PhilB

US 229-lots of regulars, good mix of friendly and bandit, my home server, come visit! (some of us been talking about eventually some clan wars and loosely organized survivor gamez among ourselves) US3480!-I think this might be the last busy vanilla server in the U.S. Awesome server, very stable, great admin, (oh hey, there he is, what up Jimmy!) Kudos for appreciating "real DayZ". I still don't understand the million vehicle spawns, spawn with ghillie/nvg/dmr,mdew. There's no point to the game if there is no struggle, no crawling your way to the top. It's too bad the remaining players don't come back to authentic dayz (don't like the vanilla term since there is nothing vanilla about official hive, its brutal now!). I've fallen in love with the game all over again after 10 months of complete unplayability because of hackers. But the hackers have moved on and it is a beautiful thing.

Thanks for running a great server, Jimmy. You're the last busy official server in my ping, cuz your server is great! That's interesting about the 3 hour restarts. I like it from a game play perspective as well. A player needs to heighten his level of awareness of time, but you adapt and it keeps the server running really smooth almost always. Maybe you might recall a short lived update (about 3-6 months ago) wherein there was no limitation or 'tapering off' of zombie spawn rates. Single players could generate massive hordes. I remember once in Berenzino, running down the road between the two stores with no less than 60-80 zombies chasing me, yes it was a little laggy but also so amazing. For once, I was amazed. I kept gaining ground on the horde, then stopping, turning and just marveling at the horde (and shooting at them, of course). Maybe Razer and his cohorts will be successful with their performance optimizations so that we can experience truly epic zombie hordes that aren't buggy. And speaking of bugs,why hasn't anyone "re-skinned" the zombies into different enemy classes with their own ai mechanics. We recognize the game isn't limited to one map, why should it be limited by setting. Instead of zombie infestation, how about giant bug infestation? DayB-bugs, DayD-dinosaurs, DayX-extraterrestrials, DayP-mega fauna of late Paleocene era(sabertooths, mammoths, short faced bear, enteledonts, etc.), DayM-Asteroid/meteor impact, DayU-ultimate combination scenario where all play out . . . humans contract a 'zombie' virus while science experiment causes giant bugs to take over while in another science experiment gone wrong dinosaurs are resurrected and thrive while alien invade while mammoths and mastodons come back (cuz of cold from global warming . .DayG) while a massive meteor impact event takes place. And you spawn next to Elektro with some flares . . .

Agreed. I think this idea fits in well with authenticity, simulation, etc. Only problem is it is doubtful nameplates will be in sa and thus you have to go on faith a guy is being truthful with his name. Still I think in game name should be permanent.

I'd like to see the house building from origins put into vanilla dayz. I'd really like a secure way to store items. I don't need all these other maps and stuffs, it's really about patrolling my area of the map on Chernarus like a mindless dog. Heck, I don't even frequent the bottom half of the map on my home server.

My own experience confirms this. I've wondered of this as well. When I had a shitty pc people complained about infected being too hard; I didn't understand. Now I have an awesome pc and I complain about infected being too hard; I understand why people with shitty pcs don't get it. HOWEVER, better pc always wins. My kill/death ratio has gone way up. I can see so clear, so far now. I don't have to wait like 5 minutes for loot to finally ffs spawn up. On a side note, there was a week period where zombie spawn was out of control. I remember running down main road in Berenzino with no less than fifty zombies chasing. I actually miss that. Zombie hit damage was lower, but it was total mayhem! Seems I remember the mod used to spawn more zombies generally. I miss that.

It's also a limitation of the game design. Many times it is quicker/safer to shoot than to switch over to direct chat and try to talk to the guy. Plus, it's a game, it's about hostility. Having said that, I second what dollon said, it's surprising how many people are friendly.

Ah dang, really? I was about to formulate my defense, from a survivor's perspective, of banditry and the kos mentality! But seriously, I'm still wondering was that a bag of all purpose flour in rocket's inventory in the devblog?

As other said, stay with melee and keep safely looting until you find a backpack big enough to hold a gun (ten slots=gun, one slot=ammo clip). The you can store both and switch using the backpack. Also realize the game's loot mechanics, infection and zombie ai changed significantly appx a month ago with far reaching consequences for gameplay. The Dayz you see on 3 month old youtube videos is not the Dayz that exists today. Honestly, I had to relearn how to play! For so long the zombies were super easy. Used to be I'd go into a shed and see 3 axes on the ground. Nowadays, I'm lucky if there's a pepsi. I salute you Johnny Trigger, you've got quite the battle on your hands. If I were you, I'd hang around the outskirts of Cherno or Elektro with direct mic open, and just ask passersby for help. People are way nicer in Dayz than people think. Especially if you're completely unarmed. I suggest letting some friendly dude take you around to help go directly to good loot sites and explain how stuff works and how to play. With someone showing you what to do in game, shouldn't take more than 30 minutes to get the jist of Dayz.

All this. Love Frankie and I think he is generally right about holding off release to provide more extensive content but I don't think that has anything to do with the evolving playstyle of DayZ or the kos mentality. Really, that's another cool part about the game. There's been trends and an evolution. Also, ups to Razor and all thems, cuz the public mod is outstanding right now, truly difficult in survival and pvp. And I think the notion the mod is overly buggy is an exaggeration. It's been really great the last 3 months or so. They've really enhanced the survival aspect of the mod which curiously has increased pvp, not cooperation, because the stakes are higher; there's simply less loot now. Frankie shows he's part of this chorus of people who wrongly believe that turning up the difficulty levels on things like zombies, loot, infection, etc. will cause players to be more inclined to work with each other. Violence, banditry and trolling are so great for the game! The 'get down bitch' bandit featured in Frankie's video was a classic character of DayZ. Haven't we all met a guy like that in DayZ? Yes, he's a nuisance, but that's how he is in real life! I think we tend to take our real life personalities and project them onto our characters in DayZ (a unique feature no one's noticed before?). We can do this primarily because of voice chat. Anyway, I'm particularly excited to see the tidbit on animations for handcuffing a guy. We all fall somewhere on the jerk scale, but a huge part of life in DayZ is doing battle with guys who are more jerky than you. And not only winning, but believing we play the game more honorably than the 'bandits'.

Looks great, thanks and keep it up! Any update on max players per server? All the new animations-zombie jump attack, submission-just great! My preference is the more variety the better. Ultimately, I'd like to see the zombies thought of as an extensive cast of characters, nuance, characteristics, all that.

Ah, my favorite topic! Rivers! Can anyone share more info on why this isn't possible with the current map? I am eager to know why. I understand the issue revolves around elevation change and how the engine generates/manages(?) water. I have this feeling there's some solution to this somewhere. What if the river meanders in a big way, a highly circuitous path, so that it avoids all intense elevation changes?

Love 'em too. I'm sure other people will answer your question in depth, not I though. There are 'events' of various kinds on servers. Look in Private Hive Discussion and Server General, I think. I wanna say to the computer people on the forum, start organizing amateur Survivor Games! New maps have run their course and what else can one do in mod past Origins? Not much, me thinks. Organizing games is the next thing. It's like there is Personal DayZ and Competitive DayZ. I wanna play in the ADZL, Amateur DayZ League!

I don't know how they could fit a whole new map into their priorities and get it done right within a timely manner. But I'm really hoping it goes like this: Release, Basic Fixes, Vehicles, Second Map, then all the refinement/content updates like base building, car customization, defecation, etc. I think a quality Western map would provide more immediate and long term benefit for the success of the game. In 3 months or less, we will all know this new Chernarus map quite intimately. How much updating can they really do in 3 months? But give us an entirely new map, DayZ London or whatever, and it may take us 6 months or more to get truly bored with it! Now Rocket's got potentially an entire year to work on refinements before the forums start grumbling about 'being bored' and 'not enough updates'.

Nice list, beans. 90% big yes. Very practical, seems doable. Maybe not a subway train, but I like the idea of tunnels or catacombs. More zombie stuff. Ever greater zombie variety-gender, ages, physicality, strength, speed, all that. Zombies should seek a bit. I think they should look around more purposefully for people. Not too hard though, after all they are jacked up, but it seems a little off that they'd be completely aimless until you aggro them.

Are you talking mod or standalone? I'm also assuming you mean strictly physical structures like prisons. I'd like: 1.Barracks at Green Mountain enterable (something else cool at GM) 2.Half of all deer stands returned to original loot tables 3. Maybe some starter bases along the western border 4. How about huge statue of Rocket as Stalin 5. Rivers, of course 6. BIG ONE-More animals! I t's safe to assume the wolf and bear populations in eastern Europe would greatly expand upon humanity's destruction. Consider how most countries actually manage their wildlife populations. Park rangers observe, diagnose and cull wild animals to keep populations healthy and stable. Long term the game servers should feature a complex yet robust wildlife simulator. One thing Rocket's been pleased to talk about is how many zombies they've been able to spawn on a server as a result of the new architecture. Something like thousands, I recall. Time wise, they couldn't be that far off from customizing their new the zombie system to spawn a plausible wildlife population. It'd be fascinating to see the ramifications of that kind of self feedback loop running in a world like DayZ. Lots of unscripted gameplay. For instance, out in the woods a wild bear smells the decaying flesh of several dead survivors at the OP's prison. Thirty minutes later you enter the scene to loot--seems quiet . . . no bandits. Inside the prison you hear the sound of fly's buzzing, alright! You brazenly crouch run around a tight hallway and bam you run right up on a fucking bear eating the dead survivor.

In the prior Survivor games, the staff served as invisible cameras. The issue then was they made noise which confused the players, and if I recall also aggroed zombies which also confused the players. They should have fixed those issues and stuck with that. It was a better way to have staff involved.

A lot of people especially hate Kamenka because so many are committed or considering traveling back to their dead bodies (and probably their buddies). Kamenka seems to be always so far from that. When you got precious time to game and it is a matter of either 30 minutes running or potentially 12 minutes running back to your squad and you gotta work early the next day and all that shit, well you make a decision. Also, I play DayZ for the brutality. I don't like a Kamenka spawn exactly for the reason some just said they like it: it's safest and easiest. Those Elektro/Cherno spawns are brutal, but it really means something when you can come out alive with an M4 and an alice pack. Fix all this by making spawns truly random but also plausible. Sometimes you luck out and spawn exactly where you want to be, most times you change your strategy based on the spawn you were dealt.

I have two thoughts for anyone that is getting impatient for an update. First, today's mod is fundamentally better than the mod of a year ago. So if you liked the game a year ago and got hooked, the simple fact is the game has gotten better since then and you have no other acceptable response than pure gratitude. (I paid $40 bucks to play this game, fuck all to the "it's a free mod, you paid for Arma" bs, it's unnecessary) My $40 for DayZ is maybe the best deal I've ever purchased; I've played the shit outta this game. Second, hasn't anyone else noticed the HACKERS ARE GONE!? You want an update, well I've fallen in love with the game all over again since the scripters moved on. I can't believe it's really been 5 months since the last update. I've been so busy enjoying the game as a result of no scripting that I haven't had time to focus on the glitches. Yes, the issues with the tents like at Stary still sucks. But really OP you should know that by now and not get yourself in that situation. I mean, c'mon, who doesn't know the zombies can hit you through the tent walls? Here's my tip for ya. I've taken a new tactic when it comes to all military tent situations. Don't do all stealth, but go in guns blazin'. Quickly take out all zombies as quickly as possible. The key here is to then loot very quickly. Yes, bandits and nosy do-gooders will be around but your unrestrained gunfire will at first cause some chaos/confusion and it always take awhile for good teams to properly set themselves up to 'properly' kill you. I find it is always enough time to safely sprint outta there.

Safe to assume we all want this sort of complexity. I hope in the long term Bohemia creates it. If at the end of all this, they can make a truly immersive survival experience, that's an engine they could sell to other developers. For instance, I just saw a demo for a crowd funded game of an idea I also thought up which is an open world dinosaur hunting simulation. This game idea would be perfect on the nascent SA engine. Anyway the whole food tree needs refinement. It is absurd one would only get 6 steaks out of a cow. If you find a living cow, that should be an enterprise, like irl. Also, don't know if ever mentioned before, but the effects of nourishment or lack thereof should take effect over time, like irl. It'd be great if you can create a situation where you've been so neglectful, in certain ways, to your character that he/she can no longer run, but only walk. For example, what if you've been gluttonous and become too fat? Or you're exploiting your survival stat by being extremely inactive? Well your character's fitness would degrade to the point where you are physically incompetent. I imagine that if you're the boss of a large DayZ clan you aren't gonna be doing much hoofing it on foot from Stary to NWairfield and back. You'll probably have an SUV. And all the luxuries that come with your status. That should be reflected in your character. In the same way if you and your buddy are constantly sharing meager rations of half a can of beans. My other dream/suggestion is splitting up a nourishment system into two separate systems. A psycho/emotional well being and a biological well being. For instance, as Schmeddy just pointed out, soda is not hydrating (not healthy generally). But in a post apocalyptic nightmare a can of pepsi certainly lifts your spirits and makes you feel better in the short term. But like in real life, if all you drink is soda, then eventually you're gonna have some issues. I don't know exactly how you could express someone's sense of emotional well being within the character. My first and easy thought would be that your character's transition animations (switching guns, eating, building fire) would be slower to express a general sense of listlessness if your character was "depressed" or faster if you're feeling upbeat. That's not quite right but awesome if something like this came about.

I've always thought the idea that hundreds of civilians wash up on shore to be a little weird. I envision more like you are a civilian emerging from your house after a few months somewhere in Chernarus. So the player spawns all over the map anywhere there is residential. The frequency would be adjusted to the assumed population size of each city. So you'd get a lot of Elektro/Cherno/Berezino spawns, which I think is realistic considering that's where most of the people would have lived before the outbreak. But you'd also get some Zeleno spawns and Polana and Mysta and Grishino or whatever. If the spawn is geographically random, I think that'd go a long way of solving the 2 city emphasis but also retain the thrill of entering the dangerously populated areas of Elektro and Cherno which is an important part of the game as well.

Good interview. Rocket continues to impress because he clearly understands how important reliability and accountability work to create the core of a successful 'MMO-style' game. I'd like to make the point that, like everyone I am super stoked for all the new content, but there has always been an 'end game'. Survival is the end game. But myriad issues like cheating/glitches/etc. have rendered the most important stat days survived to be meaningless. Right now if you were to tell me your character has survived 112 days in DayZ, I just can't trust that is legitimate. It's safer to assume you're a scripter, or you operate your own server with an average population of just you or some other artificial means. As Rocket said, the private hives almost surely saved the mod. But I think they also destroyed the core concepts of one life, one character, one global stat, one ultimate fear: death. That whole part of the game, the idea that hooked me initially, is what I miss most about the early days(one year ago lol) of the mod. Also super stoked about the defecation mechanics. So glad this was taken seriously. I plan to use mine sparingly. I imagine that taking a steaming dump on your head after I've killed you is the ultimate insult, ever. Who said revenge is a dish best served cold?

I live in the northern woodlands on public hive. I'll keep an eye out for you (and fresh bacon).

Same here. Now I have either dread or excitement of GTA 5. Who knows? Will it not provide 'that thing'? Will even GTA go in the dust pile? I don't know, I still play my fair share of BF3 and Gran Turismo on my ps3. But yeah, DayZ is now my 'real' video game, the one that counts. I can't wait for a hack/cheat free SA with awesome stat tracking. I can't wait to get quantifiable proof that I am indeed the 'Worst DayZ Player of All Time'!

Here's my advice-forget your notion about ammo and think about having a variety of guns. In my mind, there isn't one place on the map that will reliably give lots of ammo of whatever particular gun you're carrying at the moment. Instead, I say the game spits out a medium amount of ammo of a wide variety relatively smoothly all over the map with the exception of the NWAF barracks. Which helps reinforce my advice that the NWAF is single best risk/reward.A single run on just one barrack should net you 3 guns and more than likely you'll acquire some good ammo all around. And NWAF isn't that dangerous if you're not too stupid to know safer times to go. I don't recommend Stary as much because there is no easy bail out point once you're in that tent complex and there isn't much cover in there. I feel really exposed; also I've watched a lot of close combat pvp go down in those tents. I like NW because it seems like you're out in the edge of the forest and in 30 seconds you're inside the barracks, loot for two minutes, book it and in 3 minutes it feels like you're already in Grishino, out of danger.

What about instead of perma bans for naughty players, the only way they get their cd key unbanned is by doing community service down on the beaches of Cherno giving free tutorials to noobies just spawning in, etc. Obviously full of problems, accountability among them (also mostly joke), just thinking out loud how the game could teach contextually within the game, i.e. totally intuitive and no immersion breaking.