rickyriot

Just for clarity, I have 1000s of hours in Dz, and I started on the mod before moving to SA. The title itself should give you a clue. To be clear, I am not complaining about people KoS'ing, although I have to say it seems even more endemic than it's ever been. I am not a PvP'er. I was, many years ago, and I was a good one too, but time (..and the odd bit of weed!) has dulled my reactions. I could, could, go around the map, engaging with everyone but I find that boring. Dz is touted as much as a survival as it is a PvP title, and I have to admit I much prefer the survival these days. The problem is you can't have survival on the server because people KoS all the time. Again, I am not complaining about people doing that, but it really fucks over those who are not interested in such shenanigans. I am tempted to move to RP, but I have considerable reservations about it. I certainly don't want to be "a character actor" playing the game, I just want to enjoy the survival aspect without constantly needing to look over my shoulder. So that's where I am, an experienced Dz player who has gotten tired of constant KoS'ing but the solution of RP feels like it would take away some of the game. What to do?

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This is sort of linked to my other thread and the actions of KoS'ers. From the outset, I do not wish to criticise people who KoS, it's part of the game. Over time though, several 'bandit systems' have been developed in order to mitigate blatant KoS'ing. For those who haven't encountered one of these (and I have to say I've not noticed many recently), it generally revolves around who shot whom, with the "offender" being punished in some way, usually with some sort of bounty on their heads. Perhaps access to certain traders is limited to those of "good standing". You get the idea. It is fraught with problems though, this example being an easy one: Someone raises their gun towards you, you fire and kill them. I think most people would accept that kill was fair, yet in these sorts of systems you are punished because the system simply can't know the context of that interchange. With all that said, the question(s) I have are... 1) Have you ever played a server with such a system, and if so did you like it? 2) Do you think such things, in general, would benefit the game? 3) How do you think such a thing could be specifically implemented in order to be "successful", or is it just too nebulous a problem to really get to grips with?

Taking a nod to your signature... If you want a survival challenge, try driving across the map on a laggy server.

I am UK based, and play Spaggies servers. I am sure that they have dropped their capacity though, as I was certain it was 75 before. I wasn't having too much problem getting on when it was higher, but it's a Sunday evening and I guess it'll be swamped just now. If you can't get in, Spaggie has several other servers too, which are (looking at DZSA now) have slots free for Takistan, Namalsk and Dear Isle. The time, again shown on DZSA, is midday on the Chernarus servers, wait until it gets dark and I'm sure a few slots will open up.

Ha! You had me at the first line! The points you raise are also very fair, imo anyway. I have to say the servers I play on tend to be vanilla (or very lightly modded) community servers. So the abundance of loot and/or food is perhaps not as plentiful as other servers, but you are right to the extent that food isn't the issue it could (should?) be, as one cow not only gets you enough meat for days, but bones for fish hooks which will feed you for another couple of days. Thanks for the comments regarding the RP stuff, too, I'm really torn. I see some YT stuff and think, yup let's do that, then I read the "sign up" forms for the servers and it's like amateur dramatics night and I have to create a backstory and I'll be honest it turns me off.

I think it's only fair I answer these myself, and I'll put them here in a reply in order to separate my opinions from the questions themselves. 1) I have, and sort of. I liked the idea of it, but I am not sure if it did what was intended. 2) In general, yes, although I also think expanding survival/PvE elements that may offset the amount of PvP'ing. 3) It's really tough, like the example I gave, each exchange is open to many interpretations and I don't think anything other than hundreds of hours of player statistics and a lot of machine learning would bring us close to a properly working system.

I honestly don't know when the last time I played official servers. I know that doesn't answer the question about the regions those servers sit in, so apologies for that but the reason I tend to got on community servers is they will often have discords with admins who are active. I find the official servers have people acting "odd". I'm not saying hacking, as I have no proof, but if you are an experienced player you tend to spot people acting "odd".

I think I've played Deer Isle in Arma, certainly something close to it. It's not a bad map, and.. obvs.. much better than I can do, but all the servers I go on are either empty or loaded with mods which nullifies any survival aspect. I think the thing is, and this is not in any way dismissing anything that has suggested, whether there is a niche of Dz that would suit my current play-style. Changing maps is one option but it's not really going to resolve my issue, simply kick the can down the road. Edit: just to add, there is no guarantee there is an answer, it might just be that I've drifted away from what the majority of others who play the game prefer.

This is the double edged sword of Chernarus... On one hand you want a very stable and solid map, Chernarus offers us that. On the other you want it to be dynamic. I guess the gas zones provide some of that, although I'd be keen to see much more, and i think of all the maps the gas "fits" it's definitely Chernarus.

I'd say it's more the server than the actual maps, although it's a fair comment that I should try a change of scenery. My experiences with the modern Namalsk is that KoS is even greater. With the limited resources and size of the map it's understandable. Takistan is almost impossible to be a survival type. Huge open tracks of land with little, if any, cover. That leaves Esseker and Dear Isle, both of these feel unfinished. I don't own Livonia, it's not a map that appeals to me. I've taken a break loads of times, especially that barren 0.6x no update year and the shambles of 1.0 and them saying "we won't fix shit because we can't but really we think you don't care" in one of the worst BI press release I've ever seen! Still, to their credit, they are pulling things round now - who knew that console money would be the 'silver bullet' to that? Forgive my cynicism here, while it's tongue in cheek, we all know that waiting for BI to patch/fix/update a very specific issue is futile.

It is indeed, a complete circle jerk. One person KoS, then the dead person will go on and KoS another "to even it out". Ultimately this hits at the root of the "Dean Hall conundrum", that has plagued (for the lack of a better word) SA from launch, which is... "just what is Dz? A survival game? A PvP?" It's not been answered and for the last 8 years or so BI have firmly sat on the fence, sometimes leaning one way, sometime the other. I totally don't blame BI here, I am sure they are just keen to not kill the golden goose, after all, those golden eggs are tasty! This then leaves me the question, do I care enough about Dz to continue being frustrated by it, or do I accept that it's not the game I want it to be (primarily down to what the players playing want it to be - and again, I am very careful not to "blame" anyone for the way it's played). Hence the RP mention, but I've already said what my concerns about that would be. You know what I'd be ideal for? If the old "medics on call" thing came back.

I appreciate the answer, but It's nothing I don't do already, and have been doing pretty much since SA launched. I am a solo player and spend almost all my time away from main areas. I loot useful shit, like nails, saws, fishing hook and the like. I raid small towns for essentials like rope, cloth, sharpening stones etc. I very very rarely go near military bases and if I do it's in order to get suitable clothing/backpack not for the guns/ammo. I'll grab something to defend myself and I'll grab a rifle for killing animals but I very rarely look geared. Just the other day I was hugging the Western edge of the map, and found a garage along with a couple of buildings that I could make a simple base from. I grabbed a couple of logs and with the shovel in my hand and clearly in the animation of making a fence, some guy appeared out of nowhere and "spray and pray'ed" me. I guess they were a novice player and keen for the kill as an experienced one would have handled it differently (they had a huge advantage and I was unarmed - or at least I was in the middle of building a fence) but no KoS seems to be the answer for some. Again, I have no issue with PvP, or the people wanting to play PvP, and if this was a game that simply relied solely on PvP (such as CoD or Battlefield) then I'd hold my hands up and say "ok, this isn't the game for me". this is why I am at an impasse, I like the game, but feel RP would dull that experience. I don't want it sanitised, but then I don't want to spend every minute in the game constantly on high alert.

.. Sorry for the length of this (oo-er, missus!) but there is a TLDR at the end.. Clothes have a damage level and if you find something that is "ruined" you shouldn't be able to wear it - and I think that is the situation as it stands now. However if you are wearing clothes that gets "ruined" you can keep wearing them with no real negative. I think a little tweak should be added to address that. One such tweak would be clothing debuffs. Two of them, one static one active and they would be based on two metrics; capacity and integrity. These debuffs would only be applied to the lowest three tiers of damage; damaged, badly damaged and ruined. Capacity is simple enough, it's a static percentage that is applied based on it's damage level. Just for argument's sake we'll set these to 10, 25 and 60. For a pair of jeans 20 slots, would drop to 18 slots (10%) then 15 slots (25%) then 8 slots (60%). You would continue to wear the clothing item but anything that didn't fit in the reduced number of slots would be dropped at your feet. Restoring capacity is as simple as repairing the item. This will take you to "worn" which is a level above any debuffs being applied. Next up, integrity. This is applied in two ways and is affected not just by movement but by how far and how fast you move. If you don't move the integrity debuff should be almost zero percent. If you do then there could be two outcomes; either things "fall out" or the actual clothing itself "falls off". As you would expect, walking and crouching should have the lowest percentage going up for jogging then again for sprinting. What's more the value initially applied based on the movement should increment dependent on how long that action is taken. Integrity, like the capacity debuff, is improved by repairing the item. So, with all that in mind, let me explain why I'm suggesting this and how it will benefit the game. For a start it's a level of realism (well... "DayZ realism" anyway!). If you had clothing that was damaged you wouldn't expect to stuff as much other stuff into it. In real life that's because you'd be wary of putting too much strain on a damaged item, in game we can replace that with a generic % capacity debuff. If you decided to move while wearing a damaged item you could realistically expect might things to fall out, the more damage the more likely to fall out. If you had a backpack that is damaged, it's as likely to lose items as to actually fall off – which in game we consider the holding straps breaking. Another reason is the way it would effect the loot economy. At present there is a lot of clothes out there not being used. That's a lot of wasted space in memory, static and not respawning. The reason is they don't need to be used. You might check for a cheeky tin of beans but overall you're walking past that pair of capri pants. Same thing once you are geared. You're never going into a one horse town for loot scraps, you're going high stakes – and rightly so. Introducing buffs to items will raise the value of low level loot and get it circulating again. Smaller towns away from the coast (and away from fresh spawns) will start to look more inviting once your previously pristine army trousers can't hold all your gear but a new pair of low level jeans will. People will start looking after their clothing more! I am a bit obsessed, so maybe this is just me, but I will always look to repair my clothes when I get a chance. This is fairly common, but not universal. I've seen many streamers run around in ruined gear all session. As there are no debuffs applied to clothing there is no real reason to repair. Like low level clothes it would increase the value of sewing kits and duct tape but it would start people using lesser loot items. Currently, just how many people have been genuinely excited about finding a leather sewing kit? --[TL;DR]-- In short, no penalties exist for wearing ruined clothing and that could change with several debuffs applied. Exactly how strong these debuffs are is open to debate but they should not interfere with gameplay, rather they should enhance the immersion element. These debuffs would refer to the carrying capacity and the integrity of the item; the latter meaning items being dropped or the whole item itself falls off you. Not only would debuffs effect your clothing, it would alter the loot economy as it brings sewing kits and low level clothing into play far more, getting the best use out of the loot on map. Possible problems? What to do with clothing ruined during a fight? So you face up to a couple of zombies, one hits you enough to damage your jacket, your jacket happens to have the bandages and they are now on the floor and you are scrambling to pick up the bandages while working out what else has been dropped at the same time fight off the zombies. So, yeah, the idea that it's instantaneous is a bad one. It would need to be far more subtle than that. However that said, if a zombie was to slash at you it would rip your clothes and potentially rip open a pocket. What's more if you go from a standing start to a sprint and you are wearing a ruined backpack it's entirely reasonable for the items to fall out. As I said, there is a level of realism here; "DayZ realism", but realism. So... I sort of hate to ask for thoughts about this as that's when I feel it'll get ripped apart, however let's see what everyone else thinks.... Oh, and if you lasted this far down the post then well done. Your reward is this:

For background I've been playing the game for years, since the mod days. I know DayZ has always had bugs, and I stopped playing it about 6 months ago because I constantly picked up bugged weapons - to the point it was game breaking for me. I keep on dropping in and out occasionally to see if this, and other things, have been resolved. Normally it hasn't. This time we have a bug in picking up items and it happens in both vanilla and modded servers. I encountered this bug about a month ago - thought I'd let it slip and try again later. This is that later. Essentially I cannot pick up anything other than transferring it to my empty hand via the UI then moving it across to my inventory. As you can imagine this is dreadful - and certainly not intended behaviour as there is a "take" option. Here is a link to a video: https://streamable.com/73ob8 It's things like this that have ruined DayZ for me, from being someone who spent hundreds of hours per month to someone who barely even remembers DayZ is still installed. I can take the higher level bugs, things that are so complex that it's easy for them to be introduced but the bottom line is upon spawning within the first few seconds you shouldn't encounter a bug that almost instantly ruins any playthrough. It is incredible to me that this could be considered a stable release if the very act of picking up items, something we all agree is fundamental to the game, is inherently flawed. The cynic in me would suggest BI fix their fucking game before releasing paid DLC, but maybe that's my frustration coming out. I'm just annoyed that I've been stopped playing this game for what seems like 6-8 months now whether it be the "glitched gun" bug or this one.

It may be less frequent, but the problem is that it's still happening. You know the situation, when you pull out a weapon you should be able to rely on it. OK, add in RNG for gun jam but it must be very small chance (obviously based on condition).

Fairly decent connection. No idea of ping but I am on fibre and the server I play on is based in the UK (the same country I connect from). It's not good that you have experienced the same bug (or if not the same, it's similar) but at least I'm not looking like a complete idiot for being the only one complaining. I've been playing the game since the mod, I honestly can't believe that all the items that have been "bugged" were all damaged. I say believe because I simply haven't kept a note of the states but it's one of those things I'd notice if that were the case. Like you I've had axes that refuse to chop down trees, but that's been a much rarer occurrence.

"How do you handle other survivors?" 'Badly' would be my one word answer. Despite having 1000s of hours over the years covering both mod and SA I still have no way of determining if someone is going to kill you or not. A few months back, I set up a farm near one of the coastal spawn points. The intention was to run a little test to see if people would be happy to take the (literal) fruits of my labour. I was purposely unarmed, no backpack etc, all my farming tools and loot was stored in a nearby shed. I also killed all the localised zombies, collecting the food and clothes they spawned with. I was the full package. A nice fire to warm yourself by, some free food and some clothes and loot. Considering I was giving away free stuff that could save them, the percentage of people willing to kill me was still very high. Even after I explained the full scope of what I was doing. Granted some avoided me like the plague, assuming I was tricking them, but others would grab some food, grab a bag and some clothes then would attack me. Not being armed I was easy prey - but that was the point of the exercise. Over an 8 hour session (heh, yes, irl 8 hours - which was effectively 4 or so days including a night cycle on the server I was on) I must have died about 12 to 14 times out of maybe 34-40 odd interactions. The interesting part was when those who didn't kill me, came back after they respawned (or brought fresh spawns to me). Several of those then acted as my guards. While that meant it looked a bit shadier rather than one unarmed person, the whole psychology experiment was quite interesting. I might try that again, although record it and stick it up on YouTube for all to see (including the offenders!). So after all that, my only advice to OP is to do two things; 1) Find a friendly server (ideally with an interactive admin). The more you play the more people get to know you. From experience most KoS aren't actually "kill on sight", more a "kill on speak". Sure, there will always be some that just tap you from a distance and that's where you need to play clever - avoid all to obvious line of sight, and keep an eye out for vantage points like hillsides, tree-lines and tall buildings - and accept that is part of the game. Once you get a rep you'll find when people make first contact, they will get to know you and be far less likely to take you out as you will no longer be a perceived threat. 2) Learn what you look like to others. This might sound odd, but you do this with people you see, so reverse the perspective. For example, if you see a medium to heavily geared player that is beyond the usual military "hot spots" then you can deduce one of three scenarios; they are looping back for a friend, traversing from one "hot spot" to another or is looking for a fight. The first two should be obvious, the latter less so but if it's not a case of someone going from A-B, rather someone going to A, shuffling in or about A, returning to A then that (for me) is a sign they are to be avoided - especially if they are hovering about the spawn points. You will need to take your time, but that's one thing DayZ can provide you with. Hours upon hours of watching randoms just "dick about". When you realise that others are weighing you up the same way you do them, then you learn to present yourself in the least threatening manner. You will be surprised how easy it is to run through a town unscathed if you are only in the most basic clothing and no obvious weapon. Ammo, dependent on what duping bug is the order of the day, tends to be limited and people won't waste it if they get no return. If you have a shotgun, saw that down and stick it into a bag. Sure it'll affect the firing stats, but it's a lot less threatening to see someone with a bag than it is a bag and a shotgun on their back. Ok, so... ...what have we learned? Probably nothing, you'll still get shot, maybe just a bit less.

A jammed gun for ones which are badly damaged would be fairly realistic addition. Would need to be very carefully balanced though. Far Cry 2, for example had this, but it was way to common and just ended up being an annoyance rather than adding immersion. It's a fair question, but I certainly don't remember the states of all the different guns when they have failed me. Even then, I can't eject a magazine which you should be able to do even if the gun is damaged. WHo knows maybe the bug has been fixed and BI didn't include it in the patch notes (or I missed it in those patch notes). I feel if it had been though, most would reply to that effect and point me to the location in the notes where they had documented the change. It's been about a 2 months since I last played, so I might drop back in to see if the bug rears it's ugly head. Not sure what version the experimental is on (an early release of 1.06?) if so I might swap to that - if I can find a suitable server. One thing to note, and I'm surprised nobody had asked this, but I play on vanilla servers so this isn't an issue with mods conflicting.

At least once every session, and as I've said a session can be up to 2 or 3 hours. If it was just me getting it, then I'd be happy to go with the corrupt files thing (although I have reinstalled a couple of times - including appData), but watch any long term streamer and you see they encounter the same issue too. If it was just the case of picking up a weapon and it being buggered then fine, I'd just accept some guns you find are buggered, but it can happen to weapons in my inventory. I've had situations where I've just fired a gun, reloaded it, then placed it into my backpack, then later I've taken it out and it's bugged. Whatever the issue is, it seems to effect me badly, making the game almost unplayable because you just never know when something is going to fail. There is nothing more annoying than a weapon you were using seconds ago just stops working in the middle of a gun fight.

It's not about "biting" buddy, this isn't a trolling comment. I love DayZ but I just can't play it. I will pick up a gun and it won't fire and won't reload. I believe that the bug where you fired and it only fired on your client (not the server) has been resolved but I can't guarantee you on that. If I put the gun down and pick it up, it doesn't fix it. The only way to do so is log out and back in again. That is annoying, but even more so if you are on a full server and have to wait in the queue from a bug rather than something you did.

It's really not, if it were I would do that every time. I have tried every trick that is supposed to resolve it and it just doesn't the ONLY solution that works for me is logging out and logging back in again.

Literally every single session. Every session. A session could be up to 2 hours gameplay. I can also drop onto just about any twitch stream by regular players and you'll find it is fairly common. It's not just a priority it should be one of the top priorities. Don't be daft, your login suggests you have been playing the game as long as I have, presumably including the mod. The mod was pretty much very PvP, basically because Arma was. SA went away from that but with the ditching of a lot of stuff from 0.6x it has reduced the PvE. We are only now seeing the return of fishing but that was only after BI put out a really pissy press release saying they wouldn't be matching 0.6x - I don't need to know the machinations of BI's strategy in order to see what was happened in the game. You are right about most of that, which is why it is odd that the current version has focused on PvP not PvE. You don't agree with me on that, but that is irrelevant in the face of the facts. What were the things they added when 1.0 was released? Guns, guns and more guns. Not fishing, not bows, etc, etc... I am forced to stop playing because of an newly introduced bug. It wasn't present in previous editions, either that or I am very very lucky to have never experienced it for hundreds of hours then suddenly to experience it every single session I have. However it's nice to know that not only am I playing it wrong, I am not allowed to give my feedback on a public forum specifically set up to discuss such issues. I think there is a job for you being a Hong Kong police officer.

Sadly, that is what Bohemia have tilted the game towards. As for the "doing it wrong" comment? That just sounds arrogant as if "your way" is the "only way". You will find many, many people play DayZ specifically and only for PvP. Edit: I note neither of you reflected on the real reason I don't play these days, and that is the bugged gun issue. You'd think such a huge game breaking bug would be a fairly high priority but clearly not.

This has been my experience for the last couple of months: (1) Spawn -> (2) loot -> (3) find my gun is bugged -> (4) log out -> (5) come back a few weeks later to find out if they've fixed that bug yet -> (go to #1) I used to care about PvP but now I just don't, DayZ is simply not a good enough PvP game for it to be solely about that. 1.06 may breathe new life into the title, but honestly? I doubt it.