Bandit/Survivor Morphing to be removed

[Astuneta (DayZ) 0]

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I do not agree' date=' in real life you can't see if a person is "good" or "bad". You either trust them or have another source for that (a source that is potentially wrong or distorted).

That's why I like the removal of the bandit skin.

[/quote']

In real life you also have many more options for how to get informed and how to interact with others. The game will never provide that number of options. So, a convention here may be suitable.

I think that after a Zombie Apocalypse all those option would be gone. The only way to know things would be by meeting other survivors and tell those stories next to the fire. Or, if barricades and fortified areas can be build and then trading hubs are organized in order to exchange news and barter. Also if Notes or Diaries, ala Dark souls, were to be implemented that could help too to exchange information. That would improve immersion too.

[Mutonizer 78]

[..] if Notes or Diaries, ala Dark souls, were to be implemented that could help too to exchange information. That would improve immersion too

Yea. though you can't just store that server side or something, people would just spam entire books in there.

Hmmm, I wonder if it would be possible to link a "note system" to some kind of social network API, to externalize the storage. Like you could put notes as loot in some places, and when someone reads it, it's just pulling data from something like Twitter or whatever. I usually hate these shit but might be nice here.

[faceman (DayZ) 3]

I know that the bandit system is flawed, but I think this will make a change for the worse - gameplay wise. This change combined with the removal of global chat. All those vigilante crews will have a hard time identifying who and who is not a bandit.

I think we will see a rapid decline in cooperation. Less random groups forming ingame. Most people will just play with teamspeak, and avoid ingame chat and just shoot everyone they come across.. just to be safe. With no penalties this is the safest route to go.

[Shimmler 4]

A right decision, Rocket, thank you!

[maceuk71 1]

I love this change only because the 'survivors' like to think they are whiter than white and always type in the chat "Why? Why would you kill me? What did I do?" like it has really shocked them. So hopefully they will wake up now and play it like an apocalypse and not a camping trip with their chums...

[smiley (DayZ) 4]

If Rocket wants to watch his work grow or fail through real people playing the game, that is an admirable way of "play testing" and why not? We are fortunate enough that Rocket has put in the time to make this possible. I absolutely love the chaos in a free world playing field letting players decide what happens and even on what servers...

(good, bad servers could represent good/bad areas to a real life locations, with higher risk/reward)

My thoughts on the suggestion..

1.) Players/humans want identity, i think the Bandit role took over from being a "Bandit" to more about feeling slightly individual , no matter how limited the bandit skin/camo. I really do think this is one of the main reasons people became bandits, to feel different in this world.

Give the players more skin/customization character choice so bandit is not the only method for people to achieve this. It might work out, it might not.

2.) Give players a safe place to communicate in game, this is a game and in real life one can normally read other humans body language, how they talk and their actions. We don’t get this level of feedback so people pray on this; it’s turned into some "light entertainment" to gain trust just to then kill someone in the back. It’s like an achievement or something.

Please give us a location (just one) in a town/village where people can consider this a "game safe zone/ refuge point" to communicate; talk in relative safety and central hub. People then can go off on their merry ways. Kind of like what most MMOs have, when you join for the first time, there is a safe area in which to talk/learn about what’s going on, then off you go, into the dangerous world.

3.) Give players a chance to own a location/safe house/tent. In which people/players can reside too, as a kama from the chaos, and not just walking and wondering in the hope to find nothing. Its pretty normal in human nature for us to want to band together and build “bases” , let this natural process happen and see saved community’s grow and pop up, you then have on your hands a really interesting development in the game world.

[sorophx 25]

So basically you're saying if players want to completely disregard the survival' date=' exploration of the massive game world, and item hunting / vehicle repairing aspects of the game, all to make it a gigantic, coastal death match, that's okay because the game is all about the players making it what they want... right?

[/quote']

you're making it sound as if those aspects are more important than the PvP aspect, when it comes to "real" survival. as if the only proper way to play this mod is to never engage other players in a firefight, because it's "unrealistic"

the real problem with people who camp spawns is the fact that even if they die, it won't change anything. they'll be able to find a decent weapon in a matter of minutes and go back to their spawn camping. this is what needs to be addressed; if you get killed, there should be some serious repercussions.

there are ways to do that, let's not discuss them here. what's important is: the bandit system doesn't work towards the above. it doesn't serve any purpose other than tag players that have recently shot someone.

now, there are two problems with this:

1) this assumes they're inherently bad

2) this assumes that you instantly know they killed just by spotting him

the flaw in the logic of first one I don't have to explain, I hope. I do have to explain the second point, it seems, considering how many people comment on the fact that they can tell IN REAL LIFE the person's intentions based on said person's appearance.

are. you. fucking. serious?

if you possess such powers of observation and can read people, what the hell are you doing on a video game forum? you should be working for the government or a big corporation, making millions of dollars.

do you expect me to believe, that when you see a person you've never met before, one block away you instantly know his intentions based on how he's dressed? :huh:

[Creril 1]

So I went through the whole thread and didn't see a response to this, when/if we find skins in this new update do we keep them when we die? Or do we have to find them all over again?

[Captain Kirk (DayZ) 0]

I am very nervous about this change. But the bandit system is NOT working. And fuck it' date=' let's change it and see what happens? If it is more stupid, then I will roll it back. No harm, no foul. Lets do all the stupid shit now, before this gets too serious.

What do you guys say? With me on this? I mean honestly I don't know how this is going to go but the existing system is pretty shit.

[/quote']

Totally its alpha

[sherlock (DayZ) 31]

As with the last introduced feature (more zombies) I'm all for the new experiment. While the new zombie numbers did grow on me and I really started to appreciate the added difficulty, I'm a bit more critical about the outcome of this experiment.

It might be more realistic that way but it will also remove one big incentive to cooperate when bandits cannot be told appart from everyone else. If there is no drawback, the pvp is likely to rise. I don't consider just your humanity going down as a real drawback since other than your personal taste nothing is effected. If you chose to be a bandit untill now, you deliberately did so, knowing about the concequences. The concequences beeing that most people will shoot you on sight because they know that you'll do exactly the same if you get the jump on them. The removal of the visual distinction between survivors and bandits incentivises pvp and might decrease the threat posed by zombies further.

The other problem I see is the fragmentation of the player groups. A lot of people already play and communicate with friends over ts/skype or other services. This is likely to increase since the people you can trust are now people that you know or people on ts since you're able to sanction them verbally over ts, if they betray you.

One of the best parts of the game so far has been meeting someone in the middle of nowhere and that very tense few seconds where you decide to either work together, part ways or shoot each other. I fear that the other two choices are now decreased in validity.

Removing the feature for the sake of realism isn't that convincing either. In every post apocaliptic movie there are always bandits and they can be told apart from survivors easily since due to their ruthless methods they have better gear. The different skin is a reflection of that.

My biggest concern however, as already mentioned, is the increasing segregation of the players due to the new system and the direct communication channel which doesn't seem to be working (already creates an incentive to use proprietary software).

All concerns aside, I'll gladly give this a try. Well, let's see how it plays out.

I didn't see any major problems with the skin system, so I don't know what's not working. Could someone elaborate this in a bit more detail?

[bobda 11]

One of the best parts of the game so far has been meeting someone in the middle of nowhere and that very tense few seconds where you decide to either work together' date=' part ways or shoot each other. I fear that the other two choices are now decreased in validity.

[/quote']

Skins really had no impact on me for this. I missed opportunities to group up with someone because I shot them out of fear of their bandit skin, only for them to explain they are a self defense bandit who wanted to group up. (could have been lying but I have personally gotten the bandit skin once for self defense).

And 9 times out of 10 when I approach a survivor while I have a survivor skin, communicating to them before the approach and everything, I get shot either on sight, or when my back is turned.

So besides finally being able to look "unique" and easily identifiable to my own group, the game play wont change much for me. I'm sure once Direct Chat gets fixed it will make telling friend from foe 1000x easier.

[Soeg 3]

Just a wild suggestion now that the bandit skin is geeting removed: what if we could only craft skins based on your humanity? Like for example, a -40.000 humanity guy can craft camo skins, and the lower your humanity, the more expierenced you get in crafting those.

With high humanity, you would be able to craft medic skins or army skins, wich would have benefits too. You could even add rpg elements, like having a choice between diffrent skins that each have their own benefit, like for example: medic(able to revive dead people) extra heavy body armor or extra light body armor (light allowing you to move faster, and heavy giving you more resistence to small calibers and giving you more blood) for good guys, and: sniper (ghillie suit), extra heavy body armor, extra light body armor.

The higher or lower your humanity is, the better the skins you can craft, giving better benefits. This way everyone can be unique, and this would work REALLY WELL with groups, for both evil and good, because this way everyone can specialize, and have their own task within the group. (for example, heavy body armor guy fights off zombies while a light armor scouts for an escape route, and the medic makes sure everyone stays alive, and revives fallen comrades if needed)

Does anyone agree? Imo this would solve a lot of problems and it would support teamwork on both sides.

[CER10TY 3]

Just a wild suggestion now that the bandit skin is geeting removed: what if we could only craft skins based on your humanity? Like for example' date=' a -40.000 humanity guy can craft camo skins, and the lower your humanity, the more expierenced you get in crafting those.

With high humanity, you would be able to craft medic skins or army skins, wich would have benefits too. You could even add rpg elements, like having a choice between diffrent skins that each have their own benefit, like for example: medic(able to revive dead people) extra heavy body armor or extra light body armor (light allowing you to move faster, and heavy giving you more resistence to small calibers and giving you more blood) for good guys, and: sniper (ghillie suit), extra heavy body armor, extra light body armor.

The higher or lower your humanity is, the better the skins you can craft, giving better benefits. This way everyone can be unique, and this would work REALLY WELL with groups, for both evil and good, because this way everyone can specialize, and have their own task within the group. (for example, heavy body armor guy fights off zombies while a light armor scouts for an escape route, and the medic makes sure everyone stays alive, and revives fallen comrades if needed)

Does anyone agree? Imo this would solve a lot of problems and it would support teamwork on both sides.

[/quote']

Why base it on humanity? Just because I killed 2-3 people doesn't mean I'm more experienced in disguising myself, nor does it work vice versa.

[sherlock (DayZ) 31]

Skins really had no impact on me for this. I missed opportunities to group up with someone because I shot them out of fear of their bandit skin' date=' only for them to explain they are a self defense bandit who wanted to group up. (could have been lying but I have personally gotten the bandit skin once for self defense).

[/quote']

Well, as I said that's not really my major concern just something that crossed my mind as well. The increase in the player group segregation is. I also love to play with my mates, but I almost force them to use the ingame chat in PR:A2 because using ts for me is close to cheating. The game tries to be realistic and one part of realism is that people around you hear you talk if you do, not just the people in the same ts channel.

However, I know from personal experience that you don't get any negative humanity if you shoot in self-defence. Yesterday a guy tried to shoot me point blank although I made clear I'm friendly and lowered my weapon. He shot and hit me but I was able to win the firefight since he brought a pistol to a shotgun fight ;). I didn't lose any humanity points for that.

And 9 times out of 10 when I approach a survivor while I have a survivor skin' date=' communicating to them before the approach and everything, I get shot either on sight, or when my back is turned.

[/quote']

Guess I've been a bit luckier then ;). I had a couple of random encounters where either the other guy or I had the back facing to the other and no one shot. We cooperated for a time (to get medical supplies from a hospital), then split up again, no survivors were hurt ;).

[Soeg 3]

Well, thats true, but if it were to be implented then their should be a high minimum amount of - or + humanity before someone can even craft those skins, like -5000 and + 5000, so self defense killings would not instantly force you to one side

[Goldstein (DayZ) 46]

If the entire zombieverse falls into anarchy, should we not be looking to the causes as opposed to instituting the training wheels of a 'humanity' system?

Assigning people negative or positive values is too abstract. It's the equivalent of handing out golden stars or sending bad kiddies to the naughty corner. The problem is there is no mother figure in this situation, so it breaks immersion.

People kill for a reason, and people team-up for a reason. Look at these reasons, then identify the ones that are completely out of context and adapt the environment.

[Bat (DayZ) 230]

I'm kinda new to the game, I'm one of those who came recently because everyone was talking about the mod. I think I'm a clever and lone wolf type survivor, who does not trust anyone easily and avoid gunfights because I want to stay alive. And yet sometimes I'd like to team up with another random dude, BUT most of the time it ends up wrong.

I guess fixing the communication system so you can text chat to somebody in close distance would solve a lot of unwanted pk situations.

Then adding radios that you have to find in the world, in replacement of global chat, could be great from a RP point of view.

Last idea, like stated above, would be a "note" system. Find books or paper and a pen in the world, then wright messages that you can leave wherever you want. Or just write your own logbook, so that another survivor may find it and read about your adventures, just for the sake of it. Wouldn't it be cool ?

[AnthraXx 95]

I'm kinda new to the game' date=' I'm one of those who came recently because everyone was talking about the mod. I think I'm a clever and lone wolf type survivor, who does not trust anyone easily and avoid gunfights because I want to stay alive. And yet sometimes I'd like to team up with another random dude, BUT most of the time it ends up wrong.

I guess fixing the communication system so you can text chat to somebody in close distance would solve a lot of unwanted pk situations.

Then adding radios that you have to find in the world, in replacement of global chat, could be great from a RP point of view.

Last idea, like stated above, would be a "note" system. Find books or paper and a pen in the world, then wright messages that you can leave wherever you want. Or just write your own logbook, so that another survivor may find it and read about your adventures, just for the sake of it. Wouldn't it be cool ?

[/quote']

I agree, Global Chat needs removing or changing spoils the atmosphere completely.

[hexik 1]

Also... ENOUGH ABOUT THE MAIN SERVER!

Waiting for host' date=' waiting for response.... requesting character data....

The main server isn't even breaking a sweat, fuckers. It's the local servers getting fucked because you guys keep DDoS'ing them. ArmA2 wasn't designed to have thousands of people trying to connect to one server by spamming the enter key.

[/quote']

Make some sort of system where you have to wait 30 seconds in between connection attempts?

[drakenof 9]

Funny thing is : still stuck on " Waiting for server response ".

I've done like everything i have in my " admin " hands to fix this issue, it's still broken.

So main server or not, i don't know and i don't give a fuck, the only thing i know is : it was god damn broken last night, and it's the same situation now, and it's pissing me off because i can't do shit about it, already restarted the server, the mission, hive, locking the server, dancing naked under the fucking moon.

I don't know who or what is " sweating " right now, but the motherfucker should really put some roll-on under his arms.

[marlboro9 0]

This is as it should be. We have to learn who bandits are by survivor communication' date=' not just "lol look over there, a bandit"

[/quote']

You cant learn who bandits are by communication, bandit would probably not comunicate with you and he shoot on site.

I dont mind losing bandit appearance i guess, but we need some proper way to identify bandits at close range at least, like showing character name or stats at some reasonable distance, it would simulate recognizing the faces of players.

Second we need proper direct comms -voice and text for talk at also some reasonable range.

Several threads spoke about letting body of players longer in game after disconnection to avoid it everytime players feel threatened.

And finally bandits numbers would be easy to control if that its would be the case. Simply if murderer continue to kill survivors in large numbers, he can do it indefinitely, but if he would be killed once, for every murder he would be unable to join lets say for several hours/days to any dayz server. (Take a note im nots suggesting this shoud happen, but im giving ideas) So bandit would be threatend to not to die, as now its easy and comforting for bandit be killed, jump in, take another weapon from his tent and start shooting after survivors for fun. And it continues to be fun, easy loot possibly.

About gear, any idea how long it will stay on ground/how far from you if you would like to manage meeting with other stranger totaly unarmed with gear previously dropped btw?

[Kalle (DayZ) 2]

Oh Jesus ... i thought this Game is +18 ... some people here act like they are -13

[RMF 0]

It's a terrible idea. There should be consequences for killing innocents. Removing the bandit skin will mean that there is none. People will be killing other players for as little as a can of beans.

[Mutonizer 78]

People will be killing other players for as little as a can of beans.

Hah! If that were true, that'd be great though I think asking and sharing sometimes should be a better compromise. But you got people killing just because it's fun for them :)

[Saiko (DayZ) 0]

Is a really good idea, the humanity is necessary but today is not working, so go ahead with this and later you will think a new method to do the humanity viable.