Huge concept with different side features: Every action leaves a trail. Players heavy influence on the world and the consequences

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

This feature is a part of a collection of features about "How to make DayZ harder"

Another title for this feature is "Rocket gonna kill us for that. We are insane."

Inspired by Rocket’s idea of players influence the design of the interiors by their actions,

e.g. if player in killed in a clean house - it gets bloody, leaves gore and decays visually.

“In an apocalyptic scenario the first thing to vanish

would be street and environment cleaning infrastructure.”

From “The DayZ Phenomenon”.

by Dr. Wasteland MD.

October 2025

Vote it up on Reddit

Main concept.

• If you use some resource in the world it is “authentically”™ leaves marks\trails in the world.
  
• Others discover it and can guess what had happened.
  
• Players can hide marks\trails or leave it be.
  
• PLEASE! I BEG YOU! READ THIS AND DON'T EVEN MENTION THIS IN DISCUSSION! - This all is NOT about leaving actual footsteps on the ground or bullet holes!
  
• (optional) Junk, garbage items are never randomly generated in the world. They always appear after players leave them.
  

Side concepts involved.

• There are several advanced medical and injury features presupposed
  
• as well as expanding a clothes system idea in this context
  
• In the course of writing I had some interesting animals usage ideas which can contribute to this feature.
  

Effect on gameplay

• Your DayZ. Your story. Your world. Your environment. Leave or remove your mark in it.
  
• Everyone is responsible for making this world messy and dirty, or clean and comfortable.
  
• No one is forced to clean it. You choose it yourself if you want to clean your house or make your camp territory more better looking.
  
• Cleaned or well attended territory attracts people psychologically for comfortable environment effect. It gives a feeling of a safe zone, which people take care of. This is sign that people strive for fixing this apocalyptic horror in some way and don’t live like pigs in the dirt pool.
  
• On the other hand, leave all the gore, garbage, skeletons and other repulsing object to make everyone know the territory is dangerous, keep off.
  
• You can realistically understand whether the territory you enter is abandoned, heavily populated\lived in or area is a slaughter yard with campers.
  
• Dirty rotting areas can be source of disease.
  
• KOS\PvP\Dangerous areas will be naturally marked with blood, gore, and signs of death and danger. You will gone see and feel you’re entering a bad place from distance. Natural instincts will help.
  
• If you don’t cover your trails and garbage others can track you down and learn about your presence in the area.
  
• You can leave trails or marks intentionally and wisely to divert your enemies from your tracks or set up a trap\ambush.
  

Player mechanics additions

• Only one action “clean” or “hide trails\marks” depending on the context.
  

Engine additions

• Many universal decals and textures, several textures for different states etc.
  
• Some way for server\database accounting of state changes over time.
  

Predicted technical drawback

Will bring more objects to the engine and the world and impact the performance.

BUT

Most of the features are visual and don't reauire fully functional objects and their storing in the world.

Basically, everything stays the same, except for after you delete a dropped item from the world after certain amount of time as DayZ usually does, you leave some mark, some decals or pile to show it was here.

Needs some less realistic and more optimized universal design technology (a common non-object decal garbage pile, instead of a separate usable can and bottle object with full geometry etc.).

1) “Clean after yourself” - Junk, garbage, wastes, throw-offs and used\disposed items are created by player activity and discovered in the world by others.

No long explanations. Bare usage and effects examples in the pattern “what you do” - “what happens” - “how others use it”.

Side note: You can’t hide respawned loot items. You MUST pick them up first. Prevents somebody from grieving lootspots.

You cut wood for campfire

• shred and kindlings appear around a tree, you can spend some time to hide it (bury under the ground, but technically it is simply deleted after 30 - 60 seconds of action “clean marks”)
  

• other discover and know someone someone needed wood, probably for a campfire and he saw a dead cow in the field, probably there is someone around here cooking meat, I can search and find.
  

You eat canned food or drink canned\bottled drinks :beans:

• The item is not disappearing from inventory, but is substituted by a default empty can\bottle model. :emptycan: :thumbsup: You can keep it, throw to distract zombies, drop on the ground.
  

• Places of someones dinner may be discovered and people can be tracked.
  
• empty cans and bottles combined with rope or fishing line can serve as an improvised tripwire proximity detector - player or animal walks into a tripwire and you hear a sound
  

• sounds disturb the dogs
  
• you can place those around your dwelling and be aware if someone approaches
  
• empty bottle can be crushed to glass pieces and used the same as tripwire
  
• player stepping on the glass will produce less audible noise
  
• players wearing shoes with thin can have small injuries and footwear damage, leave blood trails.
  

You leave extinguish your campfire place.

• First few minutes a smoke effect is seen at the site of the campfire. Then in a few minutes smoke goes off. At this point you can hide the fire place. If not - the campfire place is contrasted and looks fresh and full of black burnt wood and white ashes. After some time it gets more greyed out and dusty\empty. Over the time it is leaving only a slightly darkened spot on the ground before being completely deleted.
  

• If you don’t hide your campfire another person can know how long ago a fire was burnt here and get approximate range of where the owner could have gone by this time.
  

You kill animal

• It’s body is not instantly removed. Small blood stains on the ground. You can hide the body. Then rots. After some time it attracts crows and flies. You cannot get meat from it. Can spread disease. (optional) May be a skeleton is left in the end.
  

• Simple. Somebody can see how long ago the animal was killed.
  

You get meat from the animals body.

• Big blood stains or a blood pool is under the body. The body texture looks more gore and messy. Then all the process from the above point “You kill animal”. You can hide it all.
  

• If you do not hide it another player can see that someone was getting meat here. Tracking opportunity.
  

You kill player with firearms\piercing weapon.

• Moderate blood under the body. Body decay same as with animal. You can hide it.
  

You kill player with a grenade\hatchet or predator kill him.

• A big blood pool is appearing. More body skin bloodstains or gore. Same as previous. Hide it.
  

• Others know how this one was killed (in case they are aware of the texture generating logics).
  

Vehicle gets destroyed.

• The terrain\grass where damaged vehicle is situated gets heavily impacted. Simulating fuel leakage can make grass around decays faster and restores slower.
  

Vehicle is destroyed with explosion\burning involved.

• As with the above, except we have a default crater decals, burnt grass, which grows again very slow. Nearby, very closely situated buildings are slightly affected and get some kind of burnt\smoked texture\decals on it. Nearby trees\bushes get burnt or fallen.
  

You use medicine (on yourself or another player).

• Empty pill box, syringe, bandage package etc. is replacing the original item. You can keep it or drop. You can hide dropped items. Bandages appear on your characters open body parts until you remove them (head injury = bloody head bandage on the head, troso wound = nothing visible, leg wound = bloody bandage visible if you wear shorts, arm wound = bloody bandage visible if you wear shortsleeve clothes). If you remove them, they can be dropped as bloody ones on the ground.
  

• If you don’t hide this, other may have an opportunity to learn that you are wounded, what type of injures\illnesses you had by analyzing what medical items you used. For performance a standard medical junk pile may be used which has an option to “examine” and you see the description of items.
  

Side note: A bandaged person having a bandage visual decals on his body is a sign to everyone he had an injury and to what part of the body.

You get injured with bloodloss effect.

• Blood leaves marks as you walk.
  
• You can hide each of them by standart “clean” action.
  
• Barely visible in grass, more visible on snow or sand.
  
• Drops are small, and can only be discovered if you kneel and have a good look at the terrain.
  
• If you pass through any vegetation such as a bush, it get covered slightly with your blood.
  
• If you sit or lay prone with an open wound you make a small blood pool (amount\size depends on the bloodloss speed).
  
• If you enter a vehicle, it gets bloody.
  
• Any clothes you change with bloodloss gets bloody
  
• If somebody carries you - he gets bloody hands and clothes may be
  

Clothes effect.

• You must bandage yourself to stop leaving blood marks. Your clothes get a bloody texture and bloody “mode”. Bloody clothes will attract dogs and predators. If you’re looted after your death other player gets you bloody clothes. Over the time bloody clothes are getting simply very bloddirty but are not tracked by dogs and predators and loose the bloody status. Dirty and bloody clothes need to be cleaned and will require a water source to do this (pool, lake, water pump, well etc. more water than any canteen provides.)
  
• Shooting part of a body will damage and bloodstain a corresponding garment.
  

Body effects

• If you bandage a bloody wound your hands get a bloody texture.
  
• You can wash your hands with a canteen water or any other drink and at any water source as well.
  
• If other player loots a body with bloody open wound his arms get bloody and must be washed.
  
• If other player loots other players bloody clothes he gets his hands bloody too.
  
  • Other players have an opportunity to track wounded enemies after they retreat in the firefight. Dogs track wounded players blood tracks very effectively. Bandaged wounds they track effective too, but not that good as open wounds. Predators, wolves, bears can find you by your blood trails and attack. “Not geting your hands bloody” will be a literal expression and other can either see you need help or suspect you as a murderer. Headshots will be rewarded, because they don’t cover clothes in blood.
    

Wet bloody hands effect

• Your hands leave blood on everything you touch or everyone you carry.
  
• Hands look very red with blood, brigt high saturation bloody colour.
  
• If blood is not yours and is infected, if you get wounded or eat food - you have the same infection.
  
• Items get bloody finger marked
  
• Weapons get blood stains too
  
• This effect lasts for 10-15 minutes until blood dries out. After this your hands get the next Dry bloody hands effect.
  
• This effect is instantly removed if you wash your hands with any liquid (soda, water etc.)
  

Dry bloody hands effect

• Your hands just look dark red dirty.
  
• If blood is not yours and is infected, if you get wounded or eat food - you have the same infection.
  
• This effect lasts for 1-2 hours
  
• After 1-2 hours your hands get simply very dirty without blood effect.
  
• This effect is instantly removed if you wash your hands with any liquid (soda, water etc.)
  

Dirty hands effect

• If you eat with your dirty hands, you have a good chance of getting a disease.
  
• This effect is instantly removed if you wash your hands with any liquid (soda, water etc.)
  

Expanding clothes effects

• Important balancing feature - any zombie must be made lootable for dirty, raggy and bloody disgusting clothes. These clothes must have a probability of triggering some disease (epecially after an injury), but very effectively conceal from dog\predator tracking and visual discovery, and sometimes may stop a zombie from aggroing you. They also are very ineffective for some natural conditions, rain, snow, they keep you warm way worse. These clothes can be washed and cleaned to remove the disease trigger and dog\predator invisibility feature and never stop zombies from aggroing you.
  
• Over the time your clothes loose color and get visibly dirty. Dirty clothes attract dogs and predators a bit more, but conceal from players better. Dirt and blood effects are visually different and are obvious for observing players whether your clothes are bloody or dirty.
  
• All freshly respawned players have their clothes perfectly clean. You can never find or loot a perfectly clean clothes in the world. Any clothes, even in the stores are always slightly degraded. Freshly respawned player must crouch prone, get wet, walk certain distance or survive a certain amount of days to make his perfectly clean clothes look the same as any other clothes in the world. When looking at a freshly a respawned player and at a person who spent It must be pretty obvious for any observer that they see a fresh spawner and a person who survived some time or experience already.
  
• For experience accounting and improved roleplay aspects we can stop giving perfectly clean clothes to te respawned if they lived for some considerable actual game time in DayZ and had at least two times died or been injured. Think of it as a veteran skin.
  

New players advice: Don’t be silly running dressed in your fresh and polished jacket around. Bandits gonna love to catch you. Once you’re safe, loot a zombie for a new clothes. Yes, it’s disgusting, but you will be less exposing yourself for the hostiles. You can later on visit any Chernarus mall to get new clothes... oh wait... it’s the Apocalypse... well, then, first you get a gun, then visit a mall :)

Expanding facial customizations.

This opens a very intricate and subtle perception of the players levels in the world. Gives them not only unique clothes, but unique states and reflects their appearance. With growing beard and hair feature this would get so immense visually and will be a phenomena, a wonder in the computer game industry.

• Players can cut hair, shave beard and moustache separately providing they have a knife (but Soviet Russia is rumoured to have people who can shave clean with a hatchet). So spending two weeks ingame you have your face overgrown a pretty much obviously.
  
• Having spent a month in the game, you can have you hair grown pretty much obviously. You have a choice to cut hair and leave face. Or cut moustache and leave beard and hair. You can cut yourself bald and leave moustache... and so on and so forth. If a player could be having an ability to choose his hair colour this will lead to even more variability.
  
• After you die, you loose your beard and hair growth progress and have a default clean face and standard haircut. It’s your choice, whether to show everyone that you lived very long or either pretend you’re fresh comer.
  
• Long surviving character will have a unique opportunity to tune up their appearance. Just another interesting reason for you to value your life and survive longer.
  

You reload a weapon with a new clip\magazine.

• An empty clip\model is added ti your inventory. You can drop and hide.
  

• If you leave it on the ground other may know which weapon do you use and track you to get it.
  

(for future advanced weapon systems) You reload a weapon’s clip\magazine from a round box, not the magazine.

• An empty ammo box is added to inventory. Drop\Hide.
  

• Empty ammo boxes server the same as empty ammo clips or magazines. Tracking, identifying the enemy weapon.
  

2) Plants\soil\interiors\exteriors\roads decay\improve as a result of human activity\inactivity.

Many people walk on the same part of terrain\grass a lot.

• Grass gets down and then after some time it gets yellow and dries out being constantly stepped at. At some point it can disappear. If left intact after some time it grows again.
  

• Populated areas are more clearly distinguished. More wild untrodded areas are too more obvious. You can visually understand where you go or what to expect. Common survivors routes can get more distinct by forming paths in the woods.
  

Asphalt roads are not driven on by vehicles.

• Road get covered in dust, has some grass grown around and in cracks, some leaves lying. Looks abandoned. If vehicles drive there such road some two or four times the road appearance gets more improved - a more clear track, less dust. If the road is driven all the time, it looks just as it looks now by default - clean and without any grass or decay. This effect is applied on some, let’s say 10-20 metres part\segment of the road.
  

• A player can tell by the state of the road whether it is commonly used or abandoned. By this you can easily discover the transport activity between two locations. If the road between the two settlements looks fresh, you can tell that in this or the other city a player with a vehicle is hanging around.
  

Not asphalted, country roads are not driven on by vehicles.

• Same as the above, but they are more densely and quickly overgrown by grass after some time.
  

• Same tracking opportunities, but with a bit more efficiency, because overgrown country road is easier to identify as abandoned.
  

Terrain\grass is driven on by a vehicle.

• Effect is the same as with players walking on it, but the effect is multiplied compensating the vehicle is much heavier than a player. May be this will change the state visually different, may be a decal showing or imitating wheel tracks.
  

Building interiors\exteriors dynamics.

Rule: Interiors are never influenced by exteriors and vice versa.

There are two totally different effects:

• passive (P) (triggered after players being present or not for certain time in the building)
  
• active (A) (never triggered if players are not performing any actions like cleaning, killing, dropping garbage etc.)
  

The Interiors

A building is seldom visited by players (this is the default state for every building after server start)

• (P) It looks pretty clean, but dusty, greyish or yellowish old, seems abandoned, spiderwebs, occasional insects, wallpaper cracks, surface damage.
  
• (P) The more players visit it or spend time inside it - the more building textures get bit more lively and less dusty.
  
• (A) Players can use “clean” action inside a building and it gets more clean looks, no dust or heavy dirt, seems pretty fresh and comfortable.
  
• (P) The more time player is pending in the clean room the more it gets improved and comfortable. Feels really cozy and inhabited.
  
• (P) If after that a player leaves clean improved room for a long time - it gets the default abandoned state over the time.
  
• In your absence other players visiting the building can understand that someone is visiting it much and even takes care of it.
  
• Hostiles can ambush or survey the building.
  
• Friendlies can leave notes with gratitude or respect\contact details after using the dwelling or even clean the room more.
  
• Zombies prefer attacking and inspecting the lively and improved buildings, but they do less damage inside it and are a bit slow.
  
• On the contrary, Zombies seldom inspect abandoned buildings (it can be only random as a result of default loitering\pathfinding) and are doing default damage with default speed.
  

If too much garbage or empty items are dropped inside the room for a long time.

• The interiors get less comfortable looks, get dirty and unattended, cockroaches may appear, wall get a bit darker. Floor gets obviously dirtier. Use “clean” action to remove garbage and to restore better looks.
  
• Garbage and human activity leftovers increase chances of zombies inspecting it.
  
• Garbage increases chances for you to get some disease if you get injured or consume food or drink found or stored inside a dirty building.
  

If zombie or human corpses, blood and gore, are left inside a building

• (P) The interiors seem more gloom over the time, a bit more depressive.
  
• (P) Rats, crows and insects and predators are attracted inside
  
• (P) Huge chance to catch a disease.
  
  • Players can leave the place without cleaning. Such “gored” “murder-house” buildings grow gloomer over time and anyone can feel and see something bad had happened here.
    

If zombie killing or player murder happened inside a building

• Death of a player makes effect more intense and gloomer compared to a zombie death.
  
• The more kills or murders happen, the less it is easy to restore comfortable state and clean the interiors.
  
• (introducing a dramatic effect) If a player has died as a cause of his own actions (thirst, hunger, jump injury, disease) - the effect is mild.
  
• If a player is killed by a zombie - the effect is more intense.
  
• If a player was killed by other player - the effect is noticeably more immense and room recovery into a comfortable state can take months depending on the other conditions (clean, lived in etc. accordingly).
  
• If friendly actions take place in the room
  
  • Such as healing, bandaging, transfusion, item sharing (?) etc.
    
  • It boosts the overall condition improving.
    

The exteriors

• A player performs “clean” action on a wall of a building.
  
  • The wall condition improves. Texture feels more repaired. Need some several stages of improvements with longer action process.
    
  • Exterior condition is purely visual and is never having any effect on zombies, predators etc.
    
  • Window glasses get repaired and are more clearly seen through.
    
  • Rooftop condition gets improved only when all walls are taken care of.
    
  • Huge building walls with more than two storeys cannot be repaired from the outside unless all the building is cleaned to a normal condition.
    
  • A player performs “clean” action at the surrounding objects (dog house, well, fence etc.)
    
  • Improved appearance.
    

Vehicles

• If player drives a certain amount of time or distance
  
  • vehicle looks degrade with mud and dust
    

  [*]if vehicle is left unattended for a considerable amount of time it gets rusty looks.

  [*]If player performs a “clean” action on a vehicle.

  • It gets less dirty (trollface)
    
  • More cleaning can remove rust.
    

  [*]If a vehicle us often used to kill zombies or players

  • it’s texture feels more gloomy and worn off, but not damaged.
    

  [*]If a player is killed inside a vehicle or is having a bloodloss injury

  • vehicle interiors are bloody and must be cleaned
    

  [*]If you drive over corpses of players, zombies or animals

  • Wheel texture gets very bloody and cleans with time, manually or driving in water.
    

Animals feature extension

Requirement: Rope feature, rubber\leather boots

Dog

• Can be bound with a rope to any object except vehicles
  Can be ordered guard spot
  
• can leave if in danger unless bound
  
• Can stop cattle in one place if ordered guarding
  

Cow\Sheep\Goat

• Can be taken to any place with a rope
  
• Can be tied to any object except vehicles
  
• Can be fed with collected grass
  
• if fed enough cow and goat can produce milk
  
• milk restores thirst and a bit of a hunger
  
• if fed long enough can give more meat when slaughtered
  
• if bound and not fed - dies after some time
  
• are around around a bound animal gets dirty and needs cleaning
  
• otherwise attracts predators
  
• can spoil milk or animal can have an infected meat
  
• cow can be tied to a ploughing device to plough soil for further eatable plants growing
  
• If we all go insane to dare implementing this
  

Wolf\Bear (predators)

• Can be skinned to use the skin as some iprovised clothing\trophy.
  
• you can extract a bearclaw to wear it as a necklace
  
• If you skin an animal which was shot, beartrapped, exploded driven over - the skin appears as damaged and cannot be used for crafting.
  
• If a predator is killed by knife or hatchet it’s skin can be used.
  
• can produce meat which restores less blood
  
• (suggestion by I Eat Friendlies ) if you kill a predator without anything but knife or bare hands (punch) and you got wounded by the predator, your character receives a face scar of three claw lines
  
  • scars are removed after death
    

Crows

• must be attracted to corpses of animals and humans, not zombies.
  
• are scared and fly off noisily shouting if player shots nearby or comes too close
  

Other forest birds

• (suggestion by some Arma2 mod I can't remember, it was already made for arma2, can't find source) randomly sit on the tress in small flocks
  
• when player approaches and is not slowly stealthy walking are scared off the trees and noisily fly away.
  
• can expose players position to hostiles
  
• can be scared off by any other animal except small (rabbits, rats, snakes)
  
• gives ambiguity about scared off birds - you can inspect the source of disturbance and find player, predator or a cow
  

Rats

• attracted the same as crows
  
• can enter building if it is abandoned or has garbage
  
• can bite if walked too close with a chance of infecting a victim with a disease
  
• do not seek and attack players
  
• can be cooked, and if eaten can cause disease
  

Insects

• cockroaches and flies invade dirty rooms and garbage
  
• flies around dead bodies (implemented)
  
• worms can be extracted from the ground with a spade to be used as a bait for fishing
  

Fish (many many players suggested it before)

• can be caught using a fishing rod and a bait (bread, beans, worm, cockroach, fly)
  
• can be cooked
  
• you can create explosion in water and have some few fish without fishing
  
• rotten corpses near or inside water kill fish over time
  
• fish is always easily caught at the coastline
  

Snakes (I heard about this feature in Namalsk)

• very rare a poisonous viper, very rare
  
• attacks only if walked by very closely
  
• cannot bite through rubber\leather boots
  
• scares bricks out of players by violent hissing
  
• mainly grass snakes without venom
  
• to scare bricks out of the unaware players
  
• inhabit fields and mainly heavily overgrown forests
  

Having all these implemented I actually don’t need to explain what gameplay awaits us. But I must say, that players who don’t want this level of realism or fear that game gets too complicated - those can ignore these features ingame and there is no need for them to go deep and use them.

Aesthetic and storytelling aspects, as well as atmosphere of the game will start playing with every possible colour and subtle variations, which are NEVER purely cosmetic and purposely designed, they are always a trail, a sign, “footprint” of a player in DayZ. And more to the point, more players produce more environmental shifts to the world. And only they choose will it be shifting to bloody fearsome wasteland or walk the hardest way and make it a better and comfortable world to live even in the apocalypse. Apart from that any action has a reaction, and any trail will sooner or later lead to it’s owner. Knowing this and thinking "authentically" ™ can help hostiles finding their targets or targets escaping their enemies.

So, survivor, be attentive and remember, in the standalone you “don’t step in the poo”,

AND you’d better remove and don’t leave your “poo” so that it won’t hit the fan which faces you.

Vote it up on Reddit

Edited December 21, 2012 by -=PA=-Mikhail

[xenomta 128]

Beautiful.

[Zeppa 562]

I see only the performance issue with this.. drawing all the foorprints garbage all around. Its suggested before and its a nice tought but huge resource draing on server.

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

I know about performance issues. I hope someone (trollface) can be inspired and come up with a more gentle design and balance to invent somehting not so heavily impacting the performance.

[topsm 11]

This is incredible.

[nikiller 122]

hi,

I don't see how it is possible to increase performances. If we only count footprints, imagine 20 players on the server and each player move 500m, let's say 1000 foorprints, 20000 footprint! It means you have to createVehicle or createVehicleLocal 1000 objects everytime one player move 500m. With the actual ArmA scripting command it will put any server on knees in less than 10min and client will suffer horrible fps/lags. Forget it it's not possible.

cya.

Nikiller.

Edited October 26, 2012 by Nikiller

[Serious Stan 202]

Maybe....

Cant have too much shit ingame, my pc cant handle it. So i only hope the SA is coming soon and dont care so much for every little aspect.

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

hi,

I don't see how it is possible to increase performances. If we only count footprints, imagine 20 players on the server and each player move 500m, let's say 1000 foorprints, 20000 footprint! It means you have to createVehicle or createVehicleLocal 1000 objects everytime one player move 500m. With the actual ArmA scripting command it will put any server on knees in less than 10min and client will suffer horrible fps/lags. Forget it it's not possible.

cya.

Nikiller.

Hey! Wait slow down!!! I have never mentioned leaving actual footprints for each step :) I step is a metaphor in the title! footpring is a metaphor for the consequence!

I'm insane, but not stupid to the point of not understanding we can't handle such amount of dynamic data... No flame or offence. Just explaining :)

EDIT: Changed title to exclude ambiguity and waste of our time and breath.

Edited October 26, 2012 by -=PA=-Mikhail

[indominator 95]

i can imagine cherno and elecktro, bullet holes everywhere, blood on every wall, piles of gore and bodies, zombies foraging food in the piles, hordes coming from outside town to eat the dead. A pure graveyard, only the wicked and insane would dare go there, shooting an enfield will become as dangerous as jumping off a hospital. You sir are a win!

Imagine prospecting for salt beneath cherno when suddenly you open a hole, its a basement, but where which town? You look back and see no end to your tunnel, almost nothing of good found, you ask yourself how much time you have spent. Entering the building you look through the window and see the madness of cherno. Silently you go back to your cave and place a dinamite charge in the entrance, you would rather off try your luck in the wilds and the huge caves than face Cherno

[sudZ! 115]

Fantastic idea.

As time goes by this will be more and more viable. My hope for DayZ is that it carries on in development for quite some time. In one years time, people's computers will be that much better and so more options like this open up.

I like it though. It's within the spirit of Rocket's intention to have us regulate the world ourselves.

[Timberwolf (DayZ) 118]

An excellent post that covers a big amount of topics that are very interesting regarding the dynamic realism the game could have. That being said there would have to be a tremendous amount of brainstorming and discussion between the dev team to scrutinize all those ideas to see what would be feasible technically and even more time to implement and balance it.

As such what you have here are extremely good ideas that MUST be seen by rocket and the rest of the developers and as the game evolves should be discussed and if possible added one by one as the game matures.

Keep up with your amazing threads.

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

i can imagine cherno and elecktro, bullet holes everywhere, blood on every wall, piles of gore and bodies, zombies foraging food in the piles, hordes coming from outside town to eat the dead. A pure graveyard, only the wicked and insane would dare go there, shooting an enfield will become as dangerous as jumping off a hospital. You sir are a win!

Imagine prospecting for salt beneath cherno when suddenly you open a hole, its a basement, but where which town? You look back and see no end to your tunnel, almost nothing of good found, you ask yourself how much time you have spent. Entering the building you look through the window and see the madness of cherno. Silently you go back to your cave and place a dinamite charge in the entrance, you would rather off try your luck in the wilds and the huge caves than face Cherno

You grasped exactly the core idea behind it all.

I can depict another situation for you.

A clan of some friendly guyz sweeps out zombies in some village, they respawn only in the outskirts. They clean the city. Remove garbage, clean houses. Bring cows and dogs there. A manmade safe-zone in DayZ. The runours about the safe zone gets spread. More volunteer to defend it. Whole place seems more living and as if ignoring the surrounding terror and apocalypse...

(And c'mon, everyone knows sniper and bandits will attack it sooner or later, don't even start it again, boring)

[terrvik 2409]

Read through it all but can't see anything about blood leaving trails. So if you bleed you leave blood on the ground, walls, bushes and trees. Not much, but enough to track.

Anyway, great ideas, hopefully some of them will be considered at least!

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

An excellent post that covers a big amount of topics that are very interesting regarding the dynamic realism the game could have.

..

Keep up with your amazing threads.

Thank you very much. Took me almost four days to think it all over, discuss with friends and come with something consistent to the forums.

That being said there would have to be a tremendous amount of brainstorming and discussion between the dev team to scrutinize all those ideas to see what would be feasible technically and even more time to implement and balance it.

As such what you have here are extremely good ideas that MUST be seen by rocket and the rest of the developers and as the game evolves should be discussed and if possible added one by one as the game matures.

That is exactly what I wanted to achieve. My post can be too idealistic and is not realistic. I made it very extended and tried to think outside of any limitations, both technical and conceptual. I hope this will just inspire the dev or they will may be implement something they liked most or considered possible...

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

1) Read through it all but can't see anything about blood leaving trails. So if you bleed you leave blood on the ground, walls, bushes and trees. Not much, but enough to track.

2) Anyway, great ideas, hopefully some of them will be considered at least!

1) Look for "You get injured with bloodloss effect."

You get injured with bloodloss effect.

• Blood leaves marks as you walk. You can hide each of them by standart “clean” action. Barely visible in grass, more visible on snow or sand. Drops are small, and can only be discovered if you kneel and have a good look at the terrain. If you pass through any vegetation such as a bush, it get covered slightly with your blood. If you sit or lay prone with an open wound you make a small blood pool (amount\size depends on the bloodloss speed).
  

2) Thanks.

Edited October 26, 2012 by -=PA=-Mikhail

[terrvik 2409]

1) Look for "You get injured with bloodloss effect."

2) Thanks.

Figured it would be in there, I just woke up so I am confused. :)

[ri_pou@yahoo.com 26]

cannot wait for this game.......

[nikiller 122]

hi,

Hey! Wait slow down!!! I have never mentioned leaving actual footprints for each step :) I step is a metaphor in the title! footpring is a metaphor for the consequence!

I'm insane, but not stupid to the point of not understanding we can't handle such amount of dynamic data... No flame or offence. Just explaining :)

EDIT: Changed title to exclude ambiguity and waste of our time and breath.

It seems you spent a long time writing your post and I don't want to destroy your great idea. I'm not offended at all but I tried to explain you with facts that your idea is not possible. Even with just garbage imagine how will be a server where nobody is cleaning? Full of created objects who will slow down the server after a while and finally becomes unplayable for the client. That's why dead bodies are deleted after a certain amount of time. I know that TAKE ON HELICOPTERS engine can handle a bigger objects number than ArmA2 but there's a limit. And I'm just talking about the object creation not about the state changes over time who will require huge scripting managed by the server. If you delete the garbage after a certain amount of time or after each server restart then it is maybe technically possible but have it as a persistant objects I doubt it.

cya.

Nikiller.

Edited October 26, 2012 by Nikiller

[TheBaby 61]

Top suggestions. Some serious depth there Could you imagine playing with even half of these things happening? I couldn't even describe it. It would just make Dayz more DayZ like, if that makes sense. Interesting to think how the pace of gameplay would be affected.

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

Even with just garbage imagine how will be a server where nobody is cleaning? Full of created objects who will slow down the server after a while and finally becomes unplayable for the client. That's why dead bodies are deleted after a certain amount of time.

I though about it and I even have this briefly suggested in the OP. Separate objects can be replcaed by some VERY VERY simple decals\sprites which add to immersion and ffel like dirt or grabage or junk, but are not actual object, tincan, bottles... Just, well, a pile of something which looks like garbage... A very lightweight unversal thingie. When you drop your cans and all the rest of wastes they are deleted the same way it is now, but instead of totally removing them, you later find this decal, this simplified grabagepile. Dead corpses deleted as well, but replaced with some generic rotten corpse without any loot, or may be just some loot...

Technical simplifications will only restrict realism, but overall design can be preserved altogether with "authenticity"

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

1) Top suggestions. Some serious depth there

2) Could you imagine playing with even half of these things happening? I couldn't even describe it. It would just make Dayz more DayZ like, if that makes sense. Interesting to think how the pace of gameplay would be affected.

1) Thanks a lot

2) Sir, I really imagined all this, many things, many possibilites in gameplay, once my crazy brain started brooding over this concept. I couldn't handle myself and ended up writing and developing it into what you see in the OP. I wish I could tell all the tales and variants that can be introduced with all these features... I have many examples you will like too.. but simply pouring all them out in here will take hours :) I'm already feel a bit exhausted after the toadys writing... Thank god my boss haven't seen me doing it all day :) He would fire me :D

Edited October 26, 2012 by -=PA=-Mikhail

[nikiller 122]

hi,

I though about it and I even have this briefly suggested in the OP. Separate objects can be replcaed by some VERY VERY simple decals\sprites which add to immersion and ffel like dirt or grabage or junk, but are not actual object, tincan, bottles... Just, well, a pile of something which looks like garbage... A very lightweight unversal thingie. When you drop your cans and all the rest of wastes they are deleted the same way it is now, but instead of totally removing them, you later find this decal, this simplified grabagepile. Dead corpses deleted as well, but replaced with some generic rotten corpse without any loot, or may be just some loot...

Technical simplifications will only restrict realism, but overall design can be preserved altogether with "authenticity"™

Ok now we are talking! Replace certain amount of trash by a pile model and rotten corpse by mass grave who will be only one object is a great idea!

I missed this information in your OP

cya.

Nikiller.

Edited October 26, 2012 by Nikiller

[Timberwolf (DayZ) 118]

Thank you very much. Took me almost four days to think it all over, discuss with friends and come with something consistent to the forums.

No problem. I love seeing amazing threads like this one. It's just glad to see such an extensive post with so many great ideas.

I have to ask, did rocket or any other person working on the game seen and commented any of your previous threads? You made some very good ones in the past and the team really needs to be more present on the forums for threads like this one.

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

1) I have to ask, did rocket or any other person working on the game seen and commented any of your previous threads?

2) You made some very good ones in the past and the team really needs to be more present on the forums for threads like this one.

1) 2) I think rocket is very busy with standalone. Or may be he saw it and went away with some thoughts. I don't expect him answering here. I just hope it reaches him. Though seeing him actually confirming he has read it will comfort me a lot and will be enough. No need for thorough assesments or quick likes\dislikes. It's a voluntary contribution, I understand it.

2) Thanks again. I think they are present, just keep it silent. And once again, these days they're crunching on the SA release, so I don't want to distract them, but can't keep such ideas to myself when I feel they can really improve something or inspire others.

[terrvik 2409]

By the way the idea of spawning with clean clothes and get dirtier the longer you survive is great. I wonder if there could be some mechanic that can visually show if a player has played for a long time overall or is a complete beginner as well? Beards? I don't know. :)