I got over feeling irritated if I got killed simply because I felt like I made a stupid mistake in the first place. Now, I basically will kill bandits without thinking, survivors if they are in my way, not communicating, or have shot at me-I'm not sure what I would do to hero characters, but chances are I would just move on unless they are targeting me. Dayz feels somewhat empty after you have enough kit(for me anyway), so now I take on little missions to give it some meaning-I'm always ready to kill bandits, somewhat ready to kill any survivor with a weapon, and occasionally shoot players doing stupid things like sitting on roofs just so they learn a lesson. My last mission was as a heli taxi for anyone who wanted a ride. It was fun, and was much needed practice at flying, even into A2 with bullets zinging off the chopper. It went great until I tried a combat landing at an airfield for a bandit who ran up to the chopper too soon as I landed too fast and "Boom!!", one dead bandit, one unconscious pilot and the end of the mission as some other player came over to the crash and promptly ran me over. I felt bad for the guy I crashed on as I had meant to pick him up and he ended up losing his gear to the server restart two minutes later. My only rule in Dayz is whatever I'm doing will be done honestly, if I say "friendly" I will be friendly, and if I don't like you I will just move on while watching to see if the player is trying to kill me. I have met a few decent players who I teamed up with for awhile, so I'm happy to not have to kill a player if they give me the opportunity to meet someone new without it ending in gunfire. In the end, don't bother getting mad at players for shooting or killing you, if they were bandits, what did you expect? If they are survivors, well bandits start somewhere, or they might be practising. Almost every death can teach you something to make you better. Sorry this was abit long.

As stated above, matching your monitor resolution to the 3D resolution is the biggest thing you can do to clear up what you see. After doing that I can see guys from much farther away and the farther away you see players in this game the better. Also, you can double tap the zoom out key in 3rd person to get a wider field of view that stays there without zooming back in automatically when you release the key-this seems like a 30% increase in what you can see on the sides. Double tap the zoom in key to cancel the zoom lock, or you can zoom in normally and the camera should go back to whichever position you locked it at when you release the key. For me the default 3rd person camera is too close, so I move it back while moving and just zoom in when I want to look at something. Good luck dude.

I saw a guy fighting off some zombies in a shed today-after trying to get his attention a couple of times I figured I might as well shoot him because we are in the same area and he isn't communicating. I hit him a couple of times before he says not kill him he is friendly-I figure why not try to just help him out. So he comes out and i get him to come up to the floor I was on and I bloodbag him-he was pretty happy, and it turned out he was pretty decent and kind of funny. A bloodsucker showed up so I gave him my AK so we could kill it quickly-I did wonder if he would shoot me once I gave it to him, but he didn't. We teamed up for an hour or so, getting parts to fix a truck, and I watched out as he fixed it up. A player turned up and started shooting, so while my new buddy drove off I followed the player and was going to shoot him when I get hit from the rooftop and die. Sadly I lost track of the dude, but that was the best game of Dayz I've played(i'm only a month in though). All because I gave a player a chance.

The 3D resolution should match your monitor resolution if possible-once I changed this the background much less blurry.

I use Dayz Commander to play-you can install mods easily and with the filter select only the mods you want when searching for a game. It also tells you when your files need updating. Also, there is a thread to get Dayz running well which will help. If you screw up the installation you will have nothing but problems. I had to uninstall everything and redo it and have had no problems since. Good luck. EDIT-this is the thread-http://dayzmod.com/forum/index.php?/topic/1808-guide-installation-guide-steam-retail-mixed-beta-common-errors/

I don't know if if can add my story about my first encounter with bandits, but here goes-I spawn on the coast and am making my way toward a small town when I see another survivor and he is dragging a bunch of zombies behind him. He is trying to kill them all with his pistol(I only have a baseball bat), so I tell him to get in the bushes and we start trying to kill them when a jeep rolls up and stops-I thought "cool, friendlies" and jump in with the other guy and the jeep drives off. I see the guys have bandit skins, and get the vibe that they are going to try something-I tell them in direct that we'll jump out here and thanks for the ride-as we get out they do to, and of course they start shooting. I run around the jeep and as they are trying to kill my new friend I get one with the bat, and the other bandit must have changed his mind because he jumps back in the jeep and drives off with my new friend shooting at him with his pistol. I was so busy laughing that I didn't see the horde coming and got knocked down and munched. My new friend didn't last more than three seconds either, but it was still bandits 0 and us 1, and of course zombies 2. Three weeks into this game and nothing like that has happened again.

My first game was a few weeks ago-I spawn in, and look around, taking it all in and head toward a small town in the distance. I find a few things and get the attention of a zed and holy shit the first time running for my life with a zombie right behind me was actually intense. I play BF3 a lot but have never had that sensation of fear. My first gun was a pistol , which I used to help another new spawn who was trying to shoot every zombie he saw and he ended up cornered in a cabin-after I killed the ones outside he came out, did the happy dance and moved off-sadly he kept shooting at zombies and I noticed he died shortly after we left each other.My first week was spent mostly avoiding other players as I had mostly bad experiences with them, and I had only encountered two friendly players that didn't immediately start shooting, but they didn't have mic's so I didn't bother trying to hang around them. I'm only a few weeks in, so every time I log in I feel like it's pretty new, and I have just enough knowledge to get in trouble now.