Buffaloe

That's exactly the way i feel about dayz at the moment. Playing the game currently feels not like playing but more like collecting loot by yourself, which is pretty damn boring. What makes this game shine are the player interactions, however now that there are large towns everywhere you can run around for ages not meeting anybody. It's a horribly depressing experience when you realize that after running around for 2 hours hoping to get actual gameplay and fun you ended up doing absolutely nothing but running. That said, I don't think enterable buildings are the main problem. On the contrary, I think those are great, and shouldn't be missed in a modern day game. The actual culprit is the extreme increase in effective map size. Sure, the map may be as large as before in square kilometers, but the amount of areas that are actually worthwile to visit has drastically increased. The only way I can see things change is by a massive increase in player numbers per server and maybe new means of transportation. However, I am unsure whether high player numbers will be possible given the current server performance, and even then there'd still be a need for actual players to fill these servers.

Got my first kill with a shotty. I had an incredible guilty conscience the while after, feeling really bad to have shot someone that didn't even see me.

If you don't kill the zombie that is trying to eat you right now, you won't have to worry about the future anyway. So that is not THAT much of an issue. It's pefectly possible to put nails in a baseball bat or thick stick and many people would come up with that in a setting like this even if it's not as effective as they think. Also rule of cool.

If they were deployable on all flat surfaces like in RO that would be sweet indeed. However, as long as the weapon can only be rested by going prone and using the bipod this is not a very good idea since it puts the weapon in rather silly limits.

Well, i guess the order in which they release new guns is not necessarily determined by what is best for the current gameplay since this is only a testing version. I think once they got their loot system sorted out and pistol mags become common they might become widespread basic weapons. After all pistols should probably be the most common firearm. However currently they indeed are rather worthless...

Seen those vids a while ago, however I thought they got rid of that since then. If they haven't, they definitely should.

Was that a ninja change that didn't make it on the changelog or are you talking experimental? Can more people confirm it or is it just bad luck/imagination of a few? Also, didn't they remove the feature where clothing reduces damage? It seems awfully silly, at least when it comes to bullets.

I think what I'd welcome the most is a completely overhauled character movement system. The current one is so clunky it makes me wanna cry. Especially urban/indoor combat is turned into a nightmare by this, but the rest is not much better. Manual bolting? Sure. Personally I don't miss it but It'd be a neat feature that is hopefully not too much work to code. Vision beeing affected by masks and helmet? Yes please, that's immersion gold.

Point of this game? Silly question! BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD, SKULLS FOR THE SKULL THRONE!

I think you guys should cool it down a little. There is no point in personally attacking each other or proclaming to have a majority behind you. Forum goers themselfes are a only special fraction of the actual player population, so polls here have little significance when it comes to the the whole community. However I doubt anyone of us has reliable figures about the community as a whole.

They might not fit the same role right now, since the mosin also doubles as the current sniper rifle. But once we get more guns that will change. And there the problem starts. Once the amount of guns goes up, the interesting decision process you mention, can quickly grow into a tiresome, complicated mess. Also, once there are more guns this decision making will be there as well, not on the microscopic level of mosin vs. blaze, but for example shotgun vs mosin, or mosin vs. some hunting rifle which can now mount a scope while the mosin cant. It would still be rather realistic and promote decision-making, while also avoiding to overcomplicate the game. Keep in mind that there are other aspects to the game than just guns. edit: While I agree with most of your post, I hope that at least some game makers also have different goals than only making money. Artistic goals, like realizing your vision for the game, and I do think this is the case with the team behind dayz, they are not simply going to cater to a group they consider the economically most worthwhile one.

Nope, I don't consider myself a casual gamer. I spend way too much time on gaming to be one. I also enjoyed playing dwarf fortress, which certainly is not a casual game by any means ^^ I can understand that you are all for more details in a part of the game that you are particularly interested in. I also have to agree that having more calibers makes the game harder and more realistic, which I approve of. However, there are cases where the streamlining makes sense. If i recall correctly one of the tweets stated, that for example blaze and mosin would use different kinds of ammo if the game was 100% realistic. I think in cases like this one, where ammo, as well as the gun are rather similiar and fill the same role streamlining makes perfect sense. Discriminating between the two wouldn't add much to the realistic feel of the game, while making it unnecessarily complicated. Ammo can still be very rare and diverse while streamlined in some cases. I'll repeat myself here and state that trying to be absolutely accurate and realistic in every department can be dentrimental to a game, even if it is realism centered. Sometimes trade-offs have to be made.

I think what many "gun enthusiasts" need to understand is, that a lot of people don't share their hobby and don't care too much whether a gun is chambered in 7.62x51 or 7.62x54 or whatever. Don't get me wrong, I am all for comprehensive and harsh gameplay that is as realistic as possible. And i assume most of the above mentioned people are as well. However they don't share your enthusiasm about rifles, pistols, cartridges etc.... Streamlining a few calibers does not mean dumbing down the game. It means sacrificing some realism for other parts of the gameplay. While realism to a certain extent is very important to a game like this, it is still a game and a balance has to be found. If the game was as accurate in all other aspects as you want it to be in the gun department it would become very complicated and bloated. And now that would mean dumbing down the game. Just think about the aforementioned fishing, then carring items, the upcoming vehicles, sleeping and other bodily functions, damage and health system, melee combat.......

That is exactly my point. Streamline different calibers where it makes sense for the gameplay. You said it yourself, streamlined and therefore more common ammo for the common guns. But more specific, and as a result of that, rarer ammo for the rare high end guns. I don't mind having more ammo types in game either. More variety, (to a certain degree) is good for the game. However, having a very large amount of different, yet very similiar ammo types for guns that may even fill the same role in the game is more a burden than a treat.

I haven't read the whole threat until this point, but it strikes me as weird that some people demand absolute realism when it comes to guns, while the game in other areas is way less realistic and sacrifices realism for gameplay. As many people said, there is no reason to have very large amounts of different and sometimes exotic ammo types in the game, when some of them are so similiar they could be grouped together as well. Just imagine the strain on the gameplay it would produce. They'd have to somehow manage the loot balance with all those calibers, while we have to fiddle around with lots of nearly identical stacks of ammo in our inventory. As it was already mentioned in this thread, ammo can very well be generalized groups, as long as it makes some sense (the ammo types and/or the respective weapons beeing very similiar). Also ammo for more "high end" weapons should be rarer to further balance the game. A common "early game" rifle should better not share it's ammo with a very rare and powerful "end game" weapon.

double post, sorry I wrote this in a confused hurry.

When i went there it was not that much about getting loot than getting action. Going west is perfectly fine, but sometimes you don't wanna make a trip over half the map, especially when you know that getting geared up will transform you into a murderous maniac. That beeing sad I think the changes to NEAF are really good. They only have to flesh it out a little. However, encouraging people to spread over the map is one thing, keeping the game interestings via encounters is another. Therefore max player numbers will have to increase, since 40 players are just not enough to populate the map.

I consider it very questionable to condemn people that strife for a progressive society. Since when are values like equality and consideration something negative? Also, isn't broadly generalizing people into arbitrary categories and referring to them with equally arbitrary abbreviations quite arrogant as well? But let's stop the pointless personal attacks and get back to the topic. I think we should not concentrate on OPs experience alone but the community as a whole. I believe several people have already advised not to use VOIP, to keep a low profile or search for a group. I think this is another proof for the problem: Why should women avoid using VOIP, to prevent beeing discriminated? Why should women keep a lower profile than men to avoid getting into situations where they might be discriminated? Why should women be in need of a premade group when it's perfectly fine for men to play alone and find people to play with in game? Interestingly enough this is quite a widespread phenomena, it's even noted in some sociological studies. Many women refrain to use voice chat or other functions that could reveal their sex. Now if women have to resort to special tactics to avoid beeing treated in a discriminitory way that is a problem, don't you agree?

I'm kind of fine with that, as long as guns and attachements are reasonably rare, and don't shoot lasers. I could not care much less whether some supressor thingy is feasible or not with a certain kind of gun barrel.

Let's cool it down a little shall we? I am going to ignore your personal attacks and keep it to the point. I was doing quite the opposite of generalizing the term "normal". Instead I was trying to point out how it is connected to the social and historical context. I think using concepts like feudalism and slavery, that are nowadays discredited in "western" societys but were the norm in the past, to emphasize this is perfectly fine. Anyway the issue of this discussion is neither slavery nor the opression of women in Iran or the issue of human rights in general, but instead sexism in video games and the respective community. To clear some things up, I am not referring to OP's point in particular but the gaming community in general so I think i can safely assume there is an issue with sexism. This thread is not the right place to list extensive amounts of publications, so I suggest you research for yourself, I am however willing to assist you via pm in doing so.

Well, first of all, you should express yourself more clearly if you do not want to get missunderstood. However I still think I got the core of your previous statement just well. Your reply strikes me as one of the "I am not against X, but..." lip services. Sexism is not simply the "hurt feelings of insecure individuals". It is discrimination by gender, which can be observed by everyone in everyday life as well as in the gaming community in the form of gender stereotypes. It can however also be quantified as done in several scientific works on the subject, for example concerning income equality or again the gaming community. Of course sexism does not exist in a vacuum. It is deeply rooted in the consciousness and subconsciousness of the people, as well as the material conditions of society. Since it is so deeply rooted it might strike the uncritical mind as "normal" but may I remember you that slavery and feudalism were also deeply rooted in past societies and widely perceived as normal. As you can see, just because something is "normal" in the historical context it is not necessarily good, or an inevitable evil. It's quite cheap to make assumptions about my private life and turn them into accusations. As a matter of fact I am politically active in several organizations. No, a single forum topic will surely not change the world, however It does contribute to making people aware of the issue. And judging from many replies there is still an enormous need for that. Ultimately, those who are affected most by sexism, i.e. women, are those who have to fight it the fiercest. Taking part or supporting the struggle is not "protecting someone weaker" to make yourself feel comfortable, it is solidary uniting yourself with other, equal human beeings to struggle for a goal you deem worthwhile.

While I am not quite sure whether i can make sense of that gibberish, it reeks of the "it has always been this way and will never change no point to argue" phrase. Which is of course completely invalid. After all just because a negative condition was present in the past and is widely present in present time, this condition is still a problem and therefore in need of change. If your "argument" was applied broadly there would be no social progress at all. I think you just outed yourself as a major reactionary.

Sarkeesian makes some very valid points, based on her own research as well as the scientific works of others. However her work is mostly concerned with the representation of women in video games in form of character designs and the roles those characters play. This discussion on the other hand is about how the community treats it's female members. To get back to point though, if you mistake the point Sarkeesian is making for an imagined one, then I suppose you are making the same mistake here.

Of course sexism is not just a problem of the dayz community. It's a problem concerning the whole society, the gaming community included. This however does not make it less of an issue, as I see it this makes the problem even more pressing. Also I do not think women beeing a minority in this community, as well as this beeing a post apocalyptic game somehow justify or alleviate sexism. By simply proclaming that sexism in video games is normal and can not be dealt with you actually create an atmosphere where sexism can thrive instead of slowly receding and then dying in a corner. In our role as members of the gaming community we can however contribute to ending sexism by pointing out the problems and making people conscious of the issue. However, by accepting things as normal or given while also downplaying the issue we achive the opposite.

What makes you think we are talking about 10 people? I don't quite understand who you mean with those people, offenders or victims? Anyway, the number is completely arbitrary and therefore meaningless. And while insults and immature behaviour are unfortunately common in the community sexist or racial slurs have a quality of their own. Why? Because they are not simple but rather unsubstantial insults like your common slurs. Instead they reenforce and perpetuate stereotypes as well as negative conditions in our society.