Tonyeh

Looks like somebody didn't test their base before congratulating themselves on building it. But as said, a bit of barbed wire would have made that a lot harder to do. Wonder what Mr Crawly ended up with in the end? Or if he could even get back out. That may have been a one way trip if it was on a community server, which would have made the whole exercise kinda pointless.

That would be a nice map alright. But I've never played any ARMA game so I don't know what it's like when actually playing. On new official maps, though, I reckon that we might not be seeing too many (if any) because the sales of Livonia weren't that great if I suspect correctly. The feedback certainly seems to have been quite lacklustre, that's for sure. Thing is, the game is ripe for expansion in such a manner. Make DayZ a worldwide phenomena. It would take quite a bit of work, however, re; asset design/implementation/testing, etc. I'd love to see DayZ transported to a jungle environment though. How cool would that be.

Big maps all the way for me. Small maps just end up in pew pew all the time and can get real boring, real fast. A bigger map will always have its pew pew areas, but also relatively quiet areas too where you can drink in the atmosphere. But I find that the encounters in the middle of nowhere are the most satisfactory. Found a guy in Northern Chernarus once with a handgun trying to fight off a pack of wolves. I ran over and he started firing at me. I said knock it off I'm trying to help you. I had a USG and dispatched them fairly quickly. We cooked the wolves and had a chat. He was from New York and I'm from Ireland. He has family over here. We had a few laughs and traded a bit of gear. Small time stuff. But it was one of the most genuine "howdys" I ever had in the game. But what I'd really like to see is a warm weather map. I'm getting really tired of the cold. I thought Deer Isle was going to be hot, but it was just another freeze. Deer Isle is a pretty good map though. I think what's needed most though are new map assets. The same old buildings can get a little stale.

That's what you have now. Before you could defeat 3 of them with ease. Now you have to learn how to deal with them. Standing there just punching them isn't going to work any more. You have to...ahem..."master" a new technique. Anyway, bottom line is get a gun, silence it, and Bob's yer uncle. In many ways the infected are easier to deal with now, cos shooting them with a suppressed weapon doesn't bring them charging in from every angle.

Avoid until you get a weapon. Then I hack at the head while pressing the S (Back) key. So far it seems to have worked ok. If there's more than 5 of them, bring a rapid firing gun and plenty of mags. I pissed away three mags and ruined an AKM silencer on a horde of them and one of these things at a plane crash last night.

Perhaps. But I checked his body and he only had buckshot on him. Quite a bit too. Maybe he'd loaded the shotgun with a different loadout. But I don't see why he would, if he had the choice of buckshot, which would be far superior. In any case if he missed it was a miracle, cos it was in a house with that kind of windowed corridor attachment to the side. I should really have been a goner and I didn't get the shock thing either? But the press vest was in a worn condition before that encounter and afterward was badly damaged, so he definitely hit me. One of DayZ's weird moments, I spose.

Has there been a boost to armour in the game? I just took two shotgun blasts at close range there and all it did was make my press vest badly damaged.

Yeh, it's probably down to mods. It's no biggie. Just mildly annoying. Either way, on Namalsk, it really doesn't matter what you look like, cos you have to cover every inch of yourself as it's cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey. It's just that one of the characters looks a bit like in IRL. 😁 Plus, Spaggies has also instituted a policy whereby you have to select a username. But you can't select a character look? Anyway...c'est la vie

I've been playing this game for donkeys years, and I'm still stumped at how characters are generated. I'm on a Spaggie Namalsk server at the moment and when I create a character (a bald male), I join the server and...whomp...I'm a female. How? Is this a thing that's just a Spaggie server issue or something?

Eh? What's the problem here? You sound upset about something and I'm not sure what it is. Sure, as you say "The game has always been, in theory, "Survive as long as you can against a myriad of environmental threats and player based threats."" But I never said that it wasn't and all that is is an elaboration on the point I was making, which was the "concept of the game has always been to survive as long as you can". You're not saying anything different.

That's still survive as long as you can.

Yeh, Livonia seems hit and miss alright. It's on sale until May 15th, so I'll decide by then. Part of me is interested, but the the other part of me thinks it just looks like a portion of the Chernarus countryside. Haven't tried Esseker yet, but I saw someone do a vid on it. Looks good. I'll do that when my current Namalsk toon bites the dust. And no, still haven't found Athena 2. But I did find another pretty large military base further south of Athena 1. Got into a massive firefight with some guys down there the other night. The infected were doing their nut as well and there seemed like there were loads of them. It was bloody crazy. Got out of there with every stitch of clothing badly damaged, two jammed guns and a B+W screen. As I was running away all I could hear was panicked gunfire and screaming zeds. Good times. 😆

I think "count_in" is the worst thing to happen to DayZ. It's probably the clumsiest mechanic that has ever been implemented into the game. Making certain items rare is fine, although I'd argue that making something like an AK-47 rare in eastern Europe is bloody stupid. But "count_in" effectively makes certain items impossible to find for too many players. As for helicopters, I don't ever want to see them in the game. The cars are bad enough. Things I would like to see is the zombie virus being an actual danger to the player. More dangerous animals, yes. Snakes perhaps? Malaria from mosquitoes, apparently they're a nightmare in southern Russia. On that subject, more maps would be great. Frankly, I'm tired of Chernarus and now wander around Namalsk, although I'm thinking of getting Livonia in the Steam sale (although nobody plays that map much). But I'd like more areas with different weather types. A summer map at 25 or 35 degrees would alter the way we have to play the game completely. No more running around with heavy clothes and armour on. The real risk of hyperthermia, which is harder to fight than hypothermia. I certainly don't want to see AI opponents in the game though. No interest in that.

I've been ok with it so far, but it does need some refinement. But I am usually flinging a silenced 9mm into their heads when there's more than one. And if I can do a sneaky backstab I will. But this is down to the fact that they nerfed things like the splitting axe. I'm all for tougher infected and many more of them, but not at the expense of weapon efficacy. But the new combat with the infected hasn't really impacted me that much. At least with the current toon I'm running with anyway, in which I have really only had to alter my approach very slightly. In fact, in a number of ways they are actually easier to deal with now. That opinion might change when I run out of 9mm. 😆

I think what happened was that the zombies of DayZ became "infected" people and not flesh eating corpses. So, the eating aspect sort of got dropped. As to them losing interest in a player when they go unconscious, I am in two minds about it. A. It's not a death sentence if the player gets into a tangle with the infected...and B. It's not a death sentence if the player gets into a tangle with the infected. Meaning that depending on the situation, not being killed by the infected if they've ganged up on you is a relief. But, also, why wouldn't (shouldn't) they kill you? I'll admit that the "lose interest" aspect helped me out of a really bad situation once and I was glad. I got boxed in on a tower by three of them and they buggered off when I went unconscious. When I came too, I was able to gun them down. But something about it also makes me think that it's a bit of a cheap cop out too. As to its impact on solo play (I always play like this) you have enough time to gather your wits and fend them off when you come to. I find that the infected tend to wander off pretty quickly. But maybe a "get up" button would help, instead of automatically having your toon come round and rise to their feet.

I'd like to see a lot of that implemented too. On the Namalsk cold resistance soft skill (I'd no idea what that little symbol was for ages), I find now that I can wear a helmet without it impacting my temp too much. Before I had to stick to wearing an ushanka or pilotka because I'd start to get cold with the helmet on. But, yeh, I think a focus on these soft skills would be a nice way to go for the future of the game.

Bases and cars are just things you can do in the game. It's an activity that the player can indulge in or not. Many, many, players, including myself, never even attempt to build a base or get a car running because the actual game doesn't need it. However, they were never the actual "concept" of DayZ which is my point. The "concept" of DayZ was, is, and always has been to survive as long as you can and you can do that with or without bases and cars. As to the balancing out of activities like base building and car running, sure there's work to be done. But you'll never satisfy everyone in this respect. Personally I don't think car stability will ever be 100%. And bases should be 100% "raid-able", which will always infuriate people who went through a lot of time building them. But, you know...tough shit. The fact of the matter is that on a map the size of Chernarus, there are just too many people roaming around for a base stay hidden or intact for too long. That's just the way it is. And, frankly, I think that that's a good thing. Because with the "count_in" flag bollocks, you have a situation where a single group can hoard all the top gear in their base and effectively diminish the game for every other player on the map. There's been times when I've come across a previously raided base and it will still have half the loot on the bloody map stashed away in boxes, barrels and tents. Now, if "count_in" wasn't a thing, I wouldn't care. But so long as it is, then raid-able bases need to be too. Because you cannot have a situation where all the good stuff gets hoarded away in an impenetrable base for one group to enjoy.

The concept of the game has always been to survive as long as you can. It was never about making bases or cars.

Exactly. As well as moving away from the idea that DayZ is "realistic", we also need to get away from the idea that there's an "end game" in effect here. The only "end game" element involved is the player's death. Your gear is just shit you find, whether that's a bread knife or a FAL. Your base is just a flimsy building that will be found and raided/destroyed. Your car is a mildly distracting time waster. None of these are milestones or achievements in the game. The only achievement anyone can speak of is how long their toon survives. But, to that end, the survival aspects of the game need to become more difficult - and I don't mean making boots wear out like paper. I think food and hunting for food needs some very serious looking into. At present there are far, far, too many options for a player once your character is past a certain point. So surviving the apocalypse as DayZ envisages it is actually quite a comfortable experience. You cannot walk a thousand yards in Chernarus without hearing the noise of some animal that you can scoff. This is one of the things that needs altering in the game. But the knock on effect is that starting out becomes stupidly hard, and that will need some rebalancing as well. You simply cannot start half starved any more if food becomes more difficult to find. But TBH, I think the loot economy needs a complete overhaul on a really deep level. I know I keep harping on about Namalsk, but that is a map that has taken numerous steps in the right direction for me. Food on that map is important and there have been a few times where I have had to come out of the wild, as it were, to try and pick up some much needed items in more populated and, arguably, more dangerous areas. On Chernarus, however, I can live quite happily without ever having to step foot in any of the major population zones. In fact, I rarely bother going to Electro or Chernogorsk at all. I have no reason to, other than to shoot a few Pew Pew Merchants.

What you'll have then is players just suiciding out and starting again. I can't imagine that there are too many players out that that would be willing to put up with limping around the map(s) for 2 entire days.

I'd probably be fine with a longer "sentence" regarding broken legs myself TBH. But, in saying that, the only time I experienced one was in Namalsk when I went into some cabin in the middle of nowhere and some dick had set a mine. So...boom it went and left me with a damaged backpack, ruined trousers and a broken leg. I just immediately made a splint and hobbled to the nearest military base where I found a new pair of strides and a bag. Between the explosion and reaching the base was about 20 minutes or so, including stops along the way to light fires to heat up. By the time I'd reached the base, the leg was back to normal. So, it just wasn't any more than a very mild annoyance. Now, I've never actually broken a bone in real life. But if and when it happens, I really hope it's like that. 😁

Accelerated time can't be used as an excuse/reason for such egregious wear and tear on certain items. Nor can it be used to explain away the fact that you can fix a broken leg in a matter of hours. Even if we take the accelerated time into account such things are happening waaaay too fast. However, while in the case of knives and boots, it annoys me no end, for the broken leg aspect, I couldn't imagine too many players willing to put up with limping around the map for 20 hours. But, in any case, this circles back to my earlier point....in that there is no realism in DayZ, even if people want to use "accelerated time" to excuse bizarre game mechanics implemented due to current balancing consensus that the devs have agreed upon. But DayZ is just one of those games where there will always be arguments about how certain mechanics are used. It just seems silly to me to be constantly banging on about "realism" in conjunction with it though. In the end, although it's irritating to an extreme level to have to be constantly on the look out for new footwear and knives, for sure, it pales in comparison for my absolute hated of the "count_in" flags that screw up the games loot economy. Again, I'll say that that's one of the absolute worst mechanics I've seen put into the game. While that nonsense is part of the game, ever other issue seems somewhat trivial.

You think a hunting knife would go from brand new to ruined in a day? Or even a few days?

There is no realism to DayZ full stop. We need to move away from this silly idea. We're talking about a game where you can fix a broken leg with a couple of sticks and be back running around in less than a day. Where military grade boots wear out in no time despite walking on grass. Where knives go from brand new to utterly destroyed in the space of a few hours because you cut a few bushes and a bit of bark. But that doesn't mean the game mechanics can't be implemented in a way that makes balanced sense. However, this is the most difficult thing to get "right" in any game. One shotting should be a thing. But there needs to be a random element to it and not every weapon should be capable of it. Likewise nobody should be able to get shot a couple of times, just shrug it off, go running to cover and start firing back like it was nothing. The unconscious element that the devs are trying out is a step in the right direction. But, like everything else, it will need some bedding in. Of course, though, the pew pew crowd will be up in arms, because their only idea of what the game is is getting a gun and plate armour and then heading to the nearest firefight...rinse/repeat.

I don't think I've ever seen them do this. They seemed to lock on tighter pre 1.12. But maybe that's just the side effect of playing alone. You kinda think every bugger is after just you. In saying that, the AI is a bit of an unknown sometimes. Maybe the tweak in 1.12 that makes them lose interest faster was the cause of them seeing you and thinking I have that guy instead of the chap in the house.