cuddly_rabbit

That was a good read. Couldn't help but laugh louldy a few times. Thank you, that was great imput. I guess, I'll stick with the semi-secret/careful appraoch. And I will gear my next guy on a high pop server. 2 more challenges ahead. :D

Bought the game yesterday, played it all night and again today, so my experience is still very limited. I am stuck in a dilemma, somehow. I love playing with/against other players (mainly with, though) and that is only possible on full servers. I mean, 40 players on THAT huge territory. But the thing I found out is that you won't get any progression in a reasonable time frame when you are on a full server because there is nothing to loot. It's no fun to run around in your white undershirt and all you have is rags, hunger and thirst. So the alternative seems to be: go to low populated server and loot where no one has been before. But I found that this is rather boring. There are like... 4 Zombies per village and fighting them yields you exactly nothing. After fixing my FPS, I can now beat them to death in melee, if necessary with boxing - all fine. But: how is running around, looting stuff from buildings that are 95 % empty fun? Somehow, the fun comes from interaction. With other players. But: this interaction needs to be on a level that "Bambis" don't reach (because there is no loot on high populated servers and few seem to take a Bambi life serious enough - me included. If I die without having anything invested... ye, who cares.) The fun was definitely there when: > I managed to loot a city and had survival gear (just basic, cool clothes, rucksack, etc). I was taken seriously, could offer trades, but was no danger. Interaction was cool, teaming up was nice. And having something to lose made playing a lot more immersive than the "I am bambi! Trying to set up quickly, so... sprint on highway...". > I managed to get geared to fight, but of course lost because I was just a noob and naively assuming that he would not shoot me. Ye. Bad call. ;) Still a good experience. But most of the time, I don't get to that "can be taken seriously, looks like a survivor, is worth my attention" and most importantly "feels like a survivor for myself" stage. Getting there takes me about 1-2 h of rather senseless running around on empty servers... and as a new player, my life on a full server very likely ends abruptly. And then I go back to the "gear up" grind. The combination of "losing + being punished by boring oorp grinding + the waste of time before you can come back into meaningful interaction with other players" is what kind of spoils it a little for me. I realize that the looting, scavenging part is meant to be tense. It's not. So my questions: > How do you get reasonably geared up fast? (1 melee weapon, backpack, clothes, food, some trade stuff - nothing fancy needed; I don't want to be that military SpecOps look guy). I take too long. That will ruin the fun in the game, if every death means 3 hours of running around empty building with exactly nothing happening. > I never seem to find ammo. Likely because everybody loots it, of course. But... QQ :D It's kind of frustrating if you manage in 10 lives to get a gun twice, but you search 2 villages for 2 hours and not a single shot to be found (and that was an empty server). Where is it? Anyways, I had 1 really nice run. Was great fun. Met a cool guy who explained things to me and helped me a lot. I still enjoy it, but I have to get faster in "getting back on my feet" after my char died. I'd hope for some tips, how I can do that. Best would be if it could be done with players around because senseless grindwork just is not what I think makes this game fun. See you out there. :) Andy

Thank you all for the advice. I am doing better now, after realizing that there are only few buildings in cities that are worth searching. That sped up things a lot. Also the piece of advice to get away from the coast as fast as possible. Gearing up (the colorful, combination, ragtag look ofc!) has been fun for the first time yesterday and today. Thank God I found Khelm (no idea I was there). It had what I wanted. :D Tnx again and see you ingame! Andy