What happened to compasses?

[lodestar 3]

So... I respawned a few days ago after an accidental suicide with a grenade (by the way, if you are the guy who was inside the church in Pustoshka, congratulations) and run my usual start up route. After getting a weapon I started looting stores and houses for the basic equipment: compass, watch, map, hatchet, matches, etc.

So far I've been to over a dozen stores and countless houses, been to the military camp in Stary twice and found three crash sites, not to mention looting tens of deer stands. Right now I have great gear (camo and ghillie suit, M14, FN FAL with night vision, 9 DMR mags and 4 FAL mags) and all basic equipment but the damn compass!

I've been looting cities specifically looking for it for two days and it doesn't spawn anywhere. It looks like they were replaced by watches on the loot tables because I found countless of them. Almost 90% of the time a loot pile in a house or store has a green bag, it's a watch.

Is anyone else having the same problem? First I considered I was just being unlucky, but now it's too consistent. Looks like an error.

[mannyfresh 1]

RNG strikes again.

[lodestar 3]

I doubt that.

[FrostDMG 398]

I doubt that.

never doubt rng. some people find useful things everywhere others cant find shit

[denkart 198]

Yeah dude, they just decided to remove compasses. Just to mess with you.

Seriously though, use your brain. It's just bad luck. I found a compass yesterday.

[KWilt 157]

I dunno if I'd call it 'bad luck'. Our group's only come across maybe half a dozen compasses since about 1.7.1.3.

They're definitely rarer for some odd reason.

[dallas 5195]

Must be bad luck, was trying to find matches yesterday for a teammate, took forever, passed a few compasses,before I found a box of matches.

[KWilt 157]

Dunno.

I know on an off day, though, I've found as many as eight to fourteen watches in a single convini store.