DayZ SA is already becoming too damn easy

[Keudn 8]

I know I'm going to get A LOT of flak for this, but the SA is too damn easy to find loot. Part of that is because people are learning where to find the loot now, which is a separate issue because we should always be kept guessing as to where the loot is. If we can say that building has shit spawns and pass to a better one then there is an issue. But the other part is that if DayZ is supposed to be set months after the apocalypse started, then loot, especially guns and ammo, should be HARD to find.

 

Food

You should have to almost completely live off of food that you hunt and kill or scavenge in the wild. Now I know that hunting hasn't really even been implemented yet, and so food and drink spawns have to be raised so people can actually live, but once hunting is a viable option, I think food and loot spawns should decrease to almost zero. There should be next to nothing in any places since people would have grabbed all the food they can carry when the outbreak occurred. 

Supplies

Supplies that are of little value should still be at least common because most people would have filled their backpacks with more important items during the first days of the outbreak. But supplies like med kits and melee weapons like hammers or axes should be nearly non existent. People would have taken theirs with them, or even if they left them scavengers coming through a couple weeks after the outbreak would have picked clean any of the last supplies. If you find a med kit you should be rich in medical supplies. It is way to easy to find medical if you leave med kits because you already have three.

 

Weapons

Weapons, especially primary weapons, should be EXTREMELY RARE. There should only be a handful on the entire map. Any rifle would have been grabbed days after the apocalypse, and you think there should be rifles aplenty months after? Fat chance. The chances of finding a military weapon should be .00000000000001%. There should be less than 20 or 30 military weapons throughout ALL THE SERVERS. The only weapons left should be a simple hunting rifle, probably a small .22 or .223. The weapons that do spawn should 99.9% of the time be close to not working at all and should jam quite often. All the good working guns should been picked clean, leaving only the rusting piles of garbage left for you and me. I will get to cleaning those guns in a bit, but I first want to talk about secondaries. Secondaries should be slightly more common, but should be found in hard to reach places or under beds and such. They are much smaller, and could be hidden in a house better than a rifle, raising their chances of staying hidden from scavengers. Most should be in bad condition, but the well hidden ones should be in better condition, and if you are reallyyyy lucky, perfect condition.

 

Gun cleaning

To clean the guns, gun cleaning kits should help keep them from jamming, but those should be very rare too. It would be nice to see a makeshift gun cleaning kit implemented that uses a rag and a stick to clean the barrel, but doesn't do as good of a job as an actual kit. I would LOVE to see an actual mechanism for the player having to disassemble the gun and have a UI with the gun parts that they have to clean and reassemble, and the better they do the better condition the gun is in, but I seriously doubt that will happen. I think it would be absolutely AWESOME, and would teach people that guns do need care to keep working properly and people who are smart and take care of their gun should have an advantage against people who just pick up a gun and shoot. I can see the people freaking out in the comments already, so I think including books that spawn that have illustrations on how to clean a specific gun would be a good idea if that was implemented. 

 

Ammo

Ammo should be REALLYYYYY hard to find, and if you do it should be in very low quantities. The only ammo left should be a couple bullets here, and a couple of bullets there. It should take you a couple hours to find enough bullets to fill a 30 round mag. All this bullshit of finding 60 round mags full and being able to fill an ammo box just by checking the buildings at balota once is shit. If the spawns aren't lowered, I can see the SA becoming what the mod was, where you can get all the gear you will ever need by checking only the good buildings in Elektro once. You should have to spend DAYS collecting loot, then maybe people would care more about their loot and would be more cautious about firing away when they see someone, which gets me to my last point.

 

Loot destruction

I agree 100% with the idea that if you shoot someone in the chest, any items in pockets in their shirt should be broken, but ONLY if the bullets actually hit the area with the pockets! Every single person I kill has EVERY PIECE OF LOOT DESTROYED. I don't know if this mechanic is broken right now or what, but no matter WHERE I hit them, ALL their loot is broken. And fixing it to the point where if you hit their shirt, all the loot in that shirt is destroyed doesn't cut it either. This mechanic, while broken or not, doesn't remove the shoot on sight mentality. It may lower it a bit for someone who is desperate for supplies to hold someone up rather than shoot them, but 90% of the time people will blow you away just to get rid of you and to neutralize the threat. What we need is for the clothing that you wear to have some kind of invisible marker on them that marks the pockets, so that when a bullet hits that area only the items IN THAT POCKET are destroyed. I get that if you fill their backpack full of lead that there won't be anything worth salvaging from their backpack, but come on. When I hit their arm and they have a long sleeve shirt it destroys everything in their WHOLE ENTIRE SHIRT. This can't and shouldn't happen, and I really really really hope that they fix this issue.

 

I can hear the comments freaking out already, and they are saying OMG YOU CAN'T MAKE IT THIS REALISTIC, ITS A GAME ITS MEANT TO BE FUN. And I say to that, if you want a game with a realistic combat system but a bountiful supply of weapons play Arma 2. DayZ is meant to be a SURVIVAL SIMULATOR, it is not supposed to be any old GAME. It is meant to mimic what would happen in real life, it isn't meant to be fun. There will be times when you loose four days worth of loot to some idiot with a revolver, but that is life, shit happens. The people who play the game tactically and take a great deal of caution should be rewarded, and the people who run in guns blazing should be killed left and right. Life months after an apocalypse should be FUCKING HARD. You should have to hunt for food more than eat left over food found in buildings. You should be considered rich if you have a full 30 round mag for your M4. It should be common to only get a revolver with 6 bullets. When people have that much ammo, they will probably think twice about attacking someone they see right away. They don't know how many people are with you, and they don't know if they have enough bullets to kill all of you either. If you REALLY do want the kill on sight mentality to stop, don't make loot be destroyed when you are shot, make the attackers life worth enough to them where they may reconsider the idea in the first place. If someone spent 3 days collecting a revolver and 3 bullets, they probably won't kill you on sight unless they are REALLY stupid. Their gun probably is in bad condition and could jam on them, there could be more than one person, and who knows what else could happen. They spent so many hours collecting what they have, they would have to be suicidal to attempt attacking you unless they absolutely had to. 

 

[Bash Arkin 266]

 

 

 

 

 

...i do agree however.

[rickyspanish 158]

I agree with most of your points 100% but it's in alpha so hopefully things will change once there's more items (less likely to find the items you need and much more crap) more guns would also mean more ammo types making it harder to find the ammo you want, basically I agree but theres alot more time for improvement.

[KerrSG1 113]

 If you REALLY do want the kill on sight mentality to stop, don't make loot be destroyed when you are shot, make the attackers life worth enough to them where they may reconsider the idea in the first place. If someone spent 3 days collecting a revolver and 3 bullets, they probably won't kill you on sight unless they are REALLY stupid. Their gun probably is in bad condition and could jam on them, there could be more than one person, and who knows what else could happen. They spent so many hours collecting what they have, they would have to be suicidal to attempt attacking you unless they absolutely had to. 

 

First, you kind of out yourself calling it 'loot'  Loot implies your intention is to kill people to take their things, to 'loot' their body.  Instead, try calling it gear.  Gear can belong to someone else, when you call something 'loot' you imply it belongs to YOU.

 

Second, no, gear being damaged by attacking a person should occur, it just seems to occur much more than it should.

[monolith1985 109]

i agree on some points to an extent, but making everything almost non existent is kinda dumb.  I mean there is meant to be thousands of zombies on the map, which would make a pretty sizeable population, therefore assuming most people didnt escape the infection, which means plenty would be left behind. even if theres supposedly looters between the infection and the time players would start, grabbing everything they can isnt grabbing everything, which is why you would find a grocery store with maybe a few cans here and there left, rather than a fully stocked shop

 

also im sure the current spawn rates are configured so everyone can find something, as already its common to spawn, run to a town thats been emptied, run to next town and its empty, then starve to death

 

although the game is trying to be a zombie survival sim, it does have to balance between realism and making the game enjoyable to play, i believe rocket said something similar at one point

[AnyoneInCherno? 187]

I can agree with ammo becoming extremely scarce. I believe military weapons should be VERRRY rare, especially "assault rifle" style weapons and "sniper" rifles. Small pistols, hunting rifles, and old shotguns should be the commoners in DayZ, but should be rare as to see someone with a revolver and 2 bullets as a threat. Like you said, people WILL think twice.

[colekern 1364]

I agree, but it is alpha, and we're testers basicallt. Loot can't be too scarce, otherwise we could never get around to testing it.

[odin_lowe 3686]

Alpher?! It'll change. Been said before.

[Corto 34]

No need to talk about fine tunning when each new patch can potentially break the game. I'm sure once everything is in place and ready, they'll introduce fine tunning options, even as cvars so they can be tunned by server for private hives. I wouldn't say the game is easy so far, I would say there isn't much to do right now and that's fine because it's in alpha (and very enjoyable alpha by the way).

[Nurrvillian 23]

I have to disagree on some of your points I like the idea of damaged weapons being nearly all you find and scarce ammo but basic survival needs like food and sodas although not hydrating.. Should be fairly common. You don't need to starve to death as soon as you start playing because ever house in a 9KM radius has been looted.

I like the idea about rifles and high powered weapons being scarce and pistols revolvers being a bit more common but everyone needs a melee weapon you can't ask them to make those more rare most aren't effective yet anyway because the mechanics aren't quite right and you can't (unless you're really good) sneak up on many people and beat them over the head to rob them and even if you can most of the time they don't die just unconscious so you get rolled for all your shit wake up find a rag bandage up and play on

[Keudn 8]

First, you kind of out yourself calling it 'loot'  Loot implies your intention is to kill people to take their things, to 'loot' their body.  Instead, try calling it gear.  Gear can belong to someone else, when you call something 'loot' you imply it belongs to YOU.

 

Second, no, gear being damaged by attacking a person should occur, it just seems to occur much more than it should.

I didn't say it shouldn't happen, I said it should only happen when you hit the pocket or pouch on that particular piece of clothing, not if you hit the shirt for example everything gets destroyed in that shirt

[blackberrygoo 1416]

Well I think you might want something that is a little unrealistic with food... Loot while I agree should be dynamic and always moving through each Of the houses so we never have a "crap loot house" , I really think that food and watier cannot be as scarce as you are saying .

manufactured food/ drinks outnumber humans something like 10 million to 1 haha . That being said , as it is only at most a year after the apocalypse I can't see food being too impossibly hard to find, it should when found be a one can of food at most and maybe an empty water bottle so you can fill up .

And in my opinion we can have a good bit of food/water loot spawns because my image of dayz standalone hunting should be very difficult very realistic but yet very rewarding , it should really be hard to catch animals, but you could get a lot of meat (more than in the mod) off of one animal , more so if its an adult , and hell maybe you could drink its blood for water.

So if you sucked at catching animals you would have to be a house looter relying on the small (not extinct) amount of food and water in the cities / towns . The smart survivor would learn to do both though , so if you did one or the other you would surely die at least once or twice from starvation in the first few dayz.

i do agree right now the loot spawns for medical and bullets are a bit high so if we drastically lower bullet spawns and do the same for medical , I'd say we'd be fine . Of course the military guns need to be a bit more rare than they are now , but definitely not .0000000001 % rare man c'mon do you really think out of like a couple hundred servers it would be plausible that only 10 people have found a military weapon ? Locks/ lockboxes and military caches should be implemented which would need a lockpick, a lot of time and maybe a crowbar to open which would contain maybe a broken military weapon (if you're lucky) that needs fixing , and to fix the military weapons it could maybe take a rare type of firing pin ( I don't know guns =} ) so people who find these dynamic ever moving gun lockers would still have to work to fix the military gun .

All these suggestions of lowering medical / bullet spawns and making it harder to break into places or things that contain high end weapons along with making these weapons themselves harder to up keep would balance the game in a really good way that everyone can agree on . only the best of the best adventurers would find and upkeep military rifles , food would be scarce enough for you to possibly die if you were solely looting and not hunting for food , bullets and medical spawns would be more rare, as the medical boxes would surely have antibiotics inside them and bullets are a bandits best friend , in other words , reduce bullets = balance a crazy bandits blood lust so instead of killing that helpless Bambi with his last sks clip , he chooses to save it for a more exciting fight with someone who can fight back .

[Lupine 14]

I say NO to melee weapons being harder to find.. Its very hard to punch out a zombie, and hard to take out 2 at the same time with just your fists. The sewing kits are a step towards things being more difficult, I have noticed that the latest "Zeek attacks" damage clothing, which can be brought back to "worn" lvl through patching. I think this is a step in the right direction.

[mgc 92]

There should be enough loot to keep a full server alive and somewhat kicking. Priority should be given to getting players to spend their ammo on Z. In order to do that, the devs have to implement something that makes players want to stay put and defend a location with firearms.

 

i.o.w.

Save your lead for zed.

[gjhook 12]

Excellent ideas. 100% agree.

[Lady Kyrah 1109]

Loot destruction

I agree 100% with the idea that if you shoot someone in the chest, any items in pockets in their shirt should be broken, but ONLY if the bullets actually hit the area with the pockets! Every single person I kill has EVERY PIECE OF LOOT DESTROYED. I don't know if this mechanic is broken right now or what, but no matter WHERE I hit them, ALL their loot is broken. And fixing it to the point where if you hit their shirt, all the loot in that shirt is destroyed doesn't cut it either. This mechanic, while broken or not, doesn't remove the shoot on sight mentality. It may lower it a bit for someone who is desperate for supplies to hold someone up rather than shoot them, but 90% of the time people will blow you away just to get rid of you and to neutralize the threat. What we need is for the clothing that you wear to have some kind of invisible marker on them that marks the pockets, so that when a bullet hits that area only the items IN THAT POCKET are destroyed. I get that if you fill their backpack full of lead that there won't be anything worth salvaging from their backpack, but come on. When I hit their arm and they have a long sleeve shirt it destroys everything in their WHOLE ENTIRE SHIRT. This can't and shouldn't happen, and I really really really hope that they fix this issue.

Nothing to fix here, it's a balancing act, it makes trading or robbing more attractive

[morrow 19]

Nothing to fix here, it's a balancing act, it makes trading or robbing more attractive

A balancing act that is a load of horse shit, the simple fact is that If I shoot you in the chest I will destroy stuff in you shirt pocket and If the bullet was a clean pass through to the top of your bag stuff that is in the top of your bag in the inventory screen should be broken but your mask is ruined to? sounds like someone is trying to force me to rob others instead of kill (which by the way when I do rob people and IF they give me their stuff they try to kill me with their fists anyways so I have to kill them anyways)

[komadose 190]

Its very hard to punch out a zombie, and hard to take out 2 at the same time with just your fists.

no it's not. it's too damn easy. if you ask me, it should be impossible to win zeds with fists. your only option should be escaping.

 

the biggest problem with weapon loot is that you don't need to use them on anything else than other players. this creates the need to reduce them drastically. if you would need to use them on zeds, however, the loot would be fine as it is.

 

i found gun and bullets, great -> random zed attacks, but save your ammo and kill it with axe. easy. result: backpack eventually filled with bullets. need to go on KoS spree because, heck, i have hard-earned gun and ammo and i want to use it on something. i don't need them for surviving, so KoS spree is the only thing left.

[Robotic Insecurity 13]

no it's not. it's too damn easy. if you ask me, it should be impossible to win zeds with fists. your only option should be escaping.

 

the biggest problem with weapon loot is that you don't need to use them on anything else than other players. this creates the need to reduce them drastically. if you would need to use them on zeds, however, the loot would be fine as it is.

 

i found gun and bullets, great -> random zed attacks, but save your ammo and kill it with axe. easy. result: backpack eventually filled with bullets. need to go on KoS spree because, heck, i have hard-earned gun and ammo and i want to use it on something. i don't need them for surviving, so KoS spree is the only thing left.

 

How do you think zombies should be handled?  Spawning more densely, more durable, more deadly, faster, combination of any of those, or something else?  It's worth mentioning that axes were the better choice over guns without silencing in the mod, where zombies are all of those aforementioned things.  Ended up saving my ammo in mod for PvP, too.  Might just be better to reduce the spawn rate of firearms.

Edited February 14, 2014 by Robotic Insecurity

[komadose 190]

How do you think zombies should be handled?  Spawning more densely, more durable, more deadly, faster, combination of any of those, or something else?  It's worth mentioning that axes were the better choice over guns without silencing in the mod, where zombies are all of those aforementioned things.  Ended up saving my ammo in mod for PvP, too.  Might just be better to reduce the spawn rate of firearms.

zeds should instakill you if they can grab you. you know, like they do in the movies. that should stir things up. you should be able to outrun them, though.

 

once they spawn in buildings, that's when the game gets interesting. you can't loot like a careless little rabbit anymore. you would want to actually team up with other bambinos for having a better chance to survive. now it's pretty much the opposite.

[Lady Kyrah 1109]

A balancing act that is a load of horse shit, the simple fact is that If I shoot you in the chest I will destroy stuff in you shirt pocket and If the bullet was a clean pass through to the top of your bag stuff that is in the top of your bag in the inventory screen should be broken but your mask is ruined to? sounds like someone is trying to force me to rob others instead of kill (which by the way when I do rob people and IF they give me their stuff they try to kill me with their fists anyways so I have to kill them anyways)

Because there is no such thing as a free lunch. But i guess you want the advantage of shooting everyone AND looting their pristine gear.

[MrBecause 11]

I agree, especially when it comes to ammo. It should take hours or days to find even a few bullets. Not only would this decrease the amount of players, who just kill for fun or out of boredom, it would also make firefights incredibly more intense. If you know you only have 2 rounds in your mosin and maybe 3 in your fnx, you can't afford to miss and have to plan your shots carefully. Melee combat would become a much bigger deal and maybe, people would try to form goups to combine what little ammo they have. Combine this with a much greater amount of zombies and you'll have an almost perfect zombie-survival game.

 

Now this is an alpha,  I'm really impessed with the game even at this state and these things really don't have to be changed anytime soon, but I am absolutely sure that they would put this game to a whole new level. I hope the devs take drastically lowering loot spawn and dynamically respawning loot into consideration. 

[leitberkley 4]

Theres no way to really be sure of what would b left for survivors, without knowing how quickly the virus spread. The population and things to find is too big of a variable to be "realistic". Instead make the game challenging. But dont make it take long enogh to get bored, to find things. Imo

[Rudette 435]

The game is to easy because of the lack of environmental danger, which is what the survival genre is all about.

Server performance and game optimization that they are working on now  will lead too : More numerous and likely more dangerous zombies and more players. Players will impact the scarcity of supplies, this will make hunger/thirst more of an issue. Zombies will add more risk.  Weather, cold, wet, body temperature, hyothermia, ect will add more to worry about, more to overcome. Hunting will offer another means of survival.  There will be more things to craft. Vehicles, hopefully, will add entities that we will have to scavenge for and constantly maintain if we want to keep them running (ideally) and will likely be fought over by players.

More content is coming---Things that will make the game meaningful. It is just a really large pvp arena currently. Just be patient, go out and kill some dudes ;p

Edited February 15, 2014 by Rudette

[Egrets 5]

Other players with guns makes survival harder if anything. If you don't put guns on the map you remove some of the tension that makes dayz fun, that fear of being gunned down at any moment.