Question regarding your hearing, how you hear other footsteps, etc

[Spidey (DayZ) 78]

So, beign a player of dayz for a few months now, I can say that this game is all about sneaking, stealth and trying to not beignt detected while trying to keep track of players ( = enemies) .

However this, unfortunately for me, is quite impossible to do. I never actually achieved the moment everyone is talking about and I see in the videos, the moment when you sneak upon someone without them even noticing. How? How is it possible that everytime I try to be stealthy, I always, and don't get me wrong, I mean EVERY single time, I get shot in the back of the head withou even seeing who actually killed me.

Uhm, back to the original question. What are the mechanics for footsteps, for example? When should I be able to hear someone's footsteps, I mean, at what distance? And vice versa ? And also, can you hear the footsteps through a building, or, if you are inside and the other guy is outside, can you hear each other?

Thanks for the answers :) Would also appretiate any good tips for making my in-game lives last longer than 30 minutes :/

[burritoman259 593]

if you have a surround sound headset you are at a huge advantage because you can sound whore or whatever its called and hear people talking on direct on side pretty much anything you do can be heard.

if you don't have a surround sound headset my advice would be to turn down your game music or whatever you play in the background and just have your effects on highest it helps in general with hearing agro and vehicles.

[taco241 393]

Sound is still kinda buggy though, especially gun shots but hey, it'snothing new.

I bought a nice headset but still find myself spinning around a few times before dying to an unseen shooter.

[Sutinen 635]

If you are very close to the enemies, you can silently roll towards them. It sounds silly, but it wont make a noise.

Then, if you keep failing on sneaking towards enemies, you better learn how to flank and avoid aggroing zombies. Do not run on roads (Crawl) or gravel (Crouch-walk), because zombie hearing is bugged at the moment.

[bad_mojo (DayZ) 1204]

If you press your W(or A,S,D) key and quickly release it, you can move silently. It takes some practice and is easy to mess up, but it works.

This video shows how its done...

[root 48]

Most importantly is that you have good headset. I have http://www.sennheiserusa.com/PC360 and they are superB. When I play with friends I can hear car or shoots far away or steps and they can't because of using speakers or not such a good headset. I sneaked many times on snipers ... really get too close to them so I could open their backpack and they didn't even know.

As it was suggested above, if you know where the sniper/player is and you think he can hear you ... just roll or half press wsda, which won't make any sound.