Night time doesn't serve a purpose

[thetamsen 57]

Its funny, I made this post about making the day/night cycle shorter so that people would actually want to PLAY during the night. I'm not bitching about how awful it is, I just would like to see it improved. No one plays during the night except for a very small amount. How is that not a problem? Yes the game is an alpha but that doesn't mean you cant give constructive feedback. I knew I'd get a few fanboys who see this game as the last hope for hardcore gamers or w/e but it still needs work OBVIOUSLY. Stop being morons and be objective.

Put a sock in it, smartass.

Learn to post in the "Suggestions" forum and leave users here to debate.

I would be so embarrased if I were you, with your smartass comments around.

[DAS1337 20]

Cool assumptions bro

Not really an assumption. You can go look at the server list and check the player count on dark servers. Then check out the high populated servers, what do you know, they are day time.

Clearly night time is an issue. Clearly 98% of the DayZ population plays during the day. The other 2% who are lucky enough to have NVG's or the really brave will play at night.

If you can't see those FACTS, then there is seriously something wrong with you. Changes need to be made. As of right now, night time is pretty much pointless for the vast majority of players.

[DAS1337 20]

Put a sock in it, smartass.

Learn to post in the "Suggestions" forum and leave users here to debate.

I would be so embarrased if I were you, with your smartass comments around.

Aw, the OP wants you to debate with some intelligence, and you just want him to shutup...

How cute..

[Tracker (DayZ) 7]

Found NVGs on a helo crash (at night time whatddaya know?), pretty much makes my chances of dying at night from players slim to none.

You can try turning your gamma/brightness all the way up, thats what I did pre nvg..And will have to do so once more again after death.

In BC (the moment you get away from the USA/Canada boarder.) its dark. Also, darkness IRL varies on the moon (ie reflection and all that jazz.) some nights you have moonlight, some you cannot even see your hand in front of your face, the game doesn't incorporate this.

Maybe some one touched upon it already, I don't feel like reading through six pages at the moment, if you made this point before me, well I tip my hat to you sir.

[Graz (DayZ) 146]

The people who are complaining about night in this thread seem to have little to no experience playing at night. Most of this QQ is pointless, seeing as very few actually understand more than jumping on a server, seeing dark and leaving. If you want to jump around servers looking for a day time there is nothing stopping you.

The moon comes up at night, at the start it is near pitch black. Yes moving around is difficult, however people who don't shoot and don't use vehicles have a massive edge. When the moon comes up spotting people becomes almost as good as day.

Sound is unaffected at night, if you are in a populated cherno and are seeing people long before hearing them. You are most likely not playing stealthy enough to survive during the day time anyway... The same for zombies, you can hear them long before they here you if you are playing the game properly.

Most snipers can't be used properly at night, there goes all the high tech issues. Even with NVG most sniper rifles are ineffective at long range due to incompatibility with a sniper rifle. ARs reign supreme at night, FAL and L8 are obviously amazing, but all the AR scopes are useable with NVG.

Flares are your friend, they attract zombies and illuminate other players. Use you brain, if you throw a flare at someone they will shit their pants %90 of the time and alt+f4 or simply run. If they don't, they are most likely pretty solid so gtfo in a hurry.

Night requires a different approach, different weaponry and different amount of thought.

Play smart and you will appreciate the night time as much as day.

For those that are day time only and are posting QQ about night, why are you complaining about an aspect that you take no part in? If you want to set up camp on a server, get used to playing at BOTH times, otherwise go play CoD, it's great for QQing and daytime play.

[Askar 177]

Honestly, I'm kinda glad almost noone plays at night. Those of us who are brave enough to face the challenges and terrors it brings have a much, much easier time at looting and gaining supplies.

[DAS1337 20]

The people who are complaining about night in this thread seem to have little to no experience playing at night. Most of this QQ is pointless, seeing as very few actually understand more than jumping on a server, seeing dark and leaving. If you want to jump around servers looking for a day time there is nothing stopping you.

The moon comes up at night, at the start it is near pitch black. Yes moving around is difficult, however people who don't shoot and don't use vehicles have a massive edge. When the moon comes up spotting people becomes almost as good as day.

Sound is unaffected at night, if you are in a populated cherno and are seeing people long before hearing them. You are most likely not playing stealthy enough to survive during the day time anyway... The same for zombies, you can hear them long before they here you if you are playing the game properly.

Most snipers can't be used properly at night, there goes all the high tech issues. Even with NVG most sniper rifles are ineffective at long range due to incompatibility with a sniper rifle. ARs reign supreme at night, FAL and L8 are obviously amazing, but all the AR scopes are useable with NVG.

Flares are your friend, they attract zombies and illuminate other players. Use you brain, if you throw a flare at someone they will shit their pants %90 of the time and alt+f4 or simply run. If they don't, they are most likely pretty solid so gtfo in a hurry.

Night requires a different approach, different weaponry and different amount of thought.

Play smart and you will appreciate the night time as much as day.

For those that are day time only and are posting QQ about night, why are you complaining about an aspect that you take no part in? If you want to set up camp on a server, get used to playing at BOTH times, otherwise go play CoD, it's great for QQing and daytime play.

Your post makes no sense.

People like myself would love to see dark servers become more populated. Do you not notice that dark servers rarely have more than 15 people on them, even the most populated ones? Do you not realize that the vast majority of people play on day servers? I myself will leave a server if it is getting too dark, as I do not have the equipment to deal with the dark. So, now I have to carry around 10 flares so that I can perhaps survive a night? Or do you suggest that I camp in the woods and stare at the fire for 8 hours? As of right now, night servers, unless a full moon, are nearly pointless for most people to play in. This of course changes if you have the gear to survive and get around at night, which again, most people don't have.

Can we get flashlight attachments for our guns? Can we get power station interactivity that turns on power grids, illuminating cities and street lamps around the map? Can Rocket turn down the darkness factor at night a little bit so that more people would actually play at night and feel the immersion that night time should bring? Is wanting a better play experience a bad thing? And yes, you are in the minority in thinking that night time is perfect. You do realize that realism does not apply here, you know, considering morphine does not mend a broken bone in real life. Or we don't respawn in real life. Or maybe that zombies aren't actually real. Realism at the expense of gameplay is a horrible thing.

[Askar 177]

Your post makes no sense.

People like myself would love to see dark servers become more populated. Do you not notice that dark servers rarely have more than 15 people on them, even the most populated ones? Do you not realize that the vast majority of people play on day servers? I myself will leave a server if it is getting too dark, as I do not have the equipment to deal with the dark. So, now I have to carry around 10 flares so that I can perhaps survive a night? Or do you suggest that I camp in the woods and stare at the fire for 8 hours? As of right now, night servers, unless a full moon, are nearly pointless for most people to play in. This of course changes if you have the gear to survive and get around at night, which again, most people don't have.

Can we get flashlight attachments for our guns? Can we get power station interactivity that turns on power grids, illuminating cities and street lamps around the map? Can Rocket turn down the darkness factor at night a little bit so that more people would actually play at night and feel the immersion that night time should bring? Is wanting a better play experience a bad thing? And yes, you are in the minority in thinking that night time is perfect. You do realize that realism does not apply here, you know, considering morphine does not mend a broken bone in real life. Or we don't respawn in real life. Or maybe that zombies aren't actually real. Realism at the expense of gameplay is a horrible thing.

While I strongly disagree with the vast majority of your post, I do like the idea with the power infrastructure and hope rocket implements something similar as the game progresses. Also, the G17, Remington 870, and M4A3 CCO weapons already have excellent flashlight attachments. While the M4A3 CCO is somewhat rare, the other two weapons are incredibly common in any military area. I would also like to see night time more populated, but not because it becomes easier. Rather, I'd like to see players stop pussy-footing around and prepare for the night, and then get out there and own it. It's not hard to gather some chemlights and flares, they're everywhere. All most people lack is courage.

[DAS1337 20]

While I strongly disagree with the vast majority of your post, I do like the idea with the power infrastructure and hope rocket implements something similar as the game progresses. Also, the G17, Remington 870, and M4A3 CCO weapons already have excellent flashlight attachments. While the M4A3 CCO is somewhat rare, the other two weapons are incredibly common in any military area. I would also like to see night time more populated, but not because it becomes easier. Rather, I'd like to see players stop pussy-footing around and prepare for the night, and then get out there and own it. It's not hard to gather some chemlights and flares, they're everywhere. All most people lack is courage.

You can't change what people want.

You can disagree all you want, but you are in the minority. Server population is vastly increased during daytime, that is fact.

I understand what you want, but you can't will everyone to gird up their loins. Those items are all rare. I've probably hit 100 deer stands, often server hopping, and the only one I've encountered is a G17. Flashlight attachments would be far better. Hell, flashlight + duct tape would be awesome, but it's not in the game. The proof that most people will not play in the night is right there in front of you. If you refuse to see the obvious, then I don't know what to tell you.

Edited July 30, 2012 by DAS1337

[Graz (DayZ) 146]

Your post makes no sense.

You just said yourself that you move servers if you encounter night time. So I'm correct in assuming that you spend VERY little time bothering with night. I'm hoping you are aware that flares come as a stack of 10 and are extremely easy to find? Chem-lights are also a better alternative, but I'm sure you've considered that.

I didn't mention anything about realism??????? It seems that you've become confused with your reply to an above post. My post is more that people aren't realizing that night is a different style of play.

If you took a little bit of time and actually looked at my profile, you will see that I post support the topics you have mentioned.

I am all for the improvement of night time play. Making it the same as day (something you are hinting towards) is stupid, this is one of the first games to have a real shift in time and I would hate to see people who have no idea what they are talking about ruin it.

You do understand that putting attachments on guns, having powered cities and having more ambient light at night will not change the fact that you need to play differently at night?

1096 often has populations of 20-30 during 2-5 AM server time. Yes I have all the cool toys and night-time edge. I can tell you as someone who has earned what they have, while it's easy to get upset and say "man I'd have dominated him if I had NVG too". It is simply not the case, this is a game of recon and stealth, your situational awareness and tactical thinking are worth more then any equipment.

Night time is fine, I would love improvements. Don't assume that it's broken because you haven't taken any time and effort in becoming good at the style of play. QQ never gets anything done, but if you've got ideas fire away.

[Askar 177]

You can't change what people want.

You can disagree all you want, but you are in the minority. Server population is vastly increased during daytime, that is fact.

I understand what you want, but you can't will everyone to gird up their loins. Those items are all rare. I've probably hit 100 deer stands, often server hopping, and the only one I've encountered is a G17. Flashlight attachments would be far better. Hell, flashlight + duct tape would be awesome, but it's not in the game. The proof that most people will not play in the night is right there in front of you. If you refuse to see the obvious, then I don't know what to tell you.

Noone is denying that most people will not play at night.

People do not want to play at night because it is a far more brutal environment in several regards. This is obvious and well known. Just because the majority want night to be easier somehow, whether they want it brighter, less cold, or for everyone to have night vision in their backpacks at the start, does not mean that this will be the case or should be the case. This game isn't designed to be player friendly. And that's fine, we've been seriously lacking for games in that department for ages. DayZ is brutal, unforgiving, and uncompromising. Take it or leave it, that's what it is and that's what rocket has indicated he will keep it as. I wouldn't mind seeing full moons made much more common (or whatever it is that sometimes lets me see without my flashlight), but making night time shorter or any easier than it already is would be unrealistic. You can argue that gameplay should trump realism all you want, but rocket has been pretty gung-ho about keeping realism a priority.

You're right in that morphine doesn't fix broken bones in reality, and that zombies aren't real, and all of those other things. Aside from the zombies, I've seen rocket say that he wants to address these very things. He's hoping to eventually implement a much more complicated and realistic medical system than what we have right now. He wants to make this as realistic as he can while still preserving the core gameplay. And I support that. Night time, simply put, is fine. Now, I'm all for seeing improvements. I'd love a repairable electric grid system, I'd love more flashlight attachments, I'd love more light sources in general and more full-moon-esque nights. Those are improvements, however. Not fixes, because it's not broken.

The reason you're seeing people migrate from night time to day time is because they can. Take minecraft, for example. If you could just switch the time of the server you play on to day whenever it became night, you bet almost every single player would do so. That's because night time is less forgiving, it's harder to see, and it's in general more challenging. The same things are true here, except that you can make it day with a few clicks and a search box. No matter what you do, night time will always be less popular. Unless it's made so much easier that day time is now consider the challenge, at which point servers will empty at dawn. There is no perfect ground, and you can only get so close to middle ground before you start making things ridiculously unrealistic. While many nights are a little too dark, at least they are true nights. In many other games, night time just consists of a purple or blue 'glow' to the environment, with the end result being similar visibility to daytime. That's unrealistic, static, and boring.

As pretty much everyone I see in this thread has said, I'd love to see more people playing at night. However, making the night itself easier is the wrong way to go about it. Instead, we should make players more able to equip themselves to face the night. I'd like to see flashlights available for many more weapons, possibly even every weapon. There would, of course, need to be drawbacks for such things unless they were integrated naturally or actual weapon attachments instead of flashlights. I'd also like to see more things like chemlights and flares. The answer to this issue, like many others in this 'game' we have here, lies with the players, not the environment. By better equipping and better preparing the players to survive this harsher environment, we can encourage more to attempt such endeavours and fully realize the benefits of nighttime play.

I think we want the same things, we just seek radically different ways of attaining them.

Edit: Also, kudos to the guy above me for saying that. Night time is indeed a different style of play.

Which also reminds me, flashlights on weapons seem kind of unnecessary to me, since zombies are so easy to sneak past. You can just use a regular flashlight for vision, and store your sidearm in your pack. And if they do aggro, losing them at night is, quite simply, stupid easy. I've run less than 20 meters with some chasing me, only for them to suddenly stop and lose interest. But I'm all for variety, and more flashlighty weapons would certainly be variety.

Edited July 30, 2012 by Askar

[ZenBC 35]

I quite like that people don't seem to like playing at night. Looting seems to become about 10x easier - less populated servers, zombies can't see you - turning gamma/brightness up does the trick and you're ready to go. Don't know why more people don't play at night!

[thewanderer 16]

night is one of the most useful things.

It makes you far less vulnerable to zombies (not that they are all that much of a threat) and gives you a much better chance of looting and avoiding other players.

yes NVGs on other players are a big advantage but they are rare and its also rare that you would be in the same place

[Robert Shannon 27]

Road flares get you shot faster than anything else. Try to find a better alt.

[Lennsik 176]

Night serves both an authentic purpose to the game as well as a technical one. The mod NEEDS night as that's how spawns/loot are determined by the client because time needs to move on. If it infinitely daytime, then the game would spaz out and we'd be lacking loot and other important game related objects. This is more of a feature in the Arma2 engine than DayZ, so because of this, it's also nearly impossible to change that. Unless you want Rocket to waste countless hours to code a shit ton of stuff on the already struggling servers so someone can have their daytime fun and not worry about changing their tactics once it becomes night.

[Aira 22]

I'd wonder if the "night is cool noone can see you" people would be quiet, if they won't have NVG's and would not be able to turn gamma up? : / This would force you to use your flashlight, cause you really see a black screen without gamma up, simple.

And if you shine your flashlight in the face of a zombie, i guess he's not so pleased about it...

[kulin 10]

Its very easy. People that don't like to play on night server just have the option to leave them. If you want them to stay make the night less painfull. Very easy.

Rockets solution was the idea to plant road flares and chem lights everywhere. This didn't work for a very obvious reason.

Since i host a server for myself i see the numbers drop every evening at about 22:00. Only 1/4 or 1/3 of the previous players are playing at night at best. So how can this be good? All players leave the servers to join day servers. All day servers are full, all night servers are empty. This is just bad design. Nothing else. The night is not even realistic. In my time in the army we had to bivouac for weeks in the alps. so you can believe me if i tell you that even in the deepest woods and in rain and snow: a night is nearly never completly black. So don't tell me this would be a gamy solution. Its even more gamy to make night server only to players with night vision interesting. This makes night visions the number one item. You get one, you look for an nearly empty night server and farm the shit out of this server without even the slightest chance to meet a player who brings any danger to barrack and heli-spawn-farming.

So my suggestion would be to make the darkness of the night dependable on the difficulty. Expert = Pitch Black. Recruit = Dawn. At Veteran, where most servers are running at, it should be atleast possible to see some color in the night. A tree or the ground shouldn't be so dark to be 100% black.

An alternative way could be to make a faster day/night cycle(3h Day(including dusk and dawn),1h complete night - as in reality).

[MikeCrick 8]

I'd wonder if the "night is cool noone can see you" people would be quiet, if they won't have NVG's and would not be able to turn gamma up? : / This would force you to use your flashlight, cause you really see a black screen without gamma up, simple.

And if you shine your flashlight in the face of a zombie, i guess he's not so pleased about it...

Never had Night Vision, never used the gamma exploit (tried it once, found it worse).

Still love nights, Logged on last night after work (well ok it was 3am) with the goal of getting to Zelen so I can play with my friends later on. Ended up getting very lost but I did manage to find a crashed Helo last night was there for a decent 10 minutes and picked up an FN FAL. Nobody else came by and the Zombies didn't agro once. Got out scott free with good gear and no damage (although I almost died of thirst while lost in a forest). It was frustrating at times but awesome at others and I'd take an experience like that over a straight forward exploration through the woods any day.

I think people need to give it more of a shot, as has been said it creates a unique set of challenges for players to explore. I'm for removing Night Vision honestly because it removes a lot of that challenge, although the recent poll shows me in the minority on that point. I'm all for improving it and I love the flashlight on gun suggestions etc. but we should avoid making it too similar to daytime play.

I will note that I can see the benefit in a shorter day/night cycle like Minecraft but I'd want it to be more like 6 on 6 off rather than be too short.

[The Darkthrone 9]

I pretty much only play on night servers, and have never had a pair of NVGs.

[Bobcomss 189]

Turn your gamma up in settings :) at least then you can make out objects and ZEDS :D

[kulin 10]

Turn your gamma up in settings :) at least then you can make out objects and ZEDS :D

I did this a few times. It was very entertaining at first. Even more thrilling than normally. But then i realized that zeds are no problem anymore at all and that there are normally no players around.

So, a night server combines two things in my eyes: on one side the game is boring, because zeds and players are no problem. On the other side the orientation, navigation and traveling is a pain in the ass. Its also annoying to see nothing but black for hours.

[hsmagnet 14]

love the night!

never had NVG

i had a FAL w/ NV till the ammo glitch disappeared.

carried that baby for 3 days and never saw any mags for it....

usually try to play on nice starry nights of course

[sarcasm83 29]

Its because a lot of servers are pitch black. I mean PITCH, you can't even see your hand. With a moonlight above you your character should slowly adjust to night and be able to make out what is around you. However, this game doesn't do that. It does try to simulate the darkness but for anyone who has spent a lot of times in the middle of the woods without a light, you know you do adjust over time and see shapes/people immediately near you.

Well I live in Finland aswell and sometimes when there's a poweroutage and all the streetlights etc. go dark and it's a cloudy night, you can't see ANYTHING. Not a thing. Not even if you stared at the darkness half an hour, the only thing you're going to see is the silhouette of the horizon - just like you do in DayZ. (Though if the sky's covered by a thick layer of dark clouds; you won't even see that and it's literally pitch black, when the town/city lights are out and not reflecting the sky - as even that's a factor near well lit cities.)

But I do agree that on a clear sky when you see the stars and the moon, DayZ servers are too dark. On a clear night the starsky and moon give out quite alot of light and you can see the shapes and different shades of colour (able to make out a tree on a grassy hill etc... I mean not clear as day, obviously, but you can atleast see when you're going to walk into a wall, unlike on DayZ..) In DayZ, the only way of knowing there's trees of buildings in front of you is wonder near enough that you can see the object against the sky... So yeah, it's literally stumbling in the dark.

But as the night servers are less crowded, it's not THAT much of a high risk to use your flashlight. Unless there just so happens to be a guy with NVG's prowling in the night. Because then, you'll be like a damn lighthouse beacon and can be seen from hundreds of miles away... A good example video of what that looks like:

But I still kinda like the fact that you can't just wait a night out in 30 minutes. That would totally take the "danger" away from the nights, as you could just camp in a bush until it's daytime again. I like going on the servers with just a few people at night.. Gives me the oppourtunity to move to a different area kinda peacefully and still gives me the rush of "What if someone's watching me from the dark" that it's all about :) Awesome atmosphere.. and using your flashlight IS a risk, but the key thing is to use it sparingly. Check out a village with your flashlight and be gone in like 5 minutes and move to another location without a flashlight.. Unless you get really unlucky and there's a guy really near you; you should be in and out before any NVG people on the faraway hills get to you... hopefully.

Gotta love the game, as the intensity is all about things like these.. Though it's a little too hard to stay warm during nighttime. I tried to stay inside a closed hangar to keep my body warm and it was pretty much the same as I was outside :P

Edited August 2, 2012 by sarcasm83

[Guest cRy]

Aside from the people that like to play on night servers. Right, OP?

Also, why would they change the cycle to placate to you? They aren't even helping the players with the hacker/exploiters.

[Larce 8]

There are flares, chem lights, and a flashlight in your tool belt for a reason, not that hard tbh.

Less chances of getting shot at too, except and NWAF or around the sniper spots in the cities due to snipers with NVGs.