Just though I'd write a bit that it may help others beginning this game and are feeling a little lost. When I first started playing I had a couple of buddies on the same server and we spent the first few hours trying to get to each other, we failed, we died, we gave up. I decided to head out on my own and the first thing I did was get an online map, this one works for me http://dayzmap.info/ I stumbled upon a firestation east of Elektra that contained lots of guns and food so stocked up and explored the coast a bit but died many times. I found myself drawn to the same firestation and found the loot was different each time...then it made sens about why people kept asking for server restarts in chat. Fact is getting geared is surprisingly easy. Once I was happy with my stuff I decided to venture out into the wilderness and picked a landmark that looked interesting and, you guessed it, headed for the airfield in the NW sector. I since realized this is an especially treasured haunt for bandits. I enjoyed the journey and not to waste it for you we'll leave it at that. I found a corpse on the way and looted most of the gear which gave me pretty much everything I needed to be self sufficient and decided to head to stary sobor to have a look at the supermarket. I got killed, I made the mistake of asking 'friendly?' which seems to be a standing joke. I spawned and managed to navigate my way back to my body with surprising ease and only on what I had spawned with, so I could have done this from day one. Pity the admin decided to restart the server when I was nearly there. You can get to stary quite easily on your spawn provisions and the supermarket is easy to get to as well. Just use the woods and avoid populated areas. Approach from the west and us the church as a visible guide. I found guns, tents, ammo, food and a nice backpack so was geared again in no time. I found zombies are fairly easy to avoid, you can crawl around a few feet from them without a problem and you also tend to hear them before you see them, especially in built up areas so you can navigate around the grunts and groans. Holding shift while crouching rarely attracts them as well but you get to know the limits yourself. I found a nice spot for my tent, which incidentally only stores on the server you are on at the time so be aware of that and you can't pitch it in trees, it has to be in a clearing. I have been filling it with some food and water just to get used to where it is and foraging the surrounding area. I have water close by and several deer hides for ammo and a barn for food. On the subject of loot there seems to be an order to it all, deer stands provide ammo, some decent weapons, maps, knives etc. Barns have food, water, ammo, bandages and supermarkets have tents, rucksacks and pretty much everything else but I've yet to find matches or a GPS. So my thoughts on what to do now are moving toward something other than survival, I feel the need to team up or help some new ones. I found a bus and am thinking about fixing it but would take a while with just me. First thing I did was settle on a server, I can build a reputation there as being helpful and trustworthy and I'll recognize players that are frequently on, the clan members seem friendly enough and there is a few of them so that helps. I would like to see a grouping facility where we can private chat, I'm not keen on vent and I don't want the whole server knowing where we are. Like I said I would like to help new ones, get them to stary, get them geared and get a good group going. Would be great to have a server of 50 people all working together. Getting killed is not the be all and end all, once you figure out some good spots you can gear yourself again easily so in my opinion killing people is just pointless, gear is easy, so being a bandit means your either scared or a dick. There is no way to really know who to trust so my advice is don't trust anyone until you know how to get geared, avoid zombies and find food and water, then find a server and stick with the folk on it. Use chat and be friendly :)
