I disagree with this suggestion

[MissSweeney 105]

I see a lot on this forum suggestions for making the game harder. People who want their to be barely enough food on the server for a player to scrape by, that zombies should be able to kill in 2 hits, that medical gear be very rare and (I've just read on another post) that zombies can catch you.

I understand making the game more realistic (as much as a fictional event can be realistic) is what some people want, but if a zombie apocalypse was real, WE'D BE DEAD. Most of us would be, you paranoid crazies would be doing just fine ;)

Point being, what would be the point of a game where you have a 90% chance of starving to death 30min after starting the game? Why play if it's impossible not to agro zombies because they can see/hear from far away, and an agro zombie will catch you and kill you? Making the game harder is fine, but I think some people take it too far. In order to be able to survive in this post apocalyptic world, it's going to have to be easier than if an outbreak was real, because there's no point playing a game where you know you're going to die within the hour.

I don't mean for this to sound like an angry rant, and I understand not everyone thinks the game should be impossible to survive, I just don't understand the people who do.

[bracing for shitstorm]

[Zionist Wabbit 154]

​Notices it's ended with [bracing for Shitstorm], immediately disregards the post due to the OP trivialising the point himself.

Edited February 19, 2013 by Zionist Wabbit

[-Gews- 7443]

The game shouldn't be harder just for the sake of being harder, but it should be realistic. I don't see a problem with letting zombies grab hold of players - that's what zombies are supposed to do!

As for your other points:

-food and water shouldn't be rare, it's not hard to find right now anyways

-you shouldn't starve to death in 30 minutes

-aggroing zombies? Try crawling!

Edit: I mean, it's a zombie survival game, so you should need to actually put some work in to avoid zombies and survive.

Edited February 19, 2013 by Gews

[unkillable94 149]

I agree to an extent, the hardcore community is one constant "OMG ITS TOO EASYMODE QQ MAKE IT HARDER" and while I would not mind the game being a bit harder, if they had it the way they wanted it it would be so hard to survive that 90% of the population would leave. That is not a good business decision nor would Rocket want the mod losing a lot of its players after all the work he has put into init and its current success.

There is a difference between realistic and impossibly hard, and there needs to be that cutoff. For everyone trying to make it as realistic as possible, reality sucks. Why else do you think we created video games?

Edited February 19, 2013 by Col Brown

[MissSweeney 105]

The game shouldn't be harder just for the sake of being harder, but it should be realistic. I don't see a problem with letting zombies grab hold of players - that's what zombies are supposed to do!

As for your other points:

-food and water shouldn't be rare, it's not hard to find right now anyways

-you shouldn't starve to death in 30 minutes

-aggroing zombies? Try crawling!

Edit: I mean, it's a zombie survival game, so you should need to actually put some work in to avoid zombies and survive.

I agree food and drink and gear should be rare, but not to the point that some people are suggesting. Not rare enough that you have a high chance of dying of starvation or thirst.

I'm also not suggesting people put zero effort into avoiding zombies. Just meaning that despite peoples best efforts, if you're raiding a city, chances are at least 1 zombie will see you at some point, crawling or prone. If that zombie can catch you and kill you in 2 hits, then a zombie catching you means certain death.

And i definately agree that you should havr to put work into avoiding zombies and surviving, I just don't think it should be so hard that the work is all for nothing.

That's not to say the game is currently that hard, not by a long shot, just meaning I don't see what the point of playing would be if that game was as hard as the small group of people suggest.

[MissSweeney 105]

I agree to an extent, the hardcore community is one constant "OMG ITS TOO EASYMODE QQ MAKE IT HARDER" and while I would not mind the game being a bit harder, if they had it the way they wanted it it would be so hard to survive that 90% of the population would leave. That is not a good business decision nor would Rocket want the mod losing a lot of its players after all the work he has put into init and its current success.

There is a difference between realistic and impossibly hard, and there needs to be that cutoff. For everyone trying to make it as realistic as possible, reality sucks. Why else do you think we created video games?

Exactly, playing just to die would be silly. Definitely make it harder, but not so hard the game is unplayable.

[MissSweeney 105]

​Notices it's ended with [bracing for Shitstorm], immediately disregards the post due to the OP trivialising the point himself.

The point of ending with bracing for shitstorm was not to belittle my own opinion, but because I know it's a topic with people on both sides of the fence. I could picture it getting quite heated.

[BwobBwub 660]

Isn't this what DayZ 2017 for?

[dallas 5195]

The standalone needs to be much harder and more complex, otherwise we'll simply crunch the gameplay mechanics and run out of content. We already master the mod, so Rocket has to throw new challenges at us.

I remember when Rocket fucked up the zombie spawns in 1.4 and instead of hotfixing it, he went "Okie dokie, let's not call this a bug, let's call it an experiment." Before 1.4 the hive had problems spawning zombies, so most deer stands would be unguarded and the general zombie population was critically low. Everyone was bored out of their minds, people committed more suicides from boredom, than from spawning at Kamenka. So when 1.4 accidentally decided to spawn hordes of zombies and spawn additional hordes, whenever you killed a single zombie or someone else triggered the spawn location, the DayZ community was initially shocked out of their minds, outraged and concerned, crying and dying and then... they adapted.

AI is simply no match for humans, but while I'm confident, we'll eventually crunch whatever Rocket throw at us, DayZ has a build in failsafe and that's why DayZ succeeds and endures. It's not because gamers are unadulterated geniuses, I mean just look at side chat, but compared to us, AI will always feel binary, while we are organic. We're like water or plants growing through concrete, we'll probe and find the path of least resistance, either because we're lazy or smart.

You too will overcome these the standalone's deadly mechanics... but only to be shot by a 14 yo with a anti-material rifle.

Edited February 23, 2013 by Dallas

[Victim187 23]

Isn't this what DayZ 2017 for?

But we are talking about stand alone.

[Wut (DayZ) 1]

There is a fine line between difficulty and fun, once a game is to difficult, well then the game is really boring. ( DON'T BREAK MY FAVORITE GAME! )

[OrLoK 16191]

Hello there

Making the game "harder" by nerfing weapons and increasing Infected strength etc, IMHO is not the way to go.

Making the game more "involving" and adding realism to tasks is what will capture the players imagination.

Ie beans. you find a can, great! Now, how do you open it? need a knife or opener, once that's been found, eat the beans raw for less of a health regain or cook em for addend bonuses like warmth? Ok need a fire, so that's kindling and a flame source...

Adding more involvement gives what some players call "harder play" but rather than make it just difficlt and annoying the above "simple" mechanic atomatically adds depth and game time to what was once an easy task, and doesnt penalise those who dont want to go the whole "craft" route.

Rgds

LoK

[DayZChainGang 19]

As someone who's only really gotten going in DayZ with the latest patch and finding it a struggle, the problem seems to be that the gameplay isn't graduated, in many ways the game starts at it's most difficult ( a new player with no weapon and no experience) and gets easier as you develop skills, get gear and learn where the gear is.

I'm not saying it's too difficult now, but I think if the basic elements were much trickier it would definitely put a lot of people off joining in.

Ideally what is needed are some characteristics that develop in a persistent way with a character (like humanity), in effect balancing the basic difficulty of the game with the experience of the player.

I had a few thoughts, based on how other games work it, and taking into account that the game environment needs to remain a level playing field

*give peripheral dots to players for the first few hours of gameplay

*limit poss of infection for the first few hours of gameplay

*a better range of melee weapons of varying quality I.e power & reach, as a gun is actually a bit of liability at first and the hatchet is literally a bit hit and miss

*slow auto-heal/better blood from food for the first few hours of gameplay

*give them a morphine for the first few hours of gameplay

These are only suggestions and I'm not claiming to have all the answers but I suppose my main thought is that for the first few hours any new player is basically trying to learn the controls, how zombies work, where everything is and in particular avoiding PvP.

I don't think it would unbalance the game to give them a leg up particularly if the environment then was made harsher to suit the more experienced player. Otherwise it might risk pulling the drawbridge on new entrants

[Gooner205 10]

I agree with making it harder but i don't think that they should go too overboard with adding things in. take a look at minecraft as an example. that game was ruined ever since they release the full version all because they started adding things in which completely ruined the survival aspect and made it far too boring.

[samazooks 8]

I see a lot on this forum suggestions for making the game harder. People who want their to be barely enough food on the server for a player to scrape by, that zombies should be able to kill in 2 hits, that medical gear be very rare and (I've just read on another post) that zombies can catch you.

I understand making the game more realistic (as much as a fictional event can be realistic) is what some people want, but if a zombie apocalypse was real, WE'D BE DEAD. Most of us would be, you paranoid crazies would be doing just fine ;)

Point being, what would be the point of a game where you have a 90% chance of starving to death 30min after starting the game? Why play if it's impossible not to agro zombies because they can see/hear from far away, and an agro zombie will catch you and kill you? Making the game harder is fine, but I think some people take it too far. In order to be able to survive in this post apocalyptic world, it's going to have to be easier than if an outbreak was real, because there's no point playing a game where you know you're going to die within the hour.

I don't mean for this to sound like an angry rant, and I understand not everyone thinks the game should be impossible to survive, I just don't understand the people who do.

[bracing for shitstorm]

The grappling with Zeds was probably me cause I mean they can run after you and run faster so y can't they catch you? I don't mean they can every time tackle you to the ground and maul you but a small chance they can grab you and bring you down temporarily.

But I do agree don't make the game insanely hard just make it more realistic. But not as realistic that you can act like your in sims or sum thing

[samiboy5 4]

I agree to an extent, the hardcore community is one constant "OMG ITS TOO EASYMODE QQ MAKE IT HARDER" and while I would not mind the game being a bit harder, if they had it the way they wanted it it would be so hard to survive that 90% of the population would leave. That is not a good business decision nor would Rocket want the mod losing a lot of its players after all the work he has put into init and its current success.

There is a difference between realistic and impossibly hard, and there needs to be that cutoff. For everyone trying to make it as realistic as possible, reality sucks. Why else do you think we created video games?

you have a point there, my friend. have some beans :P

[VisionTwelve 24]

You guys want a harder game? DayZ+

Stronger and faster zombies, loot is harder to get. Try it ;)

[OrLoK 16191]

Hello there

Dayz+ whilst it may be a worthy effort is somewhat off tack.

Its not jusT about making the game deliberately harder. it's about making the game deeper and tasks more involved.

Nerfing weapons/loot and buffing zeds/infected is a short term solution.

Eg in vanilla. I find a weapon. I'm all set.

In DAYZ O (my version :) ) One finds a weapon. What condition is it in? does it have any ammo? does it actually have the mag still in place? Is the stock damaged? etc etc etc.

This would make the completion of a main weapon part of the adventure. In DAYZ O you'd become attached to your gear as each part would have a personal backstory for you.

It's adding aspects like this to the game that fleshes it out rather than adding faster harder zeds/Inf. (no disrespect to DAYZ+ btw I talk in general terms)

Rgds

LoK

[Devon206 (DayZ) 77]

I think you should be able to die of thirst in 3 days, but of course most people do not live for more than those...

[EliteSkittle 59]

I agree with what I believe orlock was saying.

Adding more depth to each task, making you WORK for that can of beans and that gun is not making the game worse. It is making it for more rewarding, while more difficult yes, but there is nothing wrong with working for your reward (or others if your a bandit).

But its a suggestion thread at the same time, 99.9% of the suggestions are not going to be implemented or already have been in some way, the standalone will be its own game, that will be a work in progress hopefully I won't starve to death in 30 minutes, but I don't expect it to be easy.