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i liked the old 300 sec timer. Made hopping and ghosting way harder.

I've been a part of Green Mountain Sanctuary since the summer and when it ran, it ran really well. We'd have a constantly full 40 and most of the server would be at or near Green Mountain. The problem we ran in to was at first, ghosters logging in hidden locations and killing everyone. Then the hackers came and everything went to shit. Our group got labeled as hacking bandits who lured players in just to take their gear, so we just shut the whole thing down for months. We are throwing the idea of getting back up and running around since a lot has happened with the group since then (weeding out bad apples mainly) but there are still a few problems. Ghosting mainly, and a private server is too much for our owner to drop right now

I think it will be server/clan wars. Most people find this game much more enjoyable with even just one friend to play with and I agree with that. Even since I found a group who regularly plays my enjoyment has increased exponentially and my experience have varied in the same way. After a while however doing the same old with your buddies loses it's freshness. Of course the game is only limited by your imagination, but if you only have a group of 4 you are still limited to things a group of 4 can do. You can never get in to a 15 v 15 firefight when all you have is 4 (assuming the entire 15 on your side are friendly and coordinated). You can't do things like large convoys (when vehicle types get implemented), you can't set up giant ambushes, huge raids, etc... but when you have a large group you can always parcel off and still do the small group stuff. Clan wars will also give group members a common enemy and something to participate in other than your own character development. Say you have a clan of 20 people warring against a similar sized clan. Even if it's a quiet day, you can still contribute to your group by doing things like looking for supplies, ammo, weapons, backup clothes, med supplies, etc and add it to the clan camp (when that stuff all works). You'll be able to contribute to the bigger cause even if you can't actively be in that firefight while you're at work or in class. I can't even list the possibilities of a healthy community of clans working with and against each other, even better if that clan has camps on their servers that they can add to, raid camps on other servers, take enemies hostage and torture them, get in to huge fights, deal with betrayal and sabotage, etc.. It would just be awesome There are a few problems, ghosting is the main one I know of. Ghosters ruin anything you try to do thats organized if you don't want to constantly be on the move. If you want to make any building/town/location on the map with structures your home you must abandon it when people find out where it is because they will just ghost in and ruin everything in an unfair way, this especially applied if your clan invites friendlies to their location. It's one thing to pretend to be a friendly, make your way in a kill everyone. It's another to circument that process and get aground structural chokepoints by logging in behind a building. Persistance is obviously another issue. Being able to contribute to a camp is an important part of contribution outside of running missions and makes the dayz experience much nicer. So this is kind of mental vomit, but I think this is also an important part int he future of DayZ edit: I forgot to say obviously base building will HUGELY change how camps and clans operate

Trujuice... yes your way not flexy's way. Flexy's way will lead to abuse and exploit of the mechanic. Ex: fighting 2vs2 and suddenly its 2vs8... wait wut.... Ghosting in is allready bad. Being able to spawn on a friendly/clanmember is top tier Ghosting.

I snipped this straight from an article that popped up on google .. I have no experience with the x6 personally. SNIPPED FROM ARTICLE It is probably about time to give an example to bring things into context. The Microsoft Sidewinder X6 keyboard is a fairly recent gaming keyboard that is frequently criticized for its anti-ghosting capabilities or lack thereof. With this particular keyboard, the common complaint is that gamers can't press certain 3-key combinations like: Ctrl + W + R (Crouch + Forward + Reload)In this case, after pressing the first two keys (Ctrl + W), the third key ® doesn't register. While key combinations like this may not be used by every gamer, it is a real problem...even with keyboards like this marketed towards gamers. SNIPPED FROM ARTICLE

A sleeping animation is not a bad idea, I definitely agree that it would be a more immersive way of logging off. I don't think the sleeping bag and health bonus are necessary though. Perhaps logging off could also trigger a snoring sound and logging on a yawn, to further discourage ghosting and combat logging.

Intro The first time you play the game, or if your previous server is offline, or if you just click "Change Server" you will see the "Servers:" screen. There's a lot of information here and not much explanation of what it all means so this guide is designed to explain the various server options to newer players, to help them understand why sometimes their character appears to be reset and, perhaps most importantly, to assist them in getting a more rewarding DayZ experience. Throughout this article I may refer to various server hosting rules and guidelines, all of which are taken from the official thread located here. Otherwise, I mainly draw on my experience of playing 200 plus hours of DayZ SA. At the top of the screen is a row of buttons: Internet (largest section so placing in a spoiler) Column 1 is either a green circle or a gold key. The green circle means it's not password protected, the gold key means it is. Trying to join a password protected server will prompt you to enter the password - get it wrong and you cannot join. Note that it is against the server hosting rules to put a password on a public server, only private servers should be password protected. Column 2 is Host. This is a description of the server that the server admin chooses, and ideally should be something that is easy to remember (in the above screenshot I always remember one server - guess which one...hmm bacon) and should also provide 2 key pieces of information not displayed elsewhere - whether persistence is on and how often the server restarts. However, the server admin may not include this information in the description, in which case you will need to work it out for yourself. Persistence on means that most gear dropped on the floor should stay there after a regular server restart (but still not a Wednesday morning server maintenance) but can also lead to odd loot distributions and will not feature helicopter crash sites. Persistence off means that loot will be respawned after every server restart (so a tent or backpack left on the ground will disappear) but has the advantage of spawning helicopter crash sites where you can find some of the top end military loot.Server restarts will tell you how regularly the server is restarted which controls the respawn of loot. This is particularly important on persistence off servers (for finding helicopter crash sites) and just generally for getting a feel for how hard your game might be - join a high pop server 3 hours into a 4 hour restart cycle and don't expect to find much loot! Server restarts are typically 1, 2 or 4 hourly, but almost anything is possible.Note - Many server admins will chose descriptions that actually break the server hosting rules, either to attract more players or to try and warn them away. The most common of these is by promising different amounts of loot ("high loot" to attract more players or "low loot" to try and keep people off of the server) or put warnings in the descriptions like "Join=kick", "server not working", "Character reset if join" etc... The server admin has no control over loot spawn (outside of how regularly they restart the server which might help a little) and kicking players without just reason is against the rules. Column 3 is Hive and is a very important piece of information. There are 2 types of hive, public and private. In DayZ every private server you join will have its own character. So if you join a private server you have never been on before you will start as a fresh spawn on the coast. If you then switch to another new private server you will create another new character. Each character exists only on the private server they were created on. If you want to be able to play the same character across servers you will need to play on Public servers - however you also need to consider the mode of the public derver (1PP or 3PP - see "Mode" below). One final consideration when deciding between a private or public hive is that because characters on private servers only exist on that specific server, if the server is offline you cannot play that character and, even worse, if the server admin ever stops paying the bill you will lose that character forever. Column 4- Mode. This shows whether the server is a 1st Person view only server (1st Person or just generally referred to as 1PP) or a 1st Person and Third Person server (1st/3rd Person (or simply 3PP)). 1st person only mode is considered a more hardcore mode and requires significantly greater situational awareness. Switching to a 1PP server for the first time after playing a lot of 3PP is a very disorientating experience. However, it is also more rewarding. Note that you have a different character on Public 1PP servers from Public 3PP servers. Therefore, you effectively have 1 character for 1PP Public servers, 1 for 3PP Public servers and then one character for each Private server. 3PP Public servers are by far the most common and popular. 1PP servers (be they public or private) are considered "hardcore". Column 5 shows the current version of the game that the server is running. Column 6 is the in-game time - most servers are daytime so this is useful if you specifically want to play on a night time server (which is a great experience!) Column 7 shows if you have any friends currently playing on that server. Unfortunately, it doesn't tell you who the friend is, so if you have 2 friends playing on 2 different servers you'll just have to guess which one is which if they can't tell you. Column 8 shows the number of players on a server and the maximum number that can play on that server at the same time. Obviously, the more players the greater danger, but also the more opportunity for interaction. Some people also find high population servers "laggier" due to the server having to calculate more objects and items (the players and their bullets) especially when some very high ping players are on. Note that even on servers with a low number of players or even zero, the main hotspots such as the North West Airfield can still be very dangerous as people hop in and out of servers to repeatedly loot the same location across multiple servers. Even on a zero pop server you should regularly press "P" to open the player list and see if someone else has joined. Chernarus may be 225 sq km but there are lots of stories where there are only 2 players on a server and they run into each other in the middle of nowhere... Column 9 is the ping - the lower the better, obviously. Favourite When you select a server (by clicking on it once to highlight it) you'll get the option to add it to Favourites. Once you've done this, it will appear under this tab. History For me this is a bit buggy - when I switch to this tab it shows my Favourites list, then after about 15 seconds it fills up with a load more servers but not really with any that I recall playing on and certainly not in the manner that it should, i.e. most recently played server first. Friends This view lists only servers which you have friends playing on. Unfortunately, it doesn't tell you who the friend is, so if you have 2 friends playing on 2 different servers you'll just have to guess which one is which if they can't tell you. LAN Presumably it is possible to play the game over a LAN if you can find someone to host it - I've never used this. Remote This is a really useful tool for connecting directly to a server if you know the IP Address and Port. These can be found by highlighting a server in the server list and clicking on details at the bottom of the screen. Note the IP and port and put them directly into the Remote screen and you can connect in without having to search through the full list of servers. Sadly the "add to favourites" option does not currently work if using the Remote tab to find it. Finding a server - tips Another way of finding a specific server is to use the "Filter" option at the bottom of all of the screens except LAN and Remote. However, using Remote is generally easier and more reliable. If you've just played on a server but cannot remember which one it is you can check your C:\Users\yourUSERid\Documents\DayZ folder for a file called YourDayZName.DayZProfile file - open this in notepad\word\whatever and you will see the name, IP and port of the last server you played on near the bottom of the text file. So...which server should I play on? This is the big question. Ultimately, it really depends on what gaming experience you want. Public 3PP By far the most common and most popular choice, 3PP public servers undoubtedly offer the "easiest" and "quickest" game mode - whether it is frowned upon or not, the ability to transfer your character to any other public server allows people to raid the same military site across multiple servers in rapid succession and thus quickly accumulate a lot of high tech gear. It also allows ghosting and combat logging. The 3PP mode itself is also significantly easier to play than 1PP mode, offering the ability to see around corners and over walls. This sort of gameplay naturally appeals to the less patient\hardcore\serious player and thus KoS (Kill on Sight) is much more common on this sort of server. Life is just cheaper here and thus these servers, whilst offering the potential for great reward, are incredibly dangerous, especially the high pop ones. Public 1PP In my opinion, this may actually be the hardest game mode to play on since 1PP public servers are much less likely to have casual players on (becuase 1PP is "harder" than 3PP) meaning that those players you do meet will probably be more experienced players, possibly groups or clanners on team speak - this will put individual players at a serious tactical disadvantage. Also, because this is still a public server hive, these players can still gain military tech quite quickly by hopping. Private 1PP If you want a slower paced, more serious and challenging game, a 1PP private server is more likely to reward you. Since this hardcore mode is less appealing to the majority, you are more likely to find a more serious gamer, possibly an RP (Role Player) and thus less likely to be KoS - though you should always exercise extreme caution around any other player on any server. Typical player numbers on these servers are very low. This is my current favourite type of server. Private 3PP However, perhaps the best balance is the 3PP private server. This offers the easier 3PP mode but combined with the inability of people to server hop (because it's a private server) which means you are less likely to run into gangs of 5 fully kitted out military types who just want to torture bambis in Electro. However, as with all private servers, the gameplay can be a bit slower - just raided a barracks and not found anything? Tough luck, either wait for the next restart or start running for the next installation. If you are sick and tired of getting gunned down with minutes of spawning in Electro or Cherno a Private 3PP server *might* well be the answer to your problem. I hope this guide is helpful to people and feel free to make comments on where you think I can improve it. Thanks, krazypenguin

The DETHCAP server is meant to be played how you wanna play. Whether you are lonewolf, clan member, cannibal, bandit or an RPer we don't care! Website: www.dethcap.com Server Info: Name: Dethcap.com - Apply Now - WhitelistIP: 64.79.107.16:2402Host: VilayerLocation: ChicagoPlayers: 30 (Upgrading Later)Persistence: OFF (Temporary)View: 1st/3rd ONTime: 24/7 Day Rules: No HackingNo Admin AbuseNo Ghosting Streamers Features: WhitelistedServer Events: CTF/Downed Pilot... Ect (Coming Soon)Website/Forums Active Clans: [HWY] Admins: Lonebeard Please APPLY on our website to be whitelisted!

not all private servers, I said All public and private, so you have the one character on whatever server you decide to use. yeah people don't like it because they want to gear up on a dead server and then jump onto high pop and give it large. That is probably the only reason, asside from hopping servers in popular heli crash locations to improve their chances of finding one and claiming an m4.... so they can then jump onto high pop and use it. But Still i think it would be a good idea when proper base building/barricading come into play. As i said it will prevent people ghosting into your base

personally I think that all servers be it public or private should reset your character, meaning that server hopping no longer becomes a problem, same with ghosting. If you stick to a server you build up on your character on that specific server alone. If you can't find any heli crashes, you wait for a reset. You can then also have multiple characters with different levels of gear on each server, so if you die on one, you can jump on another and continue with that one. After all its supposed to be a zombie apocalypse simulator, if you don't find food in a house, you cant jump into a different dimension where there is now food waiting for you. Not that this has to do with kicking people mind you, but it will stop them from treating it as their own loot factory for them to get rambo'd up and then go high popping bambis

Am I the only one that actually enjoyed the base building in epoch? My base took me months to build and I was so proud of it when it was finished. I even made a secondary safe house close to cherno as my main one was way up by berezino. I had a spare car so i could drive round to my main compound. Obviously base building was highly dependant on the traders, and having resources to sell to gain gold, but I never really got the whole trader/safe zone aspect to epoch, but I did spend a hell of a lot of time using it. Secondly, I did mention a solution to ghosting would be to prevent anyone spawning inside an occupied structure, even if it is your own. So if someone spawns out of a house and hops server where that house is occupied, he will now appear outside the front door or outside the fence. Problem solved

I really wish they would dump all of the variables and have on standardized game mode in one form that they can then tighten up and focus on. No 3rd person only, no 1st person only, no casual or hardcore no public or private hive. Just one version that has none of the problems that plague any of the versions. A version of the game with 3rd person yet no 3rd person view peeking, a version with no ghosting or server hopping. A version where death is important and suicide is not desirable. Having different server options and catering to everyone ends up making every version subpar in the end.

The 60 second timer was never intended to discourage server hoppers, it was to stop ghosting. I have no problem with servers hoppers as long as they don't combat log. I want to kill fully kitted guys so the quicker they get kitted, the quicker I get to kill them. It used to 6 minutes so stop whinging lol The 60 second timer is irrelevant as they will be soon releasing server tools so that admins can choose their own timer if any at all.

Server loot hopping is not the problem it was meant to solve, it was to prevent or mitigate combat ghosting which was and is a far bigger problem than AKM mag hoarders. After all, those hoppers go to die on the beach promptly and re-distribute their gear in short order. Combat ghosters ruin the dynamics of the best part of the game: a sphincter-clenching, cold sweat legit gun fight.

ther timer is also to stop ghosting back when it was first released if you got into a gun fight etc some folks would log they didn't sit down for 30- seconds they would vanish then they would go to a server to move in a better position re log on the other server and kill you which was BS. so to combat that they implemented a log out timer and a log in timer. the log in timer is also for server hoppers though not as effective. i think its amazing the patience some folks have to wait for a log in timer to go try and find some piece of gear they might lose mere seconds after obtaining it. i see your point how if your game crashes etc you have to wait but such is the price to try and keep d-baggery to a minimum. just think we wouldn't have to wait if there weren't exploiters and ass hats but such is the internet and gaming there's always some shit bag amongst regular folks. all i can say is get used to it or try and fix your internet situation by the way why do folks play online game with WIFI hardline that shit you get your true speed instead of like a 1/3 of it and you get no interference.

I suspect that a lot of players are like you, Nex, in that they simply want to be able to play in their desired playstyle. Renting a server is quite expensive. The availability of more optional UI elements means that there is a chance the majority of server admins will turn on all available server options in a bid to increase their server populations (e.g. 3PP mode). Since the DayZ devs have already started to make a separation between private hives and the public hive with the addition of Hardcore mode. I wonder if they would be willing to add more options for specifically for private shards. This would have the added benefit of pushing more people to private servers effectively fixing server hopping and ghosting but reducing the amount of available servers per character. When I participate in PvP I generally play as a lone wolf and shoot anyone that I see. Target acquisition is of little importance to me. The problems I have with lack of group and player identification are specific to "no KoS"-based private communities. The prosopagnosia issue I mentioned in a previous post is a good example of why I would like to see some form of player/friendly identification. If I meet a player I would like to be able to recognize him apart from his clothing. In addition, faction identification would allow factions wars to exist on RP servers apart from their standard (boring) no KoS rules. Player/friendly identification: The other day I met two really nice guys @ NWA on a private shard. I was going to murder them, as they seemed a bit shady, but didn't. They were actually really cool. We chilled for about 15-20 minutes and I left to go loot the jail up the hill, north of the tents. Upon return I saw two individuals running through the tents. They looked almost exactly like the two guys I met earlier, which is normal since almost everyone runs around in forest ninja gear. I tracked them for a minute or two before realizing that one of them had a different mountain backpack with a different color. In a realistic scenario I would have noticed things like their height/weight/hair color/mannerisms/gait/etc. Player identification: There is a clan of cannibals on the same private shard. I have killed one of them several times. He is a super douche and always attempts to rob people. I would KoS his ass every chance I could get (or avoid him altogether) if I could recognize him. There is no way to recognize him in between play sessions as he simply changes his clothes to find innocent victims. Player/faction identification: There are traders on a different private shard. It is always the same guys. They are faction-neutral, lone wolves. If I actually meet and trade with someone I should be able to recognize them again in the future. Since traders are often murdered this isn't that great of an example since there is usually a "new life rule" on many RP servers. Still, for those RP servers that allow a continuous narrative (through deaths) a way to identify yourself as a trader or have people recognize you as a legitimate trader and not a bandit would be amazing. Faction identification: There are multiple factions on each RP private shard I play on. They each orient themselves towards some common theme; banditry, cannibalism, heroes, medical, trade, generic survival, etc. If there was some way of displaying what faction you were a part of it would allow circumvention of the "no KoS" rule to a certain extent. Heroes would always be allowed to kill bandits and cannibal factions (after target acquisition). Bandits and cannibals could attack known heroes. People would start leaving traders alone or risk being banned. Again, I don't really care what form player and faction identification comes in, I would just like something beyond clothing and voice recognition. I would also like to add that I kinda' got sidetracked and these two topics are the least of my worries in regards to the DayZ user interface. Improved health/status indicators would improve my DayZ experience the most, I guess. I just want to see some general UI love. :)

Private shards definitely fix server hopping and (if shard admins are active) ghosting. How to fix server hopping on the public hive: Increase server loyalty. Get rid of 1PP vs 3PP characters. Add public hive sharding. Allow public server admins to choose from a set of fixed public shards. Set a maximum amount of servers per public shard (e.g. 10). --- Alternate fix: Add defensible safehouse building. Breaking into a safehouse should either require rare resources (e.g. explosives), a lot of time (amateur lockpicker) or a lot of skill (experienced lockpicker) so players actually have a chance of maintaining a safehouse. Players will naturally stay closer to their homes and be less willing to hop since it will leave their safehouses undefended.

30 seconds are way too short to prevent anyone from suiciding. And freshspawn suiciders are hoppers as well - just like server hoppers they abuse the game mechanics to teleport around. Thus both most be targeted and eliminated even though I agree that the cost for death shouldn't be nearly as harsh as the cost for server switches. For our purpose here I think "ghosting" should mean switching to another server taking an action (like changing position) and then joining the old one. I would call the one that could also result from crashing - leaving a server and joining a couple of minutes after in the same place - "phasing". Any reasonable fix to server hopping would also affect ghosting basically turning it into mere comabt logging. All three could be targeted by not allowing the body of a logged player to disappear if too close to an active player. And in reverse "safe-zones" should prevent spawing into barricaded areas (unless you logged out inside). As for "phasing" it's probably reasonable to take over the body of your character if it's still ingame without any delay. If the body got removed (exact time might be a server variable instead of fixed 30 seconds) you would have to wait for a few minutes before being able to join. Now back to hopping: Server hopping is easier to deal with as the number of non-abusers affected is fairly small and can be further reduced by not counting "got kicked" and "server restart" as switches (when joining another server on the same hive/shard). Allowing only a few switches until the cost gets too high might drastically reduce the issue while always applying high cost would completely remove it but also hurt others. Spawn hopping is more tricky but could be done in a similar but less harsh way - a cost that is not too high but still noticable in combination with weighted spawns (to avoid quick regearing and spawnkilling) might do the job here.

Well at the end it is private shards. That to me is the only way currently not to have deal with ghosting and hopping. Timers help cut down on it but it never really goes away. The way it is currently it something that goes on allot in 3pp public. I lump it in with "KOS" and the other bull shit that goes on in Dayz including the bugs. I don't like it, but have learned to adapt and deal with it. Players love to complain about all the bad stuff that goes on, but sure as fuck don't mind doing it to every one else lol I really don't know what the solution is for public. What do you do other then make wait times longer.

In many ways I think that death should have no punishment. If you die then you should be able to respawn within seconds. I can deal with the 30 seconds, as I suppose that deters people from committing suicide purely because they dislike their spawn. It's the hoppers we should target. I know there was some chat about incremental timers for those who swap between servers repeatedly I am not sure if that is still in place. Ghosting is a similar problem, although clearly not the same. Should you stop people from returning to a server they have just left within a given period of time (say 5 minutes). If so, how do we get round the problem of people who are disconnected through no fault of their own, or for servers that are rebooted (crashed)?

The perfect solution to server hopping is to add a reasonable cost to server switches. This would make single servers like islands you can travel between. "Reasonable" means that the cost should be high enough to make travel on a server more attractive for ingame reasons (looting, finding action etc.) while still allowing to play on other servers for offgame reasons (meeting friends, server too full/empty etc.). Private servers are nothing else but an extreme form with infinite cost for switching that has the downside t of impossible character transfers and a smaller economy. There is no need to be this radical - if the cost for switching is high enough server hopping for loot will cease to be viable in which case all the negative consequences cease to exist. Why have the public hive instead of private servers again? Having only one character allows for better progress and adds more value to the characters life making the game both more immersive and character death more impactful..You have the option to switch servers for offgame reasons like playing with friends, the server being full/down or too empty.It allows for a greater loot economy with increased item rarity that does not exclude this items existence (it's out there somewhere).A bigger world with more actors may allow for more diverse interactions especially with base building and players having their "home servers".In fact a harsh switching system like "only one server per day" would still retain all of the advantages above while also making server hopping and ghosting pretty unbearable.

What about being able to play with anyone in the world, on any given server, at any given time?? Not to mention meeting new people, in every single game session, making encounters even more random and unpredictable?? Thats a pretty big plus, right there. Dont get me wrong, i love a good private server, it was the only place i spend my time in the mod, but that was because of the cheaters, not ghosting/server hopping. But taking away the option, to play with anyone, on any server, at any given time, because you dont want to be ghosted or dont want to see people server hop, is not fair for the rest of the player base. I can promise you theres at least as many people loving public servers, as there are hating on them. This discussion is exactly the same as 1pp vs. 3pp, its a matter of preference and play style. Im having trouble coming up with good suggestions to limit ghosting/server hopping, because it would punish the player base to much imho.

What if you could only join severs for a limited amount of time after restart before they became locked? This would hopefully give public servers a private hive feel. I think the biggest change with this implementation would be the death of ghosting and rampant server hopping (except for unlocked servers, which would be a death trap around military bases after restart). If this was coupled with centrally controlled day/night cycles it would help provide the dynamic experience that so many of us desire. So let's say the server restarts and it is 4:00PM in game time. If the server restarts every 8 hours (I wish) the server would restart at midnight. Players would only be able to join the server between 4:00PM and 5:00PM in game time. After that one hour period, the server would become locked and you would only be able to join the server if you left it within the last hour and joined no other server. Copy and paste from other thread

I only see one advantage to the public hive in that if your favorite server is down you can play on another. I don't feel it's worth the trade off though. Aside from eliminating server hopping and ghosting, the private hives turn into a community of players, and it becomes more fun to play with or against the same players.

I don't understand the point of the public hive. What does it add to the game except server hopping and ghosting? In my opinion the whole idea should be scrapped, characters should not be transferable across servers.