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sawyer42

Replace Humanity with a DAY Z ID card

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The Day Z ID would have a handful of important information displayed on it. I've mocked up an Example Below. (Sry you might have to DL it or open in another window)

[attachment=287]

Player A is moving into Zelenogorsk after moving into the town he sees Player B dart across a street. Player A then asks Player B if he's friendly. Player B responds "Yes". At this point Player A has Player B's name and Vice Versa they can both stop to open the M menu and scroll through the player list looking for each other. Once Player A finds Player B and sees that he's a stand up guy who hasn't committed a murder since last Wednesday and has a Humanity score of 2700. Player A then knows something about Player B and can make a decision based on that info. The point of this system would be too maintain the current suspense of meeting strangers (Since it would take vital time to check another players ID it couldn't be checked quickly therefore maintaining the suspense.) while laying the ground work for more player cooperation. EVE Online has a system very similar to this which works very well. You wouldn't see all this info pop up when you looked at someone you would have to go out of your way to find it.

I think a system such as this could be done on an Opt in basis and still function in practice.

Further down the line an ID system like this could be used to create a "Bounty List" where Players could put bounties on Bandits or Survivors who had wronged them. Example Survivor A is killed by Bandit B, Survivor A would then put a certain number of items (Or some other commodity) that are in their possession into escrow with the main server.

Then when Bounty Hunter C kills Bandit B he will be given the items put in escrow by Player A. Granted this bounty system would require many more systems than are currently in place (Namely allowing players some amount of storage which they can have between servers). Its just one example of what could be done by making public stats which are already tracked by the main server also by making it easier to gauge other survivors the creation of player clans and groups easier.

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Actually it wouldn't kill the suspense. Let me give an example of how this system would work in practice.

The Day Z ID would have a handful of important information displayed on it. I've mocked up an Example Below. (Sry you might have to DL it or open in another window)

[attachment=286]

Player A is moving into Zelenogorsk after moving into the town he sees Player B dart across a street. Player A then asks Player B if he's friendly. Player B responds "Yes". At this point Player A has Player B's name and Vice Versa they can both stop to open the M menu and scroll through the player list looking for each other. Once Player A finds Player B and sees that he's a stand up guy who hasn't committed a murder since last Wednesday and has a Humanity score of 2700. Player A then The point of this system would be too maintain the suspense of meeting players while laying the ground work for more player cooperation. EVE Online has a system very similar to this which works very well. You wouldn't see all this info pop up when you looked at someone you would have to go out of your way to find it.

Further down the line an ID system like this could be used to create a "Bounty List" where Players could put bounties on Bandits or Survivors who had wronged them. Example Survivor A is killed by Bandit B, Survivor A would then put a certain number of items (Or some other commodity) that are in their possession into escrow with the main server.

Then when Bounty Hunter A kills Bandit B he will be given the items put in escrow by Player A. Granted this bounty system would require many more systems than are currently in place (Namely allowing players some amount of storage which they can have between servers). I believe simply adding the ID system would greatly add to the Day Z experience simply because it would help to facilitate the creation of player Clans and groups among strangers.

At the moment the major problem with Day Z is it takes about 3 or 4 days to do everything there is to do, and everything that can currently be done can be done solo. Giving players very little incentive to group together, I know players who after a few bad experiences almost exclusively solo Day Z now just because they don't want to have to worry about being killed by other players. If this is happening to a few players then there is serious reason to be concerned with player burn-out (after all no one plays a single player game forever)

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This sounds suspiciously like...

Well I'm not going to just say it's a bad idea, let me explain why.

In DayZ, you're never supposed to know what the other player is like or going to do. Each encounter is totally random and has no bearing. Soon the bandit system will be gone and we'll all have to be plain suspicious. Having hand-holding cards that serve as a "good guy/scumbag" tag would take away from one of the critical threads holding the game together: Total destruction of society. There's no reason for you to believe anyone, because people lie all the time. It's that thought that shows a players mentality, but you wouldn't know that, he's just a random guy that you've never met. He can even sit there and claim he's friendly, but then shoot you the second you turn around. Why? Because that's how this game works.

This game(mod/anti-game whatever) is meant to be that way, and I'm sorry to say that your idea would not fit in this world. However, if you want a more co-operative experience, there's a great mod stickied in the general section for you to try.

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This sounds suspiciously like...

Well I'm not going to just say it's a bad idea' date=' let me explain why.

In DayZ, you're never supposed to know what the other player is like or going to do. Each encounter is totally random and has no bearing. Soon the bandit system will be gone and we'll all have to be plain suspicious. Having hand-holding cards that serve as a "good guy/scumbag" tag would take away from one of the critical threads holding the game together: Total destruction of society. There's no reason for you to believe anyone, because people lie all the time. It's that thought that shows a players mentality, but you wouldn't know that, he's just a random guy that you've never met. He can even sit there and claim he's friendly, but then shoot you the second you turn around. Why? Because that's how this game works.

This game(mod/anti-game whatever) is meant to be that way, and I'm sorry to say that your idea would not fit in this world. However, if you want a more co-operative experience, there's a great mod stickied in the general section for you to try.

[/quote']

While I do agree that society being destroyed is what DayZ is about, what I find most compelling about the total destruction of society is the opportunity for the re-creation of some sort of society in the wake.

First off let me say this I am not someone who is hurt or has anything against banditry or the harshness of the world DayZ presents as a matter of fact I think its one of the best worlds I've played in for some time.

I can't claim to know what the intention behind the humanity metric is, as I can tell it tracks murders and blood transfusions two very, very different ways players can interact with each other, literally taking life vs giving it. It makes sense for us the survivors to use this metric as a basis for forming groups to perform higher functions and for mutual defense. And since the main DayZ webpage infers leader-boards sometime in the near future it seems these stats are tracked and at least some stats will be made publicly available.

IRL we can judge peoples intentions by their posture, tone of voice, facial expressions and in numerous other ways however these senses are dulled almost to the point of non-existance in DayZ having some metric to compensate for all those essential cues is needed for a more, dare I say 'realistic' simulation.

And why would making someones Humanity public or being able to access their stats have an effect on if you can trust someone? I'm sure bandits give transfusions to their friends, just as much as you do to yours, or I do to mine. Sometimes 'good' players kill someone in self-defense or to stop a theft. There are ways to kill a player without getting it marked as a murder. There are still ways to game the system and to misrepresent yourself. It wouldn't change the intensity or the unknowns when you meet someone. The Humanity measure is an imperfect measure of someones integrity, It should be used to size someone up much the same as we judge others in numerous ways everyday.

Besides if your inside a store and another guy walks in the front door I doubt either of you will lower your weapon to get into a menu to go through a list to look someone up. This system would simply aide the formation of groups. And due to the decentralized nature of DayZ I doubt you would see groups getting along all the time.

This would give players some means to find other players so they can cooperate to provide some stability for each other without having to be handheld by the developers. You won't have to join with a group of people, but players should have some means to create groups and they should also have more of a basis to judge each other. A large part of survival in such a post-apocalypse is dealing with other people. I love that DayZ lets me interact with people by shooting them but I find it lacks in letting me cooperate with them in some meaningful persistent way.

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What? Why? Nooooo!

I dont' want to know if the dude I'm seeing in the distance is a murderer or not, bandit skin is bad enough already. Why would you want to kill all the tension :)

Also, bounty hunting cannot exist without a society to police it and there is no society left! Maybe later, once the tools and content are in, and people start building real camps and organize, but for now, ugh...

In EVE it's logical because it's science fiction, technology works and they have databases, computers and shit. Here, who the fuck is managing all that? Is this hunger games or something? Nope.

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What? Why? Nooooo!

I dont' want to know if the dude I'm seeing in the distance is a murderer or not' date=' bandit skin is bad enough already. Why would you want to kill all the tension :)

Also, bounty hunting cannot exist without a society to police it and there is no society left! Maybe later, once the tools and content are in, and people start building real camps and organize, but for now, ugh...

In EVE it's logical because it's science fiction, technology works and they have databases, computers and shit. Here, who the fuck is managing all that? Is this hunger games or something? Nope.

[/quote']

I do agree that my proposal isn't completely diagetic and it doesn't make sense for something like a DayZ drivers licence.

And I don't get how having some information about someone to make an inference as to their intention kills the tension. Yeah you have more to go off of I guess, but you still have to take action which in my opinion is more so where the tension comes from in DayZ.

Personally I'm a fan of having some way to identify who's a bandit and who isn't for a handful of reasons.

It helps players make decisions about who can and can't be trusted. Also it provides a measure of customization for players. Something they can point too and boast about.

So can someone please explain to me why this system would kill the tension? How would knowing if someone is a murderer or not lessen the tension? I'd imagine if you knew what someone was or at least had some indication (Which is all I'm pushing for here) of who they are, that would increase the tension especially if they're a murderer.

Yes it is early in development and not all the features or content are in yet or even fully conceptualized yet. And as your post seems to acknowledge something like this is already on the way. DayZ's gameplay leaves much to be desired at the moment especially when it comes to player interaction and cooperation. And truth be told what would be 'lost' by some system like this, I'd say we wouldn't be losing much, is a fair price to pay for finally giving the awesome community that has sprung up around this game to have some more complex in game interactions.

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I also think this is a bad idea. Even the bandit skins are abit too friendly for the player.

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