VaderZ

Yeah, but you get murdered trying to be friends, or even just go about your own business in the presence of other players one too many times and you get to a point where enough is enough. As I mentioned in a post above, occasionally, I do something stupid and let my guard down around another armed player or players. Those players have either killed me or at least opened fire on me at some point almost every single time. I've been playing DayZ almost from the beginning and can still count the number of enounters on one hand I've had with other players I didn't know IRL where that player did not shoot at me unprovoked eventually. The better my gear and the more quickly those players realize I have good shit, the quicker the attacks come. I'm not looking to be a bandit or murderer (eh, most of the time anyway). But, if you want to survive for any length of time, trusting players you don't know is FAR riskier than dealing with any zombie horde.

You probably did the right thing, if you look at it from the persective of your own survival. If the guy had turned around and seen you, 9 chances in 10 he would have shot you.

I don't trust any players I don't know IRL. It always ends badly. Just recently, I ran into the fire station in Cherno and found myself face to face with someone else. I had him dead to rights in my sights with my AKM. But, he goes, "Friendly! Friendly!" And, like a complete moron, I didn't shoot. I just kind started looking around real quick, thinking I should get out of there. Turns out his buddy was sneaking around back. When they both realized I saw his buddy, they opened fire. They hit me, but lucky for me, it wasn't bad. I escaped to a place with a good view of the doors and waited for them to come out. They never did. I'm pretty sure the chicken-shits disconnected when they lost sight of me. Though - I didn't go back in looking for them, being wounded already. It just served to reinforce my belief that unless the player is unarmed, or engaging them would compromise your own position in someway, shoot other players on sight. End of story. Sorry, but that's how it is in Chernarus right now. The only exception being, if you know the player IRL.

Locking the server so only a handful of friendly players or clan members can run around collecting all the best vehicles and equipment before unlocking the server to everyone else is cheating. I don't see it all the differently than a player signing on with hacked files such that his weapon never misses or destroys whatever it hits with one round. Most of us need to be extremely careful when going to locations where the 'good stuff' is located because of the likely presence of others who will kill you on sight. Locking out that threat is no different in my eyes that using a hacked file. You are cheating by doing it. I understand that by hosting a server you are putting your own money into it. However, this is like becoming a franchise, a DayZ franchise. When you do so, there are certain standards you have to maintain or risk losing it. Why? It's very simple, without maintaining the standards you're damaging the product, the brand name. Imagine going to a McDonalds and asking for a Big Mac and being told there weren't any left. Then you come to find out the reason they're all gone is that the store was locked for two hours that morning and the employees ate them all. That's what's happening here. If McDonalds got wind that a Franchise bearing its name was receiving numerous complaints of this nature, they would shut that Franchise down eventually for damaging it's brand name, it's image.

I have been playing for a while now and have not noticed this message. Does this really come up? I can identify with the OP's issues a little bit because we have a group of about four of us that try to play together. Sometimes it seems like we spend hours trying to meet up only to have one or more of us die for one reason or another. I agree that part of it is just being able to look at the surrounding terrain, landmarks, and a map and figure out where you are. After playing for a while, I don't think it's that hard to do. However, as a time saver, if there really is such a message when you first connect, that would be awesome. Can you confirm? Is this a new feature or has it always been in there? Does it come up only when you start a new game or every time you connect to a server?