DayZ Update 1.5.7

[memphisbelle 4]

I finally got the chance to play the new patch and I´ve got to say...wow...that is freaking awesome now. Villages are by default now full of zombies and it is an always bad feeling if you are lying in tzhe grass and a crawler comes near by you, but dont recognizes you...only thing I dont like is that I got spawned in the place were the characters were set in the Editor. I had to find my way back on the map, but now it is OK and I reported that issue.

All in all a great update and a far greater look on things to come.

[Lulu! 3]

I love you Rocket! *flashes chest*

[Zatila (DayZ) 0]

Seriously, and without being a pussy now, if you are going to keep the number of zombies, you need to adjust their movement speed or make only a fixed number of zombies able to run for example.

/Zatila

[Colt45az 0]

I would like to see more and more zombies but have them be slower. They don't have to be walking zombies. Just slower and less jerky. When I think of a perfect zombie speed I think of Killing floor. I think it would be really awesome if each type of zombie had a different speed.

For example: crawlers were slowest, monkeys were fastest, and walkers were fast walking speed. (Killing floor)

I'd really like to hear Rocket's opinion on this.

[R Lee 0]

I played on two different servers earlier today and they both had under 100 zombies and no loot. What is causing this? (They were 1.5.7 servers and near full)

[simasz 15]

I encountered that as well, in one of the servers it was actually 0 zombies constantly...

[cecil.treadwell@gmail.com 1]

Throwing my two cents regarding the zombie numbers into an already overflowing melting pot, but what the hey...

[edit - turns out to be more of a 'my experience with Day Z prior to and after the patch'.]

I started playing DayZ about a week before the patch. Absolutely loved it. I played solo at first, getting my bearings, running around completely lost most of the time... eventually I plucked up the courage to enter some buildings. I scouted a small village but none of the buildings were enter-able. I followed a dirt road into the countryside and cleared out 5 barns and a couple shacks, racking up about 20 zombie kills. It was terrifying at first, and the game is really unforgiving. As soon as I got my Lee Enfield, and realised Zombies couldn't run indoors, it was easy as sin.

The two nights before the patch rolled in, me and a friend set out together, each feeling confident since we had survived solo for about 5 days. Clearing out barns was easy, except a minor lag spike occurred and we got swarmed. I was down to 2000 blood and had entered 'shock'. Not knowing that 'shock' was 'shock', I proceeded to eat all of our food supplies hoping to get over 4000 blood would remove the effect. It didn't go away. I was effectively incapacitated and any more zombie encounters would mean my death, unless my buddy had my back 100%.

After the patch... for some reason I spawned on the absolute South-Western most beach. The maps end, as it were. I ran for hours seeing nothing until I reached about half a grid-square west of Kamenka. I scouted out the town to see it literally sprawling with zombies. I lay prone, considered my options. Out of the fuckin' blue some guy comes up behind me and starts popping me with his Makarov. So I get up and shoot him in the face with my Lee Enfield. Twice, for good measure.

I bandaged myself up, and noticed about 12 zombies were running towards me. I dropped three of them, and then ran. I ran for ages. Pretty much to the edge of the map again. Zombies glitched out? They sort of ran ahead of me at times then disappeared so I would stop and catch my breath. I eventually gave up running and killed them all. Bandaged myself, took painkillers, ate food, drank water, checked my supplies... decided that was a bit too close to comfort for my liking, I would log out. So I did.

On returning, there were about 3 players around the hills/beach area all shooting at each other and I just so happened to be in the middle of their crossfire. I barely hit 'z' before my char got shot and knocked down. I regained conciousness just in time to get shot again. Dead. 5 days played, first death. (So, 5 days... translates to about 8-9 hours of actual playing.)

So I respawned, the beaches are crawling with people since more zombies = more deaths. I made it to the hills and got picked off. Two respawns later I made it farther inland, tried sneaking into a barn, aggroed one zombie, shot him down, got eaten by the rest.

In short: Before patch, I played the game, I had fun, I was shit scared. After the patch, I got bandit-killed repeatedly, I didn't get any loot. I got frustrated. I honestly think the higher zombie count has increased the number of bandits, since, killing a player is easier than going after the horde. And everyone wants to be killing shit.

Okay, I've rambled on enough. Here are my thoughts:

Zombie numbers prior to patch were a little on the low side.

Zombie numbers after the patch are okay, except the distribution is fucked.

Zombies should spawn proportionally to their environment/location. For example, a barn might have 2 or 3, whereas a small town might have 40+.

Zombie AI is severely lacking. I think this is where the true problem lies. You can shoot a zombie from ~500 meters outside, and cause every zombie in the vicinity to charge straight for you.

Let's take a step back. Zombies are undead. They are not highly intelligent, usually they are portrayed as slow, lumbering and, frankly, thick.

I think an interesting tweak to experiment with, would be as follows:

All zombies should be harder to take down. Across the board, all weapons. Perhaps some distinction between particularly tough (fat?) zombies and weaker (thin) zombies. Headshots become pivotal. Makarov becomes? (more ?) useless.

All zombies should WALK. Even when aggro'd. When a zombie reaches low health, or has attacked a player he enters a 'frenzy' and can then RUN, as in current game speed of running. Perhaps if a player is bleeding, then zombies targetting that player begin running.

Firing pot shots at zombies should not aggro the zombie horde, attracting player attention is bad enough as it is.

With this 'durable' zombie idea in place, it becomes much more of a mission in conserving ammunition, supplies etc. We can play with some ideas like lighting a fire to attract zombies away from a building so that you can loot what is inside, or similarly throwing a smoke grenade to distract zombies. I am aware the game currently has these dynamics to a certain degree.

Anyways, these were my thoughts. I know the game is still in alpha, so don't harp on about that.

ps. First post here... Great job Rocket and I hope your hangover ain't too bad today (do people still drink at 31?) :)

pps. I have a nasty habit of keyboard bashing epically long posts. Stupid 120wpm.

[Braxen 0]

Not gonna play this again until the zeds have been nerfed in some way..

[Kamerplant 0]

Jezus christ, i read in the changelog that death entering helicopters was fixed? My fucking ass! I just lost gear and loot worth of 18 hours of gameplay by entering a stupid UH-1Y. Seriously this sucks too hard, and yes im running 1.5.7 and yes i'm playing on a 1.5.7 server!

[CptKermite (DayZ) 0]

I like this patch, cant complain to mutch about the zeeds, thes is a more fun and scary feeling. Only the respawning time is a little to fast doo. But what about the complete black darkness at night? Is it just me or did you guys change it? It is impossible to see, just black :P Well big thanks to you! Keep up the good work!

[Colt45az 0]

I like this patch' date=' cant complain to mutch about the zeeds, thes is a more fun and scary feeling. Only the respawning time is a little to fast doo. But what about the complete black darkness at night? Is it just me or did you guys change it? It is impossible to see, just black :P Well big thanks to you! Keep up the good work!

[/quote']

It depends on whether the moon is out or not

[shiro321 0]

had two friends today log back in to game (at different times) and instead of spawning where they logged off they spawned out in the temp spawn in the wilderness far south west off the map and had to walk back to the game map.

server was Virginia 11

[Longknife (DayZ) 0]

Hey people,

I just bought Combined Arms for the explicit purpose of playing this Mod. As a lifelong fan of the Zombie Films and games I was entertained by the various videos showing game play. I downloaded 1.5.6 and got to play about an hour. It was fun.

The next day, 1.5.7 came out. Though the game is fun there are problems in my opinion.

1. There are just too many zombies. The game's best feature is the suspense that is built up over time. If you know a horde is going to just spawn into existence, it destroys the feel.

A zombie encounter should be a die roll. It could be one, it could be 100. But when you know your Zombie encounters are almost always a horde. It loses something. Not to mention it destroys the enjoyment of a situation that is too skewed in one direction. Even if that's the perception you want to share. It shouldn't be the actual situation, at least not all the time.

2. Bandits. If I see someone with a Bandit outfit, I'm likely to kill them first and ask questions later. When you are forced to kill someone in self defense it is not a humanity losing act. It's self defense.

Your system does not allow for self defense killing. And therefore the entire humanity system is flawed. Killing someone in self defense should not cause you to be associated with murderers. If I am forced to defend myself, and forced to look like a bandit. My game is done. The moment it happens, I am forced to kill everyone I see. They are likely to consider me a danger.

You don't need to have this to create paranoia and tension in the game, it exists already. The bandit look and consequences are not a fun part of the game.

Right now I'm going to take a break from this mod and follow here to see what changes come about. It's a great mod and I'm excited to see what you do with it.

[borium 0]

Also, it's too effing dark. The lighting system just worked and now it's pitch black at night.

[vegeta897 3]

1. There are just too many zombies. The game's best feature is the suspense that is built up over time. If you know a horde is going to just spawn into existence' date=' it destroys the feel. [/quote']

I would agree that it would be nice if there was a random element to the amount of zombies spawning. Though, sometimes zombies will randomly not spawn at all.

2. Bandits. If I see someone with a Bandit outfit' date=' I'm likely to kill them first and ask questions later. When you are forced to kill someone in self defense it is not a humanity losing act. It's self defense. [/quote']And you don't lose humanity for killing bandits. Where is the problem?

Your system does not allow for self defense killing.

Actually' date=' it attempts to. If you get shot by a survivor, you won't lose humanity for killing him.

If I am forced to defend myself, and forced to look like a bandit. My game is done. The moment it happens, I am forced to kill everyone I see. They are likely to consider me a danger.

One murder isn't going to turn you into a bandit for life. It will wear off in a few hours. Also, you can just avoid people if you're afraid they're going to kill you.

Despite my responses to you, I agree that the bandit system is an arbitrary feature that is pretty pointless when the dynamics of mistrust and paranoia already occur in the game naturally. On the other hand it can increase the survival rate of innocents if they can be sure to avoid someone they see has a bandit model.

[thilonys 0]

In my eyes this is exactly the way its supposed to be.. You go into a city say New York if its infected theres not only gonna be 10 or 15 zeds theres gonna be a shit ton so its to be expected. From what I can tell the smaller city's have a smaller amount to them i do think the re-spawn is a bit fast tho the amount i think is fine but the re-spawn a bit to fast

[cecil.treadwell@gmail.com 1]

@vegeta897.

I became a bandit once. I still have the bandit skin regardless of my 'humanity level'. It is bugged.

Your argument against the self defense is also flawed. One shot can kill. So I'm supposed to wait for a survivor to shoot me before I can 'defend myself' without losing humanity?

A random element is what the game needs. Longknife's points were spot on. If I encounter a barn, I'd be happy if there were anything between 0 and 12 zombies in situ. Currently, there are always 10+. It kills suspense, to simply know (if you're playing solo) that you're going to run into overwhelming odds at the tiniest shack or castle ruin.

Furthermore, I find the increased zed count has exponentially increased banditry. Well, if the main page statistics are anything to go by, there has been a 1,000 increase since yesterday in bandits.

People want to kill shit. It's exponentially easier to kill an unsuspecting player and earn almost guaranteed loot of ammunition, food, water, painkillers and bandages - than to take on a horde of zombie for some empty bottles and tin cans.

I also will not be playing DayZ any more until the current situation is rectified, also, stability issues.

[vegeta897 3]

I became a bandit once. I still have the bandit skin regardless of my 'humanity level'. It is bugged.

Well a bug is a bug' date=' but the point is that they didn't intentionally make it so that you're screwed for life if you kill someone.

Your argument against the self defense is also flawed. One shot can kill. So I'm supposed to wait for a survivor to shoot me before I can 'defend myself' without losing humanity?

I wasn't making an argument, I was merely pointing out that they did attempt to address the issue of self defense. I realize that it's not going to cover every situation. But how do you know you're actually defending yourself if he hasn't shot you? Unless he misses, which is certainly possible. Again, not arguing, just discussing.

This is why it's best to just team up with people you know. I've got a group of friends to play with (not hard, since everyone loves this game) and we don't bother trying to make peace with randomers. And when you think about it, that's how a real life zombie apocalypse would probably play out. You only trust those who you know you can trust.

[savedbygrace 3]

1.--------------------------------------------------

One thing that is certainly needed is the ability to refill your canteen in any water source. Why not do this by gathering the object id's for each water source(for example:Ozerko dam is at grid reference 108068 and it's object ID is 336767). You then check the clients distance to that object id number and if within a specific distance an ASL position check is performed to determine if the client is on the same section of the terrain grade that the water line is on(for example: The water line of the pond at Ozerko dam is close to 197ASL. When they get to that ASL or lower while within the distance of the object number, you conduct your standard canteen check and empty/full stat check to determine if the refill action should be added,

Other examples are the small pond at grid reference 113077, it's object ID number is 338026. It's waterline is close to 47 ASL

Another shallow and marshy pond at grid reference 119077, object id number is 341780. Waterline is close to 5.2 ASL.

With these additional checks, you could add further features such as infectious water in certain areas.

2.-------------------------------------------

I've been carrying around an M1014 from the NW airfield and have encountered no ammo in the south. I understand the absence of military ammo in residential areas but it would be great if you would spawn military weapons/ammo/items to the humvee wrecks or dead soldiers that you place in editor or spawn.

3.--------------------------------------------

Why limit loot spawn positions to open structures? Insert a random placement modifier in there so that the loot has a chance of appearing outside of structures to resemble folks dropping items.

4.--------------------------------------------

The build fireplace feature needs some minor tweaks to allow for slope placement. I think you should add the ability to build a fire in the barn/warehouse/hangar classes on ground level and the castle class on top level.

5.--------------------------------------------

Other great features to consider adding

* Syphon hose to extract fuel from disabled cars.

* melee animation with damage variable

*melon models and gui images for garden raiding

*molotov cocktails that ignite units(playable and AI) and spread when contact is made.

*fishing pole for catching fish with fish gui variants

[johannesmp 2]

savedbygrace: these are all great suggestions, but should be shared in the suggestions section of these forums.

This topic is really intended specifically for feedback on 1.5.7, and not suggestions.

[WolfCounsel 0]

I'd like to start off by saying I've only been playing for roughly about a week now tonight, so I can only compare to my previous experience in 1.5.6

Last week was pretty intense all on it's own, getting used to navigating, coming across random strangers.

After the 1.5.7 update intense has a whole new meaning in this game.

My group is comprised of three survivors and we started off seperated into random spawns and had to regroup in Mogilevka where we ended up blasting zombies until running out of primary ammo. We didn't even get a chance to loot the town due to the high population of zombies, there was only enough time to find each other and get back out before we got bogged down with zeds.

It was a hell of a fun fight, but the drawback is that we're down to pistol ammo now (and we used a building to funnel them in through the doorways so not many missed shots, 2 with the winchester 1866 with slugs and shot, one using the lee enfield) Today alone I burned through somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 rounds on only a few minutes of combat between cities and I feel like every town is going to turn into that with the first shots fired. Tomorrow night I've proposed we try to stick to smaller towns (Like Msta, Bor and Pulkovo) and see if we have any more luck with the zeds and/or gathering ammo.

I understand the high zombie count was unintended (Alpha state), but if there was a way to have somewhere about half to three quarters of these zombies, it wouldn't feel as slow as 1.5.6 felt and I wouldn't feel like I should immediately turn to taking on the easier prey of survivors for supplies. (Coming from the voice of the group that made three people hide in a bush then prone crawled away ten minutes later just cause he saw someone in the distance at night) Don't get me wrong though, I love that there's more than 2-5 zombies in the towns now.

Also, I'm noticing a lot more roaming zombies in the fields and edges of the forest. Those have almost caught my off my guard a couple of times now and they're the ones I try to keep my eye out for most now.

We actually came across a downed Huey helicopter outside of a town and my friend climbed inside the gunner's seat. He didn't fire it, if he could, we were afraid of drawing attention, but I'm definitely glad that the bug where entering a crashed Huey killed players because we'd just spent the last couple of hours trying to get regrouped. Knowing our luck, without this patch we'd be leaving behind a lot of gear the other two of us wouldn't have been able to carry. (That would've made me die a little inside so I'm actually pretty damn grateful for this patch right now.) Even if you can't afford to repair them they make great hold out locations if you can manage to find one and lure zombies back to someone waiting in the gunner's seat.

The greater zombie count certainly isn't going to cause me to rage or stop playing, but it does dash the dreams of a certain airfield out of the minds of three survivors in particular.

[Huntik 0]

This mod is awesome!!

There's little too much zeds in 1.5.7, but then it makes killing other players easier :-).

Yesterday when I was playing I got magically teleported to middle of the ocean and then I couldn't even respawn for a long time (when I pushed "respawn" button it shown the big "you're dead" message, but then I started again in the ocean with all my stuff).

Anyone else have a similar problem?

Keep up the good work!

[WitchZero 0]

I know Zombie count error and I'm more than happy to test with it. This is just feedback.

Zed Numbers:

The number of Zombies are actually pretty good. I approached the structures SW of the Airfield and the Zombie count went from 15 to 27 (lots of ppl stuck waiting for server). I threw a flare ahead of me and sure enough I could see 3-4 wandering around. This isn't too bad. More were spread out around the area.

Zed Spawn Rate:

I found a big pole barn structure made of tin in Stary Sobor. It had a nice catwalk around the top near the roof. No zombies. Initally. They wated until i got up on the catwalk to spawn. I went through 48 rounds of Makarov ammo and they were still coming. It seemed like every one I killed another spawned. I don't know the specifics of the spawns but I killed 20 zombies easy and there were still plenty. I had to log out. I came back on another server and GTFO. Luckly there were some military tents near by and i got some more ammo and a primary weapon.

So I think the biggest issue guys run into is the rate at which they spawn not the spawn numbers.

Bugs I ran into:

Primary weapon (AK-74 equipped) and ammo disappeard when I looted a AKM. AKM Ammo disappeard as well... Dropped the AKM before looting a M1014 and it worked fine. AKM was on the ground. M1014 and ammo loaded correctly in my gear. (i think this is known)

Summary:

Played all night (US east coast, night time) and worked my way up to the Airfield from Novy Sobor. Face pulled a couple Zombies. M1014 thank you. Glow sticks are adequate for normal movement. Flare for Recon. Had a wonderful experience...at night!

It rained a lot on server last night. I Kept thinking about the Thermometer as was skirting towns and running through the countryside.

Thanks Rocket, Keep up the good work man.

[FillaRealla 0]

I enjoy "more zombies" as much as the next guy but I feel there are more zombies then there would have been population... is there no comfortable medium between the amount of Zombies in 1.5.7 and 1.5.6?

Love filla

[savedbygrace 3]

Yeah sorry about the off topic post guys.

With this new version, I have been spawned into the woods with no interface on three different occasions. Once, it grouped about 8 -10 guys under me but I was not able to interact with any key except the escape. This has happened on different servers.

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The panic mode could use a unit count ratio check. If there are more than 3 infected closer than 10 meters and all in aware/combat state, the panic mode should kick in. It should stop several seconds after the area is cleared and the heart pump sound file should play for another minute or two.

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The number increase on infected would be great if the ammo spawn joined that increase

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The temperature gauge will be a great variable for decision making. Just be sure to allow fire building inside of practical structures like farm or industrial store houses to aid the warming process.