Drake Sigar

You join a server and try to start a group, but are casually shot down by snipers watching your messages or the people you were meeting. "Solo it is" you say, since your only friends can't join your full server and the direct chats aren't working. You head north, quaffing your bottles of water, and end up at the airfield to grab yourself some nice hardware. Unfortunately you are greeted by the sight of tin cans and barbed fences sectioning off important areas. Your spirits rise when someone claims they've found a car in Zele. When you announce your precense and say you bring gas cans, he immediately tries to shoot you in the face. Luckily you were faster, and find on his body a hunting knife & matches. You head to the forest to live the next few days in total isolation. As the days progress, you are reminded of the movie Groundhog Day in which Bill Murray is forced to repeat the same tiresome experience over and over until he tries to kill himself, yet even that won't end his suffering. Server numbers are starting to thin, a good opportunity for your friends to finally join you if they didn't already think Day Z: Deathmatch had run it's course. Finally, one day, its enough. The game becomes dire, there's no incentive to leave the empty forests. You log off, and play something more rewarding. But not Diablo 3, because it blows. Now, this might not necessarily be what I believe (except the Diablo 3 part), but what makes this story less plausible than yours? :P

Would you like a side of Super Mutant with that?

Sorry your experiences haven't been very positive thus far, it really is that much sweeter when you finally locate someone who isn't trigger-happy. I recommend you never approach another player you intend to befriend without announcing yourself first.

This. Trying to form a drug-dealing relationship with the player is despicable. It scares me listening to what some of the MMO executives think of their own player bases. The ArmA devs hare more respect than that.

1 & 2 - They appear to be randomly generated in one of several pre-determined spots much like spawning a new character. Vehicles save every time you add/remove items, (not so sure about when you get in/out) and the action menu option is a safeguard letting you know for sure that you've saved it to that spot. Refuelling requires using full Jerry cans. Jerry cans can be filled at fuelling pumps (big cylindrical structures often near gas stations). This thread can assist you with your storage questions and contains other useful information about vehicles: http://www.dayzmod.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=1362 3 - The thread I mentioned also covers tents. I haven't noticed any problems since they were fixed. 4 - You don't expect me to tell you about all my local haunts, do you? :P 5 - The first question every beginner asks is "Winchester or Enfield?" The former is surprisingly quiet and has buckets of ammo. The latter has a terrible fire-rate and draws every zombie down on you within a town's radius. The CZ Hunting rifle is equally terrible in that regard, but is a prized weapon for player killing. I haven't noticed much difference between the assault rifles besides how easy or hard it is to find ammo for them.

I say Day Zed because if I don't, my friend punches me in the stomach.

You'll note that they promoted their opinion as fact, by saying "everybody is going to do this", whereas it is possible that not everybody is going to do that exact thing. There may be some (or many, or even most) who choose a different path. I like forum opinions which act more exact, and say stuff like "87% of people will do this" as if they personally went door to door and asked everyone. ;)

The respawn function doesn't seem to work on this screen (anyone is free to correct me, I haven't died in a while so they may have fixed it). You need to log out to the lobby and log back in. Don't disconnect entirely from the lobby and try to reconnect to the server because someone will have taken your spot.

The game saves at certain intervals (I think it's currently every two minutes) and automatically when you log off. Your character will keep all the items he's carrying. Items you leave on the floor will disappear over time. If you find a tent or car, you can store extra stuff there.

The servers are overloaded captain, she canna' hold! We've probably got thousands more recruits on the way now that Day Z has received coverage from more publications like PC Gamer and Rock Paper Shotgun. If any of us can get on during the weekend I will be shocked - SHOCKED!

When looting a corpse or item pile, hover over it until a green icon appears in the centre of your screen and press G. Do not use your action menu. I believe you'll also be granted access to items from the a dead survivor's backpack (wait, can we call them a survivor if they're dead?) from this same screen as long as it's on their corpse. If you want to pick up a backpack, hover over it until a green icon appears in the centre of your screen, roll your mousewheel to bring up the action menu, and select the appropriate pickup action.

Are you mistaking the blood counter for the water counter? I did that when the icons were first introduced. The drop icon is blood and the jug-like icon is water.

Dog-killers should get a Cruella de Vil skin.

Charming story, I enjoy reading newbie experiences. Met a newbie the other day, though I fear I was in a foul mood at the time, and didn't help as much as I could have. Under my lazy watch he almost starved to death, was beaten to the point of shock, and broke his legs. Now you know why all my goldfish never outlived their first week.

Some people find it fun to overlook one spot for several hours and snipe the occasional freshly spawned noob, some people think Twilight is a literary masterpiece on par with the works of Shakespeare, and some people masturbate to Pokemon. I can't tell you why all these people do what they do, but it's a given you should kill them with fire.

Short paragraphs are dramatic. Diablo 3 turned out to be shit. Banana hammock. (Seriously though, welcome back!)

I really like the novelty of large horde sizes, but I want to make it clear that I don't see this as a viable permanent solution. The organised inland groups are having a great time, while the new blood on the coast are in hell. Perhaps zombie numbers should drastically increase inland as well as the potential loot, while costal towns should mostly go back to the regular size? These past weeks some players have been very keen to segregate the community into the hardcore elite and casual masses, when the latter wouldn't own the vanilla Arma II game to begin with. And now that the mod has genuine casual interest? Oh boy, prepare for a barrage of elitism and uninspired CoD references the likes of which have never been seen.

I'm already planning to lure a town full of zombies and chuck a smoke grenade at the shed door.

Bless your little heart. :P I stumbled upon a well hidden tent the other day and felt a bit guilty after taking an assault rifle and bloodpacks, especially after I found an assault rifle merely 15 minutes later. Not an ounce of guilt for the car I stole the day after though, isn't that odd? Didn't Rocket mention plans to provide a very limited bunker storage which can't be robbed? I think that's a nice compromise if done right.

I reckon the scariest thing of all is the zombie's scream. It's as recognisable as the hiss of a Cacodemon, and the first thing you think when you hear it is "run."