Why is such a drastic increase in enterable buildings considered a good thing?

[BC_Hawke 276]

I fail to see what enterable buildings has to do with that. The player per server number is going to increase somewhat when they are doing the optimisation phase, and as far as I can see that is the only varialbe that has any influence on how frequent you have player interactions.

Don't know what else to say then.  If you cannot comprehend how drastically increasing the amount of explorable square footage of the map leads to a more spread out player population and less interaction inland from the coast then it's pointless continuing this conversation.  Increasing the player count may make up for it, but I'd prefer a MIDDLE GROUND between mod and SA as far as cities and enterable buildings are concerned and a more moderate player count.  That way there's a lot of empty and remote forest areas on the map but you have a likely chance of running into other players at hot loot spots.  The SA devs seem to be trying to cram as many cities, buildings, rooms, and objects as they can into the map with hope that someday they may be able to populate it with 1,000's of zombies and over 100 players.  I sincerely doubt they will be able to achieve this considering BI's track record on optimization.

[BadAsh (DayZ) 1513]

Because as it's been stated numerous times, you can spend way more time in a city now than the mod.  There's less incentive to travel between towns, because there's more to do in each specific area.  This might lead to more interactions in those towns themselves, but it reduces travel which in turn reduces interactions outside of them.

 

You may spend more time in the city with more enterable buildings, but it doesn't in anyway reduce incentive to travel between cities. Anyone with just the slightest experience of looting in SA will know that you quickly learn when a town has been looted, and that is more than enough incentive to travel to another town.

 

Don't know what else to say then.  If you cannot comprehend how drastically increasing the amount of explorable square footage of the map leads to a more spread out player population and less interaction inland from the coast then it's pointless continuing this conversation.  

 

I cannot comprehend it because it doesn't make any sense. If a town is looted you are indeed forced to travel inland otherwise you die. The amount of enterable buildings has zero influence on that.

[sneakydudes 278]

The expansion of new buildings is beginning to drastically impair performance so I think the current amount of buildings is enough untill rendering improvements are made

I think you will be happy once we go through the phase of new engine, and the team starts working on performance.

Get this I just loaded up rome 2 and it runs sweet on my PC. Zooming out just on the map, not battle mode and I get 30 fps on Ultra max. I got 60+ without tweaking Dayz because we cant.

Mind you the card I am running is a EVGA gtx 780ti SC 2 gb card, 16gb 1866 I think it was, with 2 x ssd, mirrored, i7 cpu and asus pro board, Liquid cooled.

 

I just about fell over that Rome 2 was so demanding, and Dayz in Alpha was running so much nicer FPS wise.

Give it some time and I think we will all be cashing in on great performance reviews in time.

 

Lets see what the Q4 brings us and see how much performance increases we get. We always tend to tweak even after they release final specs for us.

 

hehe :)

[BC_Hawke 276]

You may spend more time in the city with more enterable buildings, but it doesn't in anyway reduce incentive to travel between cities. Anyone with just the slightest experience of looting in SA will know that you quickly learn when a town has been looted, and that is more than enough incentive to travel to another town.

 

 

I cannot comprehend it because it doesn't make any sense. If a town is looted you are indeed forced to travel inland otherwise you die. The amount of enterable buildings has zero influence on that.

Your two responses in this post are based on a broken WIP mechanic of loot spawning in which loot doesn't respawn.

[Dagwood 680]

And the way loot respawns will force us to move around the map or starve to death. The game will change. You must be patient.

[Bororm 1156]

You may spend more time in the city with more enterable buildings, but it doesn't in anyway reduce incentive to travel between cities. Anyone with just the slightest experience of looting in SA will know that you quickly learn when a town has been looted, and that is more than enough incentive to travel to another town.

 

 

I cannot comprehend it because it doesn't make any sense. If a town is looted you are indeed forced to travel inland otherwise you die. The amount of enterable buildings has zero influence on that.

 

You're talking about a specific scenario, which most people who have experience avoid by picking a server that is likely to have loot to begin with.  I'd argue that most people aren't going to go beyond the coastal towns if they are empty of loot, and will simply server hop instead.

 

I don't understand how you can't comprehend the simple math of more places to loot=more time spent looting in a single place.  If you acknowledge that then it's trivial to extrapolate that more time spent in one place=less time travelling.  Saying it has zero influence is ridiculous.  A better argument would be that the buildings themselves aren't the problem but the loot is.  However there's no indication that loot isn't going to be untied to structures (that would be dumb any ways), but at least it would follow a better line of reasoning then "no it has absolutely no effect."

 

 

You can seriously spend as much time as you would have spent in a playsession of the mod looking for vehicles/crashes/mil gear around the map, in a single town in the SA.  You can spend hours looting a town in the SA, where as unless you were loot cycling in the mod, you are going to spend a fraction of that time.

 

Did you even play the mod?

Edited February 1, 2015 by Bororm

[BadAsh (DayZ) 1513]

Your two responses in this post are based on a broken WIP mechanic of loot spawning in which loot doesn't respawn.

 

Lolwut?

[BadAsh (DayZ) 1513]

You're talking about a specific scenario, which most people who have experience avoid by picking a server that is likely to have loot to begin with.  I'd argue that most people aren't going to go beyond the coastal towns if they are empty of loot, and will simply server hop instead.

 

And I say that is bs. Players do serverhop, no doubt about it, the gallery of this forum has shown several examples of it. But judging from that evidence, serverhopping is mostly reserved for military loot spawns, all of which are inland. You would have to be a special case to serverhop coastal towns for loot.

[BC_Hawke 276]

And the way loot respawns will force us to move around the map or starve to death. The game will change. You must be patient.

Isn't that backwards?  As I understand it, the current lack of properly respawning loot actually pushes people out of towns (or to be more accurate, pushes people to low pop servers as Bororm pointed out).  When loot is respawning properly, people will hang out even longer in coastal cities to get their loot.  The changes will only amplify the problem I'm pointing out.  This may not be the case in persistent servers where there's giant piles of loot in every building, but that's an entirely different conversation.  

[Bororm 1156]

And I say that is bs. Players do serverhop, no doubt about it, the gallery of this forum has shown several examples of it. But judging from that evidence, serverhopping is mostly reserved for military loot spawns, all of which are inland. You would have to be a special case to serverhop coastal towns for loot.

 

That "special case" is that you want to camp the coast, which a lot of people do, because surprise surprise that's where the majority of people are due to a large number of reasons.  One of those reasons is that there are more buildings to check, which is the topic at hand.

[BadAsh (DayZ) 1513]

That "special case" is that you want to camp the coast, which a lot of people do, because surprise surprise that's where the majority of people are due to a large number of reasons.  One of those reasons is that there are more buildings to check, which is the topic at hand.

 

That is untrue. Novod is currently the largest city on the map, an inland city.

 

And as I mentioned most players are actually surprisingly reasonably intelligent. They don't care about the amount of buildings they can enter, they care about what they will likely find in there. And military locations just spawn better loot. The coast can't compete with that. And of course as everyone not being a scrub knows, when you spawn close to an empty coastal town you just need to move inland to a non-coastal town in order to find all you didn't find at that coastal town spawn.

[Bororm 1156]

Let's also say you are going to another town because the coastal town is looted.  The same issue still applies, and is part of what Bullet_Catcher is pointing out, that once you get to that next town that hasn't been looted you're staying there a while.  Far longer than you would have in the mod, before moving on again.  Which again, is less time spent travelling, which leads to less encounters outside of town.

 

And with pretty much every little town being viable to loot, it spreads the population as pointed out.  So again, you've got more people stationary in more sections of the map for longer periods of time.  Leading to less encounters between towns/travelling.

 

I spent about 45 minutes looking for matches in Lopatino the other day, I finally found them in literally one of the last houses I checked.  You know how incredibly few enterable structures lopatino had in the mod?  I would have been in and out of there in a couple of minutes in the mod.  That's easily 40 minutes if I'm being generous of me staying in one fairly out of the way town, that I would have likely have spent travelling in the mod.

[BadAsh (DayZ) 1513]

Let's also say you are going to another town because the coastal town is looted.  The same issue still applies, and is part of what Bullet_Catcher is pointing out, that once you get to that next town that hasn't been looted you're staying there a while.  Far longer than you would have in the mod, before moving on again.  

 

I still don't get why that is a negative thing. But it actually doesn't help your case, because in your scenario everyone else would be busy checking out that town and thus everyone should be potentially running into each other when they spend that eternity checking out that inland town that everybody is forced to spend that eternity in.

[Jesus Christ The Goblin 71]

I Love the fact that people could be literally anywhere and the large number of buildings increase that chance because people have more incentive to spend time looting towns rather than running straight to the same areas over and over again.
I love the fact encounters are becoming more random and I have to actually worry that people could be hiding in places that I wont necessarily find them.

I was in Novo and it seemed that I was the only person there, I threw a flare at the top of City Hall and within 3 minutes I saw 5 players show up and shoot each other, After executing the sole survivor I had a laugh about how I had no idea there was anyone else in the town.

While you see people spreading out and spending time looting towns as bad, I see it as good. It is all a matter of opinion and in my opinion the game is taking a fantastic direction by having so many buildings to search.

Yeah I get it you want a middle ground, I don't.

 

[Bororm 1156]

I'm sorry badash but if you're not going to put in the effort to actually follow what is being discussed, and not take the extra steps in the thought process that we've tried multiple times to point out I just don't know what to do for you.

[tommy290 941]

 

THERE IS A MIDDLE GROUND THAT THEY SHOULD HAVE AIMED FOR.  I'M NOT SAYING THE MOD HAD THE RIGHT AMOUNT OF ENTERABLE BUILDINGS.  I'M SAYING THAT MORE SHOULD HAVE BEEN ADDED, BUT THEY WENT TO FAR AND ADDED TO MANY.  SOMEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER.

 

 

I can't for the life of me see why people are completely missing my point even though I've made it very clear.

 

I think most people see your point, they just don't agree with it. I certainly don't. I want every building to be enterable. It's more fun that way. I like exploring places, and I don't like going up to a door and not being able to open it. Kills the mood for me. I'm also a big fan of being able to have a huge variety of places I can go to get the loot I need. Now I'm not forced to hit up one of a small handful of big cities to get basic gear to survive. I can go almost anywhere and find things. With the higher number of enterable buildings, there's also the ability to expand the item list and still give people reasonable chances of finding things due to the increase in spawn points.

 

Your argument is focused on player interaction, and I fully understand where you're coming from. However, I do not believe DayZ should be doing anything to force player interaction. That should not be a consideration in any design choices. DayZ should center around survival simulation. Any player interaction that occurs should be due solely to the players themselves causing it. Having interesting locations in-land is fine, but to lower the amount of enterable buildings simply so people won't spend so much time looting appears to be catering to a specific playstyle, and that's not what DayZ is all about. If you want more of a chance to run into people in-land, they should simply make the entire map open for fresh spawns. That would accomplish the same goal, but without reducing the quality of the game. 

 

All that being said, performance is a justifiable reason to not have as many enterable buildings. If they can't make it so you get great performance with all the enterable buildings, they should lower the number until high performance is possible. 

[Bororm 1156]

I'm curious, do the people who like spending more time in towns also prefer urban/close quarters pvp over the medium/longer range and more rural based engagements?

[BadAsh (DayZ) 1513]

I'm sorry badash but if you're not going to put in the effort to actually follow what is being discussed, and not take the extra steps in the thought process that we've tried multiple times to point out I just don't know what to do for you.

 

I have been following what is being discussed, it was only a 3 page thread after all, it is not that difficult to follow, and I have adressed your points several times. Directly and with quotes. Please try and answer my objections instead of attempting this lame duck defence about me not following the thread. To be honest it just makes you look silly.

Edited February 1, 2015 by BadAsh

[Bororm 1156]

I have been following what is being discussed, it was only a 3 page thread after all, it is not that difficult to follow, and I have adressed your points several times. Directly and with quotes. Please try and answer my objections instead of attempting this lame duck defence about me not following the thread. To be honest it just makes you look silly.

 

You're nitpicking and getting off topic with your quotes.  You're backhanded questioning my experience and calling me a scrub in a roundabout way.

 

What is being posed is the following:

more available loot (enterable buildings)=more time spent in one place=less time travelling=less encounters out of towns

 

You have said there is no correlation between enterable buildings and player encounters in reference to that topic.  Which is objectively false.  So until you can concede that point, you can bring up situational circumstances that skirt the topic all you want but I'm done trying to point out the obvious.

 

The posters above me seem to grasp it and simply disagree.  Which is fine, and I'm now curious as to their playstyles.  In your case however, there's simply no point in discussing with you if you can't get on the initial point of the thread especially if you're going to degrade into backhanded comments.

[BC_Hawke 276]

I think most people see your point, they just don't agree with it.

Well, the majority of the people being vocal are either using straw man fallacies or misquoting what I'm saying, so I felt it necessary to express my viewpoint again in a way that it can be seen more clearly.  =P

 

 

I want every building to be enterable. It's more fun that way. I like exploring places, and I don't like going up to a door and not being able to open it. Kills the mood for me. I'm also a big fan of being able to have a huge variety of places I can go to get the loot I need. Now I'm not forced to hit up one of a small handful of big cities to get basic gear to survive. I can go almost anywhere and find things. With the higher number of enterable buildings, there's also the ability to expand the item list and still give people reasonable chances of finding things due to the increase in spawn points.

That's fine and good until it goes so far as to create a scenario in which you never really see anybody outside of cities near spawn points.  I mean, like I said before, I'll literally spend hours and hours traveling to places like NWAF, Veresnik, and other high loot areas across the map and not see a single soul.  I'm with you, I want to explore too, but putting too many redundant copy/paste structures on the map has had a negative impact on player movement and really isn't as interesting as people make it out to be.  If the world had some real variety to it then maybe, yes, it would be exciting, but you'd still have the problem of player movement across the map being stunted.

 

 

Your argument is focused on player interaction, and I fully understand where you're coming from. However, I do not believe DayZ should be doing anything to force player interaction. That should not be a consideration in any design choices. DayZ should center around survival simulation. Any player interaction that occurs should be due solely to the players themselves causing it. Having interesting locations in-land is fine, but to lower the amount of enterable buildings simply so people won't spend so much time looting appears to be catering to a specific playstyle, and that's not what DayZ is all about. If you want more of a chance to run into people in-land, they should simply make the entire map open for fresh spawns. That would accomplish the same goal, but without reducing the quality of the game. 

I agree they shouldn't "force" interactions, but it's vital to create a landscape that's conducive to people actually using it and meeting other players.  They've failed in that area in my opinion.  And making the entire map open to fresh spawns is the absolute worst thing they could do.  Yes, DayZ is a sandbox game, but one of the best things about the mod (and SA to a degree) is that there was a sense of linear progression.  You had one experience on the coast, a vastly different experience in the woods, towns, and villages while traveling North, and yet another experience once you reached areas like Stary, NWAF, NEAF, Vybor, etc.  It was a journey into the heart of darkness.  You spawned amongst chaos on the coast and had go get initial gear and GTFO.  You then could breathe a little bit as you left Cherno/Elektro/Berezino, but the began the journey into the far more dangerous areas of the map.  There were extremely dangerous hot zones where you would often get into gunfights and squad battles around the high level military loot spawn areas.  If you chose, you could be the hermit who gets a simple gun like a hunting rifle and survive in the outskirts of the map, looting heli crashes for the high end gear rather than risking a journey to NWAF.  All along the way you potentially ran into survivors, bandits, and heroes.  When you died, you started again at the coast with nothing.  Nobody was being "forced" to play a certain way, but there was just more of a variety of experiences that were more entertaining.  I find that linear progression essential to DayZ even though it's a sandbox game.

 

 

 

All that being said, performance is a justifiable reason to not have as many enterable buildings. If they can't make it so you get great performance with all the enterable buildings, they should lower the number until high performance is possible. 

Well, it's my opinion that they'll never be able to optimize the game enough to fill it with 1,000s of zombies and 100+ players (don't forget vehicles, aircraft, bicycles, boats, etc) which is really what is needed to fill all the areas they've added to the game.  BI has a very poor track record on optimizing games and one of the devs expressed doubt when I asked him if the servers would ever be able to handle enough zombies to replicate the hordes that you see in the mod.

[Jesus Christ The Goblin 71]

I'm curious, do the people who like spending more time in towns also prefer urban/close quarters pvp over the medium/longer range and more rural based engagements?

I have no preference, It all depends what equipment I have and how I feel at the time.

 

[mercules 1290]

You cannot deny that you have incredibly higher chances of running into people further inland on the map in the vanilla mod than you do in SA. 

 

Further in land? Yes. However what basically happens in the Mod is that you end up encountering people in the same locations over and over and skip nearly every small town. You basically run down a list and go:

Does this town have:

Open Church

Corner Pub

Firehall

Red Brick Building

Grocery Store

Hospital

Shed

Barns

 

 

If not you skipped it. Once you had a decent gun and a few other things you basically skipped even those towns and just went for barracks. So of course you ran into people more because loot was more or less concentrated in 10% of the map with very little chance of getting it any place else. Military loot was focussed in less than 5% of the map and so even worse. I really like SA where I don't even have to enter a town to meet most of my basic survival needs. I can find matches and rope in an out of the way place, craft a knife, kill an animal for it's hide, meat, and guts, and start crafting things like a backpack, bow, and such. 

[OrLoK 16185]

THERE IS <snip> BETTER.

 

Hello there

 

Dont do that, please.

 

Its the forum equivalent of having a temper tantrum.

 

Rgds

 

LoK

[Etherious 907]

DayZ was never mean't to be a game about constant player interaction. It's the god damn apocalypse not a Playstation Home meet up.

[Bororm 1156]

DayZ was never mean't to be a game about constant player interaction. It's the god damn apocalypse not a Playstation Home meet up.

 

No one's talking about constant player interaction.

 

When was the last time you ran into some one in the woods in the middle of no where in the standalone?  When was the last time you had a fight that wasn't in or immediately around a town?

 

The only one's I've had in recent memory are with hackers using ESP to teleport to me.

 

Another problem to throw into the hat is run speed.  You spend more time in towns and less time getting there.