Share some tips for those of us who are new to Arma and DayZ

[EO 42]

My suggestion to anyone starting out in Dayz is to try out the armory mode or boot camp to get a feel for the controls and enviroment before unleashing yourself into such a brutal world!

[Wentworth Miller 5]

For anyone who has played a zombie/survival related game (L4D, Dead Frontier, Stalker, etc) or seen a film (I Am Legend, The Book of Eli, The Road, 28 Days Later, etc) just take everything you possibly can from that and you might just survive the night.

My suggestions aren't game-mechanic related; it is about getting the most enjoyable experience:

1. Do not have a game map opened outside of the game (in your browser or printed)

- it takes away that uncertainty of where you are, what/who is around you and you have to actually search for loot instead of simply following a map like a game walk-through.

2. Avoid servers where text-chat is available

- C'mon, you are playing a survival horror game, since when can you communicate with someone across the otherside of a massive world without some form of radio? Besides, voice chat may be available within a local area, use that for communication to get the best experience.

3. Use common sense

- If you require more of an explanation for this then we have bigger issues to discuss.

[BlaBlaSoldier 16]

MOST IMPORTANT TIP!!!!!

Dont go out without lesser than 2x Morphine

[GeeksterDayZ 55]

Equipping weapons can be a bit tricky, here's what I have found after about 30+ hours of play so far.

Pick up a hatchet, open inventory, right-click hatchet and "Remove from toolbelt" to put it in your hands. You often have to click the mouse wheel to 'reload' the hatchet for some reason!

If you pick up a gun and want to switch back to the hatchet, roll the mouse wheel to open a small side-menu and then click the mouse wheel on the hatchet. To go back to the gun, do the same, scroll the wheel until it highlights the gun, click the mouse wheel.

Buggyness with backpacks. Open inventory, double-click your backpack. This will add the items in your backpack to the main items list in the top-right; the numbers of the items will be on the left of the item, the numbers on the right are the ones on your person. At the top of the list you will see the spaces you have free in your backpack (for example ALICE BACKPACK, 2/20 show you have 2 spaces free). If you have no space left, and try to add something to your backpack, you will lose it. It is GONE. I lost a morphine this way, a hard lesson.

Same with moving weapons, you can have it in your hand but if you put it away without having the space for it, you will just lose it, permanently. Learn how many space stuff takes up, and check your pack often to make sure you have what you should!

Best items to get early in your searching; hatchet, matches, knife and water bottle. If you have those, you can go away from the large cities where you are far more likely to get killed for your stuff. Go up to a tree in a dense forest-type area, open inventory, right-click on hatchet and "harvest wood". This will add a wood pile to your inventory (takes 3 spaces, I think). Now you can right-click on the MATCHES and choose "make fireplace".

Kill sheep / cows and use the knife to gut the animal (option will appear when looking at the animal, click the mouse wheel to do it). This will create 3-8 steaks depending on the size of the animal. You can then cook the steaks on the fire you can make - again the option will appear as "cook steaks" as a mouse-wheel click when you are close to the fire and looking at it. This will cook all the steaks on your person, NOT the ones in your backpack - you may have to move stuff around so always try to keep 1 slot on your person free so you can "juggle" stuff between backpack & person withou putting it on the floor (stuff often vansihes when you put it down, especially on grass!).

Steaks give you +800 blood, keep you full for a long time. You can fill the water bottle at any water source (not the sea!), often found near barns / farmland.

Bascially, with those 4 items, you can find a decent place to 'live' and survive for a few days at least while you run search missions to get more items, coming back to the farm each time :)

[GoodNewsEveryone 4]

Equipping weapons can be a bit tricky, here's what I have found after about 30+ hours of play so far.

Pick up a hatchet, open inventory, right-click hatchet and "Remove from toolbelt" to put it in your hands. You often have to click the mouse wheel to 'reload' the hatchet for some reason!

If you pick up a gun and want to switch back to the hatchet, roll the mouse wheel to open a small side-menu and then click the mouse wheel on the hatchet. To go back to the gun, do the same, scroll the wheel until it highlights the gun, click the mouse wheel.

Buggyness with backpacks. Open inventory, double-click your backpack. This will add the items in your backpack to the main items list in the top-right; the numbers of the items will be on the left of the item, the numbers on the right are the ones on your person. At the top of the list you will see the spaces you have free in your backpack (for example ALICE BACKPACK, 2/20 show you have 2 spaces free). If you have no space left, and try to add something to your backpack, you will lose it. It is GONE. I lost a morphine this way, a hard lesson.

Same with moving weapons, you can have it in your hand but if you put it away without having the space for it, you will just lose it, permanently. Learn how many space stuff takes up, and check your pack often to make sure you have what you should!

Best items to get early in your searching; hatchet, matches, knife and water bottle. If you have those, you can go away from the large cities where you are far more likely to get killed for your stuff. Go up to a tree in a dense forest-type area, open inventory, right-click on hatchet and "harvest wood". This will add a wood pile to your inventory (takes 3 spaces, I think). Now you can right-click on the MATCHES and choose "make fireplace".

Kill sheep / cows and use the knife to gut the animal (option will appear when looking at the animal, click the mouse wheel to do it). This will create 3-8 steaks depending on the size of the animal. You can then cook the steaks on the fire you can make - again the option will appear as "cook steaks" as a mouse-wheel click when you are close to the fire and looking at it. This will cook all the steaks on your person, NOT the ones in your backpack - you may have to move stuff around so always try to keep 1 slot on your person free so you can "juggle" stuff between backpack & person withou putting it on the floor (stuff often vansihes when you put it down, especially on grass!).

Steaks give you +800 blood, keep you full for a long time. You can fill the water bottle at any water source (not the sea!), often found near barns / farmland.

Bascially, with those 4 items, you can find a decent place to 'live' and survive for a few days at least while you run search missions to get more items, coming back to the farm each time :)

Just thought I'd tell you that that's a great post.

[CaptainOZ 1]

I can provide a bit of help here;

1: No. You start out with no gun.

2: Guns automactically start off armed when you equip them. If you found a 'package', you probably only found a magazine.

3: Zombies are run via the client's PC, rather than the server. The link is definitely a connection issue with either you or the server.

4: You do not start with a map. It appears as a lootable item ingame.

Now for my question - How do you type in chat to people? I can't figure this out for the life of me. I can use voice chat, but not text chat.

Hey, thanks for replying! People like you make the Earth a better place.

Edited July 11, 2012 by CaptainOZ

[DerekTen 1]

It's real time, so whenever the sun goes down for the time zone that server is in. So let's say you are PST and you are playing in a Seattle server (PST), then whenever the sun goes down/up for you, it goes down/up for the server.

Okay well I've been in the Atlanta server all day today and its been night the entire time.

[Erik-UK 0]

These are some tips ive learned over the past couple of days.

1. First priority should be an axe, it has 9999uses in melee, and one hit kills a zed - if you get good you can kill a group of 6+ without taking any damage.

2. Use the website map to find your bearings, another player kindly mentioned that when you spawn text appears telling you your general location, use it!

3. Raid a military medical center if you can find one, loads of bandages, morphene (trust me, its not worth gathering every survival tool in the game only to have to end up crawling 10kilometers just to find some morphine....

4. If another player does not have a weapon in their hands, then they probably dont have one! its safe to chat to them, on the other hand if someone has a weapon then be cautios, theres no way to tell a bandit from a friendly yet other then if bullets start flying.

5. An enfield is god gift to a zombie slayer. 10rounds per magazine, average fire speed - just dont go firing it whilst surrounded.