*Before commenting - PLEASE READ* This is not a repost, and I went through the search function thoroughly. Although similar ideas have been raised - I was not able to find this specific suggestion before. I know that there have been many ideas to add "Friends", "Clans", and "Party Matchmaking" over the years, and the community has rightly argued against any such additions. This is a different take and I want people to read the suggestion before jumping to any conclusions...If you still disagree, that is perfectly valid.
Problem / Issue: Currently, it is very hard to play with friends in the game (outside of those met during gameplay) because it is very hard to physically find them in-game with how spawns are distributed. This makes it extraordinarily difficult to teach friends how to play (as new players). As we all know, DayZ has a pretty high initial learning curve, and right now you really need to spend 5-10 hours minimum playing on your own to be able to survive, navigate the map, etc... So if you have friends who are new to the game, it is very difficult to play with them and many will simply give up on the game. There are some 3rd party tools like iZurvive, but honestly it is really silly trying to ask a friend/new player over Discord "hey, I know you're just trying to learn the controls, but can you actually run around in the open and look for a city sign? By the way, it's in cyrillic and good luck pronouncing what you see".
Suggestion: Implement a VERY RUDIMENTARY in-game "Group" system of up to 4-8 people. Enter the menu, click on a friend from your Steam friend list, or type in a Steam player name directly. This sends an in-game message to the other player which they can Accept/Reject. This will do two things:
1. Adds the player's steam name and player name in-game to a list of individuals in your "Group" via a simplistic menu. In-game, if you hover your cursor/gunsight over the player within 50 meters for more than 3 seconds, their in-game name will pop up (e.g. John Doe). This is an indication they are a friendly, but does not appear fast enough to prevent friendly-fire incidents (which is a purposeful feature in the game). Basically, it lets you check your targets in a semi-realistic way since player skins change after each respawn.
2. At distances over 1 km, a faint marker will appear on the horizon showing the general direction of the other player in the gameworld and approximate distance (e.g. 10km), similar to squad markers from Arma 3. This can be toggled on/off in the settings. At distances under 1 km, this marker disappears. This allows for new spawns to understand the rough direction of their friends who spawn in on the map and which direction to work towards, without the feature being easily exploitable. Players under 1 km must still find each other visually.
Note on Gameplay Intention: I am well aware that many of us, myself included, see DayZ as a survival "simulator". Therefore, unrealistic elements like UI tools that let you magically find other players feel "gamey" to some degree. But with any simulator or game going for realism, compromises must be made for overall better or more engaging gameplay - and some of these are already in the game. Then intention of the above mechanic is a very simple compromise: allow new players/new spawns to find a friend, or re-find a friend they made while playing without giving them an exploitable advantage. Yes, freshly players cannot beeline for their friend because they will starve to death before they get there, but it at least gives some kind of direction to work towards without having to use tools outside of the game. Also, it would let people create at least some kind of informal group system in DayZ without it being over the top. I think the most fun had it DayZ is with other players, but there is no formal support for groups at all.
Some people might say this changes the game balance by encouraging real-world friends to team up in-game instead of struggling solo. My answer is this: they already do. Good players with hundreds of hours in the game already know how to find each other as fresh spawns, communicating in Discord and using 3rd party maps, etc. Therefore good players can already find each other and create extremely powerful groups (using Discord, which honestly is the most unrealistic element here) , while new players will have little luck doing the same and will be ganged up on. Probably more frustratingly, the lack of any mechanic at all means it is virtually-impossible to get new friends to play the game with you outside of some heavily-modded servers. You cannot just hop into the game, find a friend, and try to survive together and just have a fun few hours. I have at least 5 friends who would instantly buy the game if we could play together in some rudimentary fashion, so Bohemia is just missing out on a cash cow here. Playing with friends is a chore, and it shouldn't be. I fully believe that DayZ should never become a casual game like PubG, but at the very least, I want it to be a game that I can play with real-world friends without giving myself a headache.
Let me know what you guys think...
