Basic Gamechanges that changes gameplay to more realism

[Cpt.Spaghetti 1]

Dear Dayz devteam,

I’ve got many suggestion how you could improve gameplay and realism. Most of them for the SA-version. I inspired myself by The Walking Dead, probably pretty obvious since it's an awesome series. English isn’t my mother tongue so please be patient. Unfortunately I can’t summaries my suggestions in little sentence because they stay in context with each other.

Overview

1. Zombie Movement
   
   
2. Smell
   
   
3. Zombie Noise
   
   
4. Zombie behavior in General and Killing
   
   
5. Zombie Virus
   
   
6. Skills
   
   
7. Character Movement/ 3^rd Person
   
   
8. Weapons
   
   
9. Story
   
   
10. Day Night cicle
    
    
11. Hallucination
    
    
12. Cities and houses
    
    
13. Server Hopping /Log out
    
    
14. Final Conclusion
    

First off: one thing that killed the atmosphere of Dayz for me is that zombies are way too weak or bugged. They should even be a threat for experienced player. Also really bad is the gamma setting in Arma2 that destroyed gameplay fun totally when I found out about it because I played mostly at night. Here are some of my ideas how basic game changes could change the gameplay a lot:

• Zombie Movement
  

In my opinion zombies should move slower and only if they manage to approach closely they start to move faster but not super-fast as it is now, more like jogging. Also the closer they are, the faster they get. A comparison to nature; an animal that hunts usually sneaks slowly from far away and if they think the target is close enough they start run or hit fast. Zombies should also have different speed parameters because some zombies are more injured than others and therefor can’t run fast. They should also get attracted by flashlight and all other sources of light like fire etc.

Also consider this suggestion that fits well with mine:

http://dayzmod.com/f...ie-ai-proposal/

I think when you do noise the zombies should not run because noise isn’t equal to meet. They run only on sight (even if they lost sight for a short period) and are very close. Trees and bushes shouldn’t make you invulnerable that’s very dump I hope they can fix that in the SA.

Now you think I might be a tard because I stated earlier that zombies are too weak and now I suggest making them slower, wtf. Well that needs to be compensated. There need to be more zombies. They also should be clustered sometimes. In some parts of a city there might be almost no zombie while somewhere else there might be a lot. I heard that they will implement zombie hordes, that’s nice to hear but in city’s zombies should not be even distributed as well. Also on rare occasions you might meet random zombies in forests or even groups. Also my next suggestions will make zombies stronger.

• Smell
  

Zombies can hear and see, why not smell as well? That’s probably one of the most important sense to improve gameplay drastically in my opinion. If you enter a city/village, some (not every!) zombies should smell you and walk slowly towards your position. That means, if you stay in a house or camp somewhere zombies will find you, even if they don’t see and hear you. If possible the Devs could implement wind and therefor it can matter from what side you enter the city. This could tactically be pretty interesting and you are always in danger especially the longer you stay at a certain area.

To prevent zombies to smell you, you have to cover yourself in zombie-meet from a dead body. Negative side effect for this could be, that you get sick faster or something else, haven’t thought that completely.

• Zombies noise
  

Since I heard that there will be random zombies there is one more thing to add. Zombies have to have different sound effects and different volume. Some zombies shouldn’t nearly be heard if they haven’t got agro of a player. That would scary me more because you never know if there is a zombie around the corner or in a house.

• Zombie Behavior in General and Killing
  

By the way importance of the Zombie sense: Smell < Hearing < Sight/Vision

In General zombies should move slowly even if they see, hear or smell you. But they can attract each other and encircle you if don’t pay attention. Only if they come close (like 10-20 meters) they start getting faster. Zombies should only die if you destroy their heads (or reduce body damage strongly); right now in the mod this isn’t possible because zombies are way too fast. Another thing you could do is implement zombies that look dead but aren’t in fact (especially in buildings is this very creepy).

• Zombie Virus
  

If a zombie hits you, there should be a very high chance (maybe around 70%) that you got injured and you will unfortunately turn slowly into a zombie. To prevent that from happen your teammates or yourself should try to find the rare antivirus. The player itself should not know when he will turn into a zombie. That means it can take an hour or more until you become one, it also depends on how hard the zombie has hit you but is still random. Those zombies should be faster and stronger than regular zombies since they are still very fit and therefor more dangerous. If the group is looking for an antivirus and you have to stay with them closely because you can’t see properly when you are injured you might kill your mates. Therefor your teammates have to decide if they want to help you and risk their own life or basically kill you.

To prevent people from just logging off and wait until a mate got his antivirus he should still die even logged off after the random time past.

• Skills
  

In most games you gain levels or skill points. In Dayz I suggest something similar. For example if you run a lot with time come by you can run longer and slightly faster. If you carry a lot you can carry more. If light lots of fire, you will light faster and better and warmer fire. Same with shooting; if you aim and shoot anywhere you will get better and much more things. I suggest this only because right now there isn’t much to lose when you die if teammates protect your dead body and you can just go and grab your stuff. Basically if you die you lose your skills.

• Character movement/3^rd Person
  

Well this is for sure suggested before but I need it in context with the rest. Your character shouldn’t be able to run fast forever. Maybe one minute he can run fast after that he has to run slower (jogging). Zombie speed if very close should something be in between your fast running and slower running.

I also don’t understand why they implemented 3^rd Person. It takes lots of realism away and isn’t needed at all I think. I mean in reality if I hide in the grass I can’t just look around very far without having the risk to get discovered. I also think it’s awesome how the world gets blurry when run in first person. It makes it harder to see.

• Weapons
  

Add more shot, close-combat and handguns. Remove some of the rifles. To what I read, I think that’s going to be done anyways. A little suggestion to add, mounted weapons on pickups would be nice and this:

http://dayzmod.com/f...eable-vehicles/

Pls don’t implement hair cross, really not needed in a zombie simulation where shooting is secondary (you still can aim by clicking right button). I know there are different settings for servers but this sucks. Everyone should be forced to play the same game mode. Easy mode settings destroy the whole flair of the game. I mean in reality if you shoot and don’t aim you hit nothing or need lots of bullets to luckily hit, why should that be different in a game, I really don’t understand this? With that change even slow zombies at higher number can get very dangerous. Anyways next point.

• Story
  

Well in Dayz there is no story and that’s fine but how about you add some background info’s which you can find out through notes and cassettes, radio announcements, cries for help etc. (maybe also players can record on cassettes themself they should be rare thou). For example; what happened to a certain area and why. So people can find hints that might also help them to survive. This could also help new players. This suggestion might add a bit more deepness.

• Day and Night cicle
  

This shouldn’t be 24 hours because if you stay on a server and always play at evenings you remain at the same day cicle right now for all time, this is boring. I suggest a 20 hour cicle or something close to that. In addition you could add something to the story board to why it is 20 hours. It could be because a meteorite crashed onto the earth and changed the day and night cycle as well as it might have released the zombie virus. What ever J

• Hallucination
  

Something I came across might be hallucinations. If you are injured or got a bad cold you see or hear none existing things. This might add an eerie effect. Mega creepy

• Cities Houses and landscape
  

In bigger cities I wish there would be more narrow backstreets. Houses should be closer to each other, just less space to escape. But in addition I think houses should be entered through bigger windows. Breaking window glass should create loud noise though. I would also like to see some of the smaller villages a bit bigger, just slightly.

I also would like to have more cliffs where you can die. Right now it's like: "lol noob walks around with flashlight or flares", this shouldn't be the way. Walking around without proper light should be punished that way or with another way, dont care.

• Logging out and Server Hopping
  

In the SA version log out shouldn’t be instant. You have to wait a minute.

If you change server why doesn’t the system put you on a random spot at the starting coast? You should also lose all your tents and other saves on the previous server, it just ports the things you carry with you. This is an easy and fair way to handle server hopping and should be implemented asap.

I know it’s bit long and some of the stuff I mentioned was already suggested but never in context with other suggestion therefor I had to mention it as well because I don’t think everyone has read the whole suggestion forum.

• Final Conclusion
  

I don’t know if those changes make the game harder for experienced players but I hope it makes it less interesting to wait and snipe innocent players. In my opinion experienced player should fear zombies almost as much as new players. It shouldn’t be that you need lots of skills (like aiming) to survive but mainly people that are carefully and like to play with others should have an advantage. If the devs can approach to that state then they have done a very good job. Otherwise the game gets boring and becomes a sniper fun fest. Then I play rather BF3 or other shooters.

By the way, most of the changes stay in context with each other as I stated before. I mean if you would just implement the smell and let the zombies behave as now, it would be very imbalanced and hard to survive.

Now discuss

[joe_mcentire 2073]

well...i know there a recently many new ppl around here....

BUT

why don't you use just the search bar and contribute on already existing threads!? it is really a shame. you put much effort into it, unfortunately many won't read it i can imagine.

Everything , really everything was mentioned at least 500x times. THREADS LIKE THESE ANNOY, at least me.

I'm sorry.

edit: There are threads worth to be continued! search the phrase and at least go to page 5 of your results! PLEASE!

Edited March 1, 2013 by joe_mcentire

[Cpt.Spaghetti 1]

well you dont see what i try to say; all this suggestion might have been statet at least once but i dont think anybody has put them together. For example if zombies just move slower, than the game gets even more boring but what if they move slower but there are more and they can smell etc. I would not have mentioned one of the ideas above a part from each other.

Edited March 1, 2013 by Cpt.Spaghetti

[Allie (DayZ) 97]

NO 3rd person and realistic bullet damage. All is fixed.

[hogscraper 328]

I like the hallucination from illness. If you get a cold and that turns into a fever, high tmeperatures could cause them.

I also like the twenty hour or at least a reduced day/night cycle. With what you have now some players have no choice but to be eternally in day or night. By the time I get off of work I can either play with 200 pings or at night. While night doesn't really bother me by itself it starts to suck when thats all you see. Its also one of the reasons I play only on private hives.