Jamz

When the zombie numbers increase, I think they'll have to decrease their detection levels to compensate and allow players a degree of freedom to evade them. I like the idea of numbers building up until they can't be ignored and become a real danger over the course of, say, looting a town. Knowing when to bug out would then be important and teaming up with people would have a purpose. I think a big problem at the moment is that larger zombie numbers in cities would make them no go areas unless you had a very powerful pc though.

I fit neatly between the Diamond/spade descriptions.

I can't really see things changing until the engine is changed tbh. That should enable the larger number of zombies that will be required to make random teaming up worthwhile, but whether the game goes in that direction at all now is anyone's guess. The whole zombie survival genre is reaching critical mass thanks to all the 'wannabies' and the concept is in danger of becoming stale... Maybe this is good though as it could leave just the hardcore playerbase (I don't mean HC server only players ;) ) playing DayZ... Also, there is and always has been so much more to DayZ than FPS deathmatch, never doubt that. Anyone who can't see that hasn't looked deep enough.

I'm talking about proper military gear as you find in the game, not army surplus items (which even then are not commonly available in the vast majority of the world). Also, I'm not talking about 'survival' gear either like hiking boots etc, that is more common obviously but not weapons. I see some areas of America (and possibly Russia/parts of Eastern Europe) as exceptions where it may well be easier to find these things. But using all this gear would carry the same risk and the camouflage aspect of it relatively useless imo.

I hope that could be done whilst keeping the core DayZ experience and I do look forward to private vanilla servers. I'm also hoping that the more ideas added to the game will enable more variation of playstyles eventually. The mod seemed to be heading that way and now attention has switched to the SA, maybe it can happen there but I agree balancing is the key as it is in all multiplayer games. At the moment of course the SA isn't balanced but it's in constant flux as items and mechanics are added for testing by us, even an open sandbox game needs balancing regarding items.

Throughout the majority of the world, very very few people have access to military gear actually. In such a situation as this many military/police units would potentially be cut off and operating independently to a degree, not to mention very edgy and nervous as it's the 'apocalypse'. groups of armed people in camouflage who they didn't know would I imagine make them very suspicious whereas armed civilians maybe not so much. My point here is that as cool as it is wearing milspec gear, it would have practical downsides in this specific and unique situation. You have to see the big picture here, everything has changed in the world so it's not all about hiding in bushes and sniping people anymore if you want to survive. In the game of course, it's a very different kettle of camo fish.

Quite. But then, everyone is able to determine the nature of their pvp, often when/if it's even required.

I'm here for the chance to imagine being alive in such a situation, the foreboding and deserted landscape for me creates an incredibly eerie atmosphere... The zombies will add to that when they are finished and present in proper numbers. I'm afraid that other players to me are just a fascinating inconvenience, too much of a risk to approach but not enough of a risk to kill.

I tend to use military gear at the moment in the SA for two reasons: it generally has the most inventory slots and the camo is good for avoiding detection by players. I'd like more dark civilian clothing with equal inv spaces to military gear to allow me to appear less hostile though. In reality however, wearing military gear would be a very bad idea. The camouflage would likely be unnecessary against the undead as they would probably notice movement rather than discern prey by appearance ie. if you were dressed in any darker colours and far enough away but not moving it would probably have the same affect as full camo. Secondarily, if military forces happened upon you they would probably shoot you on sight as a deserter, looter or criminal. Normal people would probably wear normal clothes, possibly looking more like tramps, rather than military gear they could only have stolen from the army or taken from a soldier - either dead or alive. Someone dressed in civvy gear, even with a gun, may encourage soldiers and armed groups to ask questions rather than fire. Looks great in the films but would just be increasing the threat to your survival imo.

I remember mentioning this months ago. The easiest way I could see of enabling player owned structures would be to allow the player to barricade certain structures only. The effects are removed on server restart and once barricaded, that house cannot be spawned into by other players by ghosting. Barricading would simply consist of boarding up windows and doors so it wouldn't be possible to barricade around the perimeter. There would always however be a way for other players to gain entry by destroying the boarding (but not for zombies to do so) but it would take time and require a strong melee weapon (not fists). I'm looking forward to it's eventual implementation.

It's a 'cleaner' version of the Cerne Abbas giant from Dorset, not sure what it's doing in Chernarus though :huh:

Players are not frightening, usually just annoying coupled with fear of losing gear/self preservation. That's not the same thing as atmospheric foreboding. For instance, I think zombies should be always making low moaning sounds even when they are dormant and wandering. If we get large groups then the combined volume of the moans should increase accordingly. For hordes/large groups I'd love to be able to hear them from a distance, maybe getting closer if I'm looting a town. Something like near the end of this clip (try to ignore the music!) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAp_-0vbOwY

I have to agree, the atmosphere isn't really there yet. Ramping up of zombie numbers and fixing their behavior may not really be enough either, it's the incidental details which also need working on.

Exactly this. We are helping to develop a game here, not play the finished article. Some aspects of the zombies can only be effectively tested by the community (there are far more of us than the devs, so evaluation is greatly speeded up this way). They receive feedback from our findings and work on fixing issues/improving things but the more testing we do, the faster things can move along. I have no doubt that the zombie respawn issue will be fixed soon, but in the meantime we have to continue to put up with it, it's not game breaking and just requires a little forward thinking before using firearms.

We paid our money and we're along for the ride, if you don't like it then get off the train. You can always get back on later :)

Without the hive system, part of the core of DayZ would be lost. There would be no attachment to your character, no fear of death if you could just jump server to the next geared one when he dies. Also, there would be no constant underlying threat the server you're on changing into a pvp warzone without you knowing. It allows for events to be created on specific servers for any player to join with their character. It allows medic/traders/rangers etc to have a profession. The negative point to the hive system is server hopping/ghosting. I believe private servers have a place, but it is a different experience to the hive.

It could encourage temporary team ups and subsequent double crosses, hopefully. Players grudgingly working together and then a standoff when they're out of trouble, or maybe kneecapping someone to cause a distraction during a frantic getaway from a zombie overrun barracks. Two groups of random players fighting at an airfield, one group unaware that one of its members has decided to go to the other group and is about to jump ship... random grouping made the mod stand out. I'd like to see it become necessary sometimes in the SA but without the zombie threat being great enough, it's just not worth the risk at the moment.

I'm hoping this is the eventual aim of the SA, for at least some areas of the map. Sorting out the zombies is however the most monumental task on the entire agenda, the A.I has to be spot on, along with the difficulty level/numbers/mechanism of detection etc. It's going to be a while.

I guess it depends on a lot of things ie how they were reanimated, how long since death and subsequent animation, what is powering them etc. All of these things are open for discussion and because of that I don't think being undead can be ruled out. They're certainly not following the classic undead rules but rules are there to be broken. Ignore people who flame you as they don't consider all the possibilities of what is biting/stomping them. ie. Infection is an easy one - requiring no rationalization, only information as to the specific nature of the infection. Reanimation is more difficult to imagine, assuming the brain and body was restarted after death then electrical activity could have recommenced. The body is dead however, so does this mean the heart is beating or not? If electrical activity has restarted then it could be, allowing the body to continue working as before albeit deteriorating over time. These zombies could appear to be infected. This is the tip of the iceberg....

An old Merc would be nice, maybe a 350 SEL.

To be honest, exactly what they are isn't really important. I, like most people, use the term zombie for convenience but they could just as easily be dead or undead in game. I like the fact that the true nature of what has happened in Chernarus has not been explained, it lends itself well to the survivor situation and fuels the imagination. Personally I do consider them infected humans (although I call them zombies) as I think that's more plausible in this situation, but as always, my heart (and braaaainzz) is with the zombies! They've always fascinated me.

I suspect you don't realise what a fool you're making yourself look :) lol

I never did, I think radio's were very rare in the mod and didn't really have a purpose (but there were stories about Green Mountain...). However, supposedly you could get night vision goggles of chopper pilot zombies at chopper crashes. Again, I never managed to.

Well you could find ammo and food/drink on zombie corpses in the mod so I expect it will happen at some point. The corpses have to stick around long enough to be searched first though!

It sounds to me like your experiences with the regular servers are from high population servers. You should try low population ones sometime, you might just find yourself getting into combat situations a little less. Unless you're starting them of course. I don't think that putting all players on full servers will have any effect other than slowing the rate at which players gear up anyway, so it's fundamentally pointless as a fix. Playing on low population servers is not an exploit, incidentally. Server hopping is and should be addressed, but not in they ways you have put forward.