Pinkintron

Well, after nothing was working, I just gave up on DayZ. However, the recent update did... something, and now my DayZ works all over again. No idea what it fixed, but my problems no longer exist.

Thank you for the reply. I will try what's instructed and be sure to get back to the thread with my results.

First off, apologies if there is a thread and/or a solution for this already. I looked the best I could and I could not find anything. My DayZ Standalone is... well, broken. I wish there was more to explain, but basically every time I join a server, I get stuck at the black screen with the white DayZ logo right in the center. Also, my FPS jumps from 60 to 250+ after a few seconds in this screen. Right before this happens, I see the red text saying "BattleEye Initiated", followed by (I'm guessing) the version number. I haven't played the game in a while. I recently bought a GTX 750ti to replace the old hunk of crap that was in my computer before, though I doubt that would be the problem. All my drivers are updated to the most recent, and every other game I've tried (Grand Theft Auto V/Online, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Serious Sam: The Second Encounter HD, blah blah blah) have been fine. I've deleted my DayZ folder that is located in my documents/ I have uninstalled and reinstalled the game. Didn't work. If you think it matters, I'm also using Windows 10. Sorry if it's something obvious that I shoulda checked on my own.

My first actual kill (or kills) was about a month ago, while playing with a buddy of mine. I've had the game for months, though I have just never grown the guts to play on a busy enough server. I hopped in a Skype call with a buddy, and went to a 50 player server, and yes, it was pretty much full! We spawned in, met each other just outside of Elektro, and went looting. Keep in mind, I did not have any experience in a fully populated server at this time. Even after watching Twitch streams often I knew how dangerous Elektro is, or can be, I have never experienced it myself. We were casually trotting through Elektro getting anything we can find. My friend finds, if I remember correctly, an SKS - no ammo. I, on the other hand, only found a sledge hammer. We kept on looting building to building when we turn down a street to spot a fella on the roof of a hospital, aiming down right at us. I stuck near my friend to try and make sure nothing happens, but he was already popping off rounds at us. About two shots in, my friend gets killed. I cannot loot his body in any way without getting shot. I was pretty angry at this moment, and I figured that if my friend died, the least I can do is try to make sure he did not die in vain. I went around some buildings and managed to sneak inside the hospital. My heart is pounding, I'm sweating - it was my first real PVP experience where I actually knew what was going on! I slowly creeped up the stairs on my way to the roof, armed with nothing but my sledge hammer. I get to the top floor, and find my way to the roof. I expected him to be aiming at me the instant I got up there, but I guess he never noticed. Still crouched, I sneak up behind him, and crack his head with my sledge hammer. I thought it was over, as I lay next to his dead body grabbing his Mosin, his ammunition, and anything else that is useful. After looting, I turn around to find, what I'm guessing was his buddy, pointing at me with his MP-133 shotgun, pistol grip. I instantly stand up and aim the Mosin at him, but he already shot. I fall to the floor with broken legs. I'm on my belly trying to line up a shot while he tries to creep his way towards me. I waste no time - I emptied whatever ammo that was in the Mosin into his body, and watched him collapse. I'm so paniced yet excited - I'm freaking out and making little kid noises over the microphone. I crawl over to his body (thankfully he had morphine), grabbed whatever I could, hid, and healed up. Either his buddy had pretty bad aim, or what people have told me during my childhood is true - I'm great under pressure.

There is a small change you can do which helped me and a buddy of mine pretty well. It's really easy to do and takes less than 3 minutes. Here is the video of where I got it, though I'll just explain it down below to potentially save time. 'User' (whatever your computer is named) -> Documents -> DayZ. You will see a file named 'DayZ.cfg'. Open that file in Notepad. Find two lines of text - they are "GPU_MaxFramesAhead" "GPU_DetectedFramesAhead", followed by an equal sign, a number, and a semi colon. Replace both numbers, and just the numbers, to 1. My numbers before I changed them were 3, and 1,000. Save the document, close it. aaaand you're done! I don't really have an idea on what it does, but it gave me better FPS from it. There is another thing you can try, but it just crashed my DayZ whenever I tried to run it. No idea why, but it might work for you. Go to your Steam Library. Find DayZ, right click it, and go to properties. Type in "-winxp" in your launch options. Close, then try running DayZ. Hopefully that works for you.

Welcome to DayZ! You seem to be a player who already knows better that gear can be lost, and that the game is still pretty buggy. And that's great! I sure wasn't starting out. I support this idea. Though, I do see one bad thing about it. High populated servers are already littered enough with flashlights and batteries - depending what they put in there, I'd rather not see a house have it's loot replaced with flashlights and other gear that players will just toss out.

Very interesting - I have noticed this myself, but I believe it has only came from my own gun. I don't get into PVP situations that often enough to notice it on another player's weapon, but I have seen this lightning glitch around. From what I've seen over the last two days, it's still there.

That's DayZ for you! Like what Steak and Potatoes mentioned, give DayZ a minute or two when switching servers. When you log out/disconnect, go get a drink, use the bathroom, or whatever you got to do to wait a bit. I've had this problem before, but playing a little waiting game helps from any shenanigans like that on my end. And yes, be sure to check you're not joining private (hive) servers. Those characters will spawn and only be for that particular server.

You might find this image useful. Some of the keys and key actions are redundant, but this is the gist of what you're going for. You're going to be using your mousewheel more than you think - it'll be how you scroll through and select different action in game. And like what Calvin Candie said, all the player motions, such as flipping off and waving hello, is all done with your F keys, F1 to F11.