WGMindless

Backstory: I was driving down the countryside, and like a lot of people, I was instantly reminded of DayZ when I saw all the familiar buildings and forests. As I drove past a big silo I got a little nervous, probably due to a lot of bad experiences with Snipers on the roof of the silo in Cherno. However, I looked up at the silo and saw a flock of birds perched on the roof and thought "No, there couldn't have been a sniper up there, the birds would have been scared away." The suggestion: What if there were random flocks of birds perching on rooftops and trees throughout the game that get scared away when someone comes near? So for instance, if you saw a group of birds sitting on a rooftop you would know there probably isn't a sniper up there, because he would have scared the birds away. Or even better, if you suddenly hear the telltale sound of a bird and then look up to see a small flock of birds flying away from the trees, it'd be like an alarm-system that someone is coming. Maybe the birds only react to people running, so they won't get startled if you sneak past them or if a simple zombie walks by. Should they only alert you of other players? Should they warn you of incoming zombies? Do they attract zombies to your location if you startle them? I don't know, I'm not a game-designer, I just thought it was a cool concept.

Wow, I absolutely love the sound of that, that's an awesome idea. It may not do that much for the gameplay, but it would look so cool. EDIT: I guess it would work as a way to tell whether or not a corpse has been looted yet. If birds are eating a player's corpse, you know nobody has touched it yet.

That's why I said "maybe". Like I said, I'm obviously not a game-designer. I was just throwing out different suggestions for how the mechanic could work, depending on what Rocket would want to focus on. (Would he want the birds to alert you of other players or of zombies? Would the birds alert the zombies of you?)

Obviously not every rooftop in the game, this isn't Assassin's Creed. There are some rooftops of high buildings that are popular Sniper spots, such as the Apartment buildings and the Silos. The birds would also perch on other stuff, like trees, power lines, and fences and flee if someone comes too close or fires a weapon. (I also love the idea of a flock of birds getting startled and flying up into the air when you shoot and kill another player, very cinematic and it feels DayZ-ish.)