Some hints and tips for noobs

[Mookie (original) 799]

Just some things I've spent a hard time learning, that may not be mentioned explicitly in other new players guides. The emphasis is on lone-wolfery:

 

1. Don't immediately run to a military base when you freshly spawn. Try to get at least some sort of firearm and ammo at a police or fire station before you jog innocently into the NEAF or NWAF or Balota. But the military option is not the only one. The game support many playstyles - survivalist, collective comedy, etc, not just PvP

 

2. Don't bother carrying food or drink cans with you. Just eat or drink them when and where you find them.

 

3. It's tempting to try to carry two rifles, especially a Mosin and something else. Don't do it - make a choice and go with it, because:

• While you will respawn with the second rifle at the bottom of your inventory, you will drop it after you put anything else in your hands. More precisely, you will drop the rifle when you put that other thing back or drop it. 
• By having to look for, and carry, two kinds of rifle ammo, you will halve the storage space for your primary ammo
• If you're having to run around with the secondary rifle in your hands, you will be slower.

4. Similar things go for sidearms. It's tempting to just pick them, and their carying ammo types up, so that you're walking around with three or four different handguns. Again, make your choice. Mine is for .45 pistols and/or Magnum.

 

4. After a while, when managing your inventory, you will need to put something down in order to move things around. Be very cautious about this. If you put something down in woodland, you may have difficulty finding it again (try going prone and first person). If you put something down on an upper storey, or (even worse) in one of those little houses that are raised above ground, it may sink into the floor and be irrecoverable.

 

5. Get a 300 round box, first aid kit, small protector cases. The point is that they maximise your inventory by having six slots, but occupying only four. And they protect things against ruination.

 

6. Prioritise can opener and canteen/bottle. You can do without them, but they also give you more independence to move. Rags at first, and then bandages, are also crucial to survival. Have at least two in an accessible place (ie near the top) of your inventory. Binos are a huge friend, but not strictly necessary if you already have an LRS.

 

7. Get a compass. Even with dayzdb map, you will get lost (especially in the woods). If worn or damaged, it will deviate from true by 10-30 degrees. Find a straight road whose direction you can tell from the map, and work out what that deviation is. Bear in mind that an occasional glitch means a compass can completely reverse (so S is N, E is W, etc.) Relogging can cure.

 

7. If you choose to run from, rather than just kill zombies (and remember, shots attract any nearby zombies...), line of sight is very important. Zig zag, and jink direction in woods or around buildings and bushes.

 

8. Camo is important. Choose the right clothes and paint other kit. Certain clothes work better in different contexts. TTsKO, for example, is great in woodland, but has high contrast in open country. You can paint rifles and melee weapons with spraycans. If you spray your Mosin green and then black, it will come up in a funky camo pattern. I even spray my fire axe black...

 

9. There are a lot of lone wolves out there. If you run into one, trying to talking to him/her, rather than slaughtering each other. Just be sure they don't have any friends :)

 

10. It's been said countless times, but DO NOT GET ATTACHED TO YOUR STUFF. Because you will die sooner or later, almost certainly to a stupid mistake.If you feel geared to a level acceptable to you, go and explore.

 

Hope someone finds some of this useful.

[zyryx 14]

Good stuff here I didn't know. I saw a "camo" mosin and had no idea how it was done (now to find some green paint). The compass is proving very hard to find, I found a couple easily when I first started playing, and dying. but my current character has been around quite awhile, fully geared with all pristine, but I still need a pristine LRS and that bloody compass.

 

I'm still playing lonewolf/surviver at the moment but I'm confused by hunting/cooking. Is it better to go with the gas stove/skillet/cook pot option or the campfire/stone option. Can you cook meat in either the skillet or pot (and are there other recipes with rice and veggies?)? This option takes up a minimum of 6 slots but I have found gas relatively easy to find. On the other had you can make/find just about everything you need for a campfire in the forest so that frees up slots in inventory, but I would need to exchange my fire axe for a pick axe to harvest stone. How does stone work? I'm assuming each stone placed in a campfire equals one spot for cooking (or do you still need a skillet/pot?), but can you resuse the stone or do you need to harvest new stone for every new campfire? Another plus with stone is I have heard you can sharpen/repair blades with stone, true?

 

Also, ruined clothing. You can still wear it, so what's the disadvantage?

Edited July 17, 2014 by zyryx

[Mystic Bagel 128]

 

 

The compass is proving very hard to find

 

I find them, more often than not, on the shelves in the fire stations

Edited July 17, 2014 by Mystic Bagel

[Solreal 11]

 

 

 

I find them, more often than not, on the shelves in the fire stations

 

 

 

 

Indeed. I was in a fire station last night that had two in the same room.

Edited July 17, 2014 by Solreal

[Solreal 11]

 

7. Get a compass. Even with dayzdb map, you will get lost (especially in the woods). If worn or damaged, it will deviate from true by 10-30 degrees. Find a straight road whose direction you can tell from the map, and work out what that deviation is. Bear in mind that an occasional glitch means a compass can completely reverse (so S is N, E is W, etc.) Relogging can cure.

 

 

 

Great info. Thanks!

[pillock 850]

I'd recommend collecting the pieces of the in-game map and combining them. When you have the full set, it's better in my opinion than using the DayZ DB one, because you don't have to Alt+Tab out of the game. This is especially important at the moment, as DayZ seems to be more susceptible to crashing in the current build - but even ignoring that, it allows you to carry on moving while looking at the map, and also listening to the environment around you, so you can tell if some nasty is approaching.

 

I have actually ditched my compass since I got used to using the map, because I find the map is all I need to navigate, even at night.

[Nesuma (DayZ) 108]

5. Get a 300 round box, first aid kit, small protector cases. The point is that they maximise your inventory by having six slots, but occupying only four. And they protect things against ruination.

Actually I wouldn't recommend the first aid kit. I used to have it all the time but you don't need 6 spaces, ever. 2 bandages (or better 12 rags) will never run out, bloodbags and saline are useless because you already heal around 1/s and every other medical item doesn't work yet. Therefore it isn't that smart to pick up the med kit

[zyryx 14]

The in game maps are much better for navigating, the topographical info matched with a compass is perfect for getting around when you avoid going anywhere near a road.