Shoving it down our throat vs encouraging players

[S3V3N 1402]

I feel like a lot of things are IN Dayz that nobody uses that much, however. 

 

An example would be the bloodpacks. I've never used one. Sure we tried out the system, but I never used one in battle. One of the reasons was, I was always already dead and my buds couldn't revive me. If we stayed unconscious for longer, it could make a bit more sense, though.

I guess the idea behind the whole medical part of the game is that you group one of your guys as medic - but who does that? Everyone loots and doesn't have space for medic stuff. It's bad to carry it around on the off-chance that you'll have an encounter that requires any of the stuff. It's also too hard to find everything; imho the stuff you need to give a transfusion should be bagged similarly to the medkits you find; so you can give a transfusion without further means (and save inventory space).

 

-> so now the devs are tweaking health restoration to push us into using the bloodbags some more; at the same time they don't give incentive to do so.

 

=> this is an idea from soldiering: have a medic on your team! Not a bad idea, but certainly not a great choice for small groups or solo players.

 

 

Another thing is the leather crafting and hunting. I really like a lot of the crafting and planting ideas of the game. But they don't correspond well with the mentality of the average Dayz player. Which is KOS. I have not had many friendly encounters and even then I often got shot while talking to the other guy (either buy himself or one of his friends). I see and understand that Dayz still has a competitive shooter game aspect for some (even though they have no leaderboards or other means to draw satisfaction from). But I could argue that people are playing the game wrong, by trying to apply game rules to Dayz. Dayz should be played with common sense - by "life" rules, if you want so. There is no compulsion to kill a crafter in leather clothing with a bit of game in his makeshift backpack, yet people do it. Just for fun.

 

There is no Live and Let die in the game. We should be able to reward ourself in some way, by playing decent, but there is no way in Dayz. I like how in some of the mods your appearance changes according to your playstyle. Visually another player can determine the risk of you shooting him, by gauging the state of your equipment and looks.

 

In a lot of ways there are brilliant systems in the game that strengthen the survival and simulation aspect. However, these aren't implemented very well because they are often in conflict with other systems of the game. Add to that the non-communicative and kill on sight way most people play the game + Dayz's general unreliability/bugs and you deal with a lot of penalties for chosing the crafting lifestyle over another. I think crafting and hunting should yield rewards you cannot simply pick up from the ground. There is no way to fix this, unless the game offers more choice for trading and hiding inventory on crafted gear (e.g. if he has the full leather set, you can't loot the hunter). The whole killing others, because they are less powerful must be turned into robbing or trading with other players, because they can be useful. There will still be a choice to kill someone, it will just be a bigger choice when that someone could be potentially useful.     

[Whyherro123 2283]

I feel like a lot of things are IN Dayz that nobody uses that much, however. 

 

An example would be the bloodpacks. I've never used one. Sure we tried out the system, but I never used one in battle. One of the reasons was, I was always already dead and my buds couldn't revive me. If we stayed unconscious for longer, it could make a bit more sense, though.

I guess the idea behind the whole medical part of the game is that you group one of your guys as medic - but who does that? Everyone loots and doesn't have space for medic stuff. It's bad to carry it around on the off-chance that you'll have an encounter that requires any of the stuff. It's also too hard to find everything; imho the stuff you need to give a transfusion should be bagged similarly to the medkits you find; so you can give a transfusion without further means (and save inventory space).

 

-> so now the devs are tweaking health restoration to push us into using the bloodbags some more; at the same time they don't give incentive to do so.

 

=> this is an idea from soldiering: have a medic on your team! Not a bad idea, but certainly not a great choice for small groups or solo players.

 

 

Another thing is the leather crafting and hunting. I really like a lot of the crafting and planting ideas of the game. But they don't correspond well with the mentality of the average Dayz player. Which is KOS. I have not had many friendly encounters and even then I often got shot while talking to the other guy (either buy himself or one of his friends). I see and understand that Dayz still has a competitive shooter game aspect for some (even though they have no leaderboards or other means to draw satisfaction from). But I could argue that people are playing the game wrong, by trying to apply game rules to Dayz. Dayz should be played with common sense - by "life" rules, if you want so. There is no compulsion to kill a crafter in leather clothing with a bit of game in his makeshift backpack, yet people do it. Just for fun.

 

There is no Live and Let die in the game. We should be able to reward ourself in some way, by playing decent, but there is no way in Dayz. I like how in some of the mods your appearance changes according to your playstyle. Visually another player can determine the risk of you shooting him, by gauging the state of your equipment and looks.

 

In a lot of ways there are brilliant systems in the game that strengthen the survival and simulation aspect. However, these aren't implemented very well because they are often in conflict with other systems of the game. Add to that the non-communicative and kill on sight way most people play the game + Dayz's general unreliability/bugs and you deal with a lot of penalties for chosing the crafting lifestyle over another. I think crafting and hunting should yield rewards you cannot simply pick up from the ground. There is no way to fix this, unless the game offers more choice for trading and hiding inventory on crafted gear (e.g. if he has the full leather set, you can't loot the hunter). The whole killing others, because they are less powerful must be turned into robbing or trading with other players, because they can be useful. There will still be a choice to kill someone, it will just be a bigger choice when that someone could be potentially useful.     

1) My clan has a medic. I usually act in that capacity, and I used to agree with you about bloodpacks: they were a hassle to find matches, and "only" restored 1000 blood, a relatively-paltry amount. I used to use saline exclusively, as it was much easier logistic-wise (everyone can accept saline), even if it only restored 500 blood. Now, with Blood restoring twice as much, I might switch back. Also, I am slowly trying to persuade everyone in my clan to carry a "1st Aid Kit", containing a splint, two bandages/rags, and a bag of their own blood. That way, if they get shot, their squad-mate can just take it from their aid kit and inject it, with no concerns about incompatibilities. 

 

2) people KoS right now because there 1) isn't really anything else to do and 2) there are next-to-no consequences for it. No hordes of zombies come running, there are no trading centers to be barred from for being a murdering scumbag, and ammo is STUPID-plentiful. If you only had 3 bullets for a gun, 30 zombies would come barreling out for your ass when you fire, and most every trader and community on the server would bar you entry/hunt you down for murdering others in cold blood, then KoS would slow/calm down.

 

Really, there should be a reason for players to make/use or trade for the supplies they need, and that reason should be scarcity. Right now, you can run around Berezino, and find enough clothing, food, drink, medical supplies and weapons/ammunition to play the game for hours. You have no reason to make a bow/leather clothing, or to actually interact/trade with other players, unless you deliberately go out of your way to do so. If the amount of clothing/canned food/medical supplies dropped drastically, and the zombie count increased drastically , then players would trade/use improvised equipment.

Edited March 1, 2015 by Whyherro123

[sachad 1016]

I feel like a lot of things are IN Dayz that nobody uses that much, however. 

 

An example would be the bloodpacks. I've never used one. Sure we tried out the system, but I never used one in battle. One of the reasons was, I was always already dead and my buds couldn't revive me. If we stayed unconscious for longer, it could make a bit more sense, though.

I guess the idea behind the whole medical part of the game is that you group one of your guys as medic - but who does that? Everyone loots and doesn't have space for medic stuff. It's bad to carry it around on the off-chance that you'll have an encounter that requires any of the stuff. It's also too hard to find everything; imho the stuff you need to give a transfusion should be bagged similarly to the medkits you find; so you can give a transfusion without further means (and save inventory space).

 

-> so now the devs are tweaking health restoration to push us into using the bloodbags some more; at the same time they don't give incentive to do so.

 

=> this is an idea from soldiering: have a medic on your team! Not a bad idea, but certainly not a great choice for small groups or solo players.

 

 

Another thing is the leather crafting and hunting. I really like a lot of the crafting and planting ideas of the game. But they don't correspond well with the mentality of the average Dayz player. Which is KOS. I have not had many friendly encounters and even then I often got shot while talking to the other guy (either buy himself or one of his friends). I see and understand that Dayz still has a competitive shooter game aspect for some (even though they have no leaderboards or other means to draw satisfaction from). But I could argue that people are playing the game wrong, by trying to apply game rules to Dayz. Dayz should be played with common sense - by "life" rules, if you want so. There is no compulsion to kill a crafter in leather clothing with a bit of game in his makeshift backpack, yet people do it. Just for fun.

 

There is no Live and Let die in the game. We should be able to reward ourself in some way, by playing decent, but there is no way in Dayz. I like how in some of the mods your appearance changes according to your playstyle. Visually another player can determine the risk of you shooting him, by gauging the state of your equipment and looks.

 

In a lot of ways there are brilliant systems in the game that strengthen the survival and simulation aspect. However, these aren't implemented very well because they are often in conflict with other systems of the game. Add to that the non-communicative and kill on sight way most people play the game + Dayz's general unreliability/bugs and you deal with a lot of penalties for chosing the crafting lifestyle over another. I think crafting and hunting should yield rewards you cannot simply pick up from the ground. There is no way to fix this, unless the game offers more choice for trading and hiding inventory on crafted gear (e.g. if he has the full leather set, you can't loot the hunter). The whole killing others, because they are less powerful must be turned into robbing or trading with other players, because they can be useful. There will still be a choice to kill someone, it will just be a bigger choice when that someone could be potentially useful.     

 

Team work is its own reward, or should be at least. I agree that right now, there isn't much incentive to go play hunter in the woods, but that'll come. People resort to gun violence because the survival aspect of the game is hardly a challenge. Food and clothing is everywhere, zombies are only a threat if you're an unarmed bambi, and until recently, even if you did take damage, regaining health was a quick process. But now that blood regeneration has been nerfed and it is becoming more difficult to stay energized and hydrated 24/7, we've taken another step in the right direction. It has been a long time since I carried saline bags, but since 0.54 I always try to carry one or two. Once zombies become a real threat, I expect players will naturally start working together. Not much point in blasting people away willy-nilly if the noise attracts a horde.

 

As for visual indicators of how you play, that has been suggested many times, and shot down as many times. In the real world, you'd have no idea what someone is like, until you interacted with them. The game should be no different. The main attraction, for me, is that there are no rules, and no objectives except staying alive. Every person you see could be a friend or an enemy. Right now, there is no real need for friends in order to stay alive, so there's no downside to killing for the heck of it.

[Bororm 1156]

The blood change was stupid.  It takes twice as much and gives twice as much.  Some people used it before by taking their own blood, but hardly anyone did because you don't want to bother regening that lost blood and you might as well use a saline.

 

Now you have to regen twice as much blood (2k out of what, 5k total? cut your life nearly in half for the time it takes to regen?) and regen was reduced and the healthy status is more annoying now.  Good luck with that change.  All it does is encourage you to steal other people's blood if anything, and no ones gonna bother with that either because you need 2 blood test kits.

 

They should change blood bags but this was a poorly thought out method of doing so.

[stielhandgranate 480]

The whole wanting to get players to use bloodbags thing is dumb.  Especially when they go the hardcore survival route and blood couldn't be stored safely without refrigeration. If anything they should be deleted.

[S3V3N 1402]

I think what you are saying is the accessibility of certain items is too high. I halfway agree on that. Superficially it looks like it. But I for one never understood why we can't find a single loaded pistol in the world. If we went your way about scarcity of items, we would have bambis in fistfights over a can of beans. A very much "the Road" kind of game, which could be really interesting by itself. However, what I always imagined Dayz would be, is a reflection of how the world could still function after a global catastrophic event. Managing survival in a world that is threatening in itself and forcing you to seek companionship or flexing out your own skills. I found it somewhat cute that you can build small houses in some of the mods, but that is entirely not the way it should be imagined. The Dayz devs luckily don't do that! Yet, they should look into tribe cultures to get an idea of how we'll survive. Instead they look into military organisation types, which is why the best thing we can expect in the game right now is a decent face-off. With a solo or no survivor. It doesn't really push that "cling to life" aspect I would like to feel.

 

You do feel that though. The best part is coming out of a fight victorious, hands shaking and heart pumping. I admit as much as that. There is fun to be had. But it is smaller than it could be potentially! 

 

I do agree on the loot being plentyful, but what bothers me about it is the uniform distribution. Imho there should be more regional differences. There should be stuff I can only get in the south/north. The weather should be regional and seasonal (if at some point possible). Possibly when the game is more complete we will finally get the trade posts that had been planned at the beginning. I realize this is a difficult thing to balance, as you don't want people to treat this as an ingame shop, but rather a means to survival; something that would most definiately exist in a post-apo world. It's not so much about spawning many items or zombies in the same place to me. it's about making the ones that do spawn meaningful, which is sorely lacking at the moment.

 

Most of all, Dayz is a looting game. Looting and shooting at people looting. I lose more gear to glitches and crashes than to other players anyway, so I'm not bothered about all the dying or starting over. I have my tent, I come prepared. I am bothered by the repetitiveness of it all. I played Chernarus Life when someone in the chat said that "this zombie mod" was done. So I started playing the mod(s) and played them for years. I didn't like how the chopper was the ultimate goal in the mods, but I did like some of the hilarious encounters I've had. There was some real fun, and I can't point my finger on where that came from. Dayz standalone is much more grim. It's harder to survive, which is good, but there are fewer zombies, which makes it more of a Deathmatch map with looting than a zombie survival game. I definitely agree that the game needs more zombies. I guess it has been said before, but if the zombies are the biggest thread on the map (because of their numbers, not their abilities), we will stop killing each other on sight. Maybe that should be something the development should focus on. We need tons of zombies ^^ 

Edited March 1, 2015 by S3V3N

[Calvin Candie 189]

---This was supposed to be a short post, but I went in detail as this may relief some of the concern that many people have in the future of Dayz---

I strongly believe the Standalone is going to be balanced for several opposite play styles upon completion.

To back up this statement, this was already done once. How you ask?

There was a server in the original DayZ Mod, which had been tweaked. It was not Epoch or Overpoch, nor was it any of the popular role playing servers which enforced some strict rules on how you play (no KoS or you get banned ect.) IT WAS A SINGLE SERVER, avoided by many and cherished by few.

It was vanilla DayZ, no admins 24/7, KoS allowed. Yet KoS was VERY rare. There were bandits, but in the true sense. They would hold you up! Most of the players were so friendly, it was like they were relieved and happy to see you! Almost like you would expect in actual apocalypse. It was the closest thing you could have imagined to what many people want from DayZ Standalone.

So how did they pull this off you ask?

The server had these settings:

- massively increased zombie count.

Towns were an undertake to loot. For example Elektro itself had 100 or 150 Zeds by my rough estimate. May have been even more. They were litterary 20 meters apart from each other. Will come back to that later.

- weather cycle, including dense fogs.

You wouldn't believe how your playstyle changes when you cannot see beyond 40-50 meteres. So intense combined with lots of Zeds.

- General loot, weaponry and ammo were on the rare side.

I remember to have carried shotties and lee enfields for quite a while, almost 2/3 or even entire of my life span.

-THATS IT!!!

Let me shortly describe one play session.

Logged in near Elektro. Time of the day was dusk. Sun was setting. Weather was foggy as hell. Visibility up to 100 meters, beyond that even binoculars were useless. That was fine, as sometimes even denser fog occured.

I had decent gear and a shotty. My goal? Get some food in Elektro. It was too damn foggy to head to some God forsaken town in this fog. Too easy to get lost without the compass (See how the fog and lack of light friggin changes your way of thinking!? And I know the map by heart! Finnaly some real choices were to be made, will I go to safer, harder to find, abandoned town or Zed infested but easy to find city).

I make my way to enterance of the city and pass the crooked "Elektro" sign. After a short run and climb over the hill, the firestation with the power plant is in my sights. I get closer, only to find out there are 5-6 Zeds inside the firestation yard. Probably more around the complex.

Better weapon would be nice. But I need food now. So better skip the firestation. Besides, how the hell would I take on 6+ Zeds at once with the old double barrel. Not to mention a lot more that would be attracted by the noise.

Coming to the houses, the sun is barrely making enough light to see anything. There were aprox. 10 Zed silhouettes which I could spot on the main road. Even more in the darker spots, in the yards, behind houses. I ducked down as this made me far less visible to them. My target was The Store.

Long story short. It took me 10 minutes just to pass 50 meters and reach the damn store.

Got some food. But still have to get out of damn Elektro. Zombies are not just standing still, many of them are shambling around, like they are "patroling", making you constantly adjust your route. Every couple of meters passed are a succes.

This was so freaking intense. And just for 2 cans of food.

Imagine this in the Standalone! Being a Hermit who lives off the land would be an option now! A medic would actually be INVALUABLE in case you got hammered by a small horde of Zeds and went black and white from blood loss and your wounds infected. No easy way to get food and just rub it off!

Want to be a bandit? Great! Hold someone up! If you shoot, both your victim and you will probably be teared to pieces by Zeds. You can still execute the victim by melee weapon, but the trick is to get them restrained in the first place.

Ok I am done. You get the picture. I want THIS again!

Edited March 1, 2015 by Calvin Candie

[ToySmokes 116]

---This was supposed to be a short post, but I went in detail as this may relief some of the concern that many people have in the future of Dayz---

I strongly believe the Standalone is going to be balanced for several opposite play styles upon completion.

To back up this statement, this was already done once. How you ask?

There was a server in the original DayZ Mod, which had been tweaked. It was not Epoch or Overpoch, nor was it any of the popular role playing servers which enforced some strict rules on how you play (no KoS or you get banned ect.) IT WAS A SINGLE SERVER, avoided by many and cherished by few.

It was vanilla DayZ, no admins 24/7, KoS allowed. Yet KoS was VERY rare. There were bandits, but in the true sense. They would hold you up! Most of the players were so friendly, it was like they were relieved and happy to see you! Almost like you would expect in actual apocalypse. It was the closest thing you could have imagined to what many people want from DayZ Standalone.

So how did they pull this off you ask?

The server had these settings:

- massively increased zombie count.

Towns were an undertake to loot. For example Elektro itself had 100 or 150 Zeds by my rough estimate. May have been even more. They were litterary 20 meters apart from each other. Will come back to that later.

- weather cycle, including dense fogs.

You wouldn't believe how your playstyle changes when you cannot see beyond 40-50 meteres. So intense combined with lots of Zeds.

- General loot, weaponry and ammo were on the rare side.

I remember to have carried shotties and lee enfields for quite a while, almost 2/3 or even entire of my life span.

-THATS IT!!!

Let me shortly describe one play session.

Logged in near Elektro. Time of the day was dusk. Sun was setting. Weather was foggy as hell. Visibility up to 100 meters, beyond that even binoculars were useless. That was fine, as sometimes even denser fog occured.

I had decent gear and a shotty. My goal? Get some food in Elektro. It was too damn foggy to head to some God forsaken town in this fog. Too easy to get lost without the compass (See how the fog and lack of light friggin changes your way of thinking!? And I know the map by heart! Finnaly some real choices were to be made, will I go to safer, harder to find, abandoned town or Zed infested but easy to find city).

I make my way to enterance of the city and pass the crooked "Elektro" sign. After a short run and climb over the hill, the firestation with the power plant is in my sights. I get closer, only to find out there are 5-6 Zeds inside the firestation yard. Probably more around the complex.

Better weapon would be nice. But I need food now. So better skip the firestation. Besides, how the hell would I take on 6+ Zeds at once with the old double barrel. Not to mention a lot more that would be attracted by the noise.

Coming to the houses, the sun is barrely making enough light to see anything. There were aprox. 10 Zed silhouettes which I could spot on the main road. Even more in the darker spots, in the yards, behind houses. I ducked down as this made me far less visible to them. My target was The Store.

Long story short. It took me 10 minutes just to pass 50 meters and reach the damn store.

Got some food. But still have to get out of damn Elektro. Zombies are not just standing still, many of them are shambling around, like they are "patroling", making you constantly adjust your route. Every couple of meters passed are a succes.

This was so freaking intense. And just for 2 cans of food.

Imagine this in the Standalone! Being a Hermit who lives off the land would be an option now! A medic would actually be INVALUABLE in case you got hammered by a small horde of Zeds and went black and white from blood loss and your wounds infected. No easy way to get food and just rub it off!

Want to be a bandit? Great! Hold someone up! If you shoot, both your victim and you will probably be teared to pieces by Zeds. You can still execute the victim by melee weapon, but the trick is to get them restrained in the first place.

Ok I am done. You get the picture. I want THIS again!

This was just an amazing story! I am confident that the devs will manage to pull this off! They know what they are doing, but they don't have the tools to do it... Yet! With the new renderer and engine over all in the game, they can finally do what they want pretty much!

[boneboys 7988]

No one is shoving anything anywhere !

 

This is DayZ. This is your story...