Making squad game play much more manageable and effective.

[ImCptCrunch 17]

So, lets get started.

Rocket has mention on many occasions, that he does not want a UI at all in the stand alone, and that the current stats such as blood, drink and food ect, will be given to the player ion a different way, such as sound. And all of knowing this, the idea I propose may not be what rocket wants in the game, but its what the players need.

Ok, first off, in your life, you talk to plenty of people per day, and you know those people, by how they sound, look, dress maybe even smell. And you know their names, and you associate their names with their...look, sound dress sense and yes maybe even smell. Now here is where the problem is...currently in DayZ/Arma2 there is no where NEAR if at any ways to identify a player and associate them with a name, as there is not way to associate a face or sound or anything with a name when everyone looks the same. now STOP, this not an idea for character customization, keep reading please. When i said "currently in DayZ/Arma2 there is no where NEAR if at any ways to identify a player and associate them with a name" I am not implying that I want this in standalone or am asking for it (even though it will probably be added) What I'm saying is we make a compromise. Something that goes against Rockets UI ideas but something that will help the game, and players.

We impliment a system where a group of players can create a clan for lack of a better word, and with this clan system comes a brand new UI, where players invite friends to their "clan" and these players, when playing together (this is where it goes against Rockets ideas) at a certain distance, maybe something like chem lights, a green name tag appears above a players head, allowing friendly's to better identify from friend or foe.

Currently my squad of 6 (sometimes 8) use a VERY rudimentary method of identification...and it goes something like this:

Me - "Is that you Mizzy?"

Mizzy - "Im gonna lean"

Me - "Ok I see you"

Now you do not know how many times this has gotten us killed, as we cannot shoot on sight as we fear its one our squad members. A simple name tag that only the clan members can see would improve the current and future game play of DayZ so much that people may actually try to form a small army (which would cause for some very interesting encounters)

Now as I said before, this DOES go against Rocket's will BUT I believe that it is a fair compromise, because in a situation like DayZ, you will know who you are looking at....just..by looking at them, but seeing as we cannot do that, a name tag would be the next best thing.

Please if you read this, leave me your thoughts as I would really like to know what the rest of the community thinks of this.

Edited November 4, 2012 by ImCptCrunch

[indominator 95]

no, it has been brought to his attention that some players have hearing deficiency or visual, so there will be difficulties for each server, the hardest wont have UI and the normal will prolly have it so these people dont get left behind, cuz they are part of this community and we must not forget about them.

He wont implement nametags, but will let us modify a little the clothing and colors, and i hope it has so much variations for clothing that we will be able to identify ourselves better than now.

My thought is: already discussed and debated a lot. Please use search function.

What we should debate is clothing design, patterns and stuff, because there are lots of clothings with lots of stuff and patters and also logos on them, so if rocket could bring something like that we would be able to identify each other much much easier, and to fool us that a stranger is part of the group to kill us closer would be much harder.

Also, it is recommend you use these outside programs to create group, metagaming is not a sin, i myself use teamspeak and am part of a clan, so we pratically KOS and have a total different game experience due to this metagaming

[tommes 331]

An optional nametag without the distance displayed and only working maybe up to 50 meters would be nice. Maybe it could be working only with players you've seen before and marked as recognized. Would be more plausible than peripheral dots, at least for servers with low skill settings.

[ImCptCrunch 17]

Also, it is recommend you use these outside programs to create group, metagaming is not a sin, i myself use teamspeak and am part of a clan, so we pratically KOS and have a total different game experience due to this metagaming

how do you think we play? but keeping a squad of 6 or 8 together and knowing each person and where they are in a firefight is not easy, even with TS. oh and the clothing idea, say you have pissed of someone to such an extent that they are out to murder you (it has happened to us before) the simple answer?

Hold on guys, one sec, lemme just change my clothes to look like you....annnnddd there we go. killing time. Just adjusting your clothing is not the answer.

[Herr Robert 28]

I completely agree with the OP and his points. A system like this needs to be implemented in the standalone.

[starwarsfan@gmx.de 450]

I'm all for more features for survivor groups, or any at all as there currently really aren't any in place. But there have been a lot of other, better ideas on how to handle this(in my opinion). For example the 'clan' armbands, a more in-depth character customization will also help. If you want to be able to recognize eachother, dress similar. Of course for that to work there would have to be a very wide varity of clothing so no one looks alike unless they intend to. At the moment you can already choose 'faces' that have facepaint on them, that might be another way to help with the whole recognition problem.

But to some extent it is even supposed to be hard to tell your friends apart from strangers, surely not in close quarters but definitly when further apart than let's say 20 to 30 metres(i grabbed that number from a hat so don't nail me on that).

And for that 'lemme just change my clothes to look like you' surely it shouldn't be that easy to switch but it should be possible, it provides a whole new tactical approach for infiltrating an enemy group. Which I can imagine to be quite fun, at least for the one doing the infiltrating probably not so much for the 'victims'.

[ImCptCrunch 17]

I'm all for more features for survivor groups, or any at all as there currently really aren't any in place. But there have been a lot of other, better ideas on how to handle this(in my opinion). For example the 'clan' armbands, a more in-depth character customization will also help. If you want to be able to recognize eachother, dress similar. Of course for that to work there would have to be a very wide varity of clothing so no one looks alike unless they intend to. At the moment you can already choose 'faces' that have facepaint on them, that might be another way to help with the whole recognition problem.

But to some extent it is even supposed to be hard to tell your friends apart from strangers, surely not in close quarters but definitly when further apart than let's say 20 to 30 metres(i grabbed that number from a hat so don't nail me on that).

And for that 'lemme just change my clothes to look like you' surely it shouldn't be that easy to switch but it should be possible, it provides a whole new tactical approach for infiltrating an enemy group. Which I can imagine to be quite fun, at least for the one doing the infiltrating probably not so much for the 'victims'.

Making your clan/group whatever, all wear the same clothes isn't the answer if you have a group of more than 2 or 3, you are going to need to klnow who you are looking at straight away, if you are all wearing the same thing, then it comes back to my statement of, having to lean to identify, or just having to ask what gun they have or something. REALISTICALLY you will know someones name by looking at them, you cannot do that with just changing clothes in a big group.

[mr_chabowski@live.co.uk 2416]

If REALISTICALLY you should know someones name by looking at them , then you should be more observant in game.

As for dressing alike, you shouldn't need to wear the exact same setup for everybody to realise you're in some way connected.

Just as IRL gang colours doesn't mean uniforms.

If you can't recognise your team mates, it's a failure on your part. Game mechanics shouldn't have to make it easier, it's truly authentic as-is.

EDIT: I'm not having a go at you, by the way. Just bear in mind, the ability to recognise people (or not) is a major part of the realism and atmosphere of DayZ.

Edited November 5, 2012 by Chabowski

[duggedank 28]

There is a solution to difficulties in recognising players, and ArmA already supports it - Just add the squad.xml logo compatibility to all DayZ skins!

Make it an armband and it will be:

Authentic - The easiest way to quickly differentiate between friend and foe? - Armbands! Have been used in real life war and other situations for ages.

Still not OP: You need to see the armband and identify it, it's not a big blue blob above someones head.

I've seen people suggest this before but I just don't understand why there doesn't seem to be support for this from the community!? People either whine that it's "not realistic" (WTF?) or just ignore it completely.

I also don't understand why the dev team doesn't appear to have considered it even once...

It's. Already. In. The. Game. - Just make the models compatible and there you go.

_:(

Edited November 5, 2012 by DuggeDank

[starwarsfan@gmx.de 450]

Making your clan/group whatever, all wear the same clothes isn't the answer if you have a group of more than 2 or 3, you are going to need to klnow who you are looking at straight away, if you are all wearing the same thing, then it comes back to my statement of, having to lean to identify, or just having to ask what gun they have or something. REALISTICALLY you will know someones name by looking at them, you cannot do that with just changing clothes in a big group.

That's where the faces come into play? How do you recognice people in real life? By their voice and their face I would assume, another factor might be size and body structure(fat/slim) but that's about it and you really shouldn't have more than that in game either. It should be hard to coordinate such a big group, because it surely isn't easy in real life either.