Make survival harder, less food and water

[agentneo 337]

Hi I just wanted to give my feedback as a Day Z fan and played the Standalone for about 50 hours now.

During the first few hours I really enjoyed the sparse, deserted landscape and finding supplies was difficult. However, now I think food and drink particulary is far too easy to come across. I think spawn rate needs reducing quickly. With the amount of streams/ wells around it is very easy to never be dehydrated. In apocalyptic situation with all the viruses and dead bodies around, I think the wells/streams/ lakes should have a chance of infecting people, like in the mod where you had to boil them.

 

Dead zombies might have fallen in or the water could be poisoned, either way its too easy to never be thirsty. I think food and drink should be hard to come across in an apocalypse. And the servers don't even have loot respawn yet. Most people say you can get fully geared up in an hour or so. I don't think its that easy but it is getting close.

 

So when we get animals, hunting and loot respawning, it seems hunger and thirst will be easy to keep not even a problem. In my current character I have 4 canteens and about 6 cans of food that I keep topping up. I didn't find it particulary challenging and I've never died of thirst or hunger, even with only 6 months experience gaming on PC and Day Z.

 

I would hope they will already be implementing the chance of getting sick/infected from drinking from wells, streams or lakes at some point. I know the cooking system is nearly ready?

Also I have suffered no bad side effects from eating badly damaged or red condition food (other than fruit) so maybe these need a chance of not satisfying hunger or slight illness/vomiting.

 

I think food should spawn about 50% less than it does currently. Especially with the loot respawning coming in at some time. This would also free up some space for spawning more zombies, which I know are coming at some point.

So feedback from me please make it harder. When cooking system is in would like to see all water (thats not boiled first) has a 50/50 chance of infection/ sickness. So you can only drink boiled water/ cans of pop. And less food, more zombies. Sorry if this has already been said I have searched for threads about it been too easy and couldn't find.

 

 

 

 

[Lady Kyrah 1110]

It would definitely make more sense for players to die of hunger more often than from a bullet.

[BFG77 3]

Well keep in mind that the server capacity is going to go up. Also my thinking is that food will be relativly easy to obtain in cities, if you avoid the masses of zombies  :) . Definitly something that has to be adjusted though, as it is too easy at the moment.

[djporternz 644]

Well keep in mind that the server capacity is going to go up. Also my thinking is that food will be relativly easy to obtain in cities, if you avoid the masses of zombies  :) . Definitly something that has to be adjusted though, as it is too easy at the moment.

Yep. Once you get 60~80+ people on a single server, and they can't insta-magi-jump spawns like they can now, you'll see a lot more whiney posts here about the food situation. Foodwise we're playing on easy mode ATM. (But I'll take all the help I can get!)

 

Unlimited water at the pumps should stay, IMHO. It is 100% safe to drink, and is the only thing in game that forces you to come out of the woods. Water purification tablets are still pretty rare.

Edited January 14, 2014 by DJPorterNZ

[Gdaddy22 299]

Food and water is too easy to find, you can find cans of food and drink in almost EVERY house. If we will keep it this way nobody will ever want to hunt, because it will make no sense since you will have to waste your time, bullets or arrows while you can just run to a house and load your backpack with food till it's full. 

 

Hunting and gathering should be the main source of food, rivers and ponds should be the main source of water, and house food should be very rare.

[Roshi (DayZ) 397]

Totally for limiting food/water spawns but think this might be and alpha/balancing issue.

[gangrenetvp 74]

I think balancing should be something more for the beta, let's get all of the gear in at high levels for now so we can test all the mechanics... cooking, hunting, etc... as they come out. Once it is all put together and the game is developed... then we can worry about balancing the game... this isn't the game right now, it's testing. 

[wolfstriked 143]

Rarer food and drink can really add to the feel of a world that has been stripped of its food supply and humanity is on the brink of extinction but the system they have made in the SA,where you must eat a ton of food to regain health,would not work then.You will have people who get shot and then must hide for ages searching for non-existant food sources to replenish health wherein most players of Dayz just wanna have gun battles with some survival aspects thrown in and will crash the forums with complaints.I posted in past of a system that seperates the survival aspect from the gunplay and feel that would be the only way to have a post apocalyptic feel in a game where people will be shooting everyone they come across.Increase the time to death from food to a whole day real time and leave the dehydration the same.Then change the medkits so that they allow people to fix themselves up after a battle to where their health is back to full.....with a twist that it takes a certain amount of time after doing the surgical work for the health to replenish.

 

 

Also,IMO we should be forced to eat rotten fruits,moldy cereal boxes etc occasionaly with the consequence being a doubled food/drink requierment for a few hours.The spoiled food and drink though should give half its normal hunger/thirst replenishment with a percentage chance that you will get sick from it as animals do have ability to eat rotten foods with no ill effects.So player starts to vomit to signal that health replenishment will be very hard for a good while.Getting sick in an apocalypse,with food very scarce and you pissing and shitting fluids and nutrients,should mean certain death as now you have to find food and drink at twice the rate and food is very scarce to come by. ;) Last resort deal or better hope you find some meds then.

[Contriturate 5]

I'm sure that as they add more items, many of the food spawns will be replaced by item spawns. As of right now I think we have a sufficient, if not a bit too much food, but I'm sure the number of food will be depleted as the game progresses.

[Capo 323]

part of balancing the alpha, but yeah i'm with you, i've got about 10 cans of food in my pack that i don't need. They've got early game right, as finding food on a high population server on the east coast is pretty hard as freshy, but once you've gotten over that hill you're set, if the entire map was like that, hunting would be a necessity. 

 

I'm keen for water contamination to be reintroduced, yesterday as i was drinking from a ditch west of lopatino, i realized that:

A. i'm not the only one going to ditches and guzzling 15 drinks

B. If i did that in real life i'd have some intense squits. 

 

so water is gonna become alot harder. 

[agentneo 337]

thanks for the comments guys. Yes I know its alpha and things will be balanced later. I just wanted to throw my feedback out there as thats what the forum is for and its quite an easy tweak to reduce food / drink spawns. I just heard all about Rocket wanting the Standalone to reflect the 'hardcore' days of the mod and I was hoping it would be very challenging to stay alive.
 

I've heard a few other people on my friends list say its too easy as well. When we get more zombies, and increase players per server, that should help slightly. But from 40/40 players to 60 or even 100 isn't that far of a stretch. With the amount of food I have found , having twice as many players, so maybe half as much food available, well it still wouldn't be that difficult to gather, especially with hunting, and loot respawning which will be enabled soon I think.

 

I guess the wells should technically and realisticlty be clean and drinkable. However streams /ponds and all water should have to boiled just for balance reasons. There are wells in nearly every little farm town, streams everywhere. You barely need to collect Sodas or canteens at this point because you can spam drink at a well and then be full for hours. is there even a punishment for over-drinking? I know he says my stomach is full and then can vomit if you keep doing it. But there doesn't seem to be a penalty? Like make him not able to sprint for 5 minutes if you over-drink or need to sit down.

 

Just thinking of ways to make it more challenging. I hope this is already all under control, and its alpha early days etc.

I just want to make sure my voice was heard and same goes for my friends that I play with., everyone says its too easy to me. More challenging survival is more rewarding and might help to encourage team work.

 

I am really looking forward to the next updates and very grateful to development team. Enjoying Standalone a lot over christmas holidays and will be playing regulary as we go through into Beta. :)

[agentneo 337]

Rarer food and drink can really add to the feel of a world that has been stripped of its food supply and humanity is on the brink of extinction but the system they have made in the SA,where you must eat a ton of food to regain health,would not work then.You will have people who get shot and then must hide for ages searching for non-existant food sources to replenish health wherein most players of Dayz just wanna have gun battles with some survival aspects thrown in and will crash the forums with complaints.I posted in past of a system that seperates the survival aspect from the gunplay and feel that would be the only way to have a post apocalyptic feel in a game where people will be shooting everyone they come across.Increase the time to death from food to a whole day real time and leave the dehydration the same.Then change the medkits so that they allow people to fix themselves up after a battle to where their health is back to full.....with a twist that it takes a certain amount of time after doing the surgical work for the health to replenish.

 

 

Also,IMO we should be forced to eat rotten fruits,moldy cereal boxes etc occasionaly with the consequence being a doubled food/drink requierment for a few hours.The spoiled food and drink though should give half its normal hunger/thirst replenishment with a percentage chance that you will get sick from it as animals do have ability to eat rotten foods with no ill effects.So player starts to vomit to signal that health replenishment will be very hard for a good while.Getting sick in an apocalypse,with food very scarce and you pissing and shitting fluids and nutrients,should mean certain death as now you have to find food and drink at twice the rate and food is very scarce to come by. ;) Last resort deal or better hope you find some meds then.

Honestly you can already recover your health instantly by using the IV drip thing or a blood bag. Filling yourself up only takes a few items and spamming drink at a well. you don't need to eat a ton. Most ailements have a specific cure- tablets, anti biotics, only food for lost blood, whereby the IV saline would be more efficient.

Also the fact that most players want to have gun battles with survivor elements isn't really what Day Z standalone is about , to be honest it IS a survival game with gun battles thrown in, or whatever you want thrown in, the majority of the community been selfish bandits who mostly like to troll each other, well we shouldn't cater the game towards them,. we should aim for a realistic survival zombie apocalypse, that you can do whatever you want in. In my opinion. We shouldnt aim for that sort of game just because there is a popular 'bandit' style associated with Day Z. thanks