Whyherro123

Oh no. I would give far less

They ARE in-game, they just don't have "foraging mechanics" attached to the models.

In reality, foraging is a simple and relatively quick way to ensure you have enough food. Hunter-gatherers only needed about 20 hours of work per week to ensure their caloric needs were met, while farmers need about 60-70. However, being a hunter-gatherer required encyclopedic knowledge of plants, not only what ones where edible, but also what time of year they grow in and where to find them, as well as keeping a small population and being really REALLY mobile. (no heavy loads for hunter gatherers!). On the other hand, farmers could stay in one place, raise large families, and essentially "set down the roots of civilization" (Human "civilization" is widely taken to have started in the Neolithic period, when agriculture was developed) The thing is; humans very rarely depended on one "method" (hunting [lumping together hunting and trapping], farming [lumping together agriculture and animal husbandry], and foraging) of food procurement. They would farm, raise animals, pick wild foragables, trap small game, hunt large game, etc, all so that if one food source fell through, they could depend on the others. This is how I envision Day Z being. You would only really have to stick to foraging in the beginning, and when you are settled, you have a little garden set up somewhere. However, you don't just raise crops: you also pick fruits and berries, wade through streams to pick cattail and lily-tubers, fish in those rivers, snare rabbits and squirrel, as well as keep an eye out for a deer to walk through your section of woods. In reality, the type of environment Day Z takes place in, Temperate Deciduous Forest, is probably the 2nd most hospitable ecosystem for humans to live in. Plenty of food, plenty of fresh water, etc. The only reason it is #2 is because of the seasons: we can't live naked year round like we could in the tropics.

-SIgh- In a real-world survival situation, I would NOT eat any mushrooms, even if I could positively identify them as safe to eat. The food-value of them is negligible, especially when compared to other equally-if-not-more viable foragables, and the chances for misidentification remain high. It ..... just isn't worth it. Not really. But, you know, the devs can add whatever survival mechanics they want, and I actually am excited they are adding mushrooms to the "foragable" list. The more "survival" mechanics there are, the better. I just wish they added something that made more sense, like cattail, first. EDIT: when I say mushrooms are not worth the energy it takes to eat/digest them, I mean it. This source (http://www.outdoorlife.com/blogs/survivalist/2011/09/survival-foods-are-wild-mushrooms-worth-risk) states that a group of 5-7 medium-sized mushrooms (not sure what species), only has 25 calories. That isn't balanced at all, and the act of gathering, picking and eating them will put you into a severe calorie deficit. This source (http://www.chiropractic-help.com/Nutritional-Value-of-Mushrooms.html) which seems more "legit" than the above source, also states that a serving of mushrooms only has about 20 calories, and are also low in carbohydrates. In other words, you would be better off leaving the mushrooms behind and continuing to forage for other plants, just based on caloric balance alone. Add in the chance for death due to misidentification, and you should (and I do) swear off mushrooms forever.

On Animals, hunting, and food So, IMO, hunting should be harder. Much harder. I know hunters that have gone years without taking a deer, and this is with a rifle. In real life, hunters and hunting was often deified, due to the difficulty involved. Most people were foragers, or after agriculture was developed, farmers. Most of our food should come from either foraged plants (it is eminently possible to survive that way, just with effort and time), or farmed produce (also with effort and time). Ideally, the survivor would do all three: plant a garden to guarantee future supply, forage fruits, berries, and other plants around their camp, and hunt and trap in their free time. That is what "ancient peoples" did : they didn't limit themselves to one method of food procurement Right now in Day Z, you can practically walk to within 30 feet of an animal to kill it. Hell, with some planning, you can kill an animal with a melee weapon! So, the animals should be harder to hunt. Not necessarily rarer, but more difficult to find. You would have to spot the animal from a distance away (200m?), track it, then apply the killing blow On the flipside, animals should provide much more "resources", not just a couple of steaks, some guts, and some hides. It would take a decently-sized group a couple of days to completely eat a medium-sized deer, and a rabbit can fill up a single person handily. Lean Meat: The "steaks". This should be the majority of the resources from the kill, to a level where you alone can't eat all the meat of a deer before it goes bad. You would want to preserve this, either in the form of jerky or pemmican Organ Meat: high in vitamins and nutrients, something you don't want to skip over, unappealing as they might be to modern tastes Intestines: "Guts". Useful not only as rope (in reality, I would use intestines as cordage last due to their other uses), but as waterproof containers and food (make sausages with lean meat, fat, and blood, then stuff them into intestines. Put them into just-off-the-boil water, then smoke them for flavor and preservation) Marrow: inside the bones, marrow is the premier "survival food". You want to eat this, if you don't eat anything else. It will keep you going like nothing else. Blood: drink it, or let it separate, pour off the plasma, and use the leftovers as soup thickeners. Fat: eat it, or use it as waterproofing for clothing, or rub it on exposed skin to protect from cold or wind Bones: knives, arrowheads, fishing gorges, sewing awls and needles, all very useful Hides/furs: self explanatort\y. With the brain of an animal, you can tan hides without fertilizer, and with bone tools you can sew together some leather clothing without going into town. EDIT: will finish later. DISCUSS

By the fact that you can only catch sardines in the ocean, and the "improvised fishing trap" can only be put into saltwater, the "Green Sea" (the body of water that Chernarus lies on) is apparently saltwater. And cattails grow worldwide.

Lesson 1: Don't get attached to your gear Lesson 2: Keep an eagle eye on your surroundings at all times. Lesson 3: Don't run, or even move quickly, through cities. It is possible (very possible) to sneak around zombies, and fast movement only attracts attention, both from zombies and other players Lesson 4: -ahem- DON'T GET ATTACHED TO YOUR GEAR

Then you are lying. Simple as that. By statistical probability alone, you would have found at least one fruit for every 30 searches, at the VERY LEAST. And I have found more than that.

So then, let us discuss the possibilities of "other" foraging, AKA other plants. The models for which are already in-game Cat-tail: If you pay attention to the plants you can see alongside a watersource (pond, stream, the ocean weirdly enough,) cat-tail will be one of them that stick out the most, alongside "generic" (which are useful in and of themselves) water-reeds. cat-tail are INCREDIBLY useful for survival, with uses ranging from food, to bedding, to firestarting, to medicine, to cordage and weaving material. The Scouts have a saying:"If you find cattail, you have food, water and fire". This is because cattails only grow in water free of pollutants. You still should boil/treat the water, but it is relatively clean http://prepforshtf.com/survival-uses-for-cattails/#.VV0tZ_lVhBc http://www.survivaliq.com/survival/edible-and-medicinal-plants-cattail.htm The "food" aspect of cattail is important, as the roots actually contain more starch per weight than potato. A good-sized cattail plant will fill you up and keep you going for hours of hiking, all in an easy-to-gather, easy-to-cook package. "Weeds": These are plants that often grow in margin-lands, aka old field and such, that actually are rather good for you, being high in Vitamin C, as well as being tasty. The easiest to recognize are Dandelion, Chicory, and Goldenrod. Goldenrod is visible in-game, as the large single-stemmed plants with spreading tufts of flowers, and dandelions and chicory can really be found anywhere grass could grow. Nearly all of the chicory and Dandelion plants is edible, and Goldenrod can be used to make teas, as well as a flour substitute in breads. http://ultimatesurvivaltips.com/goldenrods-bum-wrap-clearing-this-helpful-herb/ http://www.survivaliq.com/survival/edible-and-medicinal-plants-dandelion.htm http://www.survivaliq.com/survival/edible-and-medicinal-plants-chicory.htm Plantain: Another useful "foragable" is Plantain. The leaves are edible, and it can be used as a poultice to treat pain, as a tea to treat diarrhea, or the seeds and seed husks as a laxative. http://www.survivaliq.com/survival/edible-and-medicinal-plants-plantain-broad-and-narrow-leaf.htm There are many many more plants that I have noticed in-game that would either be edible, serve as "backwoods medicine", or be otherwise useful in survival. The devs just have to add "uses" for the model.

He is right, though.

I am sorry, but where are you getting that "hip-mounted quivers" were more common in real life? Because they most decidedly weren't. Among different cultures, maybe, but anyone that lived in a heavily wooded area probably used back-slung quivers. The Native Americans in the Eastern Woodlands almost universally used back-slung quivers. I prefer them as well, because back-mounted quivers don't swing around so much when you walk, or get stuck in bushes or trees.

Not if you set them up away from the heat, which is what a tripod does. The pot blocks the heat from the fire. I've made cooking tripods from sticks many a time. However, the in-game sticks look to be too short/slender to support a pot of stuff.

1) A solar still wouldn't really be necessary in a temperate deciduous forest, AKA where Day Z takes place. There is a LOT of fresh water available. Solar stills are more suited to deserts and the like. In its place, I propose something similar: a water filter, made from a soda bottle, sand, and charcoal. It would allow the player to treat water in order to make it potable, without the need for chemical tablets or fire. However, it would take a lot longer to fully pass through the filter, so you might want to make multiple filters. 2) I don't really know about the "gun trap". For the amount of effort it would take to set up, you could either 1) shoot them normally, or 2) make a trap that doesn't use a bullet. 3) Various animal lures. Meh. I know they are used in real life, but I prefer "scoot n' shoot" for survival-hunting, as it lets you forage for plant-food at the same time. Just my opinion 4) I have no idea what "heat beads" are. 5) Foxhole. Sure, although I think you underestimate just how much work it takes to dig a hole. Plus, I don't think the engine can support deformable terrain. 6) Yes, I want stashes. Much more realistic than storing gear in tents.

I teach wilderness survival, but I also practice some bushcraft on the side. Wilderness survival is a different animal than bushcraft. It requires almost a 180-degree change in mindset. The skills are capable of crossing over, but also change in focus. Everything changes from "immediate use" to "long-term". The whole issue is "knowing what you are doing", you are correct. But that is the whole issue. "Survival" isn't really one set of skills, it is a whole bunch, a "career" in a sense. And learning all those skills is rather difficult and time-consuming. Which is why humanity developed the "division of labor" and all that. I also think part of our "issue" is the fact that I am referring to survival in the sense of an individual. That is how I practice it, there being few other people in my area to share the hobby (ies), so I am used to referring to "survival" from the POV. I am cognizant of the fact that survival, even "hunter-gatherer"-style, becomes exponentially easier in a group. By yourself, you have to be your butcher, your doctor, your hunter and your tracker, as well as keeping the fire going and yourself fed. In a group, you can split up different "aspects" of survival to different people, lessening the labor load on all. My above quote that you refer to, all by myself? No way Jose. My above quote, with even a small group of other people? Easier, exponentially so, to the point where actual "survival" becomes trivial. Which is why humanity has never been made of up solo "mountain-men". Tribes have been around since hunter-gatherer times, hell, even before there was modern man. If I may ask, what do your relatives do? Guides? Homesteaders?

I hold the opinion that survival, and by proxy, everything you need for survival, should be either "findable" in the wilds, or capable of being made by materials you find in the wilds. In real life, "modern" metal and plastic tools and such only really have a couple of advantages over "older" wool/leather/wood/stone tools, namely weight and ease-of-use I would like to see that in-game. I want to be able to build a fire without matches, cook in a pot/bowl I've made, and eat food that I grew/foraged for. All matches have over a bow-drill or flint-and-steel is ease of use, and a metal pot is only better than a ceramic one due to weight, and that you don't have to make the metal pot from natural resources. Basically, let me make everything I need to survive from materials I find in the wilds: wood, leather, rope from grass, pottery from clay, knives/axes/projectile points from stone, without having to go into a town to find anything, expect for possibly seeds for a garden. You can make "hill-billy versions" of every medication in-game from plants, common plants. Clothing and other containers (even waterproof ones) can be made relatively easily from tanned leather and furs, and said tanning process can be done without chemical fertilizers. Fires can be started using a variety of "primitive" methods easy found on the Internet, and even carried with you relatively easily, removing the whole "lighting a fire" thing from consideration entirely. Rope and cordage can be twisted from grass and other plants. Food can be cooked on a hot rock, a skewer over a fire, or using a bowl (carved from wood)/ pot (fired from clay) and hot stones from a fire) It should be hard. As someone trained in, and who teaches others, wilderness survival skills, including the ability to replicate the above, I can say that actual wilderness survival, like what we see in Day Z, is something that a sane person should never want to do. However, what exactly do you mean by "process to surviving"? I am guessing your "process to surviving" and my "process to surviving" are several magnitudes in difference.

That.....wouldn't work. It doesn't even work in real life. Watch the video closely, and I will explain why it wouldn't work. Especially the first shot, when he throws that arrow; watch the arrow get fired back into the air. When a bullet "gets fired" in a firearm, what happens is the gunpowder burns and gives off gas. This gas has nowhere to go except out, and so it pushes on the gun barrel, on the casing and pushes on the bullet, propelling the bullet out of the barrel, and causing the user to feel recoil. Remember: "Every action has an equal and opposite reaction" If the gun wasn't there and the bullet was "fired" (AKA the gunpowder was burned via primer ignition), the actual bullet wouldn't go that far. All that would happen is the casing would get fired back, just as fast as the bullet would. This is why throwing a handful of bullets in the fire won't actually do all that much (NOTE is that dangerous? YES. DOn't throw bullets into a fire) So, attach a bullet to an arrow, and fire it at something. The bullet will probably not penetrate the target, and the arrow will get fired back due to the casing getting forced away due to powder expansion. NOTE: it does work, kinda, when the actual arrow penetrates the squash, giving the burning powder/gas something to push off of and propel the bullet. However, having a bulky bullet on the arrow will definitely mess with the ballistics and and weight of the arrow, making it hard to aim/predict where it will go, as well as making it less likely for the arrow to actually penetrate. Aim at something hard, or even a little less yielding that a squash or thin plastic, and it won't really work, not for the amount of effort and preparation that goes into that. Not.....really worth the time, in my opinion. And this is from someone trained in survival and someone that makes bows and arrows.

1) Don't run and shoot? Walk, crouch-walk, or belly-crawl into your position. 2) Use a splint or a morphine before shooting. There used to be a bug before where you could break your arm and not know it.

Good. The game is supposed to be hard. You know, I am willing to bet that the majority of people starving to death in Day Z are simply doing the same things over and over: checking the "food houses", running to supermarkets, running along the coast, etc. There is a saying about the definition of insanity: "doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting a different result".

Since I am almost certain that we will never see "actual" hand to hand, which involves grappling and holds as much, if not more, than it involves actual strikes, a good middle-ground is for bare-hand punches to cause damage to the character. Substantial damage, as (like said before) a punch to the face, or any bony part of the body, will most likely break the bones of the hand. Therefore, people now would have a reason to pick up and use melee weapons, and leave punching as the last resort of the last resort, after running away. I know for a fact that in real life, I would rather run away from an adrenaline-pumped meth-head-surrogate "zombie" than fist-fight the guy.

In reality, punching someone in the face is a good way to break all the bones in your hand. Humanity invented weapons for a reason, after all.

I am..... conflicted. And concerned

Sure..... go ahead and blow up a valuable and finite resource.

Simply put: No More eloquently put: "nameless, random" PvP is not the direction the Devs want PvP to go in. They want survival to be difficult. "Easy guns respawn" goes against that 100% IMO: If I had my way, loot would be entirely random. No "food houses", "Kitchens", "gun houses", etc. A couple of months after society collapses, and people want to find specific things in specific places?! In reality, the places where you expect to find things (hospitals, grocery stores, armories), would be picked clean, and the loot distributed across the land. :rolleyes:

....sure thing