CombatMuffin (DayZ)

This is wrong, IMO. Starting without ranged weapons, or even efficient weapons is fine. Starting without the ability to even DO something half useful, is wrong. The problem with DayZ's design IMO, is that the starting game is not very bersatile: start in coast, head to either cherno or elektro, loot a weapon, THEN the game begins. Everything else is circumstantial. A BIG issue is not that you start without a weapon per se, but that so many of the games buildings have no insides, which makes looting a weapon in small towns inefficient. Hence: Cherno or Elektro.

DO NOT attach yourself to your character. This is a test and part of that test is also starting from scratch. I think a server wipe could be healthy, if only to also test player psychology.

There is a difference between a "harsh" game, and a "frustrating" game. A disconnect can happen for a TON of reasons, not just exploits. Unless the game has a way of differentiating between a player voluntarily disconnecting, and a player abruptly disconnecting due to other causes (lag spike, internet down, server dies, etc). The player should NOT remain in game for even a second after he disconnects. Why? 5 seconds was okay, but if you allowed say, a minute, all the players disconnecting would leave assets in the game world for up to a minute, hitting performance. Do it like Diablo does it: If you hit disconnect, you get IMMOBILIZED in game, a 10 second counter begins, and once those 10 seconds are up, player is disconnected. If you aggroed zombies, you'll get hurt badly, possibly killed. A human player though, won't be as inaccurate against a close range target...