Actions present an excellent opportunity for cooperation between players. Things like preparing meat and repairing vehicles could be worked at collaboratively to reduce the time it takes to complete the action. Adding noise levels increases the vulnerability of players while performing actions, which further motivates the cooperation. This requires a rebalancing of actions to make them take longer by default. HOW IT WORKS To assist in an action, be within range of an object being acted upon, and select "assist action x" from the action menu. Assisting an action reduces its time by a base rate of 25%, then by 50% for each assistant. For example, if repairing a vehicle normally takes 60 seconds, then with one assistant it will take (60 - (60*0.25) ) * 0.5 = 22.5 seconds. Graphically, the time could be shown via a transparent bar that becomes opaque, with a "x1", "x2" or "x3" icon to indicate how much assistance is being given. Actions can now be described by the following categories: -Action -Time to Complete -Tool Required -Tool to Assist -Maximum Assistants -Noise *SURVIVAL* Action: Chop wood Time to Complete: 15 seconds Tool Required: Hatchet Tool to Assist: Hatchet Maximum Assistants: 1 Noise: High Action: Gut animal Time to Complete: 15 seconds/meat Tool Required: Hunting knife Tool to Assist: Hunting knife Maximum Assistants: 1 Noise: Low Action: Light fire Time to Complete: 30 seconds Tool Required: Matches Tool to Assist: None Maximum Assistants: 1 Noise: Low Action: Cook meat Time to Complete: 15 seconds/meat Tool Required: Meat Tool to Assist: None Maximum Assistants: 2 Noise: Low *MEDICAL* Action: Blood transfusion Time to Complete: 60 seconds Tool Required: Blood bag Tool to Assist: None Maximum Assistants: 0 Noise: Low Action: Bandage Time to Complete: 30 seconds Tool Required: Bandage Tool to Assist: None Maximum Assistants: 0 Noise: None *MECHANIC* Action: Repair Time to Complete: 60 seconds Tool Required: Fuel tank/Engine/Wheel/Scrap metal Tool to Assist: None Maximum Assistants: 2 Noise: High FUTURE POSSIBILITIES Future actions that would benefit from assistance in this fashion might include barricading doors and building structures. This mechanic would also benefit from a skill advancement system like the one detailed here: http://dayzmod.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=24651, wherein some players became better at performing actions via practice, and reduce the time required even further (or perhaps improve the efficacy). TL;DR Actions take longer, but can be assisted by other players and the time cut in half or more.

I understood. Having group spawns strengthens clans, which needs to be balanced somehow. My suggestion is to prevent them from ever being able to go back to their bodies or rejoin their friends. One life only, until next group spawn in a different server.

Only if the server you log into together is randomly chosen, and you thus cannot return to it to loot your body

You're right. Developers of games should never do things that are hard.

Though it's been talked about in several threads, I've yet to find an all-encompassing and coherent thread dedicated to a skill system wherein skills improve with practice. Adding skill advancement to the game gives players something they can offer when alive that they cannot offer when dead. This changes the dynamic of player-killing and cooperation, and additionally, it gives players a reason to value their own lives when their best loot is stored elsewhere in their ATV. The abilities of characters will gradually improve as they are used. MEDICAL Medical skill increases whenever a player performs a medical procedure on another player. Medical procedures include; blood transfusions, administering bandages, painkillers, morpheine, epi-pens, anti-biotics, and combat surgery. Players with high medical skill will perform all of these medical procedures faster and with a higher degree of success. This means that blood bags will restore more blood per bad, and bandages will better stem the flow of blood. In addition, players with high medical skill will find more medical loot. SURVIVAL Survival skill increases whenever a player performs a survival ability. Survival abilities include; killing an animal, butchering an animal, cutting wood, lighting a fire, cooking meat, collecting water. Players with a high survival skill will carry out all of these actions more quickly, obtain more meat from butchering animals, have food replenish more of the hunger stat, be able to eventually light fires with less matches and without any at all, and have fires that last longer. MECHANIC Mechanic skill increases whenever a player performs a mechanic ability. Mechanic abilities include; reparing any part of a vehicle, driving a vehicle, refueling a vehicle. Players with high mechanic skill will perform all of these abilities more quickly, require less parts, have greater control when piloting vehicles, be able to salvage parts from other vehicles, and find more vehicle-related loot. FIREARMS Gun skill increases whenever a player performs a gun ability. Gun abilities include; firing a weapon, reloading a weapon, hitting a target. A player with high gun skill will be able to do these things faster, while moving, with a steadier crosshair (including under stress from pain), will be able to switch weapons while moving, have them jam less often and will find more gun-related loot (especially ammo). ATHLETIC Athletic skills increases whenever a player does something athletic. Athletic things include; walking, sprinting, climbing, crawling. Players with high athletic skill will have stamina that depletes more slowly, be able to move faster when moving stealthily and be able to change posture more quickly. EXTRA THOUGHTS Advancement must be carefully managed to deny players the ability to "grind". For example, administering blood transfusions or bandages to players who do not need them should be either impossible or confer no benefit. As much as possible, actions should be limited by the availability of resources to enact them. The system described above would also benefit from a mechanic wherein players can assist the actions of others, like the one detailed here: http://dayzmod.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=23848. If these were implemented in tandem, more skilled characters would contribute more to assisted actions. TL;DR Skills improve with practice

Fair point. I guess just how big that hit is needs to be carefully considered. It's difficult to avoid people running back to their own corpses, and for as long as they remain able to do that, the hit will never be that hard, even with an advancement system. So for now, I'm not too worried about motivational issues. Furthermore, if we consider this more of an anti-game than a game, we can ignore player-motivation altogether. For example, we can do things like force players to log into random servers with hidden details to prevent any sort of meta-cooperation, have them unable to log back into that server (at least knowingly) after death, and also implement an advancement system. That way, each respawn is a new life, in a new world, with new people, and no surviving equipment or skills.

I thoroughly disagree. That's like saying the solution to thwarting mexican drug cartels is "people should be nicer to each other". Individual attitude fits on a predictable curve based on the checks and balances inherent in the system. The solution to PvP is to give players more mechanisms to signal and demonstrate their friendliness, and give more rewards for cooperation.

Unfortunately, this does nothing to remove camps, but it will give campers cause to think twice before leaving all of their good gear behind. Ideally ammo would be rare, so using targets for practice would be something only the most well equipped would do. I personally think we already have plenty of targets to shoot at in respawning zombies.

1. I'd like to see people restricted to certain servers based on their IP, so they are forced to play at night/during winter when it reflects the conditions in their IRL location. 2. I think people would use logging off and on to fast travel if they knew which location they'd end up at. I'd rather have people's bodies remain when they log off, forcing them to get to a safe or hidden location. 3. I've had similar thoughts. I prefer barricades to padlocks. These would be the safe places people would go to log off. I worry, though, that players will search out barricaded houses and either break in to kill logged off players, or camp outside waiting for the players to emerge. It would have to either be impossible to get in from outside after it's been barricaded, or there would have to be a very high bar to entry. What are your thoughts? 4. I agree, although I think things like workshop bonuses should be tied to particular locations. I've written about it previously: http://dayzmod.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=24625 5. I'm not sure about adding such fine detail, especially when the effects are, and need to be, so subtle. I agree that alcohol should be introduced, because as well as painkillers, this could be used for molotovs. Existing mechanics can support the need for boiling water, but I'm not convinced it's a good idea just yet. 6. While this makes sense, I'd prefer to force people to cooperate through blood bags, or have this happen at such a slow rate that they'd use blood bags anyway. 7. I get depressed enough when playing this game. I think we can leave this to the real players themselves. Paranoia already occurs naturally too. 8. Agreed. More gun mechanics are always welcome. 9. I don't think players should spawn with random loot, because they will abuse the mechanic by respawning until they get what they want. Body armour could be as simple as decreasing the chance for bleeding while increasing the chance of shock. 10. I expect a lack of trust will be the biggest problem with that idea, and players will avoid public broadcasts the same way they avoid using torches. Players will also use Teamspeak to get around the need for a radio. 11. Same as above.

Yeah, I definitely think it'll make the more experienced players more cautious with their lives. I'll edit the OP to say "firearms".

Does that mean that you support the idea, you just doubt it will reach critical mass?

Yeah, I agree that the main focus of dogs should be tracking, not attacking. They'd become the game's narrative driver.

I can't see it either. It's a shame.

It's already mostly the case because of loot. Having motivation to survive increase with time seems to be the right direction for motivation to go' date=' unless you're suggesting that people will be less inclined to take the risk of playing, in which case damn, that's a good point. This has limits - your IRL skill with cars won't help you one iota in-game. I think there's room for both real skill and in-game skills. We can leave the navigation, tactics and twitch stuff to the real skills and knowledge of the players, but make inroads in the other areas we can't simulate.

I've read the document, but I don't understand how it will be effective against groups of certain sizes but not others. If it's accurate, surely it would quickly take out a group of any size. If it's not, one person, or two tops could give it the run around

This.

In my signature you'll find a thread about "action assistance" which fits into what you've hinted at here. Make zombies able to overpower people.

Nope, broken. It's a struggle to find a server with even one free space, and besides, punishing PvP is not the answer. The answer is rewarding cooperation.

If the turrets are accurate, they are OP and your stuff is game-breakingly unstealable. If the turrets are not accurate, a player will do laps of your base until it runs out of ammo, then enter your base.

And running out of either shouldn't have any effect on your blood for a very, very long time. You should just get slower, with worse aim, until the point where you can no longer effectively move.