khaoimon

Though it should be fairly obvious there is a largely diverse player base so I just wanted to add a couple things. Using dayz commander if you click on Versions you can easily downgrade or upgrade both your arma and dayz version. If you have a favorite server you can't get onto with new updates usually commander will list: v1.7.2.4/95913(or whatever they are using). See what the server you want to log into is using and downgrade/upgrade until both your arma and dayz version match their numbers and you'll be able to log in fine. I know a few servers I play on have rolled back their updates to versions they find most stable and being fully updated will prevent you from logging in.

To preface I've only played for about a week and never had another player speak to me. I know lots of people that play but have yet to play with them as I don't want my noobness to get them killed. But I have an observation about your observations. Ignoring permadeath and hacks it would seem your post is an observation of the redevelopment of society. It would seem to me in a post apocalyptic society people would seek out those they know that survived and cling to them, try to find a group that is trust worthy to survive with, establish a safe area to keep things they scavenged, and attempt to get past the point of surviving meal to meal. It is these tendencies that lead to the development of farming and societies in cities in the first place. To expect people to not gravitate towards this would be against our nature. Whether this leads to a great game or great end game is another question. However, having read the forums of one of my guilds in another game their server has proceeded to a farther point in society. Rival clans and bases have been established. There are midnight raids for supplies-clan warefare. Societal survival of the fitest. The strongest swell in numbers as people flock to survive and then burst into civil war as internal struggles develop. The survival aspect of this game is so raw that it has lead to an exact mirror of human development. The directions this could be taken in are overwhelming-and that's not to say that it should not be made harder for this to happen. In terms of my personal experience as I said I have yet to have any contact with anyone. I know this is a little long, but some back story is necessary for my point. I saw someone last night, he didn't respond to me and quietly waited for me to approach close enough to flee out a back door. My second day I starved to death after not finding food in 3 cities and not having matches to make a fire. So I carry enough to survive for almost an entire run of the map. I don't have a tent, but I wont be starving. I have 2 bandages at all times, 1 of each important medical supply, and drink equal to my food. I have a sniper rifle and a silenced assault rifle. Even without tents or friends other than really wanting nvg I have no reason to scavenge or really do anything other than make my own fun. I have avoided populated servers after my second non-zombie death which was from an unknown player. I was inside a large building in a somewhat obscure town on a server with only three people logged in. I was careful and saw no signs of anyone inside or out. I checked my back frequently. Yet a single gunshot from an unknown place took my life. Having had no contact with other players I would almost rather be shot in the back with someone I am with than to have died for an unknown reason from a shot from an unknown place. But now, that I have everything but nvg, I have logged into my guilds server, without telling them or getting in mumble, because I know it is a pvp heavy server. I'm ready to die and I'm ready to kill simply because I am passed the point of survival playing as a loner. I think, completely ignoring tents, without large changes to survival, that small clan warfare is where excitement will be found. At some point I can see tents and stockpiling to be a fix for the lack of excitement in survival alone. Crawling through the same towns to repickup the same items to be able to trek to the good items will at a point become the same grind as gearing a new character in typical mmos. I guess in the end my point, with my limited experience, is I agree that both lone and group survival need some work to maintain that heart pounding excitement we all felt the first time we logged in-but players will gravitate towards building societies because it is our nature. I don't think I am agreeing or disagreeing with you, just my observations built on yours.