Realistic & Fair Weapons Suggestions

[TheSushi 28]

Forum stickies said to make threads specific, so I split my ideas up. This is going to involve both the zombies to an extent but its mostly about the guns, insofar as damage, ammo they take and range. I used spoiler tags to reduce wall-o-text.

Damage vs Players & Zombies

TL;DR: Guns need to take at least a couple accurate rounds to kill people, even with 5.56x45mm and 7.62x51mm. One shot-kills with an AK or an outdated lever-action rifle because you hit somewhere in the chest isn't realistic.

Personally, I've found through some good time invested playing that the approach given to designing the firearms just makes sniping the most attractive option. An AK, which is perhaps one of the most average of firearms, can kill a zombie or player in one torso shot. Your cover and accuracy doesn't really matter because it's generally an issue of who gets lucky first. I think this is an inherently flawed approach to designing the firearms.

There is no such thing as a magic bullet. Even a .50 BMG sometimes does not kill instantly. I know offhand of an incident where this guy was shot in the head and pelvis with a M2 machine gun. He took ten minutes to die, being fully conscious the entire time. A few years ago in the Bronx, a man named Angel Alvarez was shot 26 times by 9x19mm pistols and lived. Generally speaking, killing a target quickly is dependent on shot placement and the number of bullets you put into the guy. The ONLY reliable places to shoot when killing a person is the cardiovascular triangle (heart/lungs) and the CNS (central nervous system; brain / spine.) Otherwise, it's a matter of when they bleed out. Body shots aren't going to be super lethal in general. Hitting a guy in the stomach isn't the same thing as the heart or lungs.

As for specific numbers, if you literally hit the head or the tiny target that makes the heart, I think you should get a practically instant kill. Anywhere else, even with a 7.62x51mm hunting rifle should take some time and effort. 3-4 rounds from a 7.62x51 or similar rifle to the upper torso should result in a quick kill, with the knowledge that a shot or two there untreated will kill them. Does this take away from sniping as it is? Yeah, a little bit. It makes it a bit less amusing to find a tall building and snipe random people.

But a deer hunter can tell you instant kills generally don't happen. If you miss the so-called "sweet spot" you usually have to chase down the animal and put it out of its misery. Sniping is as brutal as it is because you have the position that covers you from return fire and allots time to make a careful shot where its going to hurt.

Assault rifles would also reasonably be less damaging. AKs don't instakill. The 5.56 is a pretty weak round at long range. The reason this is acceptible in real life is because the cartridges let you shoot them really, really fast, and they have better recoil than SMGs. The strength of the assault rifle is that you can put concentrated fire on a dude and kill him.

Does this mean the handguns should be ridiculously ineffective? Well, no, not really. They just have the same sort of constraints; hit the heart, lungs and head to kill a dude faster. And it doesn't make zombies ridiculously hard to kill - fix the pathing and random flanking, and it's all going to be reasonable.

Range and Damage Drop-Off

TL;DR: Assault rifles and the Winchester shouldn't do half as much damage at the ends of their ranges. Past 300 meters or so, they suffer hugely in accuracy and power. This should be reflected, so a suppressed M4 CCO isn't suddenly the best gun EVAR for everything. Also keeps a good niche for sniper weapons even with the changes I suggested before.

What goes hand-in-hand with realistic damage is realistic damage drop-off. Rounds like the 5.56x45, 5.45x39 and such are highly dependent on fragmentation and striking bone to do the most damage. Just as an example, the M855 ammunition the US military uses with a 20'' M16 generally fragments reliably at about 200 meters. That means the bullet explodes into little pieces that tear up your soft tissue and organs so you bleed out faster and die. Within 200 meters hypothetically, they would have the best power - past that, the bullet slows down and doesn't fragment as reliably. We've found in Afghanistan that 5.56 is really not a great round to return fire at 500 meters. You want to hit them as many times as you can to make sure they work. This is part of the reason we used Mk262 open-tip match ammo - it has more consistent damage at longer ranges than a lot of 5.56.

The Day Z wiki entries are generally accurate at any range. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think there is a significant drop-off for the guns at any range. This means the assault rifles are good from 0 to 1000 meters assuming you can land the hit. Assault rifles are a compromise between mag cap, rapid fire and damage. They're not going to work as well at longer ranges, and having one doesn't suddenly make you unkillable. Dudes in warzones with tons of body armor are killed by inexpensive hunting rifles every day.

Armor

TL;DR: Ceramic body armor is a reasonable and realistic addition to the game. It stops working after a few bullets and is easy enough to find, plus self-balances in concept.

If you have .50 BMG rifles, belt-fed machine guns and rocket launchers, there's really no reason to not have body armor that can stop rifle shots. There's no realistic reason not to have it. Even the Russians issued body armor during the Cold War - with steel plates capable of stopping intermediate rifle bullets. Any place with military supplies has body armor.

And it's not crazy imbalanced. Ceramic body armor stops working after a few shots - they're only tested for 3 hits from a .308 / 7.62x51mm rifle in most places. Then they break apart and you take the full hit of the bullet. They also bruise the crap out of you, so you'd still take some damage. And yeah, slowing the movement speed of your player would also be perfectly reasonable.

Think about it. Night vision goggles are a win/win - there's literally no disadvantage to having them. But body armor is balanced by making you a bigger target and slowing you down - even when it's not taking hits from bullets and actively making a difference.

And again, it doesn't really nerf sniping. There exists no body armor in the world that makes your brain invulnerable to a well-placed bullet.

Taking Damage

A bullet even to armor can KO you instantly. They also break bones more than you would expect and generally do bad things that don't make insta-killing strictly necessary. Even if you hit someone in the stomach where the blood vessels aren't as rich as the lungs, you're probably going to break their pelvis, the biggest weight-bearing bone in the lower body and drop them like a sack of potatoes.

Thanks for reading.

[ninjan777 104]

"even with a 7.62x51mm hunting rifle should take some time and effort. 3-4 rounds from a 7.62x51 or similar rifle to the upper torso should result in a quick kill" = Wtf humans are not machines on cokaine. 1 shot by a 9mm to the chest will be very lethal and you will be damn sure he ain't getting up again. If we would feel no pain things would be different but we react very strongly to a gunshot wound and what you are talking about has nothing to do with reality!

[TheSushi 28]

"even with a 7.62x51mm hunting rifle should take some time and effort. 3-4 rounds from a 7.62x51 or similar rifle to the upper torso should result in a quick kill" = Wtf humans are not machines on cokaine. 1 shot by a 9mm to the chest will be very lethal and you will be damn sure he ain't getting up again. If we would feel no pain things would be different but we react very strongly to a gunshot wound and what you are talking about has nothing to do with reality!

Again, regardless of bullet shot placement is king.

If you hit the heart, aorta or spinal cord in the chest, they'll die almost instantly, with a 9mm, .22 or anything else. But your lungs will mostly make you bleed to death. Same with your liver, stomach and most of your organs that take up your chest. There's a lot of places where you won't die instantly. And I said there's plenty of ways to punish players for getting shot that aren't instant death - shock and bleeding is generally what causes a large amount of gunshot-related deaths.

Plus, the default player skin is wearing armor if you haven't noticed.

Edited December 30, 2012 by John_234

[terminal_boy 860]

Torso hits on zombies should cause damage, but only head shots should put them down permanently.

Humans are very different... Anything that lets air in and blood out is going to seriously reduce our capability to do anything, particularly complex tasks such as firing back at whomever shot us.

And that's without hitting vital organs, joints and the central nervous system. Not to mention the "OMFG, I've been shot!" shock factor that even affects combat veterans.

You could fill a graveyard the size of Nebraska with the remains of all those shot and killed by rounds not considered "man stoppers".

I've personally seen a .35 Remington bullet fired by one of these ancient lever-action rifles drop a 150lb whitetail deer in its tracks from 150 yards away. Through and through chest cavity shot that left an exit hole the size of a golf ball and turned the heart and lungs to mush.

If you're not wearing SAPI plates over Level III soft armour, being hit by even such an old-fashioned bullet is going to seriously ruin your day..

[TheSushi 28]

Torso hits on zombies should cause damage, but only head shots should put them down permanently.

Humans are very different... Anything that lets air in and blood out is going to seriously reduce our capability to do anything, particularly complex tasks such as firing back at whomever shot us.

And that's without hitting vital organs, joints and the central nervous system. Not to mention the "OMFG, I've been shot!" shock factor that even affects combat veterans.

You could fill a graveyard the size of Nebraska with the remains of all those shot and killed by rounds not considered "man stoppers".

I've personally seen a .35 Remington bullet fired by one of these ancient lever-action rifles drop a 150lb whitetail deer in its tracks from 150 yards away. Through and through chest cavity shot that left an exit hole the size of a golf ball and turned the heart and lungs to mush.

If you're not wearing SAPI plates over Level III soft armour, being hit by even such an old-fashioned bullet is going to seriously ruin your day..

Absolutely. You're going to need medical treatment on any gunshot wound. I just think we should make being shot a matter more complex than "splat + death screen." Descending into shock, having impaired movement, vision and motor skills all make sense. Admittedly, I didn't really go over the affect of adrenaline on someone who is shot. If you don't see the bullet coming, you might die before fight-or-flight kicks in. But if you know there's a fight coming, people are notoriously hard to put down - the gunfight that the FBI had with two gunmen in Miami, 1986 is a perfect example of that.

I'd note though, that by out-dated lever-action I was just referencing the Winchester 1866, which fires a .44-40 cartridge that has similar power to some hot-loaded handgun rounds, and can be stopped by most soft body armor. There are many lever actions that do similar damage to modern bolt-actions and autoloaders. The one in-game just isn't one of them. Plus, the .35 Remington was a much newer cartridge than lever-actions were originally designed for, being introduced around the same time as modern hunting rounds like the .30-06 Springfield.

The bottom line is though, no matter what gun you're using, shot placement is going to dictate the result. Had the shooter with the .35 hit that deer in the intestines, it would not have died anywhere near as quickly, as you witnessed a vital hit in the heart and lungs. The guys in Miami had few shots to their vitals and were only stopped by CNS hits.

Also, you mean IIIA armor, correct? III is a level only used for hard inserts, as it denotes the ability to stop rifle bullets.

Edited December 30, 2012 by John_234

[Drakkarius 0]

I agree with all points stated, but would like to see Zacks drop easier when I shoot them in the head with an AK. No reason they should survive that. Also, different classes of body armour would be nice. IIA for cops and IIIA for military mayhaps? And helmets for fragmentation deflection and *maybe* small pistol rounds.

Although, in line with your fight or flight statement.

...If you don't see the bullet coming, you might die before fight-or-flight kicks in. But if you know there's a fight coming, people are notoriously hard to put down...

Last night, during the game time which most of the influence for these ideas came from, we were standing (John and myself) on a flight control tower. Next thing I know, I see a big red splat come out from just under my chest and to the right (looked like it came from the left, so that should make its path mostly through flesh that isn't vital). I died instantly from what sounded like an M4 from very far off. This made sense in a way and did not in another. As I was caught completely unaware, hydrostatic shock can instantly kill just about any man. But from a carbine which shoots with less force than your average rifle and the poor shot placement, this makes somewhat less sense.

Just my two cents.

[Rekli 995]

If you get shot in the chest you will most likely fall to your knees,or be completely knocked of your feet and you wont be getting up for a long time so what happens if you get shot by a rifle?...you fall over and get shot again... there's no way to fight back after being shot (unless you fall behind something)sure you can survive many shots to the chest...but without surgery..your as good as dead,if i got shot 8 times in non vital zones and bandaged myself i would most likely still die..also against the argument I just stated being shot would either knock you senseless or give you a rush of adrenaline giving you time to fight back and maybe stop you dieing

[OrLoK 16182]

IMHO any hit from a rifle or pistol should be severely delibitating.

If i stub my toe, im pretty much out of action for a few minutes, step on a wall plug and im pretty much incapacitated for 5-10 mins.

Paper cut? damn that hurts. Stops me from what im doing.

Having a piece of lead pushed through my skin, muscles and bone, possibly resulting in bone fractures, lead and bone splinters being left in my body to mane but a few unpleasantries, now that's really going to screw up my week.

I dont subscribe to the "stopping power" theory. If I put a hole in you be it with a pencil or a bullet, that's gonna hurt. Yes there arre other factors and one may be able to function (poorly) for a while. But if one is hit one should be "out of combat" so to speak.

Rgds

LoK

[enforcer1975 1111]

Plus, the default player skin is wearing armor if you haven't noticed.

Don't assume the vest is a kevlar vest, could also just be a normal vest without anything.

BTT

Any hit should have some effect no matter what caliber. I would be scared to shit even if someone was pointing a .22 at 200m at me even with the damage possibly beeing minimal. What you can't replicate in the game is the fear and if you give a player blurry vision to simulate disorientation and fear of something dangerous or whatever effect he/she will most likely only be annoyed by it and demanded it to be removed because it's unrealistic. Hightened senses or pain resistence aren't the only things that come from an adrenalin rush, shock is a very underestimated factor. We already have the suppression effect where the vision gets a bit blurry, shaky and the crosshairs shake.

Edited December 31, 2012 by Enforcer

[plrsniper 87]

Talks about realism, insinuates that a man can take 4-5 shots from an assault rifle before he becomes combat ineffective... Perhaps you should do some research first?

[TheSushi 28]

That's a lot of replies, so gimme a bit to respond to them all.

[TheSushi 28]

If you get shot in the chest you will most likely fall to your knees,or be completely knocked of your feet and you wont be getting up for a long time so what happens if you get shot by a rifle?...you fall over and get shot again... there's no way to fight back after being shot (unless you fall behind something)sure you can survive many shots to the chest...but without surgery..your as good as dead,if i got shot 8 times in non vital zones and bandaged myself i would most likely still die..also against the argument I just stated being shot would either knock you senseless or give you a rush of adrenaline giving you time to fight back and maybe stop you dieing

So, what sort of mechanic in-game do you support in the end, then?

IMHO any hit from a rifle or pistol should be severely delibitating.

If i stub my toe, im pretty much out of action for a few minutes, step on a wall plug and im pretty much incapacitated for 5-10 mins.

Paper cut? damn that hurts. Stops me from what im doing.

Having a piece of lead pushed through my skin, muscles and bone, possibly resulting in bone fractures, lead and bone splinters being left in my body to mane but a few unpleasantries, now that's really going to screw up my week.

I dont subscribe to the "stopping power" theory. If I put a hole in you be it with a pencil or a bullet, that's gonna hurt. Yes there arre other factors and one may be able to function (poorly) for a while. But if one is hit one should be "out of combat" so to speak.

Rgds

LoK

If you've ever competed in a sport or simply had the bejesus scared out of and incurred minor injures in the process, you generally don't notice until afterward. I have a video on hand where a guy is shot twice and doesn't even fall down.

If the URL isn't working, check out 14:35.

This isn't my opinion, this a named medical professional giving a seminar. You can watch the entire video if you like (I'd warn it's got gore at parts for obvious reasons) and its highly informative on firefights and the nature of gunshot wounds.

There's a lot of other incidents off hand, like for example, a man named Robert Butler was serving as a cop some time ago. He did a routine traffic stop and was shot in the ribs with a .22 LR. He didn't realize he was shot even though the bullet ricocheted off his ribs and punctured both lungs. He thought it was a firecracker until the guy that shot him ran off with a gun, and he started to taste blood in his mouth. He was still fully combat capable enough to carefully take aim and take four or five shots at the guy, the last one blasting out the bad guy's knee from over a hundred yards away.

Don't assume the vest is a kevlar vest, could also just be a normal vest without anything.

BTT

Any hit should have some effect no matter what caliber. I would be scared to shit even if someone was pointing a .22 at 200m at me even with the damage possibly beeing minimal. What you can't replicate in the game is the fear and if you give a player blurry vision to simulate disorientation and fear of something dangerous or whatever effect he/she will most likely only be annoyed by it and demanded it to be removed because it's unrealistic. Hightened senses or pain resistence aren't the only things that come from an adrenalin rush, shock is a very underestimated factor. We already have the suppression effect where the vision gets a bit blurry, shaky and the crosshairs shake.

I'm just saying, if the mechanic needs justification for being able to take more rounds than there are now, in-game explanations are in place. Soft body armor and the probable existence of ceramic body armor.

Arma II is very good with the effect of being shot at. The sound is immense and highly unnerving, plus guns are frightening hard to trace back. But dying instantly because of an intermediate rifle round to the general area of your trunk doesn't make sense nor offers much tension. In many situations in Day Z, all of that tension, heightened senses and shock can go right out the window. You're alive, then you die.

Talks about realism, insinuates that a man can take 4-5 shots from an assault rifle before he becomes combat ineffective... Perhaps you should do some research first?

Thanks for the feedback, but I'd ask you to read the post again.

Basically, if you get hit in your vitals, dying instantly is a reasonable expectation. But being shot in the general area of your trunk and dying without a fight is not realistic. What I said was I believe that if they miss your vitals, 3 or 4 shots is reasonable for a reliable kill. I don't mean you can eat three bullets to the heart and trololol out of the ambush site because that's fun and all. And a single shot should still screw up your day.

I stated that you should be punished for being shot with broken bones, crippling pain, severe bleeding and so forth - especially when you're shot in the chest. That is probably what I would call combat ineffective, a phrase I did not even use in the original post, FYI.

So, a single shot should have the potential to make you "combat ineffective" from bleeding, pain, shock, etc. That number for 3 or 4 rounds is just how many hits I assume would be reasonable for a for-sure death if you miss the vitals, not to disable you (which takes less) but completely kill you.

[Jeruhmi 0]

I think more realism would be great.

[plrsniper 87]

Thanks for the feedback, but I'd ask you to read the post again.

Basically, if you get hit in your vitals, dying instantly is a reasonable expectation. But being shot in the general area of your trunk and dying without a fight is not realistic. What I said was I believe that if they miss your vitals, 3 or 4 shots is reasonable for a reliable kill. I don't mean you can eat three bullets to the heart and trololol out of the ambush site because that's fun and all. And a single shot should still screw up your day.

I stated that you should be punished for being shot with broken bones, crippling pain, severe bleeding and so forth - especially when you're shot in the chest. That is probably what I would call combat ineffective, a phrase I did not even use in the original post, FYI.

So, a single shot should have the potential to make you "combat ineffective" from bleeding, pain, shock, etc. That number for 3 or 4 rounds is just how many hits I assume would be reasonable for a for-sure death if you miss the vitals, not to disable you (which takes less) but completely kill you.

No i will not read your post again because you haven't done your research.

Let me give you a few examples of what happens to someone who is shot with various weapons in certain situations.

First example:

During the Kosovo war a soldier who was running towards his enemies was hit with a bullet (5.56x45 Nato) in the head, it landed really badly and split the left side of his skull open. Half his brain was mush and hanging out.

The soldier kept running for about 50 meters before finally falling flat dead. He most likely didn't realize he had been hit... Actually, i don't think it mattered if he realized or not, he was most likely already brain dead and stuck in running mode. Brain kept doing what it was doing until it finally shut down completely and dropped to the ground.

Do you think this soldier would be able to fight back? Considering he was running completely "normally" with half his skull blown off?

Unfortunately I do not have a source reference, i was told this story by a peacefighter that was there and saw it happen.

Second example:

During the Gothenburg Riots (EU summit, 2001) a young boy (19 yo Hannes Westberg) was throwing rocks and cobblestone at the police. One policeman had been struck already and the rest where trying to defend the downed policeman. The police then fired warning shots to scatter the protesters but Hannes refused to stop throwing rocks and a policewoman shot him in the right side of his gut. (

)

As you can clearly tell by the video he reacts immediately and (not shown on this video but i have seen the source video in the past, can't find it now) it takes no more than 30 seconds before he is lying on the ground in pain and a state of shock. It's not an immediately life threatening shot but he is incapable of doing anything useful.

The weapon used was a Sig Sauer P226, 9x19mm parabellum.

Third example:

I don't remember when, where or what happened but it is in the US and a drugged up deranged man is being chased by police in his car. All of a sudden the man stops, walks out of the car and starts shooting at the police officers. They unload into him and hit him about 10 times before he finally starts to stumble and fall face first into the asphalt.

He as most likely going on adrenaline alone, no officer where harmed in the firefight and only two shots from the assailant actually hit anything of worth. The windscreen of the police cruiser with the footage. After the two first shots he was hit by the return fire and could no longer aim at the policemen.

----

So far all i have shown you are examples where the victim hasn't died right off. So how does it support my case in any way? Apart from the nato round to the head which is a special case... The remaining two victims where shot with pistols. One shot to the gut and 10 shots to the upper body. In all cases the victims became combat ineffective right away.

It doesn't matter what you are shot with (unless it's a bb gun or otherwise extremely weak round), you will not be able to return fire effectively.

Now, some other (collaboration from much research, which i have done and you not so much) examples of what happens to you when you get shot in various parts of your body with various types of weapons and ammo used in DayZ.

L85A1, AK74, M16, M4 (5.45×39mm M74, 5.56x45 mm NATO)

These are the standard issue assault rifles of the UK, Russian and US armies.

• A shot to the foot is going to break your bones in the foot, you will be unable to walk in a balanced manner on said foot and depending on circumstances (adrenaline etc) you will feel pain within a few seconds of being shot and be unable to put pressure on said foot without screaming your balls off.
  Of course you will need to stop the bleeding eventually or you may bleed to death.
  
• A shot to the leg may be fatal if hit in the artery, you will react rather quickly and your muscles may cramp in that leg or otherwise become rather ineffective at releasing and contracting as they should. See it as having your leg replaced by jello or alternatively a pogo stick.
  Pain levels depend on what was hit, soft tissue will feel more like someone hit you with a baseball bat and jabbed a hot iron into your leg. If the bone was hit it will rather feel like someone is grinding your leg down with rough sandpaper.
  
• A shot to the guts... Ever had the feeling your stomach is about to explode and at the same time puking out a coconut? Accompanied with someone pouring gasoline down your throat and simultaneously shoving a lit road flare up your rectum through your intestines?
  You are out for the count in seconds and will most likely die unless you are extremely lucky and get medical attention within the minute. You WILL need antihemorrhagics, large doses of morphine and bandaging right away and pressure applied to the area or suffer bleeding to death and even then you may not survive the first few minutes.
  
• A shot to the chest, if it's in the heart you are dead in seconds and i can't possibly describe it because i have never seen or heard of any survivors. If it's the lung then, aside from crippling pain (like the gut pain), imagine having a horse sitting on you while trying to breathe and at the same time choking of your own blood...
  You will get dizzy withing 30 seconds from lack of oxygen (as you automatically exhale the moment you are hit) and in many cases you pass out right away. You will most definitely not be able to aim at anything and even less move after 30 seconds have passed.
  Any other region of the chest will be almost as bad but in rare cases you may be capable of doing something... Just not fight back effectively.
  
• A shot to the shoulders. Actually, this is one of the few regions on the body where you can be hit without becoming combat inefficient. (SURPRISE!)
  But it's still going to be painful and once again, depending on your state of mind it can take between 1 seconds and a minute before you realize it.
  
• Arms? Well, you actually stand a high chance of survival! And unless it's your shooting arm you will even be able to fight back just fine!
  
• A shot to the head? Well, roll a dice, if you roll a seven then you may survive the next minute and simply end up in a coma and spend the rest of your life as a vegetable.
  

Now, the rest of the weapons? Bigger caliber means more damage, more pain, effects taking hold sooner and in general more blood loss and carnage. So i simply won't list them.

But what about pistols? For the sake of simplicity i am going to cover them all no matter what caliber they have.

• Foot? Stab yourself with a pitchfork and you have a good idea of what it feels like. It's not going to stop you from fighting or running though but you may eventually feel a lot more pain and even bleed to death. If you hit bone it's going to hurt a lot more and you may not be able to stand on that foot after a few seconds due to the intense pain it causes.
  
• Leg? Same thing as the foot really unless it's the artery, stab yourself with a pitchfork through and through. It may or may not hurt as much as the foot due to the larger tissue area. It really depends but one thing is sure, if you hit bone then it's going to be near impossible to stand on that leg.
  
• Guts? This is actually just as bad as with any firearm but due to the lesser velocity and caliber it won't do as much damage. In short it will take longer for you to die from it.
  
• Chest? Same as with assault rifles but once again, takes longer to die from it. A heart shot will still be as fatal and as fast though.
  
• Shoulders? Painful but you will live... You might not be able to shoulder your weapon though and may find it hard to move your arm etc.
  
• Arms? Same as shoulders.
  
• Head? Well, unlike assault rifle shots. Head injury from pistols actually have some degree of survivability but you won't be fighting for a couple of weeks, if ever again!
  

So what about shotguns? Namely pellets?

That is a very range specific question. At point blank it's going to blow your limbs off or leave a big hole in your chest, stomach etc. To the head at point blank is going to leave a stump and what can be described as a red rose with a juice fountain. NASTY STUFF REALLY!

At range however, think of it as having a cat with really large claws ripping through your body all at once. I am not talking about scratches here but actually clawing through your skin into the muscles.

Did you know what kills the duck/bird/rabbit/whatever when shot by pellets? It's not from the damage cause directly but from the shock alone. It's heart stops flat and the animal is knocked unconscious. Which is kinda similar to what happens to a human being that is shot by a particularly large caliber and/or powerful round. But that can also happen with regular rifles from the shockwaves that travel through the body.

Shotgun slugs? Same thing but much different, it's still a shock weapon but the slug will of course penetrate deeper and cause much more damage ensuring a much greater effect on larger targets. (Such as humans and large animals)

The rest i leave up to you to figure out. Needless to say at this point but you REALLY should do some research.

If anything, most weapons in DayZ are underpowered...

[TtS1991 211]

I think the body armor is a great idea. Rolling off of what you included about the Soviets using steel plates during the Cold War, how about having the option to make some kind of studded/semi-armored outfit with scrap metal and clothing to protect against Zed?

[colekern 1364]

No i will not read your post again because you haven't done your research.

Let me give you a few examples of what happens to someone who is shot with various weapons in certain situations.

First example:

During the Kosovo war a soldier who was running towards his enemies was hit with a bullet (5.56x45 Nato) in the head, it landed really badly and split the left side of his skull open. Half his brain was mush and hanging out.

The soldier kept running for about 50 meters before finally falling flat dead. He most likely didn't realize he had been hit... Actually, i don't think it mattered if he realized or not, he was most likely already brain dead and stuck in running mode. Brain kept doing what it was doing until it finally shut down completely and dropped to the ground.

Do you think this soldier would be able to fight back? Considering he was running completely "normally" with half his skull blown off?

Unfortunately I do not have a source reference, i was told this story by a peacefighter that was there and saw it happen.

Second example:

During the Gothenburg Riots (EU summit, 2001) a young boy (19 yo Hannes Westberg) was throwing rocks and cobblestone at the police. One policeman had been struck already and the rest where trying to defend the downed policeman. The police then fired warning shots to scatter the protesters but Hannes refused to stop throwing rocks and a policewoman shot him in the right side of his gut. (

)

As you can clearly tell by the video he reacts immediately and (not shown on this video but i have seen the source video in the past, can't find it now) it takes no more than 30 seconds before he is lying on the ground in pain and a state of shock. It's not an immediately life threatening shot but he is incapable of doing anything useful.

The weapon used was a Sig Sauer P226, 9x19mm parabellum.

Third example:

I don't remember when, where or what happened but it is in the US and a drugged up deranged man is being chased by police in his car. All of a sudden the man stops, walks out of the car and starts shooting at the police officers. They unload into him and hit him about 10 times before he finally starts to stumble and fall face first into the asphalt.

He as most likely going on adrenaline alone, no officer where harmed in the firefight and only two shots from the assailant actually hit anything of worth. The windscreen of the police cruiser with the footage. After the two first shots he was hit by the return fire and could no longer aim at the policemen.

----

So far all i have shown you are examples where the victim hasn't died right off. So how does it support my case in any way? Apart from the nato round to the head which is a special case... The remaining two victims where shot with pistols. One shot to the gut and 10 shots to the upper body. In all cases the victims became combat ineffective right away.

It doesn't matter what you are shot with (unless it's a bb gun or otherwise extremely weak round), you will not be able to return fire effectively.

Now, some other (collaboration from much research, which i have done and you not so much) examples of what happens to you when you get shot in various parts of your body with various types of weapons and ammo used in DayZ.

L85A1, AK74, M16, M4 (5.45

[TheSushi 28]

No i will not read your post again because you haven't done your research.

Let me give you a few examples of what happens to someone who is shot with various weapons in certain situations.

(Snip)

I appreciate the giant, well-researched response, but it doesn't actually contradict the idea I was suggesting. If anything, it supports it.

All cases you provided are examples of how grievously injured persons who were not killed cleanly with a single shot. They either lived or took some significant time to die. Exactly what I wanted to prove :)

They were unable to fight. Yeah, that's the point. In Day Z, you just die. You're rarely incapacitated when shot. I think this is a flawed approach, and that shots should impair and put you out of action as described instead of instantly killing you. So thank you for the compelling evidence.

I think the body armor is a great idea. Rolling off of what you included about the Soviets using steel plates during the Cold War, how about having the option to make some kind of studded/semi-armored outfit with scrap metal and clothing to protect against Zed?

Steel used for ballistic inserts tends to be a very specific blend not easily made with small tools. It's specifically formulated and treated to stop bullets. Plus, it shraps the heck out of you when you get hit.

Though, historically the Russians did use stuff like SN-42 armor which was just stamped steel that could stop 9mm SMG projectiles at urban combat ranges. Throughout history, we've made numerous attempts at improvised bullet-resistant materials. Cotton vests were used at the turn of the centrury to stop some handgun rounds even, and before that there's examples of silken vests.

[enforcer1975 1111]

I think more realism would be great.

Yes...no cleaning kits and 99.9% of the rifles in game would have malfunctions making weapons that are made for precision a paper weight...this would make lots of weapons like simple bolt action rifles, revolvers, AK variants and any other weapon that weren't built in a laboratory very interesting.

[Steak and Potatoes 13480]

I think the body armor is a great idea. Rolling off of what you included about the Soviets using steel plates during the Cold War, how about having the option to make some kind of studded/semi-armored outfit with scrap metal and clothing to protect against Zed?

Edited January 1, 2013 by Steak and Potatoes

[socialcorpse 13]

I think if you are wanting all this realism we should look at the things that are extremely unrealistic. Such as being able to fit a main rotor head in your back pack or even liftling it for that matter since it takes a small ceiling crane to lift it. Lugging two full car tires for 5000 meters. Being able to run indefinitely only stopping for food and water. The guns in the game are fine as they are and dont need to be messed with. You start going down that path and next thing you know its gonna be call of duty where every week a gun is getting nerfed or buffed. Leave the weapons alone please.

[TheSushi 28]

I think if you are wanting all this realism we should look at the things that are extremely unrealistic. Such as being able to fit a main rotor head in your back pack or even liftling it for that matter since it takes a small ceiling crane to lift it. Lugging two full car tires for 5000 meters. Being able to run indefinitely only stopping for food and water. The guns in the game are fine as they are and dont need to be messed with. You start going down that path and next thing you know its gonna be call of duty where every week a gun is getting nerfed or buffed. Leave the weapons alone please.

Well, its partially realism, partially balance.

[mr_chabowski@live.co.uk 2416]

I always just considered the player's vests to be nothing but simple webbing, and that's what's used for storage.

I would love to see a variety of plates/vests in game, but I think players are too solid already.

If it was easier to die, there would be some incentive to put plates in your vest instead of ammo/beans/bandages.

IMO Incapacitation would make for boring gameplay, so death, however unlikely it appears, is a good compromise.

Another good implementation (if armour is involved) would be localised damage mapping.

If you get shot in the leg while you're wearing a bulletproof vest, obviously you shouldn't get the benefit of protection.