BadAsh (DayZ)

That individual zombies should be a threat if you are not properly armed seems perfectly straightforward to me. It sounds to me like OP is imagining something like slow walkers from TWD, where the individual zombie is not a threat, but that they only pose a threat when in large numbers in cramped surroundings, something which the zombies in the game are not and probably never will be. The most useful strategy if you do not have a high quality melee weapon is to lock zombies inside buildings, you should not be able to just casually kill them without having the proper tools to do so. That being said, they are buggy at times, but it seems to me that it mostly is in connection with desync and lag, something which we will probably not see the end off until the proper optimisation phase in beta. That is just the way it is, but I would much rather have them in the game, functioning albeit slightly buggy, than have them removed altogether. They do have a significant impact on gameplay when they appear in numbers as they currently do (especially in exp) and are not just random props to be casually disposed of as they mostly are in TWD.

But that SWE 1 server is unfortunately horrible. Awful constant rubberbanding all the time and everywhere. And that is if you are lucky enough to get in, most of the time it will claim the server is full, although it isn't, or it will just say "Unable to connect to server".

I have experienced that as well in the previous build, but only on some exp servers, on others any action performed fine. So I guess it is a server issue rather than a general build problem. Anyway all exp servers seems to have gone down (and just as I was getting myself some semi-fine loot).

I'm having real trouble with my 3pp character, since he spawned in Cherno and I am quite sure that is not helpful when it comes to memory crashes. I crash about every 5 min with that guy. I am having a bit more luck with my 1pp, although he spawned in Elektro and that seems to do no wonder either when it comes to memoray crashing. However I found some decent gear, admired the school in Elektro (was that in the previous exp build, I only saw the Cherno one then?) and am getting the hell out of town to some less memory hogging environment. Hunters jackets are nice, scrub hats are in as well (noticed the other scrub clothes in the previous builds, but hadn't seen the hat). The office building in Elektro seems to have turned into a medical equipment supplier, no clothes or anything there, only medical supplies of all kinds. Fire station spawns tonnes of firehelmets and fireaxes as well (which is nice). Fireaxe is again removed from the actionbar when you paint it though.

The fact that they stated they were going to add aircraft does not change my opposition to aircraft being in this game. And I am not going to cop out of that and vote for something I don't want just because you make a deliberately skewed poll.

A lot of memory leak CTDs on this one, so it is a bit difficult to notice performance changes (stuttering as well, memory leak related i guess). I did spawn just next to the new roadblocks outside of Cherno. Very nice, with a crashed bus and several cars. Hopefully they will keep adding such apocalypse details as they go along.

Well my luck just ran out. For some time my go to spots for loot in the exp has been guard towers, since they actually spawn some good high end civilian loot, including all sorts of ammo, backpacks, weapons and food. I was at Kabanino military base just looting the towers, since all the other buildings contained nothing interesting. The place was full of military zombies, so my sledgehammer came to good use. Unfortunately that was also when bad luck hit me first. After having created another crawler zombie with my trusty hammer, I turned to the guard tower and used the ladder. But I still had the hammer in my hands, and although the animation showed that my guy placed the hammer on his back before grabbing on to the ladder, the hammer instead off showing up in the inventory completely disappeared. I only noticed it when I came back down and another zombie attacked. The action menu showed the hammer good and fine in slot 1, but when I tabbed and pressed 1 nothing happened. I scrolled my inventory and the hammer was gone. I retraced my steps but it was nowhere to be found. Swallowed by the great unknown. I had to use my chambered cr75 to take out the rest of the zombies. It was good fun, and I had plenty of 9mm, but I still missed my hammer. Second stroke of bad luck hit me a short while later as I climbed the ladder of another guard tower. As usual I just peered my head into the tower, not bothering actually entering it, because the "Take" option appears on any loot present. And sure enough, 3 pristine kitchen knives. So I press my mmb pick up the first, the "Take" option is still there so I just press mmb twice to pick up the other 2 (I had plenty of inv space), however just after the first click the icon changes from "Take" to the icon image showing a ladder with a downward pointing arrow. It happens too fast for my mind to react and I just press mmb again to pick up that last damn knife, and of course that is when I order my character to let go of his hold on the ladder. The realisation comes to me as he starts to slide. Half a second later, a short thud is heard and the screen goes black: "You are dead". I must admit a certain amount of pessimism overtook me after that. And it didn't help that the game crashes on account of memory leak after my new respawn outside of Elektro. I restarted twice and it crashes right after I join the server and take my first step. It certainly can be a frustrating experience to play exp sometimes, but that damn ladder slide option is not part of the exp experience, that is just a stupid feature that should not have been introduced into this game. It serves no purpose whatsoever other as another method of suiciding (as if we needed another method to get killed by ladders). Sorry for the rant. Just venting off some steam. Already feel better.

Indeed. Such commieblocks definitely belongs in an area like Chernarus. I also wondered at the dev comment that "such tall buildings didn't belong there", especially when considering that they added the townhall tower in Novo.

I played a couple of hours last night and didn't experience the hunger/thirst bug. I alternated between 1pp/3pp in order to skip the logon countdown, so I switched servers about 5 times. My 3pp character even made it to prison island and back without trouble, and only needed one pitstop at an appletree in Balota to stay green. Loot is very scarce though. Besides the usual clothes lootsplosion (it seems to be the only place for 6 slot pants) I only found a sledgehammer and a cr75 pistol (beneath some clothes, so I guessed missed by previous looters), luckily I have a lot of 9mm ammo to chamber it with. If anyone broke their legs when passing over a pile of clothes on prison island, I am afraid that was my doing. I found a bear trap in a shed just as I was about to embark swimming to the island, and the opportunity was just too good to miss.

There is an upcoming backpack?

Still lootsplosions at guard houses and cloth lootsplosions in select houses (I tested a certain green house next to the house next to the police station in Cherno on both 3pp and 1pp servers, and it had cloth lootsplosion on both servers, while the house next to it, which is of the same type, didn't). That tells me that the loot system still has its kinks, but I am really enjoying the fact that you have to look in places that you didn't usually need to look for loot in in order to find it. There is no point going the usual popular places (like police stations, fire stations etc) anymore, unless you are the first or second to do so after a new build. But then you can find press vests, guns and food in houses and rooms of houses that didn't spawn anything before. Simply put, the system is much closer to being inscrutable and unpredictable, as looting should be. I have always enjoyed the looting up part of this game immensely, but now it has been made even more interesting.

I found a suppressor for my AK74 in exp, but when I fired it still let out a highly noticeable "bang" sound. Anyway zombies were behaving oddly (I havent played after the small update last night), either not aggroing or aggroing but never moving or aggroing but moving extremely slow, so it was impossible to tell at that time what kind of impact the gun sound (suppressor or not) had on zombies.

I played some more tonight and I encountered the "guard house" in coastal Elektro, and the military lootsplosion bug seems still to be active on that building. I found an AK74 and a mag for it, plenty of ammo, an AK-74SU, tons of vests, including several high capacity vests, pristine combat knife and boots to boot, a landmine, smersh vest and backpack, eastern suppressor, pristine wooden furniture for my AK, a 75-round mag for the AKM, a 30-round mag for the AKM (and plenty of ammo for it, just no AKM), an FNX, sight for the FNX, flashlight for the FNX, nifty black Chernarus beret and probably a lot more but I forget. So go for the guard houses if you need military gear and everything has been picked clean in the hotspots. I hope they will eventually fix this loot bug on that building, in fact I had hoped they had done it for .56.

There is plenty of food, you just have to look in all the houses and rooms you wouldn't usually have searched. I played the 0.56 exp first time last night, and everything had clearly been looted several times before on that server, all the hotspots were picked completely clean, but after careful search of the surrounding houses (this was in Elektro), I found everything I needed anyway: Talon backpack, repeater rifle, magnum, press vest (placed on a stove in a green house), military boots, axe, cantine, matches, duct tape, plastic bottle, water purifiers and last but not least plenty of cans of food to get me light green in energy and hydration. The only thing I didn't find was some .357 ammo for my guns. I found some Winchester ammo, so I am hoping I will eventually find a rifle to match that instead.

I bet it was. Just not in a zombie survival game.

I would bet they play on them for loot. Not least the loot of players who don't use gamma exploit.

No, but 99% of all players playing at night will have turned gamma up. This means I will be in a position where all other players I encounter have an advantage over me. This fact has long since stopped me from playing night servers (except when it occasionally is night time on exp), even though I would very much like to play nighttime.

The whole discussion concerning the correct amount of darkness at night seems kinda pointless as long as the gamma exploit is still an option.

They do make a difference in gameplay, however they will only have little effect on how that gameplay is emotionally received by players. You simply won't relive that feeling of the freshness, mysteriousness and wonder at playing a new game for the first couple of times, that is not how the brain works (unless you have a memory impairment of course). Experience and a certain measurement of routine kicks in, and that is just something we have to live with. I still get the adrenaline pumping in just about every session of playing DayZ, which is more than I can say of any other games I have ever played, but that feeling of complete and utter immersement and fear of being in a new and unexplored apocalyptic world, where you are not fully aware of the scope of the game in any other way than you know that it is immense and different from anything you have ever played before, a feeling which will provide you with the biggest kick any game can ever provide, is unfortunately not an option anymore, no matter how much I try to deceive my brain into thinking that it will. It is completely valid to bring up points of critique in the game, suggestions on how features could become better, like the list of features you presented, that is one of the main purposes of a forum such as this one, however one should be aware of the rationale for the criticism and not base it on an ideal that was an ideal more on account of the novelty of the concept than on the singular features of a game. I agree with many of your points (not least concerning the darkness of nighttime), I do believe some of them will change SA for the better, but the sum of them wont bring back that which you once experienced.

People that played the mod in the early days experienced a singular fantastic feeling, because the genre of the game was new, and thus everything was experienced as being far more scary and tense than what (with hindsight) it really was. SA is far more ambitious and on the road to becoming a lot more advanced and intricate than the mods ever were, but it is still just another reiteration of the same genre. So that feeling of everything being scary and awesome and realistic is not quite as it once was. However that has nothing in the least to do with the game, that is all in the mind of the gamer. To sum it up: Mod players miss the excitement of early mod days, something that was mainly occurring because it was a new experience. SA can never fully give them that experience no matter what the devs do or how good the game is becoming.

The backpack only remains if a player took it off the body. A dead unlooted body will disappear alongside all the gear it is carrying after 10 minutes.

Haha. That last incident is classic Wile E. Coyote material.

Great shot, especially considering all the desync. Also what a pathetic response he made to you approaching him in a friendly way while he was vulnerable with that tent in his hands. It is just such a retarded way to play this game, not communicating and just attacking for no reason whatsoever. Nice to see him taken out, although I fear no lessons was learnt that day. (And the mosin just sounds awesome in slow motion, the clunk/clunk of the bolt action is music in my ears).

That small unenterable house, usually placed at industrial sites and military bases, which has a kind of tiled porch, spawns all the types of AK mags and parts in the game. I have a drum mag and several 30 round AK mags, as well as a pristine AK wooden handguard and buttstock and an SPO scope, all found there, and all found at the same time. Clearly that loot spawn is bugged, because it is always a lootsplosion of good military items (everything except actual guns). I have still to find the gun for all my mags and parts though. I even went to prison, and I only found a lot of MP5 mags, but no guns, actually nothing else. Edit: This one:

Any headgear can mean kos, any clown mask does mean kos. It is a very simple fact based on experience. And no it doesn't have anything to do with covered face or anything like that. It is the mask itself. You put that on if you want to kill other players, you leave it be if you don't (of course kosers can and will operate without it as well, so the lack of it is most certainly not a guarantuee in any way, but the presence of it is). It is a symbolic sign language accepted by both the killer and the killed. A few people are out of the loop on this language, and it is certainly a shame when they get shot for wearing a mask they just thought looked cool, but that is the price to pay for doing stupid daring things without knowing the full extent of their meaning.