less militarised more improvised

[Leto (DayZ) 72]

Considering how terribly the game handles axes and other melee weapons. I fear for the future of DayZ if the game is to become more about primitive weapons rather than firearms. The Arma2 engine is centered around  guns. 

Edited January 25, 2014 by Leto

[Franchi (DayZ) 146]

It looks like Rocket want to simulate the natural progression of technology after a catastrophic failure in society.

 

First, people will start with high-technology, because it is still in relatively good shape and people can still find parts to maintain what they have.

 

Second, people will start running out of resource to maintain their technology as the corporate infrastructure that produced the parts on the scale necessary for society no longer exists, and the transportation networks are no longer being maintained. This means that technology will become rare, and it will be difficult to take care of. In this period, we would see a lot of tech being lost, and a lot of older much more basic items being used (bows, blades, etc...)

 

Third, there will a resurgence in basic mechanical technologies as people learn how to make things (e.g. how to use basic tools to make complex items), and certain pieces of technology will begin to come back (basic homemade guns, radios, etc...).

 

This is one reason that I would like to see Rocket take Dayz into a Metro 2033 direction in terms of resources, technology, and crafting.

Just north of BZ near the tracks in the lumber mill there are 7 lathes, given that you do not have that many lathes of that size without a mill and more than likley a tracing machine and a broaching machine + assorted tools/machines in one of the nearby and as of yet sealed buildings there is no reason that mecanical technology would roll back at all. Some one would start a compound around that sight, as it already has some good walls, and easy acces to the ocean for food, bring in generators or simply power the machines from a tractor PTO or from a striped rim on the drive wheel of a car held up on jacks, and presto high end manufacturing capabilities restored as for materials to use, given the number of dead versus number of survivors scavenging disabled vehicles and such would produce more than enought to supply the compound wiht all it would need for a long time. Now eventually fuel would probably run out, but by that point finding caned food would never accur, so the game setting isn't there yet.

Edited January 25, 2014 by Franchi

[deepseamk21 11]

We need rope.  Charlie Bronson had rope!

 

Anyways, game should be 75% civilian/improvised weapons, 25% military grade.  Military has an ass ton of stock piled weapons.   So it wouldn't be a huge surprise that a lot of them would fall into survivors hands during the zombie apocalypse.   Remember, there are also civilian versions of weapons.  Who says you can't find an AR-15 in a house?  Sure, it's a lot like it's military counter part but it has only semi-auto capability.  Same with M40A5 and R700.  Different versions of the same gun, one civilian one military.  Obviously the military one has some upgrades such as barrel type and a few other things, but this could be translated into the game so there are still decent guns that are technically "civilian".  Guns can be taken care of pretty easily too.  People were still using stuff like birch oil to clean and lubricate there guns up until WWII, so I don't feel that lack of technology should be a factor in keeping the weapons in game in good condition.  Obviously, ammo would start to become scarce.  Reloads are useless if you don't have the means to manufacture gun powder (salt peter, sulfer, and charcoal is one form of black powder) and staying around to pick up brass doesn't seem the brightest idea.  If one had a enterprising group of people who found a plant that has the needed chemicals and such, one can make more ammo without electricity and such, it would just a long time to mass produce.  Game should be a good balance of end of the world stuff.  Enough time has passed so things are scarce but not enough time has past where everyone has resorted to using sabers and muskets/cannons.

[irl-calibre 744]

You say that but the story line is about as close as you will get to the game. How about having players be infected. If you loot them you may get sick and die or at least be very impaired for a while.

 

i'm expecting the environment to become very punishing interms of infection and exposure to the elements. That being said and done. I still reckon civilisation collapsing is a more interesting proposal than it being gone completely to rust, know what I mean? outbreak rather than broken..

Edited January 25, 2014 by Calibre

[Nebulae3 420]

I'm curious what the rope will be used for in future updates?

Edited January 25, 2014 by Ori42

[Franchi (DayZ) 146]

We need rope.  Charlie Bronson had rope!

 

Anyways, game should be 75% civilian/improvised weapons, 25% military grade.  Military has an ass ton of stock piled weapons.   So it wouldn't be a huge surprise that a lot of them would fall into survivors hands during the zombie apocalypse.   Remember, there are also civilian versions of weapons.  Who says you can't find an AR-15 in a house?  Sure, it's a lot like it's military counter part but it has only semi-auto capability.  Same with M40A5 and R700.  Different versions of the same gun, one civilian one military.  Obviously the military one has some upgrades such as barrel type and a few other things, but this could be translated into the game so there are still decent guns that are technically "civilian".  Guns can be taken care of pretty easily too.  People were still using stuff like birch oil to clean and lubricate there guns up until WWII, so I don't feel that lack of technology should be a factor in keeping the weapons in game in good condition.  Obviously, ammo would start to become scarce.  Reloads are useless if you don't have the means to manufacture gun powder (salt peter, sulfer, and charcoal is one form of black powder) and staying around to pick up brass doesn't seem the brightest idea.  If one had a enterprising group of people who found a plant that has the needed chemicals and such, one can make more ammo without electricity and such, it would just a long time to mass produce.  Game should be a good balance of end of the world stuff.  Enough time has passed so things are scarce but not enough time has past where everyone has resorted to using sabers and muskets/cannons.

Civilization no matter how broken will never go back to muskets, using swords sure, but not muskets, the jump from flint locks to cap and ball to modern cartridges was about inovation and invention, If you have the ability to manufacture a flintlock you have the ability to manufacture a cartridge firing weapon and amunition, the casings might be more primitave  in shape and it might use black powder (think 45-70) but it would be cartridge based

Edited January 25, 2014 by Franchi

[yessaul robinovich 42]

fyi, not bows and spears but all sorts of improvised firearms as well.

 

for example, flare gun.

shoots flare rounds. useful for deploying flares at night. to light an area. 

 

metal scraps (basic resource) + rubber tubing (basic resource) = 'craft flaregun insert' option

 

add 'flaregun insert' to flare gun as attachment = modified flare gun

fires shotgun shells, occupies 4 spaces. even less accurate than sawed-off.

takes some wear/damage with every shotgun shell shot.

 

 

 

Nail Gun - used in construction, fires caseless nail ammo, large mag capacity.

Can be used in construction for boarding-up structures or vehicles.Can be carried in Toolbelt/Box

Nail ammo can be used as weapon. Super short-range and inaccurate.

 

 

 

Use metal scraps (basic resource) on nail gun to modify it into Improvised Pistol, chambered to .22 (same as sks)

Still quite inaccurate and short-range, but there you have a basic firearm with decent mag capacity that can use existing ammo

Takes a small bit of damage with every shot fired on account of not being able to safely handle ammo type.

 

 

Might post this in suggestion forum as well.

Edited January 25, 2014 by yessaul robinovich

[zaphodity (DayZ) 41]

The wisdown of crowds, people know what they like. I'm all for fashioning my own gear and weapons when no military goodies are available, but

this is an apocalyptic shooter, not Home Improvement's Tool Time starring Fred Flinstone and Barney Rubble.

 

As far as 'realism' goes, if there really were zombies running around, they would be annihilated by mother nature within the first month:

 

http://www.cracked.com/article_18683_7-scientific-reasons-zombie-outbreak-would-fail-quickly.html

 

Also, here's some reading material I would recommend, think of the zombie apocalypse, but from the zombies perspective:

 

http://www.amazon.com/I-Zombie-Hugh-Howey/dp/1477401296/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1390685873&sr=8-1&keywords=i+zombie+hugh+howey

 

'I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but the zombie apocalypse will be fought with fire extinguishers an can openers.'

 

- Dean "Rocket" Hall

Edited January 25, 2014 by zaphodity

[Atomizer 53]

So it seems the overarching goal of the game is to remove military grade weapons and use more improvised weapons like bow's and spears.. tbh I really dunno how I feel about that. How do you feel it will effect the game? Lots of the high end weaponry that was in the mod is gone now & tbh I liked when it was in the game, but, if even ar's & rifle's are going to go as well, I probably will too. I couldn't be arsed running round like a bunch of angry farmers with shotguns or Neanderthals with spears  and bow's..

No, they are not removing military grade weapons, this is not the mod, the only military weapon in right now is the m4, so they have not "removed" anything, and don't intend to remove the m4, they will be more rare most likely, but they will still be there, and more to come, as far as I know, the SKS is "military", and will be added in the next patch, also, as of yet, there is no improvised weapons, just civilian and military, improvised weapons will just be easier to obtain, but it won't be the focus.

 

Now, compared to the mod, there might not be all the same weapons, but definitely no shortage of guns, with military guns included, and there will be MORE then the mod had.

 

In short: m4 is here to stay, the AK(not sure which one, I think it was the AK-74?) will be added, and there will be more rifles and assault rifles added later on, along with various handguns and smgs, both military and civilian.

[zaphodity (DayZ) 41]

You say that but the story line is about as close as you will get to the game. How about having players be infected. If you loot them you may get sick and die or at least be very impaired for a while.

 

Now ya talkin'. I understand Dean's going for the whole breakdown of society thing here, but one of the reasons we human beings

are on the top of the food chain, is because we are incredibly talented at finding ingenius new ways to kill things. I don't think they would involve

just bows and arrows. We have survived 2 world wars, multiple tornadoes, 2 atomic explosions, the black death, AIDS, Justin Bieber, the list goes on and on....

 

I think the only thing that can wipe out the human race, is the human race.

 

Don't want none unless you got guns hon'.

Edited January 25, 2014 by zaphodity

[irl-calibre 744]

I think we can take it as read that the risk of infection is going to become great and the environment harsh.

[Rec0n412 9]

To quote Franchi: " There is no reason mechanical technology would roll back at all."

 

That facility would fall apart and decay extraordinarily quickly due to 3 big things:

1 - Everybody is going to want a piece of that facility, and people may decide that if they can't have access to those resources then no one can (this has happened a lot in history).

2 - No one is producing replacement parts for those lathes, and there does not appear to be all that much in the way of easy methods to machine parts for those lathes in Chernhaus.

3 - No readily available electricity in the large amounts necessary to power that equipment.

 

With those three things in mind, I would say that the ability to use and maintain complex machines would disappear quickly. People would very quickly be reduced to very basic technology until enough time had gone by for people organize, begin setting up resource collecting operations (mining, wood-cutting, metallurgy, etc...), and to begin producing more complex things.

 

Edit: also, why the hell is the quote feature not working for me?

Edited January 25, 2014 by Rec0n412

[Timecharge 28]

if there was only 40 people max remaining? Depends how much military stockpile was left behind but I dont see why not

 

This is one area of the world, chances are that most people who had military weapons took their weapons with them and didn't leave them behind. To my knowledge the ones that we are finding are the weapons that were left behind. Secondly, there is more than enough ammo for these guns laying around if they had a bunch of military weapons a lot of people would probably have them but not many people would have the ammo for them. I am surprised that there is as much ammo as there is and it should probably be nerfed (why would people leave all that ammo behind? it isn't hard to carry around) 

[Timecharge 28]

For all of these really weak close-range weapons people are suggesting what is the benefit of using one of them, over a 1-2 shot kill fire axe?

[yessaul robinovich 42]

Considering how terribly the game handles axes and other melee weapons. I fear for the future of DayZ if the game is to become more about primitive weapons rather than firearms. The Arma2 engine is centered around  guns. 

 

It has been acknowledged that the melee system requires some kind of a comprehensive rework that could be best expressed through a struggle/grapple mechanic rather than getting into computation-heavy accuracy and blocking/parry stuff.  It goes without saying that running around like headless chicken awkwardly repeating the same swing animation for your axe is not the best reflection of melee combat or how it could go down.. but some kind of a mechanic allowing you to run up to someone and get a knife around their throat/stab them in the back/tackle them with a melee weapon up close... this is something that would both provide more depth to using melee weapons as well as give some advantage to employing them in situations against those equipped with firearms. 

 

Basic reaction minigames on gun vs melee weapon in hand to hand struggle with different modifiers given to diff. melee weapons..etc

Also things like riot shield that, when equipped in hands, prevent a melee-equipped character from grappling with someone protected this way. Also prevent possibility of being back-stabbed when stowed on the back.

[yessaul robinovich 42]

 but this is an apocalyptic shooter, not Home Improvement's Tool Time starring Fred Flinstone and Barney Rubble.

 

 

 

Right now there are few zombies for technical reasons. Desired entity population is something like 10 thousand. Server population limits are rising and the map could easily support a few hundred players, which it eventually will as more robust server instances/private hives kick in. With the number of zombies dramatically higher, shooting will come with the uncomfortable reality of suddenly having more aggressors than available ammunition. Also, there being far fewer firearms than people wanting to use them..

 

anyway, tl;dr version for you: this is not a shooter. this is a survival simulation, currently reduced to being played as a shooter by the COD crowd, courtesy 'public hive' architecture that lets you gear on a lowpop server than then 'hunt' on high pop. This is coming to an end, and i imagine you'll be going to play something else when it does.

Edited January 25, 2014 by yessaul robinovich

[Franchi (DayZ) 146]

To quote Franchi: " There is no reason mechanical technology would roll back at all."

 

That facility would fall apart and decay extraordinarily quickly due to 3 big things:

1 - Everybody is going to want a piece of that facility, and people may decide that if they can't have access to those resources then no one can (this has happened a lot in history).

2 - No one is producing replacement parts for those lathes, and there does not appear to be all that much in the way of easy methods to machine parts for those lathes in Chernhaus.

3 - No readily available electricity in the large amounts necessary to power that equipment.

 

With those three things in mind, I would say that the ability to use and maintain complex machines would disappear quickly. People would very quickly be reduced to very basic technology until enough time had gone by for people organize, begin setting up resource collecting operations (mining, wood-cutting, metallurgy, etc...), and to begin producing more complex things.

 

Edit: also, why the hell is the quote feature not working for me?

Yes people may well destroy them while fighting over them, that is your only valid point here.

As for wear and tear on a lathe, I have a lathe about the size the ones in game are in my shop 18x48. Mine was built in 1941, was likley in near continuous production for the entirety of WW2 (goverment ownership tags) then was owned by two seperate schools (again tags confirm this) was then owned by atleast one previous owner (the guy I bought it from) and it is still perfectly functional and precise. I also have a mill of similar heritage (minus the schools) and it is similarly functional.  If you have a lathe, mill and broaching machine you can make just about any part for any of the machines if you have the right metal, as there are SEVEN large lathes there should be atleast 3-4 mills and broachers/tracers if you cannot find the right metal to replace a part then canabalize that machine for the others.

 

I also own an Onan generator that can power all of my machines at the same time, its not much bigger than my gas powered Bobcat welder. And like I said you can remove the drive motor from a lathe and use anything that develops rotational force of sufficient torque in conjunction with belts and wheels or chains and gears to power the machines you see lathes/mills converted from electrical to gas powered in Amish shops all the time.

 

 

Keep in mind the zombies will not be out there forever, they will get killed off you shouldn't have to put in all the effort of surviving the zombie apocalypse and mainaining the equipment for more than a few years once you can move freely again it becomes a matter of getting the power water and gas flowing in a world that now features far fewer people competeing for the resources .

Edited January 25, 2014 by Franchi

[katasen 4]

son I was pwning in CS when you were probably still sucking on your ma's tit, now fuck off if you have nothing constructive to add.. toodles..

i dont think so mate ;)

[drsheepbringer 10]

Well this game surely isn't about shooting nor being a shooter, but killing stuff is. I mean whatever happens you still KILL zombies. So i'm hoping that eventually one can build/rig stuff that will kill, but won't always be a weapon. With this I mean traps etc.

 

I mean if we get sleeping (probably not, but that's how I would like to solve the combat logging) then it would be wise to boobytrap the door at the house you are sleeping, or cave etc.

 

But anways I'm all for improvised and keeping military gear really really rare.

[Whyherro123 2283]

Civilization no matter how broken will never go back to muskets, using swords sure, but not muskets, the jump from flint locks to cap and ball to modern cartridges was about inovation and invention, If you have the ability to manufacture a flintlock you have the ability to manufacture a cartridge firing weapon and amunition, the casings might be more primitave  in shape and it might use black powder (think 45-70) but it would be cartridge based

Not necessarily. Percussion caps require at least some chemistry knowledge, alongside the actual chemical materials, things which would be extremely hard to find in a collapse-of-society scenario.

In all honesty, a flintlock blackpowder musket would be a very effective survival weapon. You can, with only a little chemistry know-how, make blackpowder at home with materials around the house. Musket balls can be made from melted-down tire weights.  You can even use it as a psuedo-shotgun, as it will fire literally anything that will fit down the barrel. The only thing is, you won't be making 400+m shots with a musket, but within 100 or so meters, the accuracy of a musket is often surprisingly good.

 

And that is only a musket. If you have access to a lathe, you can make a blackpowder rifle (think the US Civil War). As accurate as modern rifles, with the same ease of ammunition and powder as a musket. In fact, they can be reloaded much faster, as you can pretty much drop a Minie ball down the barrel.

So, don't automatically disown blackpowder "primitive" weapons. They still are used nowadays for a reason.

[Franchi (DayZ) 146]

Not necessarily. Percussion caps require at least some chemistry knowledge, alongside the actual chemical materials, things which would be extremely hard to find in a collapse-of-society scenario.

In all honesty, a flintlock blackpowder musket would be a very effective survival weapon. You can, with only a little chemistry know-how, make blackpowder at home with materials around the house. Musket balls can be made from melted-down tire weights.  You can even use it as a psuedo-shotgun, as it will fire literally anything that will fit down the barrel. The only thing is, you won't be making 400+m shots with a musket, but within 100 or so meters, the accuracy of a musket is often surprisingly good.

 

And that is only a musket. If you have access to a lathe, you can make a blackpowder rifle (think the US Civil War). As accurate as modern rifles, with the same ease of ammunition and powder as a musket. In fact, they can be reloaded much faster, as you can pretty much drop a Minie ball down the barrel.

So, don't automatically disown blackpowder "primitive" weapons. They still are used nowadays for a reason.

Primitive weapons are in use now days to alow hunters to hunt during special seasons, in most cases an inline fireing system using a modern primer (most commonly a shotgun primer) is used to insure fast ignition thus corecting the main problem with matchlock, wheellock and flintlock firearms, the ignition source was droped, and then you had to wait for ignition.

 

If you can "drop a mini ball down the barrel" then you have a nearly worthless weapon, it will be horrifically inaccurate and incredibly underpowered. Minie balls are slightly smaller than the barrel they fit in and still require raming.

 

Making a contact explosive suitble for a primer IS NOT DIFFICULT, and just like blak powder they can be made form things found around, or outside a house. Making them safley is a bit more difficult, and is rather illigal in many cases, however in an end of the world situation who, pray tell, is going to arrest someone doing it?

 

Now manufacturing the casing is as I stated a bit more complex, hence why the first post apocalypse weapons would likley be more in line with previous more primitive case designs like the 45-70 and 32 rimfire.

 

Just so you understand where I am coming from on this I went to college to learn how to build guns, literaly attended a school where the entire curiculum was firearm maitnance, repair, modification and manufacture.

Edited January 27, 2014 by Franchi