Careful what you wish... my life for a bigger backpack

[KEY (DayZ) 11]

So I survived my whole first day in DayZ (not my first attempt though ;) ), got some sweet equipment including a hatchet, binoculars, a toolbox, a map & compass, a box of matches (lucky me), a M9 pistol and a Enfield rifle with quite a few rounds, several beans & pastas, some cans of soda and quite some bandages and even 2 morphine injectors. Yeah, life was good to me, indeed. On my travels I learned how to avoid the Zeds, or to shake them off whenever I was hunted by some.

So far so good... so today I came across an old shed, and looky what I got there: a czech backpack. YAY, I'm going to have more room now. But wait! I remembered hearing about you need to empty your actual backpack first before being able to pick up a new one. Ok for me, so I emptied my backpack and -here my demise kinda starts- all of my other belongings! As the last item I dropped my old coyote backpack and gripped the czech pack. Searching for the stuff I just had dropped to the ground I found myself only being able to see and get what I had in my smaller backpack: 2 cans of beans & pasta and 2 cans of soda.

Where the heck did my other stuff go? My beloved map, my hatchet, them guns, my bandages and all the other med supplies? Gone...

But I am here to find adventure and thrill... so f**k it and off I go to find the stuff I need, just elsewhere.

And man, I did well until I -totally lost in thoughts where to go next, and running blind- stumbled across one of those rotten piles of puss and that slowf**k really managed to inflict a bleeding on me with his first hit. After doing the "RUN FORREST, RUN!" tactics I end up managing to get rid of "ol' deadhead"... but the bleeding won't stop... and my vision starts to get blurry, colours fading quickly...

I find a huge twin tree, rest there in the sweet shadows and make my peace while watching as the world turns grey. In the distance I hear a familiar voice, softly calling my name... and as everything turns black I figure that the voice is my boyfriend telling me we wanted to go out for lunch today. :D

I always wanted a bigger backpack... I once said to myself "I'd give my life for a large backpack"... and I guess that I managed to achieve that. :)

Ok, my questions would be (sorry, still a newbie) :

- when finding a bigger backpack, I only need to drop the contents of my actual backpack in order to get the new, bigger one? So I keep all the other stuff on me?

- is there a way to use the hatchet as a weapon easier and quicker than dropping your rifle, open your inventory, right click the hatchet in the toolbelt and "remove hatchet from toolbelt"? (I mean, is there something like switching from pistol to rifle to hatchet? no?)

- does my character grow more hungry and thirsty even when I am logged out of a server?

- is there a difference on how some servers let you use the map? On one I can see myself on the map as a blue dot, on other servers I can't see my actual position on the map (and no, I dont have that GPS thing on any of the servers I play, and both servers are "regular difficulty")

Hope you enjoyed my little death-time story and thank you all for helping me with my questions :)

[mr_chabowski@live.co.uk 2416]

Welcome to the family ;)

You can use the mousewheel to "open" the bigger bag, then move everything from your pack into the one on the floor. Then select "take backpack". Viola!

Hatchet is a bugger, there's no quick or efficient way to go about it.

Your character doesn't get hungry or thirsty unless you're playing. Best to have supplies on you all the time anyway.

Server settings are totally up to the admins, the name of the difficulty level doesn't necessarily mean anything.

Some servers let you see yourself (and others within range) on the map. Some don't.

Hope that helps you some.

Edited December 1, 2012 by Chabowski

[Jamz 253]

When starting out I'd spend some time looking in residential houses and supermarkets for the alice pack, its big (20 slots) and quite common. Its an essential item and with all those slots you can easily move your primary straight into your pack (10 slots must be free) to equip the hatchet. There's really no need to put things on the ground normally, which is good as its a bit risky for your items!

[KEY (DayZ) 11]

Mousewheel... ok, gonna try that as soon as I am lucky enough to stumble across another czech pack :)

Ok, so no workaround about needing to drop the rifle before you can equip the hatchet as a weapon. Will be a pain in the ass, maybe I'll leave them rifles alone.

So the map thingie definately is a question of server setup, check! :)

Thanks for all the info and I am glad my character wont starve to death while I am having lunch or dinner in the real world *lol*

EDIT: ok, so the Alice backpack is the thing to find :) thanks'n'beans for your response, too, Jamz

Edited December 1, 2012 by KEY

[mr_chabowski@live.co.uk 2416]

A point about what Jamz said. BE VERY CAREFUL when you put a weapon into your backpack.

If there is not enough space (10 slots for a primary, 5 for secondary) the weapon will get deleted.

Some things you have to find out for yourself, but I'd like to save you that particular bit of torture.

[BSB Jimmy 360]

i always open the big bag, put in my new items and wear the big backpack

[bigdogsco 143]

If you absolutely have to put stuff on the ground to help manage inventory, first put something worthless on the ground. This creates a new loot pile. Leave the gear screen and re-enter it looking at the new loot pile. Once you have created a loot pile your'e less likely to lose subsequent items.

[Sula 1205]

Hi Key, welcome to the forums! That's a heck of a lot of stuff you managed to loot and a lot of hard work and time too. Sorry to hear about your loss of stuff but, as I always say, don't get to fond of your stuff because you're going to lose it - repeatedly.

Any way, I think I see where you might have gone wrong and have the solution for you! :thumbsup: Backpacks are fickle and a life of their own! Here are the tips and tricks that work for me and I think 3) below is what happened to you:

1) Remember, you can't pick up a backpack off the ground if there are any other items lying with it. You have to get rid of those first.

2) Here's the best lesson I've learned. Never empty your stuff on to the ground first, when you are swapping packs. That's for two reasons: first because someone or thing could appear and you could lose your stuff; and second, see 1) above!

To safely pick up a bigger backpack without losing it or your loot, do this:

- Point at the bigger backpack and then roll the mousewheel to "open backpack".

- When it's open, go to your current backpack's contents by clicking on its image in the inventory window, and then transfer the stuff across to the bigger backpack by clicking on the left arrow key. You'll see your items disappear. So you'll see the top left says, for example, Alice pack but you're looking at your current pack's content, and as you click to move things across to the bigger pack they will disappear from your current pack.

When your current pack is empty, close it. Next, point at the bigger backpack and again roll your mousewheel over it and select "Take backpack". At which point you will then pick up the bigger pack and your things will already in it! (Unless you forget to do that part, which means you'll be walking away from your stuff, which I've done. ) Do check!

3) Remember that whenever you hit G the inventory menu that appears is not your backpack's contents. It is everything you have with you. To view your backpack contents double click the image of it in your inventory menu. (Don't try that with a gun, they just fall on the floor and I've lost a few that way!) So, when swapping backpacks you never need to transfer maps, compasses, knives, or anything in the lower part of the inventory menu because they stay with you. Just like the guns do. :thumbsup:

I hope that helps. Most of us learned these things the hard way. Give it time and you won't even have to think about it. :beans:

By the way, I've found that many people do it the other way, they drop their full backpack, then take the bigger backpack and finally try to open the one on the floor, which doesn't always work. In my experience, they either won't open or physically disappear from the screen. I've even had pals telling me that though it has disappeared from my screen they can still see it!

Edited December 1, 2012 by Sula

[KEY (DayZ) 11]

Backpack / Inventory management was quite easy to learn... but the thing about switching your actual backpack to another, bigger one was quite a mess on my first try (as you eventually know after reading my opening post :) ). I think I got it handled now, thanks to all of you who were really sweet in answering to my questions!

When I died under that lovely twin tree I honestly already was laughing about my fate... and my dumbness... AND the awkward (glitchy?) handling of the backpack switching which surely was leading me to my demise (due to losing all my bandages). Though I have to admit that I spit out quite some names at the Zed that made me bleed in one hit, I am usually quite cool tempered when it comes to dying in games (love the Ps3 Demons Souls and Dark Souls games... and you die a lot there on your first attempts to beat the game). I am much into games that offer you some chalenge, so for me DayZ is a game to love, even when it's still glitchy and there's things Rocket sure will look into in the future (like those lunatic kind of teleporting Zeds). So I'm taking games serious to a certain point, but I'm always cautious to not let a game frustrate me.

Funny thing, I just tried a different server than the one I end up playing on mostly... and the server got hacked and I saw a big red glowing nametag saying "MONKEY", when all of a sudden I start dancing like a lunachick, getting an onscreen message "do it gang nam style" (god I despise that shitty song, sorry to the fans ;) ) and after being released off that dance animation I find myself being equipped with a sniper rifle, bandages, morphine, blood bags, food, water, all tools and stuff. Well... I don't play a game like DayZ to be in an overpowered godmode, so I dropped all the stuff that I wouldn't have as a starter... cause honestly: that would ruin my gameplay and my fun. Maybe someone else found that pile of stuff and has a good time with it.

Woah, I'm going offtopic big time here :) So again: THANK YOU ALL for your help and information! It's greatly appreciated and I hope I bombed y'all with them beans :)

[Sula 1205]

Less of that sort of thing happening these days, as battleye has improved its methods of fighting hackers. Good to hear your survived! :) And nice to see such a friendly person joining us. :thumbsup:

[KEY (DayZ) 11]

*prefers to be friendly and helpful BUT can turn into the upmost despicable bitch ever seen*

Or so the rumors go ;)