kander

Then how about posting your complaints on the Arma II [edit: or Battleye] forum, not DayZ's. Rocket needed a game engine to test out a revolutionary game concept and this happened to be a good fit. The hacking problems are an unfortunate side effect of using this engine and cannot be remedied without taking resources away from the standalone. We're alpha testing a proof of concept FFS. What the devs need is contructive criticism of features which have been included in the mod which can then be assessed and taken into the standalone. Spending time criticising features of the mod's game engine is utterly pointless, unless you have a valid and proven reason for thinking this will also going to be an identical issue in the finished game - Game not mod. If people choose not to take part in play testing because they are frustrated they're not getting finished-build quality at alpha stage, and for free, then what's the point in anyone trying out new ideas?

You can't really say 'best' or 'worst' and compare it to other games, most of which have been developed by massive teams in professional studios. Hell, this isn't even a game, it's a modification of an existing one, and it's not finished yet - nowhere near. This is an alpha, it's a chance for the dev to work out what features to carry forward and issues to iron out when it comes to the standalone. If Rocket spends too much time trying to perfect an alpha version of a mod (with the all base game's imperfections and limitations) the standalone will never get started let alone finished. It's like trying to write a song, but you don't have any instruments. You can write the lyrics and hum the guitar part and then you can try it out on your friends to get feedback, so that when your guitar gets delivered you can take on their ideas and perfect it because you now have the appropriate tools to do so. You can got hung up on perfecting the 'hummed' version of the song, and make it as good as it possibly can be, but it will still sound pretty poor and amateurish and nobody will invest in it or you in the long term. So, the way I see it, I couldn't care less if I suffer from any actions which result from the use of the Arma II engine. I don't care if I spawn in the middle of a wall and break my legs. I don't care if I get turned into a sheep occasionally by a hacker, I don't care if I get graphical glitches. The Arma II engine will not be used for the final game, so any attempts at fixing these issues are an utter waste of time. Some people are impatient and will rage quit becuase they get hacked too many times and will lose their 'lootz', but that's of no importance to me and no importance to Rocket. I don't think Rocket cares how many people stope playtesting (and that's all we're doing) the mod as long as enough people play long enough to provide constructive feedback, and enough people enjoy it enough to buy the finished game. And that's what's happening. Sadly for some, but encouragingly in the long term, Rocket has no obligation towards making the mod fully playable. - he has made it very clear that it is a proof of concept.

IhhH gootta shayy, fooOking greet game. Iv onlY beeen drinkn 5 mins I Loove you man.. oh *hic* gettng emoshonal now...

The mouse seems to have an annoying 'momentum' algorithm (similar to Windows 7 I recall - I disabled mine on my laptop) where the faster you move it the further the cursor moves, as opposed simply to moving relative to the distance covered by the mouse. This guide helped - as well as providing other smoothness tips by editing the .cfg file. NOTE this is not my own work - source cited below. "Some Ini Tweaking: Yes, you can tweak INI files. Noticably, when going to your "My Documents folder", try and find the .arma2profile and .arma2oaprofile files. You will see a lot of text. Now find these values and set them to this: Code: sceneComplexity=150000; ShadingQuality=0; MouseSmoothing=1; For some reason nobody really understands yet, this also improves your performance. Feel free to tweak the TerrainGrid setting as well. This is basically the Terrain Detail setting but the ini setting allows you to tweak it even more. Higher values mean higher performance, with the max being 50. Try setting it to 50. Note that you have to change the settings both in *.arma2profile as well as *.arma2OA profile in order to see an effect, for some reason." SOURCE: Here

Absolutely fair point, however - miss your first shot with the dinner bell, which you are likely to do especially against a fast-moving survivor, and you've got a real fight on your hands. Especially against an opponent who is similarly armed. Yeah, TBH I'd class the CZ500 as military loot for the purposes of this argument. Can be deadly at very long range, not hard to learn how to use it either. But for the most part the more 'military' the weapon, the best balance it will have between RoF, damage and accuracy. I'd rather have an FN FAL in a fight than an Enfield or AK (yes the AK is military but it is pretty basic). My argument is that the AK should be pretty much the best assualt rifle it's possible to get, barring exceptional good fortune, as it will make killing much more of a challenge. Perhaps the CZ550 the best sniper with the same caveats.

May I be the first to offer my beans? I always bring beans to parties. Wine is so pre-infection..

Far too many military grade weaps at the moment. Rocket needs to make these as rare as panda spunk. 90% of PvP battles should have to be with farm rifles/shotguns, with players havng a miniscule chance picking up something which is effective over long range. That way battles stay long, tense and tactical. Kills become a real achievement and good gear is worth getting totally paranoid about losing. As i have said before, players get a chance to disengage from a battle or pass within 300 yards of an enemy knowing that they have a decent chance of survival unless the shooter is a crack shot. More realistic. more fun. (except for the CoD kids.. oh well)

I should be able to generate car-powering methane by eating beans. It's my sandbox.. I'll play it how I like

Here's a sandbox mod with enough complex mechanics to roleplay at survival. Guns are part of this experience, but to use the engine just to entertain yourself treating it as a murder simulator is far too restrictive a playstyle for me to be able to fathom. Don't get me wrong - I get that conflict is fun. If I were in this situation for real I would of course get the biggest rush from trying to defend myself and my stuff from bandits*. But if you go looking for trouble you tend to find it, which runs counter to the idea of survival somewhat. * I would add and murderers but IRL would almost certainly not have any true murderers in the same way as DayZ. Genuine permadeath would tend to put them off. Also, I have yet to find an invincibility hack yet, though I understand that alchemists are working on it. I'd love to see some of these kids in a genuine survival situation. Actually I'm a big softie so I would probably feel sorry for them. This would be even before you include weapons and zombies for them to deal with... When your in-game lifespan would clearly exceed your real-life equivalent you know you're in trouble...

Hi. Searched, but did not find anything specifically for this issue. Quick question: does anyone know a tweak (maybe in the .cfg file) for turning down the sound of my own footsteps? It gets annoying really quick in a game where most of my time is spend just running north/west. I can turn down general audio under 'effects', but this tends to mute everything else also. Cheers

It's realistic IMO. At the first sign of infection, everyone with access to a vehicle hopped in and took off out of Chernarus quick smart. There are hardly any vehicles left now except for those which could not be started in a hurry due to being out of fuel or requiring mechanical work.

ROFL

I totally agree. Provided both prone men are consenting adults they should be free to do whatever they want to each other without interference.

You want people to give you beans by claiming that you don't want more beans and trusting that there are enough dicks in the community that they will try and break your heart? Post some interesting comments, that's the best way. Way better for the boards also,

Can't say I understand this logic. The OP is not Alt-F4ing, just waiting for a chance to co-op with his buddy when they can both get online together so he can get some help. Sure it's a bit of an exploit, but no worse than players who call 'medic' on the forums (offline), and surely it's a logical extension of meeting up with real life buddies on a safety-in-co-op basis. I for one feel the game would be far better if you couldn't (reliably at least) meet up with IRL players to cover each others' backs, roll in a massive group etc. A mechanism where you are assigned a random server within a predefined tolerable ping range would be amazing. You would then have to cooperate more with random folk in game and the milk of human kindness would flow much more freely. This is unlikely to happen however, so OP's doing nothing wrong.

Am I eligible even though I eat a lot of baked beans? And I do mean a LOT. I never seem to create any washing up though.. surely a positive.

This thread deserves to be Alt-F4ed

I have seen a few posts on the forums about the language barrier, and in particular as part of the argument: - Poster: "My murder was justified becuase I asked him several times if he was friendly and got no response" - Reply: "It was not justified because what if the victim didn't speak English and couldn't understand you". I thought I'd give my opinions, hopefully spark a debate and try to establish a rule of thumb (see below) The way I see it: I'm British, so I like to play on UK servers, but I speak French and also sometimes play on French because I can make myself understood,I also play on German and Dutch servers because they are very likely to speak English, When I'm on English speaking servers, I feel I have to assume everyone else on these servers can speak English too. I know there are plenty of folk who come from smaller countries who are unlikely to have their language represented in DayZ servers, and may end up on UK servers, but that is an unfortunate reality reflected in world politics and economics anyway. HOWEVER this doesn't just work for me, but also 'against': When I'm on a foreign language server, I always assume nobody can understand me. Even Dutch servers, though most Dutch speak perfect English. I'm on their server, I think it's a fair assumption is that I communicate in their language. If I challenge someone in English on a Spanish server for example I would give them much more leeway for not replying as I would on a UK server - even if this means they often get the first shot away. If I'm on a French server I use French first and English second. I think by communicating in 'server language' and assuming that everyone else is doing so also is the best way to end the argument that you shouldn't kill even if no response is received just because that person might not speak your language.. but I'd be interested to hear all y'all thoughts.

This. Unless it's a blood bag, in which case you kind of have no choice..

I cannot believe how cool you are. And yet, it must be true..

Ran a quick search as ever, nothing obvious on this issue.. so... The more I play this mod, the more two things have become apparent which negatively impact the enjoyment (and realism) of the game. I think they can both be fixed with an adjustment of the spawn % probabilities. EDIT: I mean the probability of certain higher-value items showing up, rather than the actual amount of loot available. 1.) It is far, FAR too easy to gear up on an empty or nearly empty server. Spawn in Elektro and you can, with a bit of luck, get an Alice pack and survival gear from the supermarket, military grade hardware from the fire station and a hatful of medical supplies from the hospital in no more than 15 mins. You don't even need to stop to kill zeds if you hit the places up in the right order. This sort of success would take much longer on a higher pop server, when you have more PKers and more competition for loot. Players can then hop to more populous servers and have the advantage over those who have had to work harder and longer for their gear. 2.) It is very depressing to see folk server hop as soon as night falls. People should be encouraged to play the game at night/discouraged from only joining daytime servers. Reduced zed aggro range at night is not enough of an incentive IMO. Both of these problems could be fixed with a scaling of the loot spawn %s. Something like, the baseline for 100% (as current) item spawn probability should be when the server is 75% full. If there is more competition, the loot spawn percentage increases to make it more profitable for everyone to go with the extra risk. As the server empties, so the likelihood of useful gear spawning decreases, down to perhaps a level around 30% of standard loot % when the server is (or near) empty. You can still get cool stuff in an empty server (I'm not proposing a limit in this respect) it's just much rarer. This is sort of realistic also as the running around in an environment with lots of survivors gives the impression of a higher population 'pre-infection', the higher the population, the more useful stuff in a settlement. Regards the day/night issue: similar system really. If you are willing to put up with the dark, the added risks etc you are more likely to get 'cool stuff'. Something like a 20% boost when it is dark. Both of these should help keep server populations fairly stable and also make the whole experience a little fairer. Would be interested to hear your thoughts, Zed lovers.

Gotcha.. thanks for the clarification

I'm going to assume you're joking, but in case you're not.. it's possible to take the realism too far. Otherwise, I propose a counter suggestion. Breathe in and out. You have to alternately press + and - all the time you are in game or you will asphyxiate and die. You have to bash 'em quicker if you're running.

Like your thinking, esp about a much bigger map idea. Re the choosing your own play style, I don't think it would suffer for my idea, for example - if you play as a solo woodland survivor you don't need all the military hardware. For clearing zeds or scaring off a fellow survivor who stumbles across your patch a Winchester or CZ 550 would be more than enough. If you get bored with this playstyle and want to 'step up' to potential PVP on another server it will feel like a true challenge.

Aw shucks, thanks guys for the beans! Bobcomss, I completely agree that loot should be massively scaled down - particularly military weapons and particularly sniper rifles. I actually get the impression that if this had not used the Arma II engine, Rocket would not have included so many military grade weapons. The reason I suggest that better loot should be available on more populated servers is that it's much harder to come across. Another player may have picked it all up in a given location or you may simply have been murdered half a dozen times before you even get a chance to get anything good. On an empty server you can simply run to NW airfield, shake the zed train and then have the pick of the place with no competition and without having to look over your shoulder. What I mean by 100% is that my understanding of the loot system from reading the forums and looking at loot maps is this, using the example of a residential spawn: Item spawns. It will spawn as trash - except there is for example a 5% chance it will not be trash but a bandage, 3% chance heatpack, 1% Winchester, etc. etc. This all adds up to maybe 60% trash, 40% 'something else'. These figures are estimated/invented, but they represent the '100% DayZ baseline' With my proposal, the probabilities at empty server are, just as an example; item spawns: it will be trash except it will be 1% likely to be a bandage, 0.6% heatpack, 0.2% Winchester. etc. etc. Totals 92% trash, 8% useful stuff Hope this makes as much sense to you lot as it does in my head! Cheers, K