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mrducky (DayZ)

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Everything posted by mrducky (DayZ)

  1. mrducky (DayZ)

    Hoppiing Solved?

    I think its a bug. (Or you have DCed right after getting shot) Most probably the game has buggily autosaved you while you were unconscious, and then failed to save you afterwards. Thus, when you log in the next time, you may find yourself at the location where you were last unconscious, and possibly with the same old gear and that. Of course, if you're getting shot at, falling unconcious, and then quickly disconnecting (or the server just rebooting at a bad moment), you just might end up at that state. (Some claim there is even an intentional feature that does this if you disconnect during a fight, but I've only witnessed the bugs.) At least that's what used to happen on earlier versions when the persistent database was swamped with masses of players. I've had several occasions where I should have spawned with a fresh character after a death, but instead ended up in the location where I died, with the gear I had before death, and being unconscious. (And I have never tried to cheat by DCing - the database just randomly bugs with the saves.)
  2. mrducky (DayZ)

    Is anyone friendly anymore?

    I just got killed up north, lost all my fancy SD gear and all that. (Decided not to shoot someone I easily could have, but rather just leave and run away, and in a matter of seconds after trying to do that, got shot by his mates that were lurking around). But I didn't care one bit. I was totally bored anyway. I was interested to get back to the coast to see how this no weapon at start thing had affected the game. Well, as far as I could tell, very little. The only difference was, that now I met a few "friendly" people. They were effectively friendly by the lack of weapon. When I had a makarov, and they had nothing, or only the hatchet, they certainly didn't try to shoot me - simply because they couldn't. But... Lets face it... All the people I met that already had weapons certainly were not friendly. ("met" in the sense that they just shot me in the back with no questions asked). So, it seems to be business as usual. The bean wars are still going on at cherno and elektro, but just a little bit more quiet than it used to be. So.. No, there still are no friendlies around really as far as I can tell. Up north you got the well equipped bandit groups and lone wolves who'll defend their gear at any cost and hunt others to relieve their boredom. Down south you got the rest. Might just as well join the south coast bean wars again. At least now it will be so much easier to massacre people when a lot of them have no weapons. :P
  3. mrducky (DayZ)

    dark is TOO FUCKING DARK -> dayz devs listen ffs

    The discussion about real nights not being as dark as the nights in the game is not really relevant... Real nights can be pretty much pitch black. Just head far north away from the light pollution during the fall and a new moon. Then go to a forest and try walking there with no light and see how far you get before smacking your face right into some tree. (Now, I can honestly tell you... its not very far.) :P You just really need to get far enough from any light pollution. (A zombie apocalypse world should probably explain why there is no light pollution) So, its not a matter of whether its realistic or not... It is realistic, but only in specific conditions. But, the real issue with it isn't really about the darkness level. Its just that currently to deal with the darkness, the player gets punished way way too much to warrant playing at those pitch black nights (unless they don't care about surviving or have happened to find NVGs). - Due to the server time sync bug, other players may have daylight when you are in total darkness -> you'll end up dead. - The bandits that have NVG goggles are likely to hunt for people during night. The NVGs give a massive advantage. -> You'll end up dead. - The controls for throwing/dropping/extinguishing the glowsticks/flares, etc. are too akward for any fast immediate reactions when being shot at, etc. -> You'll end up dead. - The flashlight/flares/etc. unrealistically shine through all of the building walls, etc. You cannot even use them inside a house without illuminating and alerting the whole damn neighbourhood -> You'll end up dead. - The flashlight cannot be pointed even remotely forward while running. You need to walk slowly to use it. -> Thus becoming a sitting duck, just begging to get shot in the head. And end up dead. But on the positive side: + It really has a great zombie survival atmosphere. If you are on a fresh respawn with nothing to lose, its worth trying out. It will make your new life much shorter though. So yeah, I guess its mostly the noobs, possibly some other fresh respawns, and the NVG guys that play at the night time servers. If the devs were to fix some of those issues at least partially, then it might make sense for the actual survivor-players that have no NVG to play at the night servers too.
  4. mrducky (DayZ)

    Killing me with kindness with Update thoughts

    Its pretty much a lost cause. That's what I think. The choices of the outcome are: 1. He is part of some bandit clan. - Thus, if you give him a weapon or help him find one, he's sure as hell gonna shoot you and take your fancy gear and then run off to his buddies to tell the tale of the easy and foolish prey he encountered. 2. He's actually an experienced player who's still playing as an all out good survivor. - Oh c'mon... This is not gonna happen, so lets forget about this scenario. There are next to none of those saint survivors anymore, and the ones that still exist, are still alive and hiding in the northern bushes, or if they should die, they know how to sneak to a town and get some weaps without getting into any major trouble with the zeds. 3. The guy is some random bandit (or a survivor, but not a very nice one). - He's just gonna shoot you and take your stuff, cos that gives him a nice start to the game. And he's also probably still pissed off for getting killed a moment earlier and thus feels the urge to shoot someone. 4. The guy just wants to do it for the lulz? - After all, you're essentially giving him the comical choice (at least in their mind), of just shooting a guy who saved them / handed them the weapon. 5. The guy is a noob. - Well now... If you can actually somehow verify that the guy is a true noob (rather than just pretending to be one), playing the game for the first few times, then you just might consider giving him the gun. There is the risk that if its his first gun ever, he feels tempted to try it out on you... But other than that, it'll probably be the first nice thing anyone has done in the game for that guy, so he'll probably be all happy and might want to team up. The problem is, that if he's a total noob, then teaming up with him will just get you killed too when he draws the attention of all the zeds and bandits. Also notice, that the guy in the video did not appear to be a total noob - based on the remarks on the new zed changes. At that point, I would have considered him a non-noob (thus, likely a bandit) and just unloaded a clip to his head. :D Essentially, you just don't give some random guy a weapon. Nor do you let him get anywhere near your backpack (especially if you keep an extra weapon there). If he seems to be going for your backback without your permission, just shoot him. The only thing that might be worth considering, is that you offer to watch his back from further away if he wants to go find a weapon to some nearby town or such. (He might be ratting out your position to his clanmates while doing so on TS or such, but at least the moment you see the guy find a gun, you say adios and get the hell outta there before he shoots you.). But since the other players are essentially the enemy in this game, why bother help one? TL;DR If the other guy seems to be a true noob, then he might still not yet be tainted by this game, you might choose to cautiously trust him and help him for a while and evaluate him for his noobness. Otherwise its an enemy combatant. Helping your enemy gets you killed. So, shoot, shoot, shoot! (There's no court marshall here, no-one will be around to judge you for shooting the unarmed). You can always say he was clearly going for the gun in your backpack. :angel:
  5. mrducky (DayZ)

    Killing me with kindness with Update thoughts

    LOL. Surely you should have seen how that was gonna end up... :D Nevertheless, I also find the idea interesting of going to the coast help some random poor bastards who have no guns. I might try it out myself too. I'm getting bored lurking in the bushes and looting the small towns for the bean cans. It might be time to get killed doing something more interesting. Though I might leave the last part undone... The part where I would actually willingly give those dumbasses a gun. Since, well, they are still the same dumbasses that were trying to shoot you on sight earlier when they had a gun. Its not like they wouldn't act the very same once they have a gun again. Actually, come to think of it... It might be more fair to just go and shoot them on sight instead. You know... To give them a little torment for the sins they've done in their previous lives. :P
  6. mrducky (DayZ)

    Making A Home

    Lemme fix that a little bit for ya... :P 1. Find tent 2. ??? 3. ??? 4. Profit Not to say that pitching a tent to any sensible place is impossible.. but.. At least doing it seems to the best kept secret, assuming it isn't impossible. (Yeah, I've read all about these walk and pitch while doing it suggestions, little use they were). At least, someone could write a comprehensive guide: "how to actually pitch the frigging tent". :D PS. I've pitched the 2 tents so far, both at some ridiculous locations, just because I simply failed at pitching them at any even remotely sensible locations.
  7. mrducky (DayZ)

    dark is TOO FUCKING DARK -> dayz devs listen ffs

    I really liked the 93666 beta enforced total darkness... Because for once, an item such as the flashlight actually had a use. (Before that, I had never even bothered to use it (apart from a quick test) - it had no benefit, and use of it only had negative implications - wasting the pistol slot and making yourself seen to others) It really did add to the atmosphere of going around towns and having to throw flares or to use the flashlight to be able to see the zeds and to be essentially able to even loot anything. It made the flashlight, flares and glowsticks useful. (Otherwise they are just dead weight.) ...However... Though it added to the general night-time gameplay feeling and was fun to fool around for a while on a freshly respawned character... It obviously also meant that you basically just could not survive at the pitch black night servers anymore, unless you had the night vision goggles. (...Or happen to have the time sync bug working in your favor and thus still having sunlight when others are in the pitch black darkness). That became painfully obvious when I got makaroved down in the middle of a pitch black forest after running away from the town in the total darkness with an idea of getting to a safe position and just about to disconnect. (I assume it was one of those NVG bandits hunting ppl at night time, but then again, an NVG guy using a makarov?... I guess it might have just as well been a time sync bugged person as well, playing at daylight. I sure know those players exist, having experienced the bug multiple times myself too, unless it was just recently fixed.) So yeah, I now myself just stay to the daylight servers. If I play during the real night time, I just join the servers on the other side of the globe where its still day. As far as the total darkness goes, its great fun against the zeds, really adds to the overall feeling of it. But it is pure suicide for anyone who likes to stay alive, since zeds never were the real threat anyway. When you got both the NVG bandits and the game time syncing bug players working against you, best just stay off the night servers (or at least find one that isn't pitch black and then max up your gamma, thus nullifying the point of the night). After the darkness changes again (maybe it possibly even got changed at latest beta?)... or at least they fix the time sync bugs... or the current pvp situation changes... or the nvgs somehow change... Playing at the night time servers may start making sense again. While waiting for that, the NVG guys can keep chasing each others (and the noobs) on the night servers as far as I'm concerned.
  8. mrducky (DayZ)

    Map shouldn't be zoomable.

    Essentially, its just the current look and feel of map that makes it feel high-tech. (Things like the changing map square numbering, etc.) But, it isn't really any more detailed than a proper real life map would be. And yeah, since you cannot fold your monitor, the monitor DPI isn't really as high as a good paper map, etc. - the zooming features and such are just a necessity to emulate the proper real map. Still, it would of course be fun if the game had a crappier and a much more common "tourist map" - and then the current detailed map. :P (I'm highly doubtful that it would be easily moddable in Arma 2 though, and frankly, quite irrelevant compared to the other current major issues.)
  9. mrducky (DayZ)

    many players are quitting

    ...Well that was a bloody long ramble, but I do agree to the general principle of it, that the game having become "shoot everyone on sight". But, alas, the realities of game development are that it takes time. Its not gonna be an easy thing to change the fundamental mechanics that make the game both so great and also cause it to slowly drift in one direction. Despite all that, and despite the mod being at some amazingly buggy early stages, it was still rather unique fun while it lasted. I'm still sticking with the game, but I'm also on the verge of stopping the playing. I probably will try to stay alive with the current character, boringly hiding in the bushes, possibly playing less hours now, and once I screw up and get killed the next time (and hopefully not by a desync bug / someone exploiting), then I think its time to take a little pause. And then I'll probably come back later occasionally to check what has changed in the game and if it has some new adventures to offer. The game is what it is. It makes sense to give feedback and critique in the hope that it will eventually get better. The flaws get fixed. But it just also needs to be understood that any changes take time, probably longer than most players will have patience for. A little pause from the game every now and then may be a good solution. The only thing that I find unfortunate, are the new players who are only getting into the game at this stage. I think they'll be hitting head first into a brick wall, if they come to the game expecting something it might have once been. :s
  10. mrducky (DayZ)

    Basic (and controversial!) Tweaks. Look inside!

    Though I like the suggestions, I would like to point out the following. I did already try playing the game by about 10 times unarmed. Dropped all of my stuff right at spawn. And how did it end up? Well, most often getting shot on sight by the other players. (No difference to wielding a weapon) So, do I think that, for example, the bandits would somehow magically stop slaughtering the newly spawned players if they had no loot? No they would not. And why not? Because they're not really killing for the beanz and shit. Beans are easy to find. You don't need to kill other players for that. They're killing because they feel bored / or feel that they have nothing better to do than to kill others. Or because they got fed up getting killed themselves and are now taking their revenge at the DayZ world. (And then there is of course the random occasional psychopath too, who just loves it and would do it in the real life as well, if there weren't laws and the fear of punishment to stop him.) They would probably just thrive on the easier prey, not even bother being tactical or anything when there is no risk of retaliation (they would just probably walk right to your face an then shoot you at close range). So... It would be an interesting experiment to remove the stuff at spawn, but I am highly doubtful it would solve anything. It would possibly even make it much worse. One thing I might consider, is making the spawn gear asymmetric based on your game hours. Let the noobs keep their makarovs. They are still the ones trying to play cooperative survival until they realize the grim reality of the game. But once you've killed enough/died enough times/or just clocked enough game hours - then the spawn weapons could just as well be removed from you. After those hours of playing you should already know where to find the weapons. It can also be considered persistence: At the start of the game you got gear at spawn, but when you keep dying for a few times, the consequence will be to lose that gear at spawn. (In real life, if you died just once, you wouldn't be back at all. In game life, just taking your starting makarov away, might be sufficiently harsh.) I would not mind having no gear at spawn if I died (been there, done that). But I wouldn't put the total noobs in that position. Because they're already f*cked as it is. As with the zombie tweaks.. Those might help with the "makarov bandits" at cherno/elektro. But as if those were the only problem. They can be avoided by not going there. The issue is with all the other random encounters and the bandits (at north as well). And those guys are well equipped, know what they are doing, stay in the bushes/hills and are probably going to snipe you from far away anyway. What effect would deadlier zeds in the towns have on that? Well, life for the friendly survivors would become even more difficult. At least now you can risk moving fast in and out of the towns, taking the risk of aggroing some individual zeds and dealing with them - thereby minimizing your exposure to the real threat that's trying to scope you. Make the zeds more difficult to deal with requiring even more slow and careful movement around the towns, and oh hell.. the sniping bandits are just gonna have you served on a silver platter. So... In conclusion, though the suggestions are good in principle, they also pose a risk of causing just the opposite they were trying to achieve.
  11. mrducky (DayZ)

    The Ban TS3 thread!

    Yeah, surely the TS, etc. gives an small "cheating" advantage over people not using them (for example, it allows you to tell the location of the enemy you just saw even after he just popped your brains out with a bullet.) But, getting rid of TS: - It would also mean forcing that people must be prevented at playing at their friends house, etc. because they can then cheat by talking to each other directly! :P - Those applications would be impossible to weed out (You can always use a frigging cell phone to call your friend and "cheat" that way if it all really comes to that!) And really, even though I don't use TS, I think that its still more realististic that not being able to communicate properly at all. (The in-game features for that seem to be crappy atm.) It would also seem realistic that a group of people in that situation would also incorporate some means of communication in their group, so its not unrealistic. The real fix to this is not to ban TS, etc. just because they give advantage - It is to instead offer similar functionality to all the other players in the game as well - a properly working direct chat and some radio system or something like that. PS. Incidentally, I have also been at the communications during my service, dragging miles of pair cables around the woods and all that shit - I think it would be hilarious if Arma/DayZ would incorporate that aspect of the comms business too, but I'm doubtful. :D
  12. The thing is, that currently some people just want to shoot others (having nothing else to do?) and others are still desperately trying to coop and are getting frustrated on always getting shot on sight... How to make it all better for everyone? Without limiting their freedom of choice. Here's my take on the matter: Suggestion 1, "a.k.a. the bandit clan military escort express for noobs": How about giving all the respawned players, even the noobs some kind of "target spot". It could be for example a weapons cache, that only that guy has knowledge about. Maybe just some map coordinate or such (or a map marker if that would be possible). That location could be in some random house or even in the woods or where-ever. Some small pile of trash, which only triggers and spawns the actual "hidden weapon" (or other high-end-gear) when the guy who has knowledge about it gets next to it. The target should usually be far away from the initial player spawn so that just running there quickly would not be an option. Or maybe it should require something like finding a newly spawned map item first. (So everyone would not just start running toward the location at spawn, they would have to risk a bit of exploration first.) Why such a thing? Well, because this would give even the bandits a totally new target to achieve. Instead of just shooting the noob, now they might want to think that hey, I'll just lure that noob into thinking that I'm a good guy, coop with him for a while, get him to lead me to his weapons cache, and then... :P Now, the bandits would have something else to do than to just shoot the poor sob on sight. (Because the guy has something - info - they can't have just by shooting him on the field). Maybe those bandits clans that have vehicles, etc., would actually even consider giving the noobs and other solo guys some safe rides on their vehicles. You know, a bit of a military escort to the target site type of service. In exchange of, well, for example, getting to take the weapon in the cache, if its something good enough that they really want - And giving some of their not quite so good a weapon in exchange (or alternatively just betraying and shooting the poor bastard.) Or maybe if the loot spawn tends to often have like 2 primary weapons or such, then it makes sense to group up to go there. Because one person will probably only need one of those, the other would generally be a leftover for the other guys. Both would be taking a risk, but both might gain on it. A safe vehicle ride to the cache to gain even a bit crappier left-over assault rifle from a bandit would still be a win for the noob, even if the bandits would take the silenced-ultra-weapon found from the cache. Considering the alternative is to probably never even getting to the cache alive. This certainly would give the bandit clans some new goals. Instead of shooting the noob - and gain some beans and makarov, or just lulz, they might have much more to gain by escorting him safely to some location across the map. (Obviously, to balance things out, the high end gear should have an even lower chance of spawn at NW airfield, etc., so just camping around there would not continue to be the easiest way to get all that stuff.) Sometimes it might go well for all involved. Sometimes it might not. At least now everyone would have a little more motivation to consider getting somewhere together and alive. And, oh boy... the possible drama at the end of it all... :P Oh... And maybe there there should be a 20% chance that the weapon's cache would instead trigger a massive zed horde spawn somewhere nearby that would immediately go aggro. Just to make things more interesting for all parties. (And to promote the "better have other people with you, don't just run here alone with your makarov") :D So basically, its like an ultra-light-version of the actual real complex scripted side missions - but incidentally randomly bound to the newly spawned players. Thus, to acquire these "side missions", it would kinda automatically mean having to somehow deal with that specific player. The good: :) + Promotes, but won't force, interaction beyond the shoot on sight with the random people you meet. Even for the bandits. + Promotes journeys beyond Cherno/Elektro/NWA/Stary even for the old timers that might not otherwise bother. + Should be semi-easy to implement since its just a specific player triggered spawn (and a position indication for that player). + Not really a scripted side mission, but hopefully a player interaction filled journey to the loot spot target. (Not the same pre-made story every time) + Does not force any player to play these, does not really aim to punish the bandit style. They can keep on PvP'ing everything that moves if they want to. + Or they can just stalk people that appear to be heading somewhere... maybe the loot spot? Wait for them to get it, then shoot. No need to go talking with them if you don't want to. + Does not have major issues with realism. It is totally conceivable that a person X could have gained knowledge, that others don't have, of some well hidden weapon stash under the floorboards of house Y in town Z (Maybe he hid the stuff there before all hell broke loose). + Most importantly: Offers something interesting / possibly beneficial things to do, other than just killing everyone. On the negative side: :( - This requires the communication in-game to work somehow. Otherwise it won't promote any teamplay with strangers. People will just keep trying to run solo / in their TS group to the target. Thus, this would not work atm. - Careful selection of the target spots is necessary. They should promote team play, not be some instant to run here after spawn. (Gotta be far enough from the coast, gotta be usually at cities/towns, not in the middle of some safe forest, must not be re-selectable by constantly respawning until a good place is found) - And additionally, it needs to have some cap - like allowing that kind of target spot trigger only once a day (or even week) per player. So that, for example, a single clan member cannot just keep killing himself over and over again, telling his teammates to pick him up with a car and thus keep farming the weapons to their tents by constant respawning. As far as the communication requirement goes, there certainly has been several posts about possibility of walkie-talkies and that kind of stuff. And the above suggestion would definitely need something like that (or just bluntly the sidechat, but I doubt that's coming back). Hence, the other related suggestion: Suggestion 2, "everyone wants the radios, right?": Obviously, the often suggested radios and such, that would allow chatter between limited set of random people even before they meet each other (without having to discuss everything globally on the side and annoying others while doing so), would be great. Now, when the random encounter with a totally nameless guy happens, its too late to go for the direct chat and start chatting with the other guy. Its just an anonymous guy, you know nothing about, you feel nothing towards, and its so easy to just shoot him. Consider the same situation, had you chatted with that guy on the radio (walkie-talkie) you found and hour ago or so. And if it was a limited group of people, possibly just you and the other guy on that specific radio channel (fixed channels per radio perhaps, and range limited by a span of few towns?)... Now, after running hours in the woods and looting towns, with only that one guy on the other end of the radio to chat with... You would have a totally different emotional bond to a possible encounter with him. Maybe it would just be a bandit who has been luring you into an ambush or trying to fish out your location. Or maybe its another fellow survivor that's just as bored to running in the woods alone as you are. Maybe when that guy says he got his bones broken by zeds on his last visit to a town and is on low health, you might actually believe it for a moment... Unlike all of those side chat yells of "I'm at elektro power station, I'm hurt. I need help, can anyone bring me morphine, I'll give you my AKM for it". (Right, sure thing, I'll be right there. Not.) And who knows, if there happens to be a bandit near enough with a radio for that channel, it might not just be you who's up for the encounter. The current "direct chat only" policy might theoretically bring some atmosphere to encounters, but what it really does at the moment, is that unless you play in some clan / teamspeak, the game is essentially a singleplayer experience, until that random encounter... And then, at the encounter, the only form of communication are the bullets. You can play for hours, without having a single human contact, and it is quite possible that even in the end, you'll die without even seeing the one who shot you. This certainly has its tension of the constant fear of getting sniped, but it has no psychological human-to-human interaction tension. It would at least be interesting to chat with someone until you die. And then, when the radio goes silent, to wonder if the other guy had been careless and had got shot. (Or if you hear/read some other guy taking contact through the radio on the same channel, you'd know that you're previous contact is probably dead on his feet.) The good: :) + Direct chat, specifically the text, is just way too little, way too late. One of the players is already dead at the typing of the first few words. This would alleviate that by a certain amount. + A possibility to finally get to know some player a little bit before possibly encountering him. Makes the choice of pulling the trigger a totally different psychological ordeal than with some anonymous avatar that has no name and you know nothing about. + Won't take away the possibility to mass-murder anonymously, with no feelings attached - for those who'd rather play that way. + Won't spam everyone globally, won't clutter their screen if they want to immerse themselves into the world and not feel like being in a chat room. The bad: :( - I dunno about the Arma 2 engine, but implementation might be tricky. At least it would need support added on the engine side, probably not moddable on this level as-is. So, what do you guys think? TL;DR probably for the most... But anyone who actually read the whole thing, did it make sense to you? There would still be the same atmosphere of thick mistrust to go around. But at least there would be a chance that the so called bandits might sometimes be willing to risk meeting up on a stranger, rather than just shooting him from afar. As long as there is nothing for the bandits to gain by not just shooting the anonymous person on sight, of course they are going to keep shooting. Ask yourself: why wouldn't they? The suggestions above attempt to give (those players specifically) some new alternative interesting things to do... And by doing that, it would also cater the needs of the so called survivors (and noobs) who would like to co-operate, but keep getting killed by the said bandits on sight. So, everyone wins. (Or in grim reality: Nothing really changes) :P (My apologies for the shiiitt long post.)
  13. Just a simple question: Are tanks legit stuff in DayZ (I would assume not)? Because I've certanly encountered one rolling down the roads of elektro a few days ago. And sorry, no I did not take a screenshot nor do I remember which server it was on (I don't often really pay that much attention when joining some random server). I had just connected to the server, heard sounds of a vehicle and went outside the building I was in to see what it was. And sure enough, there it was rolling down the street. Quickly hid behind the house, but I think the tank driver saw me (or just knew I was there) since it started heading towards me (with some massive desync warping btw). At that point, I decided it was best to just DC the heck out of that server. PS. If some lame ass says "picture or it did not happen" - well, its not like I'm asking for someone to get banned for it or anything. Because I'm not. I know I don't have a screenshot or anything for a proof. So I'm just asking to verify that it has been a hack, right? Or are there really repairable tanks somewhere? PPS. Similarly, I've since had ppl mention bradleys in the chat later on some server, and though I might have otherwise though of that as just a crappy joke - but having already seen a tank before - I take those chat comments as probably actually being true. (Indicentally, my primary weapon suddenly just went *poof* for no apparent reason after visiting that server, so I kinda assume that more than a little bit of haxoring is somehow going on around some servers.)
  14. mrducky (DayZ)

    Enemy's Body Disappeared After Death?

    Probably once happened to me with a player body as well, but that was a bit of an ambiguous case ('cos he was halfway inside a staircase/wall anyway, so I guess it the body could have just bugged otherwise and mysteriously suddenly slid down or something). But it has certainly happened to me with an animal. While gutting a boar I just shot, it just suddenly started to sink to the ground while I was still gutting it. I never got those tasty beefs. :D Maybe its just bad luck with the timing. Or just general bugginess.
  15. NO I've played ~10 games playing unarmed - New players would just insta-quit.
  16. mrducky (DayZ)

    Friendly survivor system (hard-coded 'friendliness')

    Well, those are nice suggestions and all. (I certainly would think a wait time of minutes would be way too long though, some 5-10 seconds or so might be something feasible, as it would still allow a carefully thought out betrayal and such to keep the paranoid mood in the game. (And make that time out short enough, and you're effectively talking about the old survivor and bandit skins. With an optional switch between the skins with a small delay.) :P So, even though it would be nice to somehow recognize who might be willing to team up with you (rather than shoot you), but I frankly don't think even those things would change so much, as the root cause to the killing is elsewhere. The real cause is the boredom. Once you've gained most of the stuff, there is only one fun thing to do, and it is to start killing people. That adds to the secondary cause - which is, that now there are so many bored bandits around shooting at people, that everyone just constantly gets killed and therefore get annoyed/adapt to that - and thus also start shooting everyone on sight as well to ensure their own survival. The only players you still might encounter in this game, who don't shoot everyone on sight, are the noobs. They are still untainted by the dayz world, naively thinking that they are going to find someone else to coop with and then together keep surviving the zombie apocalypse... Only to get shot on arrival to cherno/elektro (or probably even before that). Hanging around the south coast, you might still find one of those random noobs to coop with. Too bad, that the coast is also littered with the freshly respawned bandits. So, frankly, I think there only ways to reduce the DM behavior, would be to give those experienced players (a.k.a. mostly bandits) something interesting to do than to just shoot the players. Alternatively, if that is not possible due to resource constraints, the bandits and the survivors need to be kept a bit more separately (location wise) to allow both styles of play.
  17. Ooohh yeah... Since the arma beta build 93666 the nights have been pitch black - at least for me, regardless of the gamma setting. And I like it. :D Finally, there is some point for the flashlight. And flares. And all that crap. Before that, they used to be preserved for noobs only and for those who were feeling suicidal for whatever reason and really wanted to get a bullet to their head. Right now, since the beta you basically have to use them.. Just running around in the total darkness isn't much of an option. (Like it used to be with the old nights.) I really hope that it has been implemented properly so that no-one can circumvent it anymore using maxed out gamma or such. (Although, I'm sure bandits will have a blast sniping people from the darkness of the woods, now that all those other ppl have to make a target of themselves by using a flare, etc. So I guess there is a downside as well.) :P
  18. mrducky (DayZ)

    What to do

    You're kidding me, right? If you ask me, walking through walls is their favorite hobby... Right next to hitting you through walls, and walking half-inside floors... and de-sync warping in general. :P Well, maybe that was a little bit exaggerated, but anyway, they certainly can do all of those things. I've certainly witnessed those more than once. And yeah, you can often also fail to shoot them. For example, if you are prone inside a building, the shots can just hit the floor in front of you rather than the zed, even if your aim seems dead-accurate. (That's one reason to avoid going prone inside buildings - the other reason is that you may end up breaking your bones doing that stuff). Also, if the zed is still half inside the wall, you'll probably just hit the wall, rather than the zed if you try to shoot at him. So, you gotta back up a bit to allow the zed to properly emerge through the wall... They are tricky bastards those zeds - but no match once you know all of their tricks! :D So yeah, I can fully believe someone new to the zed trickery trying to unload several magazines at a zed but fail at hitting him. :D (Hint: pay attention to the hit effect, is it blood or some other effect. If it's something else, don't waste your ammo, just try to lure the zed to a better position where he will actually take damage.) Oh, and if you are lagging badly, it may take several seconds for the zed to register the hits and to actually die, even if you get the blood hit effect. Just keep your distance to it during that time.
  19. Yes, DayZ (/ Arma) has an minor issue / is lacking features with the mags. There should be some manual (and somewhat time-taking) way of transferring rounds from several half-empty mags to a single mag, if it was to be a fully realistic sim. Currently, there is not. Right now, to use the rounds efficiently, one has to basically often run around with a mag with only a few rounds in it rather than reloading, just so that you can pop those few rounds to some zeds and then get a fresh full mag (so that the almost empty mag would not clutter your gear). And sometimes, this can unfortunately get you killed, when you get into a firefight with a person on close range, and suddenly realize that your mag only had a one or two rounds in it, and the time it takes to reload is the time it takes for you to end up dead. So... the way most other games do this by instantly re-organizing all of your rounds to the mags is obviously not realistic. But neither is the current total inability organize them. (It doesn't really take a genius to move some rounds from one magazine to another in real life, but currently seems to be impossible in DayZ) :P And at least for me, it seems to have always reloaded the most full magazine. I haven't seen any bugs with that so far. It just sometimes happens that the mags I've picked up have not been full, so it might have appeared as if it had reloaded the wrong mag, when in fact, they were just all half-empty. I do have encountered the bugs/features where a partially used mag becomes full again for no apparent reason on disconnect/reconnect (maybe just sync issues?) or when a mag decides to just disappear when moved to backpack that still has plenty empty slots, etc. (I'll just put those bugs to the "Alpha" tap, even though they probably are Arma 2 bugs really) ;)
  20. Yeah, I certainly wouldn't recommend a loot map for any beginners. That would totally kill the fun of exploration (since that's one big thing to keep you interested in the beginning). After the couple of initial plays having acquired the in-game map, I do, however, recommend printing out the chernarus map (the one with the cyrillic names too) if you happen to have a printer. (Sorry, I don't remember the site for that map right off the bat.) I think it's great fun to have a printed paper map besides the keyboard when playing DayZ... so that you can scribble any good loot locations, locations of wells, and such to the map whenever you find them. It just adds to the immersion to have your very own map to scribble things on. :) Besides, a paper map is handy for some quick glipses while running around in the woods. It doesn't require you to stop or block your view like the in-game map. (I guess an interactive map on a tablet might do the trick as well) Or if you just want the quick (and less fun) way, then use the ready-made loot map. :P Might also be handy for the pros who already have pretty much explored everything.
  21. mrducky (DayZ)

    Noticeably lower FPS on 1.6.0

    I'm joining the ranks of people who are saying the 1.6.0.x is running really badly. Even before the patch 1.6.0 patch, I have had some pretty severe framerate issues (specifically after 1.5.6 and before 1.5.8.4). Though for most parts, the framerate in those versions was bearable, at about 25-30 or so. Now, with 1.6.0.1, its about 15-20 at best (happens rarely), and about 5-10 at worst (quite often). And that's the framerate even in the middle of some forest, not in the cities, and with only 5-10 players on the server during night time. It seems to be somewhat server dependent - On some servers it seems to be consistently lower than on others, and it does not seem to directly correlate the amount of players or zeds. At least on one server (where a lot of other ppl were complaining about framerate on the chat as well) I had a best case framerate of about 5-10, and mostly on the 5 fps side. Which was obviously not very playable. The framerate for me seems to be totally CPU (or much rather main memory access speed) limited - since none of the graphics settings seem to have any noticeable effect. Also, the game pretty much seems to gap at approx 50% CPU utilization (2 cores), it never manages to properly utilize all of the 4 cores (despite any command line parameters). I'm using the current steam version of Arma2. Phenom X4 @ 2.8GHz, 8Gb DDR2 @ 800, GTX 260, WinXP 64 Basically, I'll be going for a pause from the game, hoping that the next patch might resolve this, since the current framerates of 5-10 are just not playable.
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